Last Night!

The past two week ends have been a struggle spiritually.
It has not been an easy time, but I guess the most important thing to come out of this is to realize that we are all growing, trying to hear God.

As worship leader, I missed it last night.
The songs that I picked were not what was needed.
Here again is the learning process. Of course you'd think after 15 years I'd be better at it.
I'm learning.
When worship is going on, the one thing you don't want to do is watch the room and respond to how they are responding. If the crowd is flat and doesn't seem to be entering into worship, you have a tendency to want to do something to pump them up. Unfortunately, that is manipulation and I think God doesn't look to favorably on this.

The message was on "leaving the past".
Saul/Paul was the main focus of the teaching.
Paul's life prior to his Damascus road encounter with Jesus as compared to Paul's life after the encounter.
It was the encounter with Jesus that became the defining moment in Paul's life.
What occurred after this encounter was the "leaving of the past" for Paul.
no longer was he the enemy of the church.
He became the voice of the church.
Paul never forgot the terrible things that he brought against the Church of Jesus.
He never allowed it to define him. Paul took the past and used it as fuel to move forward with Jesus.

In Philippians we read where Paul lists all his accomplishments before he met Jesus as compared with his current life. Paul said that they count for nothing. In fact Paul says that they pale in comparison of the knowledge of knowing Jesus. He counts them all in the negative column when weighed against his relationship with Jesus.

Seems to me that today people simply want to forget what they have done.
Remembrance of your past does not mean you have to heap guilt, shame and condemnation on yourself. It is a reminder that fosters gratitude for what Christ has done in us and for us.
"Brothers, 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, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus."

mb