Looking to the East
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· 8 viewsMPP : In God, there is always hope no matter how bad your current circumstance may be.
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Sermon Title : Looking to the East
Occasion : English Sanctuary Sunrise Service
Location : Paya Lebar Methodist Chapel
MPP : In God, there is always hope no matter how bad your current circumstance may be.
Let us now listen to the word of the Lord… Taken from which reads
43:1 Then the man brought me to the gate facing east,
2 and I saw the glory of the God of Israel coming from the east. His voice was like the roar of rushing waters, and the land was radiant with his glory.
3 The vision I saw was like the vision I had seen when he came to destroy the city and like the visions I had seen by the Kebar River, and I fell facedown.
4 The glory of the Lord entered the temple through the gate facing east.
5 Then the Spirit lifted me up and brought me into the inner court, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple. [1]
Let us pray…
Good morning!
I ended last year by preaching at the latest sermon in the Church calendar, the watchnight service, and now, I am preaching at the earliest sermon in the Church calendar…
And my advice to you remains the same…
Because it is out of your routine in your circadian cycle, you might find it hard to keep awake… and it is understandable…
But if you dose off, please do not snore too loudly and disturb the person next to you…
Another similarity between the two sermons is that they are both preached when it’s dark outside…
Let me then ask you a question… “are you afraid of the dark?”
Well, I suspect that many of us Singaporeans would not know how to answer that question, because we are so pampered with electricity all the time, and we are so often basked in bright lights…
In fact, when I was still flying professionally, it was so easy to find Singapore at night, when I am on my way back from overseas because it is just so bright…
And the light always bring a smile to my face…
Especially when I’ve been away for a while…
The light actually provides for me direction and hope…
And because Singapore is always so bright, with constant light sources everywhere…
I think a lot of us take it for granted…
Until it is taken away from us…
Such was the case for my friend who were having their lunch at a Koran BBQ restaurant just this January when the wide-spread blackout happened in Thomson, Bishan and Ang Mo Kio area…
Not only was their sizzling stove stop sizzling, they were plunged into darkness and they didn’t know what to do…
With no hope of cooking their raw food, eventually they gave up on lunch and bumped and stumbled their way out of the darkness and into the light…
Probably not before knocking into a few tables on the way out…
Of course, after the incident, they had a heyday complaining about the incident…
And they were not the only ones…
Many people took to the social media to voice how disruptive it was to their lives…
But do you know how long it took for the lights to be restored in that place?
90 minutes…
90 minutes may feel like a long time for us Singaporeans…
but it pales in comparison to what the experience of Lise…
Now who is Lise?
Well, actually she goes by a few other names…
Including Odette, Madame Chambrun, Frau Churchill… depends on who’s asking…
You see, Lise was a British Spy during the Second World War, and in fact she was the most decorated spy male or female…
And she was an excellent spy…
But when the war started, she was actually a very ordinary lady, not even a soldier, but was a housewife, with 3 young girls… not trained in any military work…
However, when the war started, she wanted to do something for the Allied war effort, applying to the British war office… thinking she would be given a clerical job…
However, she was talent-spotted by the spy agency, undergone tough training and was covertly inserted right into German-occupied France…
She took to her job like fish in water, and was an excellent spy, only to be betrayed by a less competent British spy who was trying to save his own skin…
And because she was so good at her job, causing so much trouble to the Nazis, she ended up being Ravensbrück, the most feared concentration camp and when she got there, she was promptly ushered to what was called the bunker…
The bunker was in the Ravensbrück was the most severe form of punishment, and hence was reserved for the most incorrigible prisoners…
The place was tiny, four and a half paces long by two and a half paces wide—
being 3.4m by 1.8m <Walk around>
and was unheated even during winter…
There, inmates are often beaten, are deprived of books, exercise and bath…
But the worse punishment was that there was no light in the cell…
Except for the few seconds, three times a day, it took for the guards to push food through a tiny hatch through which a sliver of light shines through,
The few minutes of artificial light the inmates got when the light bulb in the cell was turned on,
But other than those short periods of light,
The bunker cells was covered with thick darkness…
So dark, Odette couldn’t see her hands even when they were right in front of her face… <gesture>
So dark, she couldn’t tell day form night…
And to make things worse, her cell was just beside the room in which they tortured the inmates…
Darkness and the penetration of the sounds of screams and torture…
And she described it to be “a black hole… that absorbed everything – sense of time, sense of individuality, hope and sanity…”
Corrie Ten Boom, who stayed a few units away from Odette described the place as “hell itself”
Most people wouldn’t stay in the bunker for more than 3 days…
They either left the cell because they were given a short punishment for even the Nazis recognized how terrible a place it was,
or they died because of the harsh treatment…
Many people just lost hope and gave up…
Without hope, people do not last very long…
What about Odette?
Well, she lasted more than 3 days in the bunker…
She was in the bunker for 98 days… that’s slightly more than 3 months…
And do you know how she could last for so long?
Odette replied that “in our darkest moments, we must focus to see the light…”
And she did that by focusing on God…
For during those 5 precious minutes of light every day, she would look at a leaf that she found one day on her way back from the infirmary…
Why a leaf you may ask?
Well, for the most of us who are outside her situation, we would take the leaf for granted…
But for her, it was a symbol of life, of creation and God Himself…
It’s how she reminded herself of God… to her, the leaf was a cross…
I guess this was very similar to our passage for reflection this morning, in which Ezekiel was given a vision of a perfect temple…
Now, you must remember that during Ezekiel’s ministry, there was no more any temple to speak of because the temple was destroyed in 586 BC…
There was no nation of Israel to speak of also, the Assyrians had already destroyed the northern kingdom of Israel more than 200 years before then…
And by the time we came to this point in the history of Israel,
The Babylonians had overtaken Jerusalem and the people were in exile…
They were a shell of their former self…
Far cry from what they were during King Solomon’s reign when they were so rich, according to , received 16.6 kilo tons of gold every year…
And silver was so plentiful, 2 Chronicles 4:27 described them as being as plentiful as silver…
And during King David’s reign, they had absolute supremacy over the region…
But now, they were no longer a people and in fact, Ezekiel was not even in Jerusalem when he received this vision…
For he like many of the Israelites had been deported by the Babylonians,
in a foreign land, made to be slaves, dispersed and made to serve in various places across the vast Babylonian empire…
An empire that stretched from the middle of modern Turkey to the West, to the middle of Iran to the East,
From a human perspective, it seemed like Israel would be a nation that would be forever lost…
It seemed like the covenant that God had with Abraham on his descendants being a great nation blessed with material procession, having territory of their own and having great influence over the land, seems to be lost forever…
It seemed like they would be forever be hopeless lost as a nation because of their disobedience and idolatry…
The Israelites looked at their own lives, looked at the hopeless situation they were in and asked “where are you God?”
They looked at what was promised to them through the covenant and asked…
“My Lord, My Lord, why have you forsaken me?”
And perhaps this is what you are feeling right now?
You look at your mounting debts and the many letters that come through your mail box demanding repayment and you just don’t know how you are going to pull through this situation… This hopeless situation…
You ask God… God where are you and why have you forsaken me?
You look at the medical report for either yourself, your loved ones, your friends, your partner and the report brings nothing but bad news…
You think to yourself… how am I going to overcome this hopeless situation?
And your life seems like it is just darkness… You can’t see how this situation is going to improve and you don’t think you are able to get through it…
You ask God… God where are you and why have you forsaken me?
Or perhaps you have a situation at home that doesn’t seem like it can be solved…
Perhaps it has something to do with your relationship with your spouse or your children or your parents, or siblings…
Perhaps there is just no peace in the family and every time you come together there is always this tension that doesn’t ever go away…
Your conversations always end in quarrels even if you try not to…
And the situation seems so hopeless…
You ask God… God where are you and why have you forsaken me?
Or perhaps you are struggling with a label that someone or you have placed on yourself?
You see yourself as a failure, incompetent…
Or you feel down frequently and you just can’t break out of it…
You tried and the situation seemed so hopeless…
You ask God… God where are you and why have you forsaken me?
Well, friends, do not give up and keep looking to the Lord, and be encouraged by the words in today’s passage which says
“I saw the glory of the God… coming from the East… like the roar of rushing waters and the earth was filled with his glory”
Friends, if I may remind you,
Ezekiel was at the Eastern gate when this phenomenon happened…
He was having a tour of the temple when this phenomenon happened…
He was unprepared when this phenomenon happened…
Because while Ezekiel was in the midst of his trouble,
The description of the coming of God was like the “roar of rushing waters”
Which speaks of it being quick, being sudden, catching Ezekiel off-guard…
Which means that he wouldn’t know that God was coming the moment before it happened…
And this mental picture is reinforced by the orientation of entrance of the temple towards the East from which God enters the temple, and is also the very direction of the sunrise every morning that turns the darkest nights into the brightest of day…
And if you remember the creation narrative, it was God who created light to drive the darkness away…
In we read how God will heal his people by saying… “But as for those… who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its rays”[2]
And in , which says “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned.”[3] And salvation shall be upon them!
Do not give up my friends…
No matter how dark your situation may seem,
No matter how hopeless your situation may seem,
Just like how it is absolutely dark (just) now and (in a short while), you sun rays coming through the windows and turning darkness into light…
One moment ago, everything seems dark and gloomy and if you bother to wait, you will be able to see the light of the day…
But if you give up, it’s just like you coming to the beach to watch the sunrise and because you are so impatient, you don’t bother waiting and go back to sleep, you will miss the fingers of sun rays pushing the darkness back… slowly but surely…
So, hang on friends… hang on to God and He will deliver you…
Some way, somehow…
And do you know something else from the passage we read just now?
We read that when the glory of the lord came,
The glory of the lord filled the whole earth…
This speaks of the extent of His presence…
Which is one that envelopes everything…
And because his presence envelopes everything…
Everything just pales in comparison to His sweet presence…
So, this is the picture painted for us in our passage my friends…
On one moment, everything seems so hopeless,
Everything seems gloomy and dark…
And no matter how much you seem to be turning to God,
No matter how much you try and plead to God…
It feels as if God doesn’t hear you…
It feels as if you are stuck in your situation alone…
If feels as if your prayers for restoration are bouncing off the walls back to yourself…
You feel forsaken…
Your troubles and your worries seem so overwhelming…
But the next moment,
When the lord comes, He comes…
And when he comes, he comes,
For when he comes, he will overturn your situation and he will deliver you form your situation…
And when he comes it will be sudden and will be so overwhelming that your worries and problems that seem so overwhelming, threatening to over take you and consume you, will be overwhelmed by God’s presence…
So, hang on my friends, for help is on the way…
And friends, just like how the tabernacle in the wilderness, as well as the Solomon’s temple as well as the temple in Ezekiel’s vision…
Whereby the entrance are pointed to the East, always pointing to the sunrise
That changes night to day,
In anticipation of deliverance by God
Whenever you see a sunrise, every dawn, be reminded of God’s presence every day of your life…
And look forward to the day in which you will be delivered form your troubles and problems…
For it will come sudden and sure…
Before Easter Sunday, all the hope of the world and the disciples of Jesus seem lost…
Before Easter Sunday, all mankind seemed to be hopelessly lost…
Before Easter Sunday, God the Father seemed to have forsaken His one and only Son…
But on Easter Sunday, all hope was restored with the resurrection of Christ… that came suddenly and see how much the world has been changed with that one event…
And be assured that God will come again and deliver you from all your troubles and problems…
In the meantime, keep looking to the East…
Just like how Odette kept using those 5 minutes of light every day to look at a leaf that gave her hope, by pointing herself to God who will deliver her out of the situation,
Every time you experience a new day, especially at dawn in the morning,
Remember that the Lord will never leave you nor forsake you…
And the Lord will deliver you from your situation one day, so in the meantime, continue to look to the East and trust in Him…
“The sun comes up
It's a new day dawning
It's time to sing Your song again
Whatever may pass
And whatever lies before me
Let me be singing
When the evening comes” Amen…
[1] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), .
[2] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), .
[3] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), .