Sermon Tone Analysis

Following…Being Transformed

The call of Jesus, ‘Follow Me and I will make you fishers of me’ is nothing less than an invitation to experience a radical change of life.

As we saw last Sunday Jesus’ crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension didn’t change His call to be with Him.

Rather, He promised to send His Holy Spirit to indwell us so that He would be ‘in’ us and we would experience no interruption of His presence.

If only there were concrete, specific example of one who never walked with Jesus as those early disciples did who could help us know what it means to follow Jesus and experience His promise of a transformed life.

We looked at Peter - and as important as his example is - he DID walk with Jesus before and after.

What about you and I - and generations past and future - who never had quite the privilege Peter and others had?

Of course there is one - actually there are likely millions - whose life illustrates this life.

And this one left us letters that can help us discover how we too can experience the life-transformation of Jesus.

At least twice Paul challenged those who read his letters to ‘imitate’ him as he imitated Jesus.

Simply put, to follow Jesus means to live as Jesus did, to do the things Jesus did, to speak the way Jesus spoke, to listen and respond the way that Jesus did.

Dallas Willard describes following Jesus with these words:

Jesus’ followers were to bring the presence of the Kingdom and its King into every corner of human life, simply by living fully in the Kingdom with him.

Renovation of the Heart: Putting on the Character of Christ (Colorado Springs, CO.: Navpress, 2002), 15.

Let’s investigate one passage from Paul and learn what we can about allowing Jesus’ life to be expressed in our life:

READ Romans 6:1-18

Experiencing Life ‘In Christ’

a. newness of life

What exactly is this ‘new life?’

For many believers the days and weeks after their intitial response to following Jesus is, well, pretty much like the days and weeks before!

Unlike Peter and those whom Jesus called as He walked the beaches of the Sea of Galilee, unlike Paul who literally was blinded for several days after his life-altering encounter, most of us face the same circumstances, the same family, the same community as before.

So, ‘new life?’

Paul’s words to believers in Philippians may have a clue:

This ‘new life’ which is given to us because Jesus died paying the penalty for our sin, and experienced life-giving resurrection by the power of God - who is life in and of Himself- gives US His life in place of the old life.

Even for Peter, Paul and others we read about in the NT the new life was NOT ABOUT a new location.

It is about a new way of living - even in your present circumstances.

One example:

Luke recalls an episode from Jesus’ life as He casts demons (legions of them) from an individual living in a predominately Gentile community.

When the demons were gone, the man “begged” Jesus to travel with Him.

Jesus’ instructions:

Luke 8:39 (HCSB)

“Go back to your home, and tell all that God has done for you.”

And off he went, proclaiming throughout the town all that Jesus had done for him.

That is new life!

Going back to the same people who had watched him descend into demon possession, the same people who had tried unsuccessfully to contain him - and share with them the source of this new life.

Old Life - ruled by sin;

Most of the desires that express themselves in life are not sinful in and of themselves.

Food, clothing, relationships - these are all part of what it means to be created in the image and likeness of God.

However, sin has twisted these desires.

Instead of eating for nourishment, we eat to deal with stress, we eat to try out of nervousness and anxiety.

Instead of wearing comfortable and appropriate clothing we find ourselves swayed by advertisers persuading us we need this or that label.

Instead of living in relationships as equals before God we seek ways to dominate and control those around us.

New Life - expressing the life of Jesus

The new life, though, is simply the life of Jesus expressed in us.

Jesus ate, rested, dressed, spent time with family and friends, and so on.

As He lived He laughed, He cared, He listened, He demonstrated what it means to be human as God intended humans to be.

Consider Yourself DEAD to sin…ALIVE to God

We often hear other believers say ‘let go and let God.’

That sounds biblical, and there are moments when we do need to get out of God’s way.

However, when Paul writes, ‘consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God...’ he isn’t counseling a let go and let God approach.

Rather, as he writes in other letters you and I have to participate in this new life.

To the Philippians he wrote:

Philippians 2:12–13 (HCSB)

So then, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, not only in my presence, but now even more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.

For it is God who is working in you, enabling you both to desire and to work out His good purpose.

To the Colossians he expressed it this way:

Colossians 3:8–10 (HCSB)

But now you must also put away all the following: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and filthy language from your mouth.

Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old self with its practices

and have put on the new self.

You are being renewed in knowledge according to the image of your Creator.

To the Ephesians he wrote,

Ephesians 4:20–24 (HCSB)

But that is not how you learned about the Messiah,

assuming you heard about Him and were taught by Him, because the truth is in Jesus.

You took off your former way of life, the old self that is corrupted by deceitful desires;

you are being renewed in the spirit of your minds;

you put on the new self, the one created according to God’s likeness in righteousness and purity of the truth.

Each of those analogies are worth exploring in detail - but not this morning.

Rather, I share those to help us grasp the result of the new life means.

It means we discipline our minds to think differently, we exercise discipline so that our actions are in line with the actions of Jesus.

When Paul wrote to the believers in Corinth,

he meant exaclty that.

Do as I do, because I do as Christ did.

This is specifically what Jesus promised in

John 14:12 (HCSB)

“I assure you: The one who believes in Me will also do the works that I do.

And he will do even greater works than these, because I am going to the Father.

Do you ever wonder why many believers live defeated, discouraged, and dejected lives?

Have you ever considered why some churches experience God’s presence in a vibrant way?

Dallas Willard quotes Evelyn Christenson on this issue:

Sometimes we take a perfectly good word from the Bible (such as ‘chastisement,’ ‘suffering,’ ‘submission,’ ‘healing,’ ‘God’s justice,’), dive immediately into our pool of ‘I thinks’

and weave them subtly and securely around that word, leaving the impression that all our ‘I thinks’ about the word were included in the scriptural meaning of the word.

Dallas Willard, The Spirit of the Disciplines: Understanding How God Changes Lives (New York, N.Y.: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1988), 107.

Let’s not confuse the word Paul uses in Rom 6:11 with what we ‘think’ the word means.

The word ‘consider’ or ‘reckon’ is not something done to us, it is something we must do.

Because of the new life we’ve been given - at the cost of Jesus’ death, resurrection, and ascension - we are to THINK ourselves into acting as Jesus acted, as Paul acted.

It is a choice we make.

If you’ve ever watched a child mimic their favorite athlete, you’ve seen this in practice.

The child watches the athlete.

Then carefully and deliberately the child tries to mimic - in every way - the actions of the athlete.

The actions may become ‘second nature’ at some point in the childs behavior, but it starts with a conscious choice to mimic certain actions.

I can sense some of you going here: yes, pastor - let’s ask ‘What Would Jesus Do?’

But that’s not where I want to go.

Rather, let’s rephrase the question:

In any situation you find yourself, don’t just do what Jesus might have done.

Instead, THINK - what moved Jesus to act as He did?

Look through the gospels with this lens - and you will discover that Jesus’ motivation - in every single case - was to bring the reality of the King and to bring the presence of the Kingdom to bear.

Was Jesus tempted to sin? Yes.

Matthew and Luke both record three specific temptations diesJesus experienced.