Crazy Faith - Part 2
07/01/08 10:27
The
Sunday after Pastor John Halvorsen announced to his
church, Great Lakes Gospel Church in Duluth, that he
was stepping down as pastor to embark on Prayer Walk
Eurasia, he invited me to preach at the morning
service on the subject of “Crazy Faith.” It seemed an
appropriate message in light of what God was planning
for John to do. So I drove up to Duluth with Ron
Olson (actually, Ron did most of the driving) and
shared the following message. It is an extension of
the article,
Crazy Faith, that
was in our March 2008 Langstaff Letter.
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Leave A Legacy
05/01/08 10:28
Recently,
I was speaking at a meeting about the need to leave a
legacy and a record of what God has done in your life
that can be passed on to future generations. When the
children of Israel crossed over the Jordan River to
enter the Promised Land, the Lord spoke to them,
“Take for yourselves twelve men. . . .and command
them to take twelve stones from the River Jordan.”
These stones were to be a memorial to the children of
Israel forever. In later years when their children
would ask their fathers, “What are these stones?”
(Joshua 4:4-7), they would be told the story of the
miraculous crossing of the river. In other words,
they were to build stones of remembrance; they were
to leave a legacy.
This is something that we all should do, both as individuals and as churches and ministries. We should celebrate God’s goodness, God’s faithfulness and His blessings in our lives. Read More...
This is something that we all should do, both as individuals and as churches and ministries. We should celebrate God’s goodness, God’s faithfulness and His blessings in our lives. Read More...
Crazy Faith - Part 1
03/01/08 11:26
It
was the first Sunday of the New Year and Tom Fox, the
pastor of our church, brought a word from the Lord
for the church and for individual people. It was
entitled Crazy Faith.
He used the story from Mark 2 of the four men who brought their friend to Jesus. It happened in Capernaum and Jesus was in a house, probably Simon Peter’s residence, which is where Jesus probably stayed in Capernaum. A crowd gathered that packed out the house as Jesus preached the word to them.
Along came four men carrying a paralytic, presumably each one holding on to one corner of his bed. Unfortunately, because of the crowd they couldn’t get inside the house. So what were they to do? Go home? No way! They came up with an idea that required Crazy Faith. Houses in those days had a flat roof reached by an outside stairway and used for additional living space. So the four friends carried the paralytic man up on to the roof where they proceeded to tear a hole in the roof that was so big they were able to lower the man right down into the midst of the crowd in front of Jesus. It was a crazy thing to do. To the people inside the house it must have seemed crazy, but not to Jesus. These four friends had crazy faith and the Bible records these words, “When Jesus saw their faith he said to the paralytic, ‘Son your sins are forgiven you,’” which was followed by a miraculous healing. All this because of the crazy faith of four men!
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He used the story from Mark 2 of the four men who brought their friend to Jesus. It happened in Capernaum and Jesus was in a house, probably Simon Peter’s residence, which is where Jesus probably stayed in Capernaum. A crowd gathered that packed out the house as Jesus preached the word to them.
Along came four men carrying a paralytic, presumably each one holding on to one corner of his bed. Unfortunately, because of the crowd they couldn’t get inside the house. So what were they to do? Go home? No way! They came up with an idea that required Crazy Faith. Houses in those days had a flat roof reached by an outside stairway and used for additional living space. So the four friends carried the paralytic man up on to the roof where they proceeded to tear a hole in the roof that was so big they were able to lower the man right down into the midst of the crowd in front of Jesus. It was a crazy thing to do. To the people inside the house it must have seemed crazy, but not to Jesus. These four friends had crazy faith and the Bible records these words, “When Jesus saw their faith he said to the paralytic, ‘Son your sins are forgiven you,’” which was followed by a miraculous healing. All this because of the crazy faith of four men!
Read More...