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 Page 4  |
1 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 6 | 7 | |
Mike Slaughter  |
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| Can you
see what Jesus was feeling the first day in the grave.
Like one of those Twilight Zone movies, or Alfred
Hitchcock, trapped in a coffin. When are they going to
open this thing up? Where are you God? Second day in the
Grave, what God has promised is coming, but where are you
God? But on the third day, you see you remember, you
don't focus on the pain. Like Peter, when he stepped out
of the boat, you know that point in time where your foot
steps off the edge and you step out there in thin air
before your foot hits the water. How did Peter have the
guts to take that risk?We can take that kind of
risk because we remember, we fill our minds with the
stories of what God has done in the past. You see, joy
remembers. And because joy remembers what God has done in
the past, joy dreams what God is going to do in the
future. Don't you love it? II. Dream  Don't
you like that, what it says in the first verse? It says,
"we remember how you restored the fortunes of
Zion." We remember how you led us as captives back
to Zion, so we became a people again who could dream. You
see, joy builds off the past. It anticipates the future.
Joy expects things to happen.We Suffer From Hopelessness You know, most people suffer from hopelessness, and they don't even know it. Do you know what hopelessness is? It is the inability to see beyond today. It is to live in a survival mode. Any of you ever been there? Listen to this. Here's what the Duke study says: "The inability of people to dream, to have a dream of hope for tomorrow, is as unhealthy as smoking one pack of cigarettes a day." |
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| Psalm 126:4 4: Restore our fortunes, O Lord, like the watercourses in the Negev! |
 Joy has
a future focus. It expects things to happen. Look at
verse 4 with me. The prayer is 'restore our fortunes like
streams in the Negev.' How many know what the
Negev is? It's a desert. It is baked ground. But did you
know a sudden rain in the Negev makes the desert
blaze with blossoms?God
is going to do a new thing, people, and when you live
remembering what God has done in the past, you stop
focusing on your pain or uncertainty today. You are
dreaming and expecting what God will do in the future. It
affects your whole disposition. When people look at you
they don't see a negative drain, they look at you and
they go, "Wow! How are you that way? You've just
been through a divorce. Your spouse walked out on you,
wow. It's a God thing. Wow! Truly God has done a great
thing for you."People,
remember your dreams. Some of you are sitting here
tonight and you feel that your marriage is pretty dry.
It's like baked earth. Remember when you met your spouse.
Remember those feelings. What were the reasons you had
for wanting to be married to that person? Remember those
feelings, those aren't accidental feelings. Those are
feelings that God put there. Remember those dreams,
because God makes blossoms blaze in the desert, my
brothers and sisters. |
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