"Am I One Of These?”

MELVIN M. NEWLAND, MINISTER

RIDGE CHAPEL, KANSAS, OK

TEXT: Amos 5:21-24; Mark 4:15-19; Matthew 23:23; 3 John vs. 9; Hebrews 13:2; John 4:23

ILL. James Dobson told about a mother who was sick in bed with the flu. Her little daughter wanted so much to be a good nurse to her. She fluffed the pillows & brought a magazine for her to read. Then she even surprised her mother with a cup of tea.

"You're such a sweetheart," the mother said as she drank the tea. "I didn't even know you knew how to make tea." "Oh, yes," the little girl replied. "I learned by watching you. I put the tea leaves in the pot. Then I put in the water & boiled it, & then strained it into a cup. But I couldn't find a strainer, so I used the flyswatter instead."

"You what?" the mother screamed. The little girl said, "Oh, don't worry, Mama, I didn't use the new flyswatter. I used the old one."

APPL. Now I felt a little squeamish about telling you that story. But when kids try so hard to do something, & yet get it wrong in spite of themselves, what's a parent to do? You've got to love them for trying, at least!

ILL. Some years ago Pres. Kennedy spoke at an awards banquet of the National Football Foundation. In his speech he said:

"It looks as if our great national sport is no longer playing, but watching. We are becoming less & less a nation of athletes, & more & more a nation of spectators.”

What Pres. Kennedy was concerned about for our nation, I'm concerned about for the church.

A. There is an interesting passage in the Book of Amos where God is speaking to the Jewish nation, to His people, & He is not speaking very kindly to them.

He had done so much for them. He had freed them from slavery in Egypt. He had delivered the Promised Land into their hands. He had blessed King David & King Solomon & made their reigns the golden age of Jewish history.

But now all that was past, & in Amos 5:21 23 God said to them, "I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them . . . Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps."

What happened? Why was God so angry with them? The next verse (vs. 24) makes it plain. God says, "But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never failing stream!"

Evidently, the people in Amos' day were faithful in going through all the rituals. They attended the services. They kept the holy feasts. They gave generously of burnt offerings & grain offerings.

They sang their songs of praise to God, & played their harps. But God rejected their worship. Why? Because their lives didn't measure up to what they professed.

They gave lip service to God, but there was no justice or righteousness in their lives. They didn't even try to live the way God wanted them to live.

B. And that was true in Jesus' day, too. For we hear Him saying, "Woe to you, teachers of the law & Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices mint, dill & cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law justice, mercy, & faithfulness" (Matt. 23:23a)

They went through all the right forms attended all the services were very careful to give every bit of their tithes & offerings. But Jesus still cried out to them, "Woe to you!"

PROP. My concern this morning is about the possibility that Jesus could say the same thing today. Is there any way in which we might find ourselves in the same condition as the people in Amos' day, or in Jesus' day?

I'm afraid so. In fact, as we consider modern day churches, it appears that there are at least 3 different types of people, or attitudes that are present.

I. THE PERFORMERS

The 1st of these are the "Performers," people who are putting on an act, whose lives just don't match up with what they are trying to get people to believe about them.

A. Sometimes these people are in positions of leadership & prominence. They are in the limelight, busy, active, there for all the people to see.

ILL. A while back a major TV channel featured a story about a preacher accused of trying to kill his wife so that he could marry the woman with whom he was having an affair. They spent almost an hour going over the whole sordid story.

And news stories in the past few years exposing the private lives of some religious celebrities have made us sadly aware that they must have been merely performing. Their lives do not seem even to come close to matching up with what they professed.