THE LESSONS OF HISTORY

A 77-year old Astronaut has been orbiting the earth this past week has
been praising God at every turn. Sen. John Glenn is a Christian man and
he has told people on the ground that his history-making trip has
brought him closer to God. He mentioned the other day that he is in awe
more now than ever of God’s creation.

Sen. Glenn’s generation and the one preceding his have seen more change
in one lifetime than any people in history. My grandmother lived long
enough to travel from milking cows by hand at lantern light to seeing
men walk on the moon. While we’ve learned a lot about science and
technology, human nature hasn’t changed very much. It’s sad but true
that humanity often doesn’t learn much from THE LESSONS OF HISTORY.
Let’s look at that in 4 different ways: 1) Same Expectations 2) Same
misplaced priorities 3) Same result 4) Same responsibility
Jesus is talking about 3 different times of history: the time of Noah,
the time of Lot and His own time. Just as it was then, so it is now.
People have the same expectations about the end of the world. Some think
they know when it will come, or at the very least, they know when it
won’t come. Some live as though they’re not at all worried about being
accountable to God. Then and now, human nature has 1) THE SAME
EXPECTATIONS about the end of time. There were false prophets then and
there all around us today.

Some still claim to know when it will be. Jesus has something to say
about that in today’s text. ” Once, having been asked by the Pharisees
when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God
does not come with your careful observation, nor will people say,
‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is within
you.” Then he said to his disciples, “The time is coming when you will
long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, but you will not see
it. Men will tell you, ‘There he is!’ or ‘Here he is!’ Do not go
running off after them. For the Son of Man in his day will be like the
lightning, which flashes and lights up the sky from one end to the
other. But first he must suffer many things and be rejected by this
generation.”

Please remember that the people of Jesus’ time were looking for the kind
of Savior who would usher in an earthly kingdom of peace and
prosperity. His kingdom is a SPIRITUAL KINGDOM. It’s not the kind that
you see marching on parade with flags flying and bands playing. It is
WITHIN YOU in the sense that he rules over people one at a time and
they, in turn, change their lives and the lives of people around them.
Jesus had to remind them that sin is still the major problem, just as it
was back then. He would have to take care of that problem on the cross
first. First he must suffer many things and be rejected by this
generation.

How very much we need the internal changes he brings, because we have 2)
the same misplaced priorities. “Just as it was in the days of Noah,
so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man. People were eating,
drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah
entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.”
“If there is anything we learn from history, it is that we learn nothing
from history.” Without the change that Jesus brings within us, our human
nature rushes toward destruction like a bunch of lemmings following
each other to destruction. Jesus said that’s the way it was at the time
of the flood. They were so sure that Noah was some crazy old religious
fanatic and that nothing like a flood would ever rain on their parade.
Look back at Genesis and see what caused the flood. Let’s see if we’ve
learned anything from history. We read in Gen. 6: 5 The LORD saw how
great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every
inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. 6
The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart
was filled with pain. …11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight
and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become,
for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to
Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled
with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them
and the earth.

The earth is filled with violence. You can’t turn on the news without
hearing of some violent death or assault. Count how many murders take
place on the TV screen every hour. How many babies were aborted last
week? The song is the same; we’re just singing a few different verses
than did the people of Noah’s day.

Think back to the last time you drove in your car with the windows open.
A dead animal is on the road and your nose alerts you to his presence
before your eyes do. You smell the over-powering corruption of death and
you gag at the odor.

That’s how God reacts to sin. Sin is CORRUPTION in God’s eyes. Something
had to be down about the stench. So God turned on the world’s largest
washing machine when he sent the Flood.

Jesus makes one more comparison for us. Look at the next paragraph of
the text with me now: “It was the same in the days of Lot. People were
eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. But
the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and
destroyed them all.”

Just as Noah was a preacher of righteousness for 120 years, so Lot tried
to save the people of Sodom & Gomorrah. The stench of sin sent up by
those two sin cities gave God no choice but to destroy them. That’s when
Abraham started history’s most famous auction in reverse. Abraham prayed
that if 100 souls could be found there who were righteous in God’s eyes,
could the city be saved? God said yes. It got all the way down to 10,
but there were only three. 4 left the city but one’s heart was still
back there rolling around in the muck and filth of sin. Small wonder
that Jesus told us: REMEMBER LOT’S WIFE. (Lk. 17:32)

Sin is very much a matter of the heart and that’s why we need so very
much to have this Kingdom of God live within us by faith. The world
before the flood could have been saved, despite its violent wickedness,
but no one listened to God’s warnings spoken by Noah. Sodom could have
been saved, even with its gay pride organizations, but God couldn’t even
find as few as ten righteous people there.

I have often been struck by the fact that Jesus doesn’t even mention
the violence of Noah’s time and the sexual sin of Lot’s time. No, he
points only to their fatal preoccupation with the things of this life.
He says that the people of Noah’s day were eating, drinking, marrying
and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then
the flood came and destroyed them all. Same song, next verse with the
time of Lot: “It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating
and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. But the day
Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed
them all.”

Are we learning anything from history? Human nature just doesn’t
change. What we must learn from history is that we are all doomed to
repeat the mistakes of history if we don’t have this Kingdom of God
living within us that Jesus speaks about. That comes from the power of
the Holy Spirit, which works in God’s Word.

Only this power can save us from being condemned with those who have
learned nothing from the mistakes of history.

Once the great French preacher Bourdaloue was probing the conscience of
King Louis XIV, applying to him the words of St. Paul and intending to
paraphrase them: For the good which I want to do, I don’t do; but the
evil I don’t want to do, that’s what I do. …I find two men in me…The
King then interrupted and said: Ah, these two men…I know them well.
Paul told us the only way out of our human dilemma. He writes in Rom.
7:24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of
death? 25 Thanks be to God–through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I
myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in the sinful nature a
slave to the law of sin. Rom. 8:1 Therefore, there is now no
condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through
Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit of life set me free from the law of
sin and death.

A world that has the same misplaced priorities will reap the same
condemnation. Our world needs people like Noah and Lot who will spread
the good news that God’s help is still available and that God’s Spirit
is still working to change us from our self-destructive ways. How will
people of our day know if we don’t show them the power of God to change
lives? How will they know if we don’t share it?

During the reign of Oliver Cromwell, the British government began to
run low on silver for coins. Lord Cromwell sent his men on an
investigation of the local cathedral to see if they could find any
precious metal there. After investigating, they reported, “The only
silver we could find is in the statues of the saints standing in the
corners.” To which the radical soldier and statesman of England
replied, “Good! We’ll melt down the saints and put them into
circulation!”

That’s exactly what the early church did. We read in Acts 1:8 But you
will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my
witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of
the earth.” A little later on, we’re given the same example. Those who
had been scattered by the first Christian persecution shared the good
news wherever they went.

A man once laid a piece of chocolate candy on a table. Then, picking up
an ant, he put it near the delicious morsel. He was surprised to see it
take a single bite and then hurry off to inform the rest of the colony.
Soon the little creature returned, followed by a long train of other
ants who enjoyed the treat with him. Many Christians who have tasted
that the Lord is good can learn a lesson from that little insect.
Having found God’s rich supply of grace, they ought to spread the glad
tidings to others.

At age twelve, Robert Louis Stevenson was looking out into the dark from
his upstairs window watching a man light the street lamps. Stevenson’s
governess came into the room and asked what he was doing. He replied, “I
am watching a man cut holes in the darkness.” I see this as a marvelous
picture of what our task should be as sharers of God’s light–people who
are busy cutting holes in the spiritual darkness of our world.

Some people were trapped in an elevator during a power failure. All 7
panicked at first . Then one man remembered the tiny flashlight he had
in his pocket. When he turned it on, the fear faded. During the 45
minutes they were stuck together they told jokes, laughed, and even
sang. The Bible says that we are like that little flashlight. Just as
the flashlight draws power from its batteries, we draw power from Jesus.
As light, we dispel fear, bring relief, and lift spirits. We don’t even
have to be big to be effective. We just have to be “on.” “For you were
once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of
light.” Help us to be lights in this dark world, dear Lord, and help us
to learn the lessons of history, In Jesus’ Name, AMEN