Sermon notes on 1 Corinthians 6:9-11.
“If I had one prayer….”
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If God came to you and said, “I’ll give you one prayer request,” what would you ask for? What’s the one thing you would request? That’s a revealing question isn’t it? It helps us discover our highest priority, our deepest longing, and our hidden motivation. And that’s good, because our priorities, longings, and motivations often influence and control us without us realizing it.
In Psalm 27, King David tells us what he asked for when given when given this prayer opportunity. He was facing external and internal enemies. He asked for a sight of God’s beauty because God’s beauty expels ugly fears.
“The church is full of hypocrites”
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“The church is full of hypocrites.” This is probably the most common excuse people use to avoid thinking about the claims of Christianity. They excuse their unbelief with Christian hypocrisy. They don’t act because Christians are just actors, pretenders, living contradictions.
So how do we live in such a way that the accusation is false, the charge doesn’t stick, we’re found innocent. The answer, says Psalm 26, is integrity, which means our outward lives match our inner beliefs. If hypocrisy is all about living a contradiction, integrity is all about living consistently. Psalm 26 tells us living before God consistently starts with loving God consistently.
Direction for the Disoriented
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All of us know the confusion and frustration of spiritual disorientation. So did King David, and in Psalm 25, he re-orients and re-directs us with this message: When sin disorients you, ask God to direct you.
Empowering Praise
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When you feel weak and intimidated, tour Christ’s triple kingdom to be triply empowered by Christ’s triple power.
The American Dream Comes True
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Ten years into marriage, Paul and Jen had drifted from God and from one another. They’d followed the American dream, but it had mutated into an awful nightmare. Yes, they had two busy careers, two new cars, and two beautiful children. But they had lost their love for God and for one another. They had everything, yet had nothing. They lacked nothing, yet lacked everything. God was teaching them that we will lack, lose, and get lost when we follow anyone but the Lord. But they weren’t listening or learning.
Paul’s father died of a heart attack later that year and the first song at his funeral was Psalm 23. Although they had sung it many times before, this time, Paul and Jen couldn’t get past the first line. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want (1). They choked up as they realized the Lord was no longer their shepherd and, therefore, they had multiple wants. Over the next few weeks, Paul and Jen read Psalm 23 many times, both together and alone. Its message was loud and clear: Follow the Lord’s leading and you’ll never lack, never lose, and never get lost.