(An Exhortation to
embrace life as a Christian adventure)
Some fear is healthy. Starbuck in Moby Dick said to his prospective crew: I’ll
have no man in my boat who is not afraid of a whale!
Some fear isn’t so healthy. Nelson Price had a short football
career. One night in a college game he
scooped up a fumble and looked down the field at 95 open yards. He ran with all his heart. Price looked over his shoulder to see if he
was being pursued; there was nothing but his own shadow. He glanced back over the other shoulder and
saw another shadow. Knowing he was about
to be tackled, he cut left, then right, swerving, and dodging with his best
moves all 95 yards to the end zone! When
he looked back, there wasn’t a player within 50 yards. The lights on both sides of the stadium had
cast a shadow on both sides of Nelson Price.
He had put his best moves on his own shadow![1]
It could have been that way for Abram in
the waning moments of the early morning darkness. Abram could have seen lots of shadows when
that voice first spoke to him.
Then the LORD told Abram, “Leave your country, your relatives, and your
father’s house, and go to the land that I will show you. Genesis 12:1
God had something great in store for Abram
and his descendants. It all started with
a man who was obedient to listen to that urging of God to Saddle-Up!
How do you
feel about trail blazing? What if God
called you to leave the
comfort and security of…your country, family, your father’s house, cousins, uncles,
Grandma and Grandpa, smooth roads, huge shopping malls, McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Satellite
TV with 400 channels, showers with water pressure, microwave ovens, honest
police officers, business opportunities, plush carpets, padded pews, multimillion
dollar building projects? What if God
said, Get out! Leave it! Go?
Suppose you got a phone call from
NASA. You’ve been chosen to live in the
space station…your task is to saddle-up
and go on a great adventure, different than anything you’ve known. Well, what would you do?
IF you’re like me, you would probably say,
· But I am not made to live in space, and it’s dangerous out there; people
have died out there, and, besides, I like it here,
· But…..But….But….
Has God ever shown you the road to the
Great Adventure?
And just what does that kind of road look
like? Let’s saddle-up and see.
It’s a Road God Shows You
In your life, either you lead, or God
leads. In the sixth grade (long before
Mrs. Preacher came along), some girl tried to teach me to dance. She kept saying, No, let me show you this way…
I kept saying, But I’M the boy – I
lead!
Well, I never did learn to dance very well
– and most of the times I’ve messed it up in life were the times I wanted to
get away from God’s leading in my life.
Sometimes the way God calls us to the road is not only unfamiliar, it’s
downright frightening – like a COVID virus that changes everything!
It’s
a Road Away from the Familiar
Abram (who would later be named Abraham)
lived a settled, safe life in Ur. His
family was prominent and rich. Life was
very good! What God called him to was
the life of a nomad – no home, no guaranteed water stops in the desert, no
protection from scavenging thieves.
What he could count on was sand in everything as they moved about
the desert – sand in their eyes, sand up the nose, sand in hair, teeth, and
grits! And that unfamiliar sand out
there would provide plenty of shadows – the unknowns!
Most of the things we fear in life are
those things we have never faced – or will ever face. We hold back!
I wanted to stay in the second grade.
Ms. Tufano was my first love. She
smelled good, and man she was pretty. I liked
the second grade. The only reason I went
to the third grade is Ms. Tufano became Mrs. Richardson just before second
grade ended. Imagine that! I had told her I’d marry her – she didn’t
need some guy named Richardson! But she
wouldn’t wait! Imagine!
But the real reason I wanted to stay in
the second grade was because Ms. Tufano made it safe, and happy, and fun. That was familiar, and easy to handle. Second Grade was a good place for Russell. But it wasn’t the best place for me to
stay. God leads you away from the
familiar sometimes because the great adventure, beyond the familiar, holds not
only the good; it holds the best!
In 1980 our little band of Russell,
Elizabeth, Jenn, Jason, and Carrie packed up our U-Haul, two cars and went to
seminary. New Orleans was another
world! We didn’t know a single person
there, where we’d live, how we’d eat, or anything else. All we had was a letter of acceptance from
the Dean of Students. God sent us – we
left everything familiar and travelled away.
It was a Great Adventure! It’s
still unfolding; and it isn’t second grade.
It’s a Road of Reward We May Never See
Then the LORD appeared to Abram and said,
“I am going to give this land to your offspring.” And Abram built an altar
there to commemorate the LORD’S visit. Genesis 12:7
Adoniram Judson was a great
missionary. He once said about serving
God, and success:
There is no success without
sacrifice. If you succeed without
sacrifice it is because someone has suffered before you. If you sacrifice without success it is
because someone will succeed after.
Often on the road to the Great Adventure,
we are called-upon to make great sacrifices.
God did that too. His sacrifice
had a name; that name is Jesus.
Whenever members of the body of Christ are
called upon to make sacrifices, and they step up and place their offerings on
the altar, only eternity will reveal the depth of those sacrifices – but make
no mistake, those who sacrificed the greatest will reap the most out of this
life of adventure!
It’s a Road of Tents and Altars
After that, Abram traveled southward and
set up camp in the hill country between Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar and worshiped the
LORD. Genesis 12:8
I have heard well-meaning Christian
believers say to people they hoped would accept Christ, that following Jesus is
a life of joy, peace and all problems solved.
That dog couldn’t find a trail to hunt if you chained him to it. In fact, it is just plain untrue. The life of a nomad is filled with
difficulties. When you live in a tent,
ready to move whenever the leader says, “go” you are likely to have the roof on
your tent leak, or the wind blow down your canvas walls.
On the other hand, altars are strong
places, built for worship. It’s where
you meet God. Tents are portable. You put down few long-lasting pegs in the
sand. However, everything in life truly
precious is portable.
·
Your relationships are portable, for here
and eternity.
·
Your service for God is portable.
·
And your soul is portable – and
transportable…to heaven when you die.
So, on this road, build strong altars for God;
just set up tent camps with yours.
It’s a Road that’s EASY to Wander OFF
At that time there was a severe famine in
the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to wait it out. As he was approaching the borders of
Egypt, Abram said to Sarai, “You are a very beautiful woman. When the Egyptians see you, they will say,
‘this is his wife. Let’s kill him; then
we can have her!’ But if you say you are my sister, then
the Egyptians will treat me well because of their interest in you, and they
will spare my life.” Genesis 12:10-13
One of the things I like best about the
Bible is that it gives you a complete picture.
Abram was a man of God – he wasn’t God!
He wasn’t perfect.
You and God both know that you aren’t
perfect. If you fail to saddle-up for this Great Adventure
because you don’t know if you can stay on the road, you have missed the point
entirely. We all hit the ditch. When we first arrived in North Carolina twenty
years ago, Elizabeth found every ditch on the side of every road between home
and the Oak Hollow Mall with her Dad’s old Buick. That didn’t stop her from going to the Oak
Hollow Mall!
Beloved, if you get on the road, God will
help you with your predisposition to wander off that road. That’s why you have a Good Shepherd!
It’s a Road that Leads back to
VOWS,
Not Visions!
Pharaoh then sent them out of the country
under armed escort—Abram and his wife, with all their household and
belongings. So they left Egypt and traveled north into
the Negev— Abram with his wife and Lot and all that they owned, for Abram was
very rich in livestock, silver, and gold.
Then they continued traveling by stages toward Bethel, to the place
between Bethel and Ai where they had camped before. This was the place where Abram had built the
altar, and there he again worshiped the LORD. Genesis 12:20 – 13:4
Sooner or later, everything comes down to,
and back to, the vows you make to God.
Ø The vow you make to Jesus to love and follow Him comes back to you in
assurance, peace, and an eternity to be close to the one you followed.
Ø The vow you make to give so others can hear of Him comes back to you in
abundance, sometimes thirty-fold, sometimes sixty, and sometimes a
hundred-fold!
Ø
The vow you make to God to share Christ
daily with others who need to know comes back to you in others sharing with
your loved ones who you just can’t win…and – in the end – it comes back in the
echo of the heavenly father saying, Well
done thou good and faithful servant…enter into thy master’s rest!
Every road you follow – every place you go
becomes a small place sooner or later…as it did for Abram:
…and he died at a ripe old age, joining his ancestors in death. Genesis 25:8
There were detours, and plenty of bumps –
but the road led. And Abraham came
home. And we’re still talking about his
Great Adventure today. Abraham followed
God.
The question before the house today is not
for Abraham; the question is for you and me…
There’s a Great Adventure in God’s
Kingdom for all of us…
…Are you gonna sit
there, or saddle up?
Our Prayer
Father God, we praise
you for letting us look over Abram’s shoulder at that road of Great
Adventure. We praise you even more to
know that you call us to follow and be close to you. And that you walk the road with us…to show us
the way… to open the doors of opportunity to be your children on mission.
We know how frail our
hearts and minds, and sense of worth can be, and thank you for your promise of
strength as the journey demands.
Help us, Lord, to
honor you with readiness to saddle-up when you call…and be a light for
your Word in this generation.
For the glory, honor,
and praise to which You alone are worthy, o Lord, we pray in the Name of the Son,
cooperating with the Spirit, to honor and lift up the Majesty of the Father. Let it be so in each of our lives…Amen!
Note: The idea for this sermon is
credited to Dr. Clyde Fant, who preached a similar message entitled “On the
Road With Abraham”
