I have the fantastic opportunity to attend an amazing church in aa while at college. This is sometimes what gets me through the week: every Sunday morning when I can simply wake up and praise God for the day He's given and the blessings He provides.
Today was an interesting sermon and I greatly enjoyed it. You can listen to it
here on the New Life Church website : )
He titled it "Freedom Through Weakness." I think I am going to go back and listen to Part I of his sermon sometime after finals.
To begin the service off, we have a portion called "Slice of Their Life" which is when a member of the church, typically a student, steps up and gives their testimony. Today was an amazing story of a guy who saw abuse and divorce in his family and through all his pain and struggles, met amazing people here at the U and came to know Christ and His love and power and mercy. His parents divorced at a young age and his father had an anger issue. He told that when his father remarried, he became a foster parent and had one foster boy that he "took care of." This consisted of beating the child and making his own children watch as he did so that they would not disobey him. His mother used to tell him he was worthless, he would amount to nothing, his friends didn't really care about him, and he was ugly. He grew up alone and without love in his life, except for the love of alcohol. He came to the U, met a girl, and she took him to New Life. He had been exposed to church before, but had never taken up to it. He got involved and learned that all he needed to do was talk about the ways he had been hurt, what he had seen, the issues he had bottled up inside of him and never let anyone know. As he did this, he learned that people genuinely cared, they wanted to help him, and that this form of therapy, a release, did really help him move on from his problems.
After this, one of our five (yes, five wonderful and phenomenal pastors), Rick Keith, began his sermon on Freedom through Weakness.
2 Corinthians 12:7-10 NIV
"7To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power in made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
Rick then goes on to explain how through our weaknesses, we find Christ. It is during these times of sorrow, doubt, sadness, anger, jealousy, whatever the emotion or issue at hand is, that Christ can use to reveal Himself to us and show that with Him, our thirst can be quenched, our battle can be won, our life can be complete.
Rick explains that our culture teaches us that weakness is unacceptable and shameful. We don't talk openly about failure, it is not acceptable to fail at anything (at this, he gave UM students a shout out : P ). Though if we look at so many passages of scripture, one can we that failure and weakness are welcomed with open arms by Christ and that we can learn to depend fully on him during these times.
Rick talked about several men throughout the history of the Bible who were made to have weaknesses so that they would depend fully on God's mercy and strength rather than what they knew they had.
He is saying that when we discover our weakness, we should be using it to develop an even deeper relationship with Christ, to allow Him to work in us at this "low" time, His "high" time. Rather than hide ourselves and be ashamed, we should talk to someone about what's on our heart and our burdens will be lifted through the power and love and strength of Christ.
How utterly amazing is it that we have a God so compassionate and loving that in our suffering, He reveals Himself and His love and mercy for us? That in our times of serious doubt and confusion, He will be there to help us though them.
It reminds me of a topic that was spoke about by my pastor at my church at home. He talked about how he had many people ask him why people who are so good and strong in Christ get cancer and suffer. His response was that God causes suffering in both those who are obedient and servants of God and those who are not so that one can see the difference it makes between the two: the difference between the suffering of a Christian and the suffering of a non-Christian and how in that difference, we find comfort and joy knowing that we are about to be forever with our God in eternity.
and that it is the most comforting and joyful thought that we have ever heard, felt, and believed.
and still do.
