Good Reminders

Posted on July 29, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

What is it in life that worries you?

What scares you?

What robs your sleep?

We’ve all got something. Something that makes us uneasy, something that makes us fearful, something that keeps our hearts afraid.

What is that for you.

I’ve got a list of things that worry me. I’m a worrier, it’s just how I’m wired. I worry about church, I worry about family, I worry about friends. It’s just what I do.

So, I need to the words of Psalm 71 quite often

3 Be my strong rock, a castle to keep me safe; *
you are my crag and my stronghold.
4 Deliver me, my God, from the hand of the wicked, *
from of the clutches of the evildoer and the oppressor.
5 For you are my hope, O LORD God, *
my confidence since I was young.

As big as my worries are, God is bigger. As big as my problems are, God is bigger. As big as my stresses are, God is bigger.

And God is at work in all our lives. Do we really believe God led us to this point to leave us here? Do we really think that God will abandon us after all these years?

God is with us. He is now, He has always been. He will be with us today and will be with us tomorrow.

What do we have to worry about? What do we have to fear? Why do we have to be afraid?

We don’t. God is with us.

I need to be reminded of that every once in a while. Like today.

I don’t know if you needed this word this morning, but I did.

Thanks be to God, who is bigger than whatever it is we face.

Now, go out and live today with the confidence of being a child of God!

Access

Posted on July 28, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

A couple of years ago, Holly and I went to the Holy Land. I’ll be honest with you, I was never a person that really wanted to go. I know lots of folks that went and said it was the greatest thing ever. I’d heard all that. And while I was excited to go – it wasn’t something I’d really ever desired.

But when you get there, wow. It’ really is something else. It opens up your eyes to some many things in Scripture that you didn’t see before. It really makes thing make sense in a way the didn’t before. It really is a power experience.

One of the cool things we saw was in the south part of Israel the ruins of an old army fort that dated back to Solomon. I know, cool. But, the cool thing was to go inside of it and see how it was all laid out. And inside of this fort, there was a replica of the Temple in Jerusalem. And, inside that replica of the Temple was it’s on Holy of Holies. The most sacred place in the Temple. The very place the presence of God was believed to rest. The very place where the priest would tie a rope around their ankle so if God struck them down, they could be drug out. It was the most Holy place in all the land. And each outpost had their own, which was just as holy.

In the picture to your left, you see Holly standing in that Holy of Holies. And notice, she is not struck down. It’s 3 years later and she is still with us and still alive. God did not strike her down at point.

Why?

Because of what happened in today’s text

50 Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. 51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split.

In the death of our Lord, the curtain was torn. And we have access. We are welcomed into the presence of God. No longer is God separated from us, but He is with us.

No longer do we have go through an other means of access. We can each go directly to God. We are each welcomed in. Each of us.

Today, you have access to the created of heaven and earth. Your prayers are heard by the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. You are welcomed in!

Wow!

Take advantage of that. Seek after Him. Seek His face. You have access to the King!

May we know how blessed we are. And we spend time each day seeking after Him!

Waiting

Posted on July 27, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

I don’t sit still well. Never have, never will. I don’t like waiting. If I’ve got an appointment of some sort that I feel like will take a while, I bring things to do. I don’t like waiting.

Not many of us do. It’s kind of a helpless feeling. You’re there, waiting on someone else, and there is nothing you can do about it.

Listen to the words from Psalm 62

1 For God alone my soul in silence waits; *
from him comes my salvation.
2 He alone is my rock and my salvation, *
my stronghold, so that I shall not be greatly shaken.

There are in scriptures, particularly in the Psalms, this command to wait. To wait upon the Lord.

Why? Why would God want us to wait upon Him? Why is that something we should do?

For the reason we don’t like to wait. It reminds us that it is not about us. We are not in control. It’s not, in the end, all up to us.

There is a God more powerful than us that does not conform to our schedule and our will, but will conform us to His schedule and to His will.

No one likes waiting. I detest it. But, in, the end, we need to learn to wait upon the Lord. For it teaches us who is really God. Who is really in control. Who is really at work.

It’s all about God. It’s all about His will. It’s all about what He wants to do. May we have the grace today to wait upon Him.

And may we know the freedom and life that comes from waiting upon Him.

Choices

Posted on July 26, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

Today is a day of choices. What will eat for breakfast? Will I drink two pots of coffee, or just one? Will I wake up my children while sleeping to annoy Holly, or not? (I will not)

What will I choose to do? How will I choose to live?

Who will I choose to serve?

The book of Joshua ends with this scene of choices. Will the people choose to serve God, or will the choose to serve false idols. What will they do?

Joshua had already given them a choice and said that he and his family would serve the Lord, no matter what the others will do.

And then he laid it for people – choose. What will you do. The people responded in Joshua 27:

21 And the people said to Joshua, “No, we will serve the LORD!” 22 Then Joshua said to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the LORD, to serve him.” And they said, “We are witnesses.” 23 He said, “Then put away the foreign gods that are among you, and incline your hearts to the LORD, the God of Israel.”

Joshua says, if you are going to choose to serve God, you must do two things.

First put aways those false gods. Put away those things that draw you away from God. Put away those things that keep you from serving and following. Put them away.

If I want to follow God, I mean, really follow God, then I need to put away things that keep from following.

Today, what in your life keeps you from following? What is it in your life that keeps you from following God as you should?

And the second thing is incline your heart to God. Spend time with God, listen to His voice through prayer and scripture. Seek Him. Walk with Him.

What will we choose today? How will we choose to live? What will we choose today? Will we choose to follow? Or will we not? The choice in our hands.

July 25, 2010 Podcast is up

Posted on July 25, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

Today’s sermon podcast is is up on Asbury Church’s website. This sermon is entitled Our Love for Others. The text is Luke 10: 25-37. Click the link to stream it there, or you can listen to it through my blog. You can also click here to subscribe through iTunes.

BaseCamp – Day Three

Posted on July 22, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

Yesterday was the third day of BaseCamp here in Petal and it was a learning experience. The entire week has been, but yesterday was a chance for my kids, and for me, to learn about what grace looks like.

When you are working on yards, sometimes, most times, things are perfect. Sometimes the work doesn’t go right, or the machines don’t work right or the people aren’t just pleased with the work.

We had a family we were working with this week and things just weren’t going right. Folks were working hard and trying their best, but it just seemed like nothing was going as it should. And plus everyone was hot and tired after a long few days of work.

As my crew was driving to our next site, some of the kids were talking about things weren’t going right and I saw a moment. I don’t preach to my kids a lot, I’m a preacher, that’s what they’d expect 🙂

What I do is try to use the stuff that we are doing each day to relate our work to the grace of God. Well, we were talking how we needed to love this family, even though they weren’t always easy to deal with.

And I told them, that’s what God does for us. We aren’t always easy to deal with. We don’t do what God wants. We do wrong. And, you know God must get frustrated with us sometimes. You know He just must be tempted to be fed up with us sometimes. It’s got to happen.

And, how does God respond? He responds with love. No matter how frustrated He may be, no matter what we may have done, He responds to us with love. He loves us, not matter what.

And because we’ve been loved that way, we are called to love one another in that same way. Even when it’s hard. Even when we don’t want to. Even when we are tired. God loves us no matter what; we are called to love each other.

That’s what BaseCamp is teaching these youth, and reminding us adults!

BaseCamp – Day One

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

Instead of daily reflection on scripture the next few days, I’m going to write a quick review of BaseCamp of the previous day. Yesterday, me and my crew of teens went out after breakfast and morning worship to work. I have a crew of kids that didn’t know each other. They were from different towns, different churches, had different personalities, they were just all different from each other.

And, at first, it was a little ackward. It’s tough not knowing folks and trying to figure out what to do.

And then, we went to work. And these four young folks went to work and worked HARD in the middle of the Mississippi summer. And I was very proud of them.

And it reminds me of something that I know to be true, but I’ve seen over and over again. When people, churches, people, families have no mission, no purpose, no vision, we will fuss. We will fight a little. We might not get along.

But, when we have a mission to be about, we focus on that, and we see great things happen. When we work together on a mission.

So, as individuals, as members of a church, what is your mission? What is the mission of your church? Where do you fit? What are you doing for that mission?

We all have a part to play, we all have something we can do for that mission.

Today, may we find out where we fit in that, and may we be about the mission God has given us.

Hard to Do

Posted on July 19, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

I had a professor at Mississippi College, Dr. Harold Bryson, that used to tell his students some thing that has always stuck with me – “Jesus isn’t hard to understand, He’s just hard to follow.”

That came back to me this morning as I read these words from Paul in Romans 13:

8 Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; You shall not murder; You shall not steal; You shall not covet”; and any other commandment, are summed up in this word, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.

Religion can be fun to debate about. We can passionate conversation (i.e. arguments) about baptism. Or about communion. Or about a lot of things within our faith. But, these issues, these conversations, they don’t measure up to the whole of what the faith is about, about what the faith must be producing in our lives.

Love.

We have been loved by an awesome, amazing, holy, righteous, almighty God. A God is all, before all, and beyond all. A God that is simply amazing, that our minds cannot fathom.

He has given us His son. He has taught us His way. And He wants us to live as He has called us to live.

What is the life? Perfection? Nope. Winning theological arguments? Nope. Being better than other folks? Nope.

Love. Loving your neighbor as yourself fulfils the law. That’s it. That’s the list.

That sounds awesome. The only problem is that it is hard. It’s hard to love your neighbor sometimes. It’s hard to forgive your neighbor sometimes. It’s easy to talk about, easy to right about, easy to think about. It’s hard to do sometimes.

We can only do it though God’s grace. It’s what we are called to do. It’s what we must do this week. Love. As we’ve been loved. And we are going to run into someone who we just don’t feel like we can/should love.

What is our response? Love. That’s the command of Jesus. Love. But remember that power to love doesn’t come from ourselves, but through Him.

Even when it’s hard to do, through the grace of God, may we love each other as He has loved us.

Today’s Podcast is Up!

Posted on July 18, 2010 by Andy Stoddard

Today’s sermon podcast is is up on Asbury Church’s website. This sermon is entitled God’s Love for Us, Our Love for God. The text is 1 John 3: 1-9. Click the link to stream it there, or you can listen to it through my blog. You can also click here to subscribe through iTunes.

RevAndy.org

Monthly Archives: July 2010