03/10/04 St. John’s 10:30 PDL Series “You are not an accident" Psalm 139
1. Slide 1 to start.
Show two different types of hammer.. one for a nail.. one for a chisel. The
point is… Need to know what each one is used for.. if use it for the wrong
purpose… will not get the job done properly. Eg. If try to knock a chisel in
with the wrong type of hammer.. will be hard… and you will probably injure
yourself.. and if you try to knock a nail in with a lump hammer - will probably
bend the nail and leave some marks on the wood as you knock it in.
Knowing what something is for, knowing how it is to be used… matters.
Now why shouldn’t this apply to the life that we life.
2. (Slide 2) Over the next few months… looking at the themes in this book.. The purpose driven life. At each service on Sunday we will consider one of the themes in this book… and there will be a chance to think further about it at the REAL group meetings during the week. It is important to emphasise that we are not aiming to apply the teachings of this book (show PDL) we are wanting to apply the teaching of this book (show Bible) to our lives. “The purpose driven life” is simply a systematic study in which the writer invites us to apply biblical teaching to our own everyday life. Because this book can help us to hear and respond to what the Bible says to us.. then it is worth reading.
The sermon series beginning today will continue through until Sunday 15th May next year. On that day I am praying that there will be people who are ready to make a public declaration of their commitment to live as disciples of Jesus. By baptism? Hope people make commitments before then by word of mouth.
3. You may have heard the story of the father who was having a very difficult day at home with his three children. All of a sudden he heard a great crash coming from the bedroom, followed by the sound of shouting and arguing… and he ran upstairs and went into the bedroom and meant to say “What on earth are you doing?” Instead he shouted out
“What are you doing on earth?”
(Slide 3) It’s a good question. What are you doing on earth? What is the purpose of your life. That is a question that we maybe don’t hear asked often enough. Instead we hear another question asked.
(Slide 4)
What do you want to do? That is a question that is asked a lot. Adults say to children “What do you want to do when you grow up.” Or when a young man or a woman is studying for A-levels or choosing a university course.. the question is “What would you like to do after you graduate?” And when we ask that question sometimes people have a very clear idea of what they want to do.. and sometimes people say “Um.. I don’t know really.”
The trouble is people can spend years and years and years and never find a satisfying answer to that question “What do you want to do?” It is possible to start out doing exactly what you want to do… and then discover it is not really what you want at all. And so after a few years find yourself back asking the same question… “What do I want to do?” Do you know it is possible to live a whole lifetime like that?
4. The thing is, “What do I want to do?” is not the most important question to find an answer to. (Slide 5) Much more important is a question like this …
“What are you here for?”(Slide 6) Which is just another way of saying… “What is the purpose of your life ?”
And the answer to that question doesn’t begin with your feelings, your ambitions, your talents, your gifts, your wants. In fact the answer to that question doesn’t begin with you at all. It begins with God.
Unless you believe there is no God. If there is no God there is not much point in asking “What am I here for? What is the purpose of my life?”
(Slide 7)
As one famous atheist said…
“Unless you assume a God, the question of life’s purpose is meaningless” Bertrand Russell.
(Slide 8)
The Bible says
For the life of every living thing is in his hand, and the breath of all humanity. Job 117:10
The alternative to what the Bible says… is spelt out.. by Professor Richard Hawkins. The author of The Selfish Gene… (Slide 9)
“We are on our own in the universe. Humanity can expect no help from outside, so our help, such as it is, must come from our own resources. As individuals we should make the most of the short time we have, for it is a privilege to be here. We should seize the opportunity presented by our good fortune and fill our brief minds, before we die, with understanding of why, and where, we exist.”
My dictionary defines privilege like this…
To grant special rights or benefits to somebody or something. So if we are on our own in the universe… Who gave us the privilege?
It takes a great leap of faith to believe that the whole universe and all life is the result of some meaningless accident. But if it was just an accident.. then there is no purpose to any of it anyway. So not much point thinking about it.
5. (Slide 10)
But the truth that is revealed in the Bible is that
WE are not alone. The universe is not an accident. It is not meaningless. WE were created, And there is a purpose for the life of each and every one of us.
If you want to know what the Bible says about the question “What am I here for?” you will find that Bible says the answer starts with Jesus.
Why? Because he is the one who made us.
He is the one who gives us this life to live.
He knows the purpose of our life because we were made for him. That’s what the Bible says…
(Slide 11)
Read Colossians 1:16
Jesus is the one through whom God created everything in heaven and earth. He made the things we can see and the things we can’t see—kings, kingdoms, rulers, and authorities. Everything has been created through him and for him.
(Slide 12)
God made you for relationship with Jesus.
So right now if you don’t know that you live in relationship with Jesus.. well then perhaps you can understand why you keep finding unsatisfactory answers to the question “what do I want to do with my life?” You are asking the wrong question?
You should be asking what does Jesus want me to do with my life?
(Slide 13)
The first lesson that we have to learn is that to discover the purpose of our life we have to stop looking at ourselves.. and start looking at the one who made us. And then we will discover some amazing truth.
Truth like this … (Slide 14)
You are not an accident.
Knowing this truth is just part of what we have to do. The problem we have is that we have got very used to lies. In fact we have become so used to lies that they have become a part of us, a part of the way we think about our lives, part of the way we think about ourselves.. and a part of the way we think about the purpose and meaning of our life here.
(Slide 15)
There are plenty of lies around about us. The lies that we see everyday on the media, lies that tell us we are only significant it we look a certain way, dress a certain way, life a certain lifestyle. Lies that tell us that we matter as much as our educational achievements, lies that say we are a only a success if we get a certain kind of job, live in a certain kind of house, mix with a certain kind of people.
And so a second lesson we need to learn… Learn to let go of the lies…
The truth is.. success is fulfilling the purpose that God has for our life.
And we have been told these lies so often, and for so many years.. that we don’t always recognise them for what they are. We take them into our thinking and they become a part of us…
(Slide 16)
Here is an example of a lie that can help to shape our perceptions of ourselves… these are the actually words written by a young woman in her twenties…Actually, my mother told me on my 16th birthday that I was the result of a faulty condom and I wasn't planned at all...I've been traumatized ever since.
How many times has the lie been spoken? And how many times has someone absorbed it into their understanding of themselves so that they say “I wasn’t planned.” “I was an accident.”
The truth that the Bible teaches is that there is no such thing as an unplanned baby. Life is never an “Accident.”
(Slide 17)
Listen again to what the Bible passage says…
You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvellous - and how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born.
Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. How precious are your thoughts about me, O God!
The imminent arrival of any one of us might have been a surprise to our PARENT… it may have been a surprise that was welcomed, or it may have been news that was greeted with some anxiety. But right from the start you were good news to God. He wasn’t taken by surprise, he planned you and formed you and you are not here by accident.. you are here because GOD has placed you here. He planned your life.. and if you want to know WHY.. if you want to know what your purpose is.. then you need to ask him.
Quote from the book p. 21
(Slide 18)
“In my twenty-seventh year, while riding the metro in Leningrad.. I was overcome with a despair so great that life seemed to stop at once… Suddenly, all by itself a phrase appeared: Without God life makes no sense. Repeating it in astonishment, I rode the phrase up like a moving staircase, got out of the metro and walked into God’s light.”
Without God, your life.. my life makes no sense at all.
(Slide 19)
But we were planned by God….
With God…
we know that we have a purpose, a reason for living. A purpose that stands firm and secure, no matter how our feelings rise and fall. And knowing that we have a purpose for living, begins with knowing the truth that you and I are not here by accident. God panned us.
(Slide 20)
Now lets commit ourselves to discovering over the next few months, the reason we are here, the purpose that he has planned us to fulfil.
Each one of us needs to know what our purpose is, to know why God has given us this life to live.. and then with his help we can live it and make a real success of our life here by fulfilling his purpose for us.