What Are Our Goals

[00:00:00] This audio sermon is provided by AnabaptistSermons.com and may be freely copied and distributed. You may not sell or edit this sermon. Our prayer is that you would be blessed by this ministry. I'd like to think about our goals, our purpose in life. What is your goal for, Wendell talked about this decade, about it can be more or less than that. What do you have as a goal? And I am not a proponent of New Year's resolutions, by the way. This is not a message about New Year's resolutions. [00:00:40] As we think of goals that are set forth in scripture, there are people, there are authors that were used by God to write scripture and sometimes their purpose or their goals came through very clearly. And I'm wondering, do you think of any of these? As you think of scripture, there was one especially that, as I thought, as I meditated on this, stood out to me. And maybe we should just turn to that. Turn with me to Philippians chapter 1. [00:01:15] And I'd like to read two, at least two verses here. Beginning at, I'd like to read just two verses. Verses 20 and 21. And this is the one that stood out to me. This is the one that I thought of as I thought of goals or a purpose in life. This is what Paul wrote. According to my earnest expectation and my hope, this is Philippians 1.20. According to my earnest expectation and my hope that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, so now also, Christ be magnified in my body. [00:01:57] There, I think, is a goal, whether it be by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. That was Paul's goal. He wanted to have Christ magnified in his body. He said, if I live, it's for Christ. And if I die, it's for personal gain. It's his personal gain if he dies. I thought of the words of Joshua. [00:02:28] And I could turn to this. I think you remember there is more in this verse than what I would be inclined to read. Maybe we should read all of verse 15 of chapter 24 in Joshua. Joshua talked about their goal, what they should live for. And then he said what his goal is for him and for his house. I'm going to read all of the verse. Joshua 24 verse 15 [00:03:01] He says now, if you think this isn't for you, you can be exempt from this. But then he gave his personal testimony. And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. I suppose I would just leave out part of that and I would just simply ask the question. [00:03:36] You choose. But as for me, this is my choice. We will serve the Lord. And that would go very closely hand in hand with what Laverne preached to us last Sunday. In John chapter 4, Jesus himself said, this is what my goal is in life. And he gave it a little different. He didn't say my goal, but that is what is meant. John chapter 4, verse 34, Jesus said unto them, my meat is through the will of him that sent me and to finish his work. [00:04:12] My meat, my goal, that is what I am doing. Meat is another word for food. In the Bible. But he said, that's what my purpose is, to do God's will that sent me. And we could look at other scriptures. Perhaps this is enough. No, I would like to look at a few others, though, because I think they have something to say to us. In Mark chapter 13, verse 34, Jesus, well, let's just turn to that. We're not far from that. Mark chapter 13, verse 34. It's not the same for everyone. [00:04:51] John, we in our Sunday school, it wasn't in the lesson for today, but it was for next Sunday and John suggested that maybe I should be teaching the class. I said he is in, it's fine where he is. For those of you who do not know what our lesson is, next Sunday the first verse says something about he that desireth the office of a bishop, desireth a good work, I think is what it says. And it will be interesting to hear what we have to say about that. [00:05:25] But that is what some people are called to, the work of a bishop. In Mark chapter 13 verse 34, For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far country, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and to every man his work, and commanded the porter to watch. Now, he says, I'm just going to stop reading there. And it says that you should watch because you don't know when the good man is coming back or the person in charge. [00:06:00] Were people given the same thing here? It doesn't say it here. In another, in Matthew chapter 25, I think one servant was given five, one two, and one one. Were they given the same thing? No. They were given different responsibilities and different amounts of responsibilities and I think if you look at that it says according to their ability. That is the way they were given and that's the way that God, that's how God requires things of us. [00:06:32] In 1 Samuel chapter 17, we could have looked at Psalms and I did not do that at all. David wrote about his purpose in life, but this is about David's purpose. 1 Samuel chapter 17, it is a very familiar account here, but I'd like to just draw one verse from that chapter. It is the account where Goliath was facing the Israelite armies, the Israeli armies, and he was defying them. [00:07:07] David made a statement here that is, to me, a statement about David's understanding of what his purpose in life was. Verse 26 says this. This was after Goliath's challenge to the Israelite armies. David said this, And David spake to the man that stood by him, saying, Yes, this is the correct verse. It didn't seem right. Saying, What shall be done to the man that killeth this Philistine, [00:07:39] and taketh away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God? Did David take a personal affront in what Goliath said? No. But he said, this man is insulting our God. And that is what David saw. That is why David was willing, I think, to go and fight this man, because he was insulting David's God. [00:08:13] And David said, somebody needs to exonerate God's name. And, of course, God did that through David. One of the scriptures that I'll probably come back to, even if I don't turn to it, but I should turn to it, Genesis chapter 5. My mind was drawn to this chapter, and I'll tell you a little bit more at the close of why I was drawn to this chapter and these verses. [00:08:45] Genesis chapter 5, it's talking about some of the ancient men and I'd like to read verses 21 through 24 here It says, And Enoch lived sixty and five years and begat Methuselah And Enoch walked with God after he begat Methuselah three hundred years and begat sons and daughters And all the days of Enoch were three hundred sixty and five years And Enoch walked with God, and he was not, for God took him. [00:09:18] Now, some things don't stand out unless you compare what it says about the other people. Just go up and look at some of the other people. In verse 15, it says, I'm not sure how you pronounce that word, Mahalalel lived 65 years and begat Jared. And that's what it says about each of them. They lived so long and then they had these children. But in verses 21, no, it's verse 22, and in verse 24 it says Enoch did what? [00:09:54] He walked with God. And we'll come back to that a little bit later. Now as far as our purpose in life, Paul Miller wrote, and I'd like to just read a few of the things that he had to say about purpose because I thought it was very good. Especially this first part here. He writes this way, After sanctification, it is difficult to state what your purpose in life is. [00:10:24] And listen why. Because God has moved you into his purpose through the Holy Spirit. He is using you now for his purposes throughout the world as he used his son for the purpose of our salvation. If you seek great things for yourself, thinking God has called me for that, you barricade God from using you. As long as you maintain your own personal interests and ambitions, you cannot be completely aligned or identified with God's interests. This can only be accomplished by giving up all of your personal plans once and for all, [00:10:58] and by allowing God to take you directly into his purpose for the world. Your understanding of your ways must also be surrendered. because they are now the ways of the Lord. And I could go on reading there, but I'll stop there. We have to give up, he is saying. We cannot continue what we want to do. There's one thing that occurred to me. I can say what my goal in life is. If I don't tell you and you look at my life, [00:11:30] what do you see there as my goal in life? Do these things line up? Are they one and the same? What I say my goal in life is and what I actually carry out. Or isn't it? Is it the same for me? How about you? You understand the difference. Or you understand that there can be a difference. I may say that my goal is to glorify God. But if I spend every spare minute that I have in some other pursuit, [00:12:03] what does that tell the people that observe my life? It is important that we express a right goal, but it is just as important that we live that. It's just as important that we carry that out, is what I am saying. We could look at other Bible characters. In fact, it might be good just to mention some of them. One that would come to mind is Joseph. [00:12:36] I didn't write anything down in my notes about Joseph. I did about Daniel. It's always a blessing to me and some things come through in a positive way. Some things are expressed in a negative way. Daniel expressed some things in a negative way. Some things he did in a positive way. It says in chapter 1, I think it's verse 8, Daniel purposed in his heart not to defile himself with the king's meat. Here he was being offered food that was not for a Jew to partake in. [00:13:09] And what was he to do? And he decided in his heart he was not going to defile himself. In chapter 3, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, I don't know where Daniel was in this case, they were brought to this image and they said, King Nebuchadnezzar said, you fall down and you worship this. I don't know what you would have been tempted to do. I suppose it would have been pretty tempting to fall down but pray and say we're going to pray to God They didn't do that They stayed standing and they suffered for it and we'll not go into that [00:13:44] In chapter 6, when the decree was passed that you may not make any petition to anyone but to the king What did Daniel do? his purpose in life became very clear because he went up and he opened he didn't close his window they would have probably seen him anyway but he prayed to God as he did aforetime I think is what it tells us. Now looking at some New Testament characters [00:14:15] and I'd like to turn to Acts and just simply notice and I'm going to just tell you now that some of the things that I'd like to look at with you are personal goals. Some are, may I say, cosmic goals because they involve powers beyond what you and I see. But it just became so apparent that we are seeing a clash of forces in Acts and it was just a blessing to notice that. [00:14:47] So, in Acts chapter 2, we have the apostles here, and see, this is just after the Holy Spirit came upon them, I think. I didn't check that out carefully. Yes, in chapter 2, verse 4, it says they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they were preaching here. and people understood them and people mocked and said hey how are we understanding them all in our own language and they said they're drunk and Peter said no they're not drunk and he preached to them [00:15:23] he preached to them out of the Old Testament and brought them right down into the new and the Holy Spirit did his work it says in verse 37 and when they heard this they were pricked in their heart and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles men and brethren what shall we do Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. It's not a stated aim of Peter, but his aim, his purpose was to make known the plan of salvation. [00:15:58] That is very, very clear here, I think. To lift up Jesus in chapter 3, if you just turn, in my Bible it's turning the page, Peter was talking to the, in verse 13, he said, this is what you did. He was very accusing to the Jews, and he says, he's defending how they made the lame man walk here. He said, the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, and of Jacob, the God of our fathers, hath glorified his son Jesus, [00:16:30] Jesus, whom you delivered up and denied him in the presence of Pilate when he was determined to let him go. This is what you did. Now, verse 19, repent ye therefore and be converted that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord. Again, we see Peter's purpose was to share the good news, to preach, to let people know. And it is interesting to notice, and as we go further here, as we look further in the book of Acts, [00:17:00] it becomes clear that this is not just a force, this is not a struggle of one man against another man. And we'll look at that, we'll get to that in just a bit. In verse 10 here, and this was Peter and John, I believe, Verse 10, Peter defended himself, be it known unto you all, and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by him doth this man stand before you whole. [00:17:31] There was question. How did these men heal this lame man? And this is what Peter told them. He said, there is no question. It's not us. It is power from on high. Well, after they were threatened, Peter and John decided, well, we'll have to calm down our message a little bit, right? Is that what happened? Uh-uh. That is not what happened. They spake boldly. [00:18:03] In chapter 4, verse 29 and 30, we have here what the prayer was after they were let go. And now, Lord, behold their threatenings, and grant unto thy servants that with all boldness they may speak thy word. I'm just going to stop reading there. What we need is boldness, Peter was saying. And I think if we look just a little bit later, we find that that was granted. [00:18:40] In verse 31, it says, And when they had prayed, the place was shaken, where they were assembled together, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spake the word of God with, how? Boldness. Right. Their request was granted. That was their desire. What was the desire of Ananias and Sapphira? Just the next chapter. You know, Peter told Ananias, he said, Ananias, you could have done what you did. [00:19:11] and survived. But what you were doing was you were trying to make it look like you did one thing when you actually did something else. That was your sin. I am taking a little bit of liberty there, but that's what I understand Peter to say here. What Ananias wanted to do was he wanted to be accepted with God and he wanted to have money in his pocket. When he actually was, he wanted to get, he gave the impression that he had given all When he had not given all [00:19:44] It is not possible to please God and our carnal desires at the same time That is impossible If we are trying to do that We need to read what was said about the single eye What it says about the single eye If we have dual vision We're full of darkness, the Bible says We need to have a single eye But it was the aim of the apostles in Acts to speak the truth, to reveal the truth of the matter, to keep the church pure. [00:20:17] We see that in chapter 5 when Ananias and Sapphira died, they weren't killed by the disciples, God himself struck them down. And so the aim was to keep the church pure, free from sin. We look later in the chapter, we see that the church grew by leaps and bounds. People were healed physically, they were healed spiritually. Now, the Jews decided that it's time to stop what's happening here. [00:20:49] And I'd like for us to notice, I know I've read this many times, but as I looked at this, it was amazing to me how God works in this time, God works this way even today. It says in verse 19 of chapter 5 But the angel of the Lord by night opened the prison doors After Peter and John had been put in prison late in the day It wasn't time for a trial at that time So they were placed in prison But the angel of the Lord by night opened the prison doors and brought them forth [00:21:22] And so God delivered them by opening the prison doors But he said now go hide, right? Uh-uh Go stand in the temple and preach And that's what they did. They went on preaching and again you see later in the chapter their lives were endangered. And God again brought about a miracle through the advice of Gamaliel. Verse 34 of Acts chapter 5. And there stood, then stood there up one in the council, a Pharisee named Gamaliel, [00:21:57] a doctor of the law, had in reputation among all the people and commanded to put the apostles forth a little space. And then he went on and gave his advice. He said, you let these men go. Because if you don't, you may be fighting against God. So God, I think, brought that about. God brought about a second deliverance from the powers of darkness. In chapter 6, I think we are told, don't neglect the physical needs in the church. [00:22:30] In chapter 7, we have the account where Stephen gave his defense, his famous defense. It tells us that he was powerful. They weren't able to refute what he said. But at the end of chapter 7, we have the first martyr. Now, you see what's happening. You have a buildup here. The two kingdoms are the two opposing forces and finally it's cost blood here in chapter 7 of Acts. [00:23:06] What that tells us is that God's deliverance is not always going to be physical. There are people that are going to, it's going to cost some people's lives to follow the Lord. It's easy to see that Satan's hand in what happened here to destroy the church. But I'd like for us just to follow just a little bit farther in chapter 9. And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter, you know the account very well. [00:23:42] Saul seemed to have been, well he was used of Satan in a mighty way against the church. I don't know how many people lost their lives. but it says Saul was right there giving his word against them and he arrested men and women, took them into custody. I suppose Satan felt pretty smug about Saul but then the unthinkable happened. God didn't let Saul go on. He appeared to him. I don't know, was that Jesus appearing to Saul [00:24:14] on the Damascus road? I'm not sure. It doesn't really say But Jesus spoke to him. A light appeared to Saul. Do you see how God was turning things around? Now we're looking at cosmic purpose, not just individual purpose. You see the devil trying to extinguish the flames, but as I see this, I see the devil, he's trying to stomp out the fire that's burning, [00:24:47] The church that's burning there, what does it do? Scatters the fire, is what it seems like. It's as though you blow on a fire to try to put it out. Sometimes, you know, if you have a match, you can blow it out. But you have a red hot fire going, you can blow on that. What does it do? It fans it. It makes it burn all the brighter. You will notice that the church was scattered by the persecution. and let me see, is that in chapter 8? [00:25:20] Is that, I think it was in chapter 8. I didn't jot this down. But in verse 4 of chapter 8, therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere doing what? Being quiet now, right? Uh-uh. Preaching the word. That was in the very core of their being. It reminds me of what Jeremiah said And I had that written down. I didn't turn to that. But Jeremiah, and I'm not going to read the verse, but Jeremiah in chapter 20, verse 9 says, there was a fire burning in my bones and I wanted to be quiet, but I couldn't. I had to speak up. And that's what it seems like what the church was doing here when Satan was trying to get rid of the testimony. It didn't work. [00:26:15] And so we have Saul, who later became Paul, now converted. He was at least as, I think he was stronger in building the church than he was in destroying the church before. Well, Satan doesn't ever, or does not, I shouldn't say ever, Satan does not give up easily. And you see that Paul was persecuted for his part, in his purpose of making the gospel known to people. [00:26:52] That happened in many different ways. I think it's in one of the Corinthians, is it about chapter 13? Is it 2 Corinthians? No, that's not quite right. But he gives a catalog of all the things that he suffered because of the fact that he was promoting, he was preaching the gospel. But do you notice what God told Ananias? Do you remember what God told Ananias that he's going to reveal to Saul? You find it in chapter 9, and I am not quite sure of the verse, but he said, [00:27:28] I must reveal how great things he must suffer, for I will show him how great things he must suffer for my name's sake. Not very encouraging. Here, God revealed himself to Saul, Jesus, and that's what he told him. Saul, you're going to suffer a lot of things. Not particularly inviting, but Saul was a man of integrity, he was a man of honesty, and he recognized that this was God speaking to him and so he was converted and as I said [00:28:02] Satan didn't give up. Paul suffered many things. What was he shipwrecked a number of times? He was beaten. He was he just he was in prison I don't know how many times and when Paul was in prison Was it the last time? I'm not sure. Some people say that Paul was in prison, he was turned loose, and then in prison again. I don't know. The Bible, I don't think, indicates that. But that may be the case. Could Paul have avoided the imprisonment, the being arrested? [00:28:39] He said, I'm not sure what awaits me in Jerusalem, but in every city the Spirit testifies to me that if you go to Jerusalem, You're going to be arrested. You're going to be put in prison for your faith. But for some reasons, Paul went on. I'm not sure why. I think it was because, was it because of what Jeremiah said? It's a message that has to come out. I have to preach it. But there is something else. Saul was put in prison. He preached in prison. [00:29:11] There were people that came to him in Rome. He was able to testify in Caesarea when he was taken there. But he preached to a number of people in Rome. But there is something else that happened as Paul was imprisoned. What did Paul do? What was one of the activities that stand out to us today as he was imprisoned? He wrote letters to the churches. He also wrote to Timothy, I think. He wrote the pastoral epistles. Now, do you see God's hand, God's purpose in some of these things? [00:29:51] What looked like a terrible waste to the church back then. The people of Ephesus met with Paul and Paul told him, this is the last time you're going to see me because the Holy Spirit told me I'm going to be arrested when I go down to Jerusalem. And they wept sorrow on his neck. They thought, I'm just going to guess, that there were people that said, what a waste. Was it a waste when you consider it in the light of eternity? [00:30:21] No, it was not. And so the purposes that we need to be thinking about in our lives, sometimes they go on long after people die. I have a book that my great-grandfather wrote. Well, he didn't write it in book form, but it was later put in book form. And so a man that died in the 1930s, I believe, still speaks today. And that can be true as well. [00:30:56] Talking about purpose for living, I was blessed in reading a column in the Goshen News, Written by a person that I know It's about two weeks ago She wrote a column It was her column for Christmas And she told us Some of her columns really are not of that much worth reading But somehow this column stood out to me [00:31:29] This column had things that we can learn from. She said she is going to write about the birth of a baby. And, of course, your mind goes to the birth of Christ, but that was not what she wrote about. There was this tiny baby that was born, a very tiny baby. It was a preemie, a little boy. I don't remember the weight. I think it was under two pounds. The father never stepped forward to claim his position as father. [00:32:04] In fact, he denied that he was a father. The mother showed up in the hospital for a while. Then she dropped out of sight. And so this little baby, this little mite was left to its own devices and the hand of God. The doctors and nurses did the best that they could for the baby, and the baby grew. A person, a lady, volunteered two hours every day to be there, to touch. [00:32:37] I don't know if she could hold the baby or not. I don't remember if it said. But to do what needs to be done, to give that human touch, one person volunteered two hours. and as I said the doctors and nurses did what what they could but a little bit later a man and his wife stepped forward a pastor and his wife and said we would like to adopt this baby and did and I do not know what this baby faces there were things that the lady wrote in the column that make [00:33:15] This made me think that this baby has ongoing challenges because of the fact that it was born prematurely. But the person writing the column said this. She asked her brother, who was the pastor, Why did you choose this baby to adopt? And this is what her brother told her. She said, this baby doesn't have to be first or take any prizes. [00:33:49] There is one thing that I would like for the records in the future to say about this baby. And those were the words that I read to you out of Genesis chapter 5, that he walked with God. And really, as I think about that, isn't that what we should desire that we be known by? The fact that we can be identified as children of God. [00:34:22] That the people down the road will look back and say, Oh, those people put into their walk of life, into their conversation, the King James Version says, what it means to be a child of God. I trust that that is our case. In some of the situations that we have been involved in, we have heard some things that were mentioned, like being an intellectual, and kind of as though this were something, since I was created an intellectual, this is something that I need to pursue. [00:35:13] Well, if that pursuit brings honor and glory to God, if that pursuit identifies us as people of God, and God leads you in that way, go for it. But there is one thing that I think we do well to remember, and that is that being intellectual, or having a gift with woodworking, or having a gift in anything else, that's a gift. It's not a virtue. [00:35:45] It's not a virtue until we use it to bring honor and glory to God. Then it can be a virtue. Sometimes we would like to have God bring us revival. I am reminded of what a man said about revival. I don't know who the man was, and I am depending on my memory for this. But he said, if you want to have revival, and I trust that that is our desire, but he said this, go into your prayer closet, he said, draw a circle big enough to kneel in, kneel in that circle, and don't leave until you have experienced revival here. [00:36:27] He said, if you do that, revival will happen. And I think God wants to use us to bring revival, but until it happens right here. It's not going to do me any good. That is the purpose that I think we're for. To seek God's face. To let him work through us. Let him work his purposes through us. And when we become so like God that our purpose and his purpose gets blended, you can't tell one from the other, then revival will happen. Shall we bow in prayer? Our Father in heaven, we thank you this morning that your desire is for our good, your desire is for revival, and for your purpose to take place in each one of our lives. [00:37:26] I pray, Father, that you would help us to remember that the things that you have given to us to be stewards over are gifts to be used to build your kingdom. And I pray, Father, that you would help us to have as our primary purpose to be building your kingdom. Whether that means being woodworkers or whatever you have called us to, Father, help us to do that in a way that you will be seen in us. [00:38:05] And so that people can be aware that this is a man that God is using or this is a woman that God is using. May you help us, Father, to not be satisfied until we reach that place. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.