Victory Over Danger - with Pas

[Music] church family we will begin our fall session of small group classes on tuesday september 21st with teachings written by our pastor ralph douglas west check out sgbs.tcww.org to join one of our classes to equip and encourage you in this season resilient the ability to spring back into shape after bending stretching or even being compressed does this describe you the pandemic health challenges financial crisis the stresses of work and family along with life's endless twists and turns can be the strongest person but you you're still standing women stand up the trials and tests that stretched you resulted into something beautiful and a new a resilient woman so let's celebrate join the mosaic women's ministry for our amazing women's weekend virtual experience september 23rd through the 25th you are amazing graciously embracing your journey and persevering toward your new best spiritual physical emotional and social self your hardships did not kill you you emerged like a phoenix from the ashes stronger wiser resilient so join us today and register at amazingwomensweekend.com [Music] do [Music] do [Music] do [Music] praise the lord church without walking hallelujah great and mighty is he great and mighty is he clothed in glory a raid and splendor great and mighty is [Music] is [Music] is [Music] celebrate its grace [Music] our lives [Music] is is anyways [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Music] is [Music] oh yeah [Music] [Applause] [Music] is this is the day the lord has made we rejoice and we are glad in it it is a joy for us to return during this summer season of study from the word of god and from the sacred scriptures and so i want to dive right into one of what i think is the most significant chapters in all of the scripture found in the gospel of mark primarily chapter 4 to chapter 5. it speaks of our lord's lordship over all things you'll remember when you come to colossians chapter 1 paul would write a poem and they would sing it as a hymn for the church and the theme of that hymn would be the supremacy of christ over all things and in it he says and in christ all things hold together he's lord over all things that's a big proposition that god in jesus christ is over all things but what does that look like when you say christ is over all things that jesus is lord of everything it's one thing to say it's something else to see it and so i've chosen for these next several weeks for our bible study to look at mark beginning at chapter four beginning at verse 35 and concluding at verse 41 at the voyage that jesus will take across the galilee and in this story we see where christ is lord over every danger and so i want to tag this text victory over danger let's read it and then we'll read by walking through it and make applications to our life and how we can use it beginning at verse 35 hear god's word for god's people that day when evening came he said to his disciples let's go to the other side of the sea and leaving the crowd behind it took him just as he was in a boat and there were other little boats with him a furious squall came up and the waves broke over the boat so that it was nearly swamped and jesus was in the stern sleeping on a cushion the disciples woke him and said to him teacher don't you care if we drown he got up rebuked the wind and said to the waves quiet be still then the wind died down and it was completely calm and he said to his disciples why are you so afraid do you still have no faith and they were terrified and ask each other who is this even the winds and the waves obey him you can be a casual reader of the scriptures and there are certain truths that leap from the pages especially the busy and industrious ministerial activity that espoused the life of jesus if you look at the preceding verses you'll see where he's been teaching and giving insight to what the kingdom of god is like it's like seed growing in the soil that's like a sower sowing seed or it's like a lamp on a stand and so jesus had spent so much of his energy teaching and preaching to give people an insight of what the kingdom of god looks like the kingdom of god is like but even the best of us grow weary and during this summer season though we're studying from god's word i trust that you would pull aside somewhere like jesus does in this story and take you a journey somewhere it may be the backyard it may be around the corner to the park it may be sitting on a park bench beneath the tree it may be a walk in the neighborhood that you pull apart from everything else so that you don't come apart and so after a full day of activity and so much of life and so much of ministry and healing and teaching and preaching jesus says to his disciples on that day let us go over to the other side this would be a voyage on a ship that these disciples would take with their lord and so on this voyage they would get on this boat and they had in their destination a direction in which they were going to take life is not aimlessly lived is it it has a compass and a direction we have some idea of where we want to go this is one of the hard responsibilities of parents with their children when they sit down and they're trying to shape their thinking in a particular way not to live their life through their children but to use the experiences of misdirections that we have encountered to say here are some places and things that you can possibly avoid if you set your compass in the right direction the scripture is full of these statements of direction and giving us insight on where we want to go trust in the lord with all your heart lean not to your own understanding acknowledge him in all of your ways and he will lead direct your paths think you get the notion when you hear the wisdom literature speak to us and so jesus takes his disciples on a journey for them to pull away from the busy activity of the daily ministerial needs and demands that are on us i pray that as a congregation many of you will pray for the people of our church those that had to brave covet and manage cameras so that we could bring our house or god's house into your house people who have to wear a mask and working the controls and the volume and making sure that the acoustics are right that you have the right acustomology so that you can hear god's word without interruption all the people who have had to come and make sure that things have been sanitized you know work that just keeps on going on but nobody pays attention to it it was these people that jesus was invited to go with him he himself was tired and weary and needed to take a break but it was also an invitation to those that were in ministry that it's time for them to take a break i've grown up in my preaching life where preachers bless their heart felt like that they were committing a grave sin if they took a vacation i've heard them boast about how they never took it never taken a vacation what i'm about to say now is so sensitive that i i say it with all the humility that i i can strengthen it it it reveals itself in latter years when preaching and teaching becomes so banal anybody listening to me today whether in the south or the southwest or midwest north or south no who works with the brain of creativity knows that you have to pull away to maintain some measure of creativity anybody who teaches in colleges and universities and they've been tenured know what it means to take a sabbatical this is not a vacation this is to spend some time re-emerging themselves immersing themselves into their discipline and then reading along what new what's new contributions to those disciplines that's what jesus was doing he wasn't just saying let's go and take an excursion he said this journey on the ship has meaning and purpose to it and so they're heading in the right direction they're going to go to a destination that had already been previously planned and this is where they are going we'll talk next week about that destination and what they meet there but on their journey to where it has been carved out for them to go it says something about us answering the great questions of life all of us know them who am i and why am i here and what is my purpose for living we know that they've been drilled into us my little sister said something to me the other day that was so profound i it just etched itself in my head she said ralph i will die well because i have lived well i have tried to live my life with a sense of purpose i didn't say to her how poetic that was and how theologically astute it was but that's when you know you have a destination that has been set and that you'll arrive there it teaches you how to live and that's what i want to do and i know that's what you want to do and that's why we study the scriptures so we can say lord i want to live well so when that day come when you call my name i can die well living well dying well with a purpose but when you voyage unfortunately there there are unexpected interruptions that come along the way you almost can hear the anxiety in the voice of these people as this voyage is taking place they're on the ship they're leaving the crowd behind and there's a note there before i move on it says and there were other little ships with them wherever jesus went whether on land or sea he could never get away from the others that wanted to be with him and while they're on this journey from one place to the next place read where it says clearly that a furious squall came up that is a storm broke out suddenly on this ship this ship is not to be mistaken as a cruise liner i've been on these boats you could probably call it i've been on these rickety boats and though the sea of galilee is not enormous that sea is able to swallow up that ship and so you and i in our journeys from one place to the next or so often when you go to a funeral rather than saying birth date and death date they'll say alpha and omega sunrise and sunset between sunrise and sunset between alpha and omega storms come up and they're all kind of storms that come up and they come up unexpected uninvited unwanted and we've seen them we've seen and felt the squalls of sorrow the fury of fiery tests the temp temptuous trials the winds of worldliness all wrestling on us and bringing us down it in a particular moment storms come uninvited you don't have to invite them you don't have to say come i invite you storm no it they just come and then waves break over the ship and begin to flood out this place i'll tell you one of the things that i asked on one of my trips to the holy lands and we were crossing the sea i always wanted to know if i was on that boat with a storm break out honestly and i would ask the captain and the guides have you ever been on the sea when a storm broke out and you could see the ones who had i've been on that trip with some who said no it's never happened to me but those long tenured that lead everyday tourists from around the world across that sea you can see in their faces the panic when you ask the question have you ever been here when it's stormed and they say if they come suddenly because the sea of galilee sits at the basin between mountains and sometimes that cool air comes over the top of the mountain and it runs down to the hot air at the basin of the sea and when the hot air rises and the cold air falls and they run into each other storms suddenly furiously dangerously threateningly to drown the ship and notice what happens here there's one picture not to miss the anxiety in the eyes of the disciples but then you see the awesome quietness of our lord who's asleep at the stern of the ship that is the picture that jesus desires for us to live out is to learn how to rest quietly in the storm you see on one hand that there is security in the ship notice that with all of what was outside of the ship flooding into the inside of the ship the ship didn't go under there was safety in the ship and it's a reason why god puts us in fellowship with one another is to remind us that there is safety in his house i pray that over these months where you've been able to commune with god and to think and reflect with him with bible in hand and on your knees praying that you are now incorporating some of these truths into your life to say i know what security looks like now we've gone through a tough time of pandemic this is not the first time the world has seen a present day but this first time the world has seen a pandemic of this kind and for those of us in modern medicine it's the first time we've seen to be honest i'm i'm incredulous that it could happen but it did and those who specialize in the discipline of disease control they knew of the possibilities of it and they have been preparing all along that if this happened then we would have what we would need to mitigate and then dissipate this virus and this disease safety god has given us safety and god has given us security we read these lines we are safe in his arm there's security in his arms you know when you read the scripture and you come across these images of god talking he's our rock or lift our eyes to the heels from which cometh our help those are images to help us understand the stability of god in the midst of a storm again i'm not pointing fingers this is just out of my own experience over these last 15 months people would ask me particularly preachers you know what are you preaching i said i'm i'm writing every week i'm grinding every week nothing has changed the way church is done that has changed god has not changed nothing has changed it's virtual we're not face to face but i'm not saving my best sermons for when people return physically back to building they need to hear god's hope now and i'm going to preach it now not waiting for some other time safety and security salvation and god's savior we have a savior who's on the ship to remind us that he gives us it's in him that we have safety and security no there's no time for us to push a button and say put this on and this is me let me say it again cause i know that there are preachers who are listening i'm not pointing my finger at you i'm talking about me let me on my own territory this has nothing to do with how you and god commune and the way god has led you but in my own congregation i wanted to preach weekly out of what i was learning reading through the scripture about god's safety and god's security and jesus slept on that ship it also points to the dichotomy of god and that is you see the humanity and the divinity of jesus which is very important because people fall over this how can jesus be god and he is flesh and the word became flesh and this is where faith comes in you have to believe it and what a picture of divinity and humanity in humanity jesus says that i'm sleepy i'm tired and he goes and gets him some sleep but in his divinity he says come unto me and i'll give you rest in humanity thirsty in divinity i'm the living water in humanity i'm hungry but in divinity i'm the living bread you get the idea i don't have to go through all of that that jesus is and you see safety in the ship in the midst of the storm i'm done now and you know what happens at this moment the panicking disciples decide the best thing that they need to do is to wake jesus up with a profound question teacher don't you care if we drown now this is where you find humor and desperation and sometimes you say these disciples are going to have a a long a long long teaching session if they don't get this one and so at this time they're asking to quit teach you don't you care whether we drown or not and so they forgot the very invitation of why they were on the journey in the first place let us go to the other side and it is a life lesson that jesus is teaching to his disciples but he's also teaching to you and teaching to me that there is another side to storms there's another side to it you can't you can't get past the storms that we've seen in the last year and a half i mean you can't get past it the national storm you can't get past that what has happened politically in our country and our world are internationally our economically and now medically or pandemically uh violently in all of these statements you see that there is there are storms and and with these storms people are panicking will we get to the other side and you'll ask that question if you get on a journey without the invitation of saying let us go to the other side that is there's another side to the storm most of you uh know rufus and rufus smith pastors hope presbyter but beyond that you know he's a friend that sticketh closer than a brother i don't i don't know why rufus went wrong uh i i have no clue what messed him up he he's obsessed with riding roller coasters and i mean i i'm gonna ride with him because if he sees one that means you got to buy a ticket go to the amusement park get on the roller coaster and then go i i can't i can't fool around with roo doing that stuff i can't do it but when you hear him talk about it for people that are fearful of riding roller coasters he has a great great reply and it's true he says it's safe you're strapped in and you have a mapped out journey when you sit and get strapped in and the harness is holding you you're not flying off the rail you're riding the rails and it's only a minute and a half or he'll say it's two-minute ride that means in two minutes you're gonna be back at where you started so sit back and enjoy the ride that's what leonard sweet said some years ago i think it was 2008 he was the guest at truitt seminary at baylor university and leonard sweet was talking about the future forecast of what was taking place and the world and as a futureologist he began to talk about the perfect storm he says when cultural and political and and military storms collide or emerge he says they create the perfect storm jesus was in the perfect storm to remind them that he is the savior of the lord over everything do you care whether or not we drown and they must have forgotten jesus wasn't finished with his ministry so nobody was drowning that day but storms have a way of blinding us and causing us to miss out on the purposes and plans of god let me close now i've been here long enough notice the language that jesus is about to use in verse 39 he got up rebuked the wind and said to the waves that's an important phrase because when you read in chapter one you remember jesus is going to rebuke a demon he uses the same word he got up rebuked the wind and said to the ways quiet be still that's the same word would be when he said he rebuked the winds and waved quietly he said he muzzled the mouth and at the moment that he said be quiet he rebuked he muzzled the mouth of the storm it is the indication that god has the power over every threatening danger that threatens to destroy us and i know we need to hear that today i live in houston and this is where i serve god as a pastor along with the many people who make up our congregation and we have watched over the years how violent our city has become not in our end quote ghetto in the sense of talking about deprived communities uh-uh in our suburbia no no not in the homes as we stereotypically think that if it's broken with you know one parent raising no that's not no these are homes these are not tenement dwellings these are not run down shanties we're talking about homes with families and children in them becoming violent jesus is calling us as a church to say to all of the demons in the world quiet it's time to be still verse 40. jesus now after speaking to the wind he's really now speaking to the real storm the real storm wasn't the wind and the waves remember jesus is lord over everything he created the winds and the waves the moment that he speaks the wind and the wave they identify his voice and they hush they hush he's talking now to the real storm the real storm is the storm that is brewing in the heart of his disciples you know storms they come sometimes we create our own storms i wish i didn't know that autobiographically but god knows i know it that many of the storms that i have encountered didn't have anything to do with god's doing our satan's doing it was just out of my own creative manufacturing of storms but then there are times where god will create a storm to teach you a lesson he'll allow storms to happen come your way and in it he's always teaching us something out of the storm here he's teaching his disciples a lesson about trust and faith and belief and then there are times where satan himself will create a star he's always trying to sabotage god's people his believers but in this case our lord is reminding us and so he says why you fred why do you have no faith and they were terrified over this question who is this that creation obeys him for those who have been in our church and those who have knew and listening to me the gospel of mark has always been one of my favorites because that question of faith reappears throughout the 16 chapters when you get to the middle of the book in chapter eight jesus is still debating with his disciples over faith and belief and his identity and in one breath they you think they got it in the next breath they don't have a clue who he is you know who gets it in the gospel of mark not the big fisherman peter not the beloved disciple john not the apostle james not the converted tax collector matthew not andrew the brother of the big fisherman you know who gets it the most unlikely person in the whole story a centurion at the end of the book at the crucifixion of our lord he said surely this must be the son of god don't live your life in a way that it takes forever for you not to know who jesus christ is know him today by faith you can't know it how do these storms come out well you don't have to be a scholar to figure it out i was looking recently at some commercial i've not paid any attention to the verbiage of it i just saw the picture and it has something to do with impatience and whatever and the lady is reading the book and she just turns to the back page and she reads the conclusion and said wow no don't do that oh no don't i can't believe this is happening i chuckled at it because many of us are like that we're reading through saying this book is getting longer and longer how does it turn out and in this story of our lord we know how it turns out god gives victory and you know the answer to it because he's not just the writer but he's the producer and the director of it the same one that wrote it and produced it is the one that gave us the beginning and gave us the ending and reminds us that the theme of his book in this aspect is christ is over all things victorious over all things and when it comes to danger he's victorious over that also this is the word of god thanks be unto god amen i want to give you an opportunity today for those of you who have never accepted jesus christ as lord of life that you would respond to him by faith and put your faith and trust in him and so i'll say to you the door of the church is open look at the screen and you'll see where you can find membership and sign in to be a member of the church without walls and and there you can also accept jesus christ of lord of life and for those who have strayed away from god you can return to him and those are you that are saying i need a church home you can do that too i want to welcome you while you're making that decision and let you know that i speak for all of us that we're excited about having you in the family call the church without walls but more than that in the family god praise god praise god now while you're doing that and you are uh signing in uh you may want to get whatever device you use however you give and let's prepare to give our gifts to the lord our tithe and offerings as god has blessed us to be able to do so we're thankful for that let me say and i don't say it lightly thank you for your faithfulness thank you for your faithfulness now let's prepare to give our gifts of gratitude to the lord and let's say it together whether there's a temple that has a need where there's a need that has a provision where there's a provision there's god and where there's god he'll supply his miraculous ways and we cry out yelling and screaming it's offering time praise the lord so praise the lord and god bless you and thank you for your generosity thanks pass ladies mosaic women's ministry wants you to join the group that matches your individual season of life to find out which season you're in visit women.tcww.org men we haven't forgotten about you check out men.tcww.org to find out more about momentum men's ministry now let's see what's new beyond the pew church family we will begin our fall session of small group classes on tuesday september 21st with teachings written by our pastor ralph douglas west check out sgbs.tcww.org to join one of our classes to equip and encourage you in this season resilient the ability to spring back into shape after bending stretching or even being compressed does this describe you the pandemic health challenges financial crisis the stresses of work and family along with life's endless twists and turns can be the strongest person but you you're still standing women stand up the trials and tests that stretched you resulted into something beautiful and a new a resilient woman so let's celebrate join the mosaic women's ministry for our amazing women's weekend virtual experience september 23rd through the 25th you are amazing graciously embracing your journey and persevering toward your new best spiritual physical emotional and social self your hardships did not kill you you emerged like a phoenix from the ashes stronger wiser resilient so join us today and register at amazingwomensweekend.com i look forward to seeing you next week as we study at mark chapter five one of my favorite stories and that is victory over demons that's going to be exciting as we study through this on one hand we see where the lord is victorious over nature now we're going to see him be victorious over supernatural what a study look this way let me bless you as we prepare to take our journeys into the world the lord bless you and keep you the lord make his face smile upon you and be gracious unto you the lord lift the light of his countenance upon you and grant you his peace and may the lord bless you when you go out and come in when you rise up early and settle late in your labor and in your leisure in your laughter and your tears until that day when we should stand at the feet of jesus where there's no sunrise our son said god bless you i love you have a great great day amen

Channel: The Church Without Walls

Views: 462

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: VGpmjxaV-pE

Length: 48min 14sec (2894 seconds)

Published: Wed Sep 22 2021