Do you know that today is a special Sunday? Every Sunday is special but today is most especially special because it is congregation participation Sunday. I want to know who in the early service told you what was coming. Today we’ve seen some things, we’ve seen some very small children display their faith in God they rang bells, sang songs, they played catch with Alan, what an honor! And this morning we are going to have three more people, Amanda Swanson, Teresa Swanson and Tiffany Barnhardt come up and lead us in a song. They are going to display their faith in front of people. Now when you are 13,14, 15 or any age and you¡¦ve got to stand up in front of your parents, your parents friends, your Pastors and (pause) Miss Wanda!!! And you have to display your faith its pretty nerve wracking isn¡¦t it? I can tell you for a fact that it is a bit nerve wracking! And so these ladies are going to sing us a song. You will find the words to the song on your orange sheet. Now be obedient children and take your orange sheet out. O.K. We¡¦re gonna spot you the first time through because you may not know this tune. The ladies are gonna sing it, it¡¦s very few words, it¡¦s a catchy tune. But then it¡¦s, Congregational Participation Day! You are going to join them. We will sing it three or four times through but let your heart go, show God you love him by singing this song. Please stand and help these girls sing. Show our love to God,
(song) "Becoming More Undignified Than This"
(at end of song) Lets all give God a great big hand. I know some of you who are life long Methodists may have thought that was a bit strange but, God loves us anyway!
Illustration -- Recently I went to one of the finer eating institutions in our area. As we pulled into the parking lot of the local pizza restaurant (pause), we noticed an abnormality. There was an over abundance of mini vans in the parking lot, and this long white van with big letters on it. I am sure you all are familiar with it, it said church bus. You all know what that means right? It means youth group inside beware! Loving youth groups as I do, I went inside anyway and stood next to the Please wait to be seated sign and the server came up and asked, "Do you want to be seated"? I assured her I did. Now this restaurant was over half-full with very loud teenagers, Youth Group people and they had shirts on that said, ¡§Jesus loves me¡¨, ¡§Jesus saves¡¨ and all kinds of other slogans, some that people wish they didn¡¦t have on their shirt!. They were noisy and as we were going to our table the server is apologizing for the noise and the church Youth Group. She’s just sorry there isn¡¦t a quieter place to sit. She sits us right at the end of the tables where the youth are. I was sharing wonderful conversation with my dinner guest and the food came for the youth group, they were setting it down and there were several adults with this youth group. One adult stands up and he tries to get the attention of the Youth Group. Now anybody who’s been with a youth group understands how hard that can be right? So there was a lot of this, Ssshhhh, shh, shh, shh and stuff going on. Well eventually he gets them to quiet down and, praise God he asked a blessing over the food! Amen to that! Isn¡¦t that wonderful to be out in public and display your faith? But what I didn¡¦t understand is, he is way up at one end of the tables and I¡¦m way at the other end of the tables, he asks the blessing for the food and he is just barely above a whisper. (lowered voice to a whisper) ¡§Dear God we are thankful you provide food for us¡¨.
What is the deal with the whispering stuff? Do you suppose the rest of the people in the restaurant didn¡¦t know they were Christians? Perhaps they couldn¡¦t read the side of the bus! I don¡¦t understand, now I¡¦m not asking for the man to shout. But he set his life apart, set it aside to be an example to these young people. We send our youth director out on a regular basis to do the same thing. And when it came time publicly to display his faith to those young people, he hesitated. He pulled back, he was just a little bit shy.
You know at some point in our faith journey we all, me included, me especially, act just like that group director. Some times God provides an opportunity for us to display our love, our joy in him and we hold back (cringing with lowered voice) ¡§yes I¡¦m a Christian¡¨. We hold back, we get concerned about what others might think. What they might say if we shout, we dance and we sing for God, for our joy. You know the words these three young ladies led us in, they come out of scripture. That¡¦s a story out of the life of King David. We are going to share that story this morning, but before I can jump into 2 Samuel chapter 6, you want to put your finger there. There is pew bible if you did not bring your own. But before we jump into that story I’ve gotta catch you up on King David. You may not be in a devotional of first and second Samuel. So let me tell you what is happening in David¡¦s life. First of all we have the first king of Israel which is Saul. He was chosen by God, he¡¦s a head taller than everybody, something I always wished I could be, and he is king for a while, things have gone well and then what happens to Saul? He disobeyed God didn¡¦t he? So God tells him through Samuel I am going to remove the kingship from you. I¡¦m gonna give it to another. And God sends out Samuel, he says go to the house of Jesse. And he gets to the house of Jesse, Jesse parades all his sons in front of Samuel. Samuel says no not this one not that one not this one. Then he looks at Jesse and sys don¡¦t you have any more sons? God told me he was going to pick one of your sons to be king. Jesse¡¦s answer was well I got that there runt out therein the field watching the sheep surely can¡¦t want him. Samuel said bring him, and we all know that story, David came in and in front of his brother, his father and the priest of God he was anointed with oil to be king of Israel. As you know as it is often with God, he don¡¦t give us a timetable as for when that promise is going to come true. David didn¡¦t have a coronation date. Three weeks from Monday you show up I am coming. He didn¡¦t have that all he had was a promise. So Saul is still king and he runs around and he¡¦s king and they are fighting wars he gets into a battle with the Philistines and the Philistines are on one side of the valley and Israelites on the other side of the valley and who comes in the middle? Goliath! Here he comes. (imitate a fierce wrestler) Oh Israel I¡¦m Goliath who are you gonna send out and fight me. Send out a man and if he slays me then we will serve you as your slaves. Forty days he came out and made this taunt. Not one Israelite went out to answer the challenge. And then one day, one day Jesse sends David on a snack run, or something with the mail, or to see his brothers who were in the army of Saul. When David gets there he must have been in the back of the line or something, with all the other soldiers in front of him. He must not have been able to see over their heads because when Goliath was out making his challenge David asked, ¡¨Why is no body going out there to fight him?¡¨ His brothers said, ¡¨you see that guy?¡¨ We ain¡¦t going out there. But, we know the story we know that David went out with his sling shot with the Lord and he sleuth Goliath. And in so slaying Goliath that endeared him in the heart of Saul. He brought him into his courtyard and he would play music for Saul. Now they had a custom, they had a habit and I suppose at some level we have that habit today. Where after big battles and great victories they made up songs and if you listen to country music at all now you’ve heard a couple of songs about September 11 and the war in Iraq and things like that. So the ladies made up this song and I’m no singer but I will attempt to convey the meaning to you. "There is Saul, he has slain his thousands and glory be to David who has slain his tens of thousands." You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to figure out who got top billing there do you? It wasn’t Saul. Saul got it into his head that David was a threat to his kingdom, remember God had told him "I’m gonna take that kingship from you". And so Saul on a couple of occasions tried to pin David to the wall of the palace with a spear, but David was too quick for him. So Saul came up with another plan. He heard that his daughter, Michal, loved David. So he made a pact, he put out a proclamation to any man who will slay 100 of my enemies I will give my daughters hand in marriage. Well David gathered up his many and went out an slew 200 Philistines and Michal was given to him in marriage. So now we pick up with our scripture 2
Read -- Samuel chapter 6, verses 1-16.
What is this "despised him in her heart" stuff all about? This is his wife we are told early in scripture that she loves him. He has just had a great personal victory, he has brought the ark and consolidated his power base. What kind of reception do you think David was expecting when he sees Michal? Well I can tell you. I am a man like David, I’m not quite that holy, but I have a wife! And when I get home this afternoon I have a certain expectation as to how she is going to greet me and despised in her heart isn’t one of them. This is one of the highest moments of David’s life and what happened? He got despised.
You know we have special moments of faith in our lives, we have families. What kind of expectations do we have when we come to church and we are touched by the Lord and the Spirit moves within us and we want to share it with our family, our friends or, God bless us, we want to share it with our church family. What kind of reception do we receive?
Well let’s see what Michal, what were her real words to David was, let’s go to second Samuel chapter 6 verse 20
20When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, ¡§How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, disrobing in the sight of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!¡¨
How would you react to that if that’s what you got at home? How would you react to that if you got that at church? I know how I would react, I know how I have reacted in the past, with some stern words and maybe not kind love. But the whole point of today is to react like David did, to "Become even more undignified than this". Let’s see what David’s response is.
21David said to Michal, ¡§It was before the LORD, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the LORD¡¦S people Israel¡XI will celebrate before the LORD.
There is a lesson here for us, there is! When we want to celebrate before the Lord, even our own spouse, even our own family members shouldn’t get in the way. Are we willing to choose God over our family when we celebrate? David had some more words for Michal, verse 21 no 22.
22I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes. But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held in honor.
May God give you the strength to become more like David to become even more undignified like David. On the back of your song sheet, if you will turn it over there is a place for you to write down four ways you can become more undignified just like king David.
Way number 1 ¡V Don’t be a Michal to someone else
And you think, "I’d never be a Michal to somebody else, I’d never hinder anybody’s faith. (pause) I have, bet you have to! Not just at home either. We’re a congregation here, we’re a body of Christ, a body of the Lord. There are people who come here that don’t know how we dress or how we talk or how we worship. How do you look at them? What are your first words towards them? Are they words of encouragement? Are they words of acceptance? Or do they get the look (body language showing disapproval)? Becareful, don’t be a Michal to someone else. Not your family, not your friends, not your coworkers, not your boss. Not to someone who is worshiping with us for the first time.
Way number 2 ¡V Identify the Michal’s in your own life
„« Who are you hesitant to show your faith in front of? Is it your spouse is it your children, a friend or a coworker, your boss? Identify who they are, it’s alright.
„« Once you have identified them the next step is to figure out why are you hesitant in front of these people. What’s causing you to hold back? Is it fear that you don’t know enough scripture? Is it fear that you don’t know how to pray? Whatever it is God already knows so who are you hiding it from that matters? Let it go, identify it, identify it and then figure out what’s it gonna take to move you from where you are to where you want to be, where you will shout, dance, sing and jump for joy before the Lord. For you to demonstrate your faith to your Michal’s!
Way number 3 ¡V Look for faith victories in your life
„« You know we spend a whole lot of time, a whole lot of time is spent "oh woe is me, I’m such a bad person I’ve sinned again" and we need to spend some time doing that, we do. But we need to give God the praise and the glory for what He has done in our life. And everyone of us here whether you became a Christian this morning, last night or sixty years ago you’ve got faith victories. If you look back there is something you struggled with at one time in your life that you don’t struggle with as much anymore. That’s a victory, give God the glory for the victory!
„« David had a victory. David had a faith victory! The first time he went off to move that ark what happened? He got one of his friends Uzzah killed! He didn’t listen, Moses, God gave Moses specific instructions for how to move the ark and an Ox cart wasn’t one of them! They were to make special poles and the Levites were to carry the ark. Now it has been in storage for three months at Obed’s house and David goes to get it. But he has learned something hasn’t he! He took with him some Levites and the poles. And they picked up the ark of God. Just imagine yourself being one of the ones that got picked to carry the ark. You know what happened to Uzzah! So you pick up the ark and you take the first step and you look around and count, everybody is still standing up! Step number 2, 3-4-5-6. You know when I read that story I paused at the six steps. What did David do? After six steps he stopped and celebrated a faith victory. He had got it right! He listened to God and now he could figure that he had permission to take the ark of God into the city of David. David had a faith victory. That was number 3.
Reason number 4 ¡V Obey Jesus! And celebrate your faith victory!
„« Turn in your Bibles to the book of John, the tenth chapter the tenth verse. You got it? John 10:10, easy to remember. You should remember this one always and take it home with you. John 10:10
10 The thief who xxxf is coming to kill and to destroy. But I have come so that they may have life and have it more abundantly.
What is Jesus telling us? Celebrate our faith victories! You never know when you are out in public and you hold that blessing over your food or you give that kind glance, that Christian hug to somebody else that that’s not the seed, the one seed that needs to be planted for those people to find Jesus in their life! Be bold! Celebrate the faith victories in your life!
I want to celebrate a faith victory in my own life 16 years ago I lost my job. I had to move several states away. I was separated from my family. I was so embarassed that I could not speak to my earthly mother and father for three months. I didn’t have Jesus in my life. I could do it all by myself, sounds like a two year old doesn’t it! From that day to today when I want to stand before you and shout and dance and sing before the Lord, Because I love God. From way back then the scoundrel I was, to being willing to go preach God’s word wherever He wants to send me, to whomever He wants to send me today. That’s the faith victory in my life. And it started with one person. When one person shared Jesus with me. You see my wife had faith and when I was at my lowest point she offered me Jesus. And that journey has brought me here today to be with you and you share a part of that faith victory, you do!!! When I came here in 1997 I didn’t know what a Methodist was, I didn’t know anything about meetings or Lay Leaders or Preachers rotating. I didn’t know any of that stuff (pause) and you loved me anyway. That seed that was planted all those years ago, God used you to water! You own a piece of this faith victory It’s like a rock being dropped in a pond, who knows where those ripples are going to stop. And none of us knows when we are going to be the water that falls on that seed that causes somebody else to know Jesus and to love Him today! So I urge you "BE LIKE DAVID, show your faith publicly"! It doesn’t matter how much faith you have, it doesn’t! Whether you are a prayer warrior extrodinare (spelling?), a Bible scholar or you just read it for the first time today God has put faith in your heart and you can demonstrate it and bless somebody else with it! People, like the words of the song said "I will dance, I will sing, to be mad for my king. Nothing Lord is hindering this passion in my soul". And I ask you to come with me in my dance. Will you sing with me? Will you dance for joy with me?
Altar call
So here is your chance now for you to show that you got the message. And you are not responding to me, you are responding to what ever the Holy Spirit has touched in your life. You know we open up the altar many, many times in churches today and no one comes. And that’s alright. But sometimes we feel that inner spirit nudging to come down front, to pray to God. To show Him that we love Him. Or maybe it’s not the sermon, or maybe it’s about the music or maybe it’s about nothing that happened here today. Maybe you want to ask for prayer, maybe you want to offer prayer. I tell you public displays of faith are good things. If you feel that Spirit nudging you to come down today, come down front. Praise be to God, pray with someone, pray by yourself. If they are lined up six deep at the altar it doesn’t matter! God understands if you have to kneel half-way back that’s fine. If you can’t kneel that’s fine. As we are singing the last song, sing it with joy in your heart, the story of Jesus, sing it, sing it out!. If we’re all done and we go the back and we say the benediction and you are still praying that’s okay to! It is okay to show Jesus you love Him!
God bless you today and thank you for the opportunity.
