Focus Power

 Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! Psalm 42:5

When I pastored my first church, I had an elderly man in my church, Grandpa Oakie, who had a way with words. Once when he was going through a difficult place in his life, he said, "I feel lower than a snake in a wheel track." (That's pretty low.) He was describing an emotion that most of us have experienced.

In the movie, The Karate Kid, Mr. Miyagi is teaching Daniel, his student, how to successful in mastering karate. When Daniel cannot master a certain technique Mr. Miyagi tells him his problem is lack of focus. He says, "Focus Power, Daniel San." Quit focusing on yourself. 

Discouragement is focusing on the situation rather than focusing on God (Our power).  David said, "I will put my hope (focus) in God." Discouragement comes when we focus on our inability to overcome our situation.  David said in Psalm 56:3 "when I am afraid (or discouraged), I put my trust (or focus) in you. 

So, if you are discouraged today, ask yourself where is my focus

The Impossible Made Possible

 Nothing is impossible for God! Luke 1:37

The seemingly impossible happened when hurricane-force winds changed the flow of the mighty Mississippi River. Hurricane Ida came ashore on the coast of Louisiana causing a "negative flow", meaning water acutally flowed upriver for several hours.

Experts estimate that over its life cycle a hurricane can expend energy equal to ten thousand nuclear bombs! This "negative flow" might explain Israel's experience at the Red Sea. While fleeing the Egyptians who'd enslaved them for centuries, the Israelites came to the edge of the Red Sea. In front of them was a wide body of water and behind them was the Egyptian army. In that seemingly impossible situation, "the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wide and turned it into dry land...and the Israelites went through the sea." Exodus 14:21-22.

Responding with awe is natural after experiencing the immensity of God's power. The result was Israel "put their trust" in Him. (vs 31) When we experience God's power in creation, we too can place our trust in Him.

One Is Powerful

 Only one life will soon be past, only what is done for Christ will last...C T Studd

You would think that in such a big world with so many people; one person would have very little influence, wouldn't you? Well, you couldn't be more wrong.

Just one man voting the right way saved the United States from having Aaron Burr as President of the United States.

Just one United States Senator, voting according to his conscience, saved President Andrew Johnson, who succeeded Abraham Lincoln, from being cast out of office.

Just one man, John Wilkes Booth, changed the course of history when he assassinated President Abraham Lincoln.

Because we hear so much of brave, great, and brilliant people, we start thinking that such persons as ourselves don't count.

Nothing is further from the truth. God depends on us—on you and me—for some specific task. Nobody else can or will do this one job. Our nation needs many thousands of high-school teachers, especially men teachers. Boys are actually going to jail because of a lack of good, interesting men teachers who can inspire and lead them to good lives instead of bad.

God depends on us—each one of us, not all of us at once. When Jesus called his disciples, he made each one feel as if much depended on him. Of the twelve only Judas failed. The other eleven were faithful to death.

Today, nearly two thousand years later, Jesus depends on us as he did on his twelve. Never forget—you are important. Just one person, but still one. A very wise man said, "I am just one person, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And what I can do, I will do."

What Do We Do?

I’m sure we’ve all had a power outage at one time or another. It goes like this… you’re watching the game on TV and boom, everything goes dark. You look around the room and see darkness all around you. You grab your flashlight and walk over to the window to see if it’s you or the whole neighborhood. You may even step outside and look for other people having the same issue. 

You go back inside and look around for candles, and once you settle into the loss of power, it’s like… "so what do we do now”? Therein lies the real question. What do we do when the power goes out? 

Let’s look at the apostles and what they were doing when the power came ON.

Acts 2:1 tells us, “they were all together in one place.” They were gathered together discussing the events of the day; the events being that Jesus had just ascended to the Father. Their source of "power" had been removed. They were probably thinking, “so what do we do now?" 

Verse two says, “And suddenly there came from heaven a sound like a mighty rushing wide, and it filled the entire house where they were sitting.” Sounds like the power just came on.

The difference of this power source compared to the ones we rely on is this power source is controlled by God and does not go out. 

So if we have a power source that does not go out, I think the real question is how do we tap into that power source? Do we only think about it when things get dark? Do we take it for granted or do we tap into it on a daily basis? The indwelling of the Holy Spirit was given to us to provide us with access to the one source of power that can meet all of our needs. We merely need to ask ourselves, “so what do we do now”?