Allen Jackson - The Response Team - Part 1
I wanna continue the theme we picked up for the last couple of sessions, talking about leading with faith. It’s a very important principle. All of you are leaders in a variety of arenas. Some of you have great significance and great accomplishment and great confidence in those arenas. Sometimes it’s your professional arena. Sometimes it’s a hobby or a skill that you have, a passion you’ve cultivated. You have great expertise and great understanding and there are people who highly value your opinion. Some of you can look at a pile of wood and know how to restructure that into a home or something that’s very useful. To me, it just looks like kindling.
I mean, some of you have amazing technological abilities. I mean, an enormous set of skills and that same group of people with all that confidence and all the ability. So often when we talk about leading with our faith, we turn into quivering bowls of jello. «Well, you know, pastor, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t feel comfortable doing that. I don’t, I’m not just, I don’t». Can’t you do that? Can’t you help? Won’t you do something? Can’t you pray? And I want us to grow in this. This is so important. This is more than a passing thing. We’re gonna have to learn to lead with our faith.
Everybody that imagines themselves to be a Christ follower, I would pray would have the boldness, the courage, and the ability to help somebody else become a Christ follower, to be able to make a case why reading your Bible matters and the value it brings to a human life to understand spiritual forces of freedom and bondage and how to help people find the blessings of God and be delivered from the curses of evil. Those are not skill sets for the fanatical fringe. They’re the assignments of what it means for you and me to grow up in our faith. We’ve got to learn to lead with our faith. There are some expressions of this that are beyond bizarre. I mean, we’re just addled a little bit.
All this debate around books and illicit material and evil, wicked information that we want to subject our children to, folks, this doesn’t require months and months of debate. If you’re in favor of those books in the school system, just raise your hand. We wanna know who you are. I mean, stop with the conversations about banning books and «You’re gonna take the Bible out and…» Just tell the truth. «I want to groom children». We’re gonna have to have the courage to lead with our faith. I hear what comes out of us that, you know, «Well, we’re called to bring unity». What Bible do you read? Jesus said, «I came to bring division».
I have no intention of being unified with people that deny the authority of scripture. That’s not my goal. I don’t wanna be unified with people who deny the uniqueness of Jesus. I have compassion upon them. I’ll treat them with respect and dignity. But my goal is not unity with wickedness and I would submit neither should yours be. We gotta learn to lead with our faith. I’m not sure what’s happened to us, but we’ve lost our balance a bit. This session, I wanna talk about becoming the response team. I don’t like my titles very often, but I like this one. And that we’re in a season of at least imagined. We don’t have any evidence yet, but we’re in a season where there’s a lot of discussion about sweeping changes.
You have to understand there are unimaginable forces moving to maintain the status quo. Only God will initiate change, not the bluster of elected officials. What they’re pushing against is an immovable force without the help of Almighty God. I assure you that. Lives have been lost, bodies buried, wars fought to keep change from happening. And if there is any significant changes that is to occur, it will occur because the Spirit of God opens the doors. But in the midst of all of that change, I think we have this new imaginations, even expectations perhaps, of government leaders, things that we haven’t seen before. We’re imagining we might see outcomes we haven’t experienced, that we’re hoping to become a part of our reality.
Well, I would submit to you that those things will only follow new imaginations of the people of God. That we can’t imagine we could just keep doing the same things the way we’ve always done them and behaving in the same pattern and then God will bring sweeping amazing changes. That’s illogical. It’s irrational. It’s certainly not biblically informed. We’re gonna have to choose responses we haven’t made before and outcomes that we haven’t experienced. We’re watching it happen all around us. All these people that are being nominated and chosen that are being debated and their lives are being exposed to scathing lights and evaluations and high levels of criticism. They had busy lives before those calls came. They had menus of responsibility that I assure you were overflowing before they got tapped with a new assignment.
So the question to those of us that are people of faith, are we willing to allow our schedules to be impacted? It’s an important question. I’ve been asking it to you in this way for a couple of sessions now. Would you be willing to accept a role in a significant change initiative? When you say, «Well, you know, if it was one of great prestige». Well, oftentimes the most important roles aren’t the ones that get celebrated. I promise you that. You know, it’s highly unlikely that I’m gonna be nominated by President-elect Trump for anything, or you. But let me tell you who has chosen us.
The Creator of all things, the King of all kings, the Lord of heaven and earth. He’s chosen you and me and he’s given us an assignment and that’s better than anything that could be issued from Washington, D.C. There’s nothing I would rather do than use my life to make an impact for the eternal kingdom of Almighty God. There’s no award that could be garnered, no resource that could be accumulated, no prize that could be distributed that matters to me nearly as much as making an impact for the kingdom of Almighty God. But that won’t come with a modest effort, with a half-hearted attention.
I’ve been looking at some types and patterns with you, some examples of this. I wanna introduce a new one. It’s in 2 Samuel 23. This is David, still a fugitive, hasn’t secured the throne, still has very much an adversary who happens to be the king. So he is standing in a position where there’s a tremendous power inequity. There are some people that have migrated to his side, but they’re the people who really weren’t welcomed in the halls of power anywhere else. 2 Samuel 23 and verse 15, it says: «David longed for water. 'Oh, that someone would get me a drink of water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem! '» It’s where he’d grown up. «So the three mighty men broke through the Philistine lines and drew water from the well near the gate of Bethlehem, and they carried it back to David. But he refused to drink it; instead, he poured it out before the Lord».
It’s a familiar behavior for an offering. He’s gonna offer the sacrifice that those men made before the Lord. «'Far be it from me, O Lord, to do this! ' he said. 'Is it not the blood of men who went at the risk of their lives? ' And David wouldn’t drink it. Such were the exploits of the three mighty men». A couple of observations just really quickly because I wanna move through this outline. I wanna get to the last section of it. But I think we have to know, we’ve got to register the reality that there is opposition to the purposes of God. That is normal. That’s the expected response. It isn’t unusual.
So if you raise your hand and say, «I wanna serve the Lord, I wanna make a difference for the kingdom of God. I wanna take my place,» you should understand that, as you do that, you have an adversary. When you’re birthed into the kingdom of God, you inherit an adversary. The second observation I would give you is there were many who heard David’s lament, his expression of the sweetness of the water from that well that he was so familiar with, but only three men said, «Let’s go». Folks, we gotta decide what we’re gonna do, what we’re gonna become.
I am weary with Christians that give me their spiritual resume and tell me they’ve been born again, 47 years ago. And since then I’ve been on a self-absorbed journey. That’s not a report you really wanna give. The mighty men, I didn’t put it all in here, the verses that follow that. At this point, we don’t even know their names. There’s three mighty men and a whole camp filled with not so mighty men, the average guys. I don’t mean average in IQ or average in physical stature. It has more to do with the motor than it does the… one of these three mighty men’s name was Benaiah. It explains it in a few verses. It gives a couple of their exploits, some of the things they did that caused them to gain this title of the Mighty Men. They served David in a very unique way. One of 'em, it says, on a snowy day saw a lion in a pit and he went down in the pit to get the lion.
Now, I like snowy days and I have seen some pits and I’ve even been places in the world where I’ve seen lions. At one time, we did a pastors' conference in East Africa and we had a day before we had to leave. So we made our way out into the Serengeti and we were in a Range Rover with lions. And I kept saying to Kathy, «If you’d get out of here and go stand next to that lion, I’ll take your picture». But it never occurred to me to go after the lion. I was far more aware that lion might come after me. And this guy climbed down in the pit.
I would like a little bit of that attitude for the kingdom of God, which means I have to change how I think a little bit. I have to re-message that internal programming when you recognize an opportunity where you could pray and your internal trigger goes, «Oh, don’t do that». You might pray, and nothing would happen. It would be far more intimidating if you prayed and something did. Oh, when you hear somebody talking about something that’s ungodly and you get a little message go, «You could speak up». «Oh, don’t do that». We gotta reimagine what it means to follow the Lord. We’ve been so smug and so arrogant and so self-righteous, we point at our credentials or an experience at some point in the past and fail to acknowledge that we are totally inert, no spiritual life whatsoever in the moment when it’s needed. I don’t wanna be there.
Isaiah 6, we looked at this in a previous session. Isaiah is a young man. He’s not a prophet at this point, maybe in God’s understanding but not on the understanding of the people around him. He’s just a young man and he has a vision of the Lord and the majesty of his throne room and he recognizes the great disparity between his own condition and the Majesty of the throne room of God. And he answers and he says, «Woe is me! I’m a man of unclean lips, and I live in the midst of a people of unclean lips».
God intervenes. Supernaturally, God intervenes on Isaiah’s behalf. And the question is posed in the throne room of God: «We need somebody, we need a representative, who will speak for us»? And Isaiah speaks up and said, «Here I am. Send me»! Just like those three men. «You need somebody to go? I’m in. Let’s go». We’ve looked at the passage in Exodus 3. It’s Moses’s recruitment. Moses is not a teenager. He’s not a young man. Moses is an old man. He’s got gray hair and calluses. His strength is already diminished some. He’s failed mightily, publicly, hugely. He’s a fugitive. He’s a sheep herder, the Bible says, euphemistically, on the backside of the desert. I think that’s pretty close to Murfreesboro.
I mean, I’m honored to be here, but this would be flyover country. And God recruits him. He says, «I have a job for you,» and Moses is most reluctant. God said, «There’s a huge need, a tremendous need, an overwhelming need. My people are suffering, and they need help, they need leadership, they need someone to confront Pharaoh. They deserve something better and I have come down to help them,» and Moses is going, «Yes»! And then God says, «And I’m sending you,» and Moses goes, «Whoa, hang on now, let’s pray about this».
And then God begins to present to Moses the tools he will need, everything he will need to be effective in this assignment. It’s totally unexpected. Moses hasn’t been praying for it. He hasn’t been pursuing it. One of the questions I would pose you, are you willing to allow God to write a future for you that doesn’t look like the one you’ve been asking him for? See, we know what we want God to do. We pray and fast for God to do what we want God to do. And I’m not saying that’s wrong. I think seeking the Lord has benefit. I can tell you that my life experience is the more I’ve sought the Lord, the more God walks me into pathways I didn’t even imagine I was supposed to walk in.
And that’s where Moses is at. He goes, «I wasn’t planning on this». But God provides Moses in this recruitment episode with an introduction to all the tools that he’s going to need. And Moses is doing his best to say, «No, I don’t wanna do that. I don’t intend to do that. I’m not gonna do that. You can’t make me do that». There’s an old episode from Andy Griffith where Barney’s doing that and Barney does that. You know, Moses said, «I’m gonna get back there and they’re gonna say, 'Who sent you? ' And I’m gonna go, 'You know, I was at a bush.'» And God said, «Well, what’s in your hand»? And he throws down his staff and it becomes a snake.
It’s an introduction to the miraculous power of God. Moses is gonna need that. It’s an introduction for him, but he’s gonna become dependent upon the miraculous power of God. You see, when we stop having seminars and discussions about whether God still does miracles and arguing for cessationism and understand that we are absolutely and totally dependent upon the supernatural power of God, or we will lose our freedom, our liberty, and our ability to support ourselves. Then we’ll begin to change our responses to the cultures around us. It’s an introduction to the miraculous power of God, but the recruitment doesn’t stop there. Same chapter, same recruitment episode. It’s in your notes.
Now, Exodus 4 and verse 6: «The Lord said to Moses, 'Put your hand inside your cloak.' And so Moses puts his hand into his cloak, and when he took it out, it was leprous. 'Now put it back into your cloak, ' and Moses did and he put his hand back and when he took it out, it was restored, like the rest of his flesh». He’s getting a little micro lesson in a supernatural God who can heal your body or make it very sick. God did both of those things. You gotta read the whole story. He made it leprous and he made it whole.
So I have a question. It’s important for you and me. Do we imagine that God still heals? Moses is going to need this lesson. He’s going to lead a collection of hundreds of thousands of people who have been enslaved for hundreds of years. And he’s leading them into a wilderness where the health care system is not particularly adequate and he’s gonna need to know that God heals or it’s an impossible assignment. They’re all gonna die on the journey and God is introducing him to what he’s going to need. And I believe it is a type, it’s a preview. It’s a pulling back of the curtain of what you and I need to understand. We’re not going to accomplish the assignment in ourselves. We’re going to need supernatural help and strength and insight and power and authority and opportunities that when you see them, you’ll think, «Well, only God could have done that».
There’s a fun comment on that Exodus generation that affirms what God said to Moses at the burning bush. It’s repeated several places in scripture, but I put one in your notes. It’s Deuteronomy 8. This is the report of that Exodus generation. «It says your clothes didn’t wear out and your feet didn’t swell during those 40 years». How healthy were they? Even their feet didn’t swell. Folks, I dare to say the vast majority of us couldn’t get to Israel right now without your feet swelling. You take an 11-hour plane flight. «Well, not me». Well, good. Help the person next to you. Even their feet, and it makes me smile, the detail that’s included in scripture. «How’d that group do»? «They did pretty well; they didn’t have swollen feet».
In Exodus 15, same group of people. Exodus 15 takes place 3 days after the Red Sea. They still have dirt from the mud from the Red Sea on the bottoms of their sandals. And 3 days later they get to a place and the water is such that they can’t drink it and they grumble. This is what God says to them. It’s verse 26: «If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I’ll not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I’m the Lord, who heals you».
That last phrase, it’s the modern Hebrew word today for a physician. God said, «I’ll be your doctor. I’ll do such a good job, your feet even won’t swell. If you’ll listen to me,» he said. So I have a question. Do you imagine that God is a healer? I do. I know it to be absolutely true. Then Christians, we get really weird at this point. It’s like we lose our balance completely. «Well, are you saying we shouldn’t go to the doctor»? I didn’t say that. I said, «I believe God was a healer». «Well, I don’t know what I should do». «Yes, you do. You’d rather not go to the doctor. It’s cheaper to pray».
I mean, my God’s a miracle worker too. He can do anything. He can do anything. I know he can. But when I’m out of gas in my car, I don’t sit in the driveway and pray until the tank’s full. I go to work with some opportunity that the Lord provides. And then I trust him to provide a place where somebody will exchange the money I’ve earned with the gasoline, the fuel, I need for my vehicle. And I will gladly say, «God has provided so that I can drive».
So I don’t feel like going to the doctor’s office is any way a denial of my faith or a diminishment of my confidence in God. I pray before I go, I’ll pray in the waiting room while I’m waiting to see the doctor, and I’ll thank God when I leave and I’m very grateful for the people that have sacrificed and spent years of their lives, preparing and training in order to help me be better. I feel the same way about a plumber that helps me with a hot water heater. Because if you leave that to me, we’re probably gonna take cold showers for a while. I’m very grateful.
«Well, don’t you believe in miracles? Why would you call a plumber»? Well, because there are some people that have trained and know how to fix a hot water heater. And I’ll call it a miracle when they’ll drive to my house with the tools, fix my hot water heater, and I can take a hot shower, hallelujah! We get weird or then we say things, «Well, you know, like, I just don’t think God heals anymore. He gave us medicine». Really? You haven’t taken very much, because sometimes it helps and sometimes it doesn’t. That thing doctors do, what do they call that? Practice. It’s inexact.
«Well, it’s science». Hm, you know, 100 years ago, doctors hardly washed their hands between patients. They didn’t understand germ theory. The best trained, the smartest, the most clever, hadn’t been much longer before that, if you had some conditions, they would attach leeches to you, the smart people, the health care providers. If the Lord tarries and we wait another 100 years and we maintain our freedom and liberty and we have the resources, third graders will laugh at what you consider to be science today. I’m not denying science. I’m all in favor of it. I’m telling you, there are limits to it because it reflects the collective knowledge of humanity. And God’s not limited to that.
I wanna pray with you before we go. I’m gonna ask God to give us a new boldness to stand for Jesus. When Jesus was on the earth, there was significant opposition to who he was and to what he did. And then he told us that that opposition would persist and impact our lives. And yet we’re surprised. That’s not helpful. Jesus told us it was a reality. We can see his response to it, that he was undeterred in his mission and his assignment, and we have to be the same. Please don’t let fear of someone else’s opinion keep you from being who you should be for Jesus.
Heavenly Father, give us a boldness to stand for your truth with courage and clarity wherever you open the door. I thank you for what you’re doing and I trust you in your protection, in Jesus’s name, amen.