Sermon #3
Here's the third one:
Sermon Manuscript
Thursday, March 30, 2006
Christ: the Source of our Sanctification
When I was very young my parents bought a house. I was too young to remember much when we first moved in, but I can tell you a lot about that house. I grew up there and that house became my home. Our house wasn’t a luxury home; it had only one story, and was never the fanciest house in town. It was a nice small starter home in a small town in the country. It had a little yard that was more or less bare except for a tree or two. It had two bedrooms and a simple layout, with only a small storage space for an attic and only a dirt crawlspace for a basement. When it was chosen for us to live in it was the perfect house for us. My parents saw in that house a great deal of promise, a great deal of hope, and a safe and good place to raise their two very young children. It was the perfect house, but that didn’t mean it didn’t have room to grow, to get better.
As we grew up my parents did a lot of things to this little house. First they put in a sandbox outside for the children to play in, and later a swing set. After that they planted trees in the front yard and the back yard. They filled it with furniture, and improved the wiring. It was a wonderful house and it was being made into the ideal home for our family. It was perfect, but constantly it was being improved. Sometimes it needed to change because as life developed the family changed. Children grow, jobs change along with interests and hobbies. The world changes and technology comes and goes. Weather wears on a roof and a paint job. Sometimes it needed to change to improve what it was. We added another driveway, many trees and bushes to the yard, and flowers by the front walk. Eventually a garage was added and we added a small building outside for recreation and relaxing. The swing set and sandbox were removed and the yard flourished and grew. The house was perfect, but it never stopped growing and changing. It never stopped being made perfect by those living within it.
I often wonder if we mistake the word perfect, or at the least use it in a very different way than the bible does. Sometimes we think perfect means “without flaw.” A pitcher can have a perfect no-hitter if he never fails to strike out a batter in a game. A Bowler can have a perfect game if he never misses a pin. We view perfection strictly in the context of results and performance. We live in a world that strives for perfection in the results of all actions, but tells us that it’s not really possible. We strive for perfection in business and in play. We are always striving to see productivity as high as it can possibly be, but knowing we can never get there. We play sports wanting perfect performance and yet knowing players cannot possibly reach to that potential every time, or even most of the time. Our world has set a standard of perfection that has made it both mandatory and impossible.
Even those who worship God throughout history have used this standard at times. The book of Hebrews speaks about just such a practice. It talks about a system that strived to be perfect before God through the right performance of the right sacrifices in the right way. People sacrificed time and time again, hoping to get it right. They tried harder and harder to get the ritual right and returned year after year hoping they could get it right this time and be perfect through their ritual. As the author of Hebrews proceeds to describe though, there is another way to describe perfection. One that does not understand perfection in light of performance, but in light of relationship.
*Insert Hebrews 10:8-14*
In this passage of Hebrews the opportunity for perfection is offered. It is not offered however through perfect performance of a sacrifice, it is offered by relationship to the perfect sacrifice. By one act Christ came to mend relationship and grant holiness. v. 10 “and by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” This is not perfection through performance though. This is a different kind of perfection, a holiness that comes from something else. It is the perfection that comes from right relationship to God and others. It is the chance for holiness that comes from Christ. You see, Holiness is not something that comes from some second decision or from living life with a perfect performance record; our holiness comes from the very sacrifice of Christ making our relationship to God what it should be.
The truly curious thing about this though is not its source. Many of you have heard this simple truth from others before today. It is easy to say that our holiness comes from Christ, because like so many things, it has been passed down through the church time and time again. I don’t think we can safely leave it there though. On one hand I can tell you that we should simply trust our holiness to Christ’s sacrifice, and this is true. The danger there is that we will forget that there is continual growth in the life of a believer. We are not finished; our journey is not done, even though it can be said that we are made perfect by this sacrifice. On the other hand I don’t want to push you to strive after holiness that in any way would make you think it’s about what you do. We strive and we grow, but “we are made perfect;” we do not actually do the perfecting. That’s not our job. Our Job is to serve and live in right relationship, and to live to continue to be made holy. The true mystery, the real job, is to constantly work out in our lives that we are both perfect, and still being made holy. As verse fourteen says, “because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.” We are perfect, and growing; perfected and being made holy, at the same time.
My house you see was perfect. It served our growing family well, but had to constantly grow through its life to rightly be our home. Sometimes it needed a swing set, and there was a day when the swing set had to go. It needed a new coat of paint one year, and another it needed a new roof. It grew, being improved and fixed, added on to and changed, always growing to serve better the family that lived inside it. Much in the same way we grow, change, and develop to serve better the God that has taken up residence in our hearts. The Lord will fix our dents, repair our paint, and re-furbish our lives with good things, but he will also add-on. He will add rooms, expand the landscape and put on a new garage. We are both perfect, and being made holy. As his presence expands in our lives our lives must grow and change, just as our family grew and the house had to change. In both cases the house may be perfect, but it will never stop growing to suit the expanding and changing presence of it’s residents.
God Bless!
J
Sermon Manuscript
Thursday, March 30, 2006
Christ: the Source of our Sanctification
When I was very young my parents bought a house. I was too young to remember much when we first moved in, but I can tell you a lot about that house. I grew up there and that house became my home. Our house wasn’t a luxury home; it had only one story, and was never the fanciest house in town. It was a nice small starter home in a small town in the country. It had a little yard that was more or less bare except for a tree or two. It had two bedrooms and a simple layout, with only a small storage space for an attic and only a dirt crawlspace for a basement. When it was chosen for us to live in it was the perfect house for us. My parents saw in that house a great deal of promise, a great deal of hope, and a safe and good place to raise their two very young children. It was the perfect house, but that didn’t mean it didn’t have room to grow, to get better.
As we grew up my parents did a lot of things to this little house. First they put in a sandbox outside for the children to play in, and later a swing set. After that they planted trees in the front yard and the back yard. They filled it with furniture, and improved the wiring. It was a wonderful house and it was being made into the ideal home for our family. It was perfect, but constantly it was being improved. Sometimes it needed to change because as life developed the family changed. Children grow, jobs change along with interests and hobbies. The world changes and technology comes and goes. Weather wears on a roof and a paint job. Sometimes it needed to change to improve what it was. We added another driveway, many trees and bushes to the yard, and flowers by the front walk. Eventually a garage was added and we added a small building outside for recreation and relaxing. The swing set and sandbox were removed and the yard flourished and grew. The house was perfect, but it never stopped growing and changing. It never stopped being made perfect by those living within it.
I often wonder if we mistake the word perfect, or at the least use it in a very different way than the bible does. Sometimes we think perfect means “without flaw.” A pitcher can have a perfect no-hitter if he never fails to strike out a batter in a game. A Bowler can have a perfect game if he never misses a pin. We view perfection strictly in the context of results and performance. We live in a world that strives for perfection in the results of all actions, but tells us that it’s not really possible. We strive for perfection in business and in play. We are always striving to see productivity as high as it can possibly be, but knowing we can never get there. We play sports wanting perfect performance and yet knowing players cannot possibly reach to that potential every time, or even most of the time. Our world has set a standard of perfection that has made it both mandatory and impossible.
Even those who worship God throughout history have used this standard at times. The book of Hebrews speaks about just such a practice. It talks about a system that strived to be perfect before God through the right performance of the right sacrifices in the right way. People sacrificed time and time again, hoping to get it right. They tried harder and harder to get the ritual right and returned year after year hoping they could get it right this time and be perfect through their ritual. As the author of Hebrews proceeds to describe though, there is another way to describe perfection. One that does not understand perfection in light of performance, but in light of relationship.
*Insert Hebrews 10:8-14*
In this passage of Hebrews the opportunity for perfection is offered. It is not offered however through perfect performance of a sacrifice, it is offered by relationship to the perfect sacrifice. By one act Christ came to mend relationship and grant holiness. v. 10 “and by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” This is not perfection through performance though. This is a different kind of perfection, a holiness that comes from something else. It is the perfection that comes from right relationship to God and others. It is the chance for holiness that comes from Christ. You see, Holiness is not something that comes from some second decision or from living life with a perfect performance record; our holiness comes from the very sacrifice of Christ making our relationship to God what it should be.
The truly curious thing about this though is not its source. Many of you have heard this simple truth from others before today. It is easy to say that our holiness comes from Christ, because like so many things, it has been passed down through the church time and time again. I don’t think we can safely leave it there though. On one hand I can tell you that we should simply trust our holiness to Christ’s sacrifice, and this is true. The danger there is that we will forget that there is continual growth in the life of a believer. We are not finished; our journey is not done, even though it can be said that we are made perfect by this sacrifice. On the other hand I don’t want to push you to strive after holiness that in any way would make you think it’s about what you do. We strive and we grow, but “we are made perfect;” we do not actually do the perfecting. That’s not our job. Our Job is to serve and live in right relationship, and to live to continue to be made holy. The true mystery, the real job, is to constantly work out in our lives that we are both perfect, and still being made holy. As verse fourteen says, “because by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.” We are perfect, and growing; perfected and being made holy, at the same time.
My house you see was perfect. It served our growing family well, but had to constantly grow through its life to rightly be our home. Sometimes it needed a swing set, and there was a day when the swing set had to go. It needed a new coat of paint one year, and another it needed a new roof. It grew, being improved and fixed, added on to and changed, always growing to serve better the family that lived inside it. Much in the same way we grow, change, and develop to serve better the God that has taken up residence in our hearts. The Lord will fix our dents, repair our paint, and re-furbish our lives with good things, but he will also add-on. He will add rooms, expand the landscape and put on a new garage. We are both perfect, and being made holy. As his presence expands in our lives our lives must grow and change, just as our family grew and the house had to change. In both cases the house may be perfect, but it will never stop growing to suit the expanding and changing presence of it’s residents.
God Bless!
J