Luke 9:37-50
Introduction
You want to know how to really fail in life? Just read these
two verses with me.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably
more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work
within us, to him be glory
in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and
ever! Amen - Ephesians 3:20-21
Got that? Now do the opposite:
1.
First, you dream small dreams instead of
God’s dreams.
2.
Second, power those dreams by yourself
instead of with God’s power.
3.
Third, promote yourself instead of God.
Ok. That's it. You can sleep now, you’ve got the main point.
You know I work in computers. One of the most difficult
types of failures to debug is called a “priority inversion” It is will a low-priority
program grabs ahold of computer resources and then won’t let them go when a
high-priority program needs them. Priority inversion has taken down the Mars
Rover, it has taken down Windows, it has taken down banking systems, it has
taken down my job performance…and let me tell you—priority inversion can take
down your life. We let little dreams sabotage God’s dreams for us. We hold so
tightly on to our resources that we are not free to grab ahold of God’s
resources. We are so worried about our maintaining priority, that we never let
God’s priority be promoted in our lives.
It can happen to us. It happened to Jesus’ best friends in the
second half of the 9th chapter of Luke’s biography of Jesus. Four
times in twelve verses, his disciples will fail. From a Bible point of view that’s not a very
good ratio. So what happened?
Well, let’s take a look. Turn to Luke, 9th
chapter, starting in verse 37. Jesus is on his way down from the mountain where
he was praying, and when he gets down, there is a huge crowd and lot of noise,
because of the first of his disciple’s epic fails.
Fail #1: Want To Appear Competent (vs. 37-40)
Look at the next verse:
37 The next day, when they came down from the mountain, a large crowd met
him. 38 A
man in the crowd called out, “Teacher, I beg you to look at my son, for he is
my only child. 39 A spirit seizes him and he suddenly screams; it throws
him into convulsions so that he foams at the mouth. It scarcely ever leaves him
and is destroying him. 40 I begged your
disciples to drive it out, but they could not.”
Jesus’ disciples could not cast out a particular demon. Failure
#1. The story only makes sense if you look back at the very start of chapter 9,
where it says: “When Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them power
and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases.” (Luke 9:1)
Notice the word “all”. Something has happened. Jesus is frustrated by this, and
says so, and then heals the boy and restores the family.
Before we look further at this first failure, just a side comment
about demons. When we read passages like this, we might wonder whether this
young man’s problem was something like epilepsy and those in Jesus’ time just
thought it was caused by a demon. Certainly Christians have been guilty of
assigning demonic causes to ordinary events. But look carefully at verse 42.
Luke (the author) is a doctor and he notes that Jesus “rebuked” the demon and
then healed him. That is, there were two problems: a spiritual problem and a
physical problem and Jesus recognized them both. Sometimes, in America, we are
so fond of ‘natural’ causes, that we miss the spiritual side of things that
many other cultures are aware of.
Why is Jesus frustrated? What was the root cause of the disciple's epic fail with the demon? He mentions two keys to their failure: first, the
disciples were a part of an unbelieving generation. That is, even though
they had all of the power and authority they needed to do this job (see
verse 1), and they had practice (see verse 2) and they had
success (verse 6), they were still not confident that it would still work.
Second, they were a part of the perverse generation. This means that
their desires—their want-tos—their motives—were off-the-mark. That is, they wanted to appear to be competent. Casting out the demon has become about their competence--their abilities--not God's abilities.
Now before we get too hard the disciples, what about us?
Most of us aren’t demon experts. But we want to appear like we're competent and capable. We don't just want someone to be helped, but we want to be appreciated as the type of people who help, or the type of people God uses to help. Let me reassure you: You have exactly enough strength to do
everything God wants you to do tomorrow. You have exactly enough time to do
everything God wants you to do tomorrow. But we hesitate because we doubt God.
We procrastinate because all our energy, checkbook and slots in our calendar
are taken by our plans, dreams and desires.
Our want-to is broken.
We fail when we want to appear competent, on our terms. We win when we
humble ourselves, throw away our plan, follow God's plan and allow God to be competent:
“God
opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” – 1 Peter 5:5b
Fail #2: Want To Appear Smart (vs. 44-45)
Let’s look at failure #2.
42
Even while the boy was coming, the demon threw him to the ground in a
convulsion. But Jesus rebuked the evil spirit, healed the boy and gave him back
to his father. 43 While
everyone was marveling at all that Jesus did, he said to his disciples, 44
“Listen carefully to what I am about to tell you: The Son of Man is going to be
betrayed into the hands of men.” 45 But they did not understand what
this meant. It was hidden from them, so that they did not grasp it, and they
were afraid to ask him about it.
Luke tells us that while everyone was excited about the
external miracles, Jesus repeats His message to the disciples about His
suffering and death, and they still don’t get it. Jesus is trying to prepare
them for the time when he is gone, and they must continue the job that he
started. Their failure is not so much that they didn’t understand (what’s new?),
but that (in verse 45) they were afraid to ask about what they didn’t
understand. Afraid of what?
·
Maybe they were afraid to look dumb in front of
the others.
·
Maybe they were afraid of Jesus, after he had
just chewed them out.
·
Maybe they were afraid to hear the answer,
because it might contradict what they wanted. They were afraid of the truth.
There are so many things that I don’t understand. There is
such a huge gap between God’s understanding and my understanding. But we can
ask.
If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask
God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to
him. – James 1:5
How often I have relied on this verse. God is the creator of
good ideas. We just discover them. This is true in my job. It is true in my
relationships. It is true in this church. The scariest thought to me is that God
would put me through a season of drought of good ideas.
We do not fail for ignorance. We fail for holding on to
ignorance and not asking God.
We fail when we want to appear smart. We succeed when
realize and rely on God as the smart one.
Fail #3: Want To Appear Important (vs 46-48)
First, we fail when we know what to do but don’t do it.
Second, we fail when we don’t know what to do and don’t ask.
Let’s look at the third failure, found in verses 46-48:
46 An argument started
among the disciples as to which of them would be the greatest. 47
Jesus, knowing their thoughts, took a little child and had him stand beside
him. 48 Then he said to them, “Whoever welcomes this little child in
my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. For
he who is least among you all—he is the greatest.”
The third failure when we want to appear important. The
disciples have their spiritual calculators out, punching in the numbers of
converts, demons cast out, sick healed and prayers answered, trying to
determine who has the highest score. But that misses the point. We don’t win. God wins. And those points on
the scoreboard? They are God’s. He draws people to himself. He
rebukes demons. He cures sickness. He answers prayer. It is God’s
grace from start to finish.
But then we ask…who got more grace? [sound of Jesus smacking
his own forehead]
We even see this in the church.
Francis Chan a pastor from Simi Valley exploded
onto the evangelical scene a few years ago when podcasts of sermons he gave at
his flourishing, 4,000-member Southern California church went viral. But then
in late 2010, he up and quit, saying, "I just want to disappear for a
while." One thing that bothered him, he said, was that "even in my
own church I heard the words 'Francis Chan' more than I heard the words, 'Holy
Spirit.'[1]
Pastors don’t need to hear “What a great sermon!” They need
to hear “What a great God!”
It happens to pastors, it happens to us. We advertise our virtues on the job, so that
others notice us. Only the beautiful pictures end up on FaceBook. You spend
time with the cool people, so that you’ll at least look cool, too.
Instead of making the mission about me, we need to make the
mission about God. We don’t need to be
important, we want God to be important. Here’s what I want to highlight: lives changed, books written, relationships
healed, communities revived, symphonies performed—by God. Does the stories you
tell at work or school—or FaceBook--tell a story where you are the hero, or
where God is the hero?
We fail when we want to appear important. We succeed when we
want God to appear important.
Fail #4: Want To Appear Special (vs. 49-50)
This same attitude of “making the mission about me” led to
the fourth failure, in verses 49-50:
49 “Master,” said John,
“we saw a man driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because
he is not one of us.” 50 “Do not stop him,” Jesus said, “for whoever
is not against you is for you.”
Here is the irony. The disciples notice a man driving out
demons in Jesus’ name—the very same thing they failed to do back in verse
38—but he is succeeding and they want to stop him!
Why? “Because he is not one of us.” They seem to say: “if we
fail, so should they!” Spiritual envy. “If at first we don’t succeed, neither should
anyone else.”
They are embarrassed and outdone, so they won’t give any
credit. The Bible says, “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who
mourn.” (Romans 12:15) but the Tim Lewis translation says: “Criticize those who
rejoice; make fun of those who mourn.” Some of you have read my translation.
This happens to us. Do you thank God for another church’s
growth, another believer’s growing life of faith, another marriage’s closeness
or another co-workers promotion? Or does their success immediately cause a
critical remark or thought in you?
The disciple’s motto was “Anyone who is not with us is
against us.” But Jesus’ motto was “Anyone who is not against you is for you.”
Jesus just redefined the win. The win is not what FCC does for God. The win is
what FCC and Natomas and Lakeside and Ignite and Bayside and Cornerstone do and
beyond, for God. The win is not what Tim does, or Max does or AZ does for God. The
win is when God appears uniquely as God.
We fail when we want to appear special or unique. We succeed
when we may God appear special and unique.
Conclusion
Imagine an app on your phone that decided that the phone
exists for its benefit. That inverts your phone’s mission so that instead of
serving you, it serves itself. What do we call an app like that? A virus.
The virus of selfishness and pride always tries to hijack our
lives away from God and towards ourselves. The results are destructive. We fail
because we take the life that God has given and repurpose it for goals for
which it was never intended. The Bible
says:
For
where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every
evil practice. – James 3:16
We know this to be true. The worst
and ugliest moments of our lives are the results of our pride. But somehow we
return again and again to pride’s destructive influence. It was only the
perfect selfless act of Jesus, the innocent son of God given on the cross which
can combat it and restore our broken soul.
·
We don’t need to appear smart, because
God loves me.
·
We don’t need to appear important, because
God loves me.
·
We don’t need to appear special, because
God loves me.
·
We don’t need to appear competent, because God loves me.
“Anyone who trusts in him will never be put
to shame.” – Romans 10:11b
Maybe you’ve realized that your
2013 new year’s resolutions were your plan, self-powered and self-promoting. Maybe for 2013 you can ask God
1.
To follow God’s dreams and plans instead of
yours.
2.
To power those dreams with God’s power instead
of yours.
3.
To promote God’s reputation instead of yours.
Now to him who is able to do immeasurably
more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work
within us, to him be glory
in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and
ever! Amen - Ephesians 3:20-21
That is the epic win.
Some material from the sermon “Getting It Wrong” by Steven
Simala Grant, http://www.sermoncentral.com/sermons/getting-it-wrong-steven-simala-grant-sermon-on-faults-137584.asp?Page=1
retrieved on January 8, 2013
[1] The Relentless Passion of Francis Chan,
Mark Galli, Christianity Today, posted January 4, 2013. Retrieved on January
12, 2013
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