Sermon nuggets Fri Oct 31
Theme Praying for Believers
Verse John 17: 26 I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them." (NIV)
Praying for Love
An elderly man was on his death bed, when he called his five sons to come to the farm. He wanted to share his goodbyes. When they were assembled he took a stick and had them break one, which each did easily. Then he gave them a bundle of five sticks tied together and told them to individually to break them. They couldn’t break the sticks. The father said, “Remember that when I’m gone, individually you will fall. Together you will stand strong.”
The cord that binds them together is love. It is not always the emotional closeness, but the commitment that because they were brothers by blood it pleased the father, whom they loved, to commit to working with one another for the common good of each other. That is the will of our heavenly Father as well.
St. Augustine said man year ago, “In essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty; in all things-charity.” Charity, love, is what we need to work together. There are far too many Christians so caught up in their prideful understanding that they lack love. So many churches claiming truth refuse to cooperate with other Christian groups or churches. What Jesus wants for us is to look at the Father by looking at the Son and gain a deeper understanding of His love and deeper awareness of His life within us. It is possible to disagree with others without being disagreeable. It is true love that encourages open sharing and communication. Many do not understand God because of pride, willful sin.
Marjorie Holmes wrote a book, To Help you through the Hurting. It was about the experiences of her mother, 84, who died suddenly. Before her death there was one thing the mother was unable to do and that was to help reconcile two member of her family that had been feuding. It was one of those agonizing conflicts between grown children that tear a parent apart. She wept over it, prayed over it, but the wounds were not healed.
Now in the face of preparations for her funeral Marjorie worried that contention would make things worse as there would not be unity with decisions over the distribution of the estate. While at the house the siblings saw the family Bible on the table and opened to where there passage was marked, “Now before the east of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world unto the father. Having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end.”
All the family began to cry and noticed another marker which read, “Little children, yet a little while I am with you ye hall seek me; and as I said unto the Jews, whither I go ye cannot come; so now I say to you, A new commandment I give unto you that ye love one another as I have loved you that ye love one another.”
The two who had been feuding took each other’s hands and then embraced holding one to their other tightly and crying. The peace they had that night was to last. The bridge of death had become the bridge of love.
The essential element to all the requests in prayer by Jesus was for love. He talked about joy, but joy without love is hedonism. He talked bout holiness, but without love that is self righteousness. He talked about truth which would be nothing more than bitter orthodoxy with out love.
The essential part of Jesus prayer was believers would grasp the love for God has for them and extend it to one another- that will make the church strong and bring others into the fold by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Pastor Dale
