Sermon Tone Analysis

People to care

Passion to

Presence

Power

 

Convict

Consume

Change

 

12 tribes

12 disciples

 

*/Difference between what is supernatural and what is superhuman./*

If nothing ever happens in a church or in our lives as individuals except what can be explained by good planning, giving, talent . . . .

then we are operating in an excellent way perhaps or a superhuman way perhaps but not in the arena of the supernatural.

God knows no limits.

He makes his home in the realm of the supernatural.

Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof.

Form without function is nauseating.

A form was meant to be filled with something substantial*/.

We will never receive from God what we are not prepared to use/*.

I might go a step further */– we will never receive from God that which we are not in the process of using./*

We will never receive the miraculous power and evidence of God’s work in our midst until we begin to function in ways which require that power*/.

We currently have power enough for what we are doing/*.

It would be the biggest waste in the world form me to drive a fast car.

I used to think that way until I got behind the wheel of a Mercedes.

You know when you’ve got hold of something that has power plus.

When you press the pedal there is response.

You have to hang on.

Do we want to see God heal, then we need to begin to pray seriously for healing – repeatedly, continuously regardless of how foolish it may cause us to look at times.

*/Where there are empty spots in our lives they will be filled with something/*.

I believe that the Devil looks for emptiness, places where God should be but isn’t and fills those spots in one form or another.

There is bickering and fighting and complaining in churches where there is no common vision.

There is no such thing as unity without task.

It cannot be measured apart from activity.

And for folks who are not actively engaged in the conflict then their lives begin to create it.

The most unhappy people in any given sports competition are those who sit comfortably in the seats as spectators their pudgy hands filled with that which appeases their appetites.

They neither win nor lose they only watch.

*/In 2 Timothy 3:1-5 there is no quality that could not exist happily within the fellowship of a local church./*

At times these characteristics are responsible for heinous actions blasphemously done in the name of the Christ who is their antithesis.

*/ /*

*/Perhaps people are not always changed because of the form which assimilates them./*

Could it be true that our converts will become what we are?

They may never rise beyond the acceptable level of spirituality that characterizes our fellowship?

They become like the group that they become a part of.

*/What is the evidence of power in the church today?/*

Love and grace rule the church.

Changed lives.

But as many as received him, to them gave he the power to become the sons of God even to them that believed in his name.

Answered prayer.

Miracles

 

The Miracle of Creation

 

The average human heart pumps over 1,000 gallons a day, over 55 million gallons in a lifetime.

This is enough to fill 13 super tankers.

It never sleeps, beating 2.5 billion times in a lifetime.

The lungs contain 1,000 miles of capillaries.

The process of exchanging oxygen for carbon dioxide is so complicated that "it is more difficult to exchange O2 for CO2 than for a man shot out of a cannon to carve the Lord’s Prayer on the head of a pin as he passes by."

DNA contains about 2,000 genes per chromosome—1.8

meters of DNA are folded into each cell nucleus.

A nucleus is 6 microns long.

This is like putting 30 miles of fishing line into a cherry pit.

And it isn’t simply stuffed in.

It is folded in.

If folded one way, the cell becomes a skin cell.

If another way, a liver cell, and so forth.

To write out the information in one cell would take 300 volumes, each volume 500 pages thick.

The human body contains enough DNA that if it were stretched out, it would circle the sun 260 times.

The body uses energy efficiently.

If an average adult rides a bike for 1 hour at 10 mph, it uses the amount of energy contained in 3 ounces of carbohydrate.

If a car were this efficient with gasoline, it would get 900 miles to the gallon.

Citation: Jeff Arthurs; references Dr. John Medina, genetic engineer, University of Washington,

in 1995 lecture at Multnomah Bible College, Portland, Oregon

 

Every follower of Jesus Christ needs to understand that Christ has power over both life and death -- otherwise we have no news that is ultimately Good News.

John Huffman in his book, Who's In Charge Here?, tells about Robert Dick Wilson, a great professor at Princeton Theological Seminary.

One of Dr. Wilson's students had been invited back to preach in Miller Chapel twelve years after his graduation.

Old Dr. Wilson came in and sat down near the front.

At the close of the meeting the old professor came up to his former student, cocked his head to one side in his characteristic way, extended his hand, and said, "If you come back again, I will not come to hear you preach.

I only come once.

I am glad that you are a big-godder.

When my boys come back, I come to see if they are big-godders or little-godders, and then I know what their ministry will be."

His former student asked him to explain, and he replied:  "Well, some men have a little god, and they are always in trouble with him.

He can't do any miracles.

He can't take care of the inspiration and transmission of the Scripture to us.

He doesn't intervene on behalf of his people.

They have a little god and I call them little-godders.

Then there are those who have a great God.

He speaks and it is done.

He commands and it stands fast.

He knows how to show Himself strong on behalf of them that fear him.

You have a great God; and He will bless your ministry."

He paused a moment and smiled, and said, "God bless you," and turned, and walked out.

See:  1 Chr 29:11-12; Eph 4:6

 

*/How would you know if God spoke to you today?  /*Better yet, will God speak to you today if he knows that you are unwilling to yield to him.

Have you ever wondered at the end of a service in which you have heard nothing and felt nothing whether it is a God problem or a _____________ problem?

We say, not lightly but very literally, that the truth has made us free.

They say that it makes us so free that it cannot be the truth.

To them it is like believing in fairyland to believe in such freedom as we enjoy.

It is like believing in men with wings to entertain the fancy of men with wills.

It is like accepting a fable about a squirrel in conversation with a mountain to believe in a man who is free to ask or a God who is free to answer.

This is a manly and a rational negation, for which I for one shall always show respect.

But I decline to show any respect for those who first of all clip the bird and cage the squirrel, rivet the chains and refuse the freedom,  close all the doors of the cosmic prison on us with a clang of eternal iron, tell us that our emancipation is a dream and our dungeon a necessity; and then calmly turn round and tell us they have a freer thought and a more liberal theology.

... G. K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man

 

THE MAN WHO DARED GOD TO SPEAK

 

Once there was a man who dared God to speak.