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Aug 30, 2020

Living Strong (Click Here For Resources)

Passage: 1 Peter 5:8-14

Speaker: David Taylor

Series: 1 Peter

Category: Grace Brevard

Keywords: church, jesus, god, evil, devil, strong, adversary

THEMES: enduring suffering, God is greater/strong, Christ is eternally victorious/all will be made right; “Christ in me, the hope of glory”

order of Worship

CALL TO WORSHIP: Psalm 119:89 

SONGS: 

  • Your Love Awakens Me
  • All Must Be Well
  • Before the Throne

PRAYER: Faith and the World (The Valley of Vision)

ALL:  O Lord, the world is artful to entrap, approaches in fascinating guise.

LEADER:  Let faith escape every bewitching snare in a victory that overcomes all things.

ALL:  In our duties give us devotion to Your cause and courage in Your name.

LEADER: Let faith stride forth in a giant power and love respond with energy in every act. 

ALL: Your Word is full of promises, flowers of sweet fragrance when culled by faith.

LEADER: May we be made rich in its riches, strong in its power, and delighted in it’s joy.

ALL: Lord, increase our faith.  

MESSAGE TITLE: Living Strong 

CENTRAL TEXT: 1 Peter 5:8-14

ADMISSION Of FAITH: (The Book of Common Order)

ALL: We believe in God; who has created and is creating, Who has come to us in Jesus Christ, To reconcile and make new, Who works in us and others by his Spirit. 

We trust him. He calls us to be his Church. To celebrate his presence. To love and serve others. To seek justice and resist evil. To proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen. 

Our judge and our hope. In life, in death, in life beyond death. God is with us. We are not alone. Thanks be to God. Amen. 

BENEDICTION:   Romans 16:25-27

ADDITIONAL SCRIPTURES:

  • Psalm 107
  • Psalm 119:89-94
  • 1 Thessalonians 5:9
  • Genesis 3:1-5
  • Psalm 40:17
  • Psalm 55:22
  • Matthew 5:26-27
  • Matthew 6:25-34
  • Matthew 24:42-43
  • Philippians 4:5-7

ILLUSTRATIONS:

QUOTES:

  • The devil will try to devour us not only through our inclinations toward pride, lust, envy, anger, and so on but also, more subtly, through our very desires and actions for justice, good order, peace, and progress. - Douglas Harink

  • Christians have two kinds of goods; the goods of the throne and the goods of the footstool; immovables and movables. If God has secured those, never let me trouble over the loss of these: indeed, if he had cut off his love...I had reason to be cast down; but this he hath not done, nor can he do it. - John Flavel, Keeping the Heart

  • Hamlet was someone whose doubts made him incapable of acting right. Hamlet was frozen:to be or not to be. That's the question. But. . .Hamlet had it backwards, that your doubts should free you, because once you've accepted that you don't know what happens next, that you can't predict or plan everything in your life, then you're free to act. Because what's holding you back? . . .I think my father thought that Hamlet was wrong. He believed in God. Even though no mathematical proof exists of God's existence, doubt did not compromise his faith. It was what gave him freedom to believe. - Malcolm Gladwell in the eulogy for his father 

  • Who am I? They often tell me I step from my cell calm and cheerful and poised like a squire from his manor. Who am I? They often tell me I speak with my guards freely, friendly and clear, as though I were the one in charge. Who am I? They also tell me I bear days of calamity serenely, smiling and proud, like one accustomed to victory. Am I really what others say of me? Or am I only what I know of myself? restless, yearning, sick, like a caged bird, struggling for life breath, as if I were being strangled, starving for colors, for flowers, for birdsong, thirsting for kind words, human closeness, shaking with rage at power lust and pettiest insult, tossed about, waiting for great things to happen, helplessly fearing for friends so far away, too tired and empty to pray, to think, to work, weary and ready to take my leave of it all? Who am I? This one or the other? Am I this one today and tomorrow another? Am I both at once? Before others a hypocrite, and in my own eyes a pitiful, whimpering weakling? Or is what remains in me like a defeated army, Fleeing in disarray from victory already won? Who am I? They mock me, these lonely questions of mine, Whoever I am, Thou knowest me, O God, I am thine! “Who am I,” - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

  • ...I am so sure of God’s guiding hand that I hope I shall always be kept in that certainty. You must never doubt that I’m travelling with gratitude and cheerfulness along the road where I’m being led. My past life is brim-full of God’s goodness, and my sins are covered by the forgiving love of Christ crucified....Dietrich Bonhoeffer

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