Witnesses and Magnets: Our role!
This sermon is based on the illustrations and teaching from ‘The Bible’s Big Story - Our Story’ a visual roadmap for the biblical journey, by Dr Harry Wendt.
As a lead in, we have used this material as a Bible teaching tool for the last three years, as weekend seminars, as well as Dr Wendt’s material ‘See through the Scriptures.’ Dr Wendt as a bible scholar comes from a Lutheran theological back ground while the Salvation Army has a Arminian - Wesleyan theology, some adjustment to fit theological perspectives from the original teaching has occurred for this sermon.
“The Bible’s Big Story – Our Story’ and Dr Wendt’s other teaching materials can be sourced through Crossways International, Minneapolis, USA.
It seems in life that everyone is looking for some sort of recognition some sort of attention. Lord Byron said that, “Fame is the thirst of youth”, Albert Eisenstein said, “It is strange to be known so universally and yet to be so lonely.”
I like these two, Madonna the singer said “I won’t be happy until I’m as famous as God.” And Erma Bombeck the humorist said “Don’t confuse fame with success, Madonna is one, Helen Keller is the other.”
Talking about famous it was great to see our music team leader Greg on ‘Praise Be’ this morning.
You may be wondering why I’m talking about fame and recognition. Well God in his rescue strategy for the human race had a plan for the nation of Israel to have this nation set aside recognizing his sovereignty as their ruler and in doing so have them act as “Witnesses and Magnets” who attracted the rest of humanity into a relationship with him. This race of people was to stand out, this from Leviticus 20:26 “You are to be holy to me because I, the Lord, am holy, and I have set you apart from the nations to be my own.”
1) Using ‘The Bibles Big Story” material starting with frame two and those of you who have taken part in one of these seminars will know this, the frame is an illustration of God’s original plan for humanity, as the earth was part of God’s creation, He had intended that people should live to serve Him and one another living in community. Looking at the slide we see that the earth is a place where people are servants of God and one another two people kneeling) and around the outside of the earth people male and female holding hands in community.
In the Western world today we have considerable emphasis placed on the individual, this conflicts with the Bibles emphasis on community. Biblically people are to see themselves as “Made and owned by God, Managers of a planet that is made and owned by God, Entrusted with powers of will, emotion, body, and intellect which they are to develop to glorify God and serve others, by helping others develop their powers of will, emotion, body and intellect.
Success was not meant to be measured in terms of the material goods that people might acquire and enjoy. The winner at the end of life is not the person with the most stuff. This is evidenced by the fact that you can’t take it with you. Real success is measured by how much a person conforms to God’s original plan for humanity and helps others to do the same.
So we have a situation that arose wit the human race our ancestors bless them decided to step out side God’s plan and suit themselves, sin entered the world and God had to do something. Engaging the Hebrew people he took them to a place of being his people, “Witnesses and Magnets” who would establish a place where his plan was lived out, where the rest of humanity would see this plan and want to live in this way. This all started with a man by the name of Abraham, who you will be familiar with. His descendants ended up living in Egypt in slavery, before God had a gent by the name of Moses lead them out lets take a look at frame six of ‘The Bibles Big Story.”
2) Looking at this frame we see the symbol for God the circle with the four arrows, intervening in Egypt where the people are in chains, opening the waters guiding the people to Mount Sinai (there is some dispute over the location) where he made a covenant with them, the cloud and flashes of lightening being God’s presence on the mountain The law is given to the nation (the red tablets) and they are lead through the desert to the promised land, a land that was promised to Abraham four hundred years earlier.
This is not just about the giving of the law this is about the people understanding that God is “The Lord their God”, that God tells the people that it was he who took them out of the land of Egypt and out of the house of bondage.” The law is given with Ten Commandments and a collection of stipulations for living.
The covenant is to be written down, preserved and taught to all Israel. The people are to be witnesses to the covenant and take it seriously. If the people take the covenant seriously things will go well with them if they don’t things will go badly.
Now all this didn’t happen so that the people could be in some sort of servile state to God but so that they could be in a relationship with him:
• Copying God
• Living in Community
• Witnessing to equip the Israelites to be a magnet drawing other people into God’s family
• Experiencing blessings: When people know God and do his will, they will experience inner joy and peace.
So with his guidelines for life in place God lead the people into the Promised Land! Why so that they could be witnesses and magnets, attracting other people to live in relationship with God.
3) Why this thin strip of land between desert and sea? Twenty seven miles wide at its narrowest, well you know what the real estate agents say. Location, location, location. God was strategic about bringing the people here. If people were travelling between Africa – Europe – Asia these three areas of early civilization they would have travelled through Israel, or heard of the people who lived there and about the God who they worshipped, being drawn to discover more of this God and his people. Who following his pattern for their lives were living for God and serving one another, Does that sound familiar? Being witnesses and magnets.
Now I’m going to zip right through history because as we know the people of Israel didn’t exactly make a great fist of being Witnesses and Magnets, if we look at frame seventeen we see that because they continued to make a mess of things and they moved away from God, God promised them a Messiah, a chosen one.
4) Some believed that this messiah would come in as a King , hence the crown while others thought he would be a warrior king (the halo), while others believed this king would subdue the gentile nations by might (the sword). The arrows pointing back to Israel indicate that Jews in Exile would return to the Promised Land when the Messiah came. The two slatted doors indicate the belief of some including the Pharisees that there would be a resurrection from the dead, (the door with the tick), while the door with the cross indicates that not all including the Sadducees believed this. As we know Jesus came as the messiah, and while we know this not everyone believes it. Interestingly we are drawn to Him by witnesses and by the witness of the history that is contained in this His word.
If we look at frame 20 we will get an idea then of who the messiah is.
5) At Jesus baptism the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove, God spoke saying “You are my son , whom I love; with you I am well pleased.” (Mark 1:11) Jesus came as Messiah, the chosen one but also as a servant king, before his crucifixion he washed his disciples feet, and told them they were to do the same for one another.
In this frame we see around Jesus a community, Jduring his ministry Jesus gathered people around him, he continues to gather people around him. In Jesus kingdom all distinctions between male and female, one race and another, master and servant were all declared null and void, and rejected. We see this as we read Galatians 3:28 “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male or female, for you are all one in Christ.” So this left Jesus followers with one thing and that is “How can I reflect Jesus attitude toward the Father, toward the created order and towards others” in the workplace, at school, at the community meal meeting locals next week.
Back to what I started talking about, ‘Fame and recognition’ when it comes to being in relationship. What we do is so that he can be recognized in our actions so that others may be freed from their bondage of sin and released to be in relationship with Him!
Today you may want to make that move to a relationship with God, or you may want to tell another person about him. It might be inviting Jesus to be your Saviour or witnessing for Him.
Success is when we help draw others into His kingdom as we reflect Him in our lives.
