Weekend Message/Devotion
September 8, 2019
Are You HIS? To The End?
Psalm 139:18
Sermon Prayer: “Heavenly Father, I stand before Your people, to deliver Your message. Though the words are mine and I prepared this message, I pray that this message is Your message in its entirety. I pray your blessing and anointing on the message, its delivery, its reception - and most of all, its application in our lives.” Amen
Weekend Message/Devotion
“How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! I try to count them – they are more than the sand; I come to the end- I am still with you.” Psalm 139:17-18
The words in verse 17 above are not questions they are statements of observations and realizations.
It isn’t often that I derive at a sermon message from among all the assigned lectionary readings for the day. Today, I shall be doing just that. The Old Testament reading for today is Jeremiah 18:1-11. If you recall, Jeremiah is one of the three major prophets. Most of us have heard and understand this reading. It is the visit to the potter’s house. The potter is at his wheel creating a vessel from the clay. What he was working on wasn’t coming together in a manner or design to please him. So, he simply takes the clay from the wheel and reshapes it to the blob; places it back on the wheel; and begins to reshape it.
We are to realize that we are each that blob of clay in the hands of Our Creator. He has great plans for us and desires that what He has created matures in accordance with His plans. When we decide that we might do a better job on our own and go astray in our thoughts and actions which are contrary to His design for us, we may wind up being a broken vessel. Many good things that He designed us to be and to do get left undone, which go against a larger design for all of His creation. The twists and turns of world history attest to just that fact.
It is very significant to understand the blob of clay at the potter's wheel is inanimate and has no will of its own. The blob of clay in God's hands (that would be us) has a will that can be self-destructive.
World Wars evolve from selfish motives where man has decided that he might do a better job for a nation or for the people of the world. Individually, we make decisions and act without a second thought as to what God’s plan for us might be. When I retired from law enforcement many years ago, I cashed my pension in, paid the penalty and bought a restaurant and catering business on the Miami River in South Florida. That was NOT what God had in mind for His creation and that vessel was shattered by category 5 Hurricane Andrew. We had just consummated the sale and didn’t even have insurance in place, when we were left with nothing but memories of what we thought “could have been”.
“but if that creation does evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will change my mind about the good that I had intended to do to it.” Jeremiah 18:10
“I declare to you today that you shall perish; you shall not live long in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying Him, and holding fast to Him, for that means life to you and length of days so that you may live in the land that the LORD swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob.” Deuteronomy 30:18-20
I don’t believe that I had evil intentions but admit readily that I did not hear the voice of God. I didn’t even think about God or seeking His will/design for my life. We just don’t often give much thought to what God has designed us to be, do we? If we are honest with ourselves, we just kind of keep God on a heavenly shelf to be called upon when WE think we need Him. Sure, we go to church, we pray a lot, we sing praises and do all kinds of “churchy” stuff. But how much do we include God in our daily lives? How often do we ask God about important decisions and really seek His will? I laughed at myself as I typed that last question thinking sometimes we already know and are so full of our own ambitions and self that we really don’t want to hear what God would say. That observation cries out for a hardy “AMEN!”
You see, we simply cannot be on again/off again believers. I once shared a sermon with the question; “If we truly believe but don’t practice what we believe, do we really believe?” Ponder that!
We can reinforce our beliefs by taking to heart the readings of today AND doing something positive with them.
This message is not intended to impart some legalistic or ritualistic practice of going to God with every little decision that we make. God doesn’t need to be consulted about the color of a suit or dress you may be thinking of buying. We may want to feel assured that our clothing is not provocative, however. We also can’t expect God to put His stamp of approval on anything that we think about doing that we already know goes against His will. It would be ludicrous to ask God to give the okay to go outside the bounds of marriage because you feel neglected and lonely. It is NOT in the will of God to fudge on taxes or insurance because you need the money. When I have been questioned about the insurance claims, it always comes up that the insurance company agreed to pay so why is it wrong? It would only be wrong if you exaggerated your loss. When it comes to “punitive” damages, then it is a matter of what a court decides based upon the circumstances. I truly hope you can see the difference. Again, you already know within your heart, if you don’t believe me, ask HIM.
“How weighty to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! I try to count them – they are more than the sand; I come to the end - I am still with you.” Psalm 139:17-18
My sister went home to be with the LORD, August 26. She was and is with HIM. I certainly believe that I will be with Him when my end comes, and you?
Let us now go forth to LOVE and SERVE God by loving and serving each other – ALL OTHERS!
Let us pray.
I humbly and sincerely ask for your prayers!
https://churchleaders.com/outreach-missions/outreach-missions-articles/311609-how-to-pray-for-your-pastor-ronnie-floyd.html?utm_source=outreach-cl-daily-nl&utm_medium=email&utm_content=read-more&utm_campaign=cl-daily-nl&maropost_id=&mpweb=256-7370272[HG1]
Note: It is the practice of this church to preach straight from the bible. We follow the lectionary assigned readings from which the sermon/messages are derived.
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