Moving Forward - Pt. 7
Notes
Transcript
It was a bright Sunday morning in 28th century London, but Robert Robinson's mood was anything but sunny. All along the street there were people hurrying to church, but in the midst of the crowd Robinson was a lonely man. The sound of church bells reminded him of years past when his faith in God was strong and the church was an integral part of his life. It had been years since he set foot in a church&md;years of wandering, disillusionment, and gradual defection from the God he once loved. That love for God&md;once fiery and passionate&md;had slowly burned out within him, leaving him dark and cold inside.
Robinson heard the clip-clop, clip-clop of a horse-drawn cab approaching behind him. Turning, he lifted his hand to hail the driver. But then he saw that the cab was occupied by a young woman dressed in finery for the Lord's Day. He waved the driver on, but the woman in the carriage ordered the carriage to be stopped.
"Sir, I'd be happy to share this carriage with you," she said to Robinson. "Are you going to church?" Robinson was about to decline, then he paused. "Yes," he said at last. "I am going to church." He stepped into the carriage and sat down beside the young woman.
As the carriage rolled forward Robert Robinson and the woman exchanged introductions. There was a flash of recognition in her eyes when he stated his name. "That's an interesting coincidence," she said, reaching into her purse. She withdrew a small book of inspirational verse, opened it to a ribbon-bookmark, and handed the book to him. "I was just reading a verse by a poet named Robert Robinson. Could it be…?"
He took the book, nodding. "Yes, I wrote these words years ago."
"Oh, how wonderful!" she exclaimed. "Imagine! I'm sharing a carriage with the author of these very lines!"
But Robinson barely heard her. He was absorbed in the words he was reading. They were words that would one day be set to music and become a great hymn of the faith, familiar to generations of Christians (In fact one, we have sang often):
Come, Thou Fount of every blessing, Tune my heart to sing Thy grace' Streams of mercy, never ceasing, Call for songs of loudest praise.
His eyes slipped to the bottom of the page where he read:
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love;Here's my heart, O take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above.
He could barely read the last few lines through the tears that brimmed in his eyes. "I wrote these words; and I've lived these words. Prone to wander…prone to leave the God I love.'"
The woman suddenly understood. "You also wrote, Here's my heart, O take and seal it.' You can offer your heart again to God, Mr. Robinson. It's not too late."
And it wasn't too late for Robert Robinson. In that moment he turned his heart back to God and walked with him the rest of his days.
Ron Lee Davis, Courage to Begin Again, (Harvest House, Eugene, OR; 1978), pp. 145-147
The truth of our current state, friend, is that our affections leak.
It was true of the great hymn writer Robinson and it is true of you and me too. In fact, you’ll recall, the apostle Paul wrote about his own leaking affections toward God in Romans 7.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find.
19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.
24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?
And Paul continues with - I thank God - through Jesus Christ our Lord.
You see the only hope for those who sense their own heart wanderings is Jesus!
And this is why we emphasize a daily return and reflection on the Gospel.
It is crucial for you to think about who God is, and what God has done for you.
You see, God has created us as sensory beings - and the current culture we live in is at the highest peak of pleasing the senses.
Our clothes are tailored to be pleasing to the eye.
Our colognes and perfumes appease the sense of smell.
Our food (for the most part) is carefully seasoned, cooked, and paired with things that maximize taste.
Our music options abound with something for everyone - all according to what you’d prefer to listen to.
Our stuff, in every department, is designed to feel good when first make contact with it.
It seems like everything, one way or another, has been maximized to please the consumer - and if we aren’t careful, as those who are pursuing Christ, these pleasing things will draw our hearts and affections away from the One who created the possibility of these things to be pleasurable. If we are not intentional, our affections will be drawn to created things over the Creator.
ILL: Yesterday our family was able to enjoy watching our Linton High School Girls Basketball team create history by winning the Regional Championship for the first time - and it was a thrill!
But as I sat there and reflected on our experience as a family with this truth we are looking at this morning - it’s incredible to think of how we have maximized the running back and forth of people, trying to get a ball in a basket more than the other team.
Think with me for a minute.
We have trained a group of people how to perfect the art of getting a ball through a metal ring. Thousands of hours have been spent fine tuning this process. We have built huge buildings for people to gather and watch the progressing product of this training. Not only have we built large buildings, but we have maximized how many we can fit with seating that unfolds from the wall - we have installed expensive lighting systems to be able to see and heating and cooling units to maximize comfort. We update the colored uniforms as often as possible to match the trends and efforts of the athletes. We add music before, during and after to set the mood and speaker systems to tell folks what is happened during the event. We travel hundreds of miles to watch our favorite teams and get really upset when they don’t perform how we expect. On the other hand, it is the peak of excitement when our favorite group of trained personnel accomplish the task of getting the ball in the ring more than the opposing team.
In fact, for some, there is hardly a limit to the hours, resources, and energy invested in developing this art. We prioritize, emphasize, and maximize as much as we possibly can to learn, grow, and execute a plan of getting the best we can.
Now, don’t get me wrong - i love basketball, I have played it, I have coached it, I have invested countless hours, resources, and amounts of energy to the sport. But friend, this is just a simple illustration to highlight the propensity of our heart.
If we are not intentional, created things are elevated to the throne of our hearts instead of the Creator who belongs there.
And although sports, hobbies, careers, friends, family, and even religions functions aren’t inherently bad - even good things can become bad things, when they become ruling things.
And as we look this morning at the second part of Gospel-centered Relationships, I believe it is important to emphasize that everything we are emphasizing in this current series, is a tool to help point us toward a vibrant relationship with God, not replace or detract from that.
As you recall, we have emphasized that the Gospel is the why behind the five whats we are emphasizing. Because of God’s grace to us through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we now have access to Him through faith. Our worship of God and the transformational process of change He is bringing us through is all a product of His grace through the Gospel.
And as God is drawing us closer to Him, and teaching us to love Him more with every corner of our hearts and every crevice of our lives - He develops within us and through us a greater love for people.
And as we began last week, God’s plan for His redeemed group of people is that:
The Christian faith is not intended to be lived in isolation, but in community with other believers.
God’s design is that you would live life together in community with other believers.
Community is defined as a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common attitudes, interests, and goals.
And that is what we are emphasizing - the partnering together with others that have the same biblical attitudes, interests, and goals of glorifying God.
God did not bring you to the humble spot of repentance and faith, so that you would move on from that in your own strength. He brought you to your need of salvation so that you would depend on His plan for salvation AND His plan of sanctification. And friend, His plan of changing you is in community with other sinners who are on a journey of change too!
Now, as we referenced in our opening illustration with Robert Robinson, and in our own hearts this week:
Our affections leak, so our gatherings remind us of our mutual love for God.
It is easier now, more than ever, for our affections for God to leak. We are all made out of the same stuff - and the fact of the matter is that it doesn’t take much to shift our affections from the greatness of our Creator - to the seeming greatness of created things.
This is what we mean when we say our affections leak.
It is possible to enjoy our sports, hobbies, employment, friends, family, and religious events so much that they take precedent over our relationship with God.
So we are emphasizing that getting together with other believers is to intentionally point our hearts back to God. Now, as we proceed:
The local church is not something we attend but a people to whom we belong,
and as we get together, we do so with mutual love, grace, consistency, and authenticity. Our care for one another is an overflow of Christ's care for us through the gospel.