Sermon Notes: Spiritual Inventory

Intro: Here we are this morning, four days into the New Year!  Many of you may have made New Years resolutions, realizing that making them is easy, keeping them is what’s hard. A son called his parents to wish them a happy new year. When his Dad answered the phone, the son asked him about his new year’s resolutions. His dad replied, “To make your mother as happy as I can all year." When Mom got on the phone he asked her the same question, and she replied, “To see that your dad keeps his New Year’s resolution." There’s truth behind that humor. We often need help to keep our promises, even those we call resolutions. Looking at resolutions as goals may be a more effective approach.

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I. Spiritual Inventories

A.  Most resolutions deal with one’s physical self, like losing weight, breaking bad habits, or starting good habits. But, how many make resolutions about our spiritual life? So, this morning, I’d like to focus on improving our spiritual life. But that’s too general to be really meaningful. Behavioral experts tell us goals need to be specific, achievable, and measurable over a specific time. And, we need a monitoring mechanism in place to hold us accountable, or we may never accomplish our full intent. We’ll just keep busy, without achieving our goal. Baseball legend Yogi Berra, said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you may end up someplace else.”  Having a clear goal or destination is essential to evaluate how successful you were over your chosen timeframe.

B. Successful businesses at this time of year take time to take an inventory of their assets to identify what they have, compare that with their goals of where they want to be at a specific time, and then determine the assets they need to reach those goals. Our church finance committee recently looked at last year’s income and expenses, then projected them for next year, before setting the budget for next year, adjusting any numbers needed to ensure our expenses stay within our projected income. Our goal, as a non-profit organization, is to at least break even, so throughout the year they will be monitoring our progress and adjusting any activities to reach that goal.

C. We can use that same principle to evaluate our spiritual lives. So, the first step is for us to take a spiritual inventory. Where are we, then decide where we want to be, and how we plan to get there, then do regular, honest monitoring. You may determine where you are by considering church attendance, Bible study, prayer time, and financial giving. Then set your goals for where you would like to improve, and how you can achieve those goals. By the end of your specified timeline, you can re-inventory to see where you are. Businesses would define that as net worth. You would then plan for the next year by adjusting those goals.

D. Before we get carried away with measuring our net worth, it’s critical we recognize the difference between our net value and net worth. We might measure our spiritual inventory’s net worth in terms of our measurable goals, but we must never consider that as our net value to God, becauseour net value to God is infinitely more than any net worth. The vilest of sinners, regardless of their worldly net worth, has great net value to God. We can’t earn God’s love by the net worth of our spiritual inventory; we can only grow in our love for God, through the quality of our spiritual inventory. like what Jonathan Roumie, who portrays Jesus in The Chosen series, said in an interview about how that role affected him. His self-assessment of his net worth might be measured by applause for his performances, the value others place  on them. He may have felt good about what he has accomplished, and how that role helped his spiritual inventory, but the most important means of evaluation is how Jesus sees us. Jonathan’s response was that when he arrives in heaven, he’ll ask Jesus, “How did I do?” 

D. Jesus showed His disfavor with the religious leaders’ self-evaluation of their righteousness, their spiritual inventory, condemning them for cleansing the outside of a cup, but not the inside. Or whitewashing the outside of a tomb containing dead bones. God sees the inside, our soul, to determines the quality of our spiritual inventory. Repetitious prayers without sincere meaning, Bible reading without understanding, good deeds without love, lose their value before God.

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II. Revelation 3: 4-19

A. Our NT lesson from Rev further illustrates the difference between how God sees and values people, and how others see themselves. Jesus is speaking to the church of Laodicea, the last of the seven churches Jesus is speaking to. It’s debated whether this was an actual church, or a representative church of certain qualities, perhaps even the present day Church. The root word of Laodicea, Laos, means people, so Laodicea would translate as ‘a church of the people’ rather than of God. They said they were rich, had acquired wealth, and didn’t need a thing. In other words, they felt they had great net worth. But Jesus says they were wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. In other words, their assessment of their net worth, their spiritual inventory, was considerably less in God’s eyes than in their own. Why the difference? 

B. Historically, Laodicea was located over a hot springs that were highly valued for their medicinal value. Soothing for aches and pains, healing salve for illnesses, and therapy for physical problems. Also, a cold water spring from the mountains fed the city, providing pure, crystal clear water. Water companies like Aquafina might have wanted a bottling plant there. Both assets were valuable, until they met in pools around the city and became lukewarm. Then they became like hot coffee or tea cooling to room temperature, or a cold beverage warming to room temperature. Often lukewarm water is used to make people vomit, which is what Jesus says He would do to this church... spit them out of His mouth. Jesus tells the church they had value as either hot or cold, but when they compromised those values, their net worth tanked.

C. But their net value to Him hadn’t. He tells the church to meet their real needs from Him, like gold refined in a fire, so they could become rich in value, wear white clothes, symbolizing purity to cover their nakedness or impurity, and salve for their eyes so they could see spiritually. Telling them that He loves those He rebukes and disciplines, and to be earnest and repent, He’s telling them that they still had great net value to Him.

D, If the Laodicean church is representative of this church age, what does this passage tell us about our spiritual inventory?  Using the Nicene Creed as our thermometer, and hot as a measure of how we live up to that standard of beliefs, we might evaluate our spiritual temperature. Hot would be good, but the more we compromise those beliefs, the more lukewarm we become. And we’ve seen Jesus’ response to lukewarm. I’m not going to point fingers at individual churches, but rather focus on just how we believe we at Waltz Church are measuring up. I’d also believe that disaffiliation has helped us improve our temperature.

E. John Wesley’s concept of Sanctifying Grace might be another means to consider our spiritual inventory. We noted earlier that we cannot earn God’s favor, we’re saved by His grace. His Sanctifying Grace sets us apart for His purposes as we travel on His path to perfection. Although we might only hope to approach perfection in this lifetime, we might think of measuring perfection in terms of temperature. How do we increase that temperature? We can’t do much as casual Christians. Or Cardboard Christians, appearing as Christians but lacking any depth. But rather by deepening our relationship with Him. Reading, and understanding His Word. Sincere, honest prayer. Loving our neighbors as ourselves. Being equipped with His hope, peace, love, and joy we talked about during Advent. Increasing our individual spiritual inventories, our individual temperatures, we’re also doing that as a church.

F. But if we’re to be completely honest with ourselves, we must ask ourselves an important question before we resolve to increase our temperature. It’s a question we really should ask before we can make any change in our lives. Why?  Because if we don’t have a strong reason to commit to something, there’s a good possibility of failing to see it through. Without compelling reasons to commit to a goal, it becomes too easy to lose that commitment.

G. Our Call to Worship, based on 2 Corinthians 5:17, offers a good starting point of why. If anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation. The old has gone, the new is here!  When we are dissatisfied with the old, the status quo, we want to become something new. I recently traded in my 10 year old pickup with only 63000 miles. Logic told me keeping my truck was cheaper, and would easily last several more years. I was comfortable with it, so why give it up?  In the end, my overriding need for a GPS, with my faulty sense of direction, made me commit to a change.

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III. Psalm 77:1-20

A. In our OT lesson, the psalmist Asaph questions his spiritual inventory. In distress, he calls out to God, appealing with outstretched hands, but could find no comfort in feeling God had heard him and would answer. Sound familiar?  Even men like Job, or prophets like Elijah have wrestled with problems, questioning whether their spiritual inventory was sufficient. As Asaph meditates, he remembers God’s presence over Israel’s past times of distress. In the Hebrew tradition, recalling God's past deeds was a way to find comfort and assurance in times of trouble. The former days often refer to significant events in Israel's history, such as the Exodus, that were pivotal in shaping the identity and faith of the Israelite people.

B. His remembering those days suggests a deep, meditative process, seeking to understand God's character and faithfulness through His past actions. Wrestling with his despair, the psalmist remembers God’s mighty deeds, like redeeming Israel from Egyptian slavery, and parting the Red Sea, reminding him that God’s ways are holy, and there is no greater god than our God. The psalmist’s spiritual inventory included knowing these understandings of God, enabling him to rely on God’s sustaining power,

C. Our own spiritual inventories might not use the experiences of such historical former days, but the more we put our trust in God, and experience His presence with us, the more we rely on those experiences to comfort us in our times of distress. The more we remind ourselves, through scripture, like Romans 8:28, that through our God, all things work for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Remembering that even Jesus Himself, dreading the torture of the Cros with such intensity as sweating drops of blood, asked His Father to be spared, but still trusted Himself in His Father’s Will to obey. Because He knew it was better to be in His Father’s care, doing His Will, than even avoiding the agony of the Cross.

D. But what if we find that our spiritual inventory is deficient?  When we become dissatisfied with our status quo enough to want change, to commit to change, how can we improve it? Most of all, we need to develop a deeper relationship with God.

E. That’s not just a matter of desiring it. God is always reaching out to us, deeply desiring such a relationship. But we have to connect, by learning more about Jesus by reading, and understanding Scripture. The Bible is much too deep to expect to read quickly. Study groups, church sermons, daily devotional guides are very helpful. Spending time in private prayer, listening as well as speaking. I’m hoping to develop some small groups in the near future to provide sharing faith growing experiences with each other. Ways to increase our spiritual inventories as we develop deeper relationships with the God who wants such relationship with each of us, and all of us.

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Conclusion: This morning, we are about to exercise a major part of our spiritual inventory in Communion. When we humbly come to the Communion Table, we recognize how much, by His body and blood that He gave so freely, we are changed. We are a new creation. Our former selves have gone away. We are on our paths of Sanctifying Grace, moving toward an ever deepening relationship with Him. May we set our goals in the new year that will increase our spiritual inventories to bring us closer to Christ. Amen