I. Distraction 00:00
Fill us with your Spirit, fill us with your truth, and, Lord, empower us to see through the distractions and to see you, Lord. In Jesus’ name, amen.
This morning, as I walked in and we were worshiping, I really felt the burden of all the distractions of our life. I could not focus on what was going on. Worship was great, everything was good, and I was thinking about the movie I didn’t finish the other night, and the project I’m working on, building a fence, and the money I need to pay, and the job I need to do. It was all coming into my mind. And as I was praying through it, I said, “God, help me. I want to focus on you. I’m here on a Sunday morning to worship you, to be here for you, and my mind is trying to take me to all these different places.” And in that final song of worship, God really got a hold of me and by his Spirit empowered me.
I want to say it that way, because I think we’re often so concerned with, “Well, Jesse just needs to practice more. He needs to be a better Christian if he can’t focus on a Sunday morning.” No. What happened is I turned to God and said, “God, I need your help this morning.” Part of that is probably the anxiety of getting up here and preaching in front of you. Y’all are great, and it’s intimidating sometimes: what haven’t you heard before that I can get up here and encourage you with?
All of that comes back to this word, distraction. I felt it was a real word for us, that God wanted us to highlight this concept. And I’m struggling with distraction, so I get my phone out. That’s the most important thing, right? I’m joking. But I did want to look it up, because I knew there was something in the definition of distraction that I wanted to pull forward as we begin this morning.
This is like my valedictorian speech: the word distract, from Webster’s Dictionary, means “a thing that prevents us from giving full attention to something else.” Something that prevents you from giving your full attention to something else. And on Sunday mornings our whole church is designed for one purpose: that your attention would be on him. Distraction is the weapon of the enemy to keep you from giving your attention to Jesus.
And let me tell you: when you give your attention to Jesus, everything you need to focus on falls into place. What happens is that we sacrifice what’s crucial, what’s most essential, for all the urgent things in our life, all the things begging for our attention. Important things, things you have to do, things you have to think about. But we lose our attention on the One who saves, the One who empowers, the One by whom we can do all the urgent things.
The second definition is “extreme agitation of the mind or emotions.” You may have heard the phrase “driven to distraction.” That is what’s happening in the world today. Everything is either trying to take your attention from him or trying to stir you up so much that your extreme agitation keeps you from seeing him.
The best example of this in Scripture is Peter walking on the water. He’s doing this amazing, courageous, miraculous thing, never repeated in history, and then what happens? It says in the Scripture that he looked at the wind and the waves (Matt 14.30). Now, when you’re in a storm on the water without a boat, it’s really important that you don’t get drowned by the waves. These are the urgent things coming at him, demanding his attention: “I could die if I don’t look at the wind and the waves.” But that’s not actually right. All he needed to do was keep his eyes on Jesus, because it wasn’t his responsibility to defend himself. God was walking him on water. He thought, “I need to deal with this wind and these waves,” and he sank. He is smart, though: “Jesus, help me!” He immediately remembered the important part.
So this morning, and especially as we enter this month going into the election season (I know you’re probably triggered by the word election at this point): don’t get distracted. We have one King. There’s nobody else who’s going to save you. Trump’s not going to save you. Kamala’s not going to save you. God forbid you say her last name. I am Jesse Harris, darn it! But all that said, nobody’s going to save you except Jesus. So stop being distracted. And this [the phone] is the chief tool of distraction too, so maybe start putting it away sometimes.
All of that to say, that’s the introduction. I have no idea what else we’re going to talk about. But hold on to that. If you walk out of here thinking, “I’m going to look at Jesus and not be distracted, as the enemy so chooses and wishes,” you’ll have taken something important today.
II. A Helper Fit for Him 04:26
Today I wanted to talk about God’s plan for the world. A very short topic. No. But I am going to highlight it, because this was such a powerful day in our readings. Where are we most likely to be distracted in our culture today? When it comes to the mysterious difference between a man and a woman. Where is the enemy trying hardest to distract us, either to take our focus off what’s true or to cause extreme agitation, ungodly, demonic agitation? In the difference between the man and the woman, and in their relationship and how it should be structured.
And we have such a beautiful picture. I want to emphasize that word: beauty. God’s plan is beautiful. It’s not burdensome, it’s not overbearing, it’s not tyrannical. It’s an invitation to the beauty of a new creation.
So we start today in Genesis chapter 2, beginning at verse 18, the very first time a man saw a woman and a woman saw a man:
18 Then the LORD God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.” Gen 2.18
Of course, it’s a narrative, so it’s pretending that God didn’t know what he was going to do. It’s this poetic idea, to bring you along the thought process. God knew woman before the foundation of the world. God planned that beautiful creature, woman, and that wonderful person, man, and that they would have this relationship. But we’re in this narrative with him, and he’s looking at man and he says, “What a sad, lonely individual. It is not good that he should be alone.”
And then I love this: he says, “I will make a helper fit for him.” At certain times people have thought that means women are “the help.” That is not what it means. Women are not the help, the lesser ones, the servants. No. The other places this word is used in the Old Testament (I think it’s ezer) are almost always about God’s help for us. So what is woman? God’s help for man. Highly elevated. One of the great passages is Psalm 121: “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help” (the same word) “come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth” (Ps 121.1–2).
Let me say this. It’s maybe a little bit of a joke, but it’s very true: sometimes men are looking around for help and they don’t look to their wife. God’s help for man. “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? Oh, my help comes from the Lord, who gave me this woman.” Just a thought. That’s one application.
But my point is this: if most of the time this word help has to do with how God helps us, and he says that’s what woman is, then we have no right ever to denigrate women. Period. It’s a blessing for you, men. And guess what? Even for you women, other women can be a blessing to you too. I know that can be tricky sometimes. And man is a blessing for women. It’s all a beautiful design.
III. The Parade of the Animals 09:17
So he says it’s not good that man should be alone, and then we go through this whole great moment where he basically puts on a parade to show how important it is that man has woman. Verse 19:
19 Now out of the ground the LORD God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. Gen 2.19–20
Once again, I want to lean into the comedy of the situation. God’s like, “Hey, does this chicken look like it could be your helper?” And Adam’s like, “No, that’s a chicken.” “It is a chicken.” And it moves on. “How about this one? Is this fit to be your helper?” “No, that’s an elephant.” “Okay, it’s an elephant. Move on.” It’s this beautiful show that God is putting on. And what’s the point? Stop looking elsewhere for connection, for love. God has a design in the family, in man and woman, to be fulfilled, to come together, to shape the world.
That’s really important too. In this passage, why does man get to name all the animals? Because man is in charge. God designed humanity to rule and reign with him. That’s the point. He wasn’t saying, “Oh, I need a bunch of servants.” We have this picture in pagan culture, and it’s been brought forward in a lot of literature, that what the gods need is the prayers of men to get their power. It’s explicitly stated in a lot of different literature: people stop believing in the gods, and the gods disappear. It’s a fantastical idea, not really meant to be taken seriously. But it shows how we often think about God’s use of man: that God’s up there wishing, hoping, “Please let this guy come to church and worship me, otherwise I’ll be lacking in some way.”
And it’s like, no. He’s inviting you to church because he wants to crown you with glory. He wants to lift you up to the station for which he designed the universe. Everything in the universe is so that we can have this loving community. What does Jesus say? “That they may be one, as I and the Father are one” (John 17.22). That’s a crazy idea. We’re not worthy of that. But he lifts us up and says, “Join me at the table. Be a part of my family, my design. Rule and reign with me.” It’s truly awesome as we look at his plan.
IV. Bone of My Bones 11:18
But he looks at man, at Adam, and he says, “No, you need more than just you to be a part of this.” And so, in verse 21:
21 So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22 And the rib that the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. 23 Then the man said, “This at last…” Gen 2.21–23
Just imagine. He’s looked at all these animals, and God says, “What do you think?” “No.” Then he wakes up and Eve is standing there, and he thinks, “Hallelujah! This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh!” What a revelation. In fact, in marriage every one of us gets the chance to be like Adam, to look at our wife and say, “Behold, at last: bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh.”
It’s such a beautiful moment of recognition. And what is he recognizing in her? Somebody else made in the image of God. Everything else he saw was an animal. Eve is made in the image of God. So what is he admiring in her? The image of God in her. What do we do when we love one another? We love the image of God in one another. I love you because Jesus has made you who you are, to reflect him in his glory.
That doesn’t mean I go up to some random person, my buddy Avery, and say, “Hey, could you just get rid of all the stuff that makes you you and talk like Jesus? Just read Scripture every time. That’s what I love about you, the Scripture.” No, no, no. When God makes people in his image, he makes you more of who you are. The little things that make you unique and individual and good are actually more of you being who God has made you to be.
All of that to say, he has this great moment of revelation when he finally sees the helper fit for him, the help of God in his life, the connection that will be the basis for all of mankind:
23 “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.” Gen 2.23
There’s so much to say here that we’re not going to go down too many rabbit holes. And they’re not really rabbit holes; there’s so much that’s important going on here. What does it mean that man names woman? There’s a whole relational aspect to that.
V. God's Design and the World's Distraction 14:27
I just want to pull out one thing before we move on, because in our culture the goal is to distract us from the truth. God created men and women to represent the fullness of his reign on earth. The fundamental unit of the government of the kingdom of God is a man and a woman coming together and starting a family. Then families come together in the church and become part of the body of Christ. And how is the church described? Jesus is the husband, the church is the bride, and they come together to reign and rule by the grace of God. It’s a beautiful thing that we get to participate in.
And the world wants us to say, “No, what’s actually going on is that when a person loves a person and they want to be intimate with one another for the rest of their life, they decide it together and they fulfill one another. And if they ever stop fulfilling one another, they split up and go do their own thing, because all of this was about fulfilling this person and that person.” It’s completely devoid of meaning. It’s the same argument as why you should legalize cocaine: this person wants this thing to fulfill them, and cocaine feels good, and when it doesn’t feel good anymore we should get them help to stop doing cocaine. It’s so unbelievably self-centered.
I’m not at all saying that everybody in a relationship that isn’t a man and a woman is in it as an evil, despicable, deplorable human being. Are you kidding? I’m bad at being a husband to my wife. What am I doing judging how good anybody is being to anybody else?
However, keep the focus on God’s design for the goodness and beauty of the world: that a man and a woman should come together, and out of the overflow of their love for one another children should be created and born. If you keep the focus on the beauty and goodness of that overflow of self-sacrificial love, that is the model for how we should love one another. That’s the model for how we should build community in the church.
Let me tell you this: before I got married, I was very selfish, and marriage forced me to deal with that. Then kids forced me to double down, because they do nothing for you for a long time. It’s nice, it’s like, “Oh, cute.” But they are hard. It is not easy, and they don’t contribute to the family. No, the family is there to contribute to them. This whole unit exists to raise them in the love and the care and the knowledge of the Lord. You can see how different that is from so much of what’s preached out there on social media, in movies, on the news, all this stuff that’s meant to distract. The whole point is to build people into the kingdom of God: out of the family, which comes together to be the church, which then evangelizes the world and welcomes them in.
VI. What About Single People? 16:45
So what about all you single people? What’s a single person to do, if God’s whole design for the universe is that man and woman should come together and become one flesh? Well, there’s at least one person you can imitate, and that’s Jesus. He never got married. Do you think he didn’t fulfill the fullness of God in his life because he didn’t get married? No. He is the fullness of God.
So what do you do? I have a line in my notes (we’re well past them now; I don’t know what they’re saying anymore) about how most of the joy in my life, and by most I mean about 99 percent, comes from loving and serving my family and loving and serving my church. That’s where the joy comes from. Now, occasionally I’ll get a very nice bottle of whiskey; that’s the 1 percent. “Oh, this Buffalo Trace, man.” You can find joy in a lot of things, is what I’m saying. But let’s be real: the key to life is walking the way of the cross, which is a way of love and service. That’s where joy is found.
So if you’re single, who are you loving and serving? That’s the question. I have a lot more on this, but I want to find a place to wrap up. The way it has always been taught since the beginning of the church, and you can see it in Paul (1 Cor 7.32–34), is that if you’re single, the love and service that is in you, you give to other people. You give it to the church. Single men, the church is your bride; treat her as you would a spouse. Single women, Jesus is your husband; treat him like a spouse.
What does that mean? Imagine how much time and how much money goes into a wife and kids. If you’re thinking “all of it,” you’re pretty darn close. How do you put that at the service of the kingdom of God if you’re single? Go to the church and find the ways God has called you to love and serve.
And this isn’t a big banner saying “We need help.” That is not it at all. The problem with singleness is that your life can become all about you. That’s also the problem with being married, believe it or not. But at least in marriage you have somebody who is a help, a godly help, calling you out of your selfishness every day. If you’re single, find the community that calls you out of yourself, that makes you love and sacrifice and invites you into the goodness of God, because that’s where it’s at.
VII. It Is Not Good for Man to Be Alone 20:14
That’s why Jesus in the Gospel today… let me say it this way. It says he was indignant (Mark 10.2–16). They said, “Hey, can we divorce our wives? Moses said we could.” And he says, “Wait, you want to break up the goodness of God in your life? You want to make it about you again?”
Now, of course, I know I’m walking through all kinds of waters here. Don’t get distracted. There are times when it is the right thing for somebody to get divorced. I believe that; I’m not 100 percent sure, but I believe that’s true. I’m stepping away from the pulpit a bit here. This is Jesse’s opinion, and it doesn’t matter right now. Don’t miss the forest for the trees.
What I am saying is this: God’s plan for the universe, his beautiful plan, is that you would come together with your wife, or if you’re single you would come to the church, and you would lay down your life for one another as he laid his life down for us. And if you do that, in your marriage or in your singleness, you will find the joy of the Lord that is your strength, and the truth of God will set you free to live in his kingdom and to bring his kingdom about.
I’ll end with this. It is not good for man to be alone. The other thing the enemy is trying to do is divide us one from another. Don’t fall for the trap. Don’t be vitriolic. Don’t get angry because somebody isn’t you or doesn’t think like you. Don’t fall for the distraction of anger and hate. Everything God did in the world was so that you could come together in love, not so that you could separate in anger and hate.
So if you’ve heard this whole sermon and you’re thinking about distraction, and about the relationship between men and women, let’s boil it down to this: let’s love one another as Christ loved us, and don’t be alone. Amen.