One messed up mathematical situation

Faith = (wisdom + trust in God +Obedience )/ Fear

Falsehood = Foolishness x Impatience ^ Fear + Trust in God + Obedience

Idolatry = Wisdom ^ Fear + Trust in Self + Obedience to Self

Emptiness = Wisdom + Trust in God - (Obedience x Fear)

Reflecting that this time is the last week we got to meet together three years ago.

Hard

Just started setting up a cell phone to record worship, now had to do the whole thing

Oh the politics of it all was miserable and ugly

leadership completely changed

Blessings along the way

New friendships started

God answered prayers

Always had toilet paper

Found hope and friendship

People were healed of Covid

Remember back to your prayers and worries of the time

Yet you still have prayers and burdens of today.

In this life there is no Happily Ever After.

We are not here at church today to worship a God who gets rid of all of our problems.

We are here to worship a God who saves.

We are here to worship a God who when we walk in the valley of the shadow of death is with us.

Some of us right now are going through stuff and you want to know where is God in this.

What is promised and what we realize today is

As Patrick, who the Catholics call St. Patrick, whose feast day is coming up said in his prayer, “God before me, God besides me, God behind me.”

If we follow God. I said something last week that many of you let me know you didn’t realize.

We work for God. God doesn’t work for us.

It’s humbling and vital that we live this out in our prayers, in our worship, in our lives. When we buy stuff we are sold on what would make us happy or our lives easier. We are the end.

Yet, you and I were created for a higher purpose.

Matthew 22:36–37 CSB

36 “Teacher, which command in the law is the greatest?” 37 He said to him, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.

Jesus told you the command that would give you the highest purpose. To love the Lord your God.

You feel it. When we are in worship and using our bodies to give God what He is worth it fills us with purpose.

Yet this isn’t all there is, we also are to love one another. To obey God in the midst of this difficult life.

And in this life, even when we meet our purpose of Loving God, we deal with the problems of this life.

In this life, there is no happily ever after, there is God’s leadership and presence for those who follow him, there is victory.

We see this dealing with problems in the life of a person in the Bible.

Nehemiah.

Backstory of Nehemiah

Nehemiah 2:11–20 CSB

11 After I arrived in Jerusalem and had been there three days, 12 I got up at night and took a few men with me. I didn’t tell anyone what my God had laid on my heart to do for Jerusalem. The only animal I took was the one I was riding. 13 I went out at night through the Valley Gate toward the Serpent’s Well and the Dung Gate, and I inspected the walls of Jerusalem that had been broken down and its gates that had been destroyed by fire. 14 I went on to the Fountain Gate and the King’s Pool, but farther down it became too narrow for my animal to go through. 15 So I went up at night by way of the valley and inspected the wall. Then heading back, I entered through the Valley Gate and returned. 16 The officials did not know where I had gone or what I was doing, for I had not yet told the Jews, priests, nobles, officials, or the rest of those who would be doing the work. 17 So I said to them, “You see the trouble we are in. Jerusalem lies in ruins and its gates have been burned. Come, let’s rebuild Jerusalem’s wall, so that we will no longer be a disgrace.” 18 I told them how the gracious hand of my God had been on me, and what the king had said to me. They said, “Let’s start rebuilding,” and their hands were strengthened to do this good work. 19 When Sanballat the Horonite, Tobiah the Ammonite official, and Geshem the Arab heard about this, they mocked and despised us, and said, “What is this you’re doing? Are you rebelling against the king?” 20 I gave them this reply, “The God of the heavens is the one who will grant us success. We, his servants, will start building, but you have no share, right, or historic claim in Jerusalem.”

Faith = (wisdom + trust in God +Obedience )/ Fear

Falsehood = Foolishness x Impatience ^ Fear + Trust in God + Obedience

Idolatry = Wisdom ^ Fear + Trust in Self + Obedience to Self

Emptiness = Wisdom + Trust in God - (Obedience x Fear)