God's Plan
Notes
Transcript
Can i open up by admitting something to you today?
I like simple things. yeah. I like the think that things are usually simpler than we think. The simplest answer is usually the correct one.
INSTRUCTIONS TO BE IN SHAPE. WORKOUT. EAT LESS CALORIES. But doesn’t that seem too simple? It’s almost hard to follow because of how simple it is.
I WANT COMPLICATED. I want buy this 52 step guide with 52 different workouts done 52 different ways for $5200 and then eat 52 different micronutrients.... etc
COMPLICATED ALMOST SEEMS MORE BELIEVABLE. Or at least complicated seems more likely to work.
WHAT IF FOLLOWING GOD, SEEING GOD DO GREATER THINGS IN YOUR LIFE, IS SIMPLER THAN YOU THINK.
IT’S HARD TO BELIEVE RIGHT?
THINK ABOUT HOW BIG GOD IS. (DESCRIBE GOD’S BIGNESS)
SO I WANT COMPLICATED. I THINK YOU DO TO.
LIKE DO YOU EVER GET ANNOYED WHEN IM UP HERE LIKE.... “JUST HAVE FAITH!”. And you’re like.... alright… It’s more complicated than that.
OR JUST TRUST GOD!
LIKE I HATE WHEN IM GOING TO SOMEONE WISER THAN ME WITH AN ISSUE AND THEY SAY “HAVE YOU PRAYED ABOUT IT?”
And im like… okay that’s too simple.
I THINK FOLLOWING JESUS IS SUPPOSED TO BE SIMPLE
JESUS ONCE SAID WAS TEACHING CHILDREN AND ONE DAY TOLD HIS DISCIPLES THAT WE ARE MEANT TO COME TO JESUS LIKE A CHILD. Not looking for complicated just simple trust.
PAUL LATER SAID to not make it hard for people to come to know Jesus because they wanted complicated. Rules. Steps. A 52 step class. and then you move on to the next steps and once you meet all the requirements you can follow Jesus. But Jesus said and Paul argued that it was simple.
WHEN SOMEONE CHANGES JOBS… WHAT DO WE DO? I wonder why they left that job? Did they get fired? What if they stole money? NO CANDACE THEY JUST WANTED A DIFFERENT JOB.
A LOT OF TIMES IT’S SO SIMPLE
LOOK AT YOUR NEIGHBOR AND TELL THEM IT’S SIMPLE
OUR STORY TODAY HAS A COMPLICATED PROBLEM WITH A SIMPLE SOLUTION.
ELISHA -- HAS AN ENCOUNTER WITH A GUY NAMED NAAMAN
NAAMAN WAS A COMMANDER OF AN ARMY
1 Naaman, commander of the army for the king of Aram, was a man important to his master and highly regarded because through him, the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man was a valiant warrior, but he had a skin disease.
IF WE KNEW NAAMAN TODAY WE WOULD LOOK FOR REASONS WHY HE HAD THIS DISEASE
Sometimes God will allow something into your life just so you can know what He can do.
You can’t know he can provide until you need him to provide. You can’t know the peace that surpasses all understanding until you are in a spot where you peace.
You can’t know he’s a chain breaker until you have chains that need to be broken.
WHAT WE LEARN IS THAT NAAMAN HEARS ABOUT ELISHA AND SENDS SOMEONE TO GO LET ELISHA KNOW THAT HE NEEDS HELP.
AND NAAMAN HAS HEARD OF HIM. KNOWS HIS REPUTATION. AND HE KNOWS THAT ELISHA AND ELIJAH HAD SOME PRETTY EXTRAVAGANT AND COMPLICATED MIRACLES.
10 Then Elisha sent him a messenger, who said, “Go wash seven times in the Jordan and your skin will be restored and you will be clean.”
11 But Naaman got angry and left, saying, “I was telling myself: He will surely come out, stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the skin disease.
12 Aren’t Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and left in a rage.
WE WILL GET SO FOCUSED ON WHAT WE WANT GOD TO DO AND EVEN MORE SPECIFICALLY HOW WE WANT GOD TO DO IT THAT WE WONT DO WHAT WE ALREADY KNOW
Naaman already knows what to do. But it’s too simple and it’s too normal. He’s taken baths before. He’s no stranger to a shower. And so he’s about to miss out on healing because doing something normal multiple times seems too simple.
13 But his servants approached and said to him, “My father, if the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more should you do it when he only tells you, ‘Wash and be clean’?”
What if the secret to the peace you need is just doing what you already know to do. And keep doing it.
Im sure naaman has even taken showers since he got this disease. And it didn’t help before why would it help now.
And some of you have needed peace and prayed. You needed breakthrough so you read your bible. You needed community or you needed hope so you came to church.
And it didn’t work on your timeline or your deadline so you assumed it needed to be something more complicated so you quit doing the simple things and in the process missed out on the miracle.
But what if the answer is simple? What if seeing God move in greater ways in your life is as simple as doing what you already know and doing it consistently and trusting God with the outcome?
A lot of times we want it to be more complicated because then we feel like we have more control over the outcome.
WHENEVER I GET INTERESTED IN SOMETHING I GET SUPER INTO SOMETHING. LIKE I WANT TO KNOW EVERY DETAIL. I WANT TO KNOW EVERYTHING ABOUT THE SUBJECT.
I REMEMBER WHEN I STARTED FISHING AGAIN. I SPENT SO MUCH TIME LEARNING EVERYTHING. WHAT RODS AND REELS WERE THE BEST. WHAT BAIT WORKS BEST. HOW TO LOOK AT THE WATER AND KNOW WHERE THE FISH PROBABLY WERE. I KNEW ALL ABOUT THE DIFFERENT CYCLES THAT BASS GO THROUGH AND WHEN YOU’RE MOST LIKELY TO CATCH THEM.
YOU KNOW WHAT I DIDN’T DO? IT WAS MONTHS BEFORE I ACTUALLY FISHED.
I HAD ALL THIS KNOWLEDGE AND NEVER CAUGHT A FREAKIN FISH. MY KNOWLEDGE WAS ONLY AS GOOD AS MY ACTION. JUST THROW THE BAIT IN THE WATER.
FAITH WITHOUT WORKS IS DEAD.
YOU SHOULD LEARN ALL YOU CAN ABOUT THEOLOGY AND HOW GOD WORKS AND THE INS AND OUTS OF HIS CHARACTER I BELIEVE IT’S IMPORTANT AND GREAT. BUT THAT KNOWLEDGE IS ONLY AS GOOD AS WHAT YOU DO WITH IT.
IF MY KNOWLEDGE OF GOD DOESN’T MOVE ME TO ACT THEN IT DID NOTHING.
I THINK A LOT OF US THOUGH HAVE TRIED THE SIMPLE THING WE TRIED JUST WAKING UP EALIER AND READING THE BIBLE. PRAYING. WE MADE CHURCH A PRIORITY BUT THINGS DIDN’T CHANGE WHEN WE THOUGHT THEY WOULD SO WE STOP.
BUT DID YOU NOTICE.... Naaman needed to wash 7 times. This simple thing done over and over what if he would have stopped at 5 times? at six times. This simple thing over and over is what was going to fix his problem he just needed to keep going.
we want our outcome on our time frame:
But the outcome isn’t your job. The outcome isn’t my job. My job is to be obedient. God handles the outcome. I be faithful. I be obedient and God handles the outcome. He’s way better at outcomes than you could ever be.
Can you imagine if salvation was up to us!?
We would still be trying to make it happen. But thank God for the simple Gospel that God so loved us that He sent his son.
14 So Naaman went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, according to the command of the man of God. Then his skin was restored and became like the skin of a small boy, and he was clean.
What we learn is that this causes Naaman to start following God. ONE SIMPLE THING: DOING WHAT GOD SAID CHANGED HIS LIFE FOREVER.
HOW MANY TIMES HAVE YOU STOPPED DOING THE SIMPLE THINGS? Put off the normal everyday following of Jesus. And I wonder how many times you were one more day away from seeing God change everything.
TALKING ABOUT READING GOD’S WORD, PRAYER AND MAKING CHURCH A PRIORITY IS SOMETHING IM VERY PASSIONATE ABOUT.
In almost every message I hit on it because it’s simple but these three things are what we put off and become least consistent in the most often.
10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow— in heaven and on earth and under the earth—
11 and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
CANADA STORY