Psalm 4
Preached: Feb 7, 2010 - Des Arc First UMC - Nursing Home
SCRIPTURE READINGS Psalm 4:
This psalmist also had plenty of enemies, just
like the Psalm from two weeks ago. The difference is that today’s
enemies are more than just those who assault us physically but also
mentally. Those who make it a practice of tearing us down until we
feel like the lowest of the low and worthless to anyone for
anything.
Do you ever feel like that in your lives? Do
you ever wonder when people will quit bringing up those things that
you did yesterday, let alone what you might have done 5—10 even 20
years ago? Why can’t people let go of the bad things we do in life
and look only at the good things we do in life? Maybe that is why we
have such a hard time believing that God can forget about the miss
deeds we commit when we ask for forgiveness.
As a military officer I had to investigate many
suppose sexual harassment cases for my squadron and I quickly
learned that a lot of them were not really valid sexual harassment
at all but just miss understandings of intent. This came home to me
after I was out of the military when I was up at St Paul for some
studies and I invited a woman to join our circle of discussion many
times. She miss understood my intent and turned me in for sexually
harassing her. That was never my intent but you could not convince
her of that fact. All she knew was that this gentleman kept bugging
her to join in a group that she saw no purpose in and she was leery
of our intent. I must say that I later found out that she had been a
catholic nun and had been abused in that capacity by a priest of the
one of her churches. My only defense was to plead my innocence and
ask for her forgiveness and learn that not everyone wishes to
participate in all the life events in this world. I learned that
sometimes even the innocent are accused falsely of matters they did
in life and that we need to not make snap judgments until all the
facts from both sides are learned.
How about you—have you ever been the object of
a miss judgment on someone's part or have you ever made a miss
judgment about someone or something in your life? There is only one
true arbitrator in our life and that is God. He knows all that we
have done and are doing and he knows the real desires of our hearts
doesn’t He? If you go to a prison you will find a lot of men who
profess their innocence of the crime the committed and very few will
admit to their guilt. But there is one who know all and to whom all
is truly revealed. When you stand in front of God for that
accounting of your life how will you look, and can you answer for
all the deeds you did and did not accomplish and will you be able to
say that you asked God’s forgiveness for those things you have done
that you were not supposed to have done? That is the real test you
will need to pass on that final day, Not if you have been saved and
professed that Jesus Christ is your Savior, but what did you do with
that salvation in the end.
Last week the Bible Study I am leading in
Corinthians came across a very interesting passage. It read in the 4th chapter verse 20 “For the kingdom of God is not
just fancy talk; it is living by God’s power.”
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You can be the
loudest Amen in the congregation;
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You can be the
first one up to the sinners bench;
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You can be the
weepiest sinner in your group;
But if you have not taken
the Holy Spirit into your very being and changed your life around
and started doing those things God has asked you to do. Then all you
have is a bunch of fancy talk and the power of the Holy Spirit and
the forgiveness of God will elude you.
Christ came to this world to heal it and to
redeem and make us whole. He came to show us what God expects of us
and how we are to interact with God. He stated that we need to turn
our lives around and work to end the injustices of this world and to
become better men and women. He wants us to confess our sins and to
forgive those who sin against us. You know those debts or trespasses
we talk about each time we say the Lord’s Prayer. Turn them over to
God and let him judge our true hearts and our lives honestly. Know
that we are safe and secure in His true and honest appraisal of our
lives. God will judge us by what we truly believe and what we do
with our lives and not just what he hears about us from other.
Again I have been a victim of such slander from
my time at Smackover and it is not fun, but I know my actions were
innocent and I know that God can and will judge me fairly and
truthfully so I have no fear of having done wrong, because God knows
the truth. And I like todays Psalmist can lie down in peace to my
sleep, even my eternal sleep and I know that I shall arise in the
morning, even the great getting’ up morning for my God can and will
keep me safe. Not because I have been “Saved” but because I have
been made whole and complete in and through Jesus Christ and how I
choose to live in the Spirit within my life. Not as a loud sounding
Gong or a clashing cymbal and not with a lot
of fancy talk. But as a small voice trying to do God’s work in this
life and live the life he wished of me when he remade me for his
purposes in this life.