"I'll Fly Away" By Chris Ulrich March 15th,
2015 Rob, if you could lead us in a
word of prayer. ROB: Lord Jesus, we thank
You, God, for this day, this morning, Lord.
We thank You, God, for blessing us and waking us and giving us the
privilege of being here this day, Lord God.
Lord, we come to give You praise and honor and to worship You, and also
to hear of you, Lord Jesus; to hear Your Word, and to hear Your wisdom, Lord
God. So I ask, Lord, that Your Holy
Spirit will pour down upon Chris, and, Lord, give him the words to say, and the
words to preach, Lord Jesus, and I pray, Lord, that Your anointing will be upon
him as he brings the message today. God,
bless everyone here; open our eyes, open our ears, and let us learn of
You. God, I give You glory, and honor
and praise, in Jesus’ name. Amen. You may be seated. It’s good to see everybody this
morning, and I know it kind of warmed up a little bit. I know that I wouldn’t have otherwise
mentioned it, but, since it went from about -14 degrees to sixty degrees in a
span of about two weeks, I figure it’s at least a mention. It’s good to have everybody out today. Our theme of the month has been
God’s value system; the main verse is: Jeremiah 9:24 But let him that
glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the
LORD which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth:
for in these things I delight, saith the LORD. I have to admit that when we first
started discussing this theme of the month, between myself, Jesse, and Parrish,
I wasn’t really too sure what to think. It
kind of caught me in a quandary; I wasn’t really too sure what to make of it,
and I wasn’t quite sure how to approach this message. I know we’ve had other themes: Sound
Doctrine, a Month of Encouragement, It Starts with Love… Those are just some that we’ve had over the
last couple of years. Those seemed to be
a lot easier to figure out, to identify exactly what it was we were going to
discuss, the focus that we’re going to use.
Having said that, did anyone else wonder exactly what God’s value system
meant? Good, I wasn’t the only one. Anybody else?
Good. I figured that was the
case. Keeping that in mind, and trying
to build a little momentum and understanding each week. I’ve learned that there are many things that
God has value on, and we couldn’t possibly cover every subject matter, every angle,
every approach, but I am going to highlight a couple of those that have been
shared in previous weeks. Parrish Lee started out a couple
of weeks ago and he really built a nice template, by explaining about value
systems, and using an analogy that there’s many segments of society; it could
be family, it could be military, it could be sports, and government, just to
name a few. He said that God pleads
with us to come to His value system and how that God values love, His name, and
listening to Him. One other thing that
he mentioned was that God frowns upon pride, the pride of life. And that’s not just—I think we’ve all said
that we’re proud of somebody, and it has a positive connotation. That’s not the way the Bible looks at it as
far as the pride of life; that’s thinking that you’re better than somebody, or
you’re better than something, or condescending to people. So, it was something that he really
addressed. Jesse had talked about
wisdom, faith, humility, and mercy. Not to
esteem any of those above any other, but I could relate quite a bit to the
mercy. I know that sometimes in life, really
what we need is a pass. I’m not talking
about, if somebody did a crime, they say they’ll do the time. I’m going to share just a quick story, and I
want to—this was something before I became a Christian; this was back—1986—and
I’m just going to paint little backdrop
behind that, just because—and I’m going to share something that—as we know, the
drinking age throughout the county is twenty-one. This was something that, back in those days—I
did—I drank heavily, and there was a couple of guys that I knew, in fact, one
of them played hockey with my brother, and I remember going to a rock concert
with another guy. This was like,
probably, a couple of years prior to that.
These guys were killed in a car accident coming from Vermont; now the
drinking age in Vermont, at the time, was eighteen. As a result of those two deaths, there was
legislation passed in the state of Vermont to change it to twenty-one, and they
had a grandfather clause and all that. I
share that because—this is key—I remember that, in May, which was a couple of
months after that happened, I remember coming home from a party, and, I’d had a
lot; I mean, this was something that, I’m sharing something that’s personal,
something I’m not proud of, but something that, I remember I got pulled over by
a state trooper, and I remember swerving on the road, and I wasn’t very far
from my house, but I remember this cop just looking at me, and he asked me to
recite the alphabet. I did it, but it
took me a couple of times. It was
something where it was like—he didn’t give me a breathalyzer, and I remember he
gave me a very stern warning. He gave me
an escort home. It was something that I
never forgot. It was something that I
felt like, “You now what? He gave me a pass.”
I don’t know if I could have gotten in the Navy, which I did, about a year
later, with a drunken driving charge on my record. I mean, I just don’t know. I believe that, Jesse, some of the things
that you shared about those things, like, if we have a fender-bender, how are
we showing mercy. I’m not talking
about—sometimes you have to evaluate the whole situation, but it really
resonated with me personally, and it made me think about that. I’ll share one last thing along those
lines: I believe it took years before
God gave me an understanding of how that incident, what happened to me, how it
tied in to those two friends of mine, their death, because that cop could have
very easily said, “You know what happened to these two guys?” I mean, this was fresh in everybody’s mind. I remember attending the wake. So, it was something that, it was serious,
and it was something that, despite that, I still had done what I had done, but
I look back at that, and I thank God that he’s changed my life, and I know that
He’s changed your life, too. So where does that put us
today? Well, the theme is God’s value
system and hopefully everyone here has gotten something out of the things that
have been shared this month. It’s not as
though we can go in every direction and touch them all. There might be some topics that come to your
mind that we haven’t mentioned and may not mention today, but that doesn’t mean
that they’re not a part of God’s value system. I think a lot of us have heard
expressions along the lines of, “Just tough it out” (and this is going to lead
into my first point), or “Bite the bullet”, or “Just deal with it.” I remember, Bob, years ago you had a hat—I
don’t know if you had it custom made, or if you happened to be in some fishing
shop that had it… It was custom made? Well, Bob’s cap said, “I dealt with it.” That came to mind, too. The thing that I would like to say is that as
much as we think that life is a bouquet of roses, or hope that it is, I think
that we’ve all come to the realization that it’s not, that it’s not all fun and
games, and it’s not always going to be something that it’s going to be an easy
life. But all hope is not lost. In fact, if we continue to trust in God and
do His will we have a lot to look forward to.
But I’m getting a little ahead of myself. The first point today is
enduring. Enduring temptation (James
1:12), enduring grief (1 Peter 2:19), enduring hardness as a good soldier in
Christ (2 Timothy 2:10), and enduring to the end (Matthew 24:13)... Endure, endure, endure. I mean, it’s not a pleasant and doesn’t sound
like a lot of fun, but it is a very important part of what will keep us in the
race. Hebrews 12:1-7 Wherefore seeing we
also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside
every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience
the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of
our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising
the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that endured such
contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your
minds. Ye have not yet resisted unto
blood, striving against sin. And ye have
forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son,
despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of
him: For whom the Lord loveth he
chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you
as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? I appreciate what Linda had to
share, and Sonia, you came up and followed up with some of the battles that we
all face and some of the enduring: The
loneliness, the depression, or… the list goes on. A lot of times it seems pretty overwhelming,
and it seems like, “When is it going to end?”
We’re going to get into that a little later, too. But, I do like to see how Christ is shown as
a role model here, how He endured the cross, He endured contradiction of
sinners against Himself, but then it inserts us into the equation, because it
talks about how we need to endure, as well.
God isn’t asking us to go to the cross, but He is asking us to take up
our cross. None of us knows what
tomorrow is going to bring, but in this world there’s a lot of different things
that we could commit ourselves to, but, we look at it like the Bible says that
the way of a transgressor is hard (Proverbs 13:15). So, you look at this life—because Satan’s
always going to tell us, “Oh, the grass is always greener on the other side of
the fence.” And it appears that way; it
seems that we’ve missed out on a lot of things.
Or, so it may seem. But then we’ve
got to look at the protection that God’s give s over the time. And this might even sound a little
weird and maybe even a little strange, but it’s better to endure for a great
cause than for a good cause. I‘m not
going to go too deeply into that, but there are plenty of good causes out
there, and there’s plenty of things that we could dedicate our life to, whether
it’s science, medicine, sports, politics,
philosophy, travelling, charitable causes, the Peace Corps, the Red Cross, Goodwill…
I mean, there’s a lot of good things out there that are doing good
things, charitable things, entrepreneurial things, things that are
innovative… Kirk had mentioned like the
new IPhone, or whatever, Galaxy 6, or whatever’s out there. What’s funny is, myself and Brent were
watching a movie recently, and it was from about ten years ago, and everything
was like the latest and greatest technology, and, you know, the hottest Volvo
car, and everybody’s flying around, and all that stuff, and then this guy pulls
out this old flip-phone, and it was so funny.
It’s like, we’re thinking that seems ancient, compared to what’s now,
like these smart phones, but, you look at how time goes by, and, you know,
things change so rapidly, but then we have to look at it like, okay, you go
back to the old rugged cross. I mean, we
go back to something that, it’s never going to outdate. The Bible is always going to be
relevant. I don’t care how much society
is going to tell us, “Oh, well they found this or that…” It seems like every time they come up with
these discoveries, it’s somehow some way to disannul the existence of God, or
to discredit the existence of God. “Oh,
you know what? The world has been around
a million years. A billion years. Fifty trillion,” and on and on they rattle
off these numbers, and it’s like, okay, God still made it. I don’t care if the world, it’s been
around—what’s the highest number you can think of? Quintillion? I can top that, because that has fifteen
zeroes. There’s a decillion, which is
thirty zeroes. But, anyway, it’s not
about trying to trump this guy, either—although I just trumped you—but, anyway,
God’s still real. I mean, there’s going
to be people out there who try to discredit, but the truth is, Jesus is more
than just a good cause, and it’s going to require a lot of enduring. It’s going to require enduring hardness as a
good soldier. 2 Chronicles 31:1-4 Now when all
this was finished, all Israel that were present went out to the cities of
Judah, and brake the images in pieces, and cut down the groves, and threw down
the high places and the altars out of all Judah and Benjamin, in Ephraim also
and Manasseh, until they had utterly destroyed them all. Then all the children of Israel returned,
every man to his possession, into their own cities. And Hezekiah appointed the courses of the
priests and the Levites after their courses, every man according to his
service, the priests and Levites for burnt offerings and for peace offerings,
to minister, and to give thanks, and to praise in the gates of the tents of the
LORD. He appointed also the king's
portion of his substance for the burnt offerings, to wit, for the morning and
evening burnt offerings, and the burnt offerings for the Sabbaths, and for the
new moons, and for the set feasts, as it is written in the law of the
LORD. Moreover he commanded the people
that dwelt in Jerusalem to give the portion of the priests and the Levites,
that they might be encouraged in the law of the LORD. There are a lot of synonyms for
the word encourage; exhort, uplift, help, support, assist, but the message is
still the same and it is the second point in God’s value system. To be encouraging, to be encouraged
ourselves, it’s more than checking off a box, a chore, or a task, but it’s going
to take an effort. It’s not something
that’s just going to plop in our lap without any effort at all, or without
doing anything. It does require prayer,
seeking God, fasting, sacrificing, but it’s not so much hardship that—we talk
about that God’s yoke is easy and His burden is light (Matthew 11:29-30). It’s not something where it’s like, “How hard
is it really?” Okay, the way of a transgressor
is hard, we go back to that verse, and then you’re looking at it like, “Okay,
then I can do this.” Like the guys that
shared—we had a Bible study on baptism this past Wednesday night at Grandwood,
and Malcolm, Ken, and Jose taught that—and that would be another one that we’re
not going to talk about, but that we could add to God’s value system that’s
very, very highly esteemed—but one thing that they mentioned was that God’s
commandments are not grievous (1 John 5:3), I mean, it’s not that hard. Yes, there are hardships, and there are times
when it’s more struggles and tragedies, and things like that, and misfortunes,
but then there’s lots of times where it’s like, “This is great!” I mean, honestly. Honestly, I’m enjoying this. I would rather live this life. I mean, is there a cost? yes. Christ talked about count the cost (Luke
14:29), and that’s something that we have to factor in, too, that God’s going
to give us, He’s going to load us with benefits daily (Psalms 68:19). So, I’m going to read a verse, and you don’t
have to turn to it. A lot of us are
familiar with it, but: 1 Samuel 30:6 And David was
greatly distressed; for the people spake of stoning him, because the soul of
all the people was grieved, every man for his sons and for his daughters: but
David encouraged himself in the LORD his God. For those that may not know that
story, you can go back and read it, verse one, and that chapter. Really, my point is not to tell you the whole
backstory of why all this, but to say that we have a fairly large group here of
people that are at various stages of their life in Christ. Some might already be sure about how to
encourage yourself, and to that I say, Amen. I think those of us who’ve been around a while
should know how to encourage ourselves.
Doesn’t mean we don’t need an occasional reminder, whether it’s from
each other, or whether it’s from God, or reading the Bible, or whatever it
happens to be that God gets that message across to us, but this passage is about
King David encouraging himself. Not to
say that there weren’t others that were encouraged, “Oh, yeah, he’s encouraged,
so I’m encouraged, too,” or, “That’s great; let’s get behind him. We’ll fight, and we’ll get everything back
safely.” But I’m not going to re-read
it, but I will say that encouraging ourselves is something that we need to have
first and foremost, but encouraging others is the next step beyond encouraging
ourselves. So, what does that entail? We obviously need to get both. We’re not going to be encouraging if we’re
depressed, or if we can’t seem to get the victory, we just can’t seem to shake
it off. I’m not talking about fleeting emotions
that come and go like the wind; I’m talking about being steadfast and unmovable
in Christ, and, yes, we still need to encourage ourselves in the Lord, but we
can’t forget to encourage someone else along the way. I’m going to read one last verse
from this section: Hebrews 3:12-14 Take
heed, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in
departing from the living God. But
exhort one another daily, while it is called To day; lest any of you be
hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.
For we are made partakers of Christ, if we hold the beginning of our
confidence stedfast unto the end; And exhorting one another
daily… Sometimes it just takes seeing
somebody, like Jay. Hey, there’s
Jay! He’s still in it; he’s still in the
race. I mean, I thought you were going
to preach too much, and I was going to yank you down. I was like, “Jay, you’re telling too much;
you’re telling too much!” but that was great.
But that verse is a very good
segue into my last point today because we need to exhort one another as well as
be steadfast in order to take hold of eternal life. I know this
might be an unusual statement to make, but just the thought of going to heaven
might seem out of place because we’ve never experienced it. Now, what I mean by that, it’s obviously
going to seem out of place to non-believers.
I mean, they’re looking at it like disputing it, questioning it,
second-guessing it, looking at it like…
You know you’ve gotten to the place where you’ve heard enough of the
nay-sayers or disputers that now it’s, you know, unbelief. “Oh, God isn’t real. God is dead.”
Well, if God is dead, then you would have to acknowledge that He was
alive at one point, so… I mean, all this
craziness. Pat had seen a movie a few
months back called, “God Is Not Dead.”
I’m not going to try to re-tell the whole plot, but it was very
interesting. It actually triggered doing
a study at the coffee shop on a Wednesday night that Bob had allowed us to
have. And it went well. It was something where you learn, whether
it’s at a collegiate level, or whether it’s just people in general, or people
at your workplace, whether they just, whatever stage of life that they’re at,
whatever belief or lack of belief that they had, we can’t let that sidetrack us
from believing that eternal life is a real thing. I mean, we’re banking on it, absolutely for
sure. And, again, because it does seem a
little out of place, especially to non-believers, apathy can sink in, sometimes
even into the church. Life has a
tendency to wear us down sometimes and it can have a two pronged effect; which
basically makes us yearn that much more for the after-life, or it can make us
think, “What’s the use? This is taking
forever. This is taking a lot longer
than I expected.” And I have to admit,
there’s times that I think, “This is
taking a lot longer than I thought.” I
will say this, that there’s ties when you have to come to a realization that,
“You know what? if Christ doesn’t come back in my lifetime, I’m still going to
believe.” I’m still going to trust in
Him, because there have been people for thousands and thousands of years that
have been looking for that promise as well, that had to make up their mind at
some point to say, “Okay, if he doesn’t come back in my lifetime, I’m still
going to bank on Him. I’m still going to
trust in God; I’m still going to put my hope in God,” which is what we have to
do. I hope that make sense, because
that’s the kind of thing where we don’t want to get worn out. It can happen. But, again, he that endures to the end the
same shall be saved (Matthew 10:22). But
we can never underestimate how much value God places on eternal life, and it’s a
part of what keeps us going. It’s not
just something that, “Oh, that’s cool.
That sounds like something nice.”
I mean, it has to be something that’s very deeply felt, a very
deep-hearted determination to just keep going.
This does put a
perspective on where we have to be, as far as looking at eternal life and,
yeah, there’s nothing wrong with having some things in this life. You have to live, you have to work, you have
to have a habitation and enjoy life, but we don’t want to take away from what
God asked us to have His perspective. Matthew 6:19-21 Lay not up
for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and
where thieves break through and steal:
But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor
rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your
heart be also. I was going to title this message
the four E’s, encourage, endure, eternal life, and effort, but that changed this
morning. I know that there are many
other subjects we could have chosen in God’s value system; baptism—those guys
taught a great study. That really hit a
lot of points. That’s huge; that’s very
important—holiness, stewardship, just to name a few. But I think eternal life in God’s value
system is a good way to finish this message.
I’ve got a couple of last verses I want to read: Psalms 116:15 Precious in the
sight of the LORD is the death of his saints. The Bible tells us that the sting
of death is great and for all of us who’ve lost loved ones it’s especially
true. I know Sister Lena, and Stephanie,
and Corinne, I know your mom had passed recently and our hearts go out to
you. The Bible says weep with those that
weep (Romans 12:15). I know Jeff Lynch
came up here; he did the eulogy. I
really learned a valuable lesson a couple of years ago, I was working a job in
New York, in Ken’s neck of the woods, White Plains, New York. There was a guy I was in contact with that
week, John DeChico was his name. The
Grainger representative had briefed me that he might be in and out of the
office that week, just because his dad was in the hospital, and, you know, not
doing that well. But, I got to talking
with John, and got to meet him and know him a little bit. I asked how old was
his dad, and he said, “He’s ninety.” I
said, “Wow, he’s lived a full life.” He
said, “Yeah, but that doesn’t make it any easier.” You know, that was good for me to hear that,
because I agree with that. He wasn’t
mean about it. It was just one of those
things where it’s like, yeah, I agree.
Sisters, that’s something about your mom. I know she was ninety-five. She lived a full life, and it was good to
have those memories. I’m going to read
one last verse here today: Psalms 90:10 The days of our
years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be
fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut
off, and we fly away. I want to close with a song that
is an oldie but a goodie, is near and dear to my heart, and hopefully ministers
to you, as much as it has to me. I’m
sure a lot of you will recognize it and I’ll just leave it at that but the
title of the song also happens to be the title of the message. After that, I’d like to ask Andy to come up and
dismiss us in prayer. I'll Fly Away Verse 1 Some glad morning when
this life is o’er, Chorus I’ll fly away, O glory, Verse 2 When the shadows of this
life have grown, Verse 3 Just a few more weary
days and then,
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