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Some biblical principles that can help us respond to tragedy God’s way.

1. Remember that this is not Heaven.

Bible is brutally honest about this.

Many go through life with Two mistaken ideas:

A. The good things that happen to me prove to me I’m good, and

B. The bad things that happen to me prove I’m bad.

God gives everyone the ability to make choices.

2. Be Real About How We Feel.

Tragedy always creates strong emotions.

We need to release our feelings to God.

3. Accept Help.

When a crisis comes, who’s going to hold you up without God

and any meaningful relationships?

4. Refuse to be Bitter.

Some people have no happiness: they live & die with bitter hearts.

Bitterness = self-inflicted wound.

How do we keep from being bitter?

A. Accept what we cannot change.

Faith is facing the facts of life and not getting discouraged.

B. Focus on what we have.

God’s will for us in a crisis is to express gratitude.

5. Remember What Matters.

Tragedy has a way of clarifying values.

The only security in life, is to build it on something that can never be taken from us.

What’s the most difficult command in the Bible to follow? Phil 4:6.

An average person’s worry is: 40% are things that will never happen, 30% are things about the past that can’t be changed, 12% are things about criticism by others (much of which is untrue), 10% are things about health, 8% are real problems that will be faced!

Eng. root word: “to choke, to strangle”. Gk. word: “a divided mind”.

1. What is the Truth about Worry?

A. Worry is not logical.

It can be an unreasonable obsession with unimportant things.

B. Worry is not normal.

We have learned how to worry (and we can unlearn it!)

C. Worry is useless.

It is “stewing without doing”.

D. Worry indicates a lack of understanding about God’s character.

2. What is the Truth about Overcoming Worry?

God’s solution to the problem with worry we all struggle with?

A. Have the right life priority.

Worry is a warning light of mixed-up values & confused priorities.

B. Focus on each day.

“Today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday!”

God’s provision is daily.

C. Rely on God.

Worry and trust cannot live within the same heart.

God’s peace: “stands as a sentry” – “God’s ‘protective custody’ of those who are in Christ Jesus extends to the core of their beings.

Peace or worry?

What we experience in our life becomes a spiritual question.

Who are we trusting in and relying on?

Pain is not pleasant or fun. No one likes pain. But pain is a part of life.

Why does God permit pain to sometimes touch our lives?

The truth is God often uses pain as a tool for His good purposes in our life.

1. Pain Can Be God’s Tool to Nudge Me.

It pushes & pressures & forces us to change when we don’t want to.

We don’t always “see the light”, but we “feel the heat”.

Pain can gently prod us into the arms of our Heavenly Father.

2. Pain Can Be God’s Tool to Guide Me.

The person who has never suffered does not really know much.

3. Pain Can Be God’s Tool to Examine Me.

Pain has the capacity to “burn-off” a lot of things in us.

It’s a test that reveals what we really are inside.

4. Pain Can Be God’s Tool to Protect Me.

God can use pain to guard and defend us from something worse.

5. Pain Can Be God’s Tool to Mature Me.

Pain is the high cost of growth.

The thing that is most discouraging in our life today is also the thing God is using the most to develop us.

Pain always moves us. While pain is inevitable in life, misery is optional.

Pain is never fun, and we should not go looking for it.

But God never wastes anything…even our pain.

He is using whatever pain is in our life right now to develop and grow us in ways we could have never matured otherwise.

How we see God is crucial. It affects the way we see ourselves.

Jesus taught us that God is very personal & intimately acquainted with us.

Some of us struggle because we’re not telling ourselves truth about God.

What kind of Father is God really like?

1. God is a Compassionate Father.

Misconceptions about God began with the very first human beings.

The truth is, God is “compassionate”.

Why does God sometimes say “no” to us?

Obeying God = enjoying life.

2. God is a Consistent Father.

2 phases of temptation: a. Phase 1 = doubt b. Phase 2 = deception.

God is a reliable and trustworthy Father.

God can be counted on. “His love endures forever”.

3. God is a Personal Father.

The great questions of life are profoundly shaped in us by our parents (especially Dads!).

How much is something worth?

Whatever price someone is willing to pay for something

(“you were bought at a price.” 1 Cor. 6:20).

4. God is a Gracious Father.

Some of us had parents that could never be pleased and some

of us think God is the same way.

The truth is, God is gracious, He has accepted us in Jesus Christ.

We learn lots of myths as children and we grow out of them…but we keep learning myths about ourselves, others, our world, and God all our lives.

Without the right truth in our lives, we can get into big trouble.

It’s possible to be sincere, but sincerely wrong!

1. You Are What You Think

What I believe:

A. Is My Choice (note Romans 1:25).

We can discard beliefs and accept new ones.

B. Determines My Behaviour (note Proverbs 4:23).

Wrong beliefs produce similar actions.

C. May be based on psycho-babble.

D. Powerfully Affects My Emotional Health (note Jn 8:32 & Matt 7:24)

How can we begin to change the way we think?

2. Commitment is the Key (note Romans 12:2)

A. I recognise that the only source of absolute truth is God

(note Romans 3:4; Hebrews 6:18; Luke 21:33).

What is going to be the foundation for my life?

Only 2 options: What people say, or what God says.

B. I commit myself to seeking the truth (note 2 Tim 4:3 1 Tim 4:7, 3:15)

We must be careful to not equate experiences with God’s truth…

C. I commit myself to living the truth (note Ephesians 4:14-15)

D. I commit myself to believing in the truth

(note 2 Thessalonians 2:9-13; John 14:6).

We have the freedom to choose what we believe in,

but there are consequences.

In these concluding verses, Paul points out how the “obvious life” is lived for the praise of people, while the “extraordinary life” is lived for the glory of God. What is our motive for following Jesus?

A good work is spoiled by a bad motive. (Wiersbe)

1. Motives of Legalism. (Gal. 6:12-13)

A. In Search of Applause.

Legalism thrives on the approval and applause of others.

B. Self-Preservation.

Legalism makes us completely self-absorbed.

C. Living a Lie.

The perverse element of legalism is the hypocrisy it produces.

2. Grace-Inspired Motivations. (Gal. 6:14-18)

A. Jesus Only.

Grace-based lives are continuously weaned of pride.

B. The Pursuit of Holiness.

Grace-based lives long for Holy Spirit power for life & service.

C. Eternal Perspective.

Grace-based lives are consumed with a desire to see their own lives and the lives of others profoundly changed.

D. Complete Ownership.

“stigmata” = “marks or brands to distinguish slave ownership.”

Suffering or blessing…are all used by the God.

Conclusion:

May God’s grace inspire the kind of motivations that make our lives worth living and worth being watched by others.

Freedom in Jesus motivates us to do good (by being):

1. Good Supporters. (Gal. 6:6-7)

- “Share” = “koinonia” = “fellowship” (“sharing of material blessings with one another”)

- We must remember that what we do with material things is an evidence of how we value spiritual things. (Wiersbe)

2. Good Imitators. (Gal. 6:6-8)

- Everything we do is an investment of some kind.

- The more we sow to please the Spirit…the more we will experience the reality of the fruit of the Spirit manifested in our relationships.

3. Good Marathoners. (Gal. 6:9-10)

- The Christian life is often compared to a race.

- But not a quick sprint…the Christian life is a marathon.

- The promise = “we will reap a harvest”.

Conclusion:

- Are we motivated by our freedom in Jesus to be generous?

- Are we growing weary in doing well?

- Then get refocused on the promise (“the harvest we will reap”),

The sport of weightlifting demands 2 things for success:

A. A supportive team.

B. Individual responsibility.

If we are free in Christ we extend freedom to others in 2 primary ways:

1. By Carrying Each Other’s Burdens. (Gal. 5:26-6:2)

- Difference between legalism and Spirit-produced life:

Nothing reveals the wickedness of legalism better than the way legalists treat those who have sinned. (Wiersbe)

2. By Carrying Our Own Load. (Gal. 6:3-5)

- Danger of pride in this process…

- We shift the attention from Christ to self, from divine grace to human goodness. (Blackwood)

- A man should ‘prove his own work’ in the light of God’s will and not in the shadows of someone else’s achievements.

- A person in step with the Spirit is more than willing to “shoulder his own pack” without complaining and pity-parties.

Conclusion:

- Christian freedom makes us weightlifters.

- To bear the burdens of others and to carry our own load is an expression and manifestation of the Spirit-filled life.

The “heart” of Galatians (5:16-26) concludes by returning to the absolute importance of the Spirit-filled/controlled/empowered life.

What does Gal. 5:24-26 (and Rom. 6) tell us about “keeping in step” with the Holy Spirit?

1. The “Obvious Life” Has Been “Unplugged”. (Gal 5:24 Rom 6:3-7)

- The “obvious life” has not been eliminated completely… but it has been “unplugged”.

- “Keeping in step with the Spirit” begins with a personal acceptance of this truth.

2. The “Extraordinary Life” Is Real. (Gal. 5:25; Rom. 6:8-22)

- We are free to act upon the truth that though we had once been “dead in sin”…we are now alive in Jesus.

- We are free to offer ourselves to God.

- The Spirit-filled life flows out of the following biblical principles:

A. We need to know who we are in Jesus Christ.

B. We need to believe that this truth is true for us.

C. We need to offer “the parts of our body” to the Holy Spirit.

D. We need to ask to be filled with the Holy Spirit…this is ultimately God’s work… an act of trust in a loving God.