The following is a rendition of the message I gave.
I miss ya.
John 14:1-6
“Don’t let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, and trust also in me. 2 There
is more than enough room in my Father’s home.[a] If this were not so, would I
have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you? 3 When everything is
ready, I will come and get you, so that you will always be with me where I am.
4 And you know the way to where I am going.”
5 “No,
we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how
can we know the way?”
6 Jesus
told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father
except through me.
From our
vantage point, death appears to b dreadful, defeating, and devastating. It is something that we fear for others &
for ourselves. For ourselves, because it
is unknown; for others, because we don’t want to lose them.
We can
only think of sorrow we feel at our loss, but it’s not their sorrow. Because today Jeff is enjoying what he had
waited so long on.
When I thought
about what I wanted to share I knew it had to honor God and cause Jeff to look
down from heaven and shout something crazy.
Jeff
loved music, he loved all kinds but I always thought he liked class rock the
best, Rock N Roll, so I thought, that is what we should talk about that Rock N
Roll.
Jesus
told us he was the rock, the original.
He said the rock that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. In
essence what he was saying was people will reject me but all things are built
on me, I’m God. That is a rock I wanna follow, I wanna build
on. 2000 years ago in a very religious
society, he we around telling people he was God….Either he is or he aint. Bono puts it this way.
Look, the secular response
to the Christ story always goes like this: he was a great prophet, obviously a
very interesting guy, had a lot to say along the lines of other great prophets,
be they Elijah, Muhammad, Buddha, or Confucius. But actually Christ doesn’t
allow you that. He doesn’t let you off that hook. Christ says: No. I’m not saying I’m a teacher, don’t
call me teacher. I’m not saying I’m a prophet. I’m saying: “I’m the Messiah.”
I’m saying: “I am God incarnate.” And people say: No, no, please, just be a prophet. A
prophet, we can take. You’re a bit eccentric. We’ve had John the Baptist eating
locusts and wild honey, we can handle that. But don’t mention the “M” word!
Because, you know, we’re gonna have to crucify you.
And
he goes: No, no. I know
you’re expecting me to come back with an army, and set you free from these
creeps, but actually I am the Messiah. At this point, everyone
starts staring at their shoes, and says: Oh, my God, he’s gonna keep saying this. So
what you’re left with is: either Christ was who He said He was the Messiah or a
complete nutcase. I mean, we’re talking nutcase on the level of Charles Manson.
This man was like some of the people we’ve been talking about earlier. This man
was strapping himself to a bomb, and had “King of the Jews” on his head, and,
as they were putting him up on the Cross, was going: OK, martyrdom, here we go. Bring on the
pain! I can take it. I’m not joking here. The idea that the
entire course of civilization for over half of the globe could have its fate
changed and turned upside-down by a nutcase, for me, that’s farfetched. (article here)
On that
rock I put my faith.
If he is
the Messiah, if he is God, he WILL do what he said. The scripture above says, Jesus said, I’m
gonna rise again from the dead, see you for a bit, then go to heaven and make a
place for you, because I love you.
Christ our
rock, now lets talk about the roll.
Somewhere
in Heaven is a roll book. It has the
names of those who trust Jesus for their salvation. If your name is on it, you get in. Jeffs name was on that book. He didn’t derserve to have his name there, he
was not perfect….but no one is. No one
deserves to have their name on the roll or get into heaven. Well, actually one, the rock, Jesus.
If we
trust in him, his love, his forgiveness, not our works, not the church, not
anyone but him, we can make it too.
Jeff,
Rock N Roll my friend, Rock N Roll.
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