WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

A Farewell Sermon

Cane Creek Baptist Church

Sunday, 28 September 2008

Introduction

1. This is my last Sunday as your Interim Pastor.

1. Linda and I sincerely, honestly, openly thank you for the privilege of walking with you during these last eight months.

2. We have enjoyed some very good times together.

   1. Linda and I have been blessed to get to know many of you as close friends.

   2. We have especially enjoyed the meal times and the social interaction with each of you.

3. We have also been through some difficult times for all of us:

   1. The unexpected death of our dear friend Harvey Sykes, and the death of MaryLin’s father Maurice Griffin were — and still are —great losses not only to their immediate families, but to this church family as well.

   2. And we continue to pray earnestly and fervently for Ray deFriess and all his family as he takes chemotherapy, and for Pat Vandiviere, as she recovers from cancer.

4. And there were other times when our journey together has not been easy or comfortable.

   1. Together we have explored the uncompromising demands of Scripture for personal discipleship, and for humility and even gratitude for opportunities to suffer for the cause of Christ.

      1. Paul wrote to his beloved church at Phillipi,

“¹⁰I want to know Christ, and the power of his resurrection, and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death, ¹¹if somehow I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” (Philippians 3:10, 11). (emphasis added)

1. And more and more this verse is becoming a focus for my own desire to grow in Christ, and to conform myself to his likeness.

1. And we have likewise realized that personal evangelism is always relational in its nature, that it begins by building personal relationships of understanding and respect for those who are not Christians, and it is carried out only by sharing with them the experienced reality of God in our own lives.

2. There really is no other basis for sharing the Gospel with others.

1. In all these things, we have walked together, and learned together, and laughed together, and sometimes we have even cried together.

2. And Linda and I have been blessed. And we hope that you have been blessed as well.

2. And whatever has happened for the good in those times has come about by God’s grace, and as we remember those things, may they be remembered and recounted among us for God’s glory.

3. And for the times when things were perhaps not so smooth, I pray that we will all learn from them and grow in the grace and the love of God, and in our love for one another.

4. The time now comes for us to go in different directions.

1. But our paths can never fully separate.

   1. There’s an old proverb that says, “You can take the boy out of the country, but you can never take the country out of the boy.”

   2. So it is with us: Even though we may take ourselves “out of” Cane Creek, I can assure you, Cane Creek can never be taken “out of” either of us.

   3. And so it is also with you: Even though we may no longer be with you at Cane Creek, nevertheless, for good or for ill, we can never fully be taken out of this incredible Church.

2. There are a few very poignant verses from Psalm 137 that come to mind here:

“⁵If I forget you, O Jerusalem,

may my right hand forget its skill!

⁶Let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth

if I do not remember you, O Jerusalem,

if I do not consider Jerusalem

My highest joy.”

[Psalm 137:5, 6 (NRSV)].

And those verses surely capture my feelings, and Linda’s, about all of you.

Scripture

1. Our Scriptures this morning come from the books of Acts and Hebrews.

2. The text from Acts recount Paul’s words as he prepared to bid farewell to his beloved church in Ephesus.

1. Hear what he said to the leaders of this church on his departure:

[Read here Acts 20:22-28, NRSV.]

“²²And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. ²³I only know that in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me. ²⁴However, I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me — the task of testifying to the gospel of God’s grace.

“²⁵Now I know that none of you among whom I have gone about preaching the kingdom will ever see me again. ²⁶Therefore, I declare to you that I am innocent of the blood of all men. ²⁷For I have not hesitated to proclaim to you the whole will of God. ²⁸Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you seers. Be shepherds of the church which he bought with his own blood.” Acts 20:22-28.

2. And that is what I surely hope I may honestly say to you today:

   1. My goal is to finish the task I believe the Lord has given to me — to testify to the gospel of God’s grace.

   2. And if I am faithful to that task, then whatever may happen to me is of no consequence to me. Nothing is more important than that.

   3. And to that end, I hope I may honestly declare to you today that “^26bI am innocent of the blood of all men. ²⁷For I have not hesitated to proclaim to you the whole will of God. (Acts 20:26b, 27).

3. In my ministry with you, I have tried to be faithful to the Scriptures — both the Scriptures that offer hope and encouragement and blessing, and the Scriptures that offer instruction and warning.

4. But there are times in each of our lives when we simply do not want to hear the whole word of God — and that applies to me as well as to you.

5. And so there may have been times when you may not have wanted to hear what I have had to say, or when you felt that I was being partial to one side of an issue.

6. The readings from the second and third chapters of the book of First Peter were especially challenging to all of us — but the words we find there are every bit as applicable and relevant to us as the words of John 3:16.

3. Our second text comes from Hebrews 12:1-3. It speaks of the Christian life as a matter of running a race.

I’m reading from the New International Version.

[Read here Hebrews 12:1-3, NRSV.]

“¹Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, ²looking to Jesus the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God.

“³Consider him who endured such hostility against himself from sinners, so that you may not grow weary or lose heart.” (Hebrews 12:1-3, NRSV).

4. Immediately the relevance of this text to our situation today is obvious.

1. Hebrews says that we should do two things:

   1. “since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,” it says,

   2. “let us throw off everything that hinders, and the sin that so easily entangles, and

   3. “let us run with perseverance the race marked out before us.”

2. And so we might ask ourselves

   1. Who are the “great … cloud of witnesses” that surround us here, and

   2. What are the things that might hinder and entangle us as we proceed, and

   3. How might we “run with perseverance the race marked out before us”?

Exposition

1. Cane Creek Baptist is a beautiful and historic church, now in its two-hundred-and-twentieth year of worship and service in this community.

1. To be a member of this church, let alone to stand in this pulpit, is surely to sense the great company of people who have loved and served God in this place.

2. But entirely beyond the silent witness of those who have served this church faithfully over the years are the innumerable saints of God who have gone before us all, and the heroes of faith that the author of Hebrews had in mind when he wrote these verses.

3. And the immediate “cloud of witnesses” that surrounds us is the company of folks who lie at rest in the cemetery behind us.

4. Let us therefore be faithful to their examples of service to God and to the people of this community, while keeping in mind that the love of God extends to all people, and that this community, and indeed our nation, is becoming increasingly diversified in its cultural, ethnic and religious makeup.

2. “[L]et us throw off everything that hinders, and the sin that so easily entangles,” the author of Hebrews writes.

1. The New American Standard Bible translates this verse as “let us lay aside every encumbrance,” and the New Revised Standard Version says “let us also lay aside every weight.”

   1. To fully understand what the author of this book is saying here, we must consider the cultural context in which these verses were written.

   2. The metaphor used in this verse has to do with running a race, or perhaps participating in some athletic event.

      1. In these days, athletes participating in competitive events have the benefit of specialized clothing that is lightweight and permits full freedom of movement.

      2. But in biblical times, such clothing was not available, and the everyday garments that people wore were much too bulky and cumbersome for such athletic events, or even for hard manual labor.

      3. And the result was that such activities were usually carried out without any clothing. And no one at that time was shocked or offended by such behavior. It was the normal, practical thing to do.

      4. That behavior dates from a climate and a culture that are very different from our own, and I am by no means suggesting that we should go back to it.

      5. But being aware of the custom of that day certainly helps us to hear in the back of our heads what the people of that time heard in these words.

   3. We need to have a much clearer idea how literally this verse is to be taken, and we need to understand that these words call on us literally to “throw off everything that hinders.”

2. And so we must ask ourselves, What hinders us in our relationship with Christ, and in our relationships with others?

   1. There are many answers to that question, and the answers differ from one person to the next.

   2. But I would like to suggest that one thing that often hinders us in our relationship with God and with each other is our tendency to drag along the past with the present.

      1. All too often, we fail to forgive ourselves for the mistakes of the past.

      2. Beginning with a verse that we have already read from his letter to the Philippians, Paul touches on this very point when he writes

“¹⁰I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, ¹¹and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.

“¹²Not that I have already obtained all this [he says], or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. ¹³Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind, and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:10-14.

3. And we are likewise hindered in our relationship with God and our relationships with others by our own human fears and prejudices about other faiths and peoples.

   1. The task every one of us must master is to bring ourselves to the point where we can see every human being on this earth in exactly the same way that God sees that person — a human being, created in God’s own likeness, for the purpose of having a relationship with God and with me.

   2. And to the extent that I — or you — consider myself, or yourself, in any way better than or superior to any other human being on this earth — to that extent I, or you, have not fully understood or embraced what God has done for each of us in Christ Jesus.

3. And finally, how can we “run with perseverance the race marked out before us”?

1. Both Paul’s letter to the Philippians and the book of Hebrews give a clear answer to that question: fix our eyes on Jesus, and strive to be like Him.

The author of Hebrews gives more specific instructions, writing “²Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. ³Consider him who endured such opposition from sinful men, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.” Hebrews 12:2, 3.

2. And one of the great hymns of the Church also points us in this same direction. The words are¹

His word shall not fail you — He promised;

Believe Him and all will be well;

Then go to a world that is dying,

His perfect salvation to tell.

Turn your eyes upon Jesus,

Look full in His wonderful face,

And the things of earth will grow strangely dim,

In the light of His glory and grace.

Reflections and Conclusions

1. So these are our “Marching Orders” for today, both for you and for me, as we come to this day on which our paths diverge.

2. Having walked together for these past eight months, our paths now go in different ways, but for good or for ill, they will always be intertwined.

3. But we share common goals and objectives:

1. We are to throw off literally everything that hinders our relationships with God and with each other;

2. We are to run with perseverance the race that is set before us, keeping our eyes clearly upon Christ; and

3. We are to draw encouragement from the blessed company of all of God’s people who have gone before us, both from this Church and from the Church of God through all the ages.

4. And beyond these common objectives, may we also remember the common bond of faith that we share, and the precious promise of Scripture,

“⁴There is one body and one Spirit — just as you have been called to the one hope when you were called — ⁵one Lord, one faith, one baptism, ⁶one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.” Ephesians 4:4-6.

To Him be glory in my life, and in yours, and in this Church, and in Christ Jesus, today and evermore. Amen.

BENEDICTION

“²⁴The Lord bless you and keep you,

²⁵The Lord make His face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you;

²⁶the Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace.”