Sermon Tone Analysis

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart

be acceptable to you, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer."

Page #

"For the Glory of Christ"

(Hebrews 5:5-10; John 12:20-33)

*INTRODUCTION:*

            Maybe you've had a similar experience.

There was a mother who asked her two and 1~/2 year old daughter: /"Would you like an ice cream sundae?"/

The daughter got real upset and replied, /"No...I want ice cream now."

/(1)

            Then some time back, in the comic strip The Ryatts, the little boy, Winky is sitting on the couch, Mom comes in and says, /"Winky, your socks don't match."/

Winky looks at his socks and then says, /"I tried to find some...but none of the socks in the drawer belong to the same family."

(2/)

/            /Sometimes family life is like the first story.

No matter what we say, we're misunderstood.

Sometimes family life is like the second story.

Sometimes we don't feel like we match with the family God has given us.

There are  days when you wake up and wonder if everyone else in the family hasn't been taken over by some alien life form.

You feel like you don't belong.

But most of the time family life is great.

It's great to belong to a family.

It's great to know there are people who care about you and people who love you.

Oh, at times, family life is challenging.

"Family life teaches you loyalty, patience, understanding, perseverance, ....and a lot of other things you wouldn't need if you'd stayed single."

(3)  Seriously, family and family life are very important to each of us.

A recent national survey asked the question:  /"What do you enjoy doing most in your spare time?"/

The answer, from seventy four percent of the people surveyed, was /"spending time with family and friends."/

(4)

            So what does all this talk about family have to do with today's scripture?

None of the passages seem to directly mention family, yet they do talk about the relationship Jesus had with God and with the world.

Hebrews 5:8 says, /"Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered."

/Jesus was  the Son of God, yet he didn't come to lord it over the world.

Jesus was the Son of God but he came to bring glory to God through being God's servant.

And I believe that's a model for both the family and especially for the Church.

*I.

JESUS IS LORD OF ALL:*

*            A.

JESUS IS LORD OF ALL.*

We begin with that affirmation.

Jesus, the Son of God, is Lord of all--Jews, Christians, rich and poor, righteous and unrighteous, sick or healthy.

No one is excluded.

All of us are equal in God's sight.

And that makes a difference.

Being Lord of all.

Being the Son of God, Jesus could have used all the powers at his disposal to bring about the conversion of the world.

He could have wowed us with miracle after miracle after miracle.

Instead he did only enough to show us who He really was and the power at his disposal.

And rather than use the powers of all creation, Jesus chose to show us just how much God loves us through submission and suffering and obedience.

Jesus chose the least powerful thing of all, the cross, and turned it into the most powerful symbol of all.

Jesus IS Lord of all.

Because Jesus is the Son of God and equal to God and yet was obedient to God in bearing the cross for our salvation, that makes a difference and that difference became the model for the Church.

When describing the early Christians to the Emperor Hadrian, Aristides wrote: /"They love one another.

They never fail to help widows; they save orphans from those who hurt them.

If they have something, they give freely to the person who has nothing; if they see a stranger, they take him home as a brother or sister in the spirit, the Spirit of God."/

/            /The work and ministry of Jesus became the model for the work and ministry of the Church.

The reason some people in the Church refer to one another as brother so and so and sister so and so is because  the family was seen as the model for the life of the Church.

Paul refers to us as brothers and sisters in Christ.

In Galatians Paul refers to us  as /"the family of faith."/

We're said to belong to the family of God.

Peter in his first letter, chapter 2:17,  writes: /"Honor everyone.

Love the family of believers.

Fear God."/

In Matthew 12:50 Jesus says: /"whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother."

/

*            B.

*I could go on and on with passages which refer to us as sons and daughters of God or the family of God.

We in the Church are learning, growing in our faith and trying to do God's will.

In my book, that makes us family.

As family we can look to Christ for guidance and as a role model for our relationships within our families at home and for our relationships within the church.

Jesus wanted us to know that God is like a loving parent.

It is within the family of God that we also get our values.

It is within the family of God that we draw our support when we venture out into the world.

It is God's family that should be the ultimate place we turn for love./

"Once we were no people, but now we are God's people."/

That's who we are, we are God's people.

We are the Church, the family of God and that makes a difference in how  we treat each other.

*II.

STICK TOGETHER:*

*            A.

*One of the characteristics of a strong family is that it sticks together, no matter what the situation, even in the tough times.

Picture the scene.

A wife lovingly picks a daisy and begins playing that old game of /"He loves me" "He loves me not"/ as she pulls off each petal.

Unfortunately she ends on /'He loves me not"/ just as her husband walks in the door.

The wife immediately turns on the dumbfounded husband and says, /"Well, frankly, I'm not too wild about you, either."/

We need to realize that there are going to be times in the life of this family known as the Church, when we're not going to be wild about each other.

And that's OK.

But we don't give up on each other.

And we're called to act in love towards each other even though we disagree.

We do this, not to glorify ourselves but as Christ did, to glorify God.

That's our purpose in all that we do in the Church, to bring glory to God and to act out of the same love which was shown to us.

Love is the acid test of our faith.

If we do not care about others in our fellowship or family of faith, then our faith is meaningless.

*B.

*Sometimes family life can get hectic.

Some pretty rough times can come up over night.

Our whole world can fall apart in a split second.

There are so many problems facing our world and our children and families today that it's frightening.

But that's the way it has been in every generation.

The philosopher Thucydides wrote his observation of the five major problems during the time of Christ: /"/1)/ Fear that superpowers would draw the world into conflict; /2)/ Divorce and the breakdown of the family;  /3) /Children not showing respect for elders and the wisdom of the previous generation; /4) /Political corruption; /5) /Potholes in the streets."/

That sounds just like now doesn't it.

The only two things not on the list are gang violence and drugs.

There are a lot of things that threaten family life today.

The storms of life can swoop in unexpectedly and wreak havoc.

But the mark of a healthy family is that healthy families ride the storms out together.