2.13.17 3.22.2020 Certainty in Uncertain Times
Notes
Transcript
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Entice: Most us us have over-indulged during this crisis. Deluged in data. Longing for the latest news. Jonesing for the juiciest nugget. Reveling in rumors. All of this to find answers to questions we are afraid to ask, to attain a certainty which has become elusive.
Engage: Grayville people know that I often quote the marketer Seth Godin. I have been holding on to this thought for months. It has been in my task manager since last Summer, coming due every couple of weeks. I have been snoozing it and waiting for the right moment. A moment of anxiety, doubt, and uncertainty. Keep this in mind as you are looking for more and more answers hoping for less and less doubt:
“I wish I had more data”Really? More data is usually available. It takes time or money, but you can get more data. But you’re probably not using all the data you’ve already got. I’m guessing what you meant was, “I wish I had more certainty.”And that, unfortunately, isn’t available.
Expand: The Bible contains several intertextual trajectories. Often the OT poses a question and the careful reader finds the answer in the NT, not by taking things out of context but by having "ears to hear."
4 One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.
This familiar verse is often used in worship, as an anthem or call to worship. This one verse contains a seed for what the Bible says about certainty in uncertain times.
Excite: Please understand this is not an information issue. It's an obedience issue. David was talking about faith-driven behaviors. This is a time to reconsider your faith in God, a time to reaffirm commitments, re-channel efforts, reconsider choices. My fear is that we get through this unafraid, unpersuaded, unmoved, and unchanged; what a waste that would be.
Explore: Jesus replaces anxiety with assurance, doubt with certainty, faith with fear.
Explore: Jesus replaces anxiety with assurance, doubt with certainty, faith with fear.
Explain: The Journey of faith in Jesus is a journey of discovery.
Body of Sermon:
First we discover...
Security.
Security.
(dwell in the house of the Lord forever).
The House of the Lord: a Physical place, the state of our Spirit before God.
We need security because all of the anxiety of the moment comes down to two Questions...Am I gonna be ok? Am I gonna die? Let me deal with the second question first. Yes, you will die. Now question 2: Are you going to be ok? You can be. Even if this disease claims your life. You can be ok today, tomorrow, twenty years from now on into eternity.
In Paul talks about the Church as the temple:
19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God,
20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone,
21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
(
Even when physically apart we are a part of one another.
Even when physically apart we are a part of one another.
Intimacy.
Intimacy.
(to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord)
The forced separation of quarantine will leave many people lonely.
Worship is generally the time when God's collective people...the Body of Christ gathers with one voice to give praise and to "gaze upon His beauty."
To gather in His presence as a body is always preferable, but maybe this crisis is one step towards a revolution in the way the church worships and people experience intimacy with God.
Not as a replacement or a substitute for assembling together but as an expansion and as an augment.
Clarity.
Clarity.
(to Inquire in His Temple)
God's desire for us, His design for living, and direction from His Word does not change in times of crisis.
got nothing new for you. No amazing corona-virus revelation. No epiphanies, angelic pronouncements, or individual revelation. Instead:
12 For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
13 Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching.
16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,
17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.
8 If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well.
Ultimately clarity is not found in deeper data, richer media, or novel sources of information. Clarity comes from hearing and obeying the call of the Savior...
Ultimately clarity is not found in deeper data, richer media, or novel sources of information. Clarity comes from hearing and obeying the call of the Savior...
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.”( ESV)
34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
Shut Down:
I offer you clarity-in Jesus. I offer you intimacy with God-in Jesus. I offer you security-in Jesus.
There is no non-Jesus answer to any question you have about eternal life and how to be free from the anxious, clinging self-doubt of sin. I offer you Jesus.