SERMONS
July 11/10
Be A Visionary
Ps. 8; Ps. 145:1--7; Col.
3:1--10
An art dealer was strolling down the street one day when he
noticed an antique shop. In the front window was a cat lapping milk
from a saucer. It was not the cat which caught the dealer’s
attention. It was the saucer the cat was drinking from that he was
more focused on as he recognized it as a piece of china centuries old,
extremely valuable and rare. Now if you have done yard sales and
garage sales, you know you have to be very cagey if you like
something. You don’t want to let the owner know you are very
interested or the price will go up. You try to get away with offering
say a dollar, five dollars, etc. So the art dealer concocted a
scheme.
He went into the shop and said, “I would love to buy your cat.”
The antique dealer said, “No way. He’s not for sale.” But the art
dealer persisted. “Oh please, can’t you sell him? I have mice in my
house and I could use a hungry cat to clean them out. I will give you
twenty dollars for him.” The store owner relented. “Okay, you can
have him. Give me twenty dollars.” Then the art dealer said, “Would
you mind throwing in his saucer as well? It’s just that he seems to
enjoy lapping his milk from it and it would make him feel at home.
I’ll give you twenty dollars for it too.” The antique store owner
exclaimed, “There is no way I can do that! That’s my lucky saucer.
I’ve sold sixty-eight cats this week with it.”
Obviously, the art dealer saw value where others didn’t. And
that is what God’s people are called to do as well. Christian
physicist David Von Koevering says that we are created to be
visionaries. What is a visionary? Visionaries are people who see
what others don’t and they speak of things that others don’t. For
example, Moses saw a promised land. His vision sustained him through
long years in the wilderness as he led God’s people. David was
another visionary. He had a vision of Israel as a holy nation ruled
by God, prosperous and at peace from its enemies. The book of Hebrews
chapter eleven gives us a long list of visionaries and concludes,
“They were looking for a better country--a heavenly one.” v. 16
Visionaries are people who are so heavenly minded that they can be of
some earthly good. Are you a visionary? Are you so heavenly minded
that you are of some earthly good to your heavenly Father?
I/ A VISIONARY AMONG US You may have heard of the name of Stephen
Hawking. He is the famous British scientist and cosmologist who
taught at the University of Cambridge until just a couple of years
ago. He gets around in a wheelchair as he has ALS and he uses a
speech synthesizer. He recently became scholar in residence at the
Perimeter \Institute in Waterloo, ON. Stephen Hawking is an example
of a visionary. He says, “My goal is simple. It is a complete
understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at
all.” The Perimeter Institute is devoted to exploring the universe,
much as NASA is in the United States.
He reminds me of the psalmist who was also fascinated by the
universe.
O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the
earth! …When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the
moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you
are mindful of him? Ps. 8:1, 3--4
I will meditate on all your wonderful works. Ps.
145:5
When the psalmist beholds the beauty of the universe and its divine
order, he realizes that we are small as tiny specks in its
vastness. The book of psalms is full of references to God’s
creation, and it calls us to study them, reflect upon them and
acknowledge the Creator behind it all.
II/ A VISIONARY AND AN OVERCOMER The reason that I bring up
Stephen Hawking is because he is not only a visionary, but an
overcomer of limitation. There is much to be learned from his
example.
1. WHEN NO ONE BELIEVES IN YOU Although Stephen Hawking is a
genius, that is not the way he was perceived when he was young. In
his early school years, people thought he would never amount to much
and they thought he wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. But that
all changed when he discovered the world of the universe in his
teens. Having a vision will change your life forever. I can relate
to that. When I was in high school, I struggled in the early years.
I was not good at all in math and science and I was thankful that the
Ontario school system allowed me to drop out of these courses after
grade ten. I also struggled with French and had to go to summer
school to catch up. Everything changed in the summer before I
returned for grade 12. God made Himself real to me and I became aware
of His call upon my life. I discovered the love of my life, theology
and Scripture. I began to do well in school.
You will find there will be times in life when no one believes in
you. That’s when you must remember, “If God is for us, then who can
be against us?” Rom. 8:31
2. HAVE YOU GONE AS FAR AS YOU CAN?
In his twenties, Stephen Hawking was dealt another blow. He was
diagnosed with ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Syndrome), a disease which
leads to loss of muscle control and left him in a wheelchair. Doctors
told him he had only a few years to live. Guess what? He retired
from the University of Cambridge a few years ago at the age of 67 and
as mentioned earlier, he is still going strong as a Canadian scholar
in residence. For a man who loves to explore the limitless expanse of
the universe, limitation does not exist. Have you heard that same
report, “You’ve gone about as far as you can go?” Perhaps we believe
we have gone as far as we can go with the Lord in our spiritual
growth, the development of our spiritual gifts and the use of our
time, talents and treasure for His kingdom. Don’t you believe it for
a second. You’re an ovecomer in Jesus Christ. There are heights to
climb and giants to bring down.
I find that many people are bound by a rope called limitation. It
is a rope deep within their hearts, full of all kinds of tangled knots
that bind them and keep them from moving forward. Do you have such a
rope in your heart? Do you recognize any of its knots? For example:
A. I have KNOT
B. I can KNOT
C. I ought KNOT
D. I might KNOT
E. I should KNOT
F. I may KNOT
G. I will KNOT
My goodness, that’s a lot of KNOTS, isn’t it? And the worst of all
the KNOTS is, “I’m KNOT good enough.” Nominating committees in
churches hear that one quite often as they seek to fill positions.
Friend, if you are not good enough, then who among us is? None of us
is good enough. But praise God, there is One who is. His name is
Jesus Christ and we have been made acceptable to God and approved by
the blood He shed for us. Satan delights in playing on low self
esteem to keep the people of God as underachievers instead of
overcomers. He fears the Christian who knows his/her position in
Christ.
3. VISIONARIES REFUSE TO BE LIMITED BY NEGATIVE CHANGE
The next setback for Stephen Hawking came in 1985 when he
contracted pneumonia and had to have a tracheotomy. As a result, he
lost his voice. Most people would have regarded that as a career
ending development as a university professor needs to be able to
lecture. However, Stephen Hawking is not most people and he refused
to be limited by negative change. In fact, he once wrote,
“Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.” And adapt he did.
He got himself fitted with a lap top computer and a speech
synthesizer. People joke that the only drawback was that it gave him
an American accent instead of his normal English accent. It was a new
language for the cosmologist, a digital language.
Visionaries have things to say that no one else is saying and
they find ways to say them. The psalmist speaks of the language of
God in creation. “Day after day they (the heavens) pour forth
speech.” Ps. 19:2 But when God really wanted to get up close and
personal with us, He had a problem. How was He going to communicate
with us? After all, even Moses was not allowed to see God in all His
glory. The voice of God thundered on Mt. Sinai and the mountain shook
which caused people to shrink back in terror. God tried to
communicate with us through His prophets, but people were still not
getting the message or refused to. Then He hit on the perfect way to
talk to us. He said, “I’ve got it! I’ll come down among them as one
of them. I’ll be on their level, eyeball to eyeball.” So He sent His
Son Christ into the world, a man who would know what it was to cry, to
laugh, to hurt and to need comfort. Before He ascended into heaven,
He told us to go and preach the Good News to every living creature.
In fact, one of the prophetic signs of the return of Christ is that
the Gospel message will have circled the globe.
And this Gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the
whole world as a testimony to all nations and then the end will come.
Matt. 24:14
In November, 2008, a historic and prophetic event began to
unfold. The Wycliffe Bible Translators launched THE LAST LANGUAGE
CAMPAIGN. There are 6, 905 languages in use on our planet. The
Gospel still needs to be translated into one third of these
languages. That works out to 2,200 languages and 350 million people.
The Wycliffe Bible Translators believe the goal will be accomplished
by the year 2025. They are currently raising one billion dollars for
the campaign and millions have already been raised. Enhanced computer
technology account for the rapid acceleration of language
translation. It’s a visionary goal, isn’t it?
4. TO BOLDLY GO WHERE NO ONE HAS EVER GONE BEFORE That was the
motto of the Star Trek crew on board The Enterprise. It would seem to
be Stephen Hawking’s motto as well. It would also seem to be the
creed by which many missionaries and Bible translators live. For the
Christian, there is always so much more to discover, e.g. more of God
Himself, portions of His Word which remain unexplored and unapplied.
Adventures in faith await us. Each Christian should be saying, “I
want to go farther with God than I eve have before. I want to go
deeper than I have ever have before.” Is that you? Stephen Hawking
writes of one of his discoveries,
Events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but they
reflect a certain underlying order which may…be divinely inspired.
As a nonChristan, his exploration of the universe has led him to
acknowledge this. We need to pray that one day he will discover whose
hand flung the stars in place, set the moon, the sun, the earth and
the planets in their positions.
5. VISIONARIES CHANGE THE ATMOSPHERE When we become heavenly minded,
we can finally become of some earthly good to our heavenly Father.
David Von Koevering is a Christian physicist and he says each
Christian is called to be a visionary. He also says we all have the
potential to change the material atmosphere around us through what we
see and what we say. Worship is seeing God and being transformed by
His presence. There is power in the words that come out our mouth.
In Mark chapter eleven, Jesus said that when we have faith in God, we
will be able to speak to our problems and command them to be
removed. Here is an interesting little scientific fact. Studies
show that when positive words are spoken over a glass of water, the
cellular structure of the wate changes. Here’s how to change the
atmosphere in your home, your church and your community.
A. CHANGE YOUR FOCUS “Set your minds on things which are above,
where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on
things above, not on earthly things.” Col. 3:1
B. CHANGE WHAT YOU DO Having a vision is transformational. The
apostle Paul continues, urging us to get rid of such things as anger,
slander, greed, impurity evil desires, sexual immorality, etc. He
tells us to replace these things with holy living, forgiveness and
love as a way of life.
And over all these virtues, put on love which binds them
all together in perfect unity. Col. 3:14
C. CHANGE WHAT YOU SAY
Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise. ..They will
speak of the glorious splendor of your majesty…They will tell of the
power of your awesome deeds. Ps. 145:3, 5--6
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts…Be
thankful…Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and
admonish one another. Col. 3:15--16
Are you a visionary who is creating a faith activated atmosphere
wherever you are?
6. VISIONARIES IN ACTION Here’s how it works. In 2008, an American
Airlines Boeing 757 was flying from Puerto Rico to Philadelphia at
36,000 feet when suddenly the wind screen in the cockpit shattered.
Immediately, the air pressure in the plane destabilized and fires
began breaking out. It was later determined that one loose screw
allowed a heater to rupture an inside ply on the windscreen. It was
pure terror aboard the flight as the crew fought to bring it to an
emergency landing. Twenty-four Christian students who were aboard the
flight are also being given credit. Their actions changed the
atmosphere aboard the flight, infusing faith into hearts consumed with
terror. They prayed, held hands, sang hymns and worshiped God. They
acted as visionaries. They were so heavenly minded they were of some
earthly good.
How about you? Are you a visionary? Are you creating a faith
activated atmosphere wherever you are? Are you so heavenly minded
that you are of some earthly good to your heavenly Father?
~ |