PROBLEM SOLVING 101
(All my sermons use illustrations found at www.sermoncentral.com and all scripture is NIV unless otherwise noted) (Small portions of Max Lucado’s “Every Day Deserves a Chance” are used in this sermon.)
Ever had a problem and just thought to yourself, “what in blazing hills am I going to do about this?” I know I have, most of you have been there, and if not, you probably will be before your life on earth is over. Rest assured you are not the only one that runs into problems and has no clue what to do. I think the disciples ran into problems as they followed Jesus during His ministry. If you have your Bible with you this morning, please turn with me to Mark chapter 6, we will look at a story almost everyone is familiar with. The feeding of the 5,000 and let us look at this story from a different perspective today. See this story through the eyes of the Apostles and the problem they are presented with. Mark 6:30-37 The apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught. 31 Then, because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, "Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest." 32 So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place. 33 But many who saw them leaving recognized them and ran on foot from all the towns and got there ahead of them. 34 When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things. 35 By this time it was late in the day, so his disciples came to him. "This is a remote place," they said, "and it's already very late. 36 Send the people away so they can go to the surrounding countryside and villages and buy themselves something to eat." 37 But he answered, "You give them something to eat." They said to him, "That would take eight months of a man's wages! Are we to go and spend that much on bread and give it to them to eat?"
PRAYER
WOW, a problem is seen and a problem is solved, but let us gleam from this story how unsolvable problems are solved. The Apostles, God’s chosen men, come back to Jesus after He had sent them out, 2 by 2. They were excited about the results of their first mission trip. The reported ALL they had done and taught, but when they returned to Jesus He was a little busy. The scripture tells us that it was like Grand Central Station, “so many people coming and going” and the Apostles had not even had a chance to eat yet. I know the first time I did a mission trip was into Mexico, although we ate 3 meals a day, it was usually beans, rice and tortillas. SO the first thing I wanted when we returned to America was a fat, juicy, cheeseburger. The Apostles were hungry and tired and Jesus says, “Let’s jump in the boat and find somewhere we can grab a bite and get some rest.” BUT, by now, they have the celebrity status of rock stars, and the people recognize them, and like girls at a Beetle’s concert, the crowd runs up ahead and gets to the place of rest, before Jesus and His Apostles do.
Now the scripture tells us that when Jesus saw these people, He did not get upset, but rather, He had compassion on them for they were like sheep without someone to guide and direct them. NOW, remember we are looking at this from the perspective of the Apostles, they had just spent a good deal of time working, spreading the Gospel message, they were tired and hungry. Jesus was taking them out for supper, and ALL these people were creating a problem. SO the Apostles start looking at the situation and they say, We are in the middle of NO WHERE. It is getting late, and they think the best course of action to deal with this problem is, “SEND THEM AWAY.” The Apostles are thinking, “look Lord, these people are starting to become a problem here, they are pushing in on our time, they followed us to a remote place and they have not been fed, send them away and tell them to go buy themselves some food.” Then Jesus throw a monkey wrench in the operation by saying in verse 37 “You give them something to eat.” WHOA!! We just got done working, we are tired, we are hungry, we have no money, we are in the middle of NO WHERE, and you want us to feed this crowd of 5,000 men? I think the Apostles get their first lesson in Stress Management here. Look at how they answer Jesus, “That would take 8 months of pay to do that!” “Are you saying we should spend that much money to get this done?” Have you ever felt like the Apostles did here? Have you paid all your bills only to have your vehicle break down and had no money to fix it? Have you ever given your tithe and then had no money left for food? Have you ever bent over backwards for your children only to get that dreaded phone call, “Mr. Jones we have your son here at the police station.?” We have all encountered these kind of problems, but the solution is right in front of us. God does not expect us to solve the problem on our own. If our computer broke down and your father was Bill Gates, would you ask, “What do I do now?” If our car broke down and your father was Richard Petty would you ask, I wonder what I should do? If we were hungry and didn’t know how to cook, and our father was Bobby Flay would we ask, I wonder if there are some Ramen Noodles nearby?
The Apostles know what Jesus was capable of, they had seen many, many miracles. From water being turned into wine, to a boatload of fish caught in Galilee. They had seen Jesus raise a girl from the dead and banish demons from a man. We HAVE TOO. If your Father is God and you have a problem on your hands, what do you do? YOU GO TO GOD!!
** ( This small portion is from Lucado’s Book)
Is your problem too large?
Eph 3:20 Now glory be to God, who by his mighty power at work within us is able to do far more than we would ever dare to ask or even dream of-infinitely beyond our highest prayers, desires, thoughts, or hopes. Living Version
Is your problem too great? 2 Cor 9:8 God is able to make it up to you by giving you everything you need and more so that there will not only be enough for your own needs but plenty left over to give joyfully to others. Living Version
Is your temptation too severe? Heb 2:18 For since he himself has now been through suffering and temptation, he knows what it is like when we suffer and are tempted, and he is wonderfully able to help us. Living Version
Is your future too frightening? Jude 24 And now-all glory to him who alone is God, who saves us through Jesus Christ our Lord; yes, splendor and majesty, all power and authority are his from the beginning; his they are and his they evermore shall be. And he is able to keep you from slipping and falling away, and to bring you, sinless and perfect, into his glorious presence with mighty shouts of everlasting joy. Amen.
JUST GIVE IT TO JESUS . A lecturer was giving a lecture to his students on stress management. He raised a glass of water and asked the audience, "How heavy do you think this glass of water is?" The students’ answers ranged from 20g to 500g. "It does not matter on the absolute weight. It depends on how long you hold it. If I hold it for a minute, it is OK. If I hold it for an hour, I will have an ache in my right arm. If I hold it for a day, you will have to call an ambulance. It is the exact same weight, but the longer I hold it, the heavier it becomes." "If we carry our burdens all the time, sooner or later, we will not be able to carry on, the burden becoming increasingly heavier." "What you have to do is to put the glass down, rest for a while before holding it up again." We have to put down the burdens periodically, so that we can be refreshed and are able to carry on. So, before you return home from work tonight, put the burdens of work down. Don’t carry them back home. You can pick them up tomorrow. Whatever burdens you are having now on your shoulders, let it down for a moment if you can. Pick it up again later when you have rested... Life is short, enjoy it!!
We can enjoy our lives here on earth if we are willing to give it ALL to Jesus. We must believe that He alone is able to take our burden from us and He alone is the problem solver we need. I truly believe that when we are willing to give our problem to our heavenly Father, He gives us a new and clearer perspective of our problems. One that helps us understand that it might not be as bad as we thought, and that the whole time we were able to take on the problem, with His help, from the very start.
A young man was at the end of his rope. Seeing no way out he dropped to his knees in prayer. "Lord, I can’t go on," he said. "I have too heavy a cross to bear." The Lord replied, "My son, if you can’t bear its weight, just place your cross inside this room. Then open that other door and pick out any cross you wish." The young man was filled with relief. "Thank you Lord," he sighed, and he did what he was told. Upon entering the other door, he saw many other crosses, some so large the tops weren’t even visible. Then he spotted a tiny cross leaning against the far wall. "I’d like that one Lord," he whispered. And the Lord replied, "My son, that is the cross you just brought in." Let God take your burdens your life. Don’t settle for some cheap imitation.
So many times the problem is only BIG because we won’t give it to God and allow Him to keep it.
I found a little poem by an anonymous author that sounds so familiar, it’s as if I could have written it. It says: “Lord, I’m so discouraged, I don’t know what to do; I have so many burdens, And I gave them all to you. But you didn’t take them, Jesus, will you tell me why that’s so? The answer’s simply, ‘Little one, because you won’t let go.’
If we give our problems to God in heaven the next thing we must do is:
TRUST HIM COMPLETELY Trust that He will solve the problem the best way there is. IT WILL NOT be the way we would have solved it, most likely anyway. We may hope for a spotlight in the darkness and only get the light of a birthday candle. We may want a billed paid on time and only get an extension of the due date. TRUST God and he will do as is BEST.
Several years ago Jeff Strueker was a US Army Ranger posted in Mogadishu, Somalia. Today he is a master of divinity student at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY. For him Oct 3-4, 1993 were the defining moments of his life. He was one of the troops called on to go into the center Mogadisu to secure a building as part of a larger operation. The movie “Black Hawk Down” came out about a year ago chronicling the events of those two days. In the first trip into the city he and most of his friends got out through a hailstorm of bullets. One man was shot and killed. It was then that he felt the fear. He began to pray. The humvee was painted with blood as they escaped the city with their dead and wounded comrades. The news soon worsened. A helicopter was shot down. The team received orders to return to the melee. Yet, his men understandably couldn’t fight in the bloody humvees. Struecker spent the next 30 to 45 minutes cleaning. No running water. Only sponges and buckets. "I began to talk to the Lord. I thought I was going to die," he said. Feeling his fear grow, he began to ask God to protect him. But his prayer soon changed.
"I’ll never forget this for the rest of my life. ... A scene appeared in the landscape of my mind. The scene was Jesus in the Garden. ... He clearly and honestly knew that he was going to die. ... He also showed that he did not want to go to that cross and die. And I knew that I didn’t want to die that night. But Jesus courageously said, ’God, not my will, but yours be done.’ "If I die tonight, that’s fine, as long as your will is done," Struecker said. For the first time in his life, Struecker - - who had been a Christian since age 13 -- was prepared to die. "God spoke to my mind and my heart and said, ’I’ve been protecting you every day of your life,’" Struecker said. "He did not tell me, ’You will live through the night.’ He simply showed me my life has always been in his hands." Struecker and his men returned to the field of fire in Mogadishu that night and fought with a God-given courage. The sergeant first class would later be awarded the Bronze Star Medal "V" for valor. "I fought differently that night than everybody else ... because of my faith," Struecker said. God had given him a "supernatural peace" in the midst of pandemonium, further firefights and an ambush that nearly blew his humvee off the road. "I began to understand God’s omnipotent power," Struecker said. "He was orchestrating every single bullet that was fired that night. ... The peace that I had was not only for my own life, but for the lives of my soldiers. If any of them were to get shot, then that was part of God’s sovereign plan." And God chose to preserve Struecker that night.
When our daughter Charity was just an infant we had a similar incident. Becca was feeding her some juice and she tried to cough and breathe at the same time, she chocked and could not breathe, we tried everything to get her to breathe right but nothing worked. We called 911 and told them our infant daughter was choking to death. They sent an ambulance, but we lived in the mountains of Colorado at the time and it was snowing something fierce. As we waited for the ambulance to show, an EMT who heard the call for help over his radio happened to live in our apartment complex, he rushed over to see if he could help, he measured her respirations at about 4 per minute, it should have been like 40. Becca and I huddled together and prayed, we told God that if He had to take her home, that He take her now and not let her suffer, but whatever He was going to do we trusted him. They placed her in the ambulance, placed the bulb mask over her face and squeezed air into her and she started breathing right away. She was fine before we even reached the hospital. But I know it was the greatest test of our faith and trust in God that we had ever encountered.
God is truth, not close to the truth, He is the whole TRUTH. There is NO ONE ELSE to trust more than God. If you trust in Him completely, He will give you the desires of your heart. COMPLETELY not part way, or halfway, trust Him completely.
A story is told in which an accountant answered an advertisement for a top job with a large firm. At the end of the interview, the chairman asked, “One last question—what is three times seven?”
The accountant thought for a moment and replied, “Twenty-two.” Outside he checked himself on his calculator and concluded he had lost the job. But two weeks later he was offered the post. He asked the chairman why he had been appointed when he had given the wrong answer. “You were the closest,” the chairman replied. Some people have the mistaken idea that God is like the man who conducted the interview. They think it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you’re close to the truth.
Not close to the truth, believing the whole truth, and trusting Him completely. It takes FAITH to solve the big problems in life, it takes a strong faith. So many people live by what they see instead of trusting in God to solve their problems. They like the Apostles only see what is in front of them and not what they know can be done THROUGH OUR ALMIGHTY GOD.
An elementary school teacher had a Christian student who was very outspoken about his faith. To prove a point one day, the teacher took this student to the classroom window, pointed to the sky and said, “Look up into the sky. Can you see God up there?” “No.” the student replied. “That’s because there is no God.” Smirked the teacher. “Oh.” The student said as he returned to his desk. As the teacher was making his way back up to the front of the classroom, the student turned to a classmate and said, “Look at the teacher’s head. Do you see a brain up there?” The classmate said, “Nope.” “That’s because there is no brain up there!”
Finally this morning let me leave you with this thought. If we want to solve our problems in a simple manner, we must first GIVE IT TO JESUS. We must face up to the facts that we are unable to solve all things on our own and we must give our burdens to Him. Then we must TRUST Him completely, He is TRUTH and He will solve the problem according to the best way for us. We may not see it as the best way, but we must trust that it is. Finally we must:
ACCEPT HIS SOLUTION
So many times, we Christians, give our problems to God, and Trust Him to solve the problem, but we do not accept the outcome.
Let’s imagine dialogue between Abraham and God. “Abraham, this is God speaking. I want you to leave everything and go to the land I will show you.” “Where’s that?” “If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.” “Try me.” “It’s 1500 miles from here in a place called Canaan.” “Never heard of it.” “I know, and guess what else?” “What?” “I’m going to make you the father of a great nation.” “That’s impossible. I don’t have any children.” “Don’t worry.” “What do you mean, don’t worry?” “Just trust me.” “Let me see if I’ve got this straight. You want me to leave everything, travel across the desert to someplace I’ve never heard of, and become the father of a great nation.” “Right.” “Is this some kind of joke?” “No.” “What am I supposed to tell my wife?” “That’s your problem.”
Hebrews 11:8 puts it this way: “By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.”
If we accept God’s answer to our prayers and requests, then we may see later that it is was in fact the best thing. So many times things happen and we are certain that they should not have happened. God KNOWS BEST, we must accept the things in life that happen even if we do not understand them.
Once there was a man named Jim who let his dog out to do its business late one night. He watched some TV and then remembered to let the dog back in. When he opened the door, he was shocked at what he saw! In his dog’s mouth was his neighbor’s cat, dead! "Bad dog! BAD DOG!" said the panicked man. He took the cat away and looked at it. He couldn’t bring himself to tell his neighbor what happened, so he decided to clean it up and leave it on the neighbor’s porch. He took the cat into the bathroom and washed off all the blood and dirt. It took him forever. He had to wash it four times to get it all cleaned. He brushed its beautiful white fur as he blow-dried it and put its collar back on. Since it was so dark, he snuck into the neighbor’s yard and laid the cat down on the porch, in front of the door. The next day, he saw his neighbor. "Hi," the neighbor said. "Hi," replied Jim, nervously. His neighbor said, "Something weird happened last night." "Oh yeah? What’s that?" asked Jim, sweating now. "Well, my cat died yesterday, and we buried him, and this morning he was lying on my front porch!"
ACCEPT HIS ANSWER, it may not always make sense at first, but it will one day. Are you here this morning with a problem that needs to be solved? As the ladies come forward this morning we will be singing number #62 in your hymnal, “Just As I Am,” If you need to make a decision for Jesus this morning, if you need Him to solve your problems, come forward. JUST GIVE IT TO JESUS, TRUST HIM COMPLETELY, and ACCEPT HIS SOLUTION.
INVITATION
