CPAC sermon 17 Aug 2008 Matt 15:21-28
For children’s talk… the McDonald brothers Dick McDonald & Mac McDonald
· Started McDonalds restaurant nearly 60 yrs ago, burger 15c, shake 20c, fries 10c!
· Ray Croc was paper cup salesman; he wanted ways to fill more cups and so sell more cups so hit upon the Multimix machine making shakes – became associated with McD bros thro these machines.
· Croc helped with the McD branding (Speedee then Golden Arches) & he helped them open new restaurants; then in the 60’s the McD bros sold Croc the rights to the McD brand making him eventually a very wealthy man. They were happy to do that, saying, “We have all the money we need. We’re very happy with what we have”.
· Hebrews 13:5 “Don’t love money. Be happy with what you have. God has said, “I will never fail you! I will never abandon you!” (& see verse 6)
Matthew 15:21ff – key points:
· Gentile (non Jewish) woman’s daughter is very unwell. She asks Jesus for help
· Jesus ignores her, doesn’t even speak to her!
· Disciples tell her to go away; she persists
· Jesus says He hasn’t come to help her, only the Jews but she persists
· In the end He heals her daughter! Inspite of our situation, God will ALWAYS come through for us - remember His promise to us in Hebrews 13:5,6, etc. God cannot help but help us! That is His nature, His love, His mercy, His grace….
* [Use Daniel Binet in Burwood Unit in Ch’church Hospital as an illustration of persisting with God and trusting God to come through for us….]
* Refer to our ONE Prayers summarised – up to 60 prayers collected on 6 pages – fantastic! … they will be built into CPAC’s strategic planning for next 18 months… fuller details out soon
We need to talk ourselves up as a church… let us be happy with what we have – we have a great church family! Let us be proud of what God has done in and through CPAC, what He is continuing to do and what He will do in the near and distant future! When we trust God and say, “We are what we are and we are happy with who we are in you Lord”, then we are showing that we trust God, and that we are allowing God the space to “never fail us nor abandon us!”
No one said it would be easy though.
Note that there is always a cost involved to being a disciple of Christ and to making disciples. Note Jesus’ parable about the need to understand the cost and implications when planning to build something.
Obedience costs.
Real discipleship costs
What’s the price?
It is giving up our small personal agendas that can detract from what God is wanting to do.
The price is being prepared to forsake our comfortable lives (metaphorically speaking).
Being prepared to give up claims of ownership to affluence and to security.
Like the McDonald brothers, being prepared to say
“I’m happy with what I have!”
500 years ago a young Francis Xavier was a missionary in
He dreamed of returning to
Why?
So he could go shouting up and down the streets telling the students of that day to give up their small ambitions and come eastward with him to preach the gospel of Christ!
We won’t all be Francis Xavier’s but we can all be zealous for God, just like him, being obedient and accepting of our lot and of God’s call on our lives.
In putting in place a strategic plan and offering up a bunch of ONE Prayers to God (see summarised ONE prayers) we have begun the process of interacting as a church to discover what God’s will is for us collectively.
In this collective process, our corporate contribution as a church we may be talking about applying our computer skills, offering our generous hospitality,
offering our gifts in leading a small group or playing a musical instrument,
offering our gift of helping to set up chairs for a Sunday service
or get along side someone who needs help with budgeting, or simply needs a listening ear and a helping hand, prison & elderly care visiting, helping “green” our community, speaking out about social justice issues, and so on and so on.
Be very aware that sometimes, maybe we are all trying to do a little too much.
We can’t do everything in the world in which we live.
I would like to, but I can’t!!!
And we’re going to have to begin to trust one another enough to use the skills and the abilities and the giftedness of the various members of our church family so that we can be move forward in obedience to God as His church.
So obedience means giving up our small personal ambitions.
Obedience means shifting our expectations to becoming a blessing instead of merely being blessed.
Obedience means getting to a point of saying “Dear God, I am content with who I am and where I am in my life. I give you the remainder of my life for you to direct me and to use me as you will”.
Obedience is losing your life in this way, for His sake.
It is denying your “old self”, and getting your “new self” to take up the cross of Christ.
“Taking up your cross” in Jesus’ day meant you wouldn’t need to worry much about the things that most people worry about.
Taking up your cross today may mean taking up the cause of Christ.
That is, you have put yourself at God’s disposal so thoroughly
that you have nothing left to lose.
That’s not easy – it’s a huge ask.
A old African parable told among believers in Christ, pictures just how tough it is to give up our own ambitions.
It goes like this …. READ… unquote.
So whose agenda are YOU following in your life at the moment,
yours or Gods?
And do you always need to know exactly WHY God is asking you to do a certain thing at a particular time in your life?
Sometimes as a follower of Christ, "ours is not to wonder why ,
ours is but to do and to die".
Who said these words and what do they mean?
It is from a poem called "The Charge of the Light Brigade" by Alfred
Tennyson. It was written after Tennyson read about The Charge of the
Light Brigade that happened during the Crimean War:
'Forward, the Light Brigade!'
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldiers knew
Some one had blunder'd:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do & die,
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
It basically means that soldiers on the battlefield must follow orders. They don't have time to consider the validity, or consequences, of the orders or their actions, lest they be killed in the moment that they do so.
Sometimes the Christian disciplines of denial of self, of solid prayer and reading and studying the bible, seem pointless.
But remember, whose agenda are your following?
Discipleship is a discipline with a purpose.
Jesus didn’t pander to the non Jewish woman. In the end, He did meet her needs though.
In the same way, Jesus doesn’t pander to our self-seeking instincts, and He will meet our need. This is what He says to us - I finish with these passages: Matt 10:37-39, Mark
