My sermon today is the first of two sermons I’ve planned and entitled, “Serving Up God’s Miracles.”
On the last day of school, children were bringing gifts to their teacher. The florist’s son brought the teacher a bouquet. The candy store-owner’s son brought the teacher a box of candy. Then the liquor store-owner’s son brought a big, heavy box. The teacher lifted it up and noticed that it was leaking a bit. She touched a drop of liquid with her finger and tasted it. “Is it wine?’ she guessed. “No” said the boy. She tasted another drop, “Champagne?” “No,” said the little boy. “It’s a puppy!” (contributed by Dan Cormie, “Sermon Central”)
Hopefully everyone here received gifts for Christmas, and hopefully those gifts were all pleasant surprises. Gift-giving is a time-honored way to show our love and appreciation for others. Gifts from God are also given to show His love, but sometimes we’re just not sure what to make of them. Sometimes God’s gifts are so much from the nature of God that we even have a difficult time accepting them . . . especially if they arrive in the form of miracles.
God gives each of us gifts by His Holy Spirit. Some gifts are special blessings while others may be special talents. These gifts are different for each of us, but they all have one thing in common. They must be unwrapped and opened or they have no value. Knowledge of God is just such a gift, and like the others, it must also be unwrapped and opened.
Have you opened your gifts? Or have you kept your gift in a box where you can’t use it, and no one can be blessed by it? Have you been keeping God in a box where His power and majesty seem safely contained and under your control? To open God’s gift means to be prepared for surprises and often even amazement. God is so much bigger and more amazing than we could ever imagine. What He can do, what He does, what He is going to do defies all our imaginings. That can be really scary unless you’ve truly surrendered to the Father and to His Son, Jesus Christ.
Anyone who denies the miracles in the Bible and denies that they can happen today is denying the very nature of God. Those who deny them are desperately trying to keep God inside a suitable box of their own making.
It doesn’t require a stretch of imagination to understand why some people act this way. After all, miracles are, by definition, beyond our understanding. That makes some people very uncomfortable. We like our labels and neatly stacked files.
If you enjoy history like I do, you’ve probably discovered the History Channel by now. If so, you’ve probably noticed as well that lately they’ve been doing quite a few episodes on the “Holy Bible.” In each episode that I’ve seen, there’s always at least one person described as “an expert” who presents very logical, very scientific explanations for whatever miraculous event is being discussed. This is the “box-builder.”
• The box-builder seeks to find a way to rationally relate to the Bible’s information. It seems only reasonable to me that they’d do this. After all, most people have a hard time absorbing what is actually an act of divine intervention. It means that one must accept that they don’t really have control over their surroundings. Yet, that’s what “faith” is truly all about. Rational investigation can take us only so far. The next step requires a leap of faith.
When we desperately rationalize and label things we don’t understand, we’re simply trying to make them less threatening to our view of the world. It’s rather like trying to lock a lion’s cage with scotch tape. It might appear to be sealed, but it simply won’t hold. And when the lion eventually does come out, then we’re forced to try building a bigger cage, a bigger box, a more complex set of labels and theories to explain away the inexplicable. In the end, the box builder always looses; the scotch tape always fails to hold back the power and majesty that is God.
The vast complexity that is God is partially revealed to us by the great diversity of the gifts He gives us. As we just heard in verses four through seven, “There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all:”
• Without faith to make the final leap, there’s no sense in trying to understand the truth of Jesus Christ. Any explanation without faith will always fall short.
Here’s an example of what I mean. A church hired their first woman pastor. The Senior Pastor wasn’t too thrilled because, in the past, he’d always gone fishing with his associate pastors. He assumed that, since this new pastor was a woman, she wouldn’t know how to fish, and he’d loose one of his favorite pass-times. Well, he happened to be right about her knowledge of fishing, but she’d heard about this fishing tradition and determined to give it a try.
The time came when they decided to go, and when they got in the boat and anchored down, he quickly discovered that she knew nothing about baiting a hook, so he had to bait the hook for her. When she hooked her first fish, he realized she knew nothing about how to reel it in, so he had to help her reel it in. Then, of course, he had to take the fish off the hook as well. The result was that the Senior Pastor really didn’t get much fishing that day.
After a couple of hours, the wind began to blow, and woman was cold. She mentioned that she’d left her coat in the car. When the man suggested pulling up the anchor to get go it, she said, “Oh no, don’t bother. I’ll get it myself.” And with that, she stood up, got out of the boat, and began walking across the water to the shore. The Senior Pastor just sat there shaking his head sadly. “Just like I figured,” he muttered, “She can’t even swim.”
It’s amazing sometimes the lengths to which some people will go to force God’s miracles into their own little boxes of understanding. On the one hand, we want to believe a God whose grace and mercy has set us free from sin and death. On the other hand, we also want to make God understandable within the tiny margins of our scientific knowledge.(illustration from Sermon Central)
• It has always been God’s desire for us to “know God” and thereby walk closer with Him each day. Paul wrote to the Colossians 1:9, “. . . we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.”
For those who make science their god, the true wisdom and knowledge of God will always elude them. The reality of what the one, true God can do will always sound like fairy tales to those who lack the eyes and the heart to see. Their world and their understanding will always remain as small as the boxes in which they try confining Jesus Christ. There’s no question that some small glimpses into His nature can be seized by non-believers. After all, God’s finger prints are on everything. To see the greater picture, however, requires us to see with God-given eyes; the eyes of the Holy Spirit dwelling within us.
Proverbs 3:5 admonishes us, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths.”
What is required for us to have insight and understanding into the true nature of God? Proverbs 2 tells us, “Make your ear attentive to wisdom and incline your heart to understanding; if you seek it like silver and search for it as for hidden treasures; then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding.”
• Blindness toward God’s daily miracles is a matter of confused priorities. It’s the result of making God subject to scientific laws instead of making scientific laws subject to the will of God.
So why do some people want to confine God to the laws of science? The answer is simple, PRIDE. It’s our pride that makes us want control. When we think we understand something, it gives us a sense that we can also control it. But miracles can’t be controlled. That worries some people.
It’s been said that, “Knowledge is power, and ignorance is slavery.” This is true, but knowledge comes in two shades.
• Man’s knowledge is shrouded in darkness by his sins, but God’s knowledge is revealed by His light.
In Jesus Christ, God sent His light into the world so that we may know the Truth. And the Truth of Christ IS A MIRACLE!
In the words of John 3:19, “. . . this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
In John 8:12, Jesus said, “I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.”
The understanding that comes from God cannot be confined to our boxes of prejudice and narrow perceptions of the world in which we live. By faith in Jesus Christ, God has given us the opportunity to see the world and the universe through His eyes, and through His eyes, NOTHING is impossible.
I was told that the inventor of the radio, Guglielmo Marconi, was once asked what was his inspiration for creating his invention. He replied, “I didn’t create it. It was always there. It was God who allowed me to see how it works.” This is also true of all discoveries in all of our sciences.
• Human beings never created anything. They simply discovered some of what God already made.
God has given many gifts to us, each wrapped in beautiful boxes called girls and boys, men and women, and the gift within each box is intended to bring glory to God. It’s for us to open those boxes and let in the light of God’s wisdom and knowledge. God intended each of His boxes for transporting His Truth and not for cold storage.
• God’s love is revealed through His wisdom, and God’s knowledge is found in knowing Jesus Christ. In the life, death, and resurrection of His Son, God demonstrated that faith and miracles are synonymous. They each defy the containment of our limited understanding. If we can’t believe in miracles, it’s not because they don’t exist. It’s not because we haven’t yet found the scientific explanation . . . but someday we will. It’s because we lack the faith to see them for what they really are . . . MIRACLES by the hand of God!
You may not realize it, but you already have lots of faith. Just ask my wife about faith. She exercises her faith every time she gets in the car . . . especially with me driving.
We’ve each one been given special gifts from our Creator to be used in special ways. We also have faith. They’re gifts from God, but whether we open that gift or not, and how we choose to apply God’s gifts is up to us. The first step in appreciating God’s gifts is to accept his Son, Jesus Christ, as your personal Lord and Savior.
In his Letter to the Hebrews chapter 11, Paul wrote, “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for. By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible. By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead . . . .”
“And what more shall I say? I do not have time to tell about Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel and the prophets, who through faith conquered kingdoms, administered justice, and gained what was promised; who shut the mouths of lions, quenched the fury of the flames, and escaped the edge of the sword; whose weakness was turned to strength; and who became powerful in battle and routed foreign armies. Women received back their dead, raised to life again . . . .”
“These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.” (Heb. 11:1-4, 32-35, 39-40)
PLEASE JOIN WITH ME IN PRAYER
Heavenly Father, although my faith may be small now, I know that you can make it great. I come to you now, just as I am, a sinner in need of your grace, and I ask your Son, Jesus Christ to be the Lord of my life. Please open my eyes to your Truth so that I may have the courage to open your gifts in my life. This I ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
