Campaign Kerusso

In this sermon, we examine how human pride can gradually seep into our work for Christ and morph us into Nimrods rather than Abrahams. We are called to emulate the Abrahamic walk.

With Jesus as our example and keeping Him in our sights, we can remind ourselves as often as needed, “Don’t Be a Nimrod!”

…………………

More Kerusso Couch Sermons

…………………

Don’t Be a Nimrod Transcript:

Don’t Be a Nimrod!
Am I a Nimrod or an Abraham?
Am I building a tower or laying pavers?
Pavers object lesson
Am I building up my reputation or laying down my life for the gospel?
Carnal man craves notoriety.
Smithsonian Institute even has a webpage entitled “Design Your Own Monument.”
On it, they explain:
“If you could design your own memorial or monument, what would it look like?
Would it be tall like the Washington Monument, or have columns like the World War II Memorial?
Or would it have a look all its own?
Get out your sketch pad and draw possible designs of your monument.
What shape will it be?
Will it be a building or a statue …?
Sketch a couple of different designs and then pick the one you like best.
Would it include the award you won in sports or for math … something like that?”
In our carnal flesh, we are the most important priority in our lives.
We know this because we make shrines to ourselves.
We like to draw attention to ourselves, our works, and our abilities.
A lady might adorn herself in jewels.
AN mid-life man might spend hours sculpting his six-pack abs.
Genesis 108-11 ICB
“…Nimrod became a very powerful man on earth. He was a great hunter before the Lord. That is why people say someone is “like Nimrod, a great hunter before the Lord.” At first Nimrod’s kingdom covered Babylon… went to Assyria…”
Nimrod: Founder Assyria and Babylon (Today approx. Iraq and Iran)
He was a leader at the time they built the Tower of Babylon.
Genesis 11:1-8 CSB
“The whole earth had the same language and vocabulary. As people migrated from the east, they found a valley in the land of Shinar and settled there. They said to each other, “Come, let’s make oven-fired bricks.” (They used brick for stone and asphalt for mortar.) And they said, ‘Come, let’s build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the sky. Let’s make a name for ourselves; otherwise, we will be scattered throughout the earth.’ Then the Lord came down to look over the city and the tower that the humans[b] were building. The Lord said, ‘If they have begun to do this as one people all having the same language, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let’s go down there and confuse their language so that they will not understand one another’s speech.’ So from there the Lord scattered them throughout the earth, and they stopped building the city.”
In the story of the Tower of Babble we see the prideful nature that is inside all mankind.
Stacking stones as a means to establish a place for yourself and defend it.
You cannot build a tower if you’re moving out (as the Lord told them to do) and you cannot lay a path if you’re standing still.
(illustrate with stones)
The tower builders did not want to go out as the Lord told them to do.
A city, is comfortable, gives you a sense of place, an identity.
“We are Babylonians, always have been, always will be.”
Yet, True Christian Faith has always had a walk away and go out dynamic.
Mar 10:28 NLT
“Then Peter began to speak up. “We’ve given up everything to follow you,” he said. Yes,” Jesus replied, “and I assure you that everyone who has given up house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or property, for my sake and for the Good News, will receive now in return a hundred times as many houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and property–along with persecution. And in the world to come that person will have eternal life.”
Jesus set the example…
Jesus was always about doing the father’s work.
Luke 2:49 ICB
“Jesus asked, “Why did you have to look for me? You should have known that I must be where my Father’s work is!”
Jesus might have been tempted to concentrate on His role in the family… but He walked away to do the work of the Father.
He was too young to leave home just yet, but we see He was felt strongly called to get on with the Father’s work.
Another time, Jesus had started a revival, and He was famous… but He walked away from that work.
Luke 4:42-43 WEB
“When it was day, he departed and went into an uninhabited place, and the multitudes looked for him, and came to him, and held on to him, so that he wouldn’t go away from them. But he said to them, “I must preach the good news of God’s Kingdom to the other cities also. For this reason I have been sent.”
Here we see that he found a place of ministry where He was renowned, famous, prominent…  but He walked away to do the will of the Father.
Just as Jesus was sent to go out and do His Father’s work… so too were the disciples.
Acts 13:2-4 ICB
“They were all worshiping the Lord and giving up eating. The Holy Spirit said to them, ‘Give Barnabas and Saul to me to do a special work. I have chosen them for it.’ So they gave up eating and prayed. They laid their hands on Barnabas and Saul and sent them out. Barnabas and Saul were sent out by the Holy Spirit…”
Jesus told this parable about how He sees believers who won’t go out.
Matthew 20: 1-7 BRG
“For the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which went out early in the morning to hire labourers into his vineyard. And when he had agreed with the labourers for a penny a day, he sent them into his vineyard. And he went out about the third hour, and saw others standing idle in the marketplace, And said unto them; Go ye also into the vineyard, and whatsoever is right I will give you. And they went their way. Again he went out about the sixth and ninth hour, and did likewise. And about the eleventh hour he went out, and found others standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye here all the day idle? They say unto him, Because no man hath hired us. He saith unto them, Go ye also into the vineyard; and whatsoever is right, that shall ye receive.
Each group, standing around idly said they hadn’t been called… yet they were all called…
Mark 16:15 KJV
“And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”
The Christion walk is a walk, not an exercise in monument construction or legacy securing.
Interestingly, the area Nimrods people chose to build was so barren there wasn’t even sufficient natural rocks with which to build a great tower.
But they figured out what to do, they would make man-made bricks.
They would use manufactured methods as substitutes for natural ones. (bricks for stones) God wanted altars no man’s tool had touched.
Exodus 20:25 NET
“If you make me an altar of stone, you must not build it of stones shaped with tools, for if you use your tool on it you have defiled it.”
God does not want us using man-made, manufactured techniques to achieve spiritual ends. We work on the décor, the colors, the lighting, the acoustics, the music style, the preaching style all in an effort to create a sense of the Holy Spirit’s presence or a user-friendly contemporary feel.
The results are impressive…but not to God.
But God doesn’t need our man-made tools and methods.
One Christian visitor to America from Africa said, “It’s amazing what Americans can do without the Holy Ghost.”
We may attempt use every resource and effort to build your own kingdom and reputation.
We might seek to be recognized as God-like beings or at least super Godly beings.
It is human nature to glorify ourselves-
Through Facebook, we can present to all your friends and family the exact portrayal of yourself that you want them to see.
Even professed men of God fall into the monument trap.
King Saul was A needy insecure man.
If you study the life of Saul as a sort of case study in insecurity – two verses represent two defining moments in his life.
1 Samuel 14:35: “And Saul built an altar to God; the first one he had ever built.”
1 Samuel 15:12 says, “Saul went up to Carmel to build a monument to himself.”
Somewhere between those two verses, Saul stopped building altars to God and started building monuments to himself.
There is a fine line between Thy Kingdom Come and My Kingdom Come.
And when the prophet Samuel confronted him about his sin his main concern was that he was honored before the people.
1 Samuel 15:30 GW
“Saul replied, ‘I have sinned! Now please honor me in front of the leaders of my people and in front of Israel…’”
At some point, it became no longer about God. It was about Saul.
He had gone from being secure in God to being insecure and thus having to pump up his own ministry and self-image.
Saul got caught up in the numbers game. And David had better stats.
The people were singing a song about how Saul had slain a Thousand of the Lord’s enemies, but David had slain ten thousand.
It literally drove Saul crazy.
Jesus had a successful ministry although he poured his heart and life into only twelve people!
We might be thinking…
“But, I just want to do something great for God.”
“I want to make a difference in this world by doing something impressive for the kingdom.”
“Surely, God wants me (or us) to build a great church to honor him and reach people.”
But we must always be mindful that we might have, at some point, without even noticing it, moved from doing work for God to building monument to ourselves.
The Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar is another Biblical example of a narcissist who built monuments to himself.
Daniel 4:30-32
“The king thought, ‘Look how great Babylon is! I built the royal palace by my own impressive power and for my glorious honor.’ Before the words came out of his mouth, a voice said from heaven, ‘King Nebuchadnezzar, listen to this: The kingdom has been taken from you. You will be forced away from people and live with the wild animals. You will eat grass like cattle… until you realize that the Most High has power over human kingdoms and that he gives them to whomever he wishes.’”
Monuments are a lot of hard work for a very temporal result.
When Harold & I visited Washington DC, we could not visit the Washington’s monument. It was under repairs and covered with scaffolding.
When we lived in New York for ten years, the entire time, the Statue of Liberty closed for repairs and covered with scaffolding.
The same thing happened to the Eiffel tower in France.
And the Leaning Tower of Pisa was never intended to lean. Oops!
How often people spend so much time and energy repairing and protecting their reputations—their façade—their legacy?
Please just honor me before the people.
But it is unsustainable!
King Nebuchadnezzar built a 90-foot statue of himself… but it is gone today.
As are several other so-called wonders of the world that are just gone:
Where are… the Hanging Gardens of Babylon
Temple of Artemis at Ephesus
Statue of Zeus at Olympia
Colossus of Rhodes
The Lighthouse of Alexandria
What are we doing with our gifts and resources?
Do we let them lead us out with the gospel, or do you pile them up to build them our own personal kingdom on Earth, or, even worse, are we self-deceivingly building our personal “gospel kingdom?”
Personal ministry kingdoms rob God of His glory!
Here is the recipe for robbing God of Glory:
Build yourself city, make it tall, do not be scattered. Stay in your position and don’t go wherever God’s asks you to go… Don’t give up anything, just keep airing and acquiring. Seek more and more praise and adulation to your name.
Regarding His glory, God is, in His own way, quite near sighted. When He heard their bragging of the glorious work they were doing He said, “Let us go (the Trinity and maybe even all of the angels and Heavenly beings) down and see this thing… oh you mean that little tiny pile if pebbles way down there.”
God comes down to see it and decides it is not good for man’s ego to let him continue. So, in His mercy, He brought about an end to the project.
Most tragically, monuments are just high places from which to fall.
Making the approval of others the central focus of our lives leads to pride or depression.
At the Tower of Babel, to cripple their evil intentions, God put distance between them and made it difficult for them to understand each other. They were confused about each other.
“Where is he coming from… what is he trying to say?”
We are still confused, and we still don’t understand each other. We don’t speak each other’s language. We spend lifetimes searching the world for kindred spirits.
God in His mercy protects us from human pride by letting us fail.
A young man named Triston wanted to take the selfie of all selfies on top of a beautiful bridge with the Dallas, Texas, and get the skyline in the background. He plunged 50 feet before he crash-landed on the ground. Fortunately, unlike hundreds who have died trying to take selfies, Triston survived and has made a tremendous recovery.
The people of Babel, and Triston, can tell you, pride goes before destruction, or at least before near destruction.
Proverbs 16:18 MSG
“First pride, then the crash— the bigger the ego, the harder the fall.”
As hard as falls are, they are meant to save us and protect the Lord’s glory.
Today the term “a Nimrod” means an idiot or moron.
In the old cartoons, Bugs Bunny called the idle-brained hunter Elmer Fudd a Nimrod. Today, it only means this a moron, a jerk.
What happened to his reputation as the “Great Hunter Before the Lord?”
“Don’t be a Nimrod!
All supposed great men fall! Their statues decay and are even pulled down.
Exodus 34:14 KJV
“For the Lord, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God.”
1 Corinthians 10:31NIV
“So, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.”
Colossians 3:17
“And whatever you do, in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”
1 Peter 4:11 NCV
“Anyone who speaks should speak words from God. Anyone who serves should serve with the strength God gives so that in everything God will be praised through Jesus Christ. Power and glory belong to him forever and ever. Amen.”
Work on the Tower of Babel seized and fell into disrepair but later, God sent out the Abraham from that same area.
Abraham’s obedience to God’s call was instrumental in saving all mankind through his seed.
His seed was Jesus.
Nebuchadnezzar fell but He found God out there in his broken and confused wilderness.
My Greek Olive container needed to go down to come up.
This is a picture of Baarack the sheep. He had been abandand if the woods and had grown 80 lbs. of wool on his body. He could barely walk.
He was found, rescued and shorn. Now he is happy, healthy and cared for. Sheep are shorn for their own protection. It’s hard and scary to be shorn…. That is when circumstances come that destroy what we consider to be our pride and joy, but once while we need to be shorn for our own protection.
Notice too, Baaarack is no longer wearing his own impressive but dangerous coat.
But rather, a simple, humble coat provided for him by those who rescued Him.
We may be shorn of our pride coats, but we will be covered with the humble coat he provides.
The swimmer, Michael Phelps is a highly decorated Olympic athlete with 22 medals, 18 of which were gold! Often called the greatest athlete of all time.
But Michael fell into substance abuse and clinical depression.
He said: “I was a train wreck. I was like a time bomb, waiting to go off. I had no self-esteem, no self-worth. There were times where I didn’t want to be here. It was not good. I felt lost,”
“This is the end of my life (he thought). How many times will I mess up? Maybe the world would be better without me” he thought to himself.
When Michael hit rock bottom, his good friend, NFL star Ray Lewis, stepped in.
Ray is an outspoken Christian and pushed Michael to get the help he needed in rehab and gave him the book “The Purpose Driven Life.”
After reading “The Purpose Driven Life,” Michael told ESPN Magazine he realized there was a purpose for him on this planet. He finally believed in a power greater than himself.
So, if we are not to be Nimrods, what are we to be… Abrahams!
Laying Pavers rather than building towers.
Abraham went out beating a path for his family and for all men of faith who would come after him.
Abraham left his position as one of the most successful men in Ur (he didn’t covet it) 
Later he gave the best land to Lot.
He didn’t get his promised son till he was 100 years old.
He never possessed the promised land. 
He left no monument to himself, no trophies, no tower only a path for others to follow.
A tower stands, in one place, a place of prominence, and it only grows taller and taller. But a path leads away from your sense of place, your place of prominence, your material security.A path leads you away from all that and into an unknown destiny, A path is led by God to lead us into His work for His Glory.
Does your life message say “praise me” or “follow me as I follow Jesus?”
We are not laying down a new path but rather, continuing the one started by previous believers like Abraham and our Lord Himself.
The most precious stones of all are the believers who have laid down their lives for Jesus. Hebrews 11 is a path to follow and the pavers are the lives of believers.
Jesus Himself became a paver when He laid down His life for us.
God sent Abraham and promised to make his name great.. but, his greatness would be in glorifying and honoring God.
Pavers that glorify God can only be made by letting go of self-interest and laying down our own lives for the sake of the Gospel.
Our stones are what we have to offer—our resources.
Our goods and gifts. Do we use them as steppingstones to build a path for others to follow, or as man-made bricks for building a personal kingdom? 
We are called to Continue the Path Laid by Jesus
Satan himself was like Nimrod (I shall be as God).
Jesus was like Abraham (I will leave my throne, my place of importance, my home, and go do my Father’s work).
When we follow Christ, we lay a path…  pavers for future generations.
Jesus laid a path of obedience to The Father, and for His final paver He laid down was His own life.
He bids us all… “Follow me!”
We walk on the pavers laid by those to beat a path before us…centuries of martyrs for the faith.
It is our turn to make a way for our children and our neighbors by teaching them God’s Word and setting an example of godliness.
Towers crumble but paths guide and lead the way out of darkness into light.
Philippians 2:3 KJV
“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit”
Wherever SELF-serving ambition enters in — it mars the beauty of God’s work.
It is our privilege to pour our blessed lives into ministry and then withdraw and let Christ have all the glory.
We are called to minister of the gospel not thinking of self-advancement.
We need not take credit for our work or start building monuments to ourselves.
We must be content just to do Christ’s bidding.
It starts with knowing who we really are as both children of God and servants of the gospel.
Not needing to prove we are somebody special.
Not needing to maintain the façade of your self-importance.
Jesus knew who He was: The King of all and at the same time, the Servant of all.
He never needed to prove himself to men.
As the King of all, He was a servant, and as a servant of all, He knew He was The King.
We must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.
Philippians 2:5-8 MSG
“Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn’t think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn’t claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.”
Luke 22:25-26 MSG
“Within minutes they were bickering over who of them would end up the greatest. But Jesus intervened: “Kings like to throw their weight around and people in authority like to give themselves fancy titles. It’s not going to be that way with you. Let the senior among you become like the junior; let the leader act the part of the servant.”
There really is no place for self-worship or self-aggrandizement in the Kingdom of God.
Luke 17:10
“So, you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.’”
Luke 14:11
 “For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
In order to be a paver for others, we must first lay down our lives.
Romans 12:1 ERV
“So, I beg you, brothers and sisters, because of the great mercy God has shown us, offer your lives[a] as a living sacrifice to him—an offering that is only for God and pleasing to him. Considering what he has done, it is only right that you should worship him in this way.”
We have an opportunity to leave a legacy to the next generation, but it is not going to happen by building monuments to ourselves.
 It is found by leaving a path for the next generation to follow.
In this way, we say to them: “This is the way, walk ye in it.”
In Christ, true humility is not disparaging your own works, it is just forgetting them as quickly as you do them.
Forgetting those things which are behind and getting on to the next thing God wants you to do next
Matthew 6:3
“But when you give to the poor and do acts of kindness, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing [give in complete secrecy].”
If the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing it won’t have occasion to applaud!
Don’t even let yourself know what you did.
Lay down your life and God will turn it into a path that others can follow,
As one rapper put it, “We’re here to give until we’re empty.”