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The Divine Invasion
A sermon preached by Dr. James Flamming
Pastor, First Baptist Church, Richmond, Virginia
Sunday, November 28, 2004
Scripture: Galatians 4:4-6
One of my favorites of the Narnia Chronicles of C.S. Lewis
is Prince Caspian. If you have read the Narnia children’s stories you
will remember that there are four children, whose names were Peter, Susan,
Edmund, and Lucy. In an earlier book called The Lion, The Witch and the
Wardrobe, they opened a magic door and found themselves in a quite different
world from ours. In that world they weren’t children at all but Kings and Queens
and called upon to do things they never thought they could do. For a year now
they have been back in England. They are on their way to school, Lucy feels as
if someone is pulling her, then the others feel it too. They hold onto one
another and find themselves back in that other world of Narnia, standing in a
wood with huge trees on all sides. Eventually they find shelter and discover
that they are in the ruins of the old Castle at Cair Paravel at the mouth of the
Great River of Narnia. This was the castle where they had been Kings and Queens
in their earlier visit to Narnia. But now it seems as if Cair Paravel is no
more. It is overgrown, empty, and deserted. The original dream that brought it
into being has long been forgotten. For the wonder of Narnia has been taken over
by those whose lives are full of anger and fear. Aslan, the Lion-Christ, has
called Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy back for a purpose. They are called to
help him restore the Kingdom of Narnia and put Prince Caspian on the throne.
It is a parable, a story, about our world. All you need to
do is read the headlines to get the feeling that some grand vision has been lost
somewhere. God’s great dream for his world has been tarnished, bent out of
shape, forgotten and abandoned.
The parable actually begins in Genesis 3. In early Genesis,
everything fits, everything flows, all is at peace. Adam and Eve are living
peacefully and innocently in the Garden of Eden. Then from the counsel of
eternity, God announces that Adam and Eve will be made in God’s image. This
means that God will allow us to become choosers, like he is. This will allow us
to love, to create, to organize, to make, and get and spend. With choice Satan
enters, temptation wins out, and Adam and Eve are the first to abandon God’s
dream. They choose to become their own gods, organizing life by their own
patterns and choices. Judgment comes. They are thrown out of the Garden.
Christians call this episode in the life of Adam and Eve
and in the lives of all of us, The Fall. Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall.
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall; All the Kings horses, All the Kings men,
couldn’t put Humpty together again. The fall means, with Adam and Eve,
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that we believe we can be the captain of our
fate.
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that we can do whatever we want to do and no one
else matters.
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that we can handle life all by ourselves.
The question is this: What is God going with His fallen
world?
This is where Christmas comes in. The newspaper pictures of
the shoppers crowding into the stores after Thanksgiving reminds us all that the
Christmas rush is on. Getting and spending we lay waste our Christ. On a more
joyous, holy note it means Advent has arrived. The Arrival of the Christ!
What Is God Going To Do With His Fallen World?
One thing God could do would be to erase the power we
have to choose. None of us want that, especially not God for he gave us
choice in the first place. In truth, God seems to be stubborn in allowing us
choices, for it is overcoming the wrong ones we often find him.
And let us not forget that God is also in the business of
making choices. Paul says, “He chose us before the foundation of the world.” The
question is what are we going to do with being chosen? It is the great paradox.
We are chosen, yet we choose. What we sometimes forget is that we are
accountable in our chosenness.
Another thing God could do is just walk off and leave
His fallen world. God could cut out. Like Pilate, God could wash his hands
of the whole affair and say, “enough is enough.”
And some people think everything is already decided
anyway.
They believe that God has programmed everything from the
beginning and we are just living out his decisions. This is not very far from
the belief of the ancient world who pictured many gods controlling virtually
everything people did. Reread Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.
But if everything is already decided, why do we need a
Christ?
This is where Christmas comes in. The declaration of the
Gospel is that God so loved the world that he invaded his bent-out-of-shape
world with the love and Spirit of Jesus.
I read once of a man who owned an old car he had cherished
for years. But the year came when he said, “I don’t drive it much. I don’t need
it. I pay taxes on it. I guess I should sell it.” So he did. Then one day he saw
it sitting on a lot for a Rent-A-Dent rent car agency. It had been in an
accident or two. Fenders were bent. The paint was pealing off. He asked the man
what he wanted for it and bought it back. He said to himself as he drove it out,
“I love this old car. We’ve been together in many ups and downs. It deserves a
better fate than this.”
God looked at his old world. It had been in more accidents
than he could count. The paint was pealing off. He said to himself, “I love this
old world. We’ve been together through many ups and downs. It deserves a better
fate than this.” So God invaded this world with two great gifts of his presence:
his Son and his Spirit.
Let me show you how. Invade Galatians 4:4-6 with your
attention. The page is 1813 in your pew Bible.
The First Invasion of God’s Presence
“God Sent His Son” (Galatians 4:4)
I’m going to take this verse apart for you. Turn to the
person next to you and say, “The Pastor is going to take this verse apart for
us.”
Look at the phrase God Sent. The word for sent that
Paul uses here is the word from which we get Apostle. An Apostle is one who is
sent. Jesus was God’s first Apostle, God’s heavenly apostle, God’s eternal
apostle, his Son as apostle. The emphasis is on who sent him – God sent His
Son.
Look now at Son, God sent his Son. When we
use the word Son we do not mean son in the same way as I would use the word for
my sons. For my sons are mine by procreation, and God’s Son was from the
beginning of all things. Furthermore, the Bible says, “God is Spirit,” (John
4:24) Spirit does not have skin, bones, arms, legs, eyes, ears. What the Bible
means when it says that Jesus is God’s Son is that the Spirit of God so
completely dwelt within him that he is God’s likeness in human flesh.
We enjoyed so much the visit of our youngest son and his
family at our house this last Thanksgiving. After feasting throughout the day,
Doug and I were sitting at the table enjoying conversation. I think we were
unable to move because we had eaten so much and yet not wanting to move lest we
miss another desert that might come by.
Elizabeth, his daughter and my granddaughter, came up to us
and said, “You two are so much alike.” I said, “How? Your Daddy has a full head
of black hair and my hair got scared, turned white and ran away. Your Father has
a beard and I don’t. I wear glasses and he doesn’t. He is almost three inches
taller than I am. I am older and he is younger. He teaches in a University and I
preach in a church. How are we so much alike?” She didn’t even have to think
about it. She said, “You talk alike, you sound alike, you carry yourselves in
the same way. You look at things in the same way. You express yourselves in the
same way.” I was reminded of when Doug taught at Virginia Tech. One of his
students visited a relative in Richmond and came to church here one Sunday. She
said to her Aunt on the way home, “You know it is amazing how many mannerism and
expressions Dr. Flamming has borrowed from his son.”
When we call our Lord, God’s Son, we don’t mean he is like
us physically. We mean, “like Father like Son. Jesus was like his Abba, his
Father.
The Second Invasion of God’s Presence
Now let the second invasion of God’s presence penetrate
your mine. Look at verse 6: “Because you are God’s children, God has sent the
Spirit of his Son into your hearts, and your hearts whisper, Abba, Father.” It
is the same word the Apostle used earlier. “God sent his son.” But now he walks
down the staircase of heaven, he walks into your home and mine, he joins us at
the table and says, “I’m going to give you a gift for every day of the year and
for as long as you live even into eternity. Because you are one of my children,
I am going to give you the living Spirit of Christ in your hearts. He will be
there always – even unto the end of the age. What a gift! A gift of purpose, or
promise, of possibility, of presence. What a gift.
Well, I began this morning with C.S. Lewis in Prince
Caspian The children have been in great danger almost from their arrival.
Suddenly the Great Lion appears. Lewis borrows the image from the Bible of Jesus
being the Lion of the tribe of Judah. Midway through the story, Aslan, the
Christ-Lion appears to Lucy.
“Aslan, Aslan, Dear Aslan,” sobbed Lucy. “At last.”
The great beast rolled over on his side so that Lucy fell .
. . between his paws. (I love that phrase, “fell beneath his paws) His warm
breath came all round her. She gazed up into the large wise face.
“Welcome, child,” he said.
“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”
“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.
“Not because you are?”
“I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me
bigger.”
C.S. Lewis was right. Every Christmas I find the presence
of the Lord Christ getting bigger and bigger and His indwelling Spirit getting
more important and more important. Wherever you go this Christmas, let God
invade your heart with the indwelling presence of his Son and our Savior, Jesus
Christ. Christmas is the divine invasion.
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