Glimpses
Of God: High and Lifted Up
Introduction:
We
can’t really comprehend the greatness of God but I once read an essay by an 8
yr old boy that described God better than most sermons I’ve ever heard.
One of God's
main jobs is making people. He makes them to replace the
ones that die so there will be enough people to take care of
things on earth.
He doesn't
make grown-ups, just babies. I think because they are smaller and easier to
make. That way, He doesn't have to take
up His valuable time teaching them to talk and walk, He can just leave that to
mothers and fathers.
God's second
most important job is listening to prayers. An awful lot of this goes on, since
some people, like preachers and things, pray at times besides bedtime. God
doesn't have time to listen to the radio or TV because of this. Because He
hears everything there must be a terrible lot of noise in His ears, unless He
has thought of a way to turn it off.
God sees
everything and hears everything and is everywhere which keeps Him pretty busy.
So you shouldn't go wasting His time by going over your mom and dad's head
asking for something they said you couldn't have.
Atheists are
people who don't believe in God. I don't think there are any in Chula Vista. At
least there aren't any who come to our church.
Jesus is God's
Son. He used to do all the hard work like walking on water and performing
miracles and trying to teach the people who didn't want to learn about God.
They finally got tired of Him preaching to them and they crucified Him. But He
was good and kind like His Father and He told His Father that they didn't know
what they were doing and to forgive them and God said OK.
His Dad (God)
appreciated everything that He had done and all His hard work on earth so He
told Him He didn't have to go out on the road anymore, He could stay in heaven.
So He did.
And now He
helps His Dad out by listening to prayers and seeing things which are important
for God to take care of and which ones He can take care of Himself without
having to bother God. Like a secretary only more important. You can pray
anytime you want and they are sure to hear you because they got it worked out
so one of them is on duty all the times.
You should
always go to Church on Sunday because it makes God happy, and if there's
anybody you want to make happy, it's God.
Don't skip church to do something you think will be more fun like going
to the beach. This is wrong! And, besides, the sun doesn't come out at the
beach until noon anyway.
If you don't believe in God, besides
being an atheist, you will be very lonely, because your parents can't go
everywhere with you, like to camp, but God can. It is good to know He's around
you when you're scared in the dark or when you can't swim very good and you get
thrown into real deep water by big kids. But you shouldn't just always think of
what God can do for you. I figure God
put me here and He can take me back anytime He pleases. And that's why I
believe in God."
That’s pretty good for an 8 yr old isn’t it. We will be
talking about experiencing the greatness of God over the next few week,
Glimpsing His Glory and that is about all you can do. Because you can’t measure
God’s glory and you can’t fully define it, you can’t bring God down to our level
of intellect so that we can fully understand Him. We are finite and He is
infinite.
Oswald Chambers said, “It takes all time and eternity
to know God.” - Oswald Chambers
(1874-1917) So, if we can’t measure, define or comprehend God and His glory then
why are we talking about it? Because sometimes perhaps only a few times in a
lifetime we can glimpse His greatness and glory. And when you do, when you
truly experience the greatness of the One who holds time and eternity in His
hands, it will change you forever, forever.
James Packer,
in his excellent book, Knowing God, writes:
Knowing about God is crucially important for the living of our lives. As
it would be cruel to an Amazonian tribesman to fly him to London, put him down
without explanation in Trafalgar Square and leave him, as one who knew nothing
of English or England, to fend for himself, so we are cruel to ourselves if we
try to live in this world without knowing about the God whose world it is and
who runs it. The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place, and life with it
a disappointing and unpleasant business, for those who do not know God.
Disregard the study of God and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder
through life blindfolded, as it were, with no sense of direction and no
understanding of what surrounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose
your soul.
I.
Experiencing God In Our Loss
Isaiah 6:1
A. Isaiah Had lost his King and his hope. In the history of Israel's Kings,
King Uzziah was a good one.
a)
2 Kings 15:3
And he did that which was right in the sight of the LORD, according to all that
his father Amaziah had done;
b)
But then something happened. Uzziah became proud and he
entered the holy place of God’s Temple to burn incense . This was forbidden to all except God’s
high priests and as punishment he was struck with leprosy.
I believe that Isaiah who lived at this same time may
have been looking to Uzziah as a king who would once again lead Israel to
follow God but instead he was punished by God and then he died leaving that great
task and calling undone.
Now Isaiah and Israel have lost their King and their hope.
At this time of loss, this time of pain and emptiness, he sees God.
B. Experiencing God often Follows Loss
1.
I want to share something with you that you may not want
to know but nevertheless it is necessary, if we are to truly understand how to
experience God. Many times, if not always, in order to experience God we must
come to a time of loss, of tragedy, our most painful failure sometimes even a
place of death before we can glimpse God. Let me give you some examples.
a)
Israel after facing
the armies of Egypt and certain death with no retreat and no way to go forward.
At this time of the loss of all hope, God lets them pass through the Red Sea
and afterward when they camped, they experienced God. Exodus 24:9-11 Then went up Moses, and Aaron, Nadab, and
Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel: And they saw the God of Israel: and
there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it
were the body of heaven in his clearness. And upon the nobles of the children
of Israel he laid not his hand: also they saw God,
b)
Ezekiel the prophet is
taken as a prisoner of war suffering the loss of family, friends and home, all
he had ever known and then in Ezekiel 1:1 Now it
came to pass in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, in the fifth day of
the month, as I was among the captives by the river of Chebar, that the heavens
were opened, and I saw visions of God.
c)
John according to
history is dipped into burning oil for preaching the word of God and then this near
100 year old apostle, who was the last of the apostles and now was banished and
waiting to die on a rocky island. At this time of loss, he sees the vision of
God. Revelation 4:2
And immediately I was in the spirit: and, behold, a throne was set in heaven,
and one sat on the throne.
2. To begin to experience and know God as He wants us to
see Him, we must understand the necessity of loss, pain and defeat.
a) We must lose our belief in ourselves, lose hope in our
goodness. We must see the reality of our weakness and fallibility. We must die to
ourselves in order to truly become alive to the reality of God. We must be
willing to believe that the greatest loss in our life may result in our
greatest gain by experiencing God.
3.
Scripture: Philippians 3:8 -10
a) Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the
excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered
the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, And be found in him, not having mine own
righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of
Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: That I may know him, and
the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made
conformable unto his death;
1. And Jacob was left alone; and there wrestled a man with
him until the breaking of the day. And when he saw that he prevailed not
against him, he touched the hollow of his thigh; and the hollow of Jacob’s
thigh was out of joint, as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go, for
the day breaketh. And he said, I will not let thee go, except thou bless me.
2.
At the end of himself he cries out, “I will not release
thee, except thou bless me.”
II.
Experiencing God In His House Isaiah
6:1
A. Isaiah was worshipping in the
Temple when He saw God high and lifted up.
I don’t think it was coincidental or an accident that
God revealed himself to Isaiah when he came to the Temple.
I think Isaiah was seeking God in God’s House. I think
he was praying to God for his nation in the loss of Uzziah. Perhaps he was
trying to find hope in the place where hope is always found.
So he comes to the House of God and there he experienced
God as he never had before.
2.
We see this over and over again in scripture.
a)
John in the spirit on the Lord’s Day. He was
worshipping God on the day God ordained Christians to worship. Solomon at the dedication of the Temple prays and the
Shekinah glory of God fills the Temple. The apostle and the first church of Jerusalem are
worshipping in the upper room on Sunday in the only house of worship they had
and the Holy Spirit filled the room, the parallel NT experience of the OT
Shekinah Glory of God filling the Temple.
B. Experiencing God occurs most
often in His House
1.
I ask
people who tell me they are Christians and yet don’t go to church, “How can you
say you love God and don’t even come to his house?”
And for those who think they have experienced God in
any way outside of the place where He told us he would meet with us. I ask how
can you experience God in a way that will bring a lasting change of life if you
haven’t seen Him in the temple formed by the souls of the redeemed, His Church?
3.
Scripture: David in the wilderness longed
to see God in the tabernacle. Psalms 63:1-2 O God, thou art my God; early will
I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and
thirsty land, where no water is; To see thy power and thy glory, so as I
have seen thee in the sanctuary.
C.
Illustration: God in My Experience
1.
I have seen the greatness of God while standing on the
edge of the Grand Canyon or looking up from the depths of its deep valleys. I
have seen the greatness of God in the birth of my children and in the death of
one of his saints but the place I have most often seen the greatness of God is
in the church.
2.
In the church, I saw his greatness reach done in love
and grace and save my soul as young 7 year old boy. In church I felt his hand
on my shoulder as I wept over an alcoholic father and a broken hearted mother.
In church, I experienced his presence when I knelt with my Pastor and told him
God was dealing with me to be a pastor. In church, I saw my children saved one
by precious one. In church, I have seen God touch hearts hard as stones and break
them fine dust and then reform them into his own throne. In church, I have seen
lives changed and souls saved and people caught up in the greatness and grace of
God. In church, I have experienced God more often than anywhere else and that
is not an accident it is the design and will of God for all of us.
D.
Transition:
1.
If you would experience the greatness of God, you must understand
the place of tragedy or loss. You must also
seek God where He has told us he will be found in His House of Worship. Now let
us look at the effect of experiencing God.
A. Isaiah Was Changed By His Experience
of God
1. Isaiah saw God on his throne, ruling and reigning over
all the universe.
a)
He saw God high and lifted up. His presence filled the
temple.
b)
And He heard the voices of the seraphim calling out
Holy! Holy! Holy!
2. So great was God’s presence and so loud the cry of the
seraphim that the columns of the temple shook as though being shaken in an
earthquake.
3. So powerful was this vision that Isaiah cried out, “I
am undone.” My body cannot bear the glory
of God. My soul cannot sustain the
reality of His holiness. I am being tore apart by the greatness of God’s
presence.
a) Then in that state of being reduced to nothing, one of the
seraphim came with a live coal from the altar. This coal symbolizing the sacrifice
of Jesus Christ, the only sacrifice that could make Isaiah clean and worthy to
be in the presence of God.
b) He then placed it to Isaiah lips and with this touch of
the mercy and grace of God, remade him a worthy servant who could answer when
God called for one to send, “Here am I send me.”
4.
Isaiah
was changed, transformed, literally destroyed and then reconstructed by
his experience of the greatness of God. God filled the Temple with His presence
and then filled Isaiah with His power.
B. Experiencing God Will Change You
1. Do you understand that no one can truly experience the
greatness of God and remain the same?
2.
I believe that most are afraid to risk such change. Could
the reason that many never really experience God is that they are afraid of the
change it will bring in their life?
3.
Far too many church members today find comfort in their
legalism, joy in their routines and ruts, steadfastness in their traditions and
mistakenly think that in these things they have experienced God!
4. Too often we
allow the things of God to replace time with God, ritual replaces relationship
and conformity replaces confrontation. We need God in his greatness not just
the trappings and the décor of Christianity. Without a confrontation of God in his greatness, His
glory, His grandeur we will arrive in heaven very much the same as the day we
were saved still waiting to experience the greatness of God in our lives.
5. One Sunday on
their way home from church, a little girl turned to her mother and said,
"Mommy, the preacher's sermon this morning confused me. The mother said,
"Oh? Why is that?" The little girl replied, "Well, he said that
God is bigger than we are. Is that true?" The mother replied, "Yes,
that's true, honey." "And he also said that God lives in us? Is that
true Mommy?" Again, the mother replied, "Yes." "Well,"
said the little girl, "if God is bigger than us and he lives in us,
wouldn't He show through?" -James S. Hewett, Illustrations Unlimited (Wheaton:
Tyndale House Publishers, Inc, 1988), p. 303.
6.
How great is God to you?
a) Is He great enough to bring excitement in Church
attendance, great enough to fill this auditorium?
b) Is He great enough great enough to fill my life, my
home or my marriage? Great enough to overcome with my problems, my failures, my
pain? Great enough to fill my heart, my thoughts or my hopes? Great enough to
make a difference in the way you live, think or act?
c) If God is that great, if He hasn’t changed your life then
perhaps you haven’t truly experienced God.
C. How
Great Thou Art – The Story of the hymn
The history of the hymn How Great Thou Art begins with Mr. Carl Gustaf Boberg (1859-1940). He was a Swedish pastor, editor, and member of the Swedish parliament. He was enjoying a nice walk when a thunderstorm suddenly appeared. A severe wind began to blow. After the storm was over, Mr. Boberg looked out over the clear bay. He then heard a church bell in the distance. And the words to How Great Thou Art begin to form in his heart -- O Lord, my God, When I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds Thy hands hath made. .He had glimpsed God and the result it a hymn that still is sung today.
The history of the hymn How Great Thou Art begins with Mr. Carl Gustaf Boberg (1859-1940). He was a Swedish pastor, editor, and member of the Swedish parliament. He was enjoying a nice walk when a thunderstorm suddenly appeared. A severe wind began to blow. After the storm was over, Mr. Boberg looked out over the clear bay. He then heard a church bell in the distance. And the words to How Great Thou Art begin to form in his heart -- O Lord, my God, When I in awesome wonder, consider all the worlds Thy hands hath made. .He had glimpsed God and the result it a hymn that still is sung today.
2. The hymn is so popular because it strikes a
chord in our souls that echoes like that church bell so long ago. Oh how much
we need in our own hearts to experience God in his greatness and glory.
Conclusion
1.
Experiencing God to most of us it will only be another
sermon title, just a like a dozen of others. But to some it will be more, it
will be an awaking, a call, a stirring to a quest to truly experience the
greatness of the God of the Universe.
2. AW Tozer said
this, “In the midst of
this great coldness toward God there are some, I rejoice to acknowledge,
who will not be content with shallow logic. They will admit the force of the
argument, and then turn away with tears to hunt some lonely place and pray,
"O God, show me thy glory." They want to taste, to touch with their
hearts, to see with their inner eyes the wonder that is God.” From Pursuing the Knowledge of the Holy by A.
W. Tozer.
3. They will begin perhaps right now to seek God, not just
the far away memory of their salvation but God right here right now before
their eyes filling this church and changing their lives.
4.
The
greatness of God can annihilate you and then remold you, it fills your
senses and fills your soul. The greatness of God is so much more than a theme
it is the life quest of those who truly long for more than just the routine of
another Sunday at church.
5.
Could that be you today? Could it be you? Is God even
now beginning to stir your heart to experience his greatness, his glory, his
grandeur?
No comments:
Post a Comment