Living The Abundant Life

Living The Abundant Life

Can you hear me now?

John 10:9-10 (NKJV)

I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find

pasture.

The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may

have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.

God wants a better life for you than you want for yourself

How is that possible

We know ourselves

We know our insecurities

Inhibitions

How can God want a life better for us that we do?

Abundant life is a life you want to live for the rest of your life!

If you informed that you get to live your current life

For the rest of your life

Would that be good news or bad news?

This morning God wants to talk to us about

Accessing a life

That we would want to live

For the rest of our life

When God was talking about Abundant Life

He was not speaking about eternity

To get this

You will have to give up some of your current perspective

Jesus opens this chapter taking about the sheep and the shepherd

Being sheep means

Giving up control

So immediately many of us are repelled

John 10:1-2

"Most assuredly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.

But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.

For many of us

There are thing that are sabotaging all that God has for us

Some of us

We are our worst enemy

For many

We are the thief and robber in our own life

Verse 3:

To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice;….

Can you hear me now?

When was the last time you absolutely heard from God?

I believe it is possible to hear His voice

1 Samuel 3:

Eli and boy Samuel

Samuel always heard the prophets voice

So now he was pushed to distinguish God’s voice

In John chapter 9

Jesus healed a blind man

So the haters

Tried to make it a bad thing

The man was telling everyone

He could see

He was excited

But the church people

Got together

And felt it was a bad thing

They even got his parents involved

But the man said this

I don’t know about all this church stuff

But I know this

I was blind and now I see

We have to be the same

Those that are constantly drawing us away

Knocking our beliefs

These are hindering us

And the only way to get beyond all this is to get rid of the problem

Stand up

And realize you are a citizen of Heaven

And pronounce the good things that God has done for you

We do not enter into abundant life – HERE

Because we don’t realize we are a citizen of the Most High

If we did

Our perspective would change

And instead of making a statement of faith

We make a profession of faith

We take steps of faith

We pronounce the good things that have happened in our life

For some

We have to start spending more time

With believers

Than with the lost

Our access to the abundant life

Is done by entering through the DOOR

If you are in Christ

You have access!

If you spend more time with others who do not have access

Guess what happens

They drag you down

It’s ok to love family

And neighbors and friends

But if don’t realize you are different

You have a problem

If you view yourself

As the same as them

That’s the problem

If you join in with their woe’s

Agree with their perspective on life

You are giving up your access

To the Abundant Life!

I need to hang with others who have greater faith

And greater expectations than I do

WHY

That lifts me up

It increases my faith

When you hang around those who do not believe the same

You loose access

Greater is he that is in you

Than he that is in the world

But we still have to guard ourselves from attacks

So that we are not barred

from getting to the next level in God

There is a better life for us

Than what we have been experiencing

Although it may seem bad now

It may be dark now

But tomorrow the sun will rise

And the light of the World

Will shine in my life

And it will get better

It will be better tomorrow

A sheep

Lives as the Shepherd directs

Sheep need a Shepherd

The life that the Shepherd has for us

Is better that the life we would choose for ourselves