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A Place in My Father’s House
Larry Kirkpatrick, Mentone Seventh-day Adventist Church, February 12, 2005
Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the LORD, to serve Him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be His servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of My covenant; Even them will I bring to My holy mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon Mine altar; for Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.
Can I Belong?
Belonging. Do you belong? Look out across the cultural horizon. See the people struggling to differentiate themselves. Blond, brunette, brown, black, white, red, pink, blue, and green: hair color is one way. Cars, computers, favorite style of music, favorite band, favorite television show, cell phone brand; we go out of our way to be different from others. Who am I and what is my identity? Where do I fit? People carve out their own distinct things. We all want to be unique. But we all are unique. We don’t really need to paint racing-stripes on our forehead to be different. But some do.
Some of this is fine. There is nothing wrong about having a favorite telephone you want to use. But some of the things people do betray a certain sense of insecurity. People don’t really know for sure if there is a place for them. Does this world have a place for me?
Now a sermon is not a word about us, it is a word from God to us. But because it is a word from the express image to the echo-image, from the original to the copy, there is a sense in which a sermon while telling us about our Father also tells us something about ourselves.
We wonder whether there is a place for us. We wonder whether we belong. We wonder whether there is a place in the Father’s house for us.
This wondering is not only something that we do. It is something that others, who may not have some of the clarity about God that we do, also are wondering. The people we are about to meet as we move into this evangelistic meeting may also be wondering. Where do I fit? Where will I belong? Could I belong at that little church in Mentone? No, they probably haven’t asked that yet; they may not even know we exist yet. But a month from now some will be asking themselves this question.
Now what are we? We are messengers, Malachim. Messengers for who? For the express image, for God Himself. So we are also His representatives. So when people are wondering whether they can belong—here—they will be checking out the representatives. When they speak to you, when they speak to me, will they feel they can belong? Is Mentone a place where the sparrows can find a perch?
That is the question that prompts us today to explore God’s promise to the sons of the stranger. All of us are strangers. We come here as a gathering of distinct people. We are from all over. There are persons here from every populated continent. But at the end of the day, we are a gathering of former strangers who have joined ourselves to the Lord.
Why Gathered?
To what purpose are we gathered? To what purpose are we gathered to Him as Seventh-day Adventists? Look again at our text. Do you see the parallelism?
To serve Him, and to love the name of the LORD,
To be His servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of My covenant.
See the parallel? This is a common pattern. A-B, then A-B-C. “To serve Him” and “To be His servants” is the obvious parallel. The second parallel is “To love the name of the Lord” and to keep “the Sabbath from polluting it.” Then the last extension and summary, to take hold of God’s covenant.
You cannot “be” His servant (noun) unless you “serve” Him (verb). Unless there is action there is no true actor. We joined ourselves to the Lord to serve; not just pastors; not just the deaconesses; not just church officers or conference workers: Every member. I never told my children in my home, “you should do this because you are part of the pastoral family.” I always told them, “You should do this because you are a Christian.” We didn’t join the Mentone sitting-down club; we joined ourselves to the Lord to serve Him. We don’t just sit, or even just stand. We serve. Catch the difference?
The second parallel is quite fascinating. We are gathered to the Lord “to love the name of the Lord.” In the Bible, name represents character. Could we say then that we joined ourselves to the Lord “to love the character of the Lord.” But neither is this love a passive love. I have my concerns, brothers and sisters, about all these contemporary songs that so passively say that God is beautiful, that His face is all I see. All well and good, but I hope we are doing more than admiring that beauty from a safe distance, more than just seeing His face. To love the character of the Lord will mean what? Something active happening!
So look at the parallel. Parallel to loving the name of the Lord, is to keep “the Sabbath from polluting it.” Now, praise God, that sounds active! So how is it parallel?
So much about Christianity is so passive. You take some Bible studies, get baptized, start tithing and giving offerings (two different things), and then keep on doing that. For some folks, that is the extent of their experience. And some aren’t even returning tithe or giving offering! Some aren’t even attending church. But now to keep the Sabbath, from polluting it, that is going to take a step of faith today. You may have to give up a job that pays well, or even a career, so you can be faithful to your God. You simply cannot work in secular employ during the Sabbath hours and be a Sabbath-keeper. Now all a Sabbath-keeper is, is a commandment-keeper. And all a commandment keeper is, is another way of answering Jesus’ question in John 14:15: “If you love Me,” do what, says Jesus? “Keep My commandments.” If you love Me, then don’t pollute My commandments.
How would you pollute the commandment about not bowing down to idols? You would let some disordered thing in your life remain as an idol and you would bow down to it, you would make it a higher priority than seeking your God. How would you pollute the commandment, Thou shalt not steal? You would steal in some way. How would you pollute the commandment about coveting? See how this works? You pollute a commandment by cheapening it or disobeying it, by not giving your heart fully to serving God.
The Sabbath commandment is all about us communing with God. He made this time with us in mind. It is His holy day (Isaiah 58:13) but it is the day He made for man (Mark 2:27). That is profound! His day, but made for us. His day, but made for us. His day, but made for us. Now with this idea in mind, where will we, the image-echoes, want to be during the holy Sabbath in relation to the express image? We will want to keep His Sabbath; we will want to love the name, the character of God, and we won’t know what’s in that character unless we connect to it, unless we expose ourselves to it, unless we draw close to Him so we can know Him.
Isaiah ties this all off with the extended and summarized phrase, “and taketh hold of My covenant.” We are not taking hold of His covenant unless we are serving Him, ever-more accurately echoing His character in our own, and keeping His Sabbath and all His other commandments from polluting them. All these things are encompassed in our taking hold of God’s covenant. We are wholly His (w-h-o-l-l-y), or there is a hole unfilled in us. Either we are as far we can be into His covenant, or we are out at the margin, the edge somewhere. We are sliding by, being molded by the disordered world we were born into. We are shapers of God’s kingdom or the shaped of Satan’s kingdom. We are fighting the current, heading upstream, or drifting downstream with everything else that is dead in the river.
Once when I was a child, I was out on the Willamette River with my parents in our boat. We were fishing. And along came this terrible, nasty, bloated dead monstrosity. Somewhere upstream the body of a dead cow had somehow washed into the river, and now here it came, a polluted, bloated, stinking mess. It floated on down past our boat. Let me tell you, that animal was dead. It could only go one direction, and that was down stream. As Holy Spirit empowered Christians, there is only one direction for us, and that is upstream, against the tide, against the current. It won’t be a passive experience. We won’t just take as gospel every notion someone comes along sputtering about God. We will search the Scriptures daily to see whether the claims that are made are so. We will embrace what is true and lay hold on it, and we will jettison that which is not true. That is what you do when you are alive. That is what you do when you lay hold on His covenant.
But what significance does this have when it comes to evangelism? It means that as His messengers, His malachim, His representatives, His image-echoes, we will be active in service to Him, active in loving His name, copying His character, active in keeping the Sabbath from polluting it, in guarding all His commandments, active, my brothers and sisters in taking hold of His covenant. That means we are His agents here. We need to be involved in living and giving the good news of God’s message. It is present truth time. The clock is ticking. Earth is waxing old. If not now, then when? When will we lay hold on God’s covenant? When will we put away our slow-motion, low emotion, sleeping experience, for something bigger? When will we become the 30 foot tall men and women of gospel power God intends us to be? How will the Holy Spirit use us unless we ask, Please God, use us? How will people hear unless we invite them to come and hear?
What stands before you, personally, is your moment of opportunity. God is calling all His caterpillars to break out wings and become butterflies. This meeting will be your opportunity to take wing and fly. This is part of your identity. This is part of having a place in the Father’s house. It’s not just for the pastor and four other people; its for the whole congregation. The community where you live is waiting for you. You need to invite these people to come to these meetings.
Bringing Them Here
Notice the text now as we continue and hone-in on this point:
Even them will I bring to My holy mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer.
Who will our Father bring to His holy mountain? “even them,” the sons of the stranger. He wants us to bring the sons and daughters. He wants them to become His sons and daughters. He knows they lack identity. He knows they buzz about trying to find their place, but not sure where they fit. Even them. He is calling.
But how will He add them to His family, the remnant He has called at time’s end to live and give His message? He tells us. “Even them I will bring.” He is going to bring them. So. Check this. Is this the picture? Someone in Redlands is sitting in their living room, watching the Wheel of Fortune, and suddenly a dim glow erupts in the living room. An angel materializes. He glows brightly in the room, bends forward with a smile on his face, and says, “Tomorrow night, go to the Mentone Seventh-day Adventist Church.” And in a sparkling flash He disappears. Is that what we expect? Is that what we expect while we sit in our homes quietly and pray?
Another scenario fits better. They are sitting in their living room watching television and there is a knock or the doorbell rings. A smiling person, a living, flesh-and-blood person, goes out of her way to walk to that door. God is gathering people to Him. This person comes to the door and offers them a quick, personal invitation and a flyer telling about the meetings. Accompanied by angels unseen and the Holy Spirit unseen, from doorstep to doorstep they go. How about that scenario?
Now some here are challenged when it comes to mobility. But you have a telephone. You know some people. You have some contacts out in the community, some you have never spoken to about the times in which we live. Or, perhaps until recently you were not certain that there was a church you knew well enough to feel safe to invite them to. And today you feel safe about inviting them here. You know they won’t come in here and be exposed to theological oddities, or irreverent worship, or the latest fad from Sunday-keeping Christianity. You know that here we feed with a diet of Scripture and present truth that is different than other churches. Then here and now, this is the place, this is ground-zero, this is God’s house of prayer for all people. You are sitting in it. You are a member of it. You know that the map to the pillar and ground of truth is up and running. You know that this is the place on the map where you have placed your membership. You know that the map has an arrow pointing and it says, You are here. And God put you here. And He wants you to bring others into His house of prayer. He wants you to bring them here.
Joyful in His House of Prayer
What is His promise?
Even them will I bring to My holy mountain, and make them joyful in My house of prayer.
He will make them joyful in His house of prayer. Who? The sons of the stranger that He brings here. Through you. You are an agent to bring belonging. You are a joy-bringer. You come, not bearing something temporal, passing, a momentary experience. You come with something eternal. How much does joy cost? Is that what you have? Is that what you bring? Is that what you have and refuse to bring? Are you going to horde your joy? How do you do that? You can’t keep love to yourself. Doesn’t work. God wants to make these people joyful in His house of prayer.
Now He says something very interesting, because we have to translate it to our time. We live after the cross, we live after type has met antitype, after that ultimate moment when Jesus died on the cross for us all. But before that time, here is what God spoke through Isaiah: “Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon Mine altar; for Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.”
Notice, their offerings, My altar, and acceptance. Now it is the Father who gave His Son for us. The altar, the cross, again, was His idea. But Jesus says He will accept these offerings and sacrifices which in some way are identified with them. We need to give our hearts to Him, we need to accept the sacrifice He has made for us. When we accept the sacrifice of Christ it becomes our burnt offering, it becomes our sacrifice. It is a gift from Him to us, and it is a gift we return. The ransom payment is made. Jesus dies on the cross for us.
Now notice, “their sacrifices.” Whose? Again, “The sons of the stranger.” Jesus died for all men. His sacrifice is effectual for all who will claim it. Notice the connection between accepting the sacrifices and His house being a house of prayer for all people. What house is this?
When we think of God’s house, we think first of His tabernacle in the wilderness. Later it becomes the temple in Jerusalem. Then we think of the heavenly sanctuary. Then we think also of the church. All these are all true. What was Isaiah thinking of?
Well, in chapter six of His book, in the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up and His train filled His temple. Remember that in earlier times the temple was forbidden to the non Hebrew. Isaiah sees a time when the sons of the stranger who join themselves to the Lord are also accepted. He in this text is speaking especially with reference to eunuchs. Now eunuchs don’t have children, do they? That capacity is removed. They are strangers far from home and incapable of reproducing. This may seem a sad thing to us, but in Isaiah’s day, it was immeasurably worse. Almost no outcome was viewed as worse than this for a family. The stranger was alone and the eunuch 100 times more alone, with no posterity.
But God says His house will be a house of prayer for all people. See, the earthly sanctuary was always a smaller picture of the heavenly. The earthly sanctuary was where God’s people brought their lambs, the sacrifices were killed, the sin was recorded, and once a year the sin was swept away out of the camp. The camp was cleansed. The sanctuary was about sin removal from His people.
Could it be that when Isaiah saw the Lord high and lifted up in His temple, when Isaiah saw the heavenly sanctuary, the throne room of heaven, could it be that the vast chamber and the activities there shocked Him? Could it be that what He saw there was so vast a program that He understood that God’s plan was for all humanity? That the cleansing the camp from sin in the time of the Exodus and after was meant as a small picture of the ultimate day when sin would be cleansed from the camp of all planet earth? For then we can understand the claim, “Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon Mine altar; for Mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people.” Could this statement—God’s house at the last and ultimately being the house of prayer for all people—have reference to the idea of Jesus entering the most holy place in 1844 as high priest of all believers, as heavenly intercessor for every son and daughter of the stranger? And if it includes this in its meaning, then to which church has this message for all people been given?
Friends, God is asking us to be faithful messengers. He wants His house, in this hour, to be a house of prayer for all people, a place of intercession, of connection with the intercessor Jesus. His message for this last day is given here, step by step, next month.
So the appeal comes today yet again. Won’t you have a part in the evangelistic meetings that are coming? We need volunteers. Jesus died voluntarily on the cross for you. Won’t you volunteer for just a few weeks for Him?
Plan to come every night of the meetings. Be in prayer right now to invite your friends and associates. Join in the teams we are setting up for the registration booth, children’s divisions during the meetings, visitation teams, and all the parts of the meetings. You can have a part in bringing the folk around us in our communities to these meetings where they will hear the truth and connect with other truth seekers.
You stand in this house today because God opened it up for all people. You are sons of the stranger. Our heavenly Father brought you out of darkness and into His marvelous light. You have benefited greatly from His gospel. You have an experience. You have something to share, something to tell. This meeting is the best opportunity you will have to tell it this year.
So I want to come full circle now. Belonging. This is where you found you belong. Just outside these doors are so many who do not know where they belong. Some are like the lost coin, they don’t know they are lost. Others know they are lost but clueless about how to find the pathway home. Jesus is the express image, we are just the image-echoes. The heavenly sanctuary is God’s house of prayer for all people, yet so too every Seventh-day Adventist Church is intended. God wants to bring them in here. To bring them to belonging. He wants them to have a place in the Father’s house. You can go out and help bring them in. They can belong, they can have a place in the Father’s family. It is not too late; not yet.
Plan to join us next Sabbath afternoon to distribute handbills for the meetings door to door if you are able. Be in prayer for those who will receive them. Be a part of making Isaiah 56 true here in our very own streets and neighborhoods. And to God be the glory. GCO
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