CrossPointe Community Church

Month: September 2018

  • The Tarnished Planet

    Genesis 3:1-19
    Job (selected)

    According to Oxford Dictionaries, the word ‘tarnish’ means, ‘lose or cause to lose luster, especially as a result of exposure to air or moisture.’ Synonyms listed are: corrode, discolor, oxidize and/or rust. 1

    In his book, Rust: The Longest War, Jonathan Waldman takes us chapter by chapter into the world of oxidation and the problem of rust. He tells the story of how America almost lost the Statue of Liberty to corrosion, the constant struggle needed to maintain oil pipelines, the development of stainless steel and rust resistant paint, and of the enormous cost and effort needed to beat back rust in the military. Rust happens and we can’t stop it. 2

    Many of us remember when on August 1, 2007, a bridge over the Mississippi River in Minnesota suddenly collapsed during the evening rush hour. One hundred eleven vehicles rode the surface of the bridge down 100 feet to the surface of the water and riverbank, with 13 people killed and 145 injured. A school bus with 63 children returning from a field trip ended up resting on a guardrail at the bottom. What caused the bridge to collapse? Iron in the bridge reacted chemically with oxygen and the result is a reddish-brown product that we call rust.

    What does this remind you of?

    Every time I see an orange cone it reminds me that asphalt degenerates and concrete crumbles.

    In fact, every time I see rust or tarnish or orange cones I am reminded that everything on this planet is either tarnishing, rusting, rotting, crumbling, decaying, decomposing, dying.

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  • Expire-ment Planning

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    Luke 12:13-21
    Galatians 5:22-23

    Retirees have taken to texting with gusto; they even have their own shorthand:

    BFF Show AnswerBest Friend Fainted

    CBM Show AnswerCovered By Medicare

    FWB Show AnswerFriend With Beta-blockers

    LMDO Show AnswerLaughing My Dentures Out

    GGPBL Show AnswerGotta Go, Pacemaker Battery Low!

    BYOT Show AnswerBring Your Own Teeth

    You don’t have to be a retiree to be familiar with IRA’s and 401K’s, which have what in common? And the answer is: ‘retirement planning.’

    Some of you are already retired and enjoying the fruits of your labor. It is probably true that the rest of us are concerned about our retirement, about whether we have saved enough money to live comfortably through our final decades. We wonder: Are our IRAs flush enough? Are our investment portfolios diversified enough? And ultimately: Will we run out of money before we run out of life? Retirement planning is certainly a legitimate concern and an ever increasing profitable business.

    But in today’s lesson Jesus points us toward what is in His mind, a much more important concern that we might call ‘expire-ment planning.’ This is a form of planning that looks at death, not life; it asks whether we are ready to expire, not retire. Jesus indicates that this everyman clearly should have done some expire-ment planning along with his retirement planning.

    What might this sort of expire-ment planning look like?

    Expire-ment planners realize that wealth does not equate with peace and happiness.

    The acquisition of so much material fortune gave the man in Jesus parable a false sense of security and a false sense of peace of mind. His tone is self-congratulatory: “And I’ll sit back and say to myself, ‘My friend, you have enough stored away for years to come. Now take it easy! Eat, drink, and be merry!”’ Clearly this man has yet to learn that wealth cannot buy peace and happiness.

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  • Blessing of the Children

    Mark 10:13-16

    There are many reasons we love children. Here are two of them:

    For weeks a six-year-old lad kept telling his first-grade teacher about the baby brother that was expected at his house. One day the mother allowed the boy to feel the movements of the unborn child. The six-year old was obviously impressed, but also looked a little uncertain. And after that day, he stopped telling his teacher about the impending event. The teacher finally sat the boy on her lap and said, “Tommy, whatever became of that baby brother you were expecting at home?”
    Tommy burst into tears and confessed, “I think Mommy ate him!”

    One day a little girl was watching her mother do the dishes at the kitchen sink. She suddenly noticed that her mother had several strands of white hair in contrast to her brunette head. She looked at her mother and inquisitively asked, “Why are some of your hairs white, Mom?”
    Her mother replied, “Well, every time you do something wrong and make me cry one of my hairs turns white.”
    The little girl thought about this revelation for a while and then said, “MOM, can you explain why ALL of grandma’s hairs are white?”

    Is it any wonder that we love children?

    Jesus loved(s) children too and He is still in the business of blessing children. I believe His statement, “Let the children come onto Me and hinder them not,” bespeaks His knowledge that research bears out today if we don’t reach the children before they reach the age of 18 their chances of becoming His followers diminishes greatly as 80% of those who claim to be Christians today say they made that decision before the age of 18.

    And so Jesus continues to bless His children today; through parents and grandparents and guardians (whom I am addressing today) and He also blesses them through His Church.

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  • And I Will Be Clean

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    Psalm 32

    Has anyone experienced any joy lately? I began helping my daughter Sarah by taking her daughter Kate to Kindergarten. Sarah has to drop her off an hour before school so we get to hang out. After I took her for a couple of days, Sarah called to say she was working from home and that she would take her. And then later called to say that Kate was crying when they went by our house because she wanted her papa to take her to school.

    O what joy for those who have grandchildren who love them to pieces. In fact, is there any greater joy than to be loved by your grandchildren?

    Verse 1 “O, what joy . . . for those who whose rebellion is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight.”

    Joy, happiness, and peace are three things most people are looking for. Most people, not all, (we’ve all met that person who for whatever reason prefers to be a grump) but most folks prefer to be happy, to enjoy life, to experience blessed peace.

    One thing the Psalmist wants us to know is that sin and its consequent negative feelings interferes with our being happy, joyful and peaceful. Feeling ashamed for some action taken in the past is downright discouraging.

    One Christian author writes, “Psychiatrists and doctors say that unresolved guilt is the number one cause of mental illness and suicide. It prompts millions of Americans to gulp down pills to tranquilize their anxiety.” 1

    Pastor and author Gordon McDonald writes, “We cannot expect to live healthy in the future when the baggage of our past keeps banging away at the trap door of our minds demanding attention.” 2

    But “O, what joy for those who whose rebellion is forgiven, whose sin is put out of sight.”

    Verse 2 “Yes, what joy . . . for those whose record the Lord has cleared of sin, whose lives are lived in complete honesty!”

    A new study has found that the average person is holding onto thirteen secrets, five of which they’ve never told a living soul, and that includes the Living God.

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