[NOTE: The beginning of this sermon is referring to flooding that occurred where I live in western North Carolina.}
Wow! What a week, amen? Life can come at you from out of nowhere and turn on a dime, can’t it? Last Sunday we gathered here to worship and had no idea how our little corner of the world would be turned upside down, parts of it literally just washed away. What happened as the result of the floods was sudden … it was disastrous … devastating … and beautiful.
Beautiful? What could be beautiful about a flood? Nothing … if you’re talking about the flood itself but what is absolutely beautiful and has brought many a tear to my eye is the way that we have all pulled together to help the victims of the flood. The pastors and churches of this area were among the first to rise to the challenge. We began setting up food kitchens, places where people could take a shower. We’ve been working with local authorities to help clean up and find safe shelter for those who’ve lost their homes or all their belongings. The United Methodist Committee on Relief was here within days to help the relief effort. We all have stories to share of neighbors showing up with bulldozers or backhoes to help fix driveways. Efforts are underway to rebuild all the bridges that have been destroyed.
A lot has been done and a lot more needs to be done and I will do my best to keep you informed of all the projects that are going on and how we can help. No effort or contribution is too small. Your snack contribution for the rescue workers, for example, ended up filling the back of pick-up truck and then some. Do what you can and trust me … every little bit adds up.
One of the things that I noticed was the spirit of community that superseded politics. Neighbor helping neighbor … no matter what their political or religious affiliation is. Everyone just pitching in and helping. As Methodist, for example, we’ve been helping anyone who needs help … not just Methodists. In fact, that never crossed our minds, amen? To only help some and not others.
Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. Right now we have another crisis … one that is international in scope … Afghanistan. The world has been watching the tragedy in Afghanistan in horror as people try to escape the expanding control of the Taliban. Here, politics has impeded and interfered with rescue efforts and the sad truth is that we can’t rescue everyone. We’re talking thousands and thousands of people here. Right now, our priority should be to get all the Americans out first … that seems obvious but for some reason that doesn’t seem to be happening … or maybe it is happening behind the scenes and we just don’t know about it … that’s possible. Given the Taliban’s deep resentment towards the “West,” I fear for our fellow Americans and don’t expect the Taliban to treat them with kid gloves, do you?
There’s another group that I fear will be persecuted by the Taliban … Christians … and my heart goes out to the martyrs and soon-to-be martyrs. According to Open Doors U.S.A., “Afghanistan is the second most dangerous place to be a Christian in the world today, just behind North Korea. Most of the Christians there converted from Islam” (www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2021/august/). “Right now we fear elimination,” one anonymous Afghani Christian told a Christian Broadcasting Network reporter, expressing his concern that the Taliban are going to eliminate the Christian population of Afghanistan. “Some of the believers are known in their communities; people know that they converted from Islam to Christianity, and they are considered apostates and the penalty for that is death. The Taliban are famous for carrying out that punishment,” the man told the CBN reporter. In another interview with a foreign national who has lived and worked in Afghanistan for the past 30 years, the man saw and experienced the brutality of the Taliban up close … and he fears that there will be a return to the days of regular executions, floggings, stoning, and hand chopping (www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2021/august/).
These brothers and sisters, I believe, are in even graver danger than our fellow Americans and the danger is high for both. We’re not sure how we are going to get our own out, let alone these overlooked Christians.
The fate of Afghani Christians is a potent reminder of how good we have it here in America. “More people have risked their lives to become Americans than to become citizens of any other country in the world” (Jeremiah, D. “Is This the End?” Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Pub. 2016; p. 95). I truly believe that there is a yearning in every human heart to be free and that yearning was put there by God. Our Founding Fathers recognized this yearning and its divine source when they wrote the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Our Founding Fathers built a system of government based on the Judeo-Christian Scriptures. Moses gave the nation of Israel a constitution literally carved into stone. He then formed a system based on a division of power between the prophets, the priests, and the kings. Each of these three branches of power ruled over a decentralized nation of twelve tribal states where all were equal before the throne of God. The Founding Fathers saw the wisdom in God’s plan for Israel and attempted to create a governing system based on the notion that nothing … neither politicians, nor government … should hinder or interfere with our desire, our yearning to grow closer to God and to get to know Him as deeply and as personally as we possibly can in this life and in this world.
While it seems like more and more people and more and more institutions are trying to interfere with that freedom, we still have a chance to hold on to that freedom … if we are willing to do what generations before us have done and fight for those freedoms … while we still have them. This is not a new battle but an on-going battle. In 1815, President James Madison proclaimed: “No people ought to feel greater obligations to celebrate the goodness of the Great Disposer of Events of the Destiny of Nations than the people of the United States. … And to the same Divine author of Every Good and Perfect Gift we are indebted for all those privileges and advantages, religious as well as civil, which are so richly enjoyed in this favored land” (Madison, J. In The Statues at Large and Treaties of the United States of America, Vol. 11. Boston: C.C. Little and J. Brown Pub. 1859, p. 764).
President Madison’s words are as important to us today as they were when he penned them over 200 years ago. As we discussed last week, it is easy to get discouraged and feel like our nation has gone off the rails or is headed off a cliff but the truth is that we are still beneficiaries of what Madison called the “privileges and advantages, religious and civil, this country still has to offer.” So, let’s take a few moments to today to remember the many ways in which God still provides for us and for this great country … and I think that we shall see that this nation’s cup is still more than half full, amen? I think Paul’s words to his disciple, Timothy, are good a guide.
“As for those who in the present age are rich, command them not to be haughty, or set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but rather in God who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, generous, and ready to share, thus storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of the life that really is life” (1st Timothy 6:17-19).
For nearly 250 years, this country has been free to create, innovate, manufacture, and accomplish spectacular things … everything from cars and planes to cell phones, the internet, and walking on the moon … and we have benefitted greatly as a result.
We have certainly benefitted financially. The Israelites believed that a nation’s wealth was a sign of God’s blessing as a result of their obedience to God. In fact, when you think about it, “profit” is built into God’s creation. Sow a seed in the earth, and that seed will grow and produce a hundred more plants. God told His creation to be fruitful and multiply. We were then commanded to “sow” our blessings so that we may bless others … who, in turn, are called to “sow” their blessings to produce more blessings. “Profit and abundance,” says one Christian author, “enables mankind to propagate the blessings of God to others” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 97).
In one of His parables, Jesus told us to “sow” or invest our talents (see Matthew 25:14-30). When it comes to our wealth, we have been very, very blessed indeed. According to WorldPopulationReview.com: “The top eleven countries have 1,762 of the world’s 2,604 billionaires. The United States is home to more than a quarter of these.” Even though the worldwide number of billionaires has declined over recent years, the WorldPopulationReview.com article went on to point out that the number of billionaires in America grew by 4% … from 680 to 705. “The United States has more billionaires than China, Germany, and Russia combined and has more billionaire wealth than China, Russia, Germany, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Hong Kong, India, and Saudi Arabia combined” ( Billionaires By Country 2021; worldpopulationreview.com). I’d say that makes us one blessed nation, wouldn’t you?
We are also the most generous country in the world, amen? Who does the world automatically turn to when there is a crisis? Us. “Compared to other nations,” says World Population Review, “the U.S. by far spends more foreign aid than anyone else. Germany is the next largest donor, but the U.S. spends over $10 billion a year more than this nation” (US Foreign Aid by Country (worldpopulationreview.com). According to another article I read, the United States spent an estimated $33 billion … that’s “billion” with a “b” … on foreign aid in 2020. To show you how financially blessed we truly are … that $33 billion is less than 1 percent of our federal budget (world101.cfr.org/ global-era-issues/development /brief-history-us-foreign-aid). Wow, amen?!
Do you know who we give the most financial aid to? Anyone care to guess? It’s Afghanistan … $5.94 billion … again, that’s “billion” with a “b” … a year … followed by Iraq, who receives over $5 billion a year … Israel, who receive over $3 billion a year … and then Egypt and Jordan, who each receive over a billion a year from you and me.
God told his prophet Malachi that if His people were generous in their giving, He would open the windows of Heaven and pour so much blessing upon them that there would not be room to store it (Malachi 3:10) … and that has certainly been true in our case. Everything we have is because of the generosity of God and I feel that we have been generous with what God has given us, amen?
We haven’t done so bad in the brains department either, have we? Believe it not, the first colleges and universities in America were founded to teach and produce ministers of the gospel. The motto for Princeton, for example, is: “Under God’s Power She Flourishes.” Brown University’s is: “In God We Hope” … Columbia’s motto is: “In Thy Light Shall We See Light.” At lot has changed since the 17th and 18th century. Still, our colleges and universities are some of the greatest in the world. According to U.S. News and World Report (2021), the United States has the top 17 universities in the world. Number 1 is Harvard, followed by M.I.T. and Stanford University (www.usnews.com/ education/best-global-universities/rankings). We also have six of the top 10 research universities in the world, starting with Cal Tech, again followed by Stanford and M.I.T. (www.usnews.com/ education/best-global-universities/rankings). Not bad, eh?
Hands down we are the most powerful military power in the world … although, I’m not sure what’s going on with that anymore, given what we’re seeing in Afghanistan. In the last 200 years, we have only been attacked by foreign powers twice … once by the Japanese at Pearl Harbor and by Al-Qaeda on September 11th, 2001.
Until 1960, we were an openly Christian nation. Now we are what scholars and historians call a “post-Christian” country. While we are still a predominately Christian people, the “place of faith in the nation’s future,” says one Christian author, “is an open question. … The Christian consensus that shaped the first two centuries of America’s national life is now essentially absent. The place of faith in the nation’s future is an open question” (Jeremiah, Ibid. p. 99). The “marginalization” of faith is an indication of the increasing secularization of American society (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 100).
Which leads me to the dangerous pitfalls of freedom and abundant blessing … cynicism and apathy. While we are the most generous nation on the planet, we are also the most indebted. Our current debt is well over 28 trillion dollars … or $86,043 per person … and it’s getting higher by the second. If you want to see stunning visual proof of how much we’re spending, go to “US Debt Clock.org” or “National Debt Clock.org” … you’ll get dizzy watching the numbers fly. One economist calls us a “slave-state” because everyone … nation or individual … is a slave to the person you owe the money to, amen? For example, we owe Japan $1.28 trillion … that’s “trillion” with a “t” … and China … $1.10 trillion. Our inability to repay what we owe has some frightening ramifications, amen? It could result in us being absorbed into the new global world order, much like the struggling European Union, thus losing our sovereignty and national identity.
We cannot expect God to keep blessing us if we keep ignoring his divine directives. God is long-suffering but even He has His limits, amen? We find plenty of evidence of this in the Bible. Over and over again, Israel receives the blessings for their obedience to God’s laws … and then apathy sets in. They grow bored … begin to take the Lord’s blessings for granted. They start to wander after foreign gods or worldly power. When they are about to self-destruct or crashing into the wall, God removes His hand, Israel suffers and loses God’s blessings, and then they repent. We see this cycle repeated over and over again and we are apparently headed down the same path. As one author put it: “America is rolling in luxury, reveling in excesses, rollicking in pleasure, reeling in drunkenness, revolting in morals, and rotting in sin” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 104). We are programming God out of our schools, our government, our homes, and even our churches. “America has rejected the God of its youth and has raised up in His place the idols made with its own hands” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 104). Pastor and Author Erwin Lutzer makes this point in his book, “Is God on America’s Side?”:
“When the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened, ‘God Bless America’ signs were everywhere, even on marquees on porn shops. Everyone thought that surely God could be trusted to come to our side in this war against terror. … But once our nation felt secure again, God was safely tucked away, church attendance declined, and the so-called wall of separation of church and state was built a notch higher” (Chicago: Moody Pub. 2008, p. 11-12). I agree with Pastor Lutzer, the God of the Bible will not endlessly tolerate idolatry and benign neglect. “He graciously endures rejection and insults, but at some point,” says Lutzer, “He might choose to bring a nation to its knees with severe discipline” (Lutzer, Ibid., p. 16).
Given 9/11 and the incidents of terrorism that we have seen since then, combined with what happened recently in Afghanistan, we are coming to realize that we are not as “safe” or as “invincible” as we once thought we were. “The possibility of a nation our size being brought to its knees and taking decades to recover was once unthinkable” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 103). We were once again reminded of how vulnerable we are when Russian hackers shut down over 5,000 miles of oil pipelines. Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, and Israel all have nuclear bombs now. Newer and more sophisticated weapons like the electromagnetic pulse bomb are being developed all the time. The “escape” of the COVID-19 virus suggests the possibility of other lethal viruses and germs being created in labs and unleashed on the world.
As always, our beloved “Owners’ Manuel” has the antidote for our cynicism and apathy and it is found in the Apostle Peter’s letter to the Christian exiles in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. It was written to a group of first-century believers who were facing situations that in some ways are similar to the ones that we are facing today. He starts out his letter by telling them that they had been given “a new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” and that they had received “an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading” … kept in Heaven for them who were being “protected by the power of God through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time” (1st Peter 1:3-5). How can we go from being apathetic and having no hope to having a “living hope”? Let’s find out, amen?
First of all, our faith is in a “living” Savior … Jesus Christ. If Christ has overcome our greatest enemy … death … then there is surely nothing in life that we cannot overcome with His help, amen? What a blessing and what a hope this give us. Our hope is not in a world that seems like it’s on the verge of falling apart all the time. Our hope is a living hope … and eternal hope … because Jesus is alive and eternal today, amen? The only hope that the world has to offer is limited … based on our clearly limited abilities and strength … all of which comes undone at the grave. But not so with Jesus. As the Apostle Paul pointed out, if our best hope is in ourselves or in the world, we are truly living in a hopeless and pitiable state (1st Corinthians 15:19).
When we place our hope in the eternal Jesus Christ, then we also receive an eternal inheritance reserved for us in Heaven … one that is incorruptible and undefiled and does not fade away. The word that Peter uses for “incorruptible” could also be translated as “unravaged.” The sense of the word is that our eternal inheritance cannot be violently taken away from us … not even by the most powerful people on the face of the earth. When Peter wrote this letter, Roman soldiers and marauders roamed throughout Asia Minor forcibly helping themselves to anything that interested them. In other words, they would “ravage” their defenseless victims. Peter’s goal was to remind them that a day was coming when they would receive a reward that could never be ravaged or stolen from them. We too have a treasure that is Heaven that is incorruptible. The world can take a lot of things from us but the things that truly matter … like our faith and trust and love of Jesus Christ … like our promise of an eternal life with Him in Heaven … can never be taken from us. That’s a pretty valuable promise, amen?
Apathy is a form of boredom and we live in a culture that has to be entertained constantly. In our quest for excitement and our incessant demands for entertainment, we have indulged ourselves in some rather, well … unhealthy and unholy ways, amen? We talked about some of them last week. What Jesus offers us is something that is holy, pure, and clean. It is undefiled. Our inheritance, our treasure, says Jesus, is Heaven where rust and moths and thieves cannot defile it or ravage it or take it away from us. Heaven, says the Apostle John, is a place that is pure and holy because it is a place where nothing unclean or anyone whose name isn’t written in the Lamb’s book of life may enter.
Unlike everything that we see around us … buildings, roads, mountains, empires … which will eventually fade away into oblivion, our inheritance is eternal. It will never fade away. It will never crumble into dust. The things of God, says Peter, are permanent, everlasting.
As Jesus pointed out, our inheritance is in Heaven. We can’t leave to someone in a will because it is in Heaven … which means nobody, not your relatives, not the state, or a lawyer can steal it from you. It is securely held in the hand of God and can never be stolen, lost, or destroyed … and we put our hope in this because the Holy Spirit is the guarantor of our inheritance which has already been willed to us by Jesus Christ.
Listen to what Peter did in verses 4 and 5 of his letter. In verse 4 he says that our inheritance is reserved in Heaven for us. Okay … got that? Then he says in verse 5 that WE … you and I … get this … you and I are reserved for our inheritance in Heaven. We have a double assurance that we will receive our inheritance. Listen again. Peter is saying that our inheritance has been reserved for us in Heaven and WE … you and I … have been reserved … or appointed … guaranteed … to receive our inheritance when we get to Heaven. The same God who is keeping our inheritance in Heaven is also keeping His people for the inheritance. In other words, God is protecting our inheritance in Heaven while He is protecting us down here so that we are guaranteed to receive our inheritance when we all meet and gather in His presence in His holy city.
Until then, we still have to live in this world. How do we persevere in a nation that is becoming more and more apathetic as the days go by? Glad you asked, my friend.
As Christians, we are called to be good citizens while we serve God. What specific responsibilities do we have towards our nation and our government as Christians? First of all, we are called to pray for our leaders … big, BIG time. They certainly need it, amen? Don’t just complain about our leaders … pray, pray, PRAY for them. According to the Apostle Paul we should respect, obey, and follow our leaders because “there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God” (Romans 13:1). He tells his disciple, Timothy, that we should make “supplications, prayers, intercession, giving thanks … for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior,” says Paul. (1st Timothy 2:1-3). If you think that it is hard to honor and pray for some of our government leaders today, Nero was the so-called self-appointed life-time president of the Roman Empire at the time that Paul wrote this letter … hum? Yeah.
If there ever was an organization that mismanaged money, it’s the government, amen? Not only is it mismanaged, but it is often used to fund agencies or project that are antithetical to what we believe as Christians. The Jews weren’t thrilled to have to pay taxes to support the very government that had conquered and occupied their country but Jesus told them to give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Mark 12:17).
There will never be a perfect government on earth until Jesus returns and establishes it. Until then, we have no choice but to live under secular authority for now. As one author put it: “God does not hold us responsible for the way the government uses our tax money. But we cannot remain in fellowship with Him if we avoid paying our taxes” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 112).
Our forefathers gave us a wonderful gift … the ability to change our leaders without having to go to war or stage a coup. It’s called … VOTING! Here is where Christian apathy is most evident, I think. In 2015, approximately 25 million Christians who were registered to vote stayed home on election day. Over 40 million registered Christian voters didn’t vote in this past election. Think about that number for a moment. Forty million “registered” Christian voters … that doesn’t account for Christians who haven’t even bothered to register to vote. Add them in and the estimate of Christians who didn’t vote in the last election rises to 120 million. A hundred and twenty million (CBNNEWs.com; posted December, 2020). Author, historian, and minister Edward Everett Hale, a descendent of Nathan Hale, preached about the importance of getting out to vote: “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 113).
One vote can make a difference. Eleven state House and state Senate elections in the United States have been decided by one vote (MentalFloss.com; posted September 10, 2020).
Get involved. Vote. Vote your values. Vote your beliefs. Vote your convictions. If a candidate wants your vote, do your homework. Learn what they stand for … find out what they voted for in the past. If they claim to hold Christian values, hold them to their campaign promises when they get into office.
We also need endurance. To persevere in the Christian race, says the writer of Hebrews, “you have need of endurance” (Hebrews 10:36). The lighting of the Olympic torch sprang from a unique race that is no longer run in today’s Olympics. The race involved running with a lit torch in your hand. The person who won the race was the first person who crossed the finish line with their torch still lit. Think about that one on the way home. Author Randy Alcorn says that we are “called to a life of endurance powered by Christ, and accompanied by joyful thanksgiving. Endurance requires patience, because reward for today’s right choices will come, but it may be months or years from now, or not until we leave this world” (In “A Life of Endurance.” Eternal Perspective Ministries, September 16, 2008).
Remember … our hope is not dependent on the survival of our nation but on Jesus’ promise of an inheritance in Heaven.
I believe that it’s too early to write America off. As David Jeremiah points out: “Even if Christianity becomes a minority, we must remember that only ten righteous men could have saved Sodom” (Jeremiah, Ibid., p. 115) … but we must be willing to take a stand and be willing to be counted. “If my people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways,” says God then He promises that He will hear from heaven “and forgive their sin and heal their land” (2nd Chronicles 7:14). And that is the last hope that I want to leave you with today … it is never too late, amen?
Let us pray:
