Sermon Central
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Everything You Do Matters
Contributed by Trae Durden on Sep 17, 2013 (message contributor)
Summary: This sermon demonstrates how every action we take has impact on the world around us. Influence is a powerful tool of the faithful Christian!
Everything You Do Matters
The Butterfly Effect
The law of cause and effect is no mystery. The butterfly effect was considered by some scientists years ago, with the idea that when a butterfly flaps it’s wings, the waves created in the air as those flaps traveled around the earth could eventually become a tsunami on the other side of the world. Like when you throw a rock in the water, and the ripples wash out.
Romans 13:8-10 “Owe no one anything except to love one another, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 For the commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not bear false witness,” “You shall not covet,” and if there is any other commandment, are all summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no harm to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.”
A. As we talk about the Butterfly effect, please keep in your minds the fact that this works spiritually as well!
B. You have influence on others. Your family, friends, co-workers, fellow students, you are being some kind of influence, is it for good or for bad?
C. We owe it to each other to love. And to share our love one with the other!
By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 17 But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? 18 My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. 19 And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him. 20 For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart, and knows all things.
A. The best way to share love? The Gospel!!! In deed and truth! 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, the death, burial and resurrection of Christ!
“And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, 12 for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, 13 till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; 14 that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, 15 but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ— 16 from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love.”
A. By what every joint supplies.
B. It is by what you give that God will use to grow the church. It is up to you, and as we noticed earlier we owe each other our love.
C. Do you really believe that God can use you in small ways to change the world?
D. Whatever your talent, whatever your ability, God can use you, He is here reaching out to you, waiting for you to respond. What small “Butterfly Effect” could you be a part of today? Just by doing what come naturally to you?
I. On Friday, April 2, 2004 ABC News honored a man who at that time was 91 years old. The news program was running a regular segment called “Person of the week.”
A. Usually as the one honoree’s accomplishments are listed, most folks have figured
out who it is. This time most people were puzzled!
B. In the 1940’s Norman Borlaug hybridized high yield, disease resistant corn and wheat for
arid climates!!
C. From the dust bowl of western Africa, to our own desert southwest. From South and Central America to the plains of Siberia and Europe and Asia.
D. Borlaug’s seed product flourished and regenerated where no seed had ever thrived before! He flapped his butterfly wings, just doing what he did.
E. Through the years it has been calculated that Norman Borlaug’s work saved from famine more than two billion lives! More than TWO BILLION!!!
II. But there may be a mistake! I believe the anchorman should have named Henry Wallace as person of the week.
A. Who’s Henry Wallace??? Vice President under Franklin Roosevelt. Not Truman, Wallace had been the Secretary of Agriculture, and was Roosevelt’s 2nd V.P. From 1941-1945.
