Pressing On Toward The Goal

Pressing on toward the goal

Phillippians3:12-14

Fathers Day 2008

* We had the sanctuary set up like the great outdoors. I had a canoe up front with all the boating needs, I had fishing and hunting equipment up front, I had camping things spread out. I had deer pictures around the front platform. It looked like a camp.

* I did a three minute skit

* Had special music that was geared toward men.

Intro-

Good morning everyone. I hope you enjoy that we have made our sanctuary a part of the great outdoors. I love the different fishing and hunting outfits your wearing. I believe we are outside of the box today and I am loving it. I know that we can worship God this morning even though most of us are not wearing ties and coats . I must admit it is different for me not to be up here in a suit, it feels like Saturday instead of Sunday.

Some of guys favorite characters would be uncle buck, Tim the tool man Taylor, Clint Eastwood (make my day...punk), James Bond. Of course we cannot forget our Nascar friends, baseball players, football players.

Why do we like them? We don’t personally know them, but we can relate to them. We share a same interest.

Illustration

two guys decide they are going to vacation in Mexico. They are going to go extreme bungy jump. The two are excited about it , get to Mexico, they go to the top of this little town where the bungy jumping equipment is located and the first guy gets strapped in and jumps down off this equipment and comes bouncing back up screaming but they cannot hear what he is saying. He again plummets and this time not only comes up screaming, but his friend can see that he is bruised and bleeding. After three attempts of falling and coming back up hurt, his friend reaches out and stops him from going down again. What happened ! Says the friend, “I don’t know why they were all hitting me” what is a pinata!

That is sometimes the way that we feel. We like to be different, we like to try different things. We like to take it to the extreme. We don’t like to be like everyone else. But we feel like we are everybody’s pinata.

Apostle Paul in this passage of scripture understands this-

He tells us that if it is about accomplishments- he is one of the best.

If it is about who you know and having a zeal, he was a pharasee. But when it comes to having a relationship with Christ, Paul tells us that these things don’t compare, that he counted it all loss, that he would give it all up to know Christ.

Question- How do you get there?

How do we love a man even if his name is Jesus?

How do we get past some of the churchy things to have a relationship with God.

How do we program ourselves to do things different than most in the world are doing?

Apostle Paul likens it to a race- Phillippians 3, he tells us that he puts no confidence in himself, but puts it in knowing Christ and the power of His resurrection.

Phillippians 3:12-14

I have one point this morning. Press on! Take hold of what Christ desires for you to have. In order to do that we must have devotion.

“This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark.”

Forgetting the past...reaching for the future!

There’s the target (have target up front) notice the arrows everywhere but in the bull’s eye. (Kid them that no animals were hurt in the making of the target.)

Everyone has a past!- apostle Paul had a past, he murdered Christians because he thought it was the right thing to do.

I forget the past

I forget the past failures

I forget the times that I missed the mark.

I realize I cannot move forward if I am always looking backward. (Living life looking in the rearview mirror)

The devil wants to discourage you by accusing you of things that Christ has already forgiven you for.

Sixty some days before the Olympics in China. These athletes are going with the intention of hitting the mark, but it didn’t come without a lot of practice and missing the mark quite a few times.

1 Corinthians 9:24-27

“Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training . They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air.