Setting The Boundaries Series

How come?

Then I realized:

If I knew that it was going to be my responsibility to punish people crossing the line.and I saw someone I loved walking too close to the boundary what do you think I would do?

What would you do?

If you saw someone you loved walking too close to the line wouldn’t you run over to them, take them by the arm, and pull them back?

I would!!!

And that’s one of the major functions of a church…

· to be there for each other

· to be so committed to each other that when we see one of our Christian bros or sisters walking too close to the edge

· when we see them pushing the boundaries of holiness

We rush to their side and drag them back.

ILLUS: The story is told about the Apostle John (it’s not in the Bible). It seems there was a man in one of the churches he preached in, who walked away from God. Then one day, John saw this man across a field and John began to run after the man… and literally tackled him. And John began to plead with him to return to Christ.

Now, I’m not sure that approach would work with just anybody…

But that story placed in my mind the significance of our responsibility to each other.

Our purpose as a church is to know where God’s boundaries are and to help each other avoid crossing the lines.

One last thing occurred to me as I studied this passage:

God had brought the Israelites to this mountain. He had challenged them to a life changing commitment. And they had made that verbal commitment to Him. They’d said "We will do everything the LORD has said." Exodus 19:8

And then God essentially told the Israelites…talk is cheap.

I want to see you put this into action.

If you’re going to be my people - and you’re going to pursue this commitment to me - then I’m going to expect something more than words. I want you to prepare yourselves for Me. I want you to sanctify yourselves and cleanse yourselves.

I’m going to expect you to make yourselves holy.

Now, this is how I see this applying to us

We’ve just begun our Capital Stewardship Campaign. And we have said that we want this to be an act of faith. We want this to be a project where we rely on God for its success. In fact, we’ve set the financial goal so high… that the only way we’re ever going to reach it is if God is involved.

So if we expect God to be involved in this project then we need to PREPARE ourselves.

We need to wash ourselves

We need to sanctify ourselves

We need to purify our hearts and our minds in His presence.

So, how are we going to do that?

Well, first we have to take the time to do that

When Israel was at the foot of the mountain God told them to take 3 whole days to wash up and clean up. Then he said to the people, "Prepare yourselves for the third day. Abstain from sexual relations." Exodus 19:15

These people were not allowed to distract themselves for anything.

That part about “abstaining from sexual relations”… He’s not talking about boyfriends and girlfriends not sleeping together. No, He’s talking to husbands and wives having sexual relations.

For 3 days, they weren’t to allow ANYTHING to distract their focus on purifying themselves