Sermons

Also Read: 1 Samuel 17:1-54

The Christian life is not an action movie. But neither is any part of real life. In an action movie the hero might be suddenly awakened to discover that his life is in danger and only through amazing luck and daring fight moves does he manage to get dressed, find his weapon, outrun the bad guy, and find a fast car while still managing to get breakfast. He punctuates his scrambled eggs with a high speed chase through crowded city streets and after a flight to Hong-Kong finds himself staring the super villain in the eyes in a fight to the finish dual that involves amazing choreography, three handguns, an ancient vase and a host of witty puns and wry grins. When the smoke clears he’s back in his apartment straightening up his bow-tie as he prepares for a dinner party.
Based on some of the missionary letters I’ve seen, we might think that every day on the mission field is the way the Christian life is meant to be lived – they’re talking to natives, hacking through the jungles with machete’s, or planting churches in a new village every week with at least a thousand new converts on their way to becoming pastors. Look at Christian advertising and you get questions like, “Is your church on the road to impact?” Another one shouts, “We partner with you till your project is a success!” Another one pictures a group of smiling children running because they’ve been blessed by Jesus. That one guarantees revival, the other one promises to answer all your questions, grow your church, grant your dreams, and wash away all of your problems for the base price of $299 depending on your congregational size.
Based on some of the book titles out there we’re supposed to be Radical, Happy, happy happy, or telling people about our dreams and out of body experiences. Half the titles out there sound like someone in the marketing department opened up their thesaurus to “speed freak”, “cool”, or “special” and sought out every manipulative word they could find.
But amid all of the jargon it’s gotten me wondering this: What is the portrait of the normal Christian life in Scripture, as opposed to the action movie version of Christianity that is sold in stores today? I think the answer might leave you surprised, relieved, and more than a little challenged.

It is part of God’s process of maturing us to bring us into situations where we must either trust Him or abandon Him. None could deny that Abraham was forced into such a crisis when God told him to sacrifice his only son – the son of promise. The writer of Hebrews tells us that Abraham reasoned in his heart that God must keep his first promise and therefore must raise him from the dead (Heb 11:17-19).

It was a prolonged period of running for his life which was the young David’s long protracted crisis in which he was brought daily and perhaps moment by moment to trust in God his deliverer.

It was Daniel the prophet hearing the king’s proclamation that none could pray to any but the king or suffer the lion’s den who resolutely opened his windows towards Jerusalem and prayed to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob – who then endured the terror of being thrown into a den full of lions and the thrill of God’s merciful deliverance.

Whether Jacob, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Noah, or you – the Crisis of faith is defined best by that word: Crisis.

These memories are written for our instruction and for the building up of our faith. Since there is not one of us here this morning that has not experienced some Crisis of our faith, or who will at least be certain to face such a crisis in the future; would it comfort you to witness another and to see its resolution from God’s perspective?

This week as we come back to Luke – we arrive just in time to witness a crisis of faith in the person most of us would consider the least likely to suffer such a setback: John, the cousin of Jesus, called, “the Baptist”. Please read with me from the Gospel of Luke 7:17-23.

I grew up hearing my dad say things like, “If I’ve told you once I’ve told you a thousand times!” Can you relate? The fact was – my dad probably did tell me a thousand times; but I was born with an innate ability to ignore what I didn’t want to hear, because I understood as well that if I heard something – I was responsible to either obey it or reject it. I didn’t really want that burden.
Of course the other side of the issue wasn’t just ignoring my dad it was being unable to hear him. I always had the stereo on, or the TV or whatever else and though he might be speaking well enough, and even if I might be interested in hearing what he had to say – I couldn’t hear him because of the distractions.
I wonder sometimes if that isn’t the reality for many Christians when it comes to hearing the voice of God. There are some who are afraid perhaps for some reason and that fear or maybe even for others that rebellion keeps them from even wanting to hear God speaking. For others it may not be fear or rebellion it could simply be that there are so many distractions in front of us that it never gets quiet enough inside our minds to hear God calling out to us in the pages of the Bible, which is seldom read and less seldom studied. And yet for others it may simply be that they don’t know what God voice sounds likes.
How does God communicate to us? Dreams? Sometimes. Audible voice? I’ve never heard God speak out loud. The Spirit’s prompting to your Spirit? This is usually where I hear God speaking first.
Of course there are two rules when it comes to hearing God’s voice. (1) God will never communicate something to you that will contradict his word. If it doesn’t match the scriptures – it’s not God. (2) If you want to hear you have to listen.