Sermon Series: Misconceptions About Christianity 

It's Boring! 

John 10:10 

CBC ~September 14, 2003

In a nutshell: Christianity can seem boring if we dwell on the basics and don't experience the maturity that comes from realizing the significance of the resurrection.

I. Introduction

A. It's Supposed to be Boring

The Sunday school class for seven-year-olds had been going on for about 30 minutes, when one little boy suddenly exclaimed to the teacher, "Can we hurry up? This is boring!"

Immediately the little girl to his left gave his side a sharp poke with her elbow and rebuked him. "How rude! It's supposed to be boring!"

The famous playwright and poet, Oscar Wilde once wrote the words I put on the front of your worship folders this morning… "Church is like an ageing grandmother, surrounded by memorabilia and odd musty smells. Lovely to visit, but intolerable to live with."

B. Transition

Do you believe that? What to you think about Christianity? Is it boring? Is it dull? And if it is boring or dull, is it supposed to be that way? To be honest with you, "boring" is how a lot of people view the Christian faith!

Well, we're beginning an new sermon series today that will examine some of the common misconceptions that people have about the Christian faith. We're going to be looking at a lot of things that people believe about us Christians and the faith we hold. Things like: It's irrelevant; and intolerant; and judgmental; outdated; and so on.

I'm hoping to accomplish two things over the next 8 or so weeks: -First, if you have a misconception or mistaken belief about the Christian faith, that you'll learn the truth. -And second, if you work with or know of someone who holds one of these common misconceptions about faith in Jesus Christ, that the answers we give you in the next several weeks will help you effectively communicate the truth of things to that person you know.

So, let's consider this morning the misconception that Christianity is boring.

II. What Happens When Christianity Starts?

Now, I'm convinced that the main reason that most people-whether they really are Christians, or say they're Christians, or are people looking in from the outside, at Christians-believe Christianity is boring is because they only know about how Christianity starts, but not how it continues. In other words, they know the "milk", but they haven't experienced "the meat". Let me explain what I mean.

A. The Beginning of Salvation

Most of you know what happens to a person at the point of salvation. As soon as a person agrees with God that he or she is sinful, like it says in…

Romans 3:23 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

And realizes that the only way to get rid of the consequences of that sin is to accept God's free gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, like it says in…

Romans 6:23 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

And then personally talks to God, expressing an idea similar to this…

Jesus I know I am a sinner and I need your forgiveness. I believe that when you died on the cross and rose from the dead, You did those things for me. I accept the exchange of my sin for your righteousness. And from this day on, I want to follow you as the leader of my life.

… they then enter the door to the Christian faith. And most people know that when you become a Christian, certain things happen…

B. The things that happen when you become a Christian

1. Their sins are forgiven.

2. By having their sins forgiven, they are able to then forgive themselves and forgive others, because of what they've experienced.

3. They know they have eternal life, and don't have to spend the rest of their lives worrying about whether or not they are good enough to be good enough to get into heaven. They know that their belief is what saves them, not being a good person.

4. They also know that they are children of God and therefore have a direct relationship with God and don't need any human or dead saint as a mediator to go to God on their behalf.

5. Because they know what God has done for them in providing salvation, they can't help but tell the people they know about the good news about Jesus and His salvation.

6. They also know that their bodies become temples of the Holy Spirit, so God is with them all the time.

7. And finally they know by becoming a Christian they are entitled to all the blessings that God says He'll give.

Most people who are Christians know all this, because they have grasped the significance of Jesus death on the cross, where He became the perfect righteous sacrifice that God's holy justice demanded for their personal sin.

But that's only the beginning. And if you just stay at the beginning of anything, it's going to eventually become boring.

Illustration: When I first took up motorcycling, I bought a Yamaha Virago that was 535cc's. It felt awesome to me at first! It was exciting to ride it. But eventually, the excitement wore off. Why? Because it was a beginner's bike. It was elementary. It was no longer fun. I couldn't go on long trips because it was uncomfortable. The bike felt small. I felt cramped. There wasn't much chrome! So, for me to progress in the sport, I needed to graduate to something bigger.

Well folks, that's similar to why many people think Christianity is boring. They're stuck in entry level. They've taken up residence in the beginner stage. They haven't gone on to the bigger things that God has in mind for His children.

Friends, listen…Jesus Christ's death on the cross is the beginning. But the significance of faith in Jesus Christ doesn't stop there. Because He didn't stay dead. He arose from the dead, three days after He was crucified. And based on His Resurrection, an incredibly exciting thing takes place. Jesus talked about it…

John 10:10 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; but I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

Let me tell you, if you think Christianity is boring, then you haven't grasped the power and significance of the Resurrection.

III. What is the significance of Christ's resurrection?

The apostle Peter, wrote in his first letter in the New Testament…

1 Peter 1:3 3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,

Most Christians, and even a lot of non-Christians can tell you the significance of Jesus' death. We just gone over those. But when you ask those same people, "What is the significance of Jesus Christ's resurrection?"… they have some difficulty with that one. And that's a shame, -because it's that part that takes a person from a baby in the faith to maturity in the faith. -That's the part that takes a person from basic to full blown deluxe. -That's the part that takes a person from boring to exciting.

So, what does Jesus' resurrection mean? What does His resurrection from the dead mean to us? That's what I don't want you to miss today. Christianity is not just a "someday" kind of thing. It's a "right now, in Bishop, in 2003", kind of thing.

A. Resurrection Means Life

Resurrection has to do with "LIFE". And who needs life? That's real easy…DEAD PEOPLE. Dead people need life. I think sometimes we Christians have a terrible knack of overlooking the obvious. The verse I just read from 1 Peter 1:3 says that through the resurrection of Jesus, we have been given NEW BIRTH into a LIVING hope! That, my friends, is the significance of the resurrection! Through Jesus' resurrection, we have been given NEW BIRTH into a LIVING hope!

Now why is that so significant? Because we were DEAD! Why would Jesus need to bring new life, if we weren't dead? Folks, we were stone cold, deader than a door nail, cold on the slab…dead. And Jesus brought us life!

B. When did man die?

So, when did man die? Look at…

Genesis 2:16-17 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."

Now, you know the story. Adam and Eve were created by God and placed in a marvelous place called The Garden of Eden. You also know that Satan, the devil, took on the form of a serpent and came along and succeeded in tricking Eve and Adam into doing exactly what God told them not to do. Satan first tricked Eve, then Adam into eating the fruit of the very tree that God told them not to eat of. Look at what Satan said to Adam and Eve…

Genesis 3:4 4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman.

Well, was he right? Did Adam and Eve die, or did they keep on living? Who was right?…God, or Satan? Well, you're thinking…God just pronounced a curse on the three of them and kicked them all out of the Garden of Eden. But nobody really died, right? Wrong! The Bible tells us that Adam left the Garden of Eden and lived to the age of 930. But then he died! So who was right? Did Adam and Eve die as God said they would, or, did they not die like Satan said?

C. Created in the Image of God

But physical death wasn't the only death that took place in Adam and Eve. Let me show you something else…

Genesis 1:27 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.

God created Adam and Eve in His own image. Now what's the difference between man and animals?

Illustration: While we had our dog Bentley for almost 11 years, I learned something about that big goofy animal. As long as he was healthy, well-fed, had things to play with, and we'd scratch behind his ears every once-in-a-while-he was perfectly content.

But in all the time we had him in our home, never once did I see Bentley with a thoughtful look on his face wondering why he was here. Never once did I see him wondering if there was a God that created him. In fact, I don't ever remember seeing him push his food aside and get a look of depression on his face and wonder if there was more to life than just what he was experiencing.

Now, that all sounds kind of ridiculous, doesn't it? But that's the big difference between us and all other animals-we have a spirit and they don't. Human beings have a spirit that was created for eternity and causes us to be concerned about eternal issues like… -Who am I? -Why am I here? -What's the meaning of life? -What's missing in my life?

And being created in God's image means that our spirit-that part of us that was created for eternity-is intimately connected to the Creator of heaven and earth. There is a spiritually alive relationship there. A relationship where the life of the Creator lives in His creation. And that life and relationship for Adam and Eve was terminated by their free choice to disobey, rather than obey God. And so they DIED! They chose to remove themselves from dependency on God and they suffered the consequences that God said they would, and they "died"!

Where as it says in Genesis 1:27 that Adam and Eve were created in God's image…, look at what Genesis 5:1-3 says…

Genesis 5:1-3 1 This is the written account of Adam's line. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. 2 He created them male and female and blessed them. And when they were created, he called them "man." 3 When Adam had lived 130 years, he had a son in his own likeness, in his own image; and he named him Seth.

Since Adam was dead (and by that I mean he did not have the life of God, or an intimate relationship with God in him any longer), he could not reproduce a child in the image of God. All he could do was reproduce a child in his own image.

Two spiritually dead parents could not pass on what they no longer possessed themselves-spiritual life.

D. The significance of the virgin birth

So, this all leads up to something else that's vitally important to the Christian faith. A thing called "the Virgin Birth". Look a this verse from Matthew's gospel…

Matthew 1:23 23 "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel"-which means, "God with us."

The only way that Jesus could be born spiritually alive was to have God involved in the reproductive process. Think about this… if He had been born humanly from two human parents, He would have inherited their state of spiritual death and their sinful human nature. And He had to be born spiritually alive because only then would He have a real life to lay down on behalf of the human race.

You see in order for Jesus Christ to be both human and Divine, He had to be conceived by the Holy Spirit in a human.

John 3:6 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.

God created Adam and Eve in His own image, but they died, and that image was lost. So Adam and Eve could only reproduce children in their image, not God's. Therefore Jesus Christ had to be born of the Holy Spirit and Mary to be what He needed to be-both human to take our sins to the cross, and divine so He could give us dead people, new life.

IV. Why did Jesus come?

And that leads us right back to the truth of John 10:10 that basically says, "Christianity IS NOT boring…

John 10:10 10 The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

The first part of that verse… The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; is something we've been looking at. Remember...

Genesis 3:4 4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman.

Well, we've seen that they didn't "NOT SURELY DIE"…but they really did die-physically and spiritually. So we know who the thief is, don't we? It's Satan.

But the second part of John 10:10 says, "I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full." Jesus came to bring LIFE!

People who try to be religious are boring. They lack excitement, life seems like a chore, and they live by grocery lists of do's and don'ts. That is boring. But life from God is not that! It's full!. It's abundant! It's exciting!

In his book, Experiencing God, Henry Blackaby writes this… "Do you want to experience God mightily working in your life and through your life? Then adjust your life to God in the kind of relationship where you follow Him wherever He leads you."

But I'm afraid too many Christian men and women have substituted busyness for the mighty working of God in their lives. Friends, Jesus doesn't want you busy…He wants to accomplish something significant through you. I think the problem is that we've become fanatics. And you know what a fanatic is, don't you? "A person who redoubles his efforts after he has lost sight of his goals."

Friends, if Christianity is boring, it's because we lost sight of the goal. It's Jesus living His life through us, not Him living along side us. Our only hope against having a faith that's boring, is to learn that Jesus didn't come just to get men out of hell and into heaven! He came to get Himself out of heaven and into men! HE CAME THAT WE MIGHT HAVE LIFE AND HAVE IT TO THE FULL!

IV. Conclusion

A. Poem-I saw Jesus

I came across this poem this week that I think communicates what it will look like when Christ LIVES in us. It's called, "I saw Jesus".

I saw Jesus last week. He was wearing blue jeans and an old shirt. He was up at the church building; He was alone and working hard. For just a minute he looked a little like one of our members. But it was Jesus, I could tell by his smile.

I saw Jesus last Sunday. He was teaching a Bible class. He didn't talk real loud or use long words, But you could tell he believed what he said. For just a minute, he looked like my Sunday School teacher. But it was Jesus, I could tell by his loving voice.

I saw Jesus yesterday. He was at the hospital visiting a friend who was sick. They prayed together quietly. For just a minute he looked like Brother Jones. But it was Jesus, I could tell by the tears in his eyes.

I saw Jesus this morning. He was in my kitchen making my breakfast and fixing me a special lunch. For just a minute he looked like my mom. But it was Jesus, I could feel the love from his heart.

I see Jesus everywhere, Taking food to the sick, Welcoming others to his home, Being friendly to a newcomer and for just a minute I think he's someone I know. But it's always Jesus, I can tell by the way he serves. May someone see Jesus in you today.

B. Wrap-up

Friends, dead people don't need help! What they need is life! Jesus isn't just some historical figure who lived a long time ago-Jesus is alive right now! And He wants to live in you, and give you a full non-boring life. That's what you need to be asking Him for-to be a sanctuary or dwelling place for Him to live His life through you. 

Amen.