March 5, 2011

"So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up." Galatians 6:9

If you want to grow through the grind you need to put together a daily routine that is based on the "how" of the harvest. The "how of the harvest is the simple truth that you will reap what you sow. You can't plant apple seeds and get an orange tree. Likewise, you can't sow to the flesh and reap spiritual results. So if your daily routine is driven by selfish desires and you sow seeds of instant gratification you will reap heartache and trouble. Heartache and trouble will wear you out! They will complicate your life!

The first principle of growing in the grind is this - sow in the grind! As you live out your daily routine make sure you sow spiritual seeds!

Our text today bluntly admits that doing good is harder than doing evil because you are working against your nature. So, choosing to do the right thing - the obedient thing every day can wear you out because you usually do not see immediate results.  Working hard and seeing no benefit can wear you down.

So, how do you keep from growing weary in the daily grind of sowing spiritual seeds?

That brings us to the second principle of growing in the grind - show up in the grind!

What does that mean? It means you have hope! It means that you understand the seasons of life and you have hope in the cerainty of the seasons. Ecclesiastes reminds us that everything has a season and a time. "There is a time to sow and a time to reap". This principle understands that if you have the hope of the harvest will show up every day to sow seeds of righteousness in the power of God's love. You understand that if you do the hard work now, it will be more than worth it at the time of the harvest.

Don't let the grind of daily doing good cause you to lose hope in the harvest. The harvest WILL come and when it comes it will bring the results of what you have sown! In that hope - no, in that certainty - develop a daily routine where you show up and sow spiritual seeds.

Without the hope of the harvest you will wear out and stop showing up so when the harvest comes it will reveal the results of your neglect.

Are you growing weary in your routine? Remember the hope of the harvest! Show up today and sow spiritual seeds - seeds of obedience, seeds of grace, seeds of truth, seeds of faith, and seeds of love in the power of God's Spirit. When the day of harvest shows up, you will be glad you did, too!

March 4, 2011

"Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit."  Galatians 6:7-8

Life is measured in years but it is lived out in seconds and minutes and hours and days. In those seconds and minutes and hours and days you face choices regarding good and evil. Each choice carries consequences. The legacy you leave at the end of your years will be the result of those choices made in the seconds and minutes. You will reap then what you are sowing today. There are no "throw away" decisions. Every choice matters!

That fact adds weight to the importance of the dreaded "r" word - "routine". Everyone has one, whether they mean to or not. It is how you order your day and the choices you make in daily living. Routines are like dental appointments, you may not like them but it is hard to live without them. Doing the same routine day after day after day can become a grind and that grind can get you!

In Galatians 6:7-10, Paul deals with the significance of our daily choices. He frames it in the analogy of planting and harvesting. Understanding these truths can help you not only get through the grind BUT to grow through the grind.

So, the first thing I want to call your attention to is the "hows" of the harvest. If you can understand how sowing and reaping (or planting and harvesting) work, you can understand what goes into establishing a good routine.

The "how" of the harvest is this - you will reap what you sow. If you plant beans today you will not reap potatoes in the harvest. You will harvest what you planted - beans. And if you planted lima beans you will harvest lima beans not green beans.

Likewise, if in the seconds and minutes of your daily routine you make selfish decisions based on feelings or on what is easiest, you will suffer the consequences of those selfish decisions. Bad choices come back to bite you! Unfortunately, they will also bite those who love you and are touched by your routine.

When you plant your garden in a few weeks you will ask yourself this question, "What vegetables do I want to have by the end of the Summer. If you want corn and beans and tomatoes and carrots, those are the seeds you will plant. Your planting routine will be decided by what you want to harvest.

In exactly the same way, you should make your daily decisions and build your daily routine around your desired results. If you want a good harvest, you must make spiritual decisions based on what pleases God, not what makes you feel good.

Our "Living on Purpose" study showed us that it is our purpose to "overcome evil with good". That is the outcome God expects. So, every decision every day must be made to overcome evil with good. And the next day should be the same. And the next.....

That is a routine you can live with! When your routine is determined by the "how" of the harvest you will grow through your grind!

March 3, 2011

"Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up. Therefore, whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone—especially to those in the family of faith."   Galatians 6:7-10

You get up at the same time every morning and climb out of the same side of the bed and look at the same exhausted face through the same bleery eyes in the same bathroom mirror as you prepare for the identical routine you endured yesterday. When you throw in a sick child or bad weather or a sinus headache it gets even tougher!

Once you have packed all the lunches and eaten the same cereal from the same bowl, you rush to your car to take the same route through the same traffic to sit in the same cubicle in the same office with the same co-workers trying to get it done for the same boss who doesn't really appreciate what you do.

And God expects you to be a good witness for your faith? Are you kidding?

That is what the Scripture says. "Do not become weary in well-doing"!

How can you be a spiritual giant when you have to grind it out every day just to survive? How do you keep the grind from getting you?

That is the question of the week! If you take Scripture seriously, which Christians must do, then you have to find a way to grow through the grind of daily living.

Here's the deal, either you have to change your routine OR change your reason!

Paul, writing to the Christians at Galatia says, "Change your reason for going through the grind! And don't just GO through the grind, GROW through it!"

That's what I will be sharing through out the rest of the week. Before I do, let me issue you this challenge today - start your routine by rejoicing in it! That's right, rejoice in it! Rejoice that you have a bed to get out of and a bathroom to go into and a spouse that you could lay next to and beautiful children to prepare for and a job to head to and for freedom that allows you to do these things and health to keep up with it!

HOW you go through the grind determines if you can grow through it.

After you have washed some sleep from your eyes and had a sip of coffee - thank God for the grind! Rejoice in the blessings of it! Invite Him to be your Reason in your routine!

March 2, 2011

"Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up. Therefore, whenever we have the opportunity, we should do good to everyone—especially to those in the family of faith."  Galatians 6:7-10

I remember as a kid how much fun it was to sled down the hill in the Winter snow! There aren't a lot of hills in Indiana but we happened to live atop the highest hill in our little town. All the kids from the neighborhood would come and slide down our hill. When there were a lot of kids sledding the snow would get packed down and become a sheet of solid ice. Wow! How we would fly down that hill! With a running start we could slide down the hill and for another block or two before we would come to a stop.

But then we would have to walk all the way back UP the slippery hill carrying our sleds. Not so easy and not so fun!

To enjoy the easy part and the fun part we had to endure the hard uphill part.

Now that I am older and no longer enjoy sledding, or snow or carrying a sled up a slippery hill in the snow, I have come to understand that life is similar to my boyhood sledding experience. There some easy downhill times and there are some hard uphill climbs. And, when you are a Christian who is trying to live a life that pleases God and impacts others, that is mostly an uphill climb.

As we discovered in our study of Romans 12, we are called to overcome evil with good. Evil is easy and natural like sliding down the hill. Goodness goes against our nature, so it can feel like climbing up a slippery hill.

In the case of the sledding, that maybe happened a few times a year so trekking up the hill was bearable. But the call to goodness is a daily challenge to overcome the sinful nature and obey God. You climb the hill one day and then get up the next morning and do it all over again. It can get tiring, especially as you watch all those who are sliding down the hill and seemingly having fun.

You understand the admonition to "be not weary in well doing". You are aware that doing good all day every day can take its toll. Obviously, if doing good was as easy as doing bad, we would live in a good world instead of an evil one. But we don't.

Have you grown weary from doing the right thing? Have you been tempted to just slide down the hill with everyone else? Perhaps you have been climbing the hill every day and wearing yourself out to always do the right thing and you don't see much of a payoff for all the investment. Maybe that is where you are today.

You have always heard that it pays to do the right thing. You read in your Bible that things that are pleasing to God - and you want to please Him. You know that sinful living, while easier to do, doesn't end well. But resisting evil and doing right is JUST HARD! SOME DAYS IT IS EXHAUSTING. How do you you keep from growing weary while you do the right things?

Paul wrote this portion of Scripture to encourage these believers because he knew they were growing weary. He, of all people, knew what it was to become weary in serving God. So, he encouraged them with the same encouragement he had found for himself.

I will be sharing that with you over the next few posts. I believe you will find it helpful. But, in the meantime, draw upon His strength. Live in the power of His Spirit. Saturate you brain with the promises of God and let them soak into your spirit. Walk by faith not by feelings. And finally, rejoice in Him that He has given you the desire to please Him, because that alone is a gift! God has taken away your bondage to sin and set you free to live for God.

And, as you prepare to climb the hill again today - remember to thank Him for the hill He climbed for you!

March 1, 2011

"Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows."  Galatians 6:7

What if you saw your neighbor out working in his garden and you went out to visit with him and you asked him, "What are you doing?"

He replies, "I am planting my garden!"

"Great!", you reply, "What are you planting?"

"I am planting corn!", he says with excitement.

"Really?" you respond with surprise, "Those are bean seeds you are putting into the ground!"

"No," he insists, "I am planting corn."

"Friend!", you persist, "You may want corn but you are going to get beans because those are bean seeds you are planting!"

He becomes more insistant that he is planting corn, but you know better so you continue to challenge him. As your conversation is beginning a bit heated, he finally blurts out, "Okay! Corn, beans, it doesn't matter! It's all the same!"

You would walk back across your backyard shaking your head wondering about the intelligence or the sanity of your neighbor.

When it comes to planting, the seed you plant is the vegetable that is going to grow. You may, like your neighbor, fool yourself, but you won't fool nature.

This verse reminds you that what you sow into the ground is what you will reap at the harvest.

So, it is with life. What you so into your life and into the life of others is what will be exactly what will be produced.

God knows exactly what seeds you are sowing with you life. If you pretend to be sowing spiritual seed but are actually sowing to your flesh, you may fool yourself and you may fool others, but you will not fool God. When the harvest season comes your foolishness will be revealed.

The very notion that you can fool God is exceedingly foolish. The fact that you would want to fool God is exceedingly sinful.

If you are sowing to the flesh while appearing to be spiritual, you will be exposed when the harvest season reveals the true nature of your deception.

What do you want to harvest? That is the seed you need to sow.

If you want an eternal spiritual harvest, sow spiritual seeds! Sow seeds of truth and sincerity and obedience and love and faithfulness. Good fruit wll be produced from those seeds and that fruit will produce more good fruit! 

Are you planting spiritual seeds?

If not, who are you trying to fool?

February 28, 2011

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."  II Corinthians 4:16-18

Hope is an incredibly powerful force! You know that! But maybe you don't always know where to look for hope.

Scientists have proven the significance of hope. They have documented that people can live longer without food or water than they can without hope. Perhaps that is true because the spirit is more important that the body!

Paul wrote to these Corinthian Christians to offer some hope to these struggling believers. I want to share that hope with you today just in case you are in short supply.

Where can you look for hope?

Hope In God's Power!

"Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day," V. 16

Aging can take a toll on you. It can stir up doubts and anxieties as you see strength and vitality ebb. Illness can do the same. So can suffering.

You are an eternal soul contained within a temporary body. Getting out of bed each morning is a reminder of the that! Aching joints and muscles can be reminders of that! A glance in the mirror can be a reminder of that! The graying hair and the sagging skin remind you that your body is wearing away.

Where is the hope in that?

Paul answers that by reminding you that when the reality of aging causes you to despair, remember a great reality - the power of God that is at work in you! His spiritual power at work within in you is greater than the force of aging, the force of illness, the force of life's pressure, or any other hope-draining challenge you may face!

Are you a believer? Do you know Him as your Savior? Then His power is at work in you! Hope in His power!

Hope In His Promise!

"For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."  V. 17

Suffering, pain and misery can rob you of your hope! As the long hours meld into long days, your optimism can melt like wax. Maybe that is where you find yourself today.

How can I hold onto hope when life hurts all the time?

In addition to God's power at work in you - which is no small thing! You also have the promises of God - all of them - hundreds of them - that assure you that your celebration will far outlast your suffering!

Find your comfort in His power today and take your hope from His promises for tomorrow!

Hope In His Perspective!

"So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal." V. 18 

You know that a glass of water can be seen as half-full or half- empty. Both are true but can result in a different set of emotions and a different set of decisions.

Reality is like that glass of water, it is part awareness and part attitude.

The awareness keeps you in touch with what is happening around you but your attitude determines how you will respond to it. Will you lose hope or will you choose hope! Paul encourages you to be aware of the reality you face but at the same time, be aware of a greater and eternal reality that awaits you! Your attitude toward your present reality and the actions you take will impact your eternal reality.

Hope comes not from avoiding reality but hope comes from believing in a greater reality - a more powerful and eternal reality! You live today because you are hoping for tomorrow - and the tomorrow after that!

There is hope that awaits you today! The hope of His power! The hope of His promise! The hope of His perspective!

February 27, 2011

There is much confusion over that these days. Is evil something that is done by you or to you or is evil something you are? Is it a dark and powerful personal force within you or is it the harmful and hurtful things you do? That confusion contributes to many of our problems in our world today and could be responsible for how evil is on the rise around our world.

If we are going to overcome evil, obviously we must have a clear and actual understanding of what evil is.

And, how we understand evil will determine how we understand good.

In this sermon series we have been defining what it means to Live on Purpose.

Our Purpose Is To Overcome Evil With God

Our Place Is To Discover Our Spiritual Gifts And Serve

Our Purity Is Living In Sincere Love

Our Peace Is Giving Grace, Having Empathy, and Living Humbly

Our Power Is Responding To Evil With Goodness

THE POWER OF EVIL, V. 17

"Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody."

The New York Times reported a study about the diminishing belief in the devil among Americans. Two-thirds of Americans do not believe in the devil as a living entity. In a randomly selected survey of over 1,000 Americans, pollsters asked whether they agreed that Satan is “not a living being, but a symbol of evil.” Sixty-two percent agreed with the statement. That means nearly 149 million Americans believe that Satan has no influence but that Satan is just a symbol of evil. We should know and understand that Satan is real and evil is real and that this is our number 1 enemy as believers in Jesus Christ.

This 12th Chapter of Romans thinks that evil is a problem because it warns us that if we do not overcome it we will be overcome by it. Let’s just do a quick survey of the Scripture:

V. 2 - By nature you are conformed to this world

V.2 - Your evil nature does not know God's will

V. 3 - Your evil nature is conceited

V. 9 - Your evil nature is insincere and loves what is evil

V. 13 - Your evil nature is selfish.

God thinks evil is a problem because He gave the Commandments to define it and then sent Jesus to defeat it and commissioned His Church to destroy it in the power of the Holy Spirit!

The answer to my previous question is that evil is BOTH a noun and a verb.

In other words, I do evil because I have evil in me. I am evil by nature. So are you.

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Jeremiah 17:9

In our nature we have a rebellious anti-God, anti-Christ, anti-truth bent that seeks to make everything in life about my desires and my opinions.

Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother, ‘Raca,’ is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell.

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.”

Wow! That is pretty radical stuff! Why would Jesus propose such a radical response?

When you hear the radical things Jesus said about evil and when you see the radical action Jesus took you know evil is serious business!

THE PROBLEM OF EVIL, V. 18

"If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone."

You only have to look as far as the origins of evil. Look what happened in Heaven when Lucifer made an evil choice. His relationship with God was shattered eternally and 1/3 of the angels became evil.

You only have to look as far as the early chapters of Genesis when Adam and Eve chose to do evil:

1) They experienced shame

2) Their relationship was strained

3) Their relationship with God suffered

4) Later, one of their sons murdered the other.

5) We inherited their evil nature

6) Every horrendous despicable tragic that that ever happened since are due to this evil.

Figure 1: shows how drastically the actual knowledge of high school students began to drop at an accelerating rate after 1962. David Barton, who did the report notes that the upturn in SAT scores since 1981 is due to the increase in private Christian educational facilities which began to flourish at that time. Statistics have proven that students from private Christian schools showed higher academic achievement and higher test scores.

Figure 2: This graph shows the increase in sexual activity in unmarried teen-age girls after the 1962 Supreme Court decision. It is evident from the figures provided that in the years previous to the removal of prayer the rates remained stable and relatively unchanged. In the post- prayer years the numbers immediately began to soar. The sudden increase on the graph appears as if a great restraining force had suddenly been removed.

Figure 3: Unwed women 15-19 years of age showed a phenomenal increase in the rate of pregnancies after the School Prayer decision. Note that the figure jumps drastically after the Supreme Court’s Roe vs. Wade decision which made abortion legal in the U.S. The United States now has the highest incidence of teen-age motherhood in any Western country.

Figure 4: For the 15-19 and 20-24 age group, the rates of youth suicide remained relatively unchanged during the years from 1946 to the School Prayer decision in 1962. But in the years since, suicides among the same group have increased 253 percent, or an average of 10.5 percent per year.

Figure 5: Stability in the family has also been affected since the 1962 decision. Divorce, single parent families, couples living together but not married, and adultery are areas of family breakdown which have experienced radical growth in recent years. In the graph above, the increase in single parent families (households with only a mother and children) are detailed. Note the dotted line at the bottom, which shows the rate of growth prior to the 1962 decision.

Figure 6: Crime, productivity, and national morality had been on a fairly stable level prior to the 1962 decision, but that is no longer the case. It is obvious that such a quantity of students praying for their nation had a very positive effect on the course that this nation had taken. The rate of violent crime, as shown above, has risen over 330 percent.

What God hates most about evil, besides the fact that it offends His holiness, is how it wrecks relationships and hurts people. Those are the two things He values most!

If I were to ask for a show of hands from anyone who has suffered from a relationship that has been shattered or strained by some form of evil habit or influence I would expect to see a room full of hands. EVIL WRECKS RELATIONSHIPS AND BREAKS GOD’S HEART!

So – do you dare be casual about evil?
 

THE POWER OVER EVIL, Vv. 19-21

"Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good."

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Edmund Burke

What is it I should do to overcome evil? How can I stand against evil and stem the tide of evil in an increasingly evil world?

FIRST, REPENT OF YOUR EVIL

What is repentance? Gordon MacDonald helps us to understand with these sobering words: “Repentance is not necessarily repentance for what I have done although it may necessitate that. Repentance is for, more significantly, what is in me as a sinner. I suggest to you that the Bible is teaching us over and over again that in the soul of every person in this room — even in the children — is a volcanic pocket of evil so virile and so full of potential that anyone in this world would probably be capable of destroying the world five times over if all of that evil got out.”

SECOND, BE CLEANSED OF YOUR EVIL AND FILLED WITH HIS SPIRIT

THIRD, LIVE IN HIS LOVE AND HOLY GOODNESS, Vv. 19-21


BECOME PURELY PROACTIVE – STOP REACTING!

One evening a woman was driving home when she noticed a huge truck behind her that was driving uncomfortably close. She stepped on the gas to gain some distance from the truck, but when she sped up the truck did too. The faster she drove, the faster drove the truck.

Now scared, she exited the freeway. But the truck stayed with her. The woman then turned up a main street, hoping to lose her pursuer in traffic. But the truck ran a red light and continued the chase.

Reaching the point of panic, the woman whipped her car into a service station and bolted out of her auto screaming for help. The truck driver sprang from his truck and ran toward her car. Yanking the back door open, the driver pulled out a man hidden in the backseat.

The woman was running from the wrong person. From his high vantage point, the truck driver had spotted a would-be rapist in the woman’s car. The chase was not his effort to harm her but to save her even at the cost of his own safety.

That is how you and I tend to be and it is what makes evil so dangerous. We think that evil is something "OUT THERE". It is those liberals, or those conservatives, or those pro-lifers, or those pro-abortionists, or those Catholics, or those Muslims - anything but us!

So we join good causes and take good stands but evil continues to grow!

The worst evil is the evil within!

BUT - it is an evil you can deal with! It is an evil HE can conquer! You can make the world a less evil place!

Will you?