Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Please open your Pilgrim’s Guide to page 42 and pray with me at the top of the page.

Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in us the fire of your love.

Send forth Your Spirit and we shall be created, and You shall renew the face of the earth.

Oh God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit instructs the hearts of the faithful, grant, that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever rejoice in His consolations.

Through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Good Morning!

My name is Pastor Chuck Benway, I made Western North Carolina Via De Cristo Mixed # 20 in the Fall of 2004, where I sat with my brothers in Christ at the table of St. Mark.

This time I am blessed to be seated at the Table of…

The title of this talk is “Obstacles to the Life of Grace”.

We have seen that God’s love for us is habitual - it is part of God’s nature.

God has revealed in Christ this permanent, personal, unconditional love relationship with us.

Our piety and study can deepen this relationship each day.

We have considered how God continues to make His grace available to us to strengthen our resolve to live as Christians.

We have realized that to remain vital our faith has to be active in love.

All this grace talk!

If God really loves us so much and literally showers us with so much grace, why isn’t it a reality in everyone’s life?

Good question - and that’s what this talk this afternoon is about.

Obstacles - Obstacles to Grace.

According to Webster’s, an obstacle is “anything that gets in the way or hinders”.

It need not be insurmountable, but it can discourage and distract from moving ahead”.

Think for a minute of some of the obstacles some familiar figures faced:

-Don Quixote’s windmill;

-Abraham and Lot trying to settle Palestine (water, pasture, dividing of territory);

-Moses, and the people of Israel facing the Red Sea;

-Noah and his ark (naysayers, animals, sewage).

Then, think for a minute of some of the obstacles you have faced in the past:

-Perhaps you have faced unemployment

-or, maybe a medical / physical challenge

-the loss of a loved one, child or spouse

-or, addiction, divorce, financial issues; you name it

We have all come through some minor or major disaster in our lifetimes.

I has been said that there are only three states of being: You’re either in the middle of a crisis, coming out of a crisis or going into a crisis!

Seems that way doesn’t it!?

In this talk we will stare down the ultimate obstacle, for which we ourselves are responsible: and that is SIN.

I. God’s Plan - let’s talk for a minute about how God intended things to be.

A. God’s ideal

1) A perfect creation (Genesis 1)- we read in Genesis how God created everything out of nothing; the land, seas, ski, planets, stars, sun, moon, plants and animals and such; and He said it was “good”

2) Humankind - then He created Adam and Eve, created in God’s image: free, thinking, caring, compassionate, loving, spiritual, rational; and He said it was “VERY good”)

And, then God does something unique, very special...

B. God gives the creation into our care and safe-keeping

1) God gave everything - not only did He give us the plants and animals and the like, He gave us our very existence, personality; He gave us the world!

2) God placed us into the world to enjoy it - He didn’t put us here to assume its ownership.

But, we act like it sometimes, don’t we?!

3) God gave natural, physical laws to which all creation is subject - the laws of physics, biology and other sciences; these are all things we can and seek to understand; they govern our well-being.

C. God’s intent was to live in relationship with humankind - to a large extent, that is what our faith is built upon

- In Genesis - God “walks in the garden”

1) Established some “spiritual” laws to govern our relationship with him - they were gifts, not burdens; life in grace depends upon them - St. Augustine understood it: “My heart is restless, O God, until it finds it’s rest in Thee!”

III.

Our Sin - stands in the way of this satisfying relationship and life

A. Definition - an acrostic, Self Inflicted Nonsense

1)Disobedience to God

We speak of these spiritual laws that He gave us, aka, the Ten Commandments.

To the mature believer these are what is referred to as “Spiritual Milk”.

Much like an infant cannot stomach solid food, a new believer needs something to start with, a foundation to build upon.

These are guidelines while we grow in the faith, becoming second nature at spiritual maturity.

Jesus summed them up in Matthew 22:35-40 as loving God and loving each other.

When we learn to love, really love, like He taught us, we obey God.

2)Doing what we want to do rather than what God wants.

The Cadet Prayer at West Point says this, “Make us to choose the harder right instead of the easier wrong and never to be content with a half-truth when the whole can be won.”

St. Paul says in Romans 7:18-19 “18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh.

For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.

19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

How many times have you had the “morning after” effect?

You look back on the previous day / night and regret something / everything you did.

What do you do?

3)Placing ourselves at the center of the universe - wanting to be equal with God (goes right back to the garden)

Has anyone here read the book, done the Bible study around the book by Kyle Idleman “gods at war”?

The title word, god, is spelled with a small “g”, for a good reason.

He refers to all of the competing things in our lives that we allow to supplant Jesus on the throne of our lives.

These gods we must dethrone.

The most prevalent of these gods, and the hardest to deal with, is the “god of self”.

We just simply want to be in control, don’t we?

It is the highest form of idolatry!

It is original sin! Jesus is the only rightful heir to the throne of our lives!

B. Sin as Obstacle - whatever keeps us from being what we truly are, were meant to be.

1) Forgetting that we are creatures of God

Adam forgot - since I was a kid growing up in church I believed that Eve sinned and tricked Adam.

As I studied further I discovered that that fool was standing right next to Eve all the while she was listening to the serpent.

He should have smacked that apple out of her hand and that serpent upside the head!

He had a choice to make: his woman or God.

We all know what happened, God help us!

Peter forgot, and he was right there with Jesus for 3 years, seeing it all go down.

One minute Peter is proclaiming Jesus as the Son of God, the next, forbidding Jesus from fulfilling His mission.

One minute we’re cheering Peter on, the next, Uugghh, not again!

How do you not see it Peter?

I forgot.

Even though I was brought up in church, I never really developed a relationship with Jesus.

I never built that firm foundation.

We / I was just “doing church”.

Once out on my own, the governor came off, so to speak, and my life resembled anything but that of a Christian.

Oh, sure, I attended church on Sunday, even some Bible studies here and there.

But my mind was elsewhere.

If I wasn’t working or “doing church”, my mind, and my life, was in the gutter!

Until a series of unfortunate events led me to some Godly men that the Lord placed in my path.

Thank God for that miracle!

When I look back, I wonder how I got so far into the weeds, so far off the beaten path.

The musical group Casting Crowns wrote a song that really answers that question.

The song is entitled, “Slow Fade”.