Joke:
A Montana cowboy was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture
when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him.
The driver, a young man in a Brioni suit, Gucci shoes, Ray Ban
sunglasses and YSL tie, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, If I
tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will
you give me a calf?"
The cowboy looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his
peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers,
"Sure, Why not?"
The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his Cingular RAZR V3 cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet where he calls up a GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image has been processed and the data stored.
He then accesses a MS-SQL database through an ODBC connected Excel spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a response.
Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-tech, a miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the cowboy and says, "You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves."
"That’s right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves," says the cowboy
He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused
as the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car.
Then the cowboy says to the young man, "Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give my back my calf?"
The young man thinks about it for a second and then says,"Okay, why
not?" You’re a Congressman for the U.S. Government", says the cowboy.
"Wow! That’s correct," says the yuppie, "but how did you guess that?"
"No guessing required." answered the cowboy.
"You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid
for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked. You tried to
show me how much smarter than me you are; and you don’t know a thing
about cows.. this is a herd of sheep.
Now give me back my dog!
II Peter 1:1-11
1. Every message should have at least 3 points.
2. That’s the law of preaching that you learn in your studies for ministry.
3. You just heard my first point. Laughter is good for the soul.
4. As your pastor I have love having a good laugh. Sometimes they are at the expense of a comment to others and sometimes they are the results of having to laugh at myself.
My message today is titled the Secret to Real Life.
Have you ever had this thought or said this to someone:
“I am a Christian... I am faced with a great problem in my life
and I don’t know what to do... I cannot solve it.
I know the power of prayer is great and faith in God works
miracles... O God please help me... I need a miracle.”
Peter gives us the secret to real life in his second letter.
He I encouraging Christians that were facing opposition from within the world. He warns them against false teachers within their fellowship who would lead them into apostasy. Who deny the Lord, who live a sensuous life style, and are destined for destruction. They ridicule the return of the Lord and mock and make fun of them.
Does this not sound like today?
V. 2 Grace and Peace: He says that you can have grace and peace MULTIPLIED to you in the KNOWLEDGE (repeat this word congregation) "Knowledge"
Of who? Of God and of Jesus our Lord.
First we need to find peace and in our lives.
That peace only comes in the life with Jesus
There is life in Him today
Listen to what Jesus said:
John 15:5 (NKJV)
5“I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.
6If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned.
7If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, you will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you.
8By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.
Just as the branch is dependent on the life in the Vine when you cut the branch of the vine off the branch dies.
We are no different than the branch, and that was what Jesus was saying in John 15:5, when we are cut off from Him we begin to die because there is no life left without Him connected to us. Can I hear an amen?
There is life in Knowledge:
Look at V. 3
Knowledge comes from Divine Power
It’s. More than just attending Church on Sunday morning!
It’s more than being a good person!
IT’S ABOUT BEING IN CHRIST JESUS AND KNOWING HIM, LOVING HIM, SERVING HIM, BEING WHAT HE HAS CALLED YOU TO.
We can be partakers of this divine power because we were created in His image.
1. Are you tired of everyday problems?
2. Are you tired of life?
3. Are you tired of the humdrum of life?
4. Are you tired of being the blunt of Satan’s attacks?
Try escaping the world and its problems and the gaining the knowledge of the Lord. And then add to your faith, (read Verses 5,6,7)
Here is the Promise Verse 10 and 11
Then we also have the hope of Eternity (read Verse 11)
You can have this Knowledge, Promise, and Hope just by accepting Jesus as your Lord and Savior.
Alter call:
