Sermon: Present Purpose

Text: Ecclesiastes 3:1-14

(South Shore Corps - July 31st, 1994 AM)
(Prince Rupert Corps - March 24th, 1996 PM)
(Chatham Citadel - August 29th, 1999 AM)

I love my wife very much, but she has a very annoying habit.

It drives me absolutely crazy sometimes, and she can’t seem to shake it either. The worst part is, I am not sure that I want her to!

You see, she has a habit of getting chores done around the house before I even think of doing them. Before I have myself "psyched" up to do the dishes, or the laundry, or tidy the bedroom, or the family room, she has already been there. This has the disturbing effect of making me feel like a slacker, and guilty of being lazy.

Maybe I am guilty… a little. You see I have a predisposition towards procrastination.

It doesn't matter to Val that I would have done a particular chore had I been given just a little bit more time. What really matters is that I didn't do it when it should have been done.

Why am I telling you this? Well, it all has to do with a revelation I had while reading a devotional from Oswald Chambers' book, "My Utmost for His Highest." Oswald, as we affectionately called the little book, put it this way:

"We have an idea that God is leading us to a particular end, a desired goal; He is not. The question of getting to a particular end is a mere incident. What we call the process, God calls the end." (July 27)

As I thought about this, I began to understand many things in scripture that had puzzled me. One of the more difficult passages this opened up to me was the entire book of Ecclesiastes.

For years I wondered why Ecclesiastes starts with such a strange introduction: "Meaningless! Meaningless! Says the teacher... Utterly meaningless!" I had always found that interesting, and very poetic, but like most poetry, its meaning was not obvious at first. What could Solomon have meant when he went on about everything being meaningless?

As I thought about the devotional, things began to come clearer. It was like a light bulb was coming on. Suddenly, everything I read in Ecclesiastes seemed to make sense. It is so simple, actually, that it is very easy to miss. It is simply this:

Everything has a time and place. Things come and go, but our past and our present have no meaning to God. It is our present that He is concerned with, Who we are, and how we deal with things is what matters to Him. That is "the end" that Oswald Chambers was referring to.

Well, maybe it’s not quite so simple, but it is profound enough for us to look deeper.

MEANINGLESS!

Like most of us today, Solomon was looking for meaning... for purpose in his life…

Our “western” society has fulfilled our needs and just about all of our wants as well. It has come to the point where people do not want to retire any more because instead of work being heavy labour they need to rest from, it has become a means of providing purpose in our lives, no matter how shallow that purpose might be. Solomon was in a similar situation – he had everything, had tried everything, and still had found no purpose in any of it. 

To aid him in his search for meaning, Solomon had the greatest wisdom of any man in the world, and he was also very rich - a pretty good combination if you want to figure something out! He had every material thing that a man from 950 BC could possibly want, and his wisdom exceeded every living person, and still he could not find meaning in anything.

Everything that can be done has already been done, or will be done by someone else. Every thought has been thought already in one form or another. When we think we have something new, we often find out that someone else has already done it, probably better. It may be new to us, but it is not new to someone else, and in the light of eternity it is ancient to God. It’s like rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic – they might look different, maybe even better, but the ship is still sinking and the chairs have no ultimate purpose.

We are all full of plans. We want our children to grow up and become lawyers. We want our retirement money to be set aside and well invested so that we can have a nice comfortable existence after we turn sixty-five. We want, we want, we want, and we want. But the teacher in Ecclesiastes says "It’s all meaningless."

Read Ecclesiastes and you will find all the vices men and women try to find meaning in; Wisdom, Pleasure, Toil, Folly, Oppression, Advancement, and Riches. The teacher tries each, and each he rejects them as having no meaning at all. Talk about nothing being new! These same vices have been in existence since the beginning of time, exist today, and will probably continue until time’s conclusion.

So like Solomon, we ask ourselves, where then can we find meaning in life? Where is the purpose in our existence? If it is not in the things we do, then where can we find it?

BEING

The answer is there – hidden – it is subtle, but important. Listen carefully - our purpose is not found in the things we do. It is found in who we are.

Did you catch that? You are not your job, or your possessions – you are who you are – your purpose is in our being.

Our world has taken that reality and turned it inside out! Our world tells us "Do this and you shall become." But God says "Become… and you shall do this."

Did you get that? Those who seek to “do” continue to find themselves trapped by the meaninglessness of their purpose. Those whose purpose is in being what God wants them to be find the things they do fulfilling no matter how great or how small a task they are attempting, whether they are rich or poor. It doesn't matter because inside them they have found the fulfillment of reached the goal.

Wow, how profound. If my purpose is in being, then I can find joy and peace no matter what my circumstances. That sounds good, but if being is where we find our meaning, then what is it that we should be?

For the answer to that, we need to peak at the end of the teachers’ book. Look at chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes. The teacher concludes in verses 13 and 14:

"Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter; Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil." (12:13-14)

Note that Solomon does not say "continue to fear God", or "in the future fear God." He says simply, and immediately "FEAR GOD." Present tense, no exceptions. It is the here and now that we find purpose in. Live for God in the here and now and you will have purpose to spare. Live for him each and every moment of your life. Do not live for him in the past, and do not live for him in the future, because both are meaningless and for the moment do not exist.

Remember the story of the man who built his house on the sand? Yes, he probably enjoyed the view he had from his window – It would have been beautiful with lush grasses and dainty flowers that sprang up out of the moist soft soil. He dwelt on what he understood from the past. The land looked like it had been there forever, and so he was sure it would continue. He felt safe in building on the past, until the time of the storm came, and his house collapsed.

You see, it did not matter to him what the soil was like now – it didn’t matter to consider the situation he was building in. All he cared about was that the beauty that had been there yesterday was going to be there for him now. But it didn’t last – it was meaningless.

The man who stored up his grain in his barn had the opposite problem – he looked to the future. He wanted a safe retirement. He figured if he could keep all of that grain stored up, he would have plenty to eat and never worry about labouring in his fields again. He would be rich. His future would be secure... or so he thought! That night he died. He could not enjoy the benefits of his hoarding because the future did not turn out as he expected.

Who knows what he had done to accomplish the full barns – some of it was the luck of the weather, but perhaps he had overworked his employees to build the barns and store the grain – all so that he would have a safe and secure future – that never came. It was all meaningless.

Our past will condemn us, and our future is unknown. It is only in the present that we can find certainty. Things will come and things will go, but it is all meaningless, but in the present we know what is here.

That is why Solomon says there is a time for everything. There is a time for this, and a time for that, and everything will come in and of its own time. But in the present, the here and now, God is with us. Our purpose is not in the past, or in the future, it is in the here and now. God has forgiven our past, and He holds our future. He does not even judge us for our past or our future, we are condemned for the condition of our hearts in the present, or we are saved by our obedience to Him in the here and now.

There are other clues to Solomon’s meaning: In chapter 3:11, we read "He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end." What does he mean by this? When you think about yourself, do you think about your birth? How about your death? No? You think about your existence and you find it difficult to view the vastness of history as God has created it. You contemplate yourself in the present because that is the way God created us. He has set eternity in our hearts, without beginning or end. He has created us as eternal beings who exist at this moment in time.

Can you remember what you had for breakfast this day last year? Do you know what you will have for breakfast on this day a year from now? Again… No. We contemplate eternity in the present, not in the past or the future. Our purpose, our existence is here and now. Meaning is found for us in being who we are at this very moment.

PURPOSE

Before I begin to wax too philosophical, or is it too late? Let's remind ourselves of what our purpose for the here and now is. Verse 12 of chapter 3 continues by saying "I know that there is nothing better for men than to be happy and do good while they live." As I have already stated, it appears that Solomon is saying that living as God would have us live is our purpose. Without living as God would have us live, we have no meaning in our lives. Without Him in our present there is no purpose for the future or forgiveness for the past. Again, in chapter 5, we read these words:

"Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. Go near to listen rather than to offer the sacrifice of fools, who do not know that they do wrong."

Every Sunday, we find ourselves physically in God's house: His sanctuary. The building we call a church. But physical location does not matter. In fact, Solomon is saying that going there alone is not the purpose for being in that place. He is talking about the spiritual “state”, the present purpose, of those who are going. Our physical location could be anywhere. The question is, where are you spiritually at this moment, while you sit here listening to me? Ask yourself, are you here out of obedience, worshipping God and hearing what he has to say to you, or are you simply fulfilling some religious obligation laid down by your fellow man, to offer your spiritual sacrifice and get it done?

Are you focusing on God and obeying Him, or are you thinking about the Disney movie showing later? If you are, you're living in the future! Are you thinking about how hard it was for you to get out of bed this morning, and how you would still like to be there? Then you're living in the past!

As Paul says to the Ephesians (5:14) "Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you."

Let me quote Oswald once more:

"Gods training is for now, not presently. His purpose is for this minute, not for something in the future. We have nothing to do with the afterwards of obedience; we get wrong when we think of the afterwards. What men call training and preparation, God calls the end.

"God's end is to enable me to see that He can walk on the chaos of my life just now. If we have a further end in view, we do not pay sufficient attention to the immediate present; if we realize that obedience is the end, then each moment as it comes is precious."

If you have been wondering what the purpose of your life is; what God’s plan for you is, then look no further than God, and look no further than this moment. Get your heart right with God right now, and everything else will fall into its place. My mother used to say, “take care of the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves.”

There is a time for everything, and that time will come. If God rules in your heart, your purpose will be steadfast, and you will be prepared. “But seek His kingdom and these things will be added to you as well.” Jesus says in Luke 12:31.

Meaningless? All things are meaningless. But the purpose of the present is found in God. Seek Him first and all these things will be added unto you. (Matthew 6:33). You see, it’s not about the things about you or where you are supposed to be. It’s about who you are – Seek Him first and the rest will fall into place.

Sermon: Extreme Commitment

Text: Genesis 22:1-19
(Chatham Corps – August 20^th, 1999 AM)

"In Kentucky, there is a huge rivalry in college basketball between the University of Louisville and the University of Kentucky. At one of the 'Dream Games' between the two schools, an elderly woman sat alone with an empty seat next to her. Someone approached her and said, 'Ma'am, I have rarely seen an empty seat in Rupp Arena, let alone at the Dream Game. Whose seat is this?'

"The woman responded that she and her late husband had been season ticket holders for twenty-eight years, and the seat had belonged to him. 'Well, couldn't you find a friend or relative to come to the game with you?' the person asked.

"'Are you kidding?' she replied. 'They're all at my husband's funeral.'"[1]

Commitment… not a popular word these days. Whether it be as small a thing as visiting your mother at least once a month, or as big a thing as waiting until you are married to have sex, it seems that the world does not want us to make any kind of commitment.

Commitment requires faith. Commitment requires trust. And Commitment requires discipline. Of course discipline, trust and faith are three more things the world is not eager to support.

George Barna is credited as having said “Commitment is viewed negatively because it limits our ability to feel independent and free, to experience new things, to change our minds on the spur of the moment and to focus on self-gratification rather than helping others. People willingly make commitments only when the expected outcome exceeds what they must sacrifice as a result of that commitment.”[2]

It is a sad statement to make that our society has come to the point where self-gratification has become more important than a commitment to basic principles of goodness.

Think of your heroes. They are committed to their goals. They are some of those who are honestly committed to doing something without counting the personal cost. They are not looking for personal gain from the results of their commitment. Instead they look at the affect for good in the outcome of the their actions.

If Jesus had looked at his crucifixion in terms of what he would get out of it, I am sure he would have left us in the garden of Gethsemane, or maybe become the triumphant king the Pharisees had expected him to be. Instead he sacrificed everything to die on a Roman cross so that we might have eternal life.

How many men and women have sacrificed themselves in times of war, for the greater good of those who remained at home? How many brave men and women sacrificed themselves to save others when the twin towers fell in New York? If their commitment had been less strong and they had wished to gratify only themselves, where would we be?

“Ah,” you might say, “but those were extreme circumstances.” And perhaps they were. But is commitment only required in extreme circumstances? Shouldn’t it be even easier then to make a small commitment when the circumstances are not so grave? Have a look at yourself and ask; “Would I be willing to make even a modest commitment no matter what the circumstances?”

THE COMMAND IS GIVEN

As we look at chapter 22 of Genesis, the first thing we see is that God was testing Abraham. Those of you who are fans of the King James Version will read “God did tempt Abraham.” I am afraid this is one of those times when we need a new translation of the original Hebrew. In the original, the word “nissah” is translated in the KJV as “tempt” and in the NIV as “tested.” Both are somewhat correct, but the implication of tempt is that God was trying to get Abraham to do what is evil, which was not the case. Rather, God was trying Abraham by fire to see what he was made off. He was testing him.

James 1:2-4 tells us to “consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” So we understand that God’s intention with Abraham was not to have him do evil, but to mature him and make him complete.

But what was God was testing in Abraham?

Abraham must have been very confused by the command. Pagan tribes in Abraham’s day believed that a human sacrifice – often ones own child – would strengthen the gods they worshiped, and that doing so in times of trouble would often bring relief. But for God this was unimaginable. Abraham himself, though he obeyed God to the letter, is credited as having trusted that somehow God would not let this pass without bringing Isaac back.

In vs. 8, he prophesies without even being aware of it that God himself will provide the lamb for the sacrifice. In Hebrews 11:19, Paul credits Abraham as having believed God would raise Isaac from the dead.

Whatever the case, Abraham had faith to believe that though it seemed God was asking him to do something extremely difficult, and maybe even downright wrong, that God would not allow evil to happen. God was testing many things in Abraham’s life; his trust in God, his faith and his commitment to carry out what God wished.

And so, when the command was given, the command was obeyed.

THE COMMAND IS OBEYED

There is no record of Abraham ever questioning the command, or even a reflection of inner doubt. God simply makes the command, and Abraham the next morning wakes and obeys. He does not grumble or complain. He does not question God or argue with him. He doesn’t boast to others of his unprecedented commitment to God. He simply trusts that whatever God has in mind, He will work it out.

We can only speculate what must have gone on in Abraham’s heart. When his son asked him in vs. 7, “…where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” We can only imagine the conflict that must have arisen within him. Here was his favorite son – his only son by Sarah his wife – born in their old age and as a promise from God. Here was the son that Abraham loved so dearly, and God was asking Abraham to make a sacrifice of him? Surely Abraham must have been more than curious how God was going to work this one out – and how his heart must have been heavy as he knew there was the possibility that God would require him to go through with it.

Abraham followed the command to the letter. I suspect that there were tears in his eyes as he picked up the knife and raised it preparing himself for a deed that he would not even have thought of doing had it been his own will.

When God asks us to commit to him, he doesn’t expect us to be perfect. Nor does he expect us to go down a path that is impossible for us, but he does not guarantee that it will be an easy path. Abraham was capable of doing the task that God had asked him to do, but it was neither an easy path, nor one that Abraham would have chosen to go down of his own free will.

When Dr. David Livingstone was working in Africa, a group of friends wrote him: "We would like to send other men to you. Have you found a good road into your area yet?" According to a member of his family, Dr. Livingstone sent this message in reply: "If you have men who will only come if they know there is a good road, I don't want them. I want men who will come if there is no road at all."

Would Joshua have chosen to march around the walls of Jericho once for six days, then seven times on the seventh day, blowing rams horns? I doubt he would have even considered that as a tactical plan to destroy the city, yet God in what seems foolishness to us, sometimes requires us to trust him.

And so, Abraham obeyed.

He steeled himself and went forward to do the task, which on the surface seemed to contradict his better judgement. In the end, however, that obedience was honoured.

THE OBEDIENCE IS HONOURED

Abraham did not have to sacrifice his son. God provided the sacrificial lamb. The results of the test: Abraham was credited for his commitment to follow God’s will. And Abraham’s faith and trust in God was increased immeasurably. It is one of those situations where at the beginning, it seems everything will be lost, and in the end everyone wins. You can’t ask for better.

Jesus commitment to us was like that. As we read in Philippians 2, He gave up all the glory of heaven to become a man. As if that were not enough, he gave up even that little which he still had to die on a cross for our sins – not his own sins because he did not have any sin within him – but all of our sins. He was committed to that task. He gave up all to do it for us and received only the love of those who accept his gift in return.

So, remember that question I asked earlier? “Would I be willing to make even a modest commitment no matter what the circumstances?”

What does God require of us? Commitment to a relationship with Him? Commitment to follow his commands? Commitment to preach the gospel to those who have not heard it? Commitment to a life of holiness?

There may be a cost involved in a commitment to Jesus. There may be sacrifices to be made. Today’s world is full of deception, greed, malice and a thousand other sinful vices. Are these not extreme circumstances? If you think about it, does it not require an extreme commitment to a cause of righteousness to make a change? Perhaps even a commitment on the order of Abraham, or Jesus?

So, what is your level of commitment to him?

CONCLUSION

Dr. Herbert Schaefer, a Canadian missionary who worked in India and Hong Kong once told the story of a debate, which broke out on a farm. The debate was raised between a hen and a pig. The topic of the debate was "Involvement and Commitment are equal". The hen argued, "if someone is willing to get involved, that means they are committed."

The pig said, "No, I don’t think so. Getting involved is far from ready to commit." But neither could convince the other of their point of view. Then they heard the voice of the farmer’s wife. "Honey, what would you like for breakfast? Ham or Egg?" The farmer replied, "I prefer ham."

Then the pig told the hen, "You see, when you lay an egg, you are involved in the breakfast. But we are committed to the breakfast when we are eaten as ham."

Do you see the difference? Are we just involved Christianity, or are you committed? Are you ready to commit and sacrifice yourself for the service of the Lord?

What to hear more?

 

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[1] “May All Who Come Behind Us Find Us Faithful”, Robert Russell

[2] George Barna, The Frog in the Kettle, (Ventura, CA: Regal Books, 1990), 35