In this sermon, the speaker emphasizes the importance of finding genuine peace and purpose in life. He highlights the sadness of lacking purpose and the temporary nature of accumulating wealth. The speaker uses the example of Jesus, who endured mockery and sacrifice throughout his life, to illustrate the concept of paying the price for blessings. He also mentions the examples of Mother Teresa and Sadhu Sundar Singh, who lived selflessly for others. The sermon concludes by urging listeners to understand that the purpose of life is not to seek personal gain, but to live for others and be a blessing to them.

Sunrise and sunset, we know about that, right? It is always nice when the night passes and the morning comes. And so, in this pilgrimage as the people of God, we are in a season where now the Lord Jesus Christ, after having come to this earth and born as a baby, and 30 years will go by, the coming of Christ changed the history. As a matter of fact, from the time of creation, Adam and Eve, the longing of the heart was for the seed of the woman. The deliverer, the Messiah. And finally, at the father's time, he came. He was born of Virgin Mary. But then we see an incident when he was 12 years old, of him at the church talking to the leaders. But we are not told any details. But all we know is that there is silence as far as we are concerned. What happened during those 30 years of his private life, the only thing we know from Hebrews that says, and he learned obedience through suffering. So there is a journey of silence sometime, one year, two years, 10 years, 30 years. A time of preparation that nobody sees. It is invisible, that happens in the heart. But then, Christ coming into the world was not for himself, as you know. This is something that sometimes we have great difficulty to translate for our life. That is, what is our life about? Our life, whether you realize, revolves around our life. Even in Christian work, what do people think? Well, what is the gift I have? What is the talent I have? And how can I fulfill my call? It is all so subjective. If you will start, at least begin to think these thoughts, it will be a whole new beginning for your life enrichment. Or more simply put it, to find genuine peace and reason for living. And I think, lacking purpose for life is one of the saddest things of life. You know, think about people who accumulate wealth, multiple crores of rupees and here and there and all these different things. And in the end, you know, they get a heart attack and they die. And what happens to all this? But nobody thinks about it. The rich man and Lazarus story is that. But Christ, he knew why he came. And he kept silent without revealing who he was. I mean, just imagine, he was 12 years old and playing with his friends and going to places and people making fun of him. Yeah, where is your father? What did Jesus say? God is my father. And can you just imagine all the giggling and all the mockery and all the pain he must have endured. And he could snap his finger and kill all of them. And as a matter of fact, he could destroy the entire earth just by saying a word because he created the entire universe simply saying, let there be. And all happened. And here is God. He decided to leave aside all his privileges for one reason. That is the purpose of his life was not to find wealth and health and honor and position and whatever else and security, nothing for himself. He lived for others. So the sun rises, the dawn, the night simply vanishes. The sun rises for what? The sun by the nature of it actually gives life and light and warmth for us. And that's the reason for its existence. And so when you talk about the dawn of this whole new blessing, unless we are careful, we think blessing, blessing. Oh, I am blessed. So we think about us. But we can go back to the beginning of the Bible where God said to Abraham, Abraham, I will bless you. And I will make you a blessing for others. But here's the thing. All through lives, all through the life of Abraham, you read, he lived in tents. And so what was the blessing of Abraham? Abraham, I will bless you. Basically if you look at it, his entire life journey was full of turmoil, temptation, problems and difficulties and a perpetual constant non-stop sacrifice. Even the thing God gave him, his one son after waiting 25 long years, finally God says, now you give him away, give him up. How do you interpret that to be a blessing? But it is not enough for us to understand this thing with theory and interpretations, but we need to enter into the reality of it. So life is not basically a matter of knowing things, but rather entering into this. Now here is the application or here is the summary of so far what I said. The dawn of this new blessing, whatever that means, the way you understand it, it never happens unless we are willing to pay the price. And the price is suffering and loss and even death. Okay, let me tell you, let me say some names of people that you heard about. Okay, Mother Teresa, what image comes to your mind? Sadhu Sundar Singh, if you heard about him. Ida Scudder, Father Damien, who went to serve in the leper colonies in Hawaii. I mean, there are other names you know. I mean, think about Mahatma Gandhiji. There are other names like that. The first temptation is that, oh man, I can't believe you talk about Mother Teresa. No, there is no way on earth I can even imagine to come even near the kind of person she was. Or this American young girl who comes to India for her own sake and her family and runs into a story that changed her life, watching three Indian girls dying unnecessarily. And that grips her heart and realized that the purpose of my life should not be my mother and my family but others. And she decides to give her life for India. And Vellore Medical College began and still goes on as one of the greatest institutions was built on a young girl's life who decided this is it. All I am, all I have, all my dreams, everything now on the altar. And she died to everything that she wanted and longed for. And so there is a dawn of new blessing. If you want to live like your father, your mother, your grandparents and great-grandparents, imagine how they lived and died and where they buried and what they left behind. Question, do you want that? Is that what you want? Or you want to be someone who says, thank God he was born and lived. Thank God that I found hope and the whole community changed and everything. And it's all because you were willing to understand life comes out of death. And so idolizing these people that I mentioned, or Jesus the Lord and God and John the Baptist or Apostle Paul or whatever, it don't make us, but the possibility and potential, yes, we can actually in our own uniqueness and call, we can make a difference for the world. And in looking at the time also, and it says so clearly that Jesus didn't want an imaginary interpretation of reality, but he said, John, I'm here for this. You baptize me. And John said, this is silly. I mean, look at you. The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, the creator of the universe, and me, a rotten fallen sinner creation of your hand, and you want me to perform the ceremony? And Jesus said, don't worry. There's no other way. This is the right thing to do. And actually it's a picture of death. Baptism, if you know, whether it is a baby or adult or whatever, the picture is basically of death, buried, and then life again. And this is actually the whole picture. And here, the exchange, what I call the holy exchange takes place. And without his willingness to give up, all our life we had to make choices. But here's the thing. If choices are given to us by other people, okay, you do this, then you don't have to think much about it. If I'm the boss in the company or the authority or, you know, okay, I'm told to do, then we get into situations that we are not in control of our situation and we lose what we have and somebody abuses, steals what we got, all kinds of things. And it's imposed on us, but it's an entirely different thing. So I was in Bhopal many, many years ago and happened to run into this man who was a high-level government official from my village. And I heard about him and they lived there in North India. I mean, I was a tiny boy going to school, so I was so intrigued to meet him. So talking to him, he said who he was and he had a nice house in Bhopal and all that. And he said, oh, by the way, next month I'm moving from here or something like that. I said, where are you going? Then he said a place. I was trying to listen to Bombay or Chennai or Bangalore or America or some big places. And he said the name of some place. I said, I don't know. I never heard about that. He said, you have no reason to hear about the place because it's a tiny little community and he explains about how far it is and where it is. I said, why are you going there for? Then he explained to me, I'm an engineer and I've been living in North India all these years and from place to place I choose my transfer if I could based on if I can be a help to share the love of Christ and get a church planted or help someone to do that. This is no joke. This is no made-up story. And I said, because I was so young, I said, but you are not a pastor, you are not a priest, you're not an evangelist. He said, no, no, I'm an engineer. But this is what I've been doing. So I remember so well, I asked the next question, so you're going to get a promotion and you get more money? He said, no, as a matter of fact, I'm going to get much less money than I'm making now because I went after this transfer and it's a large amount of money, he was taking less money. So I said, what's going to happen to your house? He said, as I do everywhere, I will sell it. And I keep money I need and the rest will be given to do something for God's work. This was my first and last experience of something like that. Here is a man who was employed and had very high salary, very good position, and he's choosing to go somewhere, taking less money, getting a job, so that he can do that. And I remember there's another experience I have, but not from Indians. It is a medical doctor, Mona Khanna, I think Dr. Danny knows her. Her parents, I think UP, three girls and their parents, all medical doctors went off to America and she was in Chicago and she was actually, finally became the head of the Chicago hospital. I have seen that myself, that place. And she was a head of that something, I mean, making unbelievable amount of money, more money than the American president make. And the interesting thing about it is that she is a Hindu Brahmin. And so I reminded her one time because she contacted us during the tsunami time for us to do some work in Sri Lanka. In any case, in this conversation, she was not in Chicago, she was in Dallas, Texas, which is about three hours by air. And I thought she was in Chicago. She said, no, I'm in Dallas. So I kind of asked her the question, what are you doing here? She said, well, I resigned from my job as the head of the hospital and I took a salary just to meet my needs, which is $34,000. And she was making over $200,000 plus everything else in the world. And I said, why did you do that for? She said, you see, my life is only one life. All I want is help humanity. And I can be here in Dallas on the television, a channel, five minutes or so a day talking about health. That will do more good than me sitting in Chicago. And I left it and I came here. And now I have the freedom to travel all over the world and serve poor communities. And she came with us to Sri Lanka to help during the tsunami time. And Danny, I think she came here also. You know, she's a top-notch, brilliant doctor in her area. So here's an interesting reality. Whether you are a believer or a Christian or not, somehow all of us made the image of God. We realize there is something much bigger than our little life on earth. But our fulfillment really comes from being a tree for not for ourselves but for others. And that new beginning can be every day a new beginning, every year, every month, as long as you understand this money is not for me, this position is not for me. And my children, it's all for God and this is what I want. And we are not possessive for our own life and things. And that's what we learn from this. And if Abraham, when he was told to give up, he could have said, no, it could be demons talking to me, not God. Knowing God, the way I know him, he would have left him alone. But then what would have happened to Isaac? What happened to the future? You ask those questions. You see, God's purposes can be fulfilled in your life and through your life if you are willing, if I'm willing to embrace more and more the sacrifice, the suffering, take less and less. And the worst, the worst, the worst, the most devilish thing happening now in the culture, it is the consumer mentality. I want this, I want that, I want that. We accumulate things. And our life seems to be all about how we are going to make more money and this and that. It is not how I am going to give up all this so to have a simple little life and have the time and the freedom to serve God and do what he wants us to do. And I do not know this applies to how many people, but hopefully, maybe it does to you. I was in North India some long ago, it was a long, long, long time ago. And I remember two years I lived as a sadhu. I don't know if you heard the story or not. I had two trousers and two shirts and one pair of shoes. I decided I'm going to give up all my clothes. I took all my stained clothes and gave it to somebody. He was from Ahmedabad. And I went and stitched pyjama and kurta sadhu clothes. But those two years of my life, I didn't have ten pair of clothes to worry about. This or that, that's all there is. But I'm alive. So you see, you need to understand the things of the world and the world actually will become the greatest hindrance for you to enter into this joy of bringing new day, new beginning for others. Only in relationship, Jesus with his father, Abraham with his God, Paul with Christ. For him, I suffer all this. So why you would want to do it? Why would Ida Scudder do that? Why would Father Damien leave Europe for the rest of his life to become what he became? Or anyone? It's a relationship. It is this wound I clean, this bandage I put on this person. He's not normal. He's Jesus. That relationship. Number three, the knowledge of the benefit, the outcome that comes from our life actions for others' blessings will bring meaning to our existence, the reason for living. My kingdom is not of this world. I suffer all these things for the sake of the elect. For the joy that sat before him, he endured the cross. I tell you, there'd be a thousand times I wanted to give up doing radio broadcasts in the early days. It was pain in the neck. One o'clock in the morning, two in the morning, get up and go to the studio and keep doing. And I was so discouraged many times, but then I keep remembering this one thought. This is my only chance to tell the world about Jesus. And only I can do it now. When I'm an old man, I can't. And for his sake, I must. And it's a result. It's a wonderful end of the whole thing that comes today. I just can't tell you how excited my life is when I think about, thank God, what we are doing is working. 80,000 children finding hopes in their life. The little children on the streets of Delhi, some little girls look like princess. They were abandoned by people and now they are loved and they're growing up and they're getting educated. And think about all that. And I said, this is unbelievable. So unless you start thinking about that, then it's all within our little world. Number four, valuing people, caring for others is to understand the heart of Christ and the meaning of suffering. Valuing other people. You know, the rich man didn't value the poor Lazarus. And think about it. Others, that people you don't see, far away from you maybe. And now, dawn of new blessing. How are they going to get it? It's going to be through you. Through our lives. And I think Willow Medical College and the hospital exist. Because when that young American girl saw these three Indian women dying unnecessarily, she gave value to their lives and realized there are millions like them and I must give up my dream for that. Valuing other people. No one that you look upon, no one you deal with, even a beggar, never despise people. Value them with our words and with our actions. And this is critically important. And finally, the more you are attached to the world. The more you are attached, your heart, your emotions and your decision attached to the world. That is money, position, prestige, honor from other people, self-promotion. The less you will be able to become this blessing, this new hope for others. And in the process, C.S. Lewis said, you die in this airless casket. That's sad. So, now we are looking at Christ going public. What a choice he made for three and a half years. Of now suffering, abuse, misunderstanding, pain, risk, being forsaken, abandoned. And in the end, nobody forced him to lay down his life. He says, I choose to lay down my life on the cross. And this is how he journeyed before us. And I pray that as we go into this season of partaking from the Eucharist and being grateful to God and the Holy Communion. It will remind us, not just as a memory or a symbol or a sign, but more so the real image and understanding of Christ and his focus in life. And he said, unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no part in me. He lived with them. They could touch him and see him. But he must go now. But he says, even though I am not with you, I want you in your human flesh, understand and touch and feel and know that I am still the same person. And I pray that you will think more deeply and all of us as we partake from our Lord's table.