Good Morning Family!
I'm so grateful for those of you who came to join us today...
And if you're new here, I do not believe you're here by chance or coincidence..
I've noticed some of you, ok nearly all of you (smiling) have a rather puzzled look on your faces regarding the sermon title...
Trust me, there is a message today (laughter)
First, let us honor God as we pray...
Heavenly Father,
We come together today to worship You, to learn to seek You in all things.
But Father, we confess, we are often puzzled and confused as to Your plans for us
when we have made known our requests, and nothing is seemingly happening...
or what is happening, seems to be going in the wrong direction..
We outwardly proclaim our faith and trust in You, but confess, inwardly we often doubt...
Scripture assures us, all things work for the greater good of those who love You and called according to Your purpose.
We praise You in all the times You have demonstrated Your love for us and ask Your forgiveness, in our times of doubt.
We ask You to remove, Lord, all of our clinging fears, take the burdens we carry with us today
replace them with confidence in Your promises, strength to complete the tasks of the day and take our hand, lead us, to lead others, all for Your glory.
In Your name we pray
Amen
Have any of you ever seen that page that accompanies your bank statement, a contract or other
documents that are left blank with the printed words “This page intentionally
left blank” on them?
What does that even mean?
Anyone with me here, I'm left saying to myself,
"These are smart people, right? So there must be a reason for it...but why are they wasting money on an "intentionally left blank page"... or hey, if they're not smart, why am I trusting these people with my money!"
"Thus the heavens and the earth, and all the host of them, were finished. And
on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested
on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made."
Genesis 2:1-3
Another thing I find that is interesting to me that God would stop and rest...
I mean, was He tired or something? Does God even need rest?
Of course not!
God was setting a spiritual precedence!
This was not some mistake or random act!
There was something about His pause...
Music sometimes has a pause. In slow music is it longer and drawn out, but in fast tempos it is shorter.
A poem will often times have a pause.
Sometimes it’s in the middle of a sentence, but it can also be at the beginning or end.
Winnie the Pooh said, “The best somethings happen when you’re doing nothing.”
A pause
A time of Silence.
A time to reflect.
A time to rest from all the work you did the other six days.
“This page intentionally left blank.”
I wonder if we consider how important the Sabbath is to God.
If God set aside that seventh day to rest and consider all that He had done, how much more should we?
For most of us, that Sabbath is Sunday.
But for many who work a job that requires them to work on Sunday’s, they don’t get Sunday off.
So they have to utilize one of the days they have off as their Sabbath or day of rest.
"Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is the Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings."
Leviticus 23:3
So The Sabbath is not just a day of rest, but it is a time of Sacred assembly.
To gather together to worship and learn about the Lord.
Here’s where we have to ask ourselves,
“Are we faithful to the House of God?
Do we really honor the Sabbath the way God wants us to?"
I’m not talking about the occasional vacation.
But the days that we’re too busy to come to church.
On the days, we prefer to be entertained for that matter…
When we’ve got other things to do…are we really saying..
“Sorry God, you’re going to have to wait. I’m going to have some fun today.”
God knows that we sometimes forget and that is the reason for our need to pause.
To reflect.
To refocus
To reconnect
With Him
With our church family.
With our natural family.
If it's important to God, how much more than should it be important to us?
Doesn't the fact that God says it's important, give us reason to make it a priority in our lives?
Or do we get to pick and choose what in Scripture applies to us and what we apply to others?
"Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful. 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."
Hebrews 10:23-25
Paul said, some people have gotten into the habit of not meeting with the church.
People like to talk about other people’s bad habits…
Paul said, “I got one for you…. Missing too much church!”
So what was the purpose of meeting together?
According to Hebrews 10:24, "And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works"
That we might encourage one another, now I don't know about you, but that seems like reason enough to press the pause button on whatever else we're doing on Sunday and come to church!
To stir up love and good works!
Amen?
I have heard some say,
“Oh, I don’t feel like going to church every Sunday.”
Well, let me tell you ,that’s not a good reason to stay home!
“Well, Jesus said we could get an ox out of the ditch on the Sabbath…”
Now that doesn’t mean that we go looking for ox’s to pull out of the ditch every Sunday.
There are somethings that can be scheduled for another day!
Come on now…
This time we all share together, to worship God on Sunday is important.
It has eternal consequences for each and every one of us!
"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy."
Exodus 20:8
Holy! - Definition: dedicated or consecrated to God or a religious purpose; sacred.
Yes, I know it’s not always convenient.
I understand that we don’t feel like it sometimes.
I know we have other things we’d rather do.
I also know other people don’t observe it.
Now let me remind you of something,
"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy."
Exodus 20:8
We know this world that we live in chooses, to quite a large degree to forget about God!
Sunday is His day.
It’s a Holy Day.
It’s consecrated to Him.
"And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Joshua 24:15
Why do we go to church on Sunday?
Because there is always someone we can encourage.
There is someone we can spur on to good works.
Because we often need to be uplifted ourselves.
Because we often need someone to pray with and for us in difficult times
And most importantly because it’s the day that we stop whatever we are doing in our busy lives and say, “Thank you!” to Almighty God.
“I praise and honor you today.”
“I worship you today.”
“This page is intentionally left blank.”
I really like that word “intentionally.”
In fact, I like Intentional people.
People who do things on purpose.
It’s not by accident that they showed up to church… they are intentional about it.
So intentional that you can “count on them.”
So intentional that when they are not there, you worry that maybe something is wrong.
Maybe they are so intentional, they even put it on their calendar.
Or maybe they didn’t put it on their calendar because remembering
the Sabbath and being at church isn’t something that they needed to be
reminded to do... because they look forward to it.
God in His infinite wisdom placed into this world during creation each creative day.
Day one… Light
Day two… Atmosphere
Day three… Dry land and oceans, grass, trees, seeds, reproduction.
Day four… The Sun, the moon, the stars
Day five… the animals, the birds, whales, fish, the bugs, big stuff,
small stuff so small you have to have a microscope to see it.
Day six… Man, then woman, then God creates His earthly kingdom and
sets man up to have dominion and authority to rule over all that He had
created.
Then at the end of a busy week, just when He thought He was done, he
gets sidelined by Lucifer and the whole deal of Adam and Eve eating
from the forbidden tree.
Then there’s the fall of man and the punishment of Lucifer and Adam and Eve and then the whole curse thing.
God had a busy week!
But at the end of it all, instead of going on to the next thing Day
seven comes around and He says… “This page intentionally left blank.”
“I’m going to rest.”
“I’m going to pause.”
“I’m going to reflect.”
“I’m going praise myself for all I’ve been doing…”
Does anyone here today feel like praising Him for all that He’s been doing?
Of all the decisions we make throughout the week…
“Should I do this…?”
“Should I do that…?”
"I wonder, if this is the right decision?"
"Is this the right time...."
One decision that you make will always be the right decision and that is whether or not to Keep the Sabbath Holy.
Whether or not to come to church.
"Therefore do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him."
Matthew 6:8
God knows you need a day of rest, reflection, worship.
Let me ask you something....
How can we expect God to bless us 6 days out of the week if we won’t even stop long enough to bless Him with one day?
People are like, “God I need your help today.”
“And tomorrow too God, I’m going to need your help tomorrow.”
“Oh, and I’ve got that other thing coming up the next day… God… I’m going to need your help there too…. and I've got this situation next week, God I need you to bless that too!"
Aren't we incredibly blessed that God’s not like,
“Well that’s all good, but where were you on Sunday?
You know… the Holy Day?
The day of consecration?
The day to reset
To refocus
To get your heart and mind in order?
The day I set aside for you to get your soul filled with My Holy Spirit?”
Let me share something many of you already know, it’s a lot easier to get through a difficult week when you’ve been in a good church service.
When you can say, I had a bad week, but man we had some good church on Sunday!
You could just feel the Spirit!
You could sense His presence in our midst!
I had goose bumps...
I felt something in me change!
I showed up tired, stressed and worn out from 6 days of “stuff”,
But when it was over, I left empowered by God's Word, I felt encouraged!
Why is that?
Because I kept the Sabbath.
Because I intentionally kept a page blank.
By the time it was over, I felt like my world was a better place.
I wasn’t so worried.
It wasn’t so dark.
I felt better.
I felt blessed.
In Closing...
Ask yourself...
Where does your “Blank Page” get filled up?
Where is your Sabbath?
Would you pause and take this moment to consecrate a Holy Day to the Lord?
Would you make a commitment today to be committed to gathering together to worshiping God?
Pray with me please...
Lord, I pray that help me to truly understand the value of my church in my life.
Help me to be a blessing of encouragement to others as I faithfully serve and minister to others here, and in the world.
Let this be a consecrated day to You, O Lord
Where I reflect on Your goodness, growing in wisdom and knowledge and learning about Your majesty.
Lord, thank You for this day that is set aside in my life, each and every week, to honor You, and give You the praise that You deserve
And in doing these things, that I may grow closer in my relationship with You!
Amen
Brian Monzon Ministries