I leaned pretty heavy on Wayne Searls' great sermon, God Wants To Do A New Thing In Your LIfe. I redacted it. Took Some out, added a good bit to it. This is what came out the other end.
TITLE: God’s Not Done With You Yet 08-27-2012
TEXT: Isaiah 43:18, 19 “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. 19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.
I. THANK GOD FOR CHILDHOOD SUNDAY-SCHOOL
A. Usually when we hear some say, “God’s not done with me yet.” we
generally think of some person who is doing their best to follow
Jesus, who has their faults, but is submitting them to the Lord on a
regular basis.
1. God’s not done with me yet. He is perfecting me. He is calling me
to a higher level of holiness.
2. I hope I can follow Him. I hope you will excuse me while I grow.
3. This is indeed a wonderful sentiment. We all need to treat each
other with this in mind.
B. But there is another way in which this phrase can be understood.
There is the person who has made so many mistakes, so many
wrong turns and bad moves.
1. Why they don’t even have to be sins of the flesh—not that he was
above sins of the flesh mind you.
2. These decisions could have been made ignorantly, perhaps with
too little prayer, but with pure motives.
3. And yet, time and the voice of God demonstrate that these have
been moves and decisions contrary to the path ordained by God.
4. As sure as any sinner who explores the realm of disobedience, this
person finds himself in a fix. This person finds himself at the end of
a dead-end road with no place to turn around.
5. He’s stuck. He thinks God has forgotten about him.
6. He fears his life is wasted and is just as good as over. His biggest
regret is that he has failed God.
7. But then, as gentle as the wind blows, the still small voice of the
Holy Spirit comes reminding him of a story he first learned in
Sunday-School. (Thank God for Sunday-School. There is no greater reservoir of encouragement courage for adulthood than
the childhood Sunday-School class)
8. It was the story of the Exiles in Babylon. They were defeated,
destroyed, devastated, humiliated, captured, ripped apart from
loved ones and possessions, carted-off, forced into servitude once
again.
9. A result of so many mistakes, bad moves, wrong decisions and
failing to follow the path ordained by God.
10. Yes, they too were at that very same dead-end road. Someone
had been there before. Our discouraged life traveler’s interest is
pricked. He is at least encouraged that he has not been alone in
his folly.
11. This bad decision maker, sensing the gentle whisper of the Holy
Spirit, drawing his strength from a childhood Sunday-School
lesson looked around for parched bones. Surely those people
must have died here.
12. It is so hot, dry and miserable. Nothing could survive here for very
long. But he couldn’t find any bones.
13. So he began to look for the grave stones where the people of
God gave up hope and died, one by one burying their dead here at
the dead-end land of all hopelessness. But he could find no grave
stones either. Just how did that Bible lesson go anyhow? (Read
Text).
14. There it was, as plain as day. There were no bones and no grave
stones because God didn’t let His people die there. He wasn’t
done with His people yet.
15. You can still say that about Israel today. God is not done with
Israel yet. But that is not the point of this message.
16. The point of this message is: You may be like Israel. You may
have taken whole bunch of wrong turns, made a lot of bad
decisions, wasted tons of time. Now you find yourself at this dead-
end road in the land of utter hopelessness, seeing no place to
make a turn around.
--And you wonder, Is God done with me?
--Have I made too many mistakes?
C. Please make a statement of faith audibly, aloud with me, let it come
from the depths of who you are and what you believe about God and
what the Bible says He believes about you. Let it ring in this place:
“GOD IS NOT DONE WITH ME YET!”
D. Another prophet would say Jeremiah 29:10-14 This is what the
LORD says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I
will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back
to this place. 11 For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the
LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give
you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call on me and come and
pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find
me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by
you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back from captivity.
I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have
banished you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back to
the place from which I carried you into exile.”
TS. God’s not done, He wants to do a new thing! The 1st step to
embracing this new thing in your life is to:
II. CHANGE YOUR FOCUS -- QUIT LOOKING BEHIND START LOOKING HEAD
A. v.18 “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. You see,
if you are continually looking behind you cannot see where you are
going.
1. If you are ever going to move on to new things in Christ you must
learn that you cannot depend upon past victories to sustain you.
Forget the former things.
2. The children of Israel had many victories in their past:
--Leaving Egypt
--Conquering the Land of Canaan
--Fighting of prospective conquerors
--That was the past. But God wasn’t done yet!
3. But now they are facing challenge they have never anticipated.
They thought they would always be “the blessed children of God.”
Now they are slaves.
4. Now they are in captivity. How can they be blessed or victorious in
captivity? They were at a dead-end. Their glorious past couldn’t
set them free from their gruesome present.
5. They needed to know that God still had plans which had not yet
been accomplished. God wasn’t done. It wasn’t time for them to
lay down quit and die.
6. A relationship with God is a dynamic thing. It cannot be based only
upon God’s great works in you in your past. You need to accept by
faith that it’s not over. Your best days are ahead. God has great
things in store for you.
B. Also, part of this change of focus and looking ahead to the new things
God may want to do in your life is this: #1 You Cannot Allow Your
Past Failures To Possess You. V18b do not dwell on the past.
1. The children of Israel had failed God miserably. Every time He
blessed them with good things, they returned to Him evil things:
--God gave them the Temple - they gave Him idol worship
--God gave them truth - they lived and proclaimed a lie
--God gave them His commands - they lived like they were
suggestions.
--God gave them wealth - they used it to abuse the poor
--God gave them Himself - they gave Him nothing except rejection.
2. The children of Israel did not deserve to receive anything from
God. Yet He still loved them and He earnestly wanted to help them
change.
3. Notice God’s Message: “Forget the former things; do not dwell
on the past. 19 See, I am doing a new thing!
4. God could have held a God sized grudge. He could have made
them pay.
ILL. I hope it does not sound too morbid to you. I still laugh about it. When I went out to Cali to get Dad, I rescued him from being locked up in some type of facility for the rest of his short life. He had some sort of understanding that something bad was coming down upon him and I was helping him skip town. He kept saying on the plane ride out, “Scott, I’m going to buy you the biggest, fastest BMW they make.” He didn’t understand that I had to make decisions based on his best interests and not based on what he was demanding that I do. I wasn’t long that Dad started to wave his hands in front of him as a sign that the two of us were finished, while doing so he’d say, “Scott, the BMW is out! The BMW is out!” —Over and over.
5. God could have said to Israel, “You didn’t do what I told you to do.
The BMW is out!” Why it would not have even been out of line. It
would have been the rational response.
6. But God held no grudges. He only had good plans to prosper His
people. He wasn’t done with them yet!
7. Isaiah 55:7 Let the wicked forsake their ways and the
unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the LORD, and He
will have mercy on them, and to our God, for He will freely
pardon.
8. Again and again, the scriptures remind us of the nature of God.
and yet again and again, we allow the devil to distort that picture in
our minds causing of us to think of His as some sort of tyrant.
C. If you are going miraculously turnaround on this dead-end road,
taking hold of this new thing God has, you must understand that: #2
You Cannot Live on Yesterday’s Faith
1. The children of Israel had experienced great spiritual blessings
throughout their history. Consider a few:
--The first Passover;
--The crossing of the Red Sea;
--The conquering of the Land of Canaan;
--To the building of the temple.
2. They had seen the hand of God at work in and through their
corporate history and lives.
3. Yet their faith in what God had done was doing nothing to deliver
them from their present situation. Their glorious history was not
sufficient enough to deliver them from their current dead-end
situation.
4. They needed new and living faith, a new vision of what God could
do.
--They needed fresh power,
--They needed a new anointing of the Holy Spirit.
--They needed a renewed and sustained burst faith that had
brought to pass all the victories before.
--They needed to have been in Ms. Kat Sunday-School Class or
Gene’s Teen Group.
5. Psalm 85:6-8a Will you not revive us again, that your people
may rejoice in you? 7 Show us your unfailing love, LORD, and
grant us your salvation. 8 I will listen to what God the LORD
says; he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants—
TS. The 2nd step to getting turned around and embracing the new thing
embracing the new thing God has planned:
III. CLARIFY YOUR FOCUS -- DISCOVER WHAT GOD WANTS FOR YOU
A. V19 See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not
perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in
the wasteland.
1. Perceive [GR yada’, yaw-dah’ prim. root]: to know by seeing; care,
recogni-tion, acknowledge, aware of, understand.
2. What do you see when you view your life? Do you see possibilities
or problems? Notice what God said: I am making a way in the
wilderness… Some translate that desert.
--I am making… streams in the wasteland.
3. The children of Israel could have pulled to a stop at the dead end
and said, “That’s all He wrote! It was great while it lasted. But we
have to admit it. We blew it. We missed God! There is no turning
back now. Here is where we will meet our demise.””
4. Or, they could listen to the prophet. They could open their ears of
faith. They could open their hearts and let the word in and take
hold of it.
--They could focus upon what God wanted to do in their lives from
that day forward.
--They could act upon the fact that God wasn’t done with them yet.
5. They could get on God’s way or continue to linger in the
wilderness—the end of the road—the dead-end.
--They could die of thirst there in the wasteland or drink from
God’s streams that He said He would place there.
6. I don’t know about you. But sometimes, you are just so beat-down,
you can’t take hold of God’s good word. “Surely He intends that for
someone else.
--My useful days for Him are over.
--I’ve blown it.
--I’ve failed Him too many times.
--There is absolutely no reason in this world that God would have
something good in store for me.
--What a colossal waste.
--There are so many others with cleaner hands and purer hearts
He can choose.
--No, no, that good word is for somebody else.”
7. But once again, God never said, “The BMW is out!” That’s not what
God is like. Nope, the Bible teaches of a God who isn’t done with
us yet! The Bible tells us that He wants to do a new thing is us.
B. If we are going to allow that to happen, we have to get our chin up off
the floor, #1 We Must See Ourselves as God Sees Us.
1. The children of Israel felt as though they were getting just what
they deserved because of the wrong turns, bad decisions and
general ignorance and sinfulness. Some believed that God was
done with them. But they were wrong!!!
2. You may feel like your past has made your life a wasteland but in
God, your life can become a stream of life.
3. Romans 8:1, 2 Therefore, there is now no condemnation for
those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through Christ
Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from
the law of sin and death.
4. Colossians 1:21, 22 Once you were alienated from God and
were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.
22 But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body
through death to present you holy in his sight, without
blemish and free from accusation
5. “How do I discover what good plan God has for me?”
B. #2 You Must See Your Possibilities as God Sees Them. I am making
a way in the wilderness
1. God is able to transform the wilderness areas of your life into
fields of blessing and abundance. God brought water, manna and
meat to the Children of Israel during their 40 years of wandering in
the wilderness. God made a way then. God will make a way now!
2. Do you know what that means to me? It means God can take
areas of my life that have become damaged, dried up, worn, tired
and scarred. In the very worst place, where it seems to be the
most hopeless—He can that place of my life and make a way
there.
TS. The greatest step to embracing the new thing what God wants to do
in your life is to:
IV. COMMIT YOURSELF TO GOD’S PLAN
A. God had already set into motion the events and people who would
lead Israel out of captivity and back into the land of blessing. But it
was still up to them to decide if they wanted what God was offering.
1. If they refused God’s plan, if they refused to follow where God was
leading, then they would be doomed to remain in their captivity—
the dead-end road.
2. …I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not
perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness…
3. God has already set into motion a new direction and a new
purpose for your life -- will you follow Him? Yes, you have failed
Him. You’ve made bad decisions, wrong turns. Join the club.
4. But God sent me today to tell you: He’s not done with you yet. He
has a plan to get you out of the mess you are in. He has a way in
the wilderness. Yes, we are in a wasteland, but until we reach
higher ground, He will provide streams.
5. He’s not done with you yet. Get up! It’s too soon to quit! He is
doing a new thing and He wants you to be a part of it!
4. Psalms 95:7b, 8 Today, if only you would hear his voice, 8 “Do
not harden your hearts as you did at Meribah, as you did that
day at Massah in the wilderness,
