Who Do You Think You Are? Part 2 of 2
Who Do You Think You Are? Part 2 of 2 • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction
Introduction
God says to you, “I choose you and I adopt you into my family. That’s what I talked about last week.
It is not what you do that is important, but that you respond to God’s personal call to enter into a love relationship with him.
Your past is in the past and God calls you to a new beginning and a new way of living life beyond your expectations.
That’s what we learned last week.
You are free to choose to accept God’s offer or reject it.
You are free to choose to accept God’s offer or reject it.
God offers you a new way of living and you are free to choose to accept God’s offer or reject it.
Have you ever stopped to think about what it means to be given free will - the freedom to choose.
Think about this. What if in order to accept what God offers you, you really do have the choice to reject it.
What if you have the freedom to live anyway you want.
What if when you were given free will to choose, God made available every conceivable way of living available to you.
You get to choose
You get to choose your sexual identity
GBLTQ, etc
GLBTQ
You get to choose how you will treat people.
controlling, loving, spiteful,
You get to choose every configuration of relationships we can think of.
marriage, common law, twosome, threesome, group, coed, all male, all female and anything else you can think of.
What if you are given the freedom to believe anything you want to believe, develop any philosophy you want. Create any form of religion you want and any concept of God you could conceive.
What if you are given the freedom to develop society and culture anyway way you wanted
What if God knew that you could not freely come to him, accept his truth and live life his way unless you could choose to live any way you could conceive of living.
What if God knew that anything, but total freedom of choice would smack of control and your being mere puppets?
What if having given us such freedom he then said, everything you do, everything you say, everything you think has consequences? Consequences that lead to a life that is harmful, dehumanizing and decaying or growthful, fulfilling and good.
What if God when he created humanity he gave us this freedom, but also invited us to choose that which would lead to an intimate relationship with him, harmony with each other and with creation and true shalom within ourselves?
Joshua 24:13-
‘I gave you a land on which you had not labored, and cities which you had not built, and you have lived in them; you are eating of vineyards and olive groves which you did not plant.’
“Now, therefore, fear the Lord and serve Him in sincerity and truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.
“If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
What if God has something outlandishly, astonishingly wonderful and breathtakingly beautiful in store for us, but we have choose his way in order to experience it?
And so we come to our focal verse for today.
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
1 Peter 2:
You have been chosen - the key this being chosen is to accept being chosen. God invites you into his family. And when you accept his offer he makes you part of
A royal priesthood
A holy nation
A people blessed by God
Coworkers in telling others about him and the night and day difference he makes in his children’s life.
This is no different that what God promised the people of Israel when he called them into relationship with him
Ex 19:
‘Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine;
and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel.”
What does it mean to say yes to the life God offers us - to obey his voice and keep his commands (and this is where the rubber hits the road)?
Generally speaking, I’ve noticed something about us as human beings.
19:
We want our cake and eat it too.
We want to do whatever we want and not suffer any kind of negative consequences.
Young people expect to leave school with high paying jobs and begin their work life having at least what their parents have.
I’ve noticed that we as human beings
don’t want to choose between something, we want both.
We want to live anyway we want regardless of how anyone, let alone God might say is the best way to live, and we still want to get all life’s goodies, and all of God’s blessings.
Josua made it very clear to the people of Israel and it helps us to understand who we are today. Joshua said,
“If it is disagreeable in your sight to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve: whether the gods which your fathers served which were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Josua was saying - make a choice you can serve one or the other, but not both.
A Holy Nation : God wants us to be better than we ever imagined
A Holy Nation : God wants us to be better than we ever imagined
Now many people look at this and say that God wants to frighten us into choosing his way.
But the truth is he wants us to choose his way freely. He doesn’t want puppets or mindless obedience. He wants joyous disciples who realize that as good as life may seem to be without him, with him it becomes so, so much better. God takes our lives, undergirds them by the power of His Holy Spirit and lifts them to heights that we only imagine possible.
We are chosen and invited to become part of his glorious family and then he works in us to help us to grow into the new life he offers.
So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling;
for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.
phil 2:12-1
This is what it means when we are called a holy nation.
This is what it means when we are called a holy nation.
a holy nation.
Holy means different.
Holy means different. Holy means set apart.
Holy means set apart.
Holy means morally and ethically pure
Holy means free from those things that would cheapen life.
Holy means growing in those things that enhance life.
Holy means being able to be in love with God the way he intended.
Who are you?
“If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you after He has done good to you.”
You are a chosen child of God, called to a life in which you are in a love relationship with the creator of the universe, which if you will choose to live his way will give you the fulness of life that God always, from the beginning of time, wanted you have and has been working to give you and made it possible through his incarnation, life, death and resurrection.
Who are you - I am a child of God!
have people repeat this a few times
You are called into a person relationship with God!
You are called into a person relationship with God!
And if that were not enough, you are called into a personal relationship with the one and only God who has revealed himself to the people of Israel and at the right time in history came in the person of Jesus.
As a holy child of God you invited into his royal priesthood.
In the ancient world this access to God was the privilege of the professional priests, and in particular of the High Priest who alone could enter into the Holy of Holies. Through Jesus Christ, the new and living way, access to God becomes the privilege of every Christian, however simple he may be.
William Barclay, ed., The Letters of James and Peter, The Daily Study Bible Series (Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox Press, 1976), 196.
William Barclay, ed., The Letters of James and Peter, The Daily Study Bible Series (Philadelphia: Westminster John Knox Press, 1976), 196.
There is an old story about the king of a land visiting a village. Outside where the king was staying there was a young boy playing. He fell and hurt himself so he ran up to one of the king’s guards and said that he wanted to see the king. The guard laughed and said to the little boy, who do think you are? Through his tears the boy looked at the guard and said, “I am the king’s son.” The guard immediately took the boy to see the king. When they got to the door, the guard told the boy to wait. The boy smiled and simply walked into his fathers room where his father lifted him into his arms and comforted him.
This is what it means to be part of God’s royal priesthood. We have immediate and direct access to him, everyday and every moment of every day.
In Latin their is the word Pontifex. In English it means bridge-builder. As priest we have the privilege of building a bridge so that people can come to jesus and experience the blessing we have being given.
We have been given the privilege of showing the night and day difference God can make in a person’s life.
Never again forget who you are!
Never again forget who you are!
So from today onward, don’t ever forget who you.
You are a child of God, called into a community of people who are to be different from the people around them. You have been invited into a relationship with God that gives you direct access to him. And you have been given the privilege of showing and telling people how life can be so much better if they accept the way of Jesus, believe what he tells us and life like children of the king.
You can give them a glimpse of life beyond their expectation.
So I ask you again - Who are you - I am a child of God (repeat)
have people repeat it a few times
Don’t ever forget who you are and don’t ever let someone tell you you are anything less.
For you are a child of Yahweh God, creator and sustainer and ruler of the universe.