John the Baptist – Know Who You Are

27th Dec, 2009

Written By Rev Law Hui Seng

Posted By Teresa Han

John 1:19-28
Main idea: Know your own identity and live your life full potential.
Objectives: a. To help the congregation to realize our identity in Christ. b. To teach that we must live according to our identity in Christ.

A. Introduction.
- In life, you have to know who are you everyday. You have to be conscious of your identity everyday. If you don’t you cannot live properly as a person.
- You do what you are doing because of your identity. You are a mother, so you always wake early in the morning when the school reopens to prepare the breakfast for your children and husband. You are a father and husband, so you give part of your salary to your wife and children to feed them. You are a student, so you make sure you go to school and follow all the rules in school to make sure you study well. You are a Christian, so you come to church on Sunday. You are a manager, so you mobilize your staff to execute the trading policies and principles of your company.
- You behave according to your own identity. Know who you are is so crucial in everything. Know who you are, your own identity, you will do your roles in all circumstances. You live as the society and the church expects you.
- In our passage of concentration this morning/ evening, we see that John the Baptist knows who he is and he performs all his roles as desired by God.

B. How John the Baptist knows who he is?
- We see from the passage there is a need to for the Jews of Jerusalem to know who the John Baptist is (verse 19). Brothers and sisters, it is very normal for people to know who the other people are. So, you need to find out and you need to find a way to know so and so.
- In the case of John the Baptist, he might have behaved like a messiah, a saviour, the Jews who believe in the concept definitely want to confirm whether he is the one or not. It is through such effort of the Jews (Levites, priests) who are the authoritative figures in Judaism, that John revealed his own identity. Only when he himself knows his own identity, only then he can reveal.
- From the passage, in verses 20 and 21, you can see he knew who he was, so he could confess he was not the Christ and Elijah. He honestly told the Levites and the priests he was neither Christ nor Elijah. He was not the messiah and also not the Elijah of the Old Testament whom the Jews believed.
- John the Baptist knew his own true identity, he never tried to be someone else. A point of application for you here, you should never try to be someone else by behaving like that person. And so, the young people here, do not try to be Michael Jackson, an entertainer.
- When John the Baptist was challenged to give an answer about who he was, to help the Jewish questioners, he based the authority of his answer on the Old Testament, and quoted Isaiah the prophet in verse 23, “I am the voice of one calling in the desert, Make straight the way for the Lord.” In another words, he knew his own identity with certainty. He even claimed that he was the one whom prophet Isaiah of the OT meant. He believed in himself he was raised and sent by God as prophesied by prophet to make the path of Christ straight. He knew what role God had given him. Can you imagine, when he was asked who he was, he claimed that he was the one as prophesied by Isaiah? What made him so sure? If you read Luke chapter you will find the answer. Zechariah, John’s father, after he was delivered, he was filled by the Holy Spirit to prophesy that John were to play that role for Jesus. I believe both the mother Elizabeth and father, Zechariah, raised up John according to the prophesy, and so John the baptist knew for sure his identity.
- But the Pharisees were not satisfied with his answer, they continued to hard press for more explanations. In verse 24, they asked why he baptized people if he were not the Christ, Elijah or the Prophet. He further insisted he was not anyone of them but emphasized he baptized with water and, he was just coming before Jesus to prepare people for His coming and he was not even qualified to untie the thongs of Christ’s sandals. He further defined his role.

C. Applications.
- I pray that the certainty of John the baptist’s own identity will inspire you to know especially your identity in Christ. You have lots of identity in this world but what is your one precious identity in Christ? Children of God/ disciple of Jesus/ saved with eternal life, etc. Let us apply this identity in Christ into your life now.
- Firstly, when you know you are a disciple of Jesus and see yourself as a disciple of Jesus, you will do what Jesus require you to do, right?
- Secondly, how you perceive yourself will decide whether you live the full potential in your life.
- Thirdly, don’t be somebody whom you are not created to be. Be the person whom God desires you to be.
- Fourthly, know who you are and you know your roles in life.

D, Conclusion.
- Do not a person whom the devil desires.

The Greatest Is Love

25th Dec, 2009 Christmas sermon

Written By Rev Law Hui Seng

Posted By Teresa Han

Matthew 1:18-25; 1 Corinthians 13:4-13

Main Idea: To challenge the congregation to pursue love in the person of Jesus
Objectives: a. To drive to the point that what matters most in life is love in the person of Jesus. b. To teach the congregation how to love one another.

A. Introduction.
- What is the greatest in this world? It must be the most valuable thing. It must be something that everybody needs. It must be something that cannot be replaced. It must be something money cannot buy. It must be something that is lasting and you will carry it with you into eternity.
- What is the thing that qualifies for the greatest thing? Money? Status? Material Wealth? Fame? Knowledge? Scientific Discoveries?Etc.
- Non of the above qualifies for the greatest because each of them cannot satisfies mankind’s deepest need for meaningful moral relationship. Without meaningful moral relationship, life is meaningless. Look at all the relationships around us. Husband and wife; parents and children; classmates and classmates; teachers/ lecturers and students; colleagues and colleagues; boss and subordinates; government officers and the rakyat; pastors and church members; etc.
- All these relationships need to be nurtured with the special ingredient called love. Without love, you can hardly define any meaningful moral relationship.
- Without love human relationships will be so cold, impersonal, isolated, and it does not give much meaning and purpose at all.
- The bible has a great passage to inspire, challenge, teach, train and mould us on love.

B. Apostle Paul’s definition of Love
- Apostle Paul had addressed the issue of gift of tongue by saying in 1Corinthians 13:1-3, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have no love, I am only a resounding gong... If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that moves mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor, ...but have no love, I gain nothing.
- And apostle Paul went on to give the greatest definition of love which nobody beside Jesus can match. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.
- Then, apostle Paul concluded with verse 13 that says, “And now these 3 remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.”
- And so, today, in this Christmas, I boldly say to you in this world, the greatest is love. In view of the deepest need of any human relationship for love, so the greatest is love. So, what matters the most in life for any human beings on earth is love. Not money; personal desires; material wealth; fame; knowledge, etc.
- And to my amazement, I discover that all these definitions of love, attitudes of love, actions of love, activities of love, forms of love, languages of love, and all the things in this world on love is still meaningless if it is not done in the context of human beings.
- Only human beings can produce love; only human beings with soul and spirit created by God can show love. Material things, money, plants, animals, air, water, property, science and knowledge, cars, house, and all the resources in this world, you name it, they do not show love.
- They have no life, no breathe, no personality, no soul, no spirit, of course, they cannot do it. Only human beings can do it.
- So, all the talks about love can only become realistic when it is practised by mankind. But as I reflect further and deeper in this Christmas, I see that all our human love for one another is so fallible. We can fail to love someone (our husbands, wives, children, colleagues, neighbours, relatives, very naughty children, the orphans, the poor, the rich people who are so empty in their hearts, the professionals who find life so meaningless and feel so lonely, the underprivileged, the widows, widowers, prisoners, prostitutes, gangsters, drunkards, the sick and dying, people whose characters are questionable, the hungry, etc). We cannot love so much; love everybody. We have all the prejudices.
- This leads me to desire for a perfect person who can love and who can be the best model of love. And he must love everybody. I find that only God can do it. I find this God in the person of Jesus, the owner of Christmas. The person who matters the most during Christmas. You see why the birth of Jesus is so crucial for mankind.

C. The birth of Jesus.
- Let me share with you an encounter which God has blessed me. I will remember this event for a long long time as long as I keep close to Jesus. It was probably one of the most powerful spiritual experience which God allowed it to happen in my life.
- It was this year that I was on the same plane from the way back to Miri from Kulala Lumpur, with the Air Asia boss, Fernandez. The air steward announced for anyone who would like to greet him, he was welcome. I grasped the opportunity and I thought I must ask something that is most important, most crucial in his life.
- I also got ready my own answer. Somebody that is very dear to my heart. I went forward to the front, I asked just one simple question that required an answer of one word. The golden question was, “Give me one word to explain your success in life.” To which he quickly answered, “Change.”
- Then, I give him my one word also, “love.” Then, I discover he is also a christian.
- Then, I went back to my seat and I sat down, as I was seated, an inner voice coming to me saying, “Why didn’t you say Jesus?” As I try to reason with the voice, which I believe is God speaking to me. I realize, just a word like love, it does not mean much because it is still very impersonal. Jesus, the person Jesus would make it very personal.
- Why God has to be a person? Only a person can forgive a person. Only God can forgive our sins. You see how our sins destroy all our relationships, our morality. Greed, adultery, lust, hatred, jealousy, anger, bitterness, unforgiveness, idolatry, pornography, corruption, injustice, etc.
- You need the best government, the best policies, the money, etc can solve these sinfulness of mankind. Only God can solve our problem of sin.
- Angel told Joseph in his dream that Mary was to be conceived by the Holy Spirit and the baby shall be given the name called Jesus because he will save people from their sin and his name shall be called Immanuel which means God with us.
- You see how personal is this God, in the person of Jesus to us.
- For God so loved the world is now expressed in the person of Jesus.

D. Applications.
- You see why you are called by Jesus to love all the people around you and especially all who are nearest and closest to you. Those who are closest to you you need to love the most because you may tend to take them for granted.
- Those who are far from you, it requires your love also because Jesus desires you to do so.

E. Conclusion
- What do you lose when you love as Jesus loves? You have everything to gain. You gain Jesus and eternal life.

Prayer of Faith

Written By Rev Law Hui Seng
Posted By Teresa Han
13th Dec, 2009

James 5:13-20
Main Idea: To Inspire the congregation to exercise faith to pray for the sick.
Objectives: a. To teach that prayer of a righteous person heals. b. To teach that our sins can lead to sickness. c. To teach that we need to exercise our faith to heal the sick.

A. Introduction.
- Human sickness calls for a need to be addressed. Because people are sick, our belief and faith need to address it.
- You get sick or ill, do you? No matter, how healthy you are, how holy you are, you fall sick or ill once a while. Some fall sick more often than others. And so, it calls for us to do ministry.
- Praise the Lord, today’s passage is a great passage to address it.
- I pray that the sermon today will inspire you to do the social concerns of praying for the sick. I pray that you will exercise your faith to pray for the sick.
- You will find that the passage greatly challenges you to do it by faith.
- And so, the question of how much faith you put into prayer when you pray for the sick?

B. What consists of prayer of faith for healing?
- The above in the introduction can only be answered if we know what consists of prayer of faith of healing.
- The prayer of faith of healinng is characterized by the following descriptions:
- Firstly, you need to pray when you are in trouble and you need to praise God in songs when you are happy as taught in verse 13. That is your faith must get you to totally depend on God no matter in good time or bad time.
- Secondly, when you are sick you need to have the faith to call for the elders of the church to pray for you; and to use the anointing oil to pray for the sick (verse 14). It is not the oil that heals but it is the exercise of faith that calls upon divine power to heal. So, this is the sacred power of prayer. Notice it does not say only those who are gifted in healing of sickness can do the job. It spefically mentionss the office of elders. In our context today, it is the pastors, lay leaders and LCEC members.
- Thirdly, you need to exercise your faith to pray for the sick, then, the sick will be healed and also you need the faith to expect the sins of those who are sick to be forgiven (verse 15). James here links the possibility of sins that cause sickness. This is something we must take seriously and not lightly. And he went on to emphasize the need for confession of sins to one another in public in the event you call for healing of the sick (verse 16). So no confession, no forgiveness of sins, and no healing of sickness.To encourage us to exercise our faith to pray for the sick, he now even helped to see who can pray for the sick beside those who are elders. On the one hand, the elders could be the righteous man whose prayers are powerful. On the other other hand, the righteous persons can be those in the community of faith who confess his sins and follow the standard of holiness of the church community. So, he says in the end of verse 16, the prayer of a righteous man is pwerful and effective.
- And then, even in the closing remark (verses 19, 20), he still emphasizes the need to reach out to those who have wandered away from the truth and sin against, we need to direct them. Otherwise, they still face the consequence of eternal death. In chapter 1, verse 15, James says, “Then, after desires has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin when it is full grown, gives birth to death.
- To drive home his point to get us to pray for the sick, James is trying to say Elijah is not like an angelic being, he is no God, he is just like anyone of the christians or disciples of Jesus at his time, God uses his prayers. So James is saying God can use our prayers to ask God for healing of sicknesses (verses 17, 18).

C. Applications
- This is really a very practical passage for us today. I pray that you take up the challenge to pray for the sick. This passage calls for the following 3 applications in your life:
- Firstly, there is a place for prayer of faith for the sick. I can see the challenge here is not very much on whether we believe prayer of faith can heal or not. The faith involves here is the person who prays, the elder, the pastor or whoever qualifies as the rigteous person has the courage to ask, “What sins have you committed?” And the challenge of those sick people who are being prayed for is to cofess his or her sins publicly.
- Secondly, can you qualify yourself as a righteous person to pray for the sick? I believe we can ask God for forgiveness of our sins and repented. Our challenge is whether we have the compassion and time available to pray for the sick.
- Thirdly, any one of you who are willing to leave your worldly concerns temporaray and join me to pray for the sick when there is a need?

D. Conclusion.
- If our prayers of faith for the sick and confession of sins do not work, at the end of the day, we must still respect God’s sovereignty to heal or not to heal anyone.
- Where medicine is concerned, it is a way that God bless mankind to use it for healing. If you go for medication, it does not mean that you do not believe God can heal. However, every time, you get sick, do you confess your sins to a righteous person and ask him or her to pray for healing before you go to see a doctor?
- Our responsibility is to put our faith to test and exercise our faith to pray for the sick. Will you?

Patience in Suffering

6th Dec, 2009
Written By Rev Law Hui Seng
Posted By Teresa Han

James 5:7-12
Main Idea: To teach the congregation that there is value in suffering.
Objectives: a. To teach that suffering can train you to be patient.

b. To teach that the right perspective towards suffering will determine whether we gain anything from it.
c. To help the congregation to identify areas in their life that require the training of patience.

A. Introduction
- Have you been suffering lately? Suffering of whatever degrees, be it physical illnesses, psychological hurts, mental stress or even break down, or anything that makes you feel suffering.
- What do you gain out of it?
- There is value in suffering for us christians according to the teachings of the bible.
- C. H. Spurgeon says, “Faith that does not tear at all is not living faith.”
- Baker says, “Temptations in life do not mean to destroy us. They are meant to build us. Difficulties may cause a person to lose his job but they are meant to build up his characters. The setbacks that an external person faced may become the greatest blessings of the internal person. If God allows a challenge to come to us, you need to know that the real danger and difficulties are because of our escape and rebellion; and we lose a chance to be trained by them.”
- The passage today has very clear teaching about patience in suffering. One value of suffering is that at the end of it, as you learn, you will become more patient, which all humans on earth need.

B. The Context of Suffering.
- For James, the context of suffering that he talked about was the christians and disciples in his days were persecuted by the Jews because of their belief.
- In the midst of the persecutions, James used the coming back of Christ to comfort them; to encourage them to persevere in their faith and not to give up in view of the fast coming back of Christ.
- What is the big deal about Jesus’s coming back? It is because Jesus will honour and reward them for their suffering. Whatever loses, Jesus will make up. Failure to keep the faith will result in losing all the rewards.

C. How to be patient in suffering?
- That is why James says in verse 7, Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming...
- And to be patient. James has the answers.
- Firstly, learn patience from the farmer who waits for the land to yield its valuable crop and also waits patiently for the autumn and spring rains to come, says James.
- Notice the patient waiting here does not refer to the long time waiting. It refers to the long process of endurance to face the persecutions of the enemies of faith; and not give up on their faith. That is why verse 8 says, ... be patient and stand firm...
- Also patience in the sense that the disciples of Jesus must not judge the wicked people (the rich landlord people) who exploited and oppressed the poor; and they just need to wait for God avenge them.
- Secondly, to help us to be patient in suffering, James advises his readers not to grumble against each other, verse 9. Why? Because grumbling against one another in church can cause disunity in a church community. The grumbling will produce judgement. That is grumbling will produce guilt that God will deal severely and therefore, it must be avoided.
- Thirdly, to help us to be patient in suffering, James advises his readers to set an example of suffering verse 10. He simply challenged them to follow the prophets of the Old Testament, who, for the purpose of serving God, who spoke in the name of the Lord, they suffer. They endured suffering, and so do the readers of the letter of James. James even backed up his illustrations with the Old Testament Job (verse 11), who lost almost everything because of the attack of Satan on him. He did not give up his faith and persevere. He was blessed with double blessing and so the readers will experience the same if we are patient and not give up our faith.
- James is really using his writings to tell his readers and all of us today, God does not love to see people suffering; but rather he is full of compassion and mercy, in verse 11.
- Fourthly, to help us to be patient, James says we must not swear, let our yes be yes and no be no, in verse 12. This is being truthful to God, yourself and people around you. It is the best policy we all must have in nurturing patience. Being truthful in our speech is also part of patience for James.

D. Applications for today.
- Let us get practical with this passage. In our present situation, you may not be challenged to give up your faith because of persecutions of your faith or even oppressions as experienced by the readers of the letter of James.
- But we definitely face suffering of different degrees because of different reasons I mentioned earlier. I believe we face the same temptation like the early disciples to give up our faith because Jesus is not real; He does not answer our prayers when we need Him so much.
- With this, I have 2 points of application for you:
- Firstly, in suffering of whatever kind, you need to identify areas in your life where you need patience. In whatever suffering you face, sit down and really ask Jesus what is the purpose of it. There must be a purpose as Jesus loves you so much and died a sacrificial death on the cross. Knowing the purpose, then, you will improve the areas of your life which still does not glorify God yet. May be it is in the area of unforgiveness, relationship, something you cannot let go, etc. Remember, God always uses suffering to develop you to become a strong disciple to help you to go very far for Him. If only you are humble to take it.
- Secondly, in suffering, you need to have a right view of it, then, you can be patient. How you perceive it is so crucial. It will determine whether you gain something from suffering or not. How do you see a personal accident? You blame yourself, the other driver, etc? All these are negative attitudes, you will gain nothing out of it, you never learn and do not become more matured.
- If your attitude is positive, you ask: Have I been careless? Is it sign send by God to wake me up in certain areas of my life so that I do not sin against him anymore? God want me to preach the gospel to the other driver? Is it a sign that my car is not safe to drive anymore, it needs some repair?

E. Conclusion.
- In Christ, when you face suffering, you will do reflections based on God’s word and you will arrive at Godly conclusions and you will always be a winner at the end of the day.