Monday 30 May 2011

Do not despire small beginnings - PART 4

Father's >> Young men >> children.

What a privilege we have to be able to assist others and to help them grow in their walk with God! People grow at different paces, but we all can reach out to someone close to us and help them in some way or another.

1 Corinthians 8:1 “In your letter you asked me about food offered to idols. All of us know something about this subject. But knowledge makes us proud of ourselves, while love makes us helpful to others.” CEV

We must help others in love, not in a way that they feel that we look down on them.

Examples of growth:

God is busy working in our lives and we need to stay the course. We don’t start out great, but God has great plans for our lives. The foundation forming years are our most important as everything will rest on the foundations we have in our lives. God knows what you can handle right now. If He gives you more than you can handle it will break you, so He is patient and gives you more when you are ready, when you have matured a bit more.

Abram was a husband to a barren wife, but God made great promises to him. He changed his name to Abraham (meaning father of a multitude) God promises Him that all nations will be blessed through him (Genesis 12:3). He starts our without a child, and for years he trusts God to give him an inheritance, today Abraham is the father of two great nations with so many children that it is difficult to count them all, BUT HE DID NOT START OUT THAT WAY. He was a nomad, traveling around, he did not start out owning even an inch of property. God blessed and increased him to what we see today.

When we look at ourselves we may think of the things that others have said about us, “you are just like your father”, “you will never amount to anything”, “you are useless”. But know that that is not the way that God looks at you or me.

Friday 27 May 2011

Do not despire small beginnings - PART 3

A tree needs to be a certain age before it will bear fruit as well, you can’t expect fruit from a 6 month old peach tree it just does not happen that way.

Genesis 8:22 “While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease." ESV

There is no quick fix, or instant solution when a peach tree is bare. Today we have microwaves, 2 minute noodles and instant coffee, but the things of God's Spirit take time.

Back to us, our spirits are reborn when we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour and we start a wonderful journey. God starts building certain things into our lives and we start maturing, ie. Getting ready to bear fruit.

This church had small beginnings, but God has given great words of prophecy that this church would be a great big church. How does that happen? One person at a time! How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time!

Helping others grow:

All of us are on different levels, we are not to look down on those below us or be jealous of those above us. John Maxwell says that we are to have many mentors and that one can learn at least one thing from every person you meet.

So as we grow we have the opportunity to help others to grow to where we are.

1 John 2:12-14
"12 I am writing to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven for his name's sake. 13 I am writing to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I am writing to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, children, because you know the Father. 14 I write to you, fathers, because you know him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one." ESV

Wednesday 25 May 2011

Do not despire small beginnings - PART 2

Why does God start us out small?

In Matthew 25:15 Jesus starts to tell the story of the workers who received 5, 2 and 1 talents respectively. The Message Bible says that they were entrusted with money “according to their ability”.

Why if God has such grand plans for us do we need to start small? God is busy growing and developing our character so that we can cope with more! If you promise to give your son or daughter a car and you give it to them when they are 10 years old what will happen? Exactly! You start them out with a bicycle, etc. and as they grow older and their abilities grow you can give them a car when they are capable of driving it safely.

God does the same with us. He wants to give us everything He has promised, but it will harm us to receive these things too soon. Do you understand what I am saying? Does this make sense? God promises to give you a million Rand, but do you know how to run that kind of finances? Not if you are used to earning R100 a week, no. So God builds you until you are ready to do it.

We also need to be faithful, God tests our faithfulness.

How do we grow?

Psalm 1:3 “He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.” ESV

Galatians 5:22-23 lists the fruit of the Spirit.

Like the tree planted by living waters, bearing fruit takes time. When a tree wants to have fruit it does not pick up the phone and order from Pick ‘n Pay. First the tree blossoms, producing hundreds of beautiful flowers. This is the promise of fruit to come. A humble bee pollinates the flowers on the tree, which develop into small fruit. The fruit grows and ripens and only then is the tree full of ripe fruit. Most trees bear fruit only once a year as this process takes time.

Monday 23 May 2011

Do not despire small beginnings - PART 1

Introduction:

Job 8:7 “And though your beginning was small, your latter days will be very great.” ESV

1 Corinthians 1:27-28
27 God purposely chose what the world considers nonsense in order to shame the wise, and he chose what the world considers weak in order to shame the powerful. 28 He chose what the world looks down on and despises and thinks is nothing, in order to destroy what the world thinks is important.” GNB

Mark 4:30-32
"30 What shall we say the Kingdom of God is like?" asked Jesus. "What parable shall we use to explain it? 31 It is like this. A man takes a mustard seed, the smallest seed in the world, and plants it in the ground. 32 After a while it grows up and becomes the biggest of all plants. It puts out such large branches that the birds come and make their nests in its shade." GNB

Everything starts out small, we are born, we cry, we learn to crawl, then walk then run. You might not be a spiritual giant right now, but you can be! Just as we are not born running in the physical we start out with small steps in the spiritual realm as well.

Comparing ourselves to others:

Sometimes we are tempted to look at others and what they have achieved and it demotivates us. We think, “how can I compare with this person?” – the good news is that you DO NOT HAVE TO. God never made us to be copies of other people. We are originals and God has a unique and special plan for each of us.

Galatians 5:26 “That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.” MSG

Friday 20 May 2011

Dreams

What do you want to be when you grow up? It’s a good thing to have dreams for your life.

Do you know what you want to do? Or have you not started dreaming yet?

Dream big, God did when He planned your life – Jeremiah 29:11, Ephesians 2:10. You are God’s masterpiece! He did not make you and then wonder, “what am I going to do with you now?”

An artist will think long and hard before making something and only when he is certain about what he wants does he start creating. Just as a person does not make a chair and then ask what to do with it, so also did God create us – we are special to Him, Psalm 139.

Joseph had dreams (they did not make sense at the time), but I believe that they came from God. Are you settling for second best by saying, “I want to be a mechanic” or, “I want to work at a hair salon.” Aspire to be the best at what you do and to work for the best repair centre or hair salon around. Know that God has great plans for you and that He does not want you to settle for second best.

When you dream you are putting your faith into action, read Hebrews 11:1. Faith is not seeing first, it is trusting God for the things that we cannot see, but what we are hoping and trusting Him for.

Joseph’s dreams took a long time to come to fulfillment, he also had to go through some difficult obstacles on the way, but he held on to God and did not get discouraged or depressed. God blessed him to become second in charge of Egypt and his family did bow down to him as they did in his dream.

God always starts with a dream, a dream that is given to a person. That person needs to treasure that dream and nurture it so that it can grow. Otherwise, nothing will come of it.

QUESTION:

Has this changed the way that you are going to look at your future?

Sunday 1 May 2011

The best thing that could ever happen to you

What is the best thing that could ever happen to you? Think hard for a
minute about that, then read further.

One of the best things that can happen to you is for someone else to die
in your place. Imagine being sentenced to death, you can't appeal and
you have no escape - then at the last minute someone you have never met
before volunteers to take your place. Flabbergasted you accept the
stranger's offer and count your blessings as you go free.

Did you know that Jesus died in your place? Romans 6:23 says that the
wages of sin are death. We were born into sin and so we deserve death (
as God is holy and cannot ignore our sin). The good news is the Jesus
stepped in and He bore the full punishment of our sins upon Himself.

John 3:16 says that God was motivated by love when He sent Jesus to die
on the cross for our sins. God does not hate us! God did not send Jesus
grudgingly either, He did it in love. God wants to have a personal
relationship with you, and has done everything He possibly can for you
to be able to have a relationship with Him.

Ask God to reveal Him to you as a father and watch what happens!