Allen Jackson - A Choice to Make - Part 2
I would submit to you that God has placed before us an open door, an open door, and there's a decision to be made as I have said. What will we do? We're all at different life stages and different seasons, and we have different ambitions and different dreams that we have. And that's not inappropriate, that's very normal to the human condition, but I believe God has placed before us a new open door. I think he's used COVID to do that in the shaking he's brought to the earth. He certainly changed our schedules. He's changed how we interact, how we travel, how we shop, how our children are educated, how we vacation. And in all of those changes, there's an open door.
And I want to ask you to reflect not in the moment of this lesson, but perhaps over the balance of the day. What have you done with that open door? How have you used the time? How have you used the opportunity? In 1 Corinthians 16 and verse 8, Paul's writing to the Corinthians, it's a group of believers that he has served, and he says, "I'll stay on in Ephesus until Pentecost". Pentecost is a Jewish holiday. I'll stay on until the holiday, "Because a great door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many who oppose me".
That's such an odd sentence to me. Not odd in the grammar or in its structure, the words aren't difficult to understand, but there's two ideas abutted that I wouldn't expect to find together, not because my expectations are formed by Scripture, they're just formed by my feelings. It seems like to me if God's opened a great, effective door for you, that God has eliminated opposition. That's how the big, effective door got opened. But Paul said, "A great door for effective work has opened to me, and there are many who oppose me".
See, I just want to white that out, or read quickly past it, or maybe say there's some cultural issue that I don't understand. But it seems to me that the counsel of Scripture asks us to hold those two things in tension. That the open doors of God are often come to us in times of opposition, or discomfort, or discontinuity. A great door for effectiveness in the kingdom of God and real challenges. That's not the way I would like it. I'd like it to be more like fat-free ice cream or chocolate, and the more you eat, the more defined your six pack becomes.
Now there's an invention, huh? Look in Revelation chapter 3, similar idea. Revelation, some of you will remember, addresses seven churches, and to each church Jesus gives a diagnosis, strengths and weaknesses. This is the church in Philadelphia. He said, "I know your deeds. I've placed before you an open door that no man can shut. I know you have little strength, yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name". So, a similar message to what we read, what Paul was saying about Ephesus. There's a great open door before me, but it's gonna take diligence. It's going to take determination. I'm going to have to overcome my weakness. It's not simple. It's not gonna be thrust upon me. It's not gonna be forced upon me. But I recognize a window of opportunity.
It's what Jesus is saying to the church in Philadelphia in Revelation 3: I've placed before you an open door. You have little strength, you're tired, but there's an open door in front of you. Well, I think there's a similar message to the contemporary church in our nation. There's a choice to be made. We can enter the door before us, or we can maintain the pathway we were on before the disruption came. What will we do? What will we become? I brought you some samples of some characters, and we could have done this for weeks, but it's just a sampling of some individuals with doors that were opened before them.
In Mark chapter 10, we meet a young man. He's a wealthy young man. He's an educated young man. He's a sophisticated young man. He's well liked in the community. He gains an audience with Jesus. Jesus is impressed with his knowledge of Scripture. He's impressed with his potential. In fact, it says in verse 21 of Mark 10, when Jesus looked at this young man, he loved him. So there's no anger, there's no hostility, there's no criticism. Jesus's affection rests upon this young man to the point that Jesus gives him an accurate diagnosis of his current condition. How many of you have the courage to ask the Lord for an accurate diagnosis of your current spiritual condition? Be careful, you might get one.
Some of us avoid the doctor 'cause we just don't want to know. It's just a flesh wound, no problem. We'd rather not deal with the truth. Maybe a couple aspirin will make it better. If we ignore it, maybe it we will heal. After all, we're designed to heal. Do we have the courage to ask for an accurate spiritual diagnosis? It's a wonderful little prayer to pray. Lord, if there's anything harmful in me, if there's anything in me that limits what you would call me to do, if there's anything that would diminish what you created me for, help me to see it. Well, this particular young man, Jesus loves him and he said there's just one thing you lack. Go sell everything you have, go liquidate. You could have real treasure in heaven.
How many of you'd like to know how to have treasure in heaven? Yeah, after all, whatever we accumulate now, as valuable as it is, and it's valuable, I'm not trying to diminish that, but there is a wealth that's greater than anything you could accumulate in time. There's a wealth that you can accumulate there won't be diminished, that will bear benefits for all eternity. Can you imagine that? Jesus told this young man how to have great wealth in heaven. There's an open door in front of him with an affirming Messiah holding it open for him. Jesus said come follow me, and it says the man, his face fell. I like the imagery of that.
You can see the joy drain out of him, the energy drain out of him. It says he went away sad. The cost was too high. The cost was too high. Open doors. I'm quite certain there's some of us that will look at the open door of this season and think, "No, the cost is too high. I'll just hang on for normal. I'll pedal a little faster and pretend like nothing's happening". Well, in Matthew chapter 4 we meet another young man. This one's not nearly as sophisticated, he's not nearly as educated, he's not nearly as accomplished. He's not a student of Scripture in the same way. He doesn't have the same public acumen.
In fact, it doesn't tell us that Jesus looked at Peter and said he loved him. But he looked at this brash young fishermen and he gave him an invitation. They were in the middle of casting their nets into the ocean, they're in the middle of their day job, and Jesus said, "Follow me and I'll make you fishers of men". Their response is dramatically different. It says they left their nets and followed him. Maybe they had fewer options. Maybe that's the difference. I read once that a highly-optional environment almost ensures mediocrity, 'cause you don't have to do anything well. You got so many options, you can just dabble with a little bit of everything. But Peter accepted the assignment, and the choices Peter made in time, in his little brief journey under the sun, while his earth suit was intact, are still affecting the world today.
Wow, I'll give you another example. This was a bold young woman. She's Jewish in a season when it wasn't popular to be Jewish. Hatred of the Jewish people is not a new thing. It's not a 21st-century thing. It's not a Muslim thing. In fact, it was a Christian thing before it was a Muslim thing. Christians have murdered far more of the Jewish community than the Muslims have ever thought of. This young woman was Persian, she's Jewish, but she's Persian, modern-day Iran. Iran's had a problem with the Jewish people for a long time. She's the Queen of Persia, and she's hidden her ethnicity, and the edict has been signed that the Jewish people will be annihilated, destroyed, on the appointed day.
And she's persuaded to go plead the case of her people before the king. She has an open door in front of her. She has access to the Persian king. There's one small challenge. If you approached the king without being invited, and he doesn't receive you, you'll be summarily executed. Nevertheless, Esther says I'll walk through that door. Peter walked away from his business, he walked away from his friends, he walked away from his routine to follow an itinerant rabbi. His life was never the same and it didn't meet his expectations.
If you follow Peter through the gospels, you'll find pretty quickly he's often confused. He's often behind the curve. His mouth gets him in trouble, time and time again. I'm sure when he left his fishing job to follow Jesus, Jesus was a young man, 30 years old or so. Peter imagined that there were decades that he would be engaged with this rabbi, and it ended up being a very short window of time, just about three years. You see, if you say yes to the Lord, he'll keep rewriting the script for you.
Some of us have been script-keepers. We found a way we liked to worship, a seat we like to sit in, a parking place we preferred to park in, the three songs we wish they'd sing every week. I didn't call your name. We've been script-keepers, and our attitude is don't you dare change the script. That's how we worship, and the day we worship, and the way we prefer to worship, and where we want to sit for worship, and how dare you. How dare we what? Follow the Lord, walk through the open door before us? Is he really Lord of our lives? Esther's message to those who would pray for her was, "I'll go to the king even though it's against the law, and if I perish, I perish". She took the door.
Do we have the courage to walk through the doorway that this season presents? It's not clear to me yet. When that becomes clear to me, I think the outcome of this season will be clear to us. We'll know whether we'll be delivered or we'll be handed over to further judgment. It's not about the wicked, or the ungodly, or the immoral, or the people that are elected or weren't elected, or the nature of the election, you're distracted. The focus is the hearts of God's people, the good news of the gospel and the enthusiasm with which we share it, and the abandon with which we invite other people into the story. Are we willing to face the challenges that come with that open door? Our strength is small. We're a little tired. There's a cost to be paid. Are we willing to pay the cost, or are we tryin' to get through the door and avoid the charges?
We've been reading the book of Job. I hope you do the Bible reading with us. It's one of the most significant things I know to do to unleash spiritual growth, the systematic reading of your Bible. It's not the only thing, but it's a very important component. We got a little plan we work through together, the benefit of that is from time to time we'll stop and talk about the portions we're reading. There's many Bible plans you could read, ours isn't the only one, I'm not even suggesting it's the best one, it's just the one that I'll provide some running commentary on. And since you're here, it might be helpful. We're working through the book of Job. Or for some of you, it's the book of job, right before the book of palms.
Works for me, it's right in the middle of your Bible. It's easy to find. Job is one of the oldest books in the Bible. It's not a particularly uplifting book. I've been doing the reading, but it kinda got on my awareness because multiple people have said to me in the last few days, "Oh, I hate to read Job again, I know what's coming. In fact, I just skipped Job. I went and read another book". Somebody else said, "I've been lookin' for commentaries. I've been tryin' to find the silver lining in Job". And I thought it was worth just a moment or two, I chose the end of Job. We used it a bit in a previous session, but in Job 42 and verse 1 it says, "Job replied to the Lord", you know the story, right?
Job loses everything, his health, his wealth, his servants, his family, he loses everything. And he has these friends that roll in and tell him it's all his fault. Just a happy a lot of campers. And at the end of this back and forth dialogue, God shows up and says just what do you think you're doing, son? You've said some things about me that are a little incorrect and I want to right the script. And then this is Job's response, Job 42 verse 1, "Job replied to the Lord, 'I know that you can do all things, that no plan of yours can be thwarted.'" What an amazing statement. "No plan of yours can be thwarted". I believe that.
See, I'm not concerned that bad leadership will derail our nation. I'm not concerned that immorality will derail our nation. I'm not concerned that outside forces would take the freedoms from our children. Because I know that no purpose of God can be thwarted. And if God's people will seek his face, God will watch over those people. But if we think that we'll maintain those things without sincerely seeking God, we are more deceived than anybody we're looking at. Because there's no document, there's no founding document, that will protect us. God is our protector. "No plan of yours can be thwarted. You ask who is this that obscures my counsel without knowledge"?
This is Job speaking about himself. "Surely I spoke of things I didn't understand, things too wonderful me to know. You said, 'Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you and you shall answer me.' My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you. Therefore I despise myself and repent in dust and ashes". Job is declaring a change of heart. He's humbling himself and repenting. Now, when we meet Job at the beginning of the book, God's testimony about Job is there's no man like him in the earth, he's righteous in all that he does. But he's had a personal encounter with God as this book unfolds. Job also teaches us some lessons about abundance and need.
Job 42 in verse 12, it says, "The Lord blessed Job in the latter part of his life more than the first," and then we get the review of the farm. He had 14,000 sheep, and 6,000 camels, I don't know how he was watering them all, 1,000 yoke of oxen, and 1,000 donkeys. The shorthand, if you don't remember, is God doubled Job's resources. What's my takeaway? That material provision's just not a problem to God. Do you really think it's harder for God to give you a thousand camels that it is 500 camels? You think there would have been a brown out in heaven if Job had needed 2,000 camels.
Now, I don't think so. I think the big picture is that material provision is just not a problem to God. God doesn't have to have a sale. God does not sweat inflation. In fact, his kingdom never experiences inflation. There's a message in Job, how much of our integrity do we give away around stuff and possessions? What would we compromise to accumulate something we can't keep? I've been without, and I've had some resources, and it's better to have some than to be without. I'm not arguing that point, but I am suggesting that it's not prudent, it's not a good investment of your time, your energy, and yourself, to compromise your character to accumulate something you can't keep.
Philippians chapter 4 and verse 19, "My God will meet all of your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ". And then finally, I'd like to take just a minute and look at the New Testament comment about Job. Some of you prefer the New Testament. In the book of James, do you know the book of James? James is the in-your-face book of the New Testament. James doesn't sugar coat it. If you're having a blue day, don't read James. He will bust you up. But James picks up the story of Job.
It's James 5 in verse 10. "Brothers, as an example of patience in the face of suffering". Anybody here get up today and say I would like to cultivate some patience in the face of suffering? No, nobody looks for that door. Nobody pushes the button on that door. But you know, the reality is life brings us all to that door. What will we do in the face of suffering? Curse God, withdraw from our faith, deny what God is doing? "As an example of patience in the face of suffering, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. As you know, we consider blessed those who have persevered. You've heard of Job's perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy".
It's fashionable in some segments of the church right now to aspire to the label of a prophet. The Scripture holds out to us prophets as examples of patience in suffering, so I would submit to you, before you think of the notion of being a prophet as something that's prestigious or exciting, you'd better be prepared to grapple with the notion of patience in suffering. It's the biblical doorway. I know you're tired, me, too, but that's only partially relevant.
Let's finish this. Let's determine to be advocates for Jesus with a greater enthusiasm. Let's change our behaviors. Let's repent of our sin. Let's stop pointing to our self-righteousness. Let's stop pointing at our resumes and begin to say, well, I truly love the light. I have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness. I brought you not a prayer, not just a prayer, I brought you a proclamation today, and you might be surprised, it's about not quitting. Why don't you stand with me? We can read it together. It's actually a little longer than what I brought you, but I brought you a couple of stanzas. We've been sayin' this together around here for more than a decade.
You know, what I've discovered is that we have to continually walk up to those doors and say I'll take this one. I'll go through this one. I'll walk through this one. I meet too many people that decide to stop that. I'm telling you, if you'll keep saying yes to the Lord, you'll arrive at the most remarkable destinations. It will befuddle the people watching you. How could God do that with them? I knew them. To which we just keep saying yes to the Lord. It's about his glory, and his majesty, and his goodness. 'Cause your assessment of them was accurate. I was them, and I want to keep saying yes to the Lord. I want to encourage you too. Let's make this proclamation together:
God has uniquely blessed us. The best is yet to come. The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it. He is the sovereign creator of all things. Nothing is too difficult for him. His love sustains us. Jesus, his only Son, is our Savior, Lord, and King. We live in a season of shaking. God is shaking the earth. He's restoring the Jewish people and purifying his church. If we look at the things which can be shaken, we will be filled with terror. If we look at the eternal kingdom of our Lord, we will be filled with anticipation. Our determination, as we gather today, is to declare before one another and Almighty God, we will not stop. We are not satisfied. We are not distracted. We are not weary in doing good. We are not discouraged. We have our eyes on the cross and our hearts set on the prize. We believe the one who has promised is faithful. We believe the Holy Spirit is our helper. We believe that what we ask in Jesus's name, our Father provides. We believe that the King of kings is returning to the earth in all of his glory, and we intend to be about his business until that moment in time. We will not stop. Amen.