What will you do with Jesus?
Surrender to Him Romans 10:9-11
Focus: Hearing the good news of Jesus demands a response… will it be fully surrender?
Function: To call hearers to hear the call to surrender and make Jesus Lord IN their lives.
In 1997, Leonardo DiCaprio stood on the bow of the world’s most elegant ocean liner and shouted out the words which expressed the hopes & ambitions of the Titanic itself… “I am the King of the World!” he said.
• The irony is-- the movie about one of history’s greatest disasters became just that at the box office… ‘King of the world’ and the highest grossing film of all time; making DiCaprio and the film’s director, James Cameron ‘Kings’ themselves-- in Hollywood at least.
• I didn’t think the movie was all that good, myself, and certainly didn’t appreciate how it depicted the love story, but I wonder… how many of us have quietly expressed DiCaprio’s ambition?
• How many of us would secretly like to be ‘King of the World?’
I suppose it’s a part of the Human condition; a part of fallen humanity?
• We all have a desire to be ‘king’ in some sense.
• We want to be the master of our own destiny! Men, we are taught very early that we ought to wear the pants in our families! (of course if we’re honest we’ve got to admit that its our wives who keeps them washed, pressed & mended), but WE want to wear them!
• We want to be the ‘boss’; we want to be ‘in charge’. We don’t like being told what to do. We don’t like anybody telling us how we ought to live our lives or run our households!
• Some of us are even like that about church. We don’t like that the preacher said I ought to give part of my income back to the Lord. Or we don’t like that the Elders said they expect us to be here every Sunday- as long as we are able. Some of us even resent the insinuation that there may be sin in our lives. We don’t come to church to hear that! We come to be uplifted and inspired!
• We have trouble with texts in the Bible that mention words like ‘submission.’
Eph 5:22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.
Rom 13:1 Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, Eph 5:21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Yet, the call of the gospel is a call to … SURRENDER!
In the text that was read a moment ago in Romans 10, we see that very plainly.
• We’ve looked quite a lot at Romans 10 through this series. Down in vs. 17 we see that “faith comes from hearing the word of Christ” and I asked you (in that 1st week of this series) to “LISTEN TO HIM”; to HEAR what Christ has to say to our lives. Then I challenged you to “TRUST IN HIM”; to have FAITH in Him, which is borne out of that hearing.
• Here in vs. 9, Paul has just mentioned that “word of FAITH” and he says that part of that word is in God’s promise..
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. 11 As the Scripture says, "Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame." Romans 10:9-11NIV
• What a tremendous promise! If we ‘confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord’ we will be saved! Vs. 13 loudly proclaims, “all who call on the name of the Lord will be saved!”
• What is Paul’s point in all of this?
What does it mean to “confess” that Jesus is Lord?
• To “confess” according to Strong’s & Thayer’s Bible dictionaries means to acknowledge something fully, openly & joyfully; to profess, to agree, to promise!
• What are we professing openly & joyfully? That Jesus is the Christ; the Lord, the Messiah… the King!
I. It is a call to Fully Surrender to Him!
A. Think for a moment what a counter-cultural call that is!
1. Everything in our culture tells us to ‘have it our way’; that we deserve to be happy and so we should do whatever it takes to make that happen.
B. To acknowledge Jesus as Lord is to say, “I am NOT!” And that’s tough for some of us.
1. I think of it like this: We all have a place within us; a seat of decision making power; that place in our heart out of which our lives are guided, steered; a driver’s seat or a throne.
2. I unintentionally drew some snickers when I entitled a sermon many years ago, “Who’s on the throne?”
3. But it was out of this idea… and the question was, “Who is on the throne in your life? Who is in the driver’s seat? Who is calling the shots? Making the decisions?”
4. Is it YOU? Or is it Jesus?
5. Who have YOU surrendered to? In other words, who is your King?
II. To “confess Jesus is Lord” is to make him KING in your life.
A. Some weeks ago we looked at the various names of Jesus found throughout Scripture and you’ll remember us looking at the name “Christ” or “Messiah.”
1. You’ll remember how we saw they are the Greek & Hebrew rough equivalent of “King.”
2. In Russia the word is czar; in Latin it is Caesar, in German it is Kaiser and in the Middle East it is Shah.
3. When Jesus was brought before high priest, you remember what he asked Jesus? “Are you the Christ?” and Pilate would ask him, “Are you the King of the Jews?”
B. I asked you then… is he YOUR King?
1. Just because He is truly King, doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ve recognized him as such… that you’ve ‘confessed’ him as such.
2. The question that we’ve been asking all this month has been, “What will you DO with Jesus?”
3. The gospel calls for a response; calls for a decision on our part! What will we DO with this Jesus fellow?
4. This morning I want us to see that the gospel is calling us to Surrender to Him… to make him King in OUR lives!
III. To “confess” Jesus as Lord is a tough challenge. It was tough for Ancient Israel.
A. Back in 1 Samuel 8, the nation of Israel was at a turning point. It had been led for a number of years by a series of God-appointed Judges. But that wasn’t “good enough” for them. The people looked around at other nations and became envious. Other nations had strong kings to lead them, and Israel made the mistake of attributing their successes to those foreign kings and so they decided that they needed a king, too! The Elders then got together and approached Samuel, the elderly, godly judge.
4 So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. 5 They said to him, "You are old, and your sons do not walk in your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have."
Look around, they said, everybody else has a king! Why can’t we? Samuel took it personally!
6 But when they said, "Give us a king to lead us," this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the LORD. 7 And the LORD told him: "Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. 8 As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. 9 Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will do." 1 Samuel 8:4-9NIV
And God said, “Its not YOU that they have rejected, Samuel. Its ME! They’ve rejected ME, just as they have since I rescued them from Egypt!”
He goes on to instruct Samuel what to tell them… and Samuel tells them of all the problems that would ensue with them having a king ‘just like the other nations’ but they didn’t listen!
18 When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, and the LORD will not answer you in that day."
19 But the people refused to listen to Samuel. "No!" they said. "We want a king over us. 20 Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles."
21 When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the LORD. 22 The LORD answered, "Listen to them and give them a king." NIV
The Lord gave them a king indeed, ‘just like the nations around them’… just as corrupt, just as wicked and just as evil.
B. You see, at the heart of Israel’s sin was the desire to replace God from his throne.
1. It was an outright rejection of His leadership and a desire to be their own leader!
2. I wonder how that made God FEEL?
3. Some of the kings would be wise & Godly (David, Solomon, Hezekiah); Many would be rotten & evil; But ALL of them would fall way short!
4. God was their rightful King! It was God who had rescued them from bondage! It was God who had forged them into a nation out of a rag-tag bunch of slaves! It was God who deserved to be on that throne… but they effectively shoved God out and placed man on that throne!
5. And we know the tragic consequences of their decision.
C. But we see in that story a drama that unfolds in our very lives every day.
1. When we fail to LISTEN to HIM and instead listen to the competing voices out there in the world telling us lie after lie after lie…
2. When we fail to TRUST in HIM, preferring instead to put our trust in ourselves or our abilities…
3. When we fail to TURN to HIM, instead returning to our sin like a pig that’s just been washed going back to wallow in the mud… why would anybody do that?
4. And … we effectively shove God out of his rightful place and put ourselves up there on his throne… in our own lives.
5. I wonder how that makes God feel?
D. Maybe this was what was at the root of the first sin with Adam & Eve?
1. They had been given everything in the Garden of Eden that they could possibly need! God even walked with them in the cool of the day.
2. Yet, the serpent came at them and proclaimed, “Eat of this fruit and you will be like God.”
3. Just imagine what might have gone through their heads… “We’ll no longer have to rely on God. We’ll be like him. We can rely on ourselves. We’ll be the masters of our own destiny. We’ll be in charge. We’ll wear the fig leaves in this garden!”
4. And they FALL! Because of pride, arrogance, a desire for more… and effectively remove God from his place as King in their lives.
IV. To “confess” that Jesus is Lord is more about lifestyle than it is about words-- oh, it involves words, but there’s more to it.
A. That is, “confession” is not something you do once and then its over with. It is ongoing. We confess… and we keep on confessing… with our lives!
B. Its not JUST the words that you utter before being baptized.
1. When I was baptized, I remember the preacher asking me, “Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God?” And I remember saying, “Yes, I do.” Then he immersed me in the water. I remember it well.
2. That’s a confession, but that’s not all there is to it!
3. I’m afraid we limit our understanding of true confession if that’s all we think it is… just something I said before I was baptized.
C. True confession is about LIFESTYLE…
1. Am I confessing that Jesus is my Lord with my life?
2. With the way that I treat others; love my wife; the way you love your husband; love the church and show that by my involvement in it; work in my job?
3. Would others agree by seeing the way you live, that Jesus sits on his throne in your heart?
V. To “confess” Jesus as Lord is to yield to His will, NOT yours!
A. You want to go left, but Jesus says, “Get right”… which way do you go?
B. You really wish the Bible didn’t say that about that sin, but it does… what do you do about it?
C. Problem in your marriage? It would be easier to give up and bail out? But God says to work at it… what will you do?
D. Your boyfriend is pressuring you to take your dating to the next level? But God wants you to save yourself for your husband one day… will you have the courage to say ‘No’ and them tell him why?
E. Your buddies enjoy using all kinds of colorful ways to talk about women, but the Bible says that woman was created in the image of God… will you say anything to them about it?
It seems to me that these questions get at the heart of what we’re talking about.
• When life gives you a fork in the road… how do you decide which path you’ll take?
• At what point will you consider, “What does God want me to do?”
• And then, do you do that?
VI. Make no mistake… there will come a day when we will ALL confess Jesus as Lord!
The Bible says in Rom 14:11-12
11 It is written: "’As surely as I live,’ says the Lord, ’every knee will bow before me; every tongue will confess to God.’" 12 So then, each of us will give an account of himself to God. NIV
Do we want to wait until that day? Until the day of judgement?
What will it be like if we put it off until then?
Jesus said, 32 "Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. 33 But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven. Matt 10:32-33 NIV
Isn’t it comforting to think that if we “confess” Jesus in this life, he will “confess” us in the next before the Father? But how frightening to imagine that by NOT confessing him now, we have effectively disowned him… and he promises that he will disown us before the Father on that day.
When was the last time you confessed “Jesus is Lord?”
If you haven’t in a while, I would like to encourage you this morning as we sing this invitation song… just come down here and make that confession again! How encouraging it would be to this church family to hear again that Jesus is you Lord & King! What an example that would be!
If you’ve never done it, make today your day of Surrender! Make today the day that you say to God, “I want YOU on that throne in my heart!”
Take that step and commit your life to him by being buried with him in baptism for the forgiveness of sins! We’ll help you do that.
