God Can Use Us Even When...(Jake Enns)

The title for a sermon this morning is God can use us.

Even when I'm glad, I'm thankful that God does not wait to use us

before we're perfect. Imagine you getting a promise

from God saying, OK, as soon as you're perfect, soon as you have

a perfect score, I will use you. Imagine that nobody would ever

be used by God if that were the case.

I listened to his speaker one time.

To put it this way, he said if God's grace would wait till we

were perfect to work through us, he would never use any of us at

all. I think that is so true.

God does not wait till we're perfect to use us.

We know since the Garden of Eden there have been, there have been

problems in this world. It's not perfect, but that does

not mean that God can't and doesn't use us.

He uses us in spite of all the things that are wrong and and

bad in this world. We're continuing our series in

the Book of Judges and today we're coming to a part of the

book where the writer, so to speak, zooms in and slows down

and explains a lot of detail that goes on as the writer

continues the story of the Israelites.

From this point on in the book of Judges where we are today,

it's a bit as if the writers coming in down low and slow.

So us to get everything that's happening.

But before we get into the chapter, chapter 6 and Judges,

there's a bit of a backdrop that we want to want to talk about

just kind of what happened. We first want to look at the

first part of the chapter. I won't read it, but I just want

to look at it a little bit to give us a backdrop, an idea of

what the what the season of life was like in their lives at that

time. And we will see as we go on

through the book as well, this steady decline.

And it just gets worse and worse toward the end of the book.

Some very catastrophic events that shook the nation happened

later on. But back in chapter 4 and five,

where we were last Sunday, the nation of Israel had won the

victory against the Moabites under the leadership of Barack

and Deborah, and the nation had rest 40 years.

But then we get to chapter 6, verse one, and we find the cycle

of disobedience and and rebellion repeats itself.

And we said at the beginning of the year that this year our

theme is connections. And we find repeatedly how

Israel lost connection. You know how it is you plug

something in the wall and there's no connection.

It's frustrating. The children of Israel lost

connection with God repeatedly and connected themselves to all

kinds of other things. They've been in the land now a

long time. Commentators say that by the

time we get to Judges Chapter 6, they had been in the land of

Judges 6 · chapter mention

Israel and the land of Canaan. Israel had been in the land of

Canaan for about 200 years. How long is that?

That's a very long time. Do you know that the country of

Canada is not even 200 years old?

That's true. This country became a country,

Canada, on July 1st, 1867, under.

Before that it was really British territory in some, I

don't know all the details, but it became a country in 1867 on

July 1st. I won't read verse the 1st 10

verses in chapter 6. As I mentioned, I'll just

briefly relate the story. You see, the children of Israel

had again given themselves over to the cultures around them.

They adopted their lifestyles. We're into idol worship again

and this time God gave them over to be under the hand of the

Midianites and it lasted for seven years.

Now the Midianites, they were to the east of the Jordan.

If you imagine the picture of the Palestine, they were to the

east and they were, they were Raiders.

There were robbers, marauders. They would come in and raid the

people. They would take the grain and

take the fruit and take the, the, the, the, the grapes from

the vineyards and they would take their animals.

And so the Israelites, they were very on edge.

They always, here's the Midianites coming.

They wouldn't necessarily kill them.

They would just steal from them and, and oppress them.

And so they would dig caves, holes and, and strongholds,

protect themselves in the mountains, always on the

lookout, on guard. The Midianites are coming.

The Midianites are coming and they would take whatever they

could. It was brutal and suffering

lasted for seven long years. And it says in chapter 6, the

first part, they were like a locust.

You know, when locusts come, we don't have locust problems here

in our fields, but in some countries locusts will come in

or grasshoppers will come in and just eat everything and

nothing's left the trees, the leaves are gone and everything.

That was a bit how the Midianites are described.

And in all that distress and poverty, they cry out to the

Lord, which is good, and God responds first.

God sends a prophet. He reminds the people of reasons

why this is happening. They're where they're at.

They had abandoned God, lost connection with God.

They're forgotten God again. God sent a prophet and told them

what they done. Then the prophet goes back into

history, reminding them, OK, you came from Egypt, look what I did

in Egypt for you. And God reminds them through the

prophet and told them you were supposed to get rid of all the

idols in Canaan. Instead you have now, you're now

worshipping them again. They've gone the other way.

But then in chapter 6, verse 10 and 11, there's a very sharp cut

off. It's a very abrupt change, and

I'm not sure what to make of that break in the chapter, but I

find it interesting. What is obvious, however, is

that God steps in and helps His people.

But the path that God took to helping His people come to

freedom, that's a very eventful, very action-packed path.

There's a lot of activity going on.

God rebuked His people through the prophet, not to discourage

them, but to bring them back to repentance and win them back

again. He would rescue them, but it

would be through a miracle, not through their own strength.

And we will not cover the story of Gideon today in its entirety.

We'll have a few sermons on this, this guy alone.

But in our sermon today, we'll take kind of a tour in Gideon's

life and kind of see what kind of man he was.

And we'll see how we often do the exact same thing Gideon did.

It didn't mean that he didn't believe in God and doesn't mean

that we don't believe in God. But it does highlight in our

lives where we fall short and where we need to grow.

Too often we get sucked in with the worries and the cares and

the struggles to to a point where we just can't see God's

hand in anything anymore. And then we have excuses, and we

fear, and we worry and we doubt. And whose benefit to no one.

Gideon was a man who lacked courage and it showed in how he

responded to God's Angel when he came.

And the introduction verse to our service this morning was

taken out of Judges chapter 6. Very fitting verses.

Judges 6 · chapter mention

We will see that Gideon had some serious flaws and for all his

flaws, God still used him even though he did not start out so

well. And Gideon also complained he's

comparing. And if we compare ourselves to

Gideon, always see a lot of parallels here.

Let's read Judges chapter 6, verse 11 through the end of

Judges 6:11

verse 12, and we'll just make our way through the passage.

Judges 611 to 12. Now the Angel of the Lord came

and sat under the under the terebinth tree, which was an

ofra which belonged to Joashte ABI as a right, while his son

Gideon threshed wheat in the wine press in order to hide it

from the Midianites. And the Angel of the Lord

appeared to him and said to him, The Lord is with you, you mighty

men of valor. From what we will see as we go

through this, it's surprising how God used that title for

Gideon when in fact there was no indication outwardly that he was

in any way a man of valor, never mind a mighty man at that.

We know how fearful he was, but that did not stop God from

coming to him, drawing him, and tell him, God's with you.

What was Gideon's problem? There were many, but the one

that we see right off the bat, he was fearful and God used him

even when he was fearful. So God can use us even when

we're fearful. Think about that.

I don't know of many Christians that are completely and totally

fear free. I think all of us are

contaminated at some level with fear.

Imagine God saying, OK, once the fear levels down to 0, I'll use

you. It's not how he works.

God's Angel came, sat under the terebin tree that belonged to a

man named Joash. Now, Joash was the man who owned

some property and the the tree was there.

And he also was in charge of Baal worship, or at least he

owned that that idol. And yeah, and his son Gideon is

is is the guy who the Angel comes to.

Imagine your father being one of the leaders of the idol worship

community in town. God's Angel comes to Gideon, the

son of Joash says mighty man. What's he doing?

Well, what's he doing? He's threshing wheat.

Oh, that's harvest season. Obviously he's bringing in the

harvest. What little there was, what the

Midianites had not gotten away with.

Note where he's doing it. He's doing it in a wine press.

Well, what's a wine press? A wine press is a kind of a

stone place. It's kind of a hollowed out and

there's a lower VAT. It's kind of a VAT.

There's a lower VAT right beside it and they stamp.

They just trample on the grapes are barefoot and they just tried

out the grapes and the juice flows down.

He's threshing wheat in there, which is not the place to do it,

but he's doing it. He's threshing wheat in a

winepress because he's afraid the Midianites will see it and

come and steal his grain. Is that obviously he's doing

that out of fear for the Midianites, and it's logical.

Why would he risk getting getting stolen?

Now, a threshing floor in those times would have been a wide,

flat surface outdoors where the wind gets at it and they would

have their stalks of grain spread out.

They would walk around it with oxen or drag a wooden sled over

it and it would rub out the grain.

They would throw at the straw and then just throw it in the

air and the wind would take away the chaff and so on.

That's the place to do it. Gideon's doing it in the wine

press, just not the right place to do it.

But he's doing it. And here the Angel comes and

says, the Lord's with you, mighty man of valor.

It didn't look very mighty. There was nothing mighty about

him really on the outward. The question I want to ask is,

we know he was afraid. The question I want to ask us

is, are we afraid? There are times in life when

fear seems to be all around. In Gideon's case, the Midianites

wanted Israel to be afraid. There's always bullies in the

world, always people in the world who want others to fear.

Fear is a powerful tool in the hands of oppressors.

There are people who are in power who love when they can

frighten people. We see that in countries.

Even governments do this, corporations do this and in

homes spouses do this for to each other and families.

Fear is a control mechanism and others comply.

Oh yeah, I'll be very scared. Many people live fear based

lives based on the circumstances around them.

Living a fear based life is a hard way to live.

Yeah, but times are hard, things are bad.

I can't help it. Fair enough.

I'm not trying to make light of danger or risk of danger.

But we have to remember fear is not helpful.

What do we gain by walking through life with fear?

There's a such a thing as a healthy fear, not taking risks

and doing foolish things. I get it.

But fear is not the mechanism from which we which we use

according to the Bible, we're told many times, do not fear.

Scripture always reminds us, encourage us not to fear the

challenge of life. The Old Testament, the New

Testament's full of it. I remember many years ago

watching a movie called Bridge of Spies.

Some of you may have seen it. I'll just briefly give a

summary. So there's a Russian spy in the

US spying for Russia. He gets caught, goes to jail and

at the same time the United States is also spying on Russia.

They have a spy plane up in the air and that guy gets shot down

and he survives the crash or he jumps in a parachute, I don't

know. But anyway they capture him.

So they have AUS spy in Russia and a Russian spy in the US.

Well this spy in the US, he goes to jail and he's going to be

tried before they pass sentence on him.

It so happens at the end of the story, they swap spies.

But before this goes down, the in the movie, the Soviet spy is

in prison and he's assigned a lawyer supposed to then advocate

for him in the US court. Interesting enough, he shows No

Fear. He has zero fear, doesn't show

it. And the lawyer mentions that he

says the Americans, they want to see you go on the electric chair

and it doesn't faze him. And the lawyer says you look

like you're not afraid. And the spy says, and I love the

way he does. He says, would it help?

And he does that a few times throughout the movie.

That has always remained with me.

The actor does a brilliant job. Would it help?

And that line has stuck with me. And when I face challenges and

difficulties in life, what goodwill fear do here?

In most cases, it's not only useless, it's detrimental.

That's the issue. In many of our lives, so much

good is not done because of fear, or so much compromise

happens because of fear. Does our lifestyle how we live,

does it show trust and confidence and courage and

strength, or does it show fear? Again, dictatorship.

Governments love it when they get people to tremble in fear.

Jesus never feared once, as far as we know, nor did the apostle

Paul really. Well, he did in some sense.

Maybe he's a human, but he was a man of courage when he was an

apostle. Here's here in chapter 6, verse

13, let's go on. It says verse 13, Gideon said to

all my Lord, if the Lord is with us, why then has all this

happened to us? Where are all his miracles which

our fathers told us about saying, did not the Lord bring

us up from Egypt? But now the Lord's forsaken us

and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.

What's he doing? He's complaining, He's

complaining, but you know what? God can use us even when we

can't see the whole picture, even when we complain.

Getting the last focus, He reminds the Angel of all the

things God had not done. He has not come through for us.

And yes, He had not prevented the Midianites from attacking

them, but why was that? He had warned them in the books

of the law, if you'd abandoned God, God will give you over to

your enemies. God had said that would happen,

and it had happened. They went after idols and they

reaped the consequences. They had abandoned God.

They had lost connection. It wasn't God who had moved, it

was they who had moved. But as often happens, people who

turn away from God and wonder why all this distress and so on,

God, why is God not working? Never stop to think maybe I need

to do something. Sometimes people come to me and

visit and and revisit and often times I find out that it's not

the wrong they're focused on that they're guilty of.

But why? Why is my life not working out

here's and everything, but it's the only place here they don't

want to look. Gideon was actually faint of

heart and he complaints and he can't see the picture and he

voices a very common thought that so many have.

And Gideon has experienced it right there.

He says the Lord's forsaken us delivered us to the hand of the

Midianites. OK, true, he got that right, but

he should have also gone further and expanded and said, OK, why

did this happen? He's complaining to God about

what God has not done for them. What comes next is that the

Angel just seems to dismiss his complaint as if it has no

bearing on what God is planning to do.

Sometimes the things in our mind are not in God's mind.

The nation of Israel had cried out to God.

God was going to deliver His people from the Midianites.

They had cried out for that. He's going to do it.

But what follows is how the story unfolded.

Let's read verse 14. Then the Lord turned to him as

if he hadn't even heard what he said.

Go in this might of yours, and you shall save Israel from the

hand of the Midianites. Have I not sent you?

Why did the Angel not continue the conversation about Gideon's

issue? That was not his focus.

That was not God's focus. Was Gideon's focus not God's

focus? I think Gideon had somewhat of a

victim mindset. Poor me.

You know how bad we have it. Now here's a job for you,

Gideon, and you're going to do it.

At that point, Gideon should just go on and do the job.

After all, God had spoken. But Gideon's not that easy to

convince. He's stubborn and he wants, he

wants explanations. He just does not want to do it

because he's afraid. No, he's actually, look here.

One book, I put it this way. Let me say this first excuse of

the nails used to build a House of failure.

One writer put it this way. Let's read verse 15 now.

So Gideon's talking again. He said to him, Oh my Lord, how

can I save Israel? Indeed, my clan is the weakest

in Manasseh and I am the least in my father's house.

Can you just hear it? This statement is just dripping

with fear, self deprecation. He's insecure, poor me mindset.

Just listen to this, who am I? Oh my Lord, how can I save

Israel? Indeed, my clan's the weakest in

Manasseh and I'm the least in my father's house.

Just listen to him. He speaks so negatively at who

he is, where he's from, and all that stuff, and I couldn't do

it. Nope, I'm not the right guy.

It's not working. He's trying to get out of this

calling to save Israel. He's thinking logically, but

he's not thinking godly. He's trying to inform the Angel

all the reasons why it should not be him.

As if God needs reminding. God needs some information.

Let's go. We're 16 now and the Lord said

to him, surely I will be with you and you shall defeat the

Medianites as one man. It's going to work getting your

it and God will use it even when you have all these issues.

God made a promise to him. He would be with him.

All you have to go and is do the job, the going and doing the

job. That was God Gideon's job.

The victory was God's job. Too often we have excuses and we

use those excuses to do just nothing, or we come up with

something instead of what God wants.

We try to modify it. You see, God can use us even

when we have excuses. It's interesting.

Gideon would not be the first excuse maker whom God used, and

he wouldn't be the last either. If you go back to the book of

Exodus, the story of Moses and the burning Bush, he was in the

desert now for 40 years already age 80, tending his father

Jethro's sheep meet meets God, the burning Bush and God says

I'm going to send you to Egypt to rescue my people Israel and

you'll come and worship me on this mountain.

Moses is a perfect excuse maker. He did very well, but God had

chosen him and the last thing Moses wanted was to he'll go

back to Egypt. Nope, I'm not going back there.

I've been there. I know what that is like.

He had other plans. He was getting on in years as a

shepherd, working for his father-in-law at age 80, soon to

retire. But God had other plans.

Moses had excuses, and Moses had so many excuses.

That tells us in Exodus that God became angry with him.

But in the end, Moses surrenders and he goes.

And it was under his leadership that the children of Israel was

set free and formed into a nation.

In our story this morning, Gideon was not sure.

He was not convinced. He was afraid.

He had excuses. He was like someone who had to

be dragged into service. But we don't have to ever be

dragged, do we? We always willingly follow.

And you know, we pray and then we say yes, thank you for

asking. I'm going to serve, right?

Is that how we do it? No, we have to be arm twisted

and I'll pray about it as good as saying no, I won't.

And how well do we serve? You complain and whine and

excuse. What do we do?

Well, let's let's read Isaiah 6 verse 8 tonight.

Isaiah 6:8

I don't have it in my my PowerPoint here, Isaiah 8 verse

Isaiah 8:6

6 tonight and says also, I heard the voice of the Lord Isaiah

saying, whom shall I send? Who will go for us?

And then Isaiah said, here am I send me.

He's not arguing with qualifications and abilities and

skill sets and talents. Just send me Lord your calling,

I'll go. But now, Gideon here, he's ready

to go. But he has some conditions.

Verse 17, Judges 617 Then he said to him, Gideon says to the

Angel, If now I have found favor in your sight, then show me a

sign that it is you who talk with me.

Prove it. You prove it.

He's into signs, this man. And we find later he's into

signs. And God grants some signs not

because God needs to, but to favor Gideon, he needs to grow

in his trust toward God. In verse 18 it says, do not

depart from me Gideon speaking, I pray until I come to you and

bring out my offering and set it before you Angel complies.

I'll say I'll wait until you come back in verse 19.

So Gideon went in and prepared a young goat and unleavened bread

for an eat from an EAF of flour. The meat he put in a basket.

He put the broth in the pot. Then he brought them out to him

under the Terebin St. and presented them bring you some

food. Then the Angel of the Lord said

to him, take the meat and the unleavened bread and lay them on

this rock and pour out the broth.

And he did so. Verse 21 Then the Angel of the

Lord put out the end of the staff that was in his hand and

touched the meat and the unleavened bread and fire rose

out of the rock and consumed the meat and unleavened bread and

the Angel of the Lord departed out of his sight.

You didn't want to be sure. The phrase show me a sign that's

not sin and of itself, but it's more an indicator of where my

heart is when I say that than what God's abilities and God's

strengths are. Well, Gideon now believed to an

extent, but he was still not sure.

So he says show me a sign. And he got 1.

He was not being rebellious, but he was shallow in his trust, in

his faith. And after seven years about

oppression from the Midianites, nothing had changed.

But now here, all of a sudden, deliverance is promised.

But not just is deliverance promised, You're it, man, you're

it. It's going to happen through

you. Isn't it always nice if God send

somebody else, get somebody else to do the work for us, You know,

we'll get so and so to do it. Then I don't have to do it.

No, we, I you, me, us, we here we are called Gideon is hard to

convince. He operates in a foundation of

fear. He needed assurance.

The Angel complied. The Angel gave the sign and he

prepares the meal and puts it on the rock as he's told and then

he's scared. It says in the in the next verse

22, it says now Gideon perceived that was the Angel of the Lord.

That's him. He said, alas, O Lord God, I've

seen the Angel of the Lord face to face.

Now he's scared. Angel's gone.

Gideon's back in fear mode. Verse 23 Then the Lord said to

him, peace be with you, do not fear, you shall not die.

So Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it the

Lord is peace. To this day it's still an offer

of the Abbai as rights. There it is.

Maybe. Perhaps we start feeling sorry

for Gideon. But you know what?

We're not different than he is. If we went through what Gideon

went through, we too might be trying to find strange means

just to survive and trying to put out tests and signs.

Well, God, can you answer this way or that way?

Did Gideon now rest easy? Well, let's see if he does.

See, God never saves anyone, prepares anyone, or assigns

anyone to something for simply no reason.

And now with Gideon, Gideon's convinced, OK, God is real, he's

going to save Israel. He said it's done through me.

He's convinced this is for real. Let's continue reading.

Now it came to pass that next year, No, that same night, this

is not very long. That same night the Lord said to

him, Gideon, take your father's young bull.

Now father, his dad is the is in charge of bail worship in the

town. Take your father's young bull,

the second bull of seven years old, and tear down the altar of

bail that your father has and cut down the wooden image that's

beside it and build an altar to the Lord your God on top of this

rock in the proper arrangement. And take the second bull off her

burnt sacrifice with the wood of the image which you shall cut

down South. Gideon took men from among his

servants did this as the Lord had said to him, but because he

feared there it is again his father's household and the men

of the city too much to do it by day, he did it by night.

He still modified it. Now it's not like God's a key

are ready. So next year we're going to put

you to work that very same night.

So God's going to give the journey now that start this path

to deliverance. What's he doing first get

cleaned up, clean out the idol worship start at home in your

own life. It's noteworthy, a high risk

job. I'm not sure I would have wanted

that job. What if he gets caught?

Notice all the things that these instructions, they're difficult.

Gideon's going to do clean up work now in his father's house,

Tear down Bale's altar, killed the bull, offered on a new altar

he's supposed to make on that rock his own father's house.

Talk about hard instructions. They're extreme all out.

He's going to do a wipeout of the religion of Baal, and it

begins in his dad's house and his dad's animal.

Can we see all the problems with this?

Gideon was the son of Joash. He was the man who owned this

place. Tearing it down that would be,

would be bad. I mean dangerous.

I must say when I read this, I admire Gideon for having the

courage to go against his own family, even though he had to do

it at night. Most of us wouldn't done at all.

We just wouldn't do it. He was afraid and rightly so.

Maybe he was worried what might happen if the men of the city

would catch him. Well, let's read what happened,

verse 28. And when the men of the city

arose early in the morning, there was the altar of bail torn

down, and the wooden image that was beside it was cut down.

And the second bull was being offered on the altar which had

been built. So they said to one another, who

has done this thing? And when they inquired, they

asked and asked. They said, Gideon, the son of

Joash, has done this thing. Then the men of the city said to

Joash, bring out your son that he may die because he's torn

down the altar of Baal, and because he's cut down the wooden

image that was beside it. That's it.

You see, when a person makes a commitment to God, it's always

best to make a total commitment because a half commitment is not

really a good commitment. Even though Gideon was fearful,

his commitment was total and it was very vital that it was.

He did all that God had told him to.

Even though he was afraid, he did it at night so not to get

caught or our suspicion. We see that.

See what God did. You see, God uses us even when

our faith falls short. Would it have been better if

Gideon had done this openly in public during daylight?

I can't say, because we weren't there and the story's not

written that way, but we can totally understand why it

probably took all the courage just to do it at night.

He finished the job, got ten of his servants to do the job, and

cut down the tore down the altar, cut down the the asherah

pole, the the image there, and offered the young bull on the

altar. And by morning it was done.

Can we just imagine what must have gone through Gideon's heart

and mind as he's doing this? What if I get caught?

And sure enough, sun comes up, the men of the city come about.

And what's going on here? Investigations made.

Gideon has done it. It's a done deal.

Now it's and they're furious. They demand his life.

They want him dead. Kill him for destroying the idol

when it was they who should be killed according to the law for

engaging an idol. We're to begin with, you know

how that's like a country sometimes when good is called

bad and bad is called good. Our nation is into that as well,

calling sin, calling bad things that are good and calling good

thing good things bad. Well, what's interesting in is

how God comes through. Joash's father who owned this,

who was in charge could have sided against his son, but look

what he does and I think it's the hand of God here.

Verse 31. But Joash said to all who stood

against him, Would you plead for Baal?

Gideon's dad says this. Would you save him?

Let the one who would plead for him be put to death by morning.

He challenged them right out is that if Bale is a God, let him

plead for himself because he is. His altar has been torn down

there from that day. He called him Jero Bale, saying

that Bale plead against him because he has torn down his

altar. Joash came out on the side of

the son Gideon, and as amazing as it is, Joash's dad chose more

boldness and bravery of heart than the son Gideon did.

That's amazing. But we'll say that the hand of

God was in this, so he stood up for him.

Joash basically tells him Bale can plead for himself.

You have nothing. He can defend his own stuff.

Nobody has to defend him. As we continue through the story

of of Gideon, we'll find that not everything went well with

Gideon. He was a good judge in some

ways, but also toward the end, things were not good.

But for now, things are looking up for now, the more closer to

home, the issues of idol worship and all that stuff is being

dealt with and the stage was now being prepared for him to

actually deliver his people. I want us to notice something

here this morning. God heard the cries of the

Israelites in their need. God confronted them about their

sin and wanted to help them. But first deal with your sin.

Deal with your in house problems.

Not only when that that was cleaned up within a position and

ready to start the process of getting the enemy out.

It was not that everything was perfect, but they had to get

aligned with God heading in the right direction.

Then things changed and God used getting in a very powerful way

even though he fell short. You see, God can use us even

when we're fearful. God can use us when we can't see

the whole picture. God can use us.

When we have excuses, God can use us.

When our faith falls short, God can use us.

The question I have for us this morning, do we want to?

Are we willing? Are we surrendered?

Are we committed? How ready, how available, how

committed, how surrendered are you and I today in our

relationship with God and our connection with God that God can

actually use us? Or do we constantly wait and

dawdle and and interfere? Or can we just obey?

We're free to say no. We have a free will.

We're not forced by God to say yes.

God knew Gideon's heart and character.

He was a man who wanted to obey but fell so far short in so many

ways. And we do too.

But that's no excuse to stop following after God and

thinking, oh, maybe tomorrow, maybe next week, maybe next

year. God has his hand in each one of

our lives to live out his calling on our lives.

And we don't have to wait till perfection.

He can use us now, today, here, and all of our imperfections.

So do you want to be used by God?

Most of us say, Oh yeah, for sure.

But then also, but we have these conditions, these terms.

We want to decide where and when and how.

Pretty much all the Saints in Scripture that were used by God

were not perfect. So what's holding me back?

What's holding you back from giving yourself completely to

God? What has God blessed us with?

What skill sets, what talents, what training, what abilities,

what opportunities? Let's take those surrendered and

give them to Him and then live out His calling in our lives and

see what's going to happen. And we will have the peace and

the joy and then it's assurance knowing we're in his will, in

his Kingdom, serving Him, and we'll be as the apostle Paul

wrote to the Philippians. When he wrote to the

Philippians, he wrote about how all the stuff that he had had

before he became a father of Jesus, he said, oh, that's

garbage compared to what I've gained in Christ.

We'll gain Christ, a relationship with him, a

connection with him, and our community and the world will see

the difference. But even most importantly, in

our own lives, we'll see it as well.

Let us pray. Lord, we thank you for your word

that is new every day. Thank you, Lord, for this

opportunity to be here in your House of worship to look into

your word again. I pray, Lord, that you'll help

us to realize that You want us to use You, want to use us for

your glory in many ways. Help us, Lord, to surrender our

hearts, our souls, our minds to you, for you to do with us as

you see fit what glorifies your name, and help us to trust You.

Thank you Jesus, we pray in your name, Amen.