Blessings And Woes (November 2013)

BLESSINGS AND WOES

Text: Luke 6: 17 – 26

No man can be a Christian without being a controversialist.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834–1892)

(Draper’s Book Of Quotations For The Christian World).

Jesus was often counter cultural in His day. He taught with authority that many considered controversial because He did not compromise. Jesus’s preaching and teaching was not concerned with keeping the status quo when it missed the mark of living in harmony with doing God’s will. Jesus was more concerned about preaching the good news that would amplify the Spirit of the Lord that was upon Him because He had been anointed to preach the Gospel to the poor, heal the brokenhearted, preach deliverance to the captives, recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty the bruised (Luke 4:18 -19 paraphrased). What was true for preaching of Jesus’s day is often true for us today. As it has been said many times, “Preaching comforts the uncomfortable and makes the comfortable uncomfortable”. There are always going to be people who will be shocked to learn that they received woe when they were expecting a blessing!

Compared to the list of the nine Beatitudes in Matthew 5, the list of the four Beatitudes in Luke 6 are blunt because each Beatitudes in Luke 6 has a negative counterpart.

This passage of scripture seems to ask three questions. What are those three questions? What about reversed expectations? Do those who have the most toys win? Who gets to laugh last ?

WHAT ABOUT REVERSED EXPECTATIONS?

Does everything always turn out like you expected? How many people have the expectation that all that they have to do is live a decent life and everything will turn out just fine? God did not design us to be lone rangers. John Donne once said that “No man is an island entire of itself…”. Without God, long lasting peace is an illusion As St. Augustine once said, “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord and our hearts are restless until they have rest in Thee.”(Confessions of St. Augustine). To be alone and restless is a sure sign that one is detached like a fresh cut flower. Fresh cut flowers don’t live long because they are detached.

ILLUSTRATION: Consider the detached life of the late Chris Farley. Chris Farley had a role as a regular cast member in the TV show Saturday Night Live as well as the roles he played in some of the movies he was in (The Coneheads, Tommy Boy, Black Sheep). Chris Farley labored for bread that just did not satisfy. “The late comedian and actor Chris Farley…” once thought he had his act together as an actor and a comedian. “… He thought that show business and all that goes with it, fame and money in the bank, would help him reach that place where as he said, "the laws of the universe would not apply". He also noted that philosophy was false because he "still had to work on relationships and battle his weight and other demons as well". It was unfortunate that he died at the age of 33 with a drug habit. (Craig Brian Larson. Choice Contemporary Stories & Illustrations For Preachers, Teachers, & Writers. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1998, p. 251). He was alone and detached. He was poor toward the kingdom of God and yet rich and successful according to the world’s philosophy. Whatever riches he had were a poor consolation that left him void, empty and addicted (Luke 6:20, 24).

How many times have you experienced a conclusion that was probably the opposite of what you had imagined? Henry David Thoreau once said “Even the best things are not equal to their fame”. (Compelling Quotes). Years ago there was a pastor by the name of David Wilkerson who felt compelled by God to go and witness to gang members in New York. Like Jesus, he went against the grain having the power of the Holy Spirit on him enabled him to preach the gospel to an unlikely recipient---a captive who was in need of deliverance. At first, the gang at its members resisted. Then, one day the Holy Spirit broke through the hardened heart of a gang leader by the name of Nicky Cruz. Imagine how people might have been shocked when they expected to find a gang member accept Jesus Christ. David Wilkerson had a hunger for the salvation of others that led him to go the extra mile. He helped another find Jesus as the bread of heaven when the world’s counterfeit version of bread would have left that captive in need of deliverance starving (Luke 6:21 & 25).

DO THOSE WHO HAVE THE MOST TOYS WIN?

Jesus would tell us that those who die with the most toys still die!