Sermon Tone Analysis

II Corinthians 5:11-21

 

! Introduction

In a week from tomorrow, a media campaign will begin in Manitoba.

It will not sell hamburgers or mutual funds.

It will let the people of Manitoba know that there is power to change through a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Beginning on March 19 and running until April 15, you will see testimonies by Paul Henderson, Catriona LaMay Doan, "Pinball Clemons, Billy Diamond and Marilyn Riechert as they share how God has changed their life.

These ads will be on CTV on Global television on radio and also on various print media.

Some have suggested that about 95% of Manitobans will hear the message of God’s power to change lives numerous times during that month.

Will you listen to the adds or will you do more?

Why should we as people who attend the Rosenort EM Church take this as an opportunity to share our faith with others?

Why should we participate in something like this and stretch our faith and activate our will to serve God?

When we did the evaluation of the eight quality characteristics last fall, we found that our least effective area was in need based evangelism.

Power To Change is an opportunity to improve our least effective element.

I would like to give you three reasons why I think we need to participate in the work of evangelism.

The reasons are taken from I Corinthians 5:11-21, so I invite you to turn there now.

!

I.

Because Christ’s Love Compels Us.

The first reason why we should care to become involved is because of the love we have experienced from God. Paul, in speaking about his own ministry says to the Corinthians in verse 14, “…Christ’s love compels us…”

!! A. Christ’s Love For Us

            What he is talking about is the love Christ has for us.

Do we realize the depth of Christ’s love for us?

Let me share with you some of my experience of how I have come to realize that Christ loves me.

I became a Christian at age 9 and five years later at age 14, I began to live by the value of wanting to be popular.

Even though I was a Christian and went to church and even was involved in leadership, the most important thing in my life was wanting to be a part of the “in crowd.”

In order to be accepted, I did things that were not appropriate for a Christian - I sinned.

Even after I rededicated my life and was baptized at age 16, I did many things which I don’t like to think about because I am ashamed of them.

As a pastor I have done things and said things that were not honouring to God.

I have often sought to please myself instead of God.

I am a sinner.

It is a great thing to rejoice that our sins are forgiven the first time.

For me, the love of God becomes precious when I understand that even after I gave my life to him and have sinned so many times, He continues to be patient with me and forgive me.

This gift of forgiveness is not a small thing.

It is not as if he simply overlooks my sins.

Sins are serious things.

Whenever I sin, I reject the one who created me.

God made me and when I do things that are wrong, I am in essence saying, “I don’t care what you think or want.”

I slap God’s face in my selfish pride.

Sins violate the image of God in me.

God has made me to honor him and whenever I sin, I live in a way that is contrary to what I have been created to be.

When I sin, I hurt other people.

Of course, if I murder someone, or commit adultery, other people are hurt, but vengeance, anger, foul language and every other sin also hurts other people.

When I sin, I also do things that hurt me.

Sin may look innocent, but it is always destructive.

It is obvious to us that if we sin by taking drugs or becoming drunk that there will be consequences to that which harm us.

What we don’t often realize is that every sin is destructive to us.

Jealousy is destructive of our peace of mind.

Anger can have harmful effects on our body and spirit.

When God forgives our sins, he does not overlook all of these wrongs done or their evil.

But he chooses not to hold them against us.

We have done the wrong, we and others have suffered and when God forgives, He chooses to absorb the wrong.

He does so not because he is blind or soft, but because Jesus has paid the ultimate price through his death on the cross.

We owe big time, but Jesus has paid for it and so we are free from the debt.

Let us look at just one verse which expresses what God has done.

Colossians 2:13, 14, “When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ.

He forgave us all our sins, having cancelled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.”

That is love and I John 4:10 says, “This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.”

Jesus was at a dinner at the home of one of the Pharisees.

When he was there, a woman came into the house and began to wet Jesus’ feet with her tears and dry them with her hair.

The Pharisee was incensed that Jesus should permit this sinful woman to do this.

Jesus told a parable about two men who owed a debtor large sums of money.

One owed him 500 denarii and the other 50 denarii.

Both of them could not pay the debt and the lender cancelled the debt of both of them.

Jesus then asked the Pharisee, “which one will love him more?”

Jesus concluded the scene with the words, “Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much.

But he who has been forgiven little loves little.”

How much are we aware of Christ’s love for us?

As a way of reminding ourselves of the love of God, I invite us to sing The Love Of God.

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!! B. The Impact Of Christ’s Love

When we realize that we are greatly loved by God, that is the most powerful motivating factor in giving us a desire to share the great love we have with others.

Paul goes on to say in II Corinthians 5:16, “So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view.”

If we are aware of the love of Christ in our lives, we will no longer look at anyone in the same way.

We no longer look at ourselves in the same way.

All desire for selfish living, all need to find significance in a job or in a relationship with another person is gone because we become content in the fact that we are loved by the creator of the universe.

We look at other believers differently.

We accept them not because they are good or bad or friendly or shy, but because they and we are brothers and sisters who are equally loved by an all powerful and all wise father.

Most significantly, we cannot look at unbelievers in the same way.

If we know that we have been showered with love and have experienced the freedom and peace that God gives, how can we look at people who do not have this love in their lives in any way but as people who also need to experience God’s love in their life.

We now look at the lost as those who are loved by Christ, but unaware of that love.

We become motivated to let them know that God loves them.

In Acts 4:19-20 Peter and John were arrested for preaching the gospel.

After being threatened to stop doing so, they replied, “we cannot help speaking what we have seen and heard.”

O that we would be so aware of the great love with which God has loved us that we could not help but speak about Him.

!

II.

Because Change Is Possible

            I know that sometimes ladies like to go for a makeover.

Although the change in appearance can be quite amazing, it is only the appearance that has been changed.

The change does not last.

A rain storm or a little hard work in the garden will soon wear off the effects of the makeover.

A second reason why we must become involved in sharing the gospel message is because the message of the gospel which we have to share is about real power to change.

!! A. We Are New Creatures

            In II Corinthians 5:17 Paul says, “…if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!”

The message of the gospel that we share is not a cosmetic change.

This is no mere “makeover” but a true and complete inner change.

God created us good, but when sin entered into our lives, because we were human and because we sinned, we were no longer good.

Nothing less than a complete change would make enough of a difference in us to change us from bad to good.

God has made us into something entirely new.

We are no longer under bondage to sin and death.

We are indwelt by the Holy Spirit who is renewing us day by day.

How many people in this world are longing for a complete change.