A GPS is your reference; it keeps you focused on your destination, it keeps you from wandering into “detours”, it teaches you new paths, it points out the most effective route to take. It even tells you when it’s time to “recalculate your route.” Kind of sounds like a Bible, doesn’t it?
The 3rd Sunday in November is traditionally observed as “Bible Sunday,” and so Pastor Jim took a look at the significance of the Bible in our daily walk with God. Click the below “Play” button to start the recording, then scroll down to follow along. The recording is from the 11:00 service…
The scripture reading was Luke 4:14-21, an account of what may have been one of the first “Bible Studies” led by Jesus Himself. Pastor Jim read from The Living Bible, and the New Living Translation is shown below. Click the drop down box to follow along…
Luke 4:16-21
16 When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures.
17 The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written:
18 “The Spirit of the LORD is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free,
19 and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come.”
20 He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently.
21 Then he began to speak to them. “The Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulfilled this very day!”
Holy Bible, New Living Translation ®, copyright © 1996, 2004 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers. All rights reserved.
You Get Out What You Put In…
The husband said to the wife, “Did you see the strange hat Mrs.O’Brien was wearing?“
… “No, I didn’t,” replied his wife.
The husband remarked, “Bill, the usher badly needs a haircut, doesn’t he?“
… The wife replied, “Sorry dear, I didn’t notice.“
Then with a bit of impatience in his voice, the husband said, “You know Margaret, sometimes I wonder if you get anything at all out of going to church.“
What do you expect when you come to Sunday Worship? Unless you come expecting to have an encounter with the living God, all you’ll see is distractions. Think about the Israelites who showed up for Synagogue that one Saturday… what did they expect? What did they think when Jesus read this passage from Isaiah and then claimed that He was the fulfillment of it?
This was something new; it demanded that they change course. Like them, do we need to have our “Spiritual GPSs” recalculated?
Keep Your Eyes on the Road…
Any GPS will warn you to “keep your eyes on the road”; don’t be playing with this electronic gadget when you should be watching traffic. In this passage, the thing that Jesus drew our attention to was the Scripture. And this was nothing new…
It’s always appropriate that Scripture be read and focused upon in the worship of God. Take a look at these Old Testament passages…
We see the same thing in the early church. Reading the Bible isn’t a new thing that started after the printing press. Handwritten scrolls were part of the synagogues and churches from the beginning…
| Then is it any wonder that scripture reading is a key part of our worship experience today? |  |
In this passage we’re told that when He finished reading, Jesus “closed the book and He gave it to the minister, and sat down.”
Scripture was read by standing up to show respect for the words of God. However, when the Rabbi or pastor was going to deliver the sermon, he sat down. This is what Jesus does after the reading. he sits down showing He was about to expound on the words just read.
And expound Jesus did! His sermon is one of the shortest on record. Jesus simply says “Today, the Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
Keep Your Eyes Fastened on Jesus…
Verse 20 says, “All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently.” Do our “spiritual eyes,” like a properly programmed GPS, keep us focused on the object of our worship?
From Genesis to Revelation, all 66 books in the Bible point to Jesus. The name of the Bible’s last book, Revelation, is singular because only one thing is truly revealed: Jesus! It’s all about Jesus. When we hear the Bible read at worship, when you read the Bible at home daily in your devotions, do you see Jesus? Do you hear the voice of Jesus providing a word we need for that moment. Jesus knew exactly what the people needed to hear that day and He knows exactly what we need. And in both cases, Jesus stands ready to give us a word we need.
As we read the Bible, do we see Jesus? Do we hear the word He wants to give us? Keep your eyes on “the road”…
To hear Jesus, we need to get involved with the Scripture. Don’t just read it… put yourself in it! Try out this sequence when reading a Bible passage:
| 1 | Start by just reading the passage. |
| 2 | Close your eyes and meditate on what you read. What’s it saying to you? |
| 3 | Read it again, but this time try to imagine that you’re in the room (or whatever location). You’re watching what’s going on.
|
| 4 | Now… move from an observer to a participant. Imagine that you’re the rabbi handing Jesus the scroll. Read it again…
|
We Can Trust Scripture…
Consider a few facts about the Bible:
1- It was written over a period from 2000 BC until 95 AD.
2- It was written by a wide variety of people…
3- It was written in wide variety of locations and circumstances…
And yet… with all of that variety of time, place, and circumstance the Bible is totally consistent!
Ralph O. Muncaster (who was once an atheist and staunch skeptic of the Bible) wrote…
How rare it is today to see two different authors write articles on controversial topics— like sexual conduct, men and women’s roles, politics, or life after death— that agree point by point? –From “Can You Trust the Bible” page 36
Oh, these words CAN be trusted! The same God who gave them is the same God who has preserved them for us. Theologian Charles Hodge put it this way,
Inspiration was an influence of the Holy Spirit on the minds of certain select men which rendered them the organs of God for the infallible communication of His mind and will. They were in such a sense the organs of God that what they said God said.
God used the personalities of the writers. It’s as if the Holy Spirit filtered Himself through these unique personalities so that we could identify with the Word they wrote and spoke. If the scriptures are not inspired by God, then the Bible is only a collection of opinions.
But it IS inspired! And it can be used as our roadmap or GPS.
The Bible remains the supreme and final source and standard of truth…
Psalm 119:60 I will hasten and not delay to obey your commands.
John 17:17 Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth.
It conveys God’s wisdom concerning the great questions of human existence:
- Is there a God?
- What is He like?
- How Can we know Him?
- Who are we?
- Why are we on this planet?
- Why is there death and suffering?
- What lies beyond the grave?
- What does the future hold?
- How do I know right from wrong?
Plug in the GPS Before Traveling…
The Bible is like the GPS we have for our cars yet without the disembodied voice yelling at us! The Bible is His instruction manual on how to live for best results.
BUT… we muse expose ourselves to the Bible, have our eyes fixed upon Jesus, and know that what we are reading is His word for us. In other words, a GPS doesn’t do any good if it’s locked inside the glove compartment!
A godly Irishman had come to California to recover from tuberculosis. The old man could barely speak because of his illness. But he opened his worn Bible and he simply, sweetly opened up truth after truth in a way that Ironside had never heard before. Before he knew it, Ironside had tears running down his cheeks.
He asked Frazer, “Where did you get all these things? Could you tell me where I could find a book that would open them up to me? Did you learn these things in some seminary or college?”
Frazer answered…
“My dear young man, I learned these things on my knees on the mud floor of a little sod cottage in the north of Ireland. There with my Bible open before me, I used to kneel for hours at a time and ask the Spirit of God to reveal Christ to my soul and to open the Word to my heart. He taught me more on my knees on that mud floor than I ever could have learned in all the seminaries or colleges in the world.“
(H.A. Ironside, “In the Heavenlies” pp86-87)
I suspect we all own a Bible. But do we use it as the spiritual GPS that it is? In all due respect… we will not learn the Bible through osmosis. Our Bible’s have been gifted to us from God and all He asks is we consistently read, study, memorize, meditate, and preach from the Bible.
Keep the GPS In Your Car…
On this Bible Sunday we give thanks that God has kindly gifted us with the Bible. We want to thank God that for us Bibles are freely available, and we’re free to read His word whenever we want.
Yet there are as many as 51 countries where it remains illegal to carry a Bible down the street publicly. Are we willing to do what Jesus states as His mission and purpose in Luke 4:18-19….
“The Spirit of the LORD is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free,
and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come.”
John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, said this about the Bible…
To be candid, reasonable men, I am not afraid to lay open what have been the inmost thoughts of my heart. I have thought, I am a creature of a day, passing through life as an arrow through the air. I am a spirit come from God and returning to God; just hovering over the great gulf till, a few moments hence, I am no more seen. I drop into an unchangeable eternity.
I want to know one thing: The way to heaven. How to land safe on that happy shore. God Himself has condescended to teach the way; for this very end He came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book.
O give me that book! At any price, give me the book of God!
– (John Wesley, edited by Albert C. Outler, Preface to Sermons, p89)
As we travel this road of life, do we use our GPS? Is it with us… in our hearts and minds as we take each step?
In the synagogue that day, the people’s eyes were fixed upon Jesus. When it comes to the Bible, we can refuse to listen, we can refuse to believe, and we can refuse to let it make a difference for us… but it is still true!
The Word of God stands forever, because the Word gives us life. Jesus’ obedience to God created the foundation upon which God can build and enter the temple called our heart. Jesus’ one sentence sermon that day in the synagogue was the shortest in history, but it is also the most powerful.
Quiz Time!
As you reflect on what you’ve just heard/read, give this quiz a try. If you don’t understand an answer (or if you disagree with the “correct” answer, post a comment)…
+ + + + + + +
Click this button to view other sermons: Sermon Archive
