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April 28, 2002
Sermon: "With Christ as Our Compass"
Scripture: Acts 7:55-60
Reverend Larry Gerber

The magnetic compass was an incredibly important invention, ranking right
behind the wheel, because it opened the earth to maritime exploration. But
the world was changed even more by those who chose to follow a compass called
Christ. What a beautiful song: In Christ there is no east or west, in him,
no north or south. The direction of the Christ compass always points to God
and His Kingdom.

Inventions are great. They change the world, someone has said. Inventions
bring changes to the world, but if they change the world, then God is second
in command at best!

Perhaps it is time we stopped talking about things that will "change the
world".

In a recent column by Internet columnist Guy Kewney, he extols the virtues of
Microsoft's Passport". Passport is a "roamable" Internet identity that
provides single sign-in and profile services for the World Wide Web. "It may
not use current Microsoft technology," predicts Kewney. "Nonetheless, it will
make e-commerce easier, safer, more popular. It will change the world."

There it is. It will change the world. Okay, Microsoft Passport sounds like
good technology. But world-changer? I rather doubt it. Things change, but
the world has been the world since creation. The world is still one step in
God's plan to bring humanity to The Kingdom, throught the direction and
leadership of Jesus Christ.

Book reviewer Jonathan Yardley recently plugged the words "Changed the World"
into Amazon.com, and his search produced 309 items. Among them: the color
mauve, the codfish, the Fender bass, radar, clocks, the U.S. women's soccer
team, photographs, the Model T Ford, canned food, coast-to-coast auto races
of the early 1900s, Christopher Columbus, glass, flowers, the Bible, banana
pie, Max Factor, Scotland, Princess Di, pop music and, of course, Amazon.com.

Amid all this hype about world-changing innovations, Yardley did find one
item that seemed to qualify for the distinction. He found it in Amir Aczel's
book The Riddle of the Compass, an uncommonly good book about an invention
that in his view qualifies as a world-changer: the compass.

The compass was probably invented by the Chinese at least 150 years before it
began to be used in Europe around A.D. 1200. Before the compass, sailors
relied on the skies for information about their location; in cloudy and
stormy weather they were clueless. The compass changed all that and made
shipping faster and safer, allowing for busy trading routes to develop,
linking the world together in the first phase of what we now call the "death
of distance."

Was the magnetic compass a world-changer? No doubt about it.

About a thousand years before the compass was invented, however, the
appearance of Christ, the True Compass, introduced a new way to navigate
spiritual waters and the treacherous shoals of life.

In Acts 6-7 we see how influential the Christ as Compass was in the life of
the early church. These chapters do not contain the stories of Jesus, of
course, but they illustrate just how transformative his example and guidance
proved to be in the lives of the first Christians. What we see in Acts is a
picture of a completely new way of life, one based entirely on the direction
provided by Jesus Christ.

The changes begin in chapter 6, with the selection of seven souls to serve as
deacons to ensure that the needy in their communities are properly served. So
the 12 apostles call a meeting, and ask the group to select "seven men of
good standing, full of the Spirit and of wisdom" (v. 3). The community
chooses Stephen and six others, and the apostles ordain them to the ministry
of serving the needs of the fellowship.

These are the people -- Stephen, the deacons and the apostles -- of whom it
would later be nervously said that they "were turning the world upside down"
(Act 17:6). Acts tells us that Stephen hits the streets running -- "full of
grace and power," working "great wonders and signs among the people" (v. 8).
But this winsome wonder-working is not well-received by a particular group of
Jews, and so they stir up the elders, scribes and people against Stephen, and
they bring him before the council. Hitting him with a truckload of false
charges, they try to break his spirit, but he stands before them with what's
described as "the face of an angel" (v. 15).

Stephen becomes a world-changer -- the first martyr of the Christian church
because he set his sail according to the Christ Compass. And, as such, he is
a prototype, a model, a compass, for each of us.

Stephen shows us how to navigate by the compass of Christ and to see Jesus as
the directional signal that we follow in life and in death. It means:

* To act as a servant leader, working diligently for the welfare of others.

* To speak boldly about our faith and to tell the story of God's loving
embrace of the human race.

* To look serenely to heaven, especially when the world is roaring with rage.

* To trust our Lord to hold us close, in even the most desperate of
situations.

* To try to offer forgiveness to those who hurt us, as Jesus did on the
cross.

That's what it means to follow the Christ-compass. That's what it means to be
a world-changer.

Living your faith -- that's heroic. Holding fast to your convictions, whether
people cheer you or crucify you -- that's impressive. Looking for a promised
land beyond the limitations of this world -- that's inspiring. That's what
grows the church.

We don't have to die to change the world. We simply have to live in a
particular way and move in a distinctive direction.
With Christ as our compass.

Sources:
Aczel, Amir D. The Riddle of the Compass:
The Invention That Changed the World.
Reviewed by Jonathan Yardley, The
Washington Post, August 23, 2001.

Kewney, Guy. "Intel's powerful processors."
AnchorDeskUK, anchordesk.co.uk.

Let me know what you think. The church Email is: SLUMC@att.net, Phone: 480.895.8766