Pastor P

Sunday Night Reflections

Jun 20, 2010

A few thoughts on a GREAT Father’s Day at NewSpring Church…

  • We saw over 30 people surrender their lives to Jesus today…and, you guessed it…THAT never gets old.
  • It was an honor to have Mercy Me with us today leading in worship…loved getting to meet these guys, they were genuine, humble and love Jesus and His church.
  • Their song “All of Creation” is now one of my favorite top five songs of all time…LOVE IT!
  • The message I preached today wasn’t the original message I had been planning to preach for the last month…God actually put it on my heart on Thursday to preach it…which had me excited and nervous at the same time.
  • If we could wrap our minds around what Jesus said in Matthew 7:9-11 I believe it would totally change our view of God…He wants us to be filled with joy!
  • BUT…His path for our joy isn’t always the path that we want.
  • Saying God wants us to be filled with joy does not mean that we can live our lives any way that we want…it actually means quite the opposite.  God loves us WAY too much to always let us have our way!
  • We looked at Mark 5:21-43 from a very different point of view today…had a blast teaching on it.
  • God is WAY more desperate for us than we are for Him.
  • We didn’t find Jesus (He wasn’t lost!!!)  HE FOUND US!
  • If we ever doubt the desperation of God all we need to do is look at the cross!
  • God doesn’t always do what we want Him to do…which is why MOST Christians get angry with Him, because He has not submitted Himself to our plans!
  • He doesn’t want us to submit our plans to Him but rather to surrender our hands to Him!
  • He’s not looking for our advice…He’s looking for our availability…and being available means that we follow Him without conditions, trusting Him even when it doesn’t make sense.
  • His plans for our lives are so much greater than ours…Jairus wanted Jesus to “heal the sick” but Jesus had it in mind to “raise the dead” - a MUCH greater miracle.
  • The reason Jesus doesn’t do what we ask Him to do is because he has GREATER things in store.  (See Ephesians 3:20, I Corinthians 2:9 AND, once more, Matthew 7:9-11)
  • Mark 5:36 is HUGE and Jesus is still saying that verse to so many today who want to give up hope…what we view as a tragedy HE views as an opportunity!
  • Jesus didn’t die on the cross to establish a behavior modification program…He did it so that the dead could be brought to life.  (See Ephesians 2:1-10!)
  • I mentioned in the service today that I had preached on this exact passage back in December from the viewpoint of the woman who was healed…that message was called “Mighty God” and is the 2nd message in the “Home For Christmas” series we did back in December…you can download it for free on itunes if you would like…or go here to view it.
  • I can’t believe Charisse turns three a week from today!
  • I can’t believe I turn 39 on Thursday…my last year in my 30’s…I need to do something this year that I’ve never done before!  I have no idea what that is..totally open to suggestions!
  • Our July 4th service is going to be amazing…KidSpring is taking over the main service at every location…it’s going to be one of the best Sunday’s we’ve ever had at NewSpring Church.
  • I think I am going to go eat ribs tomorrow!  :-)
  • Can’t WAIT to continue this series NEXT Sunday!

That’s it for now…haven’t preached in three weeks and…wow, I’m feeling it…I must be getting old!  :-)