walking it out: May 2006

Here is the sermon that I preached on Sunday, almost exactly one year since the last time I got to preach at the Cambridge Vineyard. (And man, did it feel good to be back again!) I must say that when I'm up there, I feel like I'm doing what I was created to do! Thank you Lord for the opportunity to walk this out... it is a great privilege and an honor!;

Intro: Most of us know the passage in 1 Cor 13:13, which says "And now these 3 remain; faith hope and love, and the greatest of these is love." Most of you would probably agree that 2 of those things are talked about all the time; those two things being faith and love. But how many of you can think of the last time you’ve heard anyone talk about hope? Why is that? (I’m not sure…but what I can tell you is that when I prayed to ask the Lord what I should talk about and he told me "Hope" I almost backed out! Actually, I thought that I’d rather speak about pretty much anything else, tithing, the four spiritual laws, anything other than hope. Why? Why did I respond to hope in this way? Well that is a long story in itself, and I will touch on some of that but first we need to ask; What is hope?

The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines hope as:
- to cherish a desire with anticipation.
- Trust
- To desire with expectation of obtainment
- To expect with confidence.
We look at these and we see the words TRUST, DESIRE, ANTICIPATION, CONFIDENCE and EXPECTATION. These are all FEELING words and they touch a part of our lives that we often try to manage… because when these things are shaken, things such as our trust, it shakes us right to our core… right to our heart! Hope is a heart level thing…going past our minds, past our defenses! Many of us try to avoid hope because somewhere in our lives we’ve been disappointed, we’ve been hurt and we just don’t want to expect too much because we’ve been told or we’ve learned to lay our expectations down and accept things as they are. We take our little "reality checks". I’m not saying reality isn’t something important or something that we don’t need to consider. The question is really this; who’s reality we are agreeing with? I’ve realized that God’s reality is a lot different from the reality that the world offers us.

Proposition: So Hope is a positioning of the heart, it is the well out of which flow our dreams for the future. Scripture says that our faith, our love and our endurance come from hope. (1 Thess 1:3 "We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ." Col 1:3-5 "We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints – the faith and love that springs from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth." )

Transition: If this is the case, and hope is the fountainhead for all of these good things, then why don’t we talk about it more often? Is it because of these "reality checks" we keep giving ourselves? Is hope just unrealistic for us today? I mean really…What does hope look like and what kind of impact does it have on our lives? First we’re going to look at a story of hope working itself out in the Old Testament…then I’ll share some of my own little journey with you.

Body: Let’s turn to 2 kings 4: 8-37
The Shunammite's Son Restored to Life
8 One day Elisha went to Shunem. And a well-to-do woman was there, who urged him to stay for a meal. So whenever he came by, he stopped there to eat. 9 She said to her husband, "I know that this man who often comes our way is a holy man of God. 10 Let's make a small room on the roof and put in it a bed and a table, a chair and a lamp for him. Then he can stay there whenever he comes to us."
11 One day when Elisha came, he went up to his room and lay down there. 12 He said to his servant Gehazi, "Call the Shunammite." So he called her, and she stood before him. 13 Elisha said to him, "Tell her, 'You have gone to all this trouble for us. Now what can be done for you? Can we speak on your behalf to the king or the commander of the army?' " She replied, "I have a home among my own people."
14 "What can be done for her?" Elisha asked. Gehazi said, "Well, she has no son and her husband is old."
15 Then Elisha said, "Call her." So he called her, and she stood in the doorway. 16 "About this time next year," Elisha said, "you will hold a son in your arms." "No, my lord," she objected. "Don't mislead your servant, O man of God!"
17 But the woman became pregnant, and the next year about that same time she gave birth to a son, just as Elisha had told her.
18 The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the reapers. 19 "My head! My head!" he said to his father. His father told a servant, "Carry him to his mother." 20 After the servant had lifted him up and carried him to his mother, the boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died. 21 She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and went out.
22 She called her husband and said, "Please send me one of the servants and a donkey so I can go to the man of God quickly and return."
23 "Why go to him today?" he asked. "It's not the New Moon or the Sabbath." "It's all right," she said.
24 She saddled the donkey and said to her servant, "Lead on; don't slow down for me unless I tell you." 25 So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When he saw her in the distance, the man of God said to his servant Gehazi, "Look! There's the Shunammite! 26 Run to meet her and ask her, 'Are you all right? Is your husband all right? Is your child all right?' " "Everything is all right," she said.
27 When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, "Leave her alone! She is in bitter distress, but the LORD has hidden it from me and has not told me why."
28 "Did I ask you for a son, my lord?" she said. "Didn't I tell you, 'Don't raise my hopes'?"
29 Elisha said to Gehazi, "Tuck your cloak into your belt, take my staff in your hand and run. If you meet anyone, do not greet him, and if anyone greets you, do not answer. Lay my staff on the boy's face."
30 But the child's mother said, "As surely as the LORD lives and as you live, I will not leave you." So he got up and followed her.
31 Gehazi went on ahead and laid the staff on the boy's face, but there was no sound or response. So Gehazi went back to meet Elisha and told him, "The boy has not awakened."
32 When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch. 33 He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the LORD. 34 Then he got on the bed and lay upon the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out upon him, the boy's body grew warm. 35 Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room and then got on the bed and stretched out upon him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.
36 Elisha summoned Gehazi and said, "Call the Shunammite." And he did. When she came, he said, "Take your son." 37 She came in, fell at his feet and bowed to the ground. Then she took her son and went out.

Let’s examine this a little closer. Here is a wealthy woman. She notices that Elisha – a man of God is coming through town quite often and she has him over for dinner. She obviously has quite a nice table because after the first time, every time Elisha’s around he comes to her house. Out of a heart of hospitality she decides that it would be a good idea to build him his own room so that he would have a place to relax and rest when he’s there. You know, She’s just serving the Lord in whatever way she knows how. This is received really well, in fact so well that Elisha decides that he wants to bless her in response to her hospitality. The thing is that she isn’t really looking for anything in return. She just wants to serve because he’s a man of God. He makes a few offers and she turns him down. She tells him " I have a place among my own people." In other words "I’m content, I don’t need anything". She just wants to serve.
Have you ever been in that place? Has God ever asked you what you wanted, what you were in need of... No, really. This isn’t a "Well you helped me move so I’ll get you some Leafs tickets…" This is a "What do you want?" Has God every asked you that? Think about that... Could it be that God is not just interested in our service, but in our hearts and our hopes and dreams – our desires even? Wow… I’m not saying that God will give us everything we ever ask for and all of that jazz, but David seemed to know something about God that we tend to miss… listen to this;
Psalm 37:4
Delight yourself in the LORD and he will give you the desires of your heart.

Psalm 103
1 Praise the LORD, O my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name.
2 Praise the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits-
3 who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases,
4 who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion,
5 who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's.

Psalm 145:14-19
14 The LORD upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down.
15 The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time.
16 You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.
17 The LORD is righteous in all his ways and loving toward all he has made.
18 The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth.
19 He fulfills the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cry and saves them.

The Shunamite woman who has been so faithful says she doesn’t need anything, But God must see something else, because Elisha just isn’t dropping this. There was something in her heart that needed to be satisfied. In fact, there are Elisha and Gehazi, two men brainstorming trying to figure out what this woman could want. (Does this give you guys some hope…here is the man of God who prophesied the dry bones to life stumped on what a woman could want! Any of you feel that way this week as mother’s day was approaching?) All of a sudden Gehazi, Elisha’s servant says, "I’ve got it! Her husband is old and she doesn’t have a son!" As you know, in those days a woman without a son who became a widow would usually become destitute. She would have no one to care for her, she would lose her land, her home, everything! Now she knows this… and she still didn’t ask Elisha for anything…So Elisha calls her to him and says "at this time next year you will hold a son in your arms!" Here is her reaction to this amazing news! Here her heart is revealed…she says "No my lord, don’t mislead your servant! Oh Man of God!" What do you hear when you read this?
I hear – "Look, I’ve already accepted my lot and it was a hard thing to do…I’ve hoped and hoped and now I’ve put that dream away…don’t ask me to awaken it again…it just hurts too much" She doesn’t want to let her heart believe that Elisha could be telling the truth, that God could really provide the son that she desires and needs. To do that, to hope and be disappointed again would just hurt too much…
Do you have anything in your life that you’ve just accepted as just being the way it is? Is there something that you once hoped for that you’ve given up on? And then, when a word or a sermon tickles your heart and causes hope to flicker again you feel the need to shut your heart to it cause it hurts just way to much? I have a feeling that this is where she was at this time…but you know what? That was okay for her at that moment because God’s ability to provide was not dependent on her ability to hope, or react the right way (and neither is it dependent on that now!) It wasn’t because she could believe enough that God blessed her with a baby. It was because He loved her and wanted to satisfy this deep desire in her heart. He wanted to show her that He loved her and knew her need. Doesn’t that just throw a wrench in your paradigm of what will cause God to move? Anyways, let’s move on!
So the years pass and one-day her son is out with his dad and he gets sick and the dad sends him home to his mom… She takes care of him but by noon he has died in her lap. Watch what she does here… she doesn’t do the traditional thing of going into mourning right away and awakening the whole house and such… she takes his body and brings him into Elisha’s room and closes the door and asks her husband if she can go out to meet with Elisha. When he asks her why she doesn’t even tell him that his son has died! She rushes off and then What she says in verse 28 . "28 "Did I ask you for a son, my lord?" she said. "Didn't I tell you, 'Don't raise my hopes'?" At first I read this and thought…ouch, she’s really lost hope this time. But then as I read and re-read it the Lord showed it to me differently.
This almost sounds like a dare to me as I read it now… Like she’s saying ,"I told you not to raise my hopes, but you raised them anyway, so now, I’ve lost my son, but my hopes have been raised to the point that I am totally expecting and trusting that God will DO something here…so come on, lets go…my son’s waiting!"
The very gift that God had given her was gone… she had experienced the blessing of God and now it was taken away from her. I’m sure many of us would be asking at this point… "God, why did you even give me this blessing if you were just going to take it away again?" But 2 Corinthians 3:12 says that "Therefore, since we have such a hope, we are very bold." All this woman knew was that God had given her a son when it had been hopeless. What else could she believe but that God would restore him to her again? Approaching Elisha the way she did was very bold. Insisting that she wasn’t going anywhere without him was even bolder! Something had happened in her heart when she allowed hope to enter it that made her bold, filled her with faith, and caused her to be able to endure a huge trial fully engaged without holding back. Was it that she wasn’t aware that her son was actually dead? That she had lost her grip on reality? NO. She had discovered that God’s reality was bigger than hers. That impossibility simply had to submit and bow the knee to God. There was nothing that could stop God from finishing what He had begun in her… and she had come to the place where this hope could sustain her in even the most devastating of circumstances. Did God come through? Yes. Elisha came, prayed for the boy, prayed for the boy again, and then handed him over to his mother.
So let me just say this again; I’m not saying that God will always give us everything we desire. Neither am I saying that we will see all that He has set in our hearts come to pass in our lifetime. Some things will be finished after we pass, but those who will finish it will be farther along and closer to the goal if we continue to hope to the very end, allowing them to build on what we have begun. It’s not just about us, its also about leaving a legacy for our children. BUT I do believe strongly that God is calling us to hope for those things He has placed in our hearts and not to allow hopelessness to continue to hinder us. We hope because Romans 5:5 says "And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us." This isn’t a superficial, plaster on a smile and act like everything’s alright all the time when its not kind of thing I’m talking about. This is a cry your heart out…be honest with God, but when hope is kindled in your heart by the Holy Spirit don’t snuff it out in order to protect yourself.

So why does this hit home so much for me? Why would I resist speaking of the thing that is the fountainhead of love and faith and endurance. Well because it has been one of my greatest challenges this last while. As most of you know Dan and I were walking out a call to the North for the last several years and finally we got the go ahead last spring! So we sold everything to go and serve the Lord in the best way we knew how. We transplanted our kids and started new lives there on Baffin Island convinced that we were walking in God’s will. Convinced that we were there for a long time! Sure enough the attacks came but the victories came as well, we were neck deep in battle when the Lord told us that He was calling us home. We just couldn’t believe it! This was our call that God himself had given us, which we hadn’t asked for, He gave it to us and we were doing our best to take care and be faithful with it. It had taken us years to even allow hope to bloom and to believe that He really could and would do this. And now He was telling us to go home? Not just that, but as he spoke to us about going to Cambridge again, He started to whisper to our hearts about some of the other dreams that we had had to lay down in order to go north. Things that had hurt so bad to lay down, things that had almost caused me to walk away from this call north in the first place because they were so strong. Now HE was telling us to hope for those things again! HE was telling us that though we had been obedient to go North, now we had to be obedient to go back and He was also calling us to be obedient and step into other things that could and most likely would be just as hard! And though I really wanted to press into the Father’s heart during this time, I really just wanted him to stay as far away as possible from talking to me about my dreams and about my future. I just couldn’t do it anymore! It just hurt too much! The reality I was living was very costly. But you see… I’m learning that God is God. And I may not know how He is going to do something, or when He is going to do something, but that when He says He’s going to do something He really, really means it! My reality must bow the knee and submit to His reality. Because of that, I have allowed my heart to open up to Him. I have allowed my heart to dream again, and to hope. Not because I’m strong. Not because I’m able to cope. Not because I’m stupid either. Because if anything else… He has shown me that He is able. What else can I do but hope in him who is Hope?

Conclusion:
Hope is one of the most difficult things to inspire these days. We are so bombarded with violence, with bad news and we are so hurt and tired and worn out by the demands of our lives that it is really hard to put down the walls we’ve built to protect ourselves. We have been disappointed by our churches, by our parents, by our spouses, by God and it’s so very hard to trust, so very hard to hope in spite of that disappointment. But while we are trying so hard to protect ourselves from pain, we are protecting ourselves from the very thing that God has planted in us. But hope is the spring out of which love and faith flow from. It is the reason we are able to endure and persevere through adversity. Hope fills us with the boldness that we need to fight for the blessings God has given us. Hope fills us with the courage to go where He has called us to go in spite of pain, in spite of grief, in spite of the circumstances that seem to stand in our way. This is what God is calling us into. He wants us to put our armor down, and allow Him to kindle hope in our hearts again. Whatever that looks like for each of you.

Ministry Point:
I sat down in the park on my lunch hour last Monday and submitted my message to him, asking him if there was anything that He really wanted to say to his church today. This is what I felt He said:
"Speak my life into their hope! Speak my life into their hearts, into their dreams. I want to fill their sails! I want to blow into their sails! But many of them have so little hope that they are like ships who are at sea but have taken their sails down. So I blow, and I blow, but their sails are all folded up. I can only move them so far, so quickly this way. It makes the going slow and difficult. It causes the journey to be much harder work than it needs to be. I want to speed things up and blow them farther than they’ve anticipated. But they don’t allow themselves to hope that what their hearts are telling them is actually possible. So they work hard, and they serve me well… and they stay rather still. But that’s not what I have for them! I want them to SOAR on the sea. I want them to soar like the Bluenose! That is what they are meant to be! I want to BLOW – cry out "UNFURL YOUR SAILS". Cast off what’s keeping you behind! Don’t worry, I will provide for you! I will give you everything you need! Stop working so hard! Put away the oars, stop paddling and watch ME move! When Scott shared the word about the ship, excitement came. But then so did the waves and the storms and with them expectations have been lowered, hopelessness has started creeping back in. But I HAVE NOT CHANGED MY MIND! I AM STILL I AM!!! Don’t retreat! Don’t settle! Move forward! " So if you would stand, I’m going to pray for us, myself as much an anyone else!

Saturday, May 27, 2006

We Got A Place!!!

Friday, May 19, 2006

What's Your Theme Song?

Monday, May 15, 2006

Hope Unfurled - Sunday, May 15, 2006

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Desire

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Endurance

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

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