Sermons from Moorpark Presbyterian Church |
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How White Are Your Knuckles? By Dave Wilkinson Ephesians 4:25 January 31. 1999 On a commuter flight from Portland, Maine, to Boston in 1987, pilot Henry Dempsey heard an unusual noise near the rear of the small aircraft. Dempsey turned the controls over to his co-pilot and went back to check it out. As he reached the tail section, the plane hit an air pocket, and Dempsey was tossed against the rear door. He quickly discovered the source of the mysterious noise. The rear door had not been properly latched prior to take-off, and it flew open. Dempsey was instantly sucked out of the jet. The co-pilot, seeing the red light that indicated an open door, radioed the nearest airport requesting permission to make an emergency landing. He reported that the pilot had fallen out of the plane and requested a helicopter search of that area of the ocean. But after the plane had landed, the ground crew found Dempsey holding onto the outdoor ladder of the aircraft. Somehow, he had caught the ladder, held on for ten minutes as the plane flew 200 mph at an altitude of 4,000 feet and then, at landing, kept his head from hitting the runway, which was a mere twelve inches away. According to news reports, it took several airport personnel more than a few minutes to pry Dempsey's fingers free from the ladder. I'll bet! What are the values in your life that are worth holding onto with that kind of white-knuckled intensity? Convictions aren't just notches on the belt of successful prosecuting attorneys. Convictions are the things in our life that are non-negotiable. Convictions are those beliefs which we hold onto in the same way Henry Dempsey held on to that ladder for dear life. Jesus holds one of three places in the life of every believer. He is either present, prominent, or preeminent. Jesus isn’t looking for temps or part-timers. He’s looking for disciples. I want to read you a letter that was written by a young man to a young woman. He wrote the letter to break off his engagement because of his total dedication to a cause. His cause was Communism. It’s a bad cause and one that is doomed to fail. We have a great cause that is destined to win. But do we have his dedication? Do we have the dedication that led him to declare in his letter, 'There is one thing in which I am dead earnest, and that is the Communist cause. It is my life, my business, my religion, my hobby, my sweetheart, my wife, my bread, my meat. I work at it in the day and dream of it in the night. I evaluate people, books, ideas, and actions according to how they affect the Communist cause. I have already been in jail because of my ideas and, if necessary, I am ready to go before the firing squad." Are we prepared to say the same thing -- about Jesus Christ? How serious are we about the commitments we make? In his book Up From Slavery, Booker T. Washington describes meeting an ex-slave from Virginia: "I found that this man had made a contract with his master, two or three years previous to the Emancipation Proclamation, to the effect that the slave was to be permitted to buy himself, by paying so much per year for his body; and while he was paying for himself, he was to be permitted to labor where and for whom he pleased. Finding that he could secure better wages in Ohio, he went there. When freedom came, he was still in debt to his master some three hundred dollars. Notwithstanding that the Emancipation Proclamation freed him from any obligation to his master, this black man walked the greater portion of the distance back to where his old master lived in Virginia, and placed the last dollar, with interest, in his hands. When talking to me about this, the man told me that he knew that he did not have to pay his debt, but that he had given his word to his master, and his word he had never broken. He felt that he could not enjoy his freedom till he had fulfilled his promise.' What about you? What about me? How reliable is our word? Are our promises to others and even ourselves worth keeping. And do we keep our word even when, as in the case of this freed slave, others may think we are a fool to keep it.. Many of you have taken more than just a few vows. Think of your marriage vows. They aren’t just formalized words. They are a promise made to another person before God. We rightly evaluate ourselves by how well we have kept those vows -- not just when everything is sunny but when health does become sickness, when richer does become poorer, when better becomes worse. How well do you hang on to your wedding vows to be loving and faithful? How white are you knuckles? Just last month the highly respected pastor of an influential church in this area resigned as the pastor of the church he had helped found. He resigned because he had engaged in an extra-marital affair. And you have to know that three years ago he could never have imagined that he would be in this situation -- sending his family and a congregation into turmoil. He has damaged his marriage and his message by somehow letting go of a promise he had fully intended to keep. I am not saying that as a judgement. I am saying that as a warning to myself. How white are my knuckles? Vows are easier to make than to keep. It is easy to stand in front of the congregation when you bring your children for baptism and promise to bring them up in the knowledge and love of God. It is harder to make that stick when the soccer team just has to play on Sunday morning and your child is the super-all-star with a guaranteed full-ride scholarship to a great soccer school. It is easy to take your vows of ordination as an elder, deacon, or pastor in the church. It is harder to "be a friend among your colleagues in ministry and to submit to the seek the peace, unity, and purity of the church when things aren’t breaking your way. It is easy to take the vow of church membership to be a "faithful member of the congregation giving of yourself in every way." It can be harder to agree to serve on that task force or write that check. Last summer we had some thirty young people stand up here and promise to maintain sexual purity. That will be harder to live when they meet someone they ‘really, really love." Honesty, keeping our promises, letting our yes be yes and our no be no is central to our walk as God’s people. But how do we do what we said we’re gonna do? How do we hold on? How to we find the strength to make it work -- especially in those times when we feel that we’re only inches above the runway? And how do we make it when we don’t see any danger and think it won’t hurt to relax our grip just a bit? Now I realize most of us don’t have trouble with honesty and integrity. Most of us always tell the truth and keep our word -- unless of course our ego is challenged or our security is threatened--or unless we want to create a certain impression. Then the truth might just possibly be bent -- like the scientist who makes a slight change in his statistics or the fish that gets bigger and bigger or the putt that gets longer and longer with each retelling. Someone said that the three most overworked lies in the world are these: "My wife doesn't understand me." "The check is in the mail," and "I am from the government and I'm here to help you." But all lies or, more politely, exaggerations--whether innovative or overworked--are to have no place in the life of the Christian. Verse 25 of our text reads: "Therefore, laying aside falsehood, speak truth, each one of you, with his neighbor, for we are members of one another." Now strictly speaking, the word in this text is not falsehood in the abstract sense but "the lie." Paul says that we are to lay aside "the lie" in our dealings with each other. How is "the lie" expressed? Certainly it is expressed, first of all, in words. In John 8:44 Jesus calls Satan a "liar and the father of lies." When we lie to each other, we are paying homage to the father of lies. That is something we must not do. Truth telling is very, very important to God. God fully expects us to keep the promises we make to him and to each other. But "the lie" is not found only in words. It is also found in actions. It is found in our pretense when we pretend to be what we are not. Peter tells us that our love for each other is to be "sincere." The word sincere comes from the Greek words "syn-cera" which literally means "without wax." Cheap pottery was sometimes made with wax to disguise flaws. It looked like normal pottery until you tried to cook in it. Then the wax would melt and the pot would fall apart. So high quality potter was marked "syn-cera"--without wax. This was the pottery that could stand up in the fire. In the same way, we are to be free from pretense. We are to avoid "the lie" in our actions and attitudes as well as in our words. Why? Because Paul writes that we are ‘members of one another." We are all one body in Jesus Christ. What could be more ludicrous than a body which lies to itself?-- having an eye that tells the foot that all is smooth ahead, when in fact, there is glass on the road and the foot will be cut--or having a heart that keeps insisting that everything is okay--keep right on running -- until it suddenly collapses? Clear communication is essential for a body to remain healthy. The same is true of the body of Christ. We are dependant on others for our own well being. There is no place for the "lie" in such a mutually dependant body. Two weeks from today we will begin a 50-Day Spiritual Adventure. And guess what this year's Adventure is called? "Promises Worth Keeping: Resolving to Live What We Say We Believe." For eight Sundays, we will explore eight promises that definitely fall into the category of white-knuckled convictions. The first week we'll look at promising to nurture a growing intimacy with the Lord Jesus Christ. Week two will find us exploring the promise to cultivate vital friendships that encourage us to keep our promises. On the third week, we will consider why it is worth promising to practice purity in our thoughts and actions. Halfway through the Adventure, we'll make a case for promising to make family relationships a priority. Week five is all about supporting the ministry of our church and those who lead it. The sixth week will move us to promise to identify and address the hidden prejudices of our hearts. My seventh message in this upcoming series relates to the benefits connected to influencing our world with the love of Christ. Our 50-Day Spiritual Adventure will conclude as we uncover together the power the living Christ makes available to us to keep on living what we say we believe as he gives us a future and a hope. If those promises sound familiar to some of you men, it's because they are an adaptation of the seven promises of Promise Keepers. The Promise Keepers have teamed up with the 50-Day Adventure people to develop this program for children, teens and families as well as for men. It won’t be the same as gathering in a coliseum with sixty thousand of our closest brothers in Christ. It will be better because it will be more personal and more sustained. Do you know what I love about 50-Day Spiritual Adventures? For a couple of months of the year, we share as a church family in a common course of study and direction. Beside what happens here in worship, small groups will revolve around the themes. The youth groups and the kids TNT program will be applying the same themes. Talk about being drawn together! In an attempt to make the most of this shared experience, we will be offering a number of small group opportunities in which you may participate. These home groups will deal with each Sunday's preaching theme and will focus on personal application. I’m leading a group for men on Wednesday evenings. Men, if you aren’t connected with a group with your wife, I encourage you to join me. I increasingly believe that small groups are among the most important things we do here as a church. People do learn and grow in their faith. But people also get to know each other and express their love and practical concern for each other. I become aware of families in the congregation with a special need of some kind and talk to the family to see if they need help. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard "of course my small group is helping." That "of course" says it all. If you aren’t yet in a small group I encourage you to go to the table after worship and sign up today -- and then come and write your name of the 50 Day Adventure banner along with all who have already signed. Remember Henry Dempsey? Not only was he one fortunate airplane pilot, he was pretty smart. He knew that you've got to grab on to what you know will keep you from crashing. That's what I'm asking you to do. I want you to grab on to the promises of the upcoming Adventure. They really are the means by which you can keep from crashing spiritually. Late last year many of us made a series of New Year's resolutions. I didn’t make any new ones. I just pulled out the list from last year which, coincidentally, was the same as the list for the year before that. For most of us, I suspect that the majority of New Year’s resolutions fall into the negotiable category. My hunch is that most of our resolutions do not have eternal significance. You know what I mean.
But there are resolutions we make for which there is a whole lot more at stake. There are resolutions that define the quality of our lives. Those are the promises we are going to talk about. These are the promises that are worth keeping and that we will keep -- as we learn to live what we say we believe. |
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