(Links to all photos are at bottom of last page)
I should begin by telling you that this is not one of my regular sermons. It is a teaching sermon, but what it teaches is primarily the concept of God’s greatness. The focal point of this sermon is to show you how powerful and how magnanimous our God is, while still taking the time to desire a deep personal relationship with each one of us.
We will find out that Jesus Christ really is the glue that holds us together. Let us begin by talking about glue.
There are different kinds of glue. There is the stuff that manufacturers use when making cheap toys. That glue doesn’t hold very well or very long. Then, there is rubber cement. It holds papers together but allows them to be taken apart when you want.
Of course, we all know about Elmer’s glue; which works much better, but can still be pulled apart. And then we have super-glue. Super-glue is a very strong glue. And for minor things it works great, but for major items it doesn’t hold well, either.
Today, I want to talk about glue; about it being stuck on you. Now you might think that having glue stuck on you is a bad thing, and most of the time it is, but there is one type of glue that actually makes everything better.
Man is born broken, and he needs mending. There is only one kind of glue that makes it possible for man to be mended and reattached to God. Let’s find out what it is by reading …
COLOSSIANS 1:15-17
‘He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him, all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him.
‘He is before all things, and in Him – all things hold together.’
This is an extremely important passage, and I want to go over it a little slower, explaining it as we go.
First of all, Paul wrote the book of COLOSSIANS, and in this passage, he is talking about Jesus Christ. Jesus looks like God! Now, some people think that means they would look like twins if they were standing side-by-side. I personally doubt that. I believe that Jesus is the perfect reflection of the essence of God, or divine holiness and perfect love.
Jesus was always. That is a concept we cannot comprehend. As humans, we need a starting and stopping point. But Jesus was always, and will always be. This passage tells us that Jesus was the Creator of all things, including the invisible spiritual realm. And not only did He create everything, He created for His purpose.
But there is something else nearly everyone misses in this passage. It is found in the last part of verse 17: ‘… and in Him, all things hold together.’
And that is what I want to talk to you about.
Jesus did not create the world, and then exit, leaving us to our own devices to keep it together, no, he created the universe, and he sustains it! He not only sustains the universe, He sustains us, individually as loved children.
You are were made with perfect love. And the Lord Jesus Christ is the One who put you together. He knew you before the creation, and He knew you in your mother’s womb. It is no accident that you are here. Jesus put you here because He loves you. You owe your very life to Him.
He also knows everything there is to know about you, and He has made a promise to those who will trust in Him. He has promised to hold them in the palm of His hand and carry them – all the days of their life.
There is another powerful passage in …
PSALM 33:9-10
‘For He spoke, and it came to be; He commanded, and it stood firm. The Lord foils the plans of the nations; He thwarts the purposes of the peoples.’
We can see the power of God in these two verses, can’t we? But after God establishes His power for us, He then does something different; He turns very personal in verses 13-15.
‘From heaven, the Lord looks down and sees all mankind; from His dwelling place, He watches all who live on the earth – He who forms the hearts of all, who considers everything they do.’
And then, the Lord goes even further. He gives us His promise in verses 18-19.
‘But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear Him, on those whose hope is in His unfailing love, He promises to deliver them from death.’
God is the powerful Creator of the universe, yet with all that power, He is so sensitive that He sees the hurt in this world and He has so much love for us that He gives us His solemn promise. If we put our hope in Him, He will deliver us from the enemy.
He will carry us through every situation we run into and He will keep us from falling. He may not change the storm around us, but He will change us so that we get through it. And all we have to do is put our faith and our hope and our love in Him. That is the promise of God! God will hold us together – no matter what!
You say that sounds good, but how do you really know He will do that? You might ask if there is proof. For many generations, we only had to rely on our faith, but I believe that, in these last days, God has provided us proof if we are only willing to take a look at it.
With the new technology that lets us look inside the smallest particles, they have found two things. One has to do with glue and the other has to do with sound. Let’s talk about the glue first.
It is deep within our bodies, and it is a small protein molecule called ‘Laminin.’ To understand this, let me give you a quick overview of cell structure. Cells organize themselves into certain molecular structures and the type of structure it is determines the type of protein it is. It is unknown how many types of proteins we have in our bodies. Estimates are somewhere between 10,000 and 60,000 different proteins in our bodies. That is a lot of structuring going on, isn’t it?
There is one type of structure that is a cell-adhesion protein that tells the cells what their jobs are in the body. That cell adhesion protein is called Laminin. It is the super-glue that keeps everything together. Without it, our skin would not stay put over our muscles and our cells would just float away from each other.
If you have ever worked with concrete, you know that they lay rebar down and pour the concrete over it. This metal rebar, or skeleton, holds the concrete together so it doesn’t crack and break off. Laminin is our rebar.
I started talking about our Lord Jesus, and how through Him, all things were made. You might be wondering why I suddenly switched to some molecular glue called Laminin that holds us together. Sometimes, we can listen to something, but it is not until we see it that we really understand it.
In COLOSSIANS 1:17, it says,
‘… and through Him (Jesus), all things are held together.’
Let me show you what Laminin looks like.
... Show photo 1 (illustration showing the blocks contained in this molecule) * - see bottom of page for link
Is it any mistake that it looks just like the cross of our Creator? Can it be that when the Bible says we are held together through Jesus, He literally means it?
Here is an actual photo of an electron microscopic image of a Laminin protein, blown up several hundred times.
... Show photo 2 (actual picture of a very magnified Laminin molecule) * - see bottom of page for link
Up until the last few years, we did not have the technology to see things like this. But I think God has given us this technology, and men who use it for Godly things, so we could catch little glimpses of His mighty wonders and ways.
The stuff that keeps our bodies held together is in the exact shape of our Savior’s cross. How awesome is that? When I saw this, I almost stood up and shouted. I was so amazed that I wanted everyone to see this and to understand that our God really is an awesome God, and He really does care about each one of us. He cares enough to watch out over us.
In COLOSSI ANS, the Apostle Paul tells us the story of the supremacy of Jesus and His divine sufficiency.
‘For by Him, all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him.
‘He is before all things, and in Him – all things hold together.’
And then Paul tells the story of grace. He says God was pleased to have all of His fullness dwell in Jesus; and through Jesus to reconcile you and me to God through the blood of Jesus who died on Calvary, for you and for me.
I spoke of the new technology that would enable us to see things we have never seen before, and that opens so many more doors that point to Jesus. They also have new technology to let us hear things that have never been heard before.
In LUKE 19 we read about what is called the Triumphal Entry. That is where Jesus rode the donkey from the Mount of Olives down into Jerusalem. Everyone was excited, because they thought Jesus was the earthly King that Israel had been waiting for.
Scripture says they all sang in loud voices and praised God for all the miracles they had seen. But some of the Pharisees told Jesus to rebuke them and tell them to be quiet.
In LUKE 19:40, Jesus says something so profound that it is only today that we are beginning to understand.
‘I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.’
I want to share something with you, and I apologize for not knowing all the scientific jargon, but they have taken the smallest particle known to man and have learned how to split it open. They have done this over and over again, and what do you think they have found in every particle? They have found one sound wave.
Now I am not familiar with how they measure that, but I do believe that is just as profound as finding out the protein that holds us together is in the shape of the cross of Jesus. Why do I say that?
Let me read to you out of GENESIS, chapter 1.
Verse 3 reads, ‘And God said, “Let there be light …”
Verse 6 reads, ‘And God said, “Let their be an expanse between the water and the heavens …”
Verse 9 reads, ‘And God said, “Let the water be gathered to one place ….”
Verse 11, ‘God said, “Let the land produce vegetation.”
And the verses keep the same pattern throughout the rest of the chapter. What I am getting at is that God spoke everything into existence. He used the sound of His voice to create. So, is it any wonder that every thing that exists has a sound wave in it? Could it be that sound wave is the very sound of our Creator speaking it into existence?
I want you to look at this next photo. It is a picture of all the planets, lined up in order, from Mercury to Pluto.
... Show photo (picture of lined up planets in our solar system) * - see bottom of page for link
Now pretend for a moment that this graphic is a real photograph, and you are the person taking the picture. You would be so many hundreds of thousands of miles out in the middle of space. Hopefully, you would have thought to make arrangements to get you back home, too.
But look at the expanse. Look how large the planets are. Now look at Earth. You can barely see it. Now, if you were to back away several million more miles, you would see that we are nothing more than one very small part of a larger galaxy called the Milky Way. In fact, we are so small, you cannot even pick out our sun in this picture.
... Show photo (picture of the Milky Way Galaxy) * - see bottom of page for link
And if you were to back out even further, you would see that there are millions of galaxies out there, and they become so small that you cannot distinguish one from another.
... Show photo (picture where galaxies are too small to be seen clearly) * - see bottom of page for link
What is my point in all this? I want you to have an idea of just how powerful our God is, and just how much He has done. And then I want you to realize that mans attempts to change God to fit our desires does not work. The only thing that works is if we change ourselves to fit His desires.
ISAIAH 55:8-9,
‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways”, declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Remember the last picture I showed – the one where space was so vast that entire galaxies could not be seen. Now look around you today. The difference in distance replicates the difference in God’s ways and our ways.
And as high as God is, as powerful as He is, He still loves us and cares for us in our need.
PSALM 34:15
‘The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and His ears are attentive to their cry.’
Yes, God loves us and all He wants is for us to love Him back enough to accept Jesus as our Savior. That’s all. And many want to love Him back.
The father asked his son, “If there are three frogs sitting on a tree limb and one decides to jump, how many frogs would be left?” The boy thought for a moment and said, “Two would be left.”
The father said that was not right. He asked him to guess again. The boy said he understood now … that if one decided to jump the others would jump too, so there would not be any frogs left.
Again, the father said that was the wrong answer. He explained to the son that if the frog “decided” to jump, that didn’t mean he actually jumped, so there would still be three frogs left.
And the same principle holds true with us. Many people do want to love God, but not badly enough to give up loving what they have in the world, and not badly enough to accept Jesus as the head of their lives.
I spoke last week about how we cannot be in the parking lot and in here at the same time. In 1 JOHN 2:15, we are told –
‘Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.’
Now this is where a preacher’s job starts to aggravate people. What does this verse really mean? Hold on to your seats because I am going to tell you.
All of us have things in this world we enjoy doing. Some of us enjoy barbecuing in the back yard; some of us enjoy going for day trips in the car, and still some of us like to do other things. Is doing these things wrong? Not in itself, but they become wrong when we choose to do them instead of going to church to worship God.
That is when we love the world more than we love God. We are to set aside a time to worship in the house of the Lord, and not let ourselves become willing to compromise on that. Don’t let anything in this world come between you and the worship of the Lord in His house.
And for those who put their trust in Jesus; fully and willingly, He bestows all He has on them. Have you put your total trust in Him yet? Or are you still wanting to keep a little for yourself? You can’t. You are either with Him, or you are against Him.
As we begin our time of invitation, I want to give each of you an opportunity to make sure you are truly stuck on Jesus; that you have put everything in this world on the back burner so that you can place Jesus on the forefront.
INVITATION
* Pictures can be found at: www.c-roads.org/space.htm
** Parts of this sermon lean heavily on a sermon by Louie Giglio, and used with permission
