STUDY QUESTIONS:
1. Name some things you are really looking forward to?
2. Name some you can see.
3. Name some that are unseen.
4. What characteristics of Jesus do you long for most? Do you NEED most?
5. What might Jesus have to say about this? What IS He saying to you about this?
I. Long before the word “staycation” was in our recession repertoire we would stay home, taking our vacation during Carnation Days. We look forward to these “Days,” along with many others in the Alliance area, judging from this year’s attendance. Thanks to Festival Board and volunteers (Pres Eddie Williams +).
B. Most DON’T look forward to growing old. As I watch my 88-year-old father deteriorate and as I read my 50+ friend Sue’s blog, chronicling her battle with cancer, I admit I don’t relish the Golden Years. For many King Midas has not touched them and turned them to gold. They are simply stained & tarnished.
C. Add to that my observations that old people don’t nec get sweeter as the years go by. Mellowing and maturity are SUPPOSED to go together. But something obviously goes wrong in some people as some age more like fish than fine wine.
D. So what are we to do since aging is inevitable? What are we to do since life brings on traumas that cause us to age faster: like war’s traumas, accidents and illness?
E. We could learn the secret of my 88-year-old friend, Chuck, who has gotten older and better? He’s up at dawn riding his bike East. When dusk falls he’s roller blading West. His disposition is as sunny as the views he sees every morning and evening.
F. He’s a seeming contrast to my dear debilitated father, who’s the same age as Chuck. But dad, while outwardly different than Chuck, inwardly the sun is often shining. He lives so close to Jesus not long ago when he was able to talk on the phone, he’d signs off his phone calls with a goodbye that sounded like he was ending a prayer. When he thanks us we can’t tell if he’s talking to us or to Jesus. I don’t chalk that up to confusion as much as his conscious, continuous closeness to Christ (4Cs).
G. Like I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, if you could eavesdrop on some of his conversations with me you couldn’t tell whether he was talking to Jesus or to me. He’s looking at me, but he’s talking to Jesus (most people don’t confuse me w/ Jesus).
H. Yet in spite of this closeness, Thursday when I was there he was in intense pain and pleading to God to end this…and I’m sure he was talking about ending more than just his pain.
II. Then we read in the Bible: “Outwardly we are wasting away…for all creation groans and waits its day of redemption…[we] groan inwardly…as we eagerly await the redemption of our bodies…meanwhile we groan longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling…For while we are in this tent, we groan and are burdened…” (2 Cor 4:16; 5:2,4; Rom 8:22-23).
A. I thought the Bible was supposed to encourage us? As I said, it’s not just the elderly. Young people are stricken by maiming disease, accidents and war. They are all around us; and they struggle.
B. So how can we look forward to the future w/ eager expectation (Rom 8:19) when we see so much suffering because of it?
III. Contemplating the three chapters where we hear all this “groaning” that saddens and shocks us; a deeper reading convinces me that getting older and better is possible. Getting older, and looking forward to it w/ “eager expectation” CAN be a reality: “Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day” (2 Cor 4:16).
A. Paul is painting a glorious picture in bold acrylic colors of what living in the power of the Holy Spirit, instead of our feeble human power, is all about, esp when sin mounts a full frontal attack on us (Rom 8:1-5).
B. He gives some powerful “how to’s” on how we can live this way, what that looks like, and that WE ARE responsible for what we think about (vs 6-7). Our thoughts have a powerful impact on us.
C. I know you hear enough of this during the work week, but listen to all this talk about “groaning” (vs 18-19).
D. The word for “eager expectation” is “apokaradokia.” This brings to mind a bold explorer, like those on the Mayflower, 101 souls most seeking religious freedom. The captain, as the primary example, stands on the prow of his ship, leaning far out over the rail, w/ telescope in hand. He’s looking, shivering, straining with excitement because now he’s seen the land far off on the horizon that he’s been eagerly expecting for week after cold seasick week. One of the passengers is dead, one was born. But many would die in the weeks to follow as their eager expectation shifts toward watching for supply ships to come from England before winter set it.
E. This is the eager expectation of the father of the prodigal, scanning the landscape with eager expectation of seeing a son who once was lost, but now has come home (Lk 15:20). Father’s didn’t run in that culture. It was beneath them, but this one did because of “eager expectation.”
F. You know how you feel when you haven’t heard from the kids for ____ (weeks). And there’s something BIG going on in their lives? You’ve talked and prayed with them…but now we’re in he season of answer or resolution. But we go into this communication dead zone. We’ve called, left voice mails, sent emails…nothing. Eager expectation builds. You know what it’s like…has the baby come…did they get the test results…from the school or the doctor…did she say yes to the proposal…for marriage or the one at work? Then it comes…one or two words of a text message. You’d think we won the lottery seeing our eager expectation. That’s this word (v 19).
G. Another reason we can have an eager expectation about an uncertain future and growing old is because of this truth: If we had perfect bodies here, why would we need Heaven? If we had no problems here, who would want this life to end? The Message says it so well: “That’s why I don’t think there’s any comparison between the present had times and the coming good times…God is arousing us within…these sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance” (Rom 8:18, 22-23 P MESS).
H. Waiting increases our eager expectation, anticipation and excitement. We couldn’t tell one of our kids about going to Cedar Point or anyplace like that. They would crawl out of their skin w/ excitement. The longer kids have to wait on something the more their excitement grows.
I. One of the things that makes us eagerly long for the new home is the falling apart of the old one. The longer we have to live in the old, the greater our eagerness and longing. I know people that have had to live in rough conditions while building their own home or remodeling. I see how much MORE they appreciate the new once they are in it than people who continue to live in the comfy surroundings, and just slide from one nice place into another: “We are enlarged in the waiting. We of course, don’t see what is enlarging us. But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy” (8:25 P MESS).
J. The elderly apostle Paul, wasting away in a Roman prison said this mature perspective doesn’t happen quickly or easily. There is no microwave maturity. The spiritual growth that needs to happen so that we can truly look forward to the future, an uncertain future, must start now and happen every day. It takes 100 years to mature an oak tree and six months to turn out a squash.
IV. How does this maturing happen? Many of us spend lots of time taking care of the bodies that will last us 80 years if we’re blessed. But how much time do we invest in taking care of that part of us that will last forever?
A. See, the second part of (2 Cor 4:16) is the key: growing closer to Christ and becoming more like Him each day is one of the few things that can make growing old something to look forward to. That can make facing an uncertain future something to look forward to; eagerly expecting to become more like Him each day.
B. What are you eagerly looking forward to? Becoming more like Jesus is one of the few things we can look forward to that will also make us look forward to an uncertain future and to growing old, with all the uncertainties that brings. C. Are you growing more like Jesus every day and looking forward to that? Ill: M. Jordan used some strange competitive drive to motivate him to be the best he could be (see bright.692) Our motivator should be Christ. “And those whom God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son…and we are being transformed into his likeness…I no longer live, but Christ lives in me…”(Romans 8:29; 2 Corinthians 3:18; Galatians 2:20).
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