God's NOT Stressed With the MESS, So WHY Should I Be?

I was reading Luke 2 this past week, when the Lord dropped a revelation on me that has had me pumped all week now. As a matter of fact, I really didn't understand why He was giving this revelation to me until about an hour later when my friend Mark Abernathy called me and said that the Lord had spoken to him and told him that I had something to say to his Leadership Team. So, I'd like to share with you what the Lord revealed to me early Tuesday morning.

Luke 2 opens up with some shepherds doing what they do....watching sheep. Then an angel appears and scares them half to death. The angel then tells them to not be afraid because he was bringing them some good news. The Savior-the Messiah-God IN Flesh had been born in Bethlehem and they were to go check Him out. The angel even told the shepherds where to look...in a manger. And if one angel didn't scare them enough, the next thing they knew a whole host of angels showed up singing the "Halelujah Chorus!"

Anyway, when the angels left the shepherds decided to go see this baby. When they got there they found Jesus right where they were told he'd be...in a manger. At this point the Lord revealed something to me that I want to share with you. Are you ready?

Jesus was born in a MANGER! You're impressed aren't you? Think about it though...JESUS-God IN Flesh was BORN IN A MANGER! A manger is MESSY! A manger STINKS! Literally...it stinks. There's animal poop. There's animal funk. It's NOT very appealing, yet Jesus was born there. So we can say that Jesus was born in a MESS! And while a MESS doesn't bother Jesus, we tend to spend the majority of our time trying to keep the MESS out of our churches! When what we really need is MORE of a MESS IN our church!

We've been trying to reach the MASSES without getting the MESS and that's impossible! God spoke to me very clearly and said, "If you'll reach the MESS, I'll give you the MASSES!"

Check this out...in Mark 5, the Gerasene demoniac was so strong that even chains were unable to keep him from wandering around naked and homeless. Yet he was not only delivered from his demons but Jesus commissioned this "former demoniac" to go back to his family and city to tell them of all the wonderful things God had done for him. So he did. When Jesus returned, the MASSES were waiting on Him. And to think it all started with Jesus touching a MESS!

God's NOT stressed with the MESS, so WHY should I be? I'm expecting 2007 to be a MESSY year, and the crazy thing is I can't wait!

Bring on the MESS!

Confessions of Carnality

First, I want to say that this blog is going to be very personal. Ever since last Sunday, the Lord has been dealing with me about prayer, more importantly about my personal prayer life. What I’m about to confess might surprise other preachers, but that’s only because they’re not being honest. I, the Pastor, confessed last night to my church that I don’t pray enough. I do not want to be a powerless Pastor who pastors a powerless church because we are all too busy to pray. God forgive us for our selfishness, laziness and complacency!

I do not want to be someone who only believes in the principle of prayer but not the practice of prayer! Most of us have heard enough doctrine to choke an elephant. We can tell you what we believe in principle, but many of us don’t practice it. We believe in the principle and power of prayer, but are we praying?

Perhaps some of our problem is that we’ve grown up with the wrong idea of what prayer really is. Most of what we call “prayer meetings” is actually us yelling at God and telling Him what He needs to do. But how must it make God feel, for us to approach Him on Sundays and then not talk to him again until the next Sunday. It seems to some that the louder you yell, the quicker God will move. But it is not the volume of your prayer that makes the difference it is the sincerity of your prayer. Think about it, how many of us run around screaming to everybody we talk to? (Not many unless you’re sanguine!)

Prayer is about relationship. Prayer is about communication between us and God. Prayer is so important because it is the lifeline between us and God. Without a consistent “prayer life” our relationship with God will digress to the point of spiritual decay. The more we pray, the closer we will get to God, and our walk and relationship with God will be stronger. An inconsistent prayer life will cause us to be unstable in our walk with God.

We are only fooling ourselves when we think that we can get by without a consistent prayer life. When our young people can spend hours playing video games, or on computers getting connected with people all over the world; or spend hours glued to a TV watching movies, but they can’t pray for 30 minutes on Sunday, what are we doing to the next generation? Who are we kidding, when we offer up our pre-packaged prayers that we recite out of habit and NOT relationship?

For example, my wife and I were eating dinner at a local restaurant a week or so ago, and had already said our prayer before we started eating. A few minutes later, a couple was seated across from us, and I watched as they prayed for their dinner. It was not like my prayer. No, it actually lasted more than 3 seconds! I watched them pray, and the longer they prayed the more convicted I became. The reality is that many of us pray the same old prayers out of habit everyday and that is a shame.

We can point fingers of accusation and blame the state of our Country on the fact that prayer was taken out of schools, but it’s not the schools’ fault that we are like we are. Taking prayer out of our personal priorities and daily routines has gotten us to where we are!

Why don’t we stop blaming everyone else and take responsibility for our carnality, and ask God to forgive us of our complacency. It is not enough to just believe in the principle of prayer and not practice prayer. We are only fooling ourselves when we attempt to worship a God we never pray to. I’ve confessed my carnality, now it’s your turn…