Many of our church’s core leadership are currently engaged in their seventh week of Experiencing God. This is a critical juncture in this study and in the life and future of this church. We are at that place where we must decide whether Experiencing God will simply be another study course, another workbook we have filled in, or it will become a new life direction, a process that will fill our lives, indeed, take over our lives, and define our life together as His church.
Frankly, I cannot imagine how anyone who has continued to this point with Experiencing God does not find the realities God is revealing to be nothing less than revolutionary. Each week, each day now, God drives truth deeper into my heart very much as a sledgehammer pounds a stake deep into hard ground. Consider our Scripture memory verse this week:
Without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him (Hebrews 11:6).
Consider as well these daily samples from this week’s journey:
Day One: The way you live your life is a testimony of what you believe about God (p 134).
Day Two: When God lets you know what He wants to do through you, it will be something only He can do. What you believe about Him will determine what you do next (p 139).
Day Three: When people see something happen that only God can do, they come to know God (p 142).
Day Four: Jesus rebuked them [His disciples caught in a storm at sea], not for their human tendency to fear but for their failure to recognize His presence, protection, and power (p 149).
Day Five: “As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead” (James 2:26). … Faith without action is dead! (p 150). A faithful servant is one who does what his Master tells him, whatever the outcome may be (p 151).
As a Christ-follower, I yearn to know Jesus more intimately and to make Him known more intentionally. As your pastor, I am acutely aware of my responsibility to God and to you to lead, to perceive what God is up to and champion His activity in our fellowship. I often look out my study window and ask God to reveal Himself, His purposes , and His ways to us. To my dismay, more often than not all I see is piles of dirt. When I persist in prayer, however, and ask God to show me what He is doing and what He wants to do through me and His church, I envision a vibrant community of faith here …
… a church that reaches and touches the lives of hundreds – yes, hundreds, of children and their families,
… a church that brings healing and hope to broken men and women, broken marriages, and broken families,
… a church that stokes a white-hot fire in a new generation of Christ-followers that will burn to the nations,
… a church that makes disciples who make disciples and sends disciple-makers to the ends of the earth,
… and a church that plants new churches in Howell, Hartland,
What would it take to see these visions become reality? Such a God-sized idea requires more people engaged in ministry than we presently have – people who may never have served before, but are willing to try, and people who have given up the notion of “retirement” from active service in church life and who now re-invest themselves for the rest of their days to the advance of God’s purposes. These visions require more energy, more devotion, more passion, more evangelistic zeal, and more biblical disciple-making fervor than we currently display. We need more parking, more space, new buildings, and new uses of existing properties. We must equip and enable new leaders, younger leaders, and older leaders stepping up to support them. Honestly, to set our feet on a path toward God’s purposes in His church requires more money than we can raise ourselves. Essentially, we need more faith in Jesus Christ – Who He is, what He says, and what He can do.
How we respond to these demands reveals what we truly believe about God. When I dare even to entertain the possibilities of what God may be calling us to be or become, I am almost immediately attacked by adversaries. Here is a short list of the thoughts the enemy provokes in me:
Fear – I could never do that. People will laugh at me, ridicule me, or hate me. It’s just too big, too high, too deep for me.
Flaws – I don’t have what it takes. I am not smart enough or strong enough or cool enough or good enough.
Failure – I fall short every day. My psyche or my reputation would never recover if I failed at something so big.
Feelings – I am not comfortable with that. It chases away my calm and makes me feel uneasy.
Frustration – I get so frustrated when things are beyond my control. I don’t need anymore of that in my life right now.
Fraudulence – I am not everything I am cracked up to be. At least for now, I am the only one that knows that, right?
Perhaps you recognize the real problem right away. It is found in a one-letter word prominent in each explanation. I have a big “I” problem – self-centeredness.
Faith, however, is fundamentally Other-centered, God-centered. So, Faith says, “Do not fear. This is not about your flaws, failures, feelings, frustrations, or even the enemy’s accusation that you are a fraud. God’s reputation is at stake, not yours. He knows who and what you are. And He loves you.”
Faith only asks us: “What does your life prove about what you say you believe about God?”
Faith is indeed the victory! (1 John 5:4).
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