A Life that Honours God

A Life that Honors God 1. This is the Point

“The LORD is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father’s God, and I will exalt him.” – Exodus 15:2

• When Moses and the Israelites were miraculously delivered out of Egypt, this is what Moses sang to God.
• How do you think God felt when Moses said this about Him?  He felt great.  He was being honored, which is what He’s after.
• God deserves our praise.  He deserves to be honoured by our lives, and this is the point of letting our lives be directed by Jesus.  Paul said to “do it all for the glory of God” in 1 Corinthians 10:31.
• In everything we do, we’re to bring honour to God (Colossians 3:17, 23).
• Habakkuk 2:14 promises, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. God wants the whole earth to be filled with His glory and bring Him honour.  Also see Psalm 48:10, Psalm 66:4, and Psalm 69:34.
• Deuteronomy 6:5 says to love God with “all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”  All of life is meant to be focused on God, and in doing this, He gets glory.

A Life that Produces Good Fruit 1. Fruitful in Character

“And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit…” – Colossians 1:10

• When you live your life with Jesus as the center, you’ll be fruitful in character, you’ll be able to “live a life worthy of the Lord and… please him in every way” as the verse above says.
• Being fruitful in your character means that you’ll develop a godly attitude toward life.  You’ll be known for your love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23).
• In the same way that “bad company corrupts good character” (1 Corinthians 15:33), letting Jesus be the center of your life will produce fruit of godly character.
• God’s goal is to make you more like Himself (Romans 8:29, Colossians 3:10).
• On the flipside, if you’re not aiming toward a life of godly character right now, then you have a serious problem.  Jesus even said that if your fruit is bad, you are bad (Matthew 7:15-23).

2. Fruitful in Impact

“I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” – John 15:5

• Besides developing godly character, a life centered around Jesus will produce good fruit in terms of impact on the world.
• Jesus promised that if we remain in Him, we’ll bear “much fruit,” but if we leave him, we won’t be able to do anything.
• What do you think it means to “remain” in Jesus?
• Remaining in Jesus simply means you stay connected to Him in the same way that a branch is connected to the vine it sprouts off from.  All your life, energy, strength, sense of purpose, and direction needs to come from Jesus.  This is “remaining” in Him.
• Jesus said that when we bear “much fruit” it would bring God glory (John 15:8).  He chose and selected us to bear fruit, not to just wander through life (John 15:16).  He wants us to make an impact in our families, friends, schools, jobs, and cities.

A Life that Grows 1. Grow in Knowledge of God

“And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God.” – Colossians 1:10

• When Jesus is our life focus, we’ll naturally grow in our knowledge of God.
• Why is it important to keep growing in your knowledge of God?
• As you grow in knowledge of God, you’ll love Him more and find it easier to obey Him (Psalm 119:10, Psalm 119:33).
• Besides the positive things we get from knowing God more, if we don’t keep growing in our knowledge of God, He’ll give us over to darkness (Romans 1:28).
• To grow in knowledge of God, go to Him.  In 2 Corinthians 4:6, Paul said that God “made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God.”  Knowledge of Him comes from Him.  Also see Proverbs 2:1-6.
• Reading the Bible will help you grow in knowledge of God.  Paul calls the laws of God, “the embodiment of knowledge and truth” in Romans 2:20.

2. Grow in Strength

“being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience…” – Colossians 1:11

• Besides growing in knowledge of God, how else will you grow when Jesus is your focus in life? One other way you’ll grow is that you’ll grow in strength.
• What are some ways that you need to be strong as a Christian?
• The first place where we need strength is in staying holy.  A life focused on Jesus will have the strength to remain holy and pure.  In Romans 12:1, Paul talked about offering our lives as holy sacrifices to God, consumed by Him.  That is a life focused on Jesus.
• God clearly expects us to live holy lives (1 Corinthians 1:2, 1 Corinthians 6:19, and 1 Thessalonians 4:7) and He will “strengthen your hearts so that you will be blameless and holy” (1 Thessalonians 3:13).
• The second place where we need strength is in reaching out to others.  God expects us to be witnesses and ambassadors to the world (see Acts 1:8 and 2 Corinthians 5:20).

3. Grow in Joy

“…and joyfully giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light.” – Colossians 1:11b-12

• Raise your hand if there are ever times where you feel like you’re lacking joy?
• We all have times when we get mad at our parents, we snap at our best friends, or we whine about our teachers, but God wants us to grow in joy above all those.
• When you give Jesus the right to your life, you’ll grow in joy.  Life won’t be such a drag because you won’t be trying to run things your own way but will be happily surrendered to God’s will for you.  See Romans 15:13, Psalm 51:12, and Hebrews 12:2.
• Godly joy remains even in the midst of difficulties, like Paul, who said, “in all our troubles my joy knows no bounds” (2 Corinthians 7:4).
• Real joy will help you continue living for God.  See Jude 1:24 and Nehemiah 8:10.
• Real joy comes straight from God (Psalm 16:11, 1 Chronicles 15:27, and Luke 10:21), so it makes sense that when Jesus is directing our lives, joy comes out.

A Life that Never Gives Up 1. Endurance

“…so that you may have great endurance and patience…” – Colossians 1:11b

• The Christian life is hard – just shout out some of the things we have to endure as Christians.
• When Jesus is the center of your life, you’ll be able to endure those things and not give up.
• Paul was a guy who understood how to endure.  He wrote, “When we are cursed, we bless; when we are persecuted, we endure it” in 1 Corinthians 4:12.
• What was his secret to keep going when he could endure no more?  He wrote, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.” (Galatians 2:20).  It is when we make Jesus our life focus that He can keep us “strong to the end” (1 Corinthians 1:8).

2. Patience

“Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.” – Ephesians 4:2

• Endurance is hard.  Another tough character trait is patience.  Raise your hand if you’ve got this one down and don’t need to work on it at all.
• We all have those times when we want to be anything but patient, but when Jesus is in charge, patience will begin to develop in us.
• All great men and women of God have had to develop patience: just think about Abraham (Hebrews 6:15), King David (Psalm 40:1), and King Hezekiah (Isaiah 38:13), to name a few.  Or Noah, who patiently built a boat and waited for the rain.  Or Moses, who waited patiently as a shepherd until God called him to lead His people out of Egypt.  Or Jesus, who was a carpenter for most of His life before doing only 3 years of actual ministry.
• Just like the farmer who trusts that God will make the seed grow in its proper time, when Jesus is your focus, you can patiently trust God to do things in His time.  See James 5:7-8.

“So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness.” – Colossians 2:6-7 

• Only in rooting our lives in Jesus will we be built up in Him!
• In focusing on Him we’ll be strengthened in the faith we were taught!
• When our lives are based in Him, we’ll overflow with thankfulness!

Have a great day.

John

This entry was posted on 23/07/2009 at 09:19 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.