Sermon Tone Analysis

pic of empty tomb

Happy Easter… Resurrection Sunday.

I am glad Jesus got up out of that grave.

If you are checking us out, welcome.

We want to take you Spiritual Journey - We believe you are on a spiritual journey already even if you don’t know you are on a spiritual journey because you are made in the image of God and no matter how hard you try, part of you longs for a relationship with God.

The Bible says in Eccl that he has set eternity in your heart so you can’t get away from it.

We want to take you on a Spiritual Journey

I believe the Bible teaches these things…

put all four on the same slide

Know God

You can actually have a relationship with God… just like we have with each other.

Because of this, you can

Find Freedom

We can overcome those things that cause you to not be the best version of yourself.

Once you settle your yesterdays, you can see tomorrow.

It’s there is smudge on your glasses, you can’t see anything.

But when you clean your glasses, you can see clearly and you can

Discover Purpose

If you try to do that through your career or ambition, it will be kind of fun, but it will not fulfill you like you thought.

The reason is that God is the only one that knows the plan for your life.

Once you know God, Find freedom and Discover your purpose, you can join others of us and …

Make a Difference

You life is not about paying bills and breathing air.

God wants you to make a difference.

I believe that each of us, in some way… it might be hidden … we all want to be able to make a difference.

So I am kind of like a tour guide and I want to take you on this spiritual journey.

Here is a great Easter verse…

Spirit of God (HS) raised Jesus from the grave and that spirit … that power lives inside you and He will give life to you.

Not necessarily physical here… but life to dead dreams… relationships… Hopes… emotions… your mind.

Listen.

God’s Power is available ofr every area of your life that’s dead and needs to be revived.

Some of us have experienced this rebirth of life… of dreams…

The resurrection of Jesus wasn’t just an event to celebrate, but a power to be experienced.

You don’t just celebrate Easter, you experience it.

You can have it working in your life.

Here is the catch… There is a word in the Bible that becomes a condition for the power of God to work in and through your life.

You have to

Believe

This is the condition for that power to come into your life and help you through life.

You have to believe.

Sounds easy, but it’s not.

It’s not easy to put your faith into something that you can’t see… that you are not sure of.

That’s what doubt is.

Doubt is being uncertain of something.

My goal is to make this word easier for you.

The answer for most people is… I don’t know.

I’m not sure....

So today we will look at how we move from being a doubter to a believer.

Check this story out.

This story shows how we end up in doubt.

But if… put yourself in the dad’s spot.

This boy has had issues all his life…

Before I finish the verse… look at this.

The dad says if you can.

Jesus kind of got caught by that phrase and said, if?

Jesus had a sense of humor.

He had kids climbing on him everywhere he went so he was kind like that favorite uncle that always came around with candy… So he said if?

Everything is possible for the one who believes.

So why don’t we believe?

We don’t think God does the right thing

Sometimes we may think that since God didn’t do what WE wanted him to do that he did it wrong.

The father in this story had doubts and didn’t realize that Jesus was going to set his son free.

We have in our minds what God should do…

We’ve tried to believe and it didn’t work

The father tried to believe and he brought his son to the disciples and they couldn’t do anything.

Maybe you brought your child to church and it hasn’t seemed to impact them… maybe you have been praying for something that hasn’t happened yet.

We’ve listened to the doubts of others

Jesus said we live in a generation of doubters.

It’s getting worse and let me say this.

If the church doesn’t rise up and really know what we believe and live it out, this whole generation will be an unbelieving generation and that can’t happen on our watch.

ILL - Story of the guy who came to the office to debate evolution… He received Jesus.

He experienced God… not an intellectual.

I am praying for you to experience the peace and the presence of God so that you can take another step towards Him.

ILL - Debate Evolution… if you believe that there was a big explosion and a particle of matter landed in a pool of water and out of that water came a creature with a tail and legs… the the ice age came and the tail fell off and then it became a person… you have way more faith than me…

You can’t intellectually know God, you have to experience God and I am praying for you to experience God.

You may not understand everything, but I am praying for you to experience him.

1960’s - space race.

Soviets publicized that they were sending a cosmonaut into space to see if there was a God or not.

It was part of their propaganda that there was no God.

the Cosmonaut went to space and left the space craft while tethered to it and declared.

That there was No God.

How many of you know that if he had unhooked that tether from the spacecraft, he would have found God that day.

...

We end up with these doubts, but how do we move towards belief.

So today we will look at the most famous doubter… doubting Thomas…

Doubting Thomas

Before I tell you how he went from doubt to believe… let me tell you the end of the story.

Thomas becomes a strong believer.

He was the first person to spread the Gospel to India.

Christianity spread tremdously and he eventually was captured by people of a different faith and told to renounce Christ to which he replied that could never do that because he had experienced Him personally so they killed him and his is buried in India.

So after the first resurrection, Jesus hung around for 40 days appearing to people at least 10 different times that are recorded in the Bible.

One time Jesus appeared to the 12 disciples, but Thomas was not there.

Thomas kind of gets mad and says that he has to see proof.

He went beyond doubt to unbelief.

He would not believe and was adamant about it.

A week later, Jesus appeared to them again.

Look,

He said peace be with you… Look at this.

How to Overcome Our Doubts

1. Realize that Jesus will always search for you

Let me say it this way....