A Secret No Longer Sermon Iii: To Love And To Cherish But Never To Part Series

TO LOVE AND TO CHERISH NOT ‘TIL DEATH DO US PART BUT NEVER TO PART

Perhaps you and yours, like me and mine, included in your wedding vows the traditional pledge to love and to cherish ‘til death do us part. We really meant it! We never gave it a second thought! And what we vowed then we vow now, with one major tweak: to love and to cherish but never to part! For you see:

We believe in God with all our heart and soul and mind, we believe in Jesus’ promise to prepare a place for all who belong to Him, and we therefore are of the belief that, since we belong to Jesus, we shall be together for eternity, even though there will be a pause - the cause of which will be the death of a physical body . . .

A major reason why we cling to our belief in “forever together” even if in a different type of relationship, is the trustworthiness of God our Father’s pledge to His children, to the Family of God, to love and to cherish His new creation – both now and forevermore!

In this final session of our series on Finding Our Value in God, we turn to the 8th Psalm entitled The Majesty of God. According to his memoirs, it was the reading of this particular psalm that inspired Dwight D. Eisenhower to write down his view of the reality of a Deity and who, he concluded, that Deity is:

“It takes no brains to be an atheist. Any stupid person can deny the existence of a supernatural power because man’s physical senses cannot detect it. But there cannot be ignored the influence of conscience, the respect we feel for moral law, the mystery of first life, or the marvelous order in which the universe moves about us on this earth. All these are the evidence of the handiwork of God. For my part, that Deity is the God of the Bible and of Jesus Christ, His Son.” I always did like Ike!

The focus of the 8th Psalm is primarily on the weakest of those who belong to God’s Family (“the least of these”) – Psalm 8:1-2 . . .

The psalmist’s proposition is simple and easy to grasp; and that is, even the weakest members of the Body of Christ . . . Church . . . Fellowship of Believers . . . God’s Family are cause for celebration . . . considered special . . . created divinely as we are told in Genesis: “And the LORD God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let him (them) rule over’” all the rest of creation.

Thus, how important, how valuable, how cherished all are in God’s eyes! And THAT no one can deny - no evolutionist . . . no atheist . . . no agnostic! For the day is coming when: “. . . at the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow, in heaven, on earth, and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is LORD, to the glory of God the Father!”

Upon memorizing this psalm, Charles Wesley said he was so struck by the realization that the human race was not an accident . . .we were planned . . . we have purpose . . . we have value, he was moved by the Spirit of God to pen those beautiful words of the hymn “Love Divine, All Loves Excelling” – with an ending that excites a believer’s imagination: “changed from glory into glory ‘til in heaven we take our place, ‘til we cast our crowns before Thee, lost in wonder, love and praise!”

Even the weakest parts of God’s creation remind us that God’s glory fills the world with the wonders we can see . . . stills the enemies of God . . . thrills poets, philosophers, prophets, professing believers and professors of theology alike - all because of the magnificence of God’s creative workmanship and the majesty of God’s very being - like no other power in all the world or universe – Psalm 8:3-8 . . .

Dr. Jack Hayford whose television ministry of many years originated from the Church on the Way in Van Nuys, California, told of touring England; moved by the deep feeling of the British people for their royal family - who stood with them through the darkest as well as the brightest days of their lives – Hayford felt overwhelmed by the thought that Christ wants His followers to have such a sense of loyalty to the Kingdom of God.

One word kept popping up in Hayford’s mind - “majesty”! Right then and there he wrote the words to a song that Christians love to sing: