Sunday's Sermon

Yesterday's sermon had me choking back tears by the end, between that and the worship music it was difficult.  I was longing for my loved ones to be next to me listening, but it was only my ears that heard.  The sermon was titled "Run baby Run" on Jonah Chapter one.

Jonah ran away from God in disobedience.  A storm developed because of his actions.  When we compromise, it is not a good thing, in fact its more like a killer.  One step of disobedience will spiral down to the next and the next...Sin always takes us further than we even want to go.  It starts in our minds with our thoughts then filters out into our lives through our actions and words.

Storms are apart of our lives.  I'm in the middle of one right now.  I know that God will use this storm for good and refinement.  Storms are important despite what you go through and all the pain or fear that might come with each one.

God will use whatever he wants to get our attention or that of those around us.  Our personal storms could be our disobedience or others that spills over into our lives.

When asking the Lord "What do you want me to do?" are you ready to do what he is asking you to do.  Its a question that I've been pondering. 

There are three things that we to do in order to have the Lord speak to us in the middle of our storms of life.

1. repent and believe in the gospel
turn from sin and run toward Christ

2. Don't quench the spirit
by not doing what He is leading you to do will quench the spirit

3. Do not grieve the spirit
doing what is clearly wrong, revealed in the scriptures He inspired will grieve the spirit

The question was put out there at the end....Why are you running?  Is it fear or pain or maybe its both?  Are you running from God or to God?

No one ever said being a Christian was going to be easy, in fact its hard at times.  A Christian's life is not without suffering.  Christ will also discipline us if we need it, after all he is our Heavenly Father.  One thing that also stuck out that I heard is the our lives are brief here and we are people of purpose.

Instead I'm going to ask more directly:  Lord what do you want me to learn?  How can this be used in the lives of others?

I heard the right things and sang the right things and said hello to the right people.  God is amazing and loving.  He takes such good care of us.  Thank you so much.