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Sermon & Worship Packages: Time to Remember
Dr. Robert McKenzie
WHY WE SHOULD ALL BE NICE...YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN IT MAY BE GOODBYE
"When you were saying goodbye I heard you say, "I wish you enough." May I ask what that means?"
He began to smile. "That’s a wish that has been handed down from other generations. My parents used to say it to everyone." He paused for a moment and looking up as if trying to remember it in detail, he smiled even more.
"When we said ’I wish you enough,’ we were wanting the other person to have a life filled with just enough good things to sustain them," he continued and then turning toward me he shared the following as if he were reciting it from memory:
" I wish you enough sun to keep your attitude bright.
I wish you enough rain to appreciate the sun more.
I wish you enough happiness to keep your spirit alive.
I wish you enough pain so that the smallest joys in life appear much bigger.
I wish you enough gain to satisfy your wanting.
I wish you enough loss to appreciate all that you possess.
I wish enough"Hellos" to get you through the final "Goodbye."
He then began to sob and walked away.
**I WISH YOU ALL ENOUGH**
The story is told that after Helen Keller’s teacher, Anne Sullivan, had given her the names of physical objects in sign language, Miss Sullivan attempted to explain God and tapped out the symbols for the name "God." Much to Miss Sullivan’s surprise, Helen spelled back, "Thank you for telling me God’s name, Teacher, for he has touched me many times before." Helen Keller knew something of God’s signature from nature, but it was wordless. Source Unknown
"Some Christians spend the first six days of each week sowing their wild oats, then they go to church on Sunday and pray for a crop failure." There is a myth that exists that says we can live comfortably in our world of faith and then flirt with the world. God calls us to another standard.
A LIGHT NAMED AL
On the morning of September 11, Jeannie Braca switched on the television to check the weather report, only to hear that a plane had just hit the World Trade Center.
Jeannie’s husband, Al, worked as a corporate bond trader for Cantor Fitzgerald. His office was on the 105th floor of Tower One.
Al had survived the World Trade Center bombing in 1993 and had even helped a woman with asthma escape from the building.
Jeannie knew that Al would do the same thing this time, “I knew he would stop to help and minister to people,” she said, “but I never thought for a minute that he wouldn’t be coming home!”
A week later, like so many others who were in that building, Al’s body was found in the rubble. Al’s wife, Jeannie, and his son Christopher were devastated!
Then the reports began to trickle in from friends and acquaintances. Some people on the 105th floor had made a last call or sent a final e-mail to loved ones saying that a man was leading people in prayer.
A few referred to Al by name.
Al’s family learned that Al had indeed been ministering to people during the attack! When Al realized that they were all trapped in the building and would not be able to escape, Al shared the gospel with a group of 50 co-workers and led them in prayer.
This news came as no surprise to Al’s wife, Jeannie.
For years, she and Al had been praying for the salvation of these men and women. According to Jeannie, Al hated his job and couldn’t stand the environment. It was a world so out of touch with his Christian values, but he wouldn’t quit.
Al was convinced that God wanted him to stay there, to be a light in the darkness, and although Al would not have put it this way, to be a hero!
Al was not ashamed of Christ and Christ’s words…and he paid the price of taking up his cross daily. Al shared his faith with his co-workers….many of whom sarcastically nicknamed him “The Rev.”
And on that fateful day…on September 11, in the midst of the chaos, Al’s co-workers looked to him—-and...
"Deep within California’s remote and rugged desert mountain ranges, living on the brink of extinction, less than a thousand bighorn sheep maintain a fragile grip on the future. Their hope lies with the crop of lambs born each winter. In preparation for this moment, ewes wander alone into the rocky wilderness to find quiet nooks where they give birth. Few people have ever seen a newborn lamb, but a couple of days after birth it is frisking about like a colt and ready to rejoin the rest of the herd. More lambs are born and survive during years with lots of fresh, green vegetation, but in the face of introduced diseases, predation by mountain lions and disturbance by hikers nothing is certain in the world of bighorn sheep. NATURAL HISTORY Bighorns are intelligent, playful and mischievous. One scientist raised a lamb and watched as it learned the rituals of the household, came to recognize voice commands (better than a dog) and slept with a litter of kittens. The lamb even claimed a seat in the family car." LOS ANGELES TIMES February 15, 2005 FIELD GUIDE Bighorn sheep David Lukas
THE PRICE THEY PAID – From Illustrations Unlimited:Have you ever wondered what happened to those fifty-six men who signed the Declaration of Independence? Five signers were captured by the British as traitors and tortured before they died. Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two lost their sons in the Revolutionary Army, another had two sons captured. Nine fought and died from wounds or the hardships of the Revolutionary War. What kind of men were they? Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine were farmers and large plantation owners, men of means, well educated. But they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well that the penalty would be death if they were captured. They signed and they pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor. Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his ships swept from the seas by the British navy. He sold his home and properties to pay his debts and died in rags. Thomas McKeam was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him, and poverty was his reward. Vandals or soldiers or both looted the properties of Ellery, Clymer, Hall, Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton. At the Battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British General Cornwallis, had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters. The owner quietly urged General George Washington to open fire, which was done. The home was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt. Francis Lewis had his home and properties destroyed. The enemy jailed his wife and she died within a few months. John Hart was driven from his wife’s bedside as she was dying. Their thirteen children fled for their lives. His fields and gristmill were laid waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves, returning home after the war to find his wife dead, his children vanished. A few weeks later he died from exhaustion and a broken heart. Norris and Livingston suffered similar fates. Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution. These were not wild-eyed, rabble-rousing ruffians. These were soft-spoken men of means and education. They had security, but they valued liberty more. Standing tall, straight and unwavering, they pledged: “For the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of the Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.” They gave us an independent America. Can we keep it?
WORSHIP OF CREATION
How many of you watched the PBS series last month on the National Parks? Besides the fabulous visual images of some of America’s most beautiful scenery, the documentary gave a very interesting perspective on the history of our national parks.
Did you know that Jim Grinnell’s dad has a great uncle named George Bird Grinnell who was part of the original National Parks movement? He also founded the Audubon Society, and even has a glacier named after him in Glacier National Park in Montana. The documentary featured Jim’s ancestor prominently.
The primary instigator of the idea of National Parks was a man named John Muir. He was a man who loved the wilderness and loved the mountains. As the program quoted him about his love for the great outdoors, I found myself really resonating with some of what he said and wrote.
The first episode was even titled "The Scripture of Nature." I’ve had several very deeply spiritual experiences in some natural settings – at Beaver Lake in Arkansas, and in the Rocky Mountains, and other places. I do, in fact, feel a connection with the Lord in those settings.
John Muir once wrote this:
A few minutes ago every tree was excited, bowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease. --John Muir
It made me think of the passage in Isaiah:
Isaiah 55:12 (NIV) You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.
It made me think of Jesus telling the Pharisees, who were complaining of the worship Jesus was receiving on Palm Sunday, that if they kept quiet, the stones would cry out in worship of Him.
But while John Muir said and wrote things about nature and creation that I can really relate to and appreciate, he also said some things that are more problematic. These kinds of thoughts were, quite frankly, echoed ad nauseum in the series by more contemporary thinkers and commentators with New Age leanings, so much so that I eventually gave up on it. Too much space on the DVR.
Anyway, John Muir wrote:
We all flow from one fountain Soul. All are expressions of one Love. God does not appear, and flow out, only from narrow chinks and round bored wells here and there in favored races and places, but He flows in grand undivided currents, shoreless and boundless over creeds and forms and all kinds of civilizations and peoples and beasts, saturating all and fountainizing all. -- June 9, 1872 letter to Miss Catharine Merrill, from New Sentinel Hotel, Yosemite Valley, in Badè’s Life and Letters of John Muir.
Without getting off on a tangent – that’s pantheism. Pantheism, in a nutshell, makes no distinction (or at most a very unclear distinction) between the Creator and the creature. According to pantheism, god is not transcendent. In practical terms, god is in all, and all is part of god
That thinking leads almost inevitably to a worship of nature. Watching this program, I thought a lot about how natural beauty – God’s creation - can lead to worship. For me, it wells up in worship of the Creator God who made it all. For others, including John Muir, and many people today, it leads not to a worship of the Creator of all the wonderful beauty around us, but to a worship of creation itself. It is, indeed, a form of idolatry.
(From a sermon by Bill Sullivan, I Put Away My Idols, 12/13/2009)
James Hudson Taylor in challenging English students during his time to be involved in China mission work, used to tell of the story about Peter, his Chinese convert and disciple. On one of their sea journeys, Peter (who do not know how to swim) fell from the side of the boat. Fortunately, there were fishermen nearby, just a grab away from where Peter fell. Taylor shouted at the fishermen and asked them to help his friend, “Hey, help my friend, he is drowning.” However, the fishermen did not bother to do his call for help because they were busy loading their catch from the net to their boat. Taylor continued to yell, “Stop what you are doing, and help my friend. He is just a grab away.” But the fishermen continued on their work until the last fish was loaded to the boat. Then they jumped and got Peter out of water. They tried to revive him, but to no avail. Peter died of drowning. He could have been saved because he was just a grab away from the fishermen. Then, he asked the students/church members what they thought of about the Chinese...
The following is a quote in a letter by Dr. Paul Luther, the youngest son of the reformer Martin Luther. “ In the year 1544, my father, in the presence of us all, narrated the whole story of his journey to Rome. He acknowledged with great joy that, in that city, through the Spirit of Jesus Christ, he had come into the knowledge of the truth of the everlasting gospel. It happened this way. As he repeated his prayers on the Lateran staircase, the words of the prophet Habakkuk came suddenly to his mind, “The just shall live by faith.” Thereupon he ceased his prayers, returned to Wittenberg, and took this as the chief foundation of all his doctrine.” (A bunch of Everlastings, by Frank Boreham, pp. 19-20)
ERWIN MCMANUS AND HIS "JOHN THE BAPTIST"
As we begin today I would like to read a true account of an experience that pastor, speaker, and author, Erwin McManus had in the early years of his ministry. Listen to what he says...
"I got a message through the urban grapevine that I was dead. It might surprise you that in the dark corridors of the urban jungle there are many prophets -- mostly prophets of doom. This angel of death went by the name William. Through my work in one of the projects, his common-law wife had come to a personal faith in Jesus Christ. He was in prison and heard the news of her conversion. He did not consider this good news. I had trespassed onto his territory. A crime punishable -- yes, that's right, you got it -- by death. So I got the word -- several times actually -- that when he got out of prison, I was going to be his first stop. He had spent most of his adult life behind prison walls, and by his own description he had broken all of the commandments. This time he had gone to prison for slitting a man's throat. That man was the brother of his common-law wife, whom we will call Lupe.
"When I heard he was released from prison, I decided to find him before he found me. He lived in a small apartment complex surrounded mostly by dilapidated houses and run-down storefronts. The complex was walking distance from the skyscrapers downtown and sat in the middle of what had once been one of the city's most prestigious neighborhoods.
"You don't ever forget meeting someone like William. He was in some ways an ethnic anomaly. He was a white guy in the middle of a Latin community who had a reputation for being good with a knife. He was in his mid-thirties, and life had made him as hard as stone.
"We sat face-to-face in a dingy apartment filled with loud children and usually inebriated neighbors. But before I knew it, we were there alone -- just William and me. I don't recall how it happened. I never noticed the exodus. It was only the silence and discomfort of the moment that made me aware of how everything had changed. Metal bars on the windows, the door soundly shut. We were alone.
"He swiftly reached into his jacket, pulled out a knife, and with a quick move of his wrist opened it where its position made the metal gleam in my direction. Like someone remembering a secret pleasure he smiled and said, 'This is the knife I slit his throat with. The police never got it.'
"A thousand thoughts were rushing through my mind. But I really didn't have any material in the category of 'witty responses to use shortly before dying at knifepoint.' I remember entertaining the thought that Lupe's brother didn't die; William just cut off his vocal cords. That thought was not at all comforting. I knew my next, my first, perhaps my last sentence was of utmost importance. And then the words came. It was as if I heard them for the first time even as he heard them.
"'William, that knife is going to send you to hell!' I looked straight into his eyes, and I knew he was shocked that I said it. To be really honest, I was shocked that I said it. But I was still breathing, which allowed me to gain courage. And so I proceeded: 'You think you're tough...' Halfway through my sentence I heard a scream in my head, What are you thinking? So I adjusted. 'Well, William, you are tough, but you're not free. You're not in prison, but you're still a prisoner. Behind every shadow there's someone waiting to kill you.'
"Somehow William's normal approach to life, one of violence and retaliation, was restrained that day. He listened, and we established a strange kind of friendship. I wish I could tell you that William's life changed that day or that it changed some other day in the future, but best I can tell, William's life never changed. But what did happen I'll never forget. William became my John the Baptist, who would prepare the way for me throughout the streets of south Dallas. He often boasted that he and I were friends because, as he would put it, he was radical for evil and I was radical for God" (Erwin R. McManus, Seizing Your Divine Moment (Thomas Nelson Publishers: Nashville, Tennessee, 2002), 128-130).
McManus took a risk. Rather than cowering at the threats of impending death by a crazy-man, he confronted William head-on. Now you may think that he's out of his mind -- that he's just plain stupid for doing what he did -- but the reality is he faced his fears with the boldness and strength that can only come from God. McManus seized a divine moment that was given him by God, and the result was an open door of opportunity for the gospel to spread into the inner city of Dallas, Texas.
(From a sermon by Eric Lenhart, Seizing Your Divine Moment, 8/16/2010)
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