Messes Into Miracles
Sermon
Big Lessons From Little-Known Letters
Second Lesson Sermons For Sundays After Pentecost (Middle Third) Cycle C
Remember your first home? You anticipated weekend improvement projects the way a child anticipates Christmas. Oh, the plans you had! Maybe it was the perfect kitchen. Perhaps you envisioned a warm, well-lit garage workshop. And of course you wanted trees and pleasing landscape perfectly manicured.
But then you hit reality. You learned the Murphy's Law of home improvement projects -- everything costs twice as much and takes twice as long as you predicted. Of course some of you stuck with it. You chuckle knowingly at the term "sweat equity." You have made many deposits in that account. But, if you look beyond the cost of materials and time, an intangible benefit often arises. You brought something back to life. You helped convert a mess into a miracle.
In 1977 some cars were designed, well, let's just say, differently. Do you remember seeing some of those land yachts trying to parallel park in a downtown street? With fender quarter panels the size of bathtubs, nimble negotiation was not something these drivers experienced in those vehicles. And if the size didn't scare you, the handling would. The suspension was softer than a pillow-top king-size bed. The steering responded like Jell-O, and the seats supported like oversized marshmallows.
Take the Lincoln Continental for example. Could that car have been the reason housing contractors started building oversized garages? But times have changed. What some car critics would have called the Titanic of land yacht vehicles has been transformed. The new Lincoln LS2000 is a four-wheel independently-suspended miracle. It now sits on an athletic Jaguar platform and boasts a manual five-speed transmission manufactured by the folks who supply BMW. Boomers can rejoice! The car you once ridiculed is the car you are now thinking about buying.
Messes into Miracles. It's a topic we are interested in because we are all immersed in the messiness of life. Looking back on his own life, Paul saw a mess. In verse 13 he pins three labels on himself. He explains that he was "formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence." These are ingredients for a perfectly messy life.
There are three graphic examples of these self-descriptives throughout the book of Acts. In Acts 26:9-11, Paul said, "I tried to force them to blaspheme; and since I was so furiously enraged at them, I pursued them even to foreign cities" (v. 11). Sounds like Paul was a full-blown stalker as well!
Acts 22:4 tells how Paul "persecuted this Way up to the point of death by binding both men and women and putting them in prison." Paul was a first-rate bounty hunter who didn't care about money -- he cared about blood.
Certainly the most chilling example of Paul's former life was how he condoned violence. At the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7:58, we find Saul with supporters laying their coats at his feet. The narrative comment in 8:1 summarizes this scenario well, "And Saul approved of their killing him."
Church history is full of lives where God changed messes into miracles. Saint Augustine had a dramatic conversion when he was providentially led to read Romans 13:13-14. This was the man who prayed, "Lord, grant me chastity and continence, but not yet!"
Paul writes to Timothy in verse 14 that "the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus." He then goes on to remind his readers that Christ Jesus specializes in changing messes into miracles. In verse 15 he points out that he was the definition of a mess, the foremost of sinners.
Jimmy Swaggart was also in a first-class mess. His tumble from grace in the late 1980s sent shock waves out worldwide. His ministry supplied one sixth of the entire Assembly of God denomination's foreign missions budget. He provided 1,500 jobs while spending 32 million dollars locally for goods and services. But, while he was building this empire, he was maintaining a dark and ugly secret sin. The story goes that Swaggart would cruise down New Orleans Airline Highway soliciting prostitutes for sexual favors. Prostitute Debra Murphree described him as "kind of perverted." And who can forget his tear-drenched public act of repentance on national television? Swaggart's face told the whole story. He knew what it was to be a "chief of sinners." The big difference was that Paul acted in ignorance, while Swaggart acted in disobedience.
Verse 15 also provides an application for churches. If "Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners ..." what should we prioritize as our reason for being? Did Christ Jesus come into the world to save programs? No, he came to save people.
Bill Bright of Campus Crusade understands this principle. He was only a little different from Paul in the conversion experience. Bright was successful and "happy in my ignorance." He was then transformed like Paul into a living example (v. 16).
Paul had risen to elite status in institutional Judaism. Bill Bright was a successful businessman, owning a gourmet food business and an Oklahoma oil drilling company. But, since 1951 he has invested in souls. He is the founder and CEO of Campus Crusade for Christ International. His famous pamphlet "The Four Spiritual Laws" has been translated into 200 languages. The organization was named by Money magazine in 1993 as "the most efficient religious group," spending 84 percent of its revenue on its mission -- going "into the world to save sinners."
Paul was "an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life" (v. 16). So is Bill Bright. His ministry has produced a movie version of Christ's life seen by an estimated 750 million people. His family is all in full-time ministry. He and his wife, Vonette, lived on a combined annual salary of 43,402 dollars in 1996. Their net worth at that time was less than 100,000 dollars. He believes that "people in Christian work should have a higher standard than anyone else. We need to model." A living example for sure.
Miracles are a part of every religion and culture. But no world religion has given more attention to the miraculous than Christianity. Christ performed hundreds of miracles. The apostles followed, even raising the dead. Of course the most important miracle is Christ's resurrection. But isn't every transformed life a miracle? Every day people as arrogant and misled as Paul are converted by God. They are broken and brought back to simple faith by the Holy Spirit.
There have been many messes in the White House. The last few years have been painful for everyone in America. And we have yet to see if any miracle will emerge for Bill Clinton. Yet, if we go back two decades, we can find a Washington mess turned into a true miracle.
The mess was Watergate. The miracle was what happened in a Nixon administration lawyer's life. That lawyer was Chuck Colson. He was the "hatchet man" on Nixon's team. Most of Colson's time was spent monitoring the president's enemies and keeping tabs on them. He was fiercely loyal to Nixon, and would stop at nothing to keep the President in power.
Colson conspired with E. Howard Hunt on a burglary team known as "the plumbers" during the 1972 Democratic National Convention. In 1974 Colson was indicted in connection with the Watergate mess. He ended up in prison, serving for seven months. There God invaded his life the same way He invaded Paul's.
Colson redirected his enormous abilities into ministry. He started "Prison Fellowship" which today has over 40,000 volunteers across the country. He broadcasts nightly on radio and now works tirelessly for Christ. A first-class mess transformed into a living miracle.
Technology has turned a lot of messes into miracles. Even bad hair days can now be perfected for anyone's most important photo opportunity. We've all seen airbrush detailing to remove pimples, but have we seen digital photo retouching? It's a much more sophisticated process that can remove wild hairs or eliminate braces at the click of a mouse.
It's a no-brainer to predict that technology will continue to turn messes into miracles. Cars that once waffled around corners can now shave confidently near the curb. Photos of supermodels on the cover of Cosmopolitan can be engineered to be beautiful beyond reality.
But one thing will never change. The God who transforms messes into miracles is "the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God" (v. 17). It's because of who God is and what God wants to be in our lives, not just for superstars like Bill Bright or Saint Paul, but for us, that we give God "honor and glory forever and ever. Amen."
But then you hit reality. You learned the Murphy's Law of home improvement projects -- everything costs twice as much and takes twice as long as you predicted. Of course some of you stuck with it. You chuckle knowingly at the term "sweat equity." You have made many deposits in that account. But, if you look beyond the cost of materials and time, an intangible benefit often arises. You brought something back to life. You helped convert a mess into a miracle.
In 1977 some cars were designed, well, let's just say, differently. Do you remember seeing some of those land yachts trying to parallel park in a downtown street? With fender quarter panels the size of bathtubs, nimble negotiation was not something these drivers experienced in those vehicles. And if the size didn't scare you, the handling would. The suspension was softer than a pillow-top king-size bed. The steering responded like Jell-O, and the seats supported like oversized marshmallows.
Take the Lincoln Continental for example. Could that car have been the reason housing contractors started building oversized garages? But times have changed. What some car critics would have called the Titanic of land yacht vehicles has been transformed. The new Lincoln LS2000 is a four-wheel independently-suspended miracle. It now sits on an athletic Jaguar platform and boasts a manual five-speed transmission manufactured by the folks who supply BMW. Boomers can rejoice! The car you once ridiculed is the car you are now thinking about buying.
Messes into Miracles. It's a topic we are interested in because we are all immersed in the messiness of life. Looking back on his own life, Paul saw a mess. In verse 13 he pins three labels on himself. He explains that he was "formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence." These are ingredients for a perfectly messy life.
There are three graphic examples of these self-descriptives throughout the book of Acts. In Acts 26:9-11, Paul said, "I tried to force them to blaspheme; and since I was so furiously enraged at them, I pursued them even to foreign cities" (v. 11). Sounds like Paul was a full-blown stalker as well!
Acts 22:4 tells how Paul "persecuted this Way up to the point of death by binding both men and women and putting them in prison." Paul was a first-rate bounty hunter who didn't care about money -- he cared about blood.
Certainly the most chilling example of Paul's former life was how he condoned violence. At the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7:58, we find Saul with supporters laying their coats at his feet. The narrative comment in 8:1 summarizes this scenario well, "And Saul approved of their killing him."
Church history is full of lives where God changed messes into miracles. Saint Augustine had a dramatic conversion when he was providentially led to read Romans 13:13-14. This was the man who prayed, "Lord, grant me chastity and continence, but not yet!"
Paul writes to Timothy in verse 14 that "the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus." He then goes on to remind his readers that Christ Jesus specializes in changing messes into miracles. In verse 15 he points out that he was the definition of a mess, the foremost of sinners.
Jimmy Swaggart was also in a first-class mess. His tumble from grace in the late 1980s sent shock waves out worldwide. His ministry supplied one sixth of the entire Assembly of God denomination's foreign missions budget. He provided 1,500 jobs while spending 32 million dollars locally for goods and services. But, while he was building this empire, he was maintaining a dark and ugly secret sin. The story goes that Swaggart would cruise down New Orleans Airline Highway soliciting prostitutes for sexual favors. Prostitute Debra Murphree described him as "kind of perverted." And who can forget his tear-drenched public act of repentance on national television? Swaggart's face told the whole story. He knew what it was to be a "chief of sinners." The big difference was that Paul acted in ignorance, while Swaggart acted in disobedience.
Verse 15 also provides an application for churches. If "Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners ..." what should we prioritize as our reason for being? Did Christ Jesus come into the world to save programs? No, he came to save people.
Bill Bright of Campus Crusade understands this principle. He was only a little different from Paul in the conversion experience. Bright was successful and "happy in my ignorance." He was then transformed like Paul into a living example (v. 16).
Paul had risen to elite status in institutional Judaism. Bill Bright was a successful businessman, owning a gourmet food business and an Oklahoma oil drilling company. But, since 1951 he has invested in souls. He is the founder and CEO of Campus Crusade for Christ International. His famous pamphlet "The Four Spiritual Laws" has been translated into 200 languages. The organization was named by Money magazine in 1993 as "the most efficient religious group," spending 84 percent of its revenue on its mission -- going "into the world to save sinners."
Paul was "an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life" (v. 16). So is Bill Bright. His ministry has produced a movie version of Christ's life seen by an estimated 750 million people. His family is all in full-time ministry. He and his wife, Vonette, lived on a combined annual salary of 43,402 dollars in 1996. Their net worth at that time was less than 100,000 dollars. He believes that "people in Christian work should have a higher standard than anyone else. We need to model." A living example for sure.
Miracles are a part of every religion and culture. But no world religion has given more attention to the miraculous than Christianity. Christ performed hundreds of miracles. The apostles followed, even raising the dead. Of course the most important miracle is Christ's resurrection. But isn't every transformed life a miracle? Every day people as arrogant and misled as Paul are converted by God. They are broken and brought back to simple faith by the Holy Spirit.
There have been many messes in the White House. The last few years have been painful for everyone in America. And we have yet to see if any miracle will emerge for Bill Clinton. Yet, if we go back two decades, we can find a Washington mess turned into a true miracle.
The mess was Watergate. The miracle was what happened in a Nixon administration lawyer's life. That lawyer was Chuck Colson. He was the "hatchet man" on Nixon's team. Most of Colson's time was spent monitoring the president's enemies and keeping tabs on them. He was fiercely loyal to Nixon, and would stop at nothing to keep the President in power.
Colson conspired with E. Howard Hunt on a burglary team known as "the plumbers" during the 1972 Democratic National Convention. In 1974 Colson was indicted in connection with the Watergate mess. He ended up in prison, serving for seven months. There God invaded his life the same way He invaded Paul's.
Colson redirected his enormous abilities into ministry. He started "Prison Fellowship" which today has over 40,000 volunteers across the country. He broadcasts nightly on radio and now works tirelessly for Christ. A first-class mess transformed into a living miracle.
Technology has turned a lot of messes into miracles. Even bad hair days can now be perfected for anyone's most important photo opportunity. We've all seen airbrush detailing to remove pimples, but have we seen digital photo retouching? It's a much more sophisticated process that can remove wild hairs or eliminate braces at the click of a mouse.
It's a no-brainer to predict that technology will continue to turn messes into miracles. Cars that once waffled around corners can now shave confidently near the curb. Photos of supermodels on the cover of Cosmopolitan can be engineered to be beautiful beyond reality.
But one thing will never change. The God who transforms messes into miracles is "the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God" (v. 17). It's because of who God is and what God wants to be in our lives, not just for superstars like Bill Bright or Saint Paul, but for us, that we give God "honor and glory forever and ever. Amen."
