Date:      21st January 2009                                                                  (Wednesday PM)                                                                                Ref: A0422

Place:     Kambah P.S.

Title: A Revival From a Rubbish Heap[i]

Text:        & Nehemiah 4:1-2

Illust:     – Couple for dinner – involved in an orphanage mission in Mozambique. – Go to the rubbish tips and get the children who are scrounging for food etc - One man’s rubbish is another mans treasure. – Can anything good come out of a rubbish heap

I.                   Law of the Rubbish Heap

i.                 Interesting to understand that all of life operates by natural laws, laws of physics, gravity, thermodynamics, law of sowing & reaping. –  There is even the laws of the rubbish heap

A.               Deterioration

i.                 At school in physics we learnt about the 2nd law of thermodynamics; it’s at work in the 1st law of the rubbish heap, the law of deterioration;  ~ Important to get a perspective of life. – Everything is headed for the rubbish heap. ~ This is the law of deterioration.

ii.               From the Bible, from our own life experiences we understand that all material things no matter how sacred or solid they appear are on their way to the rubbish heap.

        Matthew 24:1-2 1 Then Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and His disciples came up to show Him the buildings of the temple. 2 And Jesus said to them, “Do you not see all these things? Assuredly, I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another, that shall not be thrown down.” (NKJV)

           Think about what you have brought & then thrown out in a clean-up, what you  have today that will soon/ eventually hit the rubbish heap

iii.             Do us well therefore to set our affections on things that abide & which will never be consigned to the rubbish heap

        1 Corinthians 13:13 And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. (NKJV)

        Matthew 6:19-21 19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal; 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (NKJV)

        Isaiah 40:8 The grass withers, the flower fades, But the word of our God stands forever.” (NKJV)

           The eternal things of God

B.               Occupation

i.                 Secondly there is the law of occupation. – Nature abhors a vacuum. – Where man has not laboured, nature soon fills up.

      Researching my trip to the Solomon Islands, Realise it is a troubled land, in desperate of the Gospel. – In 2006 rioting mobs destroyed much of Honiara’s Chinatown. What is interesting is that I saw a picture of a shell of a burnt out building in Chinatown. – Overgrown, grass, tropical climbers cover it.

ii.               The law of occupation at work. – Nehemiah comes to Jerusalem, the weeds would have grown up, even probably some trees, moss, lichen cover the stones, it is a rubbish heap because nobody had come to labour, My backyard is full of weeds, growing on bare soil because I have not taken the time to labour, remove them, plant lawn in their place.

        Matthew 12:43-45 43 “When an unclean spirit goes out of a man, he goes through dry places, seeking rest, and finds none. 44 Then he says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when he comes, he finds it empty, swept, and put in order. 45 Then he goes and takes with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man is worse than the first. So shall it also be with this wicked generation.” (NKJV)

iii.             It is the same in your life, the mind becomes a wilderness of sinful thoughts & passions because clean & wholesome thoughts are not planted & cultivated, Our culture becomes daily more wicked because the churches by & large are silent.

C.               Elevation

i.                 Then there is the law of elevation. Think about it what makes rubbish rubbish? The latest style of shoes today is the proud footwear of their owner, tomorrow the newest style is released & suddenly, no longer are they a delight, they are ‘old’ they lie forgotten  in the bottom of the wardrobe, until finally consigned to the rubbish heap during a cleanout.

      60 Years ago, The Snowy Hydro scheme was commenced, bushland was flattened, & drowned under lakes, the Snowy River flows were dramatically reduced to utilise the water for the generation of power. The trees the rivers were removed & changed (considered as rubbish), to make way for man’s needs. .....Today however try & do that, no! trees & rivers, the environment have been elevated above the needs of man

ii.               The higher attraction relegates what once was prized to the rubbish heap. So it should be in your life & mine when we were unsaved, our lives were lived in the pursuit of this worlds goods, positions and blessings. – On receiving salvation we are to cast aside this worlds treasures in pursuit of the higher attraction

        Philippians 3:7-8 7 But what things were gain to me, these I have counted loss for Christ. 8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ (NKJV)

iii.             This life can only be counted as rubbish if you are introduced to the higher attraction, the Kingdom of God.

II.                 Revival from the Rubbish Heap

A.               Transformation

i.                 We have looked at these natural laws of the rubbish heap but now I want to address Sanballats question with the final law. vs 2. Will they revive the stones from the heaps of rubbish. – Can you turn the rubbish into something that is alive. This is the law of transformation.

ii.               I had a whole lot of rotting apricots, they have been placed in my compost bins, with the resulting rich soil I will fertilise other plants in my garden. – we take our rubbish to the tip it is buried & homes are built on the landfill. Tonnes of rubbish are recycled & new products created, transformed from rubbish into useful commodities.

iii.             This is our greatest opportunity, crowds of people in every city, suburb & small town crushed & beaten by this world’s fierce competitive system. Thrown on the rubbish heap of life. – Desperate and waiting for the transforming message of the Gospel.

B.               God’s Delight

i.                 Can God bring revival out of a rubbish heap, of course He can, a rubbish heap is His raw material, a revival the finished product.

        1 Corinthians 4:13 being defamed, we entreat. We have been made as the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now. (NKJV)

ii.               As the church of Jesus Christ, individual believers, we need to be at work proclaiming the Good News of the Gospel, that men & women can be transformed, no matter what they have done, no matter how far down they have fallen, our God is able.

        Romans 1:16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, for the Jew first and also for the Greek. (NKJV)

iii.             Your task & mine is to proclaim and to believe in faith, that God brings revival from the rubbish heap.

III.              Altar Call

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[i] Boreham F.W., The Luggage Of Life, “Our rubbish heaps”