Search Results for: fall series

WOW Relationships of Jesus

Jesus with a Troubled Man

January 25, 2009

Ben Young

God doesn’t want us to be in bondage, He doesn’t want us to be enslaved; He desires for us to be free. So, how do we get free? How do we keep Satan from keeping us in bondage? We need something explosive to combat the power of the enemy and our tendency to do our own thing. In the third message of this series, join Ben as he looks closely at the story of Legion, a troubled man whom Jesus set free. He will illustrate how we can use C-4 in our own lives, it is moldable and malleable to deal with whatever issue that has us enslaved and trapped.

Some years ago, I used to do a radio show called “The Single Connection.” Some of you have been around to remember that show, although no one listened to it! But anyway, back then, it was actually nationally syndicated because it was on Sunday nights, and Sunday night is trash time for most radio stations. So we were on nation-wide.

I was writing books at that time on dating and relationships, and I was doing a lot of traveling. I would fly into a city on a Friday night, speak that night and a couple or three times on Saturday; fly back Saturday, come back Sunday morning and preach Sunday morning and Sunday night, and do the radio show for another two hours! That was back on the edge of burn out; but I don’t do that anymore! When I’d travel a lot, I found myself sitting on a lot of airplanes in all the airports.

How many of you travel a lot during the week or the month? Raise your hand! A lot of us here do. I used to, and I would sit there and think about some weird stuff, like the safety regulations that they would always have to go through. By the way, I hate to break it to you if you’re scared of flying; but I think those safety regulations by and large are bogus! No, they are! You’re flying at 37,000 feet, going about 800 miles an hour. If that plane goes down baby, it is over! The idea that we’re going to land in water and your little life preserver is going to go “poof,” and you can blow into it—it doesn’t inflate. You’ll have the wherewithal to grab your oxygen mask and put it on yourself first before you…That’s just not going to happen! You’re going to fall like a rock from the sky, and the Gulf of Mexico is going to be like hitting cement, all right? It’s just over! The idea that your seat cushion is going to be used as a flotation device…I’m going to be using it for something else on the way down to the end of my life! It’s not going to happen! All this other stuff too, like, “Be sure your seat backs are in the upright position.” What is this? Right? Live, die. Live, die! What is the FAA doing the next morning as they’re going through and looking at the charred remains of the plane? “See this one, 4-A? If they’d only had their tray table in the upright position!”

Anyway, I know that safety and security rules are there for a reason, but I think a lot of it is because we’re in this kind of hyper-security environment that we live in and have grown up around. People even wear helmets today riding bicycles! I didn’t do that when I was a kid; but I think the whole airline deal is to give you the illusion of security, right?

To me, it gives you kind of a false sense of security that no matter what happens, everything’s going to be okay! I think a lot of times, we walk around in our world and our lives, and we live with this similar kind of illusion. In other words, we live unaware that there are forces outside of us that are way beyond our control. There are forces and actually powers that happen everywhere in many places, and in many lives that can wreak absolute havoc in our lives.

Today, I want to talk to you about some of those powers, and about how they work a little bit, and about what you can do to prevent them from really troubling your life. There is a story that is in the Gospel of Mark, so if you have a Bible, you can open to Mark. If not, it will be on the screen in front of you, Mark chapter 5.

If you’ve never read the Bible before, and you want to read a little bit about Jesus and His story; if you like action, then read the book of Mark! Mark is all about action! Action, action, we want action! It’s an action-packed book! It’s fast, and it’s furious, and it’s full of action!

Matthew is loud, right? Matthew shouts at you; he yells at you; he tells you to hit a brace and get your life in order! Luke is the doctor. He’s more detailed oriented, and more the detailed historian. If you’re into philosophy, then I’d encourage you to read John. I don’t know why I said that—it’s free! But anyway, here’s Mark, chapter 5. Here’s the action story. This is really a frightening story on some level, but it’s also a very encouraging story on another level. Let’s listen to it here:

Mark 5, “They went across the lake (they being the disciples and Jesus) to the region of the Gerasenes. When Jesus got out of the boat, a man with an evil spirit came from the tombs to meet Him. This man lived in the tombs, and no one could bind him any more, not even with a chain. For he had often been chained hand and foot, but he tore the chains apart and broke the irons on his feet. No one was strong enough to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs, and in the hills, he would cry out and cut himself with stones.”

Let me take a brief time out here, okay? Some of you are probably already lost and are saying, “Okay, now we’ve gone from real life to science fiction land!” Let me just give you a brief story to tell you that this is not science fiction; this is the real deal. Some of these things still happen today.

I have a friend of mine who was a member of our church for many, many years. He worked with HPD S.W.A.T. Narcotics—big, tough guy; first guy in, and the last guy out. He told me this story years ago about a guy, this drug addict that they tried to apprehend, who weighed about 125 lbs. Paris Hilton, Mary Kate and Ashley were muscular compared to this guy.

This guy was really a skinny little wimp! Here came these big S.W.A.T. guys, 210, 220, 235 pounds in full riot gear, jumping on this guy. They’re trained to subdue people, and this guy is throwing them off just like I would throw off a two pound weight—just chunking them off of him! Boom, boom! They couldn’t subdue this guy! How do you explain that? Again, my friend who is a cop and is also a Christian says, “That’s the power of the devil. You can’t explain it any other way, how two to four huge, trained S.W.A.T. guys can’t subdue a guy who is only 125 pounds, rolled up in a rug at the time.” Amazing!

So, these things still happen today. They are anomalies, but they still happen today. Meanwhile, let’s check back in with our guy. All right! Just didn’t want to lose you!

“When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and fell at his feet in front of Him.” Isn’t it interesting that for the last three months we’ve looked at the WOW statements of Jesus, and the WOW relationships; you find a lot of people falling at the feet of Jesus! Different kinds of people; rich people, poor people, prostitutes, all kinds of folks, demon possessed. They just—wham! Fall at the feet of Jesus.

“He shouted at the top of his voice, ‘What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? Swear to God that you won’t torture me!’ Jesus said to him, ‘Come out of this man, you evil spirit!’ Then Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’ ‘My name is Legion,’ he replied, ‘For we are many.’ He begged Jesus again and again not to send them out of the area. A large herd of pigs was feeding on the nearby hillside. The demons begged Jesus, ‘Send us among the pigs! Allow us to go into them!’ He gave them permission, and the evil spirits came out and went into the pigs. The herd, about two thousand in number, rushed down the steep bank into the lake and were drowned.” (There will be no barbeque dinner after church today!)

“Those tending the pigs ran off and reported this in the town and the countryside, and the people went to see what had happened. When they came to Jesus, they saw the man who had been possessed by the legion of demons, sitting there, dressed and in his right mind; and they were afraid. Those who had seen it told the people what had happened to the demon possessed man, and told about the pigs as well. Then the people began to plead with Jesus to leave their region. As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon possessed begged to go with Him. Jesus did not let him go, but he said, ‘Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how He has had mercy on you.’

So the man went away and began to tell people in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and all the people were amazed.” Wow! That’s a pretty radical story!

Now before we talk about the implication to the story and the whole issue of the demonic, and how that influences us; let’s unpack this story a little bit. It’s significant when it says in the very first verse that Jesus went to the region of the Gerasenes. This is the first time Jesus had done a miracle in a predominantly Gentile area. Jesus was called primarily to the Jews and to the nation of Israel. He did very little with the Gentiles initially. So he does this miracle in this region. He sees this guy who I guess is called Legion. Legion is a military term the Romans used to describe a number of soldiers. It could be anywhere from three to six thousand soldiers. So this guy was tormented by three to six thousand evil spirits and demons. He would live among the tombs, and he would run around. They would try to chain him and they couldn’t! He would break lose like that drug addict I talked about with my friend. They couldn’t subdue this guy, and it was wild and crazy! But somehow, he had some shred of sanity left in him to actually put himself at the feet of Jesus. Jesus takes the demons and casts them into the pigs.

Now, the pigs ran and drowned themselves, and when the people of the town heard about this, they weren’t too happy! For us, it’s like, “We have to do fried chicken, and seafood and barbeque!” That’s the way we kind of see it through our lens. But listen—2,000 pigs represented their economy! So it was about the economy going to the tank or drowning—you know, they watched these little pigs drown! “There goes my 401 K!”

Then it says the town’s people were what? When they saw what had happened, they saw this guy who had been a maniac and had been possessed by these demons. It was like the movie called The Exorcist. Now this person is calm…It says they were afraid! They were afraid because of the power of God, first of all. They were afraid, secondly, because Jesus is bad for business! “Go to another region! Find some cows, or some chickens and do the same thing over there! Go back to Nazareth! We’ve got our own situations here!” They wanted Him to leave. Again, this story is an exception, and not a norm.

I’ll tell you a story that happened to me about twelve years ago. I don’t tell a lot of stories like this primarily, because a lot of them don’t happen to me; but this was an unusual encounter. I was leading a Wednesday night worship service in our old sanctuary years ago, and I was doing the Lord’s Supper. On the second row, I could hear someone grumbling. As I continued to do the Lord’s Supper, I could hear someone kind of growling to my right, and then a few words.

Afterwards, some people brought me this guy, and I went into a room with some other pastors, and this guy was, to the best of my knowledge and ability to discern, possessed by demons. We talked to him; we talked to these demons. We tried to the best of our ability with the knowledge we had of Scripture, and the stories of Jesus, to cast the demons out of this guy. I don’t know if we did or if we didn’t. I know years later, the guy seemed healthy and normal, I believe. But let me tell you something: That’s really the only encounter I’ve had with someone who I would consider possessed. I’ve seen many people say, “Well, I think I’ve got a demon, blah, blah, blah…” They probably don’t.

When I was young and wanted to conquer the world; I wanted to cast out a demon, until I actually confronted demons, and then I realized, “No, I don’t want to be in that business unless God calls me to it.” But I want to tell you, the power of the devil, and the power of Satan is real. For those of you who may not know me, and this is your first time to come to Second; I’m not an “easy believe” kind of person. I’m pretty skeptical and analytical by nature; so for me to say that is almost like the devil has to appear to me with a red pitchfork and poke me in the rump! I’m pretty skeptical. But I’ve seen the power of the devil, and it’s unbelievable. I’ve seen what he’s done and what he can do in someone’s life when they give him total access.

I think that when you hear a story like this, a couple of things happen. You wonder, “Can this happen to me?” Or say, maybe you’re here and you consider yourself a Christ follower. “Can a Christ follower be possessed by a demon?” I don’t think a Christ follower can be possessed by a demon. One of the definitions for “possession” is to be owned. So if I’ve asked God to come into my life and I’ve trusted Christ; I’m owned by God. So no, I don’t believe demons can possess a believer. Can a demon wield incredible influence over a believer? Yes. Can he gain a stronghold in your life or my life when we give him access to do so? Yes! Satan and his demons are real and powerful forces, and we need to be aware. We don’t need to walk around our lives with an illusion of safety and security if we’re allowing him access and entrance into our lives.

One of the ways he wreaks havoc in our lives is through unconfessed anger and bitterness. In Ephesians 4:26 and following, it says, “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.” By the way, it’s not a sin to be angry. The phrase before that says “Be angry; yet do not sin.” But if you have unhealthy, sinful, or bitter anger that you stuff and keep inside of you, and you don’t resolve that conflict with whoever you are conflicted with; somehow, someway—the Bible doesn’t explain how—you are giving the enemy, the devil a chance to gain a foothold and to have major influence over your life.

Once he gains influence, he will create confusion; he will create lies, and he will bring destruction. He’ll try to bring destruction and disaster into your life if you don’t take heed and do something about it.

We can relate to Legion, because on some level, we all have things that we’re dealing with, right? We have the world, which is not the world in general, but the world’s system. We have our own flesh, if you would, that wants to be selfish and doing our own thing. Then we have these demons and devils that can tempt, sway us, and lead us at times…But like Legion, if we feel like we have an issue, or we feel like we are trapped or enslaved by something; what do we desire the most? We desire to be free! We desire to be free…See, God sent His Son into the world, not to condemn you, John 3:17. He didn’t send Jesus into the world to rain on your parade, and to spoil all the fun that you want to have! He didn’t send His Son into the world to give you more rules on top of you! He sent His Son into the world to set you free! He doesn’t want us to be in bondage! He doesn’t want us to be enslaved! He doesn’t want us to carry around a ball and chain, and shackles like this. He doesn’t want us to live that way! He has created us to be free!

So we all have troubles like Legion. We have our issues. To use a modern vernacular, we all have our “demons,” right? (We kind of mean that tongue and cheek.) So how do we get set free? Well, we need something explosive! We need something explosive to combat the power of the enemy and our own tendency to do our own thing, and to do stupid things, irresponsible things, sinful things. We need an explosive power! You know what we need? We need something called C-4.

I need your help here! I know we have some folks here who have been in the military, or are currently in the military. Just raise your hand. If you’re in the military, raise your hand please! I want to call on you. I want you to tell me what C-4 is. Yes sir, right there! Say it again? C-4 is plastic explosives! Yes. Sir, what is your name? Paul? Okay—Paul, I’m Ben, it’s nice to meet you! Paul, help me out again, okay? This is the second part of the test. What is the advantage of C-4, besides being able to blow things up? What is the advantage of this type of explosive? What’s one of the advantages? You can set it on fire, and it won’t blow up. What else? Electrical discharges—what else? It’s fun! Can someone else in the military tell me an advantage of C-4? There’s one more advantage. He’s named several, obviously. He’s actually played with the stuff! I won’t continue that…it’s confidential! Help me out, sir! You can mold it! Thank you very much! You can mold C-4 to fit any kind of shape, and put it into cracks and crevices, and dark places, and it still goes BAM!

The C-4 that I’m going to talk about here that can set us free is moldable and malleable to deal with whatever issue, and whatever stuff you feel has you enslaved and trapped.

The first “C” in the C-4, and I encourage you to take notes if you’re not doing that, is conviction. You’ve got to have conviction. This man, Legion, who had all these troubles, and all these demons, somehow had the wherewithal at least to throw himself at the feet of Jesus. He did something that was wrong! Everything wasn’t okay. He threw himself at the feet of Jesus! He was convicted.

Now, here’s the tough thing about conviction, and I’ve experienced this in my own life, and I’ve experienced this in the life of trying to help others. You can’t convict somebody, and I can’t convict somebody of the junk in their life. Have you noticed that? Can’t do it! It doesn’t work! Only God can do that. Your parents can’t do it for you. Grounding, though you needed to be grounded, didn’t do it for you. Getting that ticket didn’t do it for you. Missing that day of work and lying about it didn’t do it for you. You’re still not convicted! Only God can convict you. When God convicts you, He is convicting you not to get “on you”—He is convicting you and me of something that has us that He wants to break us free from. But you’ve got to be convicted. You say, “Well, I’m not convicted.” Well, pray the prayer that’s kind of at the end of Psalm 139. “Lord, search my heart. See if there is any evil way in me” or what’s going on, and allow the spotlight of God’s holiness to shine down in your life in the dark places, and the cracks and crevices. Then when God tells you what’s going on, and you probably know anyway; that leads to the second “C” in C-4, and that is confession.

When we talk about confession, immediately, we go to some Roman Catholic paradigm of going into this cathedral church, and there’s this guy there all dressed in black and white—“Forgive me, Father, for I’ve sinned…” When was the time of your last confession? “It’s been a long time, Father…” It’s not that! By the way, I think confession is a beautiful thing in what the Catholic Church does in that realm. However, that’s not what I’m talking about per se. When I talk about confession, I’m talking about “owning” it; owning whatever it is that’s wreaking havoc in your life. Owning whatever it is that God’s bringing to your mind right now that has you.

When Legion knelt at the feet of Jesus, the Lord finally asked him this one question. What was it? “What is your name?” So when God convicts us, we have to name it. It’s like that slide back there that says, “I am enslaved to ________. I am captivated by _______.” Fill in the blank…lust, greed, pornography, beauty, vanity, money, food, depression, fear. What is it? Fill in the blank. Maybe you need to use the back side of your paper for this test. Maybe you’ve got more than one thing going on; but you’ve got to confess it. You’ve got to own it.

You’ve got to name it by name. “Oh, I can handle it! I can handle this…” You probably can’t. “Oh, it’s really not that big a deal! It’s not that big a deal…” It probably is. It’s going to take C-4—BOOM! To explode that out of your life so you can be free.

Let me say this parenthetically: I’ve seen this happen before on a handful of occasions; someone who was majorly addicted, majorly enslaved to whatever issues you can name. They gave their heart and life to Christ, and BAM! Gone! Never desired to drink or get drunk again. Never desired to do cocaine again. Never desired to steal again. Never desired to do whatever it was they were doing. Never! It was just gone, cold turkey! Christ sets them free immediately! That’s only in about 2% of the people I’ve seen in my experience. For most of us, you’ve got to fight for freedom! It’s an ongoing fight, an ongoing process, an ongoing use of this very moldable, explosive C-4 of conviction and confession that helps you get free.

The third “C” in the C-4 is the Cross. It’s the Cross! The Cross seemed to be pretty important to Paul. Paul was addressing a church in Corinth, which had some major league, whacky-tobaccy, cuckoo-for-Cocoa-Puffs issues. We don’t have time to get into this. Google Corinth and their problems if you want to after church; but here’s what Paul said. Here is what his focus was. All these problems were going on in Corinth; but here is what he said in I Corinthians 1:18, “For the message of the Cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.” POG in the KOG – Power of God in the Kingdom of God. I Corinthians 2:1-2—“When I came to you, brothers, I did not come with eloquence or superior wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” Galatians 2:20, “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I that live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”

Paul is the guy that was involved in killing Christians before his conversion experience, by the way. He had a lot to be forgiven of, didn’t he? We all do…Galatians 6:14, “May I never boast except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”

When we go to the Cross; when we really go to the Cross, we experience the incredible forgiveness and cleansing of God from within, and from without. Jesus sent these demons into the pigs, and they were drowned in the lake! God says He will take our sins on the Cross, and He will drown them in the sea of His forgetfulness.

For you business men and women out there, you’re probably thinking, “Wait a minute! Jesus just wiped out the economy of this area! That’s not very ethical of Jesus. Why did he kill their economy?” I don’t know. Maybe one of the reasons why was to show that one man’s life is worth the entire economy of a town. The crowd, once again in all those stories; they wanted to maintain the status quo. “It’s okay! Let’s have this crazy, mean, demonic, lunatic running around and cutting himself, and doing all this nutty stuff! Let’s have that as long as we have our cash!” Jesus came and… No. He said, “His freedom, this man’s freedom is worth more than the economy of this town.” You say, “Well, I don’t feel like I’m worth very much, and I have a very low self-esteem. It’s so low that I can play handball against the curb! I mean, it’s low!” Listen—God loves you so much that Jesus died in your place! Look at the economy of your life from God’s point of view. How much is something worth? How much is this platform, this pulpit worth? A hundred bucks? Two hundred bucks? No! It’s worth however much someone is willing to pay for it. How much is your life worth? It’s worth the death and the blood spilled of the very Son of God! God, help us to get the reality of Your forgiveness and love into our minds, and into our hearts. The Cross has the power to forgive, cleanse and restore, and to set us free! It’s huge; it’s a part of this C-4.

The fourth “C” in the C-4 is critical. Do you know what it is? Community. Trusted community. Whatever it is that’s going on in your life; you’re not going to get rid of it, you’re not going to be conquered by it; you’re not going to experience freedom from it by doing it by yourself. Not gonna happen!

I talked to a friend of mine who is a very gifted Christian counselor. He said, “You know, Ben, I’ve never known anyone to get over any problem of any significance by themselves.” “Oh, I can do this by myself!” No you can’t—you can’t! You’re going to need help from others; help from trusted community; two or three friends who really follow Christ and have really lived it out who you can go to, and confess to, and confide in who can help you in this process.

At our church, we have large gatherings like we’re having here on Sunday mornings, but we also have medium-sized gatherings in our Bible study classes. We have small groups that come out of the Bible study classes. We have support groups, and twelve-step groups. We have LPC, licensed professional counselors on our staff. All to help us in dealing with the problems and the things that enslave us, to help set us free! They are all there, right there for you, right there for us. You’re not going to conquer this; you’re not going to get free by yourself. It’s not gonna happen.

Even Gilligan had the Skipper! Batman had Robin! Malone had Stockton! I mean, come on! Even before the Fall, Adam had Eve, and Eve had Adam! Freedom! C-4 freedom comes from the community, the body of Christ.

We can’t go to the area of the Gerasenes and wait, and here comes Jesus in this speedboat across, and—“Set me free!” It doesn’t work that way! Now He has manifested Himself through the local church. We are His hands, we are His feet, we are the body of Christ, though a broken expression of it! But we experience the presence of Christ, the healing of Christ, the freedom of Christ in local community. It’s the way God designed it.

It’s weird and a little strange, thinking about the downside of airplane security and all that. I was reading this story, and I asked, “I wonder what Legion’s new name was?” As you read the Bible a little bit, you know that when God changes your name, He usually tells you what it’s going to be, right? “Saul, you will be named Paul! Simon! You’ll now be known as the Rock, Peter! Abram, you will now be known as Abraham, the father of many nations.” I wonder what Legions new name was after he was set free? I wonder, what your new name could be when the C-4 explodes in your life and begins to set you free? I heard a song a long time ago that said, “Everyone wants to be closer to free.”

Dear God, I thank You so much that You are God, and we are not, and we just continue to bump our heads against the concrete in the ceilings and walls to figure that out. God, I thank You that mercy and grace is at the center of the universe, and not karma. I thank You that You have come to set us free! God, so many times, we just kind of mess around and play around, and play church. We just play games. You kind of hit us and say, “No more games! It’s time to get real, and it’s time to watch My power unleashed in your life.”

God, I pray for those here today who need to have an in-break of Your grace in their life. God, may they stand and come down these aisles today; Lord, give them the power in a few moments to stand and to come down front and say, “You know what? I want God to set me free today! I want Him to set me free. I want to come to Him. I want to experience Him. I want to have a new name, a new life, and a new beginning.” May they stand and come down front today. May today be the day, right now.

Right now, this is one of the best times in our service, because God gives us an opportunity to respond in the moment to what He’s doing. If you are here and you need to know Him; you need to experience an in-break of His freedom, power, and grace; I want to invite you as the band sings to make your way out from where you are seated. Make your way down one of these aisles. As He leads, and as the band plays; don’t miss this opportunity, this window of freedom! You stand and come.

CLUELESS

Currency

Ed Young

August 20, 2006

Great news! A wealthy relative has left you $100 million! You can’t access it, though, until you’re 60. But that’s some pretty good news. I’ve got some better news for you. Everyone in the place is 25. You’re 25 and when you reach 60, you’ll get the $100 million. But the downside is, you’ve got to wait 35 years. Thirty-five years to scratch out a living, 35 years until you inherit the big kahuna.

But let’s just say, because we’re talking hypothetically, that the trust was written in such a way that you could access the wealth today. Let’s say at 25, you could begin to live off 5% of the interest, which would be about $5 million a year. So, you’re rich, you’re wealthy. Five million a year. You could make that when you’re 25, 26, 27, and then when you’re 60, you could inherit the big kahuna! Would that be off the chain, or what? I mean, if that happened to me, I would do anything possible to access that kind of money.

Wouldn’t it be horrible, though, to get to 60 and have a bunch of attorneys look at you say, “Hey, you could’ve accessed that money for 35 years! You could’ve lived off the interest. You could’ve made $5 million a year, but you didn’t talk to the right people. You didn’t know who you are. You didn’t know whose you are, and you didn’t really understand what you had. So, man, you blew it. Yeah, you’re 60 and you’ve got the big money now. But, it could’ve been unbelievable for 35 years.” That would not be a happy scenario, would it?

Well, let’s face it—a lot of us are living in spiritual poverty. We don’t know who we are, whose we are, and what we have. We don’t know the wealth that we have access to. We don’t know the kind of currency that’s available for us. Our gracious God has so many things in store for us because of who we are, whose we are, and what we have. But many times, we walk around and we are clueless regarding what’s available to us. We’re clueless concerning what God has for us. We’re clueless.

The Bible is a book of promises. If you understand the promises of God, you can understand virtually every verse of Scripture in the Bible. God has promises for us to claim. Oftentimes, I talk to people who are clueless about the promises of God. That’s why I’m doing this series called, “Clueless.”

Others, though, are clueless because they think they’re clued in to the promises of God; but in reality, they’re clued in to fantasy land stuff. They walk around and say, “Well, God has promised me health and wealth and a pain-free life.”

I look at them and say, “What are you smoking? Where’s that in Scripture?”

It’s critical that we understand and know the promises of God. Because if we don’t, one day we’re going to get to heaven and inherit the big kahuna with streets of gold, mansions, etc., etc., and I’m afraid that God will look at many and say, “I had all of this for you, all of this real currency for you to tap into, but you didn’t know who you were, or whose you were, or what you had. You didn’t realize it.”

I don’t want that to happen. That’s why we need to understand the promises of God. The Bible is all about the promises of God. The promises of God are foundational. So, picture in your mind’s eye a stool. And on one leg you’ve got knowledge. On another leg, you’ve got belief. On another leg, you’ve got action. I’m talking about A-C-T-I-O-N. [with claps] Do that with me. A-C-T-I-O-N. We can do better than that. A-C-T-I-O-N. Thank you! I knew that last one would really get it!

When it comes to the promises of God, I’ve got to know them. Do you know them? Are you clueless, or are you clued in? Most of us are clueless, let’s face it.

Then we’ve got to believe them. “Okay, I believe, God, in your promises. I believe them. I know them. I believe them.”

Then, the third leg is I’ve got to put shoe leather or shoe rubber beneath them. I’ve got to live them out. I’ve got to tap into that. I’ve got to know who I am and what’s available to me and what God has done in my life. Those are huge, huge things for us to understand and for us to know—the promises of God.

The Bible says this in Hebrews 6 about the promises of God. Hebrews 6:17-19 says, “Because God wanted to make the unchanging nature of His purpose very clear to the heirs of what was promised, He confirmed it with an oath.”

Isn’t that cool? The heirs—that’s you and me.

Verse 18, “God did this so that, by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled to take hold of the hope offered to us may be greatly encouraged.”

This series, over the next several weeks, about the promises of God will be encouraging. I mean, you will be fired up!

Verse 19, “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.”

We’re looking for an anchor. Our culture is all about empty promises. We make and break promises all the time. Someone you don’t know walks up to you and they say, “Hey, can I borrow your iPOD? I promise to give it back.”

You’re thinking, “This guy’s going to probably rip it off. I’m not going to give it to him!”

Maybe your son or daughter says, “Hey Dad, can I borrow your iPOD? I promise to give it back.”

You definitely don’t let them borrow it, because you’ll never see it again! Maybe, though, your spouse asks you, “Can I borrow the iPOD, honey?”

“Yes.” I mean, hopefully you trust your spouse. Your spouse is where it is good, and you can count on your spouse’s promise!

Well, when God makes a promise, he boldly backs it up. When God says things, he does things. We serve a God who does what he says and says what he does. God wants the promises to be operative in our lives. He wants us to walk in his currency. He wants us to stand secure on his promises. Come hell or high water, we can stand on the promises of God. Broke, busted, and disgusted, we can stand on the promises of God. When rogue winds hit, we can stand on the promises of God. When your best friend disses you, you can stand on the promises of God. When someone walks out the door, you can stand on the promises of God. When you get the phone call, you can stand on the promises of God.

What is a promise? A promise is simply a declaration assuring that a person will or will not do something. We live in a culture of the empty promise. We have so many people just kind of cruising through, floating around. But talk is cheap.

My parents got me a John boat when I was a kid. It was an old green, aluminum boat, a cheap thing. They gave me one paddle. We lived off a dirt road, and I took the boat across the dirt road to a small lake. And I would paddle this boat in the high winds, because this lake was windy. One day, I thought, “I’m going to make an anchor. I’m tired of paddling. I’m going to make an anchor, something secure, something heavy.”

So I got some clothesline and a Clorox bottle. I put the Clorox bottle in the sandbox and dumped all this sand in there, put the top on it, and tied that to the clothesline. I took it to the lake, paddled out and found a good spot. I threw the anchor overboard. But I had made a dumb decision. I forgot how deep the lake was. This lake was something like 18 or 20 feet deep, but the clothesline was only like 10 feet long. And then, the Clorox bottle was so light that the sand didn’t give it the weight it should’ve had. It got all muddy and was just floating in the water. I ended up being blown all over the lake! It was terrible.

So many people I run into are looking for things that are secure and firm; yet, they’re using anchors made of clotheslines and Clorox bottles. They think, “If I sleep in this bed with this person, that’ll be it! If I make this deal, that’ll be it! If I move to the corner office, that’ll be it! If I have this high, that’ll be it! If I go to that physician, that’ll be it! If I go to that college, that’ll be it!” And they’re being blown around the lake of life with no security, nothing solid, nothing secure.

Well, God comes along and says, “Throw your anchor overboard. Put it on my Word, in my promises. Know them, understand them, believe them, and live them out.”

Well today, I’m going to talk about a promise that is the foundation for all promises. All the other promises emerge from this promise. When I tell you the promise, you’re going to say, “Ed, I’ve heard that a squillion times. I can’t believe you’re even insulting me with those words. You’re tellin’ me that’s a promise of God? Come on, let’s get something maybe deeper, something more profound.”

Well, I’m going to tell you something, this promise is so deep, most of you won’t even understand what I’m talking about. But you will one day, once you begin to walk in the fullness of this promise. And the reason I’m sharing this promise with you is for you to discover the depth that God wants for every single life here. Because remember, the promises are for our best, our best life now. It’s for us to walk in fullness.

GOD LOVES ME

So, drum roll, please. Hold onto your theater seats. Here’s the promise that we need to understand, the key and critical promise: God loves me.

That’s the promise. Let’s say it again. God loves me. Say it with me. God loves me. I’m talking about, in Scripture, the unconditional, irrational, one-of-a-kind love of God.

You see, I have a hard time getting my mind around that promise because it is so deep and rich.

“Why do you say that?”

Well, I say that because our world is all about conditional love. You keep the terms, you do this, you do that, and I’ll do this and I’ll do that. Then I’ll keep the terms and we’ll come together and, then you know, we’re going to love each other. But God says, “I love you unconditionally, irrationally, with a one-of-a-kind love.”

There is nothing that I can do; there is nothing that you can do to cause God to love you any more or any less. Nothing! That freaks me out! That blows my mind if I think about it.

“You mean, nothing? God’s going to love me unconditionally? Irrationally? With a one-of-a-kind love?”

There is nothing I could do right now to cause God to love me any more or any less. That’s what Scripture says. Now some of you are thinking, “Oh, this is a great message. God loves me unconditionally? There is nothing I can do to cause God to love me any more or any less? I guess now I can go buck wild! I can just do whatever I want to do! This is great! I love Fellowship Church! Ed, I love you. Thank you for sharing that with me. I will go out and go crazy, man!”

Ahhhh! No, no, no, no, no. No—no—no.

Yes, God loves us unconditionally, irrationally. There’s nothing we can do to cause God to love us any more or any less. That’s a fact. We can count on it. It’s a promise of God.

However, for us to access the fullness of the unconditional love, there are some conditions that we must meet. What’s the key to the Christian life? What’s the key to discovering the irrational, unconditional love of Jesus?

I’ll tell you what the key is. It’s one word—obedience. That’s it. Trust and obey, there’s no other way. Obedience is the key that unlocks the door to this deep, unconditional, irrational love. Here’s what’s so interesting. A lot of people are experiencing the unconditional love of God, but they don’t even know it. They’re walking through life without tapping into the power of God’s love. They don’t even know it!

“Well, Ed, how can you say that?”

Well, I’ll tell you how I can say that. Because, I know people who are far away from God. They’re clueless about God and the fact that God loves them, but their hearts are beating. They’re breathing. They have roofs over their heads, food on the table, clothes on their backs. Where does it come from?

Some say, “Well, they’re pretty creative. They have a good business mind.”

Well, who gave them that mind? Who gave them the body? Who gave them the ability for their hearts to beat, for them to take in breath? God did. So, they’re experiencing the unconditional love of God just by existing! That’s how much God loves them.

Now, others of us have been ambushed by God’s love. We’ve responded to God’s love. We’re like, “Wow! Lord, thank you! I love you, and I see how much you love me, and I want to return that love to you! I want to demonstrate that love to you.” A lot of people are that way.

Scripture says that God’s love is eternal. Jeremiah 31:3 says, “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.”

Again, I’ll throw this out at you. The one who knows me the best loves me the most. Think about it. With skeletons in our closets, with the moral turnovers we’ve made, with the sin, with the junk and the funk; the God of the universe loves me with an everlasting love. He knows me the best and knows you the best, and he loves you the most! That just messes me up!

Romans 8:38-39: “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

God loves me just the way I am. There is nothing I can do to cause God to love me any more or any less. God loves me unconditionally. But for me to tap in to his awesome love, there are some conditions that I’ve got to meet. God loves me just the way I am, but he loves me too much to allow me to remain in the state that I am. I hope you didn’t miss that.

John 14:15. Here’s what Jesus said: “If you love me, you will obey what I command.”

I’ve known Lisa for over 30 years, and I’ll never forget the first time I told her that I loved her. Guys—some of you are married—do you remember the first time you told her that you loved her?

We were sitting in a porch swing on Lisa’s back porch, and I was working up enough nerve to make this high-risk pronouncement. You know what I’m saying? I said, “Lisa, I like spending time with you.” And I just waited to see if she, you know, gave it back.

She said, “Well, I like spending time with you, too.”

Then I said, “I really love hanging out with you.”

She said, “Well, I love hanging out with you, too.”

And then I thought, “Okay, I’m going to say it.” So I said, “Lisa, I love you.”

And it seemed like hours. Guys, the women love to make us sweat and wait, don’t they? She was just looking at me and I’m thinking, “Okay, what will she do? I gave this high-risk pronouncement. Will she reject my love? Will she spurn my love? Will she say, ‘Ah, no, I don’t feel the same way’? What will she say?

I mean, I put the cards on the table. “I love you, Lisa…”

And like two hours later, it seemed like, she looked back and she said, “I love you, too.”

Well now, we didn’t just say it, we demonstrated it. So we’ve said it a squillion times; we also demonstrate it. We boldly back it up every day of our marriage.

God says he loves you and loves me, but he boldly backs it up. Think about it. God has said, “I love you,” and all heaven is waiting for your response. He’s brought you to this point, maybe to this service to hear this. God says, “I love you.” And he’s boldly backed it up. He’s waiting for your response. What’s your response? Are you going to hydroplane over it? Are you going to reject it? Are you going to do the stiff arm and push-back? Or, are you going to say, “I love you, too”?

And, are you going to demonstrate your love. Because again, what’s the key to walking in the fullness of the unconditional love of Jesus? Obedience. And I’m not talking about a legalistic trip. I’m talking about a love relationship. We live a life of purity, a life of holiness before God. It’s not out of our own strength and power, but because of his grace and mercy. We live it because we love him. We want to access the best for our lives, and the best is when we walk in sync with the Lord, when we walk in concert with him, when we walk in this unconditional, unfathomable, one-of-a-kind love. When we do that, we’ll find ourselves doing things that are just totally supernatural. We’ll feel the supernatural octane in our lives that the world just doesn’t have.

What did Jesus say in John 10:10? “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”

Maybe in your translation, it says “…to the full.” The word “abundance” in the Greek is pronounced “par-a-soss.” It’s a cool word. Look behind the word. The word is the picture of someone with a glass, and another someone pouring liquid into the glass. And instead of that someone saying, “That’s enough, big fella,” the pitcher keeps pouring and pouring and pouring and spilling over the brim, spilling on your hand, spilling on the table, spilling in the kitchen.

You say you love Jesus? You say it? Well, are you obeying it? Are you obeying him? Are you following him? Because, if we are, we’re spilling love onto everyone. I should be spilling love onto Lisa, spilling love onto my kids, spilling love to people I come in contact with around the community, and spilling love to people when I travel. I’m always spilling love—this unconditional, one-of-a-kind, supernatural love.

I recently spent several days in Hawaii with my family because we were celebrating my father’s 70th birthday. And there was a guy staying in a condo beneath my parents, and he had some kids with him. I found myself talking to him one day, and I discovered he was from the northwest. And I’m thinking to myself, “Why am I even talking to him? This guy can’t do anything for me. I mean, why do I want to hear about his story? I’m on my vacation! Why am I doin’ this?”

And I began to feel this connectivity with him as he told me about his family and his life. And then I began to say to myself, “I know why. God has hooked us up together.”

This guy is far away from God. He does not know Christ, and I have this love for him that’s not love from me. Because in the natural, who gives a flying flip about him? But because I’m walking in God’s supernatural, one-of-a-kind, irrational love, I have this desire to talk to him and to see what was going on in his life. And after we talked for a while, we exchanged phone numbers and emails. Then I discovered, amazingly, in March, I will be in his city doing some speaking. And we’re going to hook up there.

Nothing just happens. And since nothing just happens, and we have this irrational, unconditional, one-of-a-kind love going and flowing in our lives, it should spill over in everything we’re about.

Here’s a test that I do with myself. I always ask myself, “Ed, are you walking in this love? Are you walking in the fullness? Are you obeying? Are you serving somebody? Are you sharing with someone? And are you giving something?”

Those are three little things I ask myself. Am I serving somebody?

Jesus said, “If you want to become great, serve.”

People ask me all the time, “How do you get all these people at Fellowship Church involved in volunteering? Do you pay them or twist their arms?”

Again, I’ll tell you, I try to convince people, based on Scripture, that they’re madly loved by the God of the Universe. And when people understand that and they’re ambushed by that, they cannot wait to express their love back to God by serving him! They cannot wait to demonstrate it in the context of the local church. I’ve got to ask you, are you serving?

How about sharing? Are you sharing? I ask myself that. Am I sharing with someone?

I have a story to share, and I love to share. But it is also nerve-wracking to share, because sometimes I don’t know all the answers to the questions people ask me. And one of the best answers you can give is this: I don’t know, but I’ll find out. Then I’ll go to the Source Bookstore or I’ll go on the worldwide web or I’ll call someone who’s smarter than me (and that’s not very difficult to do), and I will get most of the answers to share.

Another question is, are you giving something? I mean something that matters, something that means something to you? Like money. Like stuff you like.

As I told you a couple months ago, Lisa and I are in the process of giving, by far, the largest gift we’ve ever given to Fellowship Church in the history of our lives. Now, if an accountant saw that, it’d probably give him or her heart palpitations. But you know what? I don’t go to the accountant before I give. I go to God. He’s the ultimate accountant.

And speaking of these things—are you serving somebody, are you sharing with someone, are you giving something—speaking of these things, I hope you see where I’m tracking. You see, risk and love are linked together.

So many people are walking around hooked on extreme sports. Snowboarding, hang-gliding, riding the giants like Laird Hamilton. It’s all about the adrenaline, that buzz, that rush. It’s sweet!

Now, that’s cool. I think it’s great to be into sports like that. That’s awesome. Why do we have this desire for adventure and risk and adrenaline? I know why. It’s given to us by God. Have you ever thought about that? It’s a God thing. God’s a God of risk. Talk about risky! Yeah, God is sovereign, but sending Jesus Christ to planet earth to die for sinful people like you and me? Talk about rolling the dice. It’s incredible!

So, yeah, if you’re an extreme sports guy or girl, good for you. But I believe that desire you have is a microcosm of a bigger desire that can only be fulfilled when you’re walking in the fullness of God’s unconditional love!

So, here’s what I’m saying—when was the last time you risked something spiritually that was so big, that was so massive God had to show up to get you through it? When was the last time that you did that? You’ve got to serve somebody in a risk-taking way. You’ve got to share with someone in a risk-taking way. You’ve got to give something in a risk-taking way, on the edge and the ledge, on the ragged edge of adrenaline and adventure. There’s nothing like it!

That is the way the Christian life is supposed to be lived. And it’s time for us to take risks as believers. That’s what I love about Fellowship Church, man. We’re a risk-taking church.

And here’s what’s so cool about taking risks. Are you ready for this? When you take a risk, what does it matter if it messes up or if you fail? If we’re in Christ, if we’re walking in the fullness of Jesus, we can fall flat on our faces. We can embarrass ourselves. And at the end of the day, Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. At the end of the day, I’m irrationally and unconditionally loved by God. So as a believer, I should be the biggest risk-taker out there. Because, again, you’re talking about a safety net; you’re talking about confidence and security and a healthy self-esteem. Jesus is smiling at you and me and saying, “I love you. You matter to me. You’re awesome.” So, we should be able to do all this stuff.

That’s why at Fellowship Church, we’ve taken a bunch of risks. It was a risk to start and to build the campus in downtown Dallas. It’s a risk to start one in Plano. It’s a risk to start one in Alliance. It’s a real risk to go to South Florida and do Fellowship Church in Miami! But, it’s fun! I love it! It’s a risk!

What if it doesn’t work? Well, who cares?! Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so. And, at Fellowship Church, we have tried to create this environment, because this is the environment as we walk in love where we do take risks. And that’s the Christian life. Read the gospels. Look at Jesus. Talk about taking risks, look at the disciples. Look at the early church followers.

Christianity should not be this thing that’s stifling, this thing that’s limiting. It’s a thing of freedom and liberation. We’re made for this irrational, one-of-a-kind love, and we can never walk in the fullness until we trust and obey, until we say, “God, I love you and I want to demonstrate my love to you.”

I John 4:19 says, “We love because he first loved us.”

I’m not loved because I’m valuable; I’m valuable because I’m loved by the God of the universe. And once I’ve discovered that, once I say, “God, I love you back,” and once I begin to walk in that, that’s when the lights come on. That’s when I discover my best life, and you’ll discover your best life as well.

Some of you have made this decision to connect with Jesus Christ, and that’s great. Serve somebody. Share with someone and give something. Take the risk! Yeah, you can still participate in extreme sports, but do the real extreme stuff.

Others of you, maybe you’ve never made the decision to say “I love you” to Jesus. Jesus said, and he says, “I love you.” He’s brought you here because of his irrational, one-of-a-kind love. He’s tried to communicate his love to you time and time again. He’s using this service, the songs, the video, my voice box and vocal cords right now to say to you, “I love you.”

You’ve never locked eyes with someone who does not matter to God. But so often, we like to carry around this little unpublished list of people that we think that don’t matter to God. You know what I’m saying to you. We think, “Oh, she’s not really loved by God. He’s not really loved by God.” Only, that’s not true. We’ve never seen anyone who’s not loved by God. You’re loved by God. God loves you. He’s crazy about you, and he’s waiting to hear your response.

Some of you are saying, “Well, Ed, you know, this is cool, but someday I might say ‘I love you’ back to God.”

Well, the Bible says there is going to be a someday and it’s called the Day of Reckoning. A lot of people will lock eyes with Jesus that day, and Jesus will say, “I sought you. I went after you. I loved you despite all of your stumblings and fumblings, all of your failures, all of your sin. But at every interchange, you kept your distance from me. At every interchange, you didn’t honor me. You hydroplaned over my love. You didn’t treasure my love. You trampled it.”

At this point, people say, “Well, Ed, how could a loving God send someone to hell?”

And I always say this: God doesn’t hurl people to hell. We make that choice. And Jesus will say to many, “You had it your way on earth and you’re going to have it your way in a Christ-less eternity.”

So I plead with you, don’t put it off. Respond to the love of God. Say, “God, I honor it. I receive Jesus Christ into my life. I want to treasure your love, to walk in the fullness and obedience that you have in store for me.”

Don’t remain clueless. Get clued in. Clue in to the radical, supernatural, one-of-a-kind love of Jesus.

[Ed leads in a closing prayer.]

MY LAME MARRIAGE

How Did We Get to This Point?

Mac Richard

A few months ago, a good friend of mine called and said, Mac, I’ve got a date set up for fishing down at the Texas coast, and I want you to go with a couple other guys and me. And I said you know what? Because I love you, I will do this. And so we made our way down to the coast. And we were only going to be fishing for one day, so we got incredibly early, got some cereal in us, and idled away from the dock with our guide before 5:30 in the morning. Pitch black dark. And as soon as we got out into the channel, our guide put the hammer down on his boat and just started screaming across the bay.

Every now and then, he would reach down and pull up a Q Beam to try and find channel markers to make sure that we weren’t about to hit one or a pylon or a buoy of some sort. And after about a 25-minute terror ride across the bay, he kind of idled into this one little flat that we were going to try to fish for the first thing that morning while it was still night dark. And as we got there, he picked this Q Beam up again and started looking this time for bait fish that were kind of crashing on the surface that would indicate the fish we were after were chasing them. And sure enough, here on this first flat, there were fish running for their lives from the big hog sow trout we were looking for. And he said, This is it. And so we started getting ready. We started pulling on wading boots, wading belts, getting our tackle ready, rods and reels. And just before we were going to slip over the side into the ink-black waters, unbeknownst to us, with our heads still down, he had picked the Q Beam up to take one last look across the flat. And while we were pulling on our boots, we heard this: Hmm, uh-oh.

Now, when it’s dark and you’re about to get into the water, you don’t want to hear hmm, uh-oh. And so all four of us who were not guides turned and looked at him and said, Hmm, uh-oh? What is hmm, uh-oh? He said, Well, you’re not going to believe this, but you see those two little dots right there at the water line about 70 yards out? Yeah. He said that’s a gator. He goes, I don’t think he’s that big. We can go ahead and fish here. And at this point, I was thinking, Hmm, uh-oh. And he took one more look. He goes, Oh, you know what? Let’s don’t do that. He’s about 10 to 12 feet long. We were like, We’re good. Let’s find another one, okay?

Now, let me ask you a question. What if, when those two orange dots had reflected back into our guide’s eyes he had not recognized what he was looking at? What if we had waded into those waters unaware of the danger that was right there just a few feet from the boat? I don’t want to even think about it. But you know, a lot of people wade into the waters of marriage with the same lack of awareness. They have no clue what dangers are lurking just beneath the surface, waiting to ambush every marriage. And every marriage starts out with such high hopes and great expectations, doesn’t it? I mean, nobody gets married saying, you know, it’s probably going to only last a couple of months, but we’ll have a good run. Of course not. You don’t spend that kind of money on a wedding and on a dress and on cake and put that kind of emotional investment in it just hoping to make it a few months. Everybody gets married thinking that it’s going to last forever. Everyone outside of Hollywood, that is.

And so the fact of the matter is that there are some very real dangers out there. And this morning, you and I are beginning together a new series of messages that is going to be kind of a Q Beam series of messages. Because over the next few weeks, we are going to highlight some of those predators, some of those things that are lurking beneath the surface of every marriage, trying to take it down. Now, as soon as we say that we’re talking about marriage, instinctively some people will choose to check out. You may be a single adult. You may be a student. You may be a divorcee. Let me encourage you to not check out no matter your marital status, because what we are talking about goes much deeper than just peace and welfare inside a home, because what we are looking at is the fact that God has set marriage up so that human beings just like you and I would experience and live out of radical MBQ. You say Mac, MBQ? What is that? MBQ is Marital Bliss Quotient. Marital bliss quotient. Yes, I completely made that up. But that is a fact of life.

A lot of times we use the term marital bliss almost as a punch line or sarcastically and ironically. Like well, how are things going? Well, I just live in marital bliss. I remember when our kids were infants and toddlers, you want to talk about survival mode for a marriage, that’s tough sledding, man. People go, How’s it going? We’re living in bliss, let me tell you. But the fact of the matter is God wants marriages to be blissful. Blissful. And if you will, go ahead and pull your outlines out of your bulletin you were handed when you came in, and I’m going to show you how this is mathematically. I’m going to give you an MBQ equation this morning that you can use to rely on as a fact of God’s desire for every husband and wife to experience radical, revolutionary, high degrees of MBQ.

The first factor in this equation is this, that God is a God of excellence. God is a God of excellence. That is a fact. God does nothing halfway. God is not watching the clock just kind of putting in his time as God. He does everything with excellence. The Bible says in Psalm 145, “Great is the Lord, and most worthy of praise. His greatness no one can fathom.” You and I can’t even get our minds around how great, how excellent God really and truly is. If you want confirmation of that, think about creation. Think about what God did. Think about how the earth’s axis is tilted at exactly the right angle. It spins at exactly the right rotation. Think about opposable thumbs. I mean, that’s engineering genius right there. God does everything with excellence.

The second factor in this equation is the fact that God ordained marriage. God ordained marriage. Marriage is not a human convention. Marriage is a divine ordained institution designed for God’s purposes. Look back in the beginning at Genesis chapter 2. “The Lord God said it is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” I want you to underline that word, helper suitable. When you first read that in the English, you need to understand that that translation cannot do justice to what was being communicated in the original language. In the original language, helper suitable is an expression that is used elsewhere only of God himself. And rather than helper suitable, we should plug in there life giver, life saver. That’s what God’s saying here. In the original language, it is ezer kenegdo. Say that with me. That’s kind of a good word to know. Ezer kenegdo.

So guys, when you’re rolling over going to bed at night, you just go, you’re my little ezer kenegdo. I mean, you talk about touching the heart of a woman, nothing does it like ezer kenegdo. Ezer kenegdo. What God is saying here is that when he looked down at man, the crowning glory of his creative work, he said it’s not good for him to be alone. At every other step of creation, God said there’s day and there’s night, it is good. There are the birds of the air, the beasts of the field, the fish of the sea. It is good. There are the trees. It is good. But when he looked and he saw man alone, you’ve got to figure the garden was messy, you know? You’ve got to figure that man had already shown himself to be lacking. And God said this is not good. There’s something bad wrong about this picture. And so he created woman. He created woman as that ezer kenegdo, that one who completes, that one who complements, that one who is distinct, who is different, but who is out of him. Bone of his bone, flesh of his flesh. So God ordained marriage.

So we have the fact that God is a God of excellence, God ordained marriage. And that equals the fact that God desires excellent marriages. God desires excellent marriages. If he didn’t want excellent marriages, he wouldn’t have created them. He wouldn’t have ordained marriage as a divinely given institution. He desires excellent marriages. I want to encourage you to make this message series, this time of worship over the next few weeks, a priority. You need to understand that there will be thousands of reasons for you to miss over the next few weeks. There will be a lot of things that come up in your calendar, in your schedule, and I want to encourage you, whether you’re married or single or student, to be here, because God is up to something significant in every single life that he draws together for this moment. And the fact of the matter is that if you are a single adult, if you’re divorced, you need to know that this material, this information, this truth matters for you as much as it does for any of us who are married, because the fact of the matter is that your perspective on marriage informs how you date. And as a general rule, how you date determines how you marry.

Now, I’m working on that. I have two children of my own, and personally, I would love to bring back the arranged marriage, but I don’t think I’m going to win that battle. They one time are going to begin dating. They are going to start making decisions on their own about who they’re going to date. And how Julie and I relate as husband and wife is going to significantly impact how they do that, and in turn, how they marry. So this is something that transcends marital status. And this morning at the very end, we’re going to wrap this up, and I’m going to show you exactly why that is. But as we begin here this morning, I think it’s important for us to just acknowledge the fact that to even bring up improvement in marriage is risky business, isn’t it? Because you’re implying that there’s room for improvement. And there is none of us in this room, especially men who are married, who want to begin that conversation. That’s a tough thing to bring up, isn’t it? Say, Honey, let’s talk about how we could improve our marriage. Boy, that’s going to be a fun time in the old town tonight, isn’t it?

So what I want to do this morning is I want to play bad cop to your good cop, okay? What I want to do is just kind of roll some MBQ questions out on the table. I’m going to roll some grenades out and then let you handle them. But you’re going to be able to say, honey, it’s not me. Mac brought it up. What did you think about that? I thought he was kind of nuts, but let’s just talk about it, shall we? Then you’ve got a conversation going. And the first MBQ question that you need to ask of each other, of yourself is this: Are we flying, running, walking, stumbling, or falling? Are we as a couple flying, running, walking, stumbling, or falling. What? This is a question that is rooted in scripture.

Look at Isaiah chapter 40. The Bible says, “Even youths grow tired and weary and young men stumble and fall. But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be faint.” When you hope in the Lord, when the hope of your marriage is placed in a relationship with God, you have the opportunity to soar, to absolutely fly. Now, I have heard, I have it on reliable authority, that not every marriage is always soaring. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I’ve heard that that’s true. You know, there are times when in a marriage it’s okay to be walking. There are times when as husband and wife over the life cycle of a marriage it’s okay to enjoy just the quiet, still of that walk. But then there are other times when God wants you to fly, he wants you to soar.

Have you ever been around somebody who maybe took a second honeymoon, and they got away just for a few days, just the two of them, left the kids with parents or babysitters back home, and they were just the two of them for three or four days or three or four weeks? You want to talk about somebody soaring and flying? Because in those moments, they have a chance to reconnect and to remember what it was that drew them together, to remember to go oh, yeah, that’s right. We were husband and wife before we were mom and dad. There was a time when we were attracted to each other physically. Yeah. And then all of a sudden, those emotions start to flow, and the consideracies start to come back, and the attention to detail and the attention to needs, those things get attention paid to them again, and all of a sudden, you’ve got a couple that is soaring. This is a great question to ask. Are we soaring? Are we running? Are we walking? Or maybe are we stumbling or are we falling? Is there room for me to improve as a husband? Yeah. That’s a great question to ask. And you need to give your spouse the freedom to answer that lovingly and honestly. Bringing the question up is not bad. But I would suggest to you that to say to your spouse, Well, what do you think? You think we’re flying, haha? That’s not a good way to begin the conversation. Again, just go, Hey, what did you think about that?

Next question, do we have any UTR issues? Do we have any UTR issues? Now, I’m not talking about the University of Texas at Richardson. Under the radar. Do we have any under the radar issues? Are there any subterranean conversations that maybe you’ve played out in your mind and decided, you know what? It ain’t worth it. Not going to do it. Wouldn’t be prudent. And you’ve said, you know what? This is a situation, this is an issue that is frustrating to me about this relationship, about my spouse. Man, I’m just not even going to go there. This is a great question to ask, to say is there anything that maybe we need to cover. Because a lot of times, we decide erroneously that it’s not worth the time, it’s not worth the effort to deal with it. But look at what the Bible says. Again, let me say this. Whatever you want to believe or think about scripture and about God, you can never, ever credibly say that it is irrelevant, that God is not involved in the details of life. Watch this. This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you. God is light. In him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, watch this, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his son purifies us from all sin. If we will bring these UTR issues into the light as God is light, then we will have fellowship. We will be one. We will be united. Why is that?

Because when we bring those things into the light, we are accurately representing the character of God. When we keep them bottled up, when we keep them stuffed down, we’re betraying the image of the one we were created to mimic, the one we were created to copy. So when we do that, when we bring those things into the light, it works. God blesses that, God honors that.

Now, I’m going to suggest to you this morning that this one will probably be the last question that you have the guts to ask. I started thinking about this. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t probably harbor some of these UTR conversations, some of these things that are just kind of there, and over time, over years, you just kind of learn to live with them. I would encourage you to lovingly bring that up. Create an environment where you can get those things out in the open. The next question, are we having fun yet? Are we having fun yet? Now, I know some of you may think, Mac, that is so shallow. Fun. I’m a Christ follower. I don’t have fun. Well, let me tell you this. Wrong. Wrong. I love you, but you’re wrong. Being a Christ follower should be joyful. Marriage should be fun.

Now, there are times when it’s not. Granted. I mean, you have to pay bills, you have to replace roofs, buy tires, get up in the middle of the night. Those things happen. But by and large, marriage should be fun. Now, let me tell you this also. Throughout this series, we’re going to speak very directly about what God says about having fun in marriage. It includes but is not limited to the subject of sex. Sex is a God-given gift. This series, as every single worship service around here, is designed for students in high school and older. If you have small children, they need to be in our children’s ministries. Because it is in there that they have ministries that are designed specifically for them, for them to discover that God loves them in a profound way, in a way that resonates with them.

Also, when your kids are in there, you can focus on what God’s doing in here. You’re not worried about giving them the blue crayon or to keep them happy or to keep them quiet. And I know people are saying, well, when I take them to the nursery, they cry. Of course they cry. They’re kids. That’s what kids do. And you’re doing them a favor when you do that, because when you take them into the nursery or somewhere like that, you help them learn how to cope with other people. They learn how to socialize. They also learn that they’re not the center of the universe. Everybody wins. So I’m telling you that.

Now, having said that, understand that marriage should have a great deal of fun in it. If you doubt that, look at Proverbs chapter 5. This is a great one to memorize. There are going to be more in this series, but this is beautiful. Proverbs 5:18. This is God talking. “May your fountain be blessed. May you rejoice in the wife of your youth.” May your fountain be blessed. He is not talking about yard decorations. What you’re thinking, that’s exactly what it means. And he’s saying enjoy your wife. Rejoice in her. Celebrate her. It doesn’t mean that things are exactly the same. You’re not exactly the same as when you got married. But as you have grown together, as you mature in your relationship, in your relationship with God, you discover new ways to enjoy each other, to celebrate each other. Men, your wife should feel celebrated. And if she doesn’t, it’s your fault, it’s my fault. Now, your wife’s not perfect. She’s got her own areas of responsibility. Make no mistake. Women, don’t think you’re getting off the hook entirely. But we should be celebrating our wives. They should feel that they are put up on a pedestal, that they are cared for, that they are in a secure relational environment. And when that happens, they want to invest themselves in a husband. They want to be rejoiced in. They want to be celebrated. Women, you can correct me if I’m wrong, but I have a feeling I may be right on this one. Because that’s what God says. We must celebrate them. And we should have fun. We should have fun in marriage.

I recognize that from time to time, issues arise. Sometimes there are medical conditions that prevent the intimacy that husband and wife are designed for physically. That’s something to be weathered also, that God can bless in those moments. But barring those type situations, we should enjoy the heck out of each other. Have fun with each other. I’m going to do a whole sermon on that. God left a whole book of the Bible to the subject of sex. Song of Solomon. Read it. If you’re married. If you’re not, don’t read it yet. And you know, I want to say this too in advance. Some people think, well, the Song of Solomon is an allegory designed to describe God’s love for his people. No, it’s not. It’s a God-given endorsement of radical, revolutionary sex between husband and wife. God bless and amen. I’m going to go Pentecostal on that. How about this one?

Is our extended family in place? Uh-oh. Is our extended family in place? In-laws. Do we have them in the right place in our family’s order? Look at what God says. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.” You know what God’s saying here? Cut the cord. Cut the apron strings from mama, daddy, and be a grown-up, be an adult, responsible for your marriage. I have to do this. You have to do this. Now, we’re not saying to just step on our parents. Thanks, see ya. The Bible says honor your father and mother. But one of the ways that we honor father and mother is by being independent, God-following adults who are responsible for our own behavior, responsible for our own homes, responsible for our own marriages before God. That is significant. We must do that.

We need to understand that our parents should not have the same level of influence and power in our lives as adults that they had when we were children. And a lot of times, we give them that kind of power and more. They may not even live in the same city, but through the telephone or through e-mail or through little digs here and little hooks there, they are a participant day in and day out in the marriage in a way that God never designed. Is our extended family in place? Are we financially compatible? Are we financially compatible? The primary stressor and number-one cause of divorce according to those who are divorced is financial pressure. Now, why is that?

I mean, especially here on a Sunday morning, you people who are here in this room, with the weather the way it is, you wanted it. I mean, you wanted to be at church this morning, okay? So in here, we would say, well, why would something as shallow as money come between husband and wife? Money is neutral. What we do with it is a heart issue. This is what Jesus said. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. That doesn’t mean that we have to be financially identical, but we need to be compatible. We need to be on the same page financially. And when we’re on the same page, the fact of the page itself really becomes secondary to the fact that we got there together.

Give you a great example. Julie and I, in our home, Julie is an incredible, incredible woman and gift, and she’s a tightwad. She is. Julie’s just a tightwad. And I said this with her in the room last night in our Saturday evening service, and she actually takes a little bit of spiritual pride in that. But on the other end of the spectrum, my natural bent, I’m the trigger puller in our home. I’m not talking about with the church’s money. But in our home, I’m the trigger puller, baby. I’m like, man, let’s go. We’ll figure out a way to earn some more or to do something else. Don’t worry about it, man. I’m not talking about going into debt. I’ve been down that road, and I don’t want to go back. But I’m talking about if it’s there and it’s not going to impact what we’re giving, it’s not going to impact what we’re eating and the kids can — babe, light the fire. Let’s go.

So we’ve had to learn over time that those two approaches need to be harmonized. They’re not going to change. But they can be harmonized. We can talk about these things together. And we can get on the same page so that our hearts are there. When our hearts are on the same page, the finances and all the other things just take care of themselves. But it’s important that we do that work.

Next question, is divorce an option? Is divorce an option for us? That’s a valid question to ask. I would encourage you to begin here. Now, let me say this. If you are divorced, you need to know that God does not discriminate, and neither do we. Divorce is not the unpardonable sin. Neither is it ever God’s ideal. Neither is it God’s desire for a husband and wife to come together and then have it break up. That’s not his plan. That’s not what we desires. So the question becomes how do we achieve the ideal that God has set out there. And we need to understand where divorce falls in God’s economy. Forget culture. Forget what the rest of the world is doing or 50 percent. That’s their deal. You and I, everyone has the opportunity through the grace and the power of God to experience, remember, radical MBQ. And in order for that to happen, we take divorce off the table. If we’re married, we say that’s not an option. That’s not just a little weapon that we’re going to pull out every now and then, say, Well, fine, maybe I ought to just leave. No. That’s not an option.

Look at what God says in Malachi chapter 2. “I hate divorce.” That’s God. God, who is love, says I hate divorce. “And I hate a man’s covering himself with violence as well as with his garment. So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith.” When you pull divorce off the table, when you say that’s not a viable option for us, you take the first step towards guarding and protecting your marriage. And it is something to be guarded and protected. Again, we’re not saying that divorce is the unpardonable sin and you should walk around with a big, scarlet D hanging around your neck, but from this moment forward to understand why it is that God says I hate divorce.

Why does he say that? To understand that, you’ve got to ask the last question. What’s the point? When we’re talking about marriage, what’s the point? If God ordained marriage and God is a God of excellence, he’s not just doing it just to do it, what’s the point? Ephesians chapter 5. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh. This is a profound mystery, but I am talking about Christ and the church. However, each one of you must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.” The end game of marriage is not marriage. The end game of marriage is a portrayal of the depth and the breadth of the love of God. He says here this is a profound mystery. We said at the very beginning God’s greatness is so great, his excellence, we can’t even get our minds around it. We can’t get our minds around his love. And so he has given us marriage to give us something that we could begin to relate to so that we could start to understand what it is that he did for us. And what it is that he did for us is that he created us to live in relationship with him. And when that relationship was broken by my sin, by your sin, he gave us a groom, the groom Jesus Christ, who offered himself sacrificially, sacrificially, so that we could have this relationship with God, so that anyone who believes in him would never die, but would have life everlasting. That is what’s going on in marriage.

So when you think of the ideal marriage, when you begin to picture that, when you begin to work toward that and live it out, you begin to get just a shadow, just an inkling of what it’s like to live in a relationship with God eternally, because then you start to understand exactly how deeply and profoundly God loves you. And that is what he did for you. That’s why marriage matters. That’s why the Bible says in the book of Hebrews chapter 13 verse 4, “Marriage should be honored by all.” Everyone. Husband, wife, single, divorced, student, pastor, nonpastor, whatever. Marriage should be honored by all because this is what’s going on.

I want to ask you this morning to begin to commit yourself emotionally at a gut level, at a soul level, to work through this subject of marriage with that understanding. And I want to ask you if you would just bow your heads and close your eyes for a moment. Because in this moment, I want to ask you if you have ever received that gift. When we talk about what it is that God did for us, have you stepped over that line of faith? True, we started talking about marriage, but the fact of the matter is that where God is concerned, all roads, all roads lead to the cross.

And this morning I want to invite you, if you’ve never stepped over that line of faith, to commit your life to him, to receive that gift, to just pray where right where you are and say God, just silently right where you are, just pray and say God, I understand that you love me. And God, in this moment, I’m choosing to believe that you communicated that love, you let me know about it through your son Christ. Jesus, I’m choosing to believe that you died on the cross for me and that you rose again for me. Jesus, in exchange for your life, I give you mine, everything that I am. In a spirit of prayer with every head bowed and every eye closed, I want to just ask you, if you just prayed that prayer if you would just quietly and briefly lift your hand up in the air and then slip it back down. If you just stepped over that line of faith, just put your hand up and then put it back down. Thank you. You know what? We celebrate that as a church.

At the end of our service this morning, we would love to just know God did that. We’d love to put a Bible in your hand just as a gift to help you commemorate this moment, say that was the day that I stepped over that line of faith for the first time, and it was nailed down eternally. If you would, just take that info card that Andrew mentioned earlier in our service and go through these doors here to my right. Out in that small lobby, there’s a place there called Starting Point, and there’ll be someone there that can take that card from you and give you a Bible. In just a moment, we’re going to worship.

HOW RELIABLE IS THE BIBLE

APRIL 18, 1999

ED YOUNG

My grandfather was confined to a wheelchair.  He sat in a Lazyboy in a tiny den in Laurel, MS with a smile on his face just talking and being with the people who would frequent his home.  Like many who are physically challenged, he had stuff stacked all around him; medication, cards, different books and periodicals.  But his Bible always was on the top.  He never let anyone put anything on top of the scripture.  He wouldn’t even entertain the thought of taking his Bible and stacking it in his stuff.  He always had it on top.  The pages of this book meant the world to him.  He built his life, his marriage and his family on these principles.  Where is the Bible in your life?  Is it stacked in stuff or on top?

You can say what you want to about it, but there is no book like the word of God.  Its inspiration is divine.  Its information, transformational.  And its claims, unprecedented.  It has been studied by theologians, researched by historians and picked apart by skeptics and modernists.  It is the best selling, most widely read and, might I add, most misinterpreted piece of literature of all times.  But I have got to ask you the question again.  Where is the Bible in your life?  Is it stacked in stuff or on top?

Several days ago, the camera crew and I hit the streets of this area to find out what people are thinking about this best selling, most widely read and misinterpreted book.  Check out the side screens and you will see what I am talking about.

(VIDEO OF ED YOUNG INTERVIEWING PEOPLE ABOUT THE BIBLE – VIDEO SHOT AT LOCAL CHIC-FIL-A)

Oh, you never know where we are going to show up.  But you have got to try the freshly squeezed lemonade at Chic-fil-A, there is nothing like it.

The Bible is utterly unique.  I have said two or three times now, is the Bible stacked in stuff or on top?  I want to talk to you about why the Bible is the top book.  The Bible is utterly unique in its translation.  It is the most translated book in the history of the world.  It has been put into over 1,200 languages.  And teams of translators, right now, are putting it into more and more languages.  Think about it.  Authors salivate to have one book on the best seller list just for a little while, yet the Bible has been on the top since they have been recording the best sellers.  It is unique in its translation.

The Bible is also unique in its orientation.  It was written over 1,500 years, spanning 40 generations, by 40 different authors on 3 different continents.  And these authors came from a wide range of backgrounds.  Some were scholars, others were capitalists, still others were billionaires, city folk, country folk.  They wrote the scripture.  Yet it is supernatural.  Take a step back and think of how all of these authors wrote on hundreds and hundreds of controversial subjects with a common thread, with a focus that could only come from God, Himself.

The Bible is unique in its translation and in its orientation.  It is also unique in its preservation.  It has survived burnings and bans and people trying to tear it apart.  Men and women have given their lives for it.  And in our world today some are being tortured right now for their belief in it.

About this time in the message some of you are saying to yourself, clap, clap, clap.  “That is great, Ed.  Amazing stuff about the Bible.  It is the top book.  Cute little acrostic there.  TOP: translation, orientation, preservation.  I didn’t know all of that.  But can you really trust the Bible as an ancient piece of literature?  Is it really a documented source?  Come on, let’s get real.  Surely it has been tweaked over time.  I know the Bible is plagued with problems and inconsistencies.  I have a hard time accepting the Bible as a truth source.  The Bible.  Come on, give me a massive break.”

I have some great words for you today.  The Bible passes the historicity test with flying colors.  For example, think about the Old Testament.  There was a group of people know as the Hittites.  Turn to your neighbor and say Hittites.  Don’t you love those names?  Well, the Bible talked about the Hittites but historians had a major problem because they said they couldn’t find any record of this nation.  So, historians say, anhhh, “We have got to question the Bible and the validity of the Old Testament documentation and accuracy.”  However, in 1906 some archeologists were digging around and unearthed the capital city of the Hittite nation.  They kept on digging and they found 40 different Hittite cities.  Oh, no, choke, choke.  The historians had to do a 180 and, “Well, we were wrong.  The Bible was correct.”

In Daniel 5 there was a king of Babylon mentioned by the name of Belshazzar.  Turn to your neighbor and say, Belshazzar.  We are on a roll, aren’t we?  That would be a great name for your little one.  Come here, Belshazzar.  Historians said that he didn’t show up in ancient Babylon and that something was wrong.  They said that the Bible was not historically accurate until 1956.  Archeologists started digging and they unearthed three stones with inscriptions.  They said the King of Babylon during that day decided to join his troops in a far away place for a far away battle and before he left he took his son, Belshazzar and put him on the throne and made him the king for awhile.  Choke, choke.  The historians had to admit that they were wrong again and the Bible right.

There have been over 25,000 archeological discoveries that substantiate the validity of scripture.  Archeology and Bible prophecy and Biblical, historical accounts are on the same page.  They move in concert together.

Renowned Jewish archeologist, Nelson Gluck, wrote these words.  “It may be stated categorically that no archeological discovery has ever controverted a Biblical reference.”  Isn’t that something?  Look at the next quote by one of the world’s greatest archeologists who is not with us anymore, William F. Albright.  He states, “There can be no doubt that archeology has confirmed the substantial historicity of the Old Testament tradition.”  So we have got a book that passes the historicity test.  And it passes it with flying colors.  It gets a big A plus on it.  It excites me.  It thrills me.

And when you have some problems between history and the Bible, as time rolls on, the problems and the inconsistencies are shrinking rather than growing.

Now for you trivia buffs, there are 184,540 words in the New Testament alone.  Scholars only have a problem with 400 out of those words.  And the 400 words they have a problem with only concern grammar and spelling and some other little issues.  These 400 words do not change any major doctrine whatever.  God has supernaturally preserved His word.  I have got to ask you once again, where is this book in your life?  Is it stacked in stuff or on top?

I love what Josh McDowell said about the Bible.  He said, “The Bible compared with other ancient writings has more manuscript evidence than any ten pieces of classical literature combined.”  He goes on to say this.  “After trying to shatter the historicity and validity of the scripture….”  Let me stop here.  Josh McDowell.  He tried to disprove the validity of Christianity and the Bible and the resurrection and I highly recommend his book, EVIDENCE THAT DEMANDS A VERDICT.  We have it available in our bookstore.  Please pick it up.  It is a classic, classic text.  He said,  “…I came to the conclusion that it is historically trustworthy.”

Now let me change gears a little bit here.  How many of you have ever heard of Plato and Aristotle?  Will you please lift your hands?  OK, let’s get really honest now.  How many of you have read the complete works of these towering, literary and philosophical giants?  Will you please lift your hands?  How about the cliff notes?  I was a cliff note guy, too, now and then.  Their historicity, their reliability, their accuracy has never been questioned.  Take a stab at how many ancient documents there are of the works of Plato and Aristotle available today so we can compare regarding their accuracy.  Well, I will tell you.  Less than ten.  Now, take a guess at how many ancient documents we have of the New Testament alone to compare with their validity?  Would you feel good if the New Testament had about five?  Maybe ten would give you some more faith.  How about twenty, thirty?  Try 14,000 ancient documents of the New Testament alone that we can use today to compare and see the authenticity of, the infallibility of the word of God.  One more time, God has supernaturally preserved His word.

You heard it in the song earlier.  There is truth, there is love in those letters because they were God-breathed, God-given.  The same cannot be said of other truth sources of other major world religions.  We have a truth source backed up by history and archeology but the other major world religions don’t have that.

This past fall I had the opportunity to speak in San Diego, CA.  I was driving down one of the major freeways there and I saw a beautiful Mormon temple.  I was thinking what a gorgeous work of architecture it is.  I wondered how much it must have cost.  Then my heart quickly saddened because the Book of Mormon has major, major problems in it.  And I use the word major in a conservative sense.  You see, the Book of Mormon says that a vast civilization lived in the Americas from 600 BC to 400 AD.  The Book of Mormon talks about all of these specific things of this civilization such as mountain ranges, lakes and rivers.  But, there is not a scientist outside the Mormon religion or inside the Mormon religion who has ever found one shred of archeological or scientific evidence to substantiate any word in the Book of Mormon, not even one word.  And most Mormons, sadly, buy the Book of Mormon lock, stock and barrel.  They believe it, but it is not true.  We serve a God who has preserved His word supernaturally and this word is true.  It is truth.  And it is God’s word to you and to me.  It talks about our lives.  It talks about our marriages.  It talks about our parenting skills.  It talks about our future.  We need to know it and own it and understand it and live it out.  The Bible is a unique book from a historical perspective.  It is like no other truth source.

Now some of you might be saying, “Ed, how about the miracles?  I have a hard time with the Bible talking about the miracles.  All these miracles: arks and floods and chariots of fire and resurrections and this and that.  I have a hard time saying something is historically accurate if it has all these miracles in it.”  Well, you have got to understand something.  Doing miracles for a holy God is just a hobby.  It is not a stretch or a reach for God to do the supernatural.  It is no problem.  You have got to think about God in that way.  God is infinite.  We are finite.  So, the writers of the Bible recorded facts through their personalities and their giftedness and they recorded many, many miracles.  Take the New Testament, for example.  When these miracles started happening there was not a big gap of time that separated the miracle from the writing of, let’s say, the gospels.  The gospel letters were circulated and if they had been just a bunch of bunk and a bunch of lies and a bunch of tabloid stuff, the culture would have said, “Ehhh, you’re lying.  That is not true.  That is a joke.  That didn’t happen.”  But the deal was that so many people had seen the miracles.  People said that they saw Jesus after the resurrection.  They saw the healings.  They saw the events.  So the Bible, the New Testament specifically, began to spread like wildfire.  Why?  Because it was true and it could be supported through the witnesses.

Let me give you a hypothetical situation.  If I decided to write a book called THE HOAX OF KOSOVO by Ed Young and I said that there was not a civil war going on over there, that everything seen on the media is not taking place but is just a media hoax being played out by actors and actresses, do you think Random House would give me a big contract?  No, they wouldn’t.  Why?  You probably know people, perhaps you even have a son or daughter over there.  You have seen the reports.  We have witnesses here and over there.  It wouldn’t fly, it wouldn’t work.  THE HOAX OF KOSOVO by Ed Young would be a joke.  It would be a farce.  The same would have been true with the writers of the New Testament if it was a hoax.  The witnesses of the Bible.

The Bible says that it is an inspired book.  Now when the Bible uses the word inspiration, it is different than when a modern songwriter claims to be inspired to write a song, which is pedestrian in comparison.  We are talking about a different realm.  Let me show you.  The Bible says in II Timothy 3:16, “All scripture is God breathed.”  And the Bible does not just contain the word of God; it is the word of God.  He used the authors of the Bible, their personalities and their giftedness, to record His word to you and me.  Now the writers did not record the words like this.  John didn’t say, “OK, God.  John 3:16.  For God, what is the next word?  So…”  It didn’t happen like that.  The Bible says in II Peter 1:21, “For prophesy never had its origin in the will of man but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”  Over 3,000 times Biblical writers say, thus says the Lord.  If I had time I could give you a great argument for the inspiration of scripture just based on fulfilled prophesy alone.

Remember I said earlier, the Bible was written over a 1,500 year time frame.  A lot of these people went out on a limb and recorded prophecies that were fulfilled hundreds and hundreds of years later.  For example, Jesus, our Lord and Savior, fulfilled 300 prophecies.  He fulfilled how He was actually born, how He ministered, how He died and how He rose again.  All of that was a fulfillment of prophecy.  And no other world religion, no other truth source from any other cult can make those claims.

I want you to read along with me what Peter Stoner, a scientist in the area of mathematical probability wrote in his book SCIENCE SPEAKS THESE WORDS.  “If we take just 8 of the 300 prophesies concerning Christ we will find the probability of their coming to pass is 10 to the 17^th power.”  Now stay with me.  Stoner goes on to illustrate it this way.  He said that if you took 10 to the 17^th power silver dollars and spread them across the state of Texas, they would cover this great state two feet deep.  Are you with me?  He added that if you took one of the coins, marked the back of it, threw it in the mix, mixed them all with a giant mixer, then blindfolded someone, droped him or her off from a helicopter with instructions to pick up only one coin, what would be the chance the marked silver dollar would be chosen?  The same chance that Jesus would have had if He would have fulfilled only eight of the 300 prophecies.  That is just eight.  We are talking about something supernatural, something otherworldly, something that is inspired, something that separates this book from all other writings.

Ruber Smith who compiled a personal library of 25,000 volumes wrote, “Mohammedism cannot point to any prophesies of the coming of Mohammed uttered hundreds of years before his birth.  Neither can the founders of any cult in this country rightly identify any ancient text specifically foretelling an appearance.”  Wow.  The Bible is reliable.

And I will tell you another way the Bible is reliable.  It is reliable concerning me and what it says about my condition.  I have never read another book that cuts through my veneer.  I have never read another book that gets in my face.  I have never read another book that talks to me so specifically like the Bible does.  Have you?  I never have.  Many times when I open the Bible I am scared to read its pages because I know it will confront me.  It will cut to the marrow.  It will get down to areas of motivation, to real sins.  I know the Bible is unique in that realm.

So today I decided to do something personal, very, very personal to illustrate what I am talking about.  I brought for you two books that are on my bedside table, two books that I read regularly over the last couple of months.  The first one is THE TESTIMENT by John Grisham.  Have you read THE TESTIMENT?  I highly recommend this book.  John Grisham is a Christian.  I didn’t know if you knew that.  I don’t know him but I have heard he is a great guy and read articles about him.  This next one is really near and dear to my heart.  It is called FLY FISHING IN SALT WATER by Lefty Craig.  Lefty Craig is one of the greatest fly fishermen of all times.  He is legendary in his demonstrations and his casting ability.  He is a master of one-liners.  Everyone loves Lefty Craig.

Well, do you think that 7,500 people would show up this weekend to hear me teach on fly-fishing in salt water?  Do you think 7,500 would show up to see a drama about this stuff, hear songs about this stuff?  Now I love these books, but these books have not changed my life.  There is nothing supernatural about these books.  Yet, when someone opens the word of God, whether it is in one of our small groups or  before a basketball game here at the Fellowship Church or in one of our student ministries, or whether it is in Children’s Church or preschool, suddenly things happen.  Suddenly something supernatural takes place.  And every weekend people come up to me and say, “Ed, have you been reading a mail?  Have you been talking to my boss?  Have you been talking to my spouse?”  No, no, no.  It is the Holy Spirit.  They may be my words, but it is God talking through His word and using my voice box to talk.  Oftentimes I have sat under a teacher, like a Preston Mitchell, like a Randy Draper, like my father, like Bill Hybels and thought that I was the only person in the place.  They were just nailing me to the wall and it is just what I needed.

I have been praying for a man in this community for eight years.  I have been praying over and over again that he will become a Christ follower.  But he is not.  He shows up here now and then.  He has a great wife and nice family.  He is smart and articulate.  But he is not a believer.  And he boldly tells people that his problem is intellectual, that his problem is with the Bible.  I have talked to him and his problem is not with the Bible, his problem is that the Bible points out his problem.  So when people tell you that they have an intellectual problem with the Bible, that it has been tweaked, changed, is only one of the truth sources, know that more then likely they are afraid.  They are afraid of the Bible.  They know just enough about the Bible to steer clear of the Bible so they send up smoke screens.  They are afraid that their lusts will be exposed.  They are afraid that their greed will come out into the light.  They are afraid of their motivations and their desires that are under the carpet where no one can see them.  That is why I laugh when people say, “Christianity is for those people who need a crutch.  It is for those people who are weak.  The church is full of hypocrites.”  Give me a break, don’t give me that weak stuff.  That is pathetic.  If you are saying that, you don’t have anywhere near the guts that a Christ follower does.  At least a Christian has enough guts to admit the truth about themselves and let the Bible speak to them.  So don’t even bring that stuff to God.

If you want to ask questions, God says, “Come on.  Come on, big boy, ask the questions.  Come on, thinking girl, Harvard MBA, dissect it, pick it apart.  Go ahead.”  Our church is here for you.  We welcome your questions.  But don’t say you can’t accept it intellectually when you have not studied it.  You have taken a two or three hour course in some college or some university and come to the conclusion about the most important book in the history of the world.  It claims to be divinely inspired and it is a dangerous decision on your part to turn your back on it without studying its validity.  But I am going to tell you something.  It will penetrate your heart and life.  It will expose problem areas and it will change you.  It has changed me and it is changing me.  That is the kind of God we serve.  That is the kind of Bible we operate under.  The Bible is our truth source.  This church, the Fellowship Church, is under the authority of this infallible book.  That’s why we are here.  That’s why I do what I do.  And that is why you are here today, to learn and apply what the scripture says.

Well, let me give you some homework.  I have shared a lot of facts with you and we have read a lot of things.  We have talked about all of the evidence.  Let’s talk about homework.  I want you to do a couple of things.  First, I challenge you to orient your life so that you can be here over the next several weeks when we will be addressing some issues that you desperately need to understand.  Secondly, I want you to apply the 30/10 principle.  For the next thirty days I want you to read the Bible ten minutes a day and I want you to start in the book of John.  Here is what I want you to do when you read the book of John.  Get a Bible that you can read easily like the New International Version or the New American Standard or maybe a paraphrase like the Living Bible.  After ten minutes of reading, stop and ask yourself two questions.  One, ask yourself what John was saying.  Two, ask how you can apply that in your life.  Just write down a couple of thoughts.  Let me tell you what will happen.  As you begin to take the Bible and move it out of stuff that has been stacked up in your life and put it on top for the next thirty days, some great things, wonderful things, transformational things will occur in your world relationally, spiritually, emotionally, psychologically.  Things will happen.  You won’t believe what will occur.

Awhile back, about six months ago, I went out of the country with a close friend of mine.  Every time you travel outside of the country it is a little bit scary because there is no place like America.  When I got to my hotel room, I was taking stuff out of my suitcase and I saw a note in my suitcase.  I recognized the writing.  It was from my lovely wife, Lisa.  It was a love note.  So I picked it up and read it.  After I read it I thought I might slip back on a plane and fly home.  I put it back in my suitcase.  The next day, I picked the letter up and read it again.  I read the letter for three or four straight days.  It was Lisa expressing her love for me by the written word.

The Bible is a bunch of love letters to you and to me.  The Bible says that we matter to God.  And the stuff talked about here is not talked about in any other book.  Read the love letters.  Read them and make them a part of your life.

If this book is the word of God, you need to know what it says.  You need to understand it and know what it says about the most important things in life.  Especially you need to understand what it says about the subject matter we will talk about next weekend, eternity.  Eternity.  But one last time I will ask you this question.  Where is it in your life?  Is the Bible stacked in stuff or is it on top?  It is a choice that you have to make.