“Depart From Evil” By Brother Kenneth Ray March 27th,
2011 This is Praise and Worship Sunday. Of course, we praise and worship every Sunday, but today there is no sermon, but I did want to share a little. God is not asking for perfection; He is not asking you to change who you are. Be who you are. There are many in the church world that want you to conform to what they are. In God, we can all worship together. God loves imperfection, because in imperfection He can show His strength. Life’s a long process, and sometimes you need to bend, so that you don’t break. You know, sometimes you get the urge to stare at people, particularly if they aren’t acting like you would expect. When I was a kid, there was a woman in church that used to stand up and raise one hand, and say, “Hit me.” I didn’t understand then that she was asking for the Holy Ghost to hit her. My brother used to say, “I bet if I threw a book at her, and hit her, she’d feel that.” Worship sincerely, trusting in God. I’ve only got one scripture today: When Jesus came along, and started preaching, a lot of people didn’t like what He had to say. Of course, what they were really saying was, “That’s not how we’ve always done it.” They were more caught up in customs and traditions than truth. When God changes things, I must follow. I’m not like Rich, I don’t love the Bears. I’m a little like George, I love fishing. We’re all different, but we should all be worshipping together on Sundays and fellowshipping together the rest of the week. We should worship on Sunday, but we should fellowship all seven days of the week. Maybe have some coffee or go fishing and just talk. And it doesn’t have to be reading the Bible. There’s more to life than just quoting scripture. As a matter of fact, if all you do is quote scripture, you’re not going to find me around much. After a while, that just gets old. Jesus told us to go out two by two. Does that mean that if you’re at work, that you can’t share with one of your co-workers unless there’s someone else from the church there? No, of course not. But, if you deliberately cut yourself off from others in the body of Christ, then you are in error. Open your heart to others. Open your home. This is how you build strong relationships. I call my mom once a week, whether she needs it or not. That’s because those bonds are important. Relationships are important. It occurs to me that I am a Fellowship Leader. I am not a Church Leader. I am not an entertainer. If we just get together on Sundays to worship, then we aren’t getting fellowship. Sometimes we should just gather in people’s homes. This is March. One of the big things that happens in March is college basketball play-offs. It’s important that those teams follow the coaches’ schemes. It’s not enough to buy into those schemes, you have to actually go out there and execute those schemes. It’s the same with God’s plan; it’s not enough to buy into God’s plan, you have to go out and execute the plan. If you have one of those GPS devices in your car, every so often you’ll miss a turn or something, and the device will say, “Recalculating.” It will try to figure out an alternate route to get you where you need to be. Sometimes in our Spiritual lives, we need to recalculate how to get back on the path that God has for us. I don’t like high-pressure sales. You ever deal with one of those time-share reps? Those guys just will not take ‘no’ for an answer. I don’t want to pressure you. If you are seeking God, then, man, do I want to hang out with you. If you’re not seeking God, then I still want to hang out with you, but maybe to get coffee or go fishing. Finally, church, I just want to say, “Pursue Jesus.”Sermon notes by Pete Shepherd |
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