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We are in week three of a series that we are calling Strong. Our Strong series. Now, the word strong is oftentimes used in communities when there are tragedies and there's the name of the city, like Boston Strong after the bombing. Um, and it's a great rally cry for getting strength when we feel weak at times. But what we're doing is realizing that strength is not just about when things go wrong, but to live a life that is strong, a life that is solid and confident and sure whether things are going well or not to have that strong life.
So before we get into that, let's uh pray and ask God to guide us. God, we thank you for our time this morning to celebrate all that you're doing among us in our church and our families with our kids as we head into a VBS week. I pray that for all of these hundreds of kids and volunteers it would be the best time of their life learning about you, you and your love and grace towards them. Thank you for every dad that is here and uh just the sacrifice and the time and the care that they put into their kids' lives. And God, guide our time that we would become strong in good times and bad, uh steady and solid and secure. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
All right, so two weeks ago we led this series with this concept of a strong narrative. Strong narrative, like what is the point of this whole life? If we're going to have a strong life, we need to know the point of this life. That this isn't some just aimless wandering journey, that we're not just a collection of randomly collided particles, that we're not just here to get as much stuff and have as much fun as possible. There's actually meaning in this journey.
And we compared this journey to whitewater river rafting where it's an adventure. You don't know what's around the corner. It could be peaceful, it could be calm, it could be beautiful, and it could be a level five rapid where you are hanging on for dear life. But in it all, in this journey, we are with each other and we're experiencing this together and God is with us and we're doing something truly meaningful together. We're making this world a little bit better than we found it. We're adding love into this world and adding goodness and kindness into this world.
Then last week we talked about a strong identity. Not only knowing what the point of this whole life is, but knowing who we are uniquely. Uniquely who we are. And we talked about the journey of discovering and defining and enjoying who we are and to settle on this reality that we are personally crafted by God, made in His image, dearly loved by God, accepted as a child of God, embraced as we are and knowing that we are. No matter what you've gone through and no matter what you will go through, because life is uncertain and life will have its challenges, you can make your story a good one.
We all love good stories, whether it's reading fiction, watching TV, or telling stories around the dinner table. We want to live a good story, an interesting journey filled with meaning, deeply connected with people that we love, and a life that is filled with love - the love of God, the love of family, and the love of friends.
On Monday, we celebrate Juneteenth, a reminder of the pleasure of God and His pride in us, and a reminder of the solid identity that we can live our lives on. We are in control of our story, not all of it, as some of it just happens to us and some of it is out of our control, but much of it is in our control and we can make our story a good one.
The Bible, and then we get to the New Testament and we get to the story of Jesus, and the story of Jesus is a story of redemption and grace and mercy and love and hope and faith. It's a story that has been celebrated for two thousand years and it's a story that is still being celebrated today and it's a story that is still being embraced by people of all races and ethnicities because the story of Jesus is truly incredible.
June 19, 1865 was a day of celebration for the black community. Major General Gordon Granger arrived in Galveston, Texas with news that the slaves were free, two and a half years after President Lincoln had signed the proclamation of freedom. The slaves had been enslaved in Texas for two and a half years without knowing they were free. When they finally heard the news, they erupted in celebration. This celebration continues today, but there is still heartbreak in the Juneteenth story. The heartbreak is that slavery ever existed in the United States of America, and that the Texas slaves were enslaved for two and a half years after they were legally set free. Despite the heartbreak, there is still victory and celebration.
The power of stories is evident in Joyce Carol Oates' award-winning short story, The Widow's First Year. The story is only four words long, yet it conveys the emotion of someone who has lost their life partner. We love a good story, whether it is four words long or a historical event.
The Bible is a collection of thousands of stories, compiled over hundreds of years. It is the single story of God's interaction with humankind. The creation story in Genesis 1 and 2 tells of God's heart as He creates all that there is and declares it good. In the New Testament, the story of Jesus is one of redemption, grace, mercy, love, hope, and faith. This story has been celebrated for two thousand years and is still being embraced by people of all races and ethnicities.
The Bible is full of wonderful stories compiled over hundreds and hundreds of years to illustrate our relationship with God. One of these stories is the story of the Fall, where mankind chooses to walk away from God's vision of love and peace and seeks pride and power. The consequence of this is the flood, where evil covers the entire Earth in violence and corruption. This narrative is a story of God giving second chances and new starts. Another story is the Tower of Babel, where humankind tends to consolidate power for ourselves. God says no and wants us to fill the Earth with His peace and rule.
The Old Testament is about the nation of Israel trying to figure out who God is and how to please God so they can earn His blessing, prosperity, land, and military victories. They struggle and have little glimpses of success, but mostly failure. The Old Testament ends in abject failure and tragedy, with 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel wiped out and two of the remaining tribes of Israel captive in Babylon. Malachi 2:9 sums it all up: "Israel, you are despised and humiliated in the eyes of all the people for you have not obeyed me."
But with every good story, there is hope. In the New Testament, a peasant named Jesus emerges from Israel and starts preaching in the poor areas. He preaches a totally different message, not trying to discover who God is and what He wants, but with humility. This tiny people group, oppressed by the great Roman Empire, finds hope in Jesus. He brings a message of peace and love, and a future for the planet. God is like a Father and a Heavenly Father who loves to embrace His children, not just the people of Israel but the entire world. He doesn't need to be appeased, pleased, or satisfied in order to give things to people. He loves us, accepts us, cherishes us, celebrates us, and is proud of us. He wants us to know how much He loves us and to walk in the confidence of His love.
The story of the Bible centers on Jesus and His commitment to sharing the message of love and grace. He went against the religious and political oppressors who were keeping people in harm, poverty, and near enslavement.
At the end of the Gospels, there is hopelessness as Jesus is unjustly arrested, tortured, and crucified. But then there is the message of the Resurrection, that not even death is the end of the story. There is life ahead, and Resurrection for all of us. This world can move forward in a good way, defined by the victory of God's love and life shown through Jesus Christ. We are part of this story, and we can live it out in our own lives.
Jesus let us know that we are part of the story by telling the famous story of His love and blessing from God. Jesus told a story called The Prodigal Son to let us know that we are a part of what God is doing here on Earth and that our lives matter in that story. In the story, a man had two sons and the younger son asked for his share of the estate before his father died. The younger son then moved to a distant land and wasted all his money in wild living. When his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land and he began to starve. He was so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. He decided to return home to his father and ask to be taken on as a hired servant. When his father saw him coming, he ran to him, embraced him, and kissed him.
Jesus said that this story is not about a son and a father, but about us and God and the story we are living. He said that the heart of the Father is always with us, always towards us, always for us, and always there to embrace us and to kiss us and to celebrate us. He said that our story can be a party, a great celebration filled with the love of God and surrounded by the love of friends and family. He said that the kind of party God is talking about is not one of eating, drinking, and laughing, but one of being surrounded by the love of God.
When we talk about our life being a party, it's not about everything being great. It's about celebrating the entire journey with God and with each other. This includes the good and the bad. It's about learning to love our unique story. To do this, we need to take some time to reflect on our lives. We need to think about where we've been, where we are, and where we're going. We need to think about the narrative of our lives.
We can look back at our childhood and youth and think about what is uniquely ours. This could be good words like family and fun, or it could be words that aren't so good like anger or abuse. We don't have to love what happened in the tough stuff, but it is part of our story and it is uniquely ours. Your life story is full of love, adventure, and surprises. You may have met someone special, fallen in love, and gotten married. Over time, life can become a bit routine and we forget the spark of the relationship. Taking time to love your story can help you get your heart back into the relationship.
This Father's Day, you may be celebrating with your children, a wonderful and deep part of your story. Life can fly by, but when we learn to love our unique story, we can pause and appreciate the miracle of our children and family. Your vocation is also a unique part of your story. You have unique gifts and skills that you are contributing to society. Even if you don't think your job is meaningful, you are still meeting a demand and bringing order to society. Your friendships are also a meaningful part of your story. You may also be involved in volunteer work or generosity, investing in something bigger than yourself.
Life can bring both surprising good things and surprising challenges. Remember that 90% of our conversations happen in our own minds. You talk to yourself a lot and it never stops. Love the journey through life, the journey of recovery, making boundaries, and gaining strength. There is a lot to love about your life.
Most people talk in words, but some people don't. I hear they don't talk to themselves in words and I can't relate to that. Words are always going, sometimes they're just complete nonsense. Sometimes I find myself actually mouthing the conversation I'm having with myself in my head and I'm sure people look at me like that person needs to be, you know, put away. There's a lot going on in here, so we have a whole story in our minds. What are we telling ourselves?
And so a lot of times our journey means we have to intentionally think about what we're thinking about because 90% of the conversation takes place right here. That's a whole journey. Then we have a whole unique emotional journey, the stuff we feel, and for some of us, we feel things very deeply and profoundly and that can involve some tough emotional journeys that we need some help with. All that's a part of your unique story. Love the whole journey.
Then you have a unique relationship with God. Everyone on Earth has a unique relationship with God that they can enjoy in their own unique way. What is your unique relationship with God like? Do you feel a closeness? Do you feel a sense of personal relationship? That's great. Some of us feel it's more distant and listen, that's okay too. That's part of your journey. Maybe we can walk towards a little bit of a sense of a closer relationship. The more you know the love of God for you, we're all very unique. Enjoy the whole story.
There are three things that get in the way of us enjoying our story. One is busyness. If you are busy, you are not enjoying your unique story, you're not loving your unique story. You're too busy, you're just go, go, go, go. Every day is filled with stuff, every day is filled with tests, every day is filled with deadlines. You're feeling overwhelmed. There's no way to love your unique life if you're busy, no way.
There's no way to love your unique life if you worry. If you are worried about what's coming, you are never living in the present and if you're never living in the present, you cannot love your life. If you're worried about the future, you will not love your life. Busyness robs loving our life, worry robs loving our life, and envy robs living our life. If we are jealous of what other people have, we'll never enjoy what we have. It's that simple.
Right? I watched my news feed twice a day, once in the morning, once at night, and I'm pretty sure that our news feeds are custom given to us based on our history. Right? We all know that. It's a matter of fact. I've got a lot of mansions dropping into my news feed, like oh this celebrity moved into that mansion. This, I've got architectural stuff I check out this mansion. Mansions are pouring into my news feed. Why is it? Because I'm probably going down those rabbit trails a lot, a lot. I built a bunch of houses. I'm a builder. I love the architecture, but I also love the stuff that's in these mansions.
All right, I'm going for it. I'm reading these things. I'm opening this stuff. Well, it's envy, right? And there's just this... It can be difficult to love our lives and be content with what we have when we are envious or jealous of what others have. To combat this, I suggest taking a break from the news feeds and social media. Instead, take some time to pray. Whether you are a prayer person or not, prayer can be a powerful tool to clear the mind and be at peace. Thank God for the life you have, for the people in your family, your job, your church, your school, your friends, your country, and all the stuff you have.
Cast your cares upon God and thank Him for everything. The Bible says that when we do this, we will experience God's peace which exceeds anything we can understand. This peace will guard our hearts and minds. Taking time to pray and thank God for the life we have can bring us much peace and love of life. Additionally, we can learn to write a unique story and love our story.
The concept of writing our own story might be a little bit foreign to us because life just tends to happen and we almost get the sense that life happens to us. Every day is really filled with the things that happen to us and so we don't really think in a lot of ways that we're in control of our lives. However, we actually are in control of a lot of our lives, not all of it. There are some things we're not in control of, for example, you're not in control of the family you were born in. The family you were born in is not in our control, you did not sign up to be born in the family you were born in, just the way it is.
For some of you, it's fantastic, you love it, for others of you, it's like, "Oh, that was good, it's kind of tough." Well, you're not in control, it's just the way it is, you have no control. The decisions of others are beyond our control. There are people out there making dumb decisions, doing dumb things, and sometimes that hurts other people, and sometimes you have been the victim of other people doing dumb things or other people doing flat-out evil things, and that is just life.
Sometimes we're not in control of that, it's part of the journey, it's part of the adventure of life, sometimes it's great and sometimes it's not. I'm teaching my daughter to drive now, and it's the scariest moment in any person's life. As we're driving around, a lot of times we hit the church parking lot because it's kind of safe, and then we're hitting other parts of the community. As we're driving, I've given her some advice and I tell her this every single time she drives: "Everybody's dumb, don't be dumb."
As she's driving, you drive like everybody's an idiot, right? Everybody's going to run that red light. That's defensive driving. I like my version better: "Drive like everybody's an idiot." Somebody's going to make a mistake, somebody's going to swerve in the wrong lane, somebody's going to do something dumb. Drive like everybody is an idiot, and then don't be the idiot, right? Be careful.
That's kind of a way to live life. Just so, there are people out there that are dumb, that say dumb things, that do dumb things. There are people out there that are flat-out mean, that do mean things. There are people out there that are evil and do evil things. Don't be dumb, don't be mean, and don't be evil. That's what it's like to kind of write your story. And some of that means that there's things that happen that we're not in control of, and that's just the way it is. To accept that is very powerful.
Nature is beyond our control. Natural disasters happen. We have DNA that we're not in control of, our DNA, so we're susceptible to certain health measures and certain diseases. Age happens, that's just nature happening. I tweaked my back going to pick up a toothbrush a couple of days ago. I didn't say I picked up a toothbrush, that would be understandable. I thought just going to get a toothbrush, I tweaked my back. Like this is just nature.
We all experience things that are beyond our control. The past is gone and we can't go back and fix it. Accidents, nature, and decisions of others are all beyond our control. We need to accept that life includes some suffering and circumstances that happen to us. We can't be enslaved by the past, but we can process through it and make apologies and bring repair and restoration.
Sometimes our story comes to us, but most of the time we get to write our own story. It takes time, energy, and intentionality to write our own story. We can intentionally choose what kind of person we want to be. We can use a pen and paper to illustrate how we write our own story. We can think intentionally about what kind of person we want to be and what words come to mind.
I want to be a kind person. To do this, I need to think about what I'm going to do differently and prioritize relationships differently. I am in charge of what kind of person I become, no matter what happens in life that is out of my control. I need to think about it intentionally, write it down, plan it, and live it.
For those who are married, think through what kind of spouse you want to be. Think about what kind of parent you want to be and how you want to be engaged, loving, and involved. Write it down, plan it, and live it.
Think about what you want to accomplish in your vocation, job, and with your hands. Do you want to be a good employee or contribute something to your field? Maybe you want to achieve a certain amount of success or own your own business. What kind of life do you want to live and what kind of story do you want to tell?
Think about the adventures you want to experience and the places in the world you want to go. Plan it, save, and get there. Start a hobby that you have imagined but haven't done yet.
Finally, think about how you want to leave the world better than you found it. Do you have a heart for children, single moms, the poor? Think about it, write it down, plan it, and live it.
For people who are feeling stuck, feeling like they can't move, or feeling trapped, there is hope. Take a pen and paper and plan out a good life. Don't let life just pass you by, write your own story. Every single day of your life matters to somebody, it matters to God, it matters to you, and it matters to your friends and family. Our story is really about relationships, so enjoy the life you've got and learn to write a unique story.
As a follower of Jesus, what about His life and His teaching do you want to emulate? Where did Jesus send His church? Talk about Jesus all the time, what did He say and what did He do? What of His life do you want to copy, do you want to follow, do you want to emulate? Think about it. Whatever it is, wherever your heart is, what are you going to contribute? You're only going to contribute when you think about it, write it, plan it, and live it.
What kind of retirement do you want to experience? Don't accidentally leak into retirement, that's not going to go well. The whole point of all this is journeying together through your story, writing your story, experiencing and going through your story. Go through it with people, you're not meant to do this alone, right? And that's the whole point of the story.
I was made for you, you were made for me, let's do this together and we can think of the story. I was made for you and that my story was made for the people I love. My story was made for my spouse, my story was made for my kids, my story was made for my friends, my story was made for God, and we can just take all of it right with all the lines on our face that show the good and the bad.
Take all of it, embrace all of it, learn to love all of it, and then learn to write a good story going forward. So, would you lead us? Yes, thank you. We can tell them to do it's true, that song that kind of gets me every time it gets me to because you know you think of the stories that we've gone through and the stories that others have gone through and some of them are pretty tough.
Yeah, but we're going through this life, all the good and bad with each other, with our family, with our friends, with the presence of God, and it's a truly great story and it's a truly strong story. Learn to love that story and learn to write that story.
Yeah, and as we tell our stories to one another, we create empathy and sympathy for one another, we lean on one another as we go through things. So, that's why it's important to be together every week like this and uh thanks for being with us. Thanks for teaching this morning. It's a great pleasure to be part of a team like this, a church like this for sure.
All right, so next week we wrap up the strong series and uh it's going to be great and there's a lot of good stuff going on out there. Always games for the kids and youth and over there is a prayer corner. Right, yep we would love to pray with you if today is something on your heart. We'll be over there and um and I'd love to meet you over there if you're fairly new to Richard, I haven't had the pleasure of meeting you yet. I'll be right over there.
God bless you, look forward to seeing you next week. All right, have a great week everybody.
on Nov 05, 2023
