Sermon Tone Analysis

His Story – My Story

1 Peter 1:22-25   |   Shaun LePage   |   August 24, 2008

\\ His Story – My Story

1 Peter 1:22-25   |   Shaun LePage   |   August 24, 2008

I.       Introduction

A.    Bible-believing, Bible-teaching churches tend to function with a couple of major presuppositions (things we assume about those who join and participate).

1.

The first is the presupposition of context.

In other words, we who teach and preach tend to assume that you understand how a book or a chapter or a person or a command fits into the larger context of the Bible.

But not everyone has been given the Big Picture (for whatever reasons) and it can be enormously helpful in understanding the verses, chapters and books.

It’s not just a story, it’s His Story—God’s work in history!

A masterpiece!

I want to spend the next several months exploring the big picture of this masterpiece—the narratives, the poetry, the letters—from Genesis to Revelation.

I’m very excited about it because it has been enormously helpful to me in my own life.

I also believe this will give birth to praise—seeing in a new way, or being reminded of, the beauty and perfection of God’s Word gives us a renewed appreciation for God Himself.

2.     The second presupposition is that you want to know what the Bible has to say—because you believe it.

You trust it.

But, of course, there are many who don’t or aren’t sure if they can—maybe this describes some of you.

But also, you and I can have a great impact on their lives if we can help them see that the Bible is trustworthy.

I think it will be an extremely valuable exercise to address this presupposition first—before we look at the Big Picture.

B.    Think about it: The Bible tells us how the universe came into existence.

How the universe fell into its current condition.

What God intends to do about it.

It tells us about ourselves—our special role in the world and our destiny.

It tells us—most importantly—about our God.

Our Creator.

Our Sovereign.

Our Lord.

His nature.

His attributes.

His commands.

His work.

His plan.

1.

If this book is not true, we are hopelessly lost on an ocean of ignorance, confusion and relativity.

We don’t know who we are or how we got here.

We know almost nothing about anything more than a few miles above our atmosphere.

We can’t agree on a system of morality, how we should govern ourselves or what is ultimately valuable.

If we can’t trust this book, history is meaningless confusion leading into a frightening darkness.

There is no right.

There is no wrong.

There is no truth.

There is no point.

2.     But, if…if it is true.

If it can be trusted, the implications are staggering!

Truly life changing!

If this book is true, there is a God who is both far beyond us as well lovingly concerned with our lives.

If this book is true, the universe was created with order and design and purpose.

Mankind has inherent dignity and worth as the only creature created in the image of God and can—therefore—relate to God in a personal way.

If this book is true, there is such a thing as sin, and its consequences are death and separation from our Creator.

If this book is true, God Himself—the Person of Jesus Christ—stepped into history and provided the one and only way to be rescued from sin, reconciled to our God and assured of eternal life in His presence.

If this book is true, history is guided and purposeful and leading to a glorious climax.

If this book is true, there is truth.

There is absolute truth for all people, of all times and in all places—if this book is true.

If it can be trusted.

II.

I doubt any of you would be surprised to know that I believe with all my heart that this book is the inspired, inerrant, sufficient word of God.

It was given by God and it has been preserved by God.

It is true.

It can be trusted.

But, if 30 years ago you had asked me this question: “Can We Trust The Bible?”

I would have said something like, “I don’t know—I suppose.”

I want to share my story with you today.

My story of how I came to believe that this book can be trusted.

A.    I am not Lee Strobel or Josh McDowell or Frank Morison—these men (and many others like them) were intellectuals who set out to disprove the Bible.

To debunk the Christian faith.

B.    But, I have always had a positive view of the Bible.

I grew up in a religious environment and we always had a Bible lying around some where.

The problem was, in the Roman Catholic world I grew up in, the Bible was no more special than our traditions.

I was given this Bible (New American—a Catholic translation) at my confirmation when I was 12 or 13, but I never read it unless I was in trouble or very, very bored.

What I did read I didn’t understand and if I did, I didn’t find it to be particularly relevant to my life.

I went to 12 years of Catholic school, and I remember seeing Bibles on shelves, but I have no memory of ever opening one and studying it.

I had a very high opinion of the Bible, but just didn’t know much about it or what was in it.

George Barna did some research and found that almost 7 out of 10 people say that the Bible is very important to them.

But when these same people were asked a series of questions about the orthodox, biblical faith, only 8% were able to give answers which were biblically sound.

That was me! High opinion, but no understanding.

If Jay Leno would’ve come up to me on the street and asked me a Bible question, I would’ve been one of those embarrassed, Biblically illiterate knuckleheads.

C.    But, when I was in high school, I met someone who believed and understood and could explain the Bible—my (now) brother-in-law, Larramie Crumpley.

He and my sister Mary began witnessing to me and when I was a freshman in college, I understood the gospel and recognized my need for Christ and one night—April 9, 1982—trusted Christ and received eternal life.

Larramie and my sister gave me this Bible (Open Bible—New American Standard Version) and I began reading it.

I now had a desire to read it, but I still felt lost.

I still found it hard to understand, but the more I read, the more it came alive for me.

I noticed someone else’s Bible had tabs at the start of each book and since I didn’t know where any of the books were located, I found a Christian bookstore and bought these tabs to mark the first page of every book of the Bible.

At that trip to the Christian Bookstore, I also bought and started to read this book, /Evidence That Demands a Verdict /by Josh McDowell.

It was at this point that I discovered there was a debate going on.

In fact there are many, many debates going on about the reliability of the Bible.

I don’t think it would be unfair to use the word “attacks”.

I learned that especially over the last 150 years or so, there have been several different attacks on the Bible.

I learned that there are attacks from outside Christianity as well as attacks from within the broad umbrella of Christianity.

Let me walk through some of these—I will address most of them in the weeks ahead (Note: No handout today, manuscripts available on information table and website).

1.     Attacks from outside Christianity include…

a)     Banning and burning.

This is the technique employed by communists and fascists.

(i)    A few years after I became a Christian I read this book, /God’s Smuggler /by Brother Andrew.

The back cover gives a great introduction to the story: “‘Lord, in my luggage I have Scripture that I want to take to Your children across this border.

When You were on earth, You made blind eyes see.

Now, I pray, make seeing eyes blind.

Do not let the guards see those things You do not want them to see.’ Brother Andrew prayed, and the guards passed his car bulging with Bibles across the Yugoslav border in 1957.

He began his mission to bring the Word to worshipers cut off from their religion.

It was a mission fraught with peril and pathos, financed by faith, supported by miracles.”

(ii)  But this attack didn’t end with the fall of the Iron Curtain.

I’ve got two news articles I found just this month (opening paragraphs of articles):