Tag: Following Jesus

Redirection

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Sometimes we get everything right. Sometimes we serve God in a way that explodes in the best way possible. Lives are changed; communities are made whole. And then sometimes, just when things seem poised to grow even further, God comes and interrupts what we are doing for Him to call us in a new direction. Why would He do such a thing? Today, as we wrap up our teaching series, When Life Gets in the Way, that is exactly what we are talking about. Thanks for being here throughout this journey. May you be better prepared for the interruptions you will yet face as you journey toward His kingdom. Here’s the message.

Redirection

In 2016, we thought we were moving. We had been serving our little, country church for several years, and things were going really well. But then another church reached out, and as we prayed through it and considered all of the various factors involved, it really seemed like this might be something God was doing. We inched our way through their process, but it was quickly clear that things were moving ahead pretty smoothly. It was not easy to wrap our heads around the idea of moving. The church we were serving was the first church we had ever served. They had taken a chance on a young guy fresh out of seminary. Our boys were all three born in that community. The church loved us well. But the further we moved forward, the more we got our hearts and minds wrapped around it, and the more excited we got about the prospect of what God seemed to be doing. 

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Morning Musing: Romans 14:16-18

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“Therefore, do not let your good be slandered, for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever serves Christ in this way is acceptable to God and receives human approval.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

I had a conversation the other day with a young man who is going through a tough season. He loves the Lord and earnestly desires for his life to reflect that, but his road has been rocky all the same. One of the questions he kept coming back to as we talked is what God’s will is for this or that. I finally told Him that while God cares about the details of our lives, He’s more concerned with the forest than the trees. If we are committed to honoring and glorifying Him in the large things, the small things will fall into place. That’s something like Paul is getting at here in instructing the church in Rome on how to get along together. Let’s take a look.

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Digging in Deeper: Romans 14:13-15

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“Therefore, let us no longer judge one another. Instead decide never to put a stumbling block or pitfall in the way of your brother or sister. I know and am persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. Still, to someone who considers a thing to be unclean, to that one it is unclean. For if your brother or sister is hurt by what you eat, you are no longer walking according to love. Do not destroy, by what you eat, someone for whom Christ died.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

In the early 20th century, some philosophers and literary critics, tired of what they saw as the restrictiveness of modernity, began to explore beyond its limits. Starting from the jumping off point that the meaning of a particular text isn’t fixed, they gradually began to apply this relativistic thinking to all of life. Thus cultural relativism was born. While possessing perhaps a grain of truth, relativism’s impact on culture broadly has mostly been poisonous that at least many Christian philosophers have been working to counter ever since. So then, why does Paul seem to propose a kind of relativism here? Let’s explore what he is saying and how we can create peaceful, welcoming churches.

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Waiting Is the Hardest Part

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Life brings all kinds of interruptions to our plans. And those interruptions come from all kinds of different sources. But sometimes they come from nothing. What I mean is that sometimes our lives get interrupted when what we expected to happen, what we expected God to do, doesn’t happen. We find ourselves facing downtime when we thought we were going to be actively doing something…anything. As we continue in the second-to-last part of our teaching series, we are talking today about what to do when we face the interruption of waiting.

Waiting Is the Hardest Part

So, the other day, I had told somebody that I would show up to help them do something at a certain time. I’m the kind of person who would rather be ten minutes early than two minutes late. So, true to form, I showed up about fifteen minutes before I said I would be there. That gave me time to make sure everything was ready when they arrived. As I was pulling in, though, I got a text: “Running a bit behind.” Given who was meeting me, I wasn’t all that surprised. I went inside and started doing the things I knew I needed to do. By the planned meeting time, all of that was done. So, I twiddled my thumbs for a bit. Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then fifteen. I expected a little late, but not that much. So, I started doing some other things I hadn’t planned on doing. Then I got those done too. The waiting wasn’t what I planned, but it turned out more useful than I expected. 

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Digging in Deeper: Acts 5:34-39

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“But a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law who was respected by all the people, stood up in the Sanhedrin and ordered the men to be taken outside for a little while. He said to them, ‘Men of Israel, be careful about what you’re about to do to these men. Some time ago Theudas rose up, claiming to be somebody, and a group of about four hundred men rallied to him. He was killed, and all his followers were dispersed and came to nothing. After this man, Judas the Galilean rose up in the days of the census and attracted a following. He also perished, and all his followers were scattered. So in the present case, I tell you, stay away from these men and leave them alone. For if this plan or this work is of human origin, it will fail; but if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them. You may even be found fighting against God.’ They were persuaded by him.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Baptists love to have meetings. Better yet, we love to have business meetings. If you hang around a Baptist church long enough, you will eventually have the chance to attend a business meeting. I daresay you would be hard pressed to find a Baptist church that doesn’t have regular business meetings in some form or fashion. Our next one is coming up here in a few weeks. I had the chance to attend the annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention this week. As far as meetings go, it was about as vanilla and uncontroversial as you could have hoped for. But on the last afternoon, something grabbed hold of my attention in a big way. I will almost certainly develop it into a whole sermon at some point. It really was that powerful. Let me tell you about it.

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