Heaven Is A Place On Earth - Dr. Michael Wittmer

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Dr. Michael Wittmer, ReCAST Guest Speaker; Heaven Is A Place On Earth

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It is great to be back with you again, and what an exciting young church where you value the gospel, and there's so many places today where that's being lost.
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It's great to see a birth of a church that does not compromise, and great to see
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Don, and you know you're blessed to have a young man who is serious about Jesus and the church.
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So many churches today and new pastors that it's almost a silliness that's out there, and what to have people realize that this something's at stake, they have a man of God who is serious about Jesus and the
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Bible. So I'm glad to be here on part two, in January I did part one, so I've never done a series this far apart, but there's actually a part three and a part four, so I do it this way so in case you like it maybe
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I can go back in three more months and do part three. So we're not going to finish it up today, but we're going to try and have each part be self -contained.
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But part one, way back in January, we talked about the Bible being a story of creation, fall, and redemption.
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So Genesis 1 and 2 begins with creation, Genesis 3 through 11 is the fall and the fallout of the fall, and then
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Genesis 12 through Revelation 22, it's a story of redemption. The empire strikes back.
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God comes and restores this good world that he has made, and the cross and the resurrection and redemption is the most important thing in the
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Bible. And we're not going to get there today, that's for part three and part four, but we're going to talk more about creation.
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Not because creation is the most important part, but because you really can't appreciate the wonder and the fullness of the cross and the resurrection and redemption if you don't have a healthy appreciation for this world and ourselves that God has made.
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So last time in January, we talked just about the world, this creation that God has made. Today we want to talk about what it means to be human, why we're here.
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And so just to give you the big overview, God made this world, he made it good, he put us here as his image bearers to steward this world on his behalf.
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Our sin has smashed us as image bearers, it's ravaged us, it's dehumanized us, it's made us less than full image bearers of God.
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It's also rippled out and destroyed all of this creation. Jesus, the true human, the God -man, has come to restore us as image bearers and restore all of this world.
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So today we're just going to finish up the first part of creation and discuss what it means to be human. So on your handout, last time we said creation is good, everything
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God made is good, with a possible exception of cats. You know
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I'm right about that. You know I'm right. You're in denial.
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We have a first unrepentant sinner over here. Everything God made is good and this world is also our home.
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We are Adam. We come from the Adamah. We are earthlings for heaven's sake.
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That's who we are. We belong here. So now let's talk about what it means to be human. There are three big purposes for the meaning of life.
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First, God has put us here to love him. Look at Matthew chapter 13. If you have your
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Bibles, Matthew chapter 13 and verse 44. Jesus says,
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The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
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Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls. When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.
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Jesus says, God and his kingdom is the pearl of great price. We as human beings, we have a body and we have a soul.
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But both our bodies and our soul are part of creation. Sometimes we confuse us and God.
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We think God is spirit, I have a spirit, therefore there's this spark of deity within me.
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As if there's this God -like part of you. We are like God, but you don't have any part of deity within you.
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God is eternal. No part of you is eternal. Your soul didn't always exist out there somewhere, and then when your body was conceived,
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God put your soul in your body. Your soul and your body were conceived at the very same time.
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Now we know that our souls will go on and live even after we're dead. But not because they have to.
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Not because even God can't annihilate them. The God that made your soul from nothing could turn your soul back to nothing again.
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Now he won't, and we know he won't because we have his word. He has promised us that we will live forever.
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So what we have is everlasting life. But we, body and soul, are entirely a part of the natural world.
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There is no divine spark, no divine part within you. There's no part of us that is
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God. God is up there, and we are down here. That's the first point of all theology.
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And yet, even though we are entirely a part of this natural world, we will never be satisfied with anything here.
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Augustine said in the Confessions, God, you have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until we find our rest in you.
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So even though we are entirely creatures, entirely this natural world, nothing here will ultimately satisfy us.
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We have this God -shaped vacuum that will only be ever satisfied when we know and love
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God. God is the pearl of great price. Jesus says, what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his soul?
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So the kingdom is the pearl of great price. But while we're in Matthew, look up at verse 33. Jesus told them another parable, the kingdom of heaven is also like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough.
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There's a tension here, right? God and his kingdom is the pearl of great price.
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Nothing here matters compared to God. And yet Jesus said God and his kingdom is also leaven or yeast, which means to permeate and transform and change this world.
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Feel the tension there? God matters more than anything else in this creation.
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But because of God, everything in this creation now matters, right?
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If you love someone, what do you love? You tend to love what they love.
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You take an interest in what they love. Because I love my children, I know more Pop -Tart flavors.
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And Hannah Montana songs than a man my age should. If you love
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God, what does God love? God loves the world. So you feel that tension?
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We must love God more than anything else in this world. But if you really love
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God, you also take an interest in this world. Because God made it. God cares about it.
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But it's this world which is the target of God's redemption. So we sing a song, and we should.
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Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim.
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That's the pearl, right? In light of Jesus, everything here should grow strangely dim.
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But we should sing a second verse. Turn your eyes upon Jesus, and the things on earth will grow strangely significant.
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It's both. God is the pearl of great price. But God in his kingdom is also leaven, which means to permeate this world.
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And we need to, there's a tension there we need to embrace. I think we may not have this economic crisis if we were more aware of the tension.
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I think in the typical American evangelical church, we only ever talk about the pearl, and we should talk about the pearl, but we forget about the leaven, the yeast part.
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And so everyone knows I should read my Bible and pray, and share my faith, and of course we should.
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And yet, I don't think we appreciate that God cares about the rest of my life as well.
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I make that point in the handout. God must permeate our lives, he's not merely a priority.
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If you make God number one, then you make God something you can check off.
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If God's number one, then you wake up in the morning, you read your Bible, pray, check. I'd serve
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God today. Now the rest of the day is for me. I give a tithe to my church, check.
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The rest of the money, that's for me. I come Sunday, give that to God, check. Now the rest of the week, that's my time.
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God is number one, he's the pearl of great price, but he can't be merely number one, something you can check off the list.
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God and his kingdom is the hub of a wheel, and all the spokes of your life must be permeated with love and service for God.
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So God cares that we read our Bible and pray, and we should do it more than we do. But he cares just as much how we treat our spouses, and our kids, and our parents, and our neighbors, and our co -workers.
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It all counts now. There are no time -outs in a Christian life. It all matters to God.
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What if Christians in America realized that? What if Christians realized, I shouldn't buy more than I can afford, because Jesus Christ is
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Lord of my money, not just of my heart. What if Christian mortgage brokers said,
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I will not give you a loan I know you can't pay for. That would be unloving. What if just the Christians in this country realized that Jesus Christ was
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Lord of all, which means he's Lord of what they buy. If just the
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Christians acted like Christians, we wouldn't have had this huge economic crisis.
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So of course we must love God more, and we'll never be satisfied with anything down here.
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Only God can satisfy. But if you really love God, he will be Lord of every part of you, including money, work, the whole shebang.
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So we're here first to love God. We're also here to serve others. Look at Genesis chapter 1, the first or second page of your
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Bible. In Genesis 127, we read that God created man in his own image.
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In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them.
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Notice there are three phrases there. The first two are basically saying the same thing, just in reverse. God made us in his image.
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But the third line, there's an explanatory tag. God made us, but instead of image, the words male and female are there.
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God is telling us that being in his image means to be male and female.
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Any ideas why that would be? Why don't we image God alone?
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Why do we image God as male and female? Why do we image God in community, in relationship?
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Isn't it because God is a trinity? God is not just a singular person.
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We often think of God like that in the West. When you think of God, you often maybe think of the
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Sistine Chapel and the solitary figure pointing to Adam. God is not a single being.
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He's a single person. He is a single being, one essence, but he's three persons.
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And this three -person God made us in his image. If God is a trinity, that means he is a community of self -giving lovers.
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Our triune God is three persons who always set aside what might be in their best interest to serve the other.
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So Jesus prays in Gethsemane, not my will, but your will be done.
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Was that a new prayer? Did the Father say, whoa, where'd that come from? Or when
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Jesus said that, was he just saying what he has always said to the Father? Not my will, but your will.
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I have come to do your will. And the Spirit obeys the Father and the Son. They sent him.
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We have three persons who always set aside what might be in their best interest to serve the other.
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They're committed to each other. They never quit on each other. Can you imagine the Son saying, that's it.
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Why do I always get the hard jobs? I'm out of here. Or the Spirit say, well, at least they notice you.
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Thank me for the Pentecostals. I'm out of here. I quit. No, they'll never do that, right?
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They're three persons that are always committed to each other. And this God has made us in his image, and we flourish and we thrive like the triune
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God when we imitate this self -giving love. I want to go back to Matthew quickly.
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Matthew chapter 16 and verse 24. Many of you know this verse. For some of you, it may be your life verse.
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Matthew 16, 24. Jesus said to his disciples, if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.
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For whoever wants to save his life will lose it. But whoever loses his life for me will find it.
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For most of my life, I thought Jesus was offering there the big trade. Every missionary conference when
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I was in high school and college ended the same way. Do you enjoy living in America? Do you like having
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NFL whenever you want it? Do you like being close to your family and friends? Well, do you? Well, then come forward, put your all on the altar, and tell
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God you go to the worst, furthest, God -forsaken place. You'll be miserable just to prove you're committed.
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So yeah, you're going to have a horrible life now, but it'll be worth it. Because in the next life, you'll get all these rewards.
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I don't think that's what Jesus is saying. I think he's saying, if you want to find your life, you have to lose it.
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Not you have to be miserable now so you can flourish in the next life, but be like me.
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You want to live? You want to flourish? Be like the triune God who's made you in his image. We have always denied ourselves to serve the other, and when you deny yourself, you flourish too.
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It sounds counterintuitive, but don't you know it's true? Think of your happiest days, the nights when your head hit the pillow, you had this broad, wide grin.
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You just were so happy to be alive. Weren't they days you didn't live for yourself?
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You set aside what you had planned, and you did something for someone else. You helped them move, helped them shingle a roof.
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You drove 300 miles just to wish your friend a happy birthday, to surprise them.
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Crazy, unexpected, uncalled for, extravagant. And on that night, you felt, wow, today
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I live for somebody else. I feel alive. Because on that day, you lived like the triune
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God who made you in his image. Our triune God is a trinity. He is a community of self -giving lovers, and he made us.
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We are wired to flourish when we do that too. And by the way, Martin Luther said, your number one neighbor is your spouse.
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It's easy to give and serve people you don't see very often, but the people you live with, that's the real test.
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One of the real tests of your Christian life is how easy are you to live with? Do we serve?
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Do we give ourselves to others? That's the test. So God has put us here to know him and love him, to serve our neighbor, starting at home.
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And then I want to spend most of the time on this third relationship. He's also put us here to govern this creation.
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That's what it means to be in God's image. Look back to Genesis chapter 1. We'll keep going back and forth between Matthew and Genesis.
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In Genesis 1 .28, we read about how God made us in his image.
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When Genesis was written in the ancient Near East, kings said, we are in the image of God.
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We represent God to all the regular people. Genesis 1 is actually a very subversive, counter -cultural chapter.
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Genesis is saying, it's not just the kings that image God. We all image God. We all represent
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God to this world. In Genesis 1 .28, God gives us five commands as human beings.
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God blessed them and said to them, Adam and Eve, be fruitful, increase in number, and fill the earth.
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Be fruitful, increase in number, and fill the earth. Those same three commands God gives to the animals in verse 22.
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But the last two commands, to subdue the world and rule over it, God reserves those commands just for us as image bearers.
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Notice this command comes before Genesis 3. This is not a part of the fall.
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This is the very first command God ever gave us as human beings. To subdue the world, to rule over it.
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He's never taken it back. He elaborates on it in Genesis 2 .15. The Lord God took the man and put him in the
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Garden of Eden to work it and to take care of it. Another little tension there.
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God told Adam to work the garden, to develop it, and the
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Hebrew word there is abad. It's the same word for slave, to serve, serve the garden. And also to shamar, guard, take care of it, protect it.
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God wants us to guard, to protect this creation, but also to develop it, to take it someplace.
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God gave Adam and Eve this wonderful, good world. And if I were
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God, I think I would say, Guys, here's this great world. Just don't break anything. But God didn't.
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He said, Here's this great world. Now you develop it. You serve it. You work it. You take it someplace.
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And we have, haven't we? Human culture is what a human does with the raw materials of creation.
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So, clothes. It's taking the raw materials of wool and cotton and weaving it and turning it into clothes.
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Musical instruments. You take the metals of the earth's crust and you pound it and turn it into trombones and trumpets and guitars.
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Every part of creation. Computers. It's sand. It's silicone.
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They took the sand on the beach and made iPads out of it. Anyone have an iPad?
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Get with it, people. Come on, it's been a week already. Now wait until the price comes down. You're probably smart.
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Thrifty. West Michigan. Dutch, probably, right? But we've gone a long way with culture.
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And that's the first command God ever gave us. Drop down letter B there. The reformers called this calling or vocation.
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Let me tell you, explain it with Martin Luther's life. In Martin Luther's day, in the Middle Ages, the Roman Catholics had a two -tiered level of piety.
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There was a normal piety for most folks, but a higher one for the spiritual people. So in the medieval
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Roman Catholic system, marriage was good. It's even a sacrament in the church. But if you really want to please
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God, you'll go higher and you'll take the vow of celibacy. Money is good.
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But if you really want to please God, you'll go higher and you'll take the vow of poverty. So the monks were the more spiritual people, the elite.
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They were really committed to God. Well, Martin Luther was serious about pleasing God, so he said, that's me.
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I'm going to forsake the world and become a monk. And he was the best monk he knew he possibly could be.
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But it was never enough. He said, even though I've went higher, I've given up marriage and money,
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I'm spending all my time trying to pray and please this holy God, it's never enough.
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How can you do enough to satisfy a holy God? And then by studying the Bible, Luther had the
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Reformation breakthrough that, you know, you can't. You don't ever work to satisfy
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God. God's favor, his acceptance is something you receive. Because of Jesus Christ, who paid the price and rose again on our behalf, we are covered in him.
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So I don't earn my righteousness. I don't earn God's favor. I receive it. It's a gift from him.
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And Luther said, wow, that's it. And he wrote this great little piece called The Freedom of a
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Christian, which Luther said, if you understand this book, you get the Reformation. He said, before I was a
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Protestant, before I had my breakthrough, I was this good monk trying to satisfy a holy
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God. But now that I realize I'm accepted just as I am, I have a lot of time on my hands.
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I don't have to spend my resources on me. I'm now free to love my neighbor.
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And so Luther and then Calvin followed him, and they said, we're all called to follow Jesus. But our calling to follow
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Jesus takes various forms. We call them secondary callings. So for me,
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I'm a husband, and then a father, and a seminary professor, and a church member, and a neighbor, and a citizen, a brother, a child.
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These are all callings that I have before God. And I show my love for Jesus when
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I do these callings with all my might. Here's a quote from Os Guinness in his book, The Call. He says, calling is the truth that God calls us to himself so decisively that everything we are, everything we do, and everything we have is invested with a special devotion and dynamism lived out as a response to his summons and service.
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If you realize that in all of your secondary callings, you're really obeying your primary calling, you're showing love to Jesus, you realize that all callings count.
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They all matter. We have this terrible phrase in our circles. We talk about pastors and missionaries being full -time ministers, or full -time
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Christian servants. Really? So the rest of us are part -time or half -time?
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Aren't we all called to follow Jesus full -time? We tend to have, just like the medieval
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Roman Catholics, this two -tier level of piety. The pastors and missionaries are this higher plane, and the rest of us are just muddling through.
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And that's what really counts. So when I was five, my parents went on a short -term mission trip to Guatemala.
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And when they came back, my dad to this day would tell you that changed his life. And yet he learned that being a missionary wasn't for him.
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He went on and became a Finnish drywaller, the best in northeast Ohio. To this day, his pastor thought he had disobeyed
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God. He'd settled for second best. Well, I don't think so. I mean, being a missionary is great, but if you're not called to do that, if that's not your giftedness, if that's not your interest, there's no shame in being a drywaller.
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It counts. It matters. I have three brothers who are all in business, and my father's pastor told him recently, you must be so grateful that one of your sons is doing something of eternal significance.
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That'd be me. Who's got two thumbs and counts? This guy. What a horrible thing to say, right?
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So if you're in business, it doesn't matter. It all counts now. In fact, don't we need more?
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Look at America. Don't we need more Christian businessmen? Don't we need more Christians on Wall Street? We need
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Christians everywhere, like Levin transforming this creation. So we just have to stop thinking that if I'm not a pastor or a missionary, if I don't get paid to study the
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Bible and preach it, somehow I don't count as much. In fact, one of the dirty little secrets is pastors and missionaries have less contact with lost people.
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If you're a pastor or a professor like me, you spend all your time around Christians.
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It's work. It's hard to get out there and meet people that don't claim to follow Jesus. We desperately need people who are in the world rubbing shoulders with lost people because the people that are paid to study the
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Bible, it's hard to get out there and meet those people. We need each other. The point is that whatever your calling is, you don't have to feel like it's second rate.
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What matters is are you doing it out of love for God and Jesus and to serve your neighbor?
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If you are, look at the back. Just some quotes from, some salient quotes on this. The first quote from Gerald Manley Hopkins.
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Sounds like someone's overcompensating for something. Actually, he's a 19th century
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English poet. But I love this quote. He says, Look at the hands in prayer give God's glory, but a man with a dung fork in his hand, a woman with a slop pail give him glory too.
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God is so great that all things give him glory if you mean they should.
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Yesterday in the front page of the Grand Rapids Press, they had this article on the unemployed in Michigan.
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And one person was saying how frustrating it is to find a job. He said, quote, Even dishwashing jobs are hard to find.
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I thought that was an interesting quote. Here's a man who's out of work for two years. And in his mind, being a dishwasher is really low, low, about as low as you can get.
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Well, last night my wife and I were out to eat. I thank God for dishwashers. Imagine being in a restaurant without dishwashers.
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We need each other. All callings count. All callings matter.
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Martin Luther's quote from a sermon. He says, God cannot bear to see anyone neglect the duties of his calling or station in life in order to imitate the works of the saints.
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Here Luther is going after this sacred, secular distinction where only the missionaries and the pastors and the monks, they really count.
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The rest of us don't count as much. Luther says, What if a married woman had this idea and she decided to follow
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Anna in this respect, leave her husband and children, and go on a pilgrimage and pray and fast and go to church?
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All these spiritual things, these higher things. Luther says, fifth line there,
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She would do nothing else but tempt God, confound the matrimonial estate with the state of widowhood, desert her own calling, and do works belonging to others.
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This would be as much as walking on one's ears, putting a veil over one's feet and a boot on one's head, turning all things upside down.
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Good works should be done, and you ought to pray and fast, but you must not thereby be kept from or neglect the duties of your calling and station.
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So, this morning, a new father and mother. You're called to be the father and mother of that child.
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And that's a way you love Jesus and serve Him. And you don't have to feel bad where, let's say you've five hours of sleep you got last night.
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So you're groggy and you have this fog, and so your devotions go really badly someday.
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And you're just so tired to pray. You don't have to feel like, on this day I just didn't serve God today.
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If you are caring for that child, that's how you love Jesus. Of course you should read the
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Bible and pray, but don't be so hard on yourself that you think only those things matter. If you care for that child, when you go to work in the auto parts factory, you're making money to feed that child, that's how you love
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Jesus. It counts. All callings matter now. Luther, let her be there,
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Luther said we represent God to each other in our callings. Luther said we are the mask of God to each other.
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He says when someone helps you, which is good to know in a recession, when we help each other, that is
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God helping each other. And if you receive aid from someone, you thank that person. But you also realize that person is the mask of God.
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God is meeting my needs through that person. John Calvin said it this way,
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God does not always act in the nude. When we pray and ask
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God for things, very rarely do you see this naked arm reach down from the sky and plop the food on your table.
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My father, he was a drywall artist, and growing up he sent me and my three brothers to Christian school where we didn't often have a lot of money.
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And my dad said he would pray for money. And he said I never got a check in the mail. I never got some anonymous, obviously a
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God thing, answer to my prayer. What my dad got was phone calls. Hey, there's a hole in my ceiling.
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Can you come fix it? And my dad said that was as much God as if it was this anonymous gift in the mail.
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He's right. Calvin says God does not always act in the nude. But by using means, by using us to help each other,
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God is, as it were, dressed. We are God with clothes on.
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Just think of all the people doing their callings, even non -Christians who contributed to you and I being able to be here today and worship
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God. All the companies and factories with all the human resource people who made clothes and made cars.
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Anyone with a Toyota? Did it drive by a few times where it got slowed down enough to pull in?
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But people that made our cars, people that made the roads and the traffic light and the police that keep the laws in force.
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Literally thousands of people doing their callings contributed to us being able to worship
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Jesus this morning. And we thank them for that. And then with faith we see through them, and we thank
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Jesus for that. And when you do your calling, it shouldn't just be for the paycheck. It should be...
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That's important, especially in a recession. But I do this out of love for God because the first command
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God ever gave me was to guard, to steward, to develop this creation and to serve my neighbor.
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And if you can find where your calling does that, you will realize there's a divine nobility in your job.
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Even if it's just a dishwasher. You're not just washing dishes. You're serving people.
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Out of love for Jesus, it counts. That's why Paul can say in Colossians 3, whatever your hands find to do, do it with all your might.
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It is the Lord Jesus Christ you are serving. Why can Paul say it's the
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Lord Jesus Christ you're serving? Because in Colossians 1, he says Jesus Christ is the creator of all things.
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And if that's true, then Jesus is the one who in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 tells us to develop these raw materials out of love for him and to serve our neighbor.
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So all callings count. Just some other choice quotes from Luther. Luther says, a sermon in his home in Matthew 6, to serve
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God simply means to do what God has commanded. That was huge for Luther. Luther said, obedience to God is always obeying
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God's command. And you know what? Monks don't have a command. Show me in the Bible where it tells you to forsake the world and become a monk.
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So you look really spiritual. You look like you're the closest people to God. But you know what?
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You have no command from God. But the most insignificant maidservant, she has
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God's command. And so she can know better than a monk that she is obeying God, and it counts.
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He says, going on, if only we would accustom ourselves to this view, the entire world would be full of service to God, not only the churches but also the home, the kitchen, the cellar, the workshop, and the field of townsfolk and farmers.
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Next paragraph. In the light of this view of the matter, a poor maid shares the joy in her heart of being able to say, now
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I'm cooking, making the bed, sweeping the house. Who has commanded me to do this?
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My master has. Who has given him this authority over me? God has. Very well, then.
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It must be true. I am serving not them alone, but also God in heaven. God must be pleased with my service.
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How could I possibly be more blessed? Why, my service is equal to cooking for God in heaven.
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And the next large catechism ends the next little paragraph. Luther says, if you understand this, you will gain a treasure such as all who pass for the greatest saints do not have.
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You please God when you obey his command. And the first command God ever gave you as a human being is, guard this creation and develop it.
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Serve me, serve your neighbor. No matter how insignificant you think your calling might be, if you can see how it develops creation, guards it, and serves your neighbor, you are obeying
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Jesus. And it will be rewarded by God just as much as if you were a missionary or a monk or a pastor.
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All callings count. So we should find out what we enjoy, what we're good at, and what does the world need.
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If you can find where those things intersect, you can find your calling from God and know that it counts.
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It all matters. A couple other thoughts I had on calling is, our most important callings tend to be the ones we're not paid for.
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Like spouse or parents or church members. And we all have various callings, and the callings that we have aren't all equal.
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Being a spouse and a parent and a church member, those are more important than any other callings you have.
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Not every calling is equal, but all should be done well. A thought on not every calling being equal.
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I think there are some jobs out there that if you're a Christian committed to Jesus, you're not going to be the best in that field.
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Take an NFL head coach. The time that's so consuming. They sleep in their office on cots.
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If you're a Christian sold out to Jesus, you probably can't be a great first -rate
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NFL head coach. Maybe that's why Tony Dungy finally said, you know what, I quit. I can't do this. It's not worth it.
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There are some fields where you have to say, you know what, maybe the best
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I can be as a Christian is a B, because I'm committed to my church, to my family, to my spouse, to my children.
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And this is not an excuse to be lazy, but if you are getting promoted all the time at work, it may be because you're forsaking some other more important callings.
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So you have to have this tension. Not all callings are equally important, but all callings do matter.
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The Apostle Paul made tents to support his missionary efforts. Paul was mostly interested in being a missionary, getting the gospel out.
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But I'm pretty sure Paul made good tents. Even though he wasn't put on this earth to make tents.
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I think if you bought a tent from Paul, it didn't leak. Jesus, the Son of God, came to this world to save us, but while he was here, he worked with his father in his shop.
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Now, I don't know for sure this is true, but Askinos in his book, The Call, says this. I like Askinos a lot, but he never documents his sources.
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He just says things. So I don't know if this is true, but it probably is true.
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It should be true anyway. But Askinos says, Justin Martyr, who was a 2nd century Greek apologist, one of our early forefathers.
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Justin Martyr, writing in the middle of the 2nd century, said there are plows that were made by Jesus and his father
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Joseph that are still being used in Palestine. Probably true.
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Jesus did not come to make plows, but I bet he made good ones. And it wouldn't shock me if long after Jesus ascended into heaven, farmers are still plowing with the plows that Jesus made.
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I can't find that, but As said it, so let's just say it's true. The point is, not all callings matter, but even your lesser callings still are worthy of doing well.
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So why are we here? God put us here to love him, to serve our neighbor, and to cultivate and guard this creation.
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But not today. The 4th reason we're here is to enjoy a Sabbath rest every 7 days.
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Let me just read Genesis 2. Genesis 2, verse 2.
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By the 7th day God had finished the work he had been doing, so on the 7th day he rested from all his work.
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And God blessed the 7th day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.
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Again, we have to be careful here and not make a law out of this. Here in West Michigan, some of you, if you're older, you probably have horror stories of growing up in very conservative homes where Sunday was the most boring, worst day of the week.
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You dress up, and you stay dressed up, and you go to your grandparents' home, and you sit around, you can't play games, just listen to the grown -ups talk.
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And Sunday becomes just ugly and boring and awful. On the other hand,
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I think we have to be careful of going off the other extreme and just throwing it away. Woo -hoo, Jesus has come, he's fulfilled the
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Sabbath, so just discard it, chuck it, it doesn't matter anymore. Jesus has fulfilled the
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Sabbath, Hebrews tells us that. But think of it, again, I don't want to make a law out of this, but if Jesus has fulfilled the
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Sabbath, then if you observe the Sabbath, aren't you being a silent witness to Jesus?
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If Jesus has come, and he has saved you, and you know that you're secure, you can now rest in Jesus, then aren't you free to take one day a week and imitate
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God's example? And if I am resting in Jesus, then I can physically rest.
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Because if I have to work and work and work on my day of rest, isn't that implying
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I'm really not spoken for? I'm really not secure. My significance,
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I'm really not saved. I have to do all these things to become something, and to be important, and to stay ahead of my colleagues or competitors.
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Sunday, I think, is the one day of the week where you and I should do nothing of economic value on purpose.
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It's a break, it's a rest. And if you don't do that, I mean, God did.
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And if we don't do that, we're saying, well, God needed their break, but no, not me. I can just plow on ahead.
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And isn't that our problem? Life moves so fast. Things are a blur. Partly it's a blur because we don't observe a
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Sabbath rest. Every day is like every other. John Calvin said the Sabbath is a high tower that God gave us to climb up into and look back and survey the terrain of our lives.
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He says if you do that, if you take one day and just rest and reflect on how good
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God has been to you, Calvin says you will live a life of gratitude Monday through Saturday.
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If you don't do that, Calvin says you're just like an animal. No difference between you and a brute beast.
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You just keep plowing ahead. So again, we can't make a new, don't want to make a law out of this and be legalistic about it.
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Jesus has come. We are free in Christ. The Sabbath is the one of the ten commandments not repeated in the
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New Testament to Christians. So don't make a law out of it, but I don't think we should just be so quick to just throw it away either.
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If you really are resting in Jesus, then it seems like we should be able to rest one day in seven.
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It slows life down. It's a time to enjoy, to savor the works of your hands, to spend time to worship
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God and spend time with your family and just enjoy being alive. What a great day to just enjoy being human and being on God's world.
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If we don't do that, I think we'll regret it. So again, this is not the whole story, but it is where the story begins.
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Before you can really understand our fall, here's what sin is. Sin has ravaged us as image bearers.
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It's dehumanized us. And it's also destroyed all of this creation. To understand how tragic that is, you have to really appreciate the goodness that's here.
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God made this world. He made it good. He put us here for this to be our home. He put us here to not be content with anything here, but only to be satisfied with knowing and loving
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Him, but also to serve our neighbors. And when we do serve our neighbors out of sacrificial love, we flourish and we live like the triune
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God is alive. He's also put us here, and think of this tomorrow as you go to work, to steward this creation, to develop it, to make something out of it, and then to rest today, every seven days, and enjoy your relationship with God, with others, and the works of your hands.
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If you do that, you will flourish as a human being. You will be following the example of Jesus Christ, who came to this world and died for our sin.
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He put all of our sin and guilt upon Himself as our substitute. He absorbed the wrath of God, so we could be restored as image bearers, worshiping
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Him, loving each other, finding joy in our work, and resting once every seven days.
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Father, we thank You for Your Word, which we've just begun the first story of creation.
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But it's exciting to think that we are here for a reason, and we pray that You would lead us in faith.
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Give us the courage to trust You, to believe that it's really true, that we don't have to earn and work for our salvation, or even our significance, but that who we are is spoken for in Your Son.
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And we want to hide in Him today, and rest in Him. And we ask You to forgive us.
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We want to turn our backs on our sin, on the times we lived selfishly, and hurt the people that were closest to us.
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And the times we went to work just for our paycheck, and the days we wouldn't stop working, we just had to keep working to stay ahead of our competitors.
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Father, forgive us for our lack of faith. We want to put all of our weight, all of our trust, we want to go limp in the cradle of grace.
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And trust Your promises, so that we can be fully human and fully alive, as we enjoy