First Things First Series

Worship is bringing pleasure to God. One way we bring pleasure to God is by doing his will for us, and his church. We have two big problems though. The first is that we may think we are inferior, and the second is that we have our own ideas about what is best.

I. We are not INFERIOR.

When I was in high school and college I had an inferiority complex at the beginning of every semester.

Sometimes we can get inferiority complexes when we have had a string of down times. Whether personally, professionally or in the church.

A. We are GOOD ENOUGH.

A few years ago, or a decade ago, SNL had Stuart Smalley who would look into a mirror and say, “You are good enough, you are smart enough, and doggoneit people like you.”

We need not have an inferiority complex.

B. God can use us NO MATTER WHAT.

Noah had never built a boat. Moses stuttered (Read Ex. 4:10). David was a shepherd and a runt (Read 1 Sam. 16:11). Nehemiah was a cupbearer (Read Neh. 1:11). Amos was a shepherd (Amos 1:1). Jesus was a carpenter (Read Mark 6:3).

No matter who we are or what our background God can use us. God is bigger than our circumstances.

II. Our plans must take a BACKSEAT to God’s plans.

In addition to an inferiority complex, we can also allow our own plans to get in the way of God’s plans.

I thought I had a better plan for serving God in my life than he did, but I had to come to the point in March of 2001 that my plans had to be in the backseat.

A. Our plans may be in OPPOSITION to God’s plans.

Sometimes, our plans directly defy God’s plans.

Jonah had plans that were in direct opposition to God’s plans. Read Jonah 1:1-3. Jonah knew God’s plan but acted in the opposite direction. Read Jonah 3:1-3.

B. Our plans may have the BEST INTENTIONS.

Sometimes, our plans are of the best intentions, but still in opposition. Jonah’s actions were not in the best intention.

In Acts 8, we read that the apostle Phillip had a great revival going in Samaria. Read Acts 8:4-8. God then called him to something different. Read Acts 8:26-27a. Things were going great, and there was not reason to leave.

Peter had a good ministry going in Joppa recorded in Acts 10, but God called him to go to Caesarea to see Cornelius.

In Acts 16, Paul and his companions are running into roadblocks in Asia. Read Acts 16:6-10. God had different plans for them.

In Romans we read Paul’s desire to go to Spain. Read Romans 15:24. Paul never made it because God had different plans.

Our plans must take a backseat to God’s plans. We may be well intentioned in doing God’s will, but our plans may still be out of line with God’s will.

III. We must answer YES to God.

God’s desire for us is that we say “yes” to him.

The boy Samuel said yes to God. Read 1 Samuel 3:10.

The prophet Isaiah said yes to God. Read Isaiah 6:8.

The disciples left their business to say yes to Jesus. Read Mark 1:16-20.

God may not call us to sell our homes and quit our jobs and move to Zimbabwe to be a missionary, but he calls each one of us to say yes to his will for our life.

God has a plan for this church that is more amazing and fantastic than what we can imagine, but our job is to say an unequivocal yes to him. We have to abandon our own preconceived notions about how God works and embrace God’s plan for our lives (individually) and for the life of this church.

This is bigger than any person or thing.

Has anyone ever heard of Agnes Bojaxhiu? She was no one really special. She never went to college, got married or owned a car. She spent her life in streets of Calcutta, India. You may know her as Mother Teresa. Just a few years before she died, someone asked her, “What will happen, Mother Teresa, when you are no longer with us?” She replied, “I believe that if God finds a person even more useless than me, He will do even greater things through her.”

God uses that which seems useless by the world’s standards. God can use us. God asks us to give him what we have in faith believing that he will use it.

God’s going to ask us to do some pretty radical things, but it is nothing that is impossible when he is with us.

Swan Quarter, NC Methodist Church in 1876. Faithfully built the church on low land. The storm came and the floodwaters moved it to prime real estates. We must faithfully obey God.

We sign the contract with God, and then he fills in the details, and then we carry them out.