Generally speaking, hitting that kind of bottom can kind of bring us to our senses a little bit. Can't it? But the reality of the situation is he really wasn't in a position to fix himself. He needed some help, but he decided to do something.
Seeing Life From God's View
Our faith is always being tested. We actually just move on to bigger and harder tests. If a nuclear physicist were to come here and solve a simple arithmetic problem, like what is four plus three, and he said, look, what I just did, nobody would think that was anything significant because he is already passed that test years ago in his life. He learned how to add and subtract simple numbers. Then he went onto much bigger, more complex things. That's the same way it is with God, that through life, we will never ever come into a place or a time where we are not being tested, our faith is not tested.
Look at Us
Turning the Bad and the Ugly Into the Good
It seems that there is more and more anger and intolerance in the world than at any other time that I've been alive in my relatively short 70 years. Not only is there more and more anger kind of coming up to the surface around the world, I see it happening in the church. I see it happening with more and more Christians, the way they talk, the things that they say in it. And it seems like countless Christians are very angry with, with most, if not all of our elected officials. And then we try to somehow justify that anger by calling it righteous indignation.
The Purpose for the Church
Although I am certainly aware of the sins of America and the sins of the church personally, and I hope you can attest to this, I believe you can, that I am growing in my understanding of a greater truth that is now becoming, for me, the preeminent passion of my life. That greater truth is a truth concerning God's heart, and it is this: that God is good all the time, that God is slow to anger. He is slow to anger and he is abundant in loving kindness. He is always good.
God’s Ways Bring Blessing
We are going to talk about the ways that God teaches us and the paths that he leads us on. Actually, the title of the message is God's ways bring blessing, because I think many of us have discovered in our lives that as we've lived the ways that the Lord has taught us, our lives keep getting better. Has anybody found that out? It just keeps getting better.
A Different Kind of Freedom
Some of the times the image I had of God is I never really wanted to pray that I would be a missionary when I was a child because I just thought that God was just waiting for those stupid people that were willing to pray that prayer, and he would send them to the worst place in the world to be a missionary. Yet that whole picture in my head was because I didn't understand how God was. I didn't understand that I could delight in listening to what God has to tell me what to do.
The Here and Now
It has led, I think, at times to some disconnects within people on how they are to live right here and what's available for us to live right here right now. Jesus offers us an opportunity to live a heaven life right now as he calls us to live a life of continuity. By continuity, I mean, this, that— I remember I had a teacher that once said that God wants me to live in such a way that when I die, the only place that I would fit would be heaven. He wants me to live that way now. That's that continuity that I believe the scriptures are talking about.
The Father We Always Wanted
We don't know yet. We really don't get it. What this love is really all about. Each of us has some level of understanding. We know conceptually that God had to love us to send his only begotten son to die on the cross. We know that because he did that, our sins are forgiven and we get to go to heaven. At least most of us understand that conceptually, but you know, the 18 inches from the head to the heart, that's a long ways.
God's Way to Belong
We, of course, go through changes when those kinds of things happen here. But we have to understand that God is a God of abundance, not a God of lack. When Jacque got the word for this year, the word of abundance for us, we have to hold on to that. We have to hold on to that when people are moving or people are starting another church. We have to hold on to that word and fan the flames through prayer and belief and excitement over it.
Post Covid Hope
Post COVID hope. Now, that's a little bit of a play on words because we all need hope. Do we not? And that's a little bit of a play on words because we all need hope here, but there is also— You would have to be in a cave somewhere to not know that the last 18 months have had an impact on all of our lives in some way, shape or form or another. When COVID hit around 18 months ago, I tried to look at this as an opportunity for, in a sense, an extended Sabbath because we couldn't do the things that we were doing prior to that. We were more isolated. We were more quarantined. I tried to take advantage of this last 18 months in slowing our pace down and to really come to know Jesus in a deeper way. I'm thankful that I've just felt God's presence so greatly in the last 18 months.
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit, Part 2
We get baptized in the name of Jesus and his spirit comes and fills us. We become the object of redemption in that baptism, but then there is a second baptism, baptism of the Holy Spirit; we'll look at some more incidences of that today in the Book of Acts where we now become the instrument of redemption, where we become endued with power from God to do the work of evangelism, to do the work of demonstrating the kingdom of God.
The Baptism of the Holy Spirit, Part 1
The early church was a fellowship of believers who I think we could say were admittedly imperfect. Wouldn't you agree that much of the early church we read about the believers were admittedly imperfect, but they were also vibrantly and dynamically alive, even in their imperfections, even in their lack of perfectness. Their imperfections actually didn't hinder their vibrancy of life. The early church was really desirous of man manifesting or painting a picture of what the power of Holy Spirit in our lives can really do.
The Bigger Picture
Let’s Get to the Heart of the Matter
The heart is seen as the center of the will, the intellect and the emotions or the feelings. We just read that the heart is the center of not only spiritual activity, but all of our life choices come out of our heart. My thoughts, intentions, conscience, values, ambitions, decisions, reactions, responses, the words I speak, the choices I make, my purposes, my plans, they all come from what is in my heart.
The Road Less Traveled
In fact, most of the things that people can do in this life, you and I can't do. We are not qualified to do. But the reality of following Jesus is that there are no secrets to living out this Christian life. Anyone can do it. We don't need these pre-qualifiers. We don't need this incredible amount of education and genetic background of brilliance and so forth. Anyone can do it from any place starting at any time. We can be followers of Jesus. As I began to ponder this whole idea of needing and wanting to be one with Christ, and I've been praying that for over a year, and I have to admit that I don't believe I have the oneness with Christ that Jesus had with his father yet, but I do believe I'm moving in that direction.
There Are No Schools Without Tests
If you go to med school, there are tests. If you go to law school, there is a bar exam. There are tests. If you go to computer school, there are tests. If you go to plumber school—Warren can talk about that. Warren goes and takes tests to make sure he can keep his plumbers’ license. Electrical school, remedial school, whatever; every school has tests, every school has tests.
The thing that we always forget in our lives is that we are all enrolled in a school. We don't know it, but we get enrolled in that school the day we take our first breath and we are in that school until the day we take our last breath. It's called the school of the spirit. The school of the spirit is a school you never graduate from. You just keep learning. Our heavenly father is the headmaster of that school.
It’s Too Soon to Quit
What I would like to focus on is after you have done everything to stand. Really what this is saying is you get knocked down, what are you supposed to do? Get back up, get back up. It's hard to fight when you are on the ground. It's much easier to fight when you are standing up isn’t it, much better balance, much more mobility, much easier to respond. Sometimes we get blindsided; sometimes we just get hit really hard with something, and it knocks the wind out of us, knocks us down. Maybe our mouthpiece goes flying over here, whatever. Go get it, put it back in your mouth and get up.
Come As You Are…Leave Totally Different
We are never in this alone. How many of you could admit to this statement that you are not what you ought to be? Can you admit to that? I say that I'm not what I ought to be, and I'm certainly not what I wish to be. I am certainly not even what I hope to be, but by the cross of Christ, I'm not what I used to be either. Isn't that good?
He Is Risen...in Me!
Yes, he is going to conquer death. Aren't you glad for a God that brings life instead of death? When you read mythology and Greek mythology and all of the other basically, religions that have to do with a man trying to worship some kind of God, so much of it has to do with oppressiveness and death and sacrificing, but not out of love and compassion. We see the contrast with what God, our creator has for us and this beautiful relationship that he has for us.