SW01.09.05am
 
But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things
 shall be added to you. - Matthew 6:33.


For consider Him who endured such hostility from sinners against Himself, lest
 you become weary and discouraged in your souls. - Hebrews 12:3.


INTRO:  Julia Bauer who lives in Bochum, Germany was driving to work one
 morning when she lost control of her car. 


1.  She smashed into a parked car and then into a lamppost causing damage of
 around $27,000.
 

2.  Julia lost control of her vehicle while she was preparing her breakfast.
 She was pouring milk into her cereal and the bowl slipped.
 

	(1.  Julia tried to catch the bowl while it was falling, which
 resulted in the crash of her car when her attention was diverted from driving.


3.  Julia might tell you that she was multi-tasking. A police officer would
 tell you that Julia was inattentive to her driving. 


	(1.  Her focus had shifted from driving to preparing breakfast and the
 falling bowl. 


	(2.  The result was bad but it could have been so much worse. At least
 there was no loss of life.


4.  It is now the year 2005 and with a New Year comes the opportunity to make
 what we used to call resolutions. Maybe we ought to call it refocusing.
 

	(1.  The dictionary defines the word “focus” as “A center of activity
 or interest.” 


Page 2

5.  With a new year we should at least take time to consider what our major
 focus of life is at this point. 

	(1.  What is your focus, your primary focus right now? 


	(2.  How does this focus line up with the focus the Bible tells us we
 ought to have?


6.  Jesus tells us plainly what should be our primary focus in Matthew 6:33.
 It may be that your life is so busy that you are thinking how can I
 do that? 


	(1.  Jesus adds, “and all these things shall be added to you.”
 

7.  This means that if we have the Kingdom of God, Jesus, as our primary focus
 everything else in our life will work out, as God would have it to.

 

	(1.  It is a matter of faith. Do we believe the Word of God to be true
 or not? 



8.  Hebrews 12:3 gives us some additional benefits of having the right
 focus “lest you become weary and discouraged in your souls.”

 

	(1.  I think we know what that means.

 

9.  It means that when we do not have the right focus we tend to become
 stressed, depressed, worried, and things start to come apart in our lives 
instead of coming together.



10.  Here are some suggestions for refocusing:


Read through the Bible in a year; 
spend 15 minutes or more in prayer every day; 
attend church regularly, faithfully; 
give financially and of your time to the Kingdom of God;

 
	(1.  And, Remember the 10 commandments are not just the 10 suggestions.



Page 3

11.  To make a commitment to refocusing your life a good place to start is 1
 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us
 our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

 

	(1.  Because if the Kingdom of God is not our primary focus we have
 sinned and we are not in a right relationship with our Lord.



12.  Resolutions and commitments are such fragile things and rarely are they
 kept over a long period of time.

 

13.  However, without a commitment of the heart, there will never be a change,
 and there will never be a refocus of your heart.

 

14.  If you will keep this commitment of refocus, you will see as you live
 life over a period of years that truly “all these things” have been “added to
 you.” 

	(1.  You will be blessed and God’s hand will be upon your life.



15.  Before the moment of opportunity slips away, REFOCUS!!!!



I.  Now I want to zero in those things that will help you to bring about a 
refocusing of your life.  First, Refocus through the Word of God. John 1:1-4, 14,
 “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
 Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made
 through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. In Him
 was life, and the life was the light of men. And the Word became flesh
 and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the
 only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.” 


	(1.  The Bible also says in 2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is given
 by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof,
 for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of
 God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.”

 

Page 4

1.  George Mueller is remembered for many things including his care of
 orphans. He began caring for orphans when he moved in 1832 to pastor a church
 at Bristol, England. 



2.  It was there at Bristol that two young children became the responsibility
 of the church. Mueller had very little money - only two
 shillings at the time he began to care for the children.

 

3.  During the next sixty years, God moved in a mighty way to provide for that
 ministry. Over seven million dollars were sent by God to help meet
 their needs. 



4.  Mueller also began 117 schools, which provided educations for more than
 120,000 children many of whom were orphans. The church he pastured
 had 2,000 members at the time of his death.

 

	(1.  Charles H. Spurgeon said of George Mueller, “Of flowers of speech
 he has none, and we hardly think he cares for them; but of the
 bread of Heaven he has abundance.”



5.  From where did George Mueller’s empowerment come? It certainly was in part
 from his voracious reading of the Word of God.

 

6.  Mueller was a student of the ministry of George Whitefield who was a great
 evangelist during the 1700s. 


	(1.  Mueller adopted a habit of Whitefield’s, which was the reading of
 the Bible while on his knees in an attitude of prayer and meditation.

 

7.  Mueller through his lifetime documented in his journal reading through the
 Bible some 200 times. 


	
	(1.  I think we can see the source of George Mueller’s empowerment.





Page 5

8.  Reading God’s Word will help you to refocus upon the Lord Jesus Christ.
 Jesus is the Word become flesh. 



9.  Jesus quotes Scripture in Matthew 4:4, to resist the temptation of the 
devil, when He says, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word
 that proceeds from the mouth of God."

 

	(1.  We cannot live the Christian life without a daily nurturing,
 filling, that comes only from the Word of God.



10.  I recently spoke with a pastor friend who sadly shared about one of his
 sons for whom nothing seems to work out. Everything his son tries
 always ends in some degree of failure. 



	(1.  His son knows what the problem is in that he knows he is not on
 the right track with his life and that he is not in God’s will.

 

11.  Joshua tells us how we can get on the right track with our lives and it
 is through the Word of God. Joshua says in Joshua 1:8, “This Book of
 the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it
 day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is
 written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will
 have good success.”



12.  You cannot expect to read the Bible for a few moments one night and
 expect your life to instantly change.

 

13.  You can expect that through a commitment to reading through the Bible in
 a year (about 3 chapters a day) that you will begin to see positive
 changes for the better in your life. 



14.  As you follow through with that commitment to God in all areas of your
 life, you will see over the course of months and years dramatic
 changes for the better occurring, 



	(1.  which will lead to the successful living of a good life for the
 glory of God.



Page 6

15.  Now’s a good time to dust off that Bible, open it up to Genesis chapter
 one and begin to read (Variety of Bible reading programs/methods).

 

16.  I can promise you that you will never regret the time you spend in the
 Word. Let us refocus our lives on Jesus through the Word of God.



II.  Second, Refocus your life through Prayer. Jeremiah in Jeremiah 33:3
 says, “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty
 things, which you do not know.”

 

1.  The apostle Paul says in Ephesians 3:20-21, “Now to Him who is able to do
 exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the
 power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus
 to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” 



2.  The writer of Hebrews says in Hebrews 4:16, “Let us therefore come boldly
 to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to
 help in time of need.” 



3.  In August 1998 Michael Giovanetti (39 years old) was heading for home.
 Michael is married with a son and twin girls. 



	(1.  He had been unemployed since April and was searching for work as
 an avionics technician. 



4.  He lost control of his car on some gravel trying to get onto a turnpike.
 He shot across the highway, over a guard rail and his car flew
 into the air and finally landed 100 feet down a steep hill strewn 
with boulders. 



5.  The accident tore the front off Giovanetti's car, which came to rest on
 its crushed roof. The passenger side of the car was buried in dirt and
 rocks. 




Page 7

6.  Michael regained consciousness upside down, his face mashed against the
 broken windshield. He unlatched his seat belt and fell against the
 steering wheel. 



7.  Michael was injured with a head wound and broken ribs but knew help was
 only 100 feet away from him. However, he was stuck in the twisted
 wreckage at the bottom of the steep hill. 



8.  He had to endure four days with humid high temperatures before he was able
 to crawl out of the wreck and drag himself up the hill.

 

9.  Michael says that he prayed mightily  (did you get that) when he first
 woke up after the wreck and gave thanks whenever a cool breeze blew through
 his car. Michael shared, "Everybody tells me I'm really lucky. I
 felt somebody else was helping me - like it was a team. Someone had a 
reason to let me go. I was in a bad way. Someone had to pull me out of
 there. I don't remember it hurting. I remember it was very hot. It was very
 difficult uprighting myself."

 

10.  Michael spent his first day yelling and banging a piece of metal from the
 wreck against the body of the car. Nobody noticed. 



	(1.  He spent the second day in a failed effort to wiggle out of the
 mangled wreck. 



	(2.  On the third day, he dragged himself halfway out of the wreckage,
 where he rigged a rubber mat to direct rainwater into plastic
 water bottles.

 

	(3.  By the morning of the fourth day, Giovanetti realized no one 
would come for him. 


		
		1.  Weakened, he dragged himself backward, crablike, up the
 steep hillside, gripping rocks in his fists to protect his hands from 
broken glass. 




Page 8

11.  When he finally made it, Giovanetti was too weak to even pull himself over the guard rail. 


	(1.  He lay on the side of the road waving unsuccessfully at passing
 cars and trucks until finally some people did pull over to help.

 

	(2.  Michael said about the ordeal, "It seemed mostly like a long, bad
 day. I didn't know it was four days until I got to the top. I just
 kept trying to get out. I wanted to see my kids." 



12.  Usually we do our best praying when we are in desperate situations.
 However, what if we didn’t wait until it was a desperate situation? What if we 
prayed every day as if our lives depended upon those prayers? 



13.  What if we prayed for our protection, the protection of our families, and
 others every day? What if we prayed for God’s will to be done in our
 lives every day? 



	(1.  What if we prayed for God to deliver from evil and temptation
 every day? 



14.  What if we committed ourselves to pray for 30 minutes to an hour or more
 every day for a year? What would happen if we were to do that? 
Jeremiah tells us in Jeremiah 33:3.

 
	(1.  The apostle Paul tells us in Ephesians 3:20-21.

 

15.  The fact is that prayer works, there is a God and He answers prayer if we
 will simply pray. Will you make that commitment? 


	(1.  Commit yourself to Refocusing your life through prayer.



III. Third, Refocus, your life through the church. Hebrews 10:24-25, “And let
 us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not 
forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some,
 but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day
 approaching.” 



Page 9

Matthew 18:20, “For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am
 there in the midst of them.” 



1.  I love the testimony of a woman whose name is Shari that I have posted on
 my website - She sent it to me several years ago.

 

2.  Shari was living with someone and using drugs by the time she was 17 years
 old. She left this man after a couple of years and started living 
with another man that she married after a year. 



3.  She was still using drugs and she left her husband when her daughter was
 five months old and eventually divorced him.

 

4.  Three and a half years later she married again but this time there was
 something different in her life. That something different was church.

 

5.  Here is what Shari says in her own words, “I have been married to him now
 10 years. During that time, I have constantly gone to church and 
looked to the Lord for guidance. It's wonderful how loving and forgiving 
the Lord can be when you've spit in his face for so long.”


“My husband came to know the Lord in September of 1994, was baptized, and is 
an active member of our church. We now have 4 daughters altogether. Our
 youngest is five and she knows nothing but going to church on Sunday
 mornings and evenings, and Wednesday nights. She even prays on Wednesday
 nights at prayer meetings! My oldest daughter is now 15, and thinks that 
people who do that kind of thing (drugs, living with someone outside of 
marriage) to themselves are stupid, and searching for something. I have
 always been honest about my past experience with my two oldest 
daughters, hoping that it will help them decide not to do those things. So
 far, it has worked.”


“It's a joy to see what the Lord can do with someone who thought they weren't
 worth much. I am now our Sunday School Director (4 years now), our
 VBS Director (this year will make 9), and the church Secretary. And I
 totally enjoy my life.”



Page 10

6.  You can grow as a Christian without going to church but that growth will
 be really slow and it will be painful. 



7.  For several years after I was saved I did not attend church regularly - 
just on a sporadic basis. 



	(1.  I only began to really grow as a Christian when I made a
 commitment to be in church for every service including Sunday School and 
Discipleship Training. 



8.  Sometimes during those early years of church attendance the preaching 
wasn’t the best in fact it was simply bad. 



	(1.  Much of the time during those early years of church attendance
 the worship service was not even bad it was worse than that. 



9.  But you see, church is not about just the preaching or the worship 
service. Church is a God thing. Church is God’s idea and it was created 
and ordained by Him.
 

10.  Even if Billy Graham or Charles Stanley is not preaching in your church
 (which there is not much chance of that here) you can still grow
 and will grow if you are faithful in attendance. 



11.  Even if the worship style is not the style you prefer whether 
traditional, or contemporary or a blend you can and will grow if you are
 faithful in attendance. 



12.  Why? Because God is in the midst of the church (Matthew 18:20) when those
 who make up the church assembles together. 


	(1.  Also because those who are the church stir up each other up unto
 love and good works. 



13.  You will never really grow as a child of God until you commit yourself to
 regular faithful church attendance. Not a partial commitment to part of
 the church program but a full commitment. 



Page 11

14.  Refocus your life - commit yourself today to faithful and regular church
 attendance.



IV.  Conclusion: Once you have made those commitments to first of all to
 refocus which is repentance (1 John 1:9) 



	(1.  and then to being in the Word of God, spending daily significant
 time in prayer, and being faithful in church attendance - 



1.  Once you have done that - out of your life will flow obedience, giving, 
service in a multitude of ways including witnessing.


2.  What better time then today, at the first of a New Year to commit yourself
 to the refocusing of your life? 



3.  Will you do it? Will you refocus? I think God wants an answer.

SW11.28.04am
Psalm 106:13-31
INTRO: Friday was the first shopping day after Thanksgiving and is known as “Black Friday”. 

1. I’ll confess that I did go shopping Friday in one store, a book store.

	(1. It was crowded but I was able to buy a bargain - If you bought two
 reduced price books you got a third one free.

2. Actually the bookstore shoppers were a little calmer than you probably
 found in most stores.

	(1. When I checked out the clerk asked if I had a penny - I didn’t
 have one but the guy behind me immediately offered one of his.

3.  Things were a little wilder across the country with stores opening as
 early as 5am and many in line for the opening long before that.

	(1. Because, stores/retailers were offering some incentives and
 bargains for the shoppers.

4.  Erik Gordon, marketing professor at Johns Hopkins University says, "Stores
 are as desperate as ever to get people in the door. But it's another
 holiday season without compelling stuff."  

5. ANNE D'INNOCENZIO, AP Business Writer, writes,  Shoppers swarmed the
 nation's malls and stores on Friday, even before the sun rose, to grab early
 bird deals on hot items like flat-screen TVs and DVD players as the
 holiday shopping season officially began. Despite freezing temperatures 
in some places, and huge crowds everywhere, shoppers came armed with lists, 
credit cards and game plans with almost military precision. They 
created shortages already in some popular gadget gifts. 

Page 2
6. C. Britt Beemer, chairman of America's Research Group, based in Charleston,S.C. 
said, "Every retailer knows that if they are going to win the holiday season, 
they must win this weekend to keep the momentum going.”

7. By the time a Wal-Mart store in the Buffalo, N.Y. suburb of Hamburg opened
 at 6 a.m., one thousand people had formed a lined that reached across 
the entire store front, in spite of the  temperature being only 31 degrees. 

8.  One of the shoppers, Ruth Pompeo, was up at 3am and in line at 4:30am with
 her 11-year-old niece said, "It's our tradition. I don't know what I'm here 
to grab, actually," she paused and then said, "Whatever I can." 

9. At a Wal-Mart store in Alpharetta, Ga., just north of Atlanta, a supply of
 discounted Hasbro Video Now personal video players sold out in only 12 minutes. 

10. Karen Dawkins, of Cayce, S.C who was at a Toys R Us store very early Friday 
morning shared that, "The deals are better this early in the morning." 

	(1.  She was almost done with her shopping just a little after 6 a.m.  because 
her family had a plan. 

	(2.  Karen went on to say, "I have my mother at Circuit City and my sister 
at Target...so we have people stationed at other stores."  "We all got together 
after Thanksgiving dinner and got the ads and made a list." 

11.  Just after 6am in a Plano, Tex., Best Buy store, Martin Clouser and his wife 
Teri were carrying out their attack plan. 

	(1.  Martin stood watch over a shopping cart overflowing with a printer, 
television set, a $14 DVD player and a voucher for a desktop computer. 

Page 3
	(2.  Martin’s wife, Teri, was hunting the aisles for more bargains for Christmas 
gifts. 

12. Martin Clouser shared, "It's like a war plan, she runs in ahead of me, and I get 
the cart. She picks out all the good bargains and carries as much as she can, then throws 
it in the cart and moves to the next station." 

13. Why would they need to be so organized and aggressive in their shopping? 
	
	(1.  When they arrived at 4am they found that there were already several 
hundred people in a line that reached around the store and down the block.

I. As I remarked a couple of weeks ago prior to Thanksgiving - it appears that Thanksgiving 
is becoming a forgotten holiday.

1. Oh, everyone enjoys the time off - but the Christmas decorations and the shopping 
starts long before Thanksgiving.

2. Thanksgiving is a purely Christian holiday with no pagan claims at all - It ought to 
be that way at Christmas but it really isn’t.

3. What is the first thing that people think about when they think of Christmas? 

	(1. It would appear that they think about shopping for Christmas gifts.

4. I would submit to you that long before Thanksgiving was becoming a forgotten 
holiday that the true meaning of Christmas had been forgotten.

5. If we return to our Scripture in Psalm 106 for a moment we will see that this is 
exactly what had happened to the Hebrews after their miraculous escape from 
captivity in Egypt.

Page 4
6. What does that ancient history have to do with us and Christmas shopping? Exactly!

7. We who are Christians have been miraculously delivered from captivity just as the 
Hebrews were.

8. We were in slavery to the world, the flesh and the devil - the chains of sin had 
us bound and we were forced to work for the wages of sin which is “death 
(Romans 6:23a)”.

9. What happened, what occurred to bring about the freedom of the Hebrews? What 
happened was that God sent a Savior, Moses, who led his people to freedom.

10. What happened, what occurred to bring about our freedom? Romans 6:23 God sent us a 
Savior who at the cost of His own life bought, paid for our release 
from bondage.

11. What is the Psalmist remembering had happened long ago after the Hebrews had been 
given their freedom?

	(1. What is happening right now with us who have been granted our freedom?

12. The Psalmist tells us very plainly what has happened and what is wrong at the same 
time. These are sad words that we find in verses 21 and 22 of Psalm 106 where 
the Psalmist says, “They forgot God their Savior, Who had done great things in Egypt, wondrous works 
in the land of Ham, awesome things by the Red Sea.” 

13.  Isn’t that what has happened in our country? We’ve forgotten what Christmas 
is supposed to be about. We’ve forgotten that Christmas is about the birth 
of our Savior.

	(1. About God intervening in history to give us at great cost a Savior - 
God’s own Son.

Page 5
14. We ought to be remembering that it was God Himself in the form of Jesus, fully God, 
yet fully man, who came down from the glories of Heaven to suffer and 
die in our place.

	(1. He became the perfect sacrifice because He was tempted at all points 
and unlike us did not sin. 

	(2. The Bible tells us in Romans 3:23, “For all have sinned and come short of 
the glory of God.”

	(3. All but Jesus have sinned, come short, missed the mark. Only Jesus has walked 
on this earth as a human being and resisted sin and lived in perfection.

15. We ought to be remembering the One who suffered and died in our place because 
we couldn’t do it.

	(1. We can’t save ourselves Ephesians 2:8-9 We can never do enough good works, 
good things to earn our salvation.

	(2. We still need a Savior and that is what Christmas is really all about. 
	(3. That’s why we need to keep the Christ in Christmas.

II.  The Hebrews were doing the same things that we are doing. They were not celebrating 
the awesome miraculous intervention of God that gave them their freedom.

1. No, the Hebrews were looking for ways to make themselves feel good - they were not 
looking to or remembering God.

2. What is it that the Hebrews were doing? The Psalmist tells us, verse 14, “But 
lusted exceedingly in the wilderness, and tested God in the desert.”

3. What were they doing? For one thing they were whining and complaining about not having any 
meat to eat.

Page 6
4. In response, God sent them so many quail to eat that they were sick of eating 
the meat.

	(1. God gave them what they wanted. 

5. The Hebrews also returned to worshipping the pagan ways, pagan gods and the Psalmist 
tells us in verse 19 and 20, “They made a calf in Horeb, and worshiped the molded image. 
Thus they changed their glory into the image of an ox that eats grass.” 

	(1. And in verse 28, “They joined themselves also to Baal of Peor, and ate sacrifices 
made to the dead.” 

6. In verses 24 and 25 the Psalmist tells us that the Hebrews despised their freedom when 
he writes, “Then they despised the pleasant land; they did not believe His word, 
but complained in their tents, and did not heed the voice of the LORD.” 

7. Does it sound a little too familiar? It ought too. It appears that we are worshipping the 
created ie in the fanatic Christmas shopping.

	(1. It seems that we despise not only the land that we live in but the One who 
has given it to us.

8. What am I saying? Exactly what the Psalmist said applies to us. 
	(1. How? After the election did you know that the number of people logging into the 
Canadian immigration website from our country rose from 20,000 per day to 115,000 on November
 3rd and has now stabilized at 65,803 visits per day?

9. 22% of the people said that moral values was the number one thing that influenced the 
way that they voted.

	(1. Apparently it wasn’t what influenced hundreds of thousands of people whose 
causes did not win in the past election 

	(2. And who now so despise this land that God has given them as to want to become 
a citizen of another country.

Page 7
III. Let’s look again at the story of the Hebrews to find wisdom for our lives today.

1. When the Hebrews asked for meat and tested God in the wilderness, God gave them what 
they asked for - but He gave them something else as well. 

	(1.  Actually it was a consequence of turning away from God.

2. What was this consequence? What was it that God gave to the Hebrews in addition 
to what they wanted?

3.  Look at verse 15, “And He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul.” 

	(1. He “sent leanness into their soul.” 

4.  What does that mean? I think it means what we think it means - it’s a bad thing.

5. In our current Christian terminology we speak of growing as a Christian or child of God. 
The opposite of growing is shrinking, or dying, or the old term was “backsliding”. 

6. That’s what “leanness” of the soul means. When we focus, concentrate, desire what 
the world, the flesh and the devil wants we may acquire/gain it.

	(1. At the same time something else is happening. When we gain the world we are 
losing God. 

	(2. The quantity of God in our lives is growing leaner with every bit of worldliness 
we add. It is in direct proportion.

7.  We sin and we become leaner in our relationship to God. We give up service to God, coming 
to church, fellowship with other Christians so that we can have more of something the 
world has to offer -
Page 8
	(1.  And what happens? We grow leaner. The God quantity in our soul shrinks 
and shrivels.

IV. Leanness of the soul is bad enough but something else happens as well - something we 
don’t like to talk about or even think about.

1. When the servant of God, Moses, was envied or you could say that they tried to minimize him 
the Psalmist tells us what happened in verses 16, 17, and 18, “When they envied Moses in 
the camp, And Aaron the saint of the LORD, the earth opened up and swallowed Dathan, and 
covered the faction of Abiram. A fire was kindled in their company; the flame burned 
up the wicked.” 

	(1. It doesn’t sound like the blessing of God does it? Instead it sounds like 
the cursing of God, the judgment of God upon them.

2. When they forgot about God, when they made the calf, when the despised the pleasant land, 
when they complained in their tents, when they did not heed the Voice of God - What 
did God say?

3.  The Psalmist says in verses 26 and 27, “Therefore He raised His hand in an oath against 
them, to overthrow them in the wilderness, to overthrow their descendants among the nations, 
and to scatter them in the lands.”

4. God would have simply obliterated them from the face of the earth if not for what? The 
intercession of Moses. Verse 23, “Therefore He said that He would destroy them, had not 
Moses His chosen one stood before Him in the breach, to turn away His wrath, lest He 
destroy them.” 

	(1. But God didn’t bless them for what they had done. Of course not! And He won’t 
bless us either.

5. When the people persisted in their sins worshipping the false god of baal and offering 
sacrifices to the dead - God rendered judgment upon them.

Page 9
	(1.  Verse 29, “Thus they provoked Him to anger with their deeds, and the plague 
broke out among them.” 

6. That plague would have destroyed them all but for what? What happened was that someone 
stood up for God, stood up for what was right. Verse 30, “Then Phinehas stood up 
and intervened, 
And the plague was stopped.” 

7. The Hebrew nation would have been destroyed outright if not for the intercession 
of their Savior, Moses.

	(1. The Hebrew nation would have been destroyed if not for one other man, Phinehas, 
who stood up for what was right and as a result the plague of judgment was stopped.

V. If you look at our nation honestly you will have to admit there is great leanness of 
soul among the people.

1. You may say but look at all the other people across the world who do not even 
know God?

2. It was the same way with the Hebrew nation but even worse at that time because they were 
the only ones in the entire world that knew the One true God.

3. We have leanness of the soul in this country and it is very obvious that we do.
	(1. In addition we have plagues which are not as obvious but still we have them.

	(2. Many people are living longer but they are not living as long as they could.

	(3. Many of my ancestors lived into their nineties but I doubt that I will.

4. New diseases, viruses, cancers, disorders seem to be discovered on an almost 
daily basis.

Page 10
5. What is it that we need? We need a Savior! We need to put Christ back into Christmas!

6. And we need godly men and women and boys and girls to rise up, to stand up for what is 
right and good - to resist the tide of darkness and evil rolling across our land.

7. Let put aside the leanness and instead grow in our Lord and as we do we will discover 
that we open the doors to God’s blessing upon our lives instead of judgment.

VI. We have been blessed as a church and individually and I don’t believe that we really 
realize by how much.

1. I attended church last Sunday at a church in Weatherford, Texas. It is a church just 
slightly larger than ours.

2. They did have a good offering of around $2,000. They are, it appeared, having to do 
some repairs to their church facility. As we know that can be expensive.

3. Sadly, their pastor, discussed their having to reduce their Lottie Moon Christmas offering 
goal from $2,500 last year to $2,000 this year.

4. He proposed several things to reach their goal including not eating out during the month 
of December and to use the money saved for the offering.

5. Another church I’ve heard about recently is a church where I was saved and baptized in 
Oklahoma City. They had contacted our son Clark about being their pastor.

6. The church had total offerings last year of nearly a half million dollars and undesignated 
offerings of $340,000. But Clark was told that the church has been in serious financial 
trouble for 18 months.


Page 11
7. They do have a large facility, and around 220 in Sunday School, and several paid staff 
members including three secretaries.

	(1. Another church in Oklahoma City is helping them through this financially 
troubled time.

8. We have been blessed here in this church not only with financial blessings but also with 
wisdom among our leaders in how to use those blessings. We should praise God for that! 
Thank Him for it!

VII. CONCLUSION - Christmas is about much more than shopping, and eating, and all of the glitz 
that we are constantly bombarded with by the world.

1. Christmas is about a Savior! And we like Phinehas need to rise up, stand up during this season 
more so than any other for what is right.

2. Last year we gave more to the Lottie Moon Christmas offering than we ever had before. 
Let us do so again.

3. But most of all let us be in the flow of God’s blessings and fullness instead of 
leanness and judgment.

4. Let us choose to honor God this Christmas with our lives.