High Beams Low Beams

I spend a lot of time traveling to and from work, both for the ministry and for painting. I would say at least one third or more of that travel time is done at night in the dark. In the winter time it is usually a little scarier because of not being able to fully see how clear the streets are. However in the summer time you deal with a bug splattered anatomy class on your windshield, so I haven’t fully made up my mind which one is better. I don’t like the cold so for me I guess the summer bugs splattered on the windshield is better than the snowy or icy roads. What about you? Which do you prefer? If you were to estimate how much of the awake hours of your life are spent in the dark what would your percentage be? When I’m driving at night I like using my high beam headlights because they allow me to see such a wider and farther view of the road I’m traveling on. There are many times though when I can’t use them because of oncoming traffic or because I’m directly behind someone. That’s when my low beams shine with their purpose. But have any of you driven or rode in the car with someone who has their lights on low beam and the lights are dirty from the roads or bug splattered? That can get real scary especially in the country where there are no street lights.

I remember one time driving out in the country at night and in a snow storm with only one headlight trying to get home from work. It was so scary and I didn’t know if I was even going to make it home. The snow was blowing and drifting on the road and it kept tugging my truck toward the ditch, but every time I managed to keep it on the road. There is absolutely no way that I would have made it home if that other light would have burnt out. Now that I have been serving Christ for a number of years I can look back at my life and realize that I spent quite a bit of it driving around in the dark with the blizzards of life all around me.

Today I am so grateful that the life I live is surrounded by Gods light. His light pierces right through any storm that life would try and throw our way. How many of you are excited that spring is finally here? Me too, I’m so excited with this new season comes all kinds of opportunities for us to shine as Gods light in our community. Let’s take a look in Genesis chapter one verse 1-5 and 14-18 and see what we learn about light and darkness.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep and the spirit of God was hovering over the waters. And God said “Let there be light,” and there was light. God saw the light was good and he separated the light from the darkness. God called the light “day” and the darkness He called “night.” And there was evening and there was morning- the first day. I find it very interesting that the first thing God made for the world is light.

It really shows me how important our sense of sight is. In verse 27 the Bible says, So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female he created them. See we need light just as much as God needed light. When I look around at all the beautiful things in this world. I’m grateful that God decided to create light before He created all the other things. We see the wonders of Gods glory and the display of Gods artwork on the canvas of the world and the universes he created.

As awesome as it is have you ever wondered what it might have looked like if he had created it in the dark? That kind of sounds silly doesn’t it, but in all reality many times we look at our lives from a dark perspective rather than from a light perspective. Our glass is half empty instead of half full. Yet we live in a world where everything around us was created in the light. God even created the stars and the moon to be the dimmer light that governs the night. Let’s take a look at what he did in verses 14-18. And God said, “Let there be light in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth. “And it was so.

God made two great lights – the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern night. He also made the stars. God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth to govern the day and the night and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good. And there was evening and there was morning. The fourth day. In Psalms 19:1 David says “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the works of His hands.” Did you know that the sun he created to govern the day is a huge ball of fire that burns at 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit and is 93 million miles away from the earth. Its light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles a second.

That’s incredible! But what’s even more incredible is the fact that he placed it right where it is. See if the sun were only a few miles closer to us we would all burn and a few miles away from us and we would all freeze. So the fact that God created a light so magnificent to govern the day and the night just proves to me how important our sight is. In Matthew 6:22-23 Jesus says “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good your whole body will be full of light. But if your eyes are bad your whole body will be filled with darkness. If then the light within you is darkness how great is that darkness. Wow that’s interesting if our eyes are the lamp of our body and the headlights the lamp of our car that means they both have a huge part in leading us on the road of life…

So where are your eyes leading you? What are you taking time to view with your eyes? Is it the things of God or is it the things of man? If your eyes are the lamp of your body what are they taking in? There are so many things in this world today that catch people’s eyes. I sometimes feel like people don’t even stop and think about where their eyes are leading them. Looking back at my own life I wish I would have taken more time to think about where my eyes were leading me. People get caught up in doing things and in the moment it seems fine, but only later to realize that they were snared into taking it too far. Even playing the x-box or chatting on Facebook can be a bad thing for you if it consumes all of your time.

Then of course you have the obvious ones such as greed, lust, envy, drunkenness, selfish ambitions, and hatred. The sad thing about these is that they are usually wrapped up in a nice package and are appealing because of that, but after opening them they come with a deadly sting. Who doesn’t want to have nice things? We all want them, but it’s when getting them becomes more important than everything else that it has become greed. The same goes for all of God’s creation isn’t it beautiful, and it only becomes lust when men look at it with selfish and impure thoughts. Then there’s envy and jealousy which stems from a lack of thankfulness for the things you do have. What about parties there great right, but there not so great when drunkenness breaks out into a fight or sexual abuse or misuse. It’s good to be ambitious until it means walking all over your peers to get to the top. Hatred is a little harder for the enemy to hide and always stems from a lack of love and discontentment. No matter what category of sin is finding its way into your life, it’s all dealt with by the blood of Jesus which was poured out for the forgiveness of our sins. I believe what God is revealing to us tonight is that we all need to keep our eyes set on Him and all His creation and not on the things created by man that lead us away from that quality time with Him.

See I believe that darkness only exists in the lack of light. There is not a single life that is too dark for the light of Jesus Christ to penetrate it! See Jesus truly exists, but darkness only exists without Him. So tonight are you operating the eyes of your life with high beams or low beams. See I believe that Jesus is asking some of you if the light within you is darkness how great is that darkness? If it is darkness are you willing to give your life to Jesus tonight and allow him to exchange your darkness for light?

Or maybe your in here tonight and you’ve already received the light of Jesus Christ but you feel like your going through life with only low beams and bugs splattered all over them. God wants to exchange them tonight for a new set of high beams. If God is speaking to you, know that God fixes faded headlights. Please come forward tonight and let him fix yours…

Thank you for worshipping with us tonight and thanks for letting God challenge you and sharpen you with His loving word. In John 8:12 Jesus say’s “I am the light of the world, he who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.” So go out and shine brightly for the things that God has done in your lives!!!

Becoming A Born Again Christian

This is definitely a matter that we must know and understand because in John 3:3 Jesus himself said “Most assuredly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” Many people hear Christians talking about being born again but do they really understand what we are talking about? Not only that but do we understand it well enough to know that if their eternal destination was left up to our sharing of the truth? Could we do it? Would they understand us?

In this third chapter of the gospel of John, Jesus is talking to a religious ruler named Nicodemus. Jesus is explaining to him how to be born again and he doesn’t get it. Imagine that, Jesus is face to face with this religious ruler, that’s right face to face, they didn’t have Nextel or Facebook, and the ruler still doesn’t understand. So in so many words Jesus tells the teacher of Israel that you must understand this first if you are going to understand anything else.

Then Jesus takes another attempt at it by sharing with him what is recorded in John 3:13-18. In these verses Jesus explains that a man came from heaven to undo what the serpent of old did by persuading man to sin. In verse 14 Jesus refers back to Moses and the sins of Gods people and how because of their sins there were fiery deadly snakes released to kill those sinning and then the people begged Moses to plead with God so that he would take away the snakes and forgive their sins. So God had him build a bronze snake that resembled the very thing that was taking their lives and told Moses to tell them that if they were bitten by the snakes, they were to look at the bronze snake on the pole and they would live. So Jesus is saying that man has been bitten by the snake that delivered sin to all mankind but if you believe and look to Him, who resembles us and who will also be put on a pole that you will live. Then Jesus goes on to explain that not only will those that believe in Him live, but that they will live forever. He says that God didn’t send Him to do away with the disease stricken people of sin, but that He was sent to be the antidote for their sin, so that through Him they would be saved.

Now that we have seen the easier explanation that Jesus gave Nicodemus, let’s take a look at the deeper explanation that He first shared in John 3:1- 6. In verse 2 Nicodemus says to Jesus “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with Him. Then Jesus answers him and says that what you said is right. I have come from God, and God is with Me, and I am returning to God, and so can you, if you are only with God by believing in Me and being reborn to God through Me. Through the water baptism which resembles my death and the giving of the spirit through the resurrection of my sinless life. See Jesus had no sin, but on the cross He bore our sins and took our punishment even to death and Hades, but neither could hold Him because the sin He bore was not His but ours. So God raised Him from the dead and through Him He has given us the opportunity to die to our sins and to be reborn into Jesus because if we were to die in our sins, we would have to receive the penalty for our sins which is eternally damnation in the lake of fire. But if we believe in Christ and die to our sins we will be reborn. Then when we die physically we will die in Christ and will be resurrected to walk streets of gold for all eternity where there are no tears.

Now lets look at verse 5 in Jesus’ words He says “most assuredly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. So how is one born of water? That’s answered as well in the 3rd chapter of john its water baptism. See water baptism is not only an ordinance that Jesus gave the church, but it’s a proclamation or confession before God and men upon a persons believing and confessing Jesus Christ to be both their Lord and their savior to be who they follow and through that following to be saved. Water baptism is not an addition to faith, it is an expression of faith. It is a faith response to the Gospel, not a work. Being born again is not a work on our part but is God’s work which is done in us through his Son and the Holy Spirit. People don’t get baptized to believe. Instead they get baptized because they believe. See it’s an act of faith not a work. Water baptism is an essential part of God’s saving grace through faith because it is an expression of that faith. This doesn’t contradict Ephesians 2:8,9 which says For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. See no where in the bible does it say that baptism is a work done by man. Even in the Old Testament where God credited Abrahams faith as righteousness, he then expressed his faith by following God.
He followed God because he believed, not because he was trying to earn his salvation. Water baptism is living out our faith by receiving and accepting what Jesus has done for us through his life, death, and resurrection.
We do it because we believe, not as an effort on our part to earn salvation.

In acts chapter 16:29-34 is the story of the Phillippian jailer who was about to take his own life because he awoke from asleep and realized that the prison doors were open and he thought that the prisoners had fled . Then upon Paul screaming for him not to harm himself, and that no one had left, the guard had realized that this was of God . So he pleaded with them and asked them what he must do to be saved. They responded and said believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved, you and your household. Then Paul and Silas shared the word of the Lord with the whole family and they went that very night and were baptized. See they were living out their faith by being baptized that night into the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the remission of their sins.
In Romans 10: 9,10 it says that “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.” Even John the Baptist didn’t just baptize anyone that was wanting to go through a motion. NO! Water baptism is not just a motion it is a showing of one’s true repentance for refusing God and his ways, they do this by claiming their wrongs and reaccepting the one who created them, by believing in the gift of His Son Jesus and their willingness to follow Him. The apostle Paul puts it this way in Romans 6:4,5, he says “therefore we were buried with Him through baptism into death, that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the Glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection” Again in verse 8 Paul says now if we died with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with Him. Which takes us right into the spiritual birth of being born of the spirit. Jesus received the Holy Spirit upon His water baptism but didn’t give the Holy Spirit until after His resurrection. See Jesus had to pay the penalty for our sins through His death before he could give us the rebirth of the spirit through us honoring His death by dying to our sinful nature.

How many of you know you can’t give something away unless you have it to give? See Jesus couldn’t give us our spiritual birth until He had gained it for us on the cross by dying in our place. We accept and honor His life, death and resurrection through water baptism, but receive our physical resurrection upon His return for us. In John chapter 20:21, 22. After Jesus was resurrected, He gave the disciples the deposit of the Holy Spirit. The spiritual rebirth that was necessary for them to be born again. Jesus said “Peace to you! As the Father has sent Me I also send you.” And when He had said this, He breathed on them, and said to them. “Receive the Holy Spirit.” At that point the disciples had been born again, both of water and spirit because they had believed in Jesus and followed him in baptism and had received the rebirthing of the Holy Spirit in their lives. Jesus had shed both water and blood on the cross. His blood resembles his life because his life is in his blood and the water resembles cleanliness and purity. His blood washed away our sins and His water cleanses and purifies us. Blood deals with sin and water deals with uncleanness.

Then in Titus 3:5 Paul says “not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit. So after accepting Christ and in doing so being born of the water and the Spirit you are a born again Christian. Jesus then goes on to say in Verse 6 that which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of spirit is spirit. So if you’ve died to the flesh you are no longer just of the flesh. Instead you are flesh that is full of the spirit of God. Paul puts it this way in 2 Corinthians 5:17 therefore, if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.

Have you received Jesus into your heart and life? Have you made Him both your BOSS and SAVIOR of your life? Do you know for sure that you are born again and living in the newness of life that Jesus Christ has purchased for you?

Screaming Brakes and Outta' Gas

Have you ever had problems with your car?! Come on, let me see how many of you drove here tonight. Well I have definitely had my fair share of car problems over the years. Even just in the last three weeks I’ve had car problems. Tyler’s car got a flat tire and it totally messed up the rim. We had to replace it. It was way beyond any repair! Then, oh yeah, there’s more! So after that my vans front brakes start screaming at me every time I would use them to stop. I mean it was metal on metal. If rotors could speak they would be sayin’ ouch! That’s still not it because then my wife, Jeanna, comes inside and says “Pat have you heard the front brakes on the car?! It sounds like they need replaced!” Too bad the gas gage doesn’t scream at ya like the brakes do. That’s right, in the last three months I have ran out of gas twice and my wife gave me a hard time about it, but guess who she called two weeks ago when she was out of gas? That’s right I went and took her gas with a big smile on my face! To top it off she was only three miles from Glidden which means she blew right past Grand Junction where there was a Casey’s.

Oh if only our gas gages would scream at us when we are running low. I believe many times that our lives can be kind of like our cars. We sometimes run them with very little gas and only fix them when their screaming. God never intended us to be running through life out of gas.That’s right with out vision for our lives we are out of gas! The vision is the gas that brings movement to the car of your destiny. If we don’t have gas in the tank if we don’t have vision for our life we will have absolutely no movement towards our destiny.

If we don’t have any gas in the tank called vision we are not going to get where God called us to be. God is on the move and we need to have to have the gas of vision for our lives if we are going to follow and keep up with Him. I can think of a couple times in my life where momentum has taken over. One was back when I used to speed skate. We use to have relay competitions and instead of passing a baton we push one another for the tag or hand off. I remember one time being tagged so hard in practice by a man named Danti Muse that I couldn’t even do my crossovers around the turn. All I could do was lean and pray that I wouldn’t wipeout. He had propelled me and sent me moving at a momentum that was way beyond me. His momentum took over my movement. That’s what Christianity is all about. It’s about us surrendering our movement for his momentum and allowing Him to propel us into the person according to his pace and his tempo.

Vision creates movement!Church wasn’t ever intended to be just a place or meeting. NO! It is supposed to be a place where we receive vision for our lives that compels us to go after our dreams and to do great things in our community for God and His kingdom. See God has a divine purpose and vision for each and everyone of you. It is that purpose that is the gas that creates movement in your life. I don’t want to stand still friends! I want to be meeting with God I don’t want to be coasting downstream and being conformed to this world. No! Instead I want to be propelled by God to swim upstream with momentum against the current of the world in such a way that others would want to follow. That my life would bear life and bring life to a new generation of people. I believe that is the desire of everyone’s heart here tonight.

See God created you to move because vision brings movement!Proverbs 16:9 “A mans heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” See we want to do something with our life. But its God who helps us get there. Noone here tonight wants to just exist. I don’t think anyone is here to just waste some time. No instead we want Gods vision and insight for our lives. Psalms 37:4 says “Delight yourself also in the Lord and he shall give you the desires of your heart.” See God is letting us know that if we desire to follow Him He will take us step by step until we achieve the desires of our heart. Not only that but it is when we delight in Him that our hearts true desires are revealed. So many times especially when we are in our youth we want to grow by leaps and bounds. We don’t want to wait until tomorrow and definitely not next year.

No, we want things now. But God didn’t create us to grow by leaps and bounds but instead by steps and by going through different seasons of life. See if we just continue to take steps and be consistent and remain faithful. He won’t let us be shaken and will give us the momentum to get to our destination. My friends I’ve got good news for you tonight because sometimes we get the wrong idea and think that if God would just show up tonight in my prayer time I would be able to get through this tough time and I would grow in leaps and bounds. But true spiritual momentum just comes by step after step. That’s right, when you begin to take steps in Gods direction for your life and continue to follow His voice He will get you on the move toward your dreams. Sometimes we get so caught up in taking the big strides in life so that others will notice us and instead we fall short and end up not even taking a step. See how many of you have had an awesome encounter with God and then just felt like man, tomorrow I’m going to go to school and win my entire class to Christ only to go home that night without winning one and then not trying again because it didn’t happen.See its not that God didn’t want you to win your grade to Him or your entire school but instead He wants you to celebrate your victories and learn from the upsets so He can grow you into the one that one day will move in leaps and bounds for Him in His kingdom through momentum.

Are you getting this thing about vision? See sometimes God gives us a vision for our lives and we misunderstand the times. Then when we go and try to fulfill the vision and it doesn’t happen we get upset and down ourselves. Then we think were just a failure. Instead of taking it step by step and realizing that God is growing us. Realizing we are gaining knowledge and wisdom that will become the momentum to fulfill the vision. See David was working as a shepard and killed the Lion and the Bear before he ever went after the giant.

See I believe that God is telling us that we must win the smaller battles and victories in life before we go after the big ones. Students do your best to win just one friend to the Lord and when you do celebrate the victory and then go win another. Successes like that will build confidence in yourself that you can and will do great things for the Lord. Which will lead you step by step to the momentum that God gives you to fulfill the vision or purpose for your life. Some of you maybe thinking I don’t know what my vision is or if I have a vision. Let me tell you weather you know it or not you have one because in Jeremiah 29:11 God says to you “For I know the plans that I have for you. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give hope and a future.”See a vision isn’t something that can be taught its something that needs to be caught.


The way that you catch your vision is by focusing on who you are in Christ right now. See we catch Gods heart and His vision by spending time with Him. We catch it by being who we are today. Remember God is always moving so if we stay connected to Him, He will move with us. He shows us this vision so that we have something to aim for without knowing what the target or destination is how would we know if we are taking the right steps. A hunter cant kill his game if he doesn’t know what it looks like or where to shoot it. Gods not going to give you a plan without showing you a hope for the future. Nor is he going to give you a future hope without a plan to get you there.

So the future hope is the vision for your life and the daily steps with God is the plan that gets you there. So if our heart plans our way and the Lord directs our steps, the vision will lead us to success. In Acts chapter 5, Peter and the apostles were living out Gods plan for their lives and were arrested for it. Then an angel of the Lord set them free. But the next day they were arrested again except this time the Jewish leaders wanted to kill them. Then a man with high respect in the Jewish community named Gamaliel said in Acts 5:38-39 “Keep away from theses men and let them alone, for if this plan or this work is of men it will come to nothing, but if it is of God you cannot overthrow it, lest you even be found to fight against God. See if its Gods plan it will succeed but if its not there’s a good chance it will fail. Here, over 2,000 years later their plan is still being lived out by us. That’s definitely of God.

So what’s your vision? What’s your plan? What’s God got for you? Is He directing your steps? See everyone of us has a major choice in life! We can either choose to listen to the enemy, the dream killer, or to listen to God, the dream giver so let’s see what we can get from God through His story of David and Goliath. 1 Samuel 17:31-40 explains that David caught what Gods plan was for him. He saw that there was a cause worth fighting for. Then King Saul tried to shoot down his plans by reminding him that he was only 16 years old and that this 9 ½ foot giant had been eating grown men in battles since David was sucking his thumb. Then in verse 34 David said to Saul “Your servant has been keeping his fathers sheep. Saul must have been like oh yeah! Then David’s like yeah! And when a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, I went after it, struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me I seized it by its beard, struck it and killed it.

See if we let the enemy reign over our friends its only a matter of time and they will be devoured and then he will be at our back door looking to do the same to us.Let’s back up because I want you to get this point in 1 Samuel 17:9 Goliath said if he is able to fight and kill me we will become your subjects but if I overcome him and kill him you will become our subjects and serve us. So David goes on to say your servant has killed both the lion and the bear, this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them because he has defied the armies of the living God. The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear, will deliver me from this Philistine. See David didn’t fight Lions and Bears he fought A lion and A bear. He didn’t fight the Philistines he fought A Philistine. See many times when you defeat the enemy in someones life the enemy in others lives runs as well. Just like the Philistines did.

So we need to get the victory with one before going after the many. But the one will lead to many. Saul dressed David up in his very own battle gear but after trying it on David said I cannot go in this because Im not used to it. See God wants you to be you and for you to go into battle knowing he is with you. So what does David do? He grabs his staff, five smooth stones from the stream, and his sling. Then heads off to slay a giant!

DAVID had a vision, but what about YOU??

Do you have a giant to slay in a friends life, or your own?

Are your brakes screaming?

Are you outta gas?

Gods got an unlimited supply of power through the Holy Spirit for your life. That will keep your life (your brakes!) from screaming.

God Bless

-Patrick Grant