TOO BIG TO FAIL? - 2012 # 9

TOO BIG TO FAIL?

# 1  > A hundred years ago, the famous ocean liner Titanic hit an iceberg and sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. What lessons can it teach us today?
As the 100th anniversary of the Titanic disater nears, what does the future hold for the English-speaking nations? Is there smooth sailing ahead, or looming disater? You need to know! When the RMS Titanic was built, it was a marvel of engineering. Its massive hull was, during its construction, reported to be the largest movable man-made structure in the world. Because of its state-of-the-art design, Shipbuilders magazine heralded it as "practically unsinkable." And yet, on April 15, 1912, the mighty Titanic struck an iceberg and sank two miles to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, only five days into its maiden voyage, killing more than 1,500 of its passengers. Instead of being forever praised for its mastery of the waves, the name Titanic became synonymous with complete and utter disater.

#  2  > A hundred years later, the United States, Great Britain, and other Western nations are at a dangerous juncture in their collective voyage. Some observers have compared our mounting economic and social ills the gash the Titanic sustained on that horrible night in 1912. Is this comparison valid? will the U.S. regain its prosperity and its international statue? Will millions of unemployed Americans and Britons find new jobs despite failing economies? Or, will the massive pressure from our national sins finally overwhelm and sink our nation? 

#  3  > What about you? How are you preparing your family for tough times ahead? When the Titanic headed for New York a century ago from Southhampton, England, it was considered the largest and most luxurious ship in the world. It appeared safe and secure. However, though it complied fully with maritime regulations of its day, there were serious problems. For example, the Titanic did not have enough lifeboats on board to carry all passengers at once. Its 16 boats and four "collapsibles" could accommodate only 1,178 people__while the ship could carry more than 3,300. And its crew members were not trained to take seriously the new Marconi wireless radio on board. Though the crew of the Titanic received warnings from other ships in the darkness of the April night, they failed to take seriously what they were hearing. When the crew finally sighted the iceberg and took evasive action, it was too late. Are we taking seriously the warnings we are hearing? Whose warnings should we be heeding? To what degree are you willing to risk your future, based on the words of today's so-called economic and financial "experts"? How much can you depend on your job or employer to be around when the times grow tough? What about your nation's government__can you count on it to provide your needs as a safety net, when many nations themselves are going broke? Where can you turn in the coming tough times?

#  4  > TAKING ON WATER
The problems our nation face today are legion__ and are accelerating every day. Our political systems are dysfunctional and full of hypocrisy. The U.S. exports degrading entertainment around the world, which brings shame to those who profess to believe in God. Traditional marriage and family are collapsing. Millions have debilitating moral problems. Pornography is epidemic. Our cities are dangerous. Many children are growing up with no direction or guidance, and feel hopeless and helpless. Practices once outlawed as perversion are now protected by law and even encouraged. Our society accepts and even praises unbridled greed and focus on the self. Global military commitments sap national strength. When will it all end? Where is our ship headed? 

#  5  > Many are shocked to hear experts predict the collapse of the once-mighty United States. Warning of the danger of a double-dip recession, economist Mortimer Zuckerman wrote: " The prognosis for America is especially discouraging. We have relied too heavily on surplus saving from abroad on top of running massive current account deficits. Until recent times, we ran deficits of this order only when we were engaged in a titanic war ... But now we are running annual deficits of $1.4 trillion, about 10 percent of the total economy ... American exceptionalism endures. But we must confront our dysfunctional and profligate government. America was founded on the principle of creating a better life for our children and grandchildren. We can do it. We aren't doing it" ( The Danger of a Global Double-Dip Recession Is Real," USNews.com, November 29, 2010 ). The warnings are serious, and the danger is real. But is anyone listening" Is anyone steering us away from the iceberg?

6. Niall Ferguson, professor of history at Harvard, recently warned that a financial downturn can turn catastrophic once it erodes faith in the financial system. "The numbers...cannot erode U.S. strength on their own, but they can work to weaken a long-assumed faith in the United States ability to weather any crisis. For now, the world still expects the United State to muddle through...But one day, a seemingly random piece of bad news__perhaps a negative report by a rating agency__will make the headlines...Suddenly, it will be not just a few policy wonks who worry about the sustainability of U.S. fiscal policy but also the public at large, not to mention investors abroad. It is this shift that is crucial: a complex adaptive system is in big trouble when its component parts lose faith in its viability" ( "Complexity and Collapse: Empires on the Edge of Chaos," Foreign Affairs, March-April 2010 ).

7 - What these experts are saying is that, while the good-ship luxury liner America appears to be upright and sea-worthy, it is actually sinking. And capsizing can come suddenly, seemingly without warning. Speaking of the nation of Israel, the prophet Isaiah warned: "Therefore this iniquity shall be to you like a breach ready to fall, a bulge in a high wall, whose breaking comes suddenly, in an instant" ( ISAIAH  30:13 ). Relative calm can deceive us of the real danger__which can appear suddenly. Now is no time to be lax at the helm.

8. - In 2000, Igor Panarin, a former KGB analyst and dean of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Academy for diplomats, predicted the U.S. would collapse within ten years. For most of the last decade, he was scoffed at and dismissed. But once the financial chaos of 2008 occurred, people started taking notice. Panarin suggested that by June 2010, mass immigration, economic decline, and moral degradation would trigger a civil war and the collapse of the dollar. He predicted that the U.S. would break into six separate pieces. Of course, the U.S. is still together. Panarin was at least wrong about the timing. Does that mean that his prediction of decline is wrong? Or is that his timing is off, but the conditions are still ripe for a collapse like the one he predicted?
The wise King Solomon recorded, "A prudent man foresees evil and hides himself, but the simple pass on and are punished" ( PROVERBS  22:3 ).

{ 9 }. - God wants us to be warned of the icebergs ahead and to prepare ourselves against calamity! Jesus Christ reiterated this principle when He said, "But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come on you unexpectedly" ( LUKE  21:34 ).
Our Savior counsels us not to be entangled with sin, destructive habits, and worthless pursuits. He challenges us to be ready for big events just ahead of us. He explains as we read further: "For it will come as a snare on all those who dwell on the face of the whole earth. Watch therefore, and pray always that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will come to pass, and to stand before the Son of Man" ( LUKE  21:35__36 ).

CONVERSION TO CHRIST: THE MAKING OF A CHRISTIAN HEDONIST - SEPTEMBER 18, 1983

CONVERSION TO CHRIST: THE MAKING OF A CHRISTIAN HEDONIST
SCRIPTURE: 
   MATTHEW     13:44__46 
#  1  > The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sels all that he has and buys that field. "Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a marchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it. Last week we saw that the infinite and overflowing happiness of God is the foundation of Christian Hedonism. God is happy because he takes perfect pleasure in the excellence of his own glory, especially as it is reflected in his divine Son. God is happy because he is sovereign and therefore can overcome every obstacle to his joy. And God's happiness is the foundation of Christian Hedonism because it spills over in mercy to us. When God calls men and women to himself, it is not out of a deficiency that he needs to fill but out of fullness that he loves to share.

#  2  > We concluded last week by saying that not everyone has an eternal share in God's joy, because there is a condition that must be met. The condition is that we obey the command: Delight yourself in the Lord ( PSALM  37:4 ). But many people take more delight in riches and revenge and recreation than they do in God. And so they have no share in God's saving mercy; they are lost. What they need is conversion to Christ__which is nothing more than the making of a Christian Hedonist. That's what I want to talk about this morning.

#  3  > Someone may ask, "If our aim is conversion, why can't we just say, 'Believe on the Lord Jesus and you shall be saved'? Why bring in this new terminology of Christian Hedonism?" It's a good question. Here's my answer. We live in a superficially Christianized society where thousands of lost people think they do believe in Jesus. In most of my witnessing to unbelievers and nominal Christians, the command, "Believe in Jesus and you shall be saved," is virtually meaningless. Drunks on the street say they do. Unmarried couples sleeping together say they do. Elderly people who haven't sought worship or fellowship for forty years say they do. Every stripe of world-loving church attendees say they do.

#  4  > My responsibility as a preacher of the gospel and a teacher of the church is not just to repeat precious biblical sentences, but to speak the truth of those sentences in a way that will prick the conscience of the hearer and help you feel your need for Christ. What I am trying to do is take a neglected and essential teaching of Scripture and make it as pointed as I can in the hope that some hearts will be stabbed broad awake. And therefore I say, when a person converted to Jesus Christ, that person is made into a Christian Hedonist. Unless a man be born again into a Christian Hedonist, he cannot see the kingdom of God. That's what I want to try to show from Scripture.

#  4  > Created by God
Before we can focus on conversion, we need to review the great thruths about reality that make conversion necessary. The first truth we have to face as human beings is that God is our Creator to whom we owe heartfelt gratitude for all we have. The best evidence for this is in your own heart and life. Why is it that the judicial sentiment of your own heart automatically passes judgment on a person who snubs you when you have done him a favor? We automatically hold a person guilty who falls to have any gratitude to someone who has shown him great kindness. Why? You know it would be a totally unsatisfying answer to say: I feel that way merely because I got spanked as a child for not saying thank you.

#  6  > We don't let people off the hook that easily. The quickness with which our hearts judge inconsiderate people bears witness to our true belief: ingrates are guilty! The real reason for why our hearts respond this way is that we are created in God's image. Your judicial sentiment, which automatically holds me guilty if I ignore you after you've saved my child from drowning, is the voice of God in you. An aspect of the image of God in you is that you involuntarily hold people accountable for ingratitude. Therefore, you know in your heart that there is a God to whom we owe heartfelt gratitude.

#  7  >