Well, this is July 4th weekend, and I have great gratitude to God for the privilege of living in a place that has freedom, in a place that enjoys prosperity, Despite all of the sins in our culture and in our history, we are a singularly blessed people. And it would be sinful of us not to appreciate that. So I hope that as you celebrate the 4th of July this weekend, that you will Make your focus on gratitude to God for the blessings that he has poured into our lives. And so what about God's people that aren't Americans? What does God say to them? He says the same thing he says to us. This world is not your home. And he says that to us. Let's look together at two passages First of all, in Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11, the great chapter that is sort of the hall of fame of faith. Beginning in verse eight, and then we'll move over to verse 13. Beginning in verse eight through verse 10, we read this. By faith, Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith, he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country. He lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. for he was looking forward to the city with foundations whose architect and builder is God. Verse 13, all these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised. They only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they'd been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country, a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. Now look over in 1 Peter chapter 2, beginning in verse 9. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world to abstain from sinful desires which war against your soul. Live such good lives among the pagans that though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. This is the word of the Lord. Folks, Where is home? Where is home for you? My grandfather on my mother's side was born in Norway and his whole life he had fond affection for Norway, for the people of Norway, for the geography of Norway. He was a painter, and we have in our dining room a painting that he did of his memory of what the view was from his home in Norway. It's a beautiful scene. He used to ski to and from school when he was growing up. It's a little cold over there. And when I look back on his life, I appreciate so much the courage that it took for him to leave home in Norway to come and establish a home in the United States when he was 15 years old. He didn't speak English, but he was planning on living with his brother who had already been in the States for a few years. Shortly before he left Norway, he got a telegram from his brother saying, I'm very ill, don't come. But he went anyway. And within the month, his brother had died. And he was on his own as a teenager in a foreign country without the ability to speak English. And he had to start from scratch, working multiple jobs. Back in those days, there was no such thing as the minimum wage. And so employers could give people a chance. They could give them a job and see what they could do, see if they work hard. And if you work hard, you became a valuable employee, and there was actually competition among employers for your labor. Now, obviously, there were people who were not as skilled or not as hardworking or not as blessed. And some of them were taken advantage of. But in my grandfather's case, it worked to his advantage that there was no minimum wage. It meant he didn't have much money. But it meant he always had a job. And he had more than one job at a time. He worked incredibly long hours. And he worked very hard. And he showed himself to be intelligent and skillful, a quick learner. And he became very successful. He built homes. For the wealthy, he built them. He designed them, and he built them. He oversaw a crew of people. And many of the homes that he built still stand in the Chicago suburbs of Hinsdale, and Western Springs, and Oak Park, where he and his family lived, and where my mother was born. Now, why am I telling you that? because my grandfather left his home in Norway, made a home in America, built houses for people to call home in America. There's much more to this story that I'm not gonna tell you today. But eventually, he died. And when he died, He went home, not to Norway. He went to the home that God had prepared for him in heaven. My parents retired to my grandmother's home in Montreat, North Carolina. When I was only 12 years old, Dad retired. Many more stories there, not going there this morning. I grew up in a house with my 90-year-old grandmother and my 70-something-year-old aunt and my dad, who was just in his 60s, and my mother, who was in her 50s. That was our situation. I never felt like a motherless child. But the fact is that Montreat became home to us. And it was home for years, even after I went out, married a beautiful lady that I'd met in Montreat. And we lived in Mississippi, and we lived in Massachusetts. But Montreat was always home, because it's where I grew up. It's where I had a lot of friends. It's where I typically went fairly often to do ministry. And I always kind of thought that we'd settle in North Carolina, but God had other plans. And eventually, God brought us here. The name of the wonderful book my wife wrote about this place is A Place to Call Home. Because it wasn't just a place for us to call home, it was designed by God to be a place where other people could come and find a home, and that's good. As my parents aged, my dad became increasingly senile, and my mom became increasingly frail, and so they came to live with us in our home. My dad's health was failing, his heart was going down, His pacemaker was giving out because the battery was wearing out. And at one point toward the end of his life, my dad said to my mom, honey, I want to go home. And she said, well, you are home, Bill, because that was their new home up there on the hill with us. He said, no, no, I want to go home. And she said, do you mean back to Montreat? And he looked at her and he said, no honey, heaven. My dad was longing for home and this isn't it. C.S. Lewis said that if there's a longing in your heart for something that this world cannot satisfy, It is because you were created for another world. You and I were designed by God to be with Him forever, and home is with Him. That's why nothing here satisfies. That's what Hebrews is talking about when it says Abraham wasn't hoping to go back to Ur of the Chaldees. Abraham was looking for a city with foundations whose architect and builder is God. He was looking for a better homeland. He was looking for some place that this world can't understand. That's why Jesus taught us to pray, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Heaven is the place that we long for. And when God brings heaven to earth, And the old earth is destroyed, 2 Peter 3 says, this creation is going to be wiped out in fire. But there's going to be a new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. That's home. That's what we're longing for. God's presence in all of its fullness with no barriers, So what are we to do if that's what we long for? Well, first of all, realize that God has already made all who are trusting in Jesus a part of that kingdom now. It doesn't say in 1 Peter 2, you're a chosen people, a royal priesthood, and one day you'll be a holy nation. He says you are. a holy nation, a people belonging to God so that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. When you trusted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, something miraculous beyond what you even comprehend happened. God made you part of his family forever. And you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, so that you may declare his praises, telling others and showing others that he has called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy. So what should we do? Dear friends, I urge you as aliens and strangers in the world to abstain from sinful desires. Do we still have sinful desires? Yeah. but we don't have to be mastered by them. They don't have to control our behavior. We have the mentors at our house. We love doing that. I always offer them two kinds of pie. They have to choose which kind they're gonna get. Some chose lemon meringue, some chose coconut cream. Both pies had leftover pieces when the mentors left. Do you suppose that I had a desire to eat some of that pie? Well, of course I did. But I was trying to pull my weight back down where it belongs because it keeps wanting to creep up. And so, as my wife can attest, I had neither kind of pie that night. The next day, my weight was down a little bit. And I thought, I can have a piece of pie. So I did. Well, that only left one slice of lemon meringue. What do you suppose my sinful desire as a selfish, gluttonous person was when I looked at that pie? I could polish that off. Mrs. Wood has said she does not want stuff like that around the house because she doesn't want the temptation. So I'd be doing her a favor. I can rationalize, you see. And there's still coconut cream. What did he do? I said no to sinful desires, that's what I did. I left that lemon meringue slice on top of the coconut cream and I waited until the next day. It's not sinful to eat pie, it's sinful to be a glutton. It's not sinful to enjoy certain things, it's sinful to let your fleshly desires control you when the Spirit of God is supposed to control you. And so you are urged, now let me just tell you this, I don't mind talking with you about pie because that's not sinful, but there are other things that are just flat out sinful that I have to abstain from, not just control and moderate my disobedience, I have to abstain from sinful desires. Why? Because people of this world live according to the flesh. They do what they feel like doing. But I'm not a part of that anymore. I'm one of God's chosen, holy people destined for glory and I need to live like it here and now. Well, when I get to heaven, then I guess I'll clean up my act. Are you going to heaven? Have you come to the point of realizing that you're a sinner and that you need forgiveness and a brand new life? Well, I can't help it, you know, these things just run in my family. We're just, you know, we're always that way. Get over it. You need to be born again. And when you are born again, that was your old family. God and his children are your family now. Does that mean I can't have anything to do with them? No, of course not. It means that you are supposed to model for them what it looks like to follow Jesus. You're supposed to live a holy life. Well, I don't want to be holier than thou, people. It depends on who thou is. It's not about comparing ourselves. It's about being holy. That means we belong to him and we are set apart for his purposes. Our identity is not found in our DNA. It is found in our relationship with the God who saved us. And so, abstain. As aliens and strangers in the world, abstain from sinful desires which war against your soul. Those desires are trying to get you to do things that are at war with your good. Live such good lives among the pagans that though they accuse you of doing wrong, if you do the right thing, there will be people who say, oh, you just think you're better than everybody else. No, I think I have been so blessed by God that he has forgiven my sin. and he is calling me to live a life that pleases him. Though they accuse you of doing wrong, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us. One day, when Jesus returns to claim his bride, the pagans will also bow before him. Every knee is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And if we really believe that, then here and now we need to start being a part of his economy, not a part of this world's economy. I was showing one of my grandchildren the other day a a piece of money from another country. This is actual currency, real money from Zimbabwe. And you can't see it from there, but it is $100 trillion. $100 trillion. Did you get that? $100 trillion I hold it in my hand, but they're not U.S. dollars. They're old Zimbabwe dollars during a time of hyperinflation, which is what, by the way, printing more and more money on the part of a government with nothing to back it up, that's what this leads to is hyperinflation. And Zimbabwe got in such a bad situation that they printed this in 2008, $100 trillion, and the day it was printed and began to circulate, it was worth $27 US. Process that. $100 trillion Zimbabwe dollars for 27 US dollars. The next day, it was worth $2.70. That's what hyperinflation is. OK, that's interesting. I don't know what that has to do with anything. The whole world system, not just the US and the Fed, the whole world system is like this. Stuff that right now seems so important, it's all going to be gone. Things that people are fighting over and striving to get and coveting, it's all going to burn. It doesn't matter in the long run. One of the most powerful things I've ever seen in my life is a scene from the movie Schindler's List, which is not recommended for children. But Oskar Schindler, who worked very hard to successfully save the lives of many Jewish people during the Holocaust, when finally the Nazi regime has been crushed and the people are being set free, the Jewish people come and they want to thank him and embrace him for all the things he did to save lives. And instead of being filled with joy and saying, well, you're welcome, you're welcome, Schindler is crushed because he thinks about how many more he could have saved if he'd been willing to make greater sacrifices. And he looks at his gold cufflinks and he said, how many lives does this represent? What could I have done? if I'd been willing to give more. I want to say it again. This world is not our home. This world is not our home. And so we not only need to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against our soul, but we need to stop chasing stuff that isn't going to last. Stop treating the things of this world as if that's what matters. Gotta look out for number one. Well, who's number one? You and I need to be focused on pleasing God, doing His will, whatever that may be. Can I still eat pie? Yes, and give thanks to God. Can I still have cufflinks, whatever they are? Yes. But you can't hang on to them as if they're what matter. You got to realize that when God says, do this, you say yes. And when God says, go here, you say yes. Because this world is not our home. Not even on July 4th weekend. We are aliens and strangers here, and we need to live like it. Father, help us to believe your word and to follow in the footsteps of Jesus, who gave his life to redeem us and conquered death so that we don't have to be afraid ever again. Help us. to trust in you, and to do what you say, and we will give you all the praise. In Jesus' name, amen.