Wonderfully Complex - 3

                                                             Wonderfully Complex - 3

Subject: Seeing We Have Two Destinies

By Rick Welborne

Psalm 139:13-18 (NLT) 

13 You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. 

14 Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. 

15 You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. 

16 You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. 

17 How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! 

18 I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me! 

Second Week:

1. We must recognize those defining moments which reveal our destinies.

2. We must understand what our soul print is.

3. We must believe that we were conceived by God before we were conceived by our parents.

–Michelangelo’s masterpiece “David” is enshrined at the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence, Italy. Thousands wait every day to look at this beautiful work.

–Many fail to notice all the unfinished sculptures that line the corridor on the way to see “David”. Like petrified prisoners whose forms are identifiable...a hand here, a torso there, a leg, or maybe an unfinished head.

–These statues were intended to adorn the tomb of Pope Julius II but were never finished. It is almost as these sculptures are trying to break free and become what they were intended to be. Michelangelo calls them captives.

–Today I want to talk to you about our two destinies:

1. As you consider God’s destiny, you sometimes feel like a captive.

 

–You do not seem to be able to break free from the habits that hold you back or hold you down. Prescription drugs, sexual addictions, and alcohol are so rampant even in church. Addictions to relationships.

–Maybe a dream God conceived in your spirit years ago has not taken shape. You know who you want to be, what you want to do, and where you want to go, but you can’t seem to get there. 

–I have no idea where you are stuck or how long you have been there but I do know that God wants to finish the work that He started in you.

Philippians 1:6 (NLT2) ⁶ And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. 

–In Jesus very first sermon Jesus stated with certainty what His mission would be...To set the captives free.

Luke 4:18 (NKJV) 18 "The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed; 

–We tend to look at this promise of the captives being set free as the judge giving us a Get Out of Jail Free card but it is so much more than that. We should look at this as God releasing us to our dual destiny.

Key - Jesus did not die just to get us off the hook. He also died to resurrect the person we were destined to be before sin distorted the image of God in us.

2. As you consider God’s destiny...you recognize He not only wanted to save you, but give you a new life.

–Jesus does not just free us spiritually...He also sets us free emotionally, relationally, and intellectually. We are held captive by so many things and in so many ways.

–We are captive by our imperfections and our insecurities. We are held captive by our guilt and fear. We are held captive by unrealistic expectations and lies and mistakes.

–When Tricia and I met, dated, and eventually married I was an insecure mess...I was saved but I was all messed up emotionally...jealous, angry, and insecure.

–I brought so much into the relationship that was damaging...so much dysfunction from home, bad relationships, and a basic distrust of anyone. Of everyone.

–I was saved but I needed a new life...I needed to be set free...When we bring this kind of baggage into a relationship, we push the person further and further away. We feel we cannot stop!

–Driving between Lakeland and Bartow listening to James Dobson...Emotions: Can You Trust Them...Holy Spirit changed my life that day. Made a U-turn and went to my pastor for prayer and agreement.

--That was definitely one of those defining moments that we talked about last week. So glad I did not miss the work God wanted to do in me that day.

Batterson - He doesn’t just set us free from who we were. He sets us free to become who we were meant to be.  Salvation is not the end goal. Salvation is a new beginning. 

--We are saved...we are being saved...we will be saved.

1 Peter 1:3‑9 (NLT) 

3 All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is by his great mercy that we have been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Now we live with great expectation, 

4 and we have a priceless inheritance—an inheritance that is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. 

5 And through your faith, God is protecting you by his power until you receive this salvation, which is ready to be revealed on the last day for all to see. 

6 So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you have to endure many trials for a little while. 

7 These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold—though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. 

8 You love him even though you have never seen him. Though you do not see him now, you trust him; and you rejoice with a glorious, inexpressible joy. 

9 The reward for trusting him will be the salvation of your souls. 

–When we give our lives to Christ, God goes to work in us and with us. He begins to use our circumstances, no matter how bad those circumstances may be, to chisel us into His image.

Romans 8:28‑32 (NIV) 

28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. 

29 For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. 

30 And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified. 

31 What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 

32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all‑‑how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 

3. As we consider God’s destiny we focus on what and where. God focuses on what we are becoming.

–What and where are secondary issues as far as God is concerned...His primary concern is who you are becoming...being is better than doing. Widow in our church. I can’t do much!

–Please keep in mind that it has nothing to do with your circumstances...It has to do with the character of Christ being formed within you. 

Key – What happens in you is more important that what happens to you. Our destination or goal should be, we look, act, feel, talk, dream, and love like Jesus. 

Philippians 2:3-5 (NLT2)
³  Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.
⁴  Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.
⁵  You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. 

Batterson: The end goal is not a revelation of who you are. The end goal is a revelation of Who God is. After all, you will not find yourself until you find God. The only way to discover who you are is to discover Who God is, because you are made in His image.

–You see...you have two destinies...Our first destiny is just like everyone else’s (it is universal) and that is to be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ.

–To follow Christ is to become like Him and that is our chief objective...to be like Jesus! To be like Him in every way.

Philippians 3:8‑14 (NKJV) 

8 Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ 

9 and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 

10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, 

11 if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. 

12 Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on, that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus has also laid hold of me. 

13 Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, 

14 I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus. 

–I want to know Him...I want to be like Him...I want to know the power of His resurrection...I want to experience the fellowship of His suffering...I want to be conformed to His death...I want to die to my life and live what He has destined for me.

–My other destiny is unique to anyone else’s destiny...to be unlike anyone else. 

Batterson: Those two destinies may seem to be at odds with each other, but they are anything but. To become like Christ is to become unlike anyone else. He sets us free from whom we’re not, so we can become who He destined us to be.