(Sermon By: Evangelist Carolyn Malaika Foster-Brooks
of Lyons, Georgia)
PRAYER:
My Father, God above. Thank You for Your eternal love. Thank You for my personal relationship with You and for Your will as it will be done in my life. Thank You God for the Prayer of Serenity which is a foundation of strength when I need it. Into thy spirit I commend my life. I accept my call and will flow into it with Your grace and mercy upon my life, willing to sacrifice and forsake all others by Your Word.
God let this sermon be a blessing to the readers everywhere. In the sweet and holy name of Jesus, I have prayed a servant’s prayer. Amen. And so it is!
SCRIPTURE: (KJV)
MATTHEW 23:27-28....WOE UNTO YOU, SCRIBES AND PHARISSEES, HYPOCRITES! FOR YE ARE LIKE UNTO WHITE WASHED SEPULCHRES; WHICH INDEED APPEAR BEAUTIFUL OUTWARD, BUT ARE WITHIN FULL OF DEAD MEN’S BONES AND FULL OF UNCLEANLINESS.
A long time ago I realized that man’s plans are often not God’s plan.
Let me explain...my parent’s were people of vision. They relocated from a huge mid-western city to a small rural country town where the only thing it had going for it was its sweet onions! Yet, my parents invested their retirement savings in real estate. They saw a need in a community and wanted to provide food for the hungry and refreshments for the thirsty!
My father, an uneducated man by academic standards, used his God given gift of carpentry and brick laying skills and built a little grocery store! I can remember the hard work and the time that it took, even I myself had a hand in building that store !Because God is not a respector of men ( SO GOD CREATED PEOPLE IN HIS OWN IMAGE; GOD PATTEREND THEM AFTER HIMSELF- MALE AND FEMALE, HE CREATED THEM), my own father taught me and gave a chance to lay bricks too. As a mattter of fact, I layed a cornerstone in that building. That was all a part of God’s divine plan, because Psalms 144:12 says that OUR DAUGHTERS MAY BE AS CORNERSTONES, CARRIED TO BEAUTIFY A PALACE.
(My father prepared a place for physical food, but my Father had spiritual food in mind!) Today that same little community store is a church!
One of the other lessons my father taught me was about painting! You see there was a time when poor people from the country didnot know very much about paint! But our fathers and grandfathers found a way to brighten the house, the barns, the hen houses, the outhouse and even our churches with a substance called whitewash!
The purpose of whitewash was to improve the outward appearance of the buildings, to make the structure look better on the outside than it did on the inside. To make it presentable to the neighborhood. A temporary solution for covering up dirt, filth, grease and grime.
But oh, on the outside. If you didn’t take time to get your house in order to clean up what you messed up, it’s like shoving things under the rug so your visitors can’t see your mess!
As long as the sun shines and the weather is dry, a whitewashed building will stand tall, looking good! But because white wash has no substance and no eternal power after a heavy down pour of rain from the heavens over and over....90% of the cover will fade away and again you will see the dirt and the uncleaninss.
In Matthew 23:27-28 Jesus spoke and said, HOW TERRIBLE IT WILL BE FOR YOU TEACHERS OF RELIGIOUS LAW AND YOU PHARISSEES. HYPOCRITES! YOU ARE LIKE WHITEWASHED TOMBS- BEAUTIFUL ON THE OUTSIDE BUT FILLED ON THE INSIDE WITH DEAD PEOPLES BONES AND ALL SORTS OF IMPURITY.!(28) YOU TRY TO LOOK LIKE UPRIGHT PEOPLE OUTWARDLY, BUT INSIDE YOUR HEARTS ARE FILLED WITH HYPOCRISY AND LAWLESSNESS.
Then in Matthew 24:1-2...AS JESUS WAS LEAVING THE TEMPLE GROUNDS HIS DISCIPLES POINTED OUT TO HIM THE VARIOUS TEMPLE BUILDINGS,. (2) BUT HE TOLD THEM, "DO YOU SEE ALL THESE BUILDINGS? I ASSURE YOU, THEY WILL BE SO COMPLETELY DEMOLISHED THAT NOT ONE STONE WILL BE LEFT ON TOP OF ANOTHER!"
.....the bible clearly lets us know that there is nothing new under the sun, Jesus declared that EARTH AND SKY WILL BE DESTROYED, BUT THE WORDS I HAVE SAID WILL NEVER BE DESTROYED. Matthew 24:35 (nlt)
So my question is this... ARE YOU A WHITE WASHED CHRISTIAN OR ARE YOU COVERED BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS???
1- Are you high on words, but low in deeds?
2- Do you pray long prayers to impress people, or do you pray for salvation of your own soul?
3- Do you pay your tithes and offerings in full public view or have you remembered that God loves a cheerful giver?
4-Have you painted a picture of devotion and dedication, or have you forgotten that God knows about your crooked, underhanded and shady dealings behind closed doors?
5- Do you truly love God’s people or are you living a lie?
6- Can you weather the storms of life like Job or will you curse God and die?
7- Do you really want to be just like Jesus or will you let somebody else bear your cross?
8- Are you covered by His blood or are you whitewashed?
THE INVITATION:
God knows that we are a sinful people and He knows that our flesh has been weakened by Adam’s fall. He knows that we are prone to choose the quick fix of whitewashing to hide our shame. Come and wash yourself in the Blood of Jesus.......the detergent that’s known as the Holy Spirit, the Living Water that will make you Bold enough to stand on God’s Word; that will Gain you a seat at the right hand of God if you live right; that will Tide you over when you feel like giving up and will Cheer you up when you feel that the whole world is against you.
THE QUESTION:
Are you whitewashed or are you covered by the Blood of Jesus????????????????????????????????????????????????
