Keep Moving Forward – John 21

8 12 2008

It is not uncommon for people to be excited about their salvation and then their baptism, but then go to a place sometime later of a loss of passion. Everybody gets the blahs. I would say that at the start of this chapter Peter had the Christian blahs.

8 things we need to remember during spiritual dryness.

1. We need Jesus to reveal himself to you, again. 1

  • Jesus appears to restore
  • Jesus appears to remind

2. It could be because of sin. 15-19

  • Peter had denied Jesus three times.

3. Our purpose in life is not just to make money. 3

  • Peter went fishing for fish instead of for men.
  • We are to live everyday for the glory of God.

4. We must hold to the original command to “Follow me” 19, 22

  • When Jesus called Peter the first time his said, “Follow me.”  Matt. 4:18-19

5. We must love Jesus. 15-19

  • We may think like Peter that it is obvious that we love Jesus, but do we love him in all things we do?  Do we love him the most?  Do we put him first in our lives?

6. We must obey. 6

  • Had the disciples not obey Jesus in throwing their nets to the other side they would not received the blessing catching 153 fish.

7. We must not get distracted by others. 21-23

  • Peter was worried about John when he should have been focusing on his own task of following Jesus.

8. We can do nothing without Jesus. 3


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When a Generation Goes Astray – Judges 2:6-15

9 06 2008

A generation goes astray when they have no leadership. 8-9

  • Joshua had died – leaving a gap in the leadership.

  • A generation goes astray when its parents have low expectation.

  • Parents don’t expect their kids to be responsible any more.

  • Sowing my wild oats. He will grow up eventually.

  • There weren’t always teenagers.

A generation goes astray when people do not remember the work the Lord has done in the past. 10

     

A generation goes astray when the people do not experience the Lord for themselves. 10

  • Some will speak of being something they have not experienced themselves. They trust in their parents religion.

A generation goes astray when they prosper. 6

  • They inherited the land (flowing with milk and honey)

  • It is good for everybody to struggle to some degree.

A generation that goes astray will meet the vengeance of God. 14-16

  • The question is not will God punish, but when will it happen.

  • Even though their parents may not have done the best, God holds them responsible.

  • The devil didn’t make you do it.

  • It’s my parents fault. NO!!!!


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The Haunting Effects of Sin by Doug Eaton

21 05 2008


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The Death of Jesus and Our Joyful Salvation – Eph. 2:11-22

18 03 2008

Jesus Died to bring us near to God. v. 12, 13

1 Peter 3:18 For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit,

Jesus didn’t died just to forgive us, He did to bring us to God.

  • “All the words of the gospel lead to [God], or they are not gospel. For example, salvation is not good news if it only saves from hell and not for God. Forgiveness is not good news if it only gives relief from guilt and doesn’t open the way to God. Justification is not good news if it only makes us legally acceptable to God but doesn’t bring fellowship with God. Redemption is not good news if it only liberates us from bondage but doesn’t bring us to God. Adoption is not good news if it only puts us in the Father’s family, but not in his arms.” John Piper (Fifty Reasons why Jesus Came to Die, p 62).

  • You don’t apologize to a friend just because you feel bad. You apologize to restore the friendship.

  • A person who seeks God’s forgiveness just because he doesn’t want to go to hell is like a man who apologizes to his friend saying, “I don’t like that guy, but I’m going to apologize because I need to feel better about myself.”

  • If Jesus’ death doesn’t draw us to God, then we have misunderstood why Jesus died.

  • How do you know if repentance is authentic? Did it draw them to God.

Jesus Died to remove the dividing wall of hostility.

Where did the dividing wall come from? – Our Sin

Sin divides families.

  • It is a devastating thing for families to divide. It has long term consequences. When I a family divides you can blame this or that, but the real cause is sin. Sin is the only cause. If sin were not involved it would not happen. Sin divides. Sin builds a wall.

Sin divides churches.

  • The majority of the time churches divide there is sin involved.

Sin Divides people from God.

  • As terrible as those things are there is something more excruciating and that is the fact that sin divides people from God.

  • Isaiah 59:1-2 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; 2 but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.

Jesus Died to destroy the wall.

The Berlin Wall divided families and friend.  When the wall was removed famlies and friends were reunited and there was joy.  If one of those people who was reunited started rebuilding the wall, we would think they were crazy.  If we go one living in sin after Jesus has removed the wall we are crazy, because sin divides us from God and keeps us from him.

Joyful Salvation

It is a choice.

  • You must choose to deny yourself. You must choose to take up your cross. You must choose to follow Jesus. Everyone who has been draw by the Father will choose these things.

It is not a choice between joy and Jesus.

  • Some think that choosing Jesus is like choosing to be miserable. They think it is choosing to live an unhappy life on purpose. They would rather choose to be happy than to choose Jesus.

  • The truth is that surrendering to Jesus is choosing real eternal joy.

Heb. 12:2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

2 Cor. 1:24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith.

If we do not delight in the cross then God does not delight in us. Jesus went to the cross with joy, so that we might have joy in him.

How do I return to the joy of my salvation?

1. Think about your sin.

  • How does thinking about my sin help me to return to Joy in my salvation? It doesn’t at first. But if you don’t think about your sin you are sure to never get to Joy.

  • A recent survey by Ellison Research found the 13% of American do not even believe the the concept of sin. If you don’t believe in sin, you don’t need to believe in Jesus’ death on the cross.

2. Think about the death of Jesus.

3. Think about what you have been saved from.


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Sermon Summary 1-27-08

30 01 2008

Gen. 3 Satan’s Schemes: Undermine God and His Word

“Watch out!” are the last words many people hear before something bad happens. This sermon is a “Watch out” sermon.  The goal is to prevent something bad from happening.

Eph. 6:11 Put on the whole armor of God, that you may be able to stand against the schemes of the devil.

Ignorance of Satan’s Scheme leads to Sin.

  • Eve didn’t know that the serpant was Satan.

  • Eve didn’t know that he was a liar.

  • John 8:44 You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

  • 1 Peter 5:8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

Satan’s Scheme is to undermine God’s Word.

  • Isolation plays a big part in this process. Eve was by herself.

    • If Satan can get you away from the church. If he can get you alone in front of the computer, if he can get you where no one else is watching, then he is more apt to win.

    • Ec. 4:12 And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

  • He uses people you love to lead you down the wrong path.

    • We are more prone to follow the bad advice of someone who loves us than the good advice of someone we don’t know very well.

  • He leads you to question God’s word. 1, 4

    • Gen. 2:16-17 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

  • He twists the word. –

    • Matt. 4 Jesus was by himself.

    • Satan is the king of the half-truth.

    • You shall not surely die.

    • The Prosperity Gospel and cults are examples of word twisting.

  • He Takes the word away. – Luke 8:12

    • whether it is the “ten commandments” or the any other part of the Bible.

    • When you are kept from the word, most of the time the devil is at work.

Satan’s Scheme is to undermine God’s character.

  • God was and is good.

  • Everything he made was “Good.”

  • His goal for you is Good.

  • God’s commands are even loving and good.

  • To complain about the commands of God is like the child who complains about his parents not letting him do drugs. “If they really loved me, they would let me do whatever I wanted.”

Sin leads to curse.

  • Satan Leads to sin; Sin leads to death.

  • Jesus leads to forgiveness; Forgiveness leads to eternal life.


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Sermon Summary 12-2-07

3 12 2007

Jesus Initiates and Sustains Healing. John 5:1-17
The Depth of the Sin problem.

  • The depth of the problem is seen in the lack of knowledge of Jesus.

    • We do not know him. v.7, 13

    • If we do not know him we do not have salvation. John. 17:3 And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.
    • 1 John 2b but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. Therefore the more we see him the more we will be like him.
  • The depth of the problem is seen in the multitude who are sick. v. 3
    • There are the blind, lame, and paralyzed.
  • The depth of the problem is seen in the inability of the sick to help themselves. v. 7
    • God helps those who cannot help themselves.
  • The depth of the problem is seen in those that love man made laws more than Jesus. v. 16.*
    • Ill. – Even law enforcement knows that there is a time to break a man made law in order help people. Emergency vehicles will break the speed limit in order to get to the house of a person who is in trouble. But we should never break God’s moral law.
  • Jesus knows the depth of the problem.
    • He knows about our problems. v. 5
    • He knows how long we have had those problems. v. 5

What does Jesus do about it?
Jesus initiates healing.

  • Jesus initiates the meeting. v. 1
    • He does this to address the lack of knowledge of himself.
  • Jesus initiates the conversation. v.8
    • He does this to address the lack of knowledge of his power over sickness and sin.
  • Jesus looks for us. v. 14
    • He does this so that the problem was understood to be sin.
  • Jesus initiates salvation because he knows we are incapable. v. 7
    • Jesus had to leave heaven because we were unable to make ourselves right with God.
    • Jesus had to die on a cross and rise again because we were unable.
    • Jesus through the Holy Spirit initiates convicting you of sin, and giving you the gift of faith, so that you will repent and and believe the gospel. He not only initiates our salvation, but He sustains it out to completion, that it why we can never lose our salvation once we truly have it.
    • 1 Thess. 5:23-24 Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.

The results of Jesus’ work.

  • Faith is created where there was no faith.
  • Life gets better. v. 14 “nothing worse may happen.”
    • We don’t get what we do deserve.
    • If this man obeyed Jesus then nothing worse happened to him. What could be worse that being crippled and sitting at a pool with but a smidgen of hope of being cured. Knowing all the while that the hope would be in vain. What is worse than that? Hell! Eternal torment!
    • We get what we don’t deserve. We are blessed. If we would follow Jesus, life would be improved. Just imagine the blessings that would come just from obeying God in one area of life. If everyone obeyed God’s standard for sexual purity. The problem of aids would be radically reduced in one generation and all other sexual diseases. Babies would not be born out of wedlock, and children wouldn’t be raised in single family homes. And that would reduce juveniles significantly, since the majority come from fatherless homes. The police department would have less to do, so we could hire less. And we would not have to pay more tax dollars to fund those counselors and government funded defense attorneys. Life would be better for everyone.
  • Grace, grace, grace
    • Your problem was your own, It was not Jesus’. He took it upon himself because of his grace to fix the problem that you deserved. He initiated your conversion. He came looking for you, even when you did not know who he was. Your sickness that you brought upon yourself kept you from saving yourself, but he graciously gave you life when you were dead in your sins.

Is Jesus initiating a conversation with you this morning? Turn from sin and unbelief and and trust Jesus. You are here aren’t you. God brought you here today to here this message. 


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