Once Every Seven Years!

Guest Sermon Series
Rev Robert D. Shofner, Jr.
St. John's UCC Boonville

Merry Christmas! Now that is finally here, let’s look back over the past few weeks. Think about it ... did the thought of Christmas ... and all the parties, and shopping, and cooking, and wrapping up presents, and setting up the decorations ... and everything else that just had to get done ... did the thought of Christmas make us feel humbug-ish ... or humdrum-ish ... or humbled?

The way we answer that has a lot to do about we feel about the different gifts that are a part of Christmas. When we focus on the gifts we have to give, a lot of times we feel pretty humbug-ish. (All that time and money and the kids went through their presents in 12 seconds flat!) When we focus on the gifts we hoped to receive from other people, then maybe we're going to feel pretty humdrum-ish. (We opened them up and thought, "Is that all there is?") But when we focus on the gifts that God has given to us ... because there really is a reason to the season ... when we focus on God's great gifts to us, then we can truly feel humbled. There's a humbling awe that God could love us that much.

The good news is that no one gives us greater presents than God. In fact, it says in James 1:17, "Every good action and every perfect gift is from God. These good gifts come down from the Creator of the sun, moon, and stars, who does not change like their shifting shadows." God gives perfect gifts. Ever receive a gift and we open it up and say, "Wow! This is perfect!"? The Bible says all of God's gifts are like that. And He just keeps on giving. Romans 8:32, "He did not spare his own Son but gave him for us all. So with Jesus, God will surely give us all things." The sacrificial and generous giving that God has shown us when He gave His only Son for us ... the Bible says God wants to show us that same giving each and every day.

Now, should we have to sum up God's giving nature, His ability to give and give what no one else can ... we can sum that up with one word, "grace." In fact, the word "grace" and the word "gift" or "give" in the New Testament are the same words. God's gift to us is grace, and God's grace to us is His gift. And there's no better gift than God's grace. John 1:14, "The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth." This is what Christmas is all about! What a perfect gift. And when we open it up, some of the most awesome things happen in our life. So this morning we're going to look at God's great gift in our lives.

Number one - we are lavished with grace. That's one thing we really want to understand. The Bible says we are lavished with grace! And that means we can make the choice to live abundantly. To live abundantly. Ephesians 1:8, " ... the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us with all wisdom and understanding." We probably don't experience that too often. The idea of something just being poured out on us, more than we can ever fully understand. It's a quintuple scoop cone of gourmet ice cream, okay? That's being lavished ... it's more than we can imagine, or eat. But with God's grace, we can never get too much of it. When something is lavished on us it means we're given something more than what we could ever dream of, but what we've always wanted. And God's says, "I want to give my grace, that gift of myself, to you." In abundance.

Now, oftentimes when somebody offers us a gift unbelievably large, we're unbelieving about it. The offer of a big gift can really make us doubt. Got a card for my birthday that said, "For your birthday I decided to get you a million dollars." I knew I wasn't going to open it up and find a check for a million dollars ... darn it all! But God has this lavish gift of grace ready to pour out on us, and we think, "Could that really be for me?" Yes, it is. Yes, it is! And when we finally accept God's gift, it changes the way we look at life. That's the real gift this year, a different way of looking at life, based on the grace that God has given us.

We can live life fearfully, we can live it selfishly, or we can live it abundantly. We can look at the world around us and what we don't have, and live our lives fearfully. Pulling in, living in fear of what we might lose. We can listen to the desires of our heart and mind and begin to live selfishly. Or we can focus on God's gift, and discover the joy of living abundantly. No longer pulling back because of our fear, or overreaching wildly to fulfill every desire, but abundant life. It's a new way of living!

John 10:10, Jesus said, "The thief's purpose is to steal, kill and destroy. My purpose is to give life in all its fullness." We don't want to live fearfully or selfishly. Jesus came so that we could live abundantly.

Now, let's look at how to turn this into more than just "positive thinking" rhetoric. Let's look at how to do this ... how to live abundantly. There's a principle we want to understand. There's no such thing as abundant living without abundant supply. Just won't work. For instance, should I say, "Go ahead and spend as much as you want at the mall today," ... you'd think I was crazy, or just got a new credit card! ... because you know there's not an inexhaustible supply behind all that spending. The ability to live an abundant life comes from the abundant grace of God. When we realize how abundantly He has supplied His grace to us, we can live an abundant life, because His grace supply never runs out! 2 Peter 1:2 (NIV), "Grace and peace be yours in abundance through the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord." It comes from knowing Him and who He is. We're lavished with grace ... so go ahead, live abundantly.

Number 2 - we're saved by grace, so live eternally. Live eternally. Ephesians 2:8, "I mean that you have been saved by grace through believing. You did not save yourselves; it was a gift from God." We've been saved by God's grace, so we can live eternally. What's that mean ... "saved"? It means three things ... it means to be forgiven, to be fulfilled, and to be set free. And God doesn't save us for a few moments or days or weeks. The salvation He gives to us is eternal. We were headed for certain death and separation from Him for eternity, and because of His great love for us, He came to us and forgave us, fulfilled us, and set us free ... for eternity. That's a great gift!

How do we begin to enjoy that gift? Notice this principle. For a gift to be enjoyed, it must be received. Pretty simple. For us to enjoy a gift, we want to first receive it. And for some of us, this Christmas will be the best ever, because we'll receive the best gift ever. God's gift of eternal life. Just ask Him for it.

When we do start enjoying His great gift? Many people think we only get to enjoy it after we die. That's just not true. 1 Timothy 6:12 says, "Hold tightly to the eternal life that God has given you ..." Notice the words "has given." Not "will give you someday," but "has given" you right now. It says to hold tightly to it ... enjoy it ... live it right now … celebrate our new life!

In my first church, working as a student pastor, there was this little guy who cornered me during Coffee Hour, and he said, "Bob, Bob, Bob! Are you coming to my birthday party?" I didn't have anything lined up for the afternoon, so I said, "Sure, I don't have any plans for today. What time is it?" He said, "No, no, no. It's not today. It's in 5 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days." "Okay, let me write that down. I'll be there. Thanks for telling me." The next Sunday, during Coffee Hour, "Bob, Bob, Bob! Are you coming to my birthday party?" "Yes, I am. In 5 months, 2 weeks, and 2 days. I'm going. Let me erase the pencil, and write it in pen. It's a for sure." The next Sunday, during Coffee Hour, "Bob, Bob, Bob! Are you coming to my birthday party?" Well, I knew this was going to happen. I brought a birthday hat and a party horn. I whipped them out of my briefcase and said, "Look! I'm ready! I can't wait!"

Then I asked his mom, "Hey, what's the deal? I've never seen anything like this. I've never seen anybody this excited over celebrating a birthday." And she told me something I'll never forget. She said, "Mark is a foster child. And Mark has never, ever had a birthday party."

And I think of Mark when I look around and see Christians who don't celebrate. Friends, we've got reasons to celebrate. We want to quit acting like spiritual foster children, and claim the heritage we have in God and celebrate our inheritance of eternal life.

Question. Can knowing what's in our future change the way we feel and act today? Of course it can! Let's suppose you haven't had a job in 6 months, and the unemployment insurance is running out. But just last week you sat down and signed a contract to start a new job the first of the year. Now, do you think you'd wait until January to celebrate the new job? No way! It's party time, right now! And the fact that we know we have an eternity secure in God changes the way we feel and act today. Or, at least it should! The fact that we have eternal life ... does that mean we have to wait to get there to celebrate it? No way! We want to celebrate it today, and every day, right now. It changes the way we look at life.

Here's something we can do to help reinforce this point. Take a 3x5 card, and on one side of it, write the word "today" and on the other side write the word "eternity." Put it in your purse or wallet or pocket ... and any time you face a worry or a problem, take out the card. First, look at the side that says "today." Think about that problem and how terrible it is in the light of today. Really make yourself miserable! Have fun with it, okay? Then after you've done that for five or ten minutes, turn the card over, and think about that problem you're facing in the light of eternity, and see how it changes your attitude. The truth is, when we look at a lot of our worries even in the light of next week it would change our attitude. And when we begin to look at them in the light of eternity ... what a difference it makes! Live eternally.

Number three, we are molded by grace ... and so live responsibly. Some of us may be thinking, "Great! Don't talk to me about responsibilities! I'm overwhelmed by responsibilities!" Maybe you're a single parent. Maybe you're struggling to hold down two jobs ... or keep a business going. Ever feel like ... "I'm just trying to do what's right!"

Reminds me of the story about the Kindergarten teacher who loved to help her little students get all bundled up to go out into the snow and cold at the end of the school day. One day she sat down in front of one of her students, pulled out a pair of boots ... the kind with laces all the way up! ... and started to diligently lace up the boots ... about a ten minute job, struggling with this squirmy little girl. She finally got them all laced up ... the little girl hopped to her feet and announced to the teacher, "These aren't my boots." So the teacher unlaced them and pulled them off and put them back in the closet. Then her little student looks up at her and says, "Those are my big sister's boots, but my Mommy makes me wear them!" Ever feel like that? Just trying to do the right thing?

Want some new energy for that worn-out life? Look at Ephesians 2:10 (NIV), "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." We are created, molded by God's grace in Christ Jesus, to do good works. But sometimes we just get so tired. That's because we're doing everything on our own. We want to learn to relax and let God's grace mold us to live responsibly. We want to learn to quit trying so hard and start trusting in God's grace.

1 Corinthians 15:10 (NIV), "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them - yet not I, but the grace of God that was within me." Paul found a new energy working within him. God's grace. And God's grace is meant to be the creating, energizing, directing influence of our lives. We don't want to be self-made men and women ... we want to be grace-molded persons.

How do we motivate ourselves to get things done? Well, we can use guilt ... or grace. Under guilt, responsibilities seem like terrible burdens. Yet under grace, responsibilities seem like wonderful opportunities. It's the difference between, "I have to do that to get God to love me." and "I want to do that because God loves me!" And grace is a much better motivator than guilt, because it won't wear us out!

2 Corinthians 9:8 (NIV), "And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work."

God's grace abounds ... and that means we live in a new kind of way ... responsibly. There's a principle here that we want to notice. The key to living responsibly is living responsively. Got that? The key to living responsibly is living responsively. Hebrews 10:24 says, "In response to all he has done for us, let us outdo each other in being helpful and kind to each other and in doing good ..."

God will never love us any more or any less than He loves us right now. And so what we do in life isn't to get Him to love us, because He does love us, but what we do in life is simply in response for the love, the grace, He already has for us.

How important is this grace, this gift, from God? Our last verse this morning, which also happens to be the last verse in the Bible. Revelation 22:21 (NIV), "The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God's people. Amen." It ends with grace. What a great gift!

Christmas reminds us that we are lavished with grace ... so we want to live abundantly. We are saved by grace, so we want to live eternally. And we are molded by grace, so we can live responsibly. God's grace. What a great gift!

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, thank You for the greatest Christmas gift we could ever imagine, Your lavish grace. Help us to receive it, that we may live abundantly, eternally, and responsibly.

And the people said, “Amen.

How Jesus Deals With Dead Things

Rev. Robert D. Shofner, Jr

St John's UCC Boonville

The church, like a lot of churches, was in desperate need of funds. So the pastor decided to hold a series of sermons on how God still works miracles even today, to try to pump the people up and encourage them to give more. He went to his deacons with the plans, and one of them was skeptical. After the meeting, he went home and told his wife, “Yeah, that preacher claimed that if I gave him a $1000 for the church, he’d show me a miracle. So I gave it to him, and he said, ‘There it is!’”

Today we want to talk about the story of Lazarus. Why? Because it’s a miracle story that applies to us today.

Lazarus was a close friend of Jesus, along with his sisters Martha and Mary. He could relax with them. He stopped by their home a lot when He was traveling through that region. He was so close to them, that when Lazarus fell ill, the only message that was sent to Jesus was a simple, “Lord, the one you love is sick.” That’s all they needed to say. By the time the message arrived, Jesus knew that Lazarus was already dead. So He stayed where He was for two more days, then He headed on down the road to Bethany to meet with the family. He wasn’t in danger of missing the funeral, because in those days, Jewish funerals lasted ten days. You had three days of just excruciating mourning, followed by four days of relatively intense mourning, and then followed by three days of more moderate mourning. So, Jesus knew if He got there the third or fourth day, the funeral would still be in full swing.

As He got close to the village, Martha got word that He was coming and she went out to the edge of town to meet Him. And she comes to Jesus the same way that most of us come to Him. She comes with her “if onlys.” “Jesus, if only you had been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.” And Jesus says, “Martha, your brother will live.” And Martha says, “Oh, I know ... I know he’s going to live at that last day when the resurrection takes place.” Jesus says, “Martha, the resurrection is not an event. The resurrection is a Person. I’m the Resurrection and the Life! Anybody who believes in me, even though he dies, will live! In fact, he’ll never really die at all! Do you believe this?” And Jesus’ words spark something in Martha and she says, “Yeah, I do believe that. I believe that You are the One who came from God.” That’s all the faith Jesus wanted to work His miracle. But He wanted to talk to Mary, too.

Mary gets word that Jesus wants to see her. She comes out, and she is followed by a whole crowd of mourners. This is an interesting group of people. Some of them are family and friends who are legitimately grieving the death of Lazarus. Others of them are just the kind of people who jump on the bandwagon whenever there’s a funeral, kind of professional mourners. Mary goes up to Jesus, and she’s a little more demonstrative than her sister ... she falls down at Jesus’ feet, and weeps, and says the same words as Martha, “Jesus, if only You had been here, my brother wouldn’t be dead.”

Now, catch this. When Martha came to Jesus, Jesus struck some sort of spark within her; a little bit of faith. But when Mary came to Jesus with her “if only”, she struck a spark in Jesus. Because when she fell down weeping with her “if only” and Jesus saw the mob of mourners following her, something broke lose inside of Him. The Bible says He was deeply moved, and troubled in His spirit. Something broke lose inside of Him and He shuddered to the core of His soul. And the Bible says that Jesus wept. Tears come pouring down His face. And He says, “Show me where he is. Where’s the tomb?”

And they take Him to the tomb, with its big boulder blocking the entrance. And He calls out, “Take that stone away!” The people object, at first, but with a little prodding they roll the stone away, and Jesus calls out, “Lazarus! Come forth!” And the mummy appears at the door. Then Jesus says, “Loosen, and let him go.”

How does Jesus deal with dead things? Jesus embraces them with tears. There’s a verse in the Bible that goes like this: “Jesus wept.” (John 11:35) That’s all there is to it. Some of you may have already memorized that verse. Because you know that out of the 31,173 verses of the Bible, that’s the shortest. What you really want to know is this: Jesus weeping is not a trivial matter. There’s something very significant about the fact that Jesus wept.

I’m amazed by it. First I’m amazed at the depth of the weeping, because the Bible says that something broke lose in Jesus’ soul and He was deeply moved and troubled in His spirit. The words carry with them the added meaning of anger and rage. Something inside of Jesus flared up when He saw His close friend weeping and this crowd of mourners wailing. He said, “This is not the way it’s supposed to be! These people are in despair, they’re grieving, and this is not the way I made life to be!” He raged against that grief. He raged against that loss. But on the outside, He breaks into tears. He enters into the pain of these people. He feels it ... knowing full well that not five minutes into the future He’s going to raise this guy to life, and the funeral is going to turn into a party! And yet Jesus, not with the false pietistic grief that these other mourners are showing, but with true, legitimate tears, enters into the sisters’ grief. That’s amazing!

Years ago I went down to my little church early one Sunday morning to get ready for the worship service. As I walked through the basement checking the toilets and sinks, I was surprised by a church member looking for me. He and his wife lived right across the street from the church. I said in my typically joyful fashion, “Hey, Kevin! You scared the you know what out of me! What’s up?” He looked at me with red and swollen eyes, and said quietly, “My baby’s dead.” His 22 year old daughter had just been killed in a head-on collision with a drunk driver.

If you’ve ever been a part of sharing grief with a person like that, you see the total person just ... break down. You just see the life run right out of the person. And there was rage and anger and pain. This is not how life is supposed to be!

As I went through that experience with him and his family ... helping him pick out a coffin ... gathering her belongings out of the crushed car ... standing before the many family and friends who came for the funeral ... the thing that bothered me the most, was that I didn’t know how to really enter into that. I hurt for them ... but I didn’t rage. I suffered with them ... but I didn’t know how to truly weep as they did. But Jesus does. And He embraces it with the same anger and the same anguish that you feel.

For some of you ... that’s all you need to hear today. You came in here with a whole truckload of dead things in your life, and you wonder, “Is there any person, anywhere, God included, who cares about what I’m going through?” Let me tell you ... there is. Jesus embraces those dead things with the same anger and the same anguish that you feel. And the Good News is that He doesn’t stop there.

How does Jesus deal with dead things? Jesus exposes them for a purpose. He exposes them for a purpose. He says, “Take away the stone!”

Now when Jesus gives that command, Martha’s sense of propriety kicks in, and she says, “Hey, wait a second. He’s been in there four days.” Now, that’s significant because Jewish folk lore said that when a person died, the spirit hovered around the body for up to three days. If there’s going to be any kind of miracle ... any kind of resurrection ... it’s going to take place inside of three days. After three days, forget it! The spirit moves on, and it’s gone forever. And besides that, you know that if you leave a dead body lying around it starts to smell. And that’s what she’s concerned about. “Jesus, bear in mind that he’s been in there four days.” In the King James it says, “Lord, he stinketh!” Yuck! You don’t pull the stone away from old dead things like that! But Jesus understands that for dead things to be exposed to light, they’ve got to be opened up. You’ve got to take the stone away and face them for what they are. Then they can be dealt with. That’s what Christian counseling is all about. Taking all those old hurts and failures and frustrations that are festering within us and making life stink; bringing those old dead things out and exposing them and facing them and dealing with them. Jesus exposes the dead things in our lives for a purpose; so we can face them, and deal with them.

How does Jesus deal with dead things? Jesus exhibits His glory in them. This is the purpose of the entire situation. When the news first came to Jesus of Lazarus’ illness, He said, “This sickness will not end in death.” He didn’t say it wouldn’t go through death; He said it wouldn’t end there. He said, “This is all happening for the glory of God. This whole situation is taking place so that the glory of God can be displayed.”

When He approached the tomb, He said, “Take the stone away.” Martha objected. He said this: “Martha, didn’t I tell you that if you believed, you’d see the glory of God? Take the stone away.” Then He calls out, “Lazarus, come forth!” He actually doesn’t say that. What He really says is, “Lazarus, here!” Exhibit A to the glory of God! The dead man lives!

Now, often, Jesus loves to exhibit His glory by resurrecting things; by healing things. He loves to resurrect dying relationships and dead hopes and dreams. He loves to heal people physically and emotionally. But He doesn’t always do that. We want to understand this. One of the things that Jesus is guaranteed to do when we bring Him our dead things, He’s guaranteed to exhibit His glory in them. But, it’s His prerogative on how He does it. And just as often, Jesus chooses to exhibit His glory by giving us the strength and the perseverance and the courage to bear the load of that dead thing and live with it, deal with it, to bear up under it. Either way, it’s His choice.

There was a young man, living in Rumania , named Petrasure. Petrasure who suffered from an inexplicable affliction that slowly destroyed the muscle actions of his body. It started in his feet, moved up to his legs, leaving him paralyzed from the waste down. Then it moved up his chest and afflicted his diaphragm, making it impossible for him to breath on his own. His parents and friends in the tiny village managed to scrap together $10,000 to buy an iron lung from England . But when it arrived, they discovered that the Rumanian soldiers had stripped it of all its usable parts. So his parents took shifts, 22 hours a day, pressing on his chest so that he could breath.

For two hours a day, Petrasure was strong enough and awake enough to sit up on his own, and while he did, he pressed his belly against a metal bar, forcing his diaphragm to work. And he prayed. Not for himself and for a cure of his affliction, but for his parents, his church, his village. And the love of God was huge in his life! The people of the village were inspired by Petrasure and his family. They came to his house at least once a week to pray with him; not so much for him, but just to pray with him. Because they loved to hear him pray. He could only get out about two or three words at a time as he rocked back and forth. But they loved to hear him pray. And they said, “The glory of God just flows through this man’s broken body and the words of his prayers.” Jesus Christ has proven Himself huge and weighty in this family. Nobody’s seen this kind of love before, this kind of perseverance and endurance, this kind of grace and selflessness that enables a person to pray for the two hours a day that he’s awake, and not wallow in self pity.

That’s what Jesus does when we bring Him our dead things. He either resurrects them, or He gives us the perseverance to bear up under them.

What Jesus does with our dead things; He engulfs them with love. Those are sweet words to me, when that mummy appears at the opening of the cave, and Jesus says, “Loosen and let him go.” Unwrap that guy. Let’s remove anything that reminds us of the death that was here. Let’s fully restore this man. And it’s instructive here that Jesus Himself doesn’t loose and let Lazarus go. And He doesn’t say to Lazarus, “Loose yourself and let yourself go.” He says to the people around Him, “Loosen and let him go.”

This illustrates a principle of the Kingdom. Restoration takes place in relationship. You get people around you to restore you and to bring you back to wholeness. We were never meant to be restored through self-help. It’s not a personal individual kind of thing ... it’s a community thing.

You see, what Jesus wants to do with your dead things ... He wants to engulf them with love. He wants to fill you with His presence on the inside and surround you with His people on the outside. And then, you are really living! Then you are restored.

Finally, what Jesus does with our dead things ...

Jesus expects them to really live. He expects them to really live. When He’s gone to all this trouble to embrace them and expose them and to exhibit His glory in them and to engulf them with His love ... He expects them to really live.

John 20:31 says, “I have written these things so that you may believe in Jesus, and by believing in Him, have life.” The words “believe” and “live” are used in the Gospel of John more than any other book of the Bible. Here's a few examples.

“In Him was life, and that life was the light of men.” (John 1:4)

“Whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16)

“For just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, even so the Son gives life to whom He is pleased to give it.” (John 5:21)

“I am the bread of life.” (John 6:48)

“Whoever believes in Me, streams of living water will flow from within him.” (John 7:38)

“I came that they might have life, and have it abundantly.” (John 10:10

“I am the resurrection and the life ... do you believe this?” John 11:25-26

Back in 1983, Al Michaels screamed through our TV sets, “Do you believe in miracles?” And we did. Because we had just watched a scrub group of US college kids defeat the mighty, powerful, unbeatable Soviet hockey team in the Olympics. Who would have “thunk” it? Nobody. That’s why Al screamed out, “Do you believe in miracles?” And we did, because we saw one right before our very eyes.

Today, Jesus asks, “Do you believe in miracles?” And, more importantly, do you believe in the Miracle Worker? If you do, believe ... and live! That’s what He wants you to do. Maybe you’ve come here with the deepest kind of dead thing ... a dead soul. Jesus invites you to put your faith and belief in Him ... and live.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, it’s such a wonder that You know how to weep with us, that You know how to embrace our pains. And I wonder, with awe, at your hugeness; your glory fills my heart and the lives of these, your people. You engulf us with your love, and you show us how to live a brand new life. I want to pray for those who come with a dead heart and soul. May they hear your voice inviting them to put their trust and faith in you, and belief ... and then live that new life you give us. Lord, resurrect our hearts. And those of us who deal with the dead things of discouragement and pain, help us to roll the stone away and expose them to you, that you may bring them back to life again, and give us hope. All for your glory and honor.

And the people said, “Amen.”