When We Move Out, God Moves In Part 3
“Moving Out In Trust” ( All my sermons use illustrations from sermoncentral.com and all scripture is NIV unless otherwise noted)
We are in the middle of a five part series entitled, “When We Move Out, God Moves In” and we have seen the importance of stepping out of God’s way in humility and we have spoken about leaving our comfort zone in order to achieve the things that God wants us to achieve. This morning I want to talk a little about moving out in trust.
A little boy was walking down the beach and he approached a lady that was seated on the beach reading a book, and he stopped and he looked at her for a moment, and then he asked her, “Lady, do you believe in God?” She was a little startled by such a question but she answered him, “Why, yes I do!” And he said, “Good” and he just stood there and she went back to reading her book. She was kind of hoping that he would just go away, but he didn’t. A few seconds later he said, “Lady, do you go to church?” She stopped her reading and said, “Well, yes I do.” “Good” he said. Again he just stood there and she went back to reading. A few seconds later he said, “Lady, do you read your Bible and pray?” “Yes, I do!” she replied with a hint of sternness in her voice. He said, “Good, would you watch my quarter while I go for a swim?”
It is hard to find people to trust anymore, and yet, everyday in our lives, we have to make decisions about who we will trust and just how much we will trust them. I am sure you will agree with me when I say, that in the world we live in, TRUST is disappearing like an endangered species. 30 to 40 years ago we didn’t lock our doors, we could leave the keys in the car with it running, those days are gone. We could send our kids to school and know that they were learning and they were safe. Today we are not sure they won’t get shot, and we know they are being enticed by the world. Today we put alarms on our homes, our cars and even our churches. Pastors have been shot while preaching God’s Word. The world is not a place of TRUST. We have been told that we can get things ABSOLUTELY FREE, and we are sold things that are supposedly NEW & IMPROVED, only to discover that it is all a lie. We have been let down by politicians, priests, pastors and leaders of all kinds. Many of us want to trust people, BUT after we have been burned a few times we become guarded and skeptical. This morning I want to talk about TRUST. We will look at how important trust is in our lives, in our relationships with one another, and in our relationship with our God.
I believe that most of us, if asked, “Hey, do you trust in God?” Would answer “Sure I do.” BUT often times our lives are so full of doubt, and deceit that we really don’t trust at all, period. And no one is immune to mis-trust.
An elderly man was desperately ill. Knowing the time for his departure was near, he called for his closest friends to come see him one last time. Attending him were his doctor, his pastor and his business manager. The old man said, “I know you can’t take it with you, but who knows for sure? What if the experts are mistaken? I want to account for all possibilities. So I’m giving you each an envelope containing $100,000. When I die, I want you each to slip the envelope in my jacket pocket at the funeral service. Then, if I do need money in the life to come, I’ll be ready. And I’m giving the envelopes to you because you are my most trusted friends.” Shortly thereafter, the man did die. Each of his three friends was seen slipping something into the deceased’s coat pocket as he walked up to the casket to pay his final respects. Following the service, while these friends were visiting with each other, the doctor, with a sheepish look on his face, said, “Guys, I have a confession to make. You know with the cost of medicine today, I don’t make that much money. The hospital is desperate for funds. We can’t even replace the CAT scan machine that’s broken down. So, I took $20,000 for the new CAT scan and put the rest in the coffin.” The minister cleared his throat and looked down at his shoes. He said, “I, too, have a confession to make. As you know, our church is seriously overburdened by the needs of the homeless. I couldn’t just see burying that money. So, in hopes of helping the homeless, I took $50,000 out of the envelope and put the rest in his pocket.” Looking sternly at the doctor and the minister, the businessman exclaimed, “I can’t believe what I’m hearing. I am astonished and deeply disappointed that you would treat a solemn trust so casually. He was our friend. I want you to know that I placed in his casket my personal check for the full $100,000.” (From Sins We Love, by Randy Rowland, p. 125-126)
The Bible tells us a different story, it tells of a trust we can have in one that will never let us down. If you have your Bible this morning, turn with me to Proverbs chapter 3. Prov 3:5-8 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. 7 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil.
8 This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.
I think we have a formula here for Moving Out in Trust, allowing God room to work in our lives, our church and our world. The key this morning is TRUST. We must move out in humility, and we must move out of our comfort zone, but we must also step out in faith, trusting the Lord with ALL of our hearts. So let’s take a little closer look at this set of instructions and see what we can do in our lives.
Step one seems to say that if we are trusting God with our lives it will not always make sense. Our understanding of things is not always clear. God does things in ways that keep us sometimes confused.
I can testify that in the ten years I have been in full time ministry there have been many things that did not make sense to me. The first church I ministered to, went through the worst split I have ever seen or heard of. A group of people who truly never attended church got interested in what changes were being made in the church, found that the paperwork was not up to date, went to the capital building and filed their own paperwork naming themselves the trustees of the church and then freezing the money and assets of the church they tried to have me removed from the building by the police and tried to take over the church, it failed. The church never did get the money back, they had to change their name as well, but they are growing now and doing well. I had no understanding of what God was doing then, today, however, I see that I grew stronger and the church pruned some dead weight.
Our lives are story after story of hardships and trials, but this is what allows us growth. James tells us, James 1:2-4 Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, 3 because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. 4 Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything
I am pretty sure that our understanding of trials is not always one that allows us PURE JOY, but God knows what He is doing and He alone knows what we need to endure. Stepping out in TRUST involves allowing the trials of this world to test our faith. It involves going through this pain, this test in order that we might be prepared for the trials to come and that we might be able to mature from it.
How many enjoy a freshly baked Krispy Kreme donut? Many of us have tasted them. Some people will line up and wait for hours to purchase these sweet delights. Let me tell you about the process that leads to a Krispy Kreme donut. First the little balls of dough are shot through with a piercing blast of air to create a hole. Then they go into the proof box where they ride up and down an elevator in an atmosphere of heat and humidity. This causes the dough to rise. After this, they are dropped into hot oil and boiled thoroughly. After surviving this ordeal, the donuts pass through a cascading waterfall of icing. Does anyone here today feel like a Krispy Kreme? Do you feel like you have been blasted with air? Do you feel like you have been boiled in oil? Well, remember that these experiences precede the sweet delight that follows. None of us look forward to trials. None of us love hardship. But without them, we will never enjoy the sweet fruit of maturity. Billy Graham said, "Mountaintops are for views and inspiration, but fruit is grown in the valleys."
TRUST in God, move out in trust by NOT leaning on your own understanding of things, especially trials, the scripture goes on. “In ALL your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight.” If the first thing we must do to move out in Trust is to is give our hearts and see things through the eyes of God, the second thing is that we must acknowledge God in everything we do, in all our ways, in all our words, in all our actions and thoughts, and He will make our paths straight. Isn’t part of the reason our lives are filled with mis-trust, because we don’t really know what direction to take? God offers us direction when we acknowledge Him in everything we do. This is simple to see, if everything we do and say, and think, is first filtered by our desire to follow God, and be in the midst of His will, then God will give us that direction. Let’s face it, we all get lost, we all have difficult times.
A man was watching the news one night when it was reported that a car was going the wrong direction on the freeway. The man knew his wife was on that freeway and became very concerned so called her on her cell phone. She answered and he said, "Dear, there’s one car going in the wrong direction on the freeway." She exclaimed, "One car! There’s hundreds of them!"
Then we see that we are lost, that we have fumbled we come up with excuses, we hate to admit that we have lost our way, made a mistake, been in the wrong. And we are good at making excuses too. This is not giving God room to work!
THE REASON IT HAPPENED... The Metropolitan Insurance Company has published this list: Reasons/Excuses for Auto Accidents: (1) “An invisible car came out of nowhere, struck my car, and vanished.” (2) “The pedestrian had no idea which direction to go, so I ran over him.” (3) “I had been driving for 40 years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had the accident.” (4) “The indirect cause was a little guy in a small car with a big mouth.” (5) “The other driver was all over the road. I had to swerve a number of times before I hit him.” (6) “I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law, and headed over the embankment.” SOURCE: David O. Dykes in "The Skin of a Reason Stuffed with a Lie" on www.sermoncentral.com. by David O. Dykes
This part of the scripture passage tells us that WHEN we set God as our priority, if we turn every aspect of our lives over to Him, then He will guide us and we won’t get lost. This is to say, our finances, our relationships, our decisions, everything! God is willing to guide us and provide for us and take care of us, BUT we must first place Him first and foremost in our lives, in everything. Is there an area of your life where you are not giving God the room He needs to guide and direct your steps? Is there some area of your life where God is not being acknowledged? The scripture is telling us to Move out in Trust and then we will travel the path designed by Him. Jesus made the same point as He preached the sermon on the mount. Matt 6:33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Moving out in trust involves TRUSTING God and seeing things through His eyes, it means we must acknowledge Him in all we do and say and it means:
Prov 3:7-8 Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD and shun evil. 8 This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones.
I think Solomon was telling us again to not LEAN on our own understanding, but he goes a step further here. He tells us that we MUST respect God and push away evil. Now I would like to think that we ALL feel we are not evil, and we do not associate with evil in any way.
One day God was looking down at Earth and saw all of the evil that was going on. He decided to send an angel down to Earth to check it out. So he called one of His best angels and sent the angel to Earth for a time. When the angel returned she told God, yes it is bad on Earth, 95% is bad and 5% is good. Well, God thought for a moment and said "Maybe I had better send down a second angel, to get another point of view." So God called another angel and sent her to Earth for a time too. When the angel returned she went to God and told Him yes, the Earth was in decline, 95% was bad and 5% was good. God said this was not good. So He decided to E-mail the 5% that were good. He wanted to encourage them..............give them a little something to help them keep going. Do you know what that E-mail said? * * * * * * * * * You didn’t get one either, huh? From Christianstories.com
The truth is that we all find ourselves in places where we COULD push evil away, but we are afraid of hurting feelings, we are afraid, that speaking the truth will alienate us from the rest of the world. We may not set out to be in a place where the world is influencing them, but it happens. We get so caught up in our own little worlds that we are not even aware that evil has crept into our lives. We are totally unaware that we are allowing the world to influence our thoughts and decisions.
Many of us can remember when we were in grade school how whenever the teacher had to leave the classroom for some reason, she would always tell the class to, “Be quiet and study!” However we also remember that as soon as she left the room, the paper wads would begin to fly! Erasers would be flung across the room while someone would draw caricatures of the teacher on the blackboard. And then, she would return. There was always that last minute adjustment as we scurried back to our seats and pretended nothing had been going on. In the book of Exodus we find Moses was called by God to go up into Mount Sinai. While he was away, the Israelites grew restless. Looking for something to entertain them, they melted down their gold, formed a golden calf as an idol and danced around it in worship. As long as Moses was around, they were doing fine, but as soon as he “left the room,” things changed! They had forgotten all the marvelous things God had done for them, how He had delivered them, and how they were supposed to behave! Do you recall what the people said when Moses asked about the calf (it sounds just like kids in the classroom when the teacher returns!)? Exodus 32:21-24 (NIV), He said to Aaron, "What did these people do to you, that you led them into such great sin?" 22 "Do not be angry, my lord," Aaron answered. "You know how prone these people are to evil. 23 They said to me, ’Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.’ 24 So I told them, ’Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!"
We are to shun evil out of respect for our relationship with God, knowing that He is never OUT OF THE ROOM! This is sound instruction on Moving out in TRUST! And this instruction come with a promise or benefit of sorts. . 8 This will bring health to your body and nourishment to your bones. I think Solomon is saying that we would get rid of a lot of stress related illness if we would just respect God and shun evil. We live in a world that is surrounding us with evil, and even more as we see the day of Christ’s return approaching. I honestly believe that this is one way we can rid our lives of stress and depression, I believe that this is moving out in trust. The world we live in is in shambles, BUT folks that is not God’s fault.
A preacher and an atheistic barber were once walking through the city slums. Said the barber to the preacher: "This is why I cannot believe in a God of love. If God was as kind and loving as you say, He would not permit all this poverty, disease, and squalor. He would not allow these poor bums to be addicted to dope and other character-destroying habits. No, I cannot believe in a God who permits these things." The minister was silent until they met a man who was especially unkept and filthy. His hair was hanging down his neck and he had a half-inch of stubble on his face. Said the minister: "You can’t be a very good barber or you wouldn’t permit a man like that to continue living in this neighborhood without a haircut and a shave." Indignantly the barber answered: "Why blame me for that man’s condition? I can’t help it that he is like that. He has never come in my shop. I could fix him up and make him look like a gentleman!" Giving the barber a penetrating look, the minister said: "Then don’t blame God for allowing the people to continue in their evil ways, when He is constantly inviting them to come and be saved.
You are invited as well! This morning as the musicians come forward, won’t you consider moving out in TRUST? If you are here this morning and you need Jesus as Lord and Savior of your life this is a time to come. If you are here and there is some aspect of your life where you are not acknowledging God, won’t you change that?
INVITATION
