The intense desire to be right is instinctive for human beings. As we continue to explore Paul’s experiences in the city of Jerusalem, we will be able to pull back the curtain and see some of the struggles and patterns of sin that Paul continued to deal with even later in his life. Our goal today is to see ourselves clearly so that we will allow the grace of God to intervene in us to help us focus more on being righteous instead of being right.
If someone were to ask you for evidence that you are a follower of Jesus Christ, what would you say? What aspect of your life would you point to? The Bible is clear that the purpose behind the new birth in Jesus Christ is to be conformed to the image of Christ. If you were to look into a spiritual mirror, would you see more of Him or of you? Is God’s impact on your life evident?
As we venture into this next section of our passage, Paul is continuing to model obedience for us. Just as everyone predicted, Paul’s arrival in Jerusalem triggered a series of events that brought about his imprisonment and eventual death. Paul was one of the first missionaries that served the Lord in the face of danger, but he certainly was not the last. So as we look back to Acts 21 and see how Paul was faithful to obey God in the face of danger, I want us to evaluate our own lives to determine if we are willing to obey God when it doesn’t make sense, or even, in the face of danger.
The Book of Acts chronicles the empowerment, growth, persecution and expansion of the New Testament church; but the end of the book was not the end of the church! It was only just the beginning! The church has continued to grow and expand ever since the time that it was established by Jesus. We need to realize that the Book of Acts records less than 2% of the overall history of the church from its birth until now. We may be coming to the end of this book in the Bible, but it is only the beginning when it comes to the work of God through His church in this world.
We will be talking about this concept of “abiding” off-and-on throughout this year. This morning, I want us this to consider the implications of Psalm 91 on “abiding” when you look at it through the lens of God’s promises and our steadfast obedience to His Word. Remember what we learned in part one of this short series: God does not promise to keep us from trouble and difficulties in this life—He promises to see us through it! So as we considered His promises to protect us in Psalm 91, do not lose sight of the fact that He is working all things—the good, the bad, and the ugly—together for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purpose.
The overall theme of this psalm is the promise of God to protect those who have trusted in Him—in whom the Holy Spirit dwells. Next week, we will focus on what these promises are and how they relate to life in a world threatened by a global pandemic, but the questions that we want to consider today are: “How do we understand God’s promises in Psalm 91? How do we interpret these promises in light of the teaching in the rest of Scripture?”
I want to invite you to join us online this Thursday evening—December 24th at 5:00 pm—for our Virtual Christmas Eve service. The service will be premiered on both Facebook and YouTube. We have spent the last couple of weeks capturing video of many of you guys so you might want to watch to see if you make the final cut! One of the highlights of the service will be getting to see the Christmas Story through the eyes of some of our children here at Temple Rogers. Again, it is helpful to consider the “Age-Old” story from different perspectives from time to time. That is exactly what I would like to do today—I would like to consider the role of the shepherds in this narrative. Who were they? What did they do? How do they contribute to the overall story? Why were they included?
Through out our life, we are faced with times of abundance and times of great need. In our last sermon of “Separate but Connected”, we are reading through Philippians 4:10-23. Paul here not only models a Spiritually Mature Contentment, but shows us how we can obtain it. Today let’s strive for a spiritually mature and content Christian life.
The Bible has much to say about our thought-life and how our thoughts influence not only what we say but also what we do—and ultimately who we become. This is why Paul encouraged us to have the same mind-set as that of Christ in Philippians 2. If we allow the Holy Spirit to transform our minds—as the Bible instructs us to do—our words and actions will soon follow.
Unity is a huge theme throughout Philippians, and actually it is a huge theme carried throughout a lot of what wrote in his letters. There is a personal cost as well as a corporate price that we pay when we do not prioritize unity in the church body. Today we are going to discuss the ways we should approach conflict, and protect ourselves from falling into faithless worry.