Sermon Central
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Made For Connection Series
Contributed by Steve Malone on Jan 25, 2019 (message contributor)
Summary: In this message we will talk about the two connections that everyone one of us were made for... connecting to God and connecting to one another.
Made For Connection
The Chase – week two
Video bumper
Wow!
Powerful video, right?
I MEAN - I can so relate… running from God. Looking for life in other places… afraid of what is going to happen when God eventually catches up to me…
AND THEN – the shock, of finding out (and I am in many ways ‘still’ finding this out)… that God is pursuing me not to punish me but to have a relationship with me… because He has a divine obsession with me!
Crazy! Powerful! True!
NOW…
I want to start off this morning… by reading several passages of Scripture, that… will provide a great foundation for our conversation today.
AND – everyone of them (though it was not planned) was part of our FCFH reading for the week… AND – each passage are words spoken by Jesus the night before His arrest…
THESE – are some of His last words to His guys before, His arrest, death and burial. SO NEEDLESS – to say this is obviously some pretty important stuff.
AS – I read these words…
PICTURE – the scene, the images, the darkness, the garden
FEEL – the emotions of the disciples (the - fear, uncertainty…)
SEE – the face of Jesus (steady, sure, confident, compassionate)
“I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you’re joined with me and I with you, the relationship intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can’t produce a thing.” – John 15:5 (msg)
After saying all these things, Jesus looked up to heaven and said, “Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son so he can give glory back to you. 2 For you have given him authority over everyone. He gives eternal life to each one you have given him.
3 And this is the way to have eternal life—to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth. 4 I brought glory to you here on earth by completing the work you gave me to do.
YEAH – Jesus (w/o a doubt) lived the life that he put on flesh to live. HE – ran the right track. HE – chased after the right things.
5 Now, Father, bring me into the glory we shared before the world began. – John 17:1-5
I am praying not only for these disciples but also for all who will ever believe in me through their message. 21 I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me.
“I have given them the glory you gave me, so they may be one as we are one. 23 I am in them and you are in me. May they experience such perfect unity that the world will know that you sent me and that you love them as much as you love me.
Prayer
OKAY…
THIS MORNING – is our second week in our new series, “The Chase, Going After The Life You Were Created To Live…”
UNDERSTAND… Tim/Laurie
IF – there is an all powerful, all knowing, always existing God who created you (and there is)!
AND IF – this all powerful, Creator God has – thoughts, plans, purposes and intentions for your life (and He does)!
THEN – there must be….
A LIFE - that you were created to live.
A RACE – you are intended to run…
A FUTURE - a destiny, you are supposed to not only chase after…
BUT – actually live within.
QUESTION…
How does it make you feel to know that there is a life that the Sovereign King of the Universe created you to live…?
I MEAN - does it even make any sense for us to CHASE AFTER a different one… to live a life less than who you were created to be?
In 2000 Bruce Willis and Samuel Jackson stared in a movie called, ‘Unbreakable’
AND – the movie Unbreakable tells the story of Philadelphia security guard, David Dunn, a seemingly ordinary guy who slowly discovers with the help of a guy, named Elijah (that he is more than he thinks he is) that in fact he is a superhero.
NOW - there is an encounter that goes down between David and Elijah that has always resonated with me – since the first time I heard it.
David – ‘this morning was the first morning I can remember, that I didn’t open my eyes and feel that sense of sadness.’
Elijah – ‘that little bit of sadness in the morning you spoke of? I think I know what that is. Perhaps, you’re not doing what you’re supposed to be doing?’
