Hope you all had a great Memorial Day weekend! To kick off our weekend we went to see the Hyles-Anderson Highlanders. They are great singers and there was definitely a spirit of worship in the air. But the part that really spoke to my heart was the preaching.
The group travels with Bro. Scott Gray and we were blessed by hearing him preach on Matt 16:13-18, 21-24
"13 When Jesus came into the coasts of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I the Son of man am?14 And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets.15 He saith unto them, But whom say ye that I am?16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it."
"21 From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.22 Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee.23 But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan: thou art an offence unto me: for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men.24 Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me."Bro. Gray spoke on how Peter was either first in line or the last in line. He showed how in the first group of verses Peter was praised by Jesus for having the "right answer". But then just a few verses later Jesus tells him "get thee behind me, satan"!
What came to my mind was, how often we are in the same boat! We are on track and we have the "right answer" then life happens and we start living, or thinking, in our flesh. But even though we may make those mistakes that doesn't render us incapable of being used by the Lord. We just have to get back to that first place of being in our spirit and not in the flesh.
See there is a call to action put out in verse 24, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me." The first thing is that there is an open invitation, it says "if any man" so that's you and me, men and women. The next thing we see is that there is an obstacle involved. We have to deny our selves and take up our cross. That's not easy, no one ordinarily wants to deny themselves and certainly no one wants to take up a cross. Crosses are heavy, and often times seem like too much to bear. But for the One who gave His life so that we could have eternal life, it's worth it! The final thing that we see is that we must follow. We can accomplish anything that we are called to if we just focus on the One who has called us.
"Look to the Lord, not others. Following man will only get you into trouble." -Bro. Gray
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