Take It With You
9/6/09 Psalm 15:1-5 James 1:19-27
Have you ever gone to Walmart with their circular baggage area, left the store and left one of your bags there in the store. What do you do when you recognize it’s missing? Or have you been to a store and left something on the counter or in the grocery cart. How do you feel about it when you get home?
As a kid did you ever have your homework done and felt good about it, until the teacher said take out your homework, and you tried to but you couldn’t. All of a sudden you remembered you left it on the kitchen table. Didn’t your heart just sink down inside of you? Now the frustration, the anger, the wasted time, the beating yourself up, could have all been avoided, if you had of just taken the stuff with you. When you to pick up something, remember to “take it with you.:
One day I was busy here at the church but got hungry for something to eat. I drove over to McDonald’s and ordered my lunch. I was so busy thinking about what I had to do. I gave my order at the little talk box. I pulled up to the first window and paid for my order. The guy gave me a receipt.
I pulled up to the second window and since there was no car in front of me, I sped right past the second window and drove back to the church. In the parking lot, as I was getting out, I reached for my lunch and there was none. I realized I had left McDonalds and missed the reason I had visited the store in the first place.
Now the interesting thing is I was still hungry, but I was too embarrassed to go back to the store and admit my mistake. Now McDonald’s did everything they were supposed to do in preparing my McChicken Sandwich, my $1 fry and my $1 drink. I on the other hand did not keep my end of the bargain, because “I didn’t take it with me.”
We base our actions for the most part on assumptions that we make. An assumption is something we believe is true, but it may not be true at all. I assumed I had my dollar menu meal, so I drove off with complete confidence and arrived back at the church empty handed and hungry.
Now all of us have assumed certain things to be true and acted upon them, and found out we were wrong in our assumptions. Sometimes it does not matter a whole lot if we are wrong. For instance if you assumed it was not going to rain and you didn’t take an umbrella but then it did rain, chances are you probably got wet coming from where you were going.
Sometimes the wrong assumption matters a whole lot. For instance you marry someone assuming you could change a destructive pattern in their lives only to discover you can’t. That’s a huge price to pay for a wrong assumption.
There is an assumption that many Christians and non Christians alike assume about Christianity that is not true. They assume, that the main thing about loving God and showing your love for God is being in church on Sunday morning. They think that God has a big attendance chart and that on Sunday morning God is filling in those charts and giving out eternal stickers.
God is saying there is John, yes. I see Amy made it. Yes. This is Fred’s 45th consecutive Sunday. Yes. Oh Oh David did not make it this week. This is not good. Look at the number of no shows on his chart.
Because we make the assumption that being in church is the main thing, we miss out on the main thing. So before church, we are saying things like, “Boy if you don’t get out of that bed and start getting ready for church I’m going to knock the living daylight out of you.” We have people saying “it’s almost 4:30 I got to leave the club so I can make it to church in the morning.” We have people saying, “if you make us late for church one more time, you are really going to be sorry.” We have people yelling and screaming at each other with the biggest fights just before church, but by George they got to church.
How many of us have even said, “man the devil sure is busy on Sunday morning. He tried to keep us out of church, but we made it.” Again we are thinking, “God sure is happy with us, look at us we made it to church.” Even those of us who are here at church and don’t want to be here, we think in the back of our minds if we were to die tomorrow, at least we could tell God, we were in church the day before we died. Why, because we assume that somehow you get points with God for being in church.
Now then once you get to church, there’s ways to get extra points with God. You get bonus points by bringing your bible. Bonus points by staying awake during the sermon. Bonus points by staying through the entire service. Bonus points by doing some kind of service in the church. Bonus points by standing during certain portions of the church.
Now these things are all good, but God is not shouting hooray, look at them in church.150 of 185 sang well, 170 of 185 stayed away, and 35 of 185 did something in worship. I certainly feel good. For some It is as though the church service is the big game of the week and as long as we made it to the game, we’re faithful members.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Now the Word of God tells us to come to church or to gather together for worship. But the purpose is not to get a sticker by your name. The purpose of coming to church is to be equipped to live like Jesus Christ the other 166 hours of your 168 hour week. On Sunday mornings, we preach the word of God in order to give instructions on how to love God and how to love each other. That boils down to being obedient to the word of God and being more considerate and loving of others. That involves dealing with our own selfishness and how it hurts others. Church is important, but the church service is not the main thing. God is not giving you points for simply showing up in the building. The only way to please God with coming to church is take it back with you into your every day life.
Think about it, I actually ended up being the loser when I went to McDonald’s and did everything except take it back with me. What would you think of somebody going grocery shopping, carefully picking out their meats, their vegetables, their fruits, and everything else they needed and then taking it to the cashier to pay for it. The person then takes the loaded cart to the door, pushes it to the side of the door and leaves it there, while they go home. At home they wonder why, there’s never much to eat, no toilet paper, and no deodarant. The person begins to say, “Every week I go shopping and it’s the same thing when I get home. Maybe I ought to try that big new store that just open up across town. Maybe then I’ll have something.” No what they need to do is to take home what they bought.
There’s a phrase “ what happens in vegas, stays in vegas.” Unfortunately that’s how many people in the church thinks church should be. “What happens in the church, stays in the church.” No my friends, you have got to take it with you if Christ is going to be real in your life. Most people do not have a problem with what Christians do on Sunday morning. Their problem is the way Christians live once they leave the church.
Your attendance in church on Sunday is not a free pass, to sin and act the fool the rest of the week. You’ve cursed out you kids, you’ve lied to your parents, you’ve backstabbed on the job, you were disrespectful to your spouse, and you didn’t behave at all in school and yet if you were to meet God today, your confidence is in telling God you were in church on Sunday.
The purpose in coming to church is to have a mirror before you of what Jesus Christ is like so that you can change to look more like him. I have a bad habit of not looking into the mirror before I leave the house. As a result, I have gone to Home Depot and then to the Bank and had cotton in my hair that has not been touched by a comb.
I get to the church look in the mirror, and say, “I cannot believe I went out looking like that.” If you see me out in public and my hair looks like it has not been combed, feel free to tell me, Pastor Rick you might want to comb your head. Better still, take around an extra comb and say “take it with you.”
We don’t come to church to get attendance records and brownie points with God. We come to church to learn how to change. It’s not enough to just sit here and agree by saying amen. James 1:22 says 22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23 Those who listen to the word but do not do what it says are like people who look at their faces in a mirror 24 and, after looking at themselves, go away and immediately forget what they look like.
James is clearly speaking to those who think, if I just get to church, then I’ve got it in good with God for the rest of the week. That’s what he calls deceiving yourself. You are assuming something that is not true. God is not doing back flips because you showed up in church. Suppose your child came to the breakfast table with a booger in his nose, slob on his mouth, and matter in his eye saying I’m ready to go to school.
You probably say, “you’re not going anywhere looking like that.” If the child says, “but I looked in the mirror.” How many of you are going to say, “well if you looked in the mirror then that’s alright, you go right on to school.” There’s no bonus points given for looking in the mirror. You have to take the knowledge you got from looking in the mirror away with you to make a change.
Going to church, feeling good in church, meeting wonderful people in church, and having a good time in church are all great, but the power in the church is in the power of Jesus Christ to change lives. The key to having a blessed life with God’s favor upon it is in, taking the church mirror with you into all areas of your life.
Look at the mirror when you want to tell somebody off. Look into that mirror when you have hurt someone’s feeling. Look into that mirror when you’re ready to get revenge. Look into that mirror when you are getting ready to do something you know is sinful and you know is wrong.
When you see Jesus and you see yourself, how do you compare. Chances are we need to change before we respond. Church is not something to endure to make God happy. It’s not something to do to get your parents off your back. It is God’s plan to give you the richest life you can possibly have. But if you leave it behind, it will not do you any more good in meeting your needs, than my lunch I left behind did for my hunger. You have to choose to take it with you.
The word of God goes on to say, 25 But those who look intently into the perfect law that gives freedom and continue in it—not forgetting what they have heard but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do. Not everybody who is coming to church is going to be rewarded for it. It is those who make the choice to really engage themselves in the study of the word of God and allow themselves to be changed by it who are going to be blessed.
The main thing is not sitting in a building for two hours to be checked in by God’s attendance keepers. The main thing is yielding our wants, our actions and out attitudes over to Jesus Christ so that we can be changed by him. We’re only deceiving ourselves if we think we have grown beyond the need to change on a weekly and daily basis.
I challenge you each night to review your life for that day and ask yourself the question, “where could I have been a little bit more like Christ.” “Where was I thinking more of me and not enough of the other person.”
Satan does not mind us going to church, as long as he can keep us thinking, what really matters is whether or not you make it to church on Sunday. He does not mind if you have an emotional experience in church that caused you to dance down the aisle. He does not mind you singing with every right note or you feeling inspired by the service. As long as you don’t take it with you, there’s no problem. Many of us are not taking it with us. Our lives are no different than the lives of our family and friends who do not know Jesus Christ. Some of us are trying to be more like them, than we are trying to persuade them to be more like Christ.
Sunday morning will not have as much affect on your life as who you are with Monday-Saturday. We become who we are with the most. Some of us would be embarrassed if the church could hear our phone message. Some of us would be ashamed of all that we have on our My space page and Facebook that denies Jesus Christ and all that our church stands for. Yet you will come asking for prayer to help you get better grades and do better in schools knowing that all through the week you reject Jesus.
Some of us fill our minds daily with music, we know could not come close to God’s approval and the only place you could find it in the afterlife is in hell. Some of us filll our minds week after week with programs that have us laughing at approving of things that the word of God condemns and we say, there’s no harm done to us. Yet when we get angry and upset, we turn to those programs for direction to how we are to respond. But the moment we get sick or in a crisis, we want to call upon Jesus.
Do we really think our God is so small, that he can be so easily deceived and tricked just by us coming to church. Do we really think God can’t read e-mails, text messages, or see the web sites we visit?
One day we will stand and give an account of our lives before God. The number of times we attended church is not going to have an affect of whether we spend eternity in heaven or hell. It is all going to boil down to our love for Jesus Christ. Jesus said, “if you love me, you will keep my commandments.”
When the Holy Spirit is telling you, you need to change and you don’t what does it say about your love for Jesus. When your lifestyle conflicts with the word of God, what does it say about your love for Jesus. When you make up your mind I’m not going to do what it takes to get away from this sin, “what does it say about your love for Jesus.”
God is not trying to use you to do something great for Him or for others. God is trying to do something in you so that you can be a genuine light and witness for him. The proof of being in Christ is that our lives have changed. If there has been no change, there has been no conversion. If anyone be in Christ, he or she is a new creation.
In other words, the person takes the word of Christ in order to become a disciple of Christ. A disciple is always striving to become more and more like the teacher giving the instruction. Let’s stop simply listening to the instructions. Take it with you when you leave the doors of this place. Let those around you, see the change so that they will want to be saved.
Sermon Outline—Pastor Rick
Take It With You
9/6/09 Psalm 15:1-5 James 1:19-27
A. Just Take It With You
1. Walmart, Store, Homework
2. The McDonald’s Experience
3. Embarrassment $3 Meal
B. The Role Of Assumptions
1. Thinking It’s True, But It’s Not
2. Consequences Of Assumptions
3. God Has An Attendance Chart
C. Get To Church At Any Cost
1. The Morning Discussions
2. The Devil Is Busy
3. I Don’t Want To Be Here
4. Picking Up Bonus Points
5. God’s Statistics Chart
D. The Reason To Come
1. To Be Equipped for 166 of 168
2. How To Love God—Others
3. Dealing With Me
4. The Real Loser
5. The Grocery Store Shopper
E. What Happens In Vegas…
1. Christians Problems On Monday
2. The Church Is The Mirror
3. Attendance Not A Free Pass
4. Give The Pastor A Comb
22Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.
F. How Excited Is God About You
1. Your Child At The Breakfast Table
2. No Points For Looking
3. Key To A Blessed Life
4. Check The Mirror & Change
G. How Do We Compare With Jesus
1. Can I Endure Church
2. How Should I Look Intently
3. It’s All About Change
H. Satan Encourages Church Attendance
1. Go Ahead Have A Great Time
2. Just Leave It Behind
I. We Become Who We Hang With
1. My Space, Face Book, TV
2. Teaching To Laugh At Sin
3. In A Crisis It’s Jesus
4. Does God Know About The Internet
J. We Shall All Meet Jesus
1. Church Attendance Has Little Weight
2. What Do We Do With The Word
3. My Love For Jesus
4. God’s Plan For Greatness
5. Being A Disciple
6. Taking It With You
23 Jesus replied, "Anyone who loves me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them, and we will come to them and make our home with them. 24 Anyone who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
I am indebted to Rev. Andy Stanley in one of his sermons for the idea of "attending church" as not being the thing that God is most concerned about.
