Prosperity
Joshua 1:8-“Do not let this book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.
Negative warning…must continue to re-wake soul quote
But we who would be born again indeed,
Must wake our souls unnumbered times a day
I want to talk to today about success. Throughout history people have been seeking success and prosperity in life. We are taught from an early age that if you work hard, apply yourself and hang on to your dreams you will accomplish them. A search of the internet on success stories reveals all kinds of information and advice on how to be successful at whatever it is you do. We look to people who have made it big in life to discover their secrets. What did Bill Gates do to become the richest man in the world? How did McDonalds become on of the biggest food franchises in the world? How did folks like Mel Gibson and Jim Carrey become such huge movie stars? In church planting, there are all kinds of people held up as huge successes…they launched a church and ended up attracting thousands of people in just a couple of years…these are the guys who give out advice at national conferences….
Whatever it is you do for a living…whatever it is you dream of doing with your life, you look at people who’ve done it well and ask how you can do the same. The advice is often the same whatever the field…It takes discipline…applying yourself 365 days/year. It takes sacrificing anything that gets in the way of reaching your goals. It takes thinking positive and never letting go of your goals…
As a result of this kind of thinking we have a world filled with people today driven to accomplish their personal goals no matter what the cost. This is what it takes to have the good life…money, recognition, freedom to do whatever we want….success and prosperity…
When you get right down to it, though, achieving success is a lot more difficult than it sounds from this type of advice. We are faced with a lot of things in life that can take our focus off those dreams. What happens when you meet someone and get married….what happens when you have kids…are their lives just obstacles to overcome…or do you expect them to be part of your personal pursuit of success? Even just having friends can distract you from your goals in life. What happens when the demands of your pursuit become greater than you can physically handle? You run out of time, you run out of energy, but there is still more important work that MUST be done! What happens when the people around you start making decisions that don’t match up with your expectations? Employees and co-workers always end up wanting to do things differently. Maybe you define success as seeing your kids grow up to be model citizen, and have successful lives…what happens when they start making their own decisions and they don’t choose to do the right things? What happens when bosses and teachers interfere with your goals or tell you that you need to do things differently?
All these things and more make achieving success in life seem to be an impossible task!
Yet, if you read the Bible, God promises to give success and prosperity to people a lot. The difference, though, is that God doesn’t give the same kind of advice that other success gurus give. It really gets back to what Mike Armbrust said last week. He pointed out that God knows everything about us…even stuff we ourselves don’t even know…right down to the number of hairs on our head. God’s desire for us is to know Him. Not just know about him…but really know him personally.
So there are really two paths you can choose in life to pursue success…I have a video to show you that helps illustrate those paths and some of the things that can result…take a look…
Two Sets of Joneses
Did you notice the differences in the choices made there? The effects are pretty clear, but what did you see about the different paths chosen?
According to God, the path to prosperity and success….and happiness whatever your circumstances are…is Him. It all starts with faithfulness to Him.
In Matthew 6, Jesus is telling people not to worry about their lives…where their food and clothing will come from. (People have always wanted these things and worked hard to achieve them.) In verse 33 Jesus says, “Seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.”
Seek God first…then you will receive the things you need for your life…food, clothing…the things God knows you need to survive.
God said it hundreds of years before that as well….look at Joshua 1:8. Let me give you a little background here first. Most of us have heard the story of Moses leading the people out of Egypt. He was taking them to the land God had promised them. The people didn’t trust God and he let them wander in the desert for 40 years until the adults had passed away and now a new generation had grown up only knowing life in the desert and depending on God to feed them and guide them. Joshua was one of only two people from the previous generation still alive…God sustained him because he did have faith in God. In the beginning of the book of Joshua, Moses has passed away and now God is putting Joshua in charge. He’s telling Joshua to get ready to enter into the land he’s promised for the Isrealites. After promising to give them the land, and give them success & victory over the enemies they will face, God tells Joshua what he must do to be successful.
Verse 7: “Be strong and very courageous. Be careful to obey all the law my servant Moses gave you; do not turn from it to the right or to the left, that you may be successful wherever you may go.”
Verse 8 says it again, “Do not let this book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
God promises great success and prosperity to Joshua, the Israelites and all their descendants…IF…they will dedicate themselves to God FIRST.
Now, through the sacrifice Jesus made, this same promise is available to ALL people. If we will seek GOD first, he promises to give us all that we need in life to be successful and prosperous. One of the main things you learn about God if you read through the Bible is that he is ALWAYS faithful in keeping his promises.
This really, is our goal for every person who becomes part of this church…that you would seek GOD first in everything you do in life. If you get to know God and allow him to speak into your life, I am confident that everything else that you want to accomplish and everything we want to accomplish in this church will fall into place. Having every person place their relationship with God as the highest priority in life will ensure success in everything we do…that is what God promised. That time with Him each day is what prepares you for whatever else you might face. Learning…and meditating on (thinking/praying about) God’s word trains you to respond to life as God would have you do…That will make you successful in whatever you do in life…
It does take some effort to do this. Some of the things I said earlier do apply here…it does take discipline, and it does mean not letting anything else get in the way of this goal-and always trusting the God WILL give you all you need as a result…God said meditate on his Law...his Word…day and night. We need to train ourselves to spend time every day reading, and thinking and praying about God’s word. Then we need to be careful to DO what God’s word says…allow God to speak into your life and train you in what to DO….that will lead to all the success and prosperity God has planned for you..
There is a reason I am talking about this today. This Sunday is really the LAST Sunday before Summer kicks in. Memorial day weekend is traditionally the weekend when people start their Summer vacations. For a church that usually means lower attendance on Sundays until September. That’s just a reality we need to work with as a church…in fact those of us leading the church have families as well who want to get away and enjoy the Summer…
There are a couple of things I want to have you consider before you begin your Summer, though. First…what we do here on Sundays is important for all of us…It’s a rare thing in this world to be able to freely gather and worship God-we need to take advantage of that; and it’s important for this church that we maintain relationships with one another…so whatever your plans are this Summer, do make plans on staying connected with the church as best you can. (we’re going to have fun this Summer, too…planning on being outdoors as often as possible!)
Second…if you are going to be away for any part of the Summer, I want to encourage you to take this message from God to heart…we all need to train ourselves to spend time with God daily; no matter what else is going on in our lives. Put “Bible” on your packing list if you are going away. Schedule in time on your vacations to get with God..continue to seek him first. If you are out of town on the weekend, consider trying out a worship service wherever you are…just for the opportunity to maintain that habit and to take advantage of the opportunity to worship Him publicly. God does not take the Summer off from working on your behalf…don’t take the Summer off from pursuing and getting to know Him…
If you’ll do this, I truly believe this Summer will be a Summer of incredible transformation for True North! We have been talking about and studying God’s word here since we launched last September, and I have been feeling lately that now it’s time for all of us to really focus on DOING the things we’ve heard and allowing God to work in our lives. We are going to have one opportunity as a church to do that on July 15th…after our regular worship service, we are planning on having a baptism…this will be a great opportunity for anyone who has never experienced that…and never personally declared their decision to follow Jesus by being baptized in the same way He was...
Beyond that it is really going to be up to you to make your relationship with God a priority and let his Word and his Spirit teach you that things God wants you to know to be prosperous and successful.
We do want to give you a tool today to help you with that, though. Sometimes the hardest part about developing the habit of daily time with God is knowing where to start and how to apply what you’ve read that day. So, we’re going to provide you with this “Life Journal” to help. This is a great resource that was developed New Hope Christian Fellowship in Hawaii (only state in the USA experiencing positive church growth right now)
Describe-daily bible reading plan. Just find the right date, start there. Bible in a year
Journal-write down thoughts on what just read and how to apply it to your life
Scripture memory cards-use them to keep significant verses in mind-memorize them
This is going to be a resource we draw on for a lot of what we do as a church. Our goal in everything we do as a church is to have God speak to us first. We will all grow best when we each get with God first and then spend time talking about what we are learning with one another. If we are all going through the bible together, we will all grow together. Willie and I are committing to using this resource…we need to continue making our relationship with God a priority, too.
I want everyone to leave here today with a copy of this...and start using it. Let this Summer be the beginning of something new in your relationship with God….let God direct your steps and let this be a time of great transformation in your life….
You Direct My steps
God’s desire…and our desire as church leaders…is for you to have a successful life. I know how crazy life is. We’re all struggling to find balance among all the things we need to do…we’ve got work tasks…our homes need to be cleaned and maintained…kid’s need to be involved in activities…you need vacation time…time with friends…we need time for physical activity…our bodies are out of shape, our work schedules are impossible, and our relationships all need improvement…
I know how it is…I’m right there with you…
God has promised that all these things depend upon our personal relationship with Him. I’ve experienced this first-hand…in times when I have focused and forced myself to read the Bible and pray about each day…to DO Joshua 1:8..life begins to fall into place and I feel more confident…
…Do not let this book of the Law depart from you mouth (keep it close to you always); mediate on it day and night so that you may be careful to do everything in it; then you will be prosperous and successful..
If I don’t see you at all this Summer, I hope and pray that when I do, you will have experienced some of the success that comes from seeking God first and that you will have some incredible stories to share of how God has worked in your life…I look forward to hearing how God has transformed you life this Summer!
Pray
