The Search For Human Saviors | A Look In the Mirror

We're going to begin this morning in Psalm 146, verses 3 and 4.

Psalms 146:3

The Bible says, put not your trust in princes, in a son of man in whom there is no salvation.

When his breath departs, he returns to the earth.

On that very day, his plans perish.

Blessed is he whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord his God, who made heaven and earth and the sea and all that is in them, and who keeps faith forever.

Church, this is the word of the Lord.

And that would be thanks be to God.

Go ahead.

All right.

Amen.

You can be seated.

I'm just messing with you guys.

It's okay.

So if you have been here the last several weeks, you'll remember, but maybe there are people who haven't been here.

And so we're going to review because this is the final week of our series called A Look in the Mirror.

And what we've been doing is we've been looking into the Word of God and viewing the Word of God as a mirror.

The Apostle James says that the Word of God is like a mirror who shows us who we truly are.

And it's important because we as humans, we don't like to see who we truly are.

We don't like to see our flaws and failures, do we?

We like to think the best of ourselves.

We like to portray the best of ourselves.

And we talked last week about how God's word is diagnostic.

It's almost like an X-ray or an MRI or a CAT scan or something like that.

The purpose of those things is when there's something going on inside, there's something wrong, but we don't know what it is.

We do imaging to try to see what's beneath the surface.

We want to see inside and see what the problem is because when we find out what the problem is, then maybe we can begin to understand what needs to happen in order to make that better, to heal that, to redeem that.

And God's word is the same way.

It helps us to see the things that are wrong on the inside of us.

When we see God in the word and we see him in his glory, and we see his majesty and we see his power, as Israel did, like we talked about last week on Sinai.

They saw God on the mountain, they heard his voice speak to them from the cloud.

And they understood in that moment who they were in comparison to who he is.

And so the first week we looked into the Word of God, we learned two things.

We learned one, who we were created to be.

We learned that God created us in his image.

We were created by him, through him, and for him for communion with him.

Okay?

And so we were created to have relationship with him, communion with him.

We were created in his image.

Our very purpose was to reflect our creator to the creation.

And from that place of communion with him, we derived everything we needed.

Our intimacy with him, completeness and wholeness, peace, the shalom.

We derived our sense of identity.

Who are we?

What is our purpose?

What's the meaning of our lives?

And these are the questions that our culture still asks today.

We got them from him, because that is the purpose for which we were created.

We learned that first week what was lost in the fall.

We learned that when humanity turned from God and rebelled against them, when they obeyed the voice of the serpent instead of the voice of God, when they begin to question his love and his trustworthiness, when they begin to question his goodness, that connection was broken as they rebelled against him.

And so their connection to eternity, to the source of all life, to the fountain of living water was broken.

And they were pushed out of that place of communion in the garden with God, and they began to feel the lack.

They began to feel the longing inside for the things that they were missing.

They began to question who they were.

They begin to question what was their meaning, what was even their purpose anymore, what was the point of it all?

And we learned in the second week that when we begin to feel those feelings inside, that longing inside that tells us that life was supposed to be more than it is, that we don't go running immediately to the one, the only one who could do anything about it.

We don't go instinctively and run to the God who has the power and the inclination to heal.

Instead, we try to look inward, we try to cover ourselves up, we try to cover our nakedness, we try to fix ourselves.

We go on Facebook and we try to portray this image of our lives like everything's cool, everything's great, nothing to see here.

We try to make a name for ourselves, we try to invent identity.

We try, you know, the current generation is struggling with this.

Trying to identify themselves.

Who am I?

I'm just gonna define for myself who I am.

And we struggle for meaning, we struggle for purpose.

And we learned last week that when we fail to find those things in ourselves, that what we do is, well, we don't go running to the one who actually has the power and the inclination to heal us.

Instead, we reach for things that are less than God to be for us and do for us what only God can do.

And so we reach for money and wealth and fame and careers and hobbies.

We reach for relationships, we reach for all kinds of different things.

It seems like everything except for God.

We go to all those things first.

And when we end up empty, because we're trusting our lives and our hope and our eternity and trying to find our identity in things of brass, we don't stop there.

And so this week we're gonna take a little deeper look.

One final look.

And the diagnosis is gonna deepen.

That when we fail to find what we want, what we need in things of brass, we start to look to the people around us to be for us and do for us what only God can be and do.

When we left off last week, we were in the wilderness with Moses.

Okay, Moses had led them out of Egypt.

They had crossed the Red Sea, parted the sea, and walked across on dry ground.

God had brought water from a rock, he was sustaining their clothing and their sandals for years and years in the wilderness, and they weren't wearing out.

They came to Sinai and God spoke to them from the mountain.

They experienced him and saw his glory.

They turned immediately to idolatry.

God ended up forgiving them.

They went back into the wilderness.

He provided for them food while they were there, he provided for them water while they were there.

He was their cover and shade during the day.

He was fire at night to light the way and to make them warm.

And we talked about what God was trying to teach them in that.

That I am everything you need.

Are you hungry?

Walk outside your tent because I've provided you bread.

Just for you, just enough for today.

And it tastes like honey and coriander seed, and you can take it and make little cakes with it.

He provided meat when they wanted meat.

He provided water.

Are you thirsty?

Are you hungry?

Do you need protection?

And he's saying, I'm Jehovah Jirah, I'm the Lord your provider, I'm Jehovah Rapha, I'm the Lord your healer, I am the Lord your everything.

I am.

And Moses ends up leading them all the way to the promised land, okay?

Right to the border.

And he's standing at the border of the promised land and he recounts to Israel everything that has happened to them since God brought them out of Egypt into this moment, right?

He recounts all those things to him and he hands over leadership to Joshua.

Then Moses goes home to be with the Lord, and now Joshua begins to lead them into the promised land.

And before they go in, the Lord's telling them through Moses, when you go in there, we'll want you to push out, drive out the nations who are there before you, break down their altars, destroy their idols so they don't become a snare to you.

Destroy them all.

Go in and just wipe it out.

And there was a reason for this.

And we we look at that story, we think, well, it was so mean of God to do that thing.

Why would he do that?

But see, back two weeks ago we talked about Abraham.

And when God had promised to give Abraham the promised land, he told them, I'm gonna give them, I'm gonna give your descendants all this land.

But first they're gonna go for 400 years into another land, which was Egypt.

They're gonna be there in bondage for 400 years, and afterward I'll bring them out.

He said, Because the iniquity of the Amorites is not complete.

In other words, what he was saying, church, is I'm gonna give those people in the land of Canaan 400 years.

I'm gonna give them lots and lots of time to turn from their wickedness and their idolatry, from their worship of Baal, their worship of Molech, and the things that they were doing in the land of that time, they were taking their children and sacrificing them to these idols, to these demon gods.

Okay?

And God gave them generation after generation after generation after generation for 400 years to turn from that before finally sending his people into the land.

And so when they went in, he said, destroy all of it.

Get rid of all of it.

Don't even leave a little tiny bit, because that little thing will be a seed that's gonna draw you into what they're doing.

And so when they first go in, they're being obedient.

They're doing everything that God said and God's blessing them.

The walls of Jericho fall.

They're facing armies that are bigger and better and better equipped with swords and chariots and horses and walled cities.

And God's just destroying them before his people.

But as happens in life, Joshua begins to get old.

In Judges chapter 2, verse 7, it says, And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the Lord had done for Israel.

Judges 2:7

And so that generation that had stood at the border of the promised land, and Moses had told them, This is all the things the Lord has done for you, these are all the things He said to you, this is what you're to do when you go in.

The generation that crossed in and saw the walls of Jericho fall, and saw the nations being driven out before them, that generation gets older, and then they begin to pass away.

And all the time that those people were alive, the children of Israel served the Lord.

But in verse 10 it says, And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers, and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.

So what happened here is that this generation of Joshua had failed to pass on their faith to the next generation.

We're gonna talk about this again later because this actually is a problem that continues today.

This is literally the reason why churches grow old and they begin to dwindle.

Because for some somewhere in there, we we we we don't get this part right.

And Joshua didn't either, and Joshua was a great man.

He didn't get this right, they didn't pass down their faith to the next generation well.

And so when that generation was gone, it's like, well, God who?

And so this new generation comes in, and what happens is that they don't drive out those idolatrous nations, they don't break apart the altars, they don't destroy the idols, they just start worshiping them.

So they start bowing down to the same idols, they start worshiping at the same altars, they start doing the wicked, nasty, disgusting things that those other nations were doing.

And so what happens?

Well, God lifts off his blessing, he lifts off his protection, and the other nations come in and they defeat them.

And so now God's people are in the promised land, living in subjection to these pagan nations.

And then they would cry out in repentance, Lord, we're so sorry, and God would raise up a judge, and the judge would come in, and the people would once again follow the Lord, and God would deliver them, and then they'd be okay for a while, and then they'd go back to idolatry.

They'd get defeated again.

And it just begins this cycle in the book of Judges, where they just go from idolatry to destruction to repentance to deliverance to idolatry over and over and over again.

And when we get to the end of Judges, the last line of judges is that in those days there was no king in Israel, and everyone did what was right in his own eyes.

It's kind of a sad report, isn't it?

Does it sound familiar at all?

A generation where everyone just does what's right in their own eyes.

They'll be the judge of what's good and evil, they'll be the ones that decide what's okay and what's not.

And this takes us all the way to the time of the prophet Samuel.

Okay?

Now, Samuel, his story's kind of cool.

If you've been around church for a while, you might have heard it.

He, his mom Hannah, couldn't have a baby, and so she prayed to the Lord, you know, please let me have a son.

And if you give me a son, then I'm gonna give him back to you all the days of his life.

And so God opens her womb, she has a son, and she does this.

She delivers him to the temple after he's womb, woman uh weaned.

Weaned.

After he's weaned.

And so he's raised in the tabernacle.

And he even has a little teeny linen ephod, and he must have been so cute, this little guy running around.

But God calls him from the time he was a child to be a prophet.

And he becomes this transitional figure that's a prophet, and he's also the final judge of Israel.

And so Samuel becomes a great man and a good influence on Israel, and he calls Israel and says, put away the foreign gods, direct your heart to the Lord and serve him only.

And so they tear down their idols and they tear down all these things, and they once again begin serving the Lord, and they confess we've sinned against the Lord.

And so God delivers them from the Philistines.

But as happens in the world, Samuel also starts to get older.

So in 1 Samuel chapter 8, the people come to Samuel.

1 Samuel 8 · chapter mention

In verse 1, they said it says, When Samuel became old, he made his sons judges over Israel.

The name of his firstborn was son was Joel, the name of his second was Abijah.

They were judges in Beersheba, yet his sons did not walk in his ways, but turned aside after Gain.

They took bribes and perverted justice, and then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah and said to him, Behold, you are old.

That's rude.

And your sons do not walk in your ways.

Now appoint for us a king to judge us like all the nations.

But this thing displeased Samuel when they said, Give us a king to judge us.

And Samuel prayed to the Lord, and the Lord said to Samuel, Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.

And so they go to Samuel, like, Look, Samuel, we like you.

You know, we respect you, but you're getting older and your sons aren't like you.

And, you know, we've kind of been looking around at the other nations over here, and they do this thing that we kind of like it, you know.

Oh, see what you think about it, but you know, they they have these kings over them.

And these kings are really impressive, you know.

They have big crowns, big beards, you know, and they wear armor, and they build these armies up with chariots and horses and pointy, shiny swords, and it's like really impressive.

It's kind of intimidating, and we want to be like them.

We just want to be like them, and when we have a king, we'll have somebody to lead us and to fight our battles and to make us secure.

And from the outside, it kind of made sense, right?

You know, when they didn't have a leader, they would just go the wrong way.

And so, kind of outwardly it made sense, but Samuel knew what was behind their request.

See, God had already told them the kind of relationship that he wanted to have with his people.

In Exodus 19, it said, He said to them, You shall be my treasured possession, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.

And we've seen all along that God just wanted to be their everything.

He wanted to be their everything.

He wanted them to be a people that stood out from the world in the way that they specifically didn't look to a human leader.

They didn't trust in a king, they weren't trusting in armies and chariots and horses and swords.

He wanted them to be a people that looked to him and trusted in him, a nation that testified in this trust in God to the power and the glory and the holiness of their God, and it was supposed to be a witness to the rest of the world.

And God had already promised them that he would be their everything, their protector, their provider, their healer, their comfort, their peace.

I will be everything to you.

He said, if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord your God, being careful to do all his commandments that I command you today, the Lord your God will.

And I didn't put it up here, but there's a big list.

He says, I'm gonna set you high above the nations.

I'm I'm blessed will you be in the city, and blessed will you be in the field, and blessed shall be the fruit of your womb, and the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your cattle, and the increase of your herds.

Blessed will be your basket and your kneading bowl.

Blessed will you be when you come in, and you'll also be blessed when you go out.

And he says, The Lord will cause your enemies who rise against you to be defeated before you.

They'll come out against you one way, but they're gonna flee before you in seven ways.

So do you hear what God's saying here?

He's saying, Trust me.

Obey me, and I will bless you, and I will protect you, and I will fight for you, and I will heal you, and I will provide for you.

In other words, everything you're looking for in a king, you already have in me.

They didn't need a king, they had God, they had the God whose voice literally formed the cosmos, in whose hand everything holds together, the one within whose being all things exist, including time itself.

Let's see, the blessings of God required something of them, it required obedience, it required their repentance, it required them to surrender to his will, to trust in him alone.

And so they didn't want those things.

They didn't want to have to do those things, they just wanted the protection.

And so they asked for a king.

And so Samuel goes to the Lord and he's like, basically, I don't like this, Lord, but the Lord says, you know what, obey the voice of the people and all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, they've rejected me from being king over them.

According to all the deeds that they've done from the day I brought them out of Egypt, even to this day, in forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are also doing to you.

And so he says, Give them a king, but warn them what that king's gonna do.

He says, That king's gonna take your sons, and he's gonna draft your sons into his army to fight his battles.

Your sons are gonna go die for the battles of this king.

And he's gonna take others of your sons, and he's gonna put them to work in the fields, and they're gonna have to plow and harvest his fields, not the fields of your family.

And you know what he's gonna do?

He's gonna take your daughters, and they're gonna have to be his cooks and his bakers and his servants, and he's gonna take, oh, your fields and orchards, and how about a tenth of your grain and your vineyards and your servants and your animals and your workers, and he's gonna take a tenth of your flock.

So, I mean, in short, you're basically gonna be his slaves.

See, before the kings, the only thing they had really was the tithe in Israel, and that really wasn't a tax, it was just it supported the worship of the nation of the Lord their God.

But after the kings, suddenly everything's taxed.

I'm gonna tax you when you're coming in, I'm gonna tax you when you're going out, I'm gonna tax your meeting bowl, I'm gonna tax your table, tax your sons and your daughters.

Does this sound familiar at all?

He says, Your kings are not gonna take care of you, they're gonna use you, they're gonna take advantage of you, and why are they gonna do that?

Because they are not God.

And so God tells him, In that day, you're gonna cry out to me because of the king that you've chosen for yourself.

And guess what?

I'm not gonna answer you in that day.

Because you put your trust in him and not in me.

And it's easy to hear this story.

And think, okay, cool, Jeff, yeah, but that's Israel.

You know, that's ancient story, man.

You know, like you're kind of going long here, ready for my snack.

I want to eat my brownie.

But this story isn't about them.

It's not just about them, it's not just for them.

This is the story of the human heart, church.

We don't just look to kings, we look to people, to be what only God can be.

And sometimes those people are political leaders.

You know, I debated whether I should even talk about this in church.

You know, I thought I'll make it about, you know, interpersonal relationships.

Because we do.

We look to spouses, we look to our kids, we look to our parents, we look to our bosses, we look to mentors, we look to motivational speakers.

Oh, we'll worship anybody.

But in our culture right now, there is a worship of politicians, there's a worship of parties, there's a worship of seats of power, there's a worship of government.

And it's idolatry.

Some of us spend more time watching cable news than we do reading our Bibles.

And then we sit there and we get all anxious because we hear one chicken little after another tell us the sky is falling.

We watch the latest election and the exit polls, and we get all anxious because we're like, I just hope my guy wins.

If we can only get this party in power, if we can only keep this party in power, if we can only get this guy into the White House, if we can only get this guy out of the White House, then everything's gonna be okay.

And you may say, I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.

You know I joke, but it's it's it's silly.

Because we literally believe that the cause of all our problems on this earth and the answer to all the problems on this earth is a political party or a political leader or a movement.

And God's message to them in that day is the same message He has for us in this moment.

You never needed a king, all you ever needed was me.

That king, that leader, that party, that president could never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever be to you what only God can be.

And he could never do for you what only God can do.

So when you look to some human leader to be for you what only God can be, or do for you what only God can do, you're doing exactly what we just read last week.

When God through the prophet Jeremiah said this, my people have committed two evils.

One, they've forsaken me, the fountain of living water, literally the source of everything they will ever need.

I'm literally the source of all of it.

And those things you feel you lack, that's not has nothing to do with politics.

It has nothing to do with a career, has nothing to do with getting your body in shape, it has nothing to do with any of that.

It has to do with what happened in the garden when humanity was cut off from the fountain of living water, the source of all life.

And so we forsake the fountain of living water, and we make for ourselves these little containers with holes all in them that can't even hold a drop.

And we put all our hopes in there.

In Jeremiah 17, the prophet says this: Thus says the Lord, cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.

He's like a shrub in the desert.

He shall not see any good come, he shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness in an uninhabited salt land.

Does that sound good to you?

Nobody raised their hand, so it doesn't sound good to any of us.

So God's saying through the prophet here that you're cursed, literally cursed, if you choose to put your hope and trust into frail and broken human beings rather than God.

This is pretty harsh, isn't it?

He's saying that to do so is to turn away from the Lord.

That not only will you not find there the answer to the longing of your heart, not only will that person not be able to be for you what you're hoping they'll be, but placing your hope in them is gonna dry you out spiritually like a shrub in the desert, and you will not see any good come.

And so we pray to the Lord, Lord, we pray you would do this, we pray you would do that, and yet we're actually placing all our hope in this over here, not in him.

But the prophet goes on and he says, This blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord.

He will be like a tree planted by water that sends out its roots by the stream and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and it is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.

See, the hope of our lives, the pathway to life, the pathway to wholeness and to completeness and to shalom and to redemption and restoration and the redemption of the whole world and all the political systems of the world is Him.

It's Jesus Christ.

To trust in God is to be like a tree whose roots go down deep into the living water.

And it doesn't matter what happens here above ground.

It doesn't matter that there's a thousand-year drought because its roots go down into the living water.

It just keeps bearing fruit right in the middle of whatever circumstances it's in.

And we're in this climate of our culture where it's like everybody hates everybody and everybody's pointing the finger at everybody, and everybody blames everybody else, and the church is supposed to be sitting there with its roots in the living water, bearing fruit unto God.

This is our purpose.

See, at the end of the day, every human savior that we place our hope in is nothing more than a broken cistern.

They don't have an ability to protect us, to provide for us, to heal us, to comfort us, because they can't even help themselves because they need the same thing we need.

They need the living water.

But what I do want you to do.

Looks like you're all looking at me, that's good.

I want to read scripture over you.

And I want you to pay attention.

Because Israel had a very similar thing spoken to them and they didn't listen.

Do you want to know God's purpose for you?

Church, do you want to know what God's calling you to be?

You are a chosen race.

You are a royal priesthood.

You're a people for his own possession.

And here's your purpose that you may proclaim the excellencies of him.

Of him who called you out of darkness and into his marvelous light.

See, once you were not a people, you were just out there with everyone else.

Fighting over scraps.

But now you're God's people.

Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

So look at me.

Do you hear what the Spirit of God is saying to his church this morning?

You don't belong to the systems of the world.

Your identity is not in party.

Your hope is not in presidents or political leaders or relationships or friendships or associations or clubs or presidents or children.

You belong to him.

And you were never meant to look to yourself or to things of brass or to the people around you in this world, or to define yourself by the world's standards.

You were created and redeemed and called to reflect a whole different kingdom.

One where the king is God Himself, where his people look to him alone to make them secure.

And this is exactly what he's been saying all along.

Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man in whom there is no salvation.

For when his breath departs, he's gonna return to the earth.

On that very day, all of his beautiful plans are gonna perish.

But blessed is he whose hope is the God of Jacob.

Blessed is he whose hope is in the Lord his God, the one who made heavens and the earth and the sea and everything that is in them, and who keeps faith forever.

Israel rejected that purpose for themselves.

They asked for a king, and from that moment there were many kings that came, and some were good, some were bad, some were better, some were worse, but every one of them failed to be the king that the people of God needed.

In fact, those kings ended up leading them deeper and deeper and deeper into apostasy and into idolatry and eventually into exile and into destruction.

But even after the exile, Israel still has not seen the promised king sit upon the throne.

See, from the very beginning, we've talked about it.

In the garden, God promised that there would come an offspring of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent.

To Abraham, he said, Through your offspring, all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

And that promise of the offspring went down through Isaac and through Jacob, and it kept going down through Israel.

He would be the one that was lifted up on a pole, that all who look upon him will receive life.

He would be the child that would be born, and the son that would be given, and the government would be upon his shoulders, and he'd be called the wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

He's the king whose throne will be established forever and ever.

And the only one that can provide for us the living water, so that we'll never look to quench that longing and that thirst in any lesser thing again.