This sermon explores Paul’s encouragement to his young disciple Timothy amidst persecution and difficulty. It explores the depth of the Christian’s commitment through the metaphor of a soldier. What separates a Good Soldier from a Bad Soldier? Listen to Paul’s counsel.

<p>This sermon explores Paul’s encouragement to his young disciple Timothy amidst persecution and difficulty. It explores the depth of the Christian’s commitment through the metaphor of a soldier. What separates a Good Soldier from a Bad Soldier? Listen to Paul’s counsel.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Great Lakes Adventist Academy

Fall Week of Prayer 2012

Sebastien Braxton

In the Midst of Chaos

Father in heaven, you know that this man is but dust in your sight.

And Lord, we are praying for your blessing not because the speaker is special, but because the People who are here are special.

You have paid an immense cost for every life in this room.

So it is our prayer that as we study being Not only Yours by creation, but Yours by redemption, that You would speak to our hearts in a very special way.

That You would show us Christ as we've never seen Him before, and that we would not resist the drawing of His Holy Spirit.

This is our prayer, And we trust that you will help this to be our experience for we ask in Jesus name.

Amen If you have your Bibles when it'll be starting in Genesis chapter 1 and verse 1.

Genesis chapter 1 and verse 1, probably the easiest verse for many of you to quote.

The Bible says, in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

The earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved The midst of the deep The Bible assumes from the very first verse the existence of God So just from Genesis chapter 1 in verse 1 it says in the beginning God first thing off atheism is not an option according to the worldview of the Bible And just by the way, there are many individuals who don't know this, but speaking on secular universities, many people don't really claim to be atheists.

Because for an individual who believes in God, I make a claim according to Genesis 1 verse 1 that God is there But not only God is there God was there before the beginning and they say well I'm atheist and atheist is just a common a combination of 2 Greek words the first Greek letter alpha That's the a and theos God, But whenever you put Alpha in front of another word in Greek, that is the negation of the thing.

So to say, A-Theos, Which means there is no God.

In order for you to say there is no God, nowhere in the universe, you'd have to be the very thing that you don't believe in.

Because an individual in debates, This happens all the time on secular campuses.

Yes, and you're 100% sure there is no God Yes, what about in drama to galaxy could God be there?

Don't know so then you're not an atheist.

You're an agnostic Alpha the negative gnosis means knowledge.

So you're not an atheist, you're an agnostic.

You don't know if God is in Andromeda or what about the other 200 billion galaxies that are out there?

Okay, so you're not an atheist, you're an agnostic.

But Genesis 1 says, no, it's not agnostic.

You can know that God is there In the beginning God, but not only is it that God is there the Bible says that God created the heavens and the earth, which means God existed before the heavens and the earth and if God existed before the heavens and the earth, the heavens and the earth are not God that is a belief of what we call pantheism that all things, pan meaning everything, world, like if you ever heard of a pandemic before That means a disease that is spreading globally Pantheism is God is Everything so your God.

I'm God the acorn is God the tree outside is God That's pantheism and by the way 1 of our pioneers got into that his name was Kellogg That's how he apostatized You think people don't believe it but as bright as he was and he went to the University of Michigan Medical School As bright as he was he fell into pantheism So no atheism no agnosticism no pantheism And then there's 1 more ism that we need to discuss and that is materialism Things that are physical are not eternal God created things Once something has a physical existence, it had a beginning.

The heavens, the earth, anything that is in them, He created them, which means He existed before them.

They have not always been, And they probably will not always be But there are some individuals who believe in materialism But the Bible goes on to say in verse 2 that the earth was without form and void And it says darkness was on the face of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.

I love this because Whenever you had a Jewish family that was raising their children and they wanted to teach them Hebrew They start from Genesis chapter 1.

I grew up in a Jewish community just north of Chicago They all after school.

They go to Hebrew school So we're waiting for the bus.

They're like, yeah I have to wait for my dad because I have to go to Hebrew school I'm like you going to another school after you got out of school.

Yes To learn Hebrew so that when they get to their bar and bat mitzvah when they turn 13 Then have to quote certain portions of the Old Testament in Hebrew.

And that is evidence that you've now transferred from boyhood to manhood.

But they start from Genesis chapter 1 and you say right here in the beginning When the Bible says the earth was without form and void, it is this Hebrew phrase, tohu vobohu.

Sounds kind of weird, kind of like tofu, right?

Which is true, without form and void of flavor.

So here you have tohu vobohu, which means this.

Without form, that means it has no structure.

You see, when I look at you, you have a form, Which means there is a boundary between you and the things around you Like your body ends your skin ends so you can say he has a form right?

So when Jesus humbled himself and took upon himself the form of a man Before this Jesus had no form But he took a form defined this is a triangle this is a square It's a formed this thing into a ball But the Bible says the earth had no form there was no boundaries, but not only that it was void That means it had no substance So it has no boundary and it has no substance.

Well this phrase throughout the Bible in the Old Testament is used to relate to wilderness to chaos and The Bible says that here God is looking down at the earth and he says the earth is in chaos It is without form and it is void and the question is What does God do when he sees chaos?

And as God comes in, the Bible says, and darkness was on the face of the deep.

So not only is this thing without form, not only is it void, it's empty, It's covered in darkness So you have dark voiceless formless, whatever and It says the very first thing that happens is the Spirit of God moves on the face of the waters In other words this young Hebrew boy as he's learning the Hebrew scriptures the first thing he learns about his God, when he goes back to the lessons of creation, is that God's Spirit moves in the midst of chaos.

In other words, that when things are falling apart, when things are not coming together, when things don't make sense, when things have turned into chaos, and please believe, chaos is not just reserved for the physical world, it's reserved for the emotional world.

According to statistics, 40% of you should be cutting yourselves because of emotional pain.

You are the most suicidal group of people on the face of the earth are high school students.

And the Bible says that the Spirit of God moves in the midst of chaos.

You say, Sebastian, what are you talking about chaos?

You know, I was in the United States Marine Corps when September 11th happened.

And that's what was interesting for me last week, when it was 9-11, it was Tuesday again, just like the first 9-11.

And I remember being in the military, and when I saw this thing on the news, I already knew I was going to get the phone call.

And I was in Atlanta at the time and so they had to shut down the CDC.

They were afraid that something else would be attacked, like the Center for Disease control, which would be a very bad thing to release all those diseases on the public at the same time.

So anyway, I had an opportunity to go in and as we checked in, you know, we had a video from the president, George W.

Bush, and he says, we are in a state of emergency, et cetera, et cetera, as our servicemen to our country, we're gonna need you more than ever, da, da, da, da, da, the whole inspirational thing from the president.

But then you start getting these stories in about what's happening actually on the ground in September 11th.

And so in the light of defining for you and I what chaos looks like, I'd like to tell you this story about 9-11.

Then I'll tell you another story at the end.

And while she's on the West Coast her significant other lives in New York City he works in these high-rise buildings in New York and while they were dating he decided in 1 of his trips, you know, to fly her out to New York and he was gonna wine and dine her and then he was gonna ask her to marry him.

I have decided I'm ready to spend the rest of my life with this woman.

So he flew her out, took her around, and then boom, the last day before it was time to leave, he got down on 1 knee and he said, hey, listen, I want to spend the rest of my life with you.

And she gets on a plane and she flies back to California.

Then on September 10th, 2001, in the evening she said, you know what, I'm ready to make my decision.

And so she calls his work office to leave a voice message.

So when he comes in, in the morning of September 11th, that he will hear her emphatic yes, I wanna spend the rest of my life with you.

Only to find out when she turns on the news that day that her would-be fiance just died in a plane crash, except he was in a building on 9-11.

And this woman said, now that I found the person that I want to spend the rest of my life with, snuffed out by terrorism.

The Heartless, the Spineless, and the Nameless

And so Father, because you have thought of this moment from the beginning of time, we pray that you would give us the blessing that you have chosen.

That somehow Lord, you would use this man who stands before us to preach your word, you would use him in spite of himself.

And we pray for the spirit of God to be moving in our hearts, in our ears, and in our minds, that you may awaken us to the reality of God and of eternity.

And We pray, Lord, that as he speaks, that you may help us to see Jesus.

And we trust that you will help this to be our experience.

I heard that there was an incident, people couldn't get into their dorm to get their Bibles.

I guess tomorrow you just carry it with you all day.

Luke, chapter 23, if you have your Bibles.

We're going to be beginning a series of messages tonight answering the question, Why did Jesus die?

Most of you, your immediate answer is Jesus died to pay for our sins That's your first question But I want to ask the question from a very practical standpoint How did Jesus go from ministering in Galilee and in Judea to ending up nailed to a piece of wood?

Why did he die and who decided to concede to this process?

So in Luke the 23rd chapter the Bible says in verse 13, Then Pilate, when he had called together the chief priests, the rulers and the people, said to them, You have brought this man to me as 1 who misleads the people.

And indeed, having examined him in your presence, I have found no fault in this man concerning those things of which you accuse him.

No, neither did Herod, for I sent you back to him, and indeed Nothing deserving of death has been done by him.

I will therefore chastise him and release him.

This is interesting because we'll look at Pilate tomorrow evening.

But this is interesting because it is not just Pilate that is listening to the words that he is saying.

It is the Jews, it is the chief priests, the rulers, Peter and John who are in the audience, and also the soldiers that are there.

And Tonight we're going to focus upon the soldiers The soldiers heard their governor the man who commands them The man who holds their lives in his hands they heard him say I find no fault with this man in other words Jesus is innocent Now you have to keep this in mind when you consider the behavior of the soldiers That while you stand you hear the governor who decides justice, who decides punishment, say this man right here I find no fault, not even 1.

No cause of death and not only did I find no fault, Herod found no fault with this man.

And so the Bible says in verse 26, Now as they led him away, that's the soldiers, They laid hold of a certain man, Simon a Cyrenian, who was coming from the country, and on him they laid the cross that he might bear it after Jesus.

Then we have a discussion with the multitude, so let's skip down to verse 32 and the Bible says there were also 2 others criminals led with him to be put to death And when they had come to the place called Calvary, or Golgotha, there they did what?

There they crucified Him, right there in the place called Calvary and The criminals 1 on the right hand and the other on the left in verse 34.

It says then Jesus said Father forgive them for they do not know what they do After pause here for a moment to make my first point about the soldiers.

You see in a very practical sense Jesus died because soldiers nailed him to a cross.

They physically held Jesus down to this piece of wood, they took the nails, held it above his physical hands, and they took a hammer and they began to hit the hammer until it not only went through his hands but into the wood, solidly into the wood.

These are not men who don't lift weights.

These are not scrawny little individuals who just enrolled because they're hyped up about being in the military.

And the first point to make about these Roman soldiers tonight is that these individuals were heartless Say why do you say heartless?

Because here You have an individual who knows from the very lips of the judge himself that this man is innocent.

So why then are you crucifying Jesus as a soldier if according to the governor, according to Herod, and according to yourself this man is innocent?

Well that's because the soldier would answer to you, why did you kill Jesus?

The soldier would say, I was just doing my job.

I was just following orders now this is interesting because these are the individuals that boggle our minds in terms of the murders that take place in history.

If you just take a moment to reflect for a second on all the tragedies that have taken place on this planet.

I've seen the people with the machete scars on their head.

I've been to the place where they lined up children and they divided them based upon their tribe, regardless of their age.

And to go there and ask yourself the question that men did not use rifles they use machetes You know what it takes to kill a person with a knife but not just a person a million of them in a hundred days.

They said the Hutu soldiers, when they would go out to kill Tutsis, they would leave like a job from 9 to 5.

And they were so used to slashing all day long that they would come home and they would continue Slashing into the night because their muscles were so cramping up all the time that they had to do this motion and just leaving corpses in the street.

And you ask the question to 1 of them individuals, why were you killing these Tutsi people?

They said, if you don't kill them, we will kill your family.

You go over to Nazi Germany, you're talking about putting babies in an oven just to see what happens.

You're talking about putting individuals on a certain diet upon which they can subsist And as they put them on this diet, they say I just want you to have enough food so that you don't die But I don't want you to have enough food to actually have strength.

And to do this for 4 years as a German soldier, and then after World War II was over, they asked them the question.

They say, why would you do this to individuals?

Why were you destroying their businesses?

Why were you kidnapping their children and putting them in ovens?

And you know what the response was in the courtroom?

It was voted by the leaders of a nation to exterminate a particular people group?

And when the judge got tired of hearing that answer, he turned to the man and he says, okay, you keep saying it was the law, now I have a question for you.

Something may be in harmony with the law, but is it ethical?

And the German soldier would respond and say, at first I didn't like it, but eventually you get used to it.

And so I want to suggest to you tonight that just like these soldiers, in terms of why did Jesus die?

Because people were just following orders.

Because people were just doing what they were told.

And I suggest to you tonight that there are many of us in this room right now we look back at the crucifixion and we're tired of hearing the sob stories, and please believe Jesus is right there with you.

Because right in this chapter, he tells them the women are weeping, Jesus says, don't weep for me.

The goal of the crucifixion was not for you and I to cry.

These preachers who get up try to make you see the blood and the gore.

It's to open your eyes to see that when you and I are in a situation where you're tested on right and wrong, and you decide to do wrong because you say, I'm just doing my job.

What if it became a policy of the school to mistreat individuals because of the color of their skin What do you do then?

And it wasn't too long ago that was this policy in school And there are many of you that would have killed Jesus because you're just following orders.

There are many people in the 1960s who would not refuse to serve people because of the color of their skin.

Reality Check

Not a day goes by that we are not depending on something outside of ourselves.

Today is no different, but yet you are the same as well.

Your love is more constant than the sun and your presence more than the air that we breathe.

We pray today that you would speak to us in a very special way.

We don't want the blessing of yesterday, we want the blessing of today.

And we pray that this man who is but dust in your sight, that you would use him, and that you would breathe upon him breath of God and you would fill him with new life.

So that the words that come out of his mouth would show us Christ, and as we see Jesus, we would not resist as we are drawn to him and he is lifted up.

This is our prayer, and we trust That you will help this to be our experience, but we ask in Jesus name Amen Genesis 1 if you have your Bibles turn there with me I'm gonna be looking at that again a little more closely Genesis chapter 1 Dealing with lessons from creation much to learn so the Bible says that the earth was without form and void and darkness was upon the face of the deep and the Spirit of God moved in the midst of chaos.

And we went on to see in verse 3 that the Bible says, Then God said, Let there be light.

So we pick up from this very notion that though the earth is in chaos it is without form and void.

This thing is at the very height, at the very edge of nothingness.

This is like the worst scenario, the worst situation.

On top of the fact that it's in darkness and Yet we find that this young Hebrew boys.

He's learning Hebrew Reading Genesis for the first time he learns that his God is not afraid of chaos.

There is no situation that stumps God There is no problem.

There is no crisis in your life that God says I can't handle this I might have to step back from this situation I don't know if I can get my hands dirty to help you out of this situation that you are in You could not have gone to such depths of darkness and chaos and maybe even utter oblivion as the earth was in that God feels that he can do nothing.

And so this God is not afraid of your chaos He's not afraid of your problem.

He's not afraid of your crisis But the Bible says not only does the Spirit of God move But there are many times that as we go through the various crises of life.

We don't want to just see God move We want to hear him This is why most of us struggle to pray is because we cannot bear the silence of God How many times as I've prayed to you for my parents to get back together?

How many times have I prayed that you would help me overcome this temptation and yet I fall time and time again?

As I told you yesterday or last night, I went to speak at an academy several years ago, and after I'd spoken a message on the grace of God and the power of the grace of God, not this fluffy grace we talk about, unmerited favor.

So after we finished discussing and studying on the grace of God, the principal and the chaplain and the pastor pulled me aside and they said, Sebastian, we need to talk to you.

And I thought I'd spoken some sort of heresy or something.

And I was thinking, well, maybe that's the end of my week of prayer.

But they said, no, no, no, no, we're not concerned with their messages.

And they said well we have a student he's 15 and he has Been struggling with the issue of masturbation He's been caught several times by staff He's been caught several times by staff.

He's been caught several times by other students.

And as we've sat him down, we haven't told his parents.

And we said, listen, you know, Do you want to get over this?

I don't want to deal with masturbation He says I'm trying but I just don't know how to stop So they said listen, we're just wondering, you know, would you be willing to sit down and talk to him and give us some counsel?

He says he wants to quit, but he's just struggling.

We tell him, study the Bible, read the Bible, pray, you know, claim these promises, and it does not work.

And some of us may wonder like this young man, how many times do I have to pray before you move God?

As if you're not interested in helping me in my situation and This is why many of us cease to pray Because nothing changes and we cannot bear the silence or the indifference of God.

And so the Bible says that yes, the spirit of God moves, but God also speaks.

And It's unique to hear God speak because God is not like your mom.

He's not gonna come and speak and you say, honey, I know that it's a rough situation and she can rub your shoulder and try to console you and comfort you and say it's gonna be all right.

That's all nice and well and good, but that doesn't change the situation God's not like that.

God's not like your dad who can come and say listen son.

We're gonna get through this I'll do what I can on my side to try to help this thing reconcile, but here again even your dad is limited But it is unique for a person who believes in the Bible.

For God to speak something is very significant according to creation.

For God to answer, to open his mouth is a serious divine act.

In verse 3, the Bible says, God said, let there be light, and what are those next 4 words and There was light Now in this situation you say when God spoke let there be light was he on a drafting table And he took out some photons or whatever matter he had or nothing and in just in thin air God just started cutting out pieces of light and sharpening this thing and say let there be light or when God said let there be light was it like a slow dim in the distance of the darkness in the abyss of the earth and it just slowly kind of warmed up over the horizon.

The Bible says when God said let there be light there was light.

But you see in different days of creation they put it a little differently.

Then God said, let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters and let it divide the waters from the waters.

Thus God made the firmament and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament, and what are those next 4 words?

So, now if anybody is a big word person like I am, I think words are significant.

There's a lot of depth to language that we lose, especially in this generation of texting and cutting everything short.

Now people start talking like that out loud.

What in the world just laugh But there's a power in words And so in English when you see the word so s o the word so means in like manner Can you say that in?

Like manner or if you wanted to be a little more less technical in the same way according to something else so when the bible says god said let there be a firmament eventually the statement is made it was so what do you mean so it was according to what God said but let's go again to another verse verse 9 the Bible says then God said let the waters under the heavens be gathered together in 1 place and let the dry land appear and what does it say?

Verse 11, then God said, let the earth bring forth grass, the herb that yields seed and the fruit tree that yields fruit according to its kind whose seed is in itself, on the earth.

It seems, we continue on in this pattern, verse 15, we could go on and on.

When God says something, the person who's giving us the creation account, which we believe is Moses, he's giving us the historical perspective.

He's saying, okay, God said, past tense, let there be light, and there was light.

God said, let there be these trees and plants and food and it was so but if we were speaking presently right now in the present tense Moses would say God said you are accepted in the Beloved it is so It is so not because you saw it, not because you felt it, but because God said it.

That means reality, listen to what I'm about to say, reality is determined by the Word of God.

You see, before there was darkness upon the face of the deep.

So there was darkness and God said, let there be what?

Is it because the darkness felt like there was light is it because the darkness just has the ability to produce light in and of itself no so what are we saying here what we're saying is here you have a situation of chaos.

Without form and void, God comes to the chaos and he says, listen to me.

When I speak to this chaos, my spirit moves first.

Series

Fall Week of Prayer 2012

The Good Soldier

Transcript

Description

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

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The Mount of Blessings

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