This is Amazing Grace!
I sure do miss having revival at the end of January at Pine Valley United Methodist Church. I had just been thinking about it last week. That Sunday morning, I went to revival! After a lot of chaos that week and some worrying, I needed revival, and I got it on Sunday morning at PVUMC. I do not take that for granted. Sometimes there just seems to be something extra special going on, and it was with the first song. We sang “This Is Amazing Grace” by Phil Wickham. “Who breaks the power of sin and darkness? Whose love is mighty and so much stronger? The King of glory, the King above all kings...Who brings our chaos back into order?...This is amazing grace, this is unfailing love. That You would take my place, That You would bear my cross.” I kept thinking about how the world can try to stop us from being encouraged and keep us from church, but God can always find a way! Of course, He does! Doesn’t He tell us He will never leave us? Deuteronomy 31:6, “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the Lord your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Pastor Tim talked about the four don’ts we should learn from Moses. Number one, don’t let your past deter your future. Exodus 3:4, “When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, ‘Moses! Moses!’ And Moses said, ‘Here I am.’” It is amazing grace that all of our past sins do not determine our future. Philippians 3:13, “Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead…”
Number two, don’t let your defeat define or disqualify you. For years, I let my defeat define me and disqualify me from many opportunities that God presented. Moses got tongue-tied, so he felt that should disqualify him. But God told him, in Exodus 4:16-17, “He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. But take this staff in your hand so you can perform the signs with it.” Remember, He doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called!
Number three, Don’t let your setback silence you. I am sure we have all wanted to give up after things didn’t go the way we thought. We let shame take over. Pastor Tim reminded us that Moses walked around the wilderness for forty years. What I did not know was that most scholars say that they should have gotten there in eleven days! Not years, eleven days!
Number four, don’t let your performance take the place of God’s presence. We make it all about ourselves. Exodus 33:14-15, “The Lord replied, ‘My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.’ Then Moses said to him, ‘If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here.’” If we invite the Holy Spirit in, it makes all the difference. I When I speak, I always ask God to empty me of myself and fill me up with the Holy Spirit because I know I cannot do it myself! Like Moses, I do not want to go there if His Presence does not go with me! With God, look at the great things Moses did!
When I left church Sunday, I felt like I had been to revival, and I was not the only one. My husband, Mike, was talking about it. We went by the grocery store and saw some church friends who said that was one of the best sermons and how it spoke to them. Later I talked to someone who had watched online, and they said it was a great sermon, and they could only imagine that music in person! It had been extra special. That night I got a text from a friend in Pennsylvania who was watching online! Isn’t it amazing how the Holy Spirit gets in there and stirs everything up in us and even comes through the television screen into our homes?! This is amazing grace!
The Bible tells us that all people have been blind, living in the darkness of sin. Jesus came to earth to live and then suffer and die on the cross to save us from our sin. We have been rescued from ourselves through God’s amazing grace. That grace is free to all who accept it! Ephesians 1:7, “In him, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.” We aren’t deserving of God’s love, but He pours it on us anyway. It’s not because of who we are, but because of Who He is. If we choose to follow Him, He sends His Holy Spirit to live in us. That is amazing grace!