Risks and Rewards 1987

Perhaps the best way to describe modern American evangelical Christianity, of which we are all a part, I want to say that because sometimes people think I'm jumping on somebody else, I'm talking about all of us, and we'd be honest too, is to say that it's boring, really boring. It doesn't demand much, doesn't cost much in terms of time or money or thought or effort, but the price we pay for this convenience and ease is that it's all pretty boring. For a while, we charismatics liven things up a little bit by putting a little more zip into the worship and by expecting and receiving miracles from God, which are still coming.

But even we charismatics, and I realize we've got charismatics, non-charismatics, and anti-charismatics all mixed together here, but speaking as a charismatic, you know, even we charismatics are sighing and yawning a lot more than we used to for all the snappy choruses and for all our emphasis, which is a right emphasis, I believe, on signs and wonders. So what is it that makes American evangelical Christianity so boring? What's happened is that we've taken the gospel of Jesus and we put it through a decaffeinating process so that now we have a gospel with a smooth taste. All the bitterness is out, but it doesn't stimulate.

What we've done is we've taken the risk out of the gospel of Jesus. We think we have been able to figure out a way to follow Jesus without any risk. Well, we still talk about faith in Jesus, but it's rarely faith in Jesus in the face of uncertainty or danger.

It's almost always faith in Jesus to give me even more security. I'm trusting Jesus to give me the desires of my heart. I'm trusting Jesus to help me get over my sinus condition.

I'm trusting Jesus, you know, to get me into a better situation that all those things are legitimate. It's okay to ask for, you know, the desires of your heart, healing for the sinuses, a better situation if we're following Jesus to Calvary. See, but if all we're doing is going around and a little safe circle of our own, then that kind of faith becomes sick.

It becomes tragic. See, when you take the element of risk out of the gospel of Jesus, you know, when faith no longer involves any kind of risk, you can't end up with anything but boredom. Hothouse Christianity, Sun Parlor Christianity, Rose Garden Christianity is always safe and it's always very, very dull.

You know, you wonder why people put up with it at all. Now, when Jesus first began calling people to follow him, he always called them to do take a step which involved faith and a faith which meant some kind of risk. Follow me.

Trust me. When Jesus said that to people, he wasn't exhorting them to have a positive mental attitude or to mastermind their way to success and riches. Jesus was calling them to leave the safe shore and come out into the deep where he was.

Okay, Peter, launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch. And that doesn't seem like a lot of risk because Peter had been out there on that lake all night long anyway, but that was a prophecy. That was a picture of the change which was to take place in Peter's life that day.

So that when Peter and the others came in from being out on the deep with Jesus, they left their boats, their fish, their plans, their habits, their everything. And they follow Jesus out into the real deep. And that was faith and that faith involved risk.

Reading from Acts chapter 13, verse one. Now in the church at Antioch, there were prophets and teachers, Barnabas, Simeon, who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manion, a member of the court of Herod the Tetrarch, and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.

Then after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them out. Now all five of these prophets, these people, they were ordinary men like here. All five of them were living a life of faith.

They had already made the big jump of committing themselves radically to Jesus. And they came from many directions. One guy was a politician high up in city hall.

He was a member of the court of Herod the Tetrarch. There was a racial mixing. Two of the five were black men.

You know, there were people who were crossing all kinds of lines that were, you know, normally not crossed. And now they had joined together and they were living a life of risk in radical commitment to Jesus. But on this particular occasion, and who knows how long it was going on, but on this day they were going even, they were also involved in a risk.

They were turning themselves away, their minds, their hearts, their bodies, even their bodies, from the safe and the predictable and the dull and the boring. And they were opening themselves up to the direction of the Holy Spirit. They were actually believing that the Holy Spirit will guide them, give them guidance as a group.

And they believed that when that word came from the Holy Spirit and they would know it, they would say, yes, that's the word from the Holy Spirit, that they could act on it. It would be something they could, in fact, do. So here comes the word.

Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them. You know, and that wasn't an easy thing at all. I mean, their flesh immediately was saying, uh-uh, not Barnabas and Saul.

Those are the two best teachers we have. If you take them away from us, this church here in Antioch is going to fall apart for sure. See, but with the spirit, they said, amen.

If that's what you're calling for, we trust that you will provide everything we need. And they set them apart and they, they sent them off. A tremendous step of faith.

See, their life was not boring. Their walk with Jesus wasn't boring. Their church life wasn't boring because it involves continuous risk in the face of the uncertain and even the dangerous, the unpredictable.

You know, they weren't afraid to risk. The only certainty that they kept holding on to was the certainty of continuously committing themselves to Jesus and continuously committing themselves to each other. That's all they had.

See, they weren't in the sun parlor. They were in the battlefield. And they weren't bored.

They were having real fun. They were. It was an adventure.

Adventure always involves risk. But with risk comes reward. Whenever you risk, in the name of the Lord, there is a reward that comes with that risk.

And I can immediately hear somebody say, wait a minute, wait a minute. We, we believe in salvation by grace alone through faith. Salvation is a gift.

Amen. That's true. Salvation is a gift given to us.

We don't earn it. It's paid for by the blood of the lamb. We receive it, but we receive it by faith.

And the minute faith is introduced, risk is introduced no way around it. Can't avoid it. You know, the minute I received salvation by faith, I moved from the no risk life to the risk life.

Can't help it. I have to, for instance, when Paul says, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, that's risk for it is God who work is works in you to willing to do for his good pleasure. God works it in as a gift, but you work it out.

You work it out by risking, taking chances. And each risk that you make in the name of Jesus in response to him carries with it a reward. For instance, when Jesus says, follow me, I will make you fishes of men.

Follow me is the risk part. I will make you fishes of men is the reward part. Follow me means that I walk in his steps.

And that means that everything that happens to Jesus could happen to me anything. That means that I'm going to also be often regarded as a failure by the very people. I would like to think, have me think of, have them think of me as a success.

I'm going to be losing some friends. I'm going to be misunderstood. I'm going to experience danger.

If I walk in his steps, there's no way around that. That's going to be part of it for each of us. That's involved, you know, but even while we had people perhaps misunderstanding us, misconstruing our motives, uh, just despising us or holding us in contempt, even while we walk through dangers, whatever we have to do as we risk comes the reward.

I will make you fishers of men. And that actually starts to happen. We experienced the power of God as we live the risk life, moving out through us and bringing people up out of their prisons into the kingdom of God and the Liberty of the kingdom of God.

We see this happening. Or when Jesus says in Matthew five 11, blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account, rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven. So men, for so men persecuted the prophets who were before you, the risk is that you will be held in contempt.

You will be despised. You will be persecuted. That's the risk.

The reward is that you have the blessing of heaven, not only after you die, but even in this life, you know, even in this life, blessed are you now right now when men revile you and persecute you and say all kinds of things, utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account, rejoice. You know, the spirit of glory and of God rests upon you even in this life or jumping down into Matthew chapter six, verse two, Jesus again is speaking. Thus, when you give alms, sound no trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by men.

Truly I say to you, they had their reward, but when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your arms may be in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. The risk is that you're giving this money away and nobody sees it and nobody appreciates it. It's not giving you any mileage at all of any way of any kind.

The reward is that the father who sees in secret visits you with his presence. Reading on, and when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites who love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward, but when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you.

The risk is that you spend all this time inside your room with the door shut. Nobody sees your spiritual life. Nobody realizes what a spiritual tiger you are and you're in there lifting up names before God.

Every day you're taking these names up before the father and you're lifting up nations before God. You know, lifting up Zimbabwe and Mozambique and South Africa and Indochina and Japan and Ireland and Cuba and on and on. The risk is that you do this, you're wasting all this time.

Your own reason tells you that you're wasting time. What good is that going to do? Is anything going to come of this, praying for these people? You've been praying for this guy for 10 years, you don't see it changing. The reward is that the father who sees in secret will absolutely, absolutely hear and answer those prayers.

And that's a risk, you know, to spend what'll add up to be days and months and perhaps years of your life praying. And when you fast, do not look dismal like the hypocrites for they disfigure their faces, that their fasting may be seen by men. Truly, I say to you, they have their reward.

But when you fast and rinse your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by men, but by your father who is in secret. And your father who sees in secret will reward you. The risk is that you really have made yourself quite uncomfortable for a while.

By fasting, going without food, you even got a headache out of it. The reward is that the father who sees in secret answers the cry of your heart, which goes up with that fast again. And one more little passage here.

God is faithful. This is from 1 Corinthians 1.9. God is faithful by whom you were called into the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Okay, the risk of responding to the call into the fellowship.

See, the spirit of the Lord calls us to Jesus. And when he calls us to Jesus, he calls us into the body. You know, we're not home-raised disciples.

We're immediately put into the body. The risk is that when I answer that call and I start committing myself to these people here, I find myself more involved with them than I ever intended to be. When a man and woman get married and they're standing up in front of the altar, you know, and they make this commitment, they're taking an awful risk.

They don't know what they're getting into really until they're into it. And that's beautiful, and it has its great rewards, but there's no question about it, there's a risk. You know, his feet are cold and her feet are cold, and they don't understand why.

It's because deep down inside, they know they're taking a chance. And they're only going to find out some time later what they really got here. This is even more true in the body of Christ.

You know, when we in fact allow ourselves to commit ourselves to each other to that extent, and I'm going to be accountable to you, and you're going to be accountable to me, and we're going to serve Jesus together, and we're going to be faithful to each other, and we're going to stick with each other, that's a risk. But when we answer that call, take that risk, the reward is that the power of God moves through our body as it can never move in the life of any lone ranger disciple out there doing his or her own thing. The gift of the Holy Spirit, the guidance of the Holy Spirit, and the power of the Holy Spirit are given to the body, not to the lone ranger disciple.

You know, this passage we looked at when these prophets of the Lord are fasting and praying at Antioch, that happened when they were together, not alone. The Holy Spirit comes on Pentecost when they're gathered together in one place with one accord. In fact, what has been happening here for a year and a half or perhaps longer has been that there is a shaking going on, and we've been doing sometimes consciously and sometimes quite unconsciously some risky things and have offended people in the process of doing this, and you know, cut things down and shaking the fruit basket, just shaking things up a little bit.

That's the risk involved, but in the process, if the result of this is that those of us, you know, who hear the call commit ourselves to each other, no matter what, the power of the Spirit of the living God will move through us, guide us, and make us fruitful beyond anything we've ever seen in the past, ever. So the Spirit of the Lord, I'm sure we all can sense this and know this, the Spirit of the Lord is calling us as individuals and as a congregation to leave the sun parlor and get out into the battlefield, you know, to respond to the call of the Lord, to repent of our no-risk faith, which is unbelief, in fact, and enter into risk faith, follow Jesus with risk faith. To follow Jesus involves risk.

To commit ourselves to each other involves risk. To answer the call that is on each of our lives involves risk. In all three of these risks, you know, we may lose some friends, we may experience danger, we may be misunderstood, we may suffer, but when we answer the call and respond in that way and take the risk and follow Jesus and walk with each other and fulfill our calling, no matter what the risk, the reward, even on this side of heaven, is absolutely glorious.

He will make us fishers of men and the Father will see our almsgiving and he will hear our prayers and our fasting and the Spirit will come into our union with each other and transform every assembly of believers among us into a Pentecost all the time. It goes on and on and on and the life we live and the things we accomplish will be anything but boring, really, and we'll have some fun. It'll be an adventure.

Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Take the risk with me and I will reward you. Let's take some time in silence.