The Bethany Bullet Sermon Message - Week of March 4, 2018

Sermon: “A Very Good Place to Start”

Text: Proverbs 1

The Fellowship of the Rings big opening scene is the 111^th birthday party of Bilbo Baggins.  As the party goers enjoy themselves there is a grand fireworks display courtesy of Gandalf.  One of his rockets bursts into a dragon that swoops down upon the party.  Those in attendance flee and hide and scream, “AAHHHHHH.” 

Suddenly the dragon soars into the night sky and explodes into the grandest of finales imaginable; and the terrified party goers break into a sigh of delight, “AAAWE!”   Terror and Wonder on display.

 

The opening scene in the book of Proverbs is the declaration that, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.”   The fear of the Lord includes Holy Terror and Holy Wonder alike.  Last week we talked about that terror (listen to the last podcast sermon or check out last week’s bullet for that information).  The hymn reminds us that, “grace, such fear (Holy Terror) relieves.”  Yet at the same time the hymn declares that grace has also taught our hearts to fear (Holy Wonder.)

F – Face down BEFORE the Lord.

E – Engaging the world WITH the Lord.

A – Awestruck OVER the Lord.

R – Rooting ourselves IN the Lord.

Wisdom from such fear finds us:

Face down BEFORE the LORD.  Realizing our whole life is lived before the face of God, and thus in humbleness we bow before His undeserved glorious presence.  

Such wisdom finds us:

Engaging the world WITH the Lord.  Think of how the angles greeted all the met in Scripture, “Fear not!” was their address.  Wisdom doesn’t seek to scare others into the kingdom, but to share what the Lord has done for us in Jesus.

This wisdom leads one to be:

Awestruck OVER the Lord.  The father of the author of this proverb himself wrote, “What is man that you are mindful of Him?”  That the God of the universe, the Alpha and Omega wants to personally connect to us is mind blowing!  

The holy wonder of the fear of the Lord ultimately ends as we: 

Root ourselves IN God.  Rooting one’s self IN God means making Him, His Word, His Love, His character, His Son your foundation.  It’s a scary thing if your foundation is your health (at some point it might fail), your wealth (one bad investment or market downturn), the promises of others (after all they are so easily broken), your brilliance (dementia is rather indiscriminant) – only one thing is a solid foundation to root your life in – HIM!

The One whose perfect love drives out all fear – with the exception of that which leads to wisdom that finds us:

V  Face down BEFORE Him

V  Engaging the world WITH Him

V  Awestruck OVER Him  and

V  Rooted IN Him.

 -Pastor Kevin Kritzer