Series: Destinations on the Journey of Faith
The Adventure Begins/New Discovery
Proverbs 1:7
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and instruction. (NIV)
Intro: A priest, a minister, and a rabbi were discussing the controversial question: “When does life begin?” The priest said life begins at conception. The minister said it was at “quickening‚” or possibly even birth. The rabbi said life begins when the kids leave home and the family dog dies.
G. Curtis Jones, 1000 Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1986), 212.
A couple of weeks ago I introduced this new series and today we officially get started on this journey.
Review each destination in this journey is just as important as the next…
Each place should be celebrated as a great accomplishment a new frontier of discovery in our journey with an amazing God!!!
I love to travel and see new places…as most of you know I love the coast and the beaches…
Driving to the point where the sea is just within sight…I am just like a kid I am in awe everytime…
I. The Recognition of God
Jesus said in Matt 18:2-3
He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Tell of traveling to world’s fair in bus…
What is the one thing about children that everyone loves…it’s the sense of awe and wonder at something new…children approach new places and things with an innocence and freshness that we as adults often never get back…except when it comes to the first step into a relationship with Jesus…
II. Different ways we arrive at destination one
a. A Sense of Awe
Proverbs 1:7 “The fear [AWE] of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and instruction.”
(Slides Fly IN)
Isaiah 6:5
“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the Lord Almighty.”
b. A Sense of Need
We often turn to God when we have experienced some sort of pain or discomfort in our lives…
Loss of a job…death of a loved one…diagnosis of illness…divorce/separation…
Basically it is a feeling of being scared or depressed and in these times God becomes very real to us as our source of comfort or encouragement because in the world we feel unloved and often very alone…tell the story of the man at East End just got out of prison…handing out VBS fliers Food Lion parking lot…no kids but a need to be loved and forgiven…
c. A Natural Awareness
Some people begin to search for God through the wonder of the world…
Romans 1:20
For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
d. A Search for Greater Meaning in Life
Zacchaeus Luke 19: 1-10
Tax collector very successful in the eyes of the world with riches and position. But the idea of Jesus and the stories of healing and forgiveness had drawn this wee little man to climb a tree just to get a look of Him…But Jesus saw him in the tree and invited himself to have supper in the home of this wee little man who had just enough curiosity about Jesus to climb a tree…when Jesus sat at his table he was convicted of how shallow and wrong his life had been so he pledged to change (repent) his ways and even repay with interest those he had wronged and Jesus summed it all up in
(FLY IN)
Luke 19:9 “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham.”
e. A Sense of Innocence
Again look at the way Jesus talks about the little children in
Matt 18:2-3
He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
In the past four years of service here Leslie and I have seen almost all the children in the Kid’s Church come to know God in with real sense of innocence…how sweet it is to talk to these children and in their words feel their adoration for God and his son Jesus…
III. Stuck/Caged at Destination One
While most of us can remember this wonderful time in our lives other seem to have never left this place in their journey. They become stuck and for various reasons they choose to remain right here…
a. Worthlessness
The Church and myself are guilty of constantly pushing its members to grow and do more and more as we are driven to see the Kingdom and Church expand as we seek to please our Father in Heaven…In these beginning travels with Christ the person is consumed with gaining as much of God as they can…therefore they are rightfully selfish like a child receiving instructions and training from their parents…but as the local church has demands and needs for volunteers and various other ministries that have to be taken care of we force people into the service before they are ready and in return we do more damage than good…this leads to another reason that many stay at destination one…
b. Spiritual Bankruptcy
These people feel as if they are drawn empty and never refilled spiritually and I have to say they are often right…as some of us choose to just let them do and do and do…they pour themselves out for the journey of faith that they have just begun and the rest of us let them run all the way down to empty…they are like the marathon runner who leads till the last 5 miles because they run out of gas and the rest of the field soon leaves them behind not taking the time to stop and encourage them to finish strong…
c. Martyrdom
After being left on empty these people are found to feel that the whole world and especially those within our local church are out to make life tough for them. Even to the point that the world wants to hurt and humiliate them…therefore these church people will certainly not help them or love and care for us…even if they know that this is not true and that these very people have poured themselves into supporting and loving and caring for them…this leads to anger that they just can’t deal with so we abandon the journey right here and choose to stay…
This leads to very low self-esteem…as they feel just stuck and pressured on every side…they take offense to statements that early on attracted them to the journey…they resent the very people that helped get them started on this journey…
Do feel that this destination is very familiar to you? It is very possible that many of you have gone way ahead in this journey only to find yourself back tracking to right here…it may it even feel that life has lost it significance…but I am here to tell you…
You can move forward once again!!!
You need to become a part of a strong group of believers that will support you…
You can let life take on more significance as you do really matter…to the church and most importantly to God
Find a leader to follow…we have some very good leaders in this church and any of them would be glad to help you along the way, but you have to choose to let them lead…
These are just suggestions but ultimately its between you and God to find the way that works best for you… there is no general specific way that each individual has to grow…but there is only on way and one truth and one life and that is Jesus…so ask Him to show you the way and then allow Him to speak to your heart…
Through Jesus we find that we are worth more than we ever imagined…we are worth dying for!!!!
1 Corinthians 6:19-20
Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20 you were bought at a price.
He died to purchase our souls and to give us reason to travel this journey of faith…He even gave us group of people that he wants us to travel with and that is His church…you see Satan would love to see more and more people isolated from the church so that he can toy with our emotions and push us farther and farther away from the journey because the closer you are to completing this journey the harder it is for him to influence you…
Listen if you have decided today that this is where you are on this journey I say hallelujah as that means that you are traveling…don’t find yourself saying why am I stuck here after all this time instead look forward to moving towards the next stop on this journey that we will talk about next week…
but some of you have never taken the first step in this journey your just sitting there thinking all this sounds really good but I am not there yet…
What will it take to get you to turn loose of yourself and let God carry you on this incredible journey that will lead you to the greatest adventure you could ever imagine…
