In God's Will
Notes
Transcript
Estate Planning
Estate Planning
I hope all of you have a will. It’s important to your family. It’s important to God, in that, you get to decide who gets how much of your stuff no matter how little or how much you have.
You pray. You decide. B/C if you don’t have a will, the court decides.
It takes more time. The legal fees get paid first. They pay off you debts. Then, they consider family.
Spouse, kids, grandkids, step-kids, cousins.
If there is a blended family in the line, they get consideration, too.
There may be a family member you would want to get more, or less, that court will say gets an even share.
A good person leaves an inheritance for their children’s children,
but a sinner’s wealth is stored up for the righteous.
You can’t take it w/ you. But you can decide who gets it when you’re gone.
And, churches and charities would get little or no consideration.
Not a fund-raiser. But, if you want to, you can leave a few dollars to MPCC, your church in the valley, or any charity (501c3) that is near and dear to you.
The court won’t. Only if you have a legal and binding will.
The court decides, not you.
My mom passed away 5 years ago. My step-dad, 2 years before that. Their will was pretty simple b/c their estate was pretty simple.
My mom was a secretary all her life. My step-dad was a hard-working, man who sold appliances at Sears.
Neither made a lot. But they made do.
Very frugal.
We sold the house in Wichita when my mom was alone. Sold her car when she couldn’t manage physically any more.
I tracked down all my step-dad investments.
Small amounts of stocks would split 2 or 3 times over the years creating multiple little accounts.
My mom put my name on all her assets w/ hers.
I have 1 sister and 1 step-brother who were heirs. They trusted me.
When my mom passed I divided everything in thirds and wrote the checks.
I spent about an hour with her atty and we spent most of the time talking ministry, Dallas Seminary. He went to church w/ my mom, 1st E-Free. $100 done.
This is Sara’s and my will.
You might think that b/c it’s so heavy and there is so much to it we must have a lot.
No, assure you, our estate is very simple, too.
We just have everything set up in a trust. When we die, our kids just take over the trust and do whatever w/ it.
The trust document is huge. PoAs are in here, DNRs. We used the family atty in Tucson.
Don’t we all wish we had that aunt or uncle, maybe a g-parent who is worth bazillions who surprisingly decided to leave you a million or 2?
It’s painful to lose a grand parent or parent. It’s a pain to be the executor. But, if there is something left for you in the end it makes things a little easier.
And if it’s wealth, then it’s pretty nice.
This morning, I am talking about being in God’s will.
The first thing that comes to mind when I say being in God’s will probably is decision-making.
But, this is about God’s estate planning. Heirs.
Those of us who have accepted Jesus as our Savior, more than just believe there is as God and there is a Jesus, but surrendered your life, faith, we are heirs to God’s estate.
It’s a fortune.
There is no reason nor need to be materialistic, selfish, or greedy here b/c when we get to heaven our own personal wealth, our share of God’s estate, will be too large to count.
Sometimes we get hung up wanting more of it now. Did any of your kids every press you to give them more now?
Maybe we do that to God, too.
There is more than any one of us can imagine for every one of God’s heirs. It will last forever.
The framework of his will has been put in place. Signed and witnessed.
It went into effect when He died.
We receive our share of His estate when we die.
This passage lays out this way:
Jesus came the first time to redeem us. In the past. Done deal.
His better body did what all those thousands, maybe millions of animals’ bodies could not do over the centuries.
Redeemed means given value. He gave you and me value. Your discount code or coupon have no value until you buy something online and apply that code to redeem it.
I think I have 2 or 3 discount codes in emails on my computer that are only worth something if I use them.
When you redeem it, it has value and reduces the amount you have to pay for what you’re getting.
Jesus redeemed you. gave you value. So that you don’t have to pay anything to get into heaven.
Like buying airline tickets w/ points.
We didn’t pay any $ to fly to HI. We redeemed points.
Right now, he is serving us, in a better place, in the worship center in heaven, not the one built by Moses, Solomon, Zerubabbel, or us.
He is praying and providing for us. He is meeting our needs, providing the fruit we need to manage our situations successfully.
As heirs, we have rec’d a deposit, down pmt, on what is coming later. This deposit comes in the form of the HS and the gifts and abilities He brings w/ Him into our lives.
The next time we see Jesus in the future he will be ushering us into the kingdom where we will receive our full share of His eternal estate.
The result of His work lasts forever. A better term than the result of the work any of us could do in our man-made worship center.
We are in God’s will, heirs to his estate. As heirs, we are entitled to share in His eternal fortune.
By accepting what He did for you, you become a member of His family, heir to his fortune that includes the fruit to help you manage your life today.
The passage begins w/ what Jesus did in the past that makes it possible to receive what He’s doing in the present and what we will get in the future.
Better Past
Better Past
In the case of a will, it is necessary to prove the death of the one who made it, because a will is in force only when somebody has died; it never takes effect while the one who made it is living. This is why even the first covenant was not put into effect without blood. When Moses had proclaimed every command of the law to all the people, he took the blood of calves, together with water, scarlet wool and branches of hyssop, and sprinkled the scroll and all the people. He said, “This is the blood of the covenant, which God has commanded you to keep.” In the same way, he sprinkled with the blood both the tabernacle and everything used in its ceremonies. In fact, the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.
Wills then are a lot like wills now.
The testator sets the terms of who gets what. The heirs have no say and have to accept the terms of the will.
The framework is put in place, the will is signed and witnessed. Then, once the person dies, it goes into affect.
Christ’s death not only redeemed us, gave us value, but it also put his will into effect.
The framework was put together immediately after Adam and Eve fell and were kicked out of the Garden.
A plan had to be put in place to redeem people and return to Eden.
Revelation 22, the last chapter of the last book in your bible describes when we Eden is restored and ppl return.
Over time, throughout the OT, the framework of the will was revealed.
Like, the first Passover, when Moses was leading Israel out of Egypt, the people, by faith, used a hyssop branch and sprinkled the blood of a lamb on their doorposts so the angel of death would pass over their homes.
The blood of a lamb saved them.
Last week I laid out how all the furnishings in the tabernacle that Moses built represented terms of the framework of Jesus’s will.
A wooden altar, like the wooden cross, where sins are paid for.
A washbasin where the guilt is washed away.
The Light and Bread of life.
A table made of wood, overlaid in gold.
A curtain, torn like Jesus’s body giving us access to the presence of God.
There’s more. But there it is. The framework of the will.
Important verse, 22. W/out the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. Why?
B/C, blood is life. If the blood is drained out fo our bodies we die. We can lose limbs, organs, and bones; just not blood.
Blood represents life. The most valuable thing we have, is life. The most valuable thing any animal has is its life.
The meat is good, the skin has value, its breeding potential has value. But if it dies, the meat rots, the skin frays, and it can’t reproduce.
The most valuable thing we have is life.
To become heirs to this estate, we must sacrifice our life.
We must give up the most valuable thing we have to get the most valuable thing Jesus has.
Who in their right mind, who understands the values involved, would not do that deal?
What Jesus did in the past, His better body did us more good for us than all the animals sacrificed over the centuries.
What Jesus paid made us valuable.
When we believe that and accept that, we become heirs to Jesus’s estate and begin to receive the share we’ve been promised.
Better Present Place
Better Present Place
It was necessary, then, for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these sacrifices, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ did not enter a sanctuary made with human hands that was only a copy of the true one; he entered heaven itself, now to appear for us in God’s presence.
A will does not go into effect until the person dies. If the person never dies, it never does.
Jesus had to die to make all this happen.
He had to die to redeem us.
He had to die to forgive us.
He had to die for us to get the HS.
He had to die to save us.
It was necessary.
One of the harder things to ponder is if Israel had accepted him when he came, they still would have had to kill him.
Picture Abraham and Isaac. A teenage Isaac tied down to the altar, knife raised, Abraham believing God could raise him from the dead so he did not hesitate to up to this point.
Then, God stopped him. There was a substitute ram with its horns caught in the branches of a bush.
For the High Priest, there would have been no stopping him, no substitute. Jesus is our substitute.
Maybe it was easier for them to kill Him b/c they hated Him. They rejected.
Either way, he had to die put into effect what had been the plan since the Garden of Eden.
The copies, like 2-dimensional images in a mirror, lacked the depth of the real thing.
Like the cheap knock offs I talked about last week that I bought in China and Sara bought in Chinatown in NY.
The rites and rituals, the furniture and practices, were cheap knock-offs, veneers, facades, that only represented the real thing.
The only value they had was to point everyone who used them and worshiped w/ them to the real Messiah.
B/C they were man-made, made by sinful people w/ products that are affected by existing in a sinful culture, they had to be sprinkled by the blood, too.
They had t/b purified, holified, cleansed, before they would be of value to lead to the cleansing of the people who worshiped w/ them.
The tabernacle that Jesus now serves in is pure, holy, and clean.
It is a better tabernacle where He now prays for us for God to equip us to manage the situations we face on a daily basis.
He prays and God provides.
The HS comes w/ power and provisions. We get the wisdom to know what to do, the courage to do it. and the tools to do it right.
He died, putting into effect His will, and now serves us in that place to provide for his heirs.
Like setting up an education fund for grandchildren. Or, a foundation or trust fund that disperses funds prior to the person’s death.
A fraction of what will come. But it helps with situations we face now.
Jesus used His better body in the past to save us.
He is now in a better place to serve us.
And in the future He will prove his work will last for a better term; forever.
Better Future Term
Better Future Term
Nor did he enter heaven to offer himself again and again, the way the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood that is not his own. Otherwise Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself. Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment, so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.
Jesus only had to do it once and the effect lasts forever.
If He were like all the other animals sacrificed then He would have had to have done repeatedly.
He isn’t, so He didn’t.
Think for just a minute, we don’t want to dwell on this too long b/c it’s depressing, but think about all the sins you have committed in your lifetime.
Multiply that by the number of ppl in the room.
The ppl in MP, AZ, USA, the world for all of history.
His 1 death, 1 act, single time paid for the entire deficit everyone created since the Garden and until his return.
That’s powerful, valuable, incredible, immeasurable.
We understand that we only get to die once. I will only die once. But my death will accomplish nothing except put my will into effect.
I can’t save anybody, even myself. I only hope to leave my kids and grandkids a little something to make their lives a little easier.
The last time Jesus came he made it possible for anyone to become an heir and get to heaven.
The next time he comes he will take his heirs there.
Let me take a minute and talk about what happens when we die. Where do we go?
First, the Bible is about why we are not going to heaven just b/c we’re born in America and what we need to do to change that situation.
It’s not about what happens when we get there.
There are some hints.
Jesus told the thief on the cross who came to faith that afternoon, w/ a deathbed confession, that He would see him in paradise later that day.
When we die here, we go to place Jesus called paradise where we will be w/ Him.
But that’s not the last place we will end up for eternity.
At the rapture, or 2nd coming, we’re going somewhere else.
Then, at the very end, after Armageddon, a new heaven and new earth are created and we go there.
How does it all work? I don’t know.
But, we’ll do it all together. Maybe we should hold hands just to make sure we’re all okay when make the moves.
There’s a lot we don’t know. But, what we do know is, either the next time we see Jesus, or the time after that, He’s going to usher to a place where we will receive and enjoy the full share of His estate that we inherit as heirs.
His better body saved us.
In His better place He serves us.
In the future He will prove what He promised will last for a better term.
Hebrews 9.
Applications
Applications
Value
Value
As an heir of Jesus’s estate, His death made you valuable.
Do not let anyone treat you like you are not.
If they do, the problem is theirs.
Maybe you need to make a change w/ who you hang out w/ in your life.
Stick w/ ppl who have been made valuable by Christ and treat you like you are, too.
Materialism
Materialism
Please don’t waste your time, energy, emotion, and relationships to get rich here.
Work hard. Save your money. Invest. Be satisfied w/ God provides you here.
We are all going to die at some point and what we get here we will not be able to take w/ us.
But what we get when we get there will make all that you have now look like a dull penny stuck to the gum on the bottom of your shoe.
Be satisfied. Content. Look forward to being ridiculously wealthy when you get to heaven.
Will
Will
Get a will. If you haven’t already, first thing Monday, call an atty, make an appt., take control of who gets what when you die.
Do not let a judge who doesn’t know your family from Adam and Eve make these important decision for you.
We are in God’s will. Hiers to His estate.
His better body redeemed us and saved us.
In His better place He serves us by praying and providing for us.
The next time we see Him, He will prove what He promised and show us what He did lasts for a better term; forever.
By accepting what He did for you, you become a member of His family, heir to his fortune that includes the fruit to help you manage your life today.
