Monday Morning Coffee with Mark

Does God ask Too Much of us?

January 16, 2023 Mark Roberts Season 3 Episode 3
Monday Morning Coffee with Mark
Does God ask Too Much of us?
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Welcome to the Westside church’s special Monday Morning Coffee podcast with Mark Roberts. Mark is a disciple, a husband, father and grand dad, as well as a certified coffee geek, fan of CS Lewis’ writings and he loves his big red Jeep. He’s also the preacher for Westside church.

Speaker 1:

Hello, and welcome to the Westside churches special Monday Morning Coffee podcast on this podcast, our preacher Mark Roberts will help you get your week started right. With look back at yesterday's sermon so that we can think through it further and better work the applications into our daily lives. Mark will then look forward into this week's Bible reading so that we can know what to expect and watch for. And, he may have some extra bonus thoughts from time to time. So grab a cup of coffee as we start the week together on Monday Morning Coffee with Mark.

Speaker 3:

Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to the Monday Morning Coffee podcast for Monday, January the 16th. I'm Mark. I do have a great cup of coffee right here. I've got my Bible open, some sermon notes. I'm ready to talk with you about our sermon yesterday, about our worship yesterday, and especially about our daily Bible reading. We are finally in the prophets, but first, some notes about the sermon yesterday. Let's get started. Let me give you some additional thoughts or how about one additional thought from yesterday's sermon about God and how we think about what God asks of us to do. This is a quote from your Christianity, CS Lewis's marvelous, marvelous book that serves in many ways as an introduction to basic New Testament Christianity and in many ways as an apologetic for it, and he wrote the following. This is a quote from page 50 on mere Christianity. God made us, he invented us as a man in Vincent Engine. A car is made to run on gasoline and it would not run properly on anything else. Now, God designed the human machine to run on himself. He himself is the fuel for our spirits, that our spirits were designed to burn. The food that our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from himself because it is not there. There is no such thing, and that is why we go all in with God. That is why God is not asking too much of us. That is why we give ourselves completely to God because it is the only way. It is the only way to truly be alive and to truly be happy. God can't give you happiness apart from some other, in some other kind of way. The only true happiness is with the Lord, and that comes only as we pursue him in relationship and relationships don't have any kind of, oh, that's too big an ask sort of thing. No, when we love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, nothing that God asks of us, particularly as I noted yesterday, because he has done so much for us. Nothing that God asked for us from us is too much hope that helps you think a little bit more in that direction. That was a different kind of sermon and uh, like I said, a big challenge to put that together. Hope this is an additional thought to help you make good use of that. Let's talk about daily Bible reading. You'll notice on your schedule today for Monday, we're reading in Second King's 14 and in Amos the first chapter. What's up with that? Well, we need to get a little bit of this history, so we're going to two Kings 14, and we're reading there that in the 15th year of Amaziah, j Bom began to reign in some area rain for 41 years. I'm so glad I've got the podcast because this is going to be a tremendous opportunity for us to learn so much and draw close to the Lord. But you've got to know some things that are happening here, one of which is this is not J Baum that we've read about before. In last week's reading, as we were reading in First King chapter 12, we read about J Balm in about introducing idolatry and so forth. That's J Baum the first, and those events occur somewhere in the neighborhood of about 930 years before the birth of Christ Jer Baum. The first is in First Kings 12. Now we're reading way over in Second Kings 14 some time's gone by, hasn't it? This is 784 to 753 bc. That's the reign of Jira Baum the second. This is not Jira. Baum the first. That's the kind of thing you wanna write in your Bible. He did evil in the side of the Lord. He did not depart. Verse 24 says, from the sins of j Bom, the son of Nebat. Oh, there it is. See, we read about Jer Bom, the son of Nebat last week. He's the guy that set up the golden calves at Dan and Bethel. Now, a whole lot of time has gone by nine 30 to 7 84. Oh my, you do the math. I'm a preacher. A lot of time has gone by. Are the people doing what's right, answer? No, they are not, and that's why Amos is going to prophesy to these people. We're reading Amos chapter one today. So let's think about Amos chapter one. Amos is not, by the way, a professional prophet. He will say that in chapter seven in verse 14, he has been called by God to go from the south to the kingdom of the North and to address the problems that are occurring there, and he does so in a marvelous fashion. This first chapter would be a super attention getting chapter because what he does is he tours all of their neighbors and talks about how God's judgment is going to fall on them. So for three transgressions or for four, that means more than enough. Three would bring it. Three would bring God's wrath upon you. But no, you, you, you transgress four times. So he starts with Damascus, verse three, then he goes to Gaza, verse six. Then he goes to tire verse nine. Then he goes to eat. Verse 11 goes to the Ammonites. Verse 13, all of the people who are listening to Amos preach say, wow, this guy from the south, he can bring it, man, I'm love. And his preaching, he's describing how God's gonna judge all of our neighbors. They're so wicked over there. I'm so glad that God is finally bringing some judgment on them. Read through this carefully, but watch out. Amos is getting their attention because he's gonna want to talk about judgment falling on these people, judgments, falling on all their neighbors. Guess what? Judgment will fall upon them as well. That's Amos chapter one. It's an easy read. See, tomorrow we'll think about Amos chapter two. It is Tuesday and we're reading Amos chapter two, and the roll call of God's judgment continues. Chapter two verse one, Moab going to be judged and then two, four, Judah will be judged. All the tribes in the north must have loved this preaching. Boy, those people in the south, God's going to get them. I'm loving this. And then he says, verse six, for three, transgressions of Israel and for four, I will not revoke their punishment. So now that he has their attention, everybody's nodding their heads up and down, ammo says, you know what? Judgment's gonna fall on you as well. But what's exciting about this in our reading today, what we might not expect, I think that's one of the questions. Question three, what's unexpected or shocking? What I expect ammos to say is, you're a bunch of idle worshipers. You're falling down to bail. God's had it. You're falling down to these golden calves that were set up way back when by jbo the first, you're still worshiping the terrible stop with your idolatry. No for three transgressions and for four, because they sell the righteous for silver, the needy for a pair of sandals, those who trample the head of the pour into the dust of the earth and turn aside the way of the afflicted. That's the emphasis in Amos social injustice. You're gonna wanna start underlining in your Bible, the places in Amos where social injustice is being highlighted. Also, start watching for the sin of in gratitude. Verse nine, 10 and 11. That's right on the edge of our reading here. Not being grateful to God for what God has done for them. These people are gonna know the judgment of God, but much about God is being stressed here, work your questions on the back of the reading schedule. Think about those questions and draw closer to the Lord by thinking about what God is saying, what God is feeling, what God wants from his people. See you tomorrow will complete Amos chapter two on Wednesday. It is Wednesday and we're reading Amos chapter two, verse 10 to 16, hear the highlight is that the Nazarite, that's those people who took that special vow, had to abstain from any of the fruit of the grate, couldn't eat raisins, couldn't drink wine, any of that. There's some special nazarites in the Old Testament, couldn't cut their hair. Sampson is a Nazarite. Samuel seems to be a Nazarite. The Nazarites verse 12 are made to drink wine and the people who are trying to call them back to the Lord have said, are commanded. Don't prophesy. We don't want to hear a word from God. We want to do what we want to do. This Amos, Amos, the second chapter, it's a short chapter and I think it was difficult to cut these readings and and to have continuity and and be able to find a paragraph. I think sometimes the thing to do is just read the whole chapter again. Just read the whole chapter again. Read our reading today, Amos two 10 to 16, and then read the whole chapter again and feel the whole chapter again. Flight shall perish from the swift. Verse 14, God's judgment is coming on these people. Amos chapter two 10 to sixteens our reading today. See, tomorrow we begin, Amos chapter three. Welcome to Thursday, and we're starting the third chapter of Amos. Amos chapter three, verse one to 10, hear the word that the Lord has spoken against you, all people of Israel against the whole family I brought up out of the land of Egypt. These people seem to think that they get special provision, that they get a pass because they're the people of God. You only have unknown verse two of all the families of the earth. Therefore, I will punish. You have to think about the responsibility that goes with being the people of God. What a powerful idea for us. Then verses three down to verse eight, deal with cause and effect. Do two walk together, verse three, unless they have agreed to meet, that's a very famous passage. People oftentimes don't set that in its context. Am just asks a series of questions, does X happen unless there's Y? Does this happen unless this is happening? And the point of all that then is for him to say in verse eight, the lion is roared who will not fear the Lord. God has spoken who can but prophesy? If I'm speaking, it's because God told me to speak. If you're hearing God's word, it's because something is wrong here. There's cause and effect. I'm not speaking on my own, but you don't know how to do what's right. Verse 10, you're storing up violence and robbery here. That social injustice theme in your stronghold. Stronghold becomes a key word in tomorrow's reading because it's repeated in verse 11. In fact, stronghold, you might wanna look again at chapter one and chapter two, stronghold is a repeated term in those prophecies there and now God talks through Amos about pulling down their stronghold. See you tomorrow. We'll finish Amos chapter three. It is Friday and we read Ammos chapter three verses 11 to 15. What a terrifying reading. This is today, verse 12, as the shepherd rescues from the mouth of a lion, two legs are a piece of vene ear, so shall the people of Israel be. So you look up your shepherd and you see a lion mauling, one of your lambs, one of your sheep, and you go and you grab it and you fight off the line. And about all you've got left is two legs in the piece of an ear. That's what's gonna happen to the people of Israel. They're gonna be torn down their stronghold. Verse 11 is gonna be plundered. God is bringing judgment on the priest. Verse 14 on the false worship center at Bethel. And then verse 15 is so important, I'll strike the winter house with the summer house. Houses of ivory shall perish, great houses shall come to an end. These people are living in luxury. They got a winter home, they got a summer house, they got houses of ivory. They are living in luxury. But chapter four, verse one, look at that. They oppress the poor and crush the needy. This is a book about social oppression, about people who are in poverty being run into the ground by those who are living in luxurious splendor and God calls them into account for it. That is certainly a important note for us to hear today. Sometimes we kind of wanna push away ideas about poverty, social justice, that kind of thing. You know, all those people need to get a job. That is not the word that comes from Amos. The word that comes from Amos is that God's people need to make sure they are not oppressing the poor. They need to be helping the poor. That's a New Testament idea. Yeah. James 1 27, Galatians six, 10, many other passages, but it is right at the center of the Book of Amos. Think about that as we conclude our reading in Amos chapter three here on Friday. Well, thank you for listening. If you like the Monday Morning Cuffy podcast, we would certainly love for you to subscribe, rate, and give a review on iTunes or whatever app it is that you are listening on. If you'd simply tell a friend about the show, maybe share it on social media, that really helps us out. So until next week, may your coffee be delightful and your Friday be wonderful. I pray the Lord will be with you today all day. I'll see you on Monday with a cup of coffee.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for listening to the Westside church of Christ podcast. Monday morning coffee with mark. For more information about west side, you can connect with us through our website, just christians.com and our Facebook page. Our music is from upbeat.is that's upbeat with two P'S UPP, B E A T, where creators can get free music. Please share our podcast with others. And we look forward to seeing you again with a company coffee, of course, on next Monday,

Sermon Notes
Monday 2nd Kings 14:23-24
Tuesday Amos 2:1-9
Wednesday Amos 2:10-16
Thursday Amos 3:1-10
Friday Amos 3:11-15