Rev. Dustin ParkerDominos DELIVERS
Who is the The King of Glory!
The Dominion Delivery Guy!
1 Cor 15:20-28
† IN THE NAME OF THE LORD! †
As we await the revealing of the glory of Christ in all His glory, may we realize the hope quickened in us that are joined in His death, that we may know the hope of His resurrection to eternally dwelling with the Father!
Guaranteed Delivery!
We get it, or do we?
It is a play on words, a very subtle gesture of a man of strong faith.
Simple, two words, that testify to an eternal truth, we might say, “the eternal truth”. Millions of people every day see it, rely on it, yet probably never realize what they are seeing.
Millions of people – of every race, of every color, of languages, and ironically – of many religions – some even hostile to Christ, testify daily to the truth of the following phrase.
The Lord Saves.
or let me translate it into Latin
Dominus Salvator
Maybe you figured out Tom Monahan’s subtle testimony to the Lord in whom he entrusts his life.
Dominoes Delivers!
Back in the day, the phrase was dominoes delivers in 30 minutes or its free. There was a guarantee of delivery of a feast. There is of course a different Dominus, and a far different delivery that we await, and a feast that is far better than any pizza – even Boston deep dish!
The problem is, like ordering a pizza – the wait!
But I tell you this, as we look towards the coming of Jesus in all His glory, it is so much worth the wait!
The Problem of Anticipation
Worth the wait… that makes me think of another commercial, another slogan.
Remember back in the 1970’s, when for 60 seconds you saw someone holding a bottle of ketchup at a 70 degree angle? There was the little kid who would look up the bottle, waiting for the ketchup to come moving slower than the government to drop onto a burger, or a hotdog, or some French fries?
Strangely prophetic for our generation, for we hate waiting, whether it is for ketchup (anyone actually ever wait 30 seconds and not try to shake the bottle, or put a butter knife up it?) or for pizza? I can have a new book on my computer in 4 seconds now, and a microwave can make popcorn in two minutes – and that seems forever! We are a culture that hates waiting, a people that detests delays.
The expectation of the delivery should make our mouth water! The anticipation should stimulate our imagination with how incredible it will be. Hope waiting to become reality, as the flavors resound off our palette.
It seems we have lost the ability to anticipate, it is as if we cannot imagine how incredible it will be. The adrenalin flows as our expectation builds, but instead of stimulating our expectation, it causes anxiety to build. Will the pizza still be hot, will the get the order right? Will it be as good as it can be, or will it be like the “last time” when the dough was rubbery and the cheese took a diamond saw to chew through. If our minds do this with 30 minute waits, what will our minds do with what has been a 2000 year wait…one that has encompassed all our lives so far?
How in the world are we to wait patiently for the return of God, for Him to make everything perfect and right and peaceful? There are days, I tell you, where I do not just want God to come back – I want Him to return yesterday! Don’t you?
I believe a lot of our struggles with temptation flow from the anxieties caused by our inability to patiently wait on God, our inability to focus on His work. We want it our way, and we want it that way now. Rather than wait, we try to take matters into our own hands, we try to create that which we want – no matter the cost. Or, rather than deal with it, we run and hide from the stress caused by a lack of patience. I Sin simply put, usually boils down to the challenge of trusting God to be God.
We keep looking out the front door, we start shaking the bottle. We want paradise now, so we look for it in places that it can’t be. Wealth, or fame, or success, or sex. Or putting others down, that we might be comparably, “up”.
I also think this reveals a lack of understanding about what our Lord delivers, a lack that is corrected by studying passages like our epistle.
The more we grasp that what it is that our Lord Jesus Christ delivers to the Father, the more we realize that the wait isn’t quite what it seems… and yet that day grows in its magnificence.
Confused about what is delivered?
Verse 24 describes the delivery,
“24 Then after Christ has destroyed all powers and forces, the end will come, and he will give the kingdom to God the Father.”
This delivery is usually pictured in frightening and ominous terms, or at least they sound like it. The Apocalypse, the Second Coming, the fearful Day of the Judgment of the Lord. We hear about the destruction of the of His enemies, of that which is hostile to God and therefore His people.
But what is this kingdom that the Lord, the Dominus, delivers?
It’s obviously not that which was destroyed, the powers and forces that oppose God, including death, for those are destroyed, including that last enemy – death. To destroy those things means to render them worthless, to make them of no account, to complete suspend their existence.
Which is what the resurrection is about – it renders death and the sin which causes death, and the anxiety and fear which leads to temptation… meaningless.
So what is delivered? What is this Kingdom?
It is the church.
The kingdom of God, like the “church”, is not the walls and roof, the floors and the altar and the beautiful wood and windows. The kingdom of God is those whom the Father had trusted the Son to deliver to Him, the people He longed to be His people, and that He would care for, as their God.
Hear the key verses again:
20 But Christ has been raised to life! And he makes us certain that others will also be raised to life.
I love how this translation puts the old translation “firstfruits”, for those fruits guaranteed the rest of the harvest – and so Christ’s being raised from the dead assures us not only of our resurrection, but the resurrection of all those who die with Him in their baptism, and are born again to new life because of the cross and empty tomb!
21 Just as we will die because of Adam, we will be raised to life because of Christ.
The picture of this is so incredible as well! That phrase “raised to life” is one word in greek – zoe-poieo – the crafting of life – bringing to mind the incredible Eph. 2:10 – “we are his craftsmanship – recreated in Christ Jesus, doing the works which God has planned for us from before! In Christ, we don’t anticipate becoming that new creation, a creation fully revealed at Christ’s return- we are that creation now! We just are waiting to really being able to comprehend what that means – to see it, to hear God’s voice, see His glory – while indeed we are part of it!
Christ will bring life to all of us. 23 But we must each wait our turn. Christ was the first to be raised to life, and his people will be raised to life when he returns.
Will be….
The kingdom the Son delivers is not one of geographical dimension, or a temple made of stone and wood, but the kingdom of people God created. The dominion delivered to the Father is the people He longs for! Since creation – God’s desire is for a people whom He could love, whom He could share His life, who would relate to Him and love Him.
Oh what a day it will be, when we can grasp what is ours, what is guaranteed to us!
We are delivered
God will be everything to everyone
Dominoes delivered to us a feast that takes 10 minutes to bake, and 10-20 to deliver. Sometimes it is perfect – and the anticipation of the blend of meats and cheese and bread is great, but sometimes, it’s not perfect.
There is a feast, a feast to come on that day when all is delivered to the Father, when all are gathered by Christ to the very throne, to the day. Before that throne we will enjoy a feast that will be beyond anything we have ever experienced, the wedding feast of the Son of God, the one who took away our sin, and death.
A feast we will share in the appetizer of in a moment – a foretaste – and yet shared with the entire dominion of God throughout time and throughout the world. Another guarantee of our resurrection, because of His.
Know this – we feast in His presence.
Even as we now live in His presence… a foretaste of that life, and..yet…the same peace, the same mercy, the same peace… because we live in Christ.
Even so, come Lord Jesus!
AMEN?
The Dominion Delivery Guy!
1 Cor 15:20-28
† IN THE NAME OF THE LORD! †
As we await the revealing of the glory of Christ in all His glory, may we realize the hope quickened in us that are joined in His death, that we may know the hope of His resurrection to eternally dwelling with the Father!
Guaranteed Delivery!
We get it, or do we?
It is a play on words, a very subtle gesture of a man of strong faith.
Simple, two words, that testify to an eternal truth, we might say, “the eternal truth”. Millions of people every day see it, rely on it, yet probably never realize what they are seeing.
Millions of people – of every race, of every color, of languages, and ironically – of many religions – some even hostile to Christ, testify daily to the truth of the following phrase.
The Lord Saves.
or let me translate it into Latin
Dominus Salvator
Maybe you figured out Tom Monahan’s subtle testimony to the Lord in whom he entrusts his life.
Dominoes Delivers!
Back in the day, the phrase was dominoes delivers in 30 minutes or its free. There was a guarantee of delivery of a feast. There is of course a different Dominus, and a far different delivery that we await, and a feast that is far better than any pizza – even Boston deep dish!
The problem is, like ordering a pizza – the wait!
But I tell you this, as we look towards the coming of Jesus in all His glory, it is so much worth the wait!
The Problem of Anticipation
Worth the wait… that makes me think of another commercial, another slogan.
Remember back in the 1970’s, when for 60 seconds you saw someone holding a bottle of ketchup at a 70 degree angle? There was the little kid who would look up the bottle, waiting for the ketchup to come moving slower than the government to drop onto a burger, or a hotdog, or some French fries?
Strangely prophetic for our generation, for we hate waiting, whether it is for ketchup (anyone actually ever wait 30 seconds and not try to shake the bottle, or put a butter knife up it?) or for pizza? I can have a new book on my computer in 4 seconds now, and a microwave can make popcorn in two minutes – and that seems forever! We are a culture that hates waiting, a people that detests delays.
The expectation of the delivery should make our mouth water! The anticipation should stimulate our imagination with how incredible it will be. Hope waiting to become reality, as the flavors resound off our palette.
It seems we have lost the ability to anticipate, it is as if we cannot imagine how incredible it will be. The adrenalin flows as our expectation builds, but instead of stimulating our expectation, it causes anxiety to build. Will the pizza still be hot, will the get the order right? Will it be as good as it can be, or will it be like the “last time” when the dough was rubbery and the cheese took a diamond saw to chew through. If our minds do this with 30 minute waits, what will our minds do with what has been a 2000 year wait…one that has encompassed all our lives so far?
How in the world are we to wait patiently for the return of God, for Him to make everything perfect and right and peaceful? There are days, I tell you, where I do not just want God to come back – I want Him to return yesterday! Don’t you?
I believe a lot of our struggles with temptation flow from the anxieties caused by our inability to patiently wait on God, our inability to focus on His work. We want it our way, and we want it that way now. Rather than wait, we try to take matters into our own hands, we try to create that which we want – no matter the cost. Or, rather than deal with it, we run and hide from the stress caused by a lack of patience. I Sin simply put, usually boils down to the challenge of trusting God to be God.
We keep looking out the front door, we start shaking the bottle. We want paradise now, so we look for it in places that it can’t be. Wealth, or fame, or success, or sex. Or putting others down, that we might be comparably, “up”.
I also think this reveals a lack of understanding about what our Lord delivers, a lack that is corrected by studying passages like our epistle.
The more we grasp that what it is that our Lord Jesus Christ delivers to the Father, the more we realize that the wait isn’t quite what it seems… and yet that day grows in its magnificence.
Confused about what is delivered?
Verse 24 describes the delivery,
“24 Then after Christ has destroyed all powers and forces, the end will come, and he will give the kingdom to God the Father.”
This delivery is usually pictured in frightening and ominous terms, or at least they sound like it. The Apocalypse, the Second Coming, the fearful Day of the Judgment of the Lord. We hear about the destruction of the of His enemies, of that which is hostile to God and therefore His people.
But what is this kingdom that the Lord, the Dominus, delivers?
It’s obviously not that which was destroyed, the powers and forces that oppose God, including death, for those are destroyed, including that last enemy – death. To destroy those things means to render them worthless, to make them of no account, to complete suspend their existence.
Which is what the resurrection is about – it renders death and the sin which causes death, and the anxiety and fear which leads to temptation… meaningless.
So what is delivered? What is this Kingdom?
It is the church.
The kingdom of God, like the “church”, is not the walls and roof, the floors and the altar and the beautiful wood and windows. The kingdom of God is those whom the Father had trusted the Son to deliver to Him, the people He longed to be His people, and that He would care for, as their God.
Hear the key verses again:
20 But Christ has been raised to life! And he makes us certain that others will also be raised to life.
I love how this translation puts the old translation “firstfruits”, for those fruits guaranteed the rest of the harvest – and so Christ’s being raised from the dead assures us not only of our resurrection, but the resurrection of all those who die with Him in their baptism, and are born again to new life because of the cross and empty tomb!
21 Just as we will die because of Adam, we will be raised to life because of Christ.
The picture of this is so incredible as well! That phrase “raised to life” is one word in greek – zoe-poieo – the crafting of life – bringing to mind the incredible Eph. 2:10 – “we are his craftsmanship – recreated in Christ Jesus, doing the works which God has planned for us from before! In Christ, we don’t anticipate becoming that new creation, a creation fully revealed at Christ’s return- we are that creation now! We just are waiting to really being able to comprehend what that means – to see it, to hear God’s voice, see His glory – while indeed we are part of it!
Christ will bring life to all of us. 23 But we must each wait our turn. Christ was the first to be raised to life, and his people will be raised to life when he returns.
Will be….
The kingdom the Son delivers is not one of geographical dimension, or a temple made of stone and wood, but the kingdom of people God created. The dominion delivered to the Father is the people He longs for! Since creation – God’s desire is for a people whom He could love, whom He could share His life, who would relate to Him and love Him.
Oh what a day it will be, when we can grasp what is ours, what is guaranteed to us!
We are delivered
God will be everything to everyone
Dominoes delivered to us a feast that takes 10 minutes to bake, and 10-20 to deliver. Sometimes it is perfect – and the anticipation of the blend of meats and cheese and bread is great, but sometimes, it’s not perfect.
There is a feast, a feast to come on that day when all is delivered to the Father, when all are gathered by Christ to the very throne, to the day. Before that throne we will enjoy a feast that will be beyond anything we have ever experienced, the wedding feast of the Son of God, the one who took away our sin, and death.
A feast we will share in the appetizer of in a moment – a foretaste – and yet shared with the entire dominion of God throughout time and throughout the world. Another guarantee of our resurrection, because of His.
Know this – we feast in His presence.
Even as we now live in His presence… a foretaste of that life, and..yet…the same peace, the same mercy, the same peace… because we live in Christ.
Even so, come Lord Jesus!
AMEN?
