Igniting a Heart ablaze Part Two Text Mark 12:30 (mess).

Transcription

1 Igniting a Heart ablaze Part Two Text Mark 12:30 (mess). Intro: Good morning and welcome to restoration life church. You are here at an exciting time as we are on the second week of a new series called Igniting a Heart Ablaze. A quick recap from last week! Nothing great is ever accomplished in life without passion. I. Nothing great is ever sustained in life without passion. a. Passion is what energizes life. Passion makes the impossible possible. b. God created you and I with the emotions to have passion in your life and He wants us to live a passionate life. text: Mark 12:30 Jesus said, (paraphrasing) "I want you to love God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength. Nothing matters more than that. That s the number one thing in life. I want you to love Me passionately." This brings us to our dilemma: So many of us have lost this passion for God. II. Nothing else matters in life if you don t love God passionately. a. My Point: We need to IGNITE that passion for God once again. b. God doesn t want you to love Him half-heartedly. He wants you to love Him with all your heart and all your soul, with all your mind and all your strength. (Illustration): Here s the Crazy thing. In America it s ok to be passionate about anything except God. But God forbid, if I am passionate about my faith and love for Jesus Christ, the church and our mission to win souls

2 build disciples and release them. Here in lie s the problem: In our culture it s ok to be passionate about anything except your faith, except your relationship with God. III. We need to IGNITE this passion once again in our hearts. Romans 12:1 "Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor." How do we do that? It starts by humbly coming before Him, prioritizing Him once again above anything and anyone. Repenting, asking for forgiveness and bathing in his presence through prayer & worship. We know that's how it starts and that's how it's sustained but we must always be aware of the passion killers in our life. We have them. What are passion killers? A passion killer is anything that causes your passion for God to diminish and eventually completely be dead or turned off! This morning we are going to look at 1 or 2 passion killers that quench our fire for God and keep us dead, ineffective and distracted. Text: Mark 12:30 Jesus said, (paraphrasing) "I want you to love God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength. Nothing matters more than that. That s the number one thing in life. I want you to love Me passionately." Quote: George Croly To bring fire on earth He came; Kindled in some hearts it is, but oh that ALL might catch the blaze, And all partake the heaven- descended dove, My heart the Altar, and thy love the flame! intro: It is very difficult to overcome distractions if there is no fire in your heart and you have not been captured by what Thomas Chalmers has called, the expulsive power of a new affection.

3 This magnificent new obsession expels all unworthy affections and attaches itself to what is high and holy. I think this is why the Holy Spirit is symbolized by fire. The presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives creates passion a passion for God, for righteousness, a passion for the call and work of God and for this life abundant. It makes all other passions seem unworthy and undesirable. When that happens we find that we are not just passing through life, we are grabbing it for all its worth. So these passion killers are distractions. dis tract ed adjective 1 : mentally confused, troubled, or remote 2 : maddened or deranged especially by grief or anxiety 3: An obstacle to attention 4: The act of distracting; drawing someone's attention away from something. Synonyms: agitated, delirious, frantic, distrait, distraught, frenzied, hysterical (also hysteric) 1. An unbalanced schedule a. That means either if you re overworked or you are under worked you re going to lose your passion for life and lose your passion for God. Life is a series of seasons, the Bible says. There s a season for everything. Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 (NIV) A Time for Everything 1 There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: 2 a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,

4 3 a time to kill and a time to heal, a time to tear down and a time to build, 4 a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance, 5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them, a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing, 6 a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away, 7 a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak, 8 a time to love and a time to hate, a time for war and a time for peace. And there s a rhythm to life. You need both in your life -- both input and output. You need both rest and work. And too much of either will cause you to lose your passion. Too much work will cause you to lose your passion. Too much of nothing -- boredom -- will cause you to lose your passion too, if you re not working enough. b. Maybe in a church our size, half of you need to work less and half of you probably need to work more. We re all different in our personalities. And you can go to either extreme. Paraphrasing Psalms127:2 Psalm 127 "It s senseless for you to work so hard from early morning until late at night, fearing that you re going to starve to death;for God wants His loved ones to get their proper rest." Application: Some of you the problem is you re always giving out. You re always helping, you re always sharing, you re always serving, you re always working, you re always being generous. And you never take time to recharge. If you never take time to recharge you ve got unbalanced on the ministry side, on the work side, you re going to eventually get compassion fatigue.

5 What is compassion fatigue? You just stop caring. You don t care about God any more, you don t care about other people any more, you don t care about anything any more. Why? Because you re burning out from too much work, from too much service. When you care and care and care, eventually you get this compassion fatigue. Luke 10:38-42 Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. And a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving. And she went up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me. But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her. b. Others of you here, you re the exact opposite. You re always taking in but never giving out. You go to Bible studies, you listen to teachers on the radio, you read all the latest thing going in in Christianity, you go to seminars, you go to Christian concerts, you go to workshops, you come to church all the time. You re always learning, always taking in, always growing in the input. But you re not giving out any. You don t have any ministry, you don t have any mission. You re not really helping anybody. You re just taking all this food in getting fatter and fatter and fatter till pretty soon we re going to have to roll you down the aisle. You re taking in all the time and you re never giving out.

6 c. I don t know which one is your problem but my guess is one of them is. You either have too much output and not enough input. Or you ve got too much input and not enough output. You ve got to decide that. I m sure God can help you out. James 2:14-19 (NIV) 14 What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? 15 Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. 16 If one of you says to them, Go in peace; keep warm and well fed, but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? 17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. 18 But someone will say, You have faith; I have deeds. Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds. 19 You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that and shudder. James 2:24-26 (NIV) You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone. & 26 As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. Let me give you a little shock though. D. Bible study without ministry is extremely dangerous. Because the Bible says in James 4:17 (mess) In fact, if you know the right thing to do and don't do it, that, for you, is evil. Application: Do you realize that the more you know about God s plan for your life the more responsible you are to God for that knowledge. And the more you know, if you don t do anything about it, you are simply increasing your judgment. Because God holds you accountable for what you know. So the Bible tells that you need both in your life -- input and output. You need work and you need rest. You need balance in your schedule.

7 What s the antidote for that? 1 Timothy 4:7 "Take the time and trouble to keep yourself spiritually fit." How do you do that? One word. We all know to be physically fit you have to have a balanced diet. And to be spiritually fit you have to have a balance of God s 6 purposes for your life in your life. 1. You need to have time to worship with God private and corporate. 2. You need to have times when you re fellowshipping with other believers. 3. You need to have times when you re reading God s word and growing as a Christian. 4. You need to have times of ministry -- service -- where you re giving out and using your abilities. 5. And you need times of mission where you re sharing your faith with others. 6. We need time of private and corporate prayer! Here's our problem. We tend to camp out on one or the other and thats not healthy. You have a lot of fellowship but nothing else. Or a lot of Bible study and nothing else. You re going to get imbalanced. And you will inevitably lose your passion. You re going to go, "How come I don t feel as close to God as I used to be?" how come my passion has fizzled and died out. Because you re out of balance. Application: Somehow we lose that passion as we grow older. The cares of this world, the routine of life and the concerns we carry put out the fire. That s why we need to come to the fire every day to get rekindled. We invite the Holy Spirit into our lives every day to renew and ignite the fire in us again, because we don t want to go dragging ourselves through life, we want to be victorious over it with a new enthusiasm for the things of God and for life itself.

8 This is what Paul experienced. He was full of enthusiasm because he knew that the love of God was the thing which enabled him to live joyfully. He said, Romans 8:31-39 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?...christ Jesus, who died more than that, who was raised to life is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord He was not going to be distracted by anything, because he was consumed by a holy passion. If the love of Christ is not something you can be passionate about, what is? In closing: 1 Peter 4:7-11 (NIV) The end of all things is near. Therefore be alert and of sober mind so that you may pray. 8 Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 9 Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. 10 Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God s grace in its various forms. 11 If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very words of God. If anyone serves, they should do so with the strength God provides, so that in all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory and the power for ever and ever. Amen Application: Notice God gives you certain talents, abilities, personality, gifts -- the shape that He s given you -- and those gifts, those talents that you ve been given are not for your benefit. They re for the benefit of other people. My gifts are for your benefit.

9 Your gifts are for my benefit. You are to use those gifts in the service of other people. God has given you a special role in this world. He wants you to make a contribution with your life. God says, I have given you these gifts and talents. If you don t use your talents you re going to lose your passion. 1 Corinthians 1:7-9 (message) Just think-- you don't need a thing, you've got it all! All God's gifts are right in front of you as you wait expectantly for our Master Jesus to arrive on the scene for the Finale. And not only that, but God himself is right alongside to keep you steady and on track until things are all wrapped up by Jesus. God, who got you started in this spiritual adventure, shares with us the life of his Son and our Master Jesus. He will never give up on you. Never forget that. A Quote: Give me the love that leads the way The faith that nothing can dismay The hope no disappointment tire The passion that will burn like fire Let me not sink to be a clod Make me thy fuel, flame of God