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Becoming A Person of Dependence in a Culture of Can-Do Arrogance

!!! Restoring the Savor of Our Salt Series       Message # 12

 

 

We are continuing in our series of messages today dealing with the overall theme of restoring the savor of our salt as we confront the culture in which we live.

We’ve been talking about the fact that our lives are shaped either by our faith, or by our culture.

The reality that we are in someone’s mold.

Everyone is in someone’s mold.

That’s the bad news.

But the good news is, we can choose our mold.

We can choose who we would have be molding us, and we have been looking for a number of weeks now at doing the very hard work of climbing out of the culture’s mold and doing the very intentional work of climbing into the mold of the Word of God.

I want to read to you Romans 12:1-2 just as we begin and then we’ll look at John chapter 15 together.

Romans 12:1-2, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.

2  And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

This is the core passage we’ve been centered in as we’ve been thinking about having our lives be molded by God.

Today I want to turn to yet another area of having our lives molded by God—the area of dependence.

We’re thinking about being a person of dependence in a culture of can-do arrogance.

John 15:1-5 please as we think about this concept.

John 15, verse 1.

The Lord Jesus is speaking to His disciples and to us as well.

He said, “I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.

2  Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.

3  Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

4  Abide in me, and I in you.

As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me.

5  I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.”

One man relates his testimony that he has lived most of his life just an eyelash short of real success.

It started, he said, in grade school.

When he graduated from high school, he was a couple of hundredths of a grade point average under 3.0.

And in the high school he attended, they graduated students in two sets.

Those at 3.0 and above were graduated first, and then they started through the alphabet again with those under 3.0.

He was just a couple of hundredths of a point away from making it into the top section.

When he graduated from college, he was a couple of hundredths of a grade point away from honors.

When he graduated from graduate school, again he was a couple of hundredths of a grade point away from the honors graduation.

He went for a doctorate in his field and needed an A in the final course to have a 4.0 average.

He got a B plus.

He says that he cannot remember how many times he had shown up two minutes later for a store to close.

He cannot recall how many times he felt just that far on the outside of a group of folks.

In fact, in his testimony, he says there is probably no one in the nation who has more experiences than he has had of falling just barely short of success.

It became a theme of his life.

In the beginning when he first figured it out, it angered him, frustrated him, and he fought it continually.

Then he came to a period of life when he resigned himself to it, and thought, why worry yourself fighting this thing.

Finally, he came to a time in his life where he decided that it was probably one of the greatest blessings he has ever known.

Hearing that testimony, you may be thinking, why would a person call falling just short of real success a blessing at all, much less one of the greatest of blessings?

Why would anyone consider this lifelong theme of being just an eyelash short to be a great blessing in life?

The answer to that question is found in John chapter 15, and looking at the parable that the Lord Jesus told here about the vine and the Vinedresser and the branches and the fruitfulness.

First of all, we need to comprehend the American system of success.

As we have been doing with nearly all these messages, I want to start by saying, here is what America thinks about success.

And then we’ll look at this issue of God’s counter-system, God’s counter-culture approach by which we have the savor of our salt in place to make our world hungry for God.

First of all, the American system of success begins, number one, with a can-do arrogance.

It is a frame of mind, a mindset that says I am a person with self-ability.

It is a mindset that believes, I have all that I need inside me for life and for happiness and for achievement.

It is a mindset that says, I am independent, gifted, capable, can-do.

I can make life work.

When now California governor Arnold Schwartneggar completed his body building career, a journalist was interviewing him and said to Schwartzneggar, what do you plan to do next?

I want to read you a direct quote.

He said, “I am going to be the number one box office start in all Hollywood.

What you do is create a vision of who you want to be, and then you live into that picture as if it were already true.”

I am suggesting, folks, that that is can-do arrogance.

Now, it may have come close to working for Arnold Schwartzneggar.

I don’t know if he ever actually achieved the number one box office star in Hollywood or not.

He came close anyway.

The problem with his little statement is, let’s say that all of us in this room today decided we will each individually be the number one box office hit in Hollywood.

We will all begin believing it is true.

We will all start living into this reality.

We’re not all going to make it, folks!

I doubt if any of us ever will, and of course, we will be much better off if we don’t achieve that kind of goal.

But this man has a can-do arrogance which amounts to self-ability.

He says, I envision what I want to be, I live as if it’s already true, and then I be the person.

This can-do arrogance, in some cases, leads to temporary success.

There is some temporary American success involved in can-do arrogance.

This kind of success entails a number of facets.

Let’s think about some of those quickly.

First facet—money and material possessions.

Some people are living with conspicuous consumption.

They have a lot of money and they are buying the toys to show us that they have a lot of money.

Second Facet.

Sometimes this kind of success involves a trophy spouse.

The kind of woman who turns heads wherever she goes.

The kind of man who looks like you won him in a raffle.

That’s exactly why my wife married me.

It was a white-elephant raffle!!! Will the ushers please remove that person who just laughed so loudly!

The third issue in this kind of success is the issue of clout.

People saying to themselves, I want to be able to have impact.

I want to be able to change stuff.

No matter what it takes, no matter how slick I need to be, no matter how deceptive I need to be, no matter how dishonest I need to be, no matter how disloyal I need to be to other people, I want to have clout.

Facet four involves reputation.

People saying to themselves, I want people to think of me in a certain way.

I want to put a skin on my public image that gives me a certain reputation.

And facet five involves accomplishment.

People piling up awards, piling up achievements, piling up businesses, piling up whatever to say, I am a successful person.

Can-do arrogance sometimes leads to success in the American system.

There are two major problems with it.

Problem # 1, it is all temporary.

It all goes away sooner or later, usually sooner.

Problem # 2, God has no commitment to those kinds of success.

If you want to invest your life in those kinds of things, you cannot count on God as a partner.

Those are not things that are valuable to Him.

There is an alternative to can-do arrogance.

There is an alternative to this entire nation that is worshipping the teetering god of success.

That alternative is found in John chapter 15.