Tenth Anniversary Sermon Heritage Baptist Church

Proverbs 16:18 says, “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” The sin of pride is an excessive preoccupation with self and one’s own importance, achievements, status, or possessions. This sin is considered rebellion against God because it attributes to one’s self the honor and glory that only God is due. The sin of pride says, “I don’t need God!”

According to the 2nd London Baptist Confession of 1689: “The acceptable way of worshiping the true God is instituted by Himself, and so limited by His own revealed will, that He may not be worshiped according to the imagination and devices of men, nor in any other way not prescribed in the Holy Scriptures!”

Sadly, that requirement of fidelity to the Scriptures and faithfulness to God regarding our times of corporate worship was not communicated to the majority of today’s ministers. Hence, the worship wars of the last 20-years that ended with the entertainment-based worship services of our day. Quite frankly, since they are not worshipful to God, they are worthless to man, and while they may attract lost people to “attend,” they are a “distraction” to their stated purpose for attending.

The Bible defines wisdom as the ability to see and respond to life’s situations from God’s perspective. Knowledge and wisdom are not the same. Knowledge is the comprehension of accumulated knowledge, but wisdom is the discernment in knowing how to use that information correctly.

The writer of Proverbs declared, “Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore, get wisdom, and with all thy getting get understanding.” (Prov.4:7). So as Christians, it is imperative that we not only acquire knowledge but also that we seek wisdom so that we might be able to see the events of our day from God’s viewpoint. And remember, as James said, “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.” (James 1:5-6)

Each time the prophet Amos returned to the City of Jerusalem, he was repulsed to see how God’s people had turned from their true worship of God, and how such apostasy had affected their love for one another. Amos said, in effect, they had violated God’s commandment, and therefore they should prepare for God’s judgment.

Again, Amos might well have been standing in the streets of America, for we are on the precipice of God’s judgment, and in many ways, we are already there.  The title of this sermon is “Return to Me! The Lord God Has Spoken.”

The Old Testament Book of Amos has a severe warning for God’s people today. In Amos’ day, as in ours, the rule of law was despised; the nation’s leaders were not only contributing to the breakdown of law and order, they were causing it, and the standards of morality were so low the people openly practiced all kinds of sexual sins.

The prophet, Amos stood in the street of Israel and proclaimed, “Repent, and return unto God, or prepare to receive the just judgment of God.” Amos might well have been standing in the streets of America, for we are on the precipice of God’s judgment, and in many ways, we are already there.

What is missing in Christianity today is what was missing in the gospel presentations of the last century.

How did we get from “ye must be born again” to “just pray and ask Jesus into your heart”?
How did we get from “repent, for the Kingdom of God is at hand”, to “God has a wonderful plan for your life”?
How did we get from “If any man come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, daily, and follow me” to “You don’t have to change your habits; just trust Jesus Christ as your Savior and become one of His followers?”

While it appears to us that everything about our way of life is falling apart, as far as God’s unfolding drama of redemption, everything is falling into place, just as God ordained it to be at the end of this age. Therefore, our hope is not for the return of our American way of life, but rather in the soon return of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ!

This sermon will conclude our series on God’s Unfolding Drama of Redemption. This week, our focus will be upon our final state: “A New Heaven and a New Earth”

Faith, Resistance, & Going the Distance, Hebrews 12:1-2

“Time is so short, and the work which we have to do in it is so great that we have none of it to spare. The work which we have to do to prepare for eternity must be done in time, or it never can be done.”

Jonathan Edwards made that profound statement in the early 1700s, and if it was true then, it must certainly be true today. As Christians, we dare not say, because the times are evil, we might as well surrender to the culture. Our assignment is to preach the gospel with our lips and our lives and allow the Holy Spirit to do His work in us and through us.

In our next sermon in this series, “God’s Unfolding Drama of Redemption,” we will look at “Life in the Millennial Kingdom.”