Sermon Tone Analysis

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Did you know that on average one ship either sunk, foundered, grounded, or was otherwise lost almost every other day in 2017?

Did you know that almost 90% of everything you buy was carried by a ship?

Did you know every year, more than 2,000 sailors die at sea?

The largest ships can store 745 million bananas in nearly 15,000 containers.

That’s about one for every person in Europe and North America.

Here the text says “he guided them to their desired haven.”

What is a haven?

It is defined as a harbor or a port

Also, it is a place of safety or refuge

The word is sometimes used to refer to a secure location for your money where it will not be taxed: A tax haven… The Cayman Islands or Luxembourg come to mind.

In scripture the passage is one of three occurrences for this word:

Psalm

In all three occurrences it is a nautical term referring to a safe harbor where ships can sit in quiet water.

When I lived in Kauai there was a very popular beach called Lydegate Beach Park.

It was especially attractive to families with kids because it had two rock enclosed ponds to create a safe haven from the open ocean waves.

Huge waves could come rolling into shore but would be zeroed out by the rock walls.

That is the idea of a haven.

It is a calm harbor where your ship can rest peacefully.

Naming the Church

Back in 2016 my wife and I traveled to Baltimore to determine where in the city we would start a church.

There were a number of county pastors that encouraged us to go to the county.

But two pastors recommended the Fells Point area.

Our trip lasted four days.

We came down here on the first day and then returned on the fourth day.

It was on our last day in town that we checked out a couple of row house rentals our Fells point.

We went down to the Canton waterfront park.

And then on the way out of town we took a wrong turn by Target and ended up on Haven St.

That kicked off a discussion between my wife and I over the word Haven as name for the church.

Once we were at the airport waiting for our flight I looked up haven in the Bible and came to this text, “He guides them to their desired haven...”

We felt like God was confirming this name for the church and with it confirming that we should live and plant the church in Southeast Baltimore.

Point #1 He guided them..

These poor sailors were business men using ships to gain a profit.

They were engaged in their vocation… their career.

They were doing what sailors do, sailing from one location to the next.

And a storm hits…

What kind of storm was it?

The waves lifted them up to heaven then crashed them down to the depths.

Their courage melted away.

In other words their manliness… “I’m a dude and I can handle this”… Their stiff upper lip.

Their brave demeanor… All of it disappeared through the storm.

Have you been there?

Have you been through a storm so terrible that it wrecks your normal composure?

Maybe you didn’t even recognize yourself as you were freaking out.

Maybe that is where you are at this morning.

But the God of the Bible is the one who guides his people.

From the very beginning God gave guidance to Adam and Eve.

God said:

God guided Adam and Eve to grow their family, to rule over the created world and to to eat the vegetables that were created.

The very first humans were guided by God...

God guided Abraham...

God guided Moses...

Jesus: The Great Guider of Humanity

Follow me statements of Jesus...

In fact the early Christians were not even called Christians they were called “The Way”.

They were the followers of The Way.

The people of God did life as those following a specified path.

They were a guided people following a new Moses into a promised land.

Look at some of the “Follow me” statements of Jesus...

John 8:12

The invitation of scripture to humans is to surrender our own sense of direction.

We can forget about blazing a new path or pioneering a new trail.

And instead we surrender to God and receive his guidance.

It is exhausting to come up with your own plan.

God extends an invitation to you: “Let me guide you.

Surrender your plan and allow we to give you a better path.”

But is God’s guidance good?

Point #2 The haven was desirable...

The haven was desirable...

One of the common cultural portrayals of Christianity is that God is a kill joy.

Whether it is the Simpsons or Saturday Night Live, Christianity is portrayed as a stale, outdated, bore, that is only concerned about rules and limits.

But that isn’t the God of the Bible or the People of God in scripture...

In this Psalm the destination that God brings the freaked out sailors to was a desirable haven.

The sailors didn’t have have to look at the haven sideways to appreciate it.

They didn’t contort their face once their arrived.

No! The destination that God brought the people to was what they desired.

All through scripture we see God guiding his people into a good land… The beauty that God described correlated to the beauty that people appreciated.

Psalm 37:4

But the most desirable aspect of the Christian message is God himself.

The more the Christian life unfolds the more beautiful Jesus becomes.

He does touch our circumstances, relationships, job, house, possessions and gives us a sense of his beauty.

But God is truly the object of our affection.

The goodness of God is often experienced through circumstances.

But the most desirable in the Christian faith is God himself.

The more the Christian life unfolds the more beautiful Jesus becomes.

He does touch our circumstances, relationships, job, house, possessions and gives us a sense of his beauty.

But God is truly the object of our affection.

God’s invitation to you is not a call to abandon beauty, love, romance, excitement… No! God’s invitation is “come and let me lead you into the true beauty, love, romance, purpose that all those other experiences have foreshadowed”.

Point #3 The haven of God...

The haven of God...

What does the haven in this story foreshadow?

What is the true haven that God wants to bring us into?

It isn’t the church

It isn’t necessarily a change in our circumstances

It isn’t the fulfillment of our dreams

All of those things are byproducts of being in The Haven.

The Haven of God is Jesus Christ.

Correlation: Jesus Calms the Storm

God’s rescue for humanity was Jesus.