Old Lea Bethel Baptist Church

Exodus 3:14 And God said unto Moses, I Am That I Am: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I Am hath sent me unto you.

There is peace in “I am”. Often, people follow this statement with a descriptor – a mother, a father, a teacher, a pastor, a son, a daughter, a citizen, a worker, an addict, a sinner, an engineer… the list goes on and on. By adding these descriptors, we add requirements, duties, expectations. Any descriptor past “I am” serves to add anxiety, fear, shame, guilt, and pride… all worldly burdens.

God said, “I Am that I Am.” God is love, justice, wrath, compassion, generosity, and the list is infinite, but, when asked to box Himself in, God simply said, “I Am”. There is only peace to be found in this statement.

When I think of Him being “I Am”, I find no limit in who He is. God are You my father? “I Am”. God are You my Savior? “I Am” God will You always be with me? “I Am – I walk behind, in front, beside, and within… I Am above and below… I Am in your past, your present, and your future. I Am with you always. I Am.”

There is infinite peace in “I am”. It’s available. We simply must detach the descriptors that box us into requirements and realize that we have only one true descriptor when we are in Christ – We are children of the Most High God (Psalm 82:6, John 10:34-35). When we truly believe this, we see that we can find peace in trusting that “I am”. Everything else flows from this perfect state of being. Everything else is an “add on” to the essential “I am”.

Remember: We limit God in our thinking, but God is not limited by our thinking.

Luke 9:23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.

God does not promise ease. He promises His Strength, His Presence, His Provision, but He doesn’t promise ease. He promises He will never leave us nor forsake us, but He does not say He won’t challenge us. John 16:33 says that we will have trials and tribulations when we follow Christ.

But, we want ease. We want to serve God, but we want it to be easy. “God, I’m ready to serve you, as long as the salary is right, I don’t have to move, I always have enough money and food, and my children can attend the same school. I’m ready to serve, as long as the church makes me smile, no one says anything hurtful, and everyone does everything my way. I’m ready to do great things for you Lord, as long as I’m not asked to lead, and not asked to follow, and not asked to do anything that I don’t find fun.” In other words, we’ll serve God in the absence of all difficulty. Let’s be honest… this serves no one but self.

When we set out to serve God, we serve knowing there will be difficulties. There will be hard days. There will be sickness. There will be people we disagree with. There will be money concerns. There will be times children stray. There will be unbelieving spouses. There will be friends who turn their backs. There will be family that question the calling.

We serve God, not in the absence of difficulties, but through the difficulties.

I often hear people say, “God won’t put anymore on me than I can stand.” It makes God sound like the logistics clerk and us the “strong person”. God says, “I will not put more on you than I can stand.” He will place whatever His Will requires in our life and, in our weakness, we must cry to Him to carry us. We must call on Christ to strengthen us. If we’re always strong enough to carry what God gives, we’re making ourselves out to be God and able to take on whatever He dishes out. Or, more likely, we’re simply not taking on much for Him.

God or Self? Difficulty or Ease? Is God the Vehicle carrying us or is He the clerk loading us? Expecting ease brings unnecessary difficulty into our daily walk with Him. Expect provision, love, strength, grace, mercy, compassion… expect challenge, trials, persecution, and tribulation. Expect no ease.

We serve God, not in the absence of difficulties, but through the difficulties. Presence of ease may indicate lack of service.

Matthew 13:33 Another parable He spoke to them: “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened.”

In physics, there’s an interesting phenomenon called the “Observer Effect.” It states that, simply by observing, the thing being observed is changed. Similar effects can be found in economics, psychology, sociology, human relationships, and even information technology. Presence impacts people and things in the environment, even when there is no intention to impact. Simply by being present, there is an impact.

What is the impact your presence brings? We must be aware that we have an impact on people, places, and things no matter whether we intend to have the impact or not. We bring beliefs, attitudes, talents, experiences, emotions, and many other individual offerings to all interactions. The offering is as unique as the individual bringing it. Some bring impact unconsciously and some bring impact consciously, but all bring impact.

Being conscious of the impact of our presence allows us to choose how we will impact. Choosing positive over negative, love over hate, acceptance over rejection, courage over fear, and understanding over divisiveness allows us to use our presence to improve our surroundings.

Notice that the leaven in the scripture was a small thing that caused an “impactful” change. It takes only one person, acting in a constructive or destructive way, to change a large environment. It’s true of business environments. It’s true of families. It’s true of churches.

Proverbs 29:2 says – When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; But when a wicked man rules, the people groan. Notice that one wicked man can cause the people to not only stop rejoicing, but to actually begin to groan. A single bad egg spoils it all. We’ve all experienced this. One person spoils the mood of the family gathering. One person changes the mood of the office. If you’ve never had this experience, it may be that you are that one person…

Be positive in presence. Be the person who makes others rejoice by your coming and not by your going. There’s an old joke that says – everyone brings joy… some by showing up and others by leaving.

What is the impact your presence brings? Being an observer doesn’t negate your impact. Be an active participant in how you impact others. Choose to have your presence make a positive, loving impact and improve your environment wherever you find yourself. Be the leaven of Christ and not the leaven of the Pharisees. Jesus spoke of both – one kind leads to the Kingdom of Heaven and the other leads to separation from God.

James 3:5 Even so the tongue is a little member and boasts great things. See how great a forest a little fire kindles!

Taming the tongue concerns more than taming the tongue of the mouth. James most likely never imagined a world where people voiced thoughts that reached the eyes of hundreds with the press of the “post” button. In today’s world of social media, e-mail, texts, and all forms of written communication, many use the tongue of the mind to write thoughts as much, if not more than, the tongue of the mouth to speak.

Words spring from our mind. Before the first muscle twitches in our mouth, the tongue of the mind has voiced the thought and sent it flying along the nerve endings to become our speech. Likewise, that same tongue of the mind sends thoughts along nerve endings to quicken our hands as we write. The tongue of the mind is a single fountain from which all our communication flows. Left untamed, it voices hurtful and damaging thoughts about others. Left untamed, it is our own cruelest critic. Left untamed, it voices self-hate and cruel words of criticism that we would never say to someone we love and would never allow another to say to us.

In this time that James likely never imagined, we must exercise extraordinary care. We must care to speak words of self-love and use our thoughts to recognize our true value. We must silence the inner critic. We must muzzle the inner perfectionist, mister or missus “never good enough”. No one needs Greta Gremlin living in our mind… have Positive Pamela throw her out. Train the mind with positive words.

We must also exercise extraordinary care to tame the tongue as it relates to what we write in texts, e-mails, and social media posts. Speak words of encouragement. Muzzle words of criticism. Look only to heal and never to wound.

Proverbs 25:11 says – A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver. We have the power to bring the tongue of our mind under much better control. We own our words; therefore, we own their impact. Hurt or healing? Tame the tongue of the mind and the tongue of the mouth will follow.

Galatians 3:13-14 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), ¹⁴ that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

             How thankful are we to Jesus? Is our thankfulness a leftover? Earlier this week, I was meditating on my degree of thankfulness to Jesus for what He’s done. He was willing to give all His blood for all colors, all nationalities, rich or poor, young or old, sick or healthy – it was not an earthly sister He was dying for, but Jews and Gentiles alike – For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life. Whosoever, that covers everyone.

We will never rise to the right height of Love for Jesus, until we reach the right depth of gratitude for what He did.

Sometimes, we get in our mind that this means Jesus paid a certain price – like He paid for our breakfast… like we forgot our wallet and Jesus stepped up and said – I’ve got you covered. Thank you Jesus… I’ll get yours next time.

This is the wrong level of gratitude. It leaves us feeling in control of our salvation. This is a level that, in our heart, we believe that it was nice of Jesus to die, but salvation can happen other ways too. If we’re on the sausage biscuit level of gratitude with Jesus, we’ll always see Him as someone nice to have when we’re sick or we’re sad. He’s a nice to have, He’s a good friend, but not the very center, the very foundation, the very bedrock of our soul.

Sometimes, we feel gratitude like Jesus paid a big bill for us. We were about to lose our house to foreclosure and Jesus came forward and said – I’ve got this for you. Thank you Jesus… I’ll pay you back every single penny if I have to work the rest of my life.

This is the wrong level of gratitude. Again, it leaves us feeling in control of our salvation. This is a level that, in our heart, we believe that not many others could have done what Jesus did, but there’s still other ways. He’s generous and kind, but we don’t reach true thankfulness.

You see, anytime we’re on a level of gratitude that is shared in any way with anyone or anything else, we’re on the wrong level of gratitude for Jesus.

Listen to verse 13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”), Jesus didn’t buy a biscuit for us… He didn’t get us out of foreclosure… He didn’t pay an earthly debt. He paid an eternal debt. He Became the Curse for us. 2 Corinthians 5: 21 tells us: For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. He became Sin… who’s sin? My sin, your sin. Could anyone else have done this for us? No – He’s not a sausage biscuit savior or a foreclosure savior. Jesus did something that no one else could do. He became our sin to make us righteousness. Anytime we’re on a level of gratitude that is shared in any way, with anyone or anything, we’re on the wrong level of gratitude for Jesus.

And God turned away from Him – Matthew 27:46 And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?” that is, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” God would not look upon the ugliness of sin Christ had become. Are we thankful on that level? Are we thankful on the “God turned away from His own Son” level? Are we thankful on the “Christ was forsaken in darkness” level? When we get there, we’ll cry and we’ll sob and our love for Him will soar because our thankfulness is so deep!

This week, be this level of thankfulness. Be the “Jesus became my sin so I could become righteousness before God” level of thankful. Allow the Truth of what Jesus did on the cross to become plain. He’s our High Priest – Our Shepherd – greatly to be praised and appreciated! He’s no sausage biscuit savior… He’s Lord of lords, King of kings, He died, rose, and lives that we might one day live with Him. When we get our mind around this, leftovers will never be on the menu for Jesus Christ again. He’ll never again get what’s left. He’ll receive the first of our fruits and the deepest thankfulness of our hearts.

We will never rise to the right height of Love for Jesus, until we reach the right depth of thankfulness, of gratitude for what He did.