August 26, 2007
Scripture
1 John 4:1-6
1Dear
friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they
are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2This is how you can recognize the Spirit of
God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is
from God, 3but every spirit that does not
acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which
you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.
4You, dear children, are from God and have
overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in
the world. 5They are from the world and therefore
speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6We are from God, and whoever knows God listens
to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we
recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.
1 Corinthians 12:1-11
1Now
about spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be ignorant. 2You know that when you were pagans, somehow or
other you were influenced and led astray to mute idols. 3Therefore
I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus
be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the
Holy Spirit.
4There are different kinds of gifts, but the
same Spirit. 5There are different
kinds of service, but the same Lord. 6There are
different kinds of working, but the same God works all of them in all men.
7Now to each one the manifestation of the
Spirit is given for the common good. 8To one there
is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of
knowledge by means of the same Spirit, 9to another
faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10to another miraculous powers, to another
prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in
different kinds of tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues. 11All these are the work of one and the same
Spirit, and he gives them to each one, just as he determines.
Message
Sacred Rhythms
“Discernment: Recognizing and
Responding to the Presence of God”
So.. have you
made any choices this week? My guess is, you have; and probably many of them. Most
of them, as I described to our children, were probably “heads-or-tails”
choices:
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Fish or spaghetti for dinner,
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Mojave tan or sunshine yellow paint for the kitchen,
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Just a trim, or a whole new hairstyle,
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What parking spot to grab at the mall,
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What home fix-up job to do first.
I think that God given us many choices in this world so that
we can celebrate our creativity and our individuality. But again, as I
mentioned to our kids, there are other choices God gives us for which He
desires us to come to Him with loving obedience and to seek His choice;
His will.
The act of discerning God’s will; to perceive the very
guidance of His Spirit in our lives today, is most certainly another way for us
to draw nearer to God, which has been the focus of our summer messages.
This morning after we
allow the Bible to speak of the importance of practicing discernment, and ways
in which God cultivates discernment in all of us, I want to offer some ideas
from Ruth Haley Barton’s book, Sacred Rhythms, as to some steps you can
take to better discern God’s guidance when you make crucial decisions in life.
1. The importance of Discernment
Just over a
year ago, Scotland Yard conducted a private exhibition of forged paintings for
art dealers. Their objective was to wake-up their select audience about the
sale of forgeries. For despite the art dealers’ over-confidence in their
ability to recognize artists’ works, and their blind trust in proper
documentation, the dealers were shocked to discover that an estimated 40% of
the art market was made up of forgeries
Fiona Ford, of the Association
of Arts & Antiques Dealers, said the level of skill displayed by the
forgers was "terrifying." She added, "If every dealer saw this
exhibition, it would further impress on them how careful they have to be."
Associated Press, "Police Display Fakes at Exhibition
to Warn Art Dealers," www.topix.net (posted on 11-23-06)
If you hear nothing else in the next 20
minutes, hear this… be careful how you live. Be careful to discern who is
guiding your life. Be careful to discern that as you identify yourself as a
“Christian”, that indeed His Spirit is guiding you. If it is, you don’t have to
worry; as the Apostle John proclaimed in
1
John 4:4
…..the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world:…
But as John
also pointed out in one of the scriptures we just read, you must not believe
every spirit you sense in this world, for indeed there are both godly and
ungodly spirits trying to lead us.
Human
acknowledgement of these guiding spirits seems to range wildly from total
disbelief in spirits to a deep interest in them. C.S. Lewis wrote in his classic
book, The Screwtape Letters,
There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can
fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to
believe, and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. They
themselves are equally pleased by both errors and hail a materialist or a
magician with the same delight. – C.S. Lewis, Screwtape Letters
Today as I discourage those extremes of either disbelief or
unhealthy interest, I encourage us to recognize the reality of holy and unholy
spiritual influences, and to have only enough interest in evil spirits to know
how to stand against them in your life
and in the world.
First of all consider, if you will, the
context of John’s first letter, and the problems faced by the early Church.
Today, we have the Bible upon which we stand, including the Gospels of the New
Testament as well as the letters that have already been discerned by early
Christian leaders as being the inspired Word of God. But the early church,
consisting mainly of isolated house churches in cities throughout the
Early on some of these house churches might
have heard a selection of stories about Jesus and his teachings, perhaps they
even had a letter or two from the apostles. So oral communications were even
more essential in their day, as Paul sent out Timothy and Silas, and John sent
out elders to relay more and more information and teachings to these house
churches.
But
there we also others; “prophets” by name who would go out to visit and offer
spiritual teachings. Now, when we hear the word “Prophet” we tend to assume a
prophet “from God”, but in truth a prophet was technically any person who
served as a mouthpiece for a spirit. That is why John and others can refer in
the scriptures to “false” prophets and “false” teachers, whenever they sensed
that these people were not speaking by the Holy Spirit of God.
Can we appreciate how vulnerable the early
church was, before the New Testament was canonized, before church leaders
agreed upon creeds which helped to summarize the basic Christian beliefs?
In his first letter, John was warning the
Christians in these scattered house churches that they needed to be careful…
that they needed to be deliberate about discerning God’s Holy Spirit, who would
draw them closer to Christ and to the Father, from spirits of this world that
would steer them away from God and the salvation they had in Jesus.
John’s
advise: Ask three questions
1.
Does this teaching
acknowledge the reality of Jesus human existence? Believe it or not,
there are people today who would argue that Jesus never existed. In John’s day
there were cults that believed that Jesus came in spirit only and just appeared
to have a body of flesh.
2.
Does this teaching
acknowledge that Jesus was also divine, that he is God incarnate in human flesh?
3.
Does this teaching
(and teacher) honor Jesus as Lord? In the Bible we have stories of demons
Jesus’ encountered in others who knew who Jesus was, but they would not
acknowledge his lordship over their lives.
Next time you listen to someone who touts
himself or herself as an “anointed” preacher or prophet, use these questions to
discern the spirit who is speaking to you.
Discerning true from
false teaching can be a life-or-death issue. The writer of Proverbs declares
that
Proverbs
8:35
… whoever finds me(wisdom) finds life
and receives favor from the LORD.
Today we trust TSA
workers at the airports to use their training to discern treats to our lives. I
don’t remember if I ever told you of the time I was traveling with my family to
As I stood between him
and a second TSA employee, in front of the screen they was observing, I saw the
contents of my bag come up as an x-ray. And there I saw the outline of a
plastic maple syrup jug (a gift to my brother) next to my palm pilot, all
intertwined with cell phone charging cords.
Friends, I couldn’t have
constructed a better looking fake bomb if I had tried.
The TSA men keep me by
their side as they carefully opened my bag, pulled out the jug, and using sterile
gauze they wiped the top of the jug and placed the gauze in their
explosives-testing machine.
After about 10 seconds,
the TSA man turned to me and said “Maple Syrup.” I thanked him for acting upon
his training, for the steps he took to discern the situation, and then walked
down to the gate with Carole and the girls.
Accurate discernment is
important for life.
If the Apostle John
proclaims the importance of discernment for life, the Apostle Paul’s words in 1
Corinthians 12 reminded us that discernment is so important that some
Christians are actually given a spiritual gift to discern between spirits.
Their gift of discernment
is as real and as remarkable as that of Ed Faubert. Faubert is what you call a "cupper"—in
layman's terms, he's a coffee-taster. His gifted, discerning taste buds are
actually certified by the state of
So refined is Ed Faubert's
sense of taste for coffee that even while blindfolded, it has been reported
that he can take one sip of coffee and tell you “not just that it is
from Guatemala, but from what state it comes, at what altitude it was grown,
and on what mountain."
Leonard
Sweet, The
Gospel According to Starbucks
(Waterbrook Press, 2007), p. 54
I don’t know if I have such a refined gift of
spiritual discernment, but I do remember a time early in my ministry with you
when, just minutes before our worship of God began, three oriental visitors
came in our doors and asked to talk to the pastor. They explained that they
were missionaries from
In
addition to feeling caught off-guard, I also remember feeling very uneasy about
these visitors. They ended up staying to worship with us, even though I
politely denied them the time they requested. After the service, they gave me
an invitation for, and a poster announcing, an interfaith breakfast hosted by
the
It
was really in retrospect that I saw at least a momentary gift of
discernment manifested in my uneasiness. Other have and use that gift often
within the church, and like all spiritual gifts it need to be recognized,
appreciated, and fully utilized for healthy congregational life.
But
like the spiritual gift of evangelism, discernment is something all Christians
are encouraged to develop, for it is an ability that comes with increasing
Christian maturity. Ernest Larkin, a highly respected catholic theologian,
teacher and priest once wrote:
Discernment in its fullness
takes a practiced heart, fine-tuned to hear the word of God and the
single-mindedness to follow that word in love. It is truly a gift from God, but
not one dropped from the skies fully formed. It is a gift cultivated by a
prayerful life and the search for
self-knowledge. - Ernest Larkin
God
will train us for discerning spirits as we become attuned to subtle spiritual
dynamics. And when we are, we will be able to distinguish between what draws us
closer to God, and what draws us away from God; in short, what is good from
what is evil.
God desires to cultivate the gift of discernment
in all of us:
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He will
train us through expectant prayer .
James 1:5-6
5If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously
to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. 6But
when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a
wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind.
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As I illustrated earlier, God will use our reflections of past experiences to make us sensitive
to future spiritual dynamics.
To understand this, all we need to do is think about our
New England Patriots football team and understand the importance of them
studying their game films over and over again. For they do so in order to learn
from their mistakes. They do so to understand themselves; particularly how they
reacted in effective or ineffective ways to the actions of their opponents.
They also look at game films of their opponents in coming
week, so that they can more quickly react, almost automatically, in their
future games.
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The most power tool
God uses to help us discern is His written Word made real to us by His Spirit.
Though the world fights the idea of
ultimate truth, when we are trying to discern good from evil, healthy from
unhealthy, or righteousness from unrighteousness, there needs to be a compass,
a standard, a ruler that keeps us orientated to life. That is what the
Bible is.
I
am told that deep sea divers, and salvage divers who often find themselves in
dark places underwater, often times so disorientated that they don’t know up
from down.
But
there is one thing that will always orient them aright. The bubbles; the
bubbles they make as they breathed out; and they always travel upward. If they
would simply remember to feel them with their hands, even a blind person could
tell which end was up underwater.
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In the 66 books of the Bible we have a reality
library—stories, letters, guidelines, and examples from God that tell us what
is true and real. Terry Carter,
Scott Duvall, and Daniel Hays, Preaching
God's Word (Zondervan, 2005), p. 41-42 |
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An interesting note to us, as a family of faith aiming to expose our
children and youth to the Bible, is that a study reported four years ago that
while 95% of teenagers had been exposed by their churches to the Bible, only
53% said that their church experience helped them to understand the Bible
enough to help them make decisions based on biblical principles.
"Real Religion," Christian Parenting Today (Winter
2003)
We need to do better than that. God has given
us His word to help us discern life’s greatest choices
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Discernment is a critical
aspect of us being able to live in loving obedience to God.
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When we remember Jesus’ decisions in the
wilderness; saying “No!” to the Devil and “Yes!” to His Father’s will;
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when we consider His prayerful time alone,
before choosing His disciples;
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when we remember His agony at
….we too need to be equipped
and encouraged to discern God’s will at critical times in our lives.
2.So this morning I want to offer some additional ideas from Ruth Haley Barton’s book, Sacred Rhythms,
presenting steps you could take to better discern God’s guidance for your life.
1.
Be clear
on what you are trying to discern.
For some of our high school
youth, this is a year of discerning what college to attend. For some, the
choices are clear, but for others, different choices need to be discerned first.
A University president use to always say that the first question that needs to
be asked is whether you want a big or small college experience. After
discerning the best setting for you, you can be clearer on other choices you
need to discern.
2.
Check
your trust level in God’s goodness toward you.
This is almost too basic to
discuss at his point, but if you don’t believe that our Heavenly Father loves
you and only directs you in ways that will cause you to be able to discover
fullness in life, then the whole process of discernment is mute.
Matthew 7:11
If you, then, though you are
evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more
will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
3.
Check
you faith in the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Similar to your trust in God’s
goodness, discernment requires that you trust the Holy Spirit to guide you in
the process. You are not alone reading your Bible and trying to understand. You
are not alone reflecting over past spiritual experiences. God is working in
you, facilitating the discernment process through his Holy Spirit. Do you
believe that?
4.
Check
your willingness to love at this time.
It is because God is love that
as we discern his will for our lives, our final actions should always be acts
of love; love for God, love for neighbors and a genuine love for one’s selves.
It may be tough love or sacrificial love, but as we seek to discern God’s will
we must always be ready and willing to love.
5.
Notice
if you are “indifferent” to everything but the will of God. This
phrasing is tricky, but it points us to ulterior motives. Here we need to ask ourselves some tough
questions about whether God’s will is really our priority. We need to ask
ourselves:
-
Are we trying to discern a “god-sign” to justify
our pre-determined conclusion? Or
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Can we let go of our attachment to a particular
outcome?
Discernment requires openness to seeing truth, and not simply expressing
our personal preferences.
It is said that the
legendary film actor, Charlie Chaplin, had become so popular that look-alike
contests to his “tramp” character, were always springing up around the world.
One time while vacationing, Charlie Chaplin secretly entered a contest , but he
failed to even make the finals.
source:
www.snopes.com
Think about those judges.
What were they looking for, if Charlie Chaplin himself was rejected?
If we are not really
looking for God’s will, why do we ask him to help us to discern it?
6.
Take
time, and seek insight from trusted Christian friends
You have to appreciate the powerful and
truthful words of Paul Little:
It sounds terribly spiritual to say "God led me",
but I am always suspicious of a person who implies that he has a
"personal" pipeline to God. When no one else senses that what the
person suggests is the will of God, then we had better be careful. God has been
blamed for the most outlandish things by people who have confused their own
inverted pride with God's will.
"Affirming
the Will of God" (Great Sermons of
the 20th Century, compiled by Peter F. Gunther). Christianity Today, Vol. 33,
no. 14.
How dangerous it is to ride solo in a church
fellowship. How dangerous it is to discern your future with only the help of
non-Christian friends. Again, what spirit is guiding your feelings and conclusions?
7.
When
one option seems clearer, take time to “walk around as if”… See if you sense an
inner peace or freedom , as you pretending you have already made that
choice.
The key here is to take time. What a
difficult thing to do when we are always in such a hurry. During my years of
ministry in
Don’t do that to yourself when
you are trying to discern which way to go!
8.
Finally,
after you have sense peace about a specific direction, take it,
knowing that God will remain with you.
I offer
this point because this is where the rubber meets the road. Discernment has a
very practical ending, and it calls for that final leap of faith. But remember
that the net of God’s presence is under you when you jump.
I appreciate the very practical steps
Barton offers us when trying to deal with the complicated task of discernment.
She says: “Ultimately, discernment is about falling in love and letting that
decide everything.” (p. 126)
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It is about loving God so much that we yield all our life to
his will,
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It is about loving our neighbors as ourselves so much that
all we want to do for them and for us is what God would do.
Discernment of God’s will and the leading of His Spirit is
extremely important, but it not an exact science for us human beings. Again, as
Barton writes:
Discernment is
risky, and there are no guarantees; we can never be absolutely sure that
we have discerned everything correctly. We are, after all, limited and fallen.
But what we can know for sure is that God is with us, that the desire to please
God does, in fact, please him, and that he will never leave us or forsake us.
That is the most important thing we need to know. – Ruth Haley Barton,
Sacred Rhythms, p. 126
Draw
closer to God as you seek to discern His Spirit and His will for your life. AMEN
Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE,
NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION
©.Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by
International Bible Society.
Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing
House. All rights reserved.
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