Genesis 22:1-14 (NLT)“Abraham!” God called. “Yes,” he replied. “Here I am.” “Take your son, your only son—yes, Isaac, whom you love so much—and go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you.” The next morning Abraham got up early. He saddled his donkey and took two of his servants with him, along with his son, Isaac. Then he chopped wood for a fire for a burnt offering and set out for the place God had told him about. On the third day of their journey, Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. “Stay here with the donkey,” Abraham told the servants. “The boy and I will travel a little farther. We will worship there, and then we will come right back.” So Abraham placed the wood for the burnt offering on Isaac’s shoulders, while he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them walked on together, Isaac turned to Abraham and said, “Father?” “Yes, my son?” Abraham replied. “We have the fire and the wood,” the boy said, “but where is the sheep for the burnt offering?” “God will provide a sheep for the burnt offering, my son,” Abraham answered. And they both walked on together. When they arrived at the place where God had told him to go, Abraham built an altar and arranged the wood on it. Then he tied his son, Isaac, and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. And Abraham picked up the knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. At that moment the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” “Yes,” Abraham replied. “Here I am!” “Don’t lay a hand on the boy!” the angel said. “Do not hurt him in any way, for now I know that you truly fear God. You have not withheld from me even your son, your only son.” Then Abraham looked up and saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. So he took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering in place of his son. Abraham named the place Yahweh-Yireh. (God Provides)
Cultivating a Hopeful Spirit.
1. Select what you expect
-Hope is not “wishful thinking”
-Hope is not driven by anxiety
-Hope is confident favorable expectation.
1 Peter 1:4 (NLT) “We live with great expectation, and we have a priceless inheritance.”
Hope must be well placed!
Proverbs 13:12(NLT) Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.
“Our Hope is not in the particulars but in His promises!”
2. Hold onto promise
Hebrews 10:23(NLT) Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise.
Hebrews 11:11(NLT) By faith Abraham, even though he was past age--and Sarah herself was barren--was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise.
3. Stay classy during difficulty
Even our struggles produce….
Romans 5:3-5 (NLT) 3 We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. 4 And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. 5 And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
4. Steward Hope
1 Thessalonians 1:3 We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
1 Peter 1:3-4 All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by his great mercy that we have been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now we live with great expectation, and we have a priceless inheritance...
Matthew 16: 13-19(NLT) When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” “Well,” they replied, “some say John the Baptist, some say Elijah, and others say Jeremiah or one of the other prophets.”Then he asked them, “But who do you say I am?”Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
1- We are HIS Church & He builds it.
2- He uses people
Ekklesia: The called out ones
1 Peter 2:4-5 (NLT)You are coming to Christ, who is the living cornerstone of God’s temple. He was rejected by people, but he was chosen by God for great honor. And you are living stones that God is building into his spiritual temple.
LIVING STONES: The church is not simply an organization it’s an organism.
3- He gives the church the keys.
“God is in charge of the product the church is over distribution.”
Genesis 28: 12 Then he (Jacob) dreamed, and behold, a ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven; and there the angels of God were ascending and descending on it. And behold, the LORD stood above it…
(16,17) Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, "Surely the LORD is in this place, and I did not know it." And he was afraid and said, "How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven!"
…gate of heaven!" | Shahar(root: Shawhar) Opening of heaven a opening that was split open. Access point, A portal…a opening.
Matthew 6:9-10 (NIV) "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
This life in Christ starts with a Question
“WHO DO YOU SAY I AM!?”
The Movement starts with a Response.
Respond by taking the keys(keys are responsibility)…
Our Purpose: Every person in our city would Encounter the reality of Jesus.
We are a people that are: Kingdom cultured, Presence centered & Relationally connected!
Created as image bearers
Genesis 1:26-28 (NLT) 26 Then God said, “Let us make human beings in our image, to be like ourselves. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground.” 27 So God created human beings in his own image. In the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. 28 Then God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it.
Then we allowed that to be questioned.
Genesis 3:5 (NIV) "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”.
“To question that we were created to represent God will hinder us fulfilling our purpose!”
Jesus established a system
1 Corinthians 6:19 (NIV) Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own.
BUT WE ARE BROKEN……
Jeremiah 2:13 "My people have committed two sins: They have forsaken me, the spring of living water, and have dug their own cisterns, broken cisterns that cannot hold water.
John 4:6...Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well(Jacobs well). It was about the sixth hour. 7 When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, "Will you give me a drink?" 8 (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.) 9 The Samaritan woman said to him, "You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?" (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered her, "If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water." 11 "Sir," the woman said, "you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his flocks and herds?" 13 Jesus answered, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." 15 The woman said to him, "Sir, give me this water so that I won't get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water." 16 He told her, "Go, call your husband and come back." 17 "I have no husband," she replied. Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true." 19 "Sir," the woman said, "I can see that you are a prophet....
Jesus…..
1. Jesus repairs what is Broken!
“Jesus wants to renew the dreams...but first he will repair the dreamer!”
“Jesus will never give what we need without giving us the means to contain it!”
Psalms 34:18 The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
2. Jesus does what it takes to meet needs.
3. Jesus opens wells
John 4:28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 "Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?" 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.…..39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony.
John 7:37-39 (NIV) 37 On the last and greatest day of the Feast, Jesus stood and said in a loud voice(NLT Shouted), "If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him." 39 By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had not yet been glorified.
