THE SPIRIT OF A CONNOISSEUR IN CHURCHES
Wade Martin Hughes, Sr.
Kyfingers@aol.com
TEXT:
Luke 19:17 Well done thou good servant: because thou hast been FAITHFUL in a VERY LITTLE, have authority over ten cities.
Job 23:10 But He knows the way that I take; When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.
Isaiah 48:10 Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
DEFINE CONNOISSEUR:
---expert, ---one that is a critical judge because they understand the details and techniques, ---one that enjoys with discrimination of subtleties
---one who appreciates fine things, ---a taster.
The thrives in the church today an ATTITUDE or SPIRIT of the CONNOISSEUR. People love to taste and judge without ever learning to prepare and be ready for the work of God.
Ponder this: FRIEND OR FOE? Connoisseur or developer?
WAS JOB’S FRIENDS HIS FRIENDS OR WERE THEY HIS ENEMY?
May be they were connoisseurs, tasters? Maybe they were critics?
Was Job’s wife his friend? or enemy?
Was Job his friend or his own enemy?
Why did Job have to suffer?
Maybe it is easier to learn how to tear down than it is to build?
Let us ponder this?
There is no answer?
After Job’s friends ask so many questions, there were no concrete answers?
After Job ask God so many questions?
God never answered one of Job’s questions?
We must live in a walk of faith.
We need an attitude that I am going to die before I will quit!
We often know more about our problems than we know about the LORD over the problems.
We shall all face several SOLEMN DAYS!
No matter how close to the Heart of God we stay, SOLEMN DAYS will come,
SOLEMN DAYS will go.
Some examples of SOLEMN DAYS are these:
1. THE SOLEMN DAY OF SICKNESS.
2. THE SOLEMN DAY OF FRIENDS DISAPPOINTING YOU.
3. THE SOLEMN DAY OF DEATH.
4. THE SOLEMN DAY OF JUDGMENT.
What will you do in your SOLEMN DAYS?
You can often tell a Christian person,
but many times you can’t tell them very much.
Seems, Christian can let circumstances and emotions rule the Spirit Man?
Seems they already know everything?
I ponder Failure and Perseverance.
I have been a student and learning is not always easy.
So you have failed?
God forgives First Degree Stupidity.
You are in some mighty good company.
David was a big failure and yet the Bible says he was a man after God’s own heart.
David disappointed many people, sin disgraced the King’s family ...
yet Psalms 51, the greatest chapter in the Bible on repentance was written because of a failed moment.
David clearly was penitent.
David was not just sorry he got caught, he was very sorry he had broken the very heart of God.
David came home to God.
David was an example of changing a heart.
David failed, but he was not a failure!
David had to grow his vineyard not just taste.
Seems the ladder of HOPE has nothing to stand on from below, the ladder of HOPE is held from above.
Peter often wore his foot in his mouth.
Peter had the nerve to rebuke the Son of God, along with many other stupid things, yet a change came over him in the book of Acts, he delivered the first message to the church after the resurrection... "What meaneth this?" Peter failed, yet he was not a failure.
Peter grew from a taster to a real leader!
If you are not careful you can get sermons from the Pastor’s notebook to the Member’s notebook and no one is using their head.
Ponder this:
When he was seven years old, his family was forced out of their home on a legal technicality, and he had to work to help support them.
At age nine, his mother died. At 22, he lost his job as a store clerk.
He wanted to go to law school, but his education wasn’t good enough.
At 23, he went into debt to become a partner in a small store.
At 26, his business partner died, leaving him a huge debt that took years to repay.
At 28, after courting a girl for four years, he asked her to marry him. She said no.
At 37, on his third try he was elected to Congress, but two years later, he failed to be reelected.
At 41, his four-year-old son died.
At 45, he ran for the Senate and lost.
At 47, he failed as the vice-presidential candidate.
At 49, he ran for the Senate again, and lost.
At 51, he was elected president of the United States.
His name was Abraham Lincoln, a man many consider the greatest leader the country ever had. Some people get all the breaks.
-- Unknown --
What is success and failure? Salary? Increase? Fame?
How do I measure success? Am I satisfied to be a taster?
I have never found it! But I ponder success... I think life has taught me success is much more than position, square footage in the house, or the type of car that you drive.
My Dad often says:
YOUR FRIENDS CAN KILL YOU AS DEAD AS YOUR ENEMIES.
I have found this to be very true.
Yet, I will tell you another lesson I have learned:
The only effective ammunition against you: are the bullets that you make and give to your enemy.
For I have found that our greatest foe and principle cause of our leanness and unfruitfulness is being unfaithful and unaccountable to meaningful prayer, Bible study, and again faithfulness.
I know many that want to travel and set the world on fire, but they are unfaithful to any church and they are unfaithful to their post of duty.
The question is not where is the God of Elijah?
The real question is: where are the Elijah’s of God.
Someone ask --- WHY DON’T MORE DOORS OPEN?
I say we are not going through the DOORS BEFORE US.
We want to skip church? Skip the prayer meeting? Skip Sunday School and yet we want to SEE THE GLORY OF GOD.
GOD DEMANDS FAITHFULNESS.
The lost key to Ministerial Door’s is FAITHFULNESS!
Failure is the foe birthed by unfaithfulness.
I know Ministers that will be in service if they are singing, preaching,but they are behind a big screen TV if they are not leading the way?
I ask you--- WHERE ARE THEY LEADING?
Is the Bible true?
What does the Bible teach about faithfulness?
Moreover of stewards it is REQUIRED That they be found FAITHFUL.
Is this a joke? I am mad, this is a good excuse?
No one lives up to my standards? The church is dead?
There are hypocrites at church?
CONNOISSEURS OF CHURCHES?
CONNOISSEUR: ---expert, ---one that is a critical judge because they understand the details and techniques, ---one that enjoys with discrimination of subtleties, ---one who appreciates fine things, ---a taster.
In Lewis’ book, "Screwtape Letters," the Devil does not mind people going to church as long as they are CONNOISSEURS OF CHURCHES ---
the Devil didn’t mind people visiting churches and experiencing emotionalism, but the Devil greatly feared people becoming established and rooted and faithful.
Many that will read this or hear this sermon are CONNOISSEURS OF CHURCHES AND MINISTRY, you love to taste and criticize others, but you will not submit to authority and be faithful.
Hur had a ministry of lifting the hands of the preacher until victory.
Joshua followed Moses all over the place. Joshua was a submitted and faithful follower, this qualified Joshua to step into a higher role of leadership.
Elisha followed Elijah and submitted to the journey. I know Elisha never agreed 100% with Elijah. I know Elisha saw Elijah’s faults and humanness, but to become what God wanted Elijah had to submit and be faithful.
Today many will never reach their potential and step up into their God calling, because they quit, they run, they hid, the undermined, they criticize, and the become a CONNOISSEUR or a taster.
It is easier to become a connoisseur of wine than it is to grow the vineyard, grow the grapes, wash the bottles, prepare the grapes into juice, and allow time to make the wine.
NAW, I HAD RATHER BE A TASTER!
Who made you judge? Why do you have a right to find faults with the splinters in the church when you have two by fours in your own eyes?
Self evaluation must be our theme.
Luke 19:17 Well done thou good servant: because thou hast been FAITHFUL in a VERY LITTLE, have authority over ten cities.
We long for a life of great ease, and the ability to order others to meet our demands. God’s system varies much from what we expect and think ---
"HE WHO WOULD BE GREAT NEEDS TO BE A SERVANT OF ALL."
Now come on... ??? We need no more CONNOISSEURS, we need growers.
Failure comes when we quit overcoming obstacles.
Why can we not see obstacles are opportunities?
Real success is learned by approaching every problem as a chance to lose God, by patient waiting and persistence we overcome.
Most of us seek paths left by big crowds, not realizing the path so popular to the crowd might not be God’s plan for us.
Who will go to the rest homes? Who will reach out to that family in crisis?
Who cares?
Well, if I care and become faithful to my post of duty it will cost!
Sure, it will cost, but what will it cost if you don’t?
Success is simply overcoming obstacles big and small.
Perhaps God leads you to cut a new path, not a taster but a faithful doer, and leave a trail to the hurting and the dying.
How can we discover greater areas of ministry sitting on a padded pew, as the minister quietly rubs our belly until we have a satisfactory burp?
How about a sanctified burp?
Many are quitting their ministry dreaming of greater? Wow, what ashame?
We can take ordinary talents, and bury them ---
or we can take extraordinary perseverance teamed with our ordinary talents, and reach new levels, and minister to hurting and lost neighbors.
If not you --- then who? If not now --- then when? If not here --- then where?
Job 23:10 But He knows the way that I take; When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold.
Job had many questions of God, his body had suffered beyond the means of acceptable lines, his coworkers had inflicted serious mental pain, his wife said, "Curse God and die!"
Job continued his questioning, saying that his suffering would be more bearable if only he knew why it was happening.
If there was sin for which he could repent, he would have!
Well, we all fail? There are not just sins of commission,
what about the sins of OMISSION?
What haven’t you done, that you should have done?
He knew about the wicked and the fact that they would be punished;
he knew God could vindicate him if he so chose.
Job learned life was more than CONNOISSEUR of good things.
Job had to learn faithfulness in the little.
In all his examples of the wicked in the world, Job’s greatest desire was for God to glorify Himself, clear his name, prove his righteousness, and explain why he was chosen to receive all this calamity.
We head for trouble when we so simplify true to the invalid conclusion, that God blesses those that love Him and only good things can happen to those in God’s perfect will. It is also an invalid conclusion that if you are going through something bad, you are bad. Not true!
You are not a CONNOISSEUR, you must not grow a connoisseur spirit.
Job tried to make his friends see that questions about God, life, and justice are not as simple as they assumed.
Job had failed, but he was not a failure.
In Job 22, Eliphaz had tried to condemn Job by identifying some secret sin which he may have committed.
Eliphaz had based his conclusions on an invalid point. Sometimes bad happens to good people, and sometimes good happens to bad people,
Eliphaz was wrong, he meant well but he was wrong.
Here Job declares his confidence in his integrity and God’s justice.
We are always likely to have hidden sin in our lives, sin we don’t even know about because God’s standards are so high and our performance is so imperfect.
If we are true believers, however, all our sins are forgiven, we are justified, because of what Christ did on the cross in our behalf.
( Romans 5:1; Romans 8:1).
The Bible also teaches that even if our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts (1 John 3:20).
His forgiveness and cleansing are sufficient; they overrule our failures and nagging doubts.
The Holy Spirit in us is our proof that we are forgiven in God’s eyes even though we may feel guilty.
If we, like Job, are truly seeking God, we can stand up to others’ accusations as well as our own nagging doubts, for we are more than spiritual connoisseurs.
If God has forgiven and accepted us, we are forgiven indeed.
Job learned you can fail and not be a failure.
Job had to overcome the spirit of his friends as Connoisseurs.
Job suddenly seemed to be arguing on his friends’ side.
For this reason, some commentators think one of Job’s friends said these words. Job was learning and growing a vineyard not just a critics heart.
He was confused, his load was great. Job was not arguing that, in every case, God rewards the wicked and punishes the righteous; he was simply asserting that in his case, a righteous man was suffering. Job was learning and growing. I rather make wine than just be a taster, maybe God will help me?
God loves people that fail, God has a plan to include all.
We must overcome the SPIRIT OF THE CONNOISSEUR, we must be faithful.
It may take years at in the dirt before the first bottle of wine.
Isaiah 48:10 Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
There was nothing seems to be very little in our actions, attitudes, or accomplishments to compel God to love and to save us. But for God’s own love and glory, and God can show who He is and what He can do, He saved us. But now we must arise and slay the CONNOISSEUR SPIRIT the lures behind unfaithfulness..
God calls you to get up and try again! Hear Him? Try. Try again. Be patient.
Find great joy in the very little.
How easy it is to complain when your life becomes complicated or difficult
if you are a taster? We are more than tasters, we are GROWERS!
Why would a God of love allow suffering and all kinds of unpleasant experiences to come to his children? God is growing us. The school of suffering is the graduate level if we stay at our post of duty.
This verse shows us plainly that God tests us in the “furnace of affliction.” Rather than complain, our response should be to turn to God in faith for the strength to endure, and rejoice in our sufferings
(see Romans 5:3; James 1:2-4).
For without the testing, we would never know what we are capable of doing, nor would we grow. And without the refining, we will not become more pure and more like Christ. What kinds of adversity are you currently facing?
Forgiveness is the hinge that the move of God swings upon --- Forgiveness is the fragrance that a rose sheds on the foot that crushed it. Thorns inflect more pain.
We are imperfect people in an imperfect world, we must invest love --- that reaches beyond the 99, (the comfort zone), to reach to failures, and give them a hand up ... we have too many older brothers angrily asking the servant, (Luke15), why is the celebration going on for a wasted life? If you judge people you have little time to love them! If you love people, you have no time to judge them.
Don’t learn to fear storms, --- learn to prepare for the storms, learn how to keep your little ship, learn how to drop anchor, learn how to guide your ship, learn where the Haven of Rest is.
Many think if the water in the well is dirty, you can paint the pump and clean the water?
For you must see...
SOME TIMES GOD MOVES THE MOUNTAINS ONE PEBBLE AT A TIME.
Wait patiently on the Lord. Identify the Connoisseur spirit and slay it.
Quit running away, buckle down.
As Winston Churchill said, as the bombs were crushing all around him:
I will not take the cowardly action, I will remain at my post of duty.
If the spring is polluted the river has no chance...
Please, don’t quit!
Never give up your dreams!
Press on, when we fall, we must learn to get up and try again.
We can fail and not be a failure. Be a grower and lifter of the arms.
His servant,
Wade Martin Hughes, Sr.
Kyfingers@aol.com Please enlarge my small hands and pass this to others?
