Life choices part four
Matthew 5:1-5:12
Introduction-
We have for several weeks been looking at life choices and today plan to finish this series.
It has been in preparation of the launching of our new Recovery group next month.
We have looked at John Bakers eight principals and they have been in your bulletin. Prayerfully, you have heard them enough that you can remember and recite them as you look at your own Hurts, habits, and hang-ups.
If you only remember a few things from this series, remember these things;
There are a lot of hurting people. They are for many different reasons. Some they have caused for themselves and some others have done to them and were unavoidable.
Each one of us is on a journey and we are at different spots in the journey.
Every one of us has hurts, habits, and hang-ups. That is not for someone else, it is for each one of us to realize and do something about it.
Matthew 5:1-12 which has been our text for weeks. Beatitudes.
Jesus waited for his disciples to come to him he was ready and willing for them to be taught, but it was not the crowd that impressed Jesus, it was the willingness to admit that you need help and seek it out in the person of Jesus Christ.
Remember that burdens are meant to be shared, shouldered, and shed.
We need others to help us, we need to help others.
Realize that you are not God- life-changing if you let it.
You are not expected to carry the weight of the universe on your shoulders.
Only one person can do that and it is not Atlas, it is Jesus Christ.
Understand that you matter to God- the God that is able to carry the universe can also at the same time care for each one of us.
Stop running from Him and run toward Him.
Matthew 5:1-5:12
By looking at this text, we have seen that we consciously have to choose.
The Lord will not force Himself upon anyone. You want help, He is willing to help. You want to keep running from Him, he’ll be there when you stop running, but understand that you will also create problems you could have avoided had you come to him.
Remember the illustration of the 4 tons of birds in a 2 tons truck and the driver having to hit the wall of the truck to keep the birds flying. Well, when you are tired of balancing all those plates, and beating your head against the wall to do what is impossible in yourself, Jesus waits for you to stop the cycle of despair and reach out to Him.
He is truly the only one that can take you hurts, habits, and hang-ups.
Until you realize that, you will struggle, you will be depressed and you will carry the weight of the world on those shoulders.
Guilt destroys confidence and God desires to restore.
Guilt will keep us in the past and Jesus wants us to live in the future.
Hurts, habits, hang-ups destroy relationships and God desires to build relationships most importantly with Himself and then those that we come in contact with everyday.
There are patterns that must be broken in our lives and there are patterns that must be established in our life and we need the Lord to help us know which is which.
He offers help.
He offers healing.
He offers people in your life to help you and some are right here in this church.
You have a choice.
The choice that you make will determine quality of life and what you will receive from the Lord.
Some will know they need help but for whatever reason will decline his help.
I cannot do anything for you except to prayer that you have a change of heart.
I want to talk to those that decide that they want help.
The people that decide they are willing to submit themselves to God and allow Him to do something amazing in their lives and through their lives.
You have tried everything that you know to try. What do you have to lose?
To have any kind of recovery, you must submit to the one that can help you and He has a name and it is Jesus Christ. The difference between Celebrate Recovery and AA or NA is that we know who the higher power is and we know His name.
It is to understand that God gets no pleasure out of someone hurting and will use that situation to help you or help others.
That sometimes what we have went through is a tool that God will use to help us help others. He recycles pain if you will to help someone else.
God requires two kinds of surrender.
(1) One is the surrender of our lives so that He can accomplish what He wants for our lives.
(2) Two; is to surrender ourselves so that God can use us to help others.
People refuse to surrender to the Lordship of Christ.
They want complete control of their life and they are making a mess of it. Lord offers to help but most people refuse. When we do not listen to God’s instructions, we will crash and burn. That is a fact of life and most people determine that they will learn that lesson the hard way.
A phrase in the church is “commit your life to Jesus.”
You have heard it and I have said it many times. I have asked you to commit to Christ.
Commit and surrender are two different things.
You can be committed to something and not sold out. Example- Committed to lose weight, but cheat and eat the wrong things. You can commit to pray everyday, read your bible daily, be in church on a regular basis, and not do any of those things and most will not know that you are not committed.
Surrender is another story.
Surrender by definition is to give up your rights.
“Cease resistance to an enemy or opponent and submit to their authority.” The Lord here is not the enemy but we treat him like the enemy until we surrender and cease resistance and submit to His authority.
Society has enough of saying they are committed to things. The church has enough people saying they are committed to the things of God both for our lives and the life of the church.
We need Surrender- to cease the resistance and treating God like the enemy and surrender to His authority as Lord of our lives.
Illustration-
As I was working on this sermon, it was like a man or women being placed in the middle of a big ocean without a life preserver and bobbing for their life and the Lord offering them a preserver and they tell the Lord that they do not need his help they are going to swim to shore on their own. It is impossible, it is not going to happen, but they are too proud or too stubborn to accept God’s help.
Surrender is ceasing to fight God and taking the help He offers and realizing that by doing that we are better off than if we did it on our own
Jesus made a statement to his disciples- He said “Follow Me”
He gave them a choice- follow me or stay where they were. If they were to follow, He wanted them to not look back into the past but forward to the future.
Why would He expect that?
Because to look back would cause you to go back. To want the things in the past more than what the Lord wants you to have in the future.
The Lord demands surrender. To talk commitment and total surrender, and live far short of it is to only fool ourselves.
We ask God to bless our mess! And the Lord says that He blesses obedience.
Churches today are filled with believers living far short of what God intends and they have no idea why they are not seeing God’s power in their lives.
Little devotion, little consecration to God, little confessed sin, little obedience to God’s truth equals little power in our lives.
1 Kings 18:21-
“Elijah went before the people and said, how long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him, but if Baal is God, follow him.”
So many believers have one foot in the church and one foot in the world, one foot in commitment to the Lord and one foot fighting God because you are trying to do things your way.
“How long will you waver between two opinions? The scripture says they answered not a word.
They could not deny it.
There is a reason that you cannot serve two masters.
You shall love the Lord God with all your heart, and all your soul, and all your mind.
All your thoughts
All your passions
All your speech
All your relationships
All your possessions
Everything
To see the blessings of God, you will have to submit or surrender to God.
You will have to determine that you will be like minded and not all over the spectrum of Christianity.
How is that done? By Jesus Christ.
How is it accomplished- one of my favorite verses
“Being confident of this very thing, that he which hath began a good work in you will perform it until the day of Christ.”
Closing
I have preached hard at you for several weeks. I know what Christ can do in a life and I want it for each of us. Some will reject it and I will keep praying for you , but truly believe some will dare to trust the Lord and He will accomplish great things in the days to come. Surrender is not a sign of weakness, it is the beginning o strength. Strength that comes from on high and has no limits.
Serenity prayer is not in the bible but it is a biblical truth
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Give me the strength to accept the things that I cannot change.
Give me the courage to change the things that I can change. I surrender those things to you Lord. Make me who you want me to be and do all the things that you want me to do. Allow me to be your hands and feet here on earth.
Let me to know the difference because I have a strong relationship in you and hear from you everyday for direction and wisdom.
Would you bow your head with me this morning?
