Hope In A Strange Land

Does anybody in here know what it’s like to FEEL OUT OF PLACE?

I do....

One day a few years back....When I was working in the Retail Business....

We had driven to Memphis, TN for a Hardware Convention.....

Bobby and Teresa were in their SUV leading the way.....

.... and Debra and I were following them in a Truck with a 26ft van box on the back.....

We’re just riding along in downtown Memphis....

....when folks began STARING and POINTING as us.....

....and the other drivers were giving us some really STRANGE LOOKS.....

Come to find out...We were driving the WRONG WAY down a ONE WAY street....

Talk about feeling OUT OF PLACE......I Did.....

...It wasn’t MY FAULT....of course.....

I was just FOLLOWING Bobby.......He led me the wrong way.....

He said "I can’t believe you just followed me down that one way street."

but see the problem was this.....

I didn’t KNOW where I was going.....

and when you don’t know where you’re going....It’s EASY to go the WRONG WAY.....

It’s easy to just go with the flow and do what everybody else is doing....

and If you’re not CAREFUL....

you’ll not only NOT GET WHERE YOU WANT TO BE....

but You’ll end up going the wrong direction Altogether.....

And you don’t to be LOST to do it....

I wasn’t LOST ...technically........I knew where I was.....

I was in Downtown Memphis

But I didn’t know How to Get to Where I wanted to Go.....

Some of you hearing this message today are in that same Place SPIRITUALLY.....

You know WHERE you are....but you don’t know HOW to get where you want to go.....

And You FEEL OUT OF PLACE.....

...Maybe you Feel as if you, are in a STRANGE LAND

Maybe because of circumstances or situations around you.....

...you are feeling Insecure, confused or even Rejected....

...Maybe you feel inhibited, stifled or even paralyzed.....

and Maybe You’ve lost all hope that It can be BETTER.....

...some of you have all but stopped trying....

That’s what happened to God’s People when Psalm 137 was written....

Let’s read the first 4 verses.....

Psalms 137:1-4 By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.

2 We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.

3 For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

4 How shall we sing the LORD’S song in a strange land?

God’s people had been taken hostage and NOW they were slaves in a foreign land.....

...the land of Babylon....

Babylon is the Greek equivalent of the Hebrew word Babel....and it means CONFUSION.....

So the people of God were held in bondage in CONFUSION......(think about that)

and as they thought about how things "Used to Be.....how they OUGHT to Be"......

..they just sat down and wept.....

These were God’s people and they were used to the good life....

They had been living in God’s Promised Land....

...they were used to singing and rejoicing.....

...they were used to being free and living in God’s Blessing.....

But now, they had lost their Homes and their freedom......

And they had forgotten who they really were.....

They were stuck in a STRANGE LAND of Confusion......

And they did what so many folks do when they don’t know what to do......

they Paralyzed their future while they longed for the past....

and all it did was make them MISERABLE......

They said in verse 1 "we wept, when we remembered Zion."

To them Zion was JUST a place....

To the Israelites Zion represented a Way of Being.....

It was their place of Strength, Security and Honor.....

It was their place of Pride and Self Satisfaction.....

....but Zion is MORE than a JUST a Place.....

It was the place that represented the Presence of God......

Isaiah 8:18 talks about the "LORD of host which dwells in mount Zion"

It’s not that He LIVED there and there alone.....but.......

God had chosen to meet them at Zion........

He had put His Presence there......

It was their Point of Contact.....

Zion was to be their point of Communion with God.....

It’s where they should have gotten Acquainted with Him.....

...to learn the HOW and the WHY of His ways.....

Zion was to them what Jesus is to us.....

He is our Way to the Father’s Presence.......

In Jesus we come into Contact with God.........we see God and learn about Him.....

Through Jesus we come into RELATIONSHIP with God Himself.....

and it’s In Christ we Live and Move and Have our Being.....

John 1:4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

They had been living in Zion but Zion was never Living in them.....