Title: Possessing Our Possessions

Text: Lk 5:11-13

Luke 15:11-13 11 Then He said: "A certain man had two sons. 12 "And the younger of them said to his father, 'Father, give me the portion of goods that falls to me.' So he divided to them his livelihood. 13 "And not many days after, the younger son gathered all together, journeyed to a far country, and there wasted his possessions with prodigal (wasteful, extravagant) living. (NKJ)

Introduction:

Recent events have sparked a strong sense of unity and patriotism in the United States that hasn't been seen for a long time. I also think we are, or at least should have become more aware of the fact this nation is blessed as probably no other nation on earth. Thomas Jefferson said, "My God! How little do my countrymen know what precious blessings they are in possession of, and which no other people on earth enjoy. " (From the Federalist, Oct 19, 2001)

Even with all the talk of economic recession and layoffs and such I think we have still seen the greatness of the blessings we have as a nation. If you just stop the think about the cleanup and recovery operations taking place in New York City, the massive amounts of equipment that is being utilized in that operation and the amount of debris that has been already removed from the site is staggering and we haven't had to call on other nations to help us with this. We possess the resources ourselves for the task.

For me this was also brought to focus this week as I read the Nov prayer letter from Don and Teresa Bolls who minister to the Zerma people group in the Niger Republic. They wrote regarding activities of a mission team there and I want to read some parts of their letter to illustrate what I mean, they write:

We went to one village to prayer walk and found about 20 cases of malaria - and just "happened" to have the necessary medicine for them. In 2 other villages we saw medical needs we were not prepared to meet. This was a bit heart-breaking for the nurses but we did come prepared to ask help from the Great Physician.

This is an update on the Medical clinic/Prayer Walk that we did this week. According to our records we saw over 200 on Tuesday 16 Oct. It was an awesome day and many were helped. Today, Wed. 17th we saw way over 200 with several of the children that would not be alive had there not been help. There were several that received IV's, some very serious wound problems, very high fevers (105.F on several infants), many malaria.

The word is out and today we were "mobbed" by the crowd before we even entered the church where we are doing the clinic. It is very hot, but Mark has "rigged up" fans for some circulation using a generator. Dr. Nester Shust, the attending doctor told us tonight at devotions/debriefing that he was sure that some of the infants were on the verge of death had we not helped.

Millet harvest is mostly over now and the people will begin on dry season gardening. Pray for them as they prepare their garden plots, pray that Don will be able to get the seeds they need to plant. Pray that they will have the energy to work in the gardens, hand pulling water from the well and watering each plant twice a day.

From Brad and Sally Womble, who minster to the Songhai people in Niger, comes this report: During the first two weeks of October, David and Michael completed a water survey in the Songhai villages from Niamey to Tera, Niger. They looked at water sources, storage, and purification, wells, crop irrigation, and other factors that affect water quality and general health . They will be making recommendations on how we can best help meet the water needs of the Songhai. They were also able to help a welder construct a treadle pump with locally available parts, that is less expensive and pumps more water than those currently being used. This pump will make a great difference in drawing drinking water from wells and irrigation water from the river.

When we consider these kinds of things as well as what we've all seen on the news about the living conditions in Afghanistan and Pakistan and any number nations in the middle east. When we look at what we have seen about the different states of the former Soviet Union and even what we know about many of the nations of Europe, we can easily see that we are a nation and a people of great earthly possessions. Even those who live at the poverty level in our country are considered wealthy when compared to much of the world's population.

The important thing about this for us is we must learn to learn to possess our possessions rather than allowing them to posses us.

I What are our earthly Possessions?

A. Our Material Possessions

Obviously when we talk about possessions we think first of material possessions. Just think about those of us gathered to worship this morning all of us or most of us came by car, and some of us in two cars. At the FBC in Sete Lagoas those with cars are in the minority. And we could go on and on about the material things we possess.

One of my friends in seminary from Brazil, Paulo Antunis was amazed that we could get hot chocolate out of a machine. A speaker at our home church years ago speaking on this same subject commented on how blessed we were not only could we buy something cool to drink on almost every corner, but that there were so many different kinds of drinks.

B. Our Political Possessions

Our political system is a marvel. A division of power exists between the executive, legislative an judicial branches, not only nationally but all the way down the chain of command to local governing bodies. We have had great military leaders, but no military dictatorships or attempts to overthrow the government. We have 50 individual states all pulling together to form one nation.

Even in the last election with the problems in Fl. Our system of government worked. There were protests and accusations on both sides, but no military or civil uprising and even though it took a while we had a president well in advance of inauguration day.

C. Our Social Possessions

In the United States we have no royalty, we have no caste system. The ideal behind our social system is that all men are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

That means a person can grow up in the ghetto and still have the opportunity to go to college. A person can be born to poor sharecroppers in the south and still become Surgeon General of the United States. A college kid can have an idea, develop it and become the world's richest person.

While everyone doesn't have the same opportunities and some have to work harder to make the most of the opportunities they do have, if they are willing to work even the disadvantaged have opportunities that are unheard of in other part of the world.

D. Our Religious Possessions

Sometimes we take for granted the religious liberty we have in this country. A look at the documents of our founding and the architecture of institutions the writings of our early leaders clearly reveal the influence religion in general and Christianity in particular had on the founding of our nation.

But even with this great influence it was determined that individuals would be free to worship or not worship God without government interference or government control. There is no Taliban to force you to submit to the requirements of any particular religion.

These are our physical or earthly possessions, but how have we possessed them? Have we made the best use of them? Have we appreciated them? Have we used them responsibly? Or, have we been like the prodigal son used them, abused them and wasted them?

II. How should we Possess our Possessions?

A. Appreciation - that means we recognize the value or significance of what we have, whether it's material, political, social or religious. We take our religious freedom, our political freedom, our social freedom for granted and we will soon lose it. It will slowly erode, and decay.

It's kind of a weak comparison, but compare it to a car. If you buy a car and take care of it, it will last years and years, but if you take that same car and neglect it, pretty soon it will fall apart. If you buy a car and park same thing happens. The battery will go dead the tires go flat the body rusts.

We must understand that all the possessions we have, have been given by God, and the Bible tells us what ever we do in word or deed should be for His glory. That includes recognizing the value and significance of our early possessions.

B. Utilization - there is an old saying use it or lose it which is appropriate. God has blessed us for a reason and we must utilize the blessings his has given us in carrying out his will to be salt and light.

You know one of the saddest commentaries about the last election was not the media foul up or the court wrangling. It was the fact that so few people voted , less than half of all registered voters voted and registered voters only made up a small percentage of the population.

We make jokes about politicians and their lack of morals and ethics and yet these kind of people continue to be elected. The reason is partly due to voter apathy, not only a failure to vote but most of the time we don't have any idea about the issues or the platforms are. We vote by sound bites and the one who pays the most and has the most sounds bites wins the election.

That's just one aspect of our dual citizenship, but the same thing applies to each area material, political, social and religious we must utilize that which God has blessed us with.

C. Stewardship - We must use wisely these possessions we have been given. They have been placed in our trust. We complain about gas prices all the time and yet even when gas was at it's highest we pay a third or less of what other nations pay, and yet we consume probably twice as much as any other nation on earth.

Yet, we're often wasteful ungrateful and unappreciative. We must be good stewards of our resources and our possessions. God has placed them in our care, He has given us dominion over the earth and we must be good stewards of all He has given.

The problem is attitudes in one area carry over into other areas, the way we handle our physical possessions often transfers to our spiritual life as well. God has given us great spiritual possessions as well as physical possessions.

He has given us free access to Himself. He has given us the gift of His word to reveal His will to us. He has given us the gift of prayer that we might commune with Him, He has given us the gift of His Spirit that we might always be in His presence and have full access to all of his provisions. Yet time and again studies show that we fail to appreciate them, fail to utilize them and fail to be good stewards of these spiritual possessions as well. We fail to possess our posssessions.

III. What is the danger of not possessing our possessions?

A. Our possessions will posses us -

B. We may lose those possessions that are unappreciated and unused

C. Our possessions may destroy us

Conclusion:

We must possess our possessions for the glory of God and for edification of ourselves and others. We must be good stewards of what God has given and always be on guard so that we do not become enslaved by our possessions. We must count our blessings both physical and spiritual, recognize they are God given and possess them for His Glory. (644)