Yesterday, our pastor began a new sermon series entitled "Think." The first part of the series, "Learn to Discern" contained such excellent information that I wanted to share some of it here. Sermon reviews are not my forte, but here's an attempt. If you'd like to listen to the sermon in its entirety, click here.
The main objective of the sermon was to help others understand how to hear the voice of God. The intro verse was John 10: 1:10..."...and his sheep follow him because they know his voice."
Did you know that ancient shepherds didn't use any special tricks to get their sheep to come to them? All they did was speak. In fact, various shepherds could have their sheep grazing in the same field and when shepherd A called out, only his sheep came to him. Isn't that neat? And here is another thing that struck me (my own deduction)...sheep aren't known as the smartest animals on the planet. Yet, they still knew the voice of their shepherd. That hit me because sometimes I struggle with my own intelligence. How can my puny little mind know the voice of the Almighty God? Yet, I do.
Some people think that very notion of humans speaking to God is ridiculous. Honestly, I once did. But I don't anymore. I can say without a doubt that many of my conversations with God are of the two-way variety.
However, we hear of people doing outrageous things and claiming that God told them to do so. Pastor Curt gave an example of another pastor who kicked a woman in the face because he was convinced God told him to. I forget my pastor's direct response to the act, but I believe the word crazy was in there somewhere.
Knowing that it is especially important for followers of Christ to "Learn to Discern."
Here are the some ways Pastor Curt listed to help us discern the voice of God.
1) Decide to train to discern - Hebrews 5:15 - "...the mature have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil." Pastor Curt, who has completed several marathons said that the shorted training program for a marathon is about 4 months. And many are longer. That said, it is similar with knowing God. One needs to hone that skill.
How to train...
- Practice Spiritual Disciplines 1) Time that is devoted to God/times of solitude and silence. 2) Focused time in the Bible---The Bible is full of truth and God will never tell you to do something that is against Biblical principle. 3) Prayer and asking God to teach us what is best. 4) Being involved in Biblical Community.
2) Test it!
"Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world." 1 John 4:1 (NIV)
"Do not be confirmed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect." Romans 12:2 (NIV)
During this part he mentioned that when MTV was new, many Christians were boycotting it. He and his wife, instead video taped some of it and watched it together with their kids and use it to teach some important lessons. He also mentioned about Oprah and her online spirituality. He said something along the lines of that his hope for our congregation is not that we avoid watching Oprah out of fear that we'll be influenced by the negative, but instead be able to watch her and know when she is speaking wrong. I thought that was very good. I know that we allow X-Factor to watch some PG movies, but we always watch them with her. In fact, she even watches American Idol with us and during the shows she has learned a lot about why some things are just not appropriate and acceptable.
4) Pass it on to Others
"For you must teach others those things you and many others have heard me speak about. Teach these great truths to trustworthy men who will, in turn, pass them on to others." 2 Tim. 2:2 (Living Bible)
And the final scripture that is so amazing...
"This is my prayer for you: that your love will grow more and more; that you will have knowledge and understanding with your love; that you will see the difference between good and bad and will choose the good." Philippians 1:9-10 (NCV)
2 comments:
Thank you for sharing this. I think the thing I miss the most about living in Germany is not being a part of a church family and hearing good solid preaching.
Wow, that is so amazing about the sheep!!! We use less than 10% of our brains... do you realize our potential if we were able to use the other 90%?! It would be astonishing, but I think God has a reason for all of that.
This is seriously amazing! I'm going to relay some of this info back to my FIL (he's a pastor). He loves listening to sermons and while he doesn't take other peoples' materials, he likes those little facts.
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