Restoration 2018:  Our Picture of God

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Restoration Ministry

Dee Casper

Don’t Forget Where You Came From

Oh sweet Jesus, I thank you that you have a blessing in store for us this evening, I believe.

And I just pray that you would keep me from getting in your way, that your spirit would indeed be present, that you would personalize this message for each and every person in this room, and that you would do something that none of us would soon forget.

Again, just a friendly reminder, the ARTV card should be in the back of the decision table if you'd like to learn more about the Adventist Review's new on-demand media platform.

The Android app just came out like yesterday, and iOS apps are coming very, very soon, so we're excited for that.

But if you're a filmmaker, an editor, script writer, have experience in media, I'd love to talk with you and see if there's maybe ways we can partner together.

The cards are in the back, and please come see me afterwards.

What I'd like to do is begin with the story of the best advice I've received in ministry to date.

I was at ASI, a large gathering basically of mission-minded business people and ministry people who kind of are meeting together trying to figure out how to finish the work.

Great networking opportunities, inspirational messages, training, and so forth.

While I'm there, I met with someone, a well-known evangelist, his name is Taj Pakleb, and Hawaiian guy, fantastic dude, was just hanging out with him a couple weeks ago at GYC Northwest, really, really nice guy.

And he's an introvert like me, so I felt like I could kind of resonate with him and get some good advice from him.

And so I asked him, I was like, hey man, what advice do you wish you would have received knowing what you know now when you first began?

Because he's been doing this for quite a while.

What do you wish someone would have told you on day 1, standing where you are now?

And instead of giving me a direct answer, he began by telling me a story.

It's not a totally foreign thing, telling a story that indirectly will deal with the question.

And he started telling me about the man at the pool of Bethesda in John chapter 5.

But the man at the pool Bethesda has been an invalid for how many years?

He's been in a terrible condition And as he's at this pool Bethesda, Jesus rolls up to this guy and asks him, Do you want to be made well?

I think the answer that's obvious, right?

Though we walked through that last evening.

But then he tells him something else which somewhat makes sense and some of it is a little bit perplexing.

He tells the man to rise, to take up his mat, and to walk.

And what Taj told me was that 2 of those things make sense, 1 of them does not.

The rising and the walking make sense, but what's with the mat?

Like this guy's mat is just a reminder of 38 years of rejection, abandonment, shame, and hopelessness.

What Jesus is basically telling the man is to not forget where you came from.

It's exactly that, a reminder of what you've been going through and a reminder of the goodness of God in spite of what you were going through.

And Jesus is basically telling the man to not forget where he came from.

And it was a very precious lesson to me as someone in ministry who this whole public figure thing is kind of horrifying to me as an introvert.

But anyway, it's a gift from God, it's a blessing to be used by God in whatever means he deems necessary, so I can't really argue with him.

But the point is, it's the best advice I could have received going into ministry.

It's not about you, it's never been about you, it's only been the grace of God that you're doing what you're doing.

But his counsel reminded me of the story of 2 people in Scripture in the New Testament, Simon the leper and Mary Magdalene.

They have 2 different journeys and life journeys, but they converge in the feet of Jesus in a very unique way that I think kind of brings out this lesson that we're talking about this evening.

So Simon is a religious leader who contracts leprosy and that's a bad day, right?

Any day that you contract leprosy it's horrible.

But the problem is it's not just the fact that he's contracted leprosy as an individual.

As a religious leader the view of that day was if you contract leprosy it's a curse from God.

So just imagine being a religious public figure who's now cursed by God.

You're separated from intimacy with people around you.

No hugs, no handshakes, complete isolation for this man.

And Jesus miraculously heals this guy and completely restores his ministry.

Now just imagine, I remember hearing the story of Steve Wahlberg a few months ago on AudioVerse, where a minister in our denomination, and he travels and speaks a lot.

And he, towards the, I don't know, about April or so of last year, he all of a sudden couldn't sleep, was having panic and anxiety attacks, was overthrown by depression, couldn't think right, was hearing voices.

It got really, really bad, and he was assured of the fact that he would never be in ministry ever again.

His entire life as he knew it was over, and it was miserable.

He was having to take sleeping pills just to try to function, but then ended up having like an addiction to sleeping pills.

It just caused him a whole lot of problems.

He eventually was able to go to the Nedley Institute when Dr.

Nedley heard about his situation and said, you need to come here immediately.

And so they took him through the program, helped to get him on his feet again, and I heard the sermon that he shared, I think it's called like, Help, I Can't Sleep, or something like that on AudioVerse, if you look it up.

But anyway, the point was, whenever he was preaching this message, telling the story of all what he went through, he's weeping, because he was sure that he would never have the privilege of serving God's people ever again, that his life was over, and God in his great mercy restored Steve to fill this role once again.

And when this is all you've known and you feel it's what God made you for and that's yanked out from under you, it can be a really crippling thing.

So just imagine how Simon the leper must have felt whenever Jesus radically restores his life.

What a blessing from the healing ministry of Jesus.

Mary Magdalene, I don't know what's going on there.

Anyway, a feast is going to be held at, she actually has a very similar story, Mary Magdalene does, that she is an outcast in the community because she was abused at a young age, was led her to going into other promiscuous lifestyle things, and she ends up in a situation where she's also an outcast in the community and everyone this is 1 of those small communities in Bethany like it reminds me of the opening lines in the song for cheers you know where everyone knows your name everybody knows your business in Bethany everyone knows her story right she's a mess she's got issues she's got baggage this is her story but Jesus heals this woman as well, restores her as well, and what ends up happening is that there's a feast held at Simon the leper's house in honor of 2 things.

The first is Simon's own restoration, but the second is the raising of Lazarus.

And this was super significant because Lazarus, he kind of, you know, died and stuff, and Jesus raised him from the dead, right?

Jesus literally resurrects this guy outside of that three-day window we talked about a few days earlier that many Jews were believing that you couldn't raise someone from the dead after 3 days because the spirit leaves the body but it stays there for 3 days.

And I'm not so hip on that particular theology but that was a belief they had in that day.

And so whenever Jesus heals this guy after 4 days, raises him from the dead, there's a whole lot of commotion.

So there's 2 big reasons for people to gather at the house of Simon the leper.

And an uninvited guest arrives at this gathering and completely steals the show.

This text is found in Mark 14, if you'd like to go with me there.

And I believe we'll actually have this on the board here.

It's good to have it in front of you too.

Mark chapter 14, beginning in verse 3, says, "...in being at Bethany, At the house of Simon the leper, as he sat at the table, a woman came having an alabaster flask of very costly oil of spikenard, of perfume.

And then she broke the flask and poured it on his head.

But there were some who were ending it among themselves and said, why was this fragrant oil, and what's the next word they say?

This woman buys a gift with everything she has as a thank offering for Jesus, and people have the audacity to say that she's wasting this gift on Jesus.

For it might have been sold for more than 300 denarii and given to the poor, and they criticized her sharply.

Now, who is it that starts these insinuations?

Is Judas actually concerned for the poor?

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Don’t Forget Where You Came From

Transcript

Parent Conference

Sponsor

Recorded

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WYC 2012 Plenary Sessions

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