Petra Podcast

Each new year brings with it new possibilities and new opportunities. God’s grace is more than enough for what each one of us will face this year. So, we begin the year with peace in our hearts knowing that God is in control.
In two weeks we will begin a week of prayer and fasting to prepare our hearts for what God wants to do in us and through us this year.
Each year we ask God to give us a theme for the year. Since this year is our 35th anniversary as a church, we decided to make it a year of celebrating what God has and is doing among us. He has done and is doing great things. He is using us to impact our families, friends, community and world.
So, our theme for 2018 is “Celebrating Gods Work Through Us”.
We know it is because of God’s faithfulness that we stand here today. It is by his power and might that we have been able to see many lives changed and the nations reached. So, we celebrate God and give him the glory!

It’s the end of the year. It’s always an appropriate time to look over your shoulder. Thank God for His faithfulness. Reflect. Slow down. Rest. There are natural stopping points in life:
• There’s a period at the end of every sentence.
• There’s a pillow at the end of every 17 hour day.
• There’s an exhale at the end of every inhale.
• On the highway there’s a rest stop every 20 miles. Unless you really need to go to the bathroom…
• Every growing season is followed by a season of dormancy.
• At the end of every six days God designed a Sabbath rest.
Why would he do that? That’s so inefficient. We could get so much more done. We could have so much more fun if he would just let us. He gave us the earth to rule over. Now why is he meddling with us?
There’s something in the Sabbath rest that is a priority to God. You’re going to spend a 7th of your precious lifetime Sabbathing. Why? What is so important to God that He interrupts what’s so important to us? We want to give you three simple words strait from the Bible that will clarify God’s love for you in the Sabbath and will help you encounter the majesty of God in it.
He Rested. He Blessed It. And He Made It Holy.

We have been focusing on the names of God and specifically those names given to the coming Messiah. We have seen the Messiah described as the Prince of Peace, Everlasting Father and Emmanuel-God with Us.
Today is the last day of Advent which brings us to the Christmas story where God reveals to Mary and Joseph what they are to name their baby. The are not to name him David, Elijah or Joseph Jr. They are to give him the name “Jesus” which means – The Lord Saves or The God who Saves. The name was descriptive of his mission of coming to earth.
Names were very important in those days. People didn’t just name their children cute names. They choose names that spoke of purpose and destiny. God chose the name for his son. God said His name shall be Jesus! Every time people said his name they were calling him “The God Who Saves”.
The name Jesus is a Greek form of the Hebrew name Joshua. Just as Joshua saved the people of Israel from the bondage and death of Egypt so Jesus would be like Joshua to save the world from bondage and sin. The full name given to Jesus was The Lord Jesus Christ. The title Christ referred to the promised Messiah. And Lord refers to his divinity and authority.
When referring to God’s son, the name “Jesus”, becomes a name of power and authority. A name above all other names. A name that changes lives. A name that saves, delivers and sets free.

So why the name Emmanuel? Of all the names, why are we talking about this one? Well I think I can answer that question using on word, it’s an awesome word. Emmanuel describes God's proximity to us. He is near to us. Understanding and believing his proximity to us changes everything.
Do you believe that he is near? Do you trust that he is near? Do you talk like he is near? When you go places are you thinking, man God is with us. If God is with us, then real life, real purpose, real power, and real forgiveness are ours for the taking!

In Part 1 we looked at Jesus as the Prince of Peace. Today we want to look at the description of Jesus as the Everlasting Father. This seems strange that Jesus, the Son of God, would be called father. But this is not a reference to the supreme father of the trinity. Jesus is not Father God. This is referring to the quality of the messiah in how he will relate to those who follow him. He will care for them just as his father does with the same enduring compassion and fatherly care.
We see this same fatherly characteristic in Jesus in Matthew 9:36 "When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd."
Jesus came to reveal the father’s heart to us. He said, “If you have seen me you have seen the father.” In the Hebrew mind the term father often refers to one who is an originator. We use the term “founding fathers”. George Washington is the father of our nation. Jesus is the originator. The founding father of everything. He is eternal. He always was. He created all things and all things exist by him. He is the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega.

As a customer, your real-life experiences shape how you view that company, that product. In the ancient world, a person’s name, their brand, was equivalent to their reputation.
We are not going to talk about our reputation, we’re are going to talk about God’s. There are literally dozens of names given to God throughout the scripture. And it’s a wonderful study. When we study the names of God, we discover His character – who He is.
Over the next four weeks, as we lean into Christmas, we’re going to focus on just four names, and those that especially lead us to this miraculous moment in history that we call Christmas...when God becomes flesh.

We are wrapping up a three-part series called Resilient. The focus is on being resilient in the face of spiritual warfare.So far, we looked at how to stand against the lies of the enemy and how to get back up when we fall into temptation. Today we will talk about how praise and worship makes us resilient in the midst of
spiritual warfare.
Spiritual warfare is a very real part of our lives and world in which we live. The Apostle Paul says there are demonic principalities and powers at work behind the scenes. We have an enemy of our souls who is looking for ways to keep us from God and if he fails at that, he
does what he can to limit us in our service to God.
Jesus describes Satan as a thief.
Yet as God’s children we have been given spiritual weapons to stand against and defeat him. We need NOT walk in fear, but we do need to walk in wisdom and spiritual understanding.

We are in the midst of a three-part series called Resilient. The focus is on being resilient in the face of spiritual warfare. Last week we looked at what it means to stand strong and be resilient against the lies of the enemy.
Today we will talk about being resilient with temptation. The definition of resilient we are using is: “Being able to withstand and recover quickly from difficult conditions.” Being able to bounce back and get up after being knocked down.
God wants to teach us to be resilient in our faith. To recover quickly when we are knocked down. To resist or rise above whatever life throws at us. instead of talking about all the ways to resist temptation we will look at it from a different angle. Let's talk about how we respond when we fail the temptation test. To be resilient means - when we fall we get back up quickly.

Today, we are beginning a new sermon series called “Resilient”. The definition of Resilient is, "Able to withstand and recover quickly from difficult conditions." As Christians, I'd like to add something to the definition of “resilient:” “Able to withstand, recover and thrive in the midst of difficult conditions.”
During this series we’ll be discussing how to combat temptation and the war on worship. We begin this series by talking about our adversary, the enemy of our soul, Satan. And more specifically, his LIES.

Today is the last part of our ALL IN series. We have been exploring what it means to go all in with God. What it means to be fully surrendered to Him. The sad reality is that it is possible for us to go to church every week and never go ALL IN with Jesus. That’s called religion and there is no life or power in it.
The Christian life is meant to be so much more than that. God wants us to live by faith - not fear, play offense - not defense, use all we got,
holding nothing back, being surrendered fully to his purpose in our lives. We don’t just add Jesus to our lives like another friend on Facebook. Jesus calls his followers to abandon all to him, go all-in, give it all up.
You see, Christianity is more of a way of life then a belief system. We are called “followers of Jesus” which means we follow his example, his teachings, his moral code, his daily direction in our lives. We are to make our faith our lifestyle not just a Sunday morning experience!
We are - Empowered by God for daily encounters. Following Jesus is not easy, but it is fulfilling with eternal rewards. Going ALL IN means different things to different people. In this series we tried not to create a rigid definition of what it means to go ALL IN. Instead we asked a key question each week to challenge our hearts.
Today’s question is: Is my devotion to God consistent and enduring?