I Have Decided to Make Everything Count

Intro

We are in week 4 of I have decided to… This is the last week. I hope that you have enjoyed the series.

Can you believe this is the first week of February, so NYR are a little old, but now is the time… to make some decisions for the Lord.

Look what Paul said,

2 Corinthians 6:2 NIV

2 For he says, “In the time of my favor I heard you, and in the day of salvation I helped you.” I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.

Look at your neighbor and say, Now is the time!

Now is the time to decide to make 2025 your best year. Now is the time to decide to leave that addiction or hurt or offense… in the past.

To do that, we have to know the answer to this question.

What are we here for?

Rick Warren wrote a followup to the Purpose Driven life called, What on earth am I her for? Once we know the answer to that, we will find that God has so many good things in store for us, so why wait to go all in?

story - Bob was promoted to CEO of a major Company. He felt totally unprepared for it. He told God, if you will guide me, I’ll give you the glory. And both kept their word. Guided him and he gave God the glory.

Many of us feel under qualified to do what God is calling us to do… to pastor a church… to lead worship… to teach kids church… to lead a group… to greet… to run the tech stuff… to share your faith with someone… , but are we still have to make a decision ot either do it or not. God has brought us this far, so what are we waiting for?

Check out Paul in this wonderful passage…

Ephesians 2:10 NLT

10 For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

Turn to someone next to you and say… You are God’s Master Piece! Turn to the other one and say the same…

We are a Masterpiece!

GK word for masterpiece - comes from a word where we get poem and a story. Is that cool or what? God designed you with a story. He steps into your story and makes you a masterpiece. Each one of you have a poem… a story that God is fulfilling in you.

I used to struggle with my self image. I was too short… too slow… to small… I can’t speak well… Maybe you have struggle too.

This is why I love this verse. I am God’s masterpiece and so are you. He made you as His masterpiece, and your identity is in Jesus, not in this world, not in your past or what someone said about you.

Look at the last part of this verse.

We are made to do good things.

We have a purpose in Jesus, and it’s to do good things. I can gt excited about the fact that before I was even born, God had a purpose for me… and he has one for you too. Before we were born He had good things that he planned for us to do for him.

You may think that you have missed it, but God doesn’t give up on you or what he has created you to do.

Romans 11:29 NLT

29 For God’s gifts and his call can never be withdrawn.

God wove your purpose into you DNA and it’s doesn’t expire. Unlike gift cards that reduce in value as time goes and they expire. God’s purpose for your life doesn’t expire. We may add some extra chapters, but the purpose of your life is always there.

This happens when we are created new in Christ Jesus.

2 Corinthians 5:17 NLT

17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!

Jesus is the author of our identity and he is the activator of our purpose. We have a hope and a future because of Jesus.

You may not feel like you are ready to do what it is God wants you to do, but it’s time. Today is the day. it’s possible because we have been made new in Christ Jesus.

Here is the decision for today …

I have decided to make every day count.

I know there is a lot of self-help about this but today. John Maxwell wrote a book titled, “Every Day Matters.” But today, we are going to study Jesus and see how He made every day count.

Growing up in church, I always heard that whatever the problem… the answer was Jesus.

I am going to give you four things to make this practical so you can apply it this afternoon and they all begin with “M.” I know… it’s a preacher thing…

1. Jesus had the right mandate.

Jesus clearly had a why… a purpose. He knew why he was here.

Philippians 2:5–7 NLT

5 You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. 6 Though he was God, he did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. 7 Instead, he gave up his divine privileges; he took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When he appeared in human form,

Jesus took on the posture of a servant. When he woke up in the morning, he had a decision to make… we have to make a decision too. Whose agenda are we going to go after today?

Too often, when we wake up it’s our own agenda… I am going to work and going to crush it…

We can either choose to pursue our own agenda or we can do what Jesus did. He actually laid aside his divinity and took on the role as a servant. We need God to give us His strength.

This is counter culture. We have blessed ourselves into insanity. We are more empty than ever before. All of these moral issues we face in our nation today, you don’t see them in many other parts of the world… we are blessed but don’t realize it.

Rom 1 Paul even says that we are making up ways to do evil. Why? Because that hole is still there.

Our youth group name was JC and company… If you were a movie character, who would you be? If I asked that today, most of you would say the name of a lead character, but in God’s economy, we make horrible lead characters. We need to understand that as an actor, you can win an oscar in a supporting role. We need to understand that we can be right where God wants us to be as we serve him.

Take a look at this… this is a good prayer to pray.

Today is not about me; it’s about you. Show me how I can serve you.

When we pray this, we put ourselves into a Jesus posture.

2. Jesus had the right mindset.

We see that Jesus lived with the right mindset.

Luke 2:52 NLT

52 Jesus grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and all the people.

circle grew.

Jesus was all God, but he was also all man. Jesus has a growth mindset. In each of these four areas he grew. He was always in a process of growth.

I want to live my life the same way. I want to always be growing. If you are out there and you think that you have a lid on your growth, recognize that there is no lid because Jesus kept growing. And if Jesus, the creator of the universe and everything in it can keep growing, you and I can keep growing.

If we live with the right mindset, then we will never grow old. Listen, old is not a number, it’s a mindset. I want to live my life with a growth mindset. I want to work hard and grow every day. My dad would always work and try to learn something new.

To grow we will have to change some mindsets… Take a look at these.

Try mindset: to attempt to do something.

A try mindset is the way too often we life life. We try something and it it works out, it’s for us. If it doesn’t it wasn’t for us. We do this in our walk with God. If something doesn’t work out the way we think it should we look elsewhere. We too often allow discouragement to close doors.

Training mindset: to engage in a process of growth.

We have an objective but we know we won’t achieve it today so when we fail at something, it’s not a failure, it’s just a setback and we will eventually get there. We don’t stop. Remember there is no lid on your growth.

ILL - Tuba - terrible at first… became very good with practice…

speaking - scared to death at first… and comfortable now.

Has anyone here besides me made mistakes and had to learn from those mistakes? We are always learning.

3. Jesus had the right method.

Jesus had a purpose… a why… and that why determined his what.

Jesus’ days were intentional.

He knew why he was here and that guided what he did every day. Look at how Luke puts it.

Luke 19:10 NLT

10 For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.”

Jesus had a GPS in his life that was leading him to his why. We have to know our why. If we don’t the world will get us so busy we don’t have time to find our why.

Jesus days were selective

Jesus didn’t do everything but he did do the right things.

Jesus spent time with his heavenly father… he spent time with his disciples… he spent time with the crowd he was influencing… He spent time serving.

He didn’t do everything but he did the right things.

Jesus days were measured.

He did the right things every day, but not all day. He took time to eat and rest… and spend time with his closest friends.

We need to protect our off time as well. When I was doing counseling, at first it seemed crazy to stop at 1 hour, but I had to do that both for the person and myself. We have to take care of ourselves as we help others.

John Maxwell came up with something he called the Rule of 5. Choose 5 activities and then commit to doing the regularly. These activities should lead towards your life’s mission.

We just have to…

Identify the right activities.

Get in the groups…

Here is a list of areas that we need to be active in. Thsi might be your five… it’s pretty good so check it out.

1. Faith

Choose an activity that fuels your faith.

First 15 -

2. Relationships

Do something every day that enriches your personal relationships.

3. Personal Growth

Could be professional growth… develop as a student…

4. Personal Care

Many of you are good at taking care of others but bad at taking care of yourself.

Do something that is for you… could be physically… steps… exercise.

5. Serving Others

From the overflow of your life… serve others.

Take these and

Do them every day.

Trust the process.

You may not see the results on day one, but trust the process. Maxwell says it’s like chopping down a huge tree. You don’t have to chop the whole thing down at once, just take a swing at it every day. Over time you will chop the tree down.

Puzzle… when you start it doesn’t look anything like the picture.

4. Jesus had the right mates.

This is your friends. Jesus was rich in purpose and in people.

There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship. Thomas Aquinas

That’s true.

If you have ever been around anyone at the end of their life, they are not talking about their achievements… they talk about their relationships.

Same was true of Jesus. As he was hanging on the Cross, he wasn’t talking about all the stuff he did… he was talking about people. John 17 was a prayer for his disciples. Right in the middle Jesus gave us this verse…

John 17:8 NLT

8 for I have passed on to them the message you gave me. They accepted it and know that I came from you, and they believe you sent me.

Jesus gave others what his father gave him. We need this framework. We learn from someone and pass it on to someone else.

Sea of Galilee - rich and alive body of water. vs Dead sea. Sea of Galilee has water coming in and going out. The Dead sea just has water coming in.

We need to be like the sea of Galilee with knowledge coming in and out.

What are we waiting for?

altar time…

God is speaking to each one of us…

Salvation -

Maybe you have a relationship… What is my next step? If you ask, he will answer.

Pray - Now is the day. It’s not about being religious… its about a relationship with Jesus. Ask God to fill you with his Holy Spirit.

Pray for those who need to take a next step. Break off enemies lies that bring condemnation … today we make a decision to make every day count.