O Taste And See That The Lord Is Good

O Taste and See that the Lord Is Good

(Ps.34:8 / Ps.37:4)

It can happen on your birthday or after a doctor’s visit but more likely it happens now at the start of a new year. The “it” I refer to is the desire, the willingness to change or as we say – to make a new year’s resolution:

- to quit smoking… to lose weight…. to find a better job… to read the Bible…

Everyone of us here at one time or another has wanted to change or tried to change- we have made resolutions in the past and most likely ended up with

mixed results or outright failure. We lost some weight but gained it back; we tried reading through the Bible but it just got too boring and tedious

so we gave it up. Even when the doctor told me if I didn’t quit smoking,

I could have another attack and die, trying to quit was impossible.

So we begin another year together, listening to the preacher but satisfied

to remain the way I am without making any changes or resolutions. It is said that the older we get, the more set in our ways we become,

so the idea of me changing for the better faces an uphill battle.

But we do know that people older people change and often; older people move to Florida to live- that’s change. I see older people using a TV

remote changer- why don’t they get up out of their chair to change the channel like they used to.

I see older people using cell phones- why don’t they just use the old dial phones- no it’s the push button phones and now the cell phones. Older people like younger people can still change and do change- sometimes willingly or unwillingly.

So, if you are sitting out there thinking, I like things just the way they are; I don’t need or want to make any new year’s resolutions – they don’t work for me anyway; I am here to remind you – that you can change and most likel will change.

Ask those people in Asia who survived the tsunami that struck 11 of their countries if they have changed – the way they think about life; the way they live now afterwards.

You’re in the wrong pew if you come here thinking another day another dollar,

another year like the one before. Have you and I forgotten that God is in the life-changing business? That, if He has called and chosen you and me, there

is no way that you and I will remain the same. Paul was very clear about that with the Corinthian Christians: II. Cor. 3:18 / 5:17

And we all….are being changed into His likeness from one degree of glory to another….

…if anyone is in Christ, he (she) is a new creation; the old has passed away behold, the new has come….

Now I should qualify what I have said by noting that you and I are in Christ and not simply in ourselves or in Satan. I am assuming that because you and I are

here in the house of God that God and not me or Satan in me is the one in charge of my life. It’s unfortunate that so much of the change we see not just in the world but in our families is Satan driven -- Adam and Eve saw change in their life all right thanks to Satan’s lies and Israel as a nation suffered terribly as king after king chose to follow the ways of Satan worshipping false idols

and engaging in all manner of sexual immorality—not that different from so much downward change we see today.

So the first point I want to make is don’t think you are going to get through this new year of 2005 without change. There will be change in your life and mine whether we are ready or not; whether we set any goals or resolutions or just try

to live out our days the way we always have.

And if change is going to come why not make it for Jesus Christ and His kingdom and not for the powers of evil.

Centuries ago the Christian Church spelled out for its members the purpose for their existence – a purpose that for any new year should be our resolution.

The statement came in the form of a catechism question:

What is the chief end or purpose of Man?

answer: To glorify God and enjoy Him forever.

It is the latter half of that answer- to enjoy Him forever- that I want us to grasp this morning.

The idea of “enjoying” God may sound strange and unfamiliar to us. We know about “fearing” God or “loving” God or “serving” God; at times we may be angry at God or confused about God. Much of the time it may seem that God is absent.