FBCPS
Sermons, teachings, and podcasts from First Baptist Church in Powder Springs, Georgia.
FBCPS
God's Blessings on Repeat | Deuteronomy 28
Have you ever felt the weight of comparing your life to the seemingly perfect lives on social media? We reflect on Pastor Allen Davis's inspiring 42-year journey of service and explore how social media can skew our perceptions of happiness and success. Through thoughtful conversations, we'll share insights on finding contentment in your unique journey, drawing inspiration from biblical lessons in Deuteronomy. Let’s shift our focus from online portrayals to nurturing a genuine relationship with God and embracing the blessings in our lives, even amidst challenges.
Could the key to spiritual fulfillment lie in embracing imperfection? Listen as we discuss powerful themes from scripture, the role of Jesus Christ in fulfilling the law, and the true essence of obedience and faith. With a touch of humor and engaging analogies, we highlight that righteousness stems from faith, not perfect adherence to commandments. Together, we'll explore how material wealth pales in comparison to the spiritual blessings offered through Christ and discover how God's grace guides us to be a blessing to others. Concluding with a heartfelt prayer, we invite you to join our community in spreading love, kindness, and positivity.
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hands together for our candy palooza this past Sunday. God is so good. He's doing so many incredible things here in our church. Just want to say thank you for being here, thank you for coming. If you're online watching, if you're here for your first time, we're just so very thankful for your presence here today. We're thankful for God's presence here today and for all that he is doing in our church. I'm even thankful for our production team as they come out and bring out the teaching TV. Just this past Sunday, as you just got to see just some snippets from our Candypalooza, we did have 115 kids last Sunday, over 150 in our children's ministry. Many of you stepped up to volunteer, which we are so very thankful for. Put your hands together for all that God is doing. We are just so thankful.
Speaker 1:As we disciple every generation, we believe in prioritizing the next generation. Speaking of that, our children's ministry is growing rapidly, so so also your opportunity to serve in our children's ministry, as we believe, as I talked about last week, that God calls us to teach the next generation. Everybody say teach. God calls us to be teaching the next generation. It takes a personal sacrifice in order to make an investment into the next generation. We need two teachers during the 9.30 hour for ones and two-year-olds. We need two teachers during the 11 o'clock hour for ones and two-year-olds. We need two teachers during the 11 o'clock hour for ones and two-year-olds and we need one teacher during the 11 for our three-year-olds as well. That's all in our preschool ministry. So, as God is laying on your heart, what ministry that he would have you to be involved in, here at First Baptist Powder Springs, we believe that God calls every Christian to serve, every Christian to have a ministry in their church. Just wanted you to know those opportunities. You can call our church office or connect with us online and we would love to help you out with that.
Speaker 1:Today is our last day as we are pounding Pastor James. Aren't you thankful for Pastor James, his wife Allison, their kids. We're so thankful for the Wilson family, god bringing them here. There's a box out in our lobby as we've just taken about three Sundays just to give a cash gift, maybe a check or maybe a gift card, that you just want to bless the Wilson family and just thank God for them coming. You can do that this morning and two Sundays is going to be November the 17th and that is going to be our Lottie Moon Sunday. We're going to set that Sunday aside and we're going to talk about global missions and what God is doing around the world. We do it every year and it's going to be our opportunity to give, to be what's part of what's called our Lottie Moon Christmas offering. Every single penny goes to missionaries that are on the mission field taking the gospel to the nations. I wanna encourage you be here on that Sunday. Also, during that Sunday we'll have an auction and everything that we are auctioning off will go to the Lottie Moon Christmas offering for those foreign missionaries. And also, next Sunday is your last opportunity if you want to make something or bake something or donate something to be to the Lottie Moon Christmas offering Now, don't bake it next Sunday and bring it to, you know, that Sunday for two weeks later. It's a little old, but if you wanna donate something, just let us know and you can bring it in next Sunday so you could be a part of that auction as well.
Speaker 1:Then the Sunday after that, november the 24th, is Pastor Allen Davis's retirement Sunday. He has served here at First Baptist Church Powder Springs for over 42 years. Can we just thank God for Pastor Allen Davis. What an honor it is to serve with him, to worship with him. We're thankful for all that God is doing.
Speaker 1:Let's bow our heads in prayer. We're not done. I'm about to get into it. Let's go, let's bow, let's pray. Heavenly Father, we love you, god, you're so good. And, father, we pray in Jesus' name. God, we pray that you would just continue, father, what you have started here in your church. God, this is not our church, it's your church. God, what we hear this morning is not our word, it's your word. God, this is not our day, it's your day, it's the Lord's day. And so, father, we just pray. I pray that you would speak to every single heart and life that is here today, god, that you would have something from your word that would change their life for your glory. Father, we love you and we pray these things in Jesus' name. In all God's people said amen.
Speaker 1:How many of y'all are on social media? Raise your hand. You're on social media. You got the Facebook. How many of y'all have the Facebook? Raise your hand. You've got the Facebook. How many of y'all have Instagram? You like to gram for the lamb? Testify, let's go.
Speaker 1:So you know, social media is such a blessing and a curse at the same time. Right? The blessing is we get to keep up in people's lives and see what's going on in friends and family. The curse is that we fall into comparing our life with everybody else, right? Typically on social media. Typically, what we post is all of the good things that's happening in our lives, and so we live fake lives on social media, right? And so we start scrolling through our social media and it looks like that everybody is at the beach at the same time, right? We see all these beach pictures and beach videos and these beach vacations and we're like why does my life stink? Why am I not at the beach? We see all these beach pictures and beach videos and these beach vacations and we're like why does my life stink? Why am I not at the beach? Everybody's at the beach. Am I the only person not at the beach? Or we see people's family pictures. Now just go with me for a second. It takes about 1,000 pictures to make one family picture. What we see online is that one split second moment in time where everybody is smiling at the same time, and we see that picture and we think why is my family not as happy as that family right? They look like the perfect family online.
Speaker 1:Or do you know the people that love to post their food on social media all the time? Can I just ask why do you do that? We all eat Well. Why do you do the people that love to post their food on social media all the time? Can I just ask why do you do that? We all eat Well. Why do you do that? I don't get it. I don't understand it. Just quit bragging, would you please. And sometimes we see people's meals and we're over here eating our microwave mac and cheese and we're like why am I not out at restaurants every night? Why can I not afford what they can afford? Why do I not get to eat like everybody else gets to eat? So that's kind of the blessing and the curse of social media.
Speaker 1:And if we're not careful, we will start to falsely compare our lives to other people's lives. And we'll falsely compare because all we're seeing is a split moment in time, and what we don't see is the hurricane that came through that beach vacation. What we don't see is the family fighting before the picture and fighting after the picture. What we don't see is the food poisoning that person got from the meal right, and we don't see the bad. All we see is the good. And we start to think about our life like God. Why am I not blessed like everybody else, god? Why am I not blessed like everybody else, god? Why am I not experiencing what everybody else is experiencing? And then what we tend to do is then we start to judge our relationship with God based on the way that we compare with other people and we start to think God, do you love me? God, are you there for me? God, am I saved? We start questioning everything in our life, all because of what we've seen on social media.
Speaker 1:Well, it's very important, as we're talking about the blessing and curse of social media. Also, what we see in scripture is we talk about. We're talking this morning through the book of Deuteronomy. We're talking about blessings and curses, and that actually comes up as we're walking through the entire Bible together. We started in January in Genesis. It's taken us a whole year to work through the book of Deuteronomy. We've just got one more sermon next week on Deuteronomy, and Deuteronomy is this fascinating book of the Bible that we don't talk about enough.
Speaker 1:To be honest with you, it's a book where, in the story of Israel. We know that they were going through the wilderness for 40 years and Deuteronomy is the tail end, is literally the last two months of this wilderness journey. In fact, they're on the other side of the Jordan River. They're overlooking the Jordan River, the waters of the Jordan. They're looking at the promised land, the land that they have been journeying, traveling, wandering to for 40 years, and God stops them. And God says before you go into the land, I wanna remind you of everything that I have been teaching my people all along, so that when you go into the land, you will live for me. When you go into the land, you will live for me. So we see it. We're calling it repeat because God was repeating everything that they were. He was teaching them. Everybody say repeat, repeat.
Speaker 1:Also, we see that Deuteronomy is actually written differently than every other book of the Bible. It's written as an ancient peace treaty. That was during that time. So we've already talked about the preamble of the peace treaty. We've already talked about the preamble of the peace treaty. We've already preached on the history, the laws, and today we are on the blessings. Next week is on the witnesses.
Speaker 1:So today we're talking about God's blessings on repeat. Why? Because nobody wants to hear about God's curses on repeat, amen. So we're gonna talk this morning about God's blessings on repeat. But that is so important because God, his actual desire, is never to curse anyone. His heart is to bless everyone. His heart, god's heart, is to bless you. In fact, as we talk about Deuteronomy, deuteronomy may very well have been you've heard me say, jesus's favorite book of the Old Testament, because many people have showed us that he probably quoted from the book of Deuteronomy, more so than any other book, and Jesus loved to talk about blessing. Let me show you.
Speaker 1:Number one is blessings for obedience. Everybody say blessing, blessings for obedience. Deuteronomy, chapter 28, says this. He says and if that is a conditional word of course there if and if you faithfully obey, if you faithfully obey. Now here's what we know is faithfully obey is actually two Hebrew words, the same word, used together to magnify or to compound the word. It's actually the Hebrew word shema, shema and so, which means to hear, to listen, to obey, to understand. And so he's doubling down and talking about our obedience, and not just our obedience, but our faithful obedience, in other words, our perfect obedience, and if you faithfully obey the voice of the Lord, your God, being careful to do all. Everybody say all, being careful to do all his commands. Moses said that I commanded you. Today, the Lord, your God, will set you high above all of the nations of the earth. He goes on to say and all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you obey the voice of the Lord, your God. Blessed you shall be in the city and blessed you shall be in the field, and blessed you shall be when you come in, and blessed you shall be when you go out. God was telling them how much he desires to bless them.
Speaker 1:In fact, did you know that the word blessing, a form of the word bless, is used some 496 times in all of the Bible 384 times in the Old Testament, 112 times in the New Testament. Some people think that God was all mad and angry in the Old Testament. God was all loving and happy in the New Testament. That's not true. Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever, and we see this constant theme throughout the Bible. In fact, the book of the Bible that uses the word bless the most is actually the book of Genesis. God started time, he started history, he started humanity wanting to bless people.
Speaker 1:So we read passages of scripture like this and we think to ourselves God, like I'm doing my best over here, I'm trying my hardest, I'm doing everything I can. God, I believe, god I obey. I know I disobey, I know I sin a little bit, but God, I'm giving it everything I've got. So, god, why are you not blessing me more? God, why am I going through what I'm going through? Why am I suffering? Why am I hurting? Why is there damage and discord around me?
Speaker 1:Did you know the word bless in Hebrew is bara, and bara means to praise or to kneel down or to adore. In other words, it's actually a flip. The definition of blessing is a flip. We think blessing is what God does to us, but actually we know that we're blessed by God when we return blessings to God. You ever thought about what blesses God? It's actually in the very word barah. And what blesses God is when we praise him out of our adoration for God. One of the ways that you can bless God is that you kneel to him out of your submission to God. So we see these blessings here, that we know that God is blessing us, that these are blessings from God when we are kneeling in God, to adoration, and when we are kneeling to God in submission.
Speaker 1:Let me show you curses. Curses for disobedience. Everybody say curse, curse. No cussing in church. Everybody say curse. Here we go. Curses for disobedience. Deuteronomy 28, start with verse 15, says but if you will not obey, if you don't obey the voice of the Lord, your God, or be careful to do all his commandments and his statutes that I command you today, then all of these curses shall come upon you and shall overtake you. And, using the exact same language as he did in the beginning, he said cursed shall you be in the city and cursed. Hit this right here and cursed. Shall you be in the field and cursed shall you be when you come in, and cursed shall you be when you go out. What is God doing? God is showing us these curses for disobedience, these blessings for obedience.
Speaker 1:Did you know that, as blessing was used 496 times in the Bible, the word curse was only used 176 times? 159 times in the Old Testament, 17 times in the New Testament, the book of the Bible, that 17 times. The New Testament, the book of the Bible that talked about curses the most. You blessed it. You guessed it, sorry. The book of Deuteronomy, the word curse is arer, arer. Did you know that arer means curse, but it also means this it means bitter. In other words, you know your life is blessed by God when you adore him with praise, when you submit to him. You know your life is cursed when you live a bitter life, when you're bitter and you're complaining, and what we'll see is those attitudes towards God are actually not based upon things that we have, or diagnoses, or actually what's going on in our life. It's actually what's going on within us. See, first of all, we have to understand where all of this even came from. All of this actually came from the very beginning of the Bible. So much of our life.
Speaker 1:We take it back to the Garden of Eden, to Genesis 1, 2, and 3. And we know that in Genesis 1, 28, god creates all of humanity and then God says this about you. God says and I wanna bless them and I wanna make them fruitful and I wanna multiply them so that they may fill the earth. And here's what he's saying. God is saying I wanna bless you for the purpose of your fruitfulness. What is fruitfulness? We know that Jesus came on the scene talking about fruitfulness, and our fruitfulness is spiritual fruit, it's spiritual growth, it's spiritual Christ-likeness in your life. You know that God is blessing you when you are becoming more like Jesus. And then he says for multiplication and multiplication is not just childbearing, multiplication is actually has more to do with disciple making. He's saying that because God has blessed me, because God has blessed you. What do we do Is we go and bless other people so that they can believe in God, so that God can bless them too. And then he says all for the purpose, so that we may fill the earth. What are we doing? We're going and filling the earth. We're going to the nations, we're going to our cities, we're going to our communities, we're going to our neighbors with the gospel of Jesus Christ, with the blessing of God. It's the best thing you could give anybody else is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1:The problem is is that that is what God blessed Adam and Eve with? But Adam and Eve chose the curse rather than the blessing. They chose the curse of sin rather than the blessing of God. Rather than the blessing, they chose the curse of sin rather than the blessing of God. Every time we choose to sin, we are propagating the curse. Every time that we choose to obey, we are continuing on the blessing of God. And so here's what we understand from Genesis 1 through 3 is that it never pays to disobey. It never pays to disobey, so they believe or they disobey. And so what happens is, when they disobey God's command, when they disobey God's law, what happens? The Bible says that then work becomes hard and childbearing becomes painful. See, if blessing means that life flourishes and if blessing means that life is multiplying and that we're being a blessing to God and to others, then what curse is? It means bitter. It means that we aren't seeing God's own blessing in our life.
Speaker 1:So we come back to passages like Deuteronomy 28 and we ask the question if my life doesn't seem to be full of blessing, then am I cursed? Because, to be honest with you, when you look back at Deuteronomy 28, I just wanna show you a couple of things real quick, just as we go back, if that's possible. Here we go. I got it as we go back. Here. It says in Deuteronomy 28, verse one. It says if you faithfully obey and we do all of his commands, then blessed we shall be. But if we don't obey and if we don't do all of his commands, then cursed we shall be.
Speaker 1:In other words, is Deuteronomy saying that we've gotta be perfect? Is Deuteronomy saying, when he says faithfully obey, that this is a perfect obedience? When he says all the commands of God, does it mean all Because God? If it mean all Because God, if you read your Bible, you can go back and read all of Deuteronomy 28. God lists all these blessings if they faithfully obey, all these curses, if they don't disobey. Does this mean that we have to be perfect in order for God to bless our life? To be honest with you, that's exactly what Deuteronomy is saying. Deuteronomy is saying. Deuteronomy is saying that we absolutely have to be perfect in order for God to bless our life. Hear me, based on the obedience of our life. It would be like I don't know if you've heard, but I heard on the internet, so it has to be true.
Speaker 1:There's a new store in New York City that is called the Husband Store, and all the ladies said amen, all right. So there's a new store in New York City that is called the Husband Store and all the ladies said amen, all right. So there's a new store in New York City called the Husband Store, and this store is six stories or six floors high. Now the rules are, when you go into the store, that you can always go up a level, ladies, but you can never go down a level. Okay, and so story has it that a lady went into the Hus's store there in New York City and she went to the first floor and there were husbands to be married everywhere, all these men and this floor.
Speaker 1:It had posted there that all of these men have good paying jobs and all God's ladies said amen, all these husbands have good paying jobs. And so the lady was thinking, oh, my goodness, well, this is incredible, a husband with a good paying job. Does it get any better than that? I've got to go see floor two. So she goes up to the second floor, gets better every floor. The sign read these men have high paying jobs and they love kids. And she's thinking, well, could life get any better than this? This is awesome High paying job and he loves kids. I've got to go to floor three. She goes up to floor three and the sign read all of these men want to be husbands and they have high paying jobs, they love kids and they are extremely good looking. So the ladies are getting happier and happier and happier. They're thinking you know, you just can't make this up.
Speaker 1:So obviously the woman has to see what is on store on floor four. So she goes up to the fourth floor and the sign read these men have high paying jobs, they love kids, they're extremely good looking and they help with the housework. And all God's lady said, hey, it was making us look bad man. And so they're getting more and more excited. They can't believe there's actually a store where they can have the perfect man. So they go, they leave the fourth floor. She goes up to the fifth floor and there's a sign that said these men have high paying jobs, they love kids, they're extremely good looking, they help with the housework and they are romantic with their wife. Well, my goodness, it just keeps getting better and better and better. Somebody just said that's good, all right, good. So I love that. I love that Someone's just taking it all in. So obviously this lady, these ladies that go into the store, they have to see what's on the sixth floor. How could this, these husband, get even better? They go up to the sixth floor and there's someone, not a sign. There's someone waiting for them and they're waiting. They're right by the door and she walks out of the elevator, goes to the sixth floor and this person says you are the 1,876,342nd woman to come into the husband's door to find a man. There are no men on the sixth floor.
Speaker 1:Knowing that there's no such thing as a perfect man, the whole point is to see that a woman cannot be fully pleased. Can I get an amen? All right, that's funny. That's funny right there. I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1:All that to say all that, to say there's no such thing as a perfect person. There's no such thing as a perfect person. In fact, I need you to hear me that, while Deuteronomy is saying that you and I, that we must be perfect, for God to base us on our life alone. It is impossible for us to be perfect. We are the imperfect ones. That is why Jesus came as the perfect one.
Speaker 1:Jesus Christ came down to this earth and the Bible says that he lived in your place.
Speaker 1:The Bible says that he obeyed God's law, god's word, god's command in every single way for you.
Speaker 1:The Bible says that he said no to every single sin, to every single temptation for you. Why? Because you couldn't do it and I couldn't do it, and that's why we see in Galatians, chapter three, it says for all who rely on the works of the law are under a curse, meaning we don't live by God's laws in order to be blessed by God. He says, for it is written cursed be everyone who does not abide by all the things written in the book. In other words, if you wanna be saved by your obedience, if you wanna just be blessed by your obedience alone, then you have to do every single bit of it. He says all these things written in the book of the law and do them. But he says but the righteous shall live by faith, and that is your faith in Jesus Christ. He says Jesus Christ, christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us. For it is written cursed is everyone who has hanged on a tree that is a quote straight out of Deuteronomy so that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles that's you, that's me so that we might receive the promised spirit of God through faith. In other words, I need you to hear me say Jesus became our curse so that he could be our blessing. In other words, jesus became your curse so that Jesus could be your blessing.
Speaker 1:The Bible says that Jesus became your curse. What does that mean? The Bible says that he became your sin. The Bible says that he became your sin. The Bible says that he bore my sin. When Jesus is hanging on the cross, he is bearing. He has become all of the sins of Chip Dean, of all of my life. He has become all of your sin, all of our sin, your sin, my sin, our sin, the billions of people who have ever lived, who ever will live, bearing the burden of sin In the body of Jesus. Jesus not only took on our curse, jesus himself became our curse. Why he became our curse? So that he could be our blessing.
Speaker 1:See, here's the deal. God's ultimate, eternal, earthly blessing on your life is not based on you. It's based on his son, jesus. That's why Romans, chapter four, verses seven through eight, says blessed are those whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sins are covered. Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord will never count against them.
Speaker 1:What we see in God's word and what we need to understand about blessing is blessing is not how much you have. Blessing is not vacations you go on. Blessing is not your car in your garage. Blessing is not your house that you may own. Blessing is not anything that is outside of you. Blessing, ultimately, is what God has placed in you. Because when we compare ourself with other people and we want more possessions, let's just be honest with ourselves. The reason we want what other people have, or the reason we want more than what other people have, our sinfulness, is because we think that those things make us happy, we think that those things bring us joy.
Speaker 1:When God says what if I could just give you the feeling without giving you the thing, what if I can just do something in feeling without giving you the thing, what if I can just do something in your heart and do something in your life to where I can bless you? What if he says, what if my greatest blessings are not physical but they are spiritual? Ephesians 1.3 says blessed be the God and Father of our Lord, jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, which means if Jesus has become your curse, then Jesus has become your blessing, which means, no matter what you are going through in your life, what God is doing is he is blessing you within your heart, within your soul, within your life, and he is giving you the blessing of himself and he is walking with you through it. He is giving you the strength. He is giving you the peace. He is giving you the hope. He is giving you the love. He is giving you the hope. He's giving you the love. He is giving you what no one else has on the planet who does not believe in Jesus. He's giving you what everybody else wants.
Speaker 1:You've heard me say before that they once put a camera in Tom Brady's face. You can look it up 60 minutes on YouTube. Said Tom, tell us how it feels to be you. We all wanna have what you have. We all wanna be who you are. Tom, you're a multi-Super Bowl champion, the greatest quarterback of all time, the GOAT, tom, you're a multimillionaire. You are you were married to a supermodel. Tom, you've achieved the ultimate status. Tell us what it's like to be Tom Brady. And Tom Brady looks in the camera and he says it just seems like there's something else. And they said Tom, that's impossible. There's nothing else. You've done it all. You've gained it all. You've earned it all. Tom, you've got it all. What else could there possibly be? And Tom Brady said I wish I knew I'm here to tell you this morning that we know.
Speaker 1:We know Jesus, who is the one who blesses our life, and so you might be asking yourself the question well, if that's so true, then why do bad things happen to good people? Pastor Chip, can I answer that question for you? It's actually a bad question, because there's no such thing as good people. We're all sinners. The only one good, jesus said, is God. Jesus is the perfect one. Jesus is the ultimate epitome of good, and bad happened to Jesus too. It's about this world that we live in.
Speaker 1:Why do Christians suffer? Why do we go through pain? Why do we go through things that we feel like are unfair? Why do we go through times that we feel like are unjust? Can I tell you why? Because what God wants to do is God wants to show you that what he is doing in you is more important than the things that he can give to you. God is doing better spiritual blessings within us than anything that he could give to us, because the greatest blessing himself is God. So why do good things happen to bad people? Well, we're all bad, we're all sinners, but it's the way in which that God is showing us hear me that things are not what ultimately make us happy.
Speaker 1:75% of the world lives on less than $10 a day. 700 million different people in the world live on roughly $2 a day, 1.5 billion people in the world don't have good shoes, 2 billion people in the world do not have access to clean water and 3 billion people in the world don't even have the internet. They can't even look on Instagram and know that they're not blessed. In other words, if God's blessing is physical, tangible things and possessions, then 75% of the world could never even be blessed. But I believe, no matter what is going on, no matter what is happening, no matter what God has allowed into your life, hear me in Christ, you are blessed.
Speaker 1:I think about my little girl, brooklyn Rose, five years old, cerebral palsy, wheelchair. To be honest, I can't even fathom how she must see her world. But I want her to know that, baby girl, you are not cursed. Baby girl, you are blessed because you know Jesus and you've believed in him, and you have Jesus Christ in your life and he is the ultimate blessing that you could ever have. And it's the same thing that I want you to know. It's the same thing that I've got to believe down deep in my heart that God's blessing is actually the physical blessings that he has for us within us. And so then we have to ask the question well, if God has already blessed us, then why should I even obey?
Speaker 1:It says in James, chapter 125,. It says whoever looks intently into the perfect law, god's word that gives us freedom, and we continue in it, not forgetting what we have. Law, god's word that gives us freedom, and we continue in it, not forgetting what we have heard from God's word. But we continue to do it, we continue to obey. It says they will be blessed in what they do.
Speaker 1:You might be thinking, pastor Chip, you told me blessing is not based on obedience, it's based on Jesus. Your ultimate eternal blessing is not based on your obedience. Here's what God is saying. God has extra special blessings reserved for your obedience in your life. God blesses every Christian, he blesses every believer, he blesses everyone that trusts in him. But when we obey, the Bible does say that he blessed us. And God blesses us for a very specific reason.
Speaker 1:Why does God bless you? 1 Peter 3, 9 said do not repay evil with evil or a curse with a curse. Don't repay an insult with an insult. On the contrary, repay evil with a blessing, because to this. You were called so that you may inherit a blessing. In other words, jesus said bless those who curse you.
Speaker 1:Why does God ultimately bless us? Here's why. Number one to bless him back in return. You know that God is blessing you if you are blessing him. You know that God is given to you as you give to him. So that's why Psalm 103, verse one, says bless the Lord. Oh my soul and all that is within me, I just wanna bless his holy name. We bless the Lord as God blesses us, but hear me, and we also bless others.
Speaker 1:What Satan loves to do is the evil. One loves to continue the curse. He loves for the curse to continue through us, and so when people insult us, he wants us to insult them back. When people do evil towards us, he wants to do evil towards them back. But Jesus said no, I want you to turn it upside down. I want you to be a part of my blessing movement. Jesus said because I have blessed you, because I've become your curse, so that I can be your blessing.
Speaker 1:When people curse you, when people are evil towards you, when people insult you as my people, here's what I'm calling you to do. I'm calling you to bless them. Why? Because when we bless them in return and we get to tell them because God has blessed us, then they will want to be blessed by God too. It's a way that we get to be a witness. It's a way we get to share the gospel. So that's our job this week just to bless people. What a great role that God has given us in his kingdom. We get to bless people, no matter how they treat us. Would they give us a bad attitude? We give them a blessed attitude. They throw a bad word our way. We give them a blessed word their way. They do something evil towards us. We bless them in return. Why? Because God has blessed us when we don't deserve it, so we bless them when they don't deserve it, so they too will desire the blessing of God.
Speaker 1:I'm going to ask you all to bow your heads and close your eyes. Nobody looking around. I just want to give you an opportunity to pray this morning with every head bowed and every eye closed. Maybe you're here this morning and you're just thinking to yourself God, I need to be more aware of your blessings. God, I need to be more grateful for your blessings and what you're doing in my life. I just wanna encourage you just to tell him that right now, just be honest with God and just thank God, show your gratefulness to God. Maybe you just need to be honest with him about the hardest part of your life, right here, right now, and just say God, would you bless me through it, god, would you help me through it? God, may I keep my eyes on you, may I experience the blessing of your love, your joy, your hope, your peace, your strength, your grace. And maybe you're here this morning and you're not experiencing the blessing. You're experiencing the bitterness of life and you know you've not given your life to God. You know you haven't given your life to Jesus. I wanna encourage you right now.
Speaker 1:May today be the day of your salvation. May right here, right now, today, be the time that I can't pray this prayer for you and I can't save you, but you can pray this prayer right now to God, and only he can save you. And you can tell God right now God, I believe in you and God, I need you. You can tell him God, I believe in your son Jesus. I believe that he died on the cross for my sin. I believe that he became my curse so that he could become my blessing. And so, jesus, I ask you to forgive me of all of my sin. I turn from my sin and, jesus, I turn and I give my life to you and you can tell God. God, I believe that he rose from the dead, he's real, he's alive, and I want a real relationship with Jesus right here, right now, for the rest of my life. And the Bible says that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe with your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. Right now, say Jesus be the Lord of my life and Jesus save me. And, god, we believe that we thank you for salvation, we thank you for Jesus, we love you. In Jesus' name, we pray and all God's people said amen.
Speaker 1:Would you put your hands together for anybody that gave their life to Jesus during this time? We are so thankful for all that Jesus has done. I just wanna encourage you, as Pastor James mentioned earlier, that you do have a next step card in front of you, and maybe God has led you this morning to make a decision for him. Maybe he's led you this morning to salvation. Maybe you need to be baptized, maybe you wanna join a group, join one of our ministries. You wanna serve in our children's ministry? Or come to our next step lunch, which is right after this. For anybody that has not come to our Next Step Lunch yet, maybe you're new, maybe you wanna learn more about First Baptist Powder Springs. You're welcome this morning to come right after the service. But I'm asking us all to stand right now, and we're gonna stand and we're gonna pray and you can fill out that Next Step card. You can take it to our Next Step station right after this service.
Speaker 1:Let me pray for us.
Speaker 1:Heavenly Father, we love you.
Speaker 1:God, you're so good.
Speaker 1:And, father, we thank you that you are the God of all blessing.
Speaker 1:God, we give you all the praise, all the honor and all the glory. God, we thank you for your goodness. We thank you for your love. God, we thank you for, when it was impossible for us to be perfect, that you sent your only son to become our curse so that he could become our blessing. And, god, I just pray that we would believe. God, I pray in Jesus' name, lord, that you would do what only you can do in our lives. And, god, I pray, god, that we would be a blessing in return to you, a blessing in return to others, god, may we be a church who is known for blessing others. May we be a church who's known for blessing our community. May we be a church who's known that, god, you have just blessed us. So, father, we pray that you would just continue to live in us, continue to live through us, and God, we love you and we pray these things in Jesus' name. And all God's people said amen. Let's sing to him right now.