Sermon Tone Analysis

You’re really doing it for yourself...

Reading Johnathan Aikin’s commentary on Ecclesiastes, I was reminded of a quote by Victoria Osteen, Joel Osteen’s wife saying,

“When we obey God, we’re not doing it for God … we’re doing it for ourselves because God takes pleasure when we’re happy.…

When you come to church, when you worship Him, you’re not doing it for God really, you’re doing it for yourself.”

Victoria Osteen

Her sentiments, unfortunately, capture too much of the American churches heart to God on Sunday mornings.

Entering the house of the Lord is not so much about fear and trembling, or standing in awe of him.

We do religion on the spectrum of either showing up to a ritual and going through the motions on the one hand, to buying your ticket to ride the entertainment train we call modern worship that gently weaves you up the mountain of “all about me” to the reservoir of “self-help” that is about an inch deep and a mile wide.

It is alarming how much of God is neglected in our Sunday mornings, our devotional books, and our ministries.

In too many churches in America, we’ve allowed preaching the bible to be little more than a 10 minute TED talk about fixing your husband or your wife or your children.

How often do you meet with your Christian friends at Jubelts and hear them talk about transcendent majesty and glory of God, that they saw in the preaching of God’s word, or the music that was sung that Sunday?

Johnathan Aikin laments the state of reverence for God in the church when he says,

“Worship has become all about me—my desires, my likes, my preferences, what I want—and that is nothing less than idolatry.

Two men have exposed this reality with what they call cat and dog theology...

A dog says, “You pet me, feed me, shelter me, and love me; you must be God,” but a cat says, “You pet me, feed me, shelter me, and love me; I must be God.”

So much modern Christianity looks just like those.

God is no longer the Almighty Sovereign King of the universe; He is personal shopper, life coach, homeboy, and genie all rolled into one.

We see God as a means to an end and not an end in and of Himself.

We use God to get what we really want.

Some come back to church, start giving money regularly, and have perfect attendance in Bible study because they hope God will take their cancer away, fix their family, provide them wealth.”

This is a trend in religion in America.

It’s as if we’ve come to this place where we can have church regardless if God is there or not.

It’s as if we can have worship regardless if the Holy Spirit is present or not.

It’s as if we can have religion regardless if we have Jesus.

This is absurd!

Religious worship is meaningless apart from the fear of God given to us in Christ Jesus.

This morning Solomon will caution us about how we worship a Holy God.

Solomon says, “fear the Lord.”

How do we do that appropriately?

To begin with, Solomon exposes our fearless worship in three ways: offerings, prayers, and promises.

Religion is meaningless when...

We offer fearless offerings (Eccl 5:1)

When Solomon says, “Guard your steps when you go to God’s house,” he is saying in so many words that you need to proceed with a fearful reverence.

It is possible that he is alluding to God’s caution to Moses about standing too close to the burning bush.

God said to Moses

Exodus 3:5 (ESV)

“Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.”

The problem for Moses was God’s holiness.

The word holiness means to be separate.

God is ultimately and absolutely separate from his creation.

Charles Hodge does a wonderful job clarifying God’s holiness for you and I. Hodge says,

“This [holiness] is a general term for the moral excellence of God.

In 1 Sam.

2:2, it is said, “There is none holy as the Lord;” no other Being absolutely pure, and free from all limitation in his moral perfection.

“Thou Holy One of Israel,” is the form of address which the Spirit puts into the lips of the people of God.

“Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at his holy hill; for the Lord our God is Holy.”

(Ps.

99:9.)

“Holy and reverend is his name.”

(Ps.

111:9.)

“Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity.”

(Hab.

1:13.)

“Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for Thou only art Holy.” (Rev.

15:4.)

“Holiness, on the one hand, implies entire freedom from moral evil; and, upon the other, absolute moral perfection.

Freedom from impurity is the primary idea of the word.

To sanctify is to cleanse; to be holy, is to be clean.”

Charles Hodge

Moses was not holy.

He was not morally clean.

That is the problem with all of us.

We are not morally clean.

The effective of the fall in the Garden of Eden is the reality that no human being is spiritually good before God.

Wayne Grudem brings clarity to just how deep our sin affects our human nature.

Grudem says,

“In our natures we totally lack spiritual good before God: It is not just that some parts of us are sinful and others are pure.

Rather, every part of our being is affected by sin—our intellects, our emotions and desires, our hearts (the center of our desires and decision-making processes), our goals and motives, and even our physical bodies.”

Wayne Grudem

Paul understood the deep effective of sin when he said

To Titus, Paul also said

And of course, you guys know Jeremiah’s take on the human heart,

It’s not that human beings can’t do good things for human society.

We are made in the image of God.

We can show comparison and kindness and generosity to our fellow man.

But when we stand before God’s holiness, our best righteousness is like a filthy used rag.

That was Moses problem and that was Israel’s problem before Mount Sinai, and that is our problem coming into God’s house.

So Solomon says, you need to guard your steps.

You are about to enter God’s house, his temple.

You need to know who you are dealing with.

This is not the big guy upstairs, or the wise grandpa on your porch.

He is not a sage or a philosopher.

Yahweh is the Living Holy God.

You must approach him with fear.

And immediately Solomon says approaching God with fear means you come with your mouth shut and your ears open ready to learn.

In the movie, Polar Express, there is a young boy who affectionately known as the, “The know-it-all kid.”

He’s very talkative and comes across as smart.

But the more he talks, you realize he has a lot to learn.

At the end of the movie he receives a golden ticket that at first reads, “LEAN.”

He starts giving the conductor a hard time about receiving such an ambiguous ticket.

What he does not realize in all his talking is that his finger is covering up the letter R. The word says LEARN.

Once he realizes it he says sorry and is quiet.

Do you ever wonder if you come to God’s house with the same attitude as the Know it all kid?

Do you know how to come like that?

You come like the know-it -all kid when you come to church with an unteachable spirit.

You lack the humility to learn something new.

When your doctrine is challenged or your beliefs are pressed, you shut down or tune out.

You say things like, “I’m not going to listen to that.”

Or instead really search for truth, you proof text (find scriptures that only support your view of things) and never entertain something else.

You do it all in the name of guarding your doctrine, which is really having the spirit of the Know it all kid.

Look, if what you believe cannot stand a little scrutiny, then you need to walk back your belief and find more solid ground to stand upon.

So, come into the house of the Lord with a teachable spirit.

Come ready, eager, to listen and learn from God’s word; let your words be few.