Cell Phones Vs. Jesus

Cell Phone vs. Jesus

Scripture: John 15:5; 14:13-14; Matthew 28:19-20; John 10:18

Introduction:

I have received some interesting emails and phone calls recently pertaining to some things that Christians have been involved in. The message this morning was inspired by several of those messages. I have titled this message “Cell Phone vs. Jesus” and is based on an email I received. In the email, the primary question was “What would happen if we treated our Bible like we treat our cell phone?” I took it one step further in that I wondered what would happen if we treated Jesus like we treat our cell phones. For those of you who have cell phones I hope that this message will have the same effect on you as that email had on me.

I. Twice As Much

There are many of you out there that have more than one cell phone, me included. I have one cell phone that was issued to me by my company and then I have a personal cell phone. When I am traveling, I keep both cell phones with me although I primarily use my work cell phone. Having two cell phones is not convenient. When I am talking on one, sometimes the second one rings. Instead of ignoring the second phone, I feel obligated to at least look and see who it is that is calling. What would happen if we had twice as much Jesus operating in our lives? Jesus said in John 15:5 “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in Him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can do nothing.” When I visualize this verse, I imagine a vine bush that my wife has planted along our fence. Those vines encircle themselves around the fence in such a tight way that you cannot pull them down; you have to cut them off. If I had a double dose of Jesus, I imagine myself being so wrapped up within Him that I would not be swayed by the things of this world. Can you imagine the power and confidence that we can walk in as a Christian when we have a double dose of Christ (if it were possible) operating in our lives? Can you imagine our lives if we’d let the fullness of Christ that is available to us now operate in our lives? Many of us have two cell phones that we proudly carry with us everyone. Some of us even have a beeper just in case we step away from the cell phone. All of this is so we can stay in touch with someone. Stay in touch with Christ, today, tomorrow, forever.

II. Don’t Leave Home Without It

How many of you have your cell phones with you right now? How many of you have your cell phone here, but you left it in the car? How many of you intentionally left your cell phone at home? How many of you, “if you left your cell phone at home and you lived near by” would turn around after getting to your destination and go home and get your cell phone? How many of you feel sort of naked without your cell phone hanging on your side, in your case or in your purse? Do you see the point? We must have our cell phones with us. If we leave it at home, we will drive miles to retrieve it “just in case” someone calls us. What would our lives be like if we felt the same way about Jesus? Remember what Jesus said in St. John 15:5? In the last part of the verse He said “for apart from Me you can do nothing.” If we fully understood (as we do with the cell phones) that without Jesus we can do nothing, I think we’d begin to make a difference in our lives and in this world. Many of us can not operate if we forget our cell phones. Heaven forbid if we are on a trip and forget to bring our charger and the battery runs down. We wake up in the morning rushing and we leave our homes in a hurry, forgetting to take Jesus with us. Would we turn around and go home to get Him? Do we ever feel naked when we do not have Jesus with us? When we leave our homes we think about the cell phone, whether or not we have it or checking it for messages if we have it with us. However, we sometimes do not even think about Jesus. Some of us can go days without thinking about Jesus, but we keep that phone close by “just in case.” We need Jesus with us much more than the cell phone.