I am the true vine! - John 15:1

I am the True Vine

September 25, 2011

John 15:1-2

Introduction

• I confess I was never very good at pruning, others definitely have much more of a green thumb than I do
• Most plants I touch, die! Though I do sometimes water plastic flowers
• However, I have looked at the pruning others do, out of necessity
• Have you ever seen how rose bushes are pruned?
• I was shocked the first time I saw it
• The beautiful full-grown rose bush had been cut back almost to the ground
• This seemed a bit radical to me!
• Later on I learned a little about how to prune trees that were growing in my back yard
• I learned some of the reasons why we prune plants
• The reason is that we want to help the plant to grow, and be productive
• This morning though, we are going to place our focus on Jesus represented by a plant, the grapevine

I am the true vine

• Let's read from John 15
• verse 1 - I am the true vine and my Father is the Gardener
• These words, I AM the true vine are the last of seven I AM statements in the gospel of John
• God revealed himself to Moses at the burning bush, by the name I AM
• Down through scripture, God describes himself by his name I AM
• I AM the God who heals you
• I AM the first and the last
• I AM the alpha and omega
• John picks up on God's name in his gospel
• I AM the bread of life - John 6:35
• I AM the light of the world - John 8:12
• I AM the gate for the sheep - John 10:9
• I AM the Good Shepherd - John 10:11
• I AM the resurrection and the life - John 11:25-26
• I AM the way, the truth and the life - John 14:6
• and lastly
• I AM the true vine - John 15:1

Significance of the true vine

• The grapevine was of special significance to God's people
• Isaiah 5:1-7
• Here, God talks about Israel as being a vineyard under His loving care
• The Jews used the grapevine motif all over the temple area
• In 1972 I was able to take part in an archaeological excavation along the south wall of the temple area
• We regularly would dig up broken bits of masonry with the grapevine motif
• It was a symbol for them of being God's people, under His care
• Jesus here in John says, I am the True vine
• When you look at the Greek, this refers to the real, true version, compared to that which was counterfeit, imperfect, frail
• The nation of Israel was imperfect, sinning continually, turning against him time and time again
• Jesus was the true son of God
• Jesus heart was perfect before God
• He was truly the son God loved
• When Jesus was baptized the Father announces to the whole world, This is my Son, whom I love, with whom I am well-pleased
• He was God's special person here on earth at that time
• The father cared for him, and nurtured him and made him productive
• But it is through Jesus, that we too can be part of that family
• We are able to call the Father, Abba, a close form of endearment
• Through Jesus, we who were not a part of the True vine, have been made part of this select group, God's favorite people
• Because of this we are His children, the apple of his eye
• Just as God enabled Jesus to be productive, he is the one who makes us bear fruit

Abide in me

• Verse 4 - remain in me, and I will remain in you
• It is through us remaining in Jesus, the true vine, that we produce fruit, God's fruit
• When we are separated from him, or draw away from him, our fruit becomes correspondingly dead and lifeless
• But when we are close to Him, and he dwells in us and us in him, then fruit can grow, grapes will abound, and the world will be blessed by our presence and the presence of Jesus flowing through us

Discernment - a lost art? - Eph 4:14

Discernment – a lost art?

September 18, 2011

Eph 4:14

Introduction

• Have you ever been caught in the dark
• This morning when I got to the church at 5.15 it was all dark. I did not immediately switch on the light, but attempted to walk down the aisle in the dark
• Sure enough, I bumped into things along the way
• I think this is a picture of what it is to be without discernment
• We bump into things, create messes, and life is painful
• God’s intention for us is that we walk in the light
• He expects us to grow up and no longer be naïve and impressionable infants, but instead that we use discernment in our lives
• This morning we will be talking about three forms of discernment

Natural discernment

• God created man with the ability to choose
• We were not created with animal instincts, but with the power to decide what we want to do
• Eve uses this natural discernment, in the garden of Eden
• Gen 3:1-6
• This natural discernment consisted of examining the issue through the five senses
• The fruit looked good, so she ate it
• She listened to the lies the enemy fed her, and chose to disobey God
• Natural discernment looks at the way things look and does not think about what is really happening here
• What was really happening was that Satan was driving a wedge between God and man
• What Adam and Eve looked at, was that the fruit looked good, and they immediately believed the lie that the enemy told them, that eating it would make them wise.
• How many of us think that that is so stupid! That eating some fruit would make you wise!
• In a way this is similar to the way a baby thinks
• A baby sees a bright red button on the floor, thinks, that looks good, I’ll eat it
• Like when we were babysitting our grandchildren
• I was playing with the youngest, age 3, on the floor. Suddenly he calmly tells me he swallowed a coin that had been on the floor. We spent half the night at the ER, and a lot of worry, till finally the coin appeared in his diaper a day or so later!
• Using natural discernment entails blindly accepting the lies that are fed to us, and making choices based on outward appearances
• It does not involve looking at the source, it does not examine the truth, it just blindly accepts the enemy’s lies and allows that to influence our behavior.
• Do we just believe everything we hear?
• I am amazed at what people will believe, when something is depicted in a movie, or on history channel!
• Suddenly everything they had learned at church goes out the window, and this new knowledge is blithely accepted, without examining whether or not it is true
• For example, the movie The Da Vinci Code
• God does not want us to continue as little babies
• Eph 4:14
• God wants us to grow up, and mature

Spiritual discernment

• Spiritual discernment looks at situations God’s way, from His viewpoint
• What does God say about this?
• The Bible is our standard by which we evaluate is it right or wrong

• “Discernment in Scripture is the skill that enables us to differentiate. It is the ability to see issues clearly. We desperately need to cultivate this spiritual skill that will enable us to know right from wrong. We must be prepared to distinguish light from darkness, truth from error, best from better, righteousness from unrighteousness, purity from defilement, and principles from pragmatics.”  - J. Stowell, Fan The Flame, Moody, 1986, p. 44.
• But how do we do this? How can we know what is truth, or what is error?
• We examine the situation in terms of God’s word
• Isaiah 8:20 To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them.
• This of course presupposes that we know God’s word
• This is why we read, study and devour the Bible.
• It is not an idle exercise in legalism
• It is because we want to see things God’s way and by studying and reading the Bible we learn how God thinks
• Devour the Proverbs. When I was 18 I asked God for wisdom, and I started reading right through the book of Proverbs, once a month.
• I would use different translations and get to know wisdom
• I read Proverbs 1:15 which says do not go along with sinners or follow their path
• I read Proverbs 3:5-6 – don’t lean on your own understanding
• Proverbs 12:15 – a wise man listens to advice
• Proverbs 13:20 – He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm
• God says, ask me for wisdom
• James 1:5-8
• Ask in faith, and be obedient to what he says

The gift of discernment

• The last form of discernment is a supernatural gift God gives us through the Holy Spirit
• This gift is the ability to evaluate right from wrong, light from darkness, is the option of God or of the enemy, as when Eve listened to the devil
• This gift is not the gift of judgment or of being critical
• It is not the gift of accusation or of jumping to conclusions
• This gift is a supernatural ability to know is it of God or is it not.
• Not everyone has this gift, though we should all be growing in this area
• Every gift should be exercised in love, not in demeaning or hurting people

Summary

• So we have looked at three forms of discernment
• One is that of natural discernment, going by appearances
• Secondly, there is spiritual discernment, is it the way God would deal with the situation
• Lastly, we have the gift of discerment, a spiritual gift God gives by the Holy Spirit, a gift given for the protection of the Body

Conclusion

• God tells us to grow up, and mature as Christians
• Eph 4:11-15
• The whole body, growing up together, unified in Christ

Joshua the son of Nun - Josh 24:31

Joshua the son of Nun

September 17, 2011 - Crossroads

Joshua 24:31

Introduction

• Who in the Old Testament had no father or mother?
• Hoshea the son of Nun - Num 13:8
• Hoshea means "salvation"
• In old testament days, a person's name often related to how the person lived
• frequently God changed people's name when there was a major change in their life
• This happened in this case
• Moses changed Hoshea's name to Jehoshua or Joshua - Num 13:16
• The name Joshua means "Yahweh saves"
• The first part of the name is Jah meaning God or Yahweh
• The second part of his name comes from hebrew Yasha meaning savior, deliverer, help, preserver, avenger, defender, rescuer, one who gives victory and relates to being liberated, victorious in battle, saved from and victorious in moral troubles
• this evening we will take a brief look at the life of Joshua

The early days

• Joshua grew up in Egypt
• He experienced the hardships of slavery to the Egyptians
• He had not known Moses Prince of Egypt, that was in the history books as far as he was concerned, as he was born after Moses had gone into exile in Midian, having killed a man
• He witnessed the miracles, the plagues on Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea
• One day Moses came out of the desert, and told Pharaoh, let my people go
• Joshua was probably in his 20's at the time
• The Amalekites attacked the Israelites soon after leaving Egypt
• Joshua must have been a young man with leadership potential, because he is chosen to lead the Israelites in battle against the Amalekites - Exodus 17
• He is victorious, because God gave him the victory
• After this battle, the next time we hear of Joshua, is that he is Moses's minister or personal servant
• Moses is training or mentoring Joshua. Note that Joshua is in his early 20's, Moses is over 80
• Not long after this the Israelites are at Sinai
• Moses and Joshua go up the mountain where Moses meets God, Joshua waits patiently for him
• The Israelites made a golden calf, an idol and God rejects the Israelies
• Moses sets up a tent, the tent of meeting, where Moses meets with God, personally
• Joshua, Moses' aide stays at the tent of meeting, even after Moses goes back to the camp
• Later on, in his early 60's, Joshua is one of the spies sent to checkout the land of Canaan, the promised land
• He is positive and believes God will give them victory
• The rest of the 12 spies, apart fro Caleb, were scared of the inhabitants
• Joshua then became the leader who brought the Israelites into the Promised nLand

Joshua's characteristics

• 1. Joshua was a man of courage
• as a 20 year old he led a battle against Amelek
• He recognized the victory came because Moses was praying for him, and God turned the tide of battle
• 2. Joshua was humble
• Joshua was prepared to be Moses' assistant or aide
• He could have been a leader in his tribe, the Ephraimites
• Instead, he chose to be a helper for an 80 year old man
• 3. Joshua was close to God
• When Moses met God in the tent of meeting, Joshua was there, and he did not leave, even after Moses went back to his tent
• Joshua kept his eyes on what God could do
• He had faith that God would come through
• He exercised that faith in the actions he took and God came through with the goods
• He taught the people he was leading, to follow God too
• All the days of Joshua, people followed God, because they had a leader who set the right example

Conclusion

• Joshua lived up to his name
• His name meant "God who saves, delivers, and gives the victory"
• He lived his life as a testimony to that name being true
• We too have a name
• Our name is Christian, from the greek Christianos
• This name means a "follower of Christ"
• I want to live my life as a follower of Christ, doing what he does, speaking what he speaks, staying in step with him every day of the week.

Treachery in High Places - Luke 10:18

Treachery in High Places

September 4, 2011

Luke 10:18

Introduction

• Back in 1605, King James 1 oppressed catholics in England
• They had been persecuted by Elizabeth 1, his
• 13 young men banded together and decided extreme violence was the answer
• So they plotted to blow up the houses of Parliament. That way they could kill the king, the Prince of Wales, and those who had voted for persecution of catholics
• They aquired 36 barrels of gunpowder and stored them in a cellar just under the House of Lords
• On Nov 5, Guy Fawkes was in the cellar ready to ignite the gunpowder
• He was caught just in time, was tortured and executed
• This was treachery of the highest order. Today we would call it a terrorist attack
• 9/11 also, was a terrorist attack
• Today we are going to talk about another terrorist attack designed to overthrow the government
• The arch terrorist was Satan himself!
• We need to talk about him because this terrorist is still at large, and waiting to destroy us
• Satan is real!
• We need to know our enemy!

Ezekiel 28

• In this passage, Ezekiel prophesies against two persons
• One is a man, the ruler or prince of the city of Tyre, which was built on a man-made island just off-shore
• This ruler was seriously affected by pride, Tyre thought that it was invincible
• The second is the king of Tyre, who is none other than Satan himself
• He was the one who inspired the ruler of Tyre to be so prideful, even thinking he was a god
• Ezekiel 28:1-10 – summary about the ruler of Tyre
• This is a prophecy about what was yet to come to pass
• It did come to pass, later, under the hands of Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon
• Verse 11-19 – read this
• Verse 11-12 – God here is mourning about what happened with this King of Tyre
• This lamentation is written in the past tense
• God relates something that had happened long ago
• This is a story about treachery in high places
• God describes this person as being the model of perfection, full of wisdom, perfect in beauty
• Verse 13 – this person was present in Eden, the Garden of God
• Who was in Eden?
• God was there, Adam and Eve were there, and Satan was there
• You were created. So this is not God
• Verse 14 – this person was anointed as a guardian cherub
• These cherubim were the highest rank of angel. They were archangels
• All angels were created by God – Col 1:16
• Originally there were three of these archangels – Gabriel, Michael and Lucifer
• It seems that each of these three archangels had a third of the angels under their authority (Rev 12:4, Rev 1:20)
• These three chrubim were at God’s throne as guardian angels
• After the Fall, when Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden of Eden, God placed cherubim there with a flaming sword, to guard the way to the tree of life (Gen 3:24)
• Besides being guardian angels, Gabriel was the archangel God used for delivering important messages (Luke 1:19)
• Michael was the warrior angel who fights on behalf of God’s people (Dan 10:13, Dan 12:1, Rev 12:7)
• Satan allowed pride to enter his heart
• Pride about himself, his beauty, his splendor
• God will not tolerate sin in his presence

Isaiah 14

• So he was expelled from God’s presence and cast down to the earth
• Isa 14:12-15 – this is speaking of this same angel, who became Satan
• Satan’s pride blinded his eyes to reality
• We saw in Ezekiel 28 that Satan was full of wisdom
• Wisdom says you cannot fight against God and win
• Satan wanted to overthrow God’s government
• But Satan was a created being, how could he win agains the one who created him?
• So God says here that he instead of taking over God’s throne, was cast down to the grave or hell
• Jesus said in Luke 10:18 – I saw Satan like lightning fall from heaven
• So Satan now roams the earth, seeking whom he may devour (1 Pet 5:8-9)

Conclusion

• Should that make us afraid? No!
• Satan is a defeated foe
• He was defeated when he staged his coup attempt
• He was defeated when he attempted to turn Jesus away from his mission
• When Jesus died, and was raised to glory with the Father, Jesus conquered Satan again
• So we have a living Christ who has the power to stand against the enemy and win.