REMEMBER THE ROOSTER, ED?
Text: First John 1:9
Benjamin Franklin once said, " A quiet conscience sleeps in thunder, rest and guilt live far asunder". (Elanor Doan. Speaker’s Sourcebook. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1988, p. 68). Ivan Krylov once wrote, "Your guilt consists in this: I want to eat you up". (Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1980, p. 420). Our guilt eats away at us when our conscience will not let us rest. The Devil therefore uses guilt as one of his greatest tools of torment.
It is the Devil’s wish to torment those whom he cannot destroy (John Wesley. Sermons On Several Occasions. Volume VI. Satan’s Devices. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, p. 32). The kingdom of heaven is set up in the heart of every repentant believer wherein there is righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit (Wesley paraphrased, p. 32). The Devil cannot stand that anyone is at peace and therefore he seeks to torment them with both the guilt and the power of sin. Why sin? The Devil uses our sin against us for evidence of making accusations against us. After all, one of the attributes of the Devil is his ability to accuse. In fact, the word Satan a.k.a. the Devil, means accuser.
SATAN DESIRES TO DESTROY THE FIRST WORK OF GOD IN THE SOUL.
As an adult, Ed was in the Air Force. He had wanted to be a pilot. But, he had what we call coke bottle glasses where the lenses are like the bottom of a coke bottle. Now, keep that in mind and see if Ed’s career in the Air Force makes sense. You see, Ed was an Air Traffic controller where people sit behind a radar screen and monitor flights.
Even as a child, Ed had poor vision. One Christmas, Ed got a sling shot for a present. His parents thought that Ed would not be able to do any harm with that sling shot. Ed’s parents figured that he was safe with a sling shot since he could not see all that well. His parents figured that he could not hit any thing due his poor vision. However, one day there was a stroke of luck as Ed aimed at his father’s prize rooster. Usually, he missed whatever he aimed at. But, this time he aimed at the rooster and hit it in the head with a rock catapulted from the sling shot while it was standing on top of a wood pile.
It was the end of Ed’s joy at that moment. Knowing that he had done wrong, he hid the dead rooster. He became a slave to guilt. Whenever there was a chore that needed to be done, his brothers (Ralph, Ben, Doug and Oscar) would always get out of their chores by blackmailing their brother Ed. Ed’s father would give one of the brothers some chore to do and they would con Ed into doing it. They would retort, “Remember the rooster Ed!” Ed eagerly jumped on the opportunity to avoid being turned in by his brothers by agreeing to do their chores over and over. But, he no longer had joy because he was exhausted.
Notice the pattern that Satan uses. After attacking our joy in the Lord, the Devil works on attacking our peace. (1) His intention is to destroy the first work of God in the soul (Wesley, p. 33). (2) After shaking us lose from our joy, he strives to attack our peace. Why? (3) If the Devil can succeed in taking away our joy and peace, then he can succeed in taking away our reason to hope. “The peace of God is another means of advancing the image of God in us” (Wesley, p. 36). (4) The Devil strives to shake the foundation of our peace in order to hinder our faith. It is by our faith in Christ we are justified. (5) Whatever weakens our faith obstructs our holiness (p. 36) which is our journey toward Christian perfection (Sanctification).
Let’s look at Ed in his slavery of guilt. Ed was fine until he killed the rooster. It is because of his guilt that Ed strives to make things right. But, he can’t bring the rooster back to life. Not only is he wrestling with the guilt of sin, but he is also wrestling with the power of sin. His joy his peace, his hope, his faith are almost non-existent. He tries to justify himself by working. His brothers take of advantage of it as they con Ed into doing their chores---“Remember the rooster Ed!” First, it was the dishes. It was one of the other brothers’ turn to do the dishes, until he said--- “Remember the rooster Ed!” Then it was the trash and again, one of the brothers said---“Remember the rooster Ed!” When it was time to gather the fire wood, you guessed it---“Remember the rooster Ed!” This kind of thing went on all that week.
GOD’S GRACE IS GIVEN FREELY, EVEN THOUGH WE DO NOT DESERVE IT.
There was nothing that Ed could do to justify his killing Dad’s prize rooster. Ed realized that there was nothing that he could do to make things they way that they were. But, Ed remembered his father’s love. He knew that he had messed up. He was running himself ragged doing the chores of his brothers as he had become a slave to his own guilt. Finally, he got tired of trying to merit the feeling or peace that he had once had. Any peace that he had since he killed the rooster was artificial. He was exhausted from trying to earn righteousness which was not working. So he decided to confess. When we confess our sins to our Lord he is both faithful and just and will forgive us and cleanse from all sin. It is faith that makes this desire possible.
When Ed confessed, to his surprise, he found that his father had forgiven him. When Ed confessed, he found that his father forgave him. In fact, Ed’s father had known all along. He had been watching Ed from a window in the house. Ed’s father said, “Ed, I knew it all along. I saw you shoot my prize rooster with you sling shot from my window. I just wondered how long it was going to take you to trust me enough to come to me and tell me about it.”
God is like that with us. He knows us better than we know ourselves. But, he wants us to always remember that he loves us. He wants us to remember that the Devil wants to kill our joy, peace, weaken our faith as he seeks to torment us. God wants us to put our faith in him and love Him with all of our heart, soul, mind and strength (Luke 10:27, Deuteronomy 6:5).
THERE IS ALWAYS GOD’S GRACE.
God’s free grace is liberating, but there is sometimes someone who will act as if they are siding with the Devil against another. There are two ways to play devil’s advocate. Like, Ed’s brothers, they might try to milk the situation for their advantage. That is what we call exploitation. Some people play devil’s advocate to help us remember our accountability and responsibility. It is when others play devil’s advocate by reminding us of a fault or a sin or an error that they can use our guilt against us like Ed’s brothers who said, “Remember the rooster Ed!”
In spite of the Devil’s advocate, we have an Advocate with our heavenly Father. 1) In the NRSV Bible the word that is used in John 14:15 uses the word Advocate whereas other versions use the words like Helper (NKJV), Comforter (KJV), Counselor (RSV) in describing Holy Spirit. 2) An advocate is one who speaks on our behalf. An advocate is also someone who speaks in favor of his/her subject. 3) Jesus says, “This is the Spirit of truth, who the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him or knows him. You know him, because he abides with you, and he will be in you” (John 14:15 NRSV). 4) The Apostle Paul put it this way, “For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father! “ it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God” (Romans 8:14-16 NRSV).
If God is for us then who can be against us? (Romans 8:31). 1) Regardless of how the Devil tries to torment those that he cannot destroy, we know that God is for us, because His word tells us that this is so. The Devil may try to shoot one of his fiery darts into our guilt within our conscience while saying “Remember your rooster!” Even though it may not be a rooster for us, we know that the Devil still uses the same strategy, reminding us of our sin and how it was that we missed the mark. The Devil may try to destroy our joy, hope, peace while seeking to unravel our faith in God. 2) The Devil may do it directly himself or he might do it indirectly through another who might in an adversarial manner play the Devil’s advocate. 3) But, we know that Jesus has given us victory over both the guilt and the power of our sin. It is because of Christ’s atonement that we are reinstated in God’s favor because we are forgiven when we confess our sin to Jesus. 4) God wants us to strive to bear fruit that is in keeping with repentance (Matthew 3:8). Our victory is in Jesus, not in ourselves! Jesus justifies us on the cross (pardon) and sanctifies us through the Holy Spirit who is our Advocate our Spirit of truth. The Holy Spirit is with us and in us. 5) Whenever the Devil cries to us “Remember your rooster”, we can throw up our shield of faith and say, “I am freed from my sin by the blood of Jesus who washed my sin away”. AMEN.
