Stirring Up the Nest
Sermon by Pastor Dennis Gleason -- July 25, 2004
“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” Psalm 23:1:1b
"I've learned that if you give a pig and a boy everything they want, you'll get a good pig and a bad boy." -- (age 77) from Live and Learn and Pass it On, Jackson Brown, Jr.
"Sin comes when we take a perfectly natural desire or longing or ambition and try desperately to fulfill it without God. Not only is it sin, it is a perverse distortion of the image of the Creator in us. All these good things, and all our security, are rightly found only and completely in him." -- Augustine, The Confessions of Saint Augustine.
C.S. Lewis gave us the following insight: "Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition, when infinite joy is offered to us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in the slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased." -- Michael Horton, Editor, The Agony of Deceit, 1990, Moody Press
A storekeeper in Maine refused to buy a salesman's wares. "You must remember, young fellow," he said, "that in this part of the country every want ain't a need."
Psalm 37:4 tells us: “Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart.”
Someone has said, “Where there is heaven in the heart, there will be heaven in the house.” Notice that the Psalmist has made the way for us clear:
1. Do not fret because of evil men
2. Trust in the Lord and do good
3. Delight yourself in the Lord and he shall give you the desires of your heart.
When the Lord is our shepherd and we delight in the Lord and trust Him, we will desire or ask for nothing but what will please God. For this reason it is easy for God to give us carte blanche. Our wills will be subdued to the will of God and because of it we can have what we will from God. God has no problem with giving us what our heart desires. He gives us what we desire and he places the right kind of desires in our hearts when we want only His Will in our lives.
It is our innermost desires that are in view here and not just what we casually wish for. There are many things our old nature might desire which grace would never permit us to have or ask for; these deep asking desires are those to which the promise is made.
When the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. That is the promise of God. He is my shepherd and he cares for me, watches over me and preserves me. These words are all in the present tense…he does all of this for me now.
The inference for us here is that because of this first statement of the Psalmist: “The Lord is my shepherd…” we shall not want. I shall not lack for temporal things or spiritual things. He is able to supply my needs. And he is certainly willing to do so; because his heart is full of love for me. He who feeds the ravens and causes the lilies to grow will care for his children.
“The young lions do lack and suffer hunger: but they that seek the Lord shall not want for any good thing.” The application of all of this for us is not only do I not want but I shall not want! It will not be true because I have money in the bank, retirement funds in my account or because I have the wit and skill to provide for myself. It will be true because the Lord is my shepherd and he will care for me to provide me with what I have need of.
Now the remainder of this psalm is an exposition of how the Lord will provide for me and my needs. It is what the shepherd does for his sheep to meet their needs. And one by one we will see what things the shepherd does for his sheep…
But before we go there together we need to pause here for a few moments longer.
The promise of God to us in this passage is that because the Lord is our shepherd we will not want. We will not lack what we need.
Now, let’s be honest with one another. We have wanted some things that we have never received. We have even asked God for some things and he hasn’t given them to us…yet.
How are we to reconcile these two things…the promise and the fulfillment of the promise with the fact that there are things we have never received and still want?
We do have difficulties and troubles as Christians that God does nothing about…to either keep them from us or remove them once they have come into our experience.
Peter tells us “In this you greatly rejoice, thought now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith – of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire – may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.” 1 Peter 1:6-7.
There have been times when we have asked God for certain things and nothing has happened.
James says, “What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? You want something but don’t get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” James 4:1-3.
James also says this in the first chapter of his epistle: Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” James 1:2-4
God’s desire for your life and mine is that we become mature believers. Our faith will be tested. It is as simple as that. We believe and trust God. We choose to make him our shepherd, the Lord of our life and our savior. We accept his offer of forgiveness of sin, of new life and the hope of our future with him in Heaven. Having accepted his offer, we confess our sin and ask for forgiveness. In turn he forgives us and restores us in our relationship with God.
Amy Carmichael once penned these thoughts: Sometimes when we read the words of those who have been more than conquerors, we feel almost despondent. I feel that I shall never be like that. But they won through step by step by little bits of wills, little denials of self, little inward victories by faithfulness in very little things. They became what they are. No one sees these little hidden steps. They only see the accomplishment, but even so, those small steps were taken. There is no sudden triumph to spiritual maturity. That is the work of the moment.
Do you remember what God told the Apostle Paul when he was afflicted with what Paul calls his “thorn in the flesh”? Three times he asked to take it away and three times God said “No!” Finally God told Paul: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Difficulties come into our lives, it is true. God not only allows them, but sends them to us. How can that be if the promise of God is that “I shall not want.”?
Well, we have to get ready for Heaven. As we are, we will never fit in there. We are somewhat well suited for here on earth, but without radical changes we will never be ready for eternity with Christ. So it is that the promise of God that I shall not want includes not wanting the spiritual as well as the physical or temporal. He will work in our lives and produce the qualities necessary to suit us for heaven. And for most of us that is quite an undertaking. However, he is committed to getting us there and having us ready for it when we get there.
Though many of us have seen pictures of a huge eagle's nest high in the branches of a tree or in the crag of a cliff, few of us have gotten a glimpse inside. When a mother eagle builds her nest she starts with thorns, broken branches, sharp rocks, and a number of other items that seem entirely unsuitable for the project. But then she lines the nest with a thick padding of wool, feathers, and fur from animals she has killed, making it soft and comfortable for the eggs. By the time the growing birds reach flying age, the comfort of the nest and the luxury of free meals make them quite reluctant to leave. That's when the mother eagle begins "stirring up the nest." With her strong talons she begins pulling up the thick carpet of fur and feathers, bringing the sharp rocks and branches to the surface. As more of the bedding gets plucked up, the nest becomes more uncomfortable for the young eagles. Eventually, this and other urgings prompt the growing eagles to leave their once-comfortable abode and move on to more mature behavior.
With God as he “stirs up the nest”, his grace is always sufficient for us. We always have everything we need for life and godliness.
This truth is found in 2 Peter 1:3 “His divine power has give us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.”
Everything we need for life and godliness is our present possession. We already have it. We just have to believe this fact and accept this truth and then live like we do.
Remember, “faith is believing something is true even when it is not yet true so that it can be true.”
We have had a challenge all week long. Last Sunday evening we met together at RuthAnn’s request that we anoint her with oil and pray for the healing of her MS. Quite a challenge and we met the challenge and prayed for her and others. Reality is that according to Scripture in James 5 she has what she asked for…healing. While some things are obvious results from that time of prayer, the healing is not yet complete. She has improved but the work is not complete yet. How and when it will be revealed in all its completeness is in God’s hands. But the truth is that she has everything she needs for life and godliness and that healing is real or God is a liar and His Word is not true. We know God does not lie and His Word is true; therefore, she has what she asked for.
Perhaps, the waiting for the complete healing is part of the process of bringing her and perhaps us as well to maturity in Christ.
The Lord is our shepherd, and we shall not want. That is God’s promise to us. And it is true no matter how things may appear on the outside.
--Dennis Gleason
