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Step Away from the Edge: Introduction, Less Is More

This sermon was prepared and preached by Pastor Mike Rose at First Federated Church in DesMoines, Iowa, on Sunday, August 3, 2008.

Copyright 2008, First Federated Church

Note:I would like to credit Pastor Andy Stanley and his teaching on Life Stewardship for shaping mythoughts on this series.

Reality TV represents a major shift that has taken place in television programming in recent years.

Within this genre of programming are shows that display people going to the extreme programs like

Fear Factor, Man verses Wild, Ice Road Truckers andDeadliest Catch are examples of this.

One of the earliest programs depicting man going to extremes was The Crocodile Hunter- SteveIrwin was always pushing things to the limits. Whether he was diving on the back of a crocodile,

subduing a poisonous snake, or swimming with stingrays in the ocean, you could always count on

Steve to take sanity and safety to the limits.

Millions tuned in to see how far Steve would go and whether or not his luck would run out as he

pushed himself and his prey to the edge. Now from the comfort and safety of my lounge chair, it was

thrilling to watch him take it to the limit. Theres something entertaining about watching someone

else on TV push themselves, their machines, their relationships to the limits.

However, back in the real world, at school, work, church, its not fun watching someone push

themselves to the brink financially, then going over the edge. Theres not a lot of entertainment value

in watching a couple take their marriage to the limits and seeing their family bust apart on the rocks

of divorce, or seeing friends take their schedules to the limit where they are stressed and on the vergeof a breakdown.

But this is our world - daily were bombarded with messages that tell us that real living is when wetake life to the edge. Were encouraged to take ourfinances to the edge: why wait till tomorrowwhen you can have today? And so, with our plastic cards, we buy and consume ourselves to the limitand beyond.

We do the same thing with ourcalendars. We pack our days, weeks and months so full of activities

that we need handheld computers to keep track of it all. It seems were always adding but rarely

subtracting, and in the midst of all the activity, we feel we must be part of, were exhausted, stressed

and even depressed.

Not only do we leverage ourfinances and time to the edge, we often take ourmorality to the edge as

well. This seems to affect professing Christians especially. I see it all the time: how close to the edge

can I get without actually crossing over into sin, or how close can I get to the edge without breakingthe law.

We live in a culture that calls us to live at the limits, to take it to the Edge, but heres what I want to

awaken us to in this series titledStep Away From The Edge:We were not created to live at the

limit!

Truth is, living at the limits is not sustainable, healthy or satisfying. And what well discover in this

series is that God invites us toStep Away From The Edge - To live a life that is sustainable, to live

(and this is a key word in this series) with margin in our lives.

Step Away from the Edge: Introduction, Less Is More | FFC | 08.03.2008 1

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Definition Margin

Marginis the amount available beyond what is actually needed. It is the extra, the reserve.

The buzz word today is go green, stop global warming. One thing we could do is to begin printing

books without any margins. taking the words from one edge of the page to the other and taking away

the space between words. That would save a lot of paper and thus save a lot of trees. In fact, 1,200

years ago thats exactly how they printed documents here is an example of John 3:16 written

without margin

FORGODSOLOVEDTHEWORLDTHATHEGAVEHISONLYBEGOTTENSONTHATWHO

SOEVERBELIEVEDONHIMWOULDNOTPERISHBUTHAVEEVERLASTINGLIFE.

John 3:16 with margin

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in

Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

Can you see the value of margin? That little bit of space between the edge of the page and the text,

and the space between words, marks the difference between gibberish and understandability.

QUESTION: Which of the two screens represent your life? We would all want to say the one with

margin, but for many of us its really the one without.

Marginis the space between our current performance and our limits.

You run, but not as fast as you could.

You show up early so you have a little time to settle in before class begins.

You get to the end of the month and have money left over.

You get to the end of the day and have some emotional reserves intact.

We need margin in our lives! We live in a culture that pushes us to forget margin and take

everything to the limits and so many of us do and then we wonder why life is so hard.

Consequences of Living without Margin.

1. Stress levels increases.

a. Youre in heavy traffic, 10 miles out from the place of your appointment. As time gets closer

and traffic remains stagnate, what happens? Stress goes up!

b. Your finances are leveraged at the very edge, and your kid comes to you with a request for

money or the washing machine breaks down, what happens? Stress goes up!

2. Your focus narrows, become self-centered. As margin decreases, the awareness of our limits

increase, and we naturally narrow our focus to deal with our limitations.

I see this in churches that once thrived, but have seen a down turn in their income and attendance.

They switch from outward focus to inward focus. The tendency is to shift from reaching the

community to simply trying to survive.


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3. Relationships Suffer Relationships thrive in the margin. It has been said that Business is theenemy of intimacy.

This is crazy, but many married couples allow themselves to get so busy and their calendars so

full that that actually have to schedule in times for intimacy Can you believe that!

So in this series were going to talk about the importance ofStepping Away From The Edge to create

margin in our lives.

Specifically Ill address: Time, to include our emotional and relational health, Morality and

Finances.

So this is a great series for you to be part of, its a great series for you to bring friends to, because this

is no small problem Its huge and affects most all of us in one way or another

Biblical Call To Margin

Now, Ive been babbling on about limits and margin, What does the Bible have to say about all this?

The creation account shows God demonstrating the need formargin Genesis chapter 1 takes usthrough the six days of creation. Now notice Chapter 2:1-3, NKJV - 1Thus the heavens and the earth,

and all the host of them, were finished. 2And on the seventh day God ended His work which He haddone, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. 3Then God blessed the

seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created andmade.

Question: does the limitless God of all creation need margin? No, but here He set the example for us

to follow, because we do.

Notice that God incorporated His example into The Law. Exodus 20:8-11 - 8Remember the Sabbath

day, to keep it holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10but the seventh day is theSabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work:. 11For in six days the LORD made theheavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORDblessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.

Dont get hung up on the issue of the Sabbath concerning what day it is, or even what you can or

cannot do in it. Dont trip over the simplicity!

We could work seven days a week, cram our schedules with activity upon activity, but when we push

ourselves to the edge the result usually isnt greater productivity and happiness, but stress and

depression.

We need margin in our time a space between what we could do (the edge) and what we should do,several steps back from the edge.

Not only did God mandate margin in our use of time, but also in ourfinances. There isnt time to get

overly technical, but God never intended that we spend on ourselves100 percent of what He

gives us.

In the Old Testament, Gods people were required to live on about 77 percent of their incomes 10

percent went to fund the work and upkeep of the Tabernacle, 10 percent went to fund the festivals and


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feasts and another 10 percent, collected every third year, was to take care of the widows, orphans and

the poor (Lev. 27, Num. 18, Deut. 14).

Well go deeper in a couple of weeks, but Gods message to His people was this:If youll trust Meand freely give Me what I ask you for, Ill make sure that all have all you need.

But how many of us not only ignore teaching on Biblical stewardship, but ignore solid principles on

saving and investing for the future, opting instead to take all that God has given us, and all that the

creditors will give us, and spend it all?

More than anything, this is why the church fails to have the resources it needs for ministry; its not

because of high gas prices and economic downturns. Its because Gods people have taken their God

given resources and leveraged them to the edge to have all that they want today without much

regard for tomorrow.

With our finances, time, emotions, relationships and moral choices many of us are like a man

standing on the edge one wrong step, and we are in serious crisis.

God calls us to Step Away From The Edge to create margin. WHY? For our safety, our sanity,

our serenity and our satisfaction.

The bottom line: We all have limits. The question is, will we live at the limits the world pushes us to,

which often takes us to brink of disaster, or, will we accept the limits God calls us to which allow

margin where the best enjoyments of life come from?

You and I are the ones who make that choice.

The First Federated Church copyright, above, is for the sermon itself, not for any items quoted in thesermon, unless otherwise stated. All quoted items are done so in good faith, and the source is

attributed when it is known.


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