John
14:6 NIV
Jesus
answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the
Father except through me.”
What Will You Do About The Truth?
Last month our church had a potluck and it was poorly attended. In fact, there were fewer people in the
worship service that day than I can remember.
A number of people put a significant amount of work into getting the
potluck ready and the food was great.
Yet I wasn’t sure if we should have another one for a while. I asked a couple if they thought we should
wait a few months for the next church potluck or have one this month and they
both smiled broadly and insisted that we have it this month. I was caught off guard by their enthusiasm
and then in a split moment of certainty, I knew that the Lord had spoken to me
through them, that He wanted us to have a potluck so I went ahead and scheduled
it.
I must admit though that I had a dilemma.
How was I to know that it really was God speaking to me and not just
peer pressure? It is not always God
speaking to you when you want it to be and it isn’t easy knowing if you are
right or wrong in it. I did not have any
Bible verse I could point to as evidence that this was coming from God. Do you just rely on positive thinking and
optimistic strategizing to guide you when you aren’t sure how to connect with
the Lord on some matter that means a lot to you? What is your go to method for hearing from
God? Most don’t care what God might be
saying; they never give it much thought but what about you? Have you come to the place where you want the
Lord to show you the way?
Good people, God’s people have made horrible mistakes, when it comes to
God. We rightfully commend Peter for his
tremendous faith taking God at His word and walking on the water. When he and his fellow disciples were going
across the Sea of Galilee in the middle of a great storm, they all saw Jesus
coming toward them but at first none of them were really sure it was Him. Timidly, Peter cried out to the Lord with a
tremendous request. "Lord, if
it's you," Peter replied, "tell me to come to you on the
water." "Come," he
said. Then Peter got down out of the
boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. (Matthew 14:28-29 NIV) However, quickly Peter’s faith failed him and
he started sinking into the billowing waves.
But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried
out, "Lord, save me!"
Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. "You of
little faith," he said, "why did you doubt?" (Matthew
14:30-31 NIV) When Peter started out toward Jesus, He had complete confidence
in God to take him along but it didn’t last and rather than walking in the
might and protection of God, he went out in his own strength and insight. He could see no way that he was going to
survive the waves and down he went.
The same was true with Mary, the mother of Jesus. Instead of maintaining her faith in Jesus and
walking in Him, she trusted in her own wits and along with her children, came
to the conclusion that Jesus had lost His mind.
What He was teaching and how He was behaving seemed irrational to
her. Then Jesus entered a house, and
again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat.
When his family heard about this, they
went to take charge of him, for they said, "He is out of his mind."
…Then Jesus' mother and brothers arrived. Standing outside, they sent someone
in to call him. (Mark 3:20-21,31 NIV)
You can talk yourself into nearly anything if you rely just on you to
figure out everything, including deciding that Jesus is crazy. When Saul, who later became Paul was an
unbeliever, he was convinced the Christian people were the worst sorts of souls
and he set out on a quest to destroy them.
It seems so very reasonable, any conclusion you make when you are
walking in yourself and deciding what you think is best. The most rational and acceptable
determinations are made by those who have no relationship with Christ. They make sense and their arguments are levelheaded. Mary, Saul and Peter all had their ducks in a
row with their conclusions but just because the whole world agrees with you
doesn’t mean it is so.
Jesus told His disciples not to talk about certain things until He was
risen from the dead. As they were coming
down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to tell anyone what they had seen
until the Son of Man had risen from the dead. (Mark 9:9 NIV) There are many things you cannot understand
nor can you grasp their importance until Christ is raised from the dead in
you. No matter how hard you look at a
matter, regardless of how intensely you stare at a problem or an idea, you
cannot get the gist of it until Jesus Christ has come alive in you. Here is a Biblical example. When Saul was just an ordinary person and had
no sense of Christ in Him, he thought it was best to do whatever He could to
stop the progression of the Christian message.
However, He met Christ and could no longer refute His Presence or
authority as Lord. Jesus became alive in
Him and it completely changed the way He saw everything. There is
a magical moment recorded in Acts 13 that completely altered the course
of His life. In the church at Antioch
there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of
Cyrene, Manaen (who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch) and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and
fasting, the Holy Spirit said, "Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the
work to which I have called them."
So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and
sent them off. The two of them, sent on
their way by the Holy Spirit, went… (Acts 13:1-4 NIV)
Consider just how monumental this really was. Saul, who had been instrumental in the horrific
persecution of Christian people in the Middle East, who personally ordered the
murder of Christians and their imprisonment was now being commissioned to begin
the great missionary movement into the depths of the Roman Empire. Not only that, Saul was accepting the call
and going off on the enterprise...without coercion, without resistance on his
part! We treat this lightly because we
are used to Paul being the greatest of all missionaries and the author of one
fourth the New Testament. This was new
ground however; for the Church as well as for Saul. Never before had any
Christian workers officially with the blessing of the Church been sent out
beyond the narrow confines of the Jewish world and certainly not someone of
Saul’s notoriety. You must consider the
risk being taken by everyone involved.
What if Saul turned on them? What
if he wasn’t spiritually strong enough to withstand the persecution they might
face? What if Saul’s Christianity had no
staying power? It was a most shocking enterprise!
Take a close look at how this decision to send Saul and Barnabas into the
wild pagan world of Roman rule developed.
In this one church in Antioch, there were a group of believers who had
some experience hearing from God and praying.
While they were in a time of worship, the Holy Spirit told them to make
Saul and Barnabas missionaries. Somehow,
the Lord got this message across to each one of these Christian leaders and
church members. They knew it was God
saying it and they were certain of what He said. Also, Christ in some way prepared Saul and Barnabas
for this dramatic change of course. They
were not like Moses or Gideon who were spiritually unprepared for the calling
each received from God. Saul and Barnabas
were ready to go; up for the challenge. God
did that in them. God prepared their
hearts for this crucial mission.
God has important things to say to you.
He has tasks for you that matter for eternity. He has a way of looking at things that He
wants you to see. The Lord has plans for
you, challenges for you, certain ways of doing things that are critical for you
and for others that you may not even know yet.
You can be oblivious to Christ and remain in a spiritual fog if you like
or you can come up into the bright sunlight of God and His word. You can know what only Christ can show
you. You can see what only the Lord can
reveal. It is possible for you to be
just as alert and spiritually alive as those Antioch church members who all
knew God wanted Saul and Barnabas to be the first missionaries to the world
outside the Middle East.
You must read the Bible if you want to hear from God. You can never be certain it is Jesus talking
to you if the Bible isn’t a part of your thinking. You don’t read the Bible to get something out
of it but to be with Jesus. If you don’t
care what He is doing or how He thinks, then keep the Bible on your coffee
table or stuck in your phone. But if you
want God to talk with you and be close to you, then you must read the
Bible. Do what God says whenever you
know what He wants you to do. The Lord
will be as silent as a door knob if you disobey Him and ignore what He is
telling you. Pray. Just sit with God and tell Him you love Him
and be quiet…do this several times a day.
You don’t have to ask for anything.
If you have a sin to confess then confess it. If you feel the desire to thank Him or tell
Him you love Him, then do that. Mostly
just sit with Christ and let the Lord have room in your mind to work in
it. Become someone the Lord talks with
and gives His thoughts and directions.
Be a disciple that the Lord can guide and lead. Make the best use of your time here on earth
by being one of the Lord’s trusted friends.
Be a disciple!
