Sermon for CATM - October 16, 2005 - “The Key to a Fulfilled Life”
Time. It hovers over our lives. It frames all that we do. Everything we can think of doing occurs in time. Thought occurs in time. The clock keeps ticking even as right now, for the first time perhaps in a while, we are all thinking about...time. What time is it? It’s around 3:30-something.
What time is it in your life? If your young it’s maybe 1 or 2 or 3 o’clock. If you’re my age and can count the hairs falling off your head every time to comb your hair, it’s maybe 7 PM. If you’re older it’s a later time. In this analogy midnight is end of the time we’ve been given.
We have at least three members of the Congregation...the babies of Maryellen, Ioulia and
Lisa...for whom time on this side of the womb hasn’t yet begun, yet it will in days or weeks or months.
What do you do with your time? How do you think of time? Do you only ever really think about time when you’re late getting somewhere? Do you only really think much about time when it’s about catching your favourite show on t.v.?
The Bible views time as that measurable space where things happen to people. There is, in God’s mind, a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot, a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain, a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. (Eccl. 3:2-8)
What...what kind of gift is time to us? What kind of responsibility do you and I have toward the time we’ve been given on earth...especially since none of us knows, really, how much time we have this side of heaven.
Our scripture today suggests very strongly an approach to being stewards of our time:
Of the three beatitudes we’ve looked at lately, today’s is the first one that suggests action. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled”. The first
beatitude is about a state of heart: blessed are the poor in spirit. The second is about a state of
mourning. The third is about a state of humility or meekness. That is very appropriate because what matters most about you and me is what we are and not what we do. That’s why we are human beings and not human doings.
But today’s beatitude prompts us to action. But it is not a busy sort of action. It is another kind of
pursuit. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled”.
The Bible suggests that there are two basic attitudes toward life. One is to spend our time worrying, the other is to spend our time fulfilling.
In Matthew chapter 6, Jesus says: “Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? "And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.
“If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ’What shall we eat?’ or ’What shall we drink?’ or ’What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them”.
An Average Person’s Anxiety Is Focused On……
• 40%——things that will never happen
• 30%——things about the past that can’t be
changed
• 12%——things about criticism by others, mostly
untrue
• 10%——about health, which gets worse with
stress
• 8%——about real problems that will be faced
A few quotes about worry:
“Worry is wasting today’s time to clutter up tomorrow’s opportunities with yesterday’s troubles”. A Swedish proverb goes like this: “Worry often gives a small thing a big shadow. And, “God is a help in trouble. In worry you are on your own”.
So, although the Bible presents worrying as an option
that many people choose, there is another way.
“Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all
these things will be given to you as well”
And then, as if knowing that we may not have really
heard what He said earlier, Jesus adds: “Therefore do
not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry
about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own”. Matthew 6:27-34
Basically, the message is that worrying is a massive
time-waster and that worry powerless to affect anything positively, and can only negatively impact us.
But there is another way. And it is a way that leads us away from a worry-filled life to a fulfilled life. “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled”, and just like it, as if to reinforce its importance, “Seek first God’s kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well”.
Hungering and Thirsting:
Have you ever be really, really hungry...or truly thirsty? What happens at those times? You carry on as if nothing’s the matter. You keep focussing on the task at hand?
No. The normal thing to do is to drop everything. It is profoundly difficult to concentrate on anything when we’re famished.
The story is told of the young man who came to
Socrates and told him that he wanted knowledge.
"Follow me" the philosopher told the student and led
him to the edge of the ocean and into the water, without warning Socrates grabbed the young man and plunged him beneath the water and held him there until the struggling stopped. He dragged the boy to the shore, left him gasping on the sand and returned to the market place.
When the boy recovered he sought out the teacher again
and asked him why he tried to drown him. Socrates
replied, "When you were under the water what did you
want more then anything?" The reply of course was
"air". And Socrates responded by saying, "When you
crave knowledge like you craved air, then you won’t
need me or anyone else to guide you."
Hungering and thirsting for righteousness means
desiring more than anything the things of God. This
does not, I want to emphasize mean “being religious” in the common sense of the phrase.
It simply means taking God and our relationship with
God very seriously. It means wanting more of what God
wants for your life...the things that add joy and depth and meaning to living.
It means: Putting people ahead of things, always.
Most messages we receive from popular culture
encourage us to focus on ourselves, in a vain attempt to satisfy our deepest longings with whatever product is being hocked. Accumulate stuff. Acquire more and more. The popular saying, I’m sure you’ve heard, goes like this “He who dies with the most toys wins”. God says ‘put people first’, ‘put your relationships first’, ‘put caring for others first’. And then, in doing that, your needs will be met. And you’ll avoid a needlessly complicated life.
Spending your energy on important rather than petty
things.
In Philippians chapter two, Paul says: “Do everything
without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without
fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which
you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life".
We cherish our right to complain. If we’re miffed about this or that, or if we’re upset about what someone has said or done, we enjoy complaining. We dig a good argument. Paul, just like Jesus, encourages us to think and live very differently.
In fact, a good way to measure how we’re doing
spiritually is to ask ourselves, “Am I complaining a lot?” “Am I spending a lot of energy arguing with others”. If the answer is yes, we need to ask God to help us realign ourselves with His priorities. So that we can “shine like stars in the universe as we hold out the word of life”.
When Dwight L. Moody was in London during one of
his famous evangelistic tours, several British clergymen visited him. They wanted to know how and why this poorly educated American was so effective in winning throngs of people to Christ.
Moody took the three men to the window of his hotel
room and asked each in turn what he saw. One by one,
the men described the people in the park below. Then
Moody looked out the window with tears rolling down
his cheeks. ““What do you see, Mr. Moody?”” asked one
of the men.
““I see countless thousands of souls that will one day
spend eternity without God if they do not find the
Savior.””
Obviously, D. L. Moody saw people differently than the
average observer does. And because he saw eternal souls where others saw only people strolling in a park, Moody approached life with a different agenda.
What’s more important that asserting my right to
complain and argue my way? Simply put, as someone in
Foundations pointed out on Thursday, “our witness”.
Nurturing a Passion for God in Your Life
A lot of us try on our own to grow closer to God. As if our relationship to God was strictly one-to -one. And a lot of people find a lot of frustration in that pursuit. But as we read the Scriptures we find that there is a great deal of discussion about the Body of Christ. That’s other believers around the world, and, more significantly to us, that’s other Christians in our community. In Toronto. Right beside you.
If you’re having trouble praying on your own, join with us at the House of Prayer every Wednesday. If you’re confused or unmotivated about the Bible or about God, come and join the 30 people who are right now journeying together through the Scriptures, discovering the height and depths of God’s love and the Christian life, as well as the sweetness of Christian fellowship.
That’s how you nurture a passion for God in your life.
You were never meant to do it on your own!
Seeking God’s Kingdom
There is a hurting, broken world all around us and inside us. There are hurting, broken and lonely people all around us. I want to suggest that the key to living a fulfilled life is making the radical decision to NOT live for yourself, but rather to live for God. God’s promise is to take care of us, to provide for all our needs as we put Him first, as we seek his kingdom.
When we live for God, we are free to spend our
energies, the energy we’d otherwise spend on worrying
about ourselves, in reaching out to others. In loving
others.
At the mission we have an odd word for this. It is
“volunteering”. That Latin word from which we get our
word, ‘volunteer’ is “voluntarius” It means “of one’s
free will"
So to volunteer means to help others freely, in a
conscious exercise of your will, your choices.
You’ve heard a lot about our Foundations program for
Christian Spiritual Formation. In this program we have
30 people (who’s here from Foundations) who are
specifically in training for their future ministry, their future volunteering, their future “loving God and loving people”.
I’m so encouraged that so many are so eager to learn
and to grow together and to share our lives and learn
what it means to live much more deeply as a Christian
and to discover their “purpose”, their mission or role in God’s kingdom. We’ve been having amazing times together where God is truly speaking into our lives.
We will have a keen, well-trained and passionate group
of people who will serve God and people, offering their love and their gifts of their own free will. And you know what? Each of them will find increasing joy in God and in life that’s going to sustain them and help them to be truly effective in life.
Time. It hovers over our lives. God wants us to live
joyful lives. Purposeful lives. Rich and abundant in
relationships and in self-giving. Everything the Bible
says about God wanting us to be holy, to be transparent and serious about overcoming our sin, to be pure vessels of His love...is there for a reason.
The reason is to make us free. Free from the burden of
sin, which turns us inward either in self-indulgence or in shame. Free from wasting our time with things that get in the way of living a fulfilled life. Free to be fully available to care for others, to respond to human needs.
To pray with those who need prayer. To comfort the
afflicted. To be a friend to the lonely and isolated. To listen. So many just need us to listen. Free to soar, really, like eagles, as we live a life of loving generosity toward God and toward others.
If we remember that as we do this, God will always,
always, always take care of all our needs, our lives will, as Jesus said in Mark 4:20 “...produce a crop--thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what was sown."
So...what will you do with your time? Will you use your time to worry, or will you use it to, by God’s grace fulfill your destiny...to shine like stars and to, with your life, point others, and love others to Jesus Christ.
Let’s pray. God, thank you for the gift of freedom. That you call us to use our freedom in a way that furthers your kingdom. Thank you that you promise to fill our lives with good things as we seek you and your kingdom, as we hunger and thirst after righteousness. Teach us, dear Lord, to do this so that Jesus Christ is exalted in our lives, and so that we may each live to our life’s richest potential. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
