Call to Commitment

One of our country's most beloved president was Abraham Lincoln.

He had the great misfortune of being at the helm of our nation during one of

its most troubling times.

The once United States had split in two, and the armies of the North and the

South were waging an incessant war that claimed the lives of more men than have died in any war since.

Lincoln felt the tragedy of this war more than anyone could have guessed.

He mourned the deaths of soldiers and spent long periods visiting the sick and

wounded in the Union hospitals.

The constant shedding of blood was almost more than he could bear.

Then, in the midst of the war, his own son died, and the president was literally brought to his knees.

In the middle of the week, Lincoln did what he often did during those days.

He found refuge at the Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C.

He went with an aide, sat with his stovepipe hat in his lap,

and tried hard not to interrupt the meeting by sitting off to the side near the preacher's study.

The minister opened the scripture and taught from God's word,

and when he finished, the president stood quietly, straightened his coat,

took his hat in hand, and began to leave.

His aide stopped him and said what

did you think of his sermon mr president he

said i thought the sermon was carefully thought through

and eloquently delivered the aide said you thought it was a great sermon then

right lincoln replied no i thought the sermon failed it failed because he didn't

ask anything great of us in the midst of his turmoil even lincoln understood

that when you listen to to God,

you should expect the Lord to call you to something great and lofty.

We should expect God to challenge us and to call us to something higher than ourselves.

If we can achieve it, it's on our own strength.

But if God wants it to be done, we will achieve it in his strength.

But the preacher that Lincoln listened to on that day had failed.

He had failed to challenge Lincoln. He had failed to challenge the rest of the crowd.

He had failed to ask something great of the president of the others present.

There was the what and the so what, but there wasn't the now what.

In the story we read this morning, Moses is the preacher, and the Israelites

are the congregation gathered to listen to a message from God.

And in the message, God is telling them that he has brought them up out of Egypt with a mighty hand.

He doesn't have to remind them of the plagues that crippled the Egyptians.

He doesn't have to remind them of the parting of the Red Sea.

He doesn't have to remind them of the drowning of Pharaoh's mighty army in the Red Sea.

All he has to do is say, you yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt and how

I carried you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself.

That's the message that was given. But then God asks them to do something great.

He turns around and he asks them for commitment. He asks them to stand up and

pledge their loyalty to him.

He says, now if you fully obey me and keep my covenant, then out of all nations

you will be my treasured possession.

So if you stand up and say, I will do what you tell us to do,

then I will do what you will tell us to do, and you will be my treasured possessions.

Although the whole earth is mine, he goes on to say, you will be for me a kingdom

of priests and a holy nation.

Up until this point, God has done what he's done because of a promise he made

to their forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph.

But now he's brought these people out of slavery in Egypt and given them an

opportunity for a new life because that was the promise he had made to men who were long now dead.

But now he speaks to this new generation of Israelites, and he tells them he's

wanting something special from them.

He wants to create a relationship with them.

He wants to make them his people, and he wants to bless them and have other

nations bless them as well. a relationship that promises even greater rewards

than anything they'd ever experienced before.

So God is calling them to be his holy nation, his kingdom of priests,

and his treasured possession.

No other nation on the face of the earth was ever offered what God was offering

to the Israelite people.

They would be God's people forever. ever. But there was a catch.

They had to accept his offer. They had to be obedient.

They had to follow his ways. And so there's an if in this proposal.

And if you look at Exodus chapter 19, verse 5, you'll see that.

Exodus 19:5

He says, now, if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then you of all nations

will be my treasured possession.

If you're willing to accept what what I'm offering, God says,

you'll have everything I can give.

There's a required action on their part, and there is on our part.

In 1 Peter, it tells us also that God has called them to something great.

God has called them to stand up and make a commitment to be loyal to them.

In Peter, it says we are called to be a holy nation, a royal priesthood,

a people belonging to God.

Now, I got asking myself, why would God do that? Why ask the Israelites to make

this verbal commitment to him?

Why not just bless them and let them have all the blessings?

When you came to Jesus, when you asked Jesus into your life and you asked him

to be the Lord of your life and the leader of your life, were there conditions on that?

Well, the conditions were you had to believe what God said and you had to accept him.

God doesn't just make us Christians without our will. We have a perfect and free will in that.

I mean, hadn't the Israelites followed Moses for this past month and a half?

I mean, that's a long time to follow one guy for one month and a half, right?

You know, it's interesting to me, and this is a side note, by the way, this is free.

It's interesting to me that last February 2nd was Groundhog's Day.

And if the groundhog had seen

his shadow we'd have six more weeks of

winter well he didn't see his shadow and according

to the groundhog since he didn't see

it see his shadow we'll have an early spring and other six and a half or six

weeks of winter but till spring or something like that but it is isn't it interesting

that we listen and trust a rodent more than we trust god just saying I don't know.

Sometimes things are just kind of wacky in this world.

But God's always been about something big. God doesn't want a casual relationship.

He doesn't want us to be in...

Just floating through life. He wants us to be giving a lifelong commitment,

a lifetime commitment calling for a physical declaration of their intention to accept.

God's always been big on that sort of thing. In fact, there's a biblical word

for that action. It's called vow.

A vow is a life-surrendering covenant.

A vow is when someone deliberately dedicated or set themselves apart part for

God, for something special for God.

A Nazarite, for example, would take a vow to dedicate himself to God's service.

For the time specified for this vow, they would refuse to drink fermented wine.

They refused to touch anything that had died. They refused to even cut their hair.

Their entire lives, or as long as

the vow was, they were dedicated and surrendered to God through this vow.

Wow, someone who had decided to make a special offering to God above what was

expected was said to make a special offering and a special vow to God.

And of course, when someone got married and gets married, they're exchanging

vows before God and before others.

Now, why is that? A vow went beyond a promise.

People break promises all the time, or what would be fathers for?

We do. We make promises, and then we don't keep them. In fact,

well, we won't even get into politicians.

But anyway, people break promises all the time in their lives.

But when someone makes a vow to God, God expects them to keep it.

Ecclesiastes says, it's better not to vow than to make a vow and not fulfill it.

Do not let your mouth lead you

into sin and do not protest to the temple messenger, my vow was a mistake.

I really didn't mean it. Why should God be angry at what you say and destroy the work of your hands?

Well, if you're making a vow, you're making a vow.

And a vow was a covenant at that time. In fact, what they did in that time,

I don't know if you remember reading the story of,

cutting the animals in half and laying them on the opposite sides of a ravine.

That was how covenants were made in that time. When somebody made a covenant

with another person or another party,

they would cut animals in half and lay them on either side of a ravine,

and then both parties to that covenant would walk through the blood in the center

of the valley, signifying that if I violate my vow,

death is the result.

And in that day, when God appeared in that ravine.

It says that they saw him walk through the ravine as a fire pot,

walking through the ravine, and we knew that God was going to take both sides of our covenant. it.

A vow is a commitment to a special relationship with God.

Vows impress God because they were a statement of devotion and dedication.

They were a statement of faith in God and his faithfulness.

As Christians, our wedding vows are a declaration of what we intend and of what we believe.

There are declarations that we make in God's presence.

When we have weddings, when we get married, we vow to, for better or for worse,

rich and poor—Nancy lost out on that one—for sickness and health as long as I feel like I like you.

Right? No. What do we say? Until death do us part.

When we make our vow to our loved one, the one we're going to marry,

we make that vow before for God and everybody, that we are going to make it

work until death do us part.

That's how important vows are. In our marriage vows, we're declaring our intentions

for a special lifelong commitment.

And that's what God was asking of Israel at the base of the mountain.

In Moses' time, when someone violated a covenant, as I said,

they were asking for their blood, basically, beyond their hands.

God was asking for a lifelong commitment from Israel, and he tells them when

they do that he'll make them a peculiar treasure, a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation.

Again, that was in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, as I said to you,

it tells us that we are a holy nation, a royal priesthood, a peculiar treasure, God's own possession.

Excuse me, that was in the Old Testament. holy nation

royal priesthood peculiar treasure god's possession in the new testament we

see this very similar holy nation a royal priesthood a peculiar treasure a people

belonging to god doesn't that mean god's possession so what was said in peter

was repeated from the old testament you'll find that a lot.

We've been called to something great. We've been told that we are on a mission.

We've been called to be on mission with God. What is the saying that we say?

Let's say this together. God is on a mission to redeem a lost world to himself,

and he chooses to use us, his chosen people, to accomplish his mission.

Notice the words in there, we are his chosen people. We are a holy nation, a royal priesthood.

We belong to God. God it doesn't get

any better than that we've been called to make a commitment to God through

Jesus Christ and for the Israelites that commitment took

place at the foot of Mount Sinai for us Christians that take place at the foot

of Mount Calvary according to Romans chapter 6 God's call to that commitment

Romans 6 · chapter mention

begins at our baptism and look at these words 6 Romans 6 chapter 6 verses 1

1 through 7, what shall we say then?

Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?

Should we keep sinning so that God's grace has to get over and over and over

to keep coming? No, by no means.

We are those who have died to sin. How can we live in it any longer?

Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ.

Into Christ Jesus, were baptized into his death?

We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death,

in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the

Father, we too may be raised to new life.

For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also

be united with him in a resurrection.

Him, thanks be to God. It goes on to say, for we know that our old self was crucified with Him,

so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer

be slaves to sin, because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.

So we know that in the Scripture, we find that God is calling us to be redeemed,

and not just be redeemed, but we see that God God is calling to put to death

the old ways, the sinful ways.

2 Corinthians 5, verse 17 says, Therefore, if any man is in Christ, he is a new creation.

2 Corinthians 5:17

The old is gone, and the new ways have begun.

When we become a follower of Jesus Christ, we put away those old things.

When we are buried in the waters of Christian baptism, we are making a declaration to God.

We are committing ourselves to die to our past. And when we rise up from that

watery grave, we are resurrected to a new life.

I love to do this when I have baptism, when we do baptism by immersion.

I love to have the congregation, when the person goes into the waters of baptism

and come out, I like to have the very first thing they hear coming out of the

water, something like, praise the Lord, hallelujah, thank you, Jesus.

So the crowd shouts, thank you, Jesus, praise the Lord. This is a blessing of

God. This is a resurrection to life.

We are signifying that God has renewed us and brought us back to life in him.

I want you to notice what verses 12 and 13 say.

Therefore, because you've made this commitment, do not let your life,

excuse me, do not let your sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its desires.

Do not offer the parts of your body to sin as instruments of wickedness,

but rather offer Offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death.

Life and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.

Don't surrender to sin, God says.

You've made yourself, you've made a commitment to God. Therefore,

offer yourselves to God as instrument of righteousness.

Just as I said to the kids, how do we know what we're doing if we're doing what's

right in our own eyes or what's right in God's?

We do it by knowing the scripture by understanding

what's correct behavior we do it by fellowship

with each other how do we how do

we share that right life with others by being instruments of righteousness by

knowing good and evil and practicing the good because that's what god would

want in fact romans chapter 6 verse 20 says when you were slaves to sin you

Romans 6:20

you were free from the control of righteousness.

You didn't belong to God back then. Verse 22 goes on and says,

but now you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God.

The benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life.

Thoughts produce feelings. Feelings produce actions. Actions have consequences, good or bad.

When we think about these things and we do these things, or emotions stir up

and say, you know, I want to do what is right before God.

And then we act on those things and become instruments of righteousness.

The consequence, the reward, is eternal life.

So when you became a Christian, you made a commitment at the foot of Mount Calvary

to a unique relationship with God.

And it's that relationship that makes all the difference in our lives.

We have become instruments of righteousness.

We have chosen to follow Jesus. We have chosen to be obedient to his ways.

We have chosen to offer an example of Christ to those around us.

A young boy came to his mother one evening and handed her a piece of paper.

On that paper, he had written the following list.

For cutting the grass, $5. For cleaning my room, $1.

This was in the days before inflation, anyway. For going to the store for you, 50 cents.

For babysitting my kid brother while you were shopping, $0.25,

for taking out the garbage, $1, for getting a good report card, $5. I got $0.10.

Just saying. Anyway, for making the yard, or for raking the yard, $2.

Total owed, $14.75.

His mother looked at him for a moment, and then she picked up the pen,

turned the paper over, and wrote the following words.

For the nine months I carried you while you were growing inside me, no charge.

For all the nights that I've sat up with you, doctored you, and prayed for you, no charge.

For all the trying times and all the tears that you've caused through the years, no charge.

For all the nights that were filled with dread and for the worries I knew were

ahead, No charge for the toys, food, clothes, and even wiping your snotty little nose.

Well, I've added the snotty in there. Anyway, no charge.

Son, when you add it up, the cost of my love for you is no charge.

When the boy finished reading what his mother had written, there were big tears in his eyes.

And he looked straight at his mom and he said, Mom, I love you.

And then he took the pen and the paper and turned it back over to his side of

the list and put a big X in it and wrote the words, paid in full.

That's the value of our relationship with Christ. We don't gain salvation because we've earned it,

but because we've made that commitment to making God our Father by accepting

his free gift of salvation.

We have been purchased with a price we owe him everything but this is what christ

writes across our paid paid in full heavenly father we give you thanks and praise,

we ask you to call us to commitment in everything we do may we be a people a

chosen your chosen people, your royal priesthood, your royal nation and holy nation.

May we be a people that are belonging to God, and Lord, may we live like it.

In Jesus' name, amen.