Sermon Transcript — June 12, 2005
To introduce my sermon today, I would like to share with you a story of Leo Carrillo. Perhaps some of you know about Leo Carrillo, but Leo Carrillo was a preservationist and a conservationist who was very well known to Californina. In fact, Governor Brown (the father), called Leo Carrillo 'Mr. California' because he became an unofficial ambassador for the State. He was born in Los Angeles but his beginnings were in San Diego's Old Town where his grandparents Josefa (Bandini) and Boston-educated Pedro Carrillo were married and maintained a residence and raised a large family in Old Town San Diego. In fact, as a wedding gift, the then Governor of California, Pio Pico, awarded them the title of Coronado Island which they held for 23 years and eventually sold for $1,000. As Leo jokingly commented one time, "I think the family let it go too soon."
Leo Carrillo was also a highly successful entertainer. He appeared in 15 major stage plays (several on Broadway) and more than 90 motion pictures in which he was featured in supporting or character roles. But Leo's greatest fame was from his portrayal as Pancho, the mischievous sidekick of Duncan Renaldo's 'Cisco Kid', in a pioneering television series in the early 1950's.
How many of you remember Pancho and the Cicso Kid? Ah, good! I'm not as old as I thought I was after all. Or maybe all of you are just as old or older than I am. This series was 156 action-western episodes that covered six very successful years on television. It was shot entirely in color — and for the early 50's, that was a breakthrough. At the peak of his film career, Leo Carrillo decided he wanted to find a retreat of what he considered to be 'the old California lifestyle' and so he began searching for a rancho in which he could have animals that he dearly loved, he could spread out a little bit, he could build these beautiful ranch-style, California homes. And so he found such a rancho in southeastern Carlsbad, California down in San Diego County. And he purchased Rancho de Los Kiotes, 840 acres for $65,000 — about $77 an acre in 1937. He immediately began construction of eighteen different structures including the main ranch house and other buildings for his ranch operations and over time he eventually gobbled up a spread that included 2,538 acres in this part of San Diego County.
As you might imagine, because of his interest in old California and his preservationist/conservationist ideas, he loved animals. And the animals that he loved most were horses - and in particular, the two horses that appeared on his television series. Leo loved these horses. Diablo was the name of the horse that the Cisco Kid rode and Loco was Poncho's horse. Leo loved his horse. Like all cowboys, he called her his first love. In fact, when it came time to retire the horses from the show, Leo bought both of them and took them to his famous Leo Carrillo Rancho in San Diego County . But eventually his first love, Loco, died and he ordered the ranch hands to carry her body to one of the highest hills on the rancho overlooking the Pacific Ocean about 3 or 4 miles away so that she could have, I guess her spirit, this wonderful view of the ocean. And over the burial spot, he erected a monument to his horse and frequently during the rest of his life he would retire there and actually pay homage to his first love, Loco.
I became acquainted with Leo's story in the year 2000, about five years ago, because I owned a home in San Marcos, adjacent to the Leo Carrillo ranch and frequently I would walk through the eastern side of that ranch — there were some beautiful avocado groves that had grown over and I used to hike up along those hills and I was disappointed like many others to see the development of the property into homes. Like most of California, developers had bought it up and they had decided and had approved the installation of 2,300 houses on what was left of the Leo Carrillo ranch. And there was a lot of construction taking place and dust was in the air and, in fact, that was one of the reasons I decided to move from that area. Not only was it going to become much more congested, but it was very dirty and filthy and it was going to be that way for about four years while this Carrillo ranch subdivision was developed. It's now finished and I drove by it not too long ago and the 2,300 homes are there and as I predicted, the traffic is very heavy along Palomar Airport Road. Some of you may have gotten snagged in that on the way to and from the Feast site in Escondido and it's become very congested. It's a very beautiful area and very expensive to live there in that particular part of the country now.
Anyway, to make a long story short, while scraping the hills down and filling the valleys to make way for the new subdivision, they came across the monument to Loco. And, of course, it was reported in the papers and conservationists and horse lovers and tree huggers — everybody in California who who was part of that group got all involved and they insisted that everything be stopped immediately and the monument be moved. And they decided to move the monument to a park that was slated to be developed inside this subdivision. You know, a certain amount of the land has to be dedicated to open space so they had dedicated a park within the subdivision and the monument was going to be moved there. And so they carefully deconstructed the monument and moved it to the location where the park was going to be. And all of this in the meantime, the construction had been halted. Now you can imagine the consternation of the developers, the frustration they had during this whole time it was being bantered back and forth among the conservationists and city officials. Once they had moved the monument, then they began to dig under the monument looking for the remains of Loco and there were cameras there, there were reporters, newspapers were covering this because they wanted to make sure that they exhumed Leo — I mean, I'm sorry, not Leo, he wasn't buried there — exhumed Loco, the horse, and move Loco to the place where they had decided to put the monument. So they dug under the monument or where it was — no bones. So they dug beside the monument — no bones. They dug all around the monument — no bones. They didn't know what to do. Construction had been halted, this had been going on now for several days costing the developers many thousands - hundreds of thousands of dollars and they didn't know where the cadaver of the horse was. Where was it? This had to get done. So while all of this was in the papers and people were battling back and forth and the developers were screaming their heads off - they had big equipment hanging around, people, and they couldn't develop any further — where was Loco? And finally, one old, retired rancho hand came forward and embarrassingly admitted that he had been part of the burial crew and, you see, Loco had died in a valley. And when Leo Carrillo had told them the instructions of where he wanted the horse to be buried, they thought about it. And when Leo Carrillo went to Los Angeles which he did frequently, they decided that Leo would never know and besides that, to carry a 2,000 lb. horse without the benefit of a wagon over three hills and two valleys to the place he had chosen, was going to be a big job. And it would be far easier just to dig a hole and bury the horse where he lay, which they did. And so, there Loco remains somewhere in one of those valleys, now probably covered by several hundred feet of dirt. And so he came forward and made this confession and everyone was "Ah".
Now what struck me was that for years Leo would go to that monument thinking his horse was buried right under it and he would pay homage, brought flowers, prayed or whatever he did - we don't really know — while he was there in his private moments with his first love, Loco, the horse.
It struck me as being a little ironic and I thought I would talk about today first love. You can entitle this sermon, if you like to entitle sermons, 'Pentecost and First Love'. We've already been there today but, of course, we know that repetition is one of the best forms of learning. Let's go back to Acts chapter 2 — Acts the second chapter. We know what Leo's first love was. Who or what is your first love? This is the question I would like to pose today and raise in the context of the first Pentecost and then to move us forward into our church context today and ask the same question. Who or what was their first love and who or what is our first love today and why we should think about it, particularly this year. In Acts 2 and in verse 1 and I would like to read again with you verses 1 through 6.
Acts 2:1 — When the Day of Pentecost had fully come...
Now Pentecost, as most of us know, means fiftieth in the Greek. Fiftieth, and it's based on the holy day we find described in Leviticus chapter 23 called the Feast of Weeks because, of course, seven weeks were to be counted from the Sabbath between the holy days of the Days of Unleavened Bread — seven weeks were to be counted and then the morrow after the last Sabbath, or the seventh Sabbath in those countings, was to be the Feast of Weeks. And it was called the Feast of Weeks because it's the only day on the festival calendar that is not fixed by a specific day, but rather a counted day.
And so we count seven weeks to arrive at the Feast of Weeks or the fiftieth day and in the Greek it's called Pentecost. It was also known in the Old Testament, as many of us know and most of us probably know, it was called the Feast of Firstfruits because in the agricultural community of this part of the world when you planted your spring crops the very first fruits started popping out this time of the year.
And if you've got fruit trees or you've got a garden — if you're lucky enough to have space for a garden in the metropolis we live in - you, of course, will now begin to see firstfruits appear. We have some citrus trees in our backyard and we are now noticing small grapefruits, lemons, limes starting to pop out. They're little, bitty fruit right now. Some of them are starting to turn in color. We have a little apple tree in our backyard. It's only about 4 feet tall, but it's beginning to produce the first fruits. Our neighbor has a big apple tree and it hangs over our property and actually serves as a great source of entertainment for our family. It's starting to produce the first fruits, small little apples, and the squirrels love these apples and they'll come along, and bound along the block fence we have at the back of our property and they'll go up and they'll pick one of these little apples off and they'll carry this apple in their mouth. And it's really funny in the fall because the apple is almost larger than the squirrel, but you see them kind of dragging the apple along the top of the fence and they will stay on top of the fence and eat part of the apple. This is part of what I call their 'torture ritual' because we have a cat, Sinatra, 'Old Blue Eyes' — he is a Siamese with blue eyes and he's a house cat, but we let him out in the yard. It's part of our ritual while I'm reading the newspaper and having a cup of coffee, he'll wander around the backyard and this is when I've noticed this torturing going, because the squirrels will bring their fruit from the tree, sit at the top of the fence knowing full well that Sinatra can't get at them. He doesn't have any front claws and he will torture our cat, this squirrel will. He'll jabber at him. He'll munch a while and he'll jabber and occasionally he'll even go over to one of the pine trees we have in the backyard and he will come down to about 4 feet off the ground and he'll jabber at the cat until the cat goes over and lunges at him. He'll move up about a foot and he'll jabber back. You can only imagine what's going on in the squirrel's small brain. This is a source of torture, but what we observe this time of the year is the beginning of the torture season for our cat and also firstfruits coming out. And one of the rituals in the Old Testament was that the people brought firstfruits of the field particularly, and these were offered at the beginning of the harvest season. And the Feast of Weeks or the Feast of Firstfruits represented this. It was the beginning of the harvest, the very first of the harvest was becoming mature.
So with this backdrop we move forward a couple thousand years if you will, to Pentecost in Jerusalem. We know, of course, that these are 120 or so that have been gathered together waiting as Christ said they should for these last ten days — He had ascended ten days earlier after forty days of intense instruction — and He said, "Wait for the promise of the Holy Spirit." I'd like to ask you, what do you think their state of mind was as they waited for the gift of the Holy Spirit? What were they experiencing? What were they anticipating? What were they wondering about? So it says when it had finally come, when it finally arrived and you can only imagine the author saying, 'We were waiting in great anticipation.' 'We were waiting for this moment, this day!' And it finally arrived and
Verse 1 — ...they were all with one accord in one place.
Verse 2 — And suddenly there was a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.
Verse 3 — And t hen there appeared to them divided tongues, like flames, and one sat upon each of them.
Verse 4 — And they were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak with other languares, as the Spirit gave them utterance.
Verse 5 — Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men, from every nation under heaven.
Verse 6 — And when this sound occurred, the multitude came together, and were confused, because they heard them speak in their own language... explaining what the 'tongues' was described here.
Verse 7 — T hey were all amazed and marveled because one said to another, Look, aren't these Galileans... the uneducated of Judea at the time?
Verse 8 — "And how is it that we hear in our own language in which we were born?
Verse 9 - "Parthians and Medes and Elamites, Mesopotamians, Judeans and Cappadocians , Pontus and Asia ,
Verse 10 - "Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya adjoining Cyrene, visitors from Rome, both Jews and proselytes,
Verse 11 — "Cretans and Arabs - we hear them speaking in our own tongues the wonderful works of God."
We know this to be one of the more incredible and dynamic miracles of the New Testament church, the arrival of the Holy Spirit. So we gather today to remember that event and to thank God for giving us His Spirit.
I don't know if you thought about it, there was something in the minds, the state of minds of these people that preceded the arrival of the Holy Spirit. It came without the aid of the Holy Spirit directly. Do you know what that was? It was first love. In fact, we've taught for many decades that what marked the beginning of the New Testament church was first love! I think there's some confusion in the church about what first love is. Leo Carrillo said this horse was his first love, Loco. I don't know exactly what he meant, because I never heard him explain it and all the research I did I never heard it explained directly from him. I'm assuming that he meant this was his primary love. Sometimes we think of first love as: well that was something the New Testament church had, they had a first love because they witnessed Christ, they witnessed the events, they witnessed all these miracles, they were there at Pentecost so they were filled with this first love chronologically. When the Bible talks about first love - and we're going to get to that eventually — it's talking about what we love primarily.
The state of mind in which these people were anticipating the arrival of the Holy Spirit was to have God and the work of God as their primary concern, as their primary purpose, as their primary — starting out with #1 and going down to #2 and #3 and #4 as their primary goal in life - was to serve God. And we see this played out. Notice in Acts chapter 2 in verse 32 in this very inspiring sermon that was described to us by Mr. Sharp, Peter says,
Acts 2:32— "This Jesus God has raised up, of which we are all witnesses.
Verse 33— "Therefore being exalted to the right hand of God, and having received from the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He poured out this which you now see and hear.
He said the Spirit has come and, I think, it came because Christ had developed an atmosphere among these disciples after personal instruction for forty days, an atmosphere of first love. It was their primary concern, it ate them up. The zeal for God and His work and His church ate them up!
Let's notice in chapter 4 and verse 31 the commentary on this zealousness that was created by first love. There were a number of events that took place here, there were a number of miracles and some of the apostles were put into prison, they were dramatically released. It says in verse 31 of chapter 4, we're picking up the story as we go along here,
Acts 4:31 — And when they had prayed, the place where they were assembled together was shaken;... and that does get your attention as many of us know this morning. ...and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, and they spoke the word of God with boldness.
Verse 32 — Now the multitude of those who believed were of one heart and one soul... The church has never been as united since as it was this day because people were filled with first love, the primary love of God — for God and His work and His church, ... neither did anyone say that any of the things he possessed was his own, but they had all things in common.
Verse 33 — And with great power the apostles gave witness to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus. And great grace was upon them all.
And I ask myself, what created that atmosphere? Was it just the presence of God's Holy Spirit? I mean, obviously God's Spirit was dynamically working here, but God's Spirit works in a certain atmosphere. It works with minds that are of a certain mindset. And even before God's Spirit arrived, those disciples were gathered together in unity with one mind, one heart and one purpose because of their first love. It was what they had put first in their lives and it superseded their possessions. It superseded their temporal goals. It superseded their own lives as Christ said it would and it would have to.
Let's go to Acts chapter 5 and verse 11 — moving along, Acts 5:11. After a number of other miracles,
Acts 5:11 — great fear came upon all the church and upon all who heard these things.
Verse 12 — And through the hands of the apostles many signs and wonders were done among the people. And they were all with one accord in Solomon's Porch.
They were all unified. They were all together. They were all of one heart and one mind. It hardly describes the atmosphere of the church today, does it? And I have asked myself many times over the last ten years especially, why not? When we look back and we see this early history of the church we say, what an exciting and dynamic time in the church. What was it that they all had in common? What created this sense of zeal, unity and enthusiasm in which the Holy Spirit could effectively work? They all had the first love.
What is this first love? Well, I've already described it to you in some form. Let's see it in action first in the life of our Savior, Jesus Christ, in John chapter 6 in verse 38. John 6:38. Christ, of course, as in many things, set us a perfect example. I'm sure He was reminded from reading the scriptures and from studying God's Word while He was on this earth, of the Shemah, the second half of which you can read in Deuteronomy 6 and verse 5, and we probably all know very well,
Deut. 6:5 — "You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength." In other words, our first love should be God and other things are secondary. I think that's one thing we can learn this feast day, the Day of Pentecost.
In John chapter 6 and verse 38, Christ said,
John 6:38 "For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.
You know, I think that's one of the most hard and difficult concepts for us to internalize because we, as human beings, are so motivated by many things in our minds and our hearts - our desire to create, our desire to work, our desire to independently think, our desire to have a creative mind - that it's so difficult for us to subject ourselves to God's will because our will struggles against that all the time, every day, every minute, every hour of the day. It's a constant battle. But Christ said,
Verse 39 — "This is the will of my Father who sent Me, that of all He has given Me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up at the last day.
Verse 40 — "And this is the will of Him who sent Me, that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have everlasting life; and I will raise him up at the last day."
When I read verses 38 through 40, Christ's comments here, it seems to summarize our duty on earth as disciples of Christ. He says, you get your priorities right. If we put God as our first love - just as we find the example of the New Testament church - then we will eventually be given eternal life and born into the family of God. I will raise him up at the last day. That's one promise that I certainly claim and I hope that all of you are in the process of claiming, I assume that's one of the reasons we are all here, because that's our goal in life.
I'd like you to notice a couple of scriptures beginning in Luke 9 because I've thought about these before, but not exactly in this context, in the context of this concept of first love. Like I said, some people have as their first love animals, and animals are certainly important in our life. And I don't want to minimize that because even though it was up until recently that I never owned a cat. I still don't own a cat. I married a beautiful woman who had a cat and it was part of the deal. But I've kind of analyzed the cat and I've come to the conclusion that cats own us. We serve their every need and they very moodily give us affection back. Anyway, I want to move on from cats. Let's go to Luke chapter 9, the comments of Jesus Christ. Like I said, some people love their animals so much that it surprises me sometimes. And I can understand that because I've had pets in the past, you probably have too, children have, but I don't know if you've noticed, but pets don't live as long as we do. Have you ever wondered why? I think God wanted us to have pets and I've had a number of people ask me, "Can I resurrect my pet in the kingdom of God?" And they mean it! We really love our pets, we miss them and sometimes I wonder if some people have as their first love, their pets like Leo Carrillo. I've really wondered about that,.and only you can analyze, you know, is your pet your first love? I hope it isn't - maybe it's your second or third, it's pretty high on the list - that's, I guess, okay. Let's go to Luke chapter 9 because there are some very challenging statements made by Christ recorded by Luke that I think we should share with one another. Luke chapter 9 and verse 57.
Luke 9:57 — Now it happened as they journeyed... talking about the disciples — Luke 9:57 - on the road, that someone said to Him, "Lord, I will follow You wherever You go." I want to be your disciple, too. What is interesting to me is that Christ gave these people the opportunity to be a disciple, perhaps one of the most intimate disciples who may have later become one of the apostles; had a chance to have their name engraved in history in the church as pillars of the church, not just engraved in history, but also to be in the kingdom of God as founding pillars of the church. What great opportunities! And I want us to analyze what held them back. ...I will follow You wherever You go."
Verse 58 — And Jesus said to him, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head."
He acknowledged the temporal nature of His ministry and that His ministry, His life was not for this earth as we read earlier in the book of John. It was to serve God, whatever that took. You know, when I read this, I'm reminded of the number of what we used to call 'new visits', these are really neophytes of the truth to become called by God and engaged and read and get excited about the truth of God and want a visit from the minister. I remember one in particular, it was a young lady in Delaware that I visited in her home and I remember, I rang the doorbell and immediately the door opened. You know, there were no footsteps. She was anxious, right behind the door. As soon as I rang the doorbell, it swung open and she said, "Oh, come in! I've been waiting for weeks for you to come and visit me. Sit down. Sit down. Sit down." I found out later she was a very hospitable person, but she was so excited about talking about the truth of God, she didn't offer me anything to drink or eat — which is okay. We sat down immediately and she sat on the edge of her chair and she said, "Tell me about this and that." And she asked me dozens of questions. We were engaged in almost a nose-to-nose discussion for over two hours and at the end of the conversation she said, "I'm ready! You tell me. What do I need to do? Where do I need to go? Just tell me. I'll go to Madagascar. I'll go to China and I'll open up an orphanage. What do you want me to do? What should I do? What does God want me to do?" And I sat back and I marveled at that attitude. And I said, "Well, slow down. We don't have any openings in the orphanage in China just yet or in the missions in Madagascar." And I explained to her the plan of God and the importance to develop character in our own environment and I started talking to her and explained that. And she eventually came to church and became baptized and married a fine young man in the congregation there and they eventually had children and they became pillars of the church. And one thing I noticed about this young lady is, even though her enthusiasm was mitigated by her maturity, she never lost her first love. And she's still an upstanding pillar in the church of God even after 25 years. There were dozens and perhaps even hundreds of those kind of visits. I used to tell people I wish I could take you on some of those visits so you could see the raw first love in action. So we see here that Christ talks to these would-be disciples. In verse 59 it says,
Verse 59 — Then He said to another, "Follow Me." But he said, "Lord, first let me go bury my father." It wasn't that his father was dead on the kitchen floor at home and he had to rush home and bury him, it was a very strong tradition and a good tradition that if you had older family members living with you, you took care of them especially in their old age until they died and then you buried them. And he, apparently, had older parents or in-laws living with him and he said, "Well, I'd love to follow you, but I've got these obligations." And Christ makes this very odd statement, He said,
Verse 60 — "Let the dead bury their own dead..." There is an indication that the lack of first love indicates spiritual death. Let the spiritually dead take care of those obligations. It'll happen. Your parents will be buried ...but you go and preach the kingdom of God."
Verse 61 — And another also said, "Lord, I will follow You, but let me first go and bid them farewell who are at my house." You know, I love my family. Family is an important priority to me — a good priority — and I need to take care of that. And Christ said in verse 62:
Verse 62 — "No one, having put his hand to the plow, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God."
This year at the General Conference of Elders I was very pleased with the tribute that we gave to four people: Mr. and Mrs. Burke McNair and Mr. & Mrs. George Meeker. The General Conference of Elders awarded them with an award, and acknowledgment and with a plaque publicly for serving fifty years in the ministry. It was an emotional time. It was a very pleasant time and it dawned on me while we were sitting there that we were acknowledging two couples that were consumed with first love. Their first love was to serve God and His church and His people and they had not been deterred from that purpose through the ups and downs in the years that had shown their toll in their lives, and I thought that was a wonderful thing that the General Conference of Elders had done.
Sometimes it's not easy. Let's go to Matthew chapter 19 and verse 16 — another example of an opportunity to engage in first love. It says in verse 16,
Mat. 19:16 — Now behold, one came and said to Him, "Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do to inherit eternal life?"
Verse 17 — So God recited to him, well ..."Why do you call Me good? No one is good but One, that is, God. He always kept that in His mind. Number one - numero uno - is God, see. My first love is God. He never allowed His own accomplishments and what God's Spirit did through Him to supercede so that He became #1. He even deferred to God when He was complimented for being good. He said, if you want to enter eternal life, keep the commandments."
And the young man said, well I was raised in the faith and I've kept the commandments.
Verse 20 — "All these things I have done. What do I still lack?"
Verse 20 — Jesus said to him, "If you want to be perfect... if you want to be in the Greek, teleios, mature ...go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." Once again, a disciple who had an opportunity to be on the ground floor of the New Testament church.
Verse 22 — But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
And then Christ talks about how difficult it is for the rich to be in the kingdom of God. You know why? It should be obvious, but it is very difficult for those people who have great possessions. To have anything other than that is their 'numero uno', is their #1, is their first love. The richest man who ever lived before Bill Gates was J. Paul Getty and you see that richness if you go to Getty Museum. You see the art that he collected over the years. A beautiful display of art. We've been there many times and appreciated what he did and what he collected. He was the man who said, "I would give all of my money to have a happy marriage." He was also the same man who wanted to hang so desperately onto his fortunes that he installed payphones in his house because he was afraid his friends who visited there would use his telephone to make long distance calls. It's ironic, isn't it?
I remember doing a public Bible lecture one time in a little town called Medicine Hat, Alberta and I was talking about the Sabbath, the importance of the Sabbath and how the Sabbath was a test commandment and it was a sign between God and His people and it oftentimes required us to put God first in our lives and put our careers and our jobs on the line. And I remember I was kind of getting worked up in my message — it was a shorter message, about 35 to 40 minutes and there were thirty five to forty people that had shown up at that particular public Bible lecture in this little town on the number one highway in Eastern Alberta next to the Saskatchewan border. I was very pleased with the audience and I thought, "well maybe someone will come out of this one". And I was about five minutes from ending my message and a man stood up on the fourth row. He was trembling. He was an older man. I remember, something inside of him kind of snapped in a way that he wasn't afraid to open himself up to the rest of the group and me and he asked a question. He just stood up and he asked a question, interrupted my presentation. And he said, "What if that person who's being tested by God has worked for the railroad for 28 years and only has two years to go to retirement and they won't let him off for the Sabbath? What do you do then?" And I could tell, he was moved. He was at a crossroads in his mind. He was trembling and I said, "Well, maybe we could talk about it afterwards." And I could see the audience, they would look at him and they would turn their heads and look at me and I realized that wasn't the answer that that man or the audience wanted and I went on to very carefully explain by reading Exodus 31 again that this was a sign between God and His people and often was a test commandment and it was very important to put God first even if it involved the jeopardy of a job. I remember explaining that to the man, and the man still standing, still trembling turned and walked out. I never saw him again. I don't know if he ever came back to the church after his retirement. I had moved from that area to another area, but I still remember it with some great clarity just as Matthew and Luke remembered these examples that Christ gave with some clarity.
God wants us to have as our first love Him — God — not our possessions, not our money, not even our family. Let's turn over to Luke chapter 14. As a minister who counsels a lot of people for baptism, this is a scripture that I always read to all of those candidates for baptism. It's a scripture that you are all familiar with. You probably had it read to you and read it along with a minister who counseled you. You have probably read it many times since.
Luke 14:26 — "If anyone comes to Me and does not hate... or that is, love less by comparison ...his father, mother, wife, children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life also, he cannot be My disciple.
His disciples heard this. Ten of the twelve who heard this statement died a martyr's death. Their lives were taken prematurely because they had as their first love, God, and they willingly gave their lives for God. I haven't been asked to make that ultimate sacrifice. I don't think any of you have, otherwise you wouldn't be here. But we may someday. And I think that's something we have to think about.
George Barna conducted a survey — of course, George Barna is the 'Gallup' of religious surveys — and let me just read the introduction to this survey. I think the results are rather interesting. He says, "Religious books have become a publishing phenonom in the past decade and no religious book other than the Bible has generated more attention or sales than Rick Warren's bestseller, 'The Purpose-Driven Life'" which by the way, I don't recommend. "More than 20 million copies of the book have been sold and millions of people have been exposed to purpose-driven church programs, classes and resources. After all the reading, teaching and conversation on the topic, exactly what do Americans percieve their purpose in life to be?" What is their #1 purpose? That was the question posed to a random national sampling of thousands of adults served by the Barna Group. The result: more than four out of every ten adults, that is 44%, said their top priority in life is having a satisfying family life. That's a pretty good goal, isn't it? A pretty good purpose — having a satisfying family life — 44%. The second most common life priority listed by 18% of all adults — less than 20% — was that of understanding and carrying out the principles of their faith or God as their first love. The only other priority named by at least one out of every ten adults was having good friends. That commitment characterized the desire of 10% of the public. So 10% wanted good friends as their number one purpose. 18% was God, and 44% was a satisfying family life. The survey data raised some important red flags for religious leaders according to Barna. "It's wonderful" he quotes, "that family and faith were the top ranked positions held by Americans. The survey results raised some questions, however, about the faith commitment of many church-going adults. One must wonder if the struggles evident in so many marriages and parent/child relationships are connected to the fact that people are generally more interested in pursuing a fulfilling family life than in understanding the principles of meaningful living that may help shape such a family experience." Even Barna challenges the results. He says, wouldn't it be more important to put God first and those principles that connect us to God and then apply those to help create a satisfying family life? So, very clearly, most Americans do not put God first in their life even if they claim to be church-goers. They go there for other reasons than their love for God.
Let's go to Revelation chapter 2 and verse 2 to close out this message today. Rev. 2:2. Christ says to this congregation that met at Ephesus and, of course, each one of these admonitions closes with the phrase 'he that has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches'. So these messages are for all of us. So for a moment I would like for us to put aside the thought that, well, that message doesn't apply to me and this message doesn't apply to me because after all, I'm whatever we like to label ourselves as — Philadelphian, Laodicean, Thyatiran, Sardis, Ephesians — whatever it is — eronious concept in my opinion.
Rev. 2:2 — "I know your works... let's apply it to us. God sees our works, He sees what we do, He knows our hearts ...your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars;
I read this in that context and I said, we did that! We did that, didn't we?
Verse 3 — "and you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for My name's sake and have not become weary.
And I said, well, we've largely done that — had a few lapses now and again as we all do, but largely we've done that.
Verse 4 — "Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
You see, we can work, we can labor, we can have patience, we can serve, we can not tolerate those who are evil, we can persevere, we can serve God's church and we can still lose the first love where number one priority begins to go down the list: family or job or college or relationships come before it. It sneaks up over it; it sneaks up so easily in our lives, doesn't it?
Verse 4 — "Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
In the context of the last four weeks where our incoming President, Mr. Kilough, has challenged us to be thinking about zeal, repentance — he's been asking us to think about, from an introspective position, where we are in relationship to God. We fasted last Sabbath - not yesterday, the week before — concerning our need to be close to God.
Verse 5 — He says, "Remember therefore from where you have fallen... What's fallen? The priorities have fallen. Priorities have been displaced by different things in our lives. "Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works... put the proper first love back in its proper position in our lives and our priorities ...or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place - unless you repent.
What does it mean to have left our first love? It means some disciples have lost their zeal for the work of God because they have allowed other things like relationships, the cares of this life and stuff to keep us from putting God first. That's first love — is putting God first! As we remember the New Testament church today, the birth of our church, let's reflect on their mental frame of mind and their attitude, their love of God that brought about the gift of the Holy Spirit. We have access to that same Spirit. That same Spirit can do the same works today as it did then, but it takes an atmosphere of first love in order for it to function effectively. The by-product of first love is zeal. This Pentecost as we have focused on zeal these past four weeks, let's ask ourselves this important question: who or what is our first love?