1 John 5:13
Concluding Affirmations
13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.
Dear Friends in Christ,
I came across a story recently that some of you here today, unfortunately, might be able to relate to, especially if you’ve ever known the following sensations: sudden heart palpitations, sweaty palms, beads of perspiration breaking out on your forehead, and an instantaneous reflex reaction to pull back on your right foot. Why? Because you see in your rear view mirror the flashing lights of a state patrol officer. That’s what happened to one woman who was barreling down a West Virginia highway going 15 mph over the speed limit. When the state trooper finally got her pulled over, he immediately wrote her a ticket, to which she replied, “Don’t you give out warnings?” (I have a feeling she’d been through this before!) He said, “Why, yes, ma’am, we do give out warnings. They’re posted all up and down the highway. They say, ‘Speed Limit 55.’”
Well, I have a feeling that when many people who have ignored or rejected God all their life find themselves standing before his judgment seat at the end of this journey that we call life and they hear a verdict that is not very favorable to them, I have a feeling many of them are going to want to say what that lady said: “But Lord, don’t you give out any warnings?” To which God will say, “Yes, I do and yes, I did. In fact, I had a whole book of warnings that I gave you so that you could be properly prepared for this day. And that book was called the Bible.” And then those people will have to hear the words that I guarantee you nobody wants to hear: “I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.”
Well, just so that none of us will ever find ourselves in that situation, back on July 29 of last year we started a journey that was designed to get us back to the Bible if you’ve been away from it for a while or to get us into the Bible if you’ve never been into it before. Though it’s been a little over 7 months since that journey began, my final sermon today marks really only the 14th one in this series. Because of other special emphasis Sundays during the Advent and Christmas seasons and other occasions, coupled with the Sundays that Pastor Mike preached, it’s just taken us this long to get these 14 sermons delivered and the series completed. And as we draw it to a close today, we’re going to finish up what we started in my last sermon. We’re at the point where we’re getting real practical and personal as we consider the question: What can I do to stamp out or prevent biblical illiteracy in my own life? Or, to put it more positively: What can I do personally to get back to the Bible which truly is the foundation of our faith? And just in case you weren’t here the last time I preached, the first 3 suggestions we looked at included the following:
- Tithe your free time to God. 2. Allow the Bible to transform you, not just inform you. 3. Metabolize the Word when you read it. If you are interested in knowing what we talked about in that sermon, you can access it on our church’s web site at salemlc.org in both printed and audio forms.
Today we want to wrap things up by looking at 4 other suggestions to help us get back to the Bible so that when we read it, we don’t look upon it as some burdensome chore that we feel we have to do, but rather we look forward to it and consider it to be one of the highlights of our day. And the next suggestion I have to help you get to that point is this: Mark your Bible. This is something that some people are reluctant to do for a variety of reasons. Some might feel that it’s sacrilegious to do it because these are the very words of God and it just doesn’t feel right to underline or highlight some of them, as if they are more important than others. Or they feel as though they are desecrating the Scriptures by marking in them. Then there are those Type A personalities who are true perfectionists at heart and who want their Bible to remain as crisp and perfect as it was the day they bought it. I suppose I used to be in that category, but as I read my Bible more and more, I kept finding passages and verses that I wanted to be able to find back again pretty easily, so I started underlining them, sometimes highlighting them, sometimes marking the page with a sticky note, sometimes turning back the corner of the page. And by the way, when you mark your Bible you might want to put the date in the margin and maybe the reason why that particular passage meant something to you that day. Then when you go back at some future time and read it, you can see how far God has brought you since then or how he has blessed you in some way. And someday after you’ve passed on, your children or grandchildren can do the same. They will have a running record of those verses in Scripture that meant a lot to you and why they meant a lot. You may have seen a Bible like that in your own family. And what a comfort it is to the family to know that God’s Word played such a vital role in the life of this loved one who is no longer with them.
Then another suggestion I have for you is: Read the Bible to get to know God better. I think when most of us read the Bible, we come to it looking for answers, looking for promises, looking for principles, looking for direction. And there’s nothing wrong with that. But I really believe more than anything that God wants us to come to the Bible looking for him.
Now if you do that, you’ve got to understand that sooner or later you’re going to discover some things about yourself that aren’t exactly flattering. For when you have a personal encounter with the great and holy God, you can’t help but see yourself in a whole new light. For the holiness of God will highlight your unholiness. The righteousness of God will underscore your unrighteousness. The perfection of God will reveal more clearly than ever your imperfection. It will strip you of all pride and bring you to your knees in humble repentance. And though that may not be what we like, it is from God’s perspective what we need. For then and only then can we fully appreciate what Jesus did for us on the cross. Then and only then can we understand the desperate need for a Savior that each one of us has. Then and only then can the immeasurable love of God break through the darkness of our sinfulness and restore us to fellowship with him again.
You see, my friends, contrary to what many Christians want to believe today, God’s priority for you and me is neither our comfort nor our convenience. Rather his priority is our salvation. His #1 goal is to get each one of us safely home to heaven. And for that reason, he has not only done everything possible and everything necessary to make that happen, he has also given us this Book so that we might read and study and learn about his plan of salvation for us and then live each and every day confident of our salvation. Did you know you can do that, my friends? Did you know that you can live each day with the certainty that if this was your last day on this earth, it would be your first day in heaven where you would dwell in God’s presence forever? That’s what John tells us in our text for today when he says: “I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.” Just imagine what living with that kind of knowledge could do for you. All of a sudden, when the storms of life come, when the ground feels like it’s giving way beneath you, when the world around you seems to be spinning out of control, you don’t have to worry. You don’t have to fret or fear because you have the blessed assurance that through Jesus your eternal destiny is secure and the best is yet to come.
Then a 3rd suggestion I have for you today is this: Read the Bible privately. By that I simply mean, read it at a time and a place where you can fully concentrate on what you’re reading. Very similar to how Jesus instructed us to pray. In Matt. 6:6 he says, “When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” All Jesus is saying there is that when you pray (and I would add, when you read your Bible), it’s wise to do so at a time when you can shut out all distractions. Now admittedly, it’s not always easy to find such a place in our day and age. There are times when I have to go to the doctor or have some other appointment where I know that I’m probably going to have to wait a while to be seen. So I usually bring a book with me, but because of the incessant elevator music that is playing in the background at most of these places, I find it very difficult to concentrate on what I’m reading. So when you read your Bible, turn off the TV, turn off the radio, turn off your cell phone. Find a quiet time and a quiet place so that you can concentrate solely and fully on the words of God that he is sharing with you that day.
And that takes us to one more suggestion I have for you to make your reading of Scripture as meaningful and enjoyable as possible, and that is: Personalize the Word. And one way you can do that is by asking yourself questions like: “How would I respond to that?” or “If that were me, what would I do?” For example, recently I was reading the book of Daniel. In fact on the morning that I completed this sermon I read the familiar story of the 3 men in the fiery furnace. And I tried to put myself in their place. If that were me and I was being told to bow down before some idol or else I’d be thrown into a fiery furnace and reduced to ashes, what would I have done? That’s a tough question, isn’t it? And I would hope that I would have the same courage as those 3 fellows who responded to the king’s threats with some of the most powerful words found in Scripture: “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”
But there’s another way you can personalize the Scriptures, and that is by applying them to yourself. For example, when Jesus says in John 3:16 that God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that means that God so loved you that he gave you his one and only Son so that if you would believe in him, you would not perish, but you would have everlasting life. Or how about this great passage out of Isaiah 43:1-3 where it says: “But now, this is what the LORD says– he who created you, O Jacob, he who formed you, O Israel: (substitute your name there) ‘Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze. For I am the LORD, your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.” So let the God of the universe speak directly to you when you open the pages of his Book and let his words bring to you the comfort and strength, the wisdom and understanding, the power and truth that we all need for all areas and all aspects of life.
Well, that brings us to the end of this sermon series that I entitled “The Foundation of Our Faith.” Once we get past Easter I plan to start a new series that I’m going to call “The Fundamentals of Our Faith.” It dawned on me that because so many Christians today have not been reading their Bibles, they no longer know the basic teachings and truths of Scripture, something that has been proven time and time again in surveys and polls that have been conducted in recent years. And with so many different views and teachings floating around out there today, it is vitally important that we be well grounded in the truth of Scripture. So I want to spend some time going back to the essentials, back to the fundamentals of the Christian faith and doing so in a fresh, new, and exciting way. And what could be more basic, more fundamental than the 10 Commandments. So that’s going to be the focus of my next series. Until then, may the peace of God that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds firmly anchored to the Rock of Ages Jesus Christ and his Word at all times. Amen.