Sermon Tone Analysis

\\ Did you ever wonder if your life might work better if someone else ran it?

I can hear a number spouses thinking that this is the essence of marriage.

And the answer is “no”!

I remember years ago having my first experience with booking a Christian musician to sing at an event.

I assumed that you would get to speak directly to the artist – but not so – you get to speak to their manager.

It seemed like the manager was the person who said “yes” or “no”.

My understanding back then was that some of those artists were heavily ministry minded and lightly business minded.

As much as it annoyed me not to have direct contact with the person, I also understood that these people could go bankrupt on love offerings.

I remember someone asking me one time, “Don’t you trust God?”

It was relative to some ministry situation.

I told the individual that I trusted God but I didn’t always trust His people.

Sad but true isn’t it.

I know you see because I’m one of God’s people.

I also have to tell you that there have been times when I have let people down.

I’ve let my wife down.

I’ve let my kids down.

I’ve let the church down.

I’ve let God down.

This has not been the pattern of my life but there are scars that others bear because I have not functioned perfectly.

John Eldredge, talking about the “father wound” in his book, “Wild At Heart”, says that he has yet to meet a man who does not carry a wound into his adult years and most of the time that comes at the hand of his father.

It’s not always a deliberate thing but it happens.

If this statement stirs something with any of you, please talk to me about it.

There might be some wonderful healing for you.

It seems that when it comes to my priorities, it might work better if I had someone else to make sure that I stayed true to them.

Maybe I need a “manager” as well.

They could be the one to yank me out of bed on the mornings that I felt like sleeping in.

They could come downstairs at night when I sit too long in front of the TV or computer and turn the thing off and put a Bible in my hands.

They could grab me by the scruff of the neck and stand me in front of the door plate that needs to be replaced on our bedroom door and give me my trusty butter knife and make me fix it.

You know what, . . .

if I ever hired a manager, I think I’d shoot him in short order.

In the Christian walk, the process of discipleship, there comes a time when we have to face the music as well.

We don’t live very long in the life of faith before we begin to realize that there are parts of our being, certain desires that we have, plan that we have formulated over years that suddenly are in conflict with the Spirit of God now living inside of our hearts and minds.

At this crisis point we have a decision to make relative to the Lordship of Christ.

The question is really, “Who knows best what is best for me?”  Part of the reason that professing Christians have so little fruit in their lives is that they have made the wrong decision at this point.

They decide that they are the ones who know best and they live in conflict with what God’s Spirit is whispering to them.

They hold certain things in reserve from God, refusing to surrender to Him in one area or another.

It could be a “call” to the ministry such as I fought in the early years of my faith experience.

It could be something as simple as asking someone forgiveness for the attitude that you have and the behavior that this has produced toward them.

Whether the issue is grand or small, it still blocks our ability to “flow” with the Spirit of God.

We become caught counter current to God’s will and in that condition, it’s just a matter of time before we lose the vitality of our connection.

We grow weary and ultimately lose out spiritually.

That’s the problem that the “Come Thirsty” campaign has addressed and today’s message has to do with the Lordship of Christ the first “L” in the “W.E.L.L.” acrostic.

So let me ask you today if there are current unresolved Lordship issues in your life?

When you try to talk to Him do you hear the same words coming?

Do you sense when you come to church that the same issue or concern is always right there in front of your face?

Rather than the particular issue, the question is, “Who knows best?”

Who is going to call the shots in your life?

Ultimately it must be God.

The lyrics to the old chorus went, “If He’s not Lord of everything then He’s not Lord at all.”  Bill Hybels says, “95% commitment to God is 5% short!”

 

Lordship has to do with several things among those today:

 

! /1.  //The Primacy of His Purpose/

!  

*He has a purpose for everything that you encounter, even when we cannot understand what it might be.

*

 

Sanctification from an Old Testament perspective, was related to several things.

It is used frequently in reference to “holy” things, to various articles and instruments of worship in the Tent of Meeting.

These things were sanctified or “set apart” by:

 

·        */Their purpose/*

 

/"They shall not profane the holy offerings of the children of Israel, which they offer to the Lord, or allow them to bear the guilt of trespass when they eat their holy offerings; for I the Lord sanctify them.’

”" (Leviticus 22:15-16, NKJV) *[1]* /

 

·        */Their anointing/*

 

/"Set up the courtyard around it and put the curtain at the entrance to the courtyard.

“Take the anointing oil and anoint the tabernacle and everything in it; consecrate it and all its furnishings, and it will be holy.

Then anoint the altar of burnt offering and all its utensils; consecrate the altar, and it will be most holy.

Anoint the basin and its stand and consecrate them."

(Exodus 40:8-11, NIV) *[2]* /

 

·        */The Presence/*

 

/ "This shall be a continual burnt offering throughout your generations at the door of the tabernacle of meeting before the Lord, where I will meet you to speak with you.

And there I will meet with the children of Israel, and *the tabernacle shall be sanctified by My glory.*

So I will consecrate the tabernacle of meeting and the altar.

I will also consecrate both Aaron and his sons to minister to Me as priests.

I will dwell among the children of Israel and will be their God.

And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt, that I may dwell among them.

I am the Lord their God."

(Exodus 29:42-46, NKJV) *[3]*/

 

In the New Testament we are admonished as followers of Christ to make ourselves an offering to God.

 

/"Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.

For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace."

(Romans 6:13-14, NIV) *[4]* /

 

So what does that mean.

In my opinion, the demonstration of the Lordship of Christ in the life of a Christ-follower is that they dedicate their lives to those things which advance the kingdom of Christ.

That would mean the manner in which they conduct themselves sin daily affairs.

They would recognize that the demonstration of God’s love is the most powerful sermon that they will ever preach.

They are determined to reach people with the message of God’s love and grace.

This is the gospel.

! /2.  //The Peace of His Presence/

!  

!

He is with you always.

We need never be lonely.

We are not abandoned.

He supports us through every difficulty.

/“When you pass through the waters, *I will be with you*; And through the rivers, they will not overflow you.

When you walk through the fire, you will not be scorched, Nor will the flame burn you.

For I am the Lord your God.” –Isaiah 43:2–3 nasb/

!

The most holy practice, the nearest to daily life, and the most essential for the spiritual life, is the practice of the presence of God, that is to find joy in his divine company and to make it a habit of life, speaking humbly and conversing lovingly with him at all times, every moment, without rule or restriction, above all at times of temptation, distress, dryness, and revulsion, and even of faithlessness and sin.

-- Brother Lawrence in The Practice of the Presence of God.

Christianity Today, Vol.

31,  no.

13.

I was looking around my home the other day.

Elaine was out of the house on business.

I noticed as I glanced here and there that the evidence of a wonderful homemaker was everywhere.

Not that everything was in it's place (most often my fault), or that there were no dust bunnies floating around (you'd have to look closely to find them) but it was obvious that someone was caring for things.

It was that much more obvious to me since I knew that I was not the one.