Withstanding Life’s Storms
There are three components to understand to help us withstanding life’s storms:
Everyone is hit by storms 25, 27
Everyone has the same instructions 24, 26
Everyone who acts withstands 24, 26
Introduction:
Children can be embarrassingly frank. A minister once visited a parishioner. The lady of the house was trying to impress him with how devout she was by pointing out the large Bible on the bookshelf and talking in a very reverential way about it as "the Word of God." Her young son interrupted the conversation, "Well, if that’s God’s book we better send it back to him because we never read it!"
• How many of you here today own at least one Bible in your home?
• How many of you have more than one Bible in your home?
• If you asked most Americans today, you would find that 93% own at least one Bible. Even though it has been on the bestseller list for quite some time it is the book most likely to stay on a bookshelf.
• Pollster George Gallup Jr. found after numerous surveys that only 4 in 10 Americans know that Jesus delivered the Sermon on the Mount.
• A majority of citizens cannot name the four Gospels of the New Testament.
• Only 3 in 10 teenagers know why Easter is celebrated.
• Two-thirds of Americans believe there are few, if any, absolute principles to direct human behavior.
• These beliefs are not held just by those who do not profess a faith in Jesus Christ. Nearly half of “born again” Christians deny the existence of the Holy Spirit and a real Satan.
• One in five Christians denies Jesus’ resurrection and believes he was a sinner.
Even though the mass majority of Americans may own a Bible, only a small minority of them actually read it, and only a smaller portion of them know what the Bible says, and only small fraction of them believe what the Bible teaches and only a slight few do what the Bible teaches.
We all would agree:
• that the Bible is important for us read, more so than the morning paper
• that the Bible is has life giving power to change lives (Hebrews 4:12)
• that the Bible is useful to correct, instruction, rebuke and teach us in the ways of righteousness so that we can be completely equipped children of God (2 Timothy 3:16)
• that the Bible is a lamp unto our feet and a light to our path (Psalm 119: 105)
• that if we hide the Bible in our hearts, we would not sin against God (Psalm 119:11)
Yet, we wonder why America is in such a terrible shape. We ask why our society is a mess, and why our families are such a wreck. We want to know why families fall apart when hit with a life-storm.
When problem drench us as a pouring rain, when stress surround us like a rushing flood or when pressure pound us like a howling wind, we want to know why life grumbles around us.
We all desire to stand strong and tall through the pounding winds, yet fall apart at a slight breeze. Many people desire to endure the harshest assault from life’s canon yet grumble at the sound of the first shot.
We all desire to have a strong life, yet many don’t. Why is that?
In our passage this morning, Jesus gives the answer that question. He tells us how to withstand the storms of life.
Read Matthew 7: 24-27.
There are three components to withstanding life’s storms.
1. Everyone is hit by storms. 25 & 27
We all face storms in life. Your storm is different than mine and yours comes at a different time than mine. Yet, we all face them. No one is excluded from this part of life. We all have this in common.
• Problems drench us like a driving rain.
• Stress surrounds us like rushing flood waters.
• Pressures pound us like a hurricane wind.
We must come to understand that even though our storms are different, we all have them. No one is excluded from the storms.
2. Everyone has the same instructions. 24 & 26
In the midst of the storms, we all receive the same instructions. We all are told what the best steps to take are. When the ice storms came this passed winter, we are told to not drive, and to stay in were it is safe.
Jesus also gives us instructions concerning life and the storms we face.
3. Everyone who acts withstands. 24 & 26
However, the difference comes in what we do with the instructions. We can choose to act upon them or ignore them.
During the ice storms, some chose to venture out to drive and ended up needing help out of the ice.
We choose to act on the teachings of Jesus found in the Bible or ignore them. Our very lives give evidences to them choice we have made. If we choose to act upon the teachings of the Bible our lives will show it. If we ignore the teachings, our lives show that as well.
It is also seen in other areas as well:
Our lives impacts our families
Our families impacts our church
Our church impacts our community
Our community impacts our county
Our county impacts our state which impacts ….
As much as we desire, we do not live in isolation. We impact others around us. Look at our own family, not such your household, but the extended family as well, and ask this question: What storms have hit that family, and how did they respond?
Our choice to be obedient to God’s Word directly impacts the ministry of the church—
• Leaders ignoring the Word, falling into sin, destroying their testimony and effectiveness for ministry
• Members ignoring to the GREAT COMMISION—Matthew 28:19-20
• Outreach on Mondays
Application:
If you are one who really wants to live a life that can withstand any storm that may blow your way, here are a few things for you. Now some of you here will say that is good preacher, I enjoyed the service, and leave here to do the same old thing. Then you will wonder in your heart of hearts, why life is so cold, empty, cruel, and a mess. The reason is because you are hearing with your ears and not with your heart. You hear me speaking but you’re not listening to God’s voice. You are listening with your ears to be listening, but you are not hearing with your heart to be changed. That is what God wants to do this morning, He wants to change your life, not fill your ears.
So, if you really want to have a life that can withstand the storms, then hear these four things. They are I choose statements in your study guide.
I want to withstand life’s storms so I choose:
• To be a Word doer
But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. James 1:22
• To stop excusing disobedience
Proverbs 28:13
He who covers his sins will not prosper,
But whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.
• To believe obedience brings blessings
James 1:25
But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.
Numbers 14:22-24
Because all these men who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have put Me to the test now these ten times, and have not heeded My voice, 23 they certainly shall not see the land of which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who rejected Me see it. 24 But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.
• To stop believing disobedience is acceptable
Isaiah 59:2
But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear.
