November 15, 1998 - LESSON: Ephesians 3:20-21, NRSV

SERMON TITLE: Beyond Imagination

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INTRODUCTION:

  1. George Ross, in "Let Us Live Before We Die,"(1) relates that "When Michelangelo was a little boy, one of his friends gave him a small Greek sculpture of a human form, half chiseled from the marble.
    1. For the rest of his life, Michelangelo kept that little statue by his bed.
      1. It was the last thing he saw before he went to sleep.
      2. It was the first thing he saw when he awoke.
    2. For him it became a symbol of man's anguished effort to be liberated from the prison of his own ignorance.
    3. Michelangelo devoted his whole life to freeing figures from stone.
      1. Sometimes it would take him months, even years.
      2. Always he began with a vision of the man or the woman locked up in the stone.
    4. He said, 'It is my job, my task, to set that man, that woman, free.'"
  2. Think of ourselves as the men and women half sculptured from marble.
    1. We are in part captive to the forces of the marble.
    2. We want to be free of the forces of the marble, to be completely free.
    3. It is our task to come to understand how we can be free.
      1. It requires knowledge
        1. Overcoming ignorance.
        2. Understanding of the principles involved.

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      2. It requires effort.
        1. We recognize that we cannot do it on our own.
        2. But, we are not able.
        3. God's help is help to allow us to exercise our freedom responsibly.
    4. It is God's task to set us free.
      1. How do we visualize God, and what god can do.
      2. Too often human being see God as Lucy in Charles Schulz's Charley Brown.
        1. Charley Brown is the universal human.
        2. Lucy is then a God figure.
          1. Lucy: "I'll hold the ball (football), Charlie Brown, and you come running up and kick it."
          2. Charlie: "I can do that."
          3. Lucy: "You can?"
          4. Charlie: Absolutely! I have a new positive attitude."
          5. Lucy: "I can't believe it. You are truly amazing! You talk the talk and walk the walk!
          6. Charlie Brown comes running and Lucy pulls the ball away.
          7. Charlie Brown falls on his back, "Aaugh!"
          8. Lucy: "But you don't kick the kick."
        3. He might, if Lucy holds the ball.
    5. God never pulls the ball out of the way.
    6. God wants us to kick the ball as far and as high as we are able.

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  3. It is God's will and desire that we live an abundant life.
    1. Who defines abundance?
    2. Who defines life?
    3. Jesus said: (John 10:10 KJV) The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly.
    4. This is why Paul writes:
      1. (Ephesians 3:20-21 NRSV) Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine,
      2. [21] to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
  4. Jesus is able to help us accomplish abundantly.
    1. Far more than we can imagine
      1. He provides an abundance of Love
        1. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you, (Jeremiah 31:3 NRSV).
      2. He provides an abundance of Grace.
        1. (John 1:16-17 NRSV) From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. [17] The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
        2. (Romans 5:14-15 NRSV) Yet death exercised dominion from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sins were not like the transgression of Adam, who is a type of the one who was to come. [15] But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died through the one man's trespass, much more surely have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for the many.
        3. (Ephesians 1:5-8 NRSV) He destined us for adoption as his children through Jesus Christ, according to the good pleasure of his will, [6] to the praise of his glorious grace that he freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. [7] In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace [8] that he lavished on us. With all wisdom and insight

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      3. He provides an abundance of Mercy
        1. (1 Peter 2:9-10 NRSV) But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. [10] Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
      4. He provides an abundance of Forgiveness.
        1. (Mark 3:28-29 NRSV) "Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for their sins and whatever blasphemies they utter; [29] but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit can never have forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin"--
    2. He enables us to live an abundant life.
    3. He does not want us to be confused about the meaning of abundance
      1. Helga and I went to Southridge.
        1. I wanted to buy a pair of jeans.
        2. I was amazed at the variety and the abundance of the merchandise that was available.
        3. It is true that stores have stocked for Christmas.
        4. It is also true that we live in a land of abundance.
      2. The temptation is to want it all.
        1. People are willing to go deeply into debt to acquire some of the abundance that is produced.
        2. Some people live with a deep sense of dissatisfaction because they cannot have what others possess.

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      3. We ought to be able to acquire all that we can afford.
  5. But then we might be reminded that Jesus cautions us
    1. (Luke 12:15-21 NRSV) And he said to them, "Take care! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; for one's life does not consist in the abundance of possessions." [16] Then he told them a parable: "The land of a rich man produced abundantly. [17] And he thought to himself, 'What should I do, for I have no place to store my crops?' [18] Then he said, 'I will do this: I will pull down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. [19] And I will say to my soul, 'Soul, you have ample goods laid up for many years; relax, eat, drink, be merry.' [20] But God said to him, 'You fool! This very night your life is being demanded of you. And the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' [21] So it is with those who store up treasures for themselves but are not rich toward God."
    2. There is a story which provides us with an alternative view.
      1. Roger Crawford, How High Can You Bounce?(2) tells one of his own stories.
        1. My teen years were spent in the San Francisco Bay area, so naturally I was an ardent Oakland Raiders fan.
        2. The "Silver and Black" were one of the top National Football League teams at the time. Pete Banaszak, Gene Upshaw and Dave Casper were all my heroes, but my favorite player was "the Snake," left-handed quarterback Ken Stabler.
        3. Once Ken was being interviewed by a reporter who was an admirer of Jack London, author of The Call of the Wild and other rugged adventure stories.
        4. In pursuit of an inspiring quote, the reporter read aloud:

            5. I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than that it should be stifled by dry rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them, I shall use my time.

        5. The reporter paused to let these words stir Stabler's soul. Then he asked him, "What do these words mean to you?"
        6. Ken Stabler replied, in his lilting Alabama accent, "Seems to me he's saying, 'Always throw deep.'"

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  6. We can, in a way, always throw deep.
    1. It is the practical application of God's abundance not only to ourown lives, but also to the lives of others.
    2. The abundant life is one that is lived, not in isolation, but in community.
    3. What God provides for each of us, he also wants us to provide for one another.
      1. An abundance of love,
      2. An abundance of grace.
      3. An abundance of mercy.
      4. An abundance of forgiveness.
  7. God also wants us to realize that this abundance is not only for the present, but also for the future.
    1. (1 Corinthians 2:9 NRSV) But, as it is written, "What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him"--
    2. Now we may not fully understand.
  8. We do know that it is as Paul writes:
    1. (Ephesians 3:20-21 NRSV) Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine,
    2. [21] to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

1. George Ross, "Let Us Live Before We Die," Akron, Ohio.

2. Roger Crawford, How High Can You Bounce? (New York: Bantam Books, 1998), 186-187.

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