24/7: Twenty-four seven
A young soldier and his commanding officer got on a train together. The only available seats were across from an attractive young women who was traveling with her grandmother. As they engaged in pleasant conversation, the soldier and the young woman kept eyeing one another; the attraction was obviously mutual. Suddenly the train went into a tunnel and the car became pitch black.
Immediately two sounds were heard: the “smack” of a kiss, and the “whack” of a slap across the face. The grandmother thought “I can’t believe he kissed my granddaughter, but I’m glad she gave him the slap he deserved.” The commanding officer thought, “I don’t blame the boy for kissing girl, but it’s a shame that she missed his face and hit me instead.”
The young girl thought, “I’m glad he kissed me, but I wish my grandmother hadn’t slapped him for doing it.” And as the train broke into the sunlight, the soldier could not wipe the smile off his face. He had just seized the opportunity to kiss a pretty girl and slap his commanding officer and had gotten away with both!
Now, that young soldier knew how seize the opportunity! In the same way, we must take advantage of every opportunity that comes our way to fulfill our purpose in life.
Unfortunately, many times we get so caught up in the details of every day to day living that we just don’t have the time to seize the day that has been given us.
We’ve got deadlines and commitments, problems, and priorities, distractions and obstacles, and though we really want more fulfillment from each day, it just doesn’t seem to be within our grasp. No one wants life to be just average, at least not many of us are willing to admit it. But by nature, we want our lives to be full and prosperous.
I am going to begin a mini-series that will finish out the month of September. It is really a look at the life of Jesus and three life lessons that we should endeavor to build into our lives. This series is a series on discipleship reduced down to the most basic of outline. As disciples or Christ Follower, our mission on this earth is to make and multiply disciples or Christ followers.
Over the next three weeks we are going to look at Living like Jesus lived, Loving like Jesus loved and Leaving behind what Jesus left behind.
Ephesians 5:15-21 “Be very careful, then, how you live-not as unwise but as wise, 16making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. 17Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the Lord’s will is. 18Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit. 19Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, 20always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. 21Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.” NIV
We have been given a mission and it could easily be code named. Doesn’t sound exciting? The Mission! We are going to code name it: 24/7!
We exist on this earth for one reason. We are to be reflections of Jesus Christ. We are to shine His light or the light of His Good News into the darkness. We are to live each day in celebration of our God. Our lives are a testimony to His work in them.
“The good news is Jesus transcends all cultures. Jesus is not modern, Jesus is not post modern. And his body, the church, is neither modern or postmodern, though it lives within both cultural paradigms. Ultimately, Christ’s community is a way of life that incarnates into and challenges any and every culture, in every time, in every place. Mission is an intrinsically translational task. Throughout history, God has shown himself relating to people within their cultural frame of reference. The life and work of Jesus Christ set a pattern for the church’s mission. In the incarnation, God became more than words. The Word himself entered culture in a specific time and space. (John 1:14)” – Jonathan Campbell
What does it mean to live like Jesus lived? How did He live? The word that epitomizes Jesus Christ more than any other would have to be the word servant. He was a servant. He was the ultimate servant.
“Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.” Philippians 2:5-8
Together this morning we will examine this one thought. What does it mean to live like Jesus lived?
1. Jesus gave His disciples two things to help them follow Him. He gave them power and a picture.
Jesus could have just simply given His disciples power but He spent three years “discipling” them. He modeled the life that He intended for them to live. Many people have rejected the church because of those who claim to be followers of Jesus Christ. It is very painful but true. “The world isn’t interested in Christianity because we Christians aren’t known as a people who live what we say.” (Michael Slaughter/Warren Bird) Until we move beyond superficial faith, we will not experience supernatural living.
The Picture Jesus Portrayed
What was Jesus like? What is the picture He gives us as we look and listen to Him?
Jesus loved the unlovable.
Jesus forgave the unforgivable.
Jesus made disciples and followers out of the least likely people.
Jesus worried about people’s physical hunger.
Jesus cried when a friend died.
Jesus took His message to the streets. He hung out with those who needed His message most.
Across the street from the bombed out Federal Building in Oklahoma City, where 168 people died needlessly and senselessly, there stands a memorial. At the heart of that memorial is a nine foot statue of Jesus. But this statue is not one of a stony Jesus with arms out wide like you may have seen in the Ozarks or in Brazil. No, this is a nine foot statue of Jesus with his face in his hands, turned slightly away from where the acts of terror took place, and the plaque reads, "And Jesus Wept."
A small boy had been consistently late for dinner. One particular day his parents had warned him to be on time, but he arrived later than ever. He found his parents already seated at the table, about to start eating. Quickly he sat at his place, and then noticed what was set before him--a slice of bread and a glass of water. There was silence as he sat staring at his plate, crushed. Suddenly he saw his father’s hand reach over, pick up his plate and set it before himself. Then his dad put his own full plate in front of his son, smiling warmly as he made the exchange. When the boy became a man, he said, "All my life I’ve known what God was like by what my father did that night." Homemade, May, 1989
What picture of Jesus do you have this morning?
Secular musician and song writer Ben Harper wrote an incredibly moving song and recorded it with the Blind Boys of Alabama. It is entitled, I’ve Got a Picture of Jesus.
It hangs above my altar
Like they hung him from a cross
I keep one in my wallet
For the times I feel lost
In a wooden frame with splinters
Where my family kneels to pray
And if you listen close
You’ll hear the words he used to say
I’ve got a picture of Jesus
In his arms so many prayers rest
We’ve got a picture of Jesus
And with him we shall be forever blessed
Now it has been spoken
He would come again
But would we recognize
This king among men
There was a man in our time
His words shine bright like the sun
He tried to lift the masses
And was crucified by gun
He was a picture of Jesus
With him so many prayers rest
He is a picture of Jesus
In his arms so many prayers rest
With him we shall be forever blessed
Some days have no beginning
And some days have no end
Some roads are straight and narrow
And some roads only bend
So let us say a prayer
For every living thing
Walking towards a light
From the cross of a king
We long to be a picture of Jesus
In his arms so many prayers rest
I long to be a picture of Jesus
With him we shall be forever blessed
The Power Jesus Promised
Jesus clearly taught that we were to emulate Him with our lives. We have been given the assignment while on this earth to use our gifts, talents, personalities and resources to live out our faith. When He gave this assignment He also promised the power to do it.
After Jesus died and rose again from the dead, He spent some time with His followers trying to talk with them about the kingdom of God on this earth and the part they would play. We read about it in Acts 1.
“In my first book[a] I told you about everything Jesus began to do and teach 2until the day he ascended to heaven after giving his chosen apostles further instructions from the Holy Spirit. 3During the forty days after his crucifixion, he appeared to the apostles from time to time and proved to them in many ways that he was actually alive. On these occasions he talked to them about the Kingdom of God.
4In one of these meetings as he was eating a meal with them, he told them, "Do not leave Jerusalem until the Father sends you what he promised. Remember, I have told you about this before. 5John baptized with[b] water, but in just a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit."
6When the apostles were with Jesus, they kept asking him, "Lord, are you going to free Israel now and restore our kingdom?"
7"The Father sets those dates," he replied, "and they are not for you to know. 8But when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, you will receive power and will tell people about me everywhere--in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth."
Jesus promised us the power to fulfill His mission. Think about this for a moment. You have to want to fulfill the mission of Jesus. You have to go after it like you and I pursue our own interest. If we want something or we want to build, buy or possess something we will spend any amount of time and energy going after it.
I am in a place right now in my own life where I am asking God to give me a passion for Him and for His ways. Let me lead a people who are passionate about being Christ followers and not just Christ fans. Fans sit in the seats and get fatter and followers get in the field and play the game.
A man once told his wife that he never wanted to live in a vegetative state dependant upon a machine. He said, “If I ever get in that shape, I want you to pull the plug.” She got up and unplugged the television. (source unknown)
What is your picture of Jesus and are you experiencing His power?
2. We are to model life as Jesus did.
We are to invite people to come and follow us as we follow Christ! We are to live in community with others.
Jesus spent three years modeling community. He surrounded himself with 12 men that he poured himself into. He mentored and gave Himself to pouring faith into someone else. He lived out in front of His disciples what it meant to follow and do God’s will on this earth.
John Frye wrote about his step father Neil. Neil was a jack of all trades kind of guy. He had the ability to tackle and fix anything. But he had something so much more important then his skills to work on things. He had the patience to teach. From the time he was in sixth grade John would hear these words, “John, watch me.” Neil operated a gas station back in the day when they would work on your car. “John watch me. Watch what I do as I take things apart. Watch how I fix them and then watch how I do reassembly.”
Often he would watch Neil as he tore a motor apart and what was running on less the eight or six cylinders would once again come roaring to life with no misses.
We are to pick up this book, (Bible) and learn how to live as Jesus lived. We are then to teach it to others. In John 4 there is an incredible story. Jesus is going north but instead of keeping with the tradition of bypassing Samaria, He amazes His disciples by insisting on going through Samaria instead of around it. They are all hot, not just from the sun, but the disciples are emotionally upset because they are going through the wrong neighborhood. You know what I am talking about. This is a racial thing. The Samaritan’s were treated with the total contempt. They were considered unclean and they were treated like dogs. This was the last place they wanted to be.
Jesus is tired so He sits by Jacobs well and rests. The disciples are hungry and so they go to the nearby town to buy food. The disciples are so bent on their own agenda that they hardly notice a woman hurrying out of town toward the well. She fills her water pot and takes a moment to rest and then she hears a strange voice.
“Give me a drink of water.” She immediately recognizes Him as a Jew and with a twinge of sarcasm responds, “How is that you a Jew, ask the likes of me, a Samaritan and a woman at that, for a drink? I know and you know that I am way out of bound to you and your kind.”
Frye writes, “Remarkably Jesus does not accept her socially and politically correct answer, and so he does not release her into a quick get-away. He shockingly enough, continues to engage her in what unfolds to be a revelatory, if not ruffled, conversation. Using words as wrenches, Jesus expertly dismantles her soul, finds the bad part, does the repair by revealing himself as Messiah, and sends her, overhauled and firing on all eight cylinders back into town.”
The disciples come back and are completely floored that Jesus is talking to this woman. They offer Him something to eat and His response it classic. He speaks of food they know nothing about. “Doing the will of God my Father is my food,” He tells them.
The woman now functioning as a true Christ Follower goes into town and models what she has just heard.
“34Then Jesus explained: "My nourishment comes from doing the will of God, who sent me, and from finishing his work. 35Do you think the work of harvesting will not begin until the summer ends four months from now? Look around you! Vast fields are ripening all around us and are ready now for the harvest. 36The harvesters are paid good wages, and the fruit they harvest is people brought to eternal life. What joy awaits both the planter and the harvester alike! 37You know the saying, `One person plants and someone else harvests.’ And it’s true. 38I sent you to harvest where you didn’t plant; others had already done the work, and you will gather the harvest."
39Many Samaritans from the village believed in Jesus because the woman had said, "He told me everything I ever did!" 40When they came out to see him, they begged him to stay at their village. So he stayed for two days, 41long enough for many of them to hear his message and believe. 42Then they said to the woman, "Now we believe because we have heard him ourselves, not just because of what you told us. He is indeed the Savior of the world."
3. We must be willing to embrace the downward spiral.
Living like Jesus lived is a downward spiral. Not downward in a negative sense but in a realistic sense. We are to evaluate our lives, relationships, action and reactions, priorities and resources in light of our relationship to God and His word. Often Jesus has called people to leave the comfortable and embrace the uncomfortable.
Jesus has always called His followers into a life that is counter-culture but somehow at its core it is an appealing call. What started out as a simple invitation, “Come follow me,” became an incredible command.
16One day as Jesus was walking along the shores of the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon[g] and his brother, Andrew, fishing with a net, for they were commercial fishermen. 17Jesus called out to them, "Come, be my disciples, and I will show you how to fish for people!" 18And they left their nets at once and went with him. Mark 1:16-18
Often God calls us out of our “normal” lives to walk a radically different way. Living in a downward spiral means that we are willing to follow Jesus even to the cross. We don’t run from adversity. We don’t run when life gets hard. We embrace the cross. It may be heavy but we carry it because our Lord carried it. We accept it because it is not the devil who gives us our crosses it is God. It was God, who let His Son die on a cross because it was good for the whole world.
Are you and I willing to be bothered in our busy lives by carrying crosses. Are we to be bothered by touching the “least of these,” with a cup of cold water or a conversation? Jesus hammered this thought home in Luke 10:30-37.
30Jesus replied with an illustration: "A Jewish man was traveling on a trip from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he was attacked by bandits. They stripped him of his clothes and money, beat him up, and left him half dead beside the road.
31"By chance a Jewish priest came along; but when he saw the man lying there, he crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by. 32A Temple assistant[d] walked over and looked at him lying there, but he also passed by on the other side.
33"Then a despised Samaritan came along, and when he saw the man, he felt deep pity. 34Kneeling beside him, the Samaritan soothed his wounds with medicine and bandaged them. Then he put the man on his own donkey and took him to an inn, where he took care of him. 35The next day he handed the innkeeper two pieces of silver[e] and told him to take care of the man. `If his bill runs higher than that,’ he said, `I’ll pay the difference the next time I am here.’
36"Now which of these three would you say was a neighbor to the man who was attacked by bandits?" Jesus asked. 37The man replied, "The one who showed him mercy." Then Jesus said, "Yes, now go and do the same."
Jesus uses the Samaritan’s once again. Are you willing to be used by God and to live like Jesus lived? We need to discover the term “Downward Mobility” and embrace the simple life that Jesus lived and modeled.
Rodney Buchanan pastor’s a Methodist Church in Mt. Vernon and is a great pastor. I want to quote from him as we prepare to close.
“Let’s imagine a situation where a homeless man is begging on the streets of New York. A well dressed man in a long limousine pulls up next to him and offers him a job as vice-president of his company. You might say that is ridiculous; nothing like that would ever happen. But that is exactly what God has done for us. He rescued us from the gutter. We were homeless and he gave us a new home. We were the rejects of the world, but he gave us self respect. We had nothing, but he gave us everything. He asks us to be a part of his kingdom and work for it.
But, now, let’s say that the homeless man sneers at him and rejects the offer for several reasons. First, he will have to give up what is familiar to him. Obviously, it is a terrible life, but it is the only life he knows how to live. Secondly, he has a few possessions which he pushes around in a cart, and the few clothes he owns are on his back. And one of the conditions the man in the limousine makes is that the man must leave everything and get into the limousine. The third reason is that the man will actually have to work and accept responsibility. Life on the street was bad, but at least no one expected anything from him. No one expected him to be any different. So he turns from the man in the expensive suit and shuffles down the street hoping for a warm grate that he can sleep on for the night.
Does the man in the story understand what he has given up? He would have had a home, a job, a purpose, a great bank account, and a high position in an important business. But he passed it up to keep what he had. How foolish. This is why Jesus said, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it” (Luke 9:23-24). Dallas Willard reminds us that if we are going to talk about the cost of discipleship, we ought to balance it by talking about the cost of non-discipleship.
Are you like the homeless man? When Christ comes to ask you to die to yourself and give up your old life, you refuse. You think about all the stuff in your cart that you will have to give up. You may be miserable, but at least you are used to it, and you know how to get by. You are not sure you would know what to do if you really died to your old life. Besides, you don’t want to put forth the effort to change. You don’t want the responsibility of living the Christian life fully. But what if you understood that you were in line to inherit the business? You were not just a partner, you were an heir. And the reason you were selected was that the man in the limousine, unknown to you, was really your father who had searched until he found you. He knew your potential. He understood what you were capable of. He wanted to call you more than vice-president; he wanted to call you son. The Bible says, “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs — heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory” (Romans 8:16-17).
We are to make Him our life song. He wants to be are all in all. He wants us to follow Him and represent Him 24/7.
