Looking Forward
I Peter 1:17- 2:3
Australia has two animals pictured on their Coat of Arms. They are an Emu and a Kangaroo. These are some strange choices to those who don’t know why they are there. The Emu is nothing but a big, dumb bird and a kangaroo just looks funny while it hops along to escape danger. But there’s more to it than that. You see, these two animals have a very special characteristic that isn’t found in any other species. It is impossible for them to move backwards. An Emu has 3 toes and they are all on the front of its foot. If he tries to move backward, he falls down. A kangaroo can’t move backwards because it’s long and heavy tail gets in the way and trips him up. So they both must move forward all the time. They were picked to symbolize Australia as a nation that will never fall back but keep moving on against all odds.
God is a god of Forward Movement, forward thinking, forward vision.
1 Peter 1:17-2:3
17 Since you call on a Father who judges each man's work impartially, live your lives as strangers here in reverent fear.
18 For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers,
19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.
20 He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake.
21 Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.
22 Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.
23 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.
24 For, "All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall,
25 but the word of the Lord stands forever." And this is the word that was preached to you.
2:1 Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of every kind.
2 Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation,
3 now that you have tasted that the Lord is good.
(NIV)
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
– Peter Drucker –
When a person meets Christ,
that person will never be the same!
Peter says that:
1 Peter 1:23
23 For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God.
(NIV)
How easy it is to become distracted. William H. Hinson tells us why animal trainers carry a stool when they go into a cage of lions. They have their whips, of course, and their pistols are at their sides. But invariably they also carry a stool. Hinson says it is the most important tool of the trainer. He holds the stool by the back and thrusts the legs toward the face of the wild animal. Those who know maintain that the animal tries to focus on all four legs at once. In the attempt to focus on all four, a kind of paralysis overwhelms the animal, and it becomes tame, weak, and disabled because its attention is fragmented.
We fill our lives with so many things, when God wants us to focus on the one thing – Christ!
Paul punctuates the fact that all we have build our lives on before Christ is not enough!
Philippians 3:4-12
4 …. If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more:
5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee;
6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.
(NIV)
Paul thought he had it made and was on the Highway of success. All of his life had pointed one direction and he had never looked back.
Notice some of the things Paul counted as successes:
vs 5 “Circumcised on the eighth day”
Paul counted his successes from his birth. Obviously his parents were strict adherents of the Law of God. Paul’s parents made sure their little boy was circumcised, a religious ceremony within Judaism to welcome infant Jewish boys into a covenant between God and the Children of Israel.
“of the people of Israel”
Paul considered the fact that he was a descendant of Israel made him successful. He was born into the right family. It is interesting to me that no descendant of Israel ever called himself a descendant of “Jacob”, even though Israel and Jacob are one in the same. No one classified himself as a Jacobite, since Jacob’s name means “supplanter”, the treacherous one. No one wanted to be associated with that. Instead, they chose to align themselves with the name God later gave Jacob: “Israel”, prince of God. Paul’s claim to fame was that he was a direct descendant of “God’s Prince”!
“of the tribe of Benjamin”
Benjamin, the youngest son of Israel. Another one whose name was changed. Benjamin was not his original name . As Rachel, his mother, was dying while giving her son last life, she cried out, “His name shall be ‘Ben-Oni’”, son of my trouble. But father Israel renamed him, Benjamin, son of my right hand. By the way, another Saul was of the tribe of Benjamin. These people considered themselves to be God’s Right Hand men, faithful servants of the Most High God!
“a Hebrew of Hebrews”
Paul counted himself successful because he was not only a natural-born Hebrew. He also still spoke Hebrew. He was taught by one of the greatest Hebrew teachers of all time, Gamalial. It was as if Paul were saying, “I was Hebrew born and Hebrew bred and when I die I’ll be Hebrew dead!” Except for the fact that Paul also said…
“in regard to the Law. a Pharisee”
What difference could that make for Paul? Pharisees were the spiritual athletes of Judaism. There were not very many Pharisees, never more than 6,000 were permitted in this elite group of sacred law keepers. They kept the Law with such faithfulness that they were called “The Separated Ones”, or the Pharisees.
vs 6 “as for zeal, persecuting the church”
To the Jew, zeal was the greatest quality of life. The Psalmist said it: “for zeal for your house consumes me, and the insults of those who insult you fall on me.” (Psalm 69:9 NIV) Paul had been so zealous as a Jew that he had tried to wipe out the opponents of Judaism. In fact when Paul found Jesus on the road, he was heading for Damascus with arrest warrants in his pocket to haul any Christian he found there off to jail.
“as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.”
Paul says that he had searched the Law of God and made his checklist of everything he, as a Jew, should and should not do. He checked twice to make sure he would never be found naughty and always found nice! He was blameless, faultless. God should escort him personally to the right hand of the throne of God because he had never done anything wrong!
Philippians 3:7-8
7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.
8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.
(NIV)
Paul says, “All those successes I have given up because I found something better. No, not something – Someone! The surpassing greatness of KNOWING Christ Jesus my Lord is worth discarding ALL things!”
Philippians 3:8-9
…I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him,
not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law,
but that which is through faith in Christ—
the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.
(NIV)
Success is not having this and that, not knowing this and that, not being recognized as a “So-and-so” and having your name in all the “Who’s Who” lists in the world.
All that matters is your answer to this question:
“Where is Jesus in relationship to your life?
Philippians 3:10-12
10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death,
11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.
12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.
(NIV)
In all probability, the problem with our resolution lists is that they are just too long. We carefully lay out a long list of priorities, and that is probably where we make our mistake. The word priority, by definition, simply cannot be plural. Only one consideration in my life comes prior to every other one. The second one is simply not my priority. Nowadays, I know many important things exist in our lives, but what is the one thing that comes prior to all the others?
Philippians 3:13-14
13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it.
But one thing I do:
Forgetting what is behind
and straining toward what is ahead,
14 I press on toward the goal
to win the prize
for which God has called me heavenward
in Christ Jesus.
(NIV)
What is your ONE priority? When you look at your life, what is the ONE thing that pulls you along? “A man who chases two rabbits catches neither.”
A young boy by the name of James had a desire to be the most famous manufacturer and salesman of cheese in the world. He planned on becoming rich and famous by making and selling cheese and began with a little buggy pulled by a pony named Paddy. After making his cheese, he would load his wagon and he and Paddy would drive down the streets of Chicago to sell the cheese. As the months passed, the young boy began to despair because he was not making any money, in spite of his long hours and hard work.
One day he pulled his pony to a stop and began to talk to him. He said, "Paddy, there is something wrong. We are not doing it right. I am afraid we have things turned around and our priorities are not where they ought to be. Maybe we ought to serve God and place him first in our lives." The boy drove home and made a covenant that for the rest of his life he would first serve God and then would work as God directed.
Many years after this, the young boy, now a man, stood as Sunday School Superintendent at North Shore Baptist Church in Chicago and said, "I would rather be a layman in the North Shore Baptist Church than to head the greatest corporation in America. My first job is serving Jesus."
So, every time you take a take a bite of Philadelphia Cream cheese, sip a cup of Maxwell House, mix a quart of Kool-Aid, slice up a DiGiorno Pizza, cook a pot of Macaroni & Cheese, spread some Grey Poupon, stir a bowl of Cream of Wheat, slurp down some Jell-O, eat the cream out of the middle of an Oreo cookie, or serve some Stove Top, remember a boy, his pony named Paddy, and the promise little James L. Kraft made to serve God and work as He directed.
What is your ONE Thing? Only one thing can be your priority. Make your one thing Jesus!
What is the ONE thing God is calling you to do? Commit yourself to doing the ONE Thing God wants for you. Then DO IT!
