Introduction:
A. Eight years ago, back in January of 2006, I preached a series called “Extreme Makeover – God Edition.”
1. At the time, the Extreme Makeover television shows were very popular.
2. You might recall that the Extreme Makeover show took ordinary people and put them through plastic surgery, exercise regimens, and hair and wardrobe transformations.
a. The show ran for five years from 2002 to 2007.
3. The Extreme Makeover – Home Edition show with Ty Pennington that took less fortunate families and schools and did complete overhauls or reconstructions ran from 2003 to 2012.
4. Both of those television shows have been canceled, but the good news is that God is still in the business of extreme makeovers.
5. At the time I originally preached this series, someone said to me, “You should preach this series at the beginning of every year.”
6. I obviously have not done that, but I have decided to rework and revise the series and present it again, starting with today’s sermon.
7. So let’s start with today’s topic: “Change is Possible!”
B. The story is told of a man who observed a very peculiar thing happening as he visited town one day.
1. Two men who worked for the city were busy at work.
2. One man would dig a hole, walk a few yards, dig another hole, walk a few more yards, etc.
3. The second man would come behind the first man and fill in the hole that had just been dug, walk a few yards, fill the next hole, and so on.
4. These actions were quite puzzling.
5. So, the man visiting town came up and asked the workers, “I really appreciate how hard you two are working, but why are you digging a hole only to have your partner come behind you and fill it?”
6. The worker replied, “Oh, yeah, I guess it must look pretty funny. What you need to know is that my job is to dig the holes, and this other guy’s job is to fill in the holes, but unfortunately, the guy whose job it is to plant the trees is sick today.”
C. As crazy as those men’s actions might seem to us, so our actions often seem to others.
1. Many of us keep doing the same foolish things over and over again, even though we don’t like the results.
2. We often get so stuck in ruts and patterns, and even though we might want to change, and try to change, everything remains the same.
D. What I want to proclaim as boldly as I can and with as much conviction as I can muster is the fact that really profound life-change is possible.
1. I know that such a statement sounds too good to be true, but it is true.
2. There is a reason that the self-help industry is a multi-billion dollar enterprise.
3. There is a reason that when you channel surf you find an infomercial on every other channel promising that you can just write a check and you will experience profound change.
4. Those marketers know that inherent in every human heart is the desire to be a better person.
5. We all want to change something about ourselves…maybe it is to stop smoking, or start exercising, or to get control of our finances, or to be more organized, or to control our tongue.
6. That’s why many of us make New Year’s Resolutions every year even through many are often forgotten or abandoned before February arrives.
7. We do want to change. We do want to be better than we are in one way or another. Right?
E. I want to invite you to explore with me over the next few weeks what God’s Word says about making change.
1. As we get started I want to point out two traps to avoid.
I. Beware of the Traps
A. First of all, beware of the trap of denying the need for life-change.
1. For a behavior to become addicting, it first has to be denied.
2. The path to becoming better always begins with ruthless honesty.
3. How in the world can we get to where we want to be if we won’t admit to where we are right now?
4. John writes in 1 John 1:8, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”
5. I hope that none of us here today are falling for this trap. I know that I need life change, and my guess is that you know that you need life change as well.
6. What happens many times is that we don’t fall for the first trap – denying that we need to change, but we fall into the second trap.
B. Second, beware of the trap of deciding that real change is impossible.
1. If you are like me, then you have tried to change things in your life only to fail.
2. And so many times we try and fail, and then we try again and harder and fail, and then we just resign ourselves to the fact that we cannot change.
3. But what I want us to learn is that the key is not to try harder. The key is trying humbler.
4. Real change is possible when we surrender to God, putting pride aside, and asking God to take over.
5. Consider again the TV show Extreme Makeover: Home Addition as an illustration.
6. If you know anything about that show you know that the family being helped is in a desperate situation, but someone from the outside comes to the rescue.
7. The extreme makeover team can see the possibilities, and they have both the ability and resources to come in and make a difference.
8. God is willing and able to do the same in our lives. He sees possibilities that we cannot. He has ability and resources that we lack. He can and does make the difference.
9. Just as our Scripture reading today says, “For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.” (Phil. 2:13)
10. I believe that real life change is possible through Jesus Christ and His influence.
11. Many of us could stand up here today and testify to the difference God has made in our lives
12. God certainly loves us right where we are, but he loves us too much to let us stay there.
C. So, let’s not fall for these two traps.
1. Let’s admit that we need to change. And let’s believe that change is possible.
2. Once we are doing those two things then we are ready to begin making the trip.
II. Begin the Trip
A. Let’s take a journey down the road to the kind of life that God wants us to have.
1. As we begin that life-changing journey we need to realize that there are three attitudes that will determine how successful we are.
2. Jesus told a story in Luke 15 about a father who had two sons – Parable of the Prodigal Son.
3. The younger son did not want to wait around for his dad to die to receive his inheritance, so he asked his dad if he could have it immediately.
4. Although I’m sure his father was hurt by this request, he nonetheless granted his son’s request.
5. Let me read part of the story, “Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything. When he came to his senses, he said, ‘How many of my father's hired men have food to spare, and here I am starving to death! I will set out and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son; make me like one of your hired men.' So he got up and went to his father.” (Luke 15:11-20)
6. That boy took a trip that all of us need to take regularly.
7. That boy had three shifts in his attitude that made that trip possible and productive.
B. First of all he said to himself, “I have not been thinking straight.”
1. The Bible says that he “came to his senses.”
2. Making real change always begins with changed thinking.
3. Behind all our sinful, destructive actions and behaviors are distorted and destructive thoughts.
4. You can’t just tell a workaholic to work less. There is a reason tucked away in his or her brain that is telling him or her to work so much.
a. The thought may be something like – “I’m only worth what I can accomplish or acquire.”
b. As long as he or she thinks this way, then they will be driven by their need to be somebody
5. The rebellious teenager is often acting out because of their belief that they have no value and that no one really cares.
a. And so they act in a way that confirms that belief.
6. The younger son in Jesus’ story had not been thinking straight and needed to come to his senses.
a. He had fallen for the oldest lie in the book – you are not free until you are your own master and get to call your own shots.
b. Did he end up free? Not at all!
7. None of us make good gods. When we follow our own rules we end up in the pig pen!
8. Jesus declared, “You shall know the truth. And the truth shall set you free!” (Jn. 8:32)
9. If we don’t learn to think straight, then we will continue to stay stuck.
C. Second, the son said to himself, “I must not blame anything or anyone else.”
1. He could have blamed his older brother, who is his mind might have always mistreated him.
2. He could have blamed his father, who in his mind hadn’t raised him right, or hadn’t treated him as fairly as he had his brother. Maybe his father hadn’t loved him as much as his older brother.
3. He could have blamed God for causing his terrible famine. He would have been fine if it wasn’t for this famine.
4. He could have blamed and blamed and blamed and stayed stuck in the mud.
5. All that blaming does for us is guarantee a continued cycle of stuckness.
6. That’s not what happened in this case. The young man got his thinking straight, looked in the mirror and saw the real problem. He said, “The real problem is me.”
7. He thought to himself, “I have sinned against heaven and against you.”
8. Life-change demands that we take responsibility for our bad choices.
9. We will never be a victor as long as we are playing the victim.
10. So, he got up and his went to his father and said, “I have sinned.”
11. That’s called confession. Confession doesn’t just mean that we are sorry. Confession is saying, “I did it and I was wrong.”
12. Confession doesn’t allow us to protect our ego. We can’t protect our ego and have a heart makeover at the same time.
13. When we are ready to stop blaming, then we are ready to start changing.
D. Finally, he said to himself, “I don’t have to stay where I am.”
1. I like what one person said, “Though you cannot go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new end.”
2. The boy in Jesus’ story refused to stay stuck in the mud. He said, “I will set out and go back to my father.”
3. Why do people stay stuck? Why do we hate where we are, but we stay there anyhow?
4. One reason is because we allow our problems to become our identity.
a. We say, “I’m just an alcoholic. I’m just a weak person. I’m just a hot-tempered fool.”
b. We let where we are, become who we are.
c. And we wouldn’t know who to be if we didn’t have the thing we are stuck in any longer.
5. Another reason we stay stuck is because if we try to change, then we will have to accept responsibility, but if we stay stuck then we can continue to blame others.
6. A final reason we stay stuck is because, even though it may hurt where we are, if we try to change and fail, then it will hurt even more.
E. Now let me encourage you to listen carefully at this point, because what I’m going to say is very important.
1. Notice that Jesus didn’t say that this boy took a shower, cleaned himself up, bought a new set of clothes and then went home.
2. He did not go home looking better than when he left.
3. No, he was stinky, dirty and penniless, when he got up and went to his father.
4. His father accepted him in that state. Not because of the boy’s perfection, but because of his direction!
5. When we come to God we can’t promise him that we will never mess up again, but we can declare that we want to change direction.
F. Ultimately, why do you think that boy had a change of heart? Because he knew something about the heart of his father.
1. Let’s finish the story. Jesus said, “But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him.”
2. His father saw him while he was a long way off. He was a long way from where he needed to be, who he needed to be, who his daddy wanted him to be.
3. But nevertheless, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him. He did the unthinkable: he ran to his son, threw his arms around his boy and covered him with kisses.
4. His father didn’t give him the cold shoulder, or the stern look with crossed arms, or a long lecture.
5. Rather than those things, his father gave him amazing grace and mercy!
G. The reason that some of us stay stuck and don’t go home to our Heavenly Father, is because we really don’t know him.
1. God has been the victim of a terrible propaganda campaign.
2. The real God has been smeared and distorted.
3. But the more we really get to know the God whom Jesus came to tell us about, then the less we are willing to stay away from him.
4. These statements of King David in Ps. 103 are echoed throughout the Bible: “The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him; for he knows how we are formed, he remembers that we are dust.” (Ps. 103:8-14)
5. God knows us. He is not expecting perfection, but he is looking for the right direction.
6. And God is not some casual observer. He is standing and watching. And the second we take a step in his direction, he will come running to meet us.
7. When we really know God as he really is, we will never be the same.
H. I believe that every one of us in this room can change, and the reason that I know that is because God never changes.
1. I don’t care where we have been, what we have done, how stuck we are, or how loathsome we feel about ourselves.
2. I’m telling you that our Father in heaven absolutely and passionately loves you and me
3. And he is relentless in his commitment to help us become who he knows we can be.
I. Allow me to end with a story that was in the news the summer of 2005. People Magazine titled the story “The Gun, the Son and a Father’s Love.”
1. A man named Dan Cummings has a son named Daniel.
a. Daniel had been a very good boy throughout his life. He graduated from High School in 2003.
b. But as graduation approached, suddenly Daniel began to act differently, strangely.
c. He seemed disinterested and lethargic.
d. One night Daniel went out and didn’t come home.
e. Dan received a call from the police saying that Daniel was in jail for stealing a gun and selling it to a drug dealer.
f. Dan discovered that Daniel had tried cocaine just 6 weeks earlier, and in just 6 weeks his life had come apart.
2. A trial took place.
a. Dan heard a judge sentence his son to prison for 10 years.
b. Florida has a law saying that if you sell guns to drug dealers, you do time.
c. The judge scolded Daniel, saying that that gun is probably being used right now to kill people.
3. Dan Cummings could not accept his son’s fate, and dedicated the next year of his life to getting Daniel out of jail.
a. Dan, who runs a bait and tackle shop, spent his $50,000 of life savings on lawyers, but an appellate court denied Daniel’s appeal.
b. But Dan refused to give up. Then an idea came to Dan.
c. Daniel’s mother, Diane Cummings said, “In my husband’s mind, if the judge said it’s because of this gun, then maybe if I can get it back, he’ll change his mind.”
d. As far as Dan could see, the only way to get the gun back was to enter the world where Daniel had sold it.
e. So, without telling the police, he began searching for Daniel’s drug dealer.
f. He was chased by dangerous people, had to pay others he had no reason to trust for information, but after months of looking, Dan Cummings successfully located the drug dealer and convinced him to sell the gun back to him.
4. Then at Daniel Cummings very last mitigation opportunity, Dan’s father walked up to the bench and handed the gun to the judge.
a. He said, “Now that drug dealer can’t kill anyone with the gun my son sold him. Please have mercy on my boy.”
b. The court administrator Barbara Hinkle said, “It was the most extraordinary thing I have ever seen. My heart stopped. I couldn’t breath. What passion, what love to go out and do that for your son…The judge was getting a little misty and tears were running down my face.”
c. The judge relented, suspending Daniel’s Cummings sentence to time served and put him on probation for its remainder.
d. Dan could not wait to hug his son. He said, “As I was running to him, I was asking permission, but I had my arms around him before the judge ever got a chance to say, ‘yes’.”
5. The last report about Daniel says that he has remained drug-free and now counsels kids about the dangers of drug use.
a. Daniel experienced profound life-change. That’s what happens when you find out how much your father loves you. That’s something that all of us need to discover about our Heavenly Father!
b. Real change is possible, because God loves us and will help us to change using God’s unlimited wisdom and power in the process.
c. But real life-change starts with us changing our thinking and coming to our Heavenly Father for help.
Resources:
My original sermon series in 2006 was based on a sermon series by Rick Atchley.
