Word of Salvation – Vol.30 No.25 – July 1985

 

Life In Abundance

 

Sermon by the Rev. A. I. De Graaf on Psalm 36:9 & John 10:10b

Scripture Readings: Gen.1:31-2:3; Ex.20; Psalm 36; John 10:1-11

Psalter Hymnal: 304; 251; 22; 38:4,5; 423: 1; 307

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Psalm 36:9: For with Thee is the Fountain of life in Thy light we see light.

John 10: 10b: Jesus said: “I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.”

 

If you hold your hand, palm up, and look into that, you see what looks like the letter “M”.

So if you hold both hands so as to look into the palms, you see two “M”‘S.  “Right,” said the Fathers, “better have a good look at that: Those two “m’s” stand for “MEMENTO MORI” which is Latin for: Remember: you, too, will have to die.”

The story goes that Emperor Charles V who ruled all of Europe at the time of the 16th century Reformation, had a coffin fitted and made for himself when still a rather young man, and now and then he went and lay down in it, to get used to the idea.

Well, is that what a child of God must do?
If so what kind of God does he think he has?

* * * *

In the same way you have well-meaning Christian people who tell us so as to make us mindful of the seriousness of life that WE SHOULD LIVE EACH DAY AS IF IT WERE OUR LAST.  I should now stand here and preach as if it could well be that this is the last sermon I will ever preach – I may have a traffic accident on the way home.

True of course: Jesus said “so watch then because you know neither the day nor the hour.  Today is the day of grace.

This is a necessary warning for people who loosely jump through their days forgetting about the Lord.

But what if you ARE a child of God.

Must you walk through life always having ‘The Grim Reaper’ as your shadow?  What kind of Father have we, then?  If we must be ready, tell me, what for?  You know, if we listen to God’s Word this morning, we get a picture that is the exact OPPOSITE: Live each day AS IF IT WERE YOUR FIRST, another Sunday of new grace, another opening of a new exercise book: you remember the feeling from your school days?  The smell of the book is the smell of the shop, beautiful smell of new stationery, crisp white pages waiting for beautiful writing.

Life is for living and I give it to you, says God.

It has cost Me plenty, says our Father, now make sure you enjoy it.

What Father would give his child a brand-new Christmas present and then expect that child to hide it away because there may be a danger that it breaks?

God is not the God of death, He is not like the Devil.
He is the God of LIFE, of eternal life.
And that eternal life is the life He Himself created.

He invites us to live the life He gives us, to start living the eternal life NOW.

* * * *

Very often, also in our Churches, we have too much of a NEGATIVE approach to life.  We are so scared of what sin can do that we do not dare to live it.  Anything we undertake, be it making music or spending the Sunday or love-making in marriage, there is always this uplifted finger: “Yes, it may be nice BUT….!”
And then we get a long lecture about all the DANGERS there…!

Whole generations of children have been brought up that way.

As if the devil had won after all, and Jesus had risen for nothing.  There is so much chance that we fall into some sin that we are cowed into staying where we are and not move too much.

As if God had not created the world good.

As if God never sent His Son for the express purpose to break the works of the evil One.

In our approach to doctrine and Christianity we then behave as if our Lord in His battle against that evil one really has not been too successful.

But is the Lord Jesus like that?  What kind of Redeemer is He, really?

* * * *

What do we Christians know about the beauty of life?  How adventurous and eager are we who claim to be children in our Father’s world?  How open to what He has made us see and hear?

Take Psalm 36, now.
– Oh there is the reality of evil at the beginning of it: the utter wickedness of those who reject their very Maker!
– And at the end of that psalm that comes back: the foot of the proud… the hand of the wicked…!

Here, too, Scripture does not whitewash the sinfulness of sin: there’s no neutrality here.

But the kind of wonderful Lord He is, and the kind of full LIFE He has prepared for His people, (already here on His earth,) stands radiant in the middle of that Psalm:
– there is the abundance,
– the fullness of life,
– the pleasures that are with Him for ever.

Of life itself OUR LORD AND OUR OWN FATHER is the very Fountain.
And in His light we really SEE light!

Oh, outside of the Lord, behind His back, even the greatest riches are but a shadow.  Well may Psalm 73 sing of the proud, who, far from God, seeks his pleasure but he will perish, cursed!
They seem to do all right, but when I went into God’s house I saw how he ends up….!

The world, alas, is full of such unfortunate and miserable people.  O.K., but you DID go into God’s holy house, and – apart from THEIR END – did you discover there YOUR OWN BEGINNING??  The beginning of your real and wonderful LIFE?

God made life and gave His Son for it.
How can a child of God dare to deny that life, or rubbish it?
You’re worse than a dope if you rubbish that!
Jesus your Saviour has come to redeem that life, and to renew it, to set you free to live it… then how does a member of His Body dare to say that he’d better stay on the safe side and not go into it too deeply?

To go and “piously” lie down in a coffin!  That coffin does not have to be made of wood, it can just be an attitude of “taste not, touch not, handle not..!” – the little circle where you close your “windows lest you get lost”?

How do you think you can evangelise that way?  No wonder that THEN nobody has much desire to enter your house or your church.

God does not want His children grey.  He wants them vibrant with colour even when that means that the black is blacker against the vivid greens and the deepest red.

* * * *

Mind you, then it will be necessary, too, in the battle-unto-blood against the evil One, to carry the cross.  But it was prayed over God’s children at their baptism that they’d be doing that JOYFULLY (the Dutch liturgical form has a word there, “vrolijk” that almost means “merrily“).

And yes, it will be necessary at times to fast.

Even Though The Bridegroom has told us HE WILL BE WITH US… ALL THE DAYS (Mat.28).

So when you Fast, said this bridegroom, make sure you anoint your head with oil.  With that attitude the fasting Paul (who did not marry for the sake of his King) can still sing of the joys of becoming one flesh in marriage in music borrowed from the Song of songs!

He does not for a moment even think of tossing the beauty of life that God gave, into the trash can.
The devil DOES do that of course.
So does the man-outside-God, who has no hope.

But you…. when you fast…. be like that old unmarried nun in the slums of Calcutta, who so lives the life of love to the full that she can spread joy in that bitter squalor and get the Nobel prize for it and, in her eighties, look so incredibly vibrant and young.  Did you see it in the paper?  That kind of Christian, for all her fasting, never became a sour no-sayer.

* * * *

Acts 17 tells us that in Paul’s days there were in Athens two kinds of philosophers:

The STOICS (who reckoned that the hurt in life was SO bitter that you had better train yourself not to feel a thing: do not love too deeply because it makes you vulnerable…!)

And the EPICUREANS (who said: Life is only short: eat, drink and be merry, tomorrow you will die: pick the rose as long as it is still in bloom…!)

What utter pessimists.  According to them the devil has won.  But right in their midst stands this living man who knows his Risen Lord and the life and abundance He came to bring us here.

Is it not high time that we, if we WANT to fight something as good Calvinists, begin to fight this NEGATIVE ATTITUDE which, after all, is the trade-mark of the man without hope, the men with no future?

* * * *

That is also true of the LAW of God, you know.  Since Christ came (and already long before in Psalm 119) that law is a matter of SONG, not of a window with thick iron bars telling us THOU SHALT NOT!  Instead it says: THOU SHALT LOVE!  All things are allowed to you – says God to His children in 1Corinthians 6 AND 1Corinthians 10.  That is because He teaches His children.  And He can afford to say that because He teaches His children, from the heart, no longer even to WANT whatever ruins the very Life He gave.

Christian life and Christian morals do never – CAN never – spring from FEAR or a NO-SAYING ATTITUDE TO LIFE & CREATION.  They spring from a song, a NEW song which God’s children learn to sing.  A song that will go on even beyond the grave.  The Christian Way then becomes a pathway with flowers blooming along its edges.

* * * *

(How come our Calvinist Christians care so little for poetry?)

* * * *

The old Liturgical Form for the Lord’s Supper says it all:
The Lord has purchased for us THE LIFE GIVING SPIRIT.  We need not seek that Spirit in extra-ordinary experiences but in the new eyes and new ears He gives us to see God in all that God gave and made, and to give Him praise in it.  The same Lord brooded on the dark waters and the upshot was the delight of the Father Himself: “Look, it is very good indeed”.

If then we long for Jesus’ coming again it is not because we are sick of God’s world, it is not because we lie down, tired of living – like Elijah did in that weak and tired moment when he tried to get an overdose of sleep:
“Lord you’d better let me die…!”

No, rather is it the homesickness for an even greater fullness when the lovely Lord of life will have NOTHING ANY MORE that denies Him and spoils the goodness of His handiwork.

* * * *

WHEN WE REJECT THE SUBSTITUTES OF SATAN, IT IS ONLY BECAUSE WE CAN GET THE REAL STUFF.  YES,WE HAVE ALREADY GOT THAT.  AND HE WHO GAVE THAT WILL – said He – NOT FORSAKE WHAT HIS HANDS HAVE STARTED.  AND HIS HANDS HAVE STARTED ALREADY – IN HIS OWN CREATION – WITH HIM ARE THE FOUNTAINS OF LIFE.
IN HIS LIGHT, there only – but then – there FULLY! …DO WE SEE LIGHT.

Jesus came, died and rose again…
THAT WE MIGHT LIVE… AND HAVE LIFE TO THE FULL.

* * * *

            You make known to me the path of life,
in Thy presence there are pleasures.
There is loveliness – everywhere and forever.
Even in the very Psalm where David confesses his sin how He had spoiled the goodness of married life and neighbourly love – God had shown him,
yes even in that very Psalm 51 where he cried out how sorry he was
even there he says LORD GIVE BACK TO ME
(not: Thy salvation, he knew he never lost that, notice that?)
but: Give BACK TO ME THE JOY of Thy salvation,
for, then I can bring sinners to you and they will turn to You!

Then I can make others jealous again and evangelise, positively singing of Thy beauty, as I could before.

* * * *

What kind of God is Your God, my friend?
And what kind of Saviour is your Jesus?
What kind of Holy Spirit did you receive?

If there is one thing that may stand out in your and my existence TODAY, it is that we DARE TO LIVE, since we received life from God’s hand as a precious gift, like that new writing pad which EACH DAY invites us to start afresh writing up the wonders of living.

Do not live each day as if it could be your LAST but rather because in God’s grace IT IS AGAIN YOUR FIRST.

In the Name of our living Lord let us throw away that negative attitude that finds fault and sits timidly on the edge of God’s Gift.

I once heard of a woman who, from the day of her marriage, wrote down in a book all things her husband did wrong to her.  That was her way of “getting back at him”.  It became an enormously thick book full of putrid facts.
I do not think it helped her marriage much.  Do You?
Forgive, yes, but forget? No never!
That’s no forgiving.  That’s self-poisoning.
And surely, you do not think that this has anything to do with the Christian life, do you?

Here on earth you only have one life.
Why waste it this way?
Jesus came to make it abundant.  Not in you getting all you want, but in you living from love and finding that there is always more where that came from.  Oh that is vulnerable all right.
But it is open not only to disappointment and hot tears but also to the sweetness of the Lord’s new beginning.

Yes, what kind of God is YOUR God?
What kind of Redeemer have you got?
Really, is that not the question we come back to?
The God Who says I AM… I am here..!
I AM with you all the days…!
He is the One Who calls Himself the very Fountain of LIFE!
In His light… we see light.

Should you not make sure you live in that light and enjoy that life in abundance?

Amen.