Awe Of God

Please stand with me for the reading of the word this morning.

From Isaiah 55.

Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, and he who has no money, come by and eat.

Come by wine and milk without money and without price.

Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which does not satisfy?

Listen diligently to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food.

Incline your ear and come to me, hear, that your soul may live, and I will make with you an everlasting covenant, my steadfast sure love for David.

Behold, I made him a witness to the peoples, a leader and a commander of the peoples.

Behold, you shall call a nation that you do not know, a nation that you do not know, you shall run to you, because of the Lord your God, and of the Holy One of Israel, for he has glorified you.

Seek the Lord while he may be found.

Call upon him while he is near.

Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts.

Let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there, but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.

It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

For ye shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace, the mountains and the hills before you shall break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress, instead of the briar shall come up the myrtle, and it shall make a name for the Lord, an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field.

The grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of their God shall stand forever.

Amen.

Kids, you are now dismissed to kids' quest.

And you know, Claude had told me, you know, the kids will write you a letter and you can respond to them.

And I was like, oh, that's sweet.

And so I got a few.

Uh, but Claude didn't tell me that sometimes they're really deep theological questions.

And I got a wonderful letter asking why did God create Satan if Satan uh was going to sin and cause other people to sin.

I was kind of like, ah, just ask your parents.

Uh yeah.

But, you know, as I began to think about it, and I was like, well, I don't fully know the answer to that, but I do know God is not the author of sin.

And I do know that God is good.

And um I wrote back when sin happened, it created the opportunity for God to express his love through choice, right?

Because we understand love by choice.

You can't force someone to love you, right?

You can't command someone to love you.

It has to be a choice.

And so when sin entered the world, it provided God the opportunity to say, I'm going to show you how much I love you by choosing you.

Because I don't need you.

He could have wiped out the whole thing, and his fullness and his glory and his value would have stayed the same.

But he wanted us to experience that.

I love you so much that I'm going to give up my life for you.

That's what I'm choosing to do.

And so as I was writing that out, it was helpful for me to just find this awe.

Just to be reminded of the awe of who God is, what he's done for me.

And so this morning, right, we're not going to talk about resolutions, right?

You're one for one, though, on that resolution to be a church more.

So congratulations.

51 more to go.

You can do it.

It's not, hey, let's let's project on what are the ways that we can improve this year.

I want us to spend this morning thinking about what brings you in awe of God.

What makes you truly captivated by who he is, who Christ is, what the Spirit is doing in you and through you.

Right?

So this morning, let's be mindful of what can create awe in us of who God is.

Reminded that who you're in awe of, you will follow.

And following Christ is how you partner with Cahaba Park.

All right, and I chose Isaiah 55 because oftentimes, right, you're very familiar with Isaiah 55, and I think a lot of times it gets used out of its context, right?

Where something kind of happens out of our control or our understanding, or maybe we just didn't like the result, and we say, like, well, we justify by like, well, God's ways are not our ways, his thoughts are not our thoughts, and so that's we we basically justify his providence and why he behaves like he does with this verse with Isaiah 55.

But what you'll see, that's not the context of Isaiah 55.

Isaiah 55 is written in this context of you to be in awe of the fact that God is not like you.

It does not take much for you to not like someone.

It's just one act like, don't like that person, don't even know them, but they did, you know, they they drove way too slow on that left lane.

There's no way I'd be friends with that person.

Right?

So we're naturally bent towards, you know what, that person deserves wrath and anger, and they're a sinner, and they deserve to be treated poorly, right?

Or we're big into reciprocity, right?

You get what you uh deserve.

But here's the problem, right, with that.

And John Calvin uh has this quote there is nothing that troubles our consciences more than when we think that God is like ourselves.

I mean, isn't that the truth?

How often do you find yourself projecting how you feel about yourself is how God in that same moment feels about you.

What are you doing in that moment?

Right?

If I'm not happy with me, if I don't love me, if I'm disappointed in me, well then a holy perfect God has got to be disappointed with me.

He's got to be discouraged with me.

And then you think, well, now I'm hopeless.

Now how do I get out of God's doghouse?

How can I behave better?

How can I re-up on my promises?

How can I try harder?

See, when you project on God how you feel and how you think and how you act is how he does it, then you become, you start to make him like you.

Right?

You become equals.

And that's a big problem because you're not in awe of you.

So you wouldn't be in a God who's like you.

You're in awe of people who are above you, who accomplish things and do things that you can't do.

I mean, the funny thing is, you think about Jonah, right?

Jonah gets mad at God for not being like him.

Right?

And Jonah 4, the people of Nineveh, the Assyrians, have just repented.

And Jonah's up on that hill, and he's just so furious that God didn't destroy him.

It's like, why?

He's like, I knew you were a nice God.

I knew you were compassionate, and I knew you were gonna save him.

You're like, what are you doing, Jonah?

That's why you came.

But he was so mad, right?

Because Jonah was like, they're not good people.

This is what they deserve.

Jonah was trying to project the frustration of, like, I thought you were a God who was like me, who loves justice in a sense of this wrath and anger.

I mean, God does love justice, right?

He is just.

But that's not what happens.

I mean, the beginning of this in verse one, it's come three times.

Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters, come buy and eat, come by wine and milk without money and without price.

It is this invitation to sinners.

It is the invitation to the neighbor, to the coworker, to the person who, isn't that likable, right?

Because if this is talking about sinners, like we're not likable.

But this is his response.

These are his thoughts.

Come, this invitation.

Right?

The same invitation that is given to you is the same invitation that God gives to these people that we work with, that we live by, that we interact with, that we just don't really like that much, and that we don't want to be around.

But his ways and thoughts are not our ways.

Jump down to verse six.

Look at these verbs.

Seek the Lord while he may be found.

Again, this is talking about sinful, unlikable people.

It's talking about us.

Seek the Lord while he may be found.

Call upon him while he is near.

Let the wicked forsake his ways and the unrighteous man his thoughts.

Let him return.

So now we have seek, call, return to the Lord.

And here's why.

That he may have compassion on him and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.

It's not reluctantly pardon.

It's not determine if it's worth pardoning.

It is an abundant pardon and forgiveness.

Here's the thing: when you make an invitation to someone, when you like it might cost you a little bit, right?

You might have to talk to that person, maybe you invite them over to your house, you have to clean your house, you have to cook, like that might be a little bit of a cost.

But he is inviting us to come for compassion and pardoning that cost him his life.

An invitation that cost him the infiniteness of who he was, that he humbled himself to be a man and to suffer.

That's not our ways.

That's not our thoughts.

Right?

You think of uh two chapters later in Isaiah 57, it's going to talk about that the heart of God is to the contrite and lowly in spirit.

Right?

700 years later, that is manifested in Christ.

How do you know that Christ is drawn to the contrite and the lowly in spirit?

Because he came and he suffered for you.

The invitation for you to be with him was to suffer.

I mean, think about the ways of the world.

Survival of the fittest.

Strong win, right?

The strongest football, the fastest football team or sports team, that's who wins games.

The bigger, stronger, faster.

The bigger, stronger nations rule.

Right?

We're kind of seeing that right now with the Ukraine and Russia.

Russia's bigger.

They want some of their land that they think is theirs and they weren't, they're taking it back.

Right?

That's this is how the world works.

The biggest, the strongest, they rule.

Right?

The wealthy.

You're wealthy, you acquire more possessions.

That's how you're wealthy.

You have possessions.

Right?

Or the powerful.

You're served.

You have an entourage.

And you actually remember this, like Matthew 20, James and John's mom kind of gets involved.

You're like, hey, uh can can my sons be on your left and right?

Right?

And you know the other guys are like, dude, you got you brought your mom here to like to.

They're like, mom, get out of here.

Uh you're embarrassing us.

But why?

Because the ways of the world, right?

Or, hey, we're associated with you, you're a big deal, you're going to rule and physically reign over Rome, and we're gonna have all what we've wanted, so like we're gonna be a part of this.

But what is his response?

That's not mine to give.

You don't really know what you're asking, and we're here to serve.

We're not here to be served.

Because Christ, in his infinite strength, he became weak.

Right?

In his infinite value and wealth, he became poor for our sake.

Right?

He became sin.

Someone of infinite value and beauty became the ugliness of sin.

That's his ways.

Infinite power.

He didn't have people serve him.

He served.

Palm Sunday, right?

He's not riding in on a war horse.

Everyone's like, he's here, he's coming, we it's it's arrived.

But it wasn't a war horse, was it?

It was a donkey.

And he wasn't riding up to a big throne and a big powerful kingdom.

What was he riding up to?

The cross.

See, Jesus' ways are like, look, you don't win by winning.

I won by losing.

I won by losing and giving up my life to defeat Satan, to defeat death, to defeat sin.

Those are my ways.

Those are my thoughts.

And when you start thinking about that, it can't but bring awe.

Look who you are.

Look what you subjected yourself to.

That brings awe and amazement.

Because he didn't have to do it.

But he chose to do it.

He voluntarily did it.

He was not forced to do it.

There's not a moment that Jesus Christ was forced to endure any bit of that suffering for 33 years.

And he did it with perfect joy.

Because he's like, that's my way.

These are my thoughts.

I love you more than you can imagine.

And who you're in awe of, you will follow.

Right?

You I look this up, right?

Athletes, celebrities, right?

Powerful people, like that's how we follow the top three Instagram current people have followers.

Cristiano Ronaldo is a football player.

He had like 600 million.

Lionel Messi, he likes 492 million.

And shockingly, Selena Gomez.

I know we had so many Selena Gomez fans out there.

She has like 400-something million.

But who are those people?

They're athletes, they're celebrities.

People follow them because they're in awe, right?

Especially for Ronaldo and Messi, you're in awe of what they can do.

Right?

For celebrities or influencers, right?

You're in awe of their beauty.

All right?

Or maybe like whatever they're showing you, or life hack, right?

You become in awe of those things.

So you follow it.

Right?

We do that in grade school for all my students here, right?

You get that the cool kid, right?

Who's bigger, stronger, more athletic, and people kind of follow him.

You have that influence.

Because we're just kind of naturally drawn to that.

I mean, we we've kind of lost the boy band age, right?

Where you've had the crazy uh following that, but like you think back to the Beatles or Elvis and just the sheer chaos and mobs that happened wherever they were.

Right?

Because people are in awe of them.

And your source of awe will compel your decisions and dictate your life.

It only takes three chapters in the Bible to figure that out.

Right?

Three chapters in, what happens?

Eve's in the garden, Satan's there with her, like, hey, look at this tree.

And what are the verbs described there?

It was good.

It said it was a delight to her eyes, and it was to be desired.

In that moment, she is in awe of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and what it's promising her.

And so she partakes of it.

Why was she not in awe?

If she was in so much awe of that tree, why was she not in awe of God who created it?

Who's clearly infinitely better if he created it, but he wasn't?

And that's what we struggle with.

The shiny object in front of us, or the person, we we get captivated by that and it leads you astray.

Right?

We find the happiness in the material possessions rather than realizing, hey, you know what, the joy I get from that possession, how much more joy do I get from the actual God who allowed humanity to create that or invent that?

Right?

You think of the spies from Numbers 13.

It's just an 11-day trip from Egypt to the Promised Land.

Okay?

It's 11 days.

They just walked out the front door of Egypt across the Red Sea on dry land.

Okay?

Most of them are like, that's enough.

Like, I'm in.

What happens?

The spies go to the land, and they're like, you know what, guys?

They got some big walls, it's a fortified city.

Everybody there is huge.

And they make us look like grasshoppers.

That's their report.

Like, this doesn't look good.

It's like, it was 11 days ago.

You walked through the Red Sea.

And now they're, but they're in awe.

They're in awe of these people.

And their city.

And so what happens?

They rebel against God.

They're like, we can't do it.

So they got to spend 40 years in the wilderness.

What is it for you that is compelling your decisions and dictating your life?

What is it that you really find awe in?

Right?

That you strive for.

Because if you aren't in awe of Christ, then the promise to be like him isn't motivating.

And that's what scripture is about.

You're going to be like him.

Right?

When scripture says you will be like him to you, then that sounds like, oh yeah, that's a great promise.

But it's not really that big of a deal to you if you're not in awe of Christ.

Right?

We spoke about it this morning in the new member class of 1 John 3, 2, where it's like, and I probably I bring this up like every, I need some new material, right?

I bring this up like every Sunday that I'm up here.

But was it say, you're going to see Christ in his glory, and you're going to be like him?

Why do they make that such a big deal?

Because that's who you really want to be.

And you finally get to see the person God has always seen you as.

Right?

The person that you ultimately should be in awe of.

It's the person that God is making you more like.

And how much joy that should bring to you.

Right?

When you trust him and you love him, it opens up the possibilities of experiencing God work in your life.

Think about David and Goliath.

Right?

It's been 40 days.

Goliath's still out there.

He's like, else God's terrible.

Bring it.

And everyone's like, again, we're all of Goliath.

No one can take him.

David's like, I'll do it.

Right?

And they put that armor on him, Saul's arm.

And I think again, because of our kids' books, where like, well, David was like a six-year-old and he's wearing like, you know, his dad's clothes, and we, you know, the dude fought off a line in a bear.

Like he wasn't a six-year-old.

But what it doesn't say he took it off because it didn't fit him, right?

He said in vain he put it on, but he didn't really test it.

In a sense, he was like, look, guys, this isn't what's going to protect me.

This sword isn't what's going to win this fight.

The only reason I'm up here is because I trust and know that God's the one who's going to deliver us.

I'm in awe of who God is.

I'll go, but I'm not going to do anything special.

I'm just allowing him to work through me.

Do you see the opportunity that was presented to him because of the awe he had of God that none of the other Israelites had?

He could have used any of them to do that.

David's not the only person who knows how to throw a rock.

They didn't have guns.

Rocks or stones.

Those are basically your only options, right?

But he was in so much awe, it created this opportunity for him to say, I'll do it.

Paul Tribb has a quote: You will live in awe of what you credit with blessing in your life, and you will worship whatever has produced what you celebrate.

That's true.

Because when you read scripture and Paul's always writing about these joys of sanctification, what is he doing?

He is crediting Christ with making him more like himself.

And he worships Christ.

So he celebrates that process of sanctification.

Philippians 1 6, right?

He's like, I am sure of this.

He who started a good work and you will bring it to completion.

Why is he so sure of that?

Because he's in awe of God, of like, this is the promise I've made.

It's not even original to Paul, right?

He got it from Isaiah 55.

You look in verse 10, right?

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there, but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and the bread of the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.

It shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I send it.

Which Paul is saying, I know it's to be more like you.

Because Christ died for me and gave me that salvation and the inheritance of eternal life and glory.

And I know he's going to bring that completion because he said it from the beginning.

He was in awe of who God was and his promises were throughout history.

I mean, Scripture is trying to tell you over and over and over about the gospel.

The gospel means good news.

It's good news for you to celebrate, for you to worship, for you to give credit for the ultimate blessing in your life.

Because that's how it works.

Colossians 3, flip over there to me, because it sets it up perfectly.

It's celebrate, follow, be thankful, and worship, right?

Colossians 3.

If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.

Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.

For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

And when Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

He is setting up this absolute amazing celebration.

He is celebrating right now.

He is celebrating that his life is no longer his, but has been hidden and clothed in Christ, and he's going to be like Christ.

So now he's celebrating.

So now what's the next step?

If you celebrate something, right, if you're in awe of something, you follow it.

That's why these next parts are these commands of what it looks like to follow.

Put to death, therefore, what is earthly in you sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetous, which is idolatry.

On account of these things, the wrath of God is coming.

And these you too once walked, when you were living in them.

But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, obscene talk from your mouth.

Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with his practices, and have to put on the new self, which is being renewed, and the knowledge after the image of its creator.

He's bringing it back to the source of this.

Is why I'm telling you to do these things.

Because it goes against who the person you now you really want to follow, right?

That you're in love with.

And then he keeps going.

Put then on as God's chosen ones, right?

Going back to what we talked about at the very beginning.

The ultimate act and experience of love is you being chosen.

He chose you.

That means something, right?

So he's trying to put, like, remember, your chosen ones, your holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another.

And one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other, as the Lord has given, forgiven you, so that you must also forgive.

And above all these, put on love which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body, and be thankful.

He's not just telling them to do these things, to do them.

He's telling them this is the natural progression of if you are in love and awe of Christ and want to be more like him, just like you want to be more like other people in your life, then these are the things that he does.

This is how he acts.

And to be thankful that you have the opportunity that the Lord has said, I'm going to bring this to completion.

Here's the thing: I get so discouraged with the lack of patience I have and the anger I have.

All the time, like, why can't I be better?

Why can't I be a better dad?

Why can't I be a better husband?

All these things, right?

It's discouraging.

It's rarely that, you know what, I should be thankful that he's promised that he's going to do these things in me.

But it's really hard to have awe of him when you're just discouraged and disappointed in yourself, and then you project that on him.

But Paul's saying, look, put these things on.

This is who you want to be, anyways.

And he's the one who's going to do them for you.

He's making you more like himself.

You're not making you more like himself, he's making you more like him.

And then the final part let the word of Christ dwell in you richly.

Why?

Because that's where you get all this source of awe from, all these promises.

Teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God.

And whatever you do in word or do, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Again, he's saying the natural progression of awe and following becomes worship.

It's singing, right?

It's praying, it's loving these things.

When I said that we're gonna talk about why should we be in awe of God?

We're gonna follow who we're in awe of, and then how following Him is how you partner here, right?

I mean, we we say live your life as mission, and we have that on the prayer calendar, which I'm still waiting for some emails on.

Um but the biggest part of how you partner here is it starts with are you in love with Jesus?

Like, is he genuinely captivating your thoughts?

Do you look up to him as someone actually worth following and wanting to be like?

Are you in awe of him?

The last week of December, we took in$298,000.

That's a lot of money.

It's probably my my one of my favorite weeks of the year.

And it has nothing to do with the amount.

What is what I'm in awe of, and I wish you actually all could come up and see, is that we aren't a church, there's like five people here who float this budget.

That's not how this church works.

There are plenty of churches that have like five or six people and they float like 60, 70% of the budget.

We're not a place like that.

Everyone here plays a part.

In the last week of the year, any, I mean, there's a huge stack of envelopes on my desk right now.

I get to see, and I'm overwhelmed with how many of all of you contribute, all of your generosity and your sacrifice, but you don't get to see that, right?

And rightfully so.

You're not supposed to go around like, yeah, this is how much I gave, right?

I understand that.

But I do wish sometimes you could get to see like how many people are bought in here and really give a lot.

Again, out of their love and their support for the Lord.

Right?

It makes me in awe because again, you you're not forced to give that money.

Like, as someone whose family depends on your generosity, that I realize you don't even have to give, the fact that you give it to me, like it's mind-blowing a lot of times that y'all are so generous.

Right?

It's humbling.

You have so y'all have so many talents and skills.

And you have such a network of people here in Birmingham, of just coworkers and friends and the community, and the ways in which you have, again, we're talking about living your life as mission to go out for the good of the city and the glory of God.

And being in awe of how God has brought us all together to accomplish that.

All right, so let's start with praying for each other.

Right?

By using that calendar.

Let's start with asking, hey, you know what, God?

I love myself more a lot of times.

I love my possessions more a lot of times.

I actually, you're like sixth or seventh on the list some days.

Help me genuinely be in awe of who you are and what you accomplished for a sinner like me.

Amen.

Amen.

Father, we thank you for this morning.

I mean, I just sit here and can confess all day just how distracted I get with other things and other people.

How I'm so easily impressed by anything that isn't you.

And yet you have given us your word, you have given us your son, and you've given us your spirit to continually show us how wonderful and good and loving you are.

Father, help us not go a day, an hour, a minute with that not being pressed on our hearts.

That there is nothing or no one greater than you.

There is no other purpose in life greater than following you.

And help us love that.

Not just know it, but genuinely be excited because we love it.

Amen.