Goal Setting Series

Most of this material was done by Rick Warren in the 50 Days Of Transformation Series. I reworked some of the material and eliminated a lot because of the length of the sermon. We used the material to kick off a church campaign for growth.

Welcome to 50 Days of Transformation as we continue The 500 Campaign. Think for a moment, when was the last time you saw something new taking place in your life. It changed you somewhat didn’t it. Transformation is about change from one thing to something new. Give us the next 50 days and you can become somebody you never imagined being.

Our theme verse for the next fifty days is going to be Romans 12:2. Let’s read it aloud together, Romans 12:2 “Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”

How many of you have ever joined a group? One of the first thing they want to do is to make you like one of them. They want you to conform to their way of thinking, dressing, and behaving. Sometimes that might be good, but sometimes its not so good. You have to use the power of your mind to know the difference. Somebody else has a plan for your mind so that they can use you for their own gain.

God knows that you will either conform or be transformed.

God created you to be unique. God created you to be special. God created you to be like nobody else. You have a unique voiceprint, thumbprint, handprint, heartbeat. And God says I want you to be unique not conformed to anybody else’s idea of what you should be.

But the problem is we all start off as originals but we end up as copies of other people. We get conformed and we get pressured and we get pushed into a mold.

During the next seven weeks we’re going to look at seven key areas of your life and how God wants to transform your thinking in order to bring the power of God into your life. God wants to work in us, but our thought patterns keep God out. Our minds need to be renewed.

God is concerned about all areas of our lives and not just what takes place on Sunday mornings. We’re going to look at our spiritual health, physical health, mental health, emotional health, financial health, relational health, and vocational health. We will be doing this on Sunday mornings, in our devotionals, and in our small group meetings. We need to be ready to be transformed because God is going to be doing something new in us, in each area.

The first thing we are going to do is to recognize in order to get to point of transformation, we have to have some goals. If you lose your goal, you lose your purpose. Any of you ever went to get something out of a room only to get to the room and not have the slightest idea why you came into the room. Sometimes that’s how we are in life when we forget our goal of getting to know Jesus Christ.

Did you know that God expects you to set goals for your life. Goals keep us focused and set us on a particular course of action. Jesus had goals on the earth, and those goals kept him from getting sidetracked. Most of us would stop and allow people to make us a celebrity or king or queen, but not Jesus. His goal was to get to the cross within a certain time frame.

So this series is about you recognizing the potential God has placed inside of you to experience the life God wants you to have. Remember, Jesus said, “I have come that you might have life, and have it abundantly.” As your pastors we want to see you make the best of the rest of your life.

Let’s look at six reasons why we should set goals in our lives. Remember, Goals are going to determine how our lives turn out.

The Bible says six things about goal setting.

WHY ARE GOALS IMPORTANT TO CHANGING MY LIFE?

1. GOAL-SETTING IS A SPIRITUAL RESPONSIBILITY

Goal setting is a spiritual responsibility. Did you know that God sets goals? Whatever God does, is something we should want to also do if we are being conformed to the image of Jesus. God has goals for human kind. If you read the book of Revelations, you see that God has goals for the believers, the unbelievers, the Anti-Christ, the devil and for history. And God certainly has goals for your life.

When we read the Scriptures, we discover that Jesus set goals. Jesus made sure that he got to Jerusalem because that was his goal. When the disciples tried to keep him from getting to a dead Lazarus, Jesus had a goal of raising Lazarus from the dead.