Change? Please, Not Now.

Change? Please not now

Good Morning

Stand with me and lift up your bible and repeat after me.

This is my Bible.

I am what it says I am.

I can do what it says I can do.

I am going to learn how to be what it says I can be.

Today I will learn more of the word of God.

The indestructible, never ending, living word Of God.

I will never be the same.

I will never be the same.

In Jesus Name

I have a question...

Are you open for change?

“Yes, I am but not now. Maybe later.”

Sound familiar?

Here is a story for you.

The man was a little different. His name is Bill. He has wild hair, wears a T-shirt with holes in it, jeans, and sandals.

This was literally his wardrobe for his entire four years of college. He is brilliant. Kind of living a simple life and is very, very bright and going.

He became a Christian while attending college.

Across the street from the campus is a well-dressed, very conservative church. They want to develop a ministry to the students, but are not sure how to go about it. One day Bill decides to go there.

He walks in with no shoes, jeans, his T-shirt, and wild hair. The service has already started and so Bill starts down the aisle looking for a seat.

The church is completely packed and he can't find a seat.

By now people are really looking a bit uncomfortable, but no one says anything.

Bill gets closer and closer and closer to the pulpit and, when he realizes there are no seats, he just squats down right on the carpet. (Although perfectly acceptable behavior at a college fellowship, trust me, this had never happened before in this church).

By now the people are really uptight, and the tension in the air is thick.

About this time, the minister realizes that from way at the back of the church, a deacon is slowly making his way toward Bill.

Now the deacon is in his eighties, has silver-gray hair, and a three-piece suit. A godly man, very elegant, very dignified, very courtly. He walks with a cane and, as he starts walking toward this boy, everyone is saying to them-selves that you can't blame him for what he's going to do.

How can you expect a man of his age and of his background to understand some college kid on the floor? It takes a long time for the man to reach the boy. The church is utterly silent except for the clicking of the man's

cane. All eyes are focused on him. You can't even hear anyone breathing.

The minister can't even preach the sermon until the deacon does what he has to do.

And now they see this elderly man drop his cane on the floor.

With great difficulty he lowers himself and sits down next to Bill and joins with him so he won't be alone.

Everyone chokes up with emotion. When the minister gains control, he says, "What I'm about to share, you will never remember. What you have just seen, you will never forget. Be careful how you live. You may be the

only Bible some people will ever read."

Please turn with me to the book of Malachi in the Old Testament. Say, “Amen when you are there.”

Malachi 3:6 “For I am the LORD, I do not change;”

Interesting. In our lives has He changed?

Have you?

We all do. Whether we like it or not.

Have we had changes that have happened at exactly the right time?

Not me. I have learned a lot about patience with the changes that have gone on in my life.

What were these changes about in my life or in yours?

Life experiences that we never expected to happen.?

Answers to prayer that were good?

Answers to prayer that were not?

Things that were expected and things that were not.

Things that were out and out miracles that only the One who loves us more than we could imagine allowed to happen?

Do you know what is the most interesting and wonderful thing that has happened in my life is?

The most interesting thing that has happened in my life is that I have learned about Jesus Christ and how He has become the most important part of my life.

As you get older like me you realize all the things you have missed about in your life. But you also realize all that He has created and allowed to be in or lives here in this world that we live. There have been some amazing things over the past 60 years in my world.

A man landed on the moon.

Cell phones.