THE THREE FINGERS OF GOD
Deut. 9:10; Dan. 5:5; Jn. 8:6
INTRODUCTION
A. HUMOR
1. Kids are so helpful! You've probably seen the tremendous lines in to inspect luggage at airports.
2. Did you hear about the lady who purchased pirate swords for her sons just before flying home from vacation? The sales clerk warned her not to carry them on the plane, fearing they might be confiscated as weapons. "Make sure you pack them in your luggage," the clerk advised.
3. At the airport, as the TSA was checking their bags, the agent asked, "Did anyone give you a suspicious package to take on the plane?"
4. The youngest son blurted out, "Yes, but it's safely packed away in our luggage!"
B. PERSONAL NOTES ARE VALUABLE
1. In 1989, a Philadelphia financial analyst purchased an old, torn picture of a country scene for $4 at a flea market in Adamstown, Pennsylvania because he liked the frame.
2. Later when he attempted to detach the picture, the frame fell apart in his hands and he found a folded document between the canvas and wood backing which appeared to be an old copy of the Declaration of Independence. A friend advised him to get it appraised.
3. It was real -- one of 500 official copies from the first printing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. Only 24 similar copies are known to exist.
4. He put it up for sale at Sotheby's on June 4, 1991 and it was purchased for $2.42 million. The man who bought it, Donald Scheer of Atlanta, put it up for sale a second time, and it was sold for a whopping $8.14 million.
5. If that hand-written note, signed by the 56 founding fathers was worth $8.14 million, think what an original hand-written note from God must be worth!
C. THESIS
1. This morning we’re going to look at "The Three Fingers of God." Three times in sacred history, God wrote with His finger.
2. How will we treat God's personal notes? So let's look at the three handwritten notes from God.
I. 1ST FINGER OF GOD WROTE THE LAW
“The Lord gave me two stone tablets inscribed by the finger of God. On them were all the commandments the Lord proclaimed to you on the mountain out of the fire” Deut 9:10.
A. THE NEED FOR THE LAW
1. When Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden, there was no Law, because evil didn’t exist in their hearts and minds.
2. But once they sinned, their innocence was lost. At this point God wanted to make the boundaries of sin very clear so he sent Moses up Mount Sinai and the etched in stone -- with His own finger -- the 10 Commandments.
3. A Royal Ranger Commander was teaching a lesson on the 10 Commandments. He asked the kids if they could name any. They began to call out several suggestions, including, "Don't drink and drive."
4. What are the 10 Commandements? [Ex. 20:1-17]; Don't have any other gods before Me. Don't make idols. Don't misuse the Name of the Lord your God. Don't forget the Sabbath. Don't disrespect your father and mother. Don't kill. Don't commit adultery. Don't steal. Don't lie. Don't covet.
5. One man said, “Pastor, I really like this series on the 10 Commands. It's made such an impression on me that I'm going to try to keep one of the 10 Commandments each week until I get through them all."
B. PURPOSE OF THE LAW
1. The first time God wrote, He wrote the Law. He drew a line we should not cross over. He established a Standard we should not fall below.
2. Many Americans are under the false assumption that they are living good enough to gain entrance to heaven. This is totally false. In fact, the Bible teaches the exact opposite.
3. Rom. 3:23 says, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." Ultimately, all of us will fail to keep all of God's commands, so the purpose of the Law is to point us to Christ. The first finger of God wrote the Law...
II. 2ND FINGER OF GOD WROTE JUDGMENT
3 So they brought in the gold goblets that had been taken from the temple of God in Jerusalem, and the king and his nobles, his wives and his concubines drank from them... 4 [and] praised the gods of gold and silver, of bronze, iron, wood and stone. 5 Suddenly the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall, near the lampstand in the royal palace. The king watched the hand as it wrote. 25 “This is the inscription that was written: mene, mene, tekel, parsin. 26 “…Mene: God has numbered the days of your reign and brought it to an end. 27 Tekel: You have been weighed on the scales and found wanting. 28 Peres: Your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.” Dan. 5:3-5, 22-28.
A. KING BELSHAZZAR’S MISTAKE
1. For Belshazzar, it was party time, until he read the writing on the wall and the party was suddenly over. A modern translation says, "His face turned pale and he was so frightened that his knees knocked together and his legs gave way."
2. Belshazzar had Mocked God and broke His Law. He brought judgment on himself. He died that night. Hebrews 10:31 says, "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the Living God."
3. There are people all around us who mock God every day by the way there are living. They take his name in vain. They live in immorality.
4. They act like they can do anything they want with no consequences. The Bible tells us we will all stand before God and give an account. When it happens we’ll look like Belshazzar – turn pale and our knees will knock together.
5. Sin is not nor has it ever been a joke to God. If you stand before Him and your sin has not been covered by the blood of Jesus, it will be terrifying!
B. LAW OF SOWING & REAPING (HUMOR)
1. “When my 3 year old son opened his birthday gift from my mother, he discovered a WATER PISTOL.
2. He squealed with delight and headed for the nearest sink. I was not pleased. I turned to Mom and said, “I’m surprised at you! Don’t you remember how we used to drive you crazy with water guns?”
3. My Mom smiled & replied, "YES, I REMEMBER!!"
C. PEOPLE ALWAYS SUGAR-COAT JUDGMENT
1. Belshazzar didn’t think his sins mattered. He was shocked when he discovered the drastic outcome of his sin. Likewise, if you and I go on willfully sinning, we will be shocked with the drastic outcome of our sin too.
2. Romans 6:23 says, "The wages of sin is death." Hebrews 9:27 says, "Its appointed unto man once to die and after that the judgment."
D. A LOVING GOD WON’T SEND ME TO HELL!
1. There was a frontier town were a horse bolted and ran away with a wagon carrying a little boy. Seeing the child in danger, a young man risked his life to catch the horse and stop the wagon. The child who was saved grew up to become a lawless man.
2. One day that man stood before a judge to be sentenced for a serious crime. The prisoner recognized the judge as the same man who had saved his life. So he pled for mercy on the basis of that experience.
3. But the words of the Judge silenced his plea: "Young man, then I was your Savior; today I am your judge, and I must sentence you to be hanged." [Warren Wiersbe's Meet Yourself in the Psalms].
4. Someday many will hear the Savior Jesus say those words if they don’t surrender.
5. Today, 38% of Americans don’t believe Hell exists. If I were the devil, I'd want to convince people there’s no such thing as hell. I’d want them to believe that a loving God would never send anyone to Hell.
6. King Belshazzar found out that Hell is real. If you could get a 10 second look into hell you'd run to the altar and get right with God this morning.
7. But Belshazzar waited too late! The first finger wrote Law. The second finger wrote Judgment....
III. 3RD FINGER OF GOD WROTE GRACE
2 At dawn [Jesus] appeared again in the temple courts…he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6...But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he...said to them, “Let [the] one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.” John 8:2-11.
A. BEAUTIFUL PICTURE OF THE GRACE OF JESUS CHRIST
1. The finger that wrote here was the finger of God! God of God, Light of light, very God of very God!
2. "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."
3. No, no one really knows what it was that Jesus wrote on the ground, but we know what he wrote upon the heart of that hurting woman that day. This time, He wrote Grace!
4. Grace is available for those who've crossed the line into sin, for those who deserve punishment, judgment. Instead, God gives them Grace.
5. As one old scholar put it after half a century he said he had learned three things:
a. He could do nothing to save himself,
b. God could not require him to,
c. The Lord Jesus had done it all. Grace = God’s Riches At Christ's Expense.
B. THE JUDGE & THE THIEF
1. The story has been told of a man who was caught and taken to court because he had stolen a loaf of bread.
2. When the judge investigated, he found out that:
a. the man had no job, and his family was hungry;
b. He’d tried unsuccessfully to get work and finally;
c. To feed his family, he’d stolen a loaf of bread.
3. Although recognizing the extenuating circumstances, the judge said, "I'm sorry, but the law can make no exceptions. You stole, and therefore I have to punish you. I order you to pay a fine of $10."
4. He then continued, "But I want to pay the fine myself." He reached into his pocket, pulled out a $10 bill, and handed it to the man.
5. As soon as the man took the money the judge said, "Now I also want to remit the fine." That is, the man could keep the money.
6. "Furthermore," the judge said, "I am going to instruct the bailiff to pass around a hat to everyone in this courtroom, and I am fining everyone in this courtroom $.50 for living in a city where a man has to steal in order to have bread to eat."
7. The money was collected and given to the defendant. This is an example of justice being meted out in full and paid in full -- while mercy and grace were also enacted to full measure."
CONCLUSION
A. ILLUSTRATION
1. It's essential that we abandon our own efforts and trust in Christ.
2. A group of believers was meeting by a river when one of their group fell into the water. It was obvious that the poor man couldn't swim, as he thrashed about wildly.
3. One of the believers was a strong swimmer and was called on to jump in and save the man before he drowned.
4. But though able to save the drowning man, he just watched until the wild struggles subsided. Then he dove in and towed the man to safety.
5. When the rescue was over, the rescuer explained his slowness to act; "If I had jumped in immediately, he would have been strong enough to drown us both. Only by waiting until he was too exhausted to try to save himself, could I save him."
6. Often times when bad times hit, we depend on our own efforts. God has to wait until we run out of options and give up, before He will step in to pick us up.
B. THE CALL
1. Would you just let God minister His Grace to you this morning?
2. His Grace of: forgiveness, reconciliation, healing, restitution, joy, hope, love.
3. "Every good and perfect gift comes down from the father of lights..."
[This is a reworked sermon by Wayde Wilson]
