The Ultimate Goal - Restoration

Got your Bible? It’s lucky you turned with me to the book of Galatians, chapter 6. We’re going to be winding this little study up. I’ve kind of taken some passages out of each of the chapters. And you’ve got to remember, Galatians is that book that I’ve heard some commentators say. It just shows how the gospel needs to be at the center of our lives. It makes us conscious of that role in our lives. And that we’re not just to be, you know, get baptized, get saved, and then just say, okay, Lord, take me home, or I’ll just wait until You come. Lord’s got a plan for us. And that’s to make a difference and to affect the world. Our theme today in chapter 6, and there’s some great verses. And I remember, I have preached, in fact, it was about a year ago, I preached out of Galatians chapter 6. And I called it, you know, spiritual farming. And we’ll look at some of those verses in a moment. But I want to look at it in the context of the whole, you know, most of the first part of the chapter, and how it all kind of goes together. Because I think scripture goes together. I think you can look at one part of the Bible and how it just affirms another part of the Bible.

And so, Paul is here, he’s talking to this church. And he’s talking about what we’re going to look at today, the word restoration. So, I think we’re all being restored. Salvation is restoration. Salvation is getting to where God wants you to be. How we were when we were back in, going all the way back to the garden. When we walked with Him and we talked with Him and, you know, and we had this incredible, special relationship with Him. And then sin came in and just messed that all up. And restoration never stops. And it won’t stop. Until one day you’re in the throne room of God and you’re standing before Him. And like I’ve told folks before, you get that perfect mind, perfect body, you’re in a perfect place because of our perfect Lord. So, that’s where we’re at today. And Paul’s talking to this church. And when I think about restoration and restoring relationships, I think that goes across the board to all of us. I know of broken relationships within my own family. I know of broken relationships. I’m sure you know of broken relationships in your family and how that’s going on and things that you want to restore. And that’s not always easy. Sometimes it needs some help. And we’re going to talk about that.

But I want to tell you, pastors aren’t perfect. When I was reading this, I brought back when I was at my very first church as pastor. And I had, and I didn’t even know I’d messed up. You know, I want to tell you, first of all, pastors aren’t perfect. All you got to do is look at my life or talk to my wife. She’ll tell you how imperfect I am. The amazing thing is, as I’ll never forget, it was a Sunday morning. Things had gone pretty smooth and had gone right. And what I would do at the end of the service is I would just kind of head out, you know, to the back. And then I would greet people as they left the church. And so we were doing that. And I don’t know how it is with your former pastor, but with me, it’s like, that’s the time everybody wants to talk to you. So I had all kinds of folks talking to me. And I’d talk to this person. And I’d turn and I’d talk to this person. And I was talking to different folks. Well, it was a couple of weeks later, I get a phone call. And it’s from one of our dear ladies in the church. And she was kind of ran our senior adult ministry. And I’ll never forget, she said, “Al, I know you probably didn’t mean to do this, but you offended somebody.” Now it’s one thing when you intentionally do that. It’s another thing when you offend somebody and you don’t even know you did it. And this was one of those kinds of situations. And apparently, here’s the story. Here’s what was happening. It was the end of the service that day. I’m talking to folks. And I was talking to this one little lady, sweet lady. Name was Ann. And I’m talking to Miss Ann. And I guess I finished, I thought our conversation was over. So I turned and I started talking to this person. Well, Apparently it wasn’t over. So in her mind, all she saw was that preacher just cut my, our conversation off. And apparently I’m not important. And I started talking and Al starts talking in this direction. I didn’t know I’d done it. And so she called and said, “Al, I don’t think, knowing you, I don’t think you did that. But I just want to let you know what happened because she’s pretty upset.” And I’ll never forget what I said to her was this: “Thank you, number one, for calling me.” And you can, by the way, you can always help your pastor if you just call him up and just say, you know, this is what happened, you know, then it’s on him to take care of it. Okay. Does that make sense? And so I never forget. Now I know about it. So I picked up the phone and called her and said, “Miss Ann, apparently I owe you an apology. Apparently what I thought and what was going on were two different things. I wouldn’t have wanted to hurt your feelings for anything.” And so we then talked a little while. And I, and I, again, I, I apologize profusely and, and then we were okay. But what could that have become? Right? What could that have become? It could have kind of grown and going into a situation and, and think of, well, let me tell you about Al Smith. And all I needed to know was I, I just needed to know. And so, and so I appreciate the gal that, you know, the lady that called me and, and I appreciate Miss Ann for forgiving me. And, and then we were, we were good because God’s always looking for us to restore relationships, especially in the church.

And in this passage, God is talking to the church. Okay. These are the churches of Galatia. These are the churches of around that Turkish area that He’s talking to. So what I want to do is, is we’re going to look at verses six, one through 10, but I want to, it almost really ought to start with the first, the last two verses of, of chapter five. So if you’ll go with me to Galatians chapter five, we’ll just look at verses 25 and 26 for just a second. It says, “If we live by the Spirit, then we ought to what? We ought to walk in the Spirit.” Does that make sense? If you’re going to say that the Spirit saved me, you ought to at least in the Lord’s in part of my life, Jesus is my Savior. I commit my life to Him. You ought to at least walk with Him. “Let us not become, listen to this now, boastful, challenging one another and envying one another.” Now, why would He, apparently that’s going on in the church. See, Paul’s got a couple in the book of Galatians. He’s got a couple of things that he’s worried about. Number one, he’s worried about doctrine. He’s worrying about some of the doctrinal issues. He’s worrying about the fact that, that they were thinking, well, you know, when I get saved, I got to do this, this, and this, and this to make sure I’m saved. And Paul’s going, no, that’s not true. All you, it’s Jesus. Okay. It’s not, it’s not salvation plus works, you know, or, or Jesus plus works equals salvation. It’s salvation plus Jesus equals works. And so we’re not earning our way so we can stand before Him and brag in front of Him one day and say, you know, y’all let me in because I did this, this, and this. So they had doctrine, but then, but there was also other issues in this church and they were unity issues. And Paul is sensing that out that they’re not united. They’re not together. And I want to tell you, the one thing a church should be is, is didn’t say uniformed. I said unified. Churches ought to be that way. They ought to be together.

But let’s go to verse chapter six, verse 20 says, “Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one, listen to this now, in a spirit of gentleness.” Now, when we look at the word restoration, I want to, let’s look at a definition for that because He’s talking about restoring. So here’s a definition I came up with and I found that I think kind of covers it all. The theme of restoration provides a foundation for understanding correctly two things. Number one, sin and suffering. Okay. You want, you know, the first thing you got to understand is that you did something.

wrong or there’s sin at the bottom of this, and we want it—we want to take care of that. It also is for God’s plan for His creation. The Bible says that when, when He comes back, He’s not just going to restore us; He’s restoring creation. See, when the fall happened in the book of Genesis, we didn’t just fall. Human beings, the creation fell, the world fell. Bible says the world still groans because of what we did. So it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s God’s plan for us and His unstoppable quest to save His people and restore them to His image. God’s always working, folks. He’s all—whether we’re working or not, God is always always working. And He invites us to join Him in His work and, and bring people again to what? The Bible says the last command of Jesus was go and make what? Disciples. So God wants to make us disciples. We got to have a master. You’re going to be mastered by something. You need to be mastered by your own sin and your own wants and desires and whatever you think is right. And I always ask folks, well, how’s that working for you? When you mess up, where do you go? But when we make Him the master, and we want to be, as it says in Romans chapter 8, we want to be conformed more to the likeness of His Son, then that makes all the difference in the world.

So again, it helps us correctly understand sin and suffering, His plan for creation, and His unstoppable quest to save people and restore them to be more like Him, His image. You know, when I think of restoration, I think of a lot of things. I think of those old, you know, those remodeling TV shows. You ever watch those? I love those. Remember the first one when they, you know, they put the family out on vacation, and they almost just about rebuild the house. And then they brought them in, and they had them, you know, stand behind the bus. Remember what they said? Move that bus. Remember all that? And then that bus would move, and all of a sudden, they looked at a house like, oh, that can’t be our house. No, that can’t be what—no. Can we go inside and look around? And so, and it was incredible. I want to tell you, that’s what God wants to do in our lives. He wants to restore us better. Remember the $6 million man? We can rebuild him. We can make him better. God wants to rebuild us. He wants to make us better. Lee Newton just had knee replacement surgery. You know what he’s hoping for? Whole better knee. He’s going through some pain right now because he’s in that first week. Six weeks, I’m going to be going through that. That’s why I was right there next to him when he went in talking to the doctor, because that doctor’s going to be doing me in about six weeks. And I’m thinking, okay, I want to know exactly what’s going on with this picture. Hopefully, that knee’s going to be better. It’s going to be almost as good as when it was perfect. Except when Jesus comes into our lives, He makes us better than that. He makes us like Him.

Now, in this passage, we’re going to see four aspects of restoration that those in the church, among those in church that we must always keep before us. Number one, we need to understand this: restoration is costly. I want to tell you, sometimes when you help to restore a relationship in the church or in your life, or even with the Lord, it gets costly. When you try to restore something with somebody else, especially, it can get messy. You know, this thing—I mean, what a great picture of these, you know, of these children trying to move that box. Thank you, Fowler, for picking the whole thing up and taking it over there. But he took that burden off of that young man. Okay, right? That young boy. That’s the picture. And sometimes that gets messy. That takes things like time. And that takes, you know, it takes our commitment. And it makes us put other things aside so we can do that. And yes, but I want to tell you, is that not what Jesus did? When He leaves the throne room of heaven, that perfect place, and He comes here? And He doesn’t just show up and say, I’m here to do this. He comes as a baby. Who does that? And He comes to people like Mary and Joseph. And He comes to a race that everybody looked down on. I mean, they weren’t even in charge. You want to talk about sacrifice? Folks, I want to tell you, when you help people, it’s sacrifice.

Look what he says here. He says, we’re to restore them in a spirit of gentleness. That’s, by the way, one of the fruits of the spirit. And that word gentleness means, it means kindness, graciousness. I mean, you can go to somebody and get right in their face and say, you know, you ought to be doing this, this, and this. And I’m going to help you, but I hope you appreciate this. Wow. You know, that just impresses people.

I read a story this week about a couple that looked, they were out eating at a restaurant. And when they were done, they looked at the waitress and said these words. Can we talk to the manager? Now, I want to see, if you’re that waitress, what are you thinking? I mean, what are you thinking? She got the manager. Manager came up. And here’s what they said. I just wanted you to know that our waitress tonight has really been exceptional. Then they described several things that their server had done that impressed them.

Waitress was standing a little bit behind the manager. How do you think that went over? You think, oh, man, really? How do you think the waitress treated them the rest of the night or treated other people that night? See, I’m always, you know, when you just share and to tell people when they do something good, not always when they do something bad. And a lot of it’s how you serve it up. People are willing to listen to you if they know you give a rip about them and care about them.

How do you serve it up? I mean, do you get defensive? Do you get in their face? I mean, let me give you a few words of communication of love and encouragement you might want to try maybe even this week. You know, you do that really well. May I pray for you right now? How are you? I mean, really? I want you to know that what you said helped me. I was wrong. Thanks for serving. Have I offended you? What can I do to help? Tell me about your day. Please forgive me. I still love you. You know, God’s big enough to [inaudible]. I’m proud of you. You know, you’re really growing. Please come over for dinner. I missed you. I am so happy for you. I mean, how does that not make things better?

But restoration is costly. So I came up with a little acronym. And I’m sure you’ve seen it before. It’s just the word joy. And I just think about this is how God’s priority for us in our lives ought to be. J, of course, is Jesus. O is others. Y is what? Is you. Now, we don’t usually like that order. I don’t know how you’d spell joy otherwise, but we wouldn’t like that order, would we? See, we want you to be number one or number two.

William Booth, who’s the founder of Salvation Army. If you ever looked at some of the early history on the Salvation Army, what an evangelistic association that place was. I mean, it still is. But when he was around, there was going to be an incredibly large national conference. And he was one of the main speakers. And he was supposed to be there. And they were looking for him to be there. And he got sick and was unable to come. But he did send a letter to be read. So they got up there and they said, we know General Booth can’t be here. And we want to. But he wants to just leave something with you. And so they opened up the letter and they unfolded it. It had one word in it. It just said others. One word. Others.

I mean, is that how we get up in the morning and we go, I want Jesus first. I want others second. I’m number three. It’s costly. It’s a sacrifice.

Number two, it’s not just costly. It’s humbling. See, and that humbling includes us. Verse two, bear one another’s burdens and therefore fulfill the law of Christ. Well, what’s the law of Christ? Well, in Matthew 22, verses 37 to 38 says what? Jesus says, number one, we’re to love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. Right? But he said the second one’s just like it. Second one is what? Love your neighbor as yourself. So what does that mean? How is it like it? Well, it’s like it because It says we’re to love our neighbor with all our heart, mind, soul. So it fulfilled. For if anyone thinks he is something when he is nothing, he deceives himself. But each one must examine his own work, and then he will have reason for boasting in regard to himself alone and not in regard to another. For each one will bear his own load.

There are three different words for trespass and burden and load in this passage. And they have, you know, at the beginning it says that when someone is caught in a trespass, it’s like you’re a Christian, and all of a sudden you find yourself in a sin, and you kind of, everything was going okay. Then all of a sudden you’re in a place that you’re going, I don’t know what to do with this. I don’t even know how I got here. And what He’s saying is we need to come along in gentleness and restore that person and help that person. I mean, his thing could go south quickly. It came upon quickly. It could go south quickly. But it also is bear one another’s burdens. It’s kind of like with the weights up here. We’re to come alongside and actually carry them and help people through.

He says here we’re to bear our own load. Because sometimes in life, people don’t need to come, but we need to understand that life just gets tough. We don’t need to have, you know, go into detail on that. I mean, financially, life gets tough. Life gets tough. You know, it’s tough at your job. It’s tough all kind of places that you go in life. Everything’s going great, and then all of a sudden it goes on. It’s like a parent with a child. You’ve got your whole day planned, and all of a sudden your child, something happens with your child. You break a leg, something happens at school, something happens stupid, and all of a sudden everything that you wanted to do that day gets out and goes thrown out the window, and all of a sudden your whole day is rearranged. Or how many times have you had your day planned, all of a sudden somebody runs a red light, boom, smacks your car. Day’s ruined. Everything changes.

See, sometimes it includes us because we need to realize it’s not just all about someone else. It’s also about us, and it makes us examine ourselves. In chapter 5, God says, here is the works, okay, of the flesh, and He names them. I mean, they’re some pretty sickening things. Here are the deeds of the flesh, immorality, impurity, sensuality, basically all the sexual sins. Idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envy, and who wants to be part of that? But as a Christian, you have that bag hanging on side of you with those seeds in there. But you also have, now that you’re Christian and Christ is in your life and the Holy Spirit has entered you, you have another bag hanging of seeds in you. And what are they? Well, they’re love, joy, peace, kindness, patience, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

So, you’re Johnny Appleseed, okay, or Joanna Appleseed. So, you’ve got these seeds, and you can throw out whatever seeds you want. You can throw the seeds of the flesh, you can throw the seeds of the Spirit. Does that make sense? It makes this example, what am I throwing out there? Am I throwing seeds of discord out there, or am I throwing seeds of joy, and peace, and kindness, and gentleness, patience, and self-control? Am I throwing those seeds out there? What takes us to the verses that we’ve read so many times, look at verse 6. The one who has taught the word is to share all good things with the one who teaches him. Do not be deceived. God is not much. For whatever a man sows, he shall also reap. If you’re throwing the seeds of the flesh, you’re going to reap that, even as a Christian. If you throw the seeds of the Spirit, you know what you’re going to reap? You’re going to reap the seeds of the Spirit.

It’s humbling. It makes us examine ourselves. Not just costly humbling, but it’s also rewarding. Here’s what God’s doing. Verse 8 says, It takes time, but it is rewarding. Why? Because God is making deep changes. When God goes to these churches, and even in Paul himself, God’s making deep changes. When you become a Christian, God starts working deep in you. See, restoration isn’t always visible on the outside. I mean, it is visible on the outside, but it always begins on the inside. You can tell, you can look at a person by what they’re doing, how God’s working in their life, but I want to tell you, before they ever got to that point, He was working on the inside. It started with salvation when someone goes, you know, this ain’t working. What I’m doing is not working. It’s just not working. It’s like what Peter, Peter was a bragger. Peter was, I mean, now he was a natural leader. Peter said all kinds of things. Lord, I’ll go, I’ll die for You. You can always count on me no matter what happens. And then when Christ needed him most, what did he do? Denied Him. But Jesus is in the restoration business. And so on that beach that day, what did Jesus, He said, Peter, do you love Me? He brings him back. He makes him examine exactly what he did. And He asked him three times and then He restores him. He not only restores him, He even tells him how he’s going to die. I like that. He goes, do you realize you’re going to be going places you don’t want to go? You’re going to end up dying in a way that you don’t want to, you don’t want to die. And Peter’s going, which is typical of what we would do. He goes, what about him? And he puts, you know, points toward John and goes, well, what about him? And Jesus goes, don’t quit worrying about him. You know, I want to tell you, sometimes when Jesus talks to you, He’s talking to you. He ain’t talking to somebody else. Talking to you. He’s talking to Al Smith. See, sometimes it shows on the outside, but it always has to start on the inside. Salvation is always in restoration and growth and discipleship is always from the inside out, not the outside in. And it keeps us close to the, to the Lord. It doesn’t end until we go to be with Him. Look what He says here. Let us not lose heart in doing good for in due time, we will reap if we do not grow weary. He just kind of gives, He just kind of sums it up in a way. He says, so then while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who are of the household of faith. It’s got to start here, folks. How can a church ever be used by God to reach outside if it’s not right on the inside? We got to be always right on the inside. I didn’t say uniformed. I said unity, unified. Should I get the right words right? It’s having this attitude of gratitude. Do you know, one of my favorite passages is actually, is in Philippians. This is out of verse, chapter two. It says, verse 14, do all things without grumbling or disputing, so that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you are to appear as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life. But then He says something interesting in chapter four. He says, we’re to just be gracious and loving folks. I mean, how many times we go, oh, poor pitiful me, man. Folks, did we not realize we live better probably than 95% of the world’s population? Rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say rejoice. Let your gentle spirit, again, that gentleness, be known to all men. The Lord is near. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. Do you understand, do you realize that when you have a spirit of thankfulness and gratitude, that there’s a part of the brain that can’t work and that’s about being anxious and having anxiety? They can’t work at the same time. When you have a thankful, gracious heart and mind, it shuts down the part of being anxious and having anxiety. I didn’t know that. I think that’s pretty interesting. I mean, look what it says here. Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication. Listen to this. With thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. Because what happens? And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your heart and your minds in Christ Jesus. Restoration is costly. It’s humbling. It’s rewarding. Let me just close with this. Reason we want to restore people, because we love them. We want to restore, make sure ourselves restored because it’s the right thing to do. Because it’s, folks, I don’t know how you are, but when you really help somebody, how Do you feel? Robertson McQuilkin. I don’t know if you know that name. 22 years, he was president of Columbia Bible College. 22 years. And then his wife came down with Alzheimer’s. Let me just show you a video that I think will just kind of sum this up.

Robertson McQuilkin was president for 22 years of Columbia Bible College and Seminary. His wife was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. And when her condition worsened, he was faced with the difficult decision of either institutionalizing his wife or resigning to care for her. But when the disease progressed in 1990, he resigned as president to care for his wife full time. She stopped recognizing him and recognizing him in 1993. And then on September 20, 2003, 10 years later, Muriel McQuilkin died at the age of 81. We put together some old scrapbook pictures with a segment of his resignation speech to the student body at Columbia Bible College.

It seems in our culture that many men and women will take the easy way out of difficult circumstances and just start looking for the exit in their marriages. Well, I wanted you to hear from this man a different story.

I haven’t in my life experienced easy decision making on major decisions, but one of the simplest and clearest decisions I’ve had to make is this one, because circumstances dictated it. Muriel now, in the last couple of months, seems to be almost happy when with me, and almost never happy when not with me. In fact, she seems to feel trapped, becomes very fearful, sometimes almost terror, and when she can’t get to me, there can be anger. She’s in distress, but when I’m with her, she’s happy and contented, and so I must be with her at all times, and you see, it’s not only that I promised in sickness and in health till death do us part, and I’m a man of my word, but as I have said, I don’t know with this group, but I’ve said publicly, it’s the only fair thing she sacrificed for me for 40 years to make my life possible. So, if I cared for her for 40 years, I’d still be in debt. However, there’s much more. It’s not that I have to, but I get to. I love her very dearly, and you can tell it’s not easy to talk about. She’s a delight. It’s a great honor to care for such a beautiful person.

Catch that. That’s our last point. Not that I have to, but that I get to. You know why, even though it’s messy, even though sometimes it costs us time, and we’ve got to put things that we’d rather do off to the side, and it’s always inconvenient. You know, restoring people and restoring things in our life and doing the right thing. I’m telling you, it is costly. It is putting others before you and Jesus before you. Yeah, it’s humbling. I want to tell you, it’s rewarding, because our attitude ought to be, it’s not because we have to, because Jesus didn’t have to leave heaven. Jesus didn’t have to come in our bodily form. Jesus didn’t have to go to the cross. Jesus didn’t have to shed His blood and die. Jesus, God, we ought to look at life. I have, I, someone goes, why’d you do that? Your answer ought to be, well, because I could. Could. Do you not think that restores relationships? You can. Get to. I get to. Don’t you think that attracts people? Would attract me? What are some things God’s working on in your life this morning? Because you have to. Because you get to.

Let’s pray. Father, thank You. Thank You for just talking about why restoration is so important to You and ought to be important to us. Relationships, things we get to do for You. Yeah, they’re inconvenient. Yeah, they’re costly. Yes, we’ve got to put ourselves off to the side. Yes, all those things and more. When it’s all said and done, it’s not because we have to. Gosh, how would it change our lives if we just looked at it? You know, I get to help somebody else and it ends up helping me. Lord, we all need to make decisions. Help us to make the decision we need to make today. In Your Son’s name we pray.