God Always Wins At Hide And Seek
Preaching
Lions And Cows Dining Together
And 111 Other Sermon Ideas
Object:
Purpose Statement: We can't get away from God.
A Texas man, bragging to an acquaintance about how big his ranch was, tried to illustrate by saying, "I can get in my pickup and drive for three hours and still not get to the other side of my property." She replied, "I have a pickup like that." God's neighborhood is even bigger and our pickups are even more inadequate. We cannot move away. Psalm 139 is a favorite of many. God knows all our thoughts (v. 2). God is all around us (v. 5). Where could we possibly go to escape from God (v. 7)? We can't hide in the dark (v. 11). We must submit to God (vv. 23-24). The early Hebrews believed God was local, and then, for a while, God was confined to a mountaintop. God finally moved into a box and then a temple. It took a Jeremiah and an Ezekiel to tell us we can worship God everywhere because God is everywhere, even in Babylonian captivity.
a. Our hiding. Whether extrovert or introvert we all like to have quiet private time and would dislike very much to have intrusions in those moments. Sometimes we want to get away from it all and be alone. There may be other specific reasons for our avoiding God.
1. Why? It might be very much like not wanting to face a spouse, a friend, or a boss when we have screwed up some responsibility, didn't even get started on a task, or know that we are going to be asked to do something we dread. Even knowing the confrontation is inevitable sooner or later, we still try to avoid the face-to-face show down.
2. How? Since Psalm 139 reveals God's ubiquitous nature, the almost universal hiding place of popular choice is simply to pretend God isn't there. If we simply don't think about God we believe we won't have to deal with what God wants us to do and not do.
b. God's seeking. The life and ministry of Jesus was totally geared to reconciling us to our creator God.
1. Compelling. We think we don't need God in our lives until an emergency occurs. We assume we get along better without God's interference because we think we have been doing so well. Even when we know parenting is frustrating us, the work place is stressing, and too many things go wrong, we won't admit our need for God. Yet our need for God is shadowing us incessantly. God desires a relationship (creator with creature, as parent with child), in order that we may become fulfilled and become more aware of God's love and forgiveness. The cross compels us to acknowledge God's constant overture to us.
2. But not obtrusive. In God's great wisdom and perfect universe, there is that delicate balance between God's love wooing us and God's respect for our privacy. In the final analysis, as Psalm 139 makes so clear, though God is all around us and inescapable, it remains for us to invite God (vv. 23-24) into our lives. God loves us so much while respecting our freedom and privacy, that strangely enough, even to our own possible destruction, we remain totally free to our dangerous devices. The redeeming feature is that ultimately we have eternal life, as the prodigal son parable makes amply clear.
A Texas man, bragging to an acquaintance about how big his ranch was, tried to illustrate by saying, "I can get in my pickup and drive for three hours and still not get to the other side of my property." She replied, "I have a pickup like that." God's neighborhood is even bigger and our pickups are even more inadequate. We cannot move away. Psalm 139 is a favorite of many. God knows all our thoughts (v. 2). God is all around us (v. 5). Where could we possibly go to escape from God (v. 7)? We can't hide in the dark (v. 11). We must submit to God (vv. 23-24). The early Hebrews believed God was local, and then, for a while, God was confined to a mountaintop. God finally moved into a box and then a temple. It took a Jeremiah and an Ezekiel to tell us we can worship God everywhere because God is everywhere, even in Babylonian captivity.
a. Our hiding. Whether extrovert or introvert we all like to have quiet private time and would dislike very much to have intrusions in those moments. Sometimes we want to get away from it all and be alone. There may be other specific reasons for our avoiding God.
1. Why? It might be very much like not wanting to face a spouse, a friend, or a boss when we have screwed up some responsibility, didn't even get started on a task, or know that we are going to be asked to do something we dread. Even knowing the confrontation is inevitable sooner or later, we still try to avoid the face-to-face show down.
2. How? Since Psalm 139 reveals God's ubiquitous nature, the almost universal hiding place of popular choice is simply to pretend God isn't there. If we simply don't think about God we believe we won't have to deal with what God wants us to do and not do.
b. God's seeking. The life and ministry of Jesus was totally geared to reconciling us to our creator God.
1. Compelling. We think we don't need God in our lives until an emergency occurs. We assume we get along better without God's interference because we think we have been doing so well. Even when we know parenting is frustrating us, the work place is stressing, and too many things go wrong, we won't admit our need for God. Yet our need for God is shadowing us incessantly. God desires a relationship (creator with creature, as parent with child), in order that we may become fulfilled and become more aware of God's love and forgiveness. The cross compels us to acknowledge God's constant overture to us.
2. But not obtrusive. In God's great wisdom and perfect universe, there is that delicate balance between God's love wooing us and God's respect for our privacy. In the final analysis, as Psalm 139 makes so clear, though God is all around us and inescapable, it remains for us to invite God (vv. 23-24) into our lives. God loves us so much while respecting our freedom and privacy, that strangely enough, even to our own possible destruction, we remain totally free to our dangerous devices. The redeeming feature is that ultimately we have eternal life, as the prodigal son parable makes amply clear.
