"Being Thankful for the Little Things in Life!" By Bob Heirtzler November 10th,
2013
I am so thankful to be here today. I am so thankful for a peace in God that
helps in every situation in our lives.
He’s always there. He’s always
faithful; He’s always faithful. I want to give honor were honor is
due; I want to give honor to my family member:
His name was Hugh McGuire. He was
a lieutenant in the American Revolutionary war.
He was my (however many greats) grandfather, and he was very instrumental
in stopping the enemy from advancing so that we have out freedom today. According to all the family trees that my cousin
and my uncles worked on, we had somebody in the military since that time. All leaders.
Every war, I had family there, involved.
I want to give thanks to the veterans here today that served. Because of you, the freedom to worship, as
the prayer went today, is awesome. Also,
I wanted to give honor to those that are in the military now, that you have a
lot of people backing you up, supporting you and praying for you. There’s a lot of retired military people to walk
you though things here. I want to give
honor also to God that saved me, a little over thirty-four years ago. There was a prayer that I prayed, “God, if
You’re real, there has to be more than this, getting married, having kids, and
dying; I need You to show me.” that was
December of ’78 that I prayed that, and in October of ’79, I got saved. God was faithful with my prayers. I want to give honor to the person who shred
with me, my pastor. Its kind of funny,
where I was raised, you weren’t allowed to read the Bible, the pastor had to
read it to you, and when he turned the Bible (I think this was the Bible, I
still have it), when he turned the Bible and faced it to me, he said, “Read it
for yourself.” I said, “Really?” When I read baptism in Jesus’ name, I said,
“Wow. I never saw that before.” I want to give honor to the person who shared
with me that day. I want to give honor
to the person that baptized me, a couple of days later. All the years of being part of this ministry,
seeing this ministry grow from a Fellowship Center on Sheridan Road—that’s all
we had at the time—We didn’t have an international ministry, Sri Lanka or Haiti
or any of the other places,, not even Norfolk was around yet. I thank God for all that. I thank God that I’ve seen prayer, and I’ve
seen people work hard, and I’ve seen this ministry grow to where it is
today. We have a lot of history, here, even
though were in a building like this, this ministry has a lot of history. It is up to us to keep writing that history,
until God takes us all home. The theme of the month, that Parrish
shared last week: Ephesians 5 20 Giving
thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ; It’s telling us to give thanks
always. Always. Not just Sundays, Friday nights and Wednesday
nights; always. Even if you get pulled
over and get a ticket. Give thanks that
someone stopped you, before you drove into something that you might not even be
aware of. Yes, I’ve gotten tickets. I posted a question on my FaceBook
page: Can you all share a brief
testimony about how you were thankful for a little thing that happen in your
life that made a BIG difference in your life, or share something that you are thankful
for!!!! I’m going to read some of them. Patrick T. was the first one to respond: In 1983, I got temporary orders to
the USS LaMoure County. It was the ugliest ship in the Navy out of Jeff:
Thankful to have my Saturday nights off.
It feels like a mountain got tossed in the sea God answers every little thing. Beverly S (She’s out of Stacey A (sister of Ken): I am thankful
for my job working with special needs children. ..My one child I work with
love's music and as soon as it’s turned on she can belt out a song and her
whole altitude changes. I tell you it’s
the little things but it blesses the socks right off me. Marianne (High School Friend): I am
thankful for friends like you who always post positive things on
here...everyday there is always an inspirational message to remind me of what
is really important in life...family and friends. The list goes on and on: Margi: I'm thankful to be able to wake
up to a nice hot cup of coffee, until you really think about it how simple it
is, but yet how many don’t wake up in a nice warm home and a nice hot cup of
coffee! Makes you appreciate the simple things in life Bill B: I'm so thankful for the
volunteer opportunities I have in the community. One in particular is at a
horse farm where they have riding therapy for special needs children. Last
Saturday I helped out in a show held for them to showcase their skills learned
and practiced in the last year. Watching the love and passion they display for
their horse/pony and practice learned responsibility, even with special needs,
has caused me ask the question 'What IS normal?' I see the grace of God in a
brand new way!!! Johanna: I am thankful every second God
gives me to guide me to be a better person for him and putting amazing people
in my path to him. The teachings he gives, knowing what and when to take and
give, his forgiveness, never leaving me alone, allowing me to be humble for he
is my strength, for being a perfect father I've never had in this world.
Through all the sad and angry experiences of kidnapping, sexual abuse by those
I loved and trusted, physical abuse, near death experiences (severe allergic
reaction shut down my liver and digestive system-blood poisoning was told if I
waited another hour I would have died-my heart stopped for 3 minutes at the
hospital during a test-and there is more), and the list is longggg, but God's
love is endless and longer than any sad or angry list I could make out. I do
not worry or concern myself with those experiences or those to come, because
they were of the flesh. My spirit is intact because I have chosen God to lead
me. My flesh is scarred immensely, but again I chose my spirit to lead, and not
the flesh. I have so many things to be thankful for, but overall without him in
everything in my life I couldn't do or be anything. I survive these seconds
only because of him, and I could never thank God enough for being in my life.
(Sorry if too long, started to get passionate.
God bless all of you! Roger M (Kayla’s grandfather): I am thankful I met my wife of 50
years on May 3rd, 1950. The list goes on and on. Jeanne M: Bob. I am so thankful for modern
medicine. My wonderful niece was diagnosed with two types of brain cancer in
2007. She has had brain surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. She then had two
children who bring such joy to our lives. Although she has been out of
remission for about a year and a half, and she is back on chemo. She is
fighting to beat this. Every day she survives gives me hope that a cure can be
found. I am so blessed to have her in my life. She is a real hero Sonja: Bob,
I am going to make this story short because it could get lengthy. I
was forced homeless when one of my ex's was "extradited" to another
state for a crime I was un-aware of. At the time I was not working and had no
money. Within a couple of days I was literally on the streets of downtown I
was carrying everything I had with me. Two medium suit cases and one very large
one that was as big as I am. I walked and walked looking for a place someone
told me about for women that were homeless. I
was exhausted and said to myself if it is not the next block I am going to turn
around. I
see two women on the corner talking so I decided to cross over and ask them, if
they knew of the place I was looking for. One
of the women said "Yes I know where it is". I said "I'm lost and
she said “You are at the right
place" I didn't understand what she meant. She said “Let me carry these
for you and she took the huge suitcase and one of the medium ones and carried
them both for me for hours that day until we arrived at our destination. She
was a "true God send". I would have never made it there on my own. I
had blisters on my hands and feet. She didn't have to carry my heavy luggage
for me or spend the day with me. It was a beautiful selfless act. Little things; acts of kindness. Linda A: Hey
Bob....I'm big at little things....but what came to my mind was one day I was
teaching at the church school and it was nap time. Debbie came in and said
Linda, mom bought you a Christmas gift! We were having a ladies Christmas
dinner at a restaurant. She bought me a complete outfit, including the nylons.
skirt, shiny jacket, and it was the one time in my life that I was speechless.
I found out later that Sis did this
every year for somebody and it is probably something nobody ever knew. So the next year a sister said she needed
her hair done for the Christmas party but she couldn’t afford it. This sister
had children to take care of and made a huge salary sacrifice to work at the
church school. So I later surprised her and I told her about the outfit that
Sis had given me and that I wanted to do something for someone else. Now the
popular term is pay it forward I guess. How it changed my life? Well, in
moments like now it is making me smile and I have that warm fuzzy feeling! LOL When
I surprised her I gave her the money for her hair...I didn’t make that
clear.... The little things that we do
encourage people. The list goes on. Ashley B.:
God is willing to bless us all the time. We just came through the 61 days if
sanctification and I can strongly say that this was a great time for myself and
for all of us here…to me, today is day number 71!! We’re still going. There were a lot of baptisms, a lot
of healings, there was stronger faith, here were answered prayers, there was shaking
off the old ways and putting on God’s way, there were people getting jobs, there
were unspoken prayer requests answered, and the list goes on and on of all the
things that happened since September first.
There are some people that say God doesn’t still live, today; where’s He
at? They’re not seeking for Him. He’s not in a building, He’s not in a statue,
He’s not in a flag, He’s within us; He’s with His people. I remember sitting out in a hallway—I decided
to take my lunch breaks in the hallway, just to talk to people. When I first started this, everybody was
doing this down the hallway (walking while making motions as if texting). That’s the only place we had a signal in the
building, was the hallway. They’d come
out from their—it’s a huge complex in Kemper Woods, it’s a thousand and
some-odd people there—they’d come out, “No signal!” and they’d get frustrated. I started saying, “Good morning!” “Good afternoon!” “How you doing?” Now, they’re looking for me out in the
hallway. “Are you the keeper out here?”
“Well, I feel like my high school days when I got kicked out and had to sit in
the hallway the whole time.” This past
week, I asked someone, “Hey, can you keep in prayer our co-worker just took her
ninety-year-old mom into the Reminds me of a person in the Bible
that kept pressing unto she received a healing…… people here kept coming back
to the altar for prayer until God answered the prayer!! I kept seeing that, people kept coming here,
asking for prayer. Two people that come
to mind is Delmy, that God healed her shoulder, and the other one was Marita,
God heeled her. I’ve heard of other
people getting healed here, too. They
kept pressing through until God answered prayer. Brother Parrish said something to me, years
ago: I said, “You know what? I gave up
praying on that. God just wasn’t answering.”
Parrish said, “Why’d you stop praying?”
I said, “Whoa! He’s right! Why did I stop praying?” I gave up on God, but God didn’t give up on
me. So, as we go into the scriptures,
here, about a woman that kept pressing through the crowd. All these three people that we’re going to be
talking about had three things in common (we’ll get to that at the end). Mark 5:24-26 And
Jesus went with him; and much people followed him, and thronged him. And a
certain woman, which had an issue of blood twelve years, And had suffered many
things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing
bettered, but rather grew worse, This person
tried everything; this young lady tried everything for twelve years and nothing
got better……then she heard good news!! Mark 5:27-29 When
she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, and touched his garment. For
she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole. And straightway the
fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was
healed of that plague. I
remember people sharing testimonies right here, people knew that God had healed
them; they felt it. So, this is two
thousand years ago we’re reading, but this still alive and kicking today. Mark 5:30-31 And
Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned
him about in the press, and said, Who touched my
clothes? And his disciples said unto him, Thou seest the multitude
thronging thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me? So,
they’re like, “Really? With all these
people here, and You want to know…?“
It’s like the quarterback getting sacked, “Who touched me?” It’s like, “They got through that wall of
people and got to me?” So, I don’t know
if they were supposed to be His bodyguards or whatever it was, or not keeping
an eye on Him, but somebody got through and touched Him. Mark 5:32-34 And
he looked round about to see her that had done this thing. But the woman
fearing and trembling, knowing what was done in her, came and fell down before
him, and told him all the truth. And he said unto her, Daughter,
thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague. Something
so simple—the Lord was just walking through the crowd. What comes to my mind is, she just needed to touch
His garment. Which makes me think that
she kept pressing until she touched God.
This takes
endurance until you receive an answer—regardless of how long it takes. Jesus Immediately knew in Himself that virtue
had gone out of Him—God knows our needs and what we are praying for. God knows exactly what we need, He just wants
us to ask Him. He knows what we need in
the morning, in the night; He knows our meals, He knows when we get in the car,
He knows our income, He knows all our needs.
The next part I liked, point 3. Jesus asked: “Who
touched my clothes?” We don’t
realize—and someone shared this, this morning—of all the people that our lives touch.
We won’t even know until we get on the
other side. Something that they hear
about someone’s story, here in this room, “So-and-so did this, and, man, it just changed their lives.” They are now going to wake up to you or I in
Heaven and say, “Remember when you in that meeting in The next story is: Acts 3:1-11 Now Peter and John went up together into the temple
at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour. I was
told that’s about three o’clock in the afternoon. Acts 3:2-4 And
a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at
the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms of them that
entered into the temple; Who seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple
asked an alms. And Peter, fastening his eyes upon him with John, said, Look on
us. You
notice Peter didn’t say, look at me? He
said, “Look on us.” Acts 3:5 And
he gave heed unto them, expecting to receive something of them. So,
what do you think he was expecting from them at that time? Money. Maybe a sandwich from their basket, or
something, but, money. But what did
Peter say after that? Acts 3:6-8 Then
Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the
name of Jesus Christ of So, we
have something in our lives to give to other people. “Bob, that was two-thousand years ago.” Well, some of us will remember this: we had a man who came to our services when we
were over on But
this man, leaping and praising God, walked into the Acts 3:10-11 And they knew that it was he which sat for alms at
the Beautiful gate of the temple: and they were filled with wonder and
amazement at that which had happened unto him. 11And as the lame man which was
healed held Peter and John, all the people ran together unto them in the porch
that is called Solomon’s, greatly wondering. So, a miracle happened outside of
the temple. If you read on in Acts, the
next two chapters, then you will realize that Peter and John did not take
credit for that at all; they gave it all to Jesus. We have something to give to others that are
in need, which is worth more than silver or gold that we have. We can pray for people and see things come to
pass. A lame man immediately was healed—leaping
and praising God.—the people knew who he was. —this man was in about 40 years
old. So, how long was he laying out
there? I don’t know, it doesn’t say, but he was laying out there long enough
for everybody to know who he was. They realized
something had happened. Now they’re
running to Peter and John, “What happened?”
Peter and Jon got to share. The next story that I have here is
in Matthew, chapter 8: The centurion, that
was beseeching him. Matthew 8:5-7 And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there
came unto him a centurion, beseeching him,
And saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously
tormented. And Jesus saith unto him, I
will come and heal him. So,
Jesus was taking care of the needs, right off the bat. But: Matthew 8:8 The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not
worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my
servant shall be healed. I
hear people share up here, “Just speak the word, only.” God honors that. If you’re walking a tight walk with God, and
God is moving in your life, you can speak things to God and it will happen. You just have to have faith that it will
happen. If you have half-faith, then
it’s not going to happen. You have to
believe that it’s going to happen. Matthew 8:8-10 The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not
worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my
servant shall be healed. For I am a man
under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he
goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he
doeth it. When Jesus heard it, he
marvelled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not
found so great faith, no, not in Israel. There’s
a man with great faith. Just say it, I
know it’s going to happen. What I got out of here was,
sometimes you just have to speak the words.
People come to us, and want to know about God, we’ve got to speak the
Word!! We can’t quote some man; we’ve
got to quote the Word of God. That’s
where the authority’s at. “Brother Parrish
said in service, three days ago, he said…”
Brother Parrish, A) would shoot you for saying that, and B) it’s the
word of God that he preaches. We’ve got
to share the Word of God. Not Sears catalog,
Bass Pro Shop catalog, but the Word of God.
What I like here, was that somebody else came and spoke on behalf of
somebody. This man came to God on behalf
of somebody else. We see that here when
we pray for our families. We pray for
our loved ones; we bring them to the altar.
It still happens today, and then the praise reports come back that… My dad had cancer, and he had part of his
intestine removed. The doctor came to us,
my mom, my two sisters, my brother-in-law, and myself, “The cancer’s still
there; I couldn’t get all of it out.”
“Okay, mom, we’ll just keep this in prayer.” I remember calling the church for
prayer. When the doctor came back, the
cancer was gone. It had disappeared. It was not to be found. It was gone, and my dad knew that God had touched his body.
My dad knew. To take this one
step further, my aunt heard this story about my dad being touched and the
cancer disappeared. She was having
cancer surgery to have part of her stomach removed. She passed every test for cancer, but when
the doctors opened her up, there was nothing there. It had disappeared. So, my dad’s doctor, and my aunt’s doctor,
wrote on their charts, “Miracle from above.”
So,, a testimony of somebody can encourage somebody else. We’ve got to live right. Who likes going to work on Mondays?
I hope we all do. It encourages everybody
else there, you know? You walk in with a
big smile on Monday, they know what you did.
They come in hung-over on Monday morning; I know what they did. They stay away from me until… One lady goes, “Give me a moment, Bob.” You know?
They know that I’ve been with Jesus.
They know That all of us have been with Jesus. Make sense?
I know the flesh don’t like Mondays.
I don’t like the alarm going off on Monday mornings, but we have to be
that example wherever we go. The other
part here is, He said, “Go thy way, and as thou hast
believed…” So, the centurion came
there, said, “I need You to take care of this,” Jesus said, “Go thy way, it’s
taken care of.” “Okay, it’s taken care
of.” Then he went, and he found out that
the man was healed at the same hour, the same time (Matthew 8:13). He was healed right on the spot. What do you think the guy laying in bed was
thinking? “What just happened? Whoa!
What just happened?” What all three of these stories have
in common is: 1. They all happened outside the temple,
out and about in the community places and it never mentions these peoples
names. It never said what their names
were. They were just everyday people
like us. God answers prayer, and, I
don’t want them to remember my name, I want them to remember the One I
serve. His name is Jesus. “He talked about Jesus all the time. I don’t remember his name, but he talked about
Jesus all the time.” That’s the way we
should live; it’s about Jesus. It’s all
about Jesus; it’s all about the Word of God.
I used to say, “God did this…” or “My God did this…” but then I realized, there’s so many gods in
this world. My God has a name; that’s
when I started saying Jesus. 2. They were drawn by the Spirit of God in
their lives. People might give us a hard
way to go, but when they have a need, they know h=who to go to. I thought about that lady in the hallway,
“Man, I’m glad you’re here.” She asked
me for prayer. Just be faithful. Do I like sitting in the hallway, staring at
the wall? Nope. But, god’s opened so many
doors, and not too many people are walking down the hallway testing or talking
on the phone any more; now they’re looking for me. I’m nobody special. If you want to have friends, you must show
yourself friendly. If you want to share
with somebody, you have to find something in common first, so you build things
in common. Make sense? I mean, there’s the old way, where you just
blast the doors down and preach Jesus when they say hello, and you tell them
they’re going to Hell because they’re not baptized in Jesus’ name—they’ll slam
the door shut pretty quick. I’ve seen
that happen. We have to become friends
first. Build something in common. If they like fishing, for example, and I do,
I might have a fishing trip and invite them.
Why? so that I can have some of you guys help me, work with that family
that comes out. If they love Puerto
Rican food, I’m going to say, either Jimmie’s family or Andy’s family, invite
them over for that. Get them something
in common, Puerto Rican food, you know? and then share with them. There’s so many doors that we can use to share
with people, and some of them are right here and we don’t even see them. We just don’t realize that they’re right here
in front of us. Every little thing that
God’s given us a talent to do, that can be a door. It’s like my tackle box. When I go fishing, I don’t use the same lures
all the time; it depends what kind of fish I want to catch. I’m not going to use this kind of lure if
it’s meant for Bass Pro Shop, and I’m over here at work… I’m going to use different lures to minister
to different kinds of people. Or, use
the analogy of the tool box: Some people
here probably have tool boxes that are as big them, but they don’t use all the
tools all the time—they’re there when it’s needed. God has given us tools in our lives to use to
reach out to people. It could be
cookware, it could be pots and pans, anything that you’re good at doing. It can be a tool to be used. Are you happy with the size of the crowd that
we’ve got now, or do you want more?
Okay, are you ready to work with more people coming? Are you ready to work with Andy and Parrish
to make sure nobody falls through the cracks, that we can reach out to
everybody? There’s a few people looking
to see who’s not here today, but, if we all take that responsibility… That’s what we want to do, right? reach out
to people? You know what? God’s got a
calling on our lives, right here in 3. All their needs were met by God. God met all their needs. Was that man that was laying in bed needed a
healing, or the lame man at the Now we’re going into
Thanksgiving. My last point here is a
little history about Thanksgiving: George
Washington's 1789 Thanksgiving Proclamation: “Whereas
it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to
obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His
protection and favor; and Whereas both Houses of Congress have, by their joint
committee, requested me "to recommend to the people of the United States a
day of public thanksgiving and prayer, to be observed by acknowledging with
grateful hearts the many and signal favors of Almighty God, especially by
affording them an opportunity peaceably to establish a form of government for
their safety and happiness: Now,
therefore, I do recommend and assign Thursday, the 26th day of November next,
to be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and
glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is,
or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere
and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this
country previous to their becoming a nation; for the signal and manifold
mercies and the favorable interpositions of His providence in the course and
conclusion of the late war; for the great degree of tranquility, union, and
plenty which we have since enjoyed; for the peaceable and rational manner in
which we have been enable to establish constitutions of government for our
safety and happiness, and particularly the national one now lately instituted'
for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed, and the means we
have of acquiring and diffusing useful knowledge; and, in general, for all the
great and various favors which He has been pleased to confer upon us.” He gave thanks for what God has done
for us. I found an article, years ago, that
I kept, about the Biblical Roots of Thanksgiving from November 10, 2007 by
Robert Hutchinson. It said that there
were three Scriptures that the governor at that time, William Bradford, used to
mandate Thanksgiving: “Unbeknownst
to many Americans, Thanksgiving is yet another legacy of the Biblical heritage
that shaped American law and culture over the centuries. There is at least some evidence that the
deeply pious Pilgrims—who, as Puritans, believed the Old Testament law was
binding on Gentiles as well as Jews—may have been partially inspired by the
Jewish harvest festival of Booths (Sukkot). Sukkot is a week-long celebration, mandated in
Leviticus 23, in which the Jewish people remember and give thanks for their
deliverance from bondage in In He goes on to say: “Thanksgiving
has evolved into a secular holiday in the What’s neat about that, the ‘native
people,’ is that I had family on both sides of that. On the Indian side, and also, John Alden, who
was on the Mayflower, is art of my family.
He survived that winter. My
cousin told me, “Hey, our family was there!”
I said “Really?” “Yeah, Squanto
was part of our family, and, also, John Alden was part of our family.” Wow.
That’s kind of neat. Not too many
people can say that. That’s powerful. I want to thank you al for listening
to me today. I love you all; I
appreciate you all. Let’s do something
great and powerful together. Let’s work
with each other, like a big family; let’s look out for each other. God bless you. Amen. Sermon notes by Pete Shepherd |
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