Who Am I
9:30 1/23/93 Romans 1:16 Exodus 3:4-14 1 Peter 3:8-16
TOBY
Our sermon for this day is on knowing "Why I Am A
Christian." Let us pray...O God we ask for the Power of the
Holy Spirit to fall and to anoint and illumine Your word, Oh God,
that the Holy Spirit may make it real in our hearts and evident
in our lives. We ask this in Jesus’s name Amen.
RICK
If someone wanted to know who you were, how do you think you
would go about explaining who you are, and where would you start?
Would you begin with your race, your age, your education, your
family, your citizenship, or your relationship with Jesus Christ.
We need to know who we are, so that we can understand why it is
that we do, what we do. Back in the 70’s everybody was out
trying to find themselves. In the 80’s everybody was out trying
to please themselves, and we’re not sure what the 90’s will bring
but hopefully for the church it will bring an understanding of
why it is we are Christians.
TOBY
Yes, we are more than our professions in life be it school
teacher, assembly worker, cook, counselor, housewife, house hus
band or whatever. We are more than the many different roles we
are called to play. Psychologists tell us it’s important to know
who we are . While it is important to know "who we are," I think
it is more important for us to know "why we are." Why are you a
schoolteacher, a factory worker, a secretary, a counselor, a cook
, a doctor or a student. And equally as important if not more
so, "Why are you a Christian."
RICK
Saints, knowing who you are will give you a sense of identi
ty. Knowing why you are, on the other hand will give your iden
tity integrity. The word integrity comes from a Latin word which
means a condition of being complete or whole. Integrity is
knowing why you are who you are. The mark of identity for most
of us is that of being a Christian. When we tell others we are
Christians, that should give them insights into the way they can
expect us to act in certain situations, if integrity is a part of
our identity as Christians.
TOBY
In 1 Peter 3:15, The apostle Peter instructed the Chris
tians in Asia Minor saying, "And always be ready to give a de
fense to everyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is
in you." Saints, the word defense here, comes from the same
Greek word that we get the term apology from. Peter is saying,
be ready to give an apology for the hope that is in you. Give an
apology? Is Peter suggesting that we apologize for our faith? Of
course not! The word apology is a legal term. It means to
develop a defense as an attorney might in a court of law. It
means to give a reason or explanation.
RICK
Could you defend the reason you are a Christian today? If it
were a crime to be a Christian and you were arrested for being a
Christian, would there be enough proof to guarantee you a jail
sentence, or would you have to be set free for insufficient
evidence? Why are you a Christian? If someone were to ask you
that question this morning, what would you tell them? Well my
parents were Christians. I want to go to heaven. My friends are
Christians. What would you say?
TOBY
My friends let us quickly share with you, a few good reasons
to be a Christian. The first is that "we need the Lord." Notice
where the need is. It’s not that God needs us, but that we need
the presence of God in our lives. From the moment we come into
the world, we need the Lord. You know when we come into the
world, we come in with a condition. A condition that theologians
call original sin. Original sin means we all originate out of a
sinful world which taints us from the word go.
RICK
Nobody ever has to teach us to be selfish. Nobody teaches us
to lie. Nobody teaches us to steal. Nobody teaches us to want
what we belongs to others. It’s all built into us from the
beginning. We all tend to make ourselves the center of the
universe right from the start. If a baby is hungry, he or she
could care less about what is going on, that baby is going to let
everyone within listening range know, that somebody better do
something for him or her or the situation is going to get worse.
TOBY
When we grow up making ourselves the center of the universe,
then we’re lost to God who is the creator and origin of the
universe. To be lost means to be out of the place that God has
in purpose for our lives. God desires that all of us be found
inside Jesus Christ. It was in our lostness that God comes to
find us and God pursues us until we find Him.
RICK
In Christianity, we have the distinct privilege of knowing
intimately and personally, the God who is not far from each one
of us. It is God’s will for us to live in Jesus, move in Jesus,
and stay in Jesus. This means knowing the presence of God in our
day to day interactions with each other. We can sense that God’s
Spirit is working in us to act and react in certain ways.
TOBY
Jesus is in us. We are in Him. He surrounds, undergirds,
and sustains us through all of life’s experiences. We have God’s
undivided attention, for the Scriptures says our God never sleeps
nor slumbers, and Psalms 33:18 says "the eyes of the LORD are on
those who fear him, on those whose hope is in His unfailing
love." My friends, the Christian faith is unparalleled in what
it offers to the human family.
RICK
The major difference between Christianity and other world
religions is that the other religions approach God based on how
good one has been, but in Christianity the only basis for ap
proaching God is on how good God has been. You see we know that
we are the pits and can’t be expected to do good without Jesus in
our hearts. God has done the work of making us righteous, by so
loving the world and giving Jesus Christ as a payment for our
sins.
TOBY
Praise God, the Christian faith does not disappoint. It does
produce what it promises. What does the Christian faith promise?
It promises to put us in a right relationship with God. It
promises to give us victory over our personal sins. Christian
faith promises to put us in right relationship to others. God
has come in Christ to show us how to love and respect one another
and to live free of a spirit of revenge toward those who have
wronged us.
RICK
The Christian faith offers us the fruits of the spirit:Gala
tians 5:22-2 says But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy,
peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, {23} gentle
ness and self-control. The Christian faith promises to fulfill
our most basic human needs. God’s promises fills the pages of
the Bible. They are everywhere and God is faithful to do as He
promises. The Christian faith will help us to know God’s forgive
ness, to learn to be forgiving, and to experience victory over
sin.
TOBY
Saints, we can’t stress enough that the Christian faith
produces what it promises. It meets all our needs, and it pre
pares us for life here and also gives us hope in the world to
come. Don’t give up because you’re not getting everything you
want right now. Hebrews 10:23 says "Let us hold unswervingly to
the hope we profess, for He who promised is faithful." Praise
God. These are just a few reasons as to why I am/ you are a
Christian. Saints are we able to give an account? Are we able to
give an apology? Are we able to give a reason or explanation for
the hope this is within us? Are we able to boldly and intelli
gently answer the question, "why am I a Christian."
RICK
The apostle Paul once declared, "For I am not ashamed of the
gospel of Jesus Christ." Paul might not have been, but most of
us are. How much of Jesus do we want others to see in us at
school, at work, at a party, or at the game? Do those around us
know that we are Christians, or is it one of our guarded and
protected secrets? Some believers almost apologize for not
participating in sin with their friends rather than taking a
stand saying Jesus has called me to something different.
TOBY
Saints, if we know all the promises that God offers us
through salvation in Jesus Christ, why is there little boldness
these days about the Christian faith? One problem is that
sadly, most folks do not realize the real, heavenly, eternal
transaction that took place the day they were saved. But saints
there is a change that takes place in a life that comes into
contact with Jesus. Jesus changes our lives. Jesus changes us
on the inside and its soon seen on the outside.
RICK
Zaccheus was a wealthy and corrupt man in the Bible. One
day he realized that he was lost. His relationship to God was
practically non-existent, and there was no way he would be knock
ing on heaven’s door. But one day Jesus came by, and after he
met Jesus, there was a change in Zaccheus on the inside and the
outside. You can’t know Jesus without being changed by Him. When
Jesus gave Zaccheus the opportunity to enter the family of God,
Zaccheus seized the moment immediately. He wasn’t saved 5
minutes without realizing he need to change his life-style.
TOBY
After cheating people and being concerned with only his own
pleasure for years we find in Luke 19:8-10, But Zacchaeus stood
up and said to the Lord, "Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of
my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of
anything, I will pay back four times the amount." {9} Jesus said
to him, "Today salvation has come to this house, because this
man, too, is a son of Abraham. {10} For the Son of Man came to
seek and to save what was lost." People, none of us deserve the
presence of Jesus Christ in our lives. It is by God’s grace that
we can even become Christians. Jesus says, you did not chose Me,
but I chose you. Can you say Praise God? God chose us.
RICK
God’s way works. God will transform people by the power of
the Holy Spirit. This is our hope today. It is the power of the
gospel to transform lives and change the values by which we live
in this society. Brothers and sisters, we are engaged in spirit
ual warfare. We have the weapons and the opportunity as the
church to Jesus Christ to present a moral and spiritual message
to a sick and needy nation. The answers will not come from the
executive, judicial or legislative arms of government. The
answers can only come from a church that’s being faithful to the
word of God. Our hope for change is found in Jesus Christ and
Jesus Christ alone.
TOBY
Saints, this hope will not be realized unless the church
becomes what God has called us to be. Tragically, in our time we
have been conformed to the world, molded as one of society’s
institutions, another organization, another bureaucracy. But, my
friends, the church of Jesus Christ is not just another organiza
tion. It is a living organism. It is the dwelling place of the
living God and the living witness of a whole new kingdom. The
apostle Peter said to the church in 1 Peter 2:9, "You are a
chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation." The promise of
Almighty God is that God will come and actually take up residence
among His chosen people.
RICK
The Gospel of Jesus Christ centers around the fact that the
Spirit of God lives in the midst of his people. Not only do we
need to know who we are, we also need to know what we are. We
find in 1 Corinthians 6:19 "Do you not know that your body is a
temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received
from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price.
Therefore honor God with your body." We are who and what we are
because of the presence of the Holy Spirit within us.
TOBY
Saints have you come to realize what distinguishes God’s
people. Christianity is not just another religion, it’s not just
another book of proverbs, and its not just a creed by which
people live. Our distinguishing factor as Christians is that the
Creator of the universe has chosen to dwell in our midst and to
call us out be God’s holy nation, a separate people, a kingdom of
his own choosing. This means that we must first pay loyalty to
the kingdom of God above all else. There is no greater challenge
to the church of Jesus Christ today, than to be what God intends
it to be.-- God’s visible presence on earth as the holy nation of
God’s own chosen people.
RICK
How are to become this? As we become anything else and
that’s only by God’s grace. We are being called to lose our
lives for Christ’s sake and thereby be turned into a holy nation.
You see, we must be willing to work to display God’s grace to the
world. "Who am I" is not nearly as an important question as,
"who is God calling me to be." When God called Moses in our Old
Testament reading today, it wasn’t that important as to who Moses
was or what Moses could do. The real issue was, "who was the
God" that was sending Moses to do this awesome task. When we see
who God is calling us to be, we may think its impossible. But we
serve a God who spends time day after day delighting in making
the impossible possible.
TOBY
Friends, what is our role in becoming what God desires for
us to be and discovering who we are. First we must discern the
false values of our culture and clearly reject them. Saints our
culture bombards us with messages--wrong messages about life. For
example the world says, seek to be served rather than serve.
Look out for number 1, yourself above all else and seek to rise
to the top regardless of the cost. Of course the gospel of Jesus
Christ is the exac t opposite of this. It says we must be willing
to lose ourselves. Jesus tells us to bear one another burdens
and be concerned not only about ourselves, but also about others.
RICK
The second thing we must do is take our stand upon the holy
and true word of God. Is the Bible your lamp determining which
way you are going, or do you determine yourself what is right and
what is wrong. So many Christians are taking the way of destruc
tion which led to the downfall of the nation of Isreal. The
Bible says of them, "each one of them was doing what was right in
his or her own eyes." We will not do what the Bible says, if we
don’t know what the Bible says to do.
TOBY
The third thing we must do is take the message of Jesus
Christ to the people. Jesus did not wait for Zaccheus to come to
the church. Jesus went into his home to share the news of God’s
salvation. Jesus went to the where the sick, the lame, and the
hurting were. He went among the outcasts and the lepers. He did
not set up an office and say, "come into the temple so that I can
tell you the good news." He went out and lived with the people,
identified with them and was in fellowship with their suffering.
Are we willing to take this message of Jesus Christ on our jobs,
at school or wherever God sends us.
RICK
"Who are we", we are called to be the children of God. As
Christians we have a responsibility. The church has been called
to proclaim a message of hope, healing and reconciliation to God.
Our proclamation to the society should be that there is a power
ð 7 3 Šin Jesus Christ that can change our lives and gives us strength
to overcome the struggles in our lives. God gives us many
choices. Yet God hold us responsible for the choices that we
make in life.
TOBY
Jesus presented people with the most difficult of choices to
make in like. He spoke not of self fulfillment and self actual
ization, but rather of discipline, denial and commitment. If
anyone comes to me and does not deny him or herself, he or she
cannot be my disciple. What kind of world would this be if
every Christian seriously took the call to be a true follower of
Jesus Christ? What the world can be, my friend, is limited only
the Christian’s imagination. What the world will be, is limited
only by the Christian’s commitment to carry out the will of God.
Let us pray. Lord, God, we would choose to stand with
those who have chosen to be responsible. That we may grow up
into our responsibility, and discover who You are calling us to
be as individuals and a church. May we take our proper place,
the place you have called us to take in your kingdom, that we
may be used of you. That we may truly be used to bless and bring
others into the fullness of life for which Christ died. In his
name we pray amen.
