“Being” in Relation to the Lord
Chuck Sligh
September 28, 2014
(A PowerPoint presentation is available for this sermon upon request by emailing me at chucksligh@hotmail.com.)
TEXT: 2 Chronicles 25:1-2 – “Amaziah was twenty and five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty and nine years in Jerusalem. And his mother's name was Jehoaddan of Jerusalem. 2 And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, but not with a perfect heart.”
INTRODUCTION
Sometimes we can be guilty of putting too much emphasis on DOING things for the Lord. Doing service for God IS no doubt important, for we see we’re taught to do it many places in the Bible. We ARE to be busy in the Lord’s vineyard, serving the Master and others.
But God is not just concerned about what we are DOING for Him, but what we are BEING for Him. Our text is an example of this. Amaziah was a man who DID the right thing, but he was not BEING the right thing because he didn’t do it with a perfect heart, which means with his whole heart.
One reason we focus more on DOING than BEING is because that’s what people see. Someone has said that: “REPUTATION is what people think you are. CHARACTER is what you are.” We like DOING because it enhances our REPUTATION without necessarily affecting our CHARACTER. But God is most concerned about our WHAT WE ARE because He is interested in our CHARACTER.
So today, I want to talk about some things that God wants you to BE:
I. BE REAL
1 Timothy 1:5 – “Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned.”
1 Peter 1:22 – “Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently.”
Philippians 1:10 – “That ye may approve things that are excellent; that ye may be sincere and without offence till the day of Christ.”
(EXPAND AS LED)
II. BE TENDER
Note:
Hebrews 3:7-8 – “Wherefore (as the Holy Ghost saith, To day if ye will hear his voice, 8 Harden not your hearts, as in the provocation, in the day of temptation in the wilderness.”
Hebrews 3:12-19 – “Take heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God. 13 But exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. 14 For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our confidence stedfast unto the end; 15 While it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts, as in the provocation. 16 For some, when they had heard, did provoke: howbeit not all that came out of Egypt by Moses. 17 But with whom was he grieved forty years? was it not with them that had sinned, whose carcases fell in the wilderness? 18 And to whom sware he that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not? 19 So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.”
There are basically two kinds of Christians in the world with regard to this point in our outline:
• First are sensitive and tender-hearted Christians
These are moldable, tender, soft-hearted before the Lord. Their attitude is immediately, “Yes, Lord” to whatever He says or wherever He leads. My pastor used to say, “We need Christians with tough hides, but tender hearts.”
• The second kind of Christian is the hard, calloused, unmovable Christian.
A hard-hearted Christian tends to be cold to one of three things or all three:
1) First, he is cold to God and His things – Isaiah 29:13 – “Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men.” (EXPAND AS LED)
2) Second, a hard-hearted Christian tends to be cold to forgiveness and restoration – Note Ephesians 4:31-32 – “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: 32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.” (EXPAND AS LED)
3) Third, a hard-hearted Christian tends to be cold to compassion – 1 John 3:16-18 – “Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 17 But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of God in him? 18 My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.” (EXPAND AS LED)
There’s an example of a man in the Old Testament whom God honored because he was tender-hearted to the things of God. Turn with me to 2 Chronicles 34. This man lived in a period in which the kingdom of Judah had forsaken God and had embraced idolatry. The Temple was in disrepair. It was such a time of sin and spiritual apostasy that the Word of God had all but been forgotten.
During that dark hour, a man came to the throne named Josiah, whom verse 2 says, “…did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, and walked in the ways of David his father, and declined neither to the right hand, nor to the left.” (2 Chronicles 34:2)
The first thing he did was break down the altars to Baalim and destroy the idols and images the Jews were worshiping. The next thing he did was raise money to repair the Temple.
While they were working in the Temple, a priest named Hilkiah found a copy of the Law of Moses, a scroll containing Genesis through Deuteronomy. For the first time in years, they actually had a copy of the book of the Law of Moses, which was what we call the Pentateuch—the first five books of the Old Testament. All known copies of the Law had been lost or destroyed, but here was an actual copy. That’s how far they had fallen and how dark was the hour in which they lived.
So Josiah had the priest read the book of the Law to him and when he heard it, he was so convicted that verse 19 says he rent his clothes. Someone was sent to enquire of the Lord about what God would do, because the people had not kept the Word of the Lord. Josiah had heard the priest read in the Law of the judgments God had said would happen to the Jews if they did not keep his Word, and Josiah knew that the Jews had fallen wide of the mark.
Part of God’s reply to Josiah is found in verses 26-27 – “And as for the king of Judah, who sent you to enquire of the LORD, so shall ye say unto him, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel concerning the words which thou hast heard; 27 Because thine heart was tender, and thou didst humble thyself before God, when thou heardest his words against this place, and against the inhabitants thereof, and humbledst thyself before me, and didst rend thy clothes, and weep before me; I have even heard thee also, saith the LORD.”
God withheld his judgment on an entire nation because its leader had a tender heart before the Lord. But Josiah didn’t just have a mushy, sentimental outward show of tender-heartedness that did not produce the fruit of action and obedience! He immediately reestablished the Passover and the Old Testament feasts and started a revival in Judah—all because one tender-hearted man’s heart was tender to the words of the Lord!
When I think about tender-heartedness, I think of that song, Have Thine Own Way:
Have Thine Own Way, Lord! Have Thine Own Way!
Thou art the potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will,
While I am waiting, yielded and still.
Have Thine Own Way, Lord! Have Thine Own Way!
Hold o’re my being absolute sway!
Fill with Thy Spirit till all shall see
Christ only always, living in me.
Would to God that every single one of us remained tender before the Lord.
III. BE INTIMATE WITH GOD
Note Genesis 4:1 – “And Adam KNEW Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD.”
It’s interesting how the Bible talks about the most intimate relationship between Adam and Eve, it says that Adam KNEW Eve, resulting in their having a child.The Hebrew world for know (’sana) does not mean merely the acquisition of MENTAL knowledge. It means knowing something by experience…or when referring to people, it infers knowing them intimately, not simply having a knowledge ABOUT them.
In a spiritual sense, we should KNOW God. So when I say you should KNOW God, I don’t simply mean that knowing ABOUT God. That’s only part of it. But we should KNOW God INTIMATELY.
I’m not implying anything sensuous here. But in the Bible whenever God’s people went into idolatry, the Bible says they “went a whoring after other gods.”
For example, Exodus 34:15-16 says “Lest thou make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and they go a whoring after their gods, and do sacrifice unto their gods, and one call thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice; 16 And thou take of their daughters unto thy sons, and their daughters go a whoring after their gods, and make thy sons go a whoring after their gods.”
This phrase is found in 18 separate verses in the Old Testament. The idea is that we are on an intimate basis with God.
In the New Testament, believers are likened to a bride. We are the Bride of Christ.We are in an intimate relationship with God in a way analogous of a man and his bride “know” one another.
Now my question for you is, “HOW intimate with God are you?” You see, it’s easy to go through the motions, but not REALLY have an intimate relationship with God. When we do that, WE are the losers. If God is our spiritual Groom, then we become intimate with God the same way we would develop intimacy with someone we loved on earth.
Let me share three ways to become intimate with God:
• Read his love letters (the Bible).
• Spend time with Him alone.
No relationship can grown without communication.
Talk daily with the Lord.
• Follow His wishes and desires. NOTE:
John 14:15 – “If ye love me, keep my commandments.”
John 14:23 – “Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.”
John 15:10 – “If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love.”
IV. BE TEACHABLE
Proverbs 9:9 – “Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning.”
Proverbs 19:20 – “Hear counsel, and receive instruction, that thou mayest be wise in thy latter end.”
(EXPAND AS LED)
