Sermons

Have you ever made a decision you later regretted? I have!

Have you ever done something with the very best intentions, but the result was the very opposite of what you hoped for? You wanted to help somebody, but instead you hurt that person. Have you ever had ambitions that were supposed to do you much good, but ended in ruining your life?

I am thinking of my friend Jim Swackhammer. Jim had set high goals for his life. He wanted to make it big in the film industry. One day he received a call. It was his big change on a big breakthrough: The producer who called him said that the director for a big project in Africa had fallen ill and had to replaced. Was Jim available and interested? Jim didn’t hesitate. He jumped at the chance.

Now this call came on the evening of his wedding day, and he had to leave the next day, for at least several months. He told his bride. She didn’t like the idea. But he said that this was so important for his career, he had to do it. And no, she couldn’t go along.

The marriage didn’t last very long. What a price to pay.

Later on Jim opened his own studio in New York for the production of commercials. He had reached the pinnacle of his career. This is what he had always wanted. After the big opening reception he got drunk for the first time. He felt empty. This should have brought him the greatest fulfillment, but he wondered, “Is this all?”

He quickly became a heavy drinker, and was drunk much of the time. It didn’t take long before he went bankrupt and lost everything. He ended up in England and was picked out of a ditch, literally, by a retired colonel, who took him to his own place. This man was the leader of a youth group of his church. The kids came to know Jim, loved him, and led him to Christ. He became a very different person. I got to work with him when I was a TV producer in Holland. I rejoiced in his newfound faith and renewed life, but was saddened about the enormous price he paid pursuing the wrong dream.

That’s what can happen to us humans. We are all very capable of doing stupid things, while thinking we are wise! And even worse, there are people who are considered to have the latest knowledge and wisdom, and the masses follow their advice while much later coming to the conclusion that they were on the wrong track.

Jesus said,

“Wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.” (Matthew 7:13-14, New International Version)

Blessed are you when you realize that you lack wisdom!

In the letter of James we read where we can find wisdom: “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God.” (James 1:5) Why would you have to ask God? Well, he is the creator, he knows how he has made us, he knows his purposes for us, he knows how we can live life to the fullest extent. And oh, let me not forget this: He loves us, more than anyone else, more than our mother and our father, more than even we love ourselves! He is the only advisor who absolutely can be trusted to lead us in the right direction! He can even save us from ourselves and create in us a new heart, make us a new creation, save us from our sins.

So, finding wisdom is very important for us. And it can be found. God wants to give it to us. And you don’t have to be smart for it.

Not that being smart is wrong in itself; certainly not!

Let me tell you about Stephen Hawking. He was in the news recently. Diane Sawyer interviewed him for ABC News. That interview was a little bit complicated because he cannot talk. He cannot use his hands. His face is totally without expression. He has Lou Gehrig’s disease. He got it when he was in his twenties and he was given a very short time to live. But that was over forty years ago, and he still lives. And he has not been sitting still, doing nothing. He is one of the greatest minds in the world today. Diane Sawyer asked the questions ahead of time, and he answered them in the only, slow, laborious way he has: Using the only muscle that he can control, in his mouth, I believe, he can move a cursor and spell words letter by letter. And then the text he has typed can be read by a synthesizer. So, while he was sitting there motionless, we heard a voice, not his own, saying the words he had “typed.”

I have great respect for science and the greatest respect for Stephen Hawking. Frankly, I don’t have the scientific background to know why scientists think he is among the greatest. I will have to take their word for it. But in his interview with Diane Sawyer he said something even I, and we all, can understand. He was talking about the 100 billion galaxies in the universe, each containing hundreds of millions of stars, and then said: “One could define God as the embodiment of the laws of nature. However this is not what most people would think of that God. They mean a humanlike being with whom one can have a personal relationship. When you look at the vast size of the universe and how insignificant and accidental human life is in it, that seems most implausible”

On what basis does he say that it is most implausible for humans to have a personal relationship with God? On the basis of the vast size of the universe, and the fact that we are small and that human life is what he calls accidental. I think we should learn from him. It is necessary that we understand and recognize that we are indeed extremely small and live for an extremely short while. The biggest and the brightest and the wealthiest and the most famous and the most powerful person in our world is no more than a speck of dust, here today, gone tomorrow.

But that does not necessarily mean that we cannot have a personal relationship with the God who is the creator of it all. If he chooses to offer us a personal relationship with him, he can! Our size is not the deciding factor; his size is! And that is what the Church believes is the case. The Church believes that God has chosen to reveal himself to us, and he has revealed himself as a personal God. The Church confesses that God has created us in his own image. The Church proclaims that God has chosen to consider us humans as very important to him! On the basis of the self-revelation of God, the Church proclaims that God has chosen to love us even in spite of our murder of God-in-human-flesh, Jesus Christ, God the Son. The story is astounding, breathtaking. We can learn from Stephen Hawking that it is truly implausible. But that does not mean that it is not true.

Stephen Hawking has one question that he cannot answer. He said, “I want to know why the universe exists, why there is something rather than nothing.”

Stephen Hawking is enormously smart, maybe smarter than all of us together. But he does not know God. He does not know the fear of the Lord. He does not have the beginning of wisdom. We should pray for this wonderful man that his eyes, which are opened to the smallness of us people, and the greatness of the universe, will be opened to the greatness of God who wants to have a personal relationship with him—and all of us. He is already on his way: although he says it is most implausible, he does not say it is impossible. I wish all scientists were this humble.

Let me contrast Stephen Hawking with somebody else. Come with me for a moment to an event in the history of Israel. The king at the time is Ahab. And a man appears to him. How he managed to come in hearing distance of the king, we are not told. But here he stands before him. What do we know about this man? We only know that his name is Elijah and that he comes from Tishbe in Gilead. You have never heard of Tishbe in any other context. It probably means that this town didn’t amount to very much. It probably was one of those many hick towns. If he had any academic credentials, which he probably didn’t have, we are not told. They are not important. If he had any wealth and influence, which he probably didn’t have, we are not told. Not important, either. The same with political power.

Nothing is important enough to tell us, other than what his message to Ahab is. Elijah is a man of very few words. His message takes just seconds to deliver. It is just one short sentence. He says to the king, “As the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, whom I serve, there will be neither dew nor rain in the next few years except at my word.” (1 Kings 17:1)

That’s all he has to say. After that Elijah quickly disappears—and goes into hiding, because Ahab desperately wants to kill him. How does he dare to say that to the king!

How do we know that what Elijah says to king Ahab in the name of the Lord is truly from the Lord? How do we even know that the Lord, the God of Israel, exists? Well, in time, Elijah is proven right! There is a drought in the land for several years, as Elijah said would happen. Elijah gets the blame for the famine! And then there is the big showdown on the Mount Carmel between the hundreds of priests of Baal and Asherah on the one side, and Elijah on the other. The end is that the people fall prostrate and cry, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!

That’s an extreme case of somebody who knows and serves God. But it is a principle for us all: All that truly counts to be God’s servant is to hear God’s voice and act on it.

That’s why we read in Scripture:

My son, if you accept my words
       and store up my commands within you,
turning your ear to wisdom
       and applying your heart to understanding,
and if you call out for insight
       and cry aloud for understanding,
and if you look for it as for silver
       and search for it as for hidden treasure,
then you will understand the fear of the LORD
       and find the knowledge of God.
(Proverbs 2:1-5)

And Scripture also says: “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” (Proverbs 9:10)

What does that mean? Do you have to be scared of God? No, but you have to have the proper respect for God. You have to see God for how mighty and holy and great he is, and yourself as how tiny and insignificant and sinful you are. That is the right perspective. That is the beginning of wisdom, crying out to God, “O God, have mercy on me, sinner.”

When I stand before God and have to give an account of my life, I have nothing to take credit for, nothing to brag about. I cannot plead on anything else but the blood of Jesus Christ, my savior. Anything that has been good in me has been his gift to me, and through me to others.

The only right attitude for us is to be humble in the light of the greatness and the mercy of God. To embrace the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. Everybody who has done that has received his love and forgiveness and is being changed by him.

Those who live in the wisdom of God will increasingly see the world from the perspective of God. You will see yourself, and every other person, as through the eyes of God. Over time you will acquire a thoroughly Christian and biblical worldview—your thinking about the world, about issues, about everything will be brought in line with the truth of God. Being led by the Spirit of Christ, you will increasingly live like Jesus wants you to live. You will live differently. You will make different choices than many of your peers, your colleagues, the world around you.

Yes, living in the fear of the Lord, fervently desiring to know him and do his will, listening to his word, seeking wisdom and guidance from him, will make you different. It will make you count for the kingdom of God. You will be accepted by those who embrace the Lord Jesus Christ and also seek their wisdom from him.

It will make you countercultural. You will be in the minority. You will be rejected by those who reject Jesus Christ. Even among those who call themselves Christian, you will find people who will urge you to adapt to the wisdom of the modern times. They will tell you that the wisdom that you have received living in the fear of the Lord is so yesterday, so 20th century, so not for now. They might ridicule you. They will consider you an outsider, weird at times. Maybe they will call you an extremist, a fanatic. But remember, you are following the Crucified! As Jesus said, “No servant is greater than his master. If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also.” (John 15:20)

But you will know God! As Jesus said in a famous prayer, “This is eternal life, that they may know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.” (John 17:3) And there will come that moment that you will stand before God, and you will hear God say to you, “Well done, my faithful servant.” Oh, the glory! Is there anything else that counts?!

When you seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness first, your heavenly Father will provide all you need, as Jesus promised. (Matthew 6:25-34) To those who obey his great commission to go out in the world and proclaim the Gospel, Jesus has promised that he will be with them to the end of the age. (Matthew 28:19-20) Paul says, based on the promises of God and his experience, that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. (Romans 8:38-39)

May your life count for the kingdom of God! Seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness first! Seek the wisdom that the world cannot give, the wisdom that the world rejects, the wisdom that comes from God! The only wisdom that is true, and that will last for time and eternity. He has promised to give that wisdom to those who realize that they lack it, and ask God for it. (James 1:5)

One day many of Jesus’ disciples were offended by his teaching. They

turned back and no longer followed him. “You do not want to leave too, do you?” Jesus asked the Twelve. Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:66-69)