This sermon was delivered to the congregation in Holy Trinity in Ayr, Ayrshire, Scotland on the 4th September 2016.
(A Scottish Episcopal Church in the Dioceses of
Glasgow & Dumfries)
Jeremiah 18:1-11 Psalm 139:1-5, 12-17 Philemon 1-21 Luke 14:25-33
Prayer: Loving God, Father Son and Holy Spirit, open our hearts and our minds that we may hear with joy your message today, and that we live in the assurance of your love forever. Amen.
Our gospel reading this morning is from the book of Luke 14:25-33. “Now large crowds were traveling with Jesus; and he turned and said to them, "Whoever comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself, cannot be my disciple. Whoever does not carry the cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a tower, does not first sit down and estimate the cost, to see whether he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to ridicule him, saying, `This fellow began to build and was not able to finish.' Or what king, going out to wage war against another king, will not sit down first and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one who comes against him with twenty thousand? If he cannot, then, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for the terms of peace. So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions."
Introduction
I was asked the other day, by a prominent member in this church as to who has influenced me the most from a Christian prospective.
Well like most of us, there are too many people to name; and more to take the blame, because getting things wrong is part and parcel of the Christian life; but it is how we handle it, and how we recover that sets us apart.
Now long are I came to know the Lord, I was struggling with the Bible, Christianity and the Church. In fact I was seeing the church, any church, as being infinitely more political and points scoring than my workplace. The one-upmanship was horrendous, and I was struggling to see where God was in all this. My attitude at the time was try even harder, to become more what Christians are mean to be like, leading a good clean life, being nice to people, but as you would guess, the harder I tried, the harder I failed. You see the problem wasn’t me directly, the problem was I was letting others use and abuse me, others who had their own issues and ambitions, others who had no true sense of the Gospel either, and I fell for their rhetoric time and time again.
By accident, I came across two Evangelists, one an American whom I met in Ayr, a man named Andrew Wommack, (from Andrew Wommack Ministries International), who help reveal to me the true meaning of the Gospel, and how the Lord loves us regardless of our sin, but how the Lord hated our sin so much as it got in the way of us being useful to him. The other Evangelist that open things up for me was an English Evangelist called Derek Prince, (Derek Prince Ministries), who taught me that the bible is logical from start to finished, if only we could see it, and I liked that because I was an Engineer for over 25 years before I became a school teacher.
And so, when I saw the Gospel in a logical format, I could see that the Lord needs to forgive our sins when we ask for his forgiveness and drink of his cup, however, he also puts things into motion that changes our basic internal nature to deal with past sin, things that are out with our control, things that are usually uncomfortable, but things that try and test us, … and when we come through the other side, we are literally transformed into someone new.
I mean, I really shudder at the things I have done wrong in the past, but I know that these cold feelings are constantly reminders to me that God has, and is cleaning me up on the inside, saying this is what I was like, and this is what I am like now, and had God not intervened, I would have been none the wiser, however this is shown as embarrassment for my past failures and sorrow for the people I have hurt. I have by no means reached a destination, but I have certainly left.
What I am getting at here is that once the Lord has tried and tested us, we are truly sorry for our past, and a such, there is no way that we will ever repeat our past sins through choice, as our old internal nature has changed, but not through any efforts of our own. It is not us who are bringing about this change but him who is guiding and leading us on this earth, preparing us for a place in heaven.
You see religion is man’s relationship with God, and what he does to impress God; whereas Christianity is God’s relationship with man, where God is in control and where we submit our lives and wills to him; him who will look after us, and strengthen us, and protect us and watch our back. As Christians we are not in control of our lives, as we have given all control over to him who loves us, and him who has a path laid out for us; despite how we measure ourselves in this world.
Many people say the bible is illogical and continually contradicts itself, well, if you live in the Old Testament of Sin and “good and bad” deeds, then that is what you will see, but if we open up our hearts to the Lord, and get an understanding of him, and why he became human in the first place, then the bible will open up for us, and it will make perfect logical sense.
If you want to try this out, try reading the first 8 chapters of Romans, and you will see that every topic is logically referenced to the topic or topics preceding it; culminating in Roman 8:1 which says, “there is therefore no condemnation in them who are in Christ Jesus”.
As you may have noticed, I almost always mention the Gospel message in my sermons, but not because I slip it in, no, it is because I see the Gospel all throughout the New Testament, the good news that Jesus commissioned us all to teach. This short article is an example, to show you that once you see and understand the true gospel, it fires you us and gives you strength and energy as you engage with the Holy Spirit, the Lord the giver of life.
I will finish with that for now, before I start going into another sermon, but I hope this will encourage to look for the source of the true power in the bible.
Amen and may God bless us with this message.
Gordon McCulloch
