Today's sermon

[Hans Deventer]

I used this (http://shofing9.wordpress.com/2010/02/05/salvation-for-a-demon/) story as illustration.
Proceeding from Matthew 6:22-23, my question was, how do we look at the world? (yes, I know having a good eye means being generous)

We often fail to look at the world like Jesus does. There I inserted U2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0dNnC4ZPCg) to drive that point home.

Rollins, in his comment, wonders if the demon might not actually be us. Can you love yourself with all your less than perfect habits? God can! But too often, rejecting ourselves, we also reject others. It might very well we need to learn to love ourselves, to look at us the way God does, in order to be able to love others.

(BTW, this doesn't mean that God is fooled regarding us, He fully well knows what needs to change, but He still loves us. Rom 5:8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. )

[Billie Goodson]

I love that illustration Hans. The priest in the story was truly free to love God. Too often we won't to love God as we want him to be.

I think our self image goes all the way back to our fall. Before sin, Adam and Eve never noticed their nakedness because they drew their self image from the creator. When sin entered, they looked not to God but at each other and themselves. Adam's self image was drawn from his work while Eve's was from Adam. That accurately reflects so much of our world today. Augustine said something about our hearts being made for God and will be restless until we find peace with him. The question then seems to be can I trust God with who He wants me to be?


"Do not wish to be anything but what you are, and try to be that perfectly."
~ St. Francis De Sales

[Randy Wise]

We often fail to look at the world like Jesus does.

There are several contexts to what Jesus taught in what we read in Matt 6.

But to sum it up Jesus put His faith in God not the gold of this world.

It was easy to walk behind Him but in the storms the disciples fled, (when He was arrested), or thought they would perish when Jesus fell asleep in the boat which was rocked by the waves in the storm. John the immerser when arrested had to hear reassurance by sending a question to Jesus (are you the one)? John was there when the Spirit came down from above and remained on Him.

Daniel 3 comes to my mind as well in that the 3 refused to bow down to the idol of "Gold". That intensified the fire, but their faith remained in God.

Jesus taught us to build our foundation on the rock (God) and not put our love in positions and the obtaining of more and more money.

Randy