Sermon Leftovers

Psalm 121:4: Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep If you've ever had a difficult day, or week, or month, or year; you know that it can't be hard to find comfort in words like Psalm 121:1-2. These verses were made famous by the Von Trapp family, "I lift my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth." You might read those verses and say, "Great. But I don't have any hills to look up to, and I don't feel like anyone is coming to help." We can't all be Maria. We don't all stumble into the perfect family and the perfect solution for our problems. So, what do you do? How do you find hope, when all you see in front of you is despair? This morning I stumbled out of verses 1 and 2, sidestepped verse 3 and then got tackled by verse 4. Indeed, He who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep Look! Israel's protector does not sleep or slu

I recently read somewhere that if you can't go an entire day without saying something negative about another person, then you have a problem. Imagine someone says, "I like to drink, but I don't have a drinking problem." You might ask, "How often do you drink?" If they respond that they cannot go a day without drinking, you might suggest that they do indeed have a drinking problem. Consider the person who says they never go a day without getting angry at least once. Would you recommend anger management? So then... If a day never passes in which you don't say at least one negative thing about one other person; do you have a "negative speech" problem? I do. Remember what James said. "And the tongue is a flame of fire. It is a whole world of wickedness, corrupting your entire body. It can set your whole life on fire, for it is set on fire by hell itself." (James 3:6) He also said, "For if we could control our to