Father's Day - June 19, 2016

Sorry friends,I don't have a lot of notes on this weekend's message. Here is the shell of ideas that I preached from. Also, the key text from Luke. If you'd like audio from the message, please email, text us or whatever so that we can send it out to you. Enjoy!

OPEN:  What emotions arise when you hear the word Father/dad?

–      Love… fishing… sports… cooking… hugs… provider… pushover…

–      Authority figure… distant… overbearing… absent… angry… abusive

GOD: Does your view of dad/father affect your view of God?

–      What do you think of Father God?

–      Most of us are deistic… or even worse, we don’t see Father thru the Jesus lens.

–      Satan’s lie.

The truth about the Father’s feelings about us.

   ·       Luke 15:1-24

   ·       Do you understand how much Papa loves you?

   ·       He loves you no matter how you feel about Him.

Letting the Father “father” you

   ·       Are you convinced that God’s love depends on you? (younger bro)

   ·       Luke 15:25-32

   ·       Do you struggle with letting God love you? (older bro)

   ·       This is about your heart not your head (not your understanding)

Learning to “father” others

     Too often we serve the King because we think it gains favor.

     Too often we are trying to older brother our way to heaven.

     Scripture calls us all to Father others (Titus 2).

ACTION: What if Fathering is about your heart change not right thinking?

   Ø  Resting in the Father’s lap (Hebrews – throne of grace?)

   Ø  Running with the Father towards His lost sheep.

   Ø  Rallying the herd to rest with us J.

Let’s pray

LUKE 15

     ¹¹ And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. ¹² And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. ¹³ Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. ¹⁴ And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. ¹⁵ So he went and hired himself out to one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. ¹⁶ And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.

      ¹⁷ “But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father's hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! ¹⁸ I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you.¹⁹ I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.”’ ²⁰ And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. ²¹ And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’ ²² But the father said to his servants, ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. ²³ And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. ²⁴ For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate.

      ²⁵ “Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. ²⁶ And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. ²⁷ And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ ²⁸ But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, ²⁹ but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. ³⁰ But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ ³¹ And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. ³² It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’”

Mother's Day Sermon by Corrie Waters - May 8, 2016

Hi everyone... excited this week to share with you my wife Corrie's notes from her Mother's Day sermon on May 8th. She did a fantastic job sharing the heart of the Father with us. Enjoy!

Precious, Chosen and Beloved

Opening

*Perfection personality –Monica Syndrome  

I have always been one to want things just the way I want it.  I would even go back behind people and fix something that I felt they didn’t do correctly in my eyes (i.e. sweeping the floor, cleaning the bathroom, folding laundry).

When Adam and I first got married I wanted everything in place, the bed had to be made, the decorative towels in the bathroom couldn’t be used, the house had to be vacuumed ALL THE TIME and my floors had to be mopped.  A nightmare right? Does this sound familiar to anyone else in this room?

I think that these tendencies stemmed from me wanting to feel in control, because so much of my teenage years I was out of control. I just wanted to be a perfect daughter and wife, because that is what the world told me I needed to be.

Ok, Corrie why are you talking to us about wanting to be a perfectionist and what does this have to do with Mother’s Day? Everything!

So I bet you are wondering if I am still that way today?  I can say that I still have some of these tendencies, but I really believe over the last couple of years God has been teaching me what it means to “Let it Go” (with 5 kids its kind of hard not to, lol) and be his daughter who is moving from perfection to precious. What does this precious perfection look like? I hope that over the next 20 minutes or so we can unpack what the answer to this question is.

God really is working through this with me by using my kids.  My two older girls are not what we would call “neat” or “tidy”.   They are very free spirited and creative (which I love), however their room…oh their room.  Lets just say I have different expectations than they do when it comes to keeping their room clean. Everyday, this is a training ground for me and I am really having to learn that what I deem as clean is not always the same in the eyes of the beholder.  Their room is perfect to them, they love every thing that makes it comfortable even if that means stinky clothes stuffed in corners, toys under beds and a 1,000 stuffed animals to sleep with.

Why is this training ground for me you ask? Because just like God, he sees everything he created as perfect and precious, I need to see my daughters in all of their messiness as perfect and much loved daughters of the King AND I need to remember that my response as a mother must reflect that I am also a much loved daughter of the King. 

Prayer

Questions...

So how do we move from the perfection mindset to the precious mindset?

So many times in life all we want is perfection.  We want the perfect job, we want the perfect marriage, we want the perfect kids, we want the perfect house with the perfect school for the kids, and for us women we always want the perfect pair of shoes. We want to be what the world tells us to be… because if we aren’t we are failures. However, I believe that before we can be truly content with our life situations we need to understand our identity as a daughter/son of the King. Can we trust God to be in control of our situations?

You belong to God, you are his precious daughter/son and he has chosen you for a purpose. And because we belong to God his plans and purposes for our lives don’t always look like our western ideals.

           

So where is your identity? Are you looking at the world to tell you who are on a daily basis or are you looking at the one who created you to tell you how much you are worth and how precious you are?

What would it look like if we all found belonging in a God who tells us WHO we are WHOSE we are and not in how the world labels us?

Can you believe and trust that God is making all things right around you, even if it doesn’t seem like it all the time? Can you trust that He is making you into who you are suppose to be?

The BIBLE...

has a lot to say on this subject we are going to look at today...

Let’s take a look at what Peter says:

1 Peter 2:9-10

9 But you are not like that, for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light.

10 “Once you had no identity as a people;

    now you are God’s people.

Once you received no mercy;

    now you have received God’s mercy.

1.We are chosen and royal priests, HOLY and God’s very own possession and because of this we can show others the goodness of God’s character through our response to them.

Verse 9: In Old testament times, people did not approach God directly.  A priest acted as the “go between” God and the sinful people. But with Christ’s victory on the cross, that pattern changed and we can now approach him without fear (Hebrews 4:16) 16 So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. When we are united with Christ as members of His body, we join in the priestly work of reconciling God and people.

Peter does a really good job paralleling our journey as Christians to the journey that the Children of Israel made from Egypt, through the dessert and finally into the Promise Land.  (Isaiah 43) We know just by reading the Old Testament the Israelites were fickle in their journey to the Promise Land, always complaining that they never had enough and always wanting Moses to fix things. They wanted their journey to be perfect, without bumps or problems.  But even through their complaining God chose them, called them out of Egypt, cared for them in the dessert and loved them.  And just like them He calls us too because we are also His chosen.

2. We have a new identity as people, because of the completion of the cross.

Verse 10: Talks about our new identity and how we have become God’s people. People often base their identity off of their accomplishments, their job, successes, wealth or knowledge. However, your value comes from being one of God’s children, not from what you can achieve. *You have worth and value because of what God does, not because of what you do.

I thought it would be fun to look up the word identity in the dictionary and here is what Webster’s says: The set of behavioral or personal characteristics by which an individual is recognizable as a member of a group.

So we are now recognized by the Fathers completion on the cross…a group of royal priests, a holy nation and God’s own chosen people.

So lets re-visit the question about where your identity lies?  Are you placing to much value of things of this world and what people think of you and not relying on what the Father is longing to tell you? The Father longs to remind you that you belong to Him, you are his precious daughter or son and he has chosen you for a purpose.

Graham Cooke writes in his book “Living in Dependency and Wonder”

   “The Bible is full of such commands to live and walk as the Beloved of Christ. No where is this more apparent that in the book of 1 John. “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God.”

   "We must behold this love in order for it to become a reality in our lives. To not fully accept this love is to reject it, a sin that grieves the Holy Spirit greatly.  We grieve Him when we do not see what God wants to be for us.  It’s not about performance or perfection – He doesn’t only provide and care for us when we see His contribution.  He is there, even then.  But God wants to step into the middle of our failures and show us His plan and love, so that we can live in confidence knowing that His love is so deep it covers everything.  We should look in the mirror every morning and know, “I am the beloved of God. I have seen the beloved and it is me. God loves me.”

ACTION

So where do we go from here?

I truly believe that YES, we are completely changed when the realization of the cross intersects our lives.  I also, believe that you have to learn and grow in the new identity that you receive at that intersection. 

There has to be a paradigm shift in our thinking.  From old to new. Our old thinking might tell us that things in our life have to look a certain way.  I mentioned earlier that we have to the perfect job, with the perfect family, in the perfect neighborhood to name a few. We strive for perfection by the worlds standard and if we don’t we are failures.  However, when we carry the personal characteristics of Christ (Identity), our thinking shifts.  We begin to discover what God’s purpose for our lives might be.  Some of us might be called to be missionaries, some might be called to live radical lifestyles for the gospel, some might be called right where they are at, but whatever it is God is calling you to do you are called and chosen.

As a mom I want to live in the place of being his Beloved, not the worlds perfectionist.  I want my response to my husband and my family to be from a place of BEING not out of a place of striving. I don’t want my reality to determine my response, because then I am not living from a place of being his chosen daughter with a purpose. This has to be a learned characteristic and the HS wants to partner with you in this journey.

So how do we do this?

   1.    Live in a place of rest – a relief or freedom, especially from anything that wearies, troubles, or disturbs

No I don’t mean sleep, I mean rest

People all the time ask me how I manage so many things all at once and do it with such peace and ease, its because I try to operate out of a place of rest. And when I try to operate out of a different place, I have a different outcome and it usually does not have the right response attached to it.

    

   2.    Learn to abide -  to remain; continue; stay

We must learn to enjoy abiding. I know as a parent my kids don’t like to stay in one place they are always going different directions. As a parents when they stop and just sit, we breath a sigh of relief and our thankful. So just like our kids we need to learn to sit, breath and learn to stay in consistent communion with the Father. If we are already in Christ, then our actions will flow out of the place of abiding in Him. The Holy Spirit comes and reminds us that we are living the life of a much loved child of the Father. His chosen, His beloved.

   3.    Learn simplicity– freedom from complexity, intricacy, or division into parts

Why do we make things difficult? Are we not his chosen people, his beloved’s? This is the God that parted the Red Sea for easy passage, right? He made it simple for the Israelites that day so why won’t he make it simple for us in our times of need?

   4.    Live in wonder and worship: to be filled with admiration, amazement, or awe; marvel

God himself is full of wonder when He looks at his creation (Genesis 1, And God saw that it was good) All creation responds and lives in the same wonder about God, so as his chosen and beloved we need to immerse ourselves in the same wonder.  Allow yourself to day dream about him, ask Him to show you more of himself to you and worship Him.  He desires that to connect with his creation. When you do this more of his character is released into your life, which then transforms you from desiring the worlds perfection to gaining the heart of the Father for the world.

Graham Cooke writes: “My goal, as a dad, is to show my children that God is a million times better than I. He is more generous and extravagant than any of us can imagine. I want to model to them the Father heart of God, because what we think about God is the single most important thing in our lives.”

Back to the story of the girls..

There are so many times I have failed to respond with the heart of the Father towards them.  I know that I have failed many times in that area, but I also know that God redeems those moments with my girls.  The reason I know that is because the Father’s heart for me always responds with extravagant love and gentleness. He is always pursuing, always reminding me whose I am and who I am.  I ALWAYS want to point my kids back to Him.  That is my purpose…that was my moms purpose. 

My mom always pointed me back to the Father and his heart for me.  She knew my value in the kingdom before I ever did.  She saw what I couldn’t see and she always believed in me. So much so she gave me a name that means “Vessel of God”.

There was brief moment (I say brief, but to my parents I am sure that it seemed like an eternity) in my high school years were I was anti God, anti church, and anti faith.  I was a troubled teen who was stubborn and rebellious.  However, my mom always responded with the Fathers heart towards me even I responded poorly to her. (TELL THE CAR ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD STORY) She always reminded of me Whose I was and Who I was.  The Father was the single most important thing in her life.  She understood the meaning of living beyond the worlds expectations and living with heavenly expectancy.

So what would the world look like if we all lived out of a place of modeling the Fathers heart…a perfect heart, that calls us precious, chosen and loved?