Sermon Tone Analysis

Background/Highlights

Small Town Rural Indiana

Show some pictures?

Very Small School

Molly and I have known each other for a LONG time - went to church, YG together

Family, mine and Moll’s, Long hair

I love sports - football, baseball, soccer, but basketball is my favorite

Colts, Purdue, if I had to pick Pacers, Tottenham Hotspur

I love

I love movies and tv shows

Star Wars, Avengers, Batman Trilogy, The Office, Parks and Rec, Stranger Things, Friday Night Lights

I love all kinds of food!!!

Burgers are probably my favorite.

But I love Mexican, Chinese, Thai, PIZZA, Wings

Pretty much anything EXCEPT ONIONS.

I can’t stand onions

Playing xbox

I can’t stand onions

playing guitar

High School

Very small school!

Very much focused on myself

Lived two separate lives - one at school, one at church - grew up in church my whole life, but never made my faith my own; didn’t get the gospel

Life was about me, about sports, I was the center!

I knew I needed God; that was always in the back of my mind, especially from my upbringing.

I knew God should be important, but that But I never really had a desire to pursue Him.

Grant

Grant came to YG with me and Jesus grabbed ahold of his heart like I had never seen before; he instantly understood what it meant to have a relationship with Jesus that literally changed not just his life, but mine

He was the first person who I saw what a life-giving relationship with Jesus looked like, and in that moment I knew that wasn’t just what I needed, it also became what I wanted

It is easy to say that we need Jesus, but I think it’s a lot different when we say that we want Jesus

**You should always bring your friends whether you want to be here or not - you never know how God will use it not just to change them, but you as well!**

This changed the direction of my life forever

Priorities Changed - Who I chose to hang out with, how I spent my time; became closer to friends at YG in 6 months than I had with friends at school in 10 years

there is NOTHING like a community that is centered around commonality in Jesus

Identity Changed - I wasn’t perfect, but I became increasingly less and less absorbed with myself; it wasn’t about me being seen as an athlete, or as popular, but as a belonging to Jesus

This had a huge impact on me as I began thinking about college and why I chose IWU

College

**What happens when you become a disciple and follow Jesus is that you learn to live the life that God has for you and not your own.

**

Went to college as a nursing major, not even a month in I was like “Nope!”

Went into it because I wanted to help people, but I knew I could make good money, and IWU had a great program

When you are following Jesus, you begin to ask questions like “Lord, what do YOU want to do with my life?

How are YOU calling me to live my life?”

No doubt this is where some of you are right now - let me just say, you don’t have to have that figured out now.

More than what we do with our lives for God, I believe that God is more concerned with who we are becoming in your relationship with Him

Place your relationship with Jesus over what you are supposed to do, and He will make clear to you the life He has for you

As we are growing and deepening in our relationship with Jesus, then Jesus begins to reveal this to us

For me, and I believe for you, it was a matter of learning how God made me and wired me, what I enjoyed doing, and how God led me as I asked for His guidance

I love people - I love relationships, making new friends, developing and growing old ones - I knew what God was calling me to was with people

I love God’s Word - I love learning about God’s Word, and I love teaching God’s Word; as I learned more about my love for people and my love for God and His Word, I began to think more about ministry

As I began to pursue this, God kept affirming it and opened the doors I sense He was leading me through

This is not to say that discerning God’s will is easy, or that He will always lead you in ways you expect.

Sometimes Jesus works in really unexpected ways, sometimes He allows things to happen that we don’t understand in the moment - yet His ways are always trustworthy and always with purpose

Jesus asks us not to understand, but to be faithful, to surrender to what He wants, to say “not my will be done, Father, but Yours”

One day I was home, and I was having some devotional time.

I was reading or journaling, I’m not sure what.

But I was home alone, and I needed some background noise - normally I do this in quiet, but for some reason I turned on the tv this day.

I turned it on, and naturally I put on SportsCenter.

When I turned it on, SC just started telling the story of a guy named Wilson Holloway.

WH was Blake Griffin’s best friend.

They grew up together, they played basketball together, you get the picture.

I really wasn’t paying attention, I was trying to read and have my quiet time, as you know, until they started talking more about WH’s story.

You see, when Wilson was only 20, he was diagnosed with NHL, a cancer of the lymph nodes.

As soon as they said this, my eyes and attention jumped to the TV to listen to this story.

The reason this caught my attention was because I had been sick for the past several weeks - I had to leave college my sophomore year because of this, and I was in and out of the hospital as drs.

were trying to figure out what i had.

I had just come back from the drs.

office only a couple days before this, and the news they gave me was was scary, but hopeful.

The doctors said that, based on their tests and procedures they had done in the past weeks, they were almost 100% positive that I had NHL.

All they needed to do to confirm this was one last surgery to find the cancer cells - and once they did this, we could then move on to doing chemo therapy to fight it.

Because of this, they told me I had to drop out of school to get ready for this.

Even though they were sure this was the diagnosis, they said there was nothing to be afraid of - that of all the cancers in the world that you can have, this is a good one, because they know how to cure it, and it has a 99% cure rate.

This was so reassuring for me to hear.

Even though this is what my life is going to be like for the foreseeable future, I will end up being okay.

“Okay, Jesus, if this is what you have for me, I trust you”

At this point in the story on SportsCenter, they are detailing WH’s journey through chemo therapy.

It is a long road, but it is one that that was successful after a few months of chemo.

What happened was just what the doctors said!

He was healed, and he eventually went back to living a normal life.

This was encouraging to hear!

The doctors were right, I could be healed just like WH.

But of course the story wasn’t over.

A few months after WH’s cancer went away, it came back again.

And this time, it was much worse.

This is not something my doctors told me was a possibility.

WH went through about months of really tough chemo, and eventually he passed away from the cancer.

This was one of the most sobering moments of my life.

I was 20 years old, listening to the story of another 20 year old who lost his life to the same cancer my doctors told me I didn’t have to worry about.

It was a moment where life really came into perspective for me for the first time - I knew that I wouldn’t live forever, but I sure never imagined that my life could end so soon.

“Okay, Jesus, if this is what you have for me, I trust you”

What God taught me in this moment was how precious of a gift life is.

I have no idea what the number of my days are, but however many there are, I want to make them count!

I don’t want to waste this life that you have given me, Lord, no matter how long it is.

Two passages that God used to help me in this season.

The first was .

This is what it says:

This passage was so encouraging to me during this season.

I love so many things about it that God used to teach me about what was going on around me -

God’s promise to always be with us - not because I choose to be with Him, but He chooses to be with me, with You

I am always with YOU; I am with You, and wherever you are is where I am supposed to be

You hold me by my right hand - I did not take ahold of your hand, but Yours is tightly gripped around mine!