Thrive Under His Care

Baby Dedication:

Baby Dedication

What Baby Dedication is

It is a commitment for the family to pursue God (this is not salvation)

1 Samuel 1:27-28 (NKJV)

[27] For this child I prayed, and the LORD has granted me my petition which I

asked of Him.

[28] Therefore I also have lent him to the LORD; as long as he lives he shall be

lent to the LORD." So they worshiped the LORD there.

Every parent has it within themselves to protect their child and ask God to bless them.

Deuteronomy 6:6–7 (NIV): 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.

Introduce the family

Speak to the parents about their commitment to their child

1. Do you receive ____________ with gratitude, as God’s gift to you and

your family?

2. Do you commit to each other as parents, to create a stable environment in

which _______________ can mature?

3. Do you commit to live a faith-filled life that honors God as an example to

____________?

4. Do you commit to be parents that will walk in love and patience with _____________

and each other?

5. Do you commit to raising _________________ in the way of the Lord?

6. Do you commit to promote the way, the love and the word of God in your

home?

7. Do you commit to leaning on the Holy Spirit for guidance, direction and

wisdom on how you should raise each of your children?

Anoint the child with oil:

In the name of the Lord Jesus I speak blessing over you ___________

• May you be blessed following and submitting to your parents

• May you be blessed as you are trained in the way you should go

• May you be blessed in your education

• May you be blessed in obeying the laws of the land

• May you be blessed in your future occupation

• May you be blessed in your family and the family you will make some day

• May you be blessed in following the plan of God for your life

• May you be blessed with health

• May you be blessed with long life

• May you be blessed with wisdom

• May you be blessed with understanding

• May you be blessed with provisions for life

• May you be blessed with knowing Jesus as your Lord and Savior at an early age.

Pray for the parents

___________________________________________________________________________________

Mark 4:35–41 NIV

35 That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” 36 Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. 37 A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. 38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” 39 He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm. 40 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?” 41 They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”

I have heard many teachings from here, as I am sure you have. And in the circles I have run in, the takeaway is quite often wrong.

And the presence of the storm did not indicate disobedience to God. It was Jesus’ idea to cross the lake. The metaphorical storms in your life do not indicate you are doing something wrong. In fact, lets get away from trying to determine what the storms mean, and simply continue in obedience and trust to what Jesus has you doing.

The emphasis has been on the disciples not speaking and declaring to the storm.

Yet in Acts 27 a man of great faith, Paul, is shipwrecked.

Yet for this (disciples speaking to the storm) interpretation of the lesson is to impress your own theology onto the text and ignore the proper methods of interpretation which is seeking the “plain meaning of the text” in its context.

One of the main problems with this idea is that it makes the object of your faith - your faith. Do I have enough faith, am I saying, doing the right thing. The focus then is on you! And you cannot be the object of faith.

My faith is not in what I’ve done right, my faith is not in what I’ve said, my faith is not in my holiness, my faith is not in my actions, my faith is in Christ and Him alone.

The object of faith, is always Jesus and those who have great faith are mostly unaware that they have faith, they are simply looking at and attentive to, and captivated by the goodness of Jesus. Believing He is who He has revealed himself to be.

Women with the issue of blood.

The 4 friends carrying their friend to the roof.

To actually go to Jesus with expectation requires such a belief in his character.

And of course, your faith in him, will lead you to do and say the right things without thinking of them.

But faith is praying to Him, about this thing, because I know you care.

So the Chief lesson we can glean from here is Jesus’ rebuke to his disciples for their lack of trust in him because they accused him of not caring.

The emphasis is not on the storm but is rather on obedience and trust in Jesus regardless of what you face.

As you obey and trust - if the storm needs to be silenced, He will silence it, if it doesn’t and you are shipwrecked, you can expect a powerful healing revival on the island.

He will be glorified in the silencing or the enduring.

Either way, he cares for you.

Peter’s Command

Mark’s gospel was believed (based on church history) to have been influenced and informed by Peter.

1 Peter 5:6–7 “6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7 Cast all your anxiety/care on him because he cares for you.”

Psalm 55:22 “Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken.”

The psalmist is imploring God to help him because the wicked were attempting to destroy him, and even his close friend had turned against him.

Peter also has first hand experience with this. He learned this on the boat at the sea. Cast your care to Jesus. Jesus there is a storm, I need you to deal with this.

Then we don’t get offended at him on what he does or doesn’t do with the storm.

Paul didn’t get offended when God didn’t stop the storm, he didn’t get offended when he was shipwrecked and all he had was the wet clothes on his back. He didn’t get offended when as he was working to make a fire a viper jumped out and bit him, humility does not get offended.

But casts our anxiety to him.

Anxiety: “merimnan” means “to be drawn in different directions, to be divided or distracted.” Whatever we are anxious about tends to distract us from trusting God. It pulls us in different directions so that we do not depend on him.

We are like what James described the doubting man as a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. They are unstable and double-minded.

Mark 4:19 “19 but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful.”

Additionally: Peter is connecting worry with pride. Because humility casts their care away, pride hangs on to it. To human pride it is humiliating to cast everything upon another and be cared for.

Worry/care/anxiety that is kept/held onto is a form of pride because they are convinced that they must solve all the problems in their lives in their own strength. The only god they trust in is themselves.

The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, Vol. VIII A Cure for Care (No. 428)

the very essence of anxious care is the imagining that we are wiser than God, and the thrusting of ourselves into his place, to do for him that which we dream he either cannot or will not do; we attempt to think of that which we fancy he will forget; or we labour to take upon ourselves that burden which he either is not able or willing to carry for us.

Besides the reality that anxiety can and will often lead us into over sins, it also weakens our usefulness to Jesus.

“When cares buzz in the ear, the music of grace is hard to hear.”

Hanging on to anxiety and worries is a mindset of fear not of faith. (If you had faith you wouldn’t hang on to it.)

Symptoms of a fear mindset (don’t feel guilty, we are all moving from fear to faith)

Content for how things are

Hate change, mindset is full of limitations. Can’t do this. You can’t see opportunities.

Don’t like correction

You see feedback and correction as a threat instead as a benefit because you feel that you must protect your identity that you have created for yourself rather than take rest in His love and identity.

Territorial - this is mine

You hold on to your titles, positions, jobs. A mindset of entitlement rather than gratitude.

Stick to what you know (afraid to grow and learn)

No interest in learning more, getting better.

You know what you know but you don’t know what you don’t know.

How am I limiting God in my life. What false knowledge am I holding onto that is limiting God’s work in my life?

Rom. 10:2 “The Israelites have zeal but not based on knowledge.

Hosea 4:6 “6 my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. “Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children.”

Offended all the time

Take everything personal.

Give up easily at the slightest inconvenience or trouble

In love with comfort and convenience rather than God’s glory. When persecution/trouble arises for the word’s sake, they are offended.

Afraid of failure, you can’t be wrong

You see failure as final rather than as a learning experience.

Worn out, tired… Anxiety will deplete you

Carrying these burdens will wear you out. We are to be refreshed, excited, lively.

Your goal is to always look good, hides weakness, puts a fake face on, instead of be vulnerable and grow.

Afraid of betrayal. Love like you’ve never been hurt.

We might experience these things, but we must “Cast” Them.

Casting—once for all [epiripsantes, aorist]. The aorist participle denoting an act once for all; throwing the whole life with its care on him.

This word suggests a deliberate decision of trust.

The one who lies awake at night losing the blessed sleep due to anxious thoughts of the future has yet to reach the place of faith in Jesus “that laughs at impossibilities and says, it shall be done.”

Sometimes we forget that the church is the only people in the world that are called to do the impossible. Not just do the possible and stamp Jesus’ name on it but rather we accomplish what we cannot do but only God can do in Jesus Name.

5 Second Rule

Why?

“He Cares” The Greek impersonal verb μελει [melei] with the dative αὐτῳ [autōi] comes off literally as “it is a care to Him.” God does care with watchful interest and affection.

God is not indifferent nor cruel. He has compassion on his children and will sustain them in every distress.

Whatever things concern a follower of God, whether they be spiritual or temporal, or whether in themselves great or small, God concerns himself with them; what affects them affects him; in all their afflictions he is afflicted. He who knows that God cares for him, need have no anxious cares about himself.

God is caring, compassionate, and merciful.

Micah 7:18 “18 Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy.”

Ezekiel 18:23 “23 Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign Lord. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?”

Psalm 86:15 “15 But you, Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.”

Mercy: deals with misery and its relief. Mercy is not merely his pardon of offenders but his attitude toward man and disposition to his creation. Mercy is both feeling and compassion (literally “from the bowels”) in action.

Jesus was moved with compassion and healed the sick.

Mark 10 (Blind Bartimaeus)

10 Men with leprosy.

It is not enough to believe that God can be merciful or showed mercy in the past, we must believe that God’s mercy is boundless, free and, through Jesus Christ our Lord, available to us now in our present situation.

Nelson’s Complete Book of Stories, Illustrations & Quotes Someone Once Said …

With the goodness of God to desire our highest welfare, the wisdom of God to plan it, and the power of God to achieve it, what do we lack?—A. W. Tozer