Ed Young

Mary was the only person present at Christ’s birth who was also present at His crucifixion.  Mary was the woman who saw Jesus come into the world as her son and leave the world as her savior.  There are one or two billion “Hail, Mary”s said daily.  Why do more than ten million people make the trek to Guadeloupe and pay homage to “our mother”?  Why is it that more little girls are named after Mary than any other historical figure?  Mary is one of the most intriguing and misunderstood personalities in the biblical record.  Some people magnify Mary.  And many people who magnify her are ignorant regarding what the Bible says about her.  The Bible never says that we are to venerate Mary.  The Bible never says that we are to worship Mary.  The Bible never says that Mary was sinless.  Others minimize Mary, I think, in a reaction to those who magnify her.  They think of Mary as little more than a figurine in a nativity scene.  Or they think of Mary as a long bomb at the end of a football game.  Or maybe they sing her name as they are singing some old hits from the Beatles like “Let It Be” or “Lady Madonna”.

The Bible says that Mary was an ordinary woman with extraordinary gifts given to her by God and she presented herself usable to Him.  I know we have many people in different stages of a spiritual pilgrimage.  Some of you are seeking.  You are investigating Christianity.  Others of you have been disillusioned by organized religion and you are just checking out church again.  Still others have just made a faith decision.  Many here have been walking with God for a long, long time.  Today I am going to talk about one of the most exciting truths of scripture, being used by God himself.  God could use angels.  God could drop leaflets from heaven.  But for the most part, as you check out His historical record, you see that God uses people like you and like me to further His purposes on the planet.

It has always intrigues me, though, how we will go to any extremes in order to find the ultimate gift, won’t we.  Especially for our children, we will shop and shop and shop.  I believe this desire we have to shop during the Christmas holidays, is a microcosm of a greater shopping need that most of us are engaged in 365 days a year.  Some of the men are saying this.  “Wait a minute, Ed.  I don’t like to shop.  I am allergic to malls.  I am not shopping 365 days a year.  Come on.  I don’t shop ‘til I drop.”

Just hold on to that line of thinking because I am going to challenge you and show you that you do.  We all like to shop.  And beneath this shopping desire is a desire to shop for a Savior.  You see, our loving, transcendent God wants us to open our lives to Him.  We matter so much to God that He sent Jesus Christ to be born of a virgin, to live a sinless life and to die on the cross for all of our sins.  God did that because we matter so much to Him.  And instead of saying, “God, I want to live life your way.  I want to come into a relationship with You.”  Instead of responding to God’s love, what do you think autonomous men and women do?  We white knuckle our carts.  We thumb our noses at God.  We say, “God, I don’t need a personal shopper.  I can determine my own destiny and we begin to shop down the aisles of life for meaning, purpose, happiness, a clear conscience and we think we can find that.

The first aisle that we shop down is an aisle called position.  Have you ever shopped down that aisle?  I have.  We have got to get the corner office.  We have got to get the promotions and the parties and the perks.  We have got to get a number of degrees.  And we pile them into this cart and amazingly we look at the cart and still see a crater in the cart.  The cart is empty.  There is something missing.  And we go up and down the aisle of position searching for something.

That brings us to the third and final ingredient. Yes, the outlook is right. Yes, the environment is needed. But this last one is desperately needed for this recipe. Open and honest communication. Open and honest communication. It’s kind of like the story of the husband and the wife who were sitting at the breakfast table. The husband was reading the sports page and the wife said, “Whatever happened to our sexual relations?” The husband threw down the sports page and he said, “I don’t know. Did we receive a Christmas card from them?” It’s sad to say but that’s about as much communication sexually that we’re involved in.

I believe only 5 to 10% of the husbands and wives here have ever sat down and really talked about their needs, their wants, their desires specifically in the marriage bed. I’ve seen this happen a number of times. Lisa and I have been out to eat with a couple and the husband will get up, go to the restroom. The waitress will come by and she’ll say, “What would you like to eat?” The wife will order for her husband and she knows exactly what he wants, how he likes his coffee, his nachos, you name it. It’s just amazing! Talk to a husband, he can tell you his wife’s favorite color and all these different things in non-threatening areas. But if you begin to interview them about what many think is a threatening area, sexuality, “No. We don’t really know that much”. Most of us think we know more about our spouses’ bodies than we actually do but we don’t know that much about them at all. Secondly, most of us are very poor mind readers. What happens when the lights dim and the clothes come off? We feel so vulnerable. We feel so afraid to talk. If we’re afraid to talk, two things will happen. We’ll live our lives and our marriages in frustration; or if we do talk, we will have a great marriage and the physical aspect will be dynamite.

Now we go to letter G.  G stands for give.  We’ve got to give criticism carefully.  Criticism — again, I know it seems crazy — criticism in the right way, confrontation in the right way, builds a person’s self-esteem.  I’ve got to give correction carefully.  I’ll never forget, five years ago I was sitting on the beach in Padre Island.  I had taken a church camp down there, and and there were about 700 young people.  I was talking to a senior in high school, and this guy began to cry.  I said, “Bill, what’s wrong, man?”  He said, “Ed, my parents don’t love me.”  I said, “I know your parents!  Yeah, they do!”  He said, “No, they don’t.”  I said, “Name one reason why your parents don’t love you.”  He said, “Because they let me get away with murder.”

What was he saying?  He was saying that discipline is one of the acid tests of value.  You see, our kids are screaming out for discipline, careful correction.  They want, parents, for us to confront their character faults.  They keep testing and they keep inching their way across the line, and if you don’t say anything, it’s devastating.  They’re out in the deep weeds with regard to their self-esteem.  How often do you confront their character faults?  When you speak the truth in love to them, when you tell them they are out of line, it builds a self-esteem.  Children will think in their minds, as you’re disciplining them they’ll think, “Whoa.  I really must have value for mom and dad to take this much time, energy, and effort to keep me out of the weeds.  Wow.  They don’t want me to shipwreck my life.  Yeah.” Will your kids tell you that?  No.  I’ve never heard mine say, “Mom, thanks for grounding me.  My self-esteem really needed a boost.”  E. J. doesn’t say, “Ed, thanks for tapping my hand, because I was really sagging in regard to my self-esteem.”  It doesn’t happen that way.  But, the Bible says, your children will come back and call you blessed, and thank you and affirm you for doing that.  Now, I’m not talking about becoming a Bobby Knight disciplinary freak, but I am talking about setting parameters.  When they cross the line, there are consequences.

One day, during the middle of finals, the owner and his wife showed up at the door unannounced.  At first blush, I thought that they had some nerve, that they could have called first.  But then I remembered it was their house.  They kind of began to inspect the house.  The husband told me he appreciated what I was doing in the house and yard.  He asked, however, if I could take care of one corner, straighten up a room or two and organize some other items.  Then they left.

Several days later I got a call from him.  He told me that they were not sure what they were going to do with the house.  They were giving consideration to moving back into it.  Maybe they would take it off the market, but at any rate, they would be spending more time in the house.  So he asked me to find another place to live.  I told him it would be no problem, that I had some friends who were looking for a roommate and that I could move in with them.  I did put two and two together and it struck me that I had blown an incredible opportunity.  You see, when he came by and checked out the house, he had been disappointed at the state in which he found it.  So I had to move out of a free lake house because I hadn’t taken care of it.

This morning, as we take up the issue of gluttony, as we continue this series on the seven deadly sins, that house stands as a perfect representation of my body and your Body In God’s Economy.  You see, our bodies are given to us free and clear of charge.  It is not like we are born into this world and then at age eighteen we receive an invoice.  God says that your body is a gift and that all it will cost you is the upkeep and the maintenance.

Number three, become a strong finisher.  Why should I be a strong finisher?  I’ll tell you why.  Because Jesus is the ultimate finisher and he is standing at the finish line.  He says, “Lock eyes with me.”

Look at Hebrew 12:2, “fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of faith, who for the joy set before him, endured the cross despising the shame and has sat down at the right hand of throne of God.”

So Christ is saying, “Don’t look to the right.  Don’t look to the left.  Follow me.  Look at me.  I endured the cross for you.  I had you on my mind when I was spilling my blood on Calvary.  I will give you endurance.  I will give you power.”

When it comes to endurance, it’s all about stepping aboard the ark.   That’s what it is about.  The Bible says the ark is a picture or an illustration of the cross of Christ.  The ark was made of wood.  The cross is made of wood.  The Bible says in the Old Testament the ark was covered with pitch, a tar like substance that sealed the ark.  “Covered with pitch” is also used in the New Testament to refer to Christ atoning for our sins.  His spilled blood, his work on the cross, seals us for eternity.  The ark saved Noah and his family from destruction.  The cross will save you and me from destruction.  The ark only had one door.  What did Jesus say?  “I am the door.  I am the way, the truth and the light.”  So, he gives you and me a choice.  He says, “Either come on board or not.  Either step to the door or not.”

When we do, we, my friends, will be empowered with endurance — the ability to stampede through stopping points.

Father, thank you very much for this message.  I pray that we apply its truth in every recess and realm of our life.  In Jesus name we pray, amen.

I guess the question that begs to be answered now is how to get in on the path?  How does one get in on God’s plan?  Let me give you two quick suggestions.  First, we have to come to the point where we admit and submit.  We have to admit that we are wandering in the wilderness, that we are directionally and intellectually challenged.  Then after we admit the obvious to God, we have to submit ourselves to shadowing the Shepherd.  We need to say that we want Him to call the shots, that we want Him to guide us and lead us in the paths of righteousness.  But, amazingly, a lot of people balk at this.  A lot of people say that they have got to do their own thing.  That they will not give up control.  Yet little do they realize that when they give up control, they gain control.

Jesus said in Luke 11:24, “Your eye is the lamp of your body.  When your eyes are good, your whole body is also full of light.  But when they are bad, your body also is full of darkness.”  What is He driving at here?  He is simply saying that if we have both eyes focused on the Good Shepherd, if we are shadowing Him, following Him, we will have light.  Our paths will be illuminated.  But if we have one eye on the Good Shepherd and one eye on our career, on this relationship, on whatever, we are going to be in darkness.  We have got to admit and then submit.

But then we have to do something else in order to discover God’s plan for our lives.  We also have to obey and pray.  We have got to obey and pray.  Have you ever thought that most of God’s plans are right there in front of you and in front of me?  Have you ever thought about that?  Because they are.  Ninety percent of God’s will has already been recorded.

Maybe, just maybe, as Kind David thought about these things, as he contemplated the snapshots and thought of the faithfulness of God, maybe, just maybe, that is when he penned these words.  “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.”  The Lord is.  That is present.  I shall not want.  That is future.  We serve a God of the present and the future.  And any good shepherd is going to take care of his sheep in the present, but also he is going to think about what is around the corner.  Where they are going to go next?  What they are going to do over there?  They are thinking about pastures and quiet streams and still waters.  A shepherd is thinking about the present and the future.

The thing that separates Christianity from all the other word religions is its personal pronouns.  David didn’t say the Lord is a shepherd or I wish He were my shepherd, or the Lord is the shepherd.  He said the Lord is my shepherd.  We have a sense of possessing God and of God possessing us.  There is power in these words.  This concept of shepherding is a little bit foreign to us, but we need to get it, to know who God really is.

David was a shepherd boy and he was the son of a shepherd.  He calls God the shepherd.  When David wrote the words, the Lord is my shepherd, he was referring to God.  And later on, Christ confirmed this statement when He said, I am the Good Shepherd.  The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.  That means that I am satisfied.  I have arrived.  It is a statement of confidence.  That is like saying, look who my shepherd is.  Look who is managing me.  Look who is running the show.  Look at my CEO.  Look at my coach.  Look at my shepherd.

Is it really an act of faith to give 10% only after all your other bills are paid? What does it say about our priorities if we pay all of our bills first and then give whatever pocket change is left over to God?

If you want to be zoned in, if you want to experience life in the blessed place, that first portion is the one that blesses the rest. The first portion carries the blessing.

People may claim, “Yeah, God is number one. He’s first. Jesus is Lord of my life!” But talk is cheap. And tithing is the litmus test. It’s tests whether we are willing to put our money where our mouth is. It is a tangible witness that God is first. If you say that God is first in your life, show me your checkbook. That’s where the rubber meets the road.

Again, I’m not talking about tithing because God needs the money. I’m delivering these truths for your own sake. God doesn’t need you to give. He asks you to honor him so that he can bless your life. I’ve never met someone who tithed regularly who was not blessed. For God not to bless your life as you are faithful to his commands would go against his unchanging nature.

He asks you to bring the tithe because he is on your side. Remember, God is for you, not against you. I’m going to keep reiterating that theme until it’s tattooed on your heart. God desperately wants you to live in the zone, and the only way that’s going to happen is if you honor God with the first part of your wealth.

Receiving

In order to be on the receiving end of God’s blessings, though, you have to first be blessable. You’ve got to be in the right position to recognize and accept God’s blessings. What is the right position? It’s in the zone. This may seem a little like a Catch-22 situation, but let me explain.

When you are blessable, you are in a mindset and position to recognize the blessings of God when they are presented to you. You can distinguish that the blessings, both intangible and tangible, are truly blessings. Thus, you reside in the zone.

Abraham was in the zone, and we can be too if can pick up on two powerful principles of zone living: receiving and reflecting. It’s not just about receiving and getting and obtaining the blessings for ourselves. It’s also about reflecting those blessings to others. We’ll get to that later.

We’ve already discovered that being blessed means being on the receiving end of the intangible and tangible favor of God. You can see in the diagram above that I have labeled God as the Blessor. Thus, living in the zone is all about receiving blessings from the Blessor. The next step, however, is where the rubber meets the road. It’s where you put shoe leather to the blessings that you receive. It’s where you discover the true meaning behind God’s blessings, because it isn’t all about you; and it isn’t all about me.

Reflecting

Abraham wasn’t simply blessed by God. He realized there is more to life in the zone than receiving God’s blessings. He was also a blessing to others. Don’t miss that. When God blessed him financially, relationally, spiritually, and in every other area of his life, Abraham turned around and reflected the generous nature of God to others. God had blessed him so that he could be a blessing others.