I would like to talk with you this morning about Jesus. My favorite topic. Every sermon is about Jesus. And this one is about the fact that Jesus became a Savior. It's not a Christmas sermon. I know it's not Christmas. But it's about Jesus. We can preach about Him any time.
Jesus was born in a lower class family during a housing shortage, and He grew up in an overcrowded house, on a dirt floor, and in a little backwoods hamlet. He didn't have much. He was home-schooled. He grew up around siblings that really didn't understand His mission or identify with it. And as He grew older He came to the place where He had to choose an occupation. Now He had been used to being a carpenter. Building furniture in His dad's workshop. It would have been easy for Him to just continue being a carpenter. So much easier. He already knew how to do it. He could have inherited the business, probably. He was good at it.
He wanted to do something better though. He wanted to be what His heavenly father wanted Him to be. That had a bigger draw on His heart than what His earthly father might have trained Him to be. And He could've been anything but He decided to be a Savior. That's why He came to this world. He read about Himself in the Bible. He memorized those scriptures and He knew, “that's My divine mission”, and He chose to accept that.
Look at Luke chapter 2 in your Bible. In verse 11. Luke two, and verse 11. "For unto you is born this day in the city of David a" what? "A Savior, which is Christ the Lord." Jesus is a Savior.
You know, if our greatest need would have been money, probably God would have sent a banker. If our greatest need had been technology, everybody would have been named Thomas Alva Edison I suppose, or some other name. If our greatest need would have been health, God would have sent a heavenly HMO. But since our greatest need was salvation, God sent Jesus, and Jesus became a Savior.
He did not have to become a Savior. I suppose He could have chosen, I mean He was God, He could have chosen to be anything He wanted to be, couldn't He? He was in charge of His own life. He could undertake any vocation He might imagine. I suppose He could have come to this world to evaporate all these miserable sinners and clean the place up and start all over again. He could've done that. He had all the power. He was omnipresent. And He chose to live here. Never traveled over 200 miles from where He was born, even though He had been omnipresent. And He was omniscient, and yet He chose to know one thing, and that was to focus on just one thing, on us. And why? Because He wanted to be a Savior.
Titus, chapter 3, and verse four. A little verse I'd like to read to you. "When the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, He saved us." What a wonderful thing that Jesus chose to become a Savior. No wonder the name of Jesus is so sweet. Jesus could have become an Adolf Hitler, or a dictator, or a slave taskmaster. We are pretty bad sometimes. In gangland the Crips are out to kill the Bloods. We fight each other. We’re in all kinds of wars. It's dog eat dog in business. And when you get in traffic, everybody else has road rage. We never do. But somehow God loves us. I don't know why He loves us sometimes, because we’re pretty bad sometimes.
He speaks of His love to us in Isaiah. Come over to Isaiah 65 in your Bible. And here's a neat text about the love of God. Isaiah 65. I want us to look at verse two and verse three. Isaiah 65. "All day long I have held out My hands to an obstinate people, who walk in ways not good, pursuing their own imaginations. A people who continually provoke Me to My very face." And all day long He does what to these types of people? He holds out His hands to them. Why does He do that? He's intelligent. Why does He love us so much? He should have come to destroy us, but instead of doing that He chose to become a Savior. Praise the Lord for that. He came down so that the darkness and death would not win. He came down to give us a chance. He chose to save us. “Thou shalt call His name Jesus and He will save His people from their sins.”
Many years ago I read a story about a poor crippled man who had been named Old Rattle-bones by a group of boys, and the ringleader of the boys was named Freddie. And one day Freddie saw old Mr. Rattle-bones heading for his own house, where Freddie lived. And Freddie thought, "Who cares if he's coming to see my mom. That's all right." Well he knocked, and he was warmly welcomed, and he asked for Freddie, and Freddie's mother said, “Come here.” And they sat down, and old Mr. Rattle-bones started telling a story.
He said, “Freddie, years ago, when you were just a baby, your nurse was pushing your baby carriage along down by the river, and she let go of it for just an instant and it started down the hill toward the river. She ran after it. She could not catch it. And it went into the river, and you went into the water.” And he said, “It was winter time. And I dove into that water and after a lot of effort, I found you and I saved you and brought you back. And before anybody could ask my name, I left. And that was 10 years ago. And since then, I have had an aggravated rheumatic condition, and I have not had good health. I could scarcely walk." And Freddie hung his head, and started to cry. He said, "Sir. Thank you for saving me. I'm sorry I named you Mr. Rattle-bones. I did that myself. But I didn't know who you were."
And you know, it makes a difference, when you know who Jesus is. Jesus is our Savior, and I invite you to find out who Jesus is. Read about Jesus. Focus your life on Jesus. The devil exists to hurt us, but Jesus exists to help us. And our focus in life should be to help other people. Just like His focus is. This incredible man here in 2007 ever lives to do what He did do 2000 years ago. He lives to save us. That's why. He wants to transform the sinner into His own sinless image. And if we will but let Him, He will cover us with His free robe of righteousness. And empower us. He wants to be our Savior, and our Lord.
What is the job description of a Savior? Well, look at Luke 19:10. Luke 19, and verse 10. "The Son of Man came to seek and to save" what? "That which was" what? "Lost!" That's right. We are the sheep, and we are lost. We frankly are lost. Some of us don't know we’re lost. You know, sheep could be lost and not even know it. Be having a fine time.
Lost describes something of value. I've been a pastor 42 years. I've had a lot of people come up to me and they’ve said, “You know what you pray for my daughter, would you pray for my son. They’re lost.” Never once has a parent come and said, my wayward son is misplaced. They say lost. If you misplace something it's something of not much value. But lost is something that we often refer to that has great value. And Jesus is seeking us. Jesus came to save that which was lost. Not misplaced. And retrieve it.
In John 10. Come over here to the 10th chapter of John in your Bible. At this Thanksgiving time, I want you to know I'm thankful for Jesus Christ. That's the greatest gift that could've ever been given to humanity, and we needed that gift. We needed Jesus. Jesus speaks in John chapter 10 of lost sheep. And look at verse 16. He says. Well let's begin with verse 14. "I am the good Shepherd. I know My sheep. And My sheep know Me, just as the Father knows Me and I know the Father. I lay down my life for", for what? "For the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also, and they too will listen to My voice and there shall be one flock, and one Shepherd." So what does He want to do for the sheep that are not in His own fold? He wants to seek them. To find them. To save them. Retrieve them. That's what He is here in this world for. He has a passionate, all-consuming, driving desire to save sheep.
I never raised sheep. In Indiana where I was born we raised chickens, and they were the most obstinate creatures. I can only imagine what sheep would be like. I don't know. I think sheep smell bad, but I don't know that. I think sometimes we human beings stink. But God loves us. I don't know why He loves us so much. I cannot figure that out. Jesus has a passionate consuming desire to seek sheep that are lost, and to bring the sheep into the fold so that they can be saved. Saved sheep instead of lost sheep.
I remember one fine spring day in Hartford City Indiana, my hometown, where I grew up. The wind was blowing. Oh it was such a lovely day. And I was out playing in the yard. I spent a lot of time outdoors. And I had found a large piece of cardboard. I don't know where it came from, but I was playing with it and threw it up and the wind blew it a long way, and I thought, “Hey, here's a new game.” So I would throw the cardboard up and then go chase it. And it would go so long. And our yard was huge. We called called our yard the grove because we had a lot of trees there, but there was a big open space, and that's where I was playing. And I would throw that cardboard up. The wind got harder and harder, and finally it blew the cardboard way off, clear across Wabash Avenue and way on down through the country. And I thought, “I can't chase it. I'm not supposed across the street.” And finally I thought, “You know, this wind is blowing me.” And so I grabbed a tree and wrapped my arms around the tree and hung on for dear life. The wind was pelting me. Debris were stinging my arms and my face. I had to shut my eyes, and I could see our house. It wasn't over 200 feet away but I couldn't get to it. So I just clung to that tree. And I heard my mother calling my name. "Donnie. Where are you?" And I called, "I'm here." But she couldn't hear me. The wind was blowing my words away. And it seemed like a terrible wind. It seemed like the wind was just sucking... Have you ever been in a real strong wind? The wind goes right past your nose, and you can’t even get a breath. It was just sucking the air right out of me. Finally, my mother saw me and came and found me, and took my hand, and together we struggled against that wind to get to the house. She had a hold of me, and we were leaning into the wind. We were pushing and struggling, and at times my feet were barely touching the ground. It was sort of like flying. It was kind of neat. I could see my grandmother's house next door, cause we lived in little group. All of us relatives were together. And the back porch blew off of her house, and went sailing away. And I thought, "This is a real wind." And we found out later it was a tornado. We finally made it to the house. And then my mother said, "Where is your sister?" I thought, I don't know. She said, “Well I'm going to go find her.” So out she went, into that wind. That terrible wind. She finally found my sister in my grandmother's garage, and there they stayed until the storm was over. She was seeking the lost. To me my mother's name is so sweet. She was my savior that day. I don't know what would have happened. Well I love my mother. She left the safety of our house and came and found me.
And that’s so much like what Jesus did. Jesus lived in a perfect environment. Everything was fine up there. And He left all that and He came out into this wild wicked place, to find us. To save us. That's why we should be so appreciative at this Thanksgiving season of Jesus. Because He came to save us.
Look at Matthew. Come over here to Matthew chapter 18 in your Bible. And here's some more wonderful words. Matthew 18, and verse 11 and 12 and 13. We're going to read a section here. Matthew 18. Let's begin with verse 10. This is the parable of the lost sheep. "See that you do not look down on one of these little ones for I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of My Father in heaven. And what do you think if a man owns a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the 90 and nine on the hills and go to look for the one that has wandered off? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the 90 and nine that have not wandered off. In the same way your heavenly Father is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost." God loves lost sheep, more, it sounds like, then saved sheep. And I don't want to get into that. I'm not going to pursue that, because He loves all of us with an eternal love. But God, when we are lost, has a keen, intense desire to come after us and find us. That's why the name of Jesus is so sweet. Because He's our Savior.
You know how we sometimes, we build a doghouse to keep our pets from running off. The dog, we put a fence around it, we build that in, and the dog has a yard to play in. Well, my mother and dad figured that they needed to build a fence in our backyard to keep me in. Because when I was a small boy about three years old I was always running off, and so they built a picket fence all around the backyard and put me in it. I don't know if I felt like a dog or not. But they said that within two minutes I had climbed the fence, and was on the other side, heading off.
One day when I was almost 3, my mother noticed that I was gone again. And after much searching, much searching, they found me at the grocery store, sitting on the counter. They had candy and everything there, and the grocer was feeding me candy. And they came and reclaimed me. I think I was an easy child, actually. I don't know. I'm sure I was. But one day we had just come home from church. My mother was starting to fix the food and everything and she got this strange feeling. It was awfully quiet in the house, and she said to my dad, "Where's Donnie?" He said, "Well, he was here just a minute ago." Well, I wasn't there. I was gone again. And we didn't have a house, so we were living with my grandmother, who eventually lived next door where we finally did find a house. And I was less than three years old and one of the Elliot boys from across Wabash Avenue came up the hill with me in his hand, and said, "Is this your boy? He was down in our yard, heading off that way." And my mother said, "Yep. That's my boy.”
A few months later my mother looked in the yard where I had been playing and I was gone again. And she searched and searched with increasing panic and could not find me. And so she went over to the neighbors and borrowed a telephone, cause we didn't have a phone, and call the laundry where my dad worked washing clothes. And he hurried home and joined the search. And all the neighbors, my grandmother and my grandfather, my uncle and aunt, and everybody was in the search. They widened it and widened it, and finally, half a mile or a mile away was a factory, and I was behind the factory, in the woods, near the railroad tracks, near the abandoned coal docks where the steam locomotives filled up their boilers with water. I was right there. I had two dogs with me, enjoying, having the time of my life. Didn't even know I was lost. And they found me, and saved me. I didn't even know I needed saving. Fortunately, I was sought after.
And there are some people sitting right here today, on this Thanksgiving Sabbath, that are lost. And you don't even know it. You don't even know you need saving. You think, "Well yeah, I'm fine. I'm saved." But you're lost. You need to give your life to Jesus Christ. He’s your Savior. You need to respond to Jesus. He wants to save you.
Come over here to Isaiah 62. Isaiah 62, verse 11 and 12. Isaiah 62:11. "The Lord has made proclamation to the ends of the earth. Say to the daughter of Zion, see your Savior comes. His reward is with Him and His recompense accompanies Him." And then notice verse 12. "They will be called the holy people, the redeemed of the Lord, and you will be called sought after."
My mother did a lot of that for me. And I appreciate being sought after. We are sought after. Jesus seeks us that He may save us. And the Hebrew word means ‘to cherish’. We are considered something of great value. The driving passion of most Americans is either to seek pleasure or comfort. And the driving passion of our Savior is to seek us when we are lost. We are highly sought after. Highly prized. Of great value in His sight. Our God even gives us a new name. Hephzibah, which means ‘My delight’. Isaiah 62 verse four, you can read this here. "No longer will they call you deserted, or name you the land of desolation. You will be called Hephzibah." And that means ‘highly desired’. We’re the apple of His eye. We are God's delight. God rejoices in us. And why is that?
We're not good. We’re sinners. We’re sheep that haven't had a bath in a long time. We don't smell good. He loves us because He has placed upon us His righteousness, His love, His life. Sent His son to die for us. He created us, and He wants us in His kingdom. He values us more than gold. Like a prospector looking for gold, Jesus comes looking for you. Not to condemn you, but to seek you. To save you.
Ezekiel 34:11. "For this is what the sovereign Lord says. I Myself will search for My sheep. I will look after them, as a shepherd looks after the scattered flock when He is with them so I will look for My sheep and I will rescue them." Verse 12. So we're lost. But we have a Savior that wants to find us. We’re weak but our Savior is strong.
Can you catch the wind? Can you make the earth spin? Can you pull the sun down or raise a man from the ground? Jesus can. We have a strong Savior. He’s fully capable of saving us. Living He loved me, dying He saved me. Living today He seeks me, and coming He will raise me.
So what should be our reaction to His great love? Thanksgiving. Thankfulness. Praise. Psalm 100 verse four. "Enter His gates with Thanksgiving, and His courts with praise. Give thanks to Him and praise His name." Verse five. "For the Lord is good and His love endures forever. His faithfulness continues through all generations."
Take time at this time of Thanksgiving to praise God. He's blessed you in many, many remarkable ways. I'm thankful for my mother and my father. The way that I was raised. Thankful for our little church. I'm thankful for all the people that have had a part in my life. My roommates in college. My wife. My friends. I'm thankful for you, for what you have done to me.
I had a godly grandmother. When I was in college at Andrews University. Was in the dorm, there in Green Gables. She would occasionally send me five dollars. She found out I was going to be a pastor, a minister. And so she gave me commentaries, and she gave me a book, you know, Counsels On Diet And Food, and ministry books and witnessing books. All my Ellen White books, many of them, are from my grandmother. Grandmother Jordan. In 1969 she came down with cancer and died. And how I wished… You know, I told her thanks several times, but I wished I had just told her thanks a little bit more.
At this time of Thanksgiving if there's somebody you need to say thank you to, do it while they're still living. It means so much. Jesus had done vastly more for us than anybody. Be sure to tell Him thanks. Have an attitude of gratitude about Jesus.
I've performed a lot of funerals in my ministry. Probably several hundred. And not once, at a military funeral, and I've performed several of those, not one time have I ever seen the American flag go down into the casket with the deceased and be buried. At every instance during the funerals that I've performed the flag was removed from the coffin and given to the family after it was very meticulously and carefully folded. You see, that symbolizes something. The nation can't die for the person. The nation survives. The removal of the flag from the casket symbolizes that. The nation goes on. Even though all of its citizens die the nation continues. And Jesus died for men and women of all nations so that they may have life. A nation will finally bid its farewell to you but Jesus will never say farewell to you. He will never leave us. He will never forsake us. And so the ultimate question for us today is, what are we doing with Jesus Christ? Have you accepted Him as your Savior?
He's calling you. You can’t come, you're on that tree. You can't let go or you'll just be blown away. But He's calling you. He wants to take your hand. Are you going to reach out or will you run away? Give your life to Jesus Christ. Give your life to Him.
Titus Chapter 2, verse 13. "Let us be looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and our Savior Jesus Christ." The Savior is coming. And He's coming to save us.
Let’s sing Pass Me Not Oh Gentle Savior. You don't want Him to pass by. You want to respond when He comes, and give your life and give your heart to Jesus Christ.
Let's sing our closing hymn, number 569.
Hymn of Praise: The Name of Jesus is So Sweet Scripture: Matthew 1:18-21 Hymn of Response: #569, Pass Me Not, O Gentle Savior
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McDonald Road Sermon transcribed by Steve Foster 12/15/07