Podcast: Play in new window | Download (0.0KB)
Sermon Notes 10-30-11am
Matthew 9: 35-38
Intro: Aunt Linda’s Breakfast on the Farm… described
- Finally, time to push away from Table and go into Field
Building more space, Gathering Space… Mindful of our Mission!
- Gather Together; Build Up; SEND OUT!
- Vote to Build AND to move forward in Mission…
t/s – The Harvest… 3 Weeks (compassionate, confident & compelled)
Jesus describes Our Work in World… The Harvest!!
Out of building to people; out of farm house into field!
Matthew 9: 35-38 (great memory verses)
Following Jesus is a Gut-Wrenching Experience.
ILL – Nov. 11, 1993, in quiet study 3:30 pm, frantic deacon!
Drove a few miles south of small town, school bus wreck
Eight children ejected; terrible, trauma… four died!
Describe bodies scattered between highway and fence..
Worst… parents began to arrive and rush into the ditch…
Sounds, smell, images… still burn bright in my mind
- I get the same feeling… Deep down… Gut-Wrenching.
“He Felt Compassion for them”
Compassion = Not from “Heart”, but Gut…. Deep Emotion
a) Heart – Heart broken, Heart Sick, from the depths of Heart
b) Gut – Gut-wrenching, punch in Gut, Makes me sick!
— Deep, intense, visceral… emotion… (anger)
Following Jesus is a Gut-Wrenching Experience.
“Compassion” used only of Jesus… His Compassion for People
- Sick People; Hungry People; blind; lonely outcast; grieving widow burying her only son… (six times)
As Jesus walked through this world, He knew joy, peace, love,… And, often, he was moved deep down with pity, sadness, even anger, because he saw people Hurting and Mistreated.
To Follow Him is to be like Him; Following Jesus is a Gut-Wrenching Experience.
Vs. 36 – He felt compassion for them because…. (vivid vocabulary)
- Distressed – mangled; plundered without pity, violence
- Dispirited – thrown down, with no capacity to recover
- Sheep without shepherd – vulnerable, abused, doomed
(hint of the failure of leaders… social, religious, political)
Anger, not toward sheep, but predators And Shepherds!
Spiritual Oppression… You were continually straying
Like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd
And the Guardian of your Soul!
Following Jesus is a Gut-Wrenching Experience.
ILL – I was exercising and watching TV News… Images of Earthquake in Turkey (Van province)… 596 dead.
Little boy’s lifeless body pulled from rubble, people in Agony!
- I flipped channel to ESPN…
T/s – Like a flash of brilliant truth, the first words of our key verse
Seeing the People….
I read the details of the Earthquake and Grieved with the people of..
I opened my heart and mind for the first time to a story that has been in the headlines since October 10…
ILL – Carina Saunders…. Graduated high school 17 months ago
- Entered a world of drug addiction, no legitimate job and no permanent address determined… Rough Crowd
- Oct. 10, animal control officers trying to catch feral cats found her mutilated, discarded body in a duffel bag.
- None of her so-called friends want to talk to police.
Unsettling…. Made me Sad, Angry, Sick…. Like Jesus.
Following Jesus is a Gut-Wrenching Experience.
Wait Preacher!
I thought we followed Jesus because He made us happy. I thought Jesus gives us joy, peace and waves of warm fuzzy!
Yes, but, to follow Him is to become like Him… At times, This cruel, cold, evil world, brings compassion… Like a punch in the Gut!
Prayer Dare: “OH Jesus, make me see the People, this week, as YOU
See them… hurtful/hurting; odd/lonely; dirty/needy
Dramatic Examples: Bus wreck, earthquake, murder
Everyday Disappointments: Left Out at School
Left Alone by Death
Lost in their guilt and sin, wandering,
Vulnerable, without a Shepherd.
Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd.
Prayer
Invitation
- Take the PrayerDare
- Join QSBC in the Harvest
- You are a Sheep without the Shepherd…
He is not angry, against, apathetic…
Compassion…
He sees you now
He cares very deeply for you…
CROSS!
