City of Refuge Fellowship

We just started a series at church that is focused on the will of God. It pains me that we have made God’s will into something that we are afraid of rather than bask in. God’s beautiful words in Jeremiah, “I know the plans that I have for you” were not intended to strike some sort of fear in our hearts that we better be careful to figure out those steps and stay in them. Those words were uttered to give us peace, to allow us to know that we were not supposed to do the best we can but rather we have the opportunity to receive the best that God has for us. God’s will is not about decision making or problem solving, it is not even about resisting temptation and denying ourselves. The will of God is a gift, a prize, not to be found but to be received. The Psalmist said that we are supposed to rejoice that the steps of the righteous are ordered by God, not fret over figuring out the right order. God is not hiding Himself or His will, in fact, the nearer we are to Him, the more clear His will becomes. God’s will is not about deciphering the times, it is all about enjoying His presence.

As I read through the gospels I see a lot of us in the lives of the apostles. It seems to me that they spent a lot of their time trying to figure out Jesus’ next move. They talked over who He was, what He would ultimately do and even what role they would get to play once He had finally fulfilled His purpose. The interesting thing about all of this debate and conjecture is that the entire time that they were trying to figure out when He would usher in His kingdom and restore Israel’s power He was actually explaining to them exactly what He was going to do. Last week we talked about the two believers that left Jerusalem and headed to Emmaus because they were disappointed that Jesus had not restored Israel as they had hoped He would. The problem is that the entire time they were listening to and following Jesus He was telling them exactly what He was going to do. He told them that He came to seek and save the lost; He told them that He came to serve and not be served; He told them that His kingdom of was not of this world and He told them that He would die and then rise again within three days. He told them His will, but they did not hear it. Why? Because they had already decided what they wanted His will to be. It is hard to hear when you have already made up your mind.

Just as he begins to wrap up his second letter Peter gives us some amazing and startling news. He writes, “God is not slow concerning His promise, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” The amazing news is that God is not slow! The startling news is that God is longsuffering concerning His will. To be slow is to simply not be motivated, to not be concerned enough to finish the task in a more timely manner. To be longsuffering is to not lose heart, no matter how difficult a task or how long it may take. God is not slow, meaning that He is motivated and He does desire to fulfill His promises and His will. At the same time He is longsuffering, meaning that He does not give up, He is not quick to quit and He is willing to endure for long seasons to see His will, salvation, come to those that He is waiting for. Classic good news, bad news; God is not slow, but He will wait as long as He can for His will to come to pass. Be careful that we do not confuse His patience with being slow. Patience produces perfect, but when we consider God to be slow we end up acting in our own strength and understanding.

My point today, and I pray that it is not convoluted to the point that it is meaningless, is that we must stop believing that our will is the same as God’s will. God is present and He is in the midst of every moment of every day that you and I live, but His will is not nearly as much about us and our wants and desires as it is about His one desire to see us and all those around us come to His saving grace. God ordered Jesus’ death at it’s exact moment for the sake of the thieves hanging on either side of Him. He ordered Stephen’s steps for the sake of those that would hear Him declare Jesus as Lord. He ordered Paul’s steps for the sake of the gentiles waiting to hear the truth of God’s love for them. He ordered John’s for the sake of all those that would read the book of Revelation and come to know Jesus as the Alpha and Omega. He is ordering my steps for the sake of those that He has chosen to use me to shine His light upon and He has ordered your steps in the same manner. As you wait for God and ponder His will today I encourage you not to call Him slow and not to fear wrong turns. Set your affection on Him, on the Author and the Finisher and then, don’t let those just be names or titles, begin living as if you believe that He will both start and finish everything good and perfect in your life.

Our calling, our opportunity, His will for our lives is not nearly as much about occupations and ministries as it is about Him; His love, His presence, His heart and His will that none would perish. When God’s will becomes our  will then we will be able to rest because we will then be able to rejoice. First we rejoice because our steps have been ordered by God and because He is longsuffering, not willing to lose heart. Then we can believe that every delay is not an obstacle to be overcome but rather a patient opportunity for someone to know the fullness of God’s love in salvation. Don’t be afraid of God’s will, walk in it, bask in it, enjoy it. I am learning to look at it this way, my salvation probably seemed like a delay of God’s promise in someone else’s life, so every time I ask “how much longer God?” I want to remember that there is someone else that is coming to salvation in the midst of my waiting. I will not be impatient with God’s longsuffering character any longer. I pray that the perfect work of patience would allow seasons of waiting to be realized and celebrated as seasons of salvation. God is not simply waiting, He is loving, speaking, revealing and ultimately saving. His will for your life is the same as His will for mine, “that none would perish but that all should come to repentance.”

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

Our National Leaders will declare “The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; the statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; the commandment of the LORD is purse, enlightening the eyes; the fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether. Psalm 19:7-9

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3

I believe I receive more prayer requests pertaining to “being in God’s will” than any other single topic. It seems that many of us have taken the promise of purpose and turned it into a fear of somehow “missing God’s will”. The will of God is not a maze to be maneuvered or a mystery to be solved. The will of God is the outcome of relationship, it is the inevitable purpose that flows from intimacy and communion. In John 5 Jesus declare that He Himself did nothing of His own initiative but simply watched His Father and fulfilled what He saw God doing. I believe that the will of God is the same for each of us, it is that we would become a part of seeking and saving that which is lost. It will take various forms and different paths that God will lead us down but the outcome is always for the same cause, “that none would perish but that all would come to repentance.” Today if you are struggling with the will of God, simply draw near to Him. Share your heart, your mind and your struggles. “God has not given us a spirit of fear” so fear will never lead us into the path that God has desired for us. Walk in your salvation, walk in God’s will with boldness, with confidence, with trust and with love. In John 5 Jesus went on to say that the Father always showed Him what He was doing because the Father loves the Son. God loves you and I as well, because of His love He will always lead, we don’t need to learn to be better discerners of God’s will, we need to learn to be better followers of His love.

As the Phillies head into the World Series it seems the entire city of Philadelphia can be heard singing the teams theme song, “We’ve got high hopes!” Have you ever told someone not to get their hopes up? Maybe you were the one being warned, with high hopes comes the opportunity for those hopes to be let down, to be disappointed. And yet, living without hope is not really living, it is going through motions, becoming cynical and hard- hearted. The truth is, when we begin to live without hope in our own life we inevitably begin trying to steal hope away from others as well. We get to a point in which we define ourselves by disappointment, which loves company just as much as misery does. One online dictionary defined the word disappointment this way, “A feeling of dissatisfaction that results when your expectations are not realized.” I thought this one really hit the mark. Disappointment is not really tied to the outcome of a situation nearly as much as it comes from my expectations going into that situation. Ever have a job offer in which the salary was not quite what you had hoped? Receive a gift that was less than you had expected? A friendship or relationship that just didn’t fulfill your expectations? In these situations we blame the company offering the job, the giver of the gift or the friend that did not come through, but what if the entire problem was our expectations? What if our hopes were unfounded or our expectations were off? Ever feel disappointed with God? Ever have a prayer that does not get answered as you had  hoped or a longing that did not get fulfilled as you determined it needed to be? I think most of us have.

After Jesus died it seems that most of the believers gathered together. I can not imagine the emotion of those few days. I am sure there was sadness, anger, fear and a lot of disappointment. For three years they had followed, they had listened, watched Him heal, teach, pray, even raise the dead and now He Himself was dead. He had told them that this would happen but that did not seem to help at all while it was all happening. I am sure in the midst of the group there were those that believed that something was going to happen, that this was not the end. I would venture to say that there were probably even a few that were remembering His words of His death and resurrection and were holding out hope that it would come to pass. Three days later some of the women of the group went to anoint Jesus’ body and give him a proper burial. When they arrived at the tomb His body was gone and an angel met them and told them that Jesus was alive. They ran back and told the Apostles and the other believers. Jesus was alive! He was alive, just as He promised, He is no longer dead! Luke 24:11 gives us some insight into how powerful the disappointment of Jesus’ death was among some of the believers, “And their words seemed like idle tales, and they did not believe them.” Even though Jesus had done everything He promised to do, because it did not meet their expectations some refused to believe. If our expectations are off disappointment is inevitable. The problem with this is that disappointment can become so strong that we refuse to see the good that is done, we choose not to rejoice at the miracle of resurrection because we are still “let down” by the reality of death.

Two of the believers showed how strong their disappointment was, they simply left. Luke 24 goes on to tell us about two believers that left Jerusalem and were walking to Emmaus. As they walked they were talking to each other about all that had happened. As they talked Jesus came to them. They did not realize it was Him, but He came close and listened and questioned them on what they were saying. Finally they shared what the real problem was, not that Jesus had died, He prepared them for that; not that He had resurrected, He had promised them that; The real problem they had was, “we were hoping that it was He who was going to redeem Israel.” An honest answer that reveals the truth of their hearts. Rather than believing that Jesus had a plan for their lives, they had a plan for Jesus’ life. They followed Him as a Prophet, possibly even as the Messiah, but they followed Him with a plan that they desired to see Him fulfill and when He did not walk according to their plan they were disappointed, so disappointed that they ultimately left.

So let’s go back to the first paragraph, ever been disappointed with God? Are you right now? In the midst of your emotions have you stopped to consider that it may be your expectations that were amiss and not God’s actions? Even more, have you stopped to search your heart and find out if you have tried to lead God rather than have Him lead you? We talk so much about God’s will that I think we have unraveled it to the point that it is no longer what God desired it to be. God’s will is not how He can order your steps for your pleasure, it is how you and I can walk in the steps that have been ordered for His glory. Henry Blackaby writes “if you ask the wrong questions you will get the wrong answers.” I want to adapt this for our thoughts today, if you have the wrong expectations you will be disappointed! We must learn to seek God for His expectations rather than seeking Him to try to get Him to fulfill ours.

Like many, if not all of us, I have miracles that I am asking God to do. I am asking God to do a miraculous healing in the infant daughter of dear friends. I am asking God to miraculously wake from a coma the 18 year old daughter of another friend. Every day I ask God to bring salvation to my community, to deliver the bound and set free the captive. I ask Him to heal the sick and to restore the broken hearted. I pray for salvation of the lost and for the abused to know that they are loved. These are all things that I have no power to control, no power to change, no power to resolve on my own. This is why we pray isn’t it? Don’t we bring our needs to God because we believe that He is able and we are already very sure that we are not? Here is what I am learning, if that is indeed why and how we pray then we are preparing ourselves to be disappointed. Prayer can not be me pleading with God to do what I am sure needs to be done, it must become me coming to God because I am sure that He is good, He is loving and He is able. It must become me coming to God and asking what He puts in my heart and believing what He speaks to my Spirit and letting Him set the expectations of my life. Prayer can not be about God proving Himself by doing what I ask, prayer must become about God already being proved by being present, by who He is not by what He can do for me.

The two men that walked along the road to Emmaus had had their hopes crushed. They share freely that Jesus had not fulfilled their expectations. After they shared this Jesus went on to teach them the true purpose of the Messiah. The Bible says that He shared from Moses all through the prophets all things “concerning Himself.” After He taught them, He broke bread with them and then they realized it was Him. As their eyes were opened He vanished and they did an amazing thing, they ran back to Jerusalem to tell the others. In the matter of a few hours they had gone from so disappointed that they walked away to so convinced that they ran back to convince the others. It is amazing how much God’s voice and God’s presence can change our perspective and raise our expectations. The truth is, God has never let us down, in fact, He usually goes over and above our expectations, we just don’t often see it that way. The two men headed to Emmaus gave up because they wanted Jesus to physically redeem Israel for them; Jesus explained that He had come to spiritually redeem all mankind. He did not meet their expectations because He came to do more. God desires to do more in your life as well. Paul wrote, “Now to Him who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think”. Thank God that He is not bound by our expectations, that would truly be a disappointing life! We must change our mindsets and stop trying to guide God with our expectations and let Him remove all boundaries by showing us His plans. Remember this, He knows the plans that He has for you. That means that His plans are not dependent upon what you and I know, understand or expect. We must learn to trust Him, His love, His character and His heart. If we can trust God then we can choose to always believe that His plans are only to give us hope and a future, they are never to harm us! If you would be so bold and so courageous today, would you join me as I try to pray this prayer with sincerity and surrender, “Jesus, I trust you today. I trust your love for me, I trust your heart for me and I trust your plans for me. I choose today to set aside my expectations so that You can reveal to me Your plans. I will not live in disappointment, I will not judge You according to my understanding or lack of it, but I will worship you according to your beauty, your greatness and Your majesty. I surrender my heart and my mind to You today and ask You to simply have your way. I trust You with my life, with my heart, and with the lives and hearts of those that I love. I choose to believe that You do all things well and that You will fulfill plans of hope and future for me and for all of those that I bring to You in prayer. You are great and Your hope never disappoints! In Jesus’ name, Amen.” Let’s prepare to walk in more than we understand and expect and let’s choose to believe that when things happen that we were not expecting and that we do not understand that we will believe that what God is doing is greater than our understanding and greater than our expectations, He is not a God who disappoints, He is a God that does much more!

The Saturday morning Women’s Prayer Meeting is changing it’s start time beginning this Saturday, October 24th. The meeting will now begin at 9:30 AM. The online calendar will be changed today.

Before we can consider knowing the will of God we must know God Himself. His heart, His character, His purposes and His ways all make up His will. Henry Blackaby, the author of the Experiencing God study writes, “Christianity is fundamentally an interactive relationship between God and people.” That interaction is built through a realization of God’s eternal love, a willingness to trust His perfect character and a desire to fulfill His great purposes for our lives. Jesus told His disciples, “You did not choose Me, but I chose  you . . .” The same is true for you and I today, we have not “found God” or chosen Him; He has chased us, He has loved us, He has revelaed Himself to us and He has made a way for us to know Him. I pray that each of us would rejoice in beling loved by a God that is willing to leave the 99 to find the one that wanders and walk in the great joy of being found!

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

Now it shall come to pass, if our National Leaders diligently obey the voice of the Lord our God, to observe carefully all His commandments, that the Lord our God will set us high above all nations of the earth. Deuteronomy 28:1 Father, I pray that our leaders will obey Your voice and observe all Your commandments.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3

There were many different reactions to the resurrection of Lazarus, some believed, some were amazed, some were confused and some were angry and threatened. The work of God is always this way, He moves and people react. The difficulty is when we try to anticpate the reaction. We all react according to what is in our hearts, according to what we are willing to surrender and according to whether or not we will willingly listen to the voice of the Holy Spirit. The reaction of many people was to put their faith in Jesus. The reaction of the Chief Priests and Pharisees was to seek Jesus’ death, faith in Him would cost them too much. The reaction of Mary was to pour out her valuable ointment upon His head and feet as an act of worship. In another passage, Zacchaeus reacted to Jesus’ presence with extravagant giving. In yet another, one of the thieves that died beside Jesus reacte to His presence with extravagant faith. How are we reacting to Jesus’ presence today? The extravagant love of God that would allow Him to come to us, to die for us to rise from the dead for us and to send His Spirit to dwell within us requires and deserves an extravagant reaction. React to Jesus’ love today, react with obedience, react with love, react with worship. The truth is, even the most extravagant of reactions is simply “our reasonable act of worship”.

How do you feel about your name? I like mine; that is not entirely true, I will try to make a long story short. I go by my middle name, Abraham. I have never used my first name, no one has ever called me by it, in fact, any time my first name is used I immediately know it is not someone that knows me. While my bank accounts, credit card and other official papers have my first name recorded, that name is really not who I am. My middle name, the name I go by, am known by and respond to, I love that name. It is my Dad’s name, it is a Biblical name, not really very popular but I believe it has character, meaning and purpose. Now, I am known by many different variations of that name. People I have formal relationships with or have done business with know me as Abraham or Abe. People I have grown up with or are close, personal friends call me Abie and my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles have a few names that don’t need to be mentioned here but when they say them they are precious to me. I love my name, in it’s many forms because I believe that it defines me without boxing me in. It says a lot about where I have come from and who I am, I have never wanted someone else’s name because honestly, I have never wanted someone else’s life. There is one more thing I love about my name and this is the point of where I am heading today, I love that my name has been written in heaven. I love that God knows my name.

Luke chapter 10 tells us that Jesus sent 70 of His followers out on a “missions trip“. He sent them and told them to go out and heal the sick and to preach “the Kingdom of God has come near you.” After a certain amount of time the 70 returned and they were excited! The Bible says that they returned “with joy” and they said, “even the demons are subject to us in Your name.” Consider what they must have seen and experienced? Everything that they had watched Jesus do for almost three years they had now experienced in and through their own lives. It was amazing to see Jesus open blind eyes or cast out demons but what must have it been like when they say these things happen in answer to their own prayers? They were overwhelmed with joy and full of faith in that hour. Their excitement was at an all time high and so Jesus answered them, not to bring them down but to fill them even fuller. He gave them more authority, gave them more of His own power and more promises of being used and then He gave them something greater than they had ever seen or heard before. He said, “rejoice because your names are written in heaven.”

Power and authority are given to servants to use for the glory and honor of the one that holds those things, but the writing of your name, that is the talk of friendship. On the night of Jesus’ arrest, recorded in John 15, Jesus said to His disciples, “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.” Friendship with God was astonishing, still is. I believe that the  notion of friendship and our names go hand in hand. There is an intimacy in our names, a depth and a vulnerability that is involved. What we find is that God has been calling us by name since the beginning of time. He walked with Adam and Eve and called out to them when they hid from Him. He spoke to Noah, called Abraham, revealed Himself to Isaac and Jacob. God’s relationships with all of these and many more were built on faith, on trust and on intimacy. When God spoke to Moses the first time He called his name when He saw that Moses had stopped to see the burning bush. The calling of our names is an indication that we are known, that the One speaking is not a stranger but rather a friend. Something amazing happened though near the end of the burning bush experience. Moses asked God a strange question. He said, “When I come to the children of Israel, and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you’, and they say to me, ‘What is His name?’ what shall I say to them?”  While the question is odd to me I believe I understand Moses’ reasoning. I believe that after all they had been through, the upheaval, the hundreds of years of slavery and mistreatment, the hope that was enduring and some that was probably lost; that Moses knew that Israel needed more than a promise from the God of their fathers, they needed a promise from their God, from a current, present and intimate God.

God does a remarkable thing in response to Moses’ request, He answers Him. Three times God responds, or I should say He responds in three ways. First He says, “I AM WHO I AM.” Then He said that Moses should tell them, “I AM has sent me to you.” And then, in an enormous outpouring of love and grace and intimacy and friendship God says, that Moses should tell Israel, “YAHWEH God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is My name forever and this is My memorial to all generations.” God told Moses His name. He answered the request, He drew near to Moses as Moses drew near to Him (James 4:8). He poured out more love and more intimacy than had ever been poured out before. He revealed something He had not revealed to Abraham or anyone else (Exodus 6:2) and He again reached out to all of us in a way that we could have never imagined or expected before.

For generations Israel had called on the God of someone else (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) and many of them had actually given up. Many of us have done the same thing. We have seen God through someone else’s eyes, someone else’s experience, someone else’s songs and someone else’s words. In Luke 10 Jesus was not rebuking the 70 or trying to quench their enthusiasm, I believe He was actually tried to build and add to it. His statement that they should not rejoice that the demons were subject to the authority that He had given them was not to take anything away, it was because He was about to add something far greater. His point was not that they should not rejoice that they had been given a gift but that they should rejoice because they were known by God! I read it almost like this, “If you think the demons obeying My power in you is reason to rejoice, listen to this, your names are written in heaven!” Today I hope to encourage you with the same truth. Authority, power, miracles, signs and wonders are all wonderful, Biblical and important, but they all pale in comparison to the truth of Jesus’ promise, my name is written in heaven. To go back to my opening thoughts, I guarantee that it is not my first name, it is not the formal, unused name that God has written but He has written the name that I wear in my heart. He has written the name that describes me at my best and my worst, the name that defines my victories and my defeats, the name that I love, that I enjoy and that I want to be known by. God has written your name in heaven as well, it is His gift of love to you but it is also your gift of love to Him. The names describe relationship, they describe friendship, they describe intimacy and they describe love. Today I hope and pray that each one of us will take a deep breath in our lives, will stop the manic pace that seems to try to devour us and will sit and smile with one thought, God knows my name. He has written it in heaven. One last thought as I close. The next thing the Luke 10 tells us is that after Jesus said these perfect words to the 70 is that He rejoiced in the Spirit. Your name in heaven is not merely for your joy but it is for God’s! As you sit and rejoice over God’s perfect love for you I am confident that He will also be “rejoicing over you with singing”. Your name has brought God joy, now that is a reason to smile!

We have set aside every Tuesday as a day of prayer for our National leaders: President Obama, the Senate and the Congress. Each week we present a specific focus, birthed from Scripture, that we can agree and pray together. This week we pray that:

Now it shall come to pass, if our National Leaders diligently obey the voice of the Lord our God, to observe carefully all His commandments, that the Lord our God will set us high above all nations of the earth. Deuteronomy 28:1 Father, I pray that our leaders will obey Your voice and observe all Your commandments.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules the people groan. Proverbs 29:2

Therefore, I will exhort that first of all supplication, prayers, intercessions, and giving thanks be made for all men, for kings and all who are in authority, that we may live quiet and peaceable lives in all godliness and reverence. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior.  I Timothy 2:1-3