SPACE TRAVELERS
#511 SPACE TRAVELERS
Scripture I Peter 3:18 NIV Orig. 8/4/1968
Rewr. 11/22/1988
Passage: For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive in the Spirit.
Purpose: Sharing anew the Biblical steps to God’s abundant life in Christ.
Keywords: Christ as Saviour God’s Love Separating from Sin
Cross Revival Plan of Evangelism
Timeline/Series: Any
Introduction
A new interest in outer space came about a few years ago with the marketing of “E.T.” A fantasy spoke to some need in people to believe that there may be someone else out there. The homesickness of the small alien touched a vital chord that all of us share.
The interest in the worlds beyond this planet are genuine. Efforts are already underway to break the bonds that tie us to earth. We are not doing a very good job maintaining what we have here, but that drive is galactic. What we don’t know about what is out there compels us forward.
A recent article in National Geographic depicts what is ahead. Plans are already being made for a serious venture toward Mars. Imagine going to a place where it will take seven to eight months to reach your destination, a delay of well over a year for the kind of planetary alignment that will make return possible, and then another seven or eight months making the swing toward home.
The article discussed some of the specifications required as an agenda for Mars nears. Can you imagine the difficulties involved in such gigantic plans? Things get pretty complicated over at our house when we are only making plans to have family in for Thanksgiving. The logistics of hosting family and friends for a few days is formidable indeed.
Fortunately, when God formulated the agenda that would bring us to Himself, He didn’t complicate it with insurmountable detail. We don’t have to be overwrought about food reserves, and time differentials. There is a way to reach out across time and space, and any other such mediums, to the place where God is.
I. The First Step is Accepting God’s Goal of an Abundant Life. “To bring you to God.”
This abundant life begins with a knowledge of God. David’s last, best advice to his son Solomon concerned this knowledge: I Chronicles 28:9 “If you seek him, he will be found by you; but if you forsake him, he will reject you forever” (NIV). Job raised a question that has furnished a dilemma for many: “Canst thou by searching find out God?” But Jeremiah resolves it for us: Jeremiah 29:13 “Ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye search for me with all your heart,”
Such knowledge comes not of the flesh but of the spirit. First, the eternal Spirit of God. John 14:16 “I will pray the father, and he will give you a comforter that he may abide with you forever.” To know God is to know what He wishes to make known. We are to be willing receptors. It is then of the human spirit.
II. The Second Step is the Admission of a Problem. “Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust.”
It addresses the reality of sin; it accepts responsibility for one’s own will; it acknowledges God’s transcendence.
All are created for this “abundant” life. A sense in which some are elected but none are denied. Irving Stone, in his biography on Michelangelo The Agony and the Ecstasy1 tells about Michelangelo’s David. At the quarry he purchases a column cut and blocked for another sculptor, but marred. Others had looked and rejected, but from this stone of flaws, he sculpted his 17’ statue. God is able to work His miracle in any life.
All are free to choose or to deny. Look at any Biblical believer, he had the freedom to reject. Any who denied, could have believed. Isaiah 53:6 “All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.”
The Biblical concept of original sin says only that Adam’s disobedience was placed in circulation, and none of us have managed to protect ourselves from its debilitating influence ever since. We have not escaped it unscathed, nor can we.
III. Thus, the Third Step of Accepting God’s Remedy—the Cross. “For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust.”
Conscience is perceived by many as the criterion for human good. It did not protect Adam. The Hebrews were not protected from their Egyptian lords. It did not prevent serious abuses of power during the middle ages. It offered no redress to the victims of the wars of this 20th Century.
When I was a teenager my family lived just a couple of miles from a place on the Tallapoosa River called Horseshoe Bend. For a lad who had never seen the Mississippi, that was an awesome spectacle. On a bluff just to the east of the river, the railroad had been laid. Every spring the talk would turn to the river undermining the railroad. After the track finally gave way, a reinforcing abutment was built. Conscience is like the dirt of the bluff that for years kept the river at bay. But clearly, of itself alone, it just wasn’t enough.
The solution, the one solution to man’s sin problem, is the cross. Conscience is a vital ally for good. But conscience breaks down. In this vein, the cross is the powerful abutment to our conscience.
We must have confidence in atoning factor. Thinking of church membership doesn’t help. Reassurance from perception is no proof. But a vital relationship with Jesus gives resolve. I Peter 1:18f “For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, . . . but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot. . . . 24 For all flesh is as grass, . . . but the word of the Lord endureth.”
IV. The Final Step, then, is to Receive Christ as Saviour. “That He might bring us to God.”
The completed action of the cross is defined for us. In v21 Peter goes on to speak of “the good conscience toward God.” It is explained in terms of the “resurrection of Jesus.”
It raises the pertinent question as to which side of the cross we are on. On the one side is sin and separation. On that side we stand alone.
But seeing the cross as we must, from God’s vantage point: Conscience is not our only ally nor our enemy. We discover God’s earnest attempt in our behalf. We know that we do not stand alone. I Peter 4:1 “Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves likewise with the same mind: for he that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin.”
Conclusion
The story is told of a stranger who walked into a great London Cathedral while the organist was at practice. The organ [was] reputed to be one of the world’s finest. The stranger listened for some time and then asked to be allowed to play. The organist of course refused. The console was sensitive. It could be ruined. The stranger, however, was insistent, finally identifying himself as Felix Mendelssohn.
The organist, recognizing the name, stepped aside and listened as his genius poured through the keys. People came in to listen. As [Mendelssohn] stood to leave, the organist said more to himself than to others gathered, “Oh, the Master was here. What if I had not let him play?”
1Stone, I. (2001.) The Agony and the Ecstasy. (Reprint.) Random House.
Stone: https://www.amazon.com/Agony-Ecstasy-Irving-Stone/dp/0099416271/ref=monarch_sidesheet_image
I PETER—A MESSAGE OF ENCOURAGEMENT
#794 I PETER—A MESSAGE OF ENCOURAGEMENT
Scripture I Peter 1:1-20, NIV Orig. 4/10/1983
Passage
1 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia, 2 who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, to be obedient to Jesus Christ and sprinkled with his blood: Grace and peace be yours in abundance.
Praise to God for a Living Hope
3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you, 5 who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 6 In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
10 Concerning this salvation, the prophets, who spoke of the grace that was to come to you, searched intently and with the greatest care, 11 trying to find out the time and circumstances to which the Spirit of Christ in them was pointing when he predicted the sufferings of the Messiah and the glories that would follow. 12 It was revealed to them that they were not serving themselves but you, when they spoke of the things that have now been told you by those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven. Even angels long to look into these things.
Be Holy
13 Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober, set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming. 14 As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. 15 But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; 16 for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”[a] 17 Since you call on a Father who judges each person’s work impartially, live out your time as foreigners here in reverent fear. 18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect. 20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
Introduction
Slides
Character: Salutation, Greeting, Prayer of Thanksgiving
Written to: “Chosen sojourners of the dispersion”
Content: Practical admonitions calling for persistence in faith—See I Peter 1:6-9
Tradition: A general persecution rather than particular, review I Peter 2:13-17
Other readers: See I Peter 1:1. Compare Acts 2:9 where some of these people perhaps heard Peter preach.
The Writer: 1) Where—“Elect in Babylon” I Peter 5:13
2) When—About the time Paul condemned to death (60’s), and James killed (62AD)
3) Who—no real reason to consider any other than Peter—I Peter 1:1, 5:12
Session 1—4/10/1983 General Information and Election (A Major Thesis Has to do with Election)
First, there are the two extreme positions: (1)God’s sovereignty controls absolutely. Man’s freedom is a pipedream. (2)Freedom on man’s part allows him total control of his eternal destiny.
Election—see also Ephesians 1:4,5: (1)God elects some people to be saved. (2)He does not elect all to be saved. (3)This election took place in eternity past. (4)This election is a happenstance of God’s foreknowledge.
The case for individual responsibility. See John 3:16, Revelation 22:17, John 6:37
What the believers have—(1)called “sojourners”—alien, pilgrim; see also Philippians 3:20-21 and Hebrews 13:14; (2)called “saints”—separated for God and are to live in conformity to God’s will.
Session 2—4/17/1983 The Great Salvation
Quote The Hiding Place(1) [by Corrie Ten Boom]. “Life in Ravensbrück took place on two separate levels, mutually impossible. One, the observable, external life, grew every day more horrible. The other, the life we lived with God, grew daily better, truth upon truth, glory upon glory.”
Also, tell the story of Dr. Schweitzer in Louisville, at bus stop on cold day. Old, ragged woman quickly given $1. “Chin up!” Next day, she’s back. Concern, sticks $20 in his hand. “Congratulations, Chin-up paid 20x1.”
I Peter 1:3 Blessed used only in regard to God. “Unto a living hope.” A miracle takes place “begotten”; through the means of the Resurrection (1)Judaism had hope, but it was never fulfilled—the Greeks had a yearning, philosophical belief, (2)Christians have an empty tomb.
I Peter 1:4 “to an inheritance”: (1)incorruptible—a secure dwelling place the Jews among knew Hebrew history, how often the land was overrun; (2)undefiled—there was no such thing as a land untouched by evils in society, culture, politics, even religion; (3)unfading—the victor’s crown was often no more than a wreath of celery leaves: they were familiar with the fading beauty of Babylon, Jerusalem. Compare Mark 10:17 “eternal life”—I Corinthians 15:50 immortality, Hebrews 1:14 salvation. Reserved in heaven = reservation, guarantee.
I Peter 1:5 “kept by the power of God”: (1)security of the believer; (2)Peter’s experience.
Salvation
1)Luke 19:9 Zacchaeus “today salvation is come.”
2)Philippians 2:12 “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.”
3)Romans 13:11 “Now is salvation nearer than when we believed.”
Session 3—4/20/1983
I Peter 1:13 “Gird up”—relates to the method of getting long garments out of the way for work; “of your mind”—a case of mental exercise; “be sober”—not directly of alcohol [but, rather], be in control.
I Peter 1:14 “As obedient children”—a case for the understanding of Christian family life under God the Father; “ignorance” would more reflect on pagans than Jews.
Session 4—4/24/1983
We concluded before with the “obedient children” v14 calling on the “Father” v17.
1) We need to consider our approach to God. (1)Psalm 48:1 “Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of His holiness.” (2)Isaiah 57:15 “Thus saith the high and lofty one that inhabiteth eternity.”
2) Is it presumptive to call such an One, Father? Jane Russell—He’s a right good guy. Scribes and Pharisees in John 8, came as officials of the law; woman taken in adultery, “Moses commanded death, What do you say?” John 8:19 “You neither know me nor my Father”; John 8:39 “Abraham is our father.” “If he was,” Jesus said, “You would act like he acted.”
3) What we must remember is that He chose to reveal Himself as Father. (1)It is not sexist lingo, it is divine choice—women’s groups get uptight,; article in file by Nun on God, our Mother. (2)He chose to send His son, not His daughter.
4) God wants us to approach Him, to invoke His help. (1)But not under conditions that satisfy us. (2)You see, the problem is not God’s ego, but our pride. Proverbs 3:7 “Be not wise in thine own eyes; fear the Lord, and depart from evil.” Isaiah 14:11 “Thy pomp is brought down to the grave. Obadiah 1:4 “Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring thee down, saith the Lord.”
5) Now, a point about the kind of response we may expect when as believers we invoke the Lord. (1)The response of equality. James 3:17 Wisdom that is from above is without partiality; the word literally: “not the face.” (2)Response of considered judgment—Isaiah 26:9 When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn right; Hosea 6:5 “Thy judgments are as light.” (3)It is a judgment covering all of life: I Peter 1:17 “conduct yourself throughout” the time of your sojourning. (4)It calls for life to be lived from a Christian perspective. I Peter 1:18 “Redeemed from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers.”
6) We turn in v18 to a thought about the word “redeemed.” See Matthew 20:28 Peter was there when the wife of Zebedee, mother of James and John, requested special treatment for her sons. The scripture says “the ten were indignant.” Jesus said “the ones who are great will be servants . . . the Son of Man came . . . to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many.” Remember that the ransoming takes place through “the blood.” (1)We don’t learn from the Old Testament by studying about the sacrificial lamb. (2)We better understand Old Testament passages because Christ gives meaning to that sacrifice. He is the type. Others are copies. “He is without blemish, without spot.” So II Peter 3:14 “Be diligent to be found by Him in peace, without spot and blameless.”
7) Then, there is another reference to “foreordained.” (1)If God had wanted to seal forever the choiceless state of predestination, He had but to use such a term here. I Peter 1:20 “He indeed was foreordained.” II Peter 2:17 “Since you know these things beforehand.” (2)There is a timelessness brought out here. We see through the eye, as a camera, one frame at a time. But God sees everything in an instant; the computer is an imperfect example. What God saw in eternity past, He chose to reveal to and through a specially chosen people: This doesn’t compromise His impartiality, it simply confirms His sovereignty. (3)There is a profoundness also about the time of Christ’s coming, and its meaning as there was about the primordial world and before: it is eternity past and eternity now (v20). Katabole—a casting down (as with seed). (4)To be a Christian is not to be lucky and be born under the right set of circumstances. It is to be overwhelmed by the glory of salvation. It is to understand the gift to come from God, through Jesus, under conditions controlled by the Father. It is to walk in fear of what might have been, if we had not such confidence in Christ, if we had disregarded Christ’s ransoming.
What about a man like Gandhi?2 “I owe, and India owes, more to one who never set foot in [India], than to anyone else; that is to Jesus Christ.” (5)John 17:1,4,5 God raised Jesus, God gave Him glory—confirmed His life.
https://www.amazon.com/Hiding-Place-Corrie-Ten-Boom/dp/0800794052#detailBullets_feature_div
https://www.gandhiashramsevagram.org/gandhi-literature/mahatma-gandhi-collected-works-volume-42.pdf p4
1Ten Boom, C., Sherrill, E., Sherrill, J. 2006. The Hiding Place: The Triumphant True Story of Corrie Ten Boom. (35th Anniversary Edition). Chosen Books.
2Gandhi Literature: Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, V42, p4. 1928: Gandhi Sevagram Ashram.
mahatma-gandhi-collected-works-volume-42.pdf (gandhiashramsevagram.org)
LIVING BUILDING STONES
#15 LIVING BUILDING STONES
Scripture I Peter 2:1-12 NIV Orig. 5/10/64 (10-81)
Rewr. 10-1-86
Passage: Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind. Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good. As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. For in Scripture it says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.” Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe, “The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone,” and, “A stone that causes people to stumble and a rock that makes them fall.” They stumble because they disobey the message—which is also what they were destined for. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Dear friends, I urge you, as foreigners and exiles, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that, though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us.
Purpose: To show that we are the Living Building Stones out of which the redemptive mission of God is brought to fruition
Keywords: Mission, Church, Christ, Propitiation, Heritage, Fellowship, Tradition
Introduction
Octoberfest celebrations are underway everywhere. Most of the people who are celebrating have no idea what the original concept was. It would never occur to them that this is a harvest ritual. They are totally void of any comprehension of meaning in relation to the bounty of God in general. And the provision of Christ in particular. How many people who are caught up in the wild melee of these celebrations will see them as a time of rededication, and of new beginnings?
Werner Marx, Moravian missionary to South America, remembers his own childhood in the home of missionary parents in Tibet. He remembers dedication services for new workers where fledgling missionaries were required to place both their hands on their head and declare, “Woe unto me if I preach not the Gospel!” Their lives were fixed to the place where they were, and they were to be prepared to be used of God to build what He would build.
It is not inordinately visionary to think of ourselves in that same light. We are “living building stones” to serve the place where we are. We are not here by accident, you and I. We are here a-purpose, and the purpose is God’s.
You remember Walt Kelly’s comic strip, Pogo. The characters were animals, but the gist of the strip was human relationships. They were having trouble getting along with one another, and Pogo observed, “The trouble with us is that we are surrounded by insurmountable opportunities.” He eulogized to his fellow-denizens of the swamp, “We have met the enemy and he is us.”
I. In the First Place, Living Stones are Provisional. V9 “But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy mountain, a peculiar people; for ye should show forth the praises of Him who hath called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.” Consider the analogy as it relates to building. The architect determines the style of stone. The workman rasps away any rough edges to bring the stone into symmetry. The stone has only yielded to this superior wisdom.
True Baptists have sustained a real romance with the local church. We have rightly viewed it as the proper descendant of the body of believers found in the New Testament. In the real sense, descendants also of Israel. The physical manifestation of the Kingdom of God.
But the Church in every age has faced the temptation to lose its outward vision. The aging process does indeed bring on the hypochondria of deterioration. This lends support to the discovery that two kinds of churches tend to grow: those newly started, who are able to sustain the freshness of mission, and those that “re-dream” the dream. What we must discover are new ways to minister to those outside the local church. We will not have many new people to come here. The key is finding a means to the disenfranchised ones. Consider the inner child of the past; bad childhood experience; the threat of surrendering some ingrained passion. What we need first at First Baptist Church is not new people in town, but those among us who re-dream the dream.
One of the real problems of the late 1980’s is to deal with the burden of spiraling expenditure that eats away at what we ought to do for others and for God. An editorial cartoon in NSW (10-81) is of two cave men exhausting their possessions trying to own the more powerful weapon. Dr. Leslie Weatherhead wrote: “Picture in your mind a man of say a million years ago, grabbing his club and running for his cave because his enemy was in sight. Then picture modern man in his imported suit grabbing his gas mask and running for his bomb shelter because the attack alarm has sounded. Which is civilized?”
II. Such Living Stones are Also Providential. V4: “So come to Him, our Living Stone—the stone rejected by men, but choice and precious in the sight of God. Come and let yourselves be built, as living stones, into a spiritual temple; become a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” We are required to rethink the entire meaning of fellowship. Clarence Willis in Oakdale attended regularly but would not unite with the church because of church suppers. The problem at Corinth was with “Love Feasts.” Jude 12: “These men are blemishes at your love feasts, eating with you without the slightest qualm—shepherds who feed only themselves. They are clouds without rain, blown along by the wind; autumn trees, without fruit and uprooted, twice dead.”
But Jesus used “sup” as an analogy of faith. Revelation 3:20: “Behold I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.” So we have justification for fellowship meals. But Blackie’s thesis is right, fellowship is more than eating together, whether in the same room or under the same tree.
I remember a wedding reception in New Orleans, but Christian fellowship was on few minds.
Fellowship is not merely a joint walk by equals either. What happens in too many marriages of those who seem supremely suited is that there is no spiritual unity between them. The novelty wears off, and the bond comes unraveled. Fellowship is a walk together in the dispensation of grace, God’s grace. It is to be of the same mind as God, and of his Son, Jesus.
In the sphere of worship, prayer, ministry, and administration, we have fellowship. 1 John 1:7 “If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with the other.” No, we don’t have to give up church suppers or dinners. We don’t even have to hold them outside. There is even some room for parlor games, the right kind, but they must be occasions of Christian fellowship.
Vance Havner said: “The church today needs time out to tune up. We are so busy building a bigger orchestra, that we won’t stop to tune the instruments. What good is a big orchestra if two-thirds of the members never show up for practice, or else are off-key when they perform?”
III. So, These Living Stones are, Above All Else, Propitiational. V6 “Wherefore also, it is contained in the scripture, behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he that believeth on Him shall not be confounded. It no longer is an extension of Judeo/Christian traditions. Upon this building stone all rests. Notice verses 7 and 8. The craftsmen are at their work. The surveyor has found the site. The architect has fitted plans to the site. The builder has begun construction. But all have discounted the capstone.
The only link to the past that matters is Christ. But our best link with Him is NOW. Don’t ask where we have been but, rather, where we are going. Do we walk together in Christ? Are we STONES for the building? Do we willingly fit into the chosen place? Is it nothing more than Pogo’s “insurmountable opportunity”? What is the church’s destiny? What is our church’s destiny?
Tonight, Sardis: “thou hast a name that thou liveth.”
In a few weeks Philadelphia: “Behold, I have set before thee an open door.”
Conclusion
Most of us have had enough of Alice in Wonderland to remember the basics of the story. Alice is at a crossroads, not sure what to do next. She encounters the Cheshire Cat. He enquires, “Where are you headed?” She responds, “I don’t know.” To which he responds what must be the feeling of our Lord for many of us as well, if you don’t know where you are going, “Then it doesn’t matter!” Which road is taken at the crossroads?
We Christians are to know where we are going, and which road leads to our destination.
Robert Frost: “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, I took the one less traveled by. That has made all the difference.”