sermonette: Growing As A First Fruit

Bill Cherry
Given 30-May-04; Sermon #669Bs; 15 minutes

Description: (show)

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I have a first fruit here. Pentecost, it's a day of first fruits, and this is the first fruit because it's first. And it, but it is not without blemish. But anyway it represents the day of fresh fruits, and the first fruits represent the best and finest quality fruit, which we should be. So let us read verse 9 when I found it. But you, but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood and holy nation, a peculiar people that you should show forth the praises of God. Who has brought you forth out of darkness into His marvelous light. So as chosen generation and royal priesthood is another way we could say that is you are first fruits, are chosen to be special first fruits of God, to show forth and some translations have this show forth God's praises as display God's virtues. And so we are chosen as first fruits. To display God's virtues to the world, and we should be examples. And even as a seed, It's a little tiny thing and it changes from a seed to To a fruit, it must make a significant change in its form and body. And we must radically be transformed from what we are now. To the perfect first fruits, if we are going to be the example that God has called us to be. So today the purpose of this sermon, is to show you that we must grow to be first fruits and grow to be examples of the world, to the world. Now let's look at verse 2, and we will spend all our time in 2 Peter. Uh, chapter 2, I mean, excuse me, I Peter chapter 2, excuse me. Uh. As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may grow thereby. And newborn babies, if they are hungry, you will know it. They cry out, they cry out for milk and this verse, not that we are babies spiritually, but that we should have the intensity of desire that the babies have, and this should be a lasting, long lasting desire that we have to for milk. But babies not only desired strongly, but they also it is also the mainstay of their diet and uh. If we are to grow spiritually, we should desire God's pure, unadulterated word. It should be a major source of our spiritual growth. And we should want to ingest it consistently and regularly. And we heard this morning that we should number our days. And I thought in, in relation to this, we should perhaps number our hours in the day and set aside a dedicated portion of our time for Bible study because without God's word, we cannot grow. Now I have another fruit. This is not Maybe it's a first fruit in terms of being first fruit, but you see it's a dried shriveled pea. And it's like some of the things that you can see as you go past the as you drive through the countryside, you can see corn is not filled out and some that may be brown like Richard's grass. But I'm using this to represent a person that cuts himself off from God's word. By getting, doing other things besides that, we need God's word if we are going to grow, and we cannot produce the kind of fruit that God wants us to have unless we get consistent regular dose of God's word. Now let's look at verses 11 and 12. Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims abstain from freshly lust, fleshly lust, which war against your soul. Having your conversation honest among the Gentiles that whereas they speak against you as evil doers. A They, they may by your good works, which they shall behold, glorify God in the day of visitation. Now the day of visitation, I understand it to be the day of trumpets when Christ comes, are commemorated by the Day of Trumpets, when Christ comes and he sets up a government that will teach the whole world the truth of God, and then they will say, oh, I know why they did that. I know why they wouldn't let their children engage in these things, or why they lived a certain way, and they will praise God because of our example, if our example is right. Right now I wanna Make a comment about the things that we must do in this section, it tells us that we can do to be good examples, and one of them is abstain from fleshly lust. Now, the first thing that might come into your mind and, and you'll say I'm not guilty of is, is sexual sins. But it also can mean love of pleasure, love of comfort, indulgence, some entertainment, appetites for food and activities and material objects, and all of those could come under this category. And the reason it might be kind of deceptive to us is because in many cases these are not sin of and by themselves. But they war against us as this scripture tells us, because In moderation, they may be beneficial, but we can get grasped into it and wrapped up into it, and they can consume our time and our energy and dominating our thinking, and they can become the foundation of our values and our, our cosmos as we have been, as we have heard, and they can cause us to shut this Bible. And pay attention to other things and leave this out of our lives instead of making this the mainstay of our diet. As babies do milk. And we also heard this morning. That we can let some of these things become our treasure and set our hearts on things that are not the things of God. So, They can war against us if we are not careful and we do not heed what we are being admonished to do in this in this scripture. Now it says having your conversation in King James, some people Uh, interpret this to be conduct among the Gentiles and their conduct includes conversation and uh. This means, and it says our good works, it mentions our good works. So our conduct, our good works are the things that we do if, if we follow God's laws and base our living on what God's word tells us to do. So If we do this, then we, when, when Many people who speak evil of us now maybe or look at us and scratch their heads at what we do. They will praise God because of our example and not praise us, they will praise God. Now let's look at verse 13. And through 15. All right, this is another section. It manages us to be examples, and it tells us why and what the result would be. Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake. Whether it be to the king as supreme or unto governors as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers and for the praise of them that do well. For so is the will of God. That with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men. So the result of us. Uh, it says, it says for the Lord's sake, obeying the ordinances of men, being law abiding citizens, traffic rules, regulations of the society that are designed for order, city ordinances, and all of the things that we are that men have set up to make this society orderly. If we abide by those, people will, will say, well, he's a law-abiding citizen. He's cooperative and he's honest, and he is a good example. And then, and there are people who sit over us. And I would like to look over our shoulders and find us doing something wrong and look at our conduct and see and want to criticize not us but God and God's church because it says submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake. So that should be our main motive and then also to cooperate, have peace and be peacemakers. And I want to give you one example in the Bible that I think is interesting. In, in Acts 3 and 4, there is an account of Peter and John walking in the temple, and they see a man who was crippled for 40 years, and Peter looked at him and said, in the name of Jesus Christ, rise up and walk. And the man, he rose up and he started leaping up and down and jumping and praising God, and the people saw this and said, look at this, and they started praising God too, and the Pharisees said, Who is this? And by what authority do you do these things? And Peter and John were orderly and polite to these men. But they took this opportunity to proclaim this was done in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified by the Jews, and they had a chance to preach the gospel. But the verse that I want to zero in on related to this. This in, in verse 15 of this chapter we just read it is the will of God that with your well doing you will put the silence, the ignorance of foolish men. So it just, they had just done an act or or through God's power, an act of healing a man, and Acts 4:14, we will not turn there, I'll read it to you. It says, and beholding the man standing with them, they could say nothing. The man was there, the deed was done, they saw the reaction of the people, the reaction of the man, and what could they say? So if we conduct our lives as perfect fresh fruits, People will not be able to say anything against us, and that's what this scripture is talking about. So the first one talks about when Christ comes, the second one talks about when What we do actually on the earth right now with our example now as we strive to become first fruits. I saw a movie several years ago about a popular singer who had problems and she was troubled in her private life, and it was a concern as she was going by her daily activities. But when performance time came, her countenance changed. She was before the audience, and she flashed a radiant smile. She glowed with enthusiasm, and she belted out beautiful music which displayed her talents. Now we are in a time of our lives where we are called to display God's virtues, and we should have this in the back of our minds in anything we do and everything we do. We are displaying, we are called to display and show God's virtues and the right to hear in this word which tells us many specific things that we should do. Our first responsibility is to be examples to our families, and our families are watching us, and they will follow our examples whether they are good or bad examples, but they will have a tendency to be just like us and whether we are children or adults. They are our example is going to be noticed and followed. And a second example is to be an example to society in this world that we are living in. So When Christ comes, they will praise God. And in this age they will have nothing to criticize about our conduct.