Do You Like What You See In The Mirror?

Sermon Title: Do you like what you see in the mirror?

Scripture Text: James 1:17-27

ILLUSTRATION:

How is it that the sunlight gives us such joy? Why does this radiance when it falls on the earth fill us with the joy of living? The whole sky is blue, the fields are green, the houses all white, and our enchanted eyes drink in those bright colors which bring delight to our souls. And then there springs up in our hearts a desire to dance, to run, to sing, a happy lightness of thought, a sort of enlarged tenderness; we feel a longing to embrace the sun.

But not all can see that sunlight and not all can feel that desire to dance, to run, to sing and feel that embrace of the sun.

SCRIPTURE:

James 1:17-27 (NLT)

17 Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. 18 He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.

Listening and Doing

19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters: You must all be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to get angry. 20 Human anger does not produce the righteousness God desires. 21 So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.

22 But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. 23 For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror.

24 You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like. 25 But if you look carefully into the perfect law that sets you free, and if you do what it says and don’t forget what you heard, then God will bless you for doing it.

26 If you claim to be religious but don’t control your tongue, you are fooling yourself, and your religion is worthless. 27 Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.

SERMON:

23 For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror.

24 You see yourself, walk away, and forget what you look like.

We can’t read Scripture and Know God, receive Jesus death and be lead by the Holy Spirit and not do what He ask of us. It’s impossible.

18 He chose to give birth to us by giving us his true word. (This Spiritual Birth came by his word) And we, out of all creation, became his prized possession.

--we have to know God and be willing to do what he says.

-I’m not talking about voting on if we should paint the sanctuary or not.

---I’m talking about the knowledge of God we have and applying it to our lives.

*-Disagreeing on painting the sanctuary is one thing.

-It’s how we get along after the vote is over.

According to Scripture we were once blind before we knew Christ but with our salvation that comes from God, through Jesus, we are filled with the Holy Spirit. We are able to see by sight and spirit and remember what we saw and heard.

-Ephesians 5:8 NLT

For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light!

James 1:25 -And “do” what we heard through sight and the spirit as we heard God.

It’s now time to join with God and His people. If we don't know God now is the time to received that Salvation.

Part of our Scripture today is talking about looking into a mirror but when we walk away we cant remember what we looked like. If we have sight we can fix that problem.

Here is part of a story by Gabrielle Moss?

I've been known to waste massive amounts of time using mirrors to do respectable, adult things, like trying to straighten my bangs.

Surely you've had the pleasure of breaking a mirror and having some helpful person inform you that you have now given yourself seven years of bad luck. You probably did not pause to reflect on this idea too deeply, possibly because you were more focused on making sure to not accidentally step on any shards of broken mirror.

But had you decided to look a bit further into it, you would have found that this superstition stems from the ancient myth that holds that the mirror reflects not just one's external surface, but one's soul, as well. Ancient Romans believed that the soul regenerated every seven years — so if you messed with a mirror, you had to consider your soul equally messed with for seven years, until you could grow a new one. The most important moral of this story? I was staring into a mirror for an hour this morning because I was trying to straighten my soul's bangs.

When you look into a mirror that shows you your soul reflection does anything need straighten up?