Sermon Tone Analysis

Proclamation of the Word

Luke

Introduction

Brothers and sisters how do people know you are who you say you are?

We do not think much about identification because it is something we live with all the time.

Even as little children we have our birth certificates, Social Security Cards, school ID tags\badges and so on.

In May I am going on a fishing trip in Canada.

In preparation I had to renew my passport, it was painless because I had an old passport.

All I had to do is just fill out the paper work, and include my old passport and payment, a couple of weeks later I had my new passport book and card.

<Show Passport and Card>

Patricia Brown couldn’t prove her identity.

On a Saturday morning in May last year, she rushed into the basement of Washington’s Foundry United Methodist Church, frantic that she would miss its I.D. Ministry hours.

She took deep breaths as she reached the bright-yellow room crowded with narrow tables, where people sat poring over papers.

Without valid identification, she couldn’t get housing or work, her food stamps or medication.

She sat in a metal chair beside me, wiping away sweat from her forehead.

The volunteer across from us looked concerned as Brown reviewed an intake checklist: Social Security card?

No. Birth certificate?

No. ID? Expired.

“So, we don’t have anything?”

the volunteer asked.

No. Nothing.

I’d seen situations like Brown’s many times.

I volunteered at the I.D. Ministry from January 2015 to March 2016.

Two Saturday mornings a month, I would help the ministry’s poor or homeless clients navigate the bureaucracy of acquiring government identification.

For most people, replacing a lost driver’s license or other ID is an inconvenience but not an ordeal.

For Foundry’s clients, however, the path to an ID is more like a high-stakes test of endurance and resourcefulness.

Brown, 61, a former receptionist, had taken three buses from Northeast Washington to the church at 16th and P streets NW, but it was clear she had been on a longer journey.

After her mother’s death in April 2014, Brown lost the apartment they had shared.

She returned from the grocery store one day to find her belongings on the sidewalk.

She had been evicted.

“I tried to ... salvage what I could, but I was by myself,” she said.

Her Social Security card and birth certificate were among the things lost that day.

Since then, she had been floating from couch to couch among acquaintances, paying her hosts what she could and trying not to overstay her welcome.

When I asked about her current housing, she said only, “It’s not a good situation.”

Identification is a big deal, you cannot vote, you cannot get housing, medication, food stamps, a job, without some form of Identification.

In our focus scripture Jesus is telling us that Identification as a follower of Jesus Christ, as a son or daughter of God, as a citizen of the Kingdom of God or we can say “Kingdom Living” is a big deal.

It is a matter of eternal life or death because the people of the world (sinners) need to be able to know who the true followers of Jesus are.

People in the world will know a true son and daughter of God by the way we treat others and most dramatically of all, by the way we treat our enemies and those who are wicked.

Connection to the Word

Governing how we treat others is the understanding that God is a god of relationship.

Before God created anything at all, God was in relationship with the Son and Holy Spirit and there is a inter-relationship betwen each member of the trinity.

We can see this in the Ten Commandments.

Turn in you bibles:

The writer of Hebrews helps us understand the new life in Christ by connecting it to the promised land God had promised Israel after he delivered them from Egypt.

The promise to the believer of entering rest still holds true because the fulfillment has not yet arrived.

The door is still open and the writer pleads for his readers not to turn away.

God is true to His Word, and His promises still stand true to this day.

It is the rest that believers have, a rest that Christ has provided through the shedding of his blood so that we can have peace with God in the free and full justification of believers from all their sins.

But the writer of Hebrews also wants us to remember, with the promise, comes a penalty, also, a warning not to miss God's rest

​ ESVTherefore, while the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.

Brothers and sisters, in the Ten Commandments we see that our relationship with God is sacred and our relationship with our neighbor and parents is sacred.

By sacred I mean that is is given by God and that it is set apart to honor God.

So inside this idea of sacred relationships we learn that life is sacred, relationships between others are sacred, property is sacred, and truth is sacred.

It is this sacredness of relationship that is driving how we love not just our families but those who are our enemies.

Luke 6:27-31

The common thread through all of the Letter to the Hebrews is that Jesus Christ is Superior to everyone and everything. in this fourth chapter we are told how Jesus is superior to Moses and the promised land, yes Moses was a leader of God’s people the giver of the law and the builder of the tabernacle.

But, Jesus is also the leader of all of God’s people, God and creator of everything.

So if it was important to pay attention to the good news of the Law of Moses, how much more important is it to pay attention to the good news of Jesus Christ.

Orientation: Living the Word

You may be asking, how can I ever hope to live up to the standard that Jesus is setting?

The truth is we cannot do it on our own.

On our own, in our own power, we want to hate our enemies and strike back at those who strike us.

It is clear that it is only through the power of the Holy Spirit that we can ever live up to this standard.

Listen to how the Prophet Jeremiah speaks about this:

Jeremiah

In December 1943, German ace pilot Hanz Stigler had every reason to shoot down the American B-17 bomber in front of him.

Enemy forces had already killed his brother early in the war and were now bombing German cities.

Not only that, If Stigler took down this particular bomber, he would round out his kill-score and secure the German equivalent of the Medal of Honor.

​ ESVFor good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

​ ESVFor good news came to us just as to them, but the message they heard did not benefit them, because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

As Stigler prepared to squeeze the trigger, he thought that it was strange that the bomber wasn’t firing back at him.

Going for a closer look, he saw the gunner dead and most of the crew wounded.

The plane itself was riddled with bullets and struggling to stay aloft.

In his heart, Stigler knew he would be killing men in cold blood.

Instead, he opted to do the honorable thing—he signaled to the shocked American pilot and flew with the bomber to prevent it being targeted by anti-aircraft fire.

Two years after God delivered Israel from Egypt they now find themselves on the verge of entering the rest awaiting them in the Promised Land.

But they missed it.

They reached the threshold and drew back, because they thought the difficulties ahead were too great ()They missed enjoying God’s rest because they were not united in faith with those who listened.

How do you know someone is listening because of the actions they make after hearing what you say.

Only Joshua and Caleb had the faith to say to the people lets go and take possession of the land.

God promised it to us and God alway keeps his promises.

However, the rest of the people could only see the obstacles and their view of the obstacles was greater than their view of God.Don’t be like them! the writer says.

God’s rest is still with us, to be entered and enjoyed in this life.

It is the rest which comes with hearing, receiving, believing and living the gospel.

It is the rest of forgiveness of sins and peace with God through Jesus Christ.David mentions God’s rest ().

​ ESVFor he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand.

Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah, as on the day at Massah in the wilderness,

Stigler escorted the plane until they reached the North Sea, where he broke off and saluted his adversaries one last time.

It was not until five decades later that the American pilot, Charles Brown, successfully tracked down the man who saved him.

The two men became the best of friends, and as a show of thanks, Brown made Stigler the guest of honor at a reunion he had planned with his crewmen.

They showed Stigler a video of their children and grandchildren, people who would not have lived were it not for his act of compassion.

He assumes that God’s rest is still awaiting us, and we may enter it today.

The only barrier is if, like the Israelites, we back away in disbelief.

God’s rest is the real sabbath—the place where we relax in all that God has done for us, and accept completely his purpose for the future.

Let’s be sure to enter it!

God still has his arms open waiting for all his people.

Be

​ ESVBut of Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.”

Closing

Be compassionate just as your father is compassionate.