In my life, I am consumed by my passion to preach, to share God’s Word.  It is what drives me and even though sermon preparation can become a chore, I press through because of my passion to preach.  As I prepare sermons, I am driven to build a message that will challenge those who hear.  To minister to those who need encouragement, to disrupt the comfortable and build up the ones who need hope.  As I study, my goal is to help others discover the truth of God’s Word and to help unpackage the Bible in a way that is memorable and that everyone learns something.  This is my passion!  It is what I am, who I am and it is the passion of my heart.

To many this is a good thing.  I have sat through many sermons that were delivered by those who were not passionate to communicate.  There is, however, a discovery that I have made in my life.  Rather, I should say that the Holy Spirit has helped me discover.  The Holy Spirit nudged me last night with a question, “Are you as passionate about prayer as you are about preaching?  Are you as passionate for souls as you are about preaching?  Are you as passionate about knowing God as you are about preaching?”

You cannot lie to the Holy Spirit!  Ask Ananias and Saphirra:) No, I am not as passionate about those things as I am preaching.  Passion for preaching is not wrong.  Our passion for preaching, however, must flow out of our passion for souls, prayer and knowing God.  If we reverse the order, we will wind up losing our passion for preaching in the end.

I have renewed my pursuit of Him.  I am stoking the fires of my passion for prayer.  I want to be able to have a passion for preaching that flows out of my passion for God.

I have been working my way through Clutter FREE Christianity, a book that helps us cut through the things that clog up our lives and helps us to develop spiritually and live in a place of rest with Christ.  I have not finished Clutter-Free Christianity, but so far it is an engaging read for those who desire a fresh walk with God that allows us to grow, not through a legalistic approach, but through finding liberty in Christ.

SUMMARY

When did the Christian life become so complicated?

Your greatest desire is to please God, but with each passing week, your spiritual to-do list grows longer. As you strive to fulfill a never-ending inventory of requirements for being a godly parent, spouse, voter, employee, and more, you feel increasingly disconnected from the God you’re trying to serve.

It’s time to cut through the clutter and get to the heart of what it means to please God. In this liberating look at the core principles of faith, Dr. Robert Jeffress reveals the truth about what God really wants from you–and what He wants to do for you.

Through solid biblical teaching and practical insights, Dr. Jeffress points you toward a revitalized faith centered on becoming more like Jesus in action, attitude, and affection. You’ll learn how to partner with God in the process of spiritual transformation as you choose to follow Christ in forgiveness, obedience, trust, contentment, service, and prayer.

Through a renewed focus on experiencing the kingdom of God right now, you’ll find your to-do list shrinking and your spiritual life deepening. It all comes with embracing Clutter-Free Christianity.

Includes a Bible study guide for personal growth and group discussion.

Author Bio:

Dr. Robert Jeffress is the senior pastor of First Baptist Dallas, one of the most historic churches in the Southern Baptist Convention. The author of sixteen books, he is a graduate of Dallas Theological Seminary and Southwest Baptist Theological Seminary. In addition, live broadcasts of Dr. Jeffress’ weekly messages reach millions of listeners and viewers each week, while his daily sermon series airs on 1,100 television stations and cable systems nationwide. Dr. Jeffress and his wife, Amy, are the parents of two adult daughters.

Clutter-FREE Christianity is available at www.christianbook.com.

Late Saturday night as I was getting ready for Sunday service, God dropped a Scripture reference in my heart.  I felt compelled to read Zechariah 6:15.

“Even those from afar shall come and build the temple of the LORD. Then you shall know that the LORD of hosts has sent Me to you. And this shall come to pass if you diligently obey the voice of the LORD your God”

What a powerful promise from the Lord and what He intends to do at RFA!  Now I am on a journey to discover how to take care of the “IF”.  This verse emphatically declares, “this shall come to pass IF you.”  Promises are often conditional.  God will give us promises but there are some things that we must do also.  In this case God says we must diligently obey His voice. 

Now comes the part I must do if I want to see God fulfill His promise.  I must tune into His voice which means I must crowd out my own voice and the voice of the world.  This means that I must spend more time in His Word and in Prayer, then I can know His voice. 

Most of you know that I love coffee and I love Iced Tea.  I have tried for years to switch to decaf, but it is not even worth drinking.  It is kind of like drinking Diet Dr. Pepper instead of regular Dr. Pepper.  It is a waste of a beverage.  Needless to say I am dependant on caffeine.  I am not addicted, I just can’t live without it.  There is a difference you know.  While drinking my two cups of Dunkin Donuts Coffee this morning, I read Mikey’s Funnies and he had this take on the 23rd Psalm.  The original version of the 23rd Psalm is much better but I identified with this one this morning.

“CAFFEINE PRAYER

Caffeine is my shepherd, I shall not doze.
It maketh me to wake in green pastures.
It leadeth me beyond the sleeping masses.
It restoreth my buzz.

It leadeth me in the paths of consciousness for its name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of addiction, I will fear no Equal ™.
For thou art with me; thy cream and thy sugar they comfort me.

Thou preparest a carafe before me in the presence of Starbucks.
Thou anointest my day with pep; my mug runneth over.

Surely richness and taste shall follow me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in the House of Folger’s forever.”

• Just a side note here.  I do not like Starbucks nor Folgers.  I prefer Community Coffee or my new love, Dunkin Donuts Original Blend.

The Easter season is a busy time for most pastors.  Sonya found this cartoon at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church’s website.  Holy Trinity is located in Port Neches, Texas.  Sonya worked there as secretary for a couple of years.  I liked this cartoon:

Holy Week for the church is kind of like Football’s Division Title Games followed by the Super Bowl.  Our Super Bowl is Easter Sunday and we are working to build up to that important service.

This morning I am finishing up my Palm Sunday message, “One Week To Live”.  Looking at Christ’s Triumphal Entry with the thought that He only has one week to live.  It reveals the passion of Christ’s heart and sets up His desired end to the Cross and Resurrection.

I just finished my message to be delivered to the Rogers Ministerial Alliance service on Monday.  I have the privilege of sharing God’s Word with the area churches for one of the Holy Week services.  I was given the topic, “The Day of Authority.”  I guess the new guy has to take the hardest of all topics to deliver nicely to all denominations.  The key text is where Jesus drives out the money changers of the temple and calls them thieves.  Sure sounds like a fun topic for a ministerial alliance sermon, huh? 🙂

By the time I finished studying this important passage, it actually reveals God’s heart for His house…to be a house of prayer, healing and joy.  Something that every church and denomination should strive to be.

I encourage you to join us for our Holy Week Services…Beginning here at RFA on Sunday 10:30am.

The ministerial alliance services will be at Rogers Oakley Chapel daily next week from 12:15-12:45pm.

See you there!

Mark Batterson writes a great article on how God’s creating Earth was perfect:

“I keep thinking about one of the opening lines of Earth. The narrator, James Earl Jones, says the earth is perfectly angled to the sun, 23 degrees, to sustain life. Actually, our axial tilt varies from 22.1 to 24.5 degrees. But it really is an amazing thing the way our planet is precariously yet perfectly positioned to sustain life. And there is no margin for error. Planet Earth is 93 million miles from the sun. If we were just 1% closer or further from the sun, the climate changes could disrupt our Eco-equilibrium making Earth uninhabitable. On top of that, our atmosphere is the perfect combination of nitrogen (78%) and oxygen (21%) with traces of carbon dioxide, argon, hydrogen, helium, and other gases. If the oxygen percentage were just a few percentage points higher, we’d be highly flammable.

So here’s the question: is this the result of random chance or Intelligent Design? I know it takes faith either way, but I honestly think it takes more faith to believe it’s all random. Of course, the curious thing is that those of us that believe in an Intelligent Designer or Creator are often put on the defensive as if we’re the only ones operating on faith.

For what it’s worth, Astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle once said in an address to the British Academy of Science, "Let’s be scientifically honest. The probability of life arising to greater and greater complexity by chance through evolution is the same probability as having a tornado tear through a junkyard and form a Boeing 747 jetliner." I love that imagery. He calculated the chances of life being the result of random chance as 1 in 10 to the 40,000th power.”

HT: Mark Batterson

As we enter into Easter Season, I am reminded of all of the benefits that have been afforded us because of Christ’s Death and Resurrection.  The greatest of those benefits, I believe, is the power He has given us over darkness.  Simply put, His salvation.

Colossians 1:13 says, “He delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love.”

Christ secured deliverance for us and placed us in His Kingdom.  He has delivered us from Satan’s snare and given us eternal life through Christ.  Salvation is the greatest benefit from this deliverance but it has much more.  We find deliverance from sin, bondage, sickness and other tactic’s of the enemy of our souls.  Christ is much more powerful and greater than any trap of Satan.

The Spirit Filled Life Bible notes interpret this verse:
“Delivered us…darkness conveys the idea of salvation rescuing us from the tyranny of darkness.  Drawing on an important OT theme (see Ex. 6:6; 14:30), it includes rescue from such negatives as danger, death, sickness, and hostile situations in general (Ps. 33:18-19). These rescues include both present deliverances and future, consummated deliverances in the world to come.  Conveyed refers to the deportation or transference of captured armies or populations from one country to another.”

My favorite picture of this deliverance from darkness is us getting a new owner.  When we were slaves to sin, we were owned by the devil.  Now God is our owner…He has transferred us to His possession.  He has given us a new title of ownership.