1 Why Lordship is Necessary? (Part 2) Matthew 7:21-29; Luke 6:46-49; Matthew 25:14-15 Pastor Brian Long : January 19th, 2013 Big Idea: Lordship settles the profession and possession issues of our lives. We are entering week three of this New Year. The New Year is a time when we tend to give more thought to our ways, thought to how we re doing life and for many, giving thought to how we are journeying with Jesus. As a result, we ve been talking about an important resolution for Christians, the Lordship Resolution! We ve been learning that Jesus didn t just come to die and rise again to be Lord of your eternal-tomorrow-in-heaven: He came to be Lord of every moment in our lives. He came to bring salvation but also transformation. He came to bring his perfect leadership to every attitude, every action, and every interaction we have with those around us. He came that we might learn to love him with ALL our heart, soul, and mind, and to love others in a similar way that we are naturally prone to love ourselves. Last we began considering the first two of four benefits that become realities for us when we make the Lordship Resolution. Let s review those first two and then consider two more this week. The first benefit of making the Lordship Resolution is It settles the position issue of my life. When you and I make Jesus Lord of our lives it means that everyday we are resoled to make Jesus #1 in everything. It means our lives are no longer determined simply by what I want or you want but by what God wants. It means that we have decided to exalt Him as supreme over the universe and supreme over our lives. The second benefit of making the Lordship Resolution is It settles the permission issue of my life. Settling the permission issue settles the question of who has a right to control my life. Since God is the supreme creator and being of the universe he not only has the right to come in and control my life but time has proven that he always does a better job than you and I do.
2 Now let s take this a step further this morning. The 3rd benefit of making the Lordship Resolution is that it settles is the Profession issue in my life or in your life. Lordship settles the Profession issue of my life. Now, I am not talking about job profession. We re talking about verbal profession. When you make the Lordship Resolution in your life you are taking a big step. You are moving from talk to action. You are going from lip service to life service. When the profession issue gets settled it means that we are no longer just nodding our head thinking Ya, that s right Pastor, preach it the people around me need it we are putting our whole body into gear in obedience. Now since Jesus knows the most about this Lordship issue I want to examine His word with you again this morning. If you want to get clear on what Lordship does for the profession issue the two best passages to study are Luke 6 and Matthew 7. Let s turn to Luke 6 first then we ll examine Matthew 7 in just a minute. Luke chapter 6 beginning in verse 46. When it comes to the profession issue in Lordship there are two different parties that encounter surprises. The first party to be surprised is the Lord himself. We see it here in verse 46 of Luke 6. Read verse 46. Understand that Jesus has been mixing and mingling with various people in various contexts. He has been noticing that some of those people have been addressing him as Lord. As time goes on he begins to detect a discrepancy and much to His surprise though these people continue to call him Lord there lives do not match their words. So, he stops to clarify with them by asking the question here in verse 46. Why do you call me Lord, and yet not do what I say? He is surprised because he has observed that at the very same time they are breathing out words of lordship they are not following what He s asking them to do. To Jesus it doesn t make sense. How can I be your Lord when you don t align your life with my teaching? In verse 47 he basically lays out the three basic steps to lordship. (Read verse 47) After bringing up the three steps He then goes on to tell the story of the wise and foolish builders, which we ll look at in just a minute as Matthew describes it. But, let s pause for a second and catch what he s saying here in these three steps to lordship:
3 Step one he who comes to me. Step two hears my words hears what I say. Step one is come to me, step two is hear my words, now notice step three. And Step three puts them into practice. Jesus is saying that when you and I do these three things our Lordship is more than words. IT S MORE THAN LIP SERVICE; IT S LIFE SERVICE. Jesus is saying when you come to me, when you listen to me, and when you obey me, then you are truly living out the Lordship Resolution. But, quite frankly, Jesus is surprised here. He s basically saying, I m surprised by the number of people that continue to call me Lord, Lord but I don t see any evidence of my lordship in their lives. So, the first person who is surprised here is Jesus. Now, if you flip back to Matthew chapter 7 and we find that there is another group who is surprised over the lordship issue. I want to pick up with verse 21. Now just a moment ago we learned that Jesus is surprised by the number of people who call him Lord but do not do what he says. Here we see that there is a second group of people who are surprised. They are the people who thought that Jesus should know them simply because they professed Him as Lord. Apparently in that day, the day of judgement there are going to be people who are surprised that Jesus does not recognize them as his. And they will question Jesus and say, Lord did we not prophesy, and drive out demons, and perform many miracles in YOUR name? And the Lord is going to say, I don t know you. In August 2003, New York City's Church of the Holy Cross was broken into twice. First a metal moneybox next to a votive candle rack was stolen. Three weeks later vandals got away with something far more valuable: a statue of Christ. What was interesting though, was the thieves unbolted the 4-foot long, 200-pound plaster Jesus from a meditation area, but they left the wooden cross he was mounted on, on the wall. David St. James, 49, a caretaker who helps maintain the sacristy of the church, was amazed that someone would try to take Jesus without also taking his cross. "They just decided, 'We're going to leave the cross and take Jesus,'" he said. "We don't know why they took just him. We figure if you want the whole crucifix, you take the whole crucifix." (Andrea Elliott, "Thieves Take Figure of Jesus, but Not the Cross," New York Times (8-25-03); submitted by Greg Asimakoupoulos, Naperville, Illinois)
4 To me, that story illustrates a reality that is far too common. People want claim an association with Jesus or God, or they claim to believe in God but there is little or no evidence in their lives. In a court of law there wouldn t be one shred of evidence to convict them of believing in God. I think we need to pay attention to three very important observations about Lordship from this passage here in Matthew 7. Saying the right words will not get me into heaven. What you say does not demonstrate the Lordship Resolution. Socrates said, The first key to greatness is to be in reality what we appear to be on the surface. He s talking about integrity and credibility and determining to make your walk match your talk. Doing good works will not get me into heaven. These people were doing great and wonderful works. You see it does not matter that you work in some sort of religious setting, or that you are doing good works for others in association with a church or some other altruistic organization. What this passage makes clear is that Obeying God s will get me into His kingdom of heaven. Lordship is not a matter of saying the right things. It is not a matter of doing something that seems to be good. Lordship is about professing Jesus as Lord with you lips and aligning your life with his teaching and will. It is coming to Him, hearing His Word and putting that word, that truth into practice in your life. Billy Graham told a story of a group of wonderful people in South Carolina who one year decided to go to New York City to see the play My Fair Lady. They took a train to the city, got on Broadway only to be discouraged to discover that there were absolutely no tickets available. They had bragged to all their friends back home that they were going to see My Fair Lady. Now what are they going to do? So, as they were standing there the people started to come out of the show and some were dropping their ticket stubs down on the ground and one of the group got an idea. They gathered up all the ticket stubs they could. And they bought the program for the show My Fair Lady and they bought the tape of the music that was sung in My Fair Lady and they learned all the songs and they went back to South Carolina and they showed the ticket stubs and they showed the program and they even sang the songs. But inside the hearts of all those South Carolina people there was a deep emptiness and sense of hollowness because they tried to say something and look like something that deep down they were not. This is an important distinction for those making the Lordship Resolution.
5 People can sing the songs, go through the motions and they look good. They look good to me they look good to you. They just look good, they just seem to fit, in and around, the church and yet they have really never really embraced the Lordship Resolution. So they have never settled the profession issue not only saying Jesus is Lord, but backing it up with their life. One man put it this way. There are three classes of people. (I have this written out for you in your notes) There are three classes of people: Those who neither call Him Lord nor do the things He says. Those who call Him Lord but do not do the things He says. Those who call Him Lord and do the things He says. This one is the Lordship Resolution. Which of these represents you this morning? Let me finish reading this passage in Matthew 7. Read verses 24-27. Notice the only major difference between the wise and foolish builders here in this story. Both built houses, both heard the words of Jesus and both encountered storms. The key difference is obedience. The wise man heard the words of Jesus and put them into practice. The foolish man heard the words of Jesus but, he chose not to put them into practice. Notice, when we don t take the Lordship Resolution we only hear what God says, but we don t practice it when life gets stormy it catastrophic! But, when we take the Lordship resolution it doesn t insulate us from powerful storms in our lives, instead it equips us and strengthens us and enables us to endure them and come through them without being destroyed. That s a wonderful blessing of the Lordship Resolution. Taking the Lordship Resolution means: I will obey no matter what because Jesus is #1 in my life (The Position Issue). He has a right to control my life (The Permission Issue). I m not just going to talk the talk, I m going to walk the walk (The Profession Issue).
6 Finally, 4) Lordship settles the Possession Issue. Lordship settles the question of who owns the things of my life. Turn with me to Matthew 25 verse 14. Jesus is teaching about the nature of the Kingdom of God and explaining what life in relationship with Jesus is like. Verse 14 settles every issue we ever want to talk about on the question of what does God own. Read verse 14. In this story, Jesus is the man who is going on a journey. And this opening line of the story is reinforcing a truth that God has regularly reminded people of God owns everything (Hag. 2:8), any wealth we have, he has given us the ability to earn (Deut. 8), he gives us life, breath and everything else (Acts 17). I think this truth is repeated so often because it s a truth that we easily forget. Two things this verse is clear about God owning. God owns me! In this parable, the man going on the journey is Jesus, and we are his servants. He owns me because he created me and he owns me because He bought me out of slavery to sin. He redeemed me with his very own blood and I am His. I Corinthians 6:20 says, You are not your own, you were bought with a price. Therefore, the buyer, Jesus himself, has ultimate ownership and therefore ultimate say over me. God owns all of my possessions. Does that make sense to you? Think it through. ALL things are His and he kindly entrusts them to you. Remember all the keys on your keyring God s trusting you with all those keys represent. S.M. Lockridge, Calvary Baptist pastor in San Diego until the early 90 s, said it so well, Christ s Lordship is based on his ownership and his ownership is based on His Lordship. God didn t have to put his initials on the corner of the sunrise and nobody else is going to cause the sun to rise except Him. He s the creator. God didn t have to sew a laundry identification tag on the lapel of the meadow because God is the owner. God didn t have to carve His initials on the side of the mountains because he is the owner and He didn t have to put His brand on the cattle on a thousand hills because He is the owner and He didn t have to take out a copyright on all the songs the birds sing. He s the owner. Often in churches it is a big taboo to talk about money and possessions. Start talking about money in church and you can just feel the temperature in the room go up. Men and women, please hear this. You can t talk about Lordship without talking about money. There is much ado about pastors talking about money and giving and challenging their people to give the tithe, the 10% back to God. When we remember that He owns 100%, returning back 10% doesn t seem so irrational. But often, we can walk in obedience in so many other areas, but when it comes to using our money the way God calls us to use it, we shake him off.
7 I played baseball all throughout my childhood up through my senior year of High School. I was a catcher most of that time until I separated my shoulder as a junior playing football. Our relationship with the Lord can be imagined like the relationship between a pitcher and a catcher. You re the pitcher. Jesus is the catcher, behind home plate. He settles into his crouch, ready to play, and you look for his signals simple commands. What pitch will he want me to throw? You wait in anticipation. For the most part you re comfortable throwing the pitches he might call for, pitches like the attend church pitch, the be compassionate pitch, or even the donate time or abilities pitch. When he calls for those you nod, wind up, and make the play. But there is one pitch that you re not so comfortable with. It s the tithe pitch. You re not comfortable throwing that one. When he calls for it, you feel yourself tense up. Throwing that pitch is scary. You ve balked so many times when that pitch is called for. Who knows how it might impact your career or your future. It feels to risky, so while you trust his pitch calling in other circumstances, against other batters, you shake him off. No, Jesus, not that pitch. Not now. I can t afford to throw that pitch in my life right now. You shake him off. Ask me to throw any other pitch, just not that one. As a catcher, I studied batters. I had a pretty good sense for what pitch could work against them and that s the pitch I called for. As catcher, Jesus is perfect. He knows exactly what pitch will work and ultimately result in a win. But, you and I have to trust his calls. We have to take the Lordship Resolution and with the power of the Holy Spirit coursing through us, we have to wind up and make the play he calls us to even when it comes to tithing. You know there is only ONE PLACE in the whole Bible where God says, TEST ME. It s in the area of giving. You know why? I think its because He knew it was going to be the toughest test of Lordship you and I will ever face. My guess is that for most of us the most major battle of lordship in our lives will be fought over our possessions. Malachi 3:10-11 says, 10 Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this, says the LORD Almighty, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. 11 I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit, says the LORD Almighty. Ivan the Great was a 15th Century Russian Zar, an incredibly mighty warrior.
8 There are a few versions of the story, but generally it states that Ivan was so busy in his military campaigns that his comrades were concerned because he was not married so there was no heir to the throne. So they found him the daughter of the King of Greece. Problem, you have to be Greek Orthodox. Ivan said okay, so for he and all his 500 closest fighting men they got tutors in the Greek Orthodox faith and got them all tutored. So they went down to Greece, but before the marriage they had to be baptized into the Greek Orthodox Church. So all 500 men and Ivan got into the water with the Greek Orthodox Priests. Another problem in Greek Orthodox Church you could not be a warrior and be a member of the church. So, at a hastily called diplomatic meeting while everyone was in the water they decided that when the Priest baptize the Warriors the soldiers would pull out their swords and put them high above the water and the arm which held the sword was never immersed under the water just the rest of their body. And they had what history called the UN-baptized arm. How many UN-baptized checkbooks are in this church this morning? How many UN-baptized wills? How many UN-baptized job decisions or relationships are here this morning? The Lordship Resolution means you are resolving to not let any area of your life be un-submitted to God s will. Church of the Foothills 2014