“RISE UP: LIVING YOUR LIFE WITH POWER”



“RISE UP: LIVING YOUR LIFE WITH POWER”

Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff

May 17, 2009

Cornerstone Community Church

I know I’ve mentioned working out at The Right Stuff down the street a number of times over the years, which got me to wondering just how long I’ve been a member there. It turns out I joined the gym in November of 1997. I mentioned this to two of the guys I often see at the gym the other day. And do you know what their immediate reaction was? They laughed. They tried not to; they knew it was impolite to laugh. But they just couldn’t help themselves. So I just said what they were thinking: “I’ve been lifting weights for 12 years, and this is all I have to show for it.”

But then I made this observation: “Think what my body would look like if I hadn’t been working out for the last 12 years!” I realize that I will never look like a weight lifter. But the fact is that lifting weights has made me stronger – my biceps are stronger than before, my shoulders are stronger and my chest is stronger. Unfortunately, and much to my disappointment, my wrists seem to get smaller every year. There are 95 year old men in my Mom’s retirement home with bigger, more powerful wrists than these. My wrists are barely big enough to keep my hands attached to my arms.

Now as you can tell, it’s always bothered me to have small wrists. When I worked as a lawyer I worked with a partner who was a brilliant guy. But do you know what most impressed me about him? He was about the same size and height as me, but he had these thick, manly wrists and these powerful, hairy forearms that just put mine to shame. And while I know this sounds pretty silly and pretty immature, I imagine that there is something about you that feels small that you have always wished you could change. Maybe like me it’s something physical. Or maybe there’s something in your personality that feels small. Maybe it’s the job you have that makes you feel small, or your bank account, or something in your family background. And all your life you’ve wished you could take that small part of you and make it big and strong and powerful, because if you could just do that – well, then you would be a big and strong and powerful person.

And to all of us Jesus says, “Don’t sweat the small stuff. Don’t let your life be ruined by things you can’t change. Don’t invest your emotional energy worrying about things that ultimately don’t matter. The size of your wrists – that’s small stuff. The size of your bank account – small stuff. Your place in the corporate ladder – small stuff. Don’t sweat it. Don’t worry about it, don’t lose sleep over it, don’t lose joy over it. Don’t sweat the small stuff.”

But as we have said in this series, it’s not all small stuff. I know – Richard Carlson’s classic best-seller is entitled “Don’t Sweat The Small Stuff … And It’s All Small Stuff.” But the truth, as even Carlson acknowledges in his book, is that it’s not all small stuff. While there is much in our lives that in the long run doesn’t matter, certain things do matter. And it is our mission in this series to discover those things that do matter, to learn how to live a life that really matters. Our strategy to discover how to live such a life is to examine the life of the one person in history who everyone would agree lived a life that really mattered – Jesus. By his words Jesus taught us what really matters. By his life Jesus showed us what really matters. And by his death and resurrection Jesus gives us the power to live a life that really matters.

In the first week of our series we discovered that a life that really matters is a life lived with purpose. In our second week we saw that a life that really matters is a life lived with passion. And today we will discover that a life that really matters is a life lived with power.

There is something in each of us that hungers for power. I’m sure you’ve noticed that it’s not just at the auto mall or the hardware store that we talk about getting more power. Hang out at the computer section at Best Buy for a few minutes and you will hear more than one customer telling the salesperson that they need a computer with “more power.” Come with me to the gym and watch people work out. We aren’t there simply because we want to lower our cholesterol or because we like to sweat. We want more power – more powerful biceps, more powerful abs and more powerful quads. Some of you are familiar with Tony Robbins. He’s got a new infomercial, this one hosted by Tom Selleck, filmed at Tony’s personal island in Fiji. How did Tony Robbins get rich and famous? By teaching people how, in his words, to unleash their “personal power,” which Tony Robbins defines as “the capacity to take massive, consistent, and intelligent action to produce the results you truly desire in life.”

And according to the Bible, a life that really matters is a life lived with power – real power, supernatural power. Not the power to drive a golf ball 300 yards or the power to drive a baseball 500 feet. Not the power of being the ruler of a company or a country. Not even the power to send a man or a woman into space. Do you know what that kind of power is, at least from where God sits? Small stuff, all small stuff. But the power Jesus offers us isn’t small stuff. The power Jesus offers is the stuff of a life that really matters, the stuff of a life lived large. It is the power of God, the same power that raised the crucified Jesus back to life.

Over and over again the Bible promises us that if we will follow Jesus with all our hearts, that if we make Jesus our Leader and our Lord, he will enable us to live our lives with power. In 1 Corinthians 4:10 the Bible says, “For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk, but of power.” Back when I was still working as a lawyer I spent a fair bit of time in my car commuting to Palo Alto, and in part to pass the time I broke down and ordered the Tony Robbins’ audio series called “Personal Power 2.” The claim is that this series will teach you how to develop the power to take control of your life. Included in the program is a monthly series called “Power Talk” in which Robbins interviews different successful people so we can learn what they have done to become successful.

Now I learned quite a bit from that series and from those interviews that I thought was fairly helpful. But I also learned that as insightful as those interviews were, they still fell short of giving me what I need. What I need is not “power talk.” What I need is power. I don’t just need someone to tell me what to do. I need someone to help me do it. And that’s what Jesus offers me, which neither Tony Robbins nor Dr. Phil nor anyone else can. Jesus offers to give you and me real power. The kingdom of God, the Bible says, is not a matter of talk. The kingdom of God is a matter of power – supernatural, irresistible power.

And nowhere is the power available to us as followers of Jesus more in evidence than in the resurrection of Jesus. Now I know it’s not Easter, and we usually only talk about the resurrection on Easter Sunday, which we celebrated about a month or so ago. But I checked, and it seems there is no rule against talking about the resurrection on other Sundays. So I’m going to spend a few minutes this morning revisiting Jesus’ resurrection as a way of helping us discover how we can make use of that same power in our own lives today.

The Power To Live With Confidence

Let me ask you this – what comes to your mind when you visualize a powerful person? The first image that pops into my head is a person who lives with confidence. A little while ago I saw some interviews on Sportscenter with some of baseball’s greatest home run hitters, and each of them sounded the same theme – hitting home runs isn’t all about having think wrists and big biceps. In large part, they said, it’s a matter of confidence. The biggest factor in hitting, they said, was the confidence they had when they stepped up to the plate that they would somehow be able to hit any ball the pitcher threw to them.

So what’s your confidence level when it comes to living life? Do you have the confidence that you can hit any ball life throws your way, that you can rise above any challenge or any obstacle life drops in your path? I’m not talking about being arrogant or cocky; I’m not talking about an obnoxious self-bravado. I am talking about the quiet confidence that comes from having a relationship with the resurrected Jesus. Listen to these words from one of Jesus’ followers, a man named Paul: “I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength.” (Philippians 4:13) So what did he mean by that? Frankly, he wasn’t talking about hitting home runs or mastering calculus or starting his own business. He was talking about the confidence that he could rise above any situation that came his way. Paul said it like this: “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.” (Philippians 4:12) Jesus gives us the power to live with the confidence that we can rise above anything life throws our way.

Before Jesus’ resurrection, Jesus’ followers were anything but confidant. Here’s what we know about the disciples, who followed Jesus around Israel for three full years. They gave up everything to follow Jesus – their homes, their jobs, even their families. They were convinced that Jesus was the Messiah, the one the prophets had predicted would lead Israel out of its oppression by the Romans. They had staked their lives on Jesus. All of their eggs were in this one basket. One of the first rules of investing, of course, is to diversify. Never put all your eggs in one basket. Invest some of your money in tech stocks, some in energy stocks, some in financials, and some in blue chips. The disciples wouldn’t have made good stock brokers, because they never even thought about diversifying. They invested everything in following Jesus.

And then everything went bad, very bad. We call it Good Friday, but for the disciples it was very much Black Friday. Their leader, their Messiah – he was dead. And the people who had arrested and crucified Jesus were quite likely looking for the disciples. So what did they do? They hid. They found a hiding place, locked the door and stayed put, like little kids who pull the covers over their head because they’re afraid of the dark. They were afraid to show their faces in public, afraid of every knock at the door, afraid of every shadow around the corner. They had no plan, no direction, no hope, and no confidence. They were immobilized by their anxiety.

Can you relate? A survey of primary care physicians in the United States found that at least one third of office visits are prompted not by a physical ailment but by some form of anxiety. Over the course of a lifetime, 25% of our population will meet the criteria for one or more medical conditions called “anxiety disorders,” treatable disorders defined by the presence of debilitating worry. Worry, the experts tell us, literally makes us sick. Dr. Charles Mayo of the Mayo Clinic said this: “Worry affects circulation, the glands, the whole nervous system and profoundly affects the heart. I have never known a man who died from overwork, but many who died from doubt.”

That was the disciples – dying from doubt. Jesus told them he was the Messiah. He promised them eternal life. They believed him. They bet their lives on him. And now he’s dead. They had watched his crucifixion, they watched his loved ones wrap his body in spices and burial cloths, they watched as his corpse was placed in the tomb, and they watched as the stone was rolled in front of the grave. How could they not doubt him? How could they not doubt his claims and his promises? And if something so awful could happen to Jesus, they why shouldn’t they be worried about something awful happening to them? If anyone had a reason to be anxious, surely it was them.

And yet, within a mere handful of days, those same eleven men were on the front lines of the Christian faith, fearlessly proclaiming the good news about Jesus with complete confidence and power. Peter, who denied even knowing Jesus three times, now tells the same authorities who crucified Jesus, “Do with me what you want, but I will not stop talking about Jesus my Lord.” The eleven disciples, who had been afraid of their own shadows, who refused to leave their locked hideaway, suddenly could not be contained. No more fear, no more anxiety, no more worry, no more doubt.

So what caused such a dramatic change? Why the sudden burst of confidence? There is only one explanation. Jesus rose. Listen to Peter’s speech to the very people who were responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion: “This man was handed over to you … and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross. But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him … God has raised this Jesus to life, and we are all witnesses of the fact.” (Acts 2:23-24, 32)

One of the most compelling reasons for us to believe that Jesus really rose from the dead is the transformation of the disciples. Some skeptics have argued through the years that what really happened is that the disciples stole the body of Jesus and then lied about it to the people. There are a number of logical problems with such a theory, and here is one of them – what’s the motivation? What would the disciples gain from stealing the body of Jesus? And here’s the big question – why would they be willing to die for something they knew was a lie? If you follow the lives of Jesus’ disciples to the end, you will discover that every one of them went to their graves swearing that Jesus had risen from the dead. Six of the disciples were themselves crucified for preaching that Jesus had risen. Peter, who denied knowing Jesus three times, was crucified upside down because he insisted Jesus had risen from the dead. Matthew and James were stabbed to death for preaching about the resurrection, one disciple was shot to death with arrows, and another was stoned to death. Here’s the point. People will die for what they believe to be true, even though their beliefs may be wrong. But nobody dies for what they know to be a lie. It is simply incomprehensible to believe that Jesus’ disciples stole his body.

So how did the disciples know Jesus rose from the dead? What was the source of their confidence? Because the risen Jesus appeared to them. They saw Jesus put to death on Friday; they saw him put in a sealed tomb Friday night. But on Sunday, they saw the risen Jesus in the flesh with their very own eyes. The written records tell us that for 40 days after his resurrection Jesus appeared to his disciples and to numerous other witnesses on numerous occasions. Let’s not make the mistake of thinking that this is the case of a few whacked-out nut jobs who thought they saw Jesus in a burrito. On one occasion, the Bible says, Jesus appeared in the flesh to a group of over 500 people. Some skeptics try to explain these appearances away by saying that they must have been hallucinations. But there are two problems with that theory. First, hallucinations don’t happen in groups. Like dreams, hallucinations are individual experiences, not group experiences. Has your family ever sat down for breakfast and said to each other, “Wow, what a neat dream we had last night!” Of course not. Dreams, like hallucinations, don’t happen to groups.

And secondly, hallucinations happen to people who intensely want to believe in what they see. But the people who saw Jesus had to be convinced against their wills that Jesus had risen. When the women who first discovered the empty tomb and who first saw the risen Jesus told the disciples what they had seen, the disciples had the same reaction as my gym friends had to me – they laughed at them. Jesus then put a stop to the laughter when he appeared in the flesh one evening to ten of the eleven disciples, all except for Thomas. Do you remember how Thomas came to be called Doubting Thomas? Here’s what he said when his buddies told him that Jesus was alive: “Unless I see the scars of the nails in his hands and put my finger on those scars and my hand in his side, I will not believe.” (John 20:25) Thomas apparently thought his buds were hallucinating, and he wasn’t about to be so gullible. He wanted proof. And Jesus gave it to him. Jesus appeared to him and said, “Here, Thomas, here are my feet and my hands. Feel the scars. Touch my side. I’m not a ghost, Thomas. You aren’t hallucinating. This isn’t a dream.” It was only against his will that Thomas, the most famous doubter of all time, became convinced that Jesus had in fact been raised from the dead. And it changed his life. No more doubts, no more anxiety, no more fear. History tells us that Thomas took the message of the resurrected Jesus farther than any of the other disciples, all the way to Southern India, where he too was killed for preaching the Gospel. There is only one way to explain the change in Thomas – Thomas saw the risen Jesus in the flesh.

And from then on the disciples lived their lives with complete confidence, with the confidence that they could rise above any obstacle, that they could hit whatever life threw their way. They could live with confidence because they were confident that Jesus had been raised from the dead. Before their lives had been dominated by the fear that they might be killed. But no more. Now they knew that because of Jesus’ resurrection, even death itself was just small stuff. They weren’t going to sweat it anymore. If death was the worst that could happen to them, then there was nothing to be afraid of. Jesus had taken care of that.

The Power To Live With Control

We have said that a life that really matters is a life lived with power, and that part of what it means to live with power is to live with confidence. The Bible also tells us that a life of power is a life of control. In 2 Timothy 1:7 the Bible says, “For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-control.”

Think about it – what does it feel like when you feel powerless? For most of us to feel powerless is to feel out of control. To be powerless is to have someone or something else control our actions and our destinies. Certainly that’s how the disciples felt in those days of despair and doubt between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. And it is how many of us feel in this economy. It’s how many of us feel when we get the test results back from the doctor. More often than not, it seems, things that are very important to us feel very much out of our control.

In fact, that’s the key word, isn’t it – feel. I picked up a book by one of the many psychologists on the radio a while ago, and in this book the author says that the number one excuse people give her on the air to justify doing something they readily admit is immoral is their feelings. They will tell her they know what they did or what they are doing is wrong, but they couldn’t help it because they felt unhappy or confused or in love or lonely or needy or anxious. And then this author wrote this: “By the way, by using the word feeling, most people think they are on sacred ground, since pop psychology has elevated feelings from information to irresistible force.” That’s true, isn’t it? We basically believe that we can’t resist our feelings, that our feelings control us, that our feelings control what we think and what we say and what we do. We are powerless to resist our feelings.

And Jesus says to us, “That’s not true. The same power that made it possible for me to rise above death is available to enable you to rise above your feelings. You don’t need to be controlled by your feelings of loneliness. You don’t need to be controlled by your feelings of anxiety. I can give you the power to be in control, to rise above your hormones and your emotions and your circumstances. I can give you the power to think clearly, to choose wisely, to act responsibly, to live holy, no matter what you might be feeling.”

And that is where the power the resurrected Jesus offers us is so much more than what any psychologist or fitness coach or financial advisor could ever offer us. They can offer us good advice. Dr. Laura’s good advice is, “Act on your morals, not on your feelings.” The financial advisor’s good advice is, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket – diversify.” Tony Robbins’ good advice is, “Design your own destiny.” The fitness coach’s good advice is, “Take control of your health; get in shape by exerting your will power.” But what Jesus offers us is far more than good advice on how to live well; Jesus offers us the power to live well. Jesus offers more than a manual on how to drive a car; he is the engine that powers the car, just as he offers to power our lives. The same power that enabled Jesus to rise above death is available to enable us to rise above our feelings and to rise above our fears.

But for all his power, there is something Jesus is still powerless to achieve. He has the power to rise above death. He has the power to create something out of nothing. He has the power to forgive our sins. He has the power to transform our lives, to melt away our fear and our anxiety and our doubt and despair and to fill us with confidence and joy and peace. He has all the power in the world. And yet all the power in the world cannot unlock the door to the human heart. My heart and your heart can only be unlocked from the inside. The Bible tells us that Jesus, gentleman that he is, is knocking at the door, that he is eager to come into our lives to enable us to live lives that really matter and to rise above those things that would drag us down. But the choice is ours. We are the ones who control our destiny; not even Jesus has the power to make this choice for us. The key is in your hand. The good news of the resurrection is that Jesus is alive. But it is only good news for you if Jesus is alive in you. And he can be, if you will open the door to your heart and invite Jesus to become your Savior and your Lord.

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