By Rev. Dr. Brent Russett – Asbury Free Methodist
August 20th, 2023- John 1:1-4, John 3:16
It is great to be back with you this morning after three weeks of vacation. You know how sometimes you come back from vacation, and it feels like you need a rest. I didn’t do that this time. I actually had some real downtime. So, I am walking into fall out of a place of rest – which is good.
I understand that you were in good hands while I was away. I heard that both Jeff and Shawn did a wonderful job. I am so thankful that I can go away and not worry about what is happening.
This week I spent some time with a lot of people. I have heard some fantastic stories of how God is at work in your life. This week I heard about a person being healed from some trauma in their life. I heard from a person who was finding God to be their comfort in the middle of some difficult circumstances. I talked to a person who God was giving them strength in the middle of some messy situations. I am so thankful for what God is doing in and around and through your people.
Of course, this past week was VBS. We had amazing volunteers. There were between 50 and 60 kids most days. From all reports, it was a great week. Here is something cool. At the beginning of the summer, we asked if you would sponsor some youth to go to camp. As you have a habit of doing, you stepped up.
Some of those youth who you sent to camp gave their hearts to the Lord. Some of those who gave their hearts to the Lord were some of the great volunteers at VBS. I think that is pretty cool.
This morning I want to talk about why do we do VBS? Why do we do church? What is the point of coming to church?
Last fall, Lynda and I went out for coffee at Starbucks with a woman who was asking questions about God and the church. She said to us, you are obviously here representing the Free Methodist Church. Lynda and I kind of looked at each other and said no. We like the Free Methodist Church -but it is not about the church. It is about Jesus.
I have known some churches where going to church and volunteering at the church and giving to the church was all about that particular church. But churches that make a difference are not about the church. They are about Jesus. That is why we will get together with a number of other churches again this year to worship Jesus. It’s about Jesus.
So, the question then becomes, what is Jesus about?
Mark 1:14–15 (NLT)
14 Later on, after John was arrested, Jesus went into Galilee, where he preached God’s Good News. 15 “The time promised by God has come at last!” he announced. “The Kingdom of God is near! Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!”
If you hang around Christians long enough, you will hear the word gospel. The meaning of the word gospel is good news.
That is why some translations of the bible phrase it this way
Mark 1:14–15 (NASB95)
Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, 15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel.”
What is Jesus about? This tells us that he was about the good news. He was about the gospel. So, he says, repent of your sins and believe the good news. Repent means that you have been walking away from God, and when you repent, you turn and walk towards God.
So, if the church is all about Jesus and Jesus is about the good news, the gospel. What is the gospel about? What does it mean to believe the gospel? What does believing in the good news do for us? Why repent and believe the good news.
****
When I was young, it seemed like the main reason to believe the gospel was to get into heaven. And it wasn’t so much that we wanted to go to heaven; it was just that we wanted to avoid the alternative. I believe in heaven. I am looking forward to heaven. You need Jesus to get you into heaven. But if heaven is the main purpose of the gospel, then this life doesn’t really matter. But when you read scripture, you can’t get away from the fact that this life isn’t all there is, but this world, who you are and how you live your life matters to God.
So, a by-product of the gospel is that you get to go to heaven. But I don’t think you make a case from scripture that this is the main point of the gospel.
****
As I grew a little older, it seemed like the main purpose of the gospel was to get rid of sin. Now it is a little easier to get that idea from scripture. After all, the Bible is very clear. It says Christ died for our sins, according to the Scripture. The Bible is very clear, there is none righteous, no not one. The Bible is very clear, He who knew no sin became sin on our behalf.
The reason that Jesus died was to deal with our sins. And if you think sin doesn’t matter, then you must believe that the death of Christ was pointless. Easter is pointless. — Our sin put Jesus on the cross. And when you see how much our sin cost Jesus, you have to come to the conclusion that in God’s eyes, sin needed to be dealt with. God hates sin.
*****
There are a lot of people who think dealing with sin is the main purpose of the gospel.
The problem comes when we try to define sin. The traditional definition of sin is a “willful transgression of a known law.” I know something is bad – like stealing, but I go ahead and steal. That is sin. We have broken God’s laws. That is all true, but there is another aspect of sin.
I think it is just as accurate from scripture to talk about sin as poison. Have you ever seen a person poisoned by hate or bitterness? Have you ever seen someone poisoned by envy or jealousy? Have you ever met someone who is so full of themselves that they left a sour taste in your mouth? Have you ever met someone who is so judgemental that they poison those around them? If you have, you can see that sin is a poison to our hearts, our souls, our lives.
Here is what you need to know about God. God loves you. I don’t mean that he kind of likes you or tolerates you or is a little fond of you. He deeply, profoundly, passionately loves you. The reason that God hates sin so much is that it poisons us. It kills us.
If you have ever loved someone who is destroying their life by drugs or alcohol, you will get this. You love them deeply, but you hate what the alcohol is doing to them.
The gospel is about dealing with sin, just like it is about going to heaven. But it is more than that.
If all Jesus had to say was don’t drink the poison, then it would have been a great public service announcement. But there is a lot more to life than not doing something. The gospel goes much further than that.
Why does God hate sin? Sin brings death. The Bible says the wages of sin is death. Here is something else that you need to know about God. The reason why God hates sin that leads to death is that death is the opposite and the enemy of who God is. Death is against all that God is. God is the author of life. God is life. What is the purpose of the gospel? The gospel is about bringing life.
Let me quickly walk you through some of the book of John.
John 1:1–4 (NIV)
1 In the beginning was the Word, (John starts out his book talking about the word – who we will see a little further down, is Jesus) and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all humankind.
In Jesus was life, and out of the life came light – which is another way to speak of the truth. The life that came from Jesus shone a light on who God is and who we are.
Let’s go ahead a few chapters in the bible to the most familiar verse of the bible.
John 3:16 (NIV)
16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
I told you earlier that God really loves you. He loves you so much that he gave you Jesus. If you believe in Jesus, you are given eternal life.
Now I know that when people sometimes read the phrase, eternal life – and substitute it for heaven. But that is not what it is saying. Life starts here, and it continues on into heaven. But this verse is not so much about heaven as it is about life. Life starts now.
One more verse from John
John 10:10 (NIV)
10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.
If you were to ask Jesus what is the purpose of the gospel, he would say – I have come that they may have life and have it to the full. Jesus came that we might be full of life. Jesus came that you might experience abundant life. The purpose of the gospel is to walk you into life.
Now there are some reasons that he wants us to be full of life, and I don’t have time to get into that this morning.
Now I have been walking with Jesus long enough to know that the world’s definition of life is not the gospel life that Jesus is talking about. The world will tell you that life depends on you losing weight, or having the right car, or being in the right relationship, or having a lot of money. Those things are nice – but they don’t define real life. Those things are more about what surrounds you. Those things are about the context you live in. Some contexts are easier than others to thrive in.
But the context you live in doesn’t define life.
Life is something that happens on the inside. It is something that happens when, in spite of the context you live in, you have a deep sense of well-being. Life is something that happens when you are able to give and receive love. Life is something that happens when you are walking in peace and joy.
Here is what Jesus knew. Real life flows out of your relationship with God. Your ability to flourish will come from Jesus and what he has done for you.
****
As you might imagine, over my years as a pastor, I have met with a lot of people. One of my observations is that people’s lives are messy. The mess may stem from choices they made, or from things done to them, or the fact that we live in a broken world where grief and sickness and injustice abound.
When I say that people’s lives are messy, I am not being judgemental. There have been many times in my life where my life was really messy.
Here is the thing, there are some messes you can fix by making different choices. There are other messes you can fix only because God gives you the strength and power to make different choices. There are other messes that you can’t fix because what is happening is that other people’s messiness is making your life messy. You can’t change other people. There are other messes that you can’t fix because we live in a broken world where things like grief and sickness and relationship breakdown and injustice are real.
Here is the good news. God loves you right now, just as you are. You don’t need to clean up your mess to come to him. I have talked to people who say, I think if I were to come to church that the church would fall in on me. Here’s the thing, you haven’t been too bad for God. God takes you in the middle of your mess. God loves you in spite of the mess. God loves you.
If you have been around Asbury for a while, you have probably heard me say that Asbury is a place where you come as you are, no perfect people allowed. We say that because we recognize that life is messy.
But here is what God wants to do. He wants to work with you to heal you of the poison that you have ingested in your life and may be continuing to ingest in your life.
He wants to change you from the inside out so that those messy things that have no fixes – and there are many of those things – there is no fix for grief because the person is gone – he will work in your life that despite the circumstances you can have this deep settled sense of well being. You will be able to say it is well with my soul – even when life isn’t good.
It has been my privilege to travel to many parts of the world and meet brothers and sisters in Christ. Some of the most joyful people I have met were in places where poverty was real and where life was hard. But they had found life in Jesus. They had learned to trust him and rely upon him in the messiness of life, and he consistently met them right where they were.
So, back to the question I asked at the start. Why do we do VBS? Why do we do church? What is the point of coming to church?
Well, church isn’t about church; it’s about Jesus. Jesus came, and his message was repent, turn and walk towards God and believe the good news. The good news, the gospel is about more than getting into heaven when you die. It is about more than just having your sins forgiven. It is about life. Jesus is about life. He said that I have come that you might have life and have it to full. We do what we do because we have found hope and help in Jesus.
He gets that life is messy. But he is able to change your heart so that you can have eternal life. A life where you flourish here and you are ready for heaven.
How does that happen? Talk to God. You can pray out loud or you can pray silently in your mind. Prayer is simply talking to God.
You can pray in your own words, but it might be helpful to pray a prayer something like this. God, I have been kind of doing my own thing. I have not been moving towards you. I repent, and I choose to move in your direction.
Forgive me of my sin. I drank a lot of poison. Please take the poison out of my heart and life. You said that you have come to give me abundant life. I believe you, Jesus. I trust you to do what you said you would do.
Lord, you know the messy parts of my life. I give those to you. I give you permission to work on me so that whatever comes, I can flourish on the inside.
I am going to ask you to bow your heads and close your eyes. If you would like to pray a prayer like that, I would invite you to pray with me. I am going to pray and then give some pauses so that you have time to tell God what you want.
Let’s pray.