Aliens Pt. 4 – Alien Communication - Pt. 2
The age old question has been asked and answered during this series. "Are there aliens among us?"
We established in week 1 that we believe in Aliens. In fact, the truth be told, we are the aliens! 1 Peter 2:11makes it abundantly clear that we are not of this world! (Slide 2) Peter addresses us like this: "Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers"
Summary:
1. We suffer from the blends. We should stand out.
2. It is our lifestyle and our excellence that should set us apart and point people to our leader.
3. We should be preoccupied with occupying (dispossessing our enemy of territory).
4. We received alien power when we operate with alien purpose.
5. Alien communication has 2 realm impact (heavenly and earthly.)
6. Alien communication should be alien . . . no lies, no dirty or foul language, no gossip, no religious talk but edifying and thankful.
Text:
Mark 1:35 - And early in the morning, while it was still dark, He arose and went out and departed to a lonely place, and was praying there.
Mark 6:45-46 - And immediately He made His disciples get into the boat and go ahead of Him to the other side to Bethsaida, while He Himself was sending the multitude away. And after bidding them farewell, he departed to the mountain to pray.
Mark 14:32-34 - And they came to a place called Gethsemane; and He said to His disciples, "Sit here until I have prayed." And He took with Him Peter and James and John, and began to be very distressed and troubled. And He said to them, "My soul is deeply grieved to the point of death; remain here and keep watch." And He went a little beyond them, and fell to the ground, and began praying.
Luke 5:16 - But He Himself would often slip away to the wilderness and pray.
Luke 6:12 - And it was at this time that He went off to the mountain to pray, and He spent the whole night in prayer to God.
Luke 22:39-41- Leaving there, he went, as he so often did, to Mount Olives. The disciples followed him. When they arrived at the place, he said, "Pray that you don’t give in to temptation." 41 And He withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and He knelt down and began to pray...
1. Aliens must phone home!
Not only are we told that Jesus practiced regular check in we are given actual examples of this. This is not a do as I say not as I do instance with Jesus! Mark and Luke give eye witness accounts that communicating with the Father was His practice. A lot of folks talk about prayer . . . few practice it like Jesus. He takes time to show His followers the importance of check in and then teaches them how to check in. If Jesus knew the need for constant and frequent check in how can we justify or be satisfied with infrequent or no check ins.?
If we fail to check in we have a tendency to check out.
How can you be about the Father’s business if you are so overcome by business that you don’t know the Father’s voice?
I have noticed that we claim closeness to our Father on different criteria than what we use to claim closeness to our friends. If we don’t talk to friends/family for a long time we usually don’t claim to be close. In fact, if someone who hasn’t talked to us or spent any time with us claims closeness to us we will correct them. I get miffed with friends that refuse to stay in contact. Yet, we can go days, weeks, and even months without actually check in with our Father and casually stroll in as if we are best friends.
Harry Emerson Fosdick writes in his classic book The Meaning of Prayer, “Our failure to think of prayer as a privilege may be partly due to the fact that we can pray any time. The door to prayer is open so continuously that we fail to avail ourselves of an opportunity that is always there.”
Maybe we should use the language you are more familiar with! Maybe the language of Facebook would cause us to be more inclined to get involved in Alien practice. We need to login!
My concern is that we have become more like the disciples than we have the Master. They couldn’t/wouldn’t take time to pray and neither will we! It is interesting to me that Jesus phoned home prior to trouble and we only phone home during trouble. Could it be that His ability to handle the horrific treatment that He was going to receive was directly linked to His time with home? And our inability to handle pain at any level is directly linked to our lack of time linked with home?
2. The regularity of your check ins determines how alien you remain!
Unless we check in on a regular basis we will have a tendency to lose our alieness! Moments with God inoculate us against the culture we live in. This culture is corrosive and contagious. It rubs off on us! Therefore our consistent contact with our Father helps us to rub off what has rubbed on! That is why Jesus turned to His disciples and said, "Pray so that you can resist temptation!" We are not called to live in a bubble or cocoon. He knew that in this atmosphere we would be exposed to contamination and therefore would need to be constantly reintroduced to His standard, His morality, His code of conduct, His thoughts, and His mind. This is how we renew our mind in Christ . . . we come into contact with the mind of Christ!
Without constant and consistent communication with our Commander we tend to become more and more like the culture we are surrounded by. Aliens become more human the longer they are unexposed to the culture they come from!
Without exposure we become exposed!
3. Aliens should expect and capitalize on loneliness!
Lonely moments should be leveraged! They are arranged for by God to encourage us to check in! God will orchestrate quiet and isolated moments to get us all to Himself. We must be careful not to vacate those moments to our own destruction. Jesus sought out lonely places . . . we run from them! We constantly fight our way out of lonely moments and I want to suggest to you that perhaps your loneliness isn’t a curse but a gift!
Maybe rather than fighting out of lonely moments, as aliens, we should fight into lonely moments! Loneliness is not a curse it a calibration tool!
Isolated moments should be seen as insulation that the Father is providing for us!
We need to remember that we are not talking about aloneness! We are never alone. It is taking advantage of moments where we are lone in our pursuit!
If you feel alone, then we need to pray for you. If you feel lonely you need to pray! That is what that season is designed for!
