Our purpose / His Purpose For Us

• Praise - cd

• Prayer

. . . —Luke 18:31, 34 and all things that are written by the prophets concerning the Son of Man will be accomplished.’ . . . But they understood none of these things . . . —Luke 18:31, 34

1. God called Jesus to (in human terms) absolute disaster – triumph in His eyes.

a) disciple saw events unfold and take place, didn’t understand at time.

b) Jesus (God) called Paul to same

3. God’s purpose is never same as man’s purpose

3. God’s purpose is to be a Father to all of His Creation (us)

Give us benefit of His Wisdom –

1 Cor. 3:19

For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness.

James 3:17

But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, [and] easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality, and without hypocrisy.

2. God’s call comes to our lives as well

1. don’t confuse call with end purpose

2. purpose is never understood (at time – Jacob)

3. call requires obedience

4. obedience requires faith - God has given all “measure of faith” – Rom 12:3 For I say, through the grace given unto me, to every man that is among you, not to think [of himself] more highly than he ought to think; but to think soberly, according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith.

5. All faith given equally – “more highly” / like God saying “you’re no better”

6. faith requires relationship with Him – renew you mind / Rom 12:1&2

3. no one hears, or recognizes unless that person has a prior relationship with Him

1. Oswald Chamber put it this way –“ The call of God is like the call of the sea— no one hears it except the person who has the nature of the sea in him.”

1. We MUST know Him as our Lord and savior
2. We must have know Him I – have relationship renew your mind – Rom 12:1-2
3. our purpose and God’s purpose must be one in same
4. we must let God be God – Word says to “lean not to our own understanding”
5. Prov. 1-4 particularly address

6. Let God and His Word guide every phase of our lives

God’s Word is very practical (every chapter, James in particular) and should be the determining standard for every question we have or compare every answer the world gives us.

When we know and rely on Him for Wisdom and we let him truly be our dad, only then will His Word be the standard that we compare everything to with confidence. Look at spiritual Father the same way we look at our earthly father

God the Father intended to be the template for fatherly behavior on earth (the way He treats His kids to be way we treat ours)

Wise As Serpents

Text -

Matt 10:16

Behold, I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.

Read Matt :11–17

Reference today – Bible, Sparking Gems From The Greek

Jesus getting ready to send disciples out to witness – preach the Gospel –start the church as we know it. Think of that … a vital part of God re-establishing His Kingdom.

• No punctuation early Greek. I have to believe Jesus Knew this would be written down for you and me to take instruction from. So what He said is translated verily, verily.

• He was telling them and us to LISTEN UP! - WHAT I’M ABOUT TO SAY IS IMPORTANT.
• Whenever we see verily, verily or in some versions, truly, truly listen carefully to what He is going to say, it’s important!
• Jesus gave at least 6 instructions and some consequences for the

disciples and the people for listening or not listening to them.

• Get to vs 16 and tells them to be “wise as serpents”

In this verse, Jesus instructs His disciples (and us) to be “wise as serpents.” The word “wise” is the Greek word pronimos, which means prudent, careful, cunning, discerning, thoughtful, intelligent,

or sensible. This word perfectly depicts the behavior and actions of snakes. They are very careful, discerning, intelligent, and prudent in how they act. The Greek word for “serpent” is the word ophis, which is the normal Greek word that refers to a snake.

It is a fact that Jesus told us that we need to be “wise as serpents”! The Greek literally means we

need to be as prudent, discerning, intelligent, thoughtful, and careful as snakes! There is obviously something Jesus wanted us to learn from the behavior of snakes, so I took the time to think about this subject. Finally, I understood exactly why Jesus used this example and how it applies to all of us regarding

our families, businesses, ministries, or any opportunity God places before us in life.

• Snakes blend in with their surrounding

• They are in any particular place for one reason, that reason is survival.

First, when serpents move into a new territory, they don’t announce their presence. Instead, they lay low, stay quiet, and blend into the environment. In fact, you can walk right past a snake and not even realize it! Snakes have the ability to be nearly invisible. They are designed to be camouflaged. This camouflage serves as a protective covering. The vilest aggressor can walk right past, but the serpent is not noticed because it has blended so well into the landscape. That camouflage gives the serpent latitude to move about freely as it finds its way around new territory. As snakes evaluate a new situation, they see what kind of opportunities are in the area. They identify places of shelter. They find “hiding places” to protect themselves from attack. They observe to see where they can find the easiest prey. When all these facts are assimilated, the serpent is ready to act. But this “settling-in” period is a key time for a serpent.

And Jesus said there is wisdom in a serpent’s behavior from which we need to learn! When God calls you or me to do something new — to move to new territory or to seize a divine opportunity — it is wisdom for us to move carefully and slowly into that new phase of our lives.

A common mistake is to act too fast. Acting hastily before all the facts are gathered and assimilated can lead us to bad decisions based on incomplete, or even worse - false information. In fact, one serious mistake can cause us to lose an opportunity altogether. I can testify to you about this firsthand.

It is better to lay low, stay quiet, and blend into the environment for a while, learning from the sights and the facts we observe.

We need to apply this to every phase of our lives – we have to be sensitive to The Spirit so we can gather facts and information : Most serious mistakes are avoidable when moving to a new situation or environment. I strongly advise you to take your time and be sure of the actions you take before you ever act.

I would suggest that you first:

• Learn the landscape of your new environment.

• Locate places of spiritual shelter for you and your family.
• See what kind of attacks could potentially come against you.
• Take time to really understand the opportunities around you.
• Take advantage of your preparation time before you announce great and glorious

plans, making sure that you are completely informed of all the facts.

Once we have gathered all the facts and know who and what the dangers are we must act and seize the moment!

• Don’t let fear or conventional “wisdom” rule (lean not your own understanding - Proverbs)
• Be sensitive to The Holy Spirit’s leading
• New ventures God springs on us are always scary – remember: you must rely on Him “where God guides, He provides”. (Pastor Dan)
• But, how do I know it’s God? –

1. listen – spend as much time listening in quiet time as talking when praying. Do you like someone who talks all the time? Do we learn more by listening or talking?
2. get to know Him – thru His Word / Renew your mind (Rom 12:1&2, Josh 1:8)

3. When we act. we must act in faith – “without faith it is impossible to please Him” Heb 11:6

4. diligently seek Him

What if I miss it?

• Everyone misses God from time to time

• Rom 8:28

• don’t miss God on purpose, because you think He is going to bail out of your recklessness, but know that by doing something, it is easier to change course and make adjustments than miss an opportunity altogether because of being afraid to act. (example of stationary car harder to turn steering wheel than one moving). Take this in context.

• Diligently seek Him

Diligently seeking Him is always the answer, whether we are in good circumstances or bad.

God's Pursuit Of Man

·    
Gen 1 :1-3    God created heaven and earth – note The Spirit brooded over the waters – caring / salvation.  God is good…..all the time…..that’s the way God is - the model for all parents dealing with their children.

·        even before man’s existence God cared for and planned to take care of mankind to begin pursuit

·        Dictionary.com’s definition of “pursuit”

                              1. The act or an instance of chasing or pursuing.

2.  The act of striving: the pursuit of higher education.

3.  An activity, such as a vocation or hobby, engaged in regularly.

•      out of desire for fellowship and deep caring - established first a place for man and gave him everything he needed – you only pursue what you care about.

examples -

Adam / Eve – Disobedience in Garden

·        Gen 3:9  “where are you?” – among God’s first dealing’s/man – He had relationship (Gen 3:21) – walked in cool of day

• ·        When Adam disobeyed, God started relentless pursuit of mankind

                 

Dictionary.com

re·lent·less–adjective   - that does not relent; unyielding severe, strict, or harsh; unrelenting:   —Synonyms
rigid, unbending, obdurate, adamant, unyielding.

• God, without giving up – relentless – unyielding – never stops

•   Adam said “we are hiding because we are naked” – at that point (they didn’t realize it) they were spiritually as well as physically naked – without God – vulnerable.

•   Gen. 3:21 - God took care of them – made clothes for them from animal skins – already taking care of them. Begins pursuit – even though fallen state.

•   Gen. 22:7-8  Abraham knew God would provide either through his son or His Son – Abraham did not know specifically about Jesus, but knew God would reward obedience and provide one way or other.

•  Gen. 22:10-13 – Abraham / Isaac – God provided sacrifice (His compassion – He found one man faithful) – Was God bound to sac. Jesus since Abe willing to sac. Isaac? (would God be outdone – “no man is greater than his master”)

•   Took care of Noah (preserve Noah and family – as well as pursuing and preserving mankind) 

•    God takes care of man, throughout  history, in ALL dealings with mankind regardless of degree of  Love. God is Love – 1 John 4:8 – everything He does - whether it seems like it or not, is done out of love. – IT HIS NATURE!

•  rescued nation from Egypt

•  provided means for escape – Pharaoh – Red Sea

•   gave them manna, quail, water

•  Duet 30:19 told them what was good for them and then told them what to choose/do

             (life-death - choose life)….not  only physical but spiritua

• even though trip took longer than it should have God took care of them and got them there

•  Through tough love – a cycle of God punishing and man coming back and the falling away again - etc. etc. He (God) pursued (pursues) man relentlessly because of unquenchable desire to have relationship with him.

•    God made final sacrifice for us – taking care of and providing sacrifice in His Son (Him) for us – we can not be good enough or take care of ourselves.

•  How to accept His help – Rom 10:9…Eph 2:-9

• His pursuit so relentless He made it about Him rescuing us – not us rescuing us, then up to us to make final decision whether we want to be rescued or not.

• He knew and we proved time and time again He would have to do redemptive work for us.

• One final plea for us – Rev 3:20 (door of heart and knock) (pursue/knock example)

• Rev 22:13 – Alpha & Omega – 1^st and last to say about our lives –

•  Eph 1:4 foundations of earth 1^st thing to say -

•    John 3:17-18 – last thing to say JUDGED ALREADY in the sense that His decision, should we not accept Christ has already bean made.

• God does not know time – past, present and future are all the same (my opinion). So “where are you?” has same relevance today to us as it did to Adam

• He always pursues us – it’s His Nature / up to us to answer call (at the door of our hearts) –

•  Heb 11:6-7 - When we respond the circle of pursuit beginsHe rewards us with his presence

throughout the Bible God seems less interested in proving existence but more interested in showing what He is like.

The Word Became Flesh

• Pray
• Text –  John 1:1-14

The Word Became Flesh

 

1)   In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

2)   He was with God in the beginning.

3)   Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.

4)   In him was life, and that life was the light of men.

5)   The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood^[a] it.

6)   There came a man who was sent from God; his name was John.

7)   He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all men might believe.

8)   He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

9)   The true light that gives light to every man was coming into the world.^[b]

10)   He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.

11)   He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.

12)   Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—

13)   Children born not of natural descent,^[c] nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.  

14)   The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only,^[d] who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

 This time of year, we celebrate the coming of Jesus in the flesh, fully God and at the time of His coming and fully man. We celebrate Emmanuel - God with us. We should celebrate. Jesus is with us not only in the spirit world we can't see, but also in the physical, the touch and feel world you and I call reality. He's with us now as surely as He was that night in Bethlehem or that day at Golgotha or when He walked out of that tomb three days later!

John vs.1-14 tells us Jesus is God and the next verses tell us that He came to earth. Think about that...GOD CAME TO EARTH. God came to earth to fix a broken relationship with man. To re-establish His Kingdom on earth. To conquer sin and death - so that you and I, by trusting Emmanuel - God With Us as our Lord and Savior could have right standing with God.

When we consider that Jesus IS God and IS the Word, we know that we have access, through His Word  - the Bible, -  to The God Of The Universe. Through reading the Bible, thinking about what we read and prayer, Jesus will literally speak life changing wisdom into your life.

Takes more faith to believe than not to believe when you consider:

1.    Word of God 66 books written by 40 people. 2 Timothy 3:16 tells us all Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness – The Bible agrees with itself – from cover to cover

·        In this day and age with fax and email I doubt if we could get 20 of our friends to totally agree on any one point let alone hundreds.

2.    The odds of the prophesy in The Bible that have been fulfilled the are about 17,000,000 to 1.The odds of unfulfilled prophesy in The Bible coming true are exponentially higher.

3.    History has proven – Hittite Empire - (mentioned only in Bible) A Hittite city has been uncovered by archeologist.

4.    Countless ruins and archeological discoveries confirm places and events mentioned in Bible. With these discoveries we confirm much of what is contained in the Bible. We have enough solid evidence that it becomes easy to accept by faith things we don't understand yet.

 Jhn 1:8,9; Jhn 8:12; Jhn 9:5; Jhn 12:35,46; Psa 84:11; Isa 35:4,5; Isa 42:6,7,16; Psa 49:6; Psa 60:1-3; Mal 4:2; Mat 4:16; Luk 1:78,79; Luk 2:32; Act 26:23; Eph 5:14; 1Jo 1:5-7; Rev 22:16