Message

Fear of Failing God

Bible, Life, Message / By /

God wants His children to be free from all fear. That’s why Jesus told so many people to “Fear not.” Not only does God want you as a believer to be fearless, He wants to use you to help others who are bound up with fear and worry.

Psalm 27:1 (NLT) The Lord is my light and my salvation— so why should I be afraid? The Lord is my fortress, protecting me from danger, so why should I tremble?

There is no reason for a believer walking with God to be afraid or to tremble in the face of danger. We’re going to talk about a different kind of fear. It’s the fear of failing God. Some people are afraid to try anything new, because they’re afraid of failing. They’re afraid of what God or other people may think if they fail. Not all failure is sin, but all sin is failure. We’ve all failed at one time or another in lives. We’ve all dropped the ball when we should have caught it.

I’m reminded of a recent baseball game. The Cardinals were playing the Dodgers in the National League Division Series. The Cardinals were looking to tie the series with a win in the second game. It was the ninth inning, the Cardinals were up 2-1, two outs and James Loney of the Dodgers hit a ball right to Cardinal Matt Holiday in the outfield. An easy catch, right? Wrong, he dropped the ball. In baseball, a failure is called an error. That was a big error. The Dodgers went on the win the game and the series.

There’s times when we’ve dropped the ball for God in the past. I’m not talking about just a mistake, but a time when we’ve sinned. Those times can come back to haunt us, to discourage us, to keep us from doing the things God is calling us to. We fear that we may fail again. We fear that maybe God doesn’t love us anymore or care about us, now that we’ve failed him. Some people feel that their past sins are so great, maybe God won’t forgive them. Let’s see what the Bible has to say about failing God.

Listen to my November 29, 2009 message “Fear of Failing God” (message notes).

Fear of Insignificance

Bible, Life, Message / By /

Our society and culture is full of people who are afraid. God doesn’t want His children to be afraid. He wants you to be fearless as you follow Him. Fear is a negative emotion that is uncomfortable. We don’t like to be afraid. However, fear is not just a minor inconvenience. Fear can lead you to miss God’s plan for your life. Fear makes people afraid to do the right things in life, fear stops people from obeying God. Fear causes people to do the wrong things in life.

The fear of insignificance is the fear of not mattering, it is the fear of not being important, fear of one’s life not having meaning, of being powerless to do anything. Now if you don’t overcome the fear of insignificance, you will end up embracing insignificance. You will feel like your life doesn’t matter, that no one cares about you, that you’re just lost in the crowd.

Have you ever wondered why people care about their lives mattering? People are afraid of not mattering because God created people for significance. Every person is born with a God-given desire to accomplish something significant with their life. Every person is born with a God-given desire to be significant to others.  I’m going to show you how that desire can fill your life with hope.

However, many people have given up hope that their lives will have any significance or they are looking for significance in the wrong places. People who feel insignificant …

  • Will achieve little in life
  • Will have no purpose or hope in life
  • Often fall into addictions and other harmful lifestyles
  • Tend to have problems with relationships
  • Can even succumb to suicide

Think about yourself. Ask yourself the question “Does my life really matter?” When I’m gone – will anyone notice? As we study God’s Word, I trust you will be able to answer those questions with an definitive Yes. Yes my life really matters. Yes, when I’m gone, I’m going to leave a powerful legacy. So, let’s look at some principles from God’s Word that will help us overcome the fear of insignificance.

Listen to my November 22, 2009 message “Fear of Insignificance”.

Facing Your Fears

Life, Message / By /

Think back on what was your earliest fear in life. I remember being afraid to let my leg hang off my bed at night, because I wasn’t sure what might lurk underneath. If I had to get out of my bed at night, I leaped off, so whatever was underneath couldn’t get a hold of me.

As we grow our fears change. Young people have fears about not doing well in school or sports. They may fear not being popular or having the right friends. As adults, we could take most of this morning listing the various kinds of things that we may be afraid of. Take a look at the news and all kinds of fearful questions are raised in our minds.

Is the recession over or will it get worse? Is my job secure? Are my savings safe? Will my taxes go up soon? What about our national debt? Will I be able to put my children through college? What will happen if Iran gets nuclear weapons? Are we safe from terrorism? What about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? Will my family get the swine flu? What is going to happen with health insurance in this country? And we could go on and on.

God wants you to face your fears and move from being fearful to being fearless. Fearless is the opposite of fearful. Being fearful comes naturally. Being fearless comes from God. As we’ll see today, Jesus was fearless, he was never afraid. So it makes sense that the most common command of Jesus in the Gospels was to not fear or not be afraid.

Matthew 10:28 (NIV) Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

God wants to deliver you from fear of man and the things on this earth. As believers, we are to fear God alone. When you fear God you won’t fear anything else. If you don’t fear God, you will fear everything else. Fear and it’s smaller cousin worry, are very detrimental to our lives. Fear is the major component to stress, which can wreak havoc on your health. Fear tends to paralyze people into inaction, they’re not able to accomplish the things God has for them to do. Fear makes it hard for you to think and make decisions. God wants you to be fearless and courageous.

Joshua 1:9 (NIV) Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go.

Courage and strength and the opposite of being terrified and discouraged. As we look at a story from the life of Jesus and His disciples, I pray that God will help each one of us move from fearful to fearless.

Listen to my November 1, 2009 message “Facing Your Fears” (message notes).

Looking Forward With Faith

Bible, Church, Message / By /

As a church family, we want to celebrate as we move forward with faith. God has done great things in and through our church in the past, but we believe that the future holds even greater things. To get to where God wants to take us, we must do more than just look forward, we must take action to move forward with faith. What is faith?

Hebrews 11:1 (NIV) Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.

You and I cannot see the future. We don’t know exactly what it holds, but God does. Moving forward with faith is to see God’s vision for our church and then take action to bring that vision to pass.

Hebrews 11:7 (NIV) By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family.

Noah obeyed God. He prepared to build the ark and then he built it, even though everyone said he was crazy. He moved forward with faith. When we look forward as a church family, what is God’s vision for us? God’s vision is for us to grow. God wants each of us to grow in spiritual maturity and He wants our numbers to grow as we reach more people for Jesus.

Ephesians 2:21-22 (NIV) In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.

These verses tell us that you and I are part of a spiritual church or temple that God is building right here at Life Church. God’s vision is for that spiritual church made of believers to continue to grow.

Listen to my October 25, 2009 message “Looking Forward With Faith” (message notes).

Looking Up For Guidance

Church, Message / By /

Who knows what tomorrow holds? Not you, not me, no human being knows what tomorrow holds. Oh, people can make general predictions, but even those often turn out to be wrong. Virtually no one predicted the financial meltdown of 2008. Will 2010 be the end of the recession or the beginning of an even greater depression? No one knows. I believe the world is entering into a phase of every increasing changes and challenges.

Daniel 12:4 (NLT) But you, Daniel, keep this prophecy a secret; seal up the book until the time of the end, when many will rush here and there, and knowledge will increase.

We are living in the time of the end. The pace of life will continue to increase, as will knowledge. Increases in knowledge lead to constant change. How can we navigate such uncertain times? A lot of people think if they just keep on doing what they’ve always done, everything will work out. Well, it’s not going to work out for them without the right guidance. Where can you go for guidance about future decisions?

Only God knows the future, so we must look, not within, but up to receive guidance for the future.

Jeremiah 29:11 (NIV) “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

God knows the future and He has a plan for you to navigate successfully through that future. Each of us has important decisions to make about our future, about our finances, about our jobs. In order to receive God’s guidance, we need to hear God speak to us. Yes, God still speaks to people today. Jesus said …

John 10:27 (NIV) My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me.

Every believer is able to listen to Jesus’ voice and follow His direction.

Listen to my October 11, 2009 message “Looking Up For Guidance” (message notes).

Looking Back With Thanksgiving

Church, God, Message / By /

There are two basic ways to look at tomorrow. The first way to look at tomorrow is with worry and fear. We let our minds race over what possibly could go wrong in the future. When we look at tomorrow with worry and fear, we are expecting tomorrow to be worse than today. God does not want us to look at tomorrow with worry and fear.

The second way to look at tomorrow is hope and faith. Our minds think about the dreams we have for a good tomorrow, both for ourselves and our church family. Hope dreams of a tomorrow that is better than our todays. Faith looks for a tomorrow in which dreams are fulfilled. God wants you to look at tomorrow with hope. Which way are you looking at tomorrow, with worry or with hope?

We’re going to see that paradoxically, the key to looking to the future with hope is looking to the past with thanksgiving. The difficulty in facing tomorrow is that tomorrow is full of challenges and the unknown. Unknown challenges can be scary. Will you be up to the challenge or will it be too big for you?

How can you deal with the challenges of the future? We might call the challenges of the future the giants that we must face. When you are called on to face a giant, it’s easy to be terrified. However, God wants you to face giants and challenges with hope and faith. The message today can be applied to challenges that you may be facing in your own life and family. Likewise, the principles we’re going to talk about today can also be applied to the challenges that our church will face in the future.

Let’s look at a story from the Old Testament found in 1 Samuel 17. I’d encourage you to read the chapter this week. In this chapter, the army of Israel was facing the Philistine army when out of their ranks emerged a giant of a man named Goliath. He challenged anyone in the Israel army to fight him alone. Goliath was over 9 feet tall and a strong warrior. How would you like to face Goliath in hand to hand combat?

1 Samuel 17:11 (NIV) On hearing the Philistine’s words, Saul and all the Israelites were dismayed and terrified.

However, there was one Israelite who was not dismayed or terrified at the thought of fighting Goliath. His name was David. Here’s what he said.

1 Samuel 17:32 (NIV) David said to Saul, “Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine; your servant will go and fight him.”

King Saul replied to David.

1 Samuel 17:33 (NIV) Saul replied, “You are not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him; you are only a boy, and he has been a fighting man from his youth.”

How could a boy have the courage to face a monumental challenge like Goliath without fear? How could David have the faith to face a fearful tomorrow? We’re going to look at how David thought about his challenge to learn how we can meet our own challenges.

Listen to my October 4, 2009 message “Looking Back With Thanksgiving” (message notes).

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