sermon "The wisdom of life" (Joni Eareckson Tada) Thank you friends. Thank you. I am so happy to be here with you today and to share with you my passion, my joy and my joy in Jesus. But I tell you I was not happy when I had read before a month or two on the cover of Newsweek magazine in bold letters: The Decline and Fall of Christianity. There, a rather dim view of Christians was drawn, their involvement in financial crisis, drugs and the disintegration of the American family. Even people like me were put in a very bad light. Today, society thinks that if someone hits like me, who is a paraplegic, a perfectly sensible and rational decision if he wants to end his life. They look at me and say: It's better for them if she is dead than disabled. The world is different than the time when I had my accident. And now we need wisdom. More than ever before, right? Wisdom to life. Not only to survive but that we are living happily and with great joy in a world that is so full of turmoil, bears so much wickedness and so much grief. Now I can not claim to be able to spread after 42 years so very much wisdom. But if these 42 years, like me, has seen in a wheelchair, unable to use his hands and legs and is paralyzed, you have something to say, especially when you smile. Then you have a key that can unlock the meaning of their other seemingly senseless suffering. So I hope to be able to pass some grain from a life full of wisdom.
The first grain of how I explain it? I guess I've experienced it, as I now Morning I woke up. So I wake up to 75 or 80% of the time always. I keep hearing how absorbed the front door, and I know my girlfriend is in the kitchen and cooking water for the coffee. She is getting ready to help me getting up and dressed, puts me in a wheelchair, I brush your teeth, brush my hair, I brush your nose and brings me to the front door. It is there to help me get up. I'm lying in bed in my bedroom, the door is closed and I think that: Oh, God, I have no strength. I'm so tired. Oh, Lord, 42 years in a wheelchair, paralyzed, paraplegic, I have no strength, I lack the energy to. I can not, sir, God. I have no strength to smile for the woman who gets in my room. I should smile at them, but I do not have a smile. I'm so tired. Oh, God, I can live with not so. Have you ever woke up and felt so? Welcome to the mankind.
And then I pray: Lord, I have no power and no power. But I have you and I need your energy. I need your strength. I can change the paraplegia not, sir. But I can do all things through you if you strengthen me. So, God, give me your smile. I have no smile for this woman, but you have to smile. Can I borrow me your smile? And a moment later, I can smile. This is a miracle. can I experience a miracle, before half past seven in the morning, because my girlfriend comes in and I smile. Not in spite of my paralysis, but because of her. My paralysis has brought me every morning to the cross of Jesus Christ, where I tell him how much I need him terribly. To this smile has been fighting this so hard and it was hard won in the early morning. This is the first grain of wisdom: Start your day with the knowledge that you need Jesus Christ urgently.
The second grain of wisdom, that when I go out the door and go, with a goal. This objective is to my life at this Day out so that I keep on the lookout for the purposes of God. I live today. This must have a purpose. Lord Jesus, what today is your job to me? I leave the house with the verse from Philippians 3, 8 - 10 in my heart and it states: "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and to share in his sufferings and he will be the same in his death. We all want to know Christ, is not it? Sure. We all want to experience its power, the power of resurrection. But not many wish to share his suffering.
We follow him to the beach, where he preached from a boat, and we follow him on the green meadow, where he talks about the lilies of the field. And, oh yes, we love to see him as He blesses the children. We take Jesus to you how nice it is, approachable, gentle in demeanor, as he blesses the children. But not many of us want the community to experience his suffering. And so we are driven by God in his goodness down the road to Calvary, where we, from a purely human, are not inclined to go out.
We have no natural inclination to go every day to cross. Why God allows us to experience suffering. The suffering is like a shepherd. A shepherd dog that snaps at your heels and rushing down the street, towards the cross, where would you go elsewhere normally. They are left there driven by the overwhelming realization that is like no other . Hinkönnen Why does God allow broken heart. It allows you to broken families. He permits it allows it does not prevent it, it can even be a broken neck, broken up, we bent, at the end and are decimated. And then we come to the cross and say: God, I need you. There, we become like him in his dying. You know what this phrase from Philippians 3? Like him to be called in his death: Each day his cross to take upon himself and give up the sins for which he died on the cross to give up the fears and worries about the future, the sin of the rejection, the twisting of the truth, manipulation or the urge to assert yourself, give up. give up these things. They give up anger, disbelief and sorrow. That is, to be like him every day to take in his death, to his cross and follow him, who carried his cross and died for the sins that we see daily.
I once came across a man in Ghana, we have provided wheelchairs. He came to me and crawled on his hands and pulled behind his legs and said, Oh Joni, welcome to our country, where God is so much greater. It is larger, Joni, because we need it more necessary. Is not that true? We have in this country so much. We are so blessed. Therefore, we bring wheelchairs and Bibles in the world. We are so rich blessed, so let's take these wheelchairs, large and small, and bring her children and adults who are disabled, in less developed countries. We bring you the love of Jesus and Bibles, we bring the Gospel, the good news. We would like to recognize people that they are need to come every day to cross, so that they understand God's plan and their mission in itself for the day. Do you know who are really disabled? Do you know? These are the people who can not clear how much they need God. These are they who hear the alarm clock in the morning, take her blanket on his own, jump out of bed, throw in a quick breakfast, God Hello throw a tight as a silent period and then go out the front door and go through their day as a cruise control. You know that if you act like God is against you? In James chapter 4, verse 6 says, God rejects the proud. Other translations say: He resists the proud. He opposes the proud. And the proud are those who live their lives on their own. But he also says: But he gives grace, grace upon grace to the humble. And who are the meek? Those who have recognized that they urgently need God. Because they have empty hands and spiritually poor. Jesus said: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of God. Who are the poor in spirit? Those every day with empty hands come to Jesus and ask him spiritually poor, explain to them the purpose of their lives that day. Because we all are just richer when we recognize our spiritual poverty. Friends, we all can only grow stronger when we recognize our weaknesses. Confess, then, that you need God to urgently and unconditionally. Go out the door and ask for the purpose of this day. That is to live the biblical way. This is the only way to live the Christian life.
one last grain of wisdom or, if I leave the house, I know that God shows me very wise things about themselves, about the people I meet, and on my behalf for that day. But ultimate wisdom does not mean that you can see everything in God's sight. Wisdom is to trust God, even if you can not see things from his perspective. So I know for example that one day I'll jump out of this wheelchair and in the sky jump, dance, and aerobics will make. I can not wait. Philippians 1:00 tells me that we eagerly await a Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ who will transform our weak bodies, and even my paralyzed. God will transform these weak body into a beautiful body. That is a glorious truth of God's word. Yes. We are not spherical spirits, no! We are the body, that work, and hands that can touch and feel and hold and hug. For the first time I'll be able to hug my husband and feel it, really feel. And you know what I still hope when I get to heaven? I hope I can take this old heavy wheelchair. I know this is not in the Bible and is not theologically correct, but if I could, I would stand up the chair right over there, over here. Okay. Then I would get up and go over with my beautiful, transformed body, I would be thrilled, and put me right next to Jesus. I would keep his pierced hands and say, 'Jesus, thank you. Thank you for saving me. Thank you free me, as I have put my sins in your cross. And, Jesus, I do not know why you have allowed it, I break my neck. You see this chair over there? Jesus, you were right when you said that we would suffer in this world. This thing has brought me much pain. A lot of suffering. But, Jesus, that I was sitting in a wheelchair, pushed me to you. The weaker I was in the wheelchair, the more I have kept you, Lord Jesus. And the more I have kept to yourself, the more I discovered how strong you are. And, oh Lord God, I do not think I ever understood how precious is your grace and your strength without that clunky thing. So, Father, I thank you, Lord Jesus, I thank thee. Holy Spirit, I am so grateful for the energy you've given me every day. And now, Jesus, if you want you can throw this thing to hell.
I guess that is not in the Bible, but I do know this: After 40 years in a wheelchair, no 42, I miscounted certainly not after 42 years as a paraplegic, I can say that my own suffering as an ice-cold water upon from God to make me wake from my spiritual slumber. This wheelchair has made me think seriously about the Lordship of Jesus Christ in my life. He has deepened my prayers. He gave me cheerful hope of heaven. He made me to take care of me and other disabled people to travel around the world full of passion to distribute wheelchairs and Bibles. He has helped to convince this skeptical and cynical world that there are more important things in life, than to be able to run. There are more important things to use as his hands. On 1st Peter, chapter 2, verse 21 says, given that called you God. For Christ also suffered for you, and he has given you an example to follow the it. Lord Jesus, I will follow your example. I will take my cross daily to me and not complain, because you, Lord Jesus, I have shown that the sky is real and hell also. This wheelchair has taught me that you're the man of sorrows, and joys of the Lord. You are the ultimate answer. You have given me such a passion for the Gospel and, Lord Jesus, that would not have gone, I was standing on my feet. Lord, you are intoxicating. To know you is indescribable. You are worth more to me than diamonds and silver. Your friendship is worth everything, Jesus. And, dear friends, you know what? You need not break his neck to agree. God bless you on this happy morning and thank you for listening. Thank you.
