Subject: Fwd: Fw: ONIONS FOR COLLECTING THE FLU VIRUS
In 1919 when the flu killed 40 million people there was this Doctor that visited the many farmers to see if he could help them combat the flu. Many of the farmers and their family had contracted it and many died.
The doctor came upon this one farmer and to his surprise, everyone was very healthy. When the doctor asked what the farmer was doing that was different the wife replied that she had placed an unpeeled onion in a dish in the rooms of the home, (probably only two rooms back then). The doctor couldn’t believe it and asked if he could have one of the onions and placed it under the microscope. She gave him one and when he did this, he did find the flu virus in the onion. It obviously absorbed the virus, therefore, keeping the family healthy.
Now, I heard this story from my hairdresser in AZ. She said that several years ago many of her employees were coming down with the flu and so were many of her customers. The next year she placed several bowls with onions around in her shop. To her surprise, none of her staff got sick. It must work.. (And no, she is not in the onion business.)
The moral of the story is, buy some onions and place them in bowls around your home. If you work at a desk, place one or two in your office or under your desk or even on top somewhere. Try it and see what happens. We did it last year and we never got the flu.
If this helps you and your loved ones from getting sick, all the better. If you do get the flu, it just might be a mild case..
Whatever, what have you to lose? Just a few bucks on onions!
Now, I want to begin today’s sermon by asking you a question: How many of you, by show of hands, believed the story I just told? Come on, don’t be ashamed. I hate to tell you, it’s not true. It’s a folk remedy, and urban legend. It’s a story that’s been passed around on the internet as truth, but it’s not true. A raw onion sitting out in your house won’t keep you from getting the flu. It’s a myth, an urban legend.
Our culture is full of urban legends. We’ll share some of them throughout this series. Some will be obviously false, others, well, you just might find out that you’ve been suckered into believing something that wasn’t completely true.
You know what an urban legend is, right? It’s a story that seems true, that’s pretty believable, that supposedly happened to a real person. They get passed along by second hand witnesses until they are widely known and believed. We tell them around campfires. They get passed along through the internet.
Well, I don’t know if you know this or not, but there are such things as spiritual urban legends.
A spiritual urban legend is just like a secular urban legend. It’s a belief, story, assumption or truism that gets passed around as fact. The source can be a friend, Bible study or even a sermon. And because they sound so plausible and come from a trusted and reputable source, spiritual urban legends are often accepted without question and then quickly passed on. Eventually, they begin to take on a life of their own, and it’s difficult to refute them because “everybody” knows they are true and anyone who questions their truth gets attacked.
Now, some spiritual urban legends aren’t all that harmful. Like is someone mistakenly believes that the Bible teaches that God helps those who help themselves, or a penny saved is a penny earned or that Jesus was some sort of efeminite, white guy who walked from town to town in an old bathrobe with a blue sash hanging off of his sleeve. These things might throw us off a small bit but they aren’t going to destroy our faith.
But, as we’re going to discover over the next few weeks, far too often, the consequences of believing spiritual urban legends can be devastating. They can destroy our faith. They can lead us to being mad at God. They can hurt us.
My hope, over the next four weeks, is that you’ll start to question everything you hear, and test everything you believe against the actual words and teachings of the Bible. Question what you hear me say and test it against what the Bible says.
Today, I want us to look at an urban legend that when you hear it, especially if you’ve grown up in the church or have any church background, you’re going to say, “that’s not an urban legend. That’s true, and I have proof.” But is it really true? Let’s see.
This urban legend is one that usually comes up in the midst of a tragedy, a difficult time, a death or a loss, a breakup or a divorce. Like have you ever had something bad happen to you and people come up to you, and they’re well intentioned, they mean good, they’re trying to be helpful, and they say things like:
- God must be up to something.
- God doesn’t make mistakes.
- You must be very special for God to trust you with this.
- Won’t it be great to see how God uses this?
- Isn’t it good to know that everything happens for a reason?
Basically each of these statements contain this Urban Legend: Everything happens for a reason. Everything happens for a reason.
Now on the surface that sounds good, doesn’t it. It’s supposed to bring comfort when bad things happen. Actually, that’s usually when we hear this statement. Your dad dies: Everything happens for a reason. Your boyfriend or girlfriend breaks up with you: Everything happens for a reason. Your dog runs away: Everything happens for a reason.
This is a statement made by well-meaning and well-intentioned people who are trying to help you make sense out of the difficult time you find yourself in. But is that really true? Does everything really happen for a reason?
Now, in one sense, when people say these things to us they are absolutely right. No matter what happens, God is in control. He is the King of the universe. He’s a good God.
But that in no way, shape or form means that he’s the direct cause of everything that happens. It doesn’t mean that everything that happens in our lives is something that he wants to happen. It certainly doesn’t mean that everything that he allows to happen is good.
Think about it: God did not cause Satan to rebel. God did not cause Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. God did not cause David to sleep with Bathsheba. God did not force the Roman soldiers to kill Jesus. Or think about this: When the Nazi’s killed 6 million Jews, did that happen for a reason? When the Tsunami killed 150,000 Indonesians, did that happen for a reason? Did 911 happen for a reason?
Let’s make it more personal. Did you’re parents getting a divorce happen for a reason? Did your breakup with your boyfriend or girlfriend happen for a reason? Did the abuse that happened to you when you were a kid happen for a reason? Was God behind all of that? Does everything that happens happen for a reason?
Now I know what some of you are thinking. There’s a verse that’s in your head right now that you’ve got as proof for saying that everything happens for a reason. This verse is really the basis of this Urban Legend. It’s found in Romans 8:28. This is a verse that is used in funerals, or when tragedy strikes, to bring comfort to those who are suffering. But does it really say that everything happens for a reason?
I believe that this verse gets misquoted all the time when it comes to working our way through life’s difficulties. Christians and non-Christians who have just a little bit of Bible knowledge quote this verse. It’s on coffee mugs, t-shirts and all kinds of other stuff that you can buy at a Christian bookstore.
But Romans 8:28 doesn’t say or mean what most people think it does. In fact, as we’re going to see, it doesn’t even apply to a large percentage of those who turn to it for comfort.
I think that some of the confusion comes because most people who quote Romans 8:28, quote the old King James version of the verse. It says, And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
Isn’t that a great verse? On the surface this seems to imply that everything that happens is part of God’s greater plan. It appears to say that, in time, everything that happens prove to be good or necessary.
But the KJV translation is more confusing than accurate. A more accurate translation of Romans 8:28 is, And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Now look at those two translations for a minute. Do you see the difference? It doesn’t say that everything that happens is good. It simply says that God is at work in all things. In other words, what Romans 8:28 says is that there is nothing that can thwart God’s ultimate plan. God can and will accomplish his good purposes no matter what. But that’s a big difference from saying that everything that happens is good or necessary.
Think about it: If every disaster, death, financial problem, infideltity, hurt or abuse that comes our way are sent directly from God, then what does that say about God? If these are a reflection of God’s goodness then we would have seen them in the garden of Eden or in the descriptions of a perfect heaven. But that is not the case.
Notice something else from the verse that gets overlooked. Let’s read it again. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. This verse is not a promise for everyone. It’s not even a promise for every Christian. It’s a promise for a specific kind of person. It’s a person who’s supposed to meet two important criteria. What are they? They are to be someone who (1) Loves God, and (2) has been called according to his purpose.
Now who is that? Who are those people?
Jesus is pretty clear about what a person who loves God is. Look at this verse in John 14:15, this is Jesus talking: If you love me, you will obey what I command. So you tell me, what characterizes somebody who loves God? Obedience. So first, this verse applies to those who are obedient, because that’s what it means to love God.
Second, that phrase, who have been called according to his purpose, refers to those people who have become followers or disciples of Jesus.
That leaves out a lot of people. That may leave you out.
It leaves out the person you work with who has no interest in spiritual things but just found out she had her third miscarriage. God loves her, yes. God has a preferred future for her if and when she turns to Jesus. But Romans 8:28 has nothing to say to her present heartache.
These conditions also leave out the really nice guy who lives next door to you, who you’ve been trying to witness to, you’ve been inviting him to church, who lost his job a month ago and may have to foreclose on his house. When you tell him that God must have something better for him, it might make both him and you feel better, but it’s wishful thinking. God doesn’t promise that to those who aren’t followers of Jesus, no matter how nice they are.
Some Christians are even left out of this. Like, if you are living in deliberate disobedience to God in some area of your life, God doesn’t promise that he’s going to step in and fix the mess that your disobedience has created.
Think about David and Bathsheba. Sure, David was forgiven for sleeping with another man’s wife and killing her husband. Sure, God used David in an incredible way to write Scripture after his sin. And eventually God brought some good out of David’s union with Bathsheba with the birth of Solomon. But things would have been a lot better if he’d never laid eyes on her. Their firstborn died in infancy. David spent the rest of his life at war. His family was the poster family for dysfunction. None of these things really sounds as if it qualifies for God’s wonderful plan for his life.
I know this sounds harsh. It is kind of harsh, but it’s what the verse says. And remember, like we said at the beginning. Believing spiritual urban legends can destroy your faith. I’d rather you get upset with the truth than to be destroyed by a lie.
There is beauty and promise in Romans 8:28, but it’s not that everything that happens to us is good and is from God. It’s that no matter what happens to us or how bad things get that God’s ultimate and eternal purposes won’t be foiled. And for those who love God, who are obedient to him, and who have been called according to his purpose, God can take tragedy and bad things and overcome them.
I think the real issue we struggle with is between what God causes and what he allows. The Bible does have instances where God does cause difficulty, tragedy and hard times, but the Bible is clear that there are a number of times where dark, difficult and hard times have nothing to do with God’s wonderful plan for our lives. I’ve come up with a few:
Sinful choices – Sometimes the trials and hardships we face are the result of sinful choices. That’s not God’s doing. That’s our doing.
Life in a fallen world – Sometimes bad things happen because we live in a fallen world. All of us are suffering from the consequences of Adam’s sin. You’ve got bad people doing bad things that hurt people. You’ve got mother nature who seems to always have a bad case of PMS somewhere in the world. You’ve got Murphy’s law which says that if something can go wrong it will go wrong. We all live under the consequence of the fall and when it comes to its consequences, none of us are immune.
Foolish decisions – Think about it, sometime we just make dumb decisions. They don’t even have to be sinful, just foolish, dumb decisions. It’s crazy to blame God for every idiotic decision that we make.
Sometimes difficulties come as the result of sinful choices, or because we live in a fallen world, or because we make foolish decisions.
Well, so what? Why is this urban legend all that important? I want to tell you why believing the right thing in this area is so important. The reason this is important is because wrong beliefs are dangerous. They can lead down paths that produce great spiritual harm.
Think about it, if everything is God’s fault, then what’s your first emotional response to that? I’ll tell you what mine is. It’s anger. If it’s God’s fault that all these bad thing are happening to me, then he can’t be that good of a God. He’s just a jerk. Most of us know someone who wants nothing to do with Jesus or God because of some tragedy that happened in their life for which they blamed God. But if everything happens for a reason and God’s behind everything, then they have a right to be angry. Wrong beliefs about this can lead us to a distorted view of God. That can be damaging to our faith.
Another unintended consequence of assuming that there’s a God-ordained reason behind everything is that we can begin to gloss over sin. To say sin’s not that big of a deal because God’s causing everything anyway. It would be like saying it was ok to have an affair because it resulted in a happy marriage or that it was ok to split a church because a new church was birthed or that it was ok that the guy committed murder because he came to know Jesus while in prison. Most of us would say that kind of thinking is crazy, and you’d be right, because it is. God never, ever, never approves of our sin. He doesn’t cause it. He doesn’t even use it. He overcomes it. That’s grace! We’ll come back to that in a minute. But it’s dangerous if we start to gloss over sin. That will lead us down a path that none of us want to be on.
All of this leads to a big question: If the statement, everything happens for a reason, is an urban legend, then can a bad thing ever be a good thing? Can a bad thing ever be a good thing? There are situations in the Bible where God takes something bad and uses it for good. My favorite example is the story of Joseph, whose brothers sold him into slavery, but who eventually became the number 2 man in charge of Egypt. But here’s the thing about that story: I’m not sure we can blame God for causing Joseph to be enslaved. What we do discover, however, is that God used it for good. God overcame what happened to Joseph.
And that leads us to the most important thing we need to remember. What’s important to remember in the midst of difficulty is not that God causes everything that comes in our lives, but that he can overcome it. And the key to his overcoming is our obedience. It goes back to what we learned from Romans 8:28. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. God works for our good when we live in obedience to him.
So I’ve got to ask: Do you qualify? Do you love God? Are you living in obedience to Jesus’ commands? To do that you need to know what he says. Spend time in this book. There is incredible value to that. One being that you will know the truth, that you won’t fall for the Urban Legends, and that the truth can set you free. Another being that obedience opens the door for God to bring good out of the bad.
Next, are you called according to his purpose? Are you a follower of Jesus? If not, you can do something about that today. Just say, “God, I’m a sinner. I need your forgiveness. I believe Jesus died on the cross for my sin and rose from the dead. I want my life to be lived for you and your purposes. Save me.”
