Introduction:
Last week we began our two-part study on “The Reset Button.” Let me give you a quick recap of what we learned last week.
We learned that the One True God is one God composed of three natures. He is composed of God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. After He created the world and all the things in it, the Bible tells us that God rested. After six days of working, God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit rested. They rested, not because they were tired, but they rested as an example for us to follow. Not only was it an example, but later God commanded that we follow that example of rest. A day of rest was so important to God that He had it chiseled into stone tablets called the Ten Commandments. These commandments were so precious to Him, that He directed Moses to construct a wooden box, cover it in gold, which was called the Ark of the Covenant, in which would hold the Commandments. On top of the Ark of the Covenant, Moses was commanded to fashion two golden angels in the form of a seat, and whenever the Ark of the Covenant was placed into the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle, the LORD God would descend from Heaven and sit on that golden seat called the Mercy Seat.
We know to obey God’s commandments. We know such passages that His Word tells us as:
“If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.”
(John 14:15)
“By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome.”
(1 John 5:2-4)
And we can all agree we should keep the commands of the LORD. God tells us not to bear false witness, or murder, or steal, we agree with those commands. When He tells us to love the LORD your God with all your heart, and to not commit adultery, and to not make an idols, we can all say I obey those commandments. But one of those 10 Commandments we often and willfully ignore on a weekly basis.
The Bible tells in James…
“For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”
(James 2:10)
This Scripture implies that if we have broken just one commandment, we have broken them all.
First Scripture Reference:
“Remember the Sabbath [day of rest] day, to keep it holy. 9Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. 11For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it."
(Exodus 20:8-11)
Just like God is composed of three natures, we also are composed of three natures. We are made up of body, spirit, and soul. We are given a physical body, a spiritual body, and mental body. Just like God rested after 6 days of work, He commands that we do the same. He knows in His infinite wisdom, and because He created this way, that we are to rest. He has placed in every single one of us a “Reset Button.”
Each day, we reset. Usually, during the day we rest or sleep. During sleep, our mind processes our thoughts. Sleep resets us mentally. It helps our mood when we rest, and it gives our body and mind time to heal when we rest. Think of it. When you sick, what does your body tell you to do?
Not only did God design us with a daily reset, but designed us so that each week, we are to have a rest. God commanded that one day out of every seven days, we are to rest from all work. It is a reset so our body and mind can function correctly.
Transitional Sentence:
We’ve seen the commands of God to reset our physical and mental body, but this morning we’re going to learn how to reset the spiritual side of our life.
There are two reset buttons in the spiritual life I want us to look at this morning. One of those resets is for those who living this life with no thought of spiritual things. We’re going to learn how to realize the error of our ways, and restart life all over again.
The First Reset
The Bible calls the first “Reset Button” as the Born Again button. Every one of us in this room has broken at least one of God’s commands. We’ve all done wrong in this life, and the Bible says that the wages of our sin is death. Not just a physical death, but a spiritual death. After this life, there is more.
The Bible tells us in Genesis 2, that God formed Adam from the dust of the ground. Then God breathed into Him a living spirit, and Scripture says that he became a living being. Before that, Adam was just flesh, but God breathed a spiritual life into the physical life. Our physical body will one day wear out, but our spiritual life is eternal. And we have to make the choice while in this physical life, where we will spend our spiritual life eternally. If we reject the commands of God, refuse to repent of our wrong doings, ignore Him in our lives, our spiritual eternity is punishment.
However, I want to share some good news with you. After Christ was baptized, He spent 40 days in the desert. After returning from the desert, He immediately began His ministry and preaching. As the religious day approached, Jesus entered the synagogue and was handed the scroll of Isaiah. There our Savior could have chosen to read any of the words from the scroll, but read this instead…
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
To preach the gospel (good news) to the poor;
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
19To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.”
(Luke 4:18-19)
My friends, this morning I want to share with you some good news. The gospel is this…we are sinful, but Christ has taken the punishment for you. The penalty of our wrong-doing was placed on Him. It is by His stripes we are healed. He loved us so much, and wanted to restore the relationship between sinful man and Holy God so much, that He offered His own life as a substitute for ours.
This past week, I was reading over some “less preached on” books of the Old Testament. There the LORD brought to my attention a 3:16 verse. Not John 3:16, but Zephaniah 3:16. God tells us…
“Do not fear; Zion, let not your hands be weak.
17The Lord your God in your midst,
The Mighty One, will save;
He will rejoice over you with gladness,
He will quiet you with His love,
He will rejoice over you with singing.”
(Zephaniah 3:16-17)
People often asked me why I get excited or emotional when I preach sometimes. I can’t help it. When I think of how unworthy I am, but God still chose to die for me so that I could stand forgiven, that makes me excited. When I think of the love that He showed this poor sinner, that’s enough to make me happy.
My friends, if we chose to confess our sins, believe on the sacrifice of Jesus, having went to the cross for our sins, died for our sins, took the punishment for sin for us, poured his blood out to forgive us, and rose again from the dead. If we believe this and daily do our best to live what we believe, we have pressed the reset button. Now we are born again.
As a minister, I can see the good in everyone here, but I don’t know your heart. Only God knows that. This morning I want to tell you this simple truth. For those that are partially committed or have never made a commitment to follow Christ, I want to tell you before its too late. You need to get serious with the LORD. You are not promised a tomorrow. You need to know today where you’ll be tomorrow. If today was your last day, do you know for certain that heaven awaits you?
There is a way you can know. The Bible tells us to repent. That means that we know we’ve done wrong, confess it to Christ, and stop living the wrong way. Secondly, confess Jesus as the Lord of your life.
The Second Reset
The second reset is for those of us who have been a lifelong follower of Jesus, but somewhere along the way, we’ve gotten complacent. Our zeal for God and for the things of God has diminished. We don’t pray as much as we used to, don’t fellowship as we once did, don’t love or share Christ as we used to, or are just not as close to God as we want or should be. Maybe the LORD doesn’t move us like He used to. It is like we’ve lost our passion for God or the things of God! If this is you…you need a reset!
Not many of us in this room can say we are like Steven. Acts 6 tells us that this man of God was on fire for the LORD. He preached to anybody and everybody. Even when he was questioned about why he was continually telling people about Jesus, He stood before the Sanhedrin and preached a sermon to them. Even as they took up stones to kill him, he was praying for them. That’s what I call strong faith in the LORD that he was so passionate about the LORD that he would lay down his life before he would recant.
Illustration—All parents, do you remember when you children got sick? Do you remember how pitiful they were? And I bet there is not one single parent in this room today that didn’t say, “I wished I could take it from them.” We’d do anything for the one’s we love. How long has it been since you’ve done something for the God who loves you unconditionally?
At the age of 16, I was a fat little boy. I had a few friends, but I was really shy. There was nothing special about me, I was just the typical quiet boy who stayed to himself. I would not have dared told any of my classmates about Jesus, much less invite them to church. I was too afraid they’d laugh at me.
When I finally got right with the LORD, I lost my shyness. I lost my fear to stand before a crowd and tell others about Him. Every Friday morning, 50-75 students gathered with me and I got to preach and teach them the Bible for nearly 30 minutes before the first class. I saw dozens of my school mates, come to accept Jesus because one little fat boy was on fire for God. The LORD allowed me to even baptize 7 of them at school.
The cold Christians used to scold me at times because I always wanted to sing or play a song to God. I always wanted to testify about Jesus even if I wasn’t the pastor of the church. After a revival service once, I was confronted by the pastor of the church. He told me, “You know I used to get excited like you when I preach. The longer you stay in the ministry, you’ll start to lose that excited preaching style.” I replied as honestly as I could. I replied, “When I’m no longer excited to tell people about the love of God, I need to stop preaching!”
The other day a friend sent a message to me that said, “Preach every Sunday like your child was sitting on the pew, and the devil’s got a hold of them.”
Chances are very likely that everyone in this room today, if they are serious with themselves this morning, will fall into one of these two categories. We either not spiritual and need to be, or we are spiritual, but need to grow in our spirituality.
As Christians, we should be on fire for the Lord, and our desire to worship Him should be so strong that nothing compares to it. What happens when that fire burns out though? What are you to do when your devotion to Him suddenly feels like a dwindling flame?
The good thing for believers is that God’s love for us never changes (Deuteronomy 7:9). It never diminishes; it never goes away (Psalm 37:28). If you have lost your spark with Jesus Christ, know that it's easy to fall right back in love. When you pause to understand why your faith has struggled, and make an action plan on how to get back into the faith, you will soon find yourself a stronger Christian than ever before.
I've talked with many believers over my years in ministry that have at one point in their life were deeply devoted to God, but slowly slid away from Him. I've even had some people tell me that they believe that they were raised in church, raised reading the Bible, sang in the choir, but slowly they got further and further from God. I want to encourage you this morning. God has not moved.
The Bible tells us…
"For the Lord your God is a compassionate God; He will not fail you nor destroy you nor forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them."
(Deuteronomy 4:31)
"I am with you always, even to the end of the age."
(Matthew 28:20)
God isn’t mad at you. God is mad about you! No one will ever love you more than the Creator who made you. God the Father created you, Jesus the Son died for you, and God’s Spirit wants to live in you. He wants nothing more than for fellowship to be restored with you.
One of my favorite songs in the world is by a group called “Pocket Full of Rocks.”
He's not mad at you,
And He's not disappointed.
His grace is greater still
Than all of your wrong choices.
He is full of mercy
And He's ever kind.
Hear His invitation,
His arms are open wide.
You can come as you are with all your broken pieces,
And all your shameful scars.
The pain you hold in your heart, bring it all to Jesus.
You can come as you are.
So where are you spiritually this morning? Do you need a reset? Do you need to restart your relationship with Him? Has your fire for Him slowly died, we’ll today is the day to restart it.
Story of Frank and the altar
Just like we press a reset button on a computer or phone, let’s press the “Reset Button” on our spiritual life. Let’s learn how to bring refreshing, new life, and a restart to our spiritual life.
In Acts 3, the Bible tells us of an encounter that John and Peter had with a crippled man. Daily, the man would sit out in front of the Temple and for money from those going to the Temple to worship. As Peter and John walked by, the man asked for help from them. Peter responded that silver and gold he did not have, but what he did have he'd give. Then told the man to stand up and walk in the name of Jesus. Peter took him by the hand, raised him up and immediately the man was able to stand. He then began to leap, then walk. He then entered the temple, leaping, walking and praising God.
The background of this story gives us an example of a true spiritual reset. Remember back in these days, people believed that God dwelt inside the Temple, so coming into the Temple would mean that one comes into the presence of God. Well, this man was content only to be outside the Temple. But when he was healed by the power of Jesus, he immediately ran into the Temple praising.
My friends in this life, we are all like this crippled beggar. We are all outside the presence of God until we have Christ in our life. This man had a need that only Jesus could fix. My friends, we all have a need in this life that only Jesus can fix. The Bible tells us that we all have a sin problem. Unless we confess Jesus, we'll never make it into the presence of God.
If you want the powerpoints to this message, please email me at saved2follow@hotmail.com. I'll send them ASAP to you for free. View the sermons online at www.mountzionfamily.com.
