Sermon: Drink from the WELL of Christ’s Work
May 26th, 2019 Rev. Betsy Perkins
First Baptist Church, Delavan WI
Scripture passage: Ephesians 2:1-10; John 4:10,14, John 7:38
“Is anyone thirsty?”
“Are you thirsty? Are you empty? Come and drink these Living Waters.”
Last Sunday we thought about thirst and about God’s offer of Living Water. Just as we get physically thirsty when we don’t get enough water to drink, our souls get thirsty when we don’t get enough spiritual water. In his book Come Thirsty, Max Lucado writes, “Stress signals a deep need, a longing.” A thirst. Signs of a dehydrated heart and soul are irritability, worry, anxiety, sleeplessness, or loneliness. Spiritual dehydration leads to resentment, hopelessness, guilt, fear, dissatisfaction, a longing for something more, a dryness deep within.
The first few verses of the passage from Paul’s letter to the church in Ephesus, that I just read, describe the life of spiritual dehydration as being “dead because of your disobedience and your many sins.” In the Message paraphrase, Eugene Peterson uses a more watery image, writing “you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin.” Sin is like a stagnant swamp of dark, foul water and muddy traps.
The first humans got mired in that swamp when they tried to reach for knowledge and self-determination, ignoring God and acting as if they were the center of the universe. They got thirsty and allowed themselves to be enticed by what was not designed to satisfy their true need. Rather than consulting their Creator, they doubted God’s goodness and God’s guidance. They gave God about the same respect that middle-schoolers give a substitute teacher – distrusted and determined to outwit. “Sin celebrates its middle letter – sIn,” Max Lucado writes. At the center of sin, is “I”, self-centeredness, me. What will make me feel good? What will satisfy my need? More excitement? More food? More money? More admiration and praise from the people around me? More love? We fill ourselves with the polluted waters of this world – a me-dominated, childish life of “doing what we feel like doing when we feel like doing it” (Eph.2:3, Msg). Then after drinking in swamp water, we wonder why we have an upset stomach!
Have you ever been thirsty and reached for something that looked good, looked enticing – a sugary soda, a cup of coffee, fancy flavors. It satisfies for a short time, but the thirst comes back stronger than ever. Sin is like that. We fill ourselves with the polluted waters of this world – the water of selfishness, of outrage, of animosity and arrogance. SIn seems to satisfy for a time, but the thirst returns, deeper, stronger, more desperate than ever.
Drink from the WELL of the Water of Life
The deep thirst in our lives can only be quenched by the living water provided by Jesus; by the Spirit of God poured into our lives when we put our trust in Jesus. Jesus shouted out to a crowd in Jerusalem, “Is anyone thirsty? Let them come to me and drink.” (John 7:38)
Thirst is a universal human condition. God created thirst as an invitation, an invitation designed to draw us into the fresh, running, ever flowing water of God’s love and care, providing for our souls the kind of nourishment that truly satisfies and truly addresses our deepest thirst. You are invited to come and drink deeply from the WELL of the waters of life.
We are going to take 4 weeks to look more closing at what is in that WELL:
to drink from the WELL of Christ’s Work,
to drink from the WELL of the Energy of God’s Spirit,
from the WELL of Christ’s Lordship in your life,
and from God’s WELL of unending, unfailing Love.
The invitation today is to drink deeply from the WELL of the Work of Jesus Christ.
Drink from the WELL of Christ’s Work
As I shared with the children, this weekend we observe Memorial Day, a day for remembering those who gave their lives to win freedoms for others. It’s a time to honor the work that their sacrifice accomplished. So too, when we come to the WELL of God’s thirst-quenching water, it begins with remembering and receiving the gift of what has been done on our behalf, the work accomplished by the sacrifice of Jesus’ life.
Jennie Hussey was born in 1874 on a small family farm in New Hampshire. As she grew up, she ended up becoming the family caregiver for her profoundly disabled sister. Her sister’s care consumed Jennie’s whole life, her time, her attention, her strength. Making the heavy responsibility even more burdensome was the added weight that Jennie herself suffered from a severe form of arthritis which was crippling and painful. She must have felt the pull into the stagnant swamp of self-pity, of resentment and regret. She must have wished at times for a more sugary, happy, carefree life. Yet those who knew Jennie were amazed by her cheerful and courageous attitude.
Jennie shared her secret in the many poems she wrote, but particularly in one that went on to become a well known hymn, titled “Lead me to Calvary.” The poem began as a prayer, as she drew strength for her own cross-bearing responsibilities from the cross-bearing work that Jesus had done for her. She prayed, “May I be willing, Lord, to bear / Daily my cross for Thee / Even Thy cup of grief to share / Thou hast borne all for me.”
The source of Jennie’s fresh courage and willingness to face the needs of each day came from remembering, remembering what Jesus had done. She drank deeply from the water of his work. The day after she wrote the prayer, she went on to add it: King of my life, I crown Thee now / Thine shall the glory be / Lest I forget Thy thorn-crowned brow / Lead me to Calvary.
Lest I forget Gethsemane / Lest I forget Thine agony / Lest I forget Thy love for me / Lead me to Calvary.
Lest the new believers in Ephesus forget, Paul detailed for them in his letter what God did. Let me read you verses 3-7 from the Message version. Paul writes about the swamp that we all have gotten ourselves mired in, and then says, “It’s a wonder God didn’t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, God embraced us. He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on His own, with no help from us! Then he picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.”
Lest we forget, let me review again:
Jesus’ work was first to set aside the privileges of being God! Of being all-powerful, and accept the limitations of a human body. God in Jesus was born, weak and thirsty, and vulnerable to the power of others.
Jesus’ work was to reveal to the world God’s immense love for us, to show us that we were created to live beyond the stagnant swamp of self-absorption, in the fresh, flowing water of true life.
Jesus’ work was then to take our place in that swamp, to expose the foul water of hatred and fear and self-preservation for what it was, to allow himself to get muddied, to join us in the deadness of sin even though he had never sinned.
Three times in verse 6, Paul uses the phrase ‘with Christ’, highlighting what was accomplished ‘with Christ’s work’. God raised us from the dead along with Christ. That is we were given real life, made truly alive, with Christ’s work. Next, God seated us with Christ in the heavenly realms. We no longer have to sit in the swamp, we can sit beside fresh, flowing streams, beside gurgling springs. Thirdly, we are united with Christ Jesus. Everything He is, everything He has, becomes ours too – the freedoms, the power, the joy, the love, all the riches of God become yours when you drink from the work that Jesus Christ did for you!
Drink from the Free Gift of God’s Grace
Let me read on in the Message, verses 7-9: “Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all His idea, start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and the saving.”
It’s all a gift! Something done for us, undeserved, unearned, unmerited; pure Grace! We simply receive it. We are to drink it in and be quenched, revived, refreshed, resuscitated, resurrected.
Jennie Hussey lived into her 70’s. Late in her life she began attending the First Baptist Church in Concord, New Hampshire and when she came before the congregation to ask to be baptized, Jennie told the pastor, “I’ve spent much of my life hidden away in the country, and I’d like to have the opportunity, before God takes me home, to tell everybody, ‘I love Jesus!’”
This morning, lest we start feeling sorry for ourselves in our own struggles or pain, lest we get mired in discouragement or depression, lest we get pulled into the swamp of indignation and criticism, lest we just get busy and forget, I’d like to take a few moments for anyone who would like to speak a word of remembrance of the work Jesus Christ did for you, or to speak a word of gratitude for God’s love and mercy, or to simply speak the words, “I love Jesus!” to do so now. ….
For the challenges we face each day, we need to first and foremost drink deeply of Christ’s work, to remember, to draw the healing water that will quench with joy and strength and power of living.
Closing Song: “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus” # 452
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