Friends With God
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We just had a wonderful VBS week. The main theme for this week was friendship with God. The kids explored several Bible stories from Elijah - how God interacted and showed himself to this prophet, Jonah - how God used a man to have compassion on a people even though this man was disobedient, Jesus calming the storm - how God comes in the midst of our troubles, the resurrection - how God made a way for man’s redemption and a simple story of a women name Lydia placing her faith in Jesus in the book of Acts - how God meets everyone right where they are at.
Each day our Bible buddies had a theme that they reminded us of God who is a friend to us.
Day 1 God is a friend who’s real
Day 2: God is a friend who loves
Day 3: God is a friend we can trust
Day 4: God is a friend forever
Day 5: God is a friend for everyone
Title Slide
I got to thinking about this word friend a bit. We use it for our contacts on Facebook. According to that use, I’ve got 731 friends. I’m not sure that is really the right use of that word in the context of being friends with God.
So, it’s got to be something a bit deeper…right?
There is this passage in James where Abraham is called a friend of God…let’s take a look at that.
In this part of James 2, we are learning about the connection between faith…what it is we believe…and action…the things we do based on what we believe. Abraham is used as an example starting in verse 21.
21 Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23 And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend.
In case you aren’t familiar with this story, I want to read it this morning. It’s in Genesis 22. While you turn there, I want to give you some context.
This man Abraham was chosen by God and God made a covenant with him at the ripe of 75. God told him to pack up and move…so he did. Along the way, he came into a situation where he was fearful for his life and the life of his wife, so he lied about his relationship with his wife. He chose to lie rather than trust God for protection
Part of this covenant that God made with Abraham was that Abraham would become the father of many nations, but his wife Sarah was not able to bear him a child. They decided to take matters into their own hands and Abraham had a child with Sarah’s slave Hagar. They chose this route because they couldn’t see a path to parenthood.
It wasn’t until Abraham was 99 that he finally had a son Isaac with his wife Sarah who laughed when she heard the prophetic word spoke of her.
That brings us to Genesis chapter 22.
1 Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”
3 Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. 4 On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. 5 He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”
6 Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, 7 Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”
“Yes, my son?” Abraham replied.
“The fire and wood are here,” Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”
8 Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” And the two of them went on together.
9 When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. 10 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. 11 But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”
“Here I am,” he replied.
12 “Do not lay a hand on the boy,” he said. “Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son.”
13 Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. 14 So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the Lord it will be provided.”
15 The angel of the Lord called to Abraham from heaven a second time 16 and said, “I swear by myself, declares the Lord, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, 17 I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, 18 and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”
Back in the book of James, Abraham is called God’s friend. I don’t know about you, but the people I’ve been through things with are my best friends. Friends who can share in my struggles, and I in theirs…friends I’ve learned with, served with spent time with....those people are my friends.
Abraham didn’t realize it, but the testing and journey that we just read about foreshadowed what would ultimately take place with God’s only son…Jesus.
2 Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”
The region of Moriah is where the city of Jerusalem would be constructed. The same city that would be the place where Jesus would be crucified. Jesus’ life was given as a sacrifice for our sin.
Abraham’s journey was three days, the same number of days Jesus was in the tomb.
Like Jesus, Isaac was a willing son. Jesus carried the cross, Isaac carried the wood. Jesus would be nailed to the cross and Isaac bound to the alter.
When I think about my children and what Abraham was willing to do with his son Isaac, I just can’t....I can’t even fathom what that was like. And to think that Jesus going to the cross was God giving up his only son just like Abraham with his only son Isaac.
Abraham didn’t know it, but God was showing him what would ultimately happen in the future with Jesus. Abraham through his faith and then his action, would become God’s friend.
They went beyond just knowing each other and talking to each other…they went through something together.
Now before you start gathering bundles of wood and asking where your kids are, this concept of friendship with God is also a New Testament concept. Turn with me to John 15.
I am going to read from the start of this chapter because it includes some context that I think is important to understand as we explore this idea of being friends with God...
1 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. 3 You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4 Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
Jesus uses the analogy of a vine, of a plant…being pruned, but also with branches being grafted it.
I’ve seen this trend with tomatoes lately where people will start two varieties of seedlings. One that is known for it’s deep strong roots and another that is known for its abundance of tomatoes. They cut the top off the first and graft in the top of the second to create a hybrid plant with strong roots and abundant tomatoes.
It’s like that with us…we get to be grafted into the vine that is Jesus.
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6 If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7 If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. 8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
Verse 7 tells us that if we are connected and remain in Christ, what we ask, it will be done. What happens is that we become so close to God and his will for us and those things around us that we begin to desire that which God desires as well. So our ask is in line with God’s will. I heard a neat analogy...
Imagine you are in a boat floating in a lake that is attached by a long rope to a dock. As you pull the rope, are you pulling the dock closer to you, or are you pulling yourself closer to the dock.
It’s the same idea when it comes to prayer. As we pray in the will of God, we pull ourselves into closer alignment with God’s will and plan.
9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. 10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.
OK…Jesus is the vine, we are the branches…We have to remain in him.
As we remain in him, connected to him, we are aligned with his will, and his will for us is to do as he commands.
Bottom line…his command is for us to love each other, like Christ. This one verse is a sermon series all on its own, but Jesus drills down just a bit more for us...
13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. 16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. 17 This is my command: Love each other.
Jesus is speaking to us here as well as his speaks directly to his disciples. These guys had been with Jesus non-stop for the last three years. He showed them, he taught them, he laughed with them, cried with them…they had been through quite a bit together.
It is not long after this that Jesus would got to the cross and he is telling them…and us that as we are on this journey with Christ as Lord and Savior, he also calls us friend. He calls us friend not just as Jesus the man, but as Jesus, God.
The God of the universe has made a way for us to be friends with him. He sent his son Jesus to die for us…as the payment for the penalty of our sins. Our response it to place our faith in Jesus as both Lord and Savior.
We saw in our passage from James that our faith will result in our action - our action in fulfilling what Jesus commanded - to love one another.
My best friends, the ones who I know love me, are not just willing to agree with everything I want to do, but they challenge me, they help me see the errors in my ways and they push me toward holiness and right living.
