A Desolate Place

INTRO: This has been a week of funerals; a week of visitation and services.

I was personally involved in two, and made the visitation for another, and was unable to make another I would like to have.

But, a week of funerals nonetheless.

How will it be at the end of your life?

Many of us have that all worked out.

We have given our deaths consideration in that we have planned for our eternity by accepting the gift of grace so mercifully offered to us by God through His son Jesus and His completed work on the cross.

But, while we may have considered our deaths in doing that, we have failed, in many cases to consider our life!

I say that because many Christians, once saved, sit back and wait for the day they will be in Heaven without giving much consideration to what they could or should be doing down here on earth.

What about your life!

The life of man or woman is a very curious thing.

Most seek their purpose in life, but if I were to ask you right now “Why are you here?” what would you say?

If I were to ask you what your purpose in being here is what would you say?

James asked the question in...

James 4:14 NIV

Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

Think about that! It almost seems cruel to put the question out there “What is the meaning of your life?” until you realize, as James put it, life is but a vapor, here then gone.

But as we all know, anyone who has ever truly contemplated the answer to that question has come to this conclusion…it is not easy to answer.

I understand this all too well, having come into my calling at the age of 35.

Either for lack of discovery, or lack of revelation I was way into life before I realized what it was that God wanted me to do.

Maybe that’s why, at the age of 53 I have two children that are the age of many of my peers’ grandchildren, I don’t know.

But, I know this; it is never too late to discover God’s direction for your life!

But, and here is the crux of my message today, you must realize from where you start in order to come to the place God wants you to arrive.

The life of a person is changeable!

, especially the life of good Christian men and women!

Too often we put limits on our lives where God is concerned. God I’ll go, but only so far. God I’ll do, but only so much. God, I’ll serve, but only those I want to serve. God, I’ll reach out, but only so far. God, I’ll give, but only this much. God, I will dwell in unity with my brothers and sisters, but only so far as I like everything they do. Yes, the life of a person is changeable by God, but only inasmuch as you allow Him to change you. Placing limits makes us unchangeable! And, unchangeable people cannot change the world for Christ.

Think about it; we say we submit ourselves to God, but we don’t offer God all of us to work with.

Without giving all of us to God, we will never experience all God has to give to us. What if you had the best recipe for a food dish but were never able to get all of the ingredients? Perhaps you could make a version of the dish, but you could never do it the way it was intended to be done, with every ingredient in the right proportions and the right technique to bring the dish from a recipe written on paper to a wonderfully consumable food dish. God is the master of taking the ingredients He created and turning them into something that is beautiful and beneficial to the Kingdom. But, when we withhold something the recipe is not complete and we are only a version of the original masterwork that God wants us to be. What are you withholding from God…your time, talent, money, spiritual gifts…what? How long must God wait for you to give Him everything so that he can do what He wants to do in you and through you?

Let’s look at the life of Moses to understand that…

God’s is patient in His methods, so that when we present ourselves usable to Him He implements a plan, and that plan may take more time than we think it should. And… God doesn’t see age, high or low, as a barrier to accomplishing something for the Kingdom. You, Christian, regardless of your age, are in the Service of God.

The years of the life of Moses are remarkably divided into three forties:

The first forty he spent as a prince in Pharaoh's court The second a shepherd in Midian. The third a king in Jeshurun;

Moses had now finished his second forty, when he received his commission to bring Israel out of Egypt.

Exodus 3:1–4 NIV

Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.” When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!” And Moses said, “Here I am.”

In Exodus 3:1 Moses came to Horeb, another name for Mt. Sinai. Horeb means “desolate place.” Yet, because God appeared there this desolate place would become holy, the mountain of God.

In order for us to become usable by God for His work we must realize that we, without God, are a desolate place!

Desolate: –adjective 1. barren or laid waste; devastated: a treeless, desolate landscape. 2. deprived or destitute of inhabitants; deserted; uninhabited. 3. solitary; lonely: a desolate place. 4. having the feeling of being abandoned by friends or by hope; forlorn. 5. dreary; dismal; gloomy: desolate prospects.

All addictions are the result of mankind seeking meaning and purpose and fulfillment.

It’s just that we are looking in the wrong place.

When mankind fails at relationships it isn’t because we don’t want them to work, rather, it is that we try them without God’s help, and we fail.

Our attempt at a meaningful existence outside of the miraculous impartation of Jesus’ righteousness, His holiness that becomes ours, is impossible to achieve because without Him we are barren, deprived, left feeling abandoned and desperately lonely.

This is not the existence God wants for us, but we must, like Moses trek to the desolate place of our being to meet with God there and He will begin the work of delivering us from that desolate place.

We are desolate without God!

Yet, He chooses to inhabit our lives and we become holy, people of God.

Moses didn’t just give-in to this idea just because he was called, literally, to a desolate place and spoken to by God from a burning bush.

Despite the miraculous nature of the event Moses resisted God.

He said… But God, I’m a nobody; Pharaoh won’t listen to me.

And God said you will speak for Me!

But God, they won’t believe You really talked to me.

So God gave him the ability to do miraculous things to prove it.

But God, I can’t speak well.

And God said I will help you speak, teach you the words.

But God, please send someone else.

And God said I will send Aaron with you.

You see, God understands your fear, your excuses, your anxiety at being His mouthpiece on this world, and He is going to be with you every step of the way to let the world know that He has sent you, that He will do miraculous through you, that He will be your mouth, your strength and your shield.

He overcame Moses’ excuses and He will overcome yours if you will only meet Him at the desolate place to begin your journey, your great adventure with Him.

The time for excuses and inaction is over and the church needs to start being the church again in this world.

Serve God NOW, but listen and wait for His ultimate purpose for YOU!

Note, Sometimes it takes a while for God to call his servants to the work He designed them for.

There is a time of preparation.

Moses was 80 when he began to really serve in his calling as deliverer of Israel.

Moses was born to be Israel's deliverer, and yet not a word is said of it to him till he is eighty years of age.

Now watch this:

Jesus only had three years of ministry!

His life, up to around the age of 30, was preparation for a three year ministry that would change the world.

I’m not giving you permission to wait around.

I know Christians that have been saved for 30 years and are no closer to doing anything for the Kingdom than they were when they were unsaved!

It’s time to take up your cross and follow Christ!

Do something with the life God has given you!

When Rosina Hernandez was in college, she once attended a rock concert at which one young man was brutally beaten by another.

No one made an attempt to stop the beating.

The next day she was struck dumb to learn that the youth had died as a result of the pounding.

Yet neither she nor anyone else had raised a hand to help him.

She could never forget the incident or her responsibility as an inactive bystander.

Some years later, Rosina saw another catastrophe.

A car driving in the rain ahead of her suddenly skidded and plunged into Biscayne Bay.

The car landed head down in the water with only the tail end showing.

In a moment a woman appeared on the surface, shouting for help and saying her husband was stuck inside.

This time Rosina waited for no one.

She plunged into the water, tried unsuccessfully to open the car door, then pounded on the back window as other bystanders stood on the causeway and watched. First she screamed at them, begging for help, then cursed them, telling them there was a man dying in the car.

First one man, then another, finally came to help.

Together they broke the safety glass and dragged the man out. They were just in time -- a few minutes later it would have been all over.

The woman thanked Rosina for saving her husband, and Rosina was elated, riding an emotional high that lasted for weeks.

She had promised herself that she would never again fail to do anything she could to save a human live.

She had made good on her promise. - Bits & Pieces, June 24, 1993, pp. 20-21.

There is a world around us that is looking for purpose.

Some of them are dying around us while we stand by and watch, unwilling to help.

Some people, maybe you’re here today, want so desperately to be the person God is calling you to be, but you just aren’t sure how.

Tell God all of your excuses; all the reasons why you can’t.

And watch Him show that you can.

Often, if we're not careful, Christianity can degenerate into religion.

It can become simply, as Napolean called it, “Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”

God has much more than that for those that follow Him.

Will you meet Him in that desolate place, this morning?

Will you allow Him to help you become a Moses, Abraham or Paul?

He’s calling you!

It may not be from a burning bush, but it is the same thing; calling you to a life that you think you can’t live, but God knows you can.

Will you answer?

Let us pray...