Prayer: Father we come to you now giving you all honor and praise. We surrender everything in your hands. Knowing that you care for us and we shall have your expected end, in the name of Jesus. We ask you to forgive us of our sins and we repent, and turn from our wicked ways and we look to you. We change our minds and our thoughts to align with your word and character in the name of Jesus. We thank you for the trails, blessings, lessons we learned in 2017 because they have helped us to become who we are. But we now look forward to this new year of 2018, we let go of everything, and we let you Lord take control. In the name of Jesus have your way in this service that no one would leave the same way they came in, none of me but all of you in Jesus name Amen!
Scripture: 1 Peter 3:20-22 “to those who were disobedient long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water, and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a clear conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at God’s right hand with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.
Title: Love, Liberty and New Beginnings 2018
We are so grateful for this holiday, to the Lord that he has brought us through. We give God all the glory and honor and the praise in the name of Jesus for he is worthy to be praised. What a word there is from the Lord on this evening!
This year has been a very trying time, but it has also been filled with many blessings. So we must learn to thank God in all situations and in all things for the book of James tells us to “count it all joy” (James 1:2-3). Let us look to the word of God, as we look deeper into the scripture, We see that Peter gives reference to the time of Noah. As we know the story of Noah the world was wicked and God choose to save Noah and his family. The family of Noah totaled to eight people exactly which I did not know. The number eight is so important and it is the focus of our sermon on this evening as we enter into 2018.
The Lord promised Noah that he would send rain on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights. Noah was instructed to build the Ark, and inside the Ark would not only include his family but every kind of animal and creature male and female in order to procreate the earth once the rains stops. Noah met the task, and obeyed the word of the Lord, as the famous story goes. The Ark was needed to save Noah and his family and the animals, to start the procreation of the earth all over again because man had become very corrupt and wicked. God choose to destroy the earth by flooding it, and as a promise that he would destroy the earth in this way again, he gave the promise of the rainbow. All this is a foreshadowing of salvation and resurrection of Jesus Christ as we see in the above scripture.
We are entering into 2018, lets focus on the eight, eight in Christianity meaning new beginnings thus, the title of this message and the focus 2018. We see just like as we were brought into this world shaped in sin, the people on Noah’s day were bathed in disobedience. Noah and his family were saved, just as we need salvation from our sins. The end result of sin is death, and those that were not in the Ark were doomed to death. So here we see many parallels of the need for salvation and the story of Noah.
However the greatest parallel here is what it takes for salvation, and that is repentance. Without repentance of sins there is no reception of salvation. We see Peter here focus on Water, not as in the water that cleanses us. But the Water of the spirit of the living God that washes us into the wholeness of reconciliation!
The penalty of sin is then washed off of us, as soap washes off dirt. What is amazing is that we go from a person full of sin to a whole new creation, that now has a clear conscience that is open to the spirit of God. Not that christians never sin after salvation, but we are free from the penalty of sin. We no longer practice sin, but we walk after righteousness, and the Kingdom (see Matthew 6:33).
We must continue to look to the Lord for all things and in this year, we must let go of the past and focus on Jesus. We are nothing without him, but we can do all things through Christ! Our christianity does not stop at salvation, or attending a church service, but it begins at a relationship with Jesus that gives us access to the Father. We must take the lessons we have learned from this year into 2018 and that’s it. We must let go and let God, lay everything at the feet of Jesus and get up reassured with a new confidence in our relationship with Him. Let us go into next year remembering these things: the Love of Jesus, The Liberty of the Spirit, and this New Beginning we are embarking on in 2018!
