This past Sunday was Scout Sunday at our church. We have several strong Scout programs in our church and a number of boys and girls participated in the service. They all did a fantastic job! The sermon was a message of God's love and the potential each us has been created with. If you missed it, download the audio or read text below.
http://www.mediafire.com/file/mommmt2kuny/Soar like an Eagle.mp3
“Soar Like an Eagle”
Brimfield Faith UMC
February 14, 2010
Isaiah 40:28-31; Ephesians 2:8-10
Thanks everyone for being here this morning. God is doing some powerful things in the life of this church and in the ministry of the Scouts. I am proud of the way the Scout programs are run and the quality of the young men and women that they produce. The Boy Scout Troop 259 has a distinguished reputation for producing Eagle Scouts. The award of Eagle Scout is the top award in the Boy Scout program. When a young man becomes an Eagle Scout, it should mean he has acquired certain skills, lives by a certain moral standard, and has achieved a level accomplishment. I like the Eagle Scout award and the scouting program because it helps to draw positive things out of our youth. Along those lines, I want to talk this morning about how we restore the God-given potential in each of us. To begin, I want to tell a story:
A man found an eagle’s egg and put it in a nest of barnyard hen. The eaglet hatched with the brood of chicks and grew up with them.
All of his life the eagle did what barnyard chicks did, thinking he was a barnyard chicken. He scratched the earth for worms and insects. He clucked and cackled. And he would thrash his wings and fly a few feet into the air.
Years passed and the eagle grew very old. One day he saw a magnificent bird above him in the cloudless sky. It glided in graceful majesty among the powerful wind currents, with scarely a beat of its strong golden wings.
The old eagle looked up in awe. “Who’s that?” he asked.
That’s the eagle, the king of birds,” said his neighbor. “He belongs to the sky. We belong to the earth—we’re chickens.” So the eagle lived and died a chicken, for that’s what he thought he was. (Anthony DeMello, Awareness, 1990)
Most of us believe that we are chickens. We spend out days running around with our heads in the ground, pecking for food, and squawking at each other. We don’t believe that we are created with a purpose or a destiny in our lives. As a result, we live pedestrian lives because we don’t know any different. We live and die chickens because our original purpose and God-given image has been tainted, marred and is barely recognizable.
We don’t have to live and die as chickens though, because in actuality humans are like eagles. We are like the eagle because we have been created in the image of God: an image that is glorious, beautiful, and holy. We have been created to love and be loved. We have been created be holy as God is holy. God understands that we are stuck thinking and acting like a chicken and has made a way for us to be restored to the ways of the eagle and to the image of our Creator.
BECOME AN EAGLE
If you want to stop being a chicken and become an eagle, there is only one way. It is through a relationship with the Creator of both the chicken and the eagle. God Almighty, the Creator the universe, who created each of us in his image. It is through a relationship with the living God that facilitates the restoration process.
Ephesians 2:8-10 reads, “8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” From these verses, we understand that the restoration process is a free gift given from God. We cannot facilitate the transformation from the chicken to the eagle on our own: for it is not by works for no one can boast. Instead, it is when we receive the Holy Spirit that we can start living like God intends us to live.
Similar to the story we heard, you can have all of the characteristics of an eagle but not live as eagle. For the Scouts, you can meet all of the requirements of an Eagle Scout but not live as a true Eagle Scout. True life transformation can only happen when we encounter the living God through relationship. It happens when we allow God to work in us and move in our lives. It is his Spirit that provides the missing piece to discovering the fullness of life. In verse 10, we are called God’s workmanship, created to do good works. In other words, we have been created to live like the eagle and bring glory to God’s name.
The process of learning to live like an eagle begins by trusting our lives to Jesus Christ. It is an ongoing process of faith, trust, obedience, and love. To continue the metaphor of the eagle, I want to talk about the defining qualities of the eagle in relation the defining qualities of a life with God.
TO SOAR
The first defining quality as the eagle is its ability to fly and to soar. When you look at a chicken, you don’t see a bird designed to do much flying. They have been bred to lay eggs and to be eaten. If you watch a chicken, they primarily hop around. Chickens can fly but typically will only do so out of fear. And then they go far enough to escape the danger. It’s not the chicken’s fault, they simply are not designed to fly.
The eagle, on the other hand, is designed, not only to fly, but to soar. It can fly as fast as 60 mph and can reach speeds of 100 mph when diving. The eagle also has the ability to climb into the thermal wind currents miles above the sky. When they climb up, they can then simply glide effortlessly for hours. Watching an eagle soar is one of the marvels of the world. Proverbs 30:18-19 even notes it: “Three things are too wonderful for me; four I do not understand: the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship on the high seas, and the way of a man with a woman.”
The way of the eagle in the sky is remarkable. Like the eagle, we are metaphorically created to soar. To soar is to be lead and strengthened by the Holy Spirit. In Isaiah 40:28-31, we gain insight into what this means: “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. 29 He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. 30 Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; 31 but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.”
We have been created to soar on wings like eagles. It is through God’s Spirit that we are empowered to live. Instead of trying to do things in our own strength, God calls us to rest in him, to trust in him, and to follow his leading.
SOAR W/O WORRIES
To be able to soar with Jesus means that we no longer have the same worries of the world. When the world is running around like chicken’s with their heads cutoff, we called to trust in Jesus. We don’t have to stress about life in the same way as others do. We can live with a renewed strength because God is with us. In Matthew 6, Jesus tells us to free ourselves from worry. “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?”
Jesus calls us to soar with God by placing the worries of the world in his hands. We do that by praying instead of worrying and leaning on God instead spinning our wheels. When we can start to cast our worries upon the Lord, we don’t need to feel compelled to lay awake at night wondering where your next pay check will come from or whether you’re going to get a promotion at work. Allowing stress and worry to run your life never improves a situation. Stress and worry do shorten our lives and drain our energy. When we seek to rely upon God, we will have the energy and ability to soar with God and to live an abundant life filled with peace, joy, and love.
CONCLUSION - OUT OF THE NEST
Learning to soar can be a difficult and something scary process, but it is an important one to embark upon. If we long to fully discover our potential in God, we must trust in Christ to learn us to soar. To be restored to the fullness of life, is not an easy process. It requires risk and the proverbial leap of faith. We have to stretch our wings and believe that God has more for us in this world.
In the story I shared, the eagle never realized his true nature. He died thinking he was a chicken and never got to experience the joys of soaring in the heavens. There is nothing more tragic than someone dying without ever discovering their full potential. God’s heart and desire is for us to spread our wings and learn to soar with him. Now that we realize we aren’t chickens, it is time to get off the ground and into the heavens. As I conclude I want to share one last tidbit about the eagle and its offspring.
Eagles have a unique way of ensuring their offspring get out of the nest and learn to soar. When an eagle builds a nest, it begins building the nest with sharp objects like stones, broken branches, and thorns. Then it lines the nest with really soft things like fur, feathers, and leaves. As the baby eagle grows and is ready to begin to fly, the eagle with gradually rip out the softer layers of the nest. Eventually, the nest is too uncomfortable for the baby eagles to stay in. At that point, the eagles stretch their wings, learn how to fly, and gain their independence from their parents.
In the same way, God wants to coax us out of the nest. He wants us to take that leap of faith and learn to soar. He wants us to discover our fullest potential and purpose in life. Is your nest starting to get uncomfortable? Is it ready to branch out? It is time to stop being a chicken and time to start step out of the nest and to soar like an eagle.
Let’s pray.
Raise your hand if you want a relationship with Jesus
and if you want to soar like an eagle.
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