Sermon Central
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Learning To Lean
Contributed by Johnny Creasong on Sep 9, 2009 (message contributor)
Summary: Becoming a person who follows after God’s heart requires open heart surgery!
LEARNING TO LEAN
5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;
6 in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.
(NIV)
What do you LEAN on?
What if your CRUTCHES were taken away?
18 The LORD is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
(NIV)
“There is nothing more painful than being stripped
of all the TOYS of your heart!”
-Dr. Chuck Swindoll
In order to follow after God’s Heart,
David needed OPEN HEART surgery!
“… while David was playing the harp,.. Saul had a spear in his hand and he hurled it, saying to himself, "I’ll pin David to the wall." But David eluded him twice.”
“… While David was playing the harp,
Saul tried to pin him to the wall with his spear, but David eluded him as Saul drove the spear into the wall.
That night David made good his escape.”
First Corrective Heart Surgery:
REMOVE POSITIONAL SECURITY
Now Saul’s daughter Michal was in love with David, and when they told Saul about it, he was pleased.
1 Sam 19:11-12
Saul sent men to David’s house to watch it and to kill him in the morning. But Michal, David’s wife, warned him, "If you don’t run for your life tonight, tomorrow you’ll be killed."
So Michal let David down through a window, and he fled and escaped.
Second Corrective Heart Surgery:
UNTIE FAMILY TIES
1 Samuel 19:18-20, 22; 20:1
“When David had fled and made his escape, he went to Samuel at Ramah and told him all that Saul had done to him. Then he and Samuel went to Naioth and stayed there.
Word came to Saul: "David is in Naioth at Ramah";
so he sent men to capture him…
Finally, he himself left for Ramah…
Then David fled from Naioth at Ramah…”
Why did David flee?
“… there is only a step between me and DEATH."
Third Corrective Heart Surgery:
CONFRONT COMFORT ZONES
“After the boy had gone, David got up from the south side [of the stone] and bowed down before Jonathan three times, with his face to the ground. Then they kissed each other and wept together-- but David wept the most…Then David left, and Jonathan went back to the town.”
Fourth Corrective Heart Surgery:
STAND ALONE!
“That day David fled from Saul and went to Achish king of Gath.
But the servants of Achish said to him, "Isn’t this David, the king of the land? Isn’t he the one they sing about in their dances: "’Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands’?"
David took these words to heart and was very much afraid of Achish king of Gath.
So he pretended to be insane in their presence; and while he was in their hands he acted like a madman, making marks on the doors of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard.
Achish said to his servants, "Look at the man! He is insane! Why bring him to me?
Am I so short of madmen that you have to bring this fellow here to carry on like this in front of me? Must this man come into my house?"
Fifth Corrective Heart Surgery:
FORGET BEING “COOL”
In order to follow after God’s Heart,
we need OPEN HEART surgery!
Anything dwelling in our heart besides God,
must GO !
And God spoke all these words:
I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
You shall have no other gods before me.
You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand [generations] of those who love me and keep my commandments.
