Is Jesus the Lord of Your Life?
This morning I want to address the question of what it means for Jesus to be the Lord of our lives.
Rom 10:9-10
9 That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.
10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.
(NIV)
The word Lord means to govern over or to rule over. By confessing with our mouths that Jesus is Lord means that we will follow His every teaching and allow Him total control over our lives. Many times we concentrate on Jesus being our Savior and neglect Jesus has our Lord. Once we accept Christ as our Savior, it doesn’t stop there. We are also commanded to accept Christ as our Lord or ruler. This is where many Christians are falling short today. We “talk the talk”, but we don’t “walk the walk”. God had blessed our founding fathers with a new nation that acknowledged God as the supreme ruler.
What has happened to the Nation that God had blessed us with? We as Christians have let ourselves become complacent in our walk with Christ. We no longer put Him first in our lives. We have allowed sin not only to come into our lives, but also into our churches.
Growing up in North Carolina in the 50’s and early 60’s, life was a lot simpler than it is today. We didn’t have the luxuries that we have today, but we did have joy, peace and our right to practice our Christianity. If you needed something from the store, you had better get it on Saturday, because all stores were closed on Sundays. This was a state law respecting the authority of God not to work on the Sabbath. Attending elementary school, we said the Pledge of Allegiance (including the words “under God”) each morning and then a teacher would say a prayer over the intercom that included the name of Jesus Christ. At lunchtime a blessing would be said before eating. We were encouraged to bring our Bibles to school and we were allowed to read them. We could even witness to others and pray with them in school. The Ten Commandments were posted in each school. What has happened in the last 50 years?
Since the time of my youth many things have changed.
1. Christian Clergy can no longer speak in our schools, but other religions can be discussed in our schools.
2. Prayer and moments of silence has been removed.
3. The reading of the Bible and handing out Christian tracks in schools are discouraged.
4. The posting of the Ten Commandments and “In God We Trust” posters have been removed from our schools
5. Clergy can no longer pray at Graduation ceremonies.
6. A student lead prayer at graduation ceremonies must be written out and approved in advance. The prayer cannot mention Jesus Christ.
7. High School football games can no longer start with prayer.
8. The Boy Scouts are being ridiculed for mentioning God in their motto and for not allowing homosexuals to become scoutmasters.
9. Ten Commandments monuments and nativity scenes are being removed from government property.
10. Pornography has been ruled as free speech.
11. The killing of unborn babies is now legal up to the day that the baby is due.
12. In some states, it is against the law to discuss religion on public transportation.
13. Divorce is running rampant even in our churches.
14. Same sex marriages are now becoming legal in most states.
15. Just about every show on TV depicts adultery, sex or homosexuality. Many TV shows and movies make fun of or ridicule our Christian beliefs.
Why is this happening? Is it because we have turned our backs on God? Is it because we have the attitude that we have our ticket to heaven, so why worry? I believe that this is the attitude of many believers and many pastors.
Matt 7:21-23
21 "Not everyone who says to me, ’Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.
22 Many will say to me on that day, ’Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’
23 Then I will tell them plainly, ’I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’
(NIV)
As pastors we are to preach salvation through the blood of Jesus Christ. We must teach what it means to really accept Christ as our Savior. In the book of Romans, Paul tells us that we must believe in our hearts. This is not the same as believing in our minds. Remember in the Garden of Eden when the serpent convinced Eve to eat from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Satan did this by using Eve’s mind and her senses. Eve knew in her heart that she shouldn’t, but Satan used her mind to convince her that she would become like and equal to God. Believing in you mind that Jesus exists and that He is the Son of God does not save you. Even Satan believes and knows that Christ is the Son of God, but Satan refuses to accept Christ in his heart. So it is with many who confess to be Christians today. They believe in their mind, but have not given their hearts to Christ. The heart is the life support of our bodies. When we turn our heart over to Christ, we are actually giving total control of our lives over to Christ. We are saying, “Here I am Lord. Take me. Use me. Lead me and I will follow wherever you lead. May your will be done and not that of my own.” That takes a lot of courage to do, but that is what Salvation is all about. Surrendering to the saving grace of Jesus Christ.
In verse 22 that we just read talks about pastors, who believe in their mind, but refuse to accept Christ in their hearts. We have heard recently on the news about the Episcopal Church that has just appointed the first homosexual bishop of that denomination. The Bible tells us that homosexuality is a sin. How did the Episcopal Church get to this point of sanctifying sin in the church? It starts out small just like it did in the Garden of Eden. One little bite won’t hurt. That is how Satan works. He knows that you can’t just eat one. You will want more. When we let sin creep into our churches, it will continue to grow. When pastors begin to play games and politics to get their way, it will lead to lying. The lying will lead to cover-up. I have been in churches where pastors have had affairs, others where pastors have divorced and where pastors have even taken additional jobs that require them to compromise their beliefs. I have been in churches where the pastors have had dreams of splendors in building a beautiful new church when only 30% of the pews in the current church were full. They dream of writing books and becoming the next Billy Graham, when they should be showing a spirit of humbleness. When you see things like this happening in the church, it is only a matter of time before the church will fall away from the basic doctrine of the Bible. I even heard one associate pastor of a mainstream denomination say that the Bible isn’t revelent today; it was written for the people of Jesus’ time. Of course, this pastor divorced a few weeks later. To justify the divorce, he had to discredit the Bible. We should run these pastors off and if that isn’t possible then we should find a bible believing, bible teaching church. It doesn’t surprise me to see sin entering the church, but as true Christians, we should speak out against it, even if it means that we will be persecuted.
When farmers used to plow their fields by hand using a horse or mule to pull the plow, blinders were placed on the animal so that it would not be distracted by anything. Today Christians are wearing blinders. We don’t want to see or even be concerned with what is happening in the world today. Let me ask you what you would do if a SWAT team would walk through these church doors today and say we are in violation of the separation of church and state clause and we must return to the privacy of our homes to worship? You would probably say that could never happen in this nation, but could it? The German people never believed it could happen to them either, until Adolph Hitler came into power in the 1940’s. Let me read to you a letter written by a German Doctor during the reign of Adolph Hitler.
Pastor Neimoller
Nazi Germany
In Germany they first came for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for the Trade Unionist,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics,
and I didn’t speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me….
and by that time there was no one left to speak up.
When will we speak up?
Luke 9:23-26
23 Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.
24 For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.
25 What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self?
26 If anyone is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man will be ashamed of him when he comes in his glory and in the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.
(NIV)
Today in Alabama, Judge Roy Moore is taking a stand for God in refusing to remove a monument of the Ten Commandments from the State Supreme Court Building. I applaud Judge Roy Moore for his faith and courage to stand up for our God who is above all governments of all nations. All of the laws of this nation is based upon the Ten Commandments. I have copies of legal documents and letters that our founding fathers wrote. They all agreed that without God and His commandments there would be no morals in this nation. We have allowed the Ten Commandments to be taken out of our schools and even out of some of our churches. Today we are living with the results of this decision. There is very little morality left in this nation. Are we on a road to ungodliness? I believe so. Is there any hope? Yes!
2 Chr 7:14
14 if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
(NIV)
We must return back to God. We must allow Christ to be our Lord, not just on Sundays, but 24/7. We must humble ourselves before God, pray and repent from our sins and the sins that we have allow to happen as a Godly nation. We must love Christ more than anything in our lives and we must speak out against all that is sin. Christ never promised that it would be easy. He said just the opposite.
Matt 5:10-12
10 Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
11 "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me.
12 Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
(NIV)
Rejoice and be glad. As Christians we should be excited about spending eternity in heaven with our Lord. Our Lord Jesus Christ suffered and died on a cross so that all who would believe in their hearts that God raised Him from the dead will be saved.
Invitation:
