Totally Dependant on His Spirit

In the book RADICAL by David Platt in the chapter The Importance of Relying On God's Power  he speaks of how we program this thing called worship service to satisfy the appetites of consumer society called our congregation by:  " 1) Having  a really good performance.   2)  Having a beautiful edifice that will hold & house the crowd for this incredible performance....because if they can't entertain us...what's the point of going.  3)  We have to have someone that is so good....that they keep coming back.  "

I'm really excited...as a new Pastor of a church, because I'm being prepared to help lead people into Truly Loving God, and Loving People....and while I belong to a great church, Calvary, and they are dynamic in everything they do down to even supporting me until I am able to transition from my full time job, into full time ministry.....I still wake up everyday dependant on the Power of God and His Spirit!  Don't get me wrong we have a great worship vocal team, a top quality band, power point presentations to help connect people to the songs, as well as the messages, and no amount of schooling, and preparation for the morning's messages will ever be good enough to replace the impact of God's Spirit that I must rely on, to touch the hearts of the people that fill the seats from week to week.  In 1Kings 18:20-40 Elijah shows us why relying on God's power is key to all we do....

1 Kings 18:22-40 (MSG)  ^22-24 Then Elijah said, "I'm the only prophet of God left in Israel; and there are 450 prophets of Baal. Let the Baal prophets bring up two oxen; let them pick one, butcher it, and lay it out on an altar on firewood—but don't ignite it. I'll take the other ox, cut it up, and lay it on the wood. But neither will I light the fire. Then you pray to your gods and I'll pray to God. The god who answers with fire will prove to be, in fact, God."

Elijah, following GOD, put a set of circumstances in order to prove who was the real GOD, God or Baal that they had been worshipping.  Elijah had even went to the extreme of dousing the altar God had him to build with copious amounts of water...that made it seemingly impossible for fire to come and engulf the sacrifice...but when He trusted and believed in the Power of God, and prayed.....GOD BLESSED.  TODAY it is essential that you live out your faith, leaning and depending on GOD not your ability to re-articulate Sunday's message, because the truth is we live in a world that believe in Baal or that they themselves are their own gods.    They will come to their limitations and when they do, they need to see that you are trusting in something that is greater than yourself.  That when crisis strikes you aren't destroyed to your core.

So I know today is only Monday, and you have to get up, get out and _______________________, but here's my encouragement for you....You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you....Phil.4:13 which includes your ability through Him, to truly LOVE GOD, and LOVE people!  You may not know how you are going to make it through...but I assure you that if you rely on the POWER OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD, you will surely make it through!  LGLP