Core Beliefs - People - Mark Ralf

Core Beliefs: People

Reading: Romans 3:5-23

⁵ But if our unrighteousness brings out God’s righteousness more clearly, what shall we say? That God is unjust in bringing his wrath on us? (I am using a human argument.) ⁶ Certainly not! If that were so, how could God judge the world? ⁷ Someone might argue, “If my falsehood enhances God’s truthfulness and so increases his glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner?” ⁸ Why not say—as we are being slanderously reported as saying and as some claim that we say—“Let us do evil that good may result”? Their condemnation is deserved.

⁹ What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin. ¹⁰ As it is written:

“There is no-one righteous, not even one;

¹¹ there is no-one who understands, no-one who seeks God.

¹² All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no-one who does good,

not even one.”

¹³ “Their throats are open graves; their tongues practise deceit.” “The poison of vipers is on their lips.”

¹⁴ “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”

¹⁵ “Their feet are swift to shed blood;

¹⁶ ruin and misery mark their ways, ¹⁷ and the way of peace they do not know.”

¹⁸ “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

¹⁹ Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. ²⁰ Therefore no-one will be declared righteous in his sight by observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of sin.

²¹ But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. ²² This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, ²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

SLIDE 1 – TITLE

Welcome everyone again as we continue to look at our core beliefs as a church

God

Jesus Christ

The Holy Spirit

The Bible

People

Salvation

The Church

The Future

We are at the halfway point.

So far we have looked at God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit and the Bible.

Today we are going to look at our core beliefs about People.

Over the next three Sundays we will also look at Salvation, the Church and the Future.

So what does our core belief statement say about people?

SLIDE 2 – Core beliefs

People

· All men and women are created in the image of God and have equal dignity, worth and accountability.

· God created people to have fellowship with him, but we have all defied him and incurred his anger by sinfully going our own way.

· Each person therefore needs to be forgiven and reconciled to God, in order to be restored to fellowship with him.

LET’S HAVE A QUICK LOOK AT THE THREE STATEMENTS.

NOTICE AS YOU READ THEM:

The first statement is about us. What we are, what our origins are, and how we should view and treat one another and also what we should expect from one another.

The second statement is looking at us the way that God looks at us. He created us but we have each turned our backs on him and he is rightfully angry.

The third statement is our desperate need to get right with God again. Our defiance has created a breakdown in relationship with God. We need help and restoration.

THESE ARE OUR CORE BELIEFS ABOUT PEOPLE

My job this morning is to astound you, terrify you, and depress you – not the normal job of the preacher here at Christ Church.

I want to astound you with the wonder of what God has done for us.

I want to terrify you when we explore what we have done to God

And I want to depress you with the huge gap that has opened up between God and us.

So this week is only part 1 of the story.

Please, please, please be here next week and hear Norman tell us the marvellous news of what God has done to restore us to that place of wonder, repair the impact of what we have done and restore us to himself through Jesus. But that is next week.

SLIDE 3 - first half of top 2

SO LET’S START WITH THE FIRST STATEMENT AND THE FIRST PART OF THE SECOND STATEMENT:

· All men and women are created in the image of God and have equal dignity, worth and accountability.

· God created people to have fellowship with him…

Let’s think about Genesis chapter 2 where God creates man and woman.

They are to be God’s people – made in his image.

They are set in God’s perfect place – the garden made for them, perfectly adapted to their needs.

In that garden they are to live under God’s rule.

There is harmony, work is good and fulfilling, and there is a wonderful relationship with God. God’s people in God’s place under God’s rule.

It is a marvellous world, but it is a lost world.

Why is it lost?

We know that God loves his creation – he said it was very good. He was intimately involved in their lives and cared for them.

Because we are created in the image of God we know we are not worthless. We bear the stamp of our maker. If I take off my ring, I can see the stamp of the maker. The badge on most cars tells you who made it. We bear the marks of our maker too.

We are unique, every one of us. We are created in his image and we are loved by him.

Not loved the way I love Claire and she loves me. I only met Claire after I was twenty one.

God knew us and loved us before we were born. The hairs on our heads are numbered – an increasingly easy job in my case as the years go on!

Every individual is loved by God. Not just the lovely. Not just the rich or those with resources. God loves the starving and those dying with Aids just as much as he loves you and me.

Isn’t that amazing?

It’s very easy to love the likeable people. But the old, the dying, the diseased, the starving? That’s harder.

God also made us free. Man and woman could choose to be obedient or to defy god in the garden. But they are accountable for their actions and so are we.

We bear the mark of the creator and some of that brilliance comes shining through in creativity, technology and ingenuity.

But we are also accountable for what we do.

The human hands that made penicillin also made the atomic bomb. The humans that give birth and nurture precious life can also kill, maim and destroy.

We are responsible and accountable for what we do – each one of us.

It is a marvellous and confusing world, but it is a lost world.

Why?

SLIDE 4 – Second half of top 2

THIS BRINGS US TO THE “BUT” IN THE SECOND OF OUR CORE BELIEFS

· God created people to have fellowship with him,

BUT

· we have all defied him and incurred his anger by sinfully going our own way.

WHAT HAS GONE WRONG?

We have defied him. Our reading said “There is no difference (between any of us – we are all the same) for ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”

Well that’s a bit heavy isn’t it.

I mean this is Ewell and we all reasonably nice people – aren’t we?

No mass murderers here – I think?

SLIDE

Really bad people have turned from God. The Sept 11^th bombers, Harold Shipman, Fred and Rosemary West. Hitler, Sadaam Hussein. They are really evil. But surely not us?

Well what about us? We don’t want to add our name to that list, so we. Compared to them we must be better, surely. (CLICK FOR SLIDE REVEAL)

Well no. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of god.

SLIDE

If you remember the two talks I gave on Generous Living and Generous Giving, I showed a video about the Countess of Huntingdon who had a significant impact in eighteenth century England. This is what the Dowager Duchess of Buckingham wrote to her:

“I thank your ladyship for the information concerning the Methodist preachers.

Their doctrines are most repulsive and strongly tinctured with impertinence and disrespect before their superiors, in perpetually endeavouring to level all ranks

and do away with all distinction. It is monstrous to be told you have a heart as

sinful as the common wretches that crawl on the earth. This is highly offensive.”

SLIDE

This quote comes from the book, “Cross Examined” by Mark Meynell, published by IVP.

It is a very good book about the central place of the cross in God’s plan for us all.

Yes it is offensive – to be confronted for the first time with our defiance before God, sinfully going our own way and incurring God’s anger. To recognise that each one of us has pushed God away and tried to go it alone – we have defied the true King.

However monstrous and offensive it is to be confronted with the fact, it is true.

Otherwise why can’t we love the ones we claim to love?

Why can’t people and businesses stay honest and truthful?

Why can’t we treat people fairly?

SLIDE

Lets look a little earlier in Romans chapter 1 v18

¹⁸ The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, ¹⁹ since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them.

Every day we refuse to recognise God as our ruler in his world – every day our actions show that we don’t love him and we are in rebellion. And God is angry with us.

As we push Jesus to the edge of our lives as we seize centre stage for ourselves God is rightly and justly angry.

God’s anger is not like the temper tantrum of the terrible two year old.

God’s anger is not the trauma of the turbulent teenager

God’s anger is not like a selfish film star who sulks when they don’t get the attention they want.

God’s anger is not the insanity of road rage – recently a local man whom Claire & I know got involved in some road rage at a local dump. The other driver came over pulled his arm out of the car and broke it. Several days later he died.

God’s anger is not impetuous and uncontrolled like that

God’s anger is a steady, unrelenting, uncompromising hatred of our refusal to recognise him as God in his world.

So as we push him further and further to the fringes of our thinking, God is angry.

As we drive all mention of his Son out of our homes and our places of work, God is angry.

As we are embarrassed to speak openly about our creator for fear of ridicule, God is angry.

It is a consistent theme in the Bible – old and new

· When Adam and Eve refuse to accept God’s rule in the garden, he curses them and throws them out.

· When God’s people reject his rule in the land, he curses them and throws them out.

· God’s anger towards our attitude to Jesus and his rule is one of steady anger.

· In the New Testament, Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount “For the gate is wide and way is easy that leads to destruction”.

· He also says “Whoever does not obey the son shall not see life but the wrath of God remains on him” says Jesus

God is utterly pure and totally holy and he hates our rebellious attitude and his anger burns against our rebellion towards him

This has to be right doesn’t it? Can God be less than pure and holy?

Can he be a bit condoning of rebellion, a little tolerant of evil, turning a blind eye to wrong-doing?

What kind of Holy God would that be? A bit second rate.

No, God is holy and pure – he is not a mockery of God, he not a shabby parody of a holy God.

I have stressed God’s anger – very strongly because it so often left out, or skipped over when we present the gospel and especially when we talk about the perilous state that we are in and why Jesus came to die.

We all love to hear about the God who loves us – and he does.

He loves his creation so much - even in the full knowledge of what we would do and how we would behave and he put in place the rescue plan so that we can be reconciled to him.

But we cannot ignore his anger – it is real.

We need rescuing. There is no doubt.

SLIDE

We know that we do wrong. Even when we want to do right.

Listen to Romans 7v21

²¹ So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. ²² For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; ²³ but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. ²⁴ What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? ²⁵ Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin

Most of us feel the same in our lives, don’t we?

We can’t get to God on our own and we only have to disobey once!

That’s all the devil has ever wanted.

He wants to tempt us as he tempted Adam and Eve in the garden to put themselves first, deny God and push God to the edge of their lives while they take centre stage. The same temptation we face. When we fail as each of us does, we need rescuing.

SLIDE

Did you hear the news of the tragic fire in Stevenage? Where two firemen lost their lives re-entering a building to rescue someone?

Not mentioning the anger of God would be the same as the fireman never mentioning that the building from which he is trying to rescue people is on fire and they are in danger.

Imagine the fire is on the ground floor and the fireman goes to the 10^th floor and opens up the window and calls out “get onto my ladder and I’ll take you away”. They’ll look at him and ask him why? If the fireman replies, “well I really like you and we think it would be a good idea”. As the building goes up in smoke, they would be cursing the fireman “why didn’t you tell us the danger we were in?”

If we don’t consider the anger of god and our rebellion we are saying that Jesus’ death doesn’t matter.

SLIDE

LET’S LOOK AT THE THIRD STATEMENT

· Each person therefore needs to be forgiven and reconciled to God, in order to be restored to fellowship with him.

So we definitely need rescuing

We need to be forgiven and brought back to fellowship with God

but where is that rescue going to come from?

SLIDE

God may be angry but he still loves us.

Listen to 1 John 4:10

¹⁰ This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son…”

The initiative is all God’s – it’s his idea, he sent his son.

SLIDE

And again in John 3:16

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. ¹⁷ For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

God loved us before we sinned. God loves us even though we have sinned.

Even though we have failed, even though we continue to fail, God loves us and sent his Son to rescue us. God is not reluctant to help us.

God knows we deserve his anger but because he loves us he sends his Son to satisfy his anger by pouring out all his anger on himself – in the form of God the Son - Jesus.

But we continue to do what the devil wants: to reject God’s rule.

We are in the grip and under the rule of God’s enemy

SLIDE

Later in John we see in chapter 8verse 34

“³⁴ Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.

We are enslaved to God’s enemy.

When we push Jesus to the fringe of our lives - we are enslaved to God’s enemy.

When we try to push Jesus out of our lives - -we are enslaved to God’s enemy.

So if we reject Jesus, whose side are we on?

We need rescuing from slavery to sin and we can’t save ourselves – we need to accept God’s rescue plan.

SLIDE

What are our Core Beliefs about People?

· All men and women are created in the image of God and have equal dignity, worth and accountability.

· God created people to have fellowship with him, but we have all defied him and incurred his anger by sinfully going our own way.

· Each person therefore needs to be forgiven and reconciled to God, in order to be restored to fellowship with him.

These are true for every person.

Through God, we are made for a purpose, we are valued, we are loved but we have to choose for ourselves whom we will serve.

Forgiveness and reconciliation is free from God.

We can enjoy fellowship with God again but we have to choose.

SLIDE – auto music

This song by Bob Dylan from his first Christian album expresses this very well – You’ve got to serve somebody

Bob Dylan song:

SLIDE

• You may be an ambassador to England or France, You may like to gamble, you might like to dance, You may be the heavyweight champion of the world, You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls

• You might be a rock 'n' roll addict prancing on the stage, You might have drugs at your command, women in a cage, You may be a business man or some high degree thief, They may call you Doctor or they may call you Chief

– But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed You're gonna have to serve somebody, Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord But you're gonna have to serve somebody.

SLIDE for second verse – then sound down.

Let’s pray