Slide 1: Today we want to focus on something we may not think much about- the stewardship of our legacy. How do we live so that our lives continues to change the world, shape the world for God even after our lives here end?
Slide 2: Psalm 78- this is The Message version- goes like this:
1-4 Listen, dear friends, to God’s truth, bend your ears to what I tell you. …I’ll let you on the sweet old truths, Stories we heard from our fathers, Counsel we learned at our mother’s knee. [You know what that’s called – That’s legacy.]We’re not keeping this to ourselves, we’re passing it along to [ what ? ] the next generation- God’s fame and fortune, the marvelous things he has done,
5-8 He planted a witness in Jacob set his Word firmly in Israel, Then commanded our parents [what did he command them?] to teach their children So the next generation would know, and all the generations to come- [even the children yet to be born, and they in turn would tell their children] Know God’s truth and tell God’s stories, So that they will put their trust in God, And never forget his works, And ever keep his commands.
Slide 3: In Jeremiah 35 there’s a story you may not know.The Rekabites were like the Amish in Israel. And Jeremiah turns to the people of Judah and says: V. 17: The Lord God Almighty says, ‘Learn a lesson here about obedience. The Rekabites don’t drink wine because 200 years ago their ancestor Jehonadab told them once not to. But I have spoken to you again and again, and you refuse to listen and obey. The families of Rekab have obeyed their ancestor completely- but you have refused to listen to me.” Here is a very impressive legacy! Take-A-Way: We continuing imprinting our truths and valued, our lifestyle and our faith, so 200 years from now our spiritual kids and grandkids are still living it!
Slide 4: The second story is one you all know: the Parable of the Sower Mark 4:1-20
…and they produce a crop- 30, 60, 100 fold. Now there’s a legacy! Take-A-Way: We make sure the spiritual field here is plowed and cleared and free of weeds and thorns and we sow a harvest 30-60-100 fold!
Slide 5: The third story is the story of Abraham in Hebrews 11…Abraham believed God for a million grandchildren. Take-A-Way: We pledge ourselves everyday to the King of kings, to a heavenly country, the kingdom of God for a massive spiritual posterity over the next hundred years and beyond, that will glorify not us but God- Lord give us a million grandchildren!
Slide 6: Prayer: Lord Jesus, you have led the way into God’s future. You have shown us what that everlasting kingdom and its glory looks like. We want to follow you there. And we want to take as many with us as we can. We want the doors of this church to be a gateway to your kingdom- for generations that are still to be born. Give us faith to believe you and to work for that amazing legacy! Amen.
Old Testament Lesson: Isaiah 25:6-9
On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines, of rich food filled with marrow, of well-aged wines strained clear. And he will destroy on this mountain the shroud that is cast over all peoples, the sheet that is spread over all nations; he will swallow up death forever. Then the Lord God will wipe away the tears from all faces, and the disgrace of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. It will be said on that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him, so that he might save us. This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.
Gospel Lesson: John 11:32-44
When Mary came where Jesus was and saw him, she knelt at his feet and said to him, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died.” When Jesus saw her weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep. So the Jews said, “See how he loved him!” But some of them said, “Could not he who opened the eyes of the blind man have kept this man from dying?”
Then Jesus, again greatly disturbed, came to the tomb. It was a cave, and a stone was lying against it. Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days.” Jesus said to her, “Did I not tell you that if you believed, you would see the glory of God?” So they took away the stone. And Jesus looked upward and said, “Father, I thank you for having heard me. I knew that you always hear me, but I have said this for the sake of the crowd standing here, so that they may believe that you sent me.” When he had said this, he cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come out!” The dead man came out, his hands and feet bound with strips of cloth, and his face wrapped in a cloth. Jesus said to them, “Unbind him, and let him go.”