New Covenant Community Church
TOGETHER to get there Roadblocks To Relationship
Sermon Series
Locations & Times
New Covenant Community Church
255 Edgewood Ave, Audubon, NJ 08106, USA
Sunday 10:15 AM
TOGETHER to get there
ROADBLOCKS TO RELATIONSHIP
Galatians 2:20 My old self has been crucified with Christ.It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Four Metaphors of relationship road blocks.
- City Builder
- Fire Lighter
- Wall Whitewasher
- Well Digger
City Building
City builders depend on their own resources to make their lives work.
· In Genesis 4 Cain rebelled -
· Genesis 4:17 Cain had sexual relations with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Then Cain founded a city, which he named Enoch, after his son.
· We want a comfy home..
· But we don’t always experience that picture.
· God doesn’t seem to be working to improve the situation so we take on
the job.
· Mark 8:34 Then, calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. 35 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. 36 And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?
The Spirits Work: Desert experiences
· In the hands of a gracious God, the Holy Spirit begins to change the questions we ask.
· God helps change our heart and the question from am I adequate? to what can I give? Eyes off me.
· This is a process.
· The passion of a city builder to find, prove, and display personal adequacy dies best in the desert.
· Are you in the desert right now?
· You are adequate, and He believes in you..
· New Passion: "What can I give?"
· Acts 20:35 And I have been a constant example of how you can help those in need by working hard. You should remember the words of the Lord Jesus: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”
FIRE LIGHTING
Fire lighters reduce the mystery of life to manageable categories of understanding.
· Isaiah 50:10 Who among you fears the Lord and obeys his servant? If you are walking in darkness,without a ray of light,trust in the Lordand rely on your God.11 But watch out, you who live in your own light and warm yourselves by your own fires.This is the reward you will receive from me:You will soon fall down in great torment.
· God has created the world with structure
· But behind the structure is a being (God), a free, unmanageable, who is bound to nothing outside himself.
· If we don’t trust him, we hate the unknown
· Fire lighters are more concerned with doing it right
· Fire Lighters see the Bible as a rule book
· But that passion and the question
· The demand to be right is an urge to be killed.
· Matthew 22:36 “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?”37 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
· When our dreams aren’t met and there’s no way to make them work, that’s when our questions finally begin to change.
· When passion to be right is mortified, a new one arises: a longing to trust God.
Spirits Work: Takes us through Dark Places
Put to Death Urges:
New Passion: "Trusting in Christ"
Psalm 23:4 Even when I walkthrough the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me.Your rod and your staffprotect and comfort me.
ROADBLOCKS TO RELATIONSHIP
Galatians 2:20 My old self has been crucified with Christ.It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. So I live in this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
Four Metaphors of relationship road blocks.
- City Builder
- Fire Lighter
- Wall Whitewasher
- Well Digger
City Building
City builders depend on their own resources to make their lives work.
· In Genesis 4 Cain rebelled -
· Genesis 4:17 Cain had sexual relations with his wife, and she became pregnant and gave birth to Enoch. Then Cain founded a city, which he named Enoch, after his son.
· We want a comfy home..
· But we don’t always experience that picture.
· God doesn’t seem to be working to improve the situation so we take on
the job.
· Mark 8:34 Then, calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross, and follow me. 35 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. 36 And what do you benefit if you gain the whole world but lose your own soul?
The Spirits Work: Desert experiences
· In the hands of a gracious God, the Holy Spirit begins to change the questions we ask.
· God helps change our heart and the question from am I adequate? to what can I give? Eyes off me.
· This is a process.
· The passion of a city builder to find, prove, and display personal adequacy dies best in the desert.
· Are you in the desert right now?
· You are adequate, and He believes in you..
· New Passion: "What can I give?"
· Acts 20:35 And I have been a constant example of how you can help those in need by working hard. You should remember the words of the Lord Jesus: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’”
FIRE LIGHTING
Fire lighters reduce the mystery of life to manageable categories of understanding.
· Isaiah 50:10 Who among you fears the Lord and obeys his servant? If you are walking in darkness,without a ray of light,trust in the Lordand rely on your God.11 But watch out, you who live in your own light and warm yourselves by your own fires.This is the reward you will receive from me:You will soon fall down in great torment.
· God has created the world with structure
· But behind the structure is a being (God), a free, unmanageable, who is bound to nothing outside himself.
· If we don’t trust him, we hate the unknown
· Fire lighters are more concerned with doing it right
· Fire Lighters see the Bible as a rule book
· But that passion and the question
· The demand to be right is an urge to be killed.
· Matthew 22:36 “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?”37 Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.”
· When our dreams aren’t met and there’s no way to make them work, that’s when our questions finally begin to change.
· When passion to be right is mortified, a new one arises: a longing to trust God.
Spirits Work: Takes us through Dark Places
Put to Death Urges:
New Passion: "Trusting in Christ"
Psalm 23:4 Even when I walkthrough the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me.Your rod and your staffprotect and comfort me.