Sermon for 12-9-12

Philippians 4:10-14

  I rejoice in the Lord greatly that now at last you have revived your concern for me; indeed, you were concerned for me, but had no opportunity to show it. Not that I am referring to being in need; for I have learned to be content with whatever I have. I know what it is to have little, and I know what it is to have plenty. In any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of being well-fed and of going hungry, of having plenty and of being in need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. In any case, it was kind of you to share my distress.
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Today, we're going to focus on today. Makes perfect sense, right?

Last week we talked about what the gift of Jesus Christ means for our past—about what how the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ gives us peace with our past sins. We no longer have to look at our past with fear and trembling, letting it have power over us. With Christ's grace and love, we can let our past sins drop onto the shoulders of Christ and live with a freedom that is not available through any other source.

Today, we're going to talk about how the gift of Jesus Christ gives us strength for today. This is about the present—how the reality of a resurrected Savior gives us what we need to face daily life.

First of all, I'm going to talk about Caleb. Why? Because he's my son and this is my sermon, so we're going to talk about him! Plus, he's cute.

Now, let's say you were going to advise us on Caleb's diet. Which would be appreciated, since Rachel and I have no idea what we're doing. What should we include in his diet?

Now, what are things we should probably not include, at least not on a regular basis?

Why would we structure his diet this way? Why do we want to make sure he eats a healthy diet?

We focus on giving Caleb a healthy diet because the healthier the diet, the healthier the life he will have, and the healthier growth he will have. If he does not have the nutrients and vitamins that his growing body requires, his growth will not reach the fullest potential that God has in store for him. A misstep now could lead to stunted results later, right? Proper nutrition is vital to future growth. In order for him to be the child God wants him to be, we have to be sure he is eating well.

Friends, our spiritual life is not any different. For each and every one of us, we can look back at our past spiritual habits and see how they have determined how vital or flaccid our spiritual life is today. You cannot be the prayer champion you long to be if you never bother to spend any time in prayer. You cannot have a knowledge of the Scriptures if you never bother to open them. You will not have a dynamic spiritual life if you never sink any energy into it.

What I am trying to say is that for us to experience the type of spiritual growth that we all want, it takes time, and it takes work. There is no substitute, no shortcut. You know what you need to do. You don't need to hear from me about how important prayer and Scripture reading are. It just takes the decision by you to do it.

How this ties in to Christ giving us strength for today is this: Christ is trying to feed you. He's not trying to feed you spinach and carrots to make you physically healthy, although I have to imagine that if Christ was designing a diet for all of us today it would probably involve more salads and less Krystal, but that's another topic for another day. What Christ is trying to feed you is spiritual knowledge. He's trying to feed your soul so that you will grow up big and strong. Each of us is a child of God. Each of us is a child of the God who created the universe and set this planet spinning around the sun. Each of us is precious to him—and he wants us to grow up into mature Christians, just like every parent wants their child to grow up into a mature adult. God wants the best for you. But, in order for you to grow up big and strong and healthy, you have to take in the right things. You need nutrients and vitamins. You need healthy intake. You need Scripture, prayer, worship and Christian fellowship.

Now, I'm not saying that a lack of effort on our part will prevent God from working in our life. I'm not saying that God's wondrous love is blocked by the fact that you're too busy to pray. What I am saying is that a major source of God's strength is being missed by you if you never take the time to attend to it. The Scriptures are filled with different examples of how God has strengthened his children throughout the years. Christian literature today is filled with countless more examples of the way God works. But if you never bother to take the time to learn about it, you might miss the ways that God is seeking to strengthen you today.

Similarly, God wants to strengthen you through your prayers. Imagine yourself wearing a vest filled with rocks. These rocks represent your burdens. This vest would make it much harder to walk or to go about your daily life, right? In prayer, we offer all those burdens to God, laying them down before him and lightening our own load. God wants to help you through life, but you have to be willing to receive God's help. God wants to strengthen you, but if you're too busy to let God work in you, you'll miss out on a good portion of it.

Now that we know the way that Christ strengthens us, let's talk about what Christ strengthens us for. Now, Philippians says that we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us. What does that mean?

Has anyone ever been skydiving? What do you imagine that feeling would be like, standing at the door of a perfectly functioning airplane and deciding that a piece of fabric is a better way down? What would it feel like to stand there and decide that you can do all things through Christ, including jump out of an airplane without a parachute? It says all things, right? Doesn't that mean we can do anything?

Now, we can't do all things. We can't fly. We have our limits. I can't sing on key. I can't heal other people or answer some of the toughest questions of life. There are many things I cannot do. So how do we understand verse 13, which clearly says that we can do all things?

To understand this rightly, I want us to think about last week. In our Ephesians passage last week, Paul told us why we were created—for the purpose of doing good works. That is our purpose in life. Now, in John's Gospel, Jesus tells us the purpose of our good works—so that people will see them and give glory to God. Want to know the meaning of life? There it is, straight from Scripture—do good works so that others give glory to God.

So that is our purpose on this earth. To do anything that doesn't give glory to God is working against God, and I don't believe that Christ strengthens us to do sin. Therefore, we can understand verse 13 in this context—the rest of Scripture helps us interpret this verse. Christ strengthens us to do good works so that others will give glory to God.

To live today, this very day, in such a way that brings glory to God, and so that others could watch us live and give glory to God.

For anyone who has ever faced a challenge, this is a lot tougher than it sounds. I don't pretend, for one moment, that this is easy. Which is exactly why we need Christ's strength, and this is exactly why Christ offers that to us, each and every day.

Now, I don't know what you're facing. I'm not going to pretend to understand. But I can promise you this—God will give you the strength you need to endure. God may not always make things easier, but God will help you get through it. In Psalm 23 it says that we walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Just because we're a Christian doesn't mean we get to avoid this valley and many others like it. But we endure. We can endure with confidence, knowing that God is with us. We can endure with peace, knowing that nothing in this world can separate us from the greatest power in the universe. We can endure with strength, knowing that Christ endured the cross and the grave, and he promised to bring us through these, too. We have strength for today—I promise that you will endure whatever it is that you face. And if we face it with confidence and peace, that is a witness to those around us that our trust is placed in a God bigger than this life and bigger than death. Some of the challenges we face lead us to the grave, some of them to our own grave—even in the face of these, we have strength bigger than the grave. We have strength to face our challenges, strength to endure them, because Christ has faced similar challenges, bigger challenges, and he promises to bring us through them. Let us never, for one moment, believe we are on our own in the face of challenges. You have the strength to endure if you are willing to rely upon it and trust in it.

Now, life isn't always just challenges, right? Sometimes, oftentimes, life is grand, right? Let's not pretend that Christianity is only about enduring through challenges. Christianity is also about rejoicing in the wonders of life, in love and sunshine and puppies and the laughter of little children. Christ gives us strength for these, too. The picture we get of Christ in the Gospels is a man who loved dinner with friends, a man who loved a wedding feast and little children, a man who loved the wonders of nature. The three years of his public ministry were not just constant talk of the end of the world. There was joy and wonder in the midst of that, and Christ helps us face the wonder in our life, too, because when we rejoice, that is of God, too. That is a good work that can give glory to God. We can offer up our laughter and our play and our fun to God, too, and let that be a proclamation of the wondrous love of God.

Let us not paint God as a dull figure only accessible to those in suffering, but rather as a sovereign God who wants life to be filled with abundant blessings but who will also endure the challenges of life alongside, too. Let our lives proclaim the truth that God abides with you in everything that you do, and that we can do these things for God because the strength and love and wonder of God fills us, renews us, and sends us back out into the world to serve him and point others to him.

Let us pray