Sermon
10-5-14 Rethink your abilities world communion sunday
Ro
12:1-8
12 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and
sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy
and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship. 2 Do not
conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of
your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his
good, pleasing and perfect will. 3 For by the grace given me I
say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought,
but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the faith
God has distributed to each of you. 4 For
just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all
have the same function, 5 so in Christ we,
though many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. 6 We have different gifts, according to the grace given
to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with
your[a] faith; 7 if it
is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; 8
if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then
give generously; if it is to lead,[b] do it diligently; if it is to show
mercy, do it cheerfully
Col
3:23-25
23
Whatever
you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human
masters,
24 since you know that you will receive an
inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.
25 Anyone who does wrong will be repaid for
their wrongs, and there is no favoritism
This
one made me feel guilty. They beat us
with it as youth.
The
bishop offered another angle- renew your mind.
Today
a new sermon series on thinking.
Rethinking-
it implies that it might be helpful for us to find a new paradigm
Don’t
check out
Come
let us reason together says the lord.
Isaiah 1:18
Today-
rethink your abilities, your gifts.
Each
member has a function
Each
has different gifts
They
come from God’s grace
What
ever your gift, do it with all your might.
Many
issues related to our gifts and abilities
Someone
may feel - I don’t have any abilities
I
felt this way growing up. I wasn’t fast
like steve noviki, I wasn’t smart like mark flammer. I wasn’t good looking like eddie butler. We weren’t rich like robin reed. I was average. I was below average.
If
you feel that way, you are wrong.
Everyone
has gifts and abilities.
To
deny this fact is to rob God and the world of your services and to rob you of
the joy of purpose
Someone may say, I have gifts and abilities, but I don’t
think that they are very important
How
you feel about a thing often has no bearing in reality
We
need to get over our feelings and realize that god uses everyone
Do
you know what gift or ability is the most important in a given situation?
It
is the one that is the most relevant to the moment.
If
a plane is in flight, the most important gift is that of the pilot.
If
you need a gall bladder out, no one cares if you are a pilot.
You
have a sphere of influence
There
is a person that you can be there for, that no one else can touch as you can.
Someone might say, I am afraid of failure, I don’t want
to try or stretch
It
is very easy to live a life of ho hum and despair.
I
have done it
It
is the eyore syndrome
Gosh,
Pooh, what are we going to do? Gosh
pooh, no one loves me.
Mike
scott – “whats going on?”
I
struggle with fear of failure. What if
your church heads in the wrong direction?
What
if we cant figure out the next step?
People
that allow themselves to succumb to this king of thinking rob
God and others of your gifts and they rob yourself of a sense of joy and purpose in life
God and others of your gifts and they rob yourself of a sense of joy and purpose in life
Quote-
This is the
true joy in life,
the being
used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one;
the being
thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap…
and being a
force of nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod
of ailments
and grievance,
complaining
that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.
This is the
true joy in life,
the being
used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one;
George
Bernard Shaw
Story – replacements
Keanu
reaves- gives up
Winners
always want the ball when the game is on the line.{PICTURE}
Nothing
in life was ever accomplished by those who gave in to their fears.
But
amazing things have been done by those who dreamed that they could stretch.
the story of
Takeru Kobayashi, the hot dog eating
champion, and how he had a normal stomach like other babies but somewhere along
the line decided to become a competitive eater. I’ll tie it into
rethinking our abilities and how God can use us to do things beyond what we can
imagine.
In 1978, Takeru is
born & has the same size stomach as other little babies.
Day
1 – marble
Day
3 – ping pong ball
Day
10 – extra large chicken egg
By the time we're
adults, it's softball size. But he has a
technique for training to do this. He's
rethought his limitations of having a normal size stomach and pushing his
limits.
Trademark body
wiggle ::: the "Kobayashi Shake"
Forces food down his
esophagus and settle more compactly in his stomach
• Splits the frankfurter in ½ - dips the
buns in water - stuffs both parts in his mouth
He calls it "The
Solomon Method." Hahahaha!
What if we started
looking at our gifts in different ways and rethought them like Kobayashi does?
Kobayashi’s
stats
· 69
hot dogs in 10 minutes
· 14
Twinkies in 1 minute
· 13
grilled cheese sandwiches in 1 minute
· 93
hamburgers in 8 minutes
· 106
tacos in 10 minutes
· 62
slices of pizza (15 and a half pizzas) in 12 minutes
· 17.7
pounds of cow brains in 15 minutes
Someone might say - I use my abilities for me and those I
love
Then
you can look forward to the smugness of a selfish life.
God
has plans for you that go far beyond you and those you love.
Love
is indiscriminate
Everyone
can smell the fragrance of a rose
The
shade of a tree gives comfort to all.
A
light guides the way for anyone who turns it on
True
love is indiscriminate
What
does it gain you to love those who love you? Mt 5:43-48
43 “You have heard
that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor[i] and hate your enemy.’ 44 But
I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven.
He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the
righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you
love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax
collectors doing that? 47 And if you
greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans
do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as
your heavenly Father is perfect.
Now those were all things that people say that don’t get
it right
There
are others who do get it
And
I am hoping that you are one, or are willing to become one who says
I
am willing to use my abilities generously for anyone
In
fact
I
am open to be used by god in ways that I have never thought of
When
we use our gifts for God, we begin to act in nonselfish ways
using
your abilities for god may mean that you do things that you would not prefer,
in order to help a larger cause.
And
We are the better person for it…….
When
you set aside your preference and dare to be used……….
Charles
Frazier, in his novel of the American Civil War, Cold Mountain, introduces a minor character, a
fiddler whose life is changed through an incident that causes him to look at
his musical talents in a whole new way.
The fiddler is a drunk, who knows
only six songs, His military unit camps near a house where there’s a powerful
explosion. A young girl is severely burned and is near death, and her father
sends for a fiddler to help ease her way to heaven. The fiddler enters the dark
cabin where the young girl suffers in excruciating pain. From her deathbed, she
says, “Play me something.” He plays a tune. “Play me another.” The fiddler
plays his drinking tunes slowly, thinking it more appropriate to the
circumstances. Soon he has exhausted his small repertoire. “Play me another,”
she says as she struggles against the pain. “Don’t know no more,” he says.
“That’s pitiful,” she says, “what kind of a fiddler are you? Make me up a tune
then.” He marvels at such a strange request. But he has a go at it. Soon the
girl passes away. Her father thanks the fiddler for lifting her to heaven with
his fiddle.
A transformation takes place, and
the author writes, “Time and time again during the walk back to camp the
fiddler stopped and looked at his fiddle as if for the very first time. He had
never before thought of trying to improve his playing, but now it seemed
worthwhile to go at every tune…” Thereafter, he never tired of trying to
improve his playing, and he went into taverns of every kind to study the sounds
and methods of other musicians. “From that day…on, music came more and more into
his mind…His playing was as easy as a man drawing breath, yet with utter
conviction in its centrality to a life worth claiming.”
The scripture talks about Living sacrifices vs. livestock
sacrifices
This is in contrast to the OT animal
sacrifices
The
sacrifice isn’t about behaving-
God
calls us to get our hands dirty
calls
us to be an active participant
to
have a faith that engulfs our very lives!
I
hope I have convinced you today that you have gifts
the
question left for today is will you make yourself available for the purpose of
God
today is world communion Sunday
We
think of our family, our schools, our city our church, but we can touch places
around the world-
Our
gifts can have a far reach
And this is a day that we remember that we
stand with Christians in all nations and are bonded together with them in
Christ.
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