6, February 2005
Dakota Community Church
Turning Points
Introduction:
Did I ever tell you about the young Zoad?
Who came to a sign at the fork of the road
He looked one way and the other way too
The Zoad had to make up his mind what to do - Well, the Zoad scratched his head,
And his chin, and his pants. - And he said to himself, "I’ll be taking a chance.
If I go to Place One, that place may be hot
So how will I know if I like it or not.
On the other hand, though, I’ll feel such a fool
If I go to Place Two and find it’s too cool
In that case I may catch a chill and turn blue.
So Place One may be best and not Place Two.
Play safe," cried the Zoad,
"I’ll play safe, I’m no dunce.
I’ll simply start off to both places at once.
And that’s how the Zoad who would not take a chance
Went no place at all with a split in his pants.
Those words of wisdom from Dr. Suess really do describe many people.
Ester 4: 11-16
"All the king’s officials and the people of the royal provinces know that for any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned the king has but one law: that he be put to death. The only exception to this is for the king to extend the gold scepter to him and spare his life. But thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king."
When Esther’s words were reported to Mordecai, he sent back this answer: "Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?"
Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: "Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my maids will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish."
John 12: 12-19
The next day the great crowd that had come for the Feast heard that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem. They took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, “Hosanna!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Blessed is the King of Israel!” Jesus found a young donkey and sat upon it, as it is written, “Do not be afraid, O Daughter of Zion;
see, your king is coming,
seated on a donkey’s colt.”
At first his disciples did not understand all this. Only after Jesus was glorified did they realize that these things had been written about him and that they had done these things to him.
Now the crowd that was with him when he called Lazarus from the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to spread the word. Many people, because they had heard that he had given this miraculous sign, went out to meet him. So the Pharisees said to one another, “See, this is getting us nowhere. Look how the whole world has gone after him!”
There must have been a level of character already established in the heart of Ester in order for her to be able to make the choice she made at this turning point in her life.
What must have been in the hearts of these Pharisees that would allow them to choose to want to respond to the turning point Jesus presented them with in the fashion that they did.
Basically they said, "Hey this guy raised a dead guy and now all kinds of people are folowing him instead of us, how can we kill him?"
Over the course of our lives we can all look back and reflect on the turning points that made a huge difference in the path our lives have taken.
We can easily look back and recognize the forks in the road; they are not always easy to see at the time!
Illustration:
In Louis Carroll’s book Alice in Wonderland, Alice comes to a fork in the road and doesn’t know which way to turn. She sees the grinning Cheshire cat and asks which direction she should take. The cat replies, “That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.”
How can we be certain that we are ready to make the right decision when we unexpectedly find ourselves at a fork in the road?
- When a new relationship comes into our lives.
- When a new business or job opportunity arises.
- When we are considering a move or a new church.
Tonight I want to talk about making the right decisions when we face the turning points of life.
1. We need to live ready!
It is too late to prepare when the moment is upon us.
Ester was able to make this statement, “If I perish, I perish” only because she already had some depth and understanding of God and life and eternity.
How could she be ready to that? How can we?
a.) We must keep our love for the Lord passionate.
Watch Him, worship Him, and imitate Him.
John 15: 7-8
If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
John 2: 13-17
When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found men selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! How dare you turn my Father’s house into a market!”
His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.”
b.) We must keep a joyful attitude.
Nehemiah 8: 10
Nehemiah said, "Go and enjoy choice food and sweet drinks, and send some to those who have nothing prepared. This day is sacred to our Lord. Do not grieve, for the joy of the LORD is your strength."
Galatians 5: 22
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Romans 14: 17
For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness, peace and joy in the Holy Spirit
Proverbs 15: 13, 15, and 30
A happy heart makes the face cheerful but heartache crushes the spirit.
All the days of the oppressed are wretched, but the cheerful heart has a continual feast.
A cheerful look brings joy to the heart, and good news gives health to the bones.
Like Smith Wigglesworth we need to learn to tell ourselves how we are going to feel about things.
Learn to laugh at yourself.
Psalm 23: 5-6
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies. You anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. Surely goodness and love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the LORD forever.
The oppressed are wretched but the cheerful have a feast!
Fake joy is better than genuine misery.
Learn to unburden yourself by casting your cares upon God.
1Peter 5:7
Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
Illustration:
How much does a glass of water weigh? It is not the weight it is how long you carry it.
You were not designed to carry stress and anxiety.
c.) We must stay filled with the Spirit of God.
Acts 4: 30-31
Stretch out your hand to heal and perform miraculous signs and wonders through the name of your holy servant Jesus.”
After they prayed, the place where they were meeting was shaken. And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke the word of God boldly.
They were filled again!
Pray in the Spirit for edification.
1Corinthians 4: 4
He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church.
Illustration:
There are three kinds of Christians:
(1) Row-boat Christians—struggling in their own power; stop to rest for a while, only to find that the current has taken them back where they started.
(2) Sail-boat Christians—let the wind do all the work; enjoy the high moments, But what happens when the doldrums come?
(3) Steam powered Christians—take the water of the Word and combine it with the fire of the Holy Spirit and there is constant power no matter what the conditions!
The entrance of His Word brings light.
2. We must realize that life involves taking risks.
Everything in life that is worth having involves risk.
- Marriage
- Ministry
- Travel
- Having Kids
Illustration:
The founder of IBM Thomas Watson says: "The way to succeed is to double your failure rate." Or as Thomas Edison said "There is only one good idea in 100 so I want to discover the 99 failures as quick as possible.”
Here is a personal evaluation question: Do I view failure as an opportunity for growth in the kingdom or as a personal indictment? Just think about these things for a moment.
Every 9 sales calls will only bear 1 sale. It takes 9 times of hearing the gospel in a variety of 6 mediums before someone typically responds to Christ. Do you realize that successful people have 9 times more failures than unsuccessful people?
Roughly 60% of all basketball shots made don’t go in. 25% of all batters make it to first base. In an oil company, only 10% of oil wells drilled hit oil. For actors, only 1 out of 30 auditions turns up in something that is of value. Two out of 5 investments are winners.
John Maxwell says it this way: We need to take success and failure concerning ourselves much less seriously and take God much more seriously.
We need to seed a risk taking mind set. We need to constantly be planting seeds that will develop a mind set that is willing to take risks.
There is always risk involved when we stand at the cross roads. The turning points are dangerous times; but, that is no reason to be paralyzed with fear.
2Kings 7: 3-7
Now there were four men with leprosy at the entrance of the city gate. They said to each other, "Why stay here until we die? If we say, ’We’ll go into the city’-the famine is there, and we will die. And if we stay here, we will die. So let’s go over to the camp of the Arameans and surrender. If they spare us, we live; if they kill us, then we die."
At dusk they got up and went to the camp of the Arameans. When they reached the edge of the camp, not a man was there, for the Lord had caused the Arameans to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a great army, so that they said to one another, "Look, the king of Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings to attack us!" So they got up and fled in the dusk and abandoned their tents and their horses and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.
The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.
Then they said to each other, "We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace."
a.) Calculate the risk – count the cost.
Jesus was counting the cost in the garden of Gethsemane:
Mark 14: 35-36
Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. “Abba, Father,” he said, “Everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”
John 10: 18
No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”
Matthew 26: 51-54
With that, one of Jesus’ companions reached for his sword, drew it out and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear.
“Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him, “for all who draw the sword will die by the sword. Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?”
Most elderly people when asked if they would do anything different say they would take more risks.
- Put it on paper.
- What is the worst that could happen?
b.) Check your faith / fear meter.
Isaiah 35: 3-4
Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; say to those with fearful hearts, "Be strong, do not fear; your God will come, he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you."
You should never do anything that fear is the primary motivating factor for.
Many tried to warn Kathy and I not to get married.
Fear sees goliath too big to kill – faith sees goliath too big to miss.
3. After counting the cost we must act.
Only you can make the move when you stand at the turning point.
- Knowing what to do is not enough.
- Being prepared is not enough.
- Information does not equal application.
You can pray about it, you can study it and gain all kinds of information about it, you can even imagine it and see it all done in your inner eye; but that will still not get it done.
You will have to act on it to get it done.
James 2: 14-17
What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
Ecclesiastics 4: 5
The fool folds his hands and ruins himself.
You are where you are because of the choices you have made; someone else may hinder you and slow you down but only you can stop you.
Think back to the turning points in your life where you failed to take action.
Numbers 13: 26-33
They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land. They gave Moses this account: "We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. But the people who live there are powerful and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites live in the Negev; the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan."
Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, "We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it."
But the men who had gone up with him said, "We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are." And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, "The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them."
This is the turning point for a generation!
Numbers14: 1-35
That night all the people of the community raised their voices and wept aloud. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, "If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this desert! Why is the LORD bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?" And they said to each other, "We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt."
Then Moses and Aaron fell facedown in front of the whole Israelite assembly gathered there. Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had explored the land, tore their clothes and said to the entire Israelite assembly, "The land we passed through and explored is exceedingly good. If the LORD is pleased with us, he will lead us into that land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and will give it to us. Only do not rebel against the LORD. And do not be afraid of the people of the land, because we will swallow them up. Their protection is gone, but the LORD is with us. Do not be afraid of them."
But the whole assembly talked about stoning them. Then the glory of the LORD appeared at the Tent of Meeting to all the Israelites. The LORD said to Moses, "How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse to believe in me, in spite of all the miraculous signs I have performed among them? I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them, but I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they."
Moses said to the LORD, "Then the Egyptians will hear about it! By your power you brought these people up from among them. And they will tell the inhabitants of this land about it. They have already heard that you, O LORD , are with these people and that you, O LORD , have been seen face to face, that your cloud stays over them, and that you go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. If you put these people to death all at one time, the nations who have heard this report about you will say, ’The LORD was not able to bring these people into the land he promised them on oath; so he slaughtered them in the desert.’
"Now may the Lord’s strength be displayed, just as you have declared: ’The LORD is slow to anger, abounding in love and forgiving sin and rebellion. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation. ’In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people, just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now."
The LORD replied, "I have forgiven them, as you asked. Nevertheless, as surely as I live and as surely as the glory of the LORD fills the whole earth, not one of the men who saw my glory and the miraculous signs I performed in Egypt and in the desert but who disobeyed me and tested me ten times- not one of them will ever see the land I promised on oath to their forefathers. No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it. But because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly, I will bring him into the land he went to, and his descendants will inherit it. Since the Amalekites and Canaanites are living in the valleys, turn back tomorrow and set out toward the desert along the route to the Red Sea."
The LORD said to Moses and Aaron: "How long will this wicked community grumble against me? I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites. So tell them, ’As surely as I live, declares the LORD , I will do to you the very things I heard you say: In this desert your bodies will fall-every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me. Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun. As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected. But you-your bodies will fall in this desert. Your children will be shepherds here for forty years, suffering for your unfaithfulness, until the last of your bodies lies in the desert. For forty years-one year for each of the forty days you explored the land-you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.’ I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me. They will meet their end in this desert; here they will die."
Live ready – Realize the risk – Take action.
PowerPoint available on request dcormie@mts.net
