Raca: The Danger Of Empty!

RACA: DANGER OF EMPTY

By Wade Martin Hughes, Sr. Kyfingers@aol.com

I. FEW WILL EVER REALLY UNDERSTAND THE DANGERS AND PERILS OF BEING SPIRITUALLY EMPTY.

A. My first car was a 1961 black VW Beetle, it never had a gas gauge? There was a handle by your feet that opened a one gallon reserve tank when you ran out?

B. Have you ever been driving and ran out of gas?

Matthew 12:43 When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none.

44 Then he saith, I will return into my house from whence I came out; and when he is come, he findeth it empty, swept, and garnished.

45 Then goeth he, and taketh with himself seven other spirits more wicked than himself, and they enter in and dwell there: and the last state of that man

is worse than the first. Even so shall it be also unto this wicked generation.

58 But Peter followed him afar off unto the high priest’s palace, and went in, and sat with the servants, to see the end.

C. EMPTY:

Barren, unfruitful.

Containing nothing.

Deserted, unoccupied.

HOLLOW, INSINCERE.

Vacant, lacking in value.

D. RACA:

Vain, empty worthless.

A word of contempt ---

COMES FROM THE ROOT WORD: to spit

E. Have you ever been hungry? Eat?

And still be hungry?

Eccles. 6:7 All the labour of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled.

II. BROKEN, EMPTY CISTERNS? DO WE APPRECIATE THE WELL WHEN THERE IS NO WATER?

A. GOD’S PEOPLE DID WRONG, THEY SETTLED FOR LESS THAN LIVING WATER... THEY ALLOWED THEIR SOURCE TO BECOME DRY.

Jeremiah 2:13 For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.

B. 5 FOOLISH VIRGINS ALLOWED THEIR OIL SUPPLY TO GO DRY! They missed the MASTER!

III. HOW SHALL WE RELEASE A MIRACLE?

6 EMPTY WATER POTS, HOW SHALL WE ATTAIN OUR MIRACLE?

FILL UP THE EMPTY.

A. What will start Jesus’ first public miracle?

FILLING THE EMPTY.

John 2:5 His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it.

B. DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT WOULD HAVE BEEN TO GET

150 TO 180 GALLONS OF WATER?

John 2:6 And there were set there six waterpots of stone, after the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins apiece.

C. WHEN YOU FILL THE EMPTY THE MIRACLE GROWS NEAR!

John 2:7 Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And they filled them up to the brim.

IV. IT IS EASY TO GET EMPTY WHEN YOU SEEM TO BE AIMLESSLY WANDERING THROUGH DRY SEASONS.

A. 40 days of complaining and bellyaching can cost dearly.

Numbers 32:11 Surely none of the men that came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, shall see the land which I sware unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob; because they have not wholly

followed me:

B. Their sin? Empty? Not WHOLELY FOLLOWING GOD!

V. THE BRIGHT DAY OF SOLOMON’S GLORY FADES QUICKLY INTO DOOM AND DARKNESS.

The history show Solomon’s decline to a terrible fall as a sad, sad record.

A. As Solomon aged, he spent more and more time just being idle.

His idleness was spent living among 1,000 women.

B. SOLOMON’S PALACES BECAME KNOWN AS PLEASURE DENS.

C. SLOW --- GRADUAL DRIFTING OFF COURSE CAN HURT!

1 Kings 11:7 Then did Solomon build an high place for Chemosh, the abomination of Moab, in the hill that is before Jerusalem, and for Molech, the abomination of the children of Ammon.

8 And likewise did he for all his strange wives, which burnt incense and sacrificed unto their gods.

9 And the Lord was angry with Solomon, because his heart was turned from the Lord God of Israel, which had appeared unto him twice,

D. AT FIRST SOLOMON TOLERATED THE STRANGE WOMEN AND THEIR gods.

This interest was first curiosity then IMITATING the heathen way.

E. IN SOLOMON’S MIND HE DID NOT STOP THE SACRIFICES AND WORSHIP AT THE TEMPLE, BUT SLOWLY THE ISSUES OF THE HEART TURNED SOLOMON’S WORSHIP TO NOT BE RIGHT WITH GOD.

F. Solomon’s emptiness left him WITHOUT RELIGIOUS FERVOUR and ZEAL.

G. This SPIRIT OF EMPTINESS brought GOD’S DISPLEASURE and eventually JUDGMENT.

H. SOLOMON’S ENEMIES PREVAIL, and Solomon becomes famous for saying:

VANITIES OF VANITY all is vanity.

USELESS, USELESS ALL THINGS ARE USELESS.

I. Solomon’s great sin? EMPTINESS!

VI. SAUL WOULD NOT APPROACH THE OLD MAN OF GOD EMPTY!

BUT SOMETHING HAPPENS IN SAUL’S LIFE THAT EMPTINESS

BECOMES ACCEPTABLE.

A. Saul was a handsome, tall man. He would have been the dream of every college basketball coach.

B. They had a problem, Saul’s Dad was named Kish.