©2006 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

03-26-06

Things I Know

3/26/06 Things I Know

I mentioned to you last week

that while Sandee and I were on vacation

I got into one of my more meditative moods

and realized that there are some things that I know.

I’m going to take this morning

to try to share some of them with you.

I’m not far from 60 years old now,

a fact that some of the teenagers I work with

very much enjoy pointing out to me on a regular basis.

I think maybe knowing the things I know

has something to do with having been on this planet this long.

But the truth is

I do know some things about life.

I know big things,

important things,

things that make other things make sense.

I honestly don’t know how I came to know what I know,

not really.

I could say it was the result of experiences I’ve had,

or because when something happens in my life

I tend to think about it lots,

but I know that isn’t true,

at least not completely

because lots of other people have had similar experiences

and many of them have far better minds than I do,

and yet they don’t seem to know the things I know.

All I really know

is that there are certain things I know

and they are things that are very much worth knowing.

And just as I don’t know how I came to know these things,

I also don’t know what to do with them,

apart from continuing to build what’s left of my life upon them, of course.

I’ll tell you honestly,

there is a part of me

that feels very sad at the thought

that I may fail to pass these things on to others,

and if I don’t

the things I know will be lost once again

until others rediscover them on their own.

Just recently I had a teenage boy

tell me he hated it because I was always right.

I’m not, of course,

and I told him so,

but there are some times when I am right

and both he and I know it.

He and I talk a great deal about life,

and when we talk about life

I push him as hard as I can

into ideas that stretch him,

ideas, some of which I know are still far beyond his grasp.

It was during one of these conversations

that he said he hated it because I was always right.

I don’t think he really hated it.

In fact I think he liked it.

I think he liked knowing that he had a friend

who knew things about life.

I think it gave him hope

that he, too, would someday know things,

and the knowing would make life a little (or maybe a lot) easier for him.

The problem I’ve run into with the things I know

is that knowing things about life

isn’t the same as knowing things about math,

or about chemistry or physics.

It’s not that the things I know

are any less true.

In fact, in some ways I believe they are even more true

because they are eternal,

because they stretch beyond just the 70 or 80 years we spend here,

and as such

they are more significant than things that people know about math, and chemistry, and physics.

The problem is that knowing things about life

is frustrating

because truth about life

cannot be passed on to others

in the same way as truth about math, and science, and history.

You see, the truths about life

have implications,

they have consequences in our lives once we know these things with certainty,

consequences that will affect our lives in the most profound ways.

And we know this instinctively deep within our spirits,

and because we fear change,

because it makes life uncomfortable to the extreme,

we fear knowing these things.

Instead we simply choose to believe them - some of them, anyway.

Believing something

and knowing something are two very different things.

Nearly everything I now know

I once simply believed.

And when I simply believed it,

it did not upset my life.

In fact, simply believing these things

was really very comforting.

When I simply believed them

I suppose it would have been fair to call them my “doctrines”

or possibly my “theology”.

All of us have doctrines.

All of us have our own personal theologies -

those ideas we have chosen to believe about God, and about life, and about the way things really are.

It isn’t just Christians who have theologies.

Every person alive has his or her own belief system about God and about life.

Before I knew things,

back when I simply believed,

those beliefs did not upset my life as do the things that I now know.

And yet, when I simply believed them,

I found myself far more compelled to try to convince others to believe them as well.

Maybe it had something to do with wanting to win,

wanting to prove myself right and others wrong.

But now, with the things I have come to know,

I no longer have any desire to convince,

or to prove,

or to justify what I know.

I have no interest in proving I’m right

or proving others are wrong.

And yet a new and far more intense motivation

to communicate to others what I know

now exists within me.

It is...well I guess I would have to call it a deep sorrow

for those who do not yet know what I know

because I know the emptiness,

and the fear,

and the confusion and stress and tension that comes with not knowing.

These thoughts about the things I know

actually started on our flight to Kona.

There was a man who was probably in his late 20's or early 30's

in the window seat next to Sandee and me.

I avoided conversation with him for the first part of the trip

because in such conversations

the other person nearly always asks what I do for a living

and then they find out I’m a preacher

and from that point on any hope of friendship or real communication ceases.

But toward the end of our flight

the three of us began talking.

I skillfully avoided revealing my occupation,

and within a few minutes we’d developed one of those enjoyable comradeships

that sometimes takes place between fellow travelers.

I liked the fellow as soon as we started talking.

I don’t think he was a Christian,

but there was a kindness, and an openness and sensitivity about him

that made me think that, under different circumstances,

we could have easily become good friends.

He, like us, was on his way to Hawaii for a vacation.

And he, like so many others on that plane,

was going, I think, with the unspoken hope

that such an expensive and significant vacation

would help fill the emptiness inside.

It’s what we tell ourselves

because, until we know the truth,

it’s the only answer we have.

The emptiness within us is a given of our existence.

We bring it with us

when we enter this world,

and as we move into our adult years

it becomes the driving force of our lives.

We may call it the pursuit of purpose,

or significance,

or happiness,

or identity,

or prestige,

or love,

or the good life.

But no matter what label we paste on it,

underlying the search

is the longing to somehow fill the emptiness inside

and quiet the inner demons that torment us.

And as I talked with my new friend on that plane

I suddenly found a deep sorrow inside,

and a longing for this man to know the things I know,

the things that have the power to fill the emptiness within

and to quiet the demons.

So what are these things I know?

The first one that I’d share with you

is the one upon which all the others rest.

It’s not complicated,

it’s just that knowing this,

really knowing it changes our lives forever.

And it is simply this,

that we are created beings,

created by God for Himself,

and the emptiness we feel inside

is caused by our separation from Him

and the longing deep within our spirits to be reunited with Him.

And if you think what I just said

is basically a “religious” statement

it simply means you have not yet come to a knowledge of the truth.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with religion.

Religion is all about us trying to find some way of fulfilling

what we believe to be our obligation to God.

I’m not talking about that at all.

What I’m talking about

is the most fundamental truth of our existence.

What I’m talking about

is what was at the heart of what I believe my friend on that plane

was hoping to find on the Island of Kona.

It’s what’s causing that deep, unnamed emptiness and sorrow

that some of you are carrying around inside you right now.

It’s what’s driving some of you to keep up that frantic schedule,

and others to seek greater and greater affluence,

and still others to try to achieve social prominence or prestige or control over others.

I was talking with a young person recently

about some choices he’d been making in his life

and he said, “It’s all about happiness...trying to find happiness.”

When he said that

I knew he was expressing the same hunger

that is deep within every one of us.

What can I find in life,

what can I do

that will give me a reason, a purpose for getting up this day?

And no matter what we cram into that gaping hole within us,

it cannot fill the void

until it’s filled with the Spirit of God Himself.

And please understand -

I’m not trying to convince you of this.

I’m not trying to convince anyone of anything today.

I’m simply telling you

what I know is true.

And the second thing I know

is that God feels love

for every one of us.

He delights in our existence.

He enjoys the sound of our voice.

He feels our pain.

He rejoices in our victories.

He thinks about each one of us,

and the thoughts stir emotional responses within Him.

Sandee and I have one child,

an adult daughter who is married,

with one child and another one on the way.

She has been out of our home now for a number of years.

There are some days when I just long to hear her voice,

and if the phone rings and it’s Joni Sue

then everything else for the rest of the day is OK.

God responds to your voice in the same way.

He likes you.

He even likes me.

I have heard all sorts of theories and philosophies in my lifetime

about the battles raging in the unseen world around us,

and about what’s happening and why.

One of those theories suggests

that what God is really focused on

is this raging cosmic battle between Himself and Satan,

and we just happen to be caught in the middle of this thing.

I understand why we come up with theories like that.

I understand why our minds reach out for some huge cosmic warfare

that would justify what God is doing

in His involvement in the human race.

And certainly I recognize

that there is a huge battle raging around us

and that we do have in Satan an enemy seeking our destruction,

an enemy who is cruel, brutal, vicious in his attacks against us.

But here is the truly amazing thing -

God’s focus, God’s motivation in this whole thing

is not so that He can win this great cosmic battle against Satan.

His motivation is simply to win us.

What He has been fighting for from the first day of creation

is to reveal Himself to us

in such a way as to make it possible

for us to see His heart.

He wants us to know the true nature of His love for us.

His goal is to communicate Himself to us

in such a way as to create within us

a longing, a hunger to...well, to pick up the phone and call Him and say, “Papa, I just wanted to hear your voice.”,

and to know that all He wanted was the same thing - just to hear our voice.

You see, the love of God for us

is not generic.

It isn’t just once size fits all.

It isn’t just pride of ownership

or the satisfaction of a creative artist as He looks at what He’s done.

The love of God for us,

for you and for me

is rich, and deep, and personal, and emotion-filled.

It is the kind of love

that causes God to feel something very good very deeply when He hears your voice talking with Him.

I know this now.

Just a little tiny bit,

but at last, at least I know it a little.

Those were the first two things that went on my list of things I know -

that we are created beings,

and that God’s love for each of us

is a deep, personal, emotion-filled kind of love,

a love that literally causes Him to delight in the sound of our voice.

And then there were some other things I jotted down as well,

things I know about life.

I’ll just list them for you now

because you’ve heard me preach about all of them at great length

at times in the past.

I know we have all been wounded by Satan in childhood

in ways designed to make it extremely difficult

for us to believe in a God who loves us.

And I know there are certain truths we cannot tell ourselves,

and unless someone else finds a way inside our souls

and then tells us those truths

we will live in deep pain or fear forever.

I know that God’s response to my sin is not anger born out of righteous indignation,

but rather it is deep sorrow born out of love.

I know that all true redemption is a sovereign work of God

accomplished by Him

in the heart of a soul calling out to Him in desperate, helpless need.

I know that we cannot love another

until we have first been loved ourselves

and been able to believe and to receive that love.

I know that there is no greater motivational force in our lives than love.

And I know that to love is to hurt,

yet where there is no love

there is no purpose in life.

And I know that the pain of love

brings with it the hope of healing and redemption.

I have seen the lives of those who,

because of fear,

or because of anger

or perhaps because they have sensed the pain that will come with love

have refused to embrace it.

And I have seen the emptiness it has brought

and I have seen the way they have desperately sought something,

anything to fill the void - sex...money...prestige...dominance over others...victory...the good life...

And I have seen their hands full of sand

and their mouths full of bitterness

and their hearts full of pain...

not the pain of love leading to hope and healing,

but the pain of emptiness,

and loss,

and isolation,

and loneliness,

and regret.

And I know that somehow we in the religious world

have managed to create a form or religion

in which it is possible for a person to “accept Jesus Christ”

and yet still not receive His love.

And when that happens

it creates very strange people indeed,

people who live within a rigid religious form,

and keep up a strong religious facade,

and yet who are incapable of truly loving others

because their ongoing anger, or fear, or resentment, or bitterness against God

has prevented them from knowing and receiving His love.

And I know now that life is very, very short,

and the choices we make when we are 20

have a profound impact on the degree of fulfillment we find when we are 60.

And I know that all of us begin life not knowing who we are

or why or if we have value.

And answering that question becomes the desperate driving search of our lives.

And the first place we seek the answer

is in the eyes of those around us.

And because the answer matters so much,

and because the pain of not knowing is so intense,

we search frantically for someone...anyone who will tell us we do matter.

But I also know

that it is neither safe nor wise

to delegate to any other human being

the authority to tell us who we are or if we have value

because they don’t know the truth about us

and because they, too, are seeking the same answers about themselves.

And I know

that only God Himself can answer the question correctly,

but I can only hear His voice telling me the truth

when I have let go of my desperate search to find the answer in those around me,

and turn instead to Him.

And I also know

that true fulfillment in life

can only be found through the love relationships we build,

and if we fail to build them

nothing else we do can compensate.

I recently received

what is certainly one of the most encouraging comments about our church

that I have ever received.

Sandee was in a conversation with a person

whose family is involved in our fellowship,

and in the course of that conversation

the lady said they loved being here so much

because for the first time in their life they were being taught

that all that matters is our learning to love the ones God has entrusted into our care.

When I heard that

it made me realize

that sometimes all of this preaching

really does help bring truth and freedom into the lives of those who hear.

There are other things I know, too.

I know that religion is a far more effective weapon

with which to blind people to the love of God

than are the sins of the flesh.

So many churches,

so many groups,

so many of them honestly believing that success is measured in numbers

and that guilt and fear and intimidation are valid tools for the motivation of God’s people.

Well, that’s enough of the things I know.

My hope in sharing them with you this morning

is that, perhaps you too have come to know some of the same things

and my putting them into words

might make it a little easier for you to trust what you already know.

JOH 8:32 “...and you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. "