Focal Point

Focal Point
Focal Point is more than a blog. It's purpose is to help us stay focused on Christ through Gods Word as we navigate through life and today's culture.

Monday, January 23, 2012

Extreme Makeover part three

All of us want to feel good.  We want to feel good about life and we want to feel good about ourself.  Take me for instance, yesterday afternoon I felt great.  We had a great service at Smith River Baptist, we worshiped the Lord in music, spoke on the blessing of sharing the most liberating news to ever hit the planet and that's the gospel of Christ, did a skype video call to our missionaries in Chile and hear from one of our college students preparing for ministry on the mission field.  I got to be with my church family and have a church dinner together afterwards in the gym.. I was feeling good.  Then I came home, put on my Joe Montana no. 16 SF 49ers football jersey and got ready to watch them slay the NY Giants in a NFC championship title game.  Nope, didnt happen.  By the end of the night not only had the 49ers lost in the most ridiculous way, (2 fumbles on a punt return by the same player which put the Giants in field goal positions), but also I got crushed in xbox Madden football by a 10 year old boy from church, (Robby I want a rematch!!) and then I heard that the Oregon Ducks head football coach was going to leave in order to coach in the pros (which by monday morning he had refused) ..so, when I went to bed I wasn't feeling as good and joyful as I had felt a few hours before.  Although I was feeling good for Robby that he went to bed knowing he had taken down his Pastor  :) 

Now, I totally realize those are trivial reasons for not feeling good and I mention them only in a humurous way.  Because there are people who genuinely do not feel good about life and especially in regard to the context of this blog do they not feel good about themself.  They get up in the mornng, look in the mirror and do not like what they see and they set out to do something about it.  Thus their goal for the day is to feel better about themself.

What do you do when you want to feel better about yourself? Well, some people shop – “I’ve just got to buy something” they will say. For others, its eating or just the opposite - dieting. Everyone has something they do when they want to feel better. And for some people it’s trying to improve the way they look and how they dress and its not just women - it’s men as well. That’s why some men (and women) hit the gym and the weights, it is not just a health reason, they are doing something that will help them feel better about themself. But then their are others who go to an even more extreme idea in order to feel better. Their solution is getting a face lift, rhinoplasty, tummy tucks, liposuction, and Botox, But you know, when it’s all said and done you’re still stuck with the same you on the inside.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with wanting to improve your outward looks. But God has a purpose for your life and that is to have a real attractiveness and beauty that comes from within. It’s a beauty that the finest beautician, plastic surgeon and fitness gym can not give. And that beauty and makeover begins in the heart with who we really are. God wants to make us into a totally new person – with a new character, new attitudes and new actions and it all begins with a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  Then, as we get into the Word of God, and we let it work itself out in our life we will then begin to see amazing changes take place.

We will start feeling better about ourself when we see ourself thinking, acting and talking different. That is when a real makeover has taken place.

Friday, January 20, 2012

Extreme Makeover part two

There’s a saying “Beauty is only skin deep but ugly goes straight to the bone”  Well, that is somewhat true because some people are working so hard to improve their outward looks and doing nothing to change who they really are.  They have no self control, they lack patience and as a result have little peace with themselves or others and as a result they act in unkind ways.  But God can change all that and give you a true beauty and attractiveness that not only goes clear to the bone – But one that all will see.

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Extreme Makeovers part one

It seems that more and more people today are getting makeovers, and while it may make you feel better about yourself and give one a sense of confidence and self esteem, it still leaves you as the person you really are on the inside.  It doesn’t change the real you.  Only God can give an internal makeover that can bring real peace, patience, self-control, kindness and goodness in your life and all the while give you an inward beauty that will truly be an extreme makeover. 

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Living for a Greater Cause

In my study for Sundays sermon I came across this article titled 'Living for a Greater Cause'.  I am starting my message sunday morning with this and sharing it with my blog and facebook friends now.  It is written by Os Hillman, president of Marketplace Leaders.

Living for a Greater Cause

"I can do everything through Him who gives me strength" (Philippians 4:13).

What does it mean for businesspeople to live for a cause greater than themselves in our day and time? Jeremiah Lanphier was a businessman in New York City who asked God to do this in his life in 1857.

In a small darkened room, in the back of one of New York City's lesser churches, a man prayed alone. His request of God was simple, but earth-shattering: "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" [John Woodbridge, ed., More Than Conquerors (Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1992), 337]

He was a man approaching midlife without a wife or family, but he had financial means. He made a decision to reject the "success syndrome" that drove the city's businessmen and bankers. God used this businessman to turn New York City's commercial empire on its head. He began a businessmen's prayer meeting on September 23, 1857. The meetings began slowly, but within a few months, 20 noonday meetings were convening daily throughout the city. The New York Tribune and the New York Herald issued articles of revival. It had become the city's biggest news. Now a full-fledged revival, it moved outside New York. By spring of 1858, 2,000 met daily in Chicago's Metropolitan Theatre, and in Philadelphia the meetings mushroomed into a four-month long tent meeting.

Meetings were held in Baltimore, Washington, Cincinnati, Chicago, New Orleans, and Mobile. Thousands met to pray because one man stepped out. Annus Mirabilis, the year of national revival, had begun.

This was an extraordinary move of God through one man. It was unique because the movement was lead by businessmen, a group long considered the least prone to any form of evangelical fervor, and it had started on Wall Street, the most unlikely of all places to begin.

Could God do something extraordinary through you? Take a step. Ask God to do mighty things through you.

Os Hillman is president of Marketplace Leaders, an organization whose purpose is to raise up and train men and women to apply Biblical faith in the workplace. His email address is os@marketplaceleaders