Sermon Text: 2 Corinthians 4: 3-6
3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing.
4 The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.
5 For what we preach is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake.
6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ.
Morning Message
We come once again to this time of the year when we start to consider the season of Lent. On Wednesday we will once again start the journey that leads to the cross and ultimately to Resurrection. We do not make that journey alone. As Christians we journey with Jesus, drawing strength from Him. We realize that He made this journey in life alone so that we would never have to. We can take the ashes on our forehead and consider our sins and start the process of renewal because we know that we are saved and that our Resurrection into God’s kingdom is secure. We are getting ready for the opportunity to grow in our faith, to give up and turn from the other gods in our lives. I have an idea for Lent this year. Instead of giving up something trivial like cake or pie, give up one of your gods. Give up something that has become sacred to you that you know God would rather you not have in your life. You have three days to think about what that might be.
Before we start that Lenten journey we have this opportunity to get a glimpse of the true light of the world. I look at Transfiguration as a time to be encouraged and strengthened in our faith. It is a glimpse of God’s glory, a reinforcement of God’s promise of heaven to come. Let’s look at the story of that glorious day when Jesus handpicked, Peter, James, and John to go up the mountain with him and experience God’s glory. Jesus, most times, went up on the mountain by himself to pray. This makes me wonder if, on all of those other occasions, He met with the likes of Elijah and Moses; did He have regular conversations with them? That’s a little off the point, but I can’t help but wonder. They get to see him in His heavenly form, possibly the way that He looks now, in His resurrected body, or maybe as He existed before He came to earth and took on human form. No one can really say for sure what He looked like, but it must have been spectacular. Did you ever wonder why Jesus showed these three this? I’m sure that there were many long lasting positive affects this experience had on them, but I believe that one reason was to strengthen them for the hard journey that was before them. I think we can use Transfiguration Sunday in that same positive way. If we take it seriously and allow ourselves to bask in the glory of Jesus and the Resurrection that is to come; to go into the Lenten season full of hope, knowing that whatever battles we fight during this season, glory awaits us on the other side.
Peter was a bit blinded by the light. He kind of missed the point of the experience. This was not a permanent situation; they didn’t need to build shelters and plan on living on that mountain forever. This was a temporary encouraging glimpse to strengthen their faith for the journey ahead. Our scripture for today tells us that the gospel is veiled to unbelievers. We must be careful here because this doesn’t mean that they can never see it or be saved by the gospel. What it does mean is that without Jesus in your heart, the gospel can seem like a mystery to you and be very difficult to understand. It says that the god of this age has blinded unbelievers so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that leads to Jesus. That is a very true account of how the devil works to keep people from being saved. If you have ever tried to witness to someone who is unsaved, you have most likely encountered this. No matter how hard you try they just don’t seem to understand. It takes God to remove the veil and open their minds.
I want to pick up on verse four that says the god of this age. While it is easy to just give the devil credit for blinding the unsaved, we must acknowledge that God is able to overcome anything that Satan might put in our path to salvation. And for believers, the god of this age might refer to whatever we have allowed to become the god of our lives. We are sometimes blinded by the light of the things that we still cling to. The devil will help us along in this, but we now have power over him that we refuse to use. This is why we need times of self examination. Lent is the time to take your life and lay it out piece by piece and see what is not pleasing to God and what we need to change. I know that I keep coming back to this, but it is a real sticking point in our Christian lives. We know that God wants us to grow and that we must allow change in our lives in order for that to take place. We sometimes miss the obvious, because when we tell God that He can have everything in our lives we have at least one thing that we are holding back. Listen because this is important. Don’t be blinded by the light of your salvation. Don’t allow that very grace that saved you make you feel so comfortable that you miss the obvious change that God wants you to make in your life. I don’t know what or who that is, could be anything or anyone, but if you are wondering why things just aren’t working out in your Christian life, don’t miss the obvious. Just one small disclaimer here, I’m not giving you permission to get rid of your husband or wife, marriage vows are sacred, and that’s a whole other subject.
I preach Jesus as Lord; I am just a servant to Him; all of us are servants to Jesus. We must remember that He is the only thing in our lives that makes sense, and we must be willing to forsake all else, ALL ELSE, for Him. God, who created light and called it in to existence, has allowed that glorious light to shine in our hearts. We have the same glory within us that the disciples saw on the face of Jesus on that mountain. Don’t be blinded by the light; bask in it; let it shine forth from you; share it. Don’t block that light from shining through you by allowing something in your life that God wants out. This is the season to discover and remove those things that keeps you from the full glory of your Savior.
In Christ’s Love and Peace
Pastor Bob
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