Covenant of Hope
Ministries Sunday Sermon_11_17_2013
Good
afternoon, and welcome to this Sunday Sermon for Covenant of Hope Ministries. I
am Rev. Laura A. Neff. The ministry knows me as the Rainbow Minister. Find us
posted on Sundays and studies on Wednesday. Our locations are online only:
Our Main Video Feed: Covenant_of_Hope
We have
email (instant messenger if you need me) through Facebook every day. These are
now extremely variable. We’re still working this out between the two of us as
to what will happen, our Elder, Cal Jennings and I. I will inform you further
regarding changes. These changes were made due to health reasons. The sermon
length has shortened dramatically. We are unsure as to when there might be
video presentations.
Prayer List: We have many on our prayer list. Some wish to remain anonymous, and others only wish to have their first names mentioned. Our prayer list has grown from last week. This is our current prayer list for this week.
- Continue your prayers for Phoebe Fair’s family as they
continue to grieve her loss.
- Please keep Elder Cal Jennings in your prayers as his health
doesn’t know where it wants to be.
- Please pray for my friend Teresa’s sister who is in stage four
cancer. Keep Teresa and her daughter in prayer for many other things that have
been weighing down on their hearts, minds, and spirits.
- Please keep others known by any of us up in prayer for
whatever they might need.
- Please keep my friend Heather in prayer for patience and safe
haven.
- Please keep my whole family in prayer for the pain, suffering,
and chaos we are going through.
- Please keep a child from my sister’s classes who lost his
mother. He is nine years old. The family is devastated and needs prayers for
solace and understanding.
- Pray that the adversity and the pain we have seen around the
world would be relieved, and swept away. May we find common ground in many
ways, even if we start with just one step.
- Remember those who have been lost either violently or
peacefully this week.
- Keep the ministry in your thoughts, each member, no matter
their location, their circumstances, because a group of friends, a ministry,
should support one another.
- There are many in our ministry who are searching for more in
regard to our presence with my health, and with the health of others. We pray
that there would be health found once more, and that we have answers to all and
for all.
Prayer: Father in heaven, we
thank You for this day and for these who are here to share it with us. We are
thankful for the blessings and inspirations brought to us sometimes minute to
minute. We are thankful for the gifts of friendship, family, hope, and love. We
pray for those who need all of those and for those of us who have lost our
faith. Open the eyes of our hearts, and help us see how to set them free. Amen
and so it shall be.
Opening Song: Open the Eyes of My Heart http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zHRpZjk3ctU
Sermon: There are so many times we ask,
beg, plead for mercy. David, as we have noted, and most of those in Jerusalem
or all of Scripture, would do this same thing. Why do we ask for mercy so much?
We forget to give those things that stress us up to Him. We’ll start here in Psalm 51:1 KJV – Have
mercy upon me, O God, according to thy lovingkindness: according unto the
multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my transgressions.
According
to God’ patience, and mercy, take our transgressions. This is what is being
asked. Patience and mercy often seem to go together because we often forget to
keep our patience so that not only do we receive His mercy, we can also be
merciful. Yet, here we are again, asking for mercy. Another view is found here
in Colossians 2:14 KJV – Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was
against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to
his cross.
Nailing
it where? Nailing our transgressions, our sins, and all that has built up
within us that shouldn’t be, all of that, to the cross where Jesus died for us.
Now, isn’t this interesting that we should equate what is asked for, begged for
in Psalms to what is proven and given in the New Testament? No, not really,
it’s known as forseeing, prophesy of the future. It is just as much a hope as
it is a prayer and then given action, making it real. That’s why we go back and
forth through Scripture to see what was, what should be, and then look at it
through what is. Here we see another view in Psalm 51:10
KJV – Create in me a clean heart, O God; and
renew a right spirit within me.
How many
times do we want someone else to clean up the mess? Well, regardless that we
would get ourselves tangled up in that same mess, and all by ourselves, we
don’t always want to get ourselves out on our own. That’s when we beg for
mercy, we ask to start over. Then, all we do is start to doubt we’ve done, or
He has helped us do, that, as is shared here. Proverbs
20:9 KJV –Who can say, I have made my heart
clean, I am pure from my sin?
We go
from having God’s help to God showing us what’s been wrong. God can indeed
prove us wrong, and has done so many times to many people, within and outside
of Scripture. Here we see a view of what God would rather not see. Jeremiah 13:27 KJV – I
have seen thine adulteries, and the neighings, the lewdness of thy whoredom,
and thine abominations on the hills in the fields. Woe unto thee, O Jerusalem!
wilt thou not be made clean? when shall it once be?
This is
the question. When will it happen? Why won’t we keep it that way? Well, first
of all, we’re human and it is our choice, but, we must be careful what we
choose. Now we get to the good part. It is possible to change completely. There
are many times we have heard about the heart of stone. In this case, that can
be made new, in more ways than one. Here’s just an example. Ezekiel 11:19 KJV – And
I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you; and I will
take the stony heart out of their flesh, and will give them an heart of flesh!
Many
times we don’t realize our hearts have become indifferent, unmovable, hard and
sometimes impossible to see. We don’t understand how this can happen, but it
does all the same. Yet, there are, again, ways of resolving this. One of those
is opening our eyes, the eyes in our hearts. When we do, we can learn to see
things in a new pair of eyes as shared in this verse. Acts
15:9 KJV – And put no difference between us
and them, purifying their hearts by faith.
No
barriers between us or them, hearts purified by faith. That’s the challenge, to
see what God has given us. The ability to realize that flesh and blood is flesh
and blood. Our hearts can be made pure if we see it not in the color of our
skin, our eyes, hair, or any thing that is outside of us. It is within us that
we find the most important part. Our minds, our spirits, our souls, our hearts,
those are much more worthy of examination than the rest. Here is yet another
reason why. Ephesians 2:10 KJV – For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto
good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.
Walk in
His footsteps, those footprints in the sand. We are His workmanship, in more
ways than one. We are through the fact that He created us. Then we add that we
are because Jesus gave us a new life, a new beginning to prove that His
creations can regain what was lost. What would this be? Faith, trust,
understanding, and more, there are so many things that once were lost to us,
but we can find them, not just on our own, but through Christ Jesus who died
for us. Now that’s something to think about as we pray in the prayer Jesus
taught us saying: After this manner therefore pray ye:
Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine
is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. (Matthew 6:9-13 KJV)
Closing Song: Footprints in the Sand
~Shalom~
Covenant
of Hope Ministries
Scripture
Excerpts: The New Open Bible Study Edition:Copyright © 1990: Thomas Nelson
Publishers, Inc.
Scripture
Excerpts: Holy Bible: Copyright © 1982: E. E. Gaddy and Associates, Inc.
Scripture
Excerpts: Holy Bible: Copyright © circa 1890-1910: International Bible
Press,The John C. Winston Co.; Philadelphia, PA., USA
Sermon or
Study Copyright © 2012 http://covenantofhopeministries.blogspot.com/
Our mission for Covenant of Hope Ministries and
Poetic-Expressions is not to exploit fear, but to conquer it, and overcome all
that is created through fear together as the rainbow in the darkness.
No comments:
Post a Comment