Transcript
Well, I wouldn’t say that they roasted me last night. I would say they charbroiled me. Nevertheless, licking my wounds as I’ve returned home, I want you to know that I was just very profoundly appreciative and touched by last night’s occasion.
A couple of people this morning said nothing seemed to go wrong. Most of the time you have a special gathering of some sort. If something can go wrong, something will go wrong. And apparently Murphy’s Law does not apply this time. And nothing seemed to go wrong. Everything was very, very smooth.
I didn’t have a chance to say to you guys. And this is a more appropriate forum in which to say it. But I considered that my many years with you have been a very wonderful privilege given to me by the Lord himself. And I wouldn’t trade them for anything.
And I deeply value all the relationships that have been established here with you folks. As you know, you are my friends and my family and my brothers and sisters in the Lord. And thank you very much for last night.
By the way, I walked into the other room this morning. And a member of the church told me that the tables were wet. And I said, “Consult the board.” For the first time in years, I could not walk to a board of which I was not a member.
Let me invite your attention for our consideration this morning once again to the book of Judges, chapter 2. Judges chapter 2. And we want to begin reading at verse six.
When Joshua had dismissed the people, the children of Israel went each to his own inheritance to possess the land. So the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the Lord which he had done for Israel.
Now Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died when he was one hundred and ten years old. And they buried him within the border of his inheritance at Timnath Heres in the mountains of Ephraim, on the north side of Mount Gaash.
When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the Lord nor the work which he had done for Israel. Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals. And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt.
And they followed other gods from among the gods of the people who were all around them. And they bowed down to them. And they provoked the Lord to anger. They forsook the Lord and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.
And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel. So he delivered them into the hands of plunderers who despoiled them. And he sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, so that they could no longer stand before their enemies. Whenever they went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for calamity, as the Lord had sworn to them. And they were greatly distressed.
Then the Lord raised up judges who delivered them out of the hand of those who plundered them. Yet they would not listen to their judges, but they played the harlot with other gods and bowed down to them. They turned quickly from the way in which their fathers walked in obeying the commandments of the Lord. They did not do so.
And when the Lord raised up judges for them, the Lord was with the judge and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge. For the Lord was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who oppressed them and harassed them. And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they reverted and behaved more corruptly than their fathers by following other gods to serve them and bow down to them. They did not cease from their own doings nor from their stubborn way.
Allow me to introduce you to the angel of Grand Forks. As most of you already know, this past April the terrible flood swept through the city of Grand Forks, North Dakota, and her sister city East Grand Forks, Minnesota. This flood left a trail of devastation in its wake: ruined homes, ruined businesses, people who had lost just about everything.
A number of days after the flood, Patti Owens, the mayor of Grand Forks, was thumbing through a stack of several hundred telephone messages when she was particularly attracted to one of them. It turned out to be a message from an anonymous woman who was offering a no-strings-attached gift of two thousand dollars to each and every household in the two cities that had suffered severe flood damage.
Patti Owens said to herself, “There’s no way this woman can be for real.” But she was wrong. She was for real. And by Tuesday, April the 29th, two million dollars had been deposited in the North Dakota Community Fund. This in the capital of Bismarck. Another sum of money had been deposited in the Grand Forks Housing Incorporation for distribution.
By Wednesday morning people were lining up for their checks. And when they applied, the only thing that was asked was whether they lived in one of the areas that was most devastated by the flood. Nobody went out to their house to check on the extent of their flood damage. The checks were given out on an honor system basis.
It was estimated that in the two cities there were about five thousand residences, five thousand households that had suffered severely from the flood. And this anonymous donor, who was now being called angel, this angel will probably wind up giving somewhere in the neighborhood of ten million dollars. Naturally everybody was trying to guess who she was.
And one experienced fundraiser said that anyone who gave away ten million dollars was probably worth at least a hundred and fifty to two hundred million dollars. As a matter of fact, there are a substantial number of women in the United States who are worth a great deal more than that. According to Forbes list of the four hundred richest Americans, there are sixty women in the United States who are worth at least four hundred and fifteen million.
And the richest of all the women is also the prime suspect for being angel. The richest is Joan Kroc, the widow of the founder of the McDonald’s fast food chain of restaurants. And it is estimated that Joan is worth somewhere in the neighborhood of one and seven-tenths billion dollars. She is a suspect for being angel because she was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
And true, she grew up very close to the flooded area. At the time that the story appeared in USA Today, Joan Kroc was reported to be traveling and was unavailable for comment. But that didn’t keep people from guessing and far from expressing their gratitude. One woman who was a dental assistant and whose office was underwater said, “I figure she’s a special person who has lost something herself. I figure that she’s pretty religious.”
And Monica Soler, who is trying to support five children and one grandchild, said this. She said, “Angel’s donation means the difference between eating and not eating when you have six people that you’re trying to support. It’s a real lifeline. She is an angel.” I think most of you will agree with me that this anonymous woman deserves the title that she’s been given. She is the unknown angel. She is the unknown angel of Grand Forks, North Dakota.
But did you know that there is someone much richer than the angel of Grand Forks? Someone far, far more liberal than this wonderful anonymous giver? And this person is also unknown to millions and millions and millions of people. He is, of course, the unknown God. The unknown God.
And if you happen to be here this morning and you have never believed in the Lord Jesus Christ for the absolutely free gift of eternal life, if you have never been sure that you’re going to heaven, then this God is not known to you. You see, the Bible says, “This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.”
And the most fundamental way in which we can know God is by believing his promise in Jesus Christ to give eternal life to everyone who trusts him for that. But even though you may know God in this very fundamental way, even though you may have experienced his salvation, it is possible that as the years have passed God has become less real for you. He seems far away. He seems remote.
He has become someone that you barely know. And therefore the question that I want to ask you this morning is simply this: Is your God a stranger? And that question just happens also to be the title of my message for you this morning: Is your God a stranger to you?
Many years ago when I was still a student in seminary, I had a good friend who was also a student. Then he told me one time a story that I’ve never forgotten. He was a missionary kid. His parents were on the mission field serving the Lord. But at a very early age my friend had been sent back to the United States to receive his education.
And he was separated from his parents for many, many years. Then one day, apparently when his parents were on furlough, my friend told me that he was in a room and his father walked into the room. And I’ll never forget what my friend said about that. He said, “I knew that he was my father, but I had no more emotional reaction to him than if he had been a perfect stranger.”
Through all those years of separation, father and son had become strangers. And there is a sense, my friends, in which something like that happened to the nation of Israel according to the passage of Scripture that we read just a few minutes ago. You see, in the infancy of the nation God had delivered them from the bondage of Egypt.
He had performed a series of wonderful signs and miracles in the sight of Israel and the Egyptians. He had led the Israelites, you remember, through the Red Sea on dry land. And Egyptian soldiers tried to do it. They were drowned by the hand of Moses. He had been for forty years on the back side of the desert after Moses.
He had performed great signs and wonders. And when Moses died on the borders of the land of Canaan, Joshua, one of the great military leaders of military history, took over. And he led them into the land to win victory after victory. And you remember how the walls of Jericho fell down as Joshua and the children of Israel captured and destroyed that city.
And remember that on one occasion Joshua commanded the sun to stand still in the valley of Aijalon. And in the light of the extended day, Israel won a great victory. But now, according to our passage of Scripture, Joshua is an old man. And at the age of one hundred and ten he dies.
And he is buried in the inheritance which he had fought for and won in Timnath Heres in the mountains of Ephraim, on the north side of the mountain of Gaash. But after Joshua died, there was still some of the old men, some of the elders who had been with him and had seen all of the mighty deeds that the Lord had done.
And as long as these elders were alive, the children of Israel served the Lord. But the day came when all the elders were dead as well as Joshua. And then something happened to the nation of Israel which is very terrible, very frightening. Something that is like a dark cloud hovering over the horizon of that nation.
You see, the Bible tells us in our passage that after that generation had been gathered to their fathers, after they had died and been buried, another generation arose after them. Another generation arose after them that did not know the Lord. They did not know the Lord. And they did not know the work which the Lord had done for Israel. How tragic.
The God who had so mightily performed miracles in the presence of his people now seemed, for all his great works, seemed far away and remote and distant. Think about it. Think about it. The God of Israel was somebody that they knew about. The elders had passed down the stories of his mighty deeds.
In fact, Moses had left behind the first five books of the Bible, Genesis to Deuteronomy. So the stories were there. But none of this was real to the new generation. And the God of Israel had become a stranger. The God of Israel had become a stranger to his people.
And I realize that that can happen to a Christian. A Christian can drift so far from God. And his experiences with God can be so far in the past that God is almost like a person he no longer knows. God is a stranger. When I first came to this particular work, it was of course a mission that operated first of all in a place on Hickory and Jeffries.
And then later we met in a building on Hickory and Ardenes. And during those years I was still a seminary student. And I had a Sunday School class of boys. And there was a boy in my Sunday School class. I’m not going to give you his name because if I did most of you would recognize it. But don’t try to guess me.
This story could be told about several boys that I’ve had over the years in my Sunday school class. This particular boy was first of all of my Sunday school class. When I told a story from the Bible, he listened with intensity and close attention. When the story was over, he could answer every question that I asked about the story.
If I asked them to do a memory verse, he always had his memory verse done. And you don’t always say it perfectly. If I had a contest in the class, he was almost sure to be first or second in that contest. And he wasn’t just doing this for the purposes of winning prizes.
Because not only did he come regularly in the morning to Sunday school, but he came to the evening preaching service which we had in those days. And he came faithfully for both meetings and with obvious first of all that he had believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. He was saved. He was going to heaven.
But more than that, even as a young boy God was real to him. And he was responding to his Savior. That young man is not in the meeting this morning. He’s only been into this building a very small number of times since we’ve been here. His life has been filled with difficulties and disappointments.
I’m not even sure whether he could explain clearly to you how verses a tragic story. My Sunday school class is now a person to whom evidently God is a stranger. What should we draw from this lesson? I think we should draw this. That no matter where we are at this moment in time, no matter what our commitment to God may be, if we gradually let it slip, the God who is close to us can become distant.
And he can become a stranger to us just as he had become a stranger to the nation of Israel. Are you surprised at what happens next? The Bible tells us that another generation that rose did not know the Lord and did not know the work that God had done for Israel. And the very next thing that we read is then Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord.
And they worshiped the various gods who went by the name of Baal. They deserted the Lord God of their fathers who had brought them out of the land of Egypt. They turned to other gods, to the gods of the people who were round about them. And they bowed down to them. And the anger of the Lord was hot against them.
They worshiped Baal and they worshiped that female goddess of the Canaanite people whose name was Ashtoreth. They did evil in the sight of the Lord. Did you know that in the New Testament the Apostle John writing to Christian people said, writing mind you to Christian people, he said, “And by this we know that we know him if we keep his commandments.” He who says, “I know him,” and does not keep his commandments is a liar.
You see, the surest evidence that we do not know the Lord up close and personal, the surest evidence that we as Christians are not having intimate fellowship with God, the surest evidence of that is disobedience to the commandments of God. And therefore almost inevitably we expect the next verses to follow. Because in the following verses we are told that the Lord delivered his people into the hands of plunderers who despoiled them.
They were robbed of their possessions. He sold them into the hands of their enemies. They became slaves. They could no longer stand before their enemies. And whenever they went out to battle the hand of God was against them for calamity. They were defeated. And the bottom line of our passage is this. And they were in great distress.
I hope that everybody in this audience understands that the Bible says very clearly to Christians, “My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord and do not lose heart when you are rebuked by him. For whom the Lord loves he punishes and he puts every son whom he receives.” And when we who are Christians who know that we are going to heaven by the saving grace of God, when we who are Christians wander apart from God, you know what happens?
We can get robbed of things and people that we wanted to keep. We can get sold so that we are addicted to passions and bad habits. We can find that our life is an experience of defeat after defeat after defeat. Now I’m not a prophet, okay? Nor am I a son of a prophet. But I’m just a guy that’s been around here for a long, long time.
And if you’re a Christian and you’re not walking with God, I want to make a prediction. May I make a prediction about your life? Sooner or later you will be where the children of Israel were. You will be in great distress. Great distress. In the island of Jamaica there was once a city by the name of Port Royal. For a period of time Port Royal won a reputation as the richest and most wicked city in the world.
Back in the days when there were pirates that were buccaneers and pirates met and gathered in Port Royal. Through the years Port Royal offered to sinful men first of all about all of the pleasures that they wanted. It offered liquor and gambling and dope and women. There were brothels and street fights in Port Royal. And people were murdered. And the blood of murder victims ran freely in that city. Rape and theft were common.
And then on June the 7th, 1692, that’s just a little more than three hundred years ago, Port Royal was struck by two serious earthquakes. In the second earthquake the sea was rolled back about a half mile. And great cracks and crevices opened in the ground underneath Port Royal. And men and women fell screaming into these cracks and crevices.
The choking fumes of sulfur seeped up through the cracks in the ground. And then the sea that had been driven back returned. And a great roll of water swept over the city of Port Royal, smashing ships, knocking buildings off of their foundations. And then with a loud and sudden roar the city of Port Royal sank beneath the waves with most of its population.
And I have read that you can go to Jamaica today and you can go to the former site of Port Royal. And you can look down through several fathoms of clear ocean. And you can see the barnacle-encrusted ruins of Port Royal, the world’s richest and most wicked city. And my friends, the Bible tells us in very solemn words, “The Lord will judge his people.” And it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
And if we who have come to know the Lord Jesus Christ do not walk with God, then the hand of God can come down upon us. And the waters of his judgment can be like a wave sweeping over our lives. They can be like kindling wood which is burned out by the fire. And that is why the Bible also says, “Let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire.”
For our God is a consuming fire. When our God is also a merciful God, you know what he did for Israel when they were oppressed by their enemies? He raised up judges, men of courage, men of faith. And whenever the judges, that is where he was with the judge and he delivered Israel from the hand of their enemies. And the Bible explains why this was so. Because the Lord was moved to pity by the groaning of his people because of the people who had oppressed them and harassed them.
And he delivered them time and again through the judges. And they served the Lord while the judges were alive. But you know what happened when the judges died? The Bible says they reverted. They turned back to their wickedness. And they were more wicked than their fathers who were before them. Once again they worshiped and served other gods.
And the bottom line of our passage is this. And they did not turn from their doings and from their stubborn ways. They did not turn from their doings and from their stubborn ways. I’ve already said how much I appreciated the birthday party last night. And I’ve lost count. If I had been trying to keep it, I would have lost count of the number of times the number of sixty-five was mentioned over and over again.
I’ll never forget how old I am at least for this year. But there was a number that wasn’t mentioned very often. And it was a number forty-two, shortly to be forty-three. You see, I’ve been with this church forty-two years going on forty-three in September. Now one of the advantages of being with a church for a long time, there are many advantages having good friends like I have you in the membership. The other advantage is that you get a chance to watch people.
And you begin to get a chance to see how the Lord deals with people. You see a lot of things in the lives of individuals. Let me tell you what I’ve seen here at Victor Street. I have seen from time to time people who are genuine, they say you know they’re on their way to heaven, who have been away from the church for a long time. I’ve seen them come back.
And I’ve seen them involve themselves with the church for several weeks or maybe several months, maybe even longer than that. And then one day they’re gone. They’re not coming anymore. They’ve gone back to their old lifestyle. They go back to their old ways. Maybe God had begun to help them with their troubles. But now somehow or other I can see they’ve reverted.
And they have not stopped from their doings or from their stubborn ways. I tell you that because it really happens. It not only happened in the days of the judges. It happens today with real people that you and I know. Years ago when the nation of Egypt conquered Nubia to itself, on one occasion an Egyptian regiment of soldiers was going through the Nubian desert.
Because the soldiers were always very thirsty for water, they were thirsty. And then suddenly they saw a beautiful lake. And they urged their Arab guide to take them over to that lake so that they could quench their thirst. The Arab guide refused. He told them the lake wasn’t real. That the lake was a mirage.
And he even refused to lose time by going off course in the direction of a mirage. They argued with him. And words came to blows. And they killed their Arab guide on whom their lives depended to lead them through the desert. They started off in the direction of the beautiful lake. But after a while the beautiful lake disappeared. And was replaced by blazing sand.
And now they suffered terrible thirst and horrible despair. And now they desperately needed the guide who was no longer with them and who could only lead them through the desert. They were lost. And much later when Arabs were sent to search for this regiment from which not a single man escaped, they found the regiment. They were a collection of dried and withering corpses decaying in the scorching sun of the Nubian desert.
Now there are times, my friends, our decision to turn to the Lord turns out to be a mirage. At first it looks like a beautiful lake. But the more time progresses, the more it becomes evident that there is nothing there. And the question that I want to leave with you this morning, whether you have just recently turned to the Lord or whether you are still walking with the Lord, I want to ask you if your commitment to God is real, if it’s deep, if it’s strong, or if it’s shallow, superficial and something that easily vanishes away.
So you see, when your commitment to Jesus Christ vanishes away, the tragic result is there. That the God who has saved you by his grace becomes a stranger, a stranger to you. Pepe Pearson who is a running back with the Buckeyes of Ohio State, you say Zane I didn’t think you were interested in football and besides this is Cincinnati Reds season. How can you be a fan of Pepe Pearson?
Well it doesn’t have very much at all to do with the fact that he plays football. I am a fan of Pepe Pearson because he was planning after his appearance in the Rose Bowl in January the first to send a postcard to his sixth-grade teacher. You see Pepe Pearson believes that his sixth-grade teacher was a wonderful influence on his life and a more than usual role model. Her name is Ruth Molinaro.
And Ruth refuses to take very much credit for anything that has happened in Pepe Pearson’s life. She says that when he was in sixth grade he was mischievous. But somehow or other in sixth grade he settled down and got down to business and got serious about his studies. And then she said this about Pepe Pearson. She said at eleven years old he was very focused because he was determined to become a professional football player.
And not just a football player. He was determined to become a running back. There were times when he would miss the school bus so that he could walk home and strengthen his legs. He was involved in the track program so that he could practice his speed and keep himself in shape for football. Now the story about Pepe Pearson appeared in December in USA Today. And I haven’t heard a subsequent report.
But I am willing to bet that after he played in the Rose Bowl on January the first he did in fact send a postcard to Ruth Molinaro, his sixth-grade teacher. And the question I’d like to ask each of you this morning: Are you as focused on your commitment to God as Pepe Pearson was on football? Are you really committed to him? You try to strengthen your spiritual legs every single day of your life.
Here’s a suggestion that you can put in practice this morning if that’s your commitment. Don’t go home after this meeting. Come to the Lord’s table. And while at the Lord’s table send the Lord a card. It’ll be delivered by prayer express. Tell the Lord that you appreciate the fact that his Son died for you and paid for all your sins and that you’re saved just by believing in him.
And ask the Lord to keep you walking in his way so that he will never become a stranger to you. And whether you go or stay I hope you will remember the words of the Bible which speak to each of us: “Let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire.”
Shall we pray? Father you are a God of grace. However we know that. But you are also a consuming fire. And the chaff and garbage of sin that was in our lives is something that you can see and something that we’re sometimes burned by. Father help each Christian in this audience this morning to realize the seriousness of their relationship with thee. May they press forward so that you are always close to them and you never, never become a stranger.
We ask these things in Christ’s name. Amen.