"Dealing With Adversity"
Sermon Transcript for February 27, 2005
By Joel Sonnenberg
Thank you very much. How are you guys doing today? Good! You guys have been in school, right? Maybe you are taking a public speaking class. If you have, you would know that a speaker is suppose to have an introductory remark. And usually the introduction has something to do with a joke or a funny story to break the tension, to be able to communicate to the audience at ease, and for the audience to get to know the speaker. Well, I’m 27 now and I’ve really never had to do that. Do you know why? Because God has, I believe, has given me a gift. People have questions before I even speak. And typically their question is, “What happened to you?” I’ve heard that more times than you care to hear. What happened to you? But first, before I answer that, I want to know what happened to you? I mean…really! I saw some of you walking in here. That’s for sure—especially those in the back. No, I’m just kidding. I can’t see that far.
Today I want to tell you some of my story. And I’d like to then point out a few things that, a few out of many things, that I’ve learned through my life. So what happened to me? What happened happened at the age of two. I was approximately 22 months old. My family and I were on the first vacation we’d ever been on as a family. And our idea of a great vacation was up on the beaches of Maine because we lived in New York at the time. We decided that that was the perfect place for a young family like ours to go on our first vacation, to get away from the hectic lifestyle of home and the busyness of the day, the dishes, all of that good stuff. So we headed off for the beach; and I was at the two-year old stage where I drove my parents crazy. And I sat in my infant seat, or more commonly known in my family as a safety restraint. And we drove down the highway. We stopped for gas; we filled up with gas. We headed back on the Interstate. And probably about a mile down the road, after we had filled up for gas, we took a detour--a detour in New Hampshire. We stopped at a tollbooth. It was no special tollbooth. It was your average, every day, pay your fine to drive on someone else’s pavement tollbooth. They have them everywhere up northeast and Chicago, right? Not too many down here; I know that. But it was typical, very typical.
But this was not an ordinary day. God had a detour of His own in mind. Because when my Dad had his hand reached out to pay the toll, that was the last thing he remembers. Because when that happened, a tractor-trailer truck, a huge semi, hit the line of cars going about 50-60 miles an hour. And amidst the chaos and the confusion that followed, our car exploded on impact. My family was able to get out pretty quickly with minor injuries, none of them that you could ever tell today. But they gathered along side the accident and they realized everyone was okay except for me. And that’s when they heard me crying inside the car, which was now a furnace of flames too hot to even go close to let alone do anything about it. Fortunately, someone grabbed a fire extinguisher—a tollbooth attendant who worked there—and started spraying down the flames. Another person, who was a 17-year old kid, a young man who had coincidentally taken a wrong turn that day, had gone through the tollbooth; already paid his fine. He started to realize he’s not exactly where he needs to be. So he pulled over his car to the side of the road and started fiddling with some maps, which I consider the first miracle because a young man fooling with maps and trying to figure out where he’s going, I mean—getting directions—that’s a miracle in itself, right? Because I wouldn’t do it! Anyways, he heard and saw the accident in his rearview mirror, ran back to see if there was anything he could do to help. That was when this person started spraying on the flame and he reaches in to the car with his bare hands, risking his own life, and picks me up in my red-hot child seat that was virtually red-hot. He burnt his hands very severely as he carried me across to safety—about 10 or 15 feet away, dropped me on the ground.
And soon an ambulance came and rushed me off to the nearest hospital. And upon entering the nearest emergency room, the doctors there said, “Wait a second, we can’t take care of this child. Because if you leave him here, he will surely die.” You see back then a young or the very small hospital in New Hampshire didn’t have enough technology to keep me alive. So they rushed me across town to Boston. And Boston remains to this day the premier place to go in all the world if you are badly burned. I was only an hour and a half away. And I was burned badly. I was burned over 88% of my body and was given a 10% chance of living. At that news, my mom heard that I was given a 10% chance of living; she was elated because she didn’t think I had a chance. And instead of sitting and sulking in a corner and feeling for herself and her family members and sorry for all the things that happened that day because, I mean, she lost everything. Everything they owned was in that car. What life did they have left? She had every right to sit in a corner and sulk, but she didn’t. She went straight to the phone. And she started a prayer network. She didn’t know how to pray—whether I should live or die—but she thought it was important that I just get prayer. So the next day and the following days after that, people started praying for my family and I. And it’s not an unusual occurrence, even to this day, that someone comes up to me and says, “You know, Joel, I heard about your accident back in 1979 and I started praying. And I want you to know that I haven’t stopped.” Those prayers are felt even to this day.
Slowly but surely I spent the next four and a half months in the hospital recovering, recuperating. And I was finally released from the hospital after four and a half months of fighting for my life on Groundhogs Day. It’s true. And I saw my shadow and I ran back in! That’s where the story ends. Just kidding. But this is a crucial point in the story that you guys need to remember. This is where my real memory picks up. You see, I don’t remember anything about the accident, don’t remember really what it was like to have fingers, toes, smooth skin and hair, don’t really remember much about the hospital visit either because the medical professionals had me in what they call a medically induced coma where I don’t really remember much at all. So it’s as if, when I was released from the hospital, I didn’t know anything else. And I consider that a blessing in many ways that I was able to adapt, I think, a little bit easier because of that. Some within the church we hear are born again, don’t we? Well, I experienced that in more than one way. I truly was born again after I was released from the hospital. I had to relearn how to talk, had to relearn how to walk, everything. I almost completely regressed while I was in the hospital.
So I went to church growing up. And I was born into a Christian family fortunately even before the accident. So I was very fortunate. But even though I grew up in a Christian family and I went to church, I learned about Jesus, I had a head knowledge of what Jesus was. And just because I had Christians that surrounded me and Christian theology that surrounded me, didn’t make me a Christian. You see, it wasn’t until I realized surgeries were going to be a normal part of my life did I really begin to think seriously about my faith. You see surgeries were as normal as eating breakfast in the morning or dinner at night, whatever your meal you eat most often. I had surgeries when other kids were playing in the summer time in the swimming pools. I had to stay inside because I had a cast on or some kind of therapy that I had to go through. That was my life. And all I knew was I didn’t so much like the hospital. It was in my estimation every child’s worst nightmare because there I saw people who would stick needles in me; strangers would come out of nowhere and make me feel uncomfortable. Of course their job, I now recognize, was to get me out of the hospital. But then it didn’t feel so good and I needed my parents more than anything while I was in the hospital. But not all the time could they always be there for me. So I realized as I was going to surgery after surgery after surgery, I had to do something about my situation or someone else had to do it for me. The situation about the hospitals and the surgeries and the pain that I had to go through--this was a constant part of my life. So I came to a decision if you will. I realized my parents, the people that I trusted the most, the people that loved me the most, the people that helped me in this life the most couldn’t always be there for me. When I needed them the most in the OR and at night when often they couldn’t be there, they weren’t there. So I figured, okay well that’s my best option, my parents. And the second best option is me and I realized I can’t do it by myself. That’s when I realized and came to grips with the head \knowledge of Jesus Christ. You see I was sitting in a car going to another surgery. And this all came to fruition and I realized Jesus is my only hope. He is my only answer. And so right there on the Interstate I prayed the sinner’s prayer. And while I can’t say that my pain went away, nor did the surgeries, but I will tell you this—I knew someone was there with me, someone who knew what I went through, someone who shared my pain. And He has made all the difference in my life. Jesus has made all the difference!
And after the surgeries I began to realize that my life isn’t so “normal”. I thought it was normal because that was all I knew. Surgeries, hospital visits, things like that. But it wasn’t long before things started to set in. I came to a point that I’m either going to follow God’s view of me or the world’s view of me. And those two different opinions were very, very different. I saw as I grew up there were three main areas that God’s view of me and the world’s view are very different. Those areas were in appearance, achievement, and accumulations—three A’s--real easy to remember—appearance, achievement and accumulations.
Appearance—how you look in our culture is highly valued, right? We don’t have to look far to know that, do we? And no more was this apparent when I stepped outside of my comfort zone, outside of my home, outside of my community, outside of my school. I was vulnerable for attack. Anywhere I went I had people look at me, stare. And that was the kindest of gestures. Too often they made fun of me when I was a kid, would point fingers, call me names, say, “Take off your mask.” Often they would follow me around the malls thinking I didn’t notice, thinking maybe I didn’t have feelings, maybe I wasn’t a Christian. And sometimes, just for the heck of it, I would turn around and follow them. I hoped that they might get a sense of how uncomfortable it was. How we look in our culture is who you are many times, right? If you look good you are a good person. If you look kind of shady, you are a bad person, right? The world says, “If you look good, you are a good person. If you look bad, you are a bad person.” God says something very different. I Samuel 16 says, “God sees not as man sees. For man looks on the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart.” Very different from what the world told me!
Achievement—what we achieve in life gives us significance. When was the last time you met somebody and you asked them the question, “So how are you doing? You know, what do you do?” What do you do? That tells you a little bit about them. Many times it shapes a lot of our identities. What if they said, “Nothing”? Wouldn’t that blow you away? You’d be like, “Then who are you?” Many times if we are good at something, for instance, sports. If I can dunk a basketball, I can score more points, especially in Indiana, right? --I’m a good person, right? I’m somebody! Whereas those bench warmers, you know, who are they? Right? You probably can’t name too many bench warmers in the NBA. Now, let me make sure that you get me. I am not trying to encourage underachievement here. That is not my goal. What I want to impress upon you is that achievement should not be the foundation to what we believe. Jesus Christ is our foundation. Achievement is what the world believes, that you should achieve everything no matter the cost. So, for instance, wisdom--the world would say, “wisdom”, man if you get a good grade, if you get A++ on every test and every exam and every homework assignment and you get a perfect score on the SAT, you are somebody, right? God says something very different, I believe, of all this. For instance, in Proverbs 1:7 he says this, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of all wisdom. Fools despise wisdom and discipline.” Philippians’ says, “Whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely and admiral, think upon these things. Very different to what the world says to achievement.
Accumulations—Satan suggests and disguises truth and suggests that the more money you have and the more things you own the better off you’ll be. Is that what God says? I don’t think so. Satan says, “The more you own the better person you’ll be, the more fulfilled you’ll be.” God says, “The more you own, the more it will own you.” And in nowhere is this more apparent then, I believe, on TV. It’s not that I don’t love TV; I might love it too much. But I want to tell you a little secret that someone told me once. They said, “You know, Joel, the primary reason for TV, the primary purpose of television is to sell you something.” Think about that. The primary purpose of television is to sell you something. So the next time you are watching your Indiana Pacers or Hoosiers or whatever you want to call your favorite show on television—the Oscars, right? —think about what they are trying to sell you. Think about it. It’s going to be very different from what God is selling you. I’ll tell you that right now because I know it to be true. In Mathew 6, God says this, “Store up treasures in heaven for where your treasure is, your heart will be also.” I Timothy reads, “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness” Satan wants you to believe that your personal identity is the polar opposite of God’s desires.
Where do you see yourself in these three things? Maybe you are saying to yourself, “Oh, my appearance is very important to me, that new outfit, the idea that I can go outside the door and have everything perfect—all my makeup on, my hair right.” Maybe that new suit nicely pressed. Maybe you are saying to yourself, “Oh, achievements are where I foul up. I want to press others down so I can succeed. And I don’t care what gets in my way. I don’t take into account others feelings. I am all about personal profit.” Maybe you think to yourself, “It’s accumulations. It’s really—I want more of everything--that new car that I want, that new cell phone, new HDTV, new plasma, whatever it is.” Whatever it is—maybe it’s all these three things—but whatever it is, one or more of these three things is a true identity of an unhealthy identity. Okay?
So those three things are selfish pursuits. And more often than not our selfish pursuits are found in what others think about us. Where we get our identity is often how others view us, right? We validate ourselves by others view of us. See, if you like me, I’m nice. If you laugh at me I’m funny; I’m a good person, right? Their opinion validates who I am. Other people’s opinion validates who I am. Whether it is someone of significance or someone unworthy of attention. But do you know what, ladies and gentlemen? I’ve got a news flash for you. No one has said anything worse about you than God. He calls us sinners. He calls us deceitful and desperately sick. But I’ve also got another news flash for you. No one has anything better about you than God. He created us in His image. He loved us enough to send His Son, Jesus Christ, to die on the cross, to be crucified for my sins and for yours. And as we respond to His unconditional love, our self-identity is truly validated freeing us from the need to always look to others and their opinions of us as our identity. Because of Jesus we are delivered from the power of sin and selfishness. It is only Jesus that can deliver you from your sins and selfishness.
And this is my challenge to you this week. It is in Romans 12. It reads, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind so that you might prove what the will of God really is—that which is good, acceptable and perfect.” Ladies and gentlemen, when you go throughout this week, if it helps, remember my scars. Remember that God is using my scars for His purposes. And as different as I look from you it goes the same for you. You see I know that you don’t think you have scars, but you do. I see them; do you? They may not be on the outside; they might be on the inside. I want you to know that God can use your scars just as much as He can mine. He doesn’t love me more than He loves you. He is more than willing and more than able to do exceedingly more than your modest expectations.
Let us pray, “Father, God, I pray that you will focus on the only opinion that matters. And that is yours, God. May we stay focused and turn away from what the world thinks of us and how we never measure up. And may we latch on to Jesus, the author and perfect of our faith, that we might be seen pure and holy when you come again. In your name we pray, Amen.”
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