The Banks Of Your River

I was pleased to provide the following lesson at Joy Church today.

Don’t fool yourself into thinking that you are a listener when you are anything but, letting the Word go in one ear and out the other. Act on what you hear! Those who hear and don’t act are like those who glance in the mirror, walk away, and two minutes later have no idea who they are, what they look like.

But whoever catches a glimpse of the revealed counsel of God—the free life!—even out of the corner of his eye, and sticks with it, is no distracted scatterbrain but a man or woman of action. That person will find delight and affirmation in the action. (James 1:22-25, The Message)

This is the Word of our Lord

Thanks be to God

Has anyone here ever gone canoeing? I’ve only done it a couple of times. Back when I was in college, I had a great friend and roommate – still a great friend to this day – who grew up in northwest Ohio, and it was tradition for his family to vacation in Michigan every summer.  And, if you have ever explored Michigan, you know that, despite being, well, Michigan, they have some absolutely beautiful rivers. 

So, there were a few times many years ago when I visited Michigan with this friend and, a couple of those times, we went canoeing. Now, he was a very experienced canoer and, in his mind, it was not going to be fun at all if we accidentally tipped the boat over and went into the river. Personally, I didn’t think that sounded all that horrible. I mean, I could easily see the bottom of the river. The water, maybe, would have been up to my knees if we went in. But he was pretty determined that we were not going to do that. More than anything, I think that, being an experienced canoer, he would have been horribly embarrassed if we tipped.

I remember that, when we canoed, he insisted on being in the back of the canoe because he said that is where you steer from.  Frankly, this idea of steering from the back didn’t make a lick of sense to me. I mean, I’d driven and ridden in a car before and I knew that, in a car, you steer from the front. A back seat driver can try all they want, but they really can’t determine the direction that the car is going. 

But, he was insistent that isn’t how it works in a canoe, so I let him be in the back of the canoe. Now, as we were canoeing, I started to realize that his whole theory of only being able to steer from the back was pretty bogus. I mean, yes, it was perhaps most natural to have the canoe’s direction determined from the stern or back of the boat but, fact is, if I tried, I could control it some from the front as well. Well, until he hit me in the back of my head with his paddle, that is.

In any event, I am pleased to say that, neither time that we canoed did we end up in the water. I saved that for later in life when I tipped over a jet ski that Lisa, Evan, and I were all on. 

Anyway, so, regardless of who was steering that canoe in Michigan with my friend, there were still limits to where we could go. Let me ask you, when you’re in a canoe on a river, what, more than anything else, limits where you can go? The banks of the river, right? While there might be some little side tributaries or lagoons you can explore, you still can’t go outside the banks of the river, right? As a rule, once you’re in the canoe, we need to follow the river and stay within the banks.

So, what happens if I’m in that canoe and I get hungry … and I realize that I forgot to pack a lunch. Or, worse yet, what if I DID pack a lunch and we tipped the canoe and our food washed away or got water soaked? Not a lot I can do, is there? Very few people see reason to build restaurants alongside remote rivers in the middle of nowhere Michigan. I mean, we may be lucky and see a 75’ tall McDonalds sign off in the distance, but it’s three miles away through a woods and lots of underbrush. Tempting though it may be, I can’t go there from my spot on  the river, can I? Of course not! I have to stay within the banks.

I believe that a Christian’s life is pretty similar to that canoe trip – you really want to stay within the banks of the river that God puts before you but, well, sometimes it’s not so easy, is it?

As I think about the trip that I have taken down the river of life my past 56 years, I have to give some thought to the choices I have made. Sometimes I have made mistakes, I’ve sinned. I’ve messed up, done things I regretted. Didn’t do some things that I wish I would have done. Sometimes though I have stayed on what our grandmas called the straight and narrow path. Sometimes I have done good things and sought God’s best in the life of myself and those around me. But other times I have made bad choices and done things that were destructive to myself or others. 

Sometimes, too, I have chosen to ignore the things God was tugging at my heart to do. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? Those times when God calls us to go way out of our way to help someone else, but we choose instead to just care for our own needs and self-centered desires? I think we’ve all been there, haven’t we? I know I have been, far more often than I care to remember. 

But thinking back to canoeing down those rivers in Michigan, what if life really could be like that river? What if we had defined banks that we have no choice but to stay within? The devil may be calling me to ignore my health and stop by McDonalds for their two sausage breakfast burritos for $2 deal but what if the banks of my river simply prevented me from doing that?

Of course, too, what if I do go through the drive-through line at McDonald’s and God tugs at my heart to pay it forward and pay for the food for the person behind me in line? What if I look up and inside that car behind me appears to be a single mom with several kids and she just looks exhausted and frazzled as can be? What if God keeps tugging at me about what a blessing it would be for her if I paid for her meal? But then my selfish nature – driven frankly by the devil – tells me to keep my money and not do that -- tells me that she’s probably going to be ordering twelve happy meals and a bunch of other food – why it could be $40 or $50! So, even with God tugging at my heart, I don’t do it.

But what if the banks of the river – the banks of my life if you will, guided me in a way that I had no choice but to follow God and His leading? What if, faced with the decision of whether to pay the McDonalds bill of the woman behind me, I had something that forced me to follow how God was tugging at my heart? What would it look like if my life had to stay within the banks of the river … and it was God who created the banks of that river?

Businesses, churches, and other organizations create their banks of the river by writing Core Values. You may even remember a couple of years ago here at Joy Church when we had a sermon series on our Core Values as a church. We have Core Values where I work. Other organizations I have been involved with over the years have had Core Values. 

Core Values become the barriers beyond which that organization will not cross. In fact, those organizations will even say, if they violate those Core Values – if they go outside the banks of their river – then they have failed as an organization. 

Now, we know that, as Christians, if we go outside the banks of the river that God has set before us, He still loves us … we may have messed up but He gives us His grace, mercy, and compassion … and encourages us to admit our mistakes and get our lives back within the banks of the river. He is always the God of second, third, and fourth chances because He knows that we’re human. He knows that our sinful nature kicked in long ago with Adam and Eve eating that darned apple in the Garden of Eden. So, we have grace when we mess up.

But, think about this, just like a business or a church does by developing Core Values to be their banks of the river, what if we established our own boundaries for how we’re going to live our lives? What if used what we can learn from God’s Word and from following Him to establish rules of life for ourselves?

We all run into situations many times each day when we must make decisions. What actions are we going to take with our lives? What words are we going to speak? What comments are we going to write on Facebook? In what ways are we going to treat our friends, our neighbors, our family, our co-workers? Sometimes when we face those decisions, we make the right choices and sometimes we make the wrong choices. Sometimes we do that nice, generous favor for a neighbor but then, other times, we don’t. Sometimes we work out and get some exercise to take care of the body God blessed us with but other times we go ahead and eat that candy bar or those breakfast burritos. For some of us, maybe sometimes we resist that next cigarette or that next drink but then other times, we don’t do so well.

What if we established Core Values for our lives – very specific things that are important to us in our lives which are going to determine how we live – the banks of our rivers if you will? What if we evaluated our lives and determined the things that we struggle with -- the things that we know we can’t make it through on our own power, the things that we need God’s strength, direction, and wisdom to navigate – what if we look at those things and write our own Core Values to serve as reminders for those areas of our lives? What if we become so intent on staying within our Core Values – the banks of our river that, whenever we think about something which might go against one of those Core Values, we automatically seek God’s strength to make it through that situation?

Kind of a neat thought, no? But, here’s the kicker, we have to not make our Core Values be the easy things in our lives but instead have them be about those areas where we struggle. For example, I could make for myself a Core Value to preserve life, to not kill anyone, to not support abortion but, for me, those aren’t tough things. I absolutely would stay true to that Core Value but I’d be staying true on my own strength, not because I needed to go to God and seek His strength. 

Instead, I need to choose Core Values to address the things I struggle with. To watch my diet and take care of my body. To always be kind and generous toward others. To spend active, participating time with my wonderful wife and family during which I am 100% present instead of thinking about work or Joy Church or other things. To always speak with love and compassion, and not with self-centeredness. If I made Core Values pertaining to those things, then I would be making Core Values that I can adhere to only by turning to God.  Those types of Core Values actually would remind me to turn to God.  If I struggled with something like substance abuse, then that would be a great Core Value for me because I would know that I can only resist that next drink or whatever it may be with God’s strength – not with my own strength.

As you set the banks of the river for your life, make your Core Values be your places of weakness – your places where you need to seek God – your places where, given to your own strength, you know that all too often you will make the wrong choice, do the wrong thing, not do the right thing. Make those your Core Values and, when your life intersects with those things, seek God for His strength, His direction, His wisdom … so that you might remain within the banks of the river determined by those Core Values rather than drift outside the river into areas that you will regret, areas where you will not find God’s best for your life, areas where you know that you will later have to ask God for forgiveness. 

As we think about overcoming the tough areas of our life, here are some Core Values we may want to consider:

Be kind to everyone

Be generous whenever the opportunity arises

Always speak without swearing or using God’s name in vain

Pray regularly 

Take care of ourselves with exercise and diet

Resist that next cigarette or that next drink

Love others as we love ourselves

Seek peace in our hearts and our relationships

Be joyful at all times

Put God first in our lives

Put others before ourselves

Put forth our best effort in all things

Be bold and creative and adventurous in life

Here’s one that’s definitely for me – always show extreme love and compassion to those who are sick or grieving (far too often I am so self-centered!)

Did you see anything in that list that is “easy” for you – that you never struggle with? If so, then you must have that down and therefore you don’t need that as a Core Value. But, if you see anything in that list that is difficult for you, that you struggle with, an area where you need God’s strength – that, for you, can be a Core Value – a firm bank of the river that you must establish for your life. And, when faced with the possibility of going outside that bank, you remind yourself to turn to Jesus. “Please, Lord, redirect my thoughts and actions. Give me Your strength to do the right thing here … the thing that pleases you, the thing that is right for me and those around me, the thing that brings life rather than tears it down.” 

If you establish Core Values to guide your life and you turn to God when you’re at risk of violating one of those Core Values, do you realize what strength and power you’re tapping into? It’s pretty incredible, really. You are tapping into the power of the Creator of the Universe – the One who loves you without end. And, because He loves you, He wants the best for your life.

Think about it – thinking pack on some of our possible Core Values, among other things,

God wants you to speak kindly to others and breathe His love into their lives.

God wants you to exercise and watch what you eat so that you might live a long vibrant life of service to Him and to others.

God wants you to pray to Him and put Him first in your life so that He can be your friend, not just your 9-11 call when times are tough.

God wants you to resist that next cigarette or that next drink if those are things you struggle with.

And, if we call out to Him to help us stay within the banks of our river – His river really –we can rest assured  that ultimately His best will prevail in our lives.

So, all of this banks of the river stuff may have you thinking “Gosh, Todd, I don’t know … that sounds kind of boring, doesn’t it?” I mean, if I am always doing the right thing, taking care of my body, putting God and others before myself, avoiding the things that tempt me … wow, that sounds like a lot of work and maybe not a lot of fun!

But, you know what, this is where God challenges us and makes things exciting for us. He challenges us to stay within the banks of the river and to do His work – to change the world. What could possibly be more exciting than having the Creator of the universe want your help in making the world a better place?

If we’re doing the tough stuff for us – the things that make up our Core Values – God will always have plenty to teach us and to bring to us. If we’re loving others and being generous, God will bring amazing people into our lives. If we’re taking care of our health and our bodies and avoiding things that might harm us, we will stay active and vibrant for long, full lives. If we’re loving others, we will find deep relationships of great fun with those in our lives. If we’re working to stay active and productive in life, God will lead us to new discoveries, and learning new things.

John 10:10 says that Jesus came that we might “have life, and have it to the full.” Does that really sound even the slightest bit boring? I don’t think so! If we’re following God, life within the banks of the river will be anything but boring. Following God and His Word changes our lives!

My friends, God’s ways are always higher than our ways. Following the Word of God and establishing Core Values that draw you closer to God in the areas where you know that you’re weak – the areas where you know that you struggle to do the right thing -- will only make your life fuller and better. He is the Creator of you and the universe, and He wants to be your best friend, active in guiding your life.

Let’s pray