Seagulls and Worms
Last week we discussed the problems present
with
psychological guilt. As you remember
we only looked at
part of the topic.
Before I begin, will you let me give you
a quiz?
First. Are you more like a seagull
or a worm.
Second. Does the Bible teach
us to be seagulls
or worms.
Third. How do you respond when someone
compliments
you on a job well done, one that
you know that you did well.
Fourth. What are the limits
of accomplishment of the
Christian. For you as a Christian?
Fifth. Can you get on your
knees and pray after doing
something that you know was wrong?
Now you may be wondering what these questions
have to
do with each other. hen again you may
not. And its possible that
you are already asleep, I hope not. If
you are still with me, I believe
that you will find that these questions
have to do with how we
see ourselves. Some people might
refer to self-image
All of us have come kind of picture
of ourselves, and we tend
to make it while reacting to the influence
of other's reactions
to us.
One Old Testament character is very notable
for his self image,
and for the way that it changed over a
period of years. He began
his life as a boatman, rose to the courts
of the rulers of the
world, became an outcast, then a shepherd,
and again regained
his stature and backed down the rulers
that he had been raised
with, this time to become the leader of
another nation.
As you may have guessed, I am referring
to Moses. A man who was
a seagull, became a worm, and then found
his true identity , he
followed his God.
His seagull experience came after he had
been in the courts of
pharaoh for 28 years. Somehow he knew
that he had a calling from
the Lord to deliver the Israelites from
bondage. No doubt after
victories as leader of pharaoh's army,
after studying with the
scholars of his time, after being hailed
as the possible
successor to the throne, he felt quite
capable of delivering the
Israelites from bondage. However, he quickly
learned
differently. For at the time that he though
he had begun to
fight, he found himself running for fear
of death.
Then he ran until he found a shepherd family
that took him in,
and he began a new career as a shepherd.
After 40 years He was
approached by God. All of a sudden,
the prince who had studied
with scholars, couldn't speak to them.
The leader who had killed
for his people, felt afraid that they
would reject him.
You know the rest of the story. He finally
followed God. and
when he did, his self image problems disappeared,
and God was
able to use him in a great way.
You may still be wondering about seagulls
and worms. Let me
explain. In 1971 a book hit the market
and made a big splash.
The title was Jonathan Livingston Seagull.
It was really the
seminal New Age book. It taught
that there is no personal God,
that we are all sons of God, (in a way
that's true), that there
are many enlightened spiritual teachers,
and all limitations of
human nature are illusions. The book teaches
that we can move
higher and higher by our own concentrated
efforts to accomplish
anything that we want.
About the worms. I would like to refer
you to two songs for
illustration. The first is that beloved
hymn, Amazing Grace. We
have all sung it and appreciate it.
But there is one phrase,
which if concentrated on, will warp our
perspective on
Christianity.
Amazing grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
Another that we sing is "At the Cross."
Alas and did my savior bleed, and did
my sovereign die
Would he devote that sacred hear, for
such a worm as I.
Add these words to a sermon that is designed
to produce
psychological guilt, and what do you have?
Now, I'm not
knocking these songs, for they are beautiful
when taken as a
whole. But when any one happens to focus
on this one part of the
Biblical truth that we are not whole beings,
and runs it into
the ground, they get a very distorted
view of human nature.
May I suggest that neither the seagull
or the worm is the true
image of the follower of Christ. But if
we do away with the two,
where do we stand?
The Bible tells that there is some truth
in each of the views,
but neither contains the whole truth,
for it tells us that we
are very special, that we are deeply fallen,
and that we are
greatly loved.
Genesis two tells us that God made man
in his image. This
indicates that as originally planned that
we have a purpose, we
are significant, and eternally valuable.
You may ask, "Didn't sin change all that?"
Never. Adam did bring sin to the human
race, and our own
rebellion has severely distorted the beauty
of God's image in
us. But that does not mean that suddenly
that humanity has
become non human. That gap between man
and animals remains.
We still bear the image of God. and our
dignity and personal worth
remains.
The fact is that Jesus put great worth
upon us. In Mark 8:36 he
said "What does it profit a man to gain
the whole world and lose
his own soul?"
Here he places humanity as much more valuable
than all earthly
riches. Then in Matthew 6:30 he said that
if God clothes the
wildflowers of the hillsides so beautifully,
will he not much
more do for you?
To the Christians at Corinth, Paul told
them, that in spite of
their corrupt background that they still
bore the stamp of the
image and glory of God, and James warns
us not to curse other
men since they reflect the likeness of
God.
This truth becomes more and more obvious
as we study the great
plan of salvation Christ didn't die primairly
for animals, or
plants or wealth. He did not come to die
be cause he had to. He
came do die for us because we were and
are so valuable to Him.
But in spite of all these assurances, there
is another fact
that the Bible makes very clear. The same
book of the Bible the,
records our importance, tells us that
that mankind rebelled
against his Creator, and that rebellion
resulted in an
alienation of mankind against God. We
don't have to look far to
see the results of this in our world today.
Genesis isn't the
only book that verifies this condition.
David wrote in the 53rd
Psalm, vs 2,3 "God has looked down from
heaven upon the sons of
men to see if there is anyone who understands,
who seeks after
God. Everyone of them has turned aside;
together they have
become corrupt; there is no one who does
good, not even one."
Jeremiah wrote, "the heart is more deceitful
than all else and
is desperately sick, who can understand
it?.
Paul reminds us that we all have sinned
and fall short of the
glory of God.
So on it goes.
But the key to understanding here is that
there is a difference
between value, or worth, and righteousness,
or holiness. Those
of us that are parents might be able to
understand that concept,
for I suppose that not one of us has raised
a perfectly
righteous child. But even when that child
is disobeying and
unpleasant we do not cease feeling the
worth or value of that
child as part of us and part the family.
So it is with God. He
paid an incalculable price for us, and
although we are
unrighteous, we are immensely valuable
to him. Though we are
depraved, we have great worth.
But the story doesn't end there. Not only
are we valued by God,
but we are valued just as he values his
own son. He loves us
with the same love that he loves his Son.
This alone should
cancel out self-hatred. If God, our creator
and the highest
moral authority in existence, loves us,
we shouldn't contradict
him and tell him he's making a grave mistake.
But we have trouble with this because so
much of our love is
conditional. Don't we choose the ones
we love by what they can
do for us If some one looks good, or is
smart, or makes us feel
secure, or needed, or loved, we love them.
We learn that certain
behaviors bring certain rewards and approval
and love..
Again look at the children. When
you stay up all night nursing
a sick child, you do not do that
because they are earning your
love. And when the older kids wake up
at 6:15 on Sunday morning,
your only day to sleep in, they are not
doing something that
earns your love. As a matter
of fact, sometimes you will fell
that they are making unreasonable demands
on your life. You may
even punish them for some things that
they do. But you still
love them, and you would do just about
anything for their
welfare, because they are your children,
and that is reason
enough to love them.
Well God looks at us a little like that.
Just because we are his
children, he is devoted to our welfare.
And when we begin to
realize our unconditional value to him,
we should begin to
develop a Godlike respect for ourselves.
We should begin to see
ourselves as important children of God,
valuable because of who
we are.
Our real problem is that we haven't begin
to realize who we are.
We think that we are all bad and must
change to all good before
we are accepted.
Let's look at four words in the Bible that
describe various
portions of our personalities. First if
the word ego (ego) or
"I". When this word is used in the
Greek, it means the total
person or the self. The Bible does use
other words to describe
portions of our being, spirit, soul heart,
etc., it uses "Ego""
to describe the totality of our being.
Another word used to describe us is Sarx
(sarks), or flesh. That
even sounds bad doesn't it? This
refers to our fallenness, our
tendency to do those things which work
against a commitment to
God.
Like the ink that mingles with a glass
of water until all of it
has changed color, sin has permeated the
very fiber of our
beings. It has discolored our ego if you
will, Sometimes the
word sin is used the same as flesh. I
John 1;9 says, "If we say
that we have no sin, we are deceiving
ourselves, and the truth
is not in us."
It is important that here sin isn't an
act of wrong doing. It
refers to the rebellion that influences
our whole lives. Since
the Bible uses flesh as our tendency towards
sin and away from
God, we are warned not to respond
to the desires of the flesh,
or the tendency towards rebellion. And
if you study carefully, I
believe that you will find that the totally
of you, the ego, is
not bad. What is bad is the sarx, the
flesh that has discolored
it and works to erase the image of God
in you.
There are two more terms that we see, particularly
in the
writings of Paul. The first of these is
old Man. Now that
doesn't refer to your father, or your
husband. Paul uses the
term in Romans 6:6. You may want to read
that with me. "knowing
this, that our old man was crucified with
Him, that the body of
sin might be done away with, that we should
no longer be slaves
of sin."
Several times Paul describes the Christian
as the one who puts
off the old man. Now you may want to put
the old man" in the
same category as the flesh. But I think
perhaps there is a
difference between the two as used in
the Bible. The flesh is a
force within us that moves us to actions
that we as followers of
Christ wish we wouldn't do. The "Old Man"
is a person, a whole
being. It is us when we were not believers..
It indicates a
person apart from Christ, unforgiven,
alienated, and totally
subjected to our own fallenness. Contrast
this with the person
who has come to know Christ. True we are
not suddenly through
with our problems, but the change is so
drastic that it has come
to be called being born again. Words that
Christ himself used.
Paul says we become new people. we are
suddenly alive and
responsive to God, and receive the potential
for overcoming our
rebellion though Christ.
Someone has compared the Old Man/New
Man thing with a person
who changes citizenship. They come to
the new country with a
relationship with another country. They
owed loyalty to the old
country. They were expected to honor its
flag. They were
expected to fight in it's wars. And they
were expected to pay
its taxes. But they go through a ceremony.
They are questioned
about their intent to be a citizen of
the new country. They then
break their relationship with the other
country, and accept a
new relationship with a new country.
Now they owe alliance to the flag
of their new country. Now
they are expected to fight in the wars
on the side of the their
new homeland. They are expected to pay
taxes to the government.
They are expected to be loyal to the new
country, in return for
the privileges and protections that they
are enjoying under that
same government They are in a way a new
person.
But this can bring about a personal civil
war. You find yourself
homesick for the old country, even though
it may have had its
problems. You seek out those who can speak
the language you were
used to. You still may want to react to
the old flag when you
see it flying somewhere. But you know
that you have chosen a
better way, and you work hard at becoming
a citizen of the new
country. You do all the right things,
and work to fit into the
culture of the new country.
Which brings us to another point. God has
nothing against your
self. your ego. But he does have a problem
with your flesh. He
wants to rid us of that ink that stains
our whole being. He
wants to rid us of our sinfulness and
our fallenness, because he
knows the hurt it causes us.
Self denial as an end is totally useless
in the Christian life.
There is no salvation by self denial,
and God never intended
that the Christian should live a life
that is essentially a
suicide of the self. However, There is
a call for the
extermination of our flesh. And there
is certain self denial
that is called for, as Christ himself
said in Matthew 16:24 "If
any one wants to follow me, let him take
up his cross and follow
me."
The self denial that Christ is calling
for is a self denial that
is done for the purpose of reaching a
higher and more worthy
goal. There used to be many professed
followers of Christ that
did much self denying. There were even
those who would sit on a
flag pole for days and years denying themselves
all but the
barest necessities. But this kind of self
denial is useless.
Sometimes we are called on to deny ourselves
for the sakes of
others.
Sometimes we are called upon to deny ourselves
in order not to
offend others.
We also told to deny ourselves our fallenness
Peter wrote some timely words on the subject
in I Peter 2:ll
"Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and
pilgrims, abstain from
fleshly lusts which war against the soul,"
These expressions do not tell us
to deny our true self, but
instead to deny the expression our fallenness
because it works
against our personal growth and happiness.
And one last reason for self denial is
to help spread the good
news of Christianity. Everything cannot
be pleasureful if we are
to accomplish anything significant. Every
good thing
accomplished has called for self denial.
But this self denial is
not self hatred or debasement. It says
that our self is worthy
of being motivated by a noble purpose,
and this may require us
to miss some otherwise acceptable activities.
There are two things that I would like
for you to recognize
today. First is that you are a unique
being very much cared for
by God..
Turn with me to Psa 139:13 "For You
formed my inward parts; You
covered me in my mother's womb."
Psa 139:14 "I will praise You, for
I am fearfully and
wonderfully made;
If this doesn't tell you that you are unique
and important to
God I don't know what can.
The other thing is that you are gifted.
And those gifts are not
limited to playing the piano, singing,
drawing, painting, or
even turning in large offerings
So what does all this have to do with psychological
guilt? This
may all sound good, but where do I go
from here. First, we must
develop an attitude of self love, not
self hatred, based on the
truths that we are the creatures of God's
hands, and as such are
worthy. We can love ourselves because
God loves us, and because
he tells us to love ourselves.
Then, we must expect something of ourselves.
Though we will fail
in the Christian life from time to time,
we should recognize
that as the Holy Spirit leads us we will
have changes in our
lives to bring us closer to Christ.
Finally, we must deny our fallneness without
denying our selves.
We have asked for God to make us new,
and we shouldn't try to
hide the new that God is making in us.
We should live confident,
humble, lives boldly so that the world
can see that the Spirit
can change mane and women into better
people.
Yes, you are worth a lot. But psychological
guilt denies your
worthiness to God and your importance
to each other. That is why
our enemy would keep to keep us wrapped
up in guilt all the
time. Yes, you are guilty theologically
and morally, but that
has been pardoned by our Savior if we
have confessed it. So we
can stand before the world, knowing our
true worth to our Lord
and to others. This is the Christian who
will joyfully be
bringing others to a knowledge of his
savior, because of the
freedom he has found.