April 3, 2022 | Alien God Part 3

New Life Saginaw

April 3, 2022 | Alien God Part 3

April 3, 2022 • Pastor Ken Cline

When Isaiah encountered the Lord in His holy presence, he responded as anyone would. “I am ruined,” the prophet said, when he crossed the line into God’s presence. “Woe is me,” he declared. (Is. 6:8) We forget that God alone is holy, and we reduce Him to a lower level. When we do this, everything goes to a lower level.

Are we forever separated from God? Lost forever? No hope? Because of the blood of Jesus, we enter God’s presence without fear. This is the Good News. The more you understand your sin, the more you will worship and praise Him for what He has done.

Sin brings disease, disaster, and ruin. Romans 3:10-12 says that no one is righteous. The good news is that we do not need to remain in sin. God puts His hand down and draws us up! Atonement = AT ONE MENT, reconciliation with God. After our true encounter with God, the natural response is to share this with others (Is. 6:6-7).

In the Old Testament, the blood of a lamb was necessary for atonement (Lev. 17:11, Is. 55:8-9). Yom Kippur was the one day of the year where Aaron, the high priest, went into the Holy of Holies to take care of his own sin first and then the sins of the people.There were two goats–the sacrificial lamb and the scapegoat, which went into the desert. Jesus’ perfect blood takes away our sins, not just once but for all time. No animal sacrifices could permanently take away sin. Jesus is the High Priest for all time (Heb. 4:14). Atonement happened with
1. ONE person (Jesus)
2. ONE day (crucifixion/Good Friday)
3. ONE place (cross)
(See John 1:14, Heb. 7:26-27, Rom. 3:23-25)

Like the old hymn asks, “What can take away my sin?” The answer is, “Nothing but the blood of Jesus!”

Have you received Jesus and His forgiveness? Are you ready to start a relationship with Him? Have you confessed your sins and asked Him to forgive you? (Heb. 4:14-16)

March 20, 2022 | Alien God Part 1

March 20, 2022 • Pastor Ken Cline

This sermon is based on Isaiah 6 which describes Isaiah’s vision of God and his subsequent commitment to God’s mission. Isaiah is utterly fearful of God’s majesty (picture the Wizard of Oz scene with the face appearing on the curtain and fire blazing). He says, “Woe to me! I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.” God is not like us, he is “alien” and so much greater than us. He created everything by just speaking it into being. God is not our buddy, he is a consuming fire (Hebrews 12:28, 29) and we need him to be that to conquer our struggles. If we find ourselves worried and shaken by the things of this world, it’s a phony, a voice behind the curtain (Oz analogy). We live in a sinful world, yet God calls us to be different. We exist to work for his pleasure and not our own. If we don’t follow him, we’re the ones losing out, not him. We need to ask ourselves what is keeping us from doing that. Are we too tired? Don’t have enough time? We’re never going to have more. We need to begin to follow what he has for us to do now and keep pursuing it. When we stumble and fall, we need to get up and keep doing it until we see Jesus face to face.

March 27, 2022 | Alien God Part 2

March 27, 2022 • Pastor Ken Cline

When God speaks, what is your answer? For Isaiah, “woah is me” was the immediate response. “I am a man undone.” Isaiah recognized his sin, repented, and surrendered himself to whatever God wanted of him without question. When faced with the holiness of God, person after person in Scripture fell to their knees, covered their faces, and repented of their sins. Yet many times, when we are confronted with God’s holiness, we try to negotiate. God has drawn a line in the sand. It’s a boundary meant to protect us from what Satan wants to use to destroy us. God warns us of the damage to come out of love for us. In fact, He crossed the line between Heaven and Earth out of love for us, to atone for sin and provide a way to a new life of freedom. We cannot pay the price for our sin alone. We were born in bondage to sin. We needed a Savior and Jesus gave us Himself. The proper response to such a sacrifice is humility and repentance. When we truly understand the cost Jesus paid for our sin, we will stop trying to see how close we can get to the ways of this world without getting burned. Instead of trying to mimic the world we will start to win the world to Jesus, submitting to God’s plan as Isaiah did—“Here am I. Send me.”