No Way, Yeah But, And Whatever You Say

(why do I get the feeling everyone is staring at me right now?  )

Errrrrrr.

Yeah but gets you nowhere.

God does not want to hear an excuse,

Even if it is a great one.

God wants our obedience and trust.

He will figure out the details.

Okay, let’s lower that limbo stick a bit.

How many people honestly give a tithe to the church?

That is 10% of you income as a sacrifice to God?

Why not? You have been told to in God’s word?

Yet only 2% of Christians tithe.

Yeah but I have a great reason not to!

I am sure you do.

So do I!

But God is not interested in our yeah buts.

God is interested in our obedience and trust

Knowing that he will take care of us.

I heard of one church that offered a money back guarantee on people’s tithes.

If after one year, you do not believe that God is honoring his part of the deal,

We will give you back your money.

If you do not see with your own two eyes that ninety percent of your money blessed by God

Will go farther than 100% that you hang on to yourself…

We will give you back your money.’

In all the years they have had this policy,

not one person has ever asked for there money back.

Why?

God is faithful.

Are we willing to follow what he asks us to do?

Or do we stand and find all the many excellent excuses to

Yeah but him, in Jesus case, literally to death.

Now, I have only given you 3 cases of where we “yeah but”

God, but there are far more ways than that.

Each and every one of us has done it,

And many of us will continue.

That is the difference between a follower and a disciple.

A follower is willing to give God a little bit of their lives,

Probably out of guilt, and then a bunch of excuses

For all the things that God has asked of them that seem unreasonable.

People of God,

God is not reasonable.

At least, not to our human way of understanding.

God does not ask us to reason with him.

He asks us to follow us on the journey that he has set out for us.

Now, I told you there were three types of people.

We have heard from the “no ways”

And we have heard from the “yeah butters”

Both of these people got similar responses from Jesus.

Goodbye.

But then there was the third type.

The “whatever you say” folks.

Now, are these great and powerful people of God

Who understand the greatest mysteries of the universe, spirituality,

And God himself’s very mind heart and soul?

Hardly.

The third type in this story is once again the bumbling disciples

Who do not have any clue what Jesus is about or what he is up to.

Once again they get it all wrong.

“Shall we cause fire to fall down from heaven?”

No John, don’t even go there.

“Shall we have the fire consume them”

No James. And quit playing with matches.

I told you earlier that I would come back to talking about

Jesus being completely alone,

Even in the midst of his closest friends.

They did not understand him.

They didn’t have the slightest clue.

In fact, when we repeatedly keep seeing the most outrageous and bizzare

Responses from these people.

Why on earth would Jesus surround himself with this band of idiots?

We have already heard the answer several times this morning.