Getting ready for Sunday - SHIFT in my role models.

There are 168 hours in a week.  If we sleep 7 hours a day (49 hours a week), then we're awake for 149 hours.  If we're in worship, growth groups (Bible studies), and in our private devotions then perhaps we setting aside another 10 hours or so on time specifically set aside for God, for his Word, and for prayer.  That leaves us with 139 hours in our week.  Who are you listening to during that time?

Paul Tripp writes: “No one is more influential in your life than you are because no one talks to you more than you do. You're in an unending conversation with yourself. You're talking to yourself all the time, interpreting, organizing, and analyzing what's going on inside you and around you.”

Kind of a scary thought, isn't it?  More than anyone else in my life, I'm preaching to myself.  I'm preaching to myself in my private devotions.  I'm preaching to myself when I'm at work.  I'm preaching to myself wherever I go and whatever I do.

Whose word are you preaching to yourself?  What message are you preaching?  What are you telling yourself?  Who influences the sermons you preach to your heart?

More than a little scary, isn't it?

That makes my time in God's Word all the more important.  It needs to go with me even when I'm not devoting all of my energies to meditating on it and praying about it.  God's Word needs to flow from my heart into my ears all day long.  It needs to be the thing I chew on all day long. The time we spend in God's Word on Sunday, in growth groups (Bible studies), and in our private, personal devotions are so important.  We want our Father's voice, which is loud and clear in the Bible, to be the voice ringing in our hears through our days.

That makes our friends so important, especially our closest friends and our advisors, especially our role models.  We need them to be speaking God's Word to us and redirecting us to the one thing needful, one thing true and certain, the one thing powerful and saving.  Our friends, our role models, our advisors and counselors, are so important.

This Sunday we will consider Hebrews 10:19-25 and remember why it's so important for us to keep showing up.

Beyond Sunday - SHIFT in my involvement.

Yesterday turned into an interesting but an awesome day. But it didn't go as planned.  Sunday morning was great! I always love the chance to share God's Word.  Lunch was awesome.  Got to visit with so many people.  Add to that the joy of seeing God's people connecting to each other - and not wanting to leave.  Then I got teach the basics of the faith.  All part of the plan, so far.

Then I came out to the car and had a flat.  Not exactly how I wanted to spend the next part of my Sunday.  But it turned out well.  I got home from getting the flat fixed and enjoyed a great evening with my family.  God gave me some down time that I hadn't planned on and it was just what I needed so that I could come home refreshed to be with family.

We're all busy.  I haven't met anyone in this world who isn't busy.  In fact, that is the common reason that something can't get done, someone can't meet... I can't do that because I'm busy.  Take a look at your day, take a look at your calendar and what do you see? You're busy. We're all busy.

We're all busy.  But don't be too busy for God.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the life that he's given you.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the grace that he's given you, the forgiveness that he's given you.

Take just a moment today and thank God for the way he is ruling your life and taking care of you, even if you don't agree with his plan.

Take just a moment and ask God to help you through whatever it is that is on your plate.

It's so easy for us to substitute our action and activity for trust in God's action and activity.  It's so easy to think, "I'm too busy to pray.  I'm too busy to read my devotions."  But take note at what we're doing... We're thinking that our work is more important than God's.  We're thinking that our will is more important than God's.  And we all know that that just isn't true.

Slow down and ponder God's will and work.

Slow down and ponder God's mission and ministry.

Slow down and pray.

Slow down and see how God get's involved in your life.

Slow down and see the opportunities that God gives you to be involved in the lives of the people around you.

Then, get off the bench and get into the game.

Getting ready for Sunday!

We live with people.  We live around with people.  We work for people.  We work with people.  We work next to people.  We interact with people more than ever before either in person or through some other medium.  We get phone calls, text messages, Facebook alerts, maybe even Voxer. Unless you are a hermit living on a mountaintop you interact with people all day long. What's that experience like?  Some people enjoy a tech free day off, a quiet day away from it all.  Many people would benefit from just a few moments unplugging.

That's what Jesus is doing with his disciples in the text we'll look at this Sunday (Matthew 14:13-21). They were going away by themselves to unplug.  The disciples had come off of a missionary trip.  Jesus had just received the news that John the Baptist had been beheaded.  They were worn out and tired and need a chance to unplug and to refuel in prayer and meditation on God's Word.  BUT THE CROWDS CHASED THEM THERE TOO!

Yet, what do we see in Jesus?  Pay close attention.  Jesus may have been worn out, but he was never too exhausted to give his love and care to that crowd that interrupted his quiet time.  He saw that they were harassed and helpless.

As you get ready for Sunday, learn this about Jesus - our Father in heaven is never too busy, never to exhausted, never empty to hear our prayers.  We are his children and he doesn't brush us off or view our prayers as too small a thing for him to be concerned about.  Jesus is the very same way.  He looked at this crowd and he was overflowing with compassion for them.

How do you look at the people in your life that enter it through a purposeful plan of yours or through God's purposeful plan (that you didn't know about!)? How do you see their intrusion into your day?

Jesus wanted to teach his disciples something that day.  He teaches us something too.  This Sunday we learn from Jesus about a SHIFT in our involvement in the lives of the people around us and learn to impact them in the same way that we have been impacted by Jesus himself.

Read Matthew 14:13-21 (for a fuller picture you can also read: Matthew 14:1-36; Mark 6:1-56; and/or John 6:1-70).

See you Sunday!

Beyond Sunday - SOAP journal entry

What joy God gave Sarah and Abraham in their old age. After a life of waiting, a life of pilgrimage (that wasn't done yet), God gave them a great joy - a son. This was nothing short of a miraculous gift of God. Their bodies were as good as dead, the apostle writes, yet God gave life in those bodies that were as good as dead.

Reminds me of Ecclesiastes 9: 9 Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that God has given you under the sun—all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in life and in your toilsome labor under the sun. Life is a struggle.  Sins curse makes work toil, the sweat if the brow.  Sins curse troubles relationships wherever we turn.  Sins curse makes our life a steady march to the grave.  Life then becomes pointless.  So, I can learn from Sarah to laugh in thanks to God for the gifts of  Ruth and our children, truly amazing gifts of God.

Lord, help me to laugh in thanks to you for your grace to me in my family. They are an amazing and gracious gift to me from you.  Thank you for this grace. Fill me with joy in this grace today and don't let me get bogged down with the other struggles that sin brings.  Let me laugh and play and enjoy the gifts that they are to me. Thank you especially for the faith that you've planted in them. That is your greatest gift it them and to me.  I pray you then, defend this house, our family, from the attacks of the evil one that nothing would cause them to stumble and trip up, so that they lose their faith.  Nothing would bring me more sadness.  Keep them in the faith! Thank you for hearing me Father and for walking with me today in all that I think, say, and do.

Getting ready for Sunday (Matthew 6:1-15)

SHIFT in your private devotional life.

Lots of studies show it.  Church attendance is down.  Biblical illiteracy is high.  Just google it.  Just look at what Barna studies reveal about church attendance, about Bible reading, about devotional reading.  As much as America wants to be a Christian country, we're not walking in God's Word publicly or privately as one would expect.

But this shouldn't surprise us.  In the early 20th Century (1919) one church leader (August Pieper) already wrote: 

“Spiritual life among us in a state of steep decline...There is little discussion of the gospel and the grace of God among our people in their daily lives.  Regular  morning and evening devotions no longer predominate.  Joint family prayers and no longer spoken, often not even table prayers. A worldly point of view has slipped in among our Christian people” (The Wauwatosa Theology, 59).

How would you assess our country?
How would you assess our congregation?
How would you assess yourself?

Is Pieper right when he writes those things above?

What should we do about it?  On Sunday we will study what Jesus says about our private devotional life in Matthew 6:1-15.

Meanwhile, chew on these words from Pieper as we seek to grow up in our walk with Jesus.  Here he comments on the encouragement of Jesus to pray for the Holy Spirit (Luke 11:11-13).

“We should and will want to pray, not for a specific measure of the Spirit, but for as much as is necessary, that we do not decline in spiritual strength, but grow stronger daily, for as much as is necessary to carry out our office properly, and to edify the souls entrusted to us and to make them rich in good works; as much as is necessary to carry his gospel into all the world and gather the elect; as much as is necessary that the church in our midst does not die out, but grows every stronger inwardly and outwardly, in short, Spirit and strength enough and in overflow for the adornment and perfection of his church - that is what he promised and will give us if we do not cease to petition him for it.”

See you Sunday! Pastor Nate

Getting ready for a new series!

Be honest: Are you happy with your life? Wish you could change something? Are you already making plans for what you’ll change in the New Year? New Year’s resolutions? We’d love to hit a grand-slam-walk-off home run.  We’d love to throw or catch the “hail mary” to win the football game.  We’d love to make that huge change that will have a huge impact.  The problem is that change is tough, especially if you try to do a 180 in a month.  That kind of change is really tough.

So what works? What can we do as we walk with Jesus toward heaven? What can we do as we grow together and walk with our fellow believers?

Small, steady shifts. Little, but powerful changes. Imagine feeling confident instead of fearful. Hopeful instead of despaired. Fulfilled instead of worthless. Small, steady shifts. God created us to walk with him every day and he guides us and helps us in making these SHIFTS: Small Changes that make a BIG difference. 

This Sunday - SHIFT in our worship experience.  We'll listen to Jesus teach us about how he wants us to approach him and his Word, how he wants us to listen and what he wants us to do with what he says.  And in so doing he helps us understand the purpose of our time with him.  Our worship experience, our time with Jesus on Sunday morning is our time to meet with God, to meet with Jesus, to hear from him, to be drawn closer to him so that our faith is built on the rock.  Jesus teaches us to shift our attention to him and to his Word in our worship and in so doing he works powerful in us.

So, let's get our year, our week and our year started built on Jesus and his words.  Our worship gets our week out of the blocks and sprinting toward the finish line.

Read the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) to read the whole context of what Jesus says.  We will give special attention to Jesus' words in Matthew 5:1-2 and 7:24-29.

See you Sunday!

Getting ready for church - A Tale of Three Kings

So...it's a new year and time for some changes.

What are the changes that you've resolved to make? What are the hopes and dreams that you have for the coming year?  What are you going to get done by God's grace and willing?

Lots of people do that.  Many people kick the new year off with resolutions, goals, and changes they want to make in their life.  In many ways they (you) want to transform your life in one way or another.  As you look forward to a new year what changes do you need and want to make in your life to live as God would have you live spiritually, emotionally, physically, even relationally?  In one week we're going to start a new series called SHIFT where we will discuss some of those little changes that God teaches us to make that will make a huge difference.

This week, however, we're asking the question: What must I keep in mind as I make my plans and move forward into the new year?  What do I have to remember?  Where must my faith be founded? Where must my heart be directed as we begin to follow through on our resolutions and make some of those small shifts that God teaches us to make?

Tomorrow, as we walk with the wise men, we will learn to understand what the wise men knew and believed AND what Herod knew but hated.  It's a tale of three kings: Matthew 3:1-17.

See you tomorrow!