A Big God

Introduction

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Grab your Bibles, iPads, iPhones, or some inferior device and turn to . Yes, Jesus still loves you if you use an android. He understands. Just kidding.

DEEP BREATH

Big Picture Series

Big Picture Series

Wow! It is really good to be here with you. It really is kind of surreal. It feels like it’s been a long time in this process but in reality, it’s been quite short as these kinds of things go. God really worked all of this out in some amazing ways. Alex told me to send you his greetings!

Thank you all for your very warm welcome. The church council, the staff, all of you today. We feel loved. I’m very humbled. We feel taken care of!

However, I’m not above asking for help if I need it. On Monday night, our trailers get here and I would love a few hands to help unload them. It’s actually right around the corner on Mills. Friends of ours have a warehouse that they are graciously letting us use. We will send out an email this afternoon with the specific address. Any help would be great.

I will probably say this often but I want to communicate clearly that I consider it an honor to be your pastor. It is not something I take for granted at all. I see this incredible opportunity to help lead (I certainly won’t be doing it alone because of the great team here) a group of people to be more like Jesus and make a significant impact in the communities around us as we proclaim the good news about Jesus. I’m excited. I’m really looking forward to what where God is taking us.

So… Speaking of traveling. On any journey, you have two kinds of people. You’ve got the big picture folks and then you’ve got the turn by turn people. The turn by turn folks just want to know the very next step. Don’t bother me with a big picture. It will just confuse me. The big picture person gets out the map because they want to see it all in one place. I’m choosing to believe that a healthy marriage involves having both. So, honey, we have a balanced healthy marriage. Amanda is a turn by turn person and I’m definitely a big picture person. I just have to know where we are going.

So that’s what we are going to do for the next four weeks as a church. We are going to look at the big picture. Sure, we will talk about some specific turns but we’ve got to start with the big picture. Week one. Week two. Week three. Week four.

A Big God

A Big Mission

Introduction

A Big Difference

A Big Family

Some of those are pretty obvious at we are referring to but if not, you’ll just have to come and see what they are all about. In September then we start a series on the Kingdom. The King and his Kingdom. A walk through Matthew’s account of Jesus’ teachings on the kingdom. We’ll take three months to do that. We’ll celebrate advent and then in January, we will start the year with a huge emphasis on prayer but also present the next chapter in the vision that we believe God is going to give us.

I invite you to be a part of all of that. If you’ve been a part of Gateway, great! Keep going. If you are new, jump on board. Come be a part of what God is doing. Get to know Gateway. Dinner with the pastor. Becoming a ministry partner. Serving. Giving. Let’s do this!

As many of you know, we moved from here 2 1/2 years ago to west Michigan to oversee church planting for our denomination. It was a good 2 1/2 years. God did some really cool things. One is that I had the opportunity to learn a ton. It was a very different role than pastoring. In a good way.

One of the truths that grabbed me in deep way as our need for churches to be VERTICAL vs. horizontal. Love God. Love your neighbor. It’s sort of easy to focus more on the horizontal.

A couple of books really challenged me in this area. The first was vertical church by James McDonald. Wow. He challenged church leaders and pastors to focus on how Great God is and how he deserves all of our worship. That then forms the foundation for our relationship with each other and with a broken, fallen world. This might be a book some of our church leadership reads together.

The other one really messed me up as an individual follower of Jesus. JD Greear wrote the book, “Not God Enough - Why your small God leads to big problems.” God has incredibly convicted me that my sinful struggles in life are because I simply do not view God for who he is - A REALLY BIG GOD. Our culture wants us to believe that God is small. As Lebron would say, “The big man upstairs.”

My friends, he’s not the big man upstairs. He’s almighty God, the perfect, holy, just, creator, savior, sustainer of the world! It’s all about him! He’s the center of the universe. Not you and me or anyone else for that matter. Bottom line, there is no one like our God.

Psalm 139:1–6 NLT

1 O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. 2 You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away. 3 You see me when I travel and when I rest at home. You know everything I do. 4 You know what I am going to say even before I say it, Lord. 5 You go before me and follow me. You place your hand of blessing on my head. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand!

Let’s take a quick walk through together. Probably a bit familiar to some of you or at least some of the verses might be. This is a psalm of David. In the four stanzas (six verse sections), we see four ways that God is unlike anyone else but specifically with how he relates to us as individuals. Let’s read the first six verses.

Psalm 139:1–6 NLT

1 O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. 2 You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away. 3 You see me when I travel and when I rest at home. You know everything I do. 4 You know what I am going to say even before I say it, Lord. 5 You go before me and follow me. You place your hand of blessing on my head. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand!

Truth #1...

No One KNOWS Me Like God KNOWS Me

He knows everything! What we say, what we think, where we go, what do we do! Everything. The theological term is omniscience.

Notice that he knows when we travel. Let me tell you a crazy story.

Boxes flying out of trailer story

Notice David’s response in verse 6. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand. I argue that if we aren’t having moments like that, our God is too small. Let that sink in! If God’s attributes do not overwhelm us sometimes, we simply do not see God the way that Scripture presents him.

Let’s look at the next six verses.

Psalm 139:7–12 NLT

7 I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! 8 If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave, you are there. 9 If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, 10 even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me. 11 I could ask the darkness to hide me and the light around me to become night— 12 but even in darkness I cannot hide from you. To you the night shines as bright as day. Darkness and light are the same to you.

Truth #2...

No One IS WITH Me Like God IS WITH Me

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Little kid saying, “You can’t see me!” Story about CJ’s overnight for church youth group. Girl hiding in the pipe organ chamber.

You can’t hide from God. He’s everywhere.

Do you ever feel all alone? Lonely? Even with people all around us, we often feel a disconnectedness and loneliness. At the risk of coming across as insensitive, if we struggle with loneliness, then maybe our God might not be big enough. I also believe that the more we struggle with private sins, the smaller our God is. We turn to other things and experiences because we don’t acknowledge the presence of God in our lives. The omnipresence of God should impact our daily lives. This is something I’m really wrestling with right now personally. How should the presence of God impact my life today? He is everywhere!

He keeps going. Some intense verses in 13-18.

Psalm 139:13–18 NLT

13 You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. 14 Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. 15 You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. 16 You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. 17 How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! 18 I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me!

Truth #3...

No One CARES about Me Like God CARES about Me

So lot’s of babies at Gateway. What’s going on? What are you serving at the potlucks or in the coffee on Sundays?

You new parents or parents to be should connect with these verses a little more. Look at what’s going on in the womb. God is doing some knitting and weaving. You think that’s a kick? That’s a knitting needle. God is a craftsmen.

Again, can you feel the sense of being overwhelmed by God’s love in these verses? It’s like, “Wow, God. You really care about me! You made me special! You think about me! A lot! This goes hand in hand with his presence.

Let’s look at the last 6 verses. Get a feel for what’s happening here. God, you really know me. God, you are with me wherever I go. God you really care about me. I think David gets a little distracted but then comes back around.

Psalm 139:19–24 NLT

19 O God, if only you would destroy the wicked! Get out of my life, you murderers! 20 They blaspheme you; your enemies misuse your name. 21 O Lord, shouldn’t I hate those who hate you? Shouldn’t I despise those who oppose you? 22 Yes, I hate them with total hatred, for your enemies are my enemies. 23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

Psalm 139:19–22 NLT

19 O God, if only you would destroy the wicked! Get out of my life, you murderers! 20 They blaspheme you; your enemies misuse your name. 21 O Lord, shouldn’t I hate those who hate you? Shouldn’t I despise those who oppose you? 22 Yes, I hate them with total hatred, for your enemies are my enemies.

I think there is a pause here in his thinking. There’s a shift.

Psalm 139:23–24 NLT

23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 Point out anything in me that offends you, and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

Truth #4

No One LEADS Me Like God LEADS Me

Anyone here struggle with anxiety? We all do. To Varying degrees. What do we do with those anxious thoughts. Our default sinful reaction is to run to all kinds of idols. David recognizes: Wait a minute. God knows me. He’s with me. He cares about me. I’m going to let him lead me in his ways. I’m going to let him guide me. Direct me. Show me how to live life the way he wants to. I’m going to let me take care of my enemies. He was grasping how his Big God should impact his daily life.

No One LEADS Me Like God LEADS Me

Big Idea: Do I really believe...?

Big Idea: Do I really believe...?

Time for a little confession: This move was really really hard… And I didn’t handle it well. My reactions to the stresses of life revealed to me that I often believe in a small God. I’ve got a long way to go. Do you?

I chose this passage and the idea of a big God for our first week together because that’s where it all starts. He’s the creator. He’s the boss. He’s in charge. He’s the perfect and holy one. He’s the savior. He’s the one who knows how we should live.

Idolatry

Do we really believe all this? I think our struggle is moving from believing it when we are at church or growth group or when life is going well to believing it as our first reaction to any kinds of struggles. That my friends is character development which only happens thorough being a disciple of Jesus.

2 Questions

2 Questions

My job today is to be the messenger and not the Holy Spirit. I want to give room for Him to do his job. I’m going to consistently ask you to answer two questions.

What is God telling me?

What am I going to do about it?

Communion