Power Factors For Your Life

In this chapel service, I want to share with you Seven Power Factors for a Successful Journey with the Lord. You already have a zeal for Christ, or you would not be attending this service today. How can you perpetuate that for the long run? What are the essentials for a fruitful ministry in the days ahead? Seven principles that will empower you to fulfill God’s calling on your life and finish well.

I didn’t get this message from a book. I got it on the messy, muddy road of my own journey. Sometimes, I slipped and fell; sometimes, I came short of what I am going to share with you today. But each time by the grace of God, I got up and continued the journey. I am not sharing these touchstones as one who has lived it out perfectly. I share with you as a fellow disciple who has learned the importance of these things by experience.

If I could share nothing else with you, I would tell you this one thing today: No matter what is going on in your life, keep coming to God. If you are succeeding, keep giving God the glory for that success. It would not be there without him. If you are failing, keep coming to God for help. He is the one who can supply the strength to get up and finish the race. The devil is a master at tripping us up, then standing over us with arms folded, saying, “You just as well give up; you can’t do this thing called Christianity.” He is a liar; he is an accuser; he is a discourager. Of course, you can’t do it; but God can strengthen you and give you victory. His strength is made perfect in your weakness (2 Cor. 12:9).

In John 6, Jesus gave a challenging sermon. People did not like that sermon. John 6:66-67 says: “From that time many of His disciples went back and walked with Him no more. 67 Then Jesus said to the twelve, ‘Do you also want to go away?’” Peter’s answer sets an example for all of us. Verse 68: “But Simon Peter answered Him, ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.’” If you fail, there is no better place to go than to the one who loves you and gave himself for you. In the ups and downs of life, we keep coming to Christ for his grace and mercy. We keep coming with hearts of gratitude for that grace and mercy.

This is one of the big differences between King Saul and King David. David failed God miserably in his adultery with Bathsheba and the murder of her husband. It was an ugly blot on his personal testimony. It was a sin worthy of the death penalty according to the Law of Moses. But when the prophet Nathan called him out on it, he did not try to justify himself. He repented and threw himself on God’s mercy. Consequences for that sin followed. But God forgave him. His relationship with the Lord was restored, and his life ended well. In 1 Samuel 15, King Saul sinned by disobeying God’s commandment to him. When he was confronted by the prophet Samuel, he did not humble himself. He did not repent. He justified himself and blamed others for what happened. His relationship with the Lord was never restored. He died in defeat.

My counsel to you is this: No matter what happens, keep coming to the Lord. Do not draw back from him. He alone has the words of eternal life. He alone can reach down and pick you up. Keep coming to God. Keep coming to God. Philippians 2:13: “For it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.”

Now for these Seven Power Factors for godly living. The first is:

I. ENCOUNTER

We cannot live on abstracts and theory. We cannot live on religion. We must encounter the Living God in a personal way. Jesus told the Woman at the Well: “The hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. 24 God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth [or in spirit and in reality]” (John 4:23-24). Millions of professed Christians have no reality in their relationship with God. Some are Catholics, some are Protestants, all are religious. They have bought into a religion. They have bought into a stated set of rules and beliefs. But they have never experienced God for themselves. They were talked into a religion, and people who have been talked into a religion can be talked out of it.