Good morning, CHURCH!

(Opening joke)

Father Lewis woke up Sunday morning and realizing it was an exceptionally beautiful and sunny early spring day, decided he just had to play golf.

So... he told the Associate Pastor that he was feeling sick and persuaded him to say Mass for him that day.

As soon as the Associate Pastor left the room, Father Lewis headed out of town to a golf course about forty miles away.

This way he knew he wouldn't accidentally meet anyone he knew from his parish.

Setting up on the first tee, he was alone. After all, it was Sunday morning and everyone else was in church!

At about this time, Saint Peter leaned over to the Lord while looking down from the heavens and exclaimed, “You’re not going to let him get away with this, are you?"

The Lord sighed, and said, "No, I guess not."

Just then Father Lewis hit the ball and it shot straight towards the pin, dropping just short of it, rolled up and fell into the hole.

IT WAS A 430 YARD HOLE-in-ONE!

St. Peter was astonished. He looked at the Lord and asked, "Why did you let him do that?"

The Lord smiled and replied, "Who's he going to tell?"

Are you ready to be equipped today?

Let me see your Bibles.

Let’s go to the book of Galatians 5:7-8 for this week’s wisdom Vaccination.

This Week’s Wisdom Vaccination

Galatians 5:7-8 ESV

You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? 8 This persuasion is not from him who calls you.

Ancient writers on moral topics often compared the moral life to running a race.

You were on the right road and were making good progress when this interruption occurred.

We could say, you were once believing correctly.

Who did you start listening to, that caused you to start believing differently?

So, if you believe right, you will live right and the right way to believe is the new covenant positional righteousness based on the work of the cross.

Today’s message title is:

9 Habits of Highly Effective Christians

What are habits?

Habits are behaviors, patterns and rituals that we perform automatically.

Habits are the small decisions you make and actions you perform every day.

Researchers from Duke University say that habits account for about 40% of our behaviors on any given day.

With that percentage being so high, we could say that our lives are mostly a result of our habits.

Habits can be bad, and habits can be good.

The more your habits line up in the good column, the better off your life will be.

The more they line up in the bad column, the worse off your life will be.

We all have all kinds of habits.

We have eating habits, exercise habits, communication habits, entertainment habits, reading habits, work habits, money habits, thinking habits and the list goes on and on.

In this series we’re going to focus in on 9 habits that will cause you to be a successful Christian.

Habit #1

Habit of regular church attendance

Church attendance trends in advanced industrial societies is in gradual general decline with people shifting from weekly to monthly or holiday attendance.

Church attendance in and of itself is not the goal.

But attendance can be a sign of other deeper issues.

I read this quote that said even committed church attenders are attending church less often.

This may just be me, but I think it’s an issue if you can just wake up and not go to church, or if you can just sleep in and not go to church.

Another issue with church attendance is that we live in a society that doesn’t respect the need to attend church. (online options, kids activities, travel, not seeing the benefit)

Hebrews 10:25 (ESV)

not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

Several research studies in the USA and Europe found that church attendance practices of parents, especially fathers, can be highly influential in forming the future church attendance practices of their children.

A non-practicing mother with a regular attending father will see a minimum of two-thirds of her children ending up at church.

In contrast, a non-practicing father with a regular attending mother will see two-thirds of his children not attending church.

If his wife is similarly irregular in attendance, that figure rises to 80 percent.

(The truth about men and the church.)

Research on individuals residing in the United States and Canada concluded that "Ninety-six percent of the un-churched are at least somewhat likely to attend church if they are invited.

#1 was regular church attendance

Habit #2

Habit of keeping good company

Sometimes the people we have grown accustomed to hanging, around change or evolve into people we shouldn’t be hanging around anymore.

All day 1’s don’t need to be day 2’s.

1 Corinthians 15:33-34 ESV

Don’t be fooled: “Bad friends will ruin good habits.” 34 Come back to your right way of thinking and stop sinning. Some of you don’t know God. I say this to shame you.

Paul was giving a rather stern warning here.

You see he believed that those who denied the resurrection of the dead would corrupt sincere Corinthian believers because they would have different morals.

Today, though some believe in the resurrection, they don’t believe with the intent to obey all that God says and that is just as bad if not worse.

This will cause some of the current believers to be deceived in their morals and live in ways that don’t show you are a believer.

And he is warning them and us not to hang around such people.

Proverbs 22:24-25 ESV

Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, 25 lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare.

If you kick it with quarrelsome people, you tend to become just like them and find yourself in trouble that you didn’t want to be in.

This proverb is trying to warn the unsuspecting which are often misled by bad company.

I can remember back when I came home from my first year of college at 19 years old. I had never hung out in night clubs. I had never done anything even remotely illegal.

But a high school friend drove by and saw me standing near the curve. He stopped to talk and invited me into his world.

It was the biggest mistake I ever made in my life.

It could have landed me in prison. It could have gotten me shot. It could have gotten me babies out of wedlock.

I was ensnared and entangled into a world that up until that point I had avoided.

Psalm 1:1-2 ESV

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; 2 but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.

The way to go is to avoid those going in the wrong direction.

To all my young people in the audience, please avoid the wrong crowds.

You can also have the wrong company as it relates to those who call themselves believers.

Galatians 3:1 ESV

O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified.

He went on to say:

Galatians 3:2 ESV

Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith?

He was astounded that they had let someone else come and have them believing in a way different from what they had been taught.

They were now focusing on works righteousness, when they had been taught about grace which leads to righteousness by faith.

#2 was keeping good company

Habit #3

Habit of reading and studying the Bible

Throughout the scriptures, we are told to study, learn, focus on and meditate on the word of God.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 ESV

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work.

Paul was telling young Timothy that because the scriptures are inspired by God and God knows better than we do how we should live, they are profitable for us to learn and teach.

I love how Paul threw in that they train us in righteousness.

Joshua 1:8 ESV

This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.

This principle from the 1st covenant can still be applied by us today.

Through constant meditation on the scriptures and adding obedience to all it tells us to do, we can be certain that we will live prosperous and successful lives.

Psalm 119:105 ESV

Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.

If we turned off all light in this room right now it would be difficult to move about in a timely fashion without running into trouble.

But if we shined some light, we could see our way and avoid running into trouble.

The word of God is that light in our life that keeps us from avoiding unnecessary troubles of life.

God’s word is the light to a good path.

Any other way is going down the wrong road.

This habit of studying the Bible is one of the most important habits of the nine that we will cover.

Not just that you study the Bible, but also that you learn how to properly study the Bible.

You don’t want to be learning something you think is from the Bible but is actually harming you.

That’s why Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:15:

2 Timothy 2:15 ESV

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.

(Closing illustration)

For the early years of my Christian walk I would study the Bible religiously and try to use my Bible studies to keep me from committing sins.

When I learned that through the work on the cross, Christ had overcome sins rule in my life, I switched my focus to studying the scriptures to know how much God loved me and how through grace I now had the power to overcome sin.

My focus no longer being on sin itself and how to stop sinning, but now being on the love of God and the way that God shows his love to us through the scriptures.

The more I focused on the way he loves me, the more it gave me victory in areas of my life that I used to struggled in.

Even the secret things I struggled in.

When I say secretly, it may have been a secret to other believers, but it was no secret to those that lived with me.

Regular church attendance; keeping good company and studying the Bible.

These are definitely good habits of highly successful Christians.

If you’re watching online or here in the room, I have a very important question to ask you.

What is Holy Spirit saying to you right now?