New Year's - W.I.G.I.M.I.

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Title: W.I.G.I.M.I.

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Scripture:

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Redemptive Closure (point to Jesus):

Benediction:

Bumper

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlC-Gzv0LFc

WELCOME

Good morning!!! My name is Ryan Hanson and I have the honor of serving here at The Light KC as the lead pastor. I’m so glad you’re here with us.

‌Welcome to those joining us online. We hope your doing well and hope to see you in person in the coming weeks.

And a special welcome to those joining us for the first time. We’re so glad you chose to be here. As a special thank you, we’d love to give you a small gift. Just go to the info desk after service and one of our volunteers will be there to welcome you and give your your gift. It’s our way of saying thank you for worshiping with us and to let you know how much we appreciate you being here.

ME/INTRO - Tension

Before we start today’s teaching, will you join me in taking a deep breath? Breathe in…and out… We made it. This is the last week of 2024. If 2024 was a great year for you, or if 2024 was the worst year you’ve had, it is over on Tuesday.

Now this is a time when people typically reflect on how their year has gone. It is the time of year when people commit or recommit to something that they think will make the next year better than the last year.

So, I want to start with a question.

How many people plan to set a New Year’s resolution?

From what I’ve seen online, 68% of people set new year’s resolutions. On the screen is the list of the most common set last year.

[graphic of most common New Year’s resolutions]

Do you see something they all have in common? They are all focus on self-improvement. We see exercise more, get healthier, lose weight, save money, pursue a career ambition, spend less time on social media, get a new hobby, drink less, renovate the house, etc.

There’s nothing wrong with that, and I have set many of these myself over the years, but what I have found is that a goal set with the singular purpose of improving one’s self is not compelling enough for me to stick with throughout the year. Every time I have set one of these self-motivated resolutions I have given up on before January is over.

One year, a few years ago, I decided to try something different than setting another “self-improvement” resolution. I was going to say “YES” whenever I felt God calling me to serve someone else. I was going to pre-accept whatever God asked of me. The problem was, I expected God to make a grand invitation, something like this. Take a look at this video.

Operation Yellow Ribbon Video (entire video)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_Ey5ph4wW8

Did you know about this? I only found out a few months ago. The sad thing is, this is what I expected God to do for me during the year. I thought God’s invitation to serve would be as clear as 38 airplanes and 7,000 people unexpectedly showing up to my front door. The reality was that nothing that grand happened. The one thing that did happen was that God showed me a picture of what service typically looks like. This is what I’d like to talk about today. If you will turn with me to the book of Ruth.

WE - Tension

We’ll have the scripture on the screen, but if you have a Bible with you, or Bible app on your phone, I’d encourage you to turn to the passage and follow along. There is nothing that replaces having God’s word in your hand.

As you turn there let me give us a little background on the book of Ruth.

the book is really the story of Naomi and her family. Naomi was an Israelite who was married to Elimelek. They had two sons, Mahlon and Kilion. Israel was suffering from a famine and to feed his family Elimelek decided that he would move to Moab. During the ten years they were there, both sons got married; one to Ruth and the other to Orpah. Also, during those ten years Elimelek and both sons died, leaving Naomi with two daughters and no means of supporting them. You see at that time, women did not have standing in society. They could not enter into business transactions. They were essentially helpless. If a woman’s husband died and she had no sons, many widows were typically forced to sell themselves into slavery just to survive. Naomi, hearing that the famine was over in Israel, decided to go back to see if she could find family that could help her. Naomi encouraged both daughters to stay in Moab and re-marry. Orpah agreed, but Ruth had other plans.

GOD - Text

RUTH’S YES

It is here we pick up the story. Please turn with me to Ruth 1:16-18:

Ruth 1:16–18 (NIV)

But Ruth replied, “Don’t urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God. Where you die I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord deal with me, be it ever so severely, if even death separates you and me.” When Naomi realized that Ruth was determined to go with her, she stopped urging her.

Ruth had a choice to make. She could stay in Moab, re-marry, have a family, and live a normal life. Or…she could stay with Naomi, go to a land where she knew nobody, worship and serve a God she did not grow up with, and face a very uncertain future. Ruth chose to stay with Naomi. I like how Daniel Block, professor of Old Testament at Wheaton College in Illinois describes Ruth’s choice to stick with Naomi. He writes,

With radical self-sacrifice she abandons every base of security that any person, let alone a poor widow, in that cultural context would have clung to: her native homeland, her own people, even her own gods

- Daniel Block

I love that phrase, “radical self-sacrifice”. Through the rest of the book of Ruth we see how God honors that “radical self-sacrifice” to serve her mother-in-law. He allows her to glean (which means pick up the scrap grain left over from harvest) in a field owned by a man named Boaz. Boaz shows favor to her by helping her beyond what is expected. Boaz ends up marrying her as the Kinsman Redeemer, which basically is a process outlined in Leviticus where a relative can buy-back the property sold when a relative runs into hard times. Boaz and Ruth have a child named Obed and both Ruth and Naomi’s futures are secure.

What strikes me about the story of Ruth is what we find in Matthew 1:5 in the genealogy of Jesus. It states

Matthew 1:5 (NIV)

Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab,

Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth,

Obed the father of Jesse,

It was through the family tree of Ruth that Jesus was born. Ruth’s selfless act to stick by Naomi when she had nothing to gain and everything to lose, created the branch in the family tree of Jesus.

Ruth couldn’t have known that her decision to serve Naomi would eventually lead to Jesus, the promised Messiah, our savior, being born. In reality, God rarely gives us the clear, instant results for our deeds like he gave those in Gander. I definitely have not received that clarity in my life.

Have you been in a position like Ruth, called by God to do something that makes no sense?

Called to act based on nothing else than the faith that God will use the obedience at an unknown point in the future?

Maybe not even your future.

RYAN’s YES

In my life, I find God leads me through a long list of opportunities that seem small in the moment, but in retrospect add up to huge changes when I obediently continue to say “yes”.

I’ve shared my story before, but God started over 20 years ago providing opportunities for me to say “yes” to His plans for my life.

I said “yes” to Volunteering with middle schoolers

I said “yes” to Joining the leadership team and teaching team of a middle and high school youth group

I said “yes” to Leading a campus as their youth pastor

I said “yes” to Going to seminary

I said “yes” to Helping to launch a church and lead the adult ministries and community outreach

I said “yes” to Join a teaching team at a church

I said “yes” to Quit my job of 20 years at Trane and apply to Churches

I said “yes” to coming down here to KC

I could have never imagined throughout this entire story that God was working as He was. Through this story and others like it, God used my “Yesses” to bring me here speaking to you now.

As I understand it now, this is how God “typically” works. He gives us an opportunity to join Him, with no vision or promise of results. The opportunity typically feels like more of an inconvenient request than a God ordained opportunity to do Kingdom work.

Where is God calling you to obediently say “yes” this week?

When I look back on the other times I have said “yes” I think of how easily it would have been to have said “no”.

FAILURE TO SAY “YES”

On a few occasions, I have said “no”. God reminded me of this clearly when this picture came across my FaceBook feed. This picture is not in any way vulgar, but it could be disturbing to some. If you don’t personally want to see or don’t want your children to see, please look away for the next few seconds. It was a picture taken during the 1993 Sudan Famine, was run on the cover of Time Magazine, and won a Pulitzer Prize. Please show the picture.

[vulture and child picture]

Thanks, please take it down.

The picture depicts a starving girl trying to crawl to the UN Food camp a mile away while a vulture looks on waiting for her to die. The photographer stood watching this young girl try to crawl for 20 minutes. He thought the picture would be better if the vulture had its wings open. After 20 minutes, he scared the vulture away, lit a cigarette, prayed for the girl, and walked away, never helping her get to the food line. Having to deal with the weight of his choices, this photographer never recovered from the guilt of saying “no” to this opportunity to help this girl. He wrote

“I am haunted by the vivid memories of killings & corpses & anger & pain.”

Now, this picture stood out to me, because it reminded me of two pictures I took while in Africa. I was touring the Kibera Slum in Kenya, home to roughly 1,000,000 people. As we toured the slum a certain child stood out. The girl was in a “child sponsorship” school and stood out because she looked so sad even though she was getting her needs met.

[girl in red dress in kibera slum]

I clearly remember thinking that this is the type of picture people would want to see in my photo book of Africa. A sad child living in the slum. I took the picture, even edited the colors to emphasize the girl, and did nothing to help.

The second picture was taken in the Masai Mara, the African plains, in a mud hut village of a girl who was sitting there with flies on her face, not even trying to swat them away.

[girl with flies on her face]

Again, I clearly remember, that this is another picture I thought people would want to see in my photobook. I took a picture and did nothing to help.

There was realistically not much I could do, but I could have walked up to them, I could have spoken to them, maybe I could have done something or said something that could have brought a smile to their faces. It wouldn’t have taken much. Here is another picture I took in the same slum.

[Group of kids chasing our van]

This was a group of kids who we entertained for over a half an hour doing nothing more than showing them pictures of themselves in the preview screen of our cameras. As you can see, they loved it.

I have never regretted the times I have said “yes” to God’s prompting to serve others, but I have regretted every time I have said “no”

YOU - Takeaway

In 1 Corinthians 9:24 Paul writes,

1 Corinthians 9:24 (NIV)

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize.

I want to be able to say at the end of 2025 that I ran the race God gave me to win. To do that, I commit to the following two things. First my New Year’s resolution will be to:

New Year’s Resolution: Look at the inconvenient requests that people make of me and ask God if it is an opportunity He is providing me to serve

I will also adopt a word for the year. In my former job (sales) I am continually told that the first thing that comes to people’s mind when confronted with a request is

W.I.I.F.M.

Which stands for

W.I.I.F.M.

What’s In It For Me

My word for this year will be

W.I.G.I.M.I.

You may not be familiar with this word, because I made it up. It stands for

W.I.G.I.M.I.

What Is God Inviting Me Into

Every time an inconvenient request presents itself in 20259, I am going to ask myself how God might be using it as an opportunity to invite me into the work He is already doing, calling me into a larger role in His kingdom. I for one do not want to pass up on anything God has planned for me.

I ask you to join me in 2025 to pre-saying “yes” to every inconvenient request that you feel the Spirit leading you accept.

Imagine what God could do through this church if we decided right now to say “yes” to the opportunities to serve others even when it is inconvenient, or we don’t see the benefit that we might get from it.

WE / JESUS - Redemptive Close - Call to Action

Jesus, dealt with this same issue with His disciples. When two of them asked to be elevated above the rest, Jesus used it as an opportunity to teach them how He wanted them to live.

Matthew 20:25–28 (NIV)

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

As we start 2025, let’s follow Jesus’ lead and focus our efforts and time on serving others.

Let’s be “the light” to hurting of this world.

PRAYER

Will you join me in prayer...

God, I thank you for everything you’ve done in 2024. I thank you for the good things that you gifted us with. I also thank you for the tough things that you used to challenge us and grow us into the people that we are today. I pray that in 2025 you give us the radical self-sacrifice of Ruth. Help us to run the race you give us in 2025 to win. Help us to look at every inconvenient request as a potential invitation to join You in growing Your Kingdom. Soften our hearts, and help us say “YES” when you invite us to join you in your Kingdom work. We love you and we cannot wait to see what you have planned for The Light KC over the next year.

Amen.

SONG

As we enter into our final song, I want to open the steps up front as an altar to anyone who needs God this week. The steps are open for you to pray to the God who is with you, who loves you, you wants to give you His peace.

You may feel a hand on your shoulder as I or one of the elders join you in prayer.

BENEDICTION

Galatians 5:13 (NIV)

You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love.

This week as we enter into a new year, let’s commit to thinking less about “What’s in it for me” and more about “What God is inviting us into”

Let’s go out, in 2025, serve others, and be The Light to a very hurting world.

Quick reminder...

I hope you have a great week.

Go in peace.

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