INTRO.- ILL.- Just before takeoff one day, a flight attendant approached Muhammad Ali and asked that he fasten his seat belt. "Superman don’t need no seat belt," Ali growled. "Well, Superman," the stewardess replied, "don’t need no airplane!"
Did you ever meet Muhammad Ali in person? My son-in-law met him in the Chicago airport one time. He did take a picture of him but otherwise, I’m not sure my son-in-law was overly impressed with him. He did say Ali was very friendly toward the people.
If you could meet someone famous, who would it be? An actor or actress? Or a famous sports figure?
In my lifetime, however, I’ve seen John F. Kennedy, actor Dennis Weaver, singer Barry Manilow, Heavyweight boxer Smokin’ Joe Frazier, and President Ronald Reagan. And frankly, none of these people overly impressed me. I thought and still think that Barry Manilow is a great singer. And I enjoyed actually visiting with Joe Frazier who said he would attend my church if he’d stayed in town on Sunday but he didn’t.
Otherwise, these famous people did little to enhance my life or move me to do anything different or better in life. I can’t sing. I can’t fight. I can’t act. I can’t and won’t get into politics. And none of these people moved me to want to serve my fellow man any more or better in life.
BUT there is one person who moves me more and more every day. GUESS WHO? I’m sure you know.
1 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead. In the presence of God.
We are living in the presence of God here on Sunday and on Monday. And someday we will be in His presence, face-to-face. At one funeral I said, “I would hate to leave this world and enter into eternity, meet God and have Him say, ’I don’t believe I know you.’” WOULD YOU WANT THAT TO HAPPEN?
We are living in His presence. We must live in His presence in order to prepare for the next life. This life is but a preparation for the next and the next will last trillions and trillions of years!
There is nothing you do or say that escapes His notice. And living in His presence should do something positive to you or for you! Living in the presence of God should motivate you to action!
1 In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead....
Some day God will judge the living and the dead. However, because we are in Christ and Christ is in us, we will not be judged in regard to our sins because Christ paid for our sins. We will have no sins to account for! But what about other people? What about people who don’t know God or Christ? What will happen to them? If we fear for them eternally then we must do something.
PROP.- God will judge the living and the dead. What must we do?
1- We must preach the Word
2- We must correct the incorrect
3- We must discharge the duties
I. WE MUST PREACH THE WORD
2 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.
ILL.- One preacher never prepared his sermon during the week, and then on Sunday morning he’d sit on the platform while the church was singing the hymns desperately praying, "Lord, give your message, Lord, give me your message."
One Sunday, while desperately praying for God’s message, he heard the Lord say, "Ralph, here’s my message. You’re lazy!"
I’ve met some preachers like that: too lazy to study, too lazy to do their homework, too lazy to work. Period.
I probably spend more time preparing my sermons than ever before in my life. And why would I do this since I’ll be 67 years old in December and near retirement? Why would I spend more time than ever before? HERE’S WHY.
Because I realize more than ever that I am living in the presence of God and I want to please Him more than ever before! I owe it to God to do my best.
I also realize that my time is running out. I’m on the downhill slide as far as this life is concerned. And I don’t want to rust out. I prefer to burn out!
Are you too lazy to preach the Word? Huh? How’s that? You might say, “Hey, I can’t preach!” But you do preach whether you realize it or not. You preach every day. And some people are listening.
ILL.- I’d rather see a sermon than hear one any day,
I’d rather one would walk with me than merely tell the way;
The eye’s a better pupil and more willing than the ear,
Fine counsel is confusing, but example’s always clear;
The best of all the preachers are the men who live their creeds,
For to see good in action is what everybody needs.
I soon can learn to do it if you’ll let me see it done,
I can watch your hands in action, your tongue too fast may run;
The lectures you deliver may be very wise and true,
But I’d rather get lessons by observing what you do;
I may not understand the high advice you give,
But there’s no misunderstanding how you act and how you live.
Brothers and sisters, our conversation, our actions, etc. do reveal who we are, whose we are, and what we are!
We do preach the Word of God when we pray in public and when we act decently and in order in public. We are preaching all the time. What do people where you work think of you?
Acts 4:13 “When they saw the courage of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they were astonished and they took note that these men had been with Jesus.”
II. WE MUST CORRECT THE INCORRECT
2 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. 3 For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine.
ILL.- A senior citizen said: We went to breakfast at a restaurant where the ’seniors’ special’ was two eggs, bacon, hash browns and toast for $2.99. ’Sounds good,’ my wife said. ’But I don’t want the eggs.’
’Then, I’ll have to charge you three dollars and forty-nine cents because you’re ordering a la carte,’ the waitress warned her.
’You mean I’d have to pay for not taking the eggs?’ my wife asked incredulously. ’YES!!’ stated the waitress.
’I’ll take the special then,’ my wife said. ’How do you want your eggs?’ the waitress asked. ’Raw and in the shell,’ my wife replied. She took the two eggs home and baked a cake. DON’T MESS WITH SENIORS!!!
We must correct the incorrect in life. But how do you do that? Do you go around correcting everyone you see who does something wrong? “Hey, that’s not right. You’re supposed to do it this way, not that way.”
I tell other drivers that all the time! BUT THEY DON’T LISTEN! So I honk and flash my lights!
ILL.- Seriously, one time I was driving down Parker Road, getting ready to turn onto Culberhouse Road road to go home. The guy in the car in front of me was driving very slow and with his right arm draped across the passenger seat. And I thought, “Come on now! Let’s get with the program of driving.” Or something like that. I mean he was taking his own sweet time so I flashed my lights at him.
AND GUESS WHAT? He flashed his lights back at me and they were not his headlights! He was a highway patrolman! Whoa!
Truthfully, I don’t think he should have been driving with his right arm across the passenger seat. To me, that’s not being attentive to your driving. However, there was no way in the world that I was going to correct him!
And most of the time, we can’t correct others by telling them how something is supposed to be done or not done.
2 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction.
Correct, rebuke and encourage. These are things that a preacher must do in his preaching but what about the rest of us? What about the Christian in the pew and in the working world?
We correct the incorrect by living the correct life as best we can. Living a faithful Christian life will probably do more to correct the errors of others better than anything else we could do or say.
III. WE MUST DISCHARGE THE DUTIES
5 But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
ILL.- A guy stopped at a local gas station and, after filling his tank, he paid the bill and bought a soft drink. He stood by his car to drink his cola and watched a couple of men working along the roadside. One man would dig a hole two or three feet deep and then move on. The other man came along behind him and filled in the hole. While one was digging a new hole, the other was 25 feet behind filling in the hole. The men worked right past the guy with the soft drink and went on down the road.
"I can’t stand this," said the man tossing the can into a trash container and heading down the road toward the men. "Hold it, hold it," he said to the men. "Can you tell me what’s going on here with all this digging and refilling?"
"Well, we work for the government and we’re just dong our job," one of the men said.
"But one of you is digging a hole and the other fills it up. You’re not accomplishing anything. Aren’t you wasting the taxpayers’ money?"
"You don’t understand, mister," one of the men said, leaning on his shovel and wiping his brow.
"Normally there’s three of us: me, Elmer and Leroy. I dig the hole, Elmer sticks in the tree and Leroy, here, puts the dirt back. Now just because Elmer’s sick, that don’t mean that Leroy and me can’t work."
Brothers and sisters, do your work even if no one is working in our government! Whoa! Seriously, we must go to work every day and discharge our duties, even if our duties are not what we would like.
ILL.- I know that my son Shane doesn’t particularly like getting up at 4 every morning and going to work at 5, unloading two-liter soda, etc. And on some days he may work 12 hours. But he does the work anyway and knows he’s blessed to have a job.
My son-in-law, Chris Santasiere, informed me that his wife Holly had to get her grade cards out this week for her 5th grade class. And she’s been behind on things because she got the H1N1 flu and was out of school a week. Chris said that Holly didn’t get to bed until 3 a.m. Thursday morning and got only 2 hours of sleep.
Now you know as well as I do, that’s not good. That’s not conducive to good health, being a good wife and a good mother.
Holly informed me when we were there that she’s been working 60 hours a week and still trying to be a wife to Chris and a mother to those three kids. AND THAT’S HARD TO DO!
But you know what, I still commend her for her good, diligent work in spite of hardship and long hours. She is discharging her duties as best she can and we all must. And also in regard to serving the Lord.
Paul said, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry. (whatever it is)
ILL.- Preacher Wayne Smith used to say, “I like those people who crawl in sick rather than call in sick.” DISCHARGE YOUR DUTIES IN LIFE, including your Christian duties.
CONCLUSION------------------------
ILL.- Someone said: "I would say that a ’dull preacher’ is a contradiction in terms; if he is dull he is not a preacher. He may stand in a pulpit and talk, but he is certainly not a preacher."
Preach the Word! Be urgent about it! And don’t be dull. Don’t be a dull Christian. Be excited. Be on fire.
God calls us to do His work whenever, wherever we are and whoever we are! Are you doing your duty?
Steve Shepherd, Jonesboro Christian Church, AR
jonesborochristianchurch@suddenlink.net
