Preparation for the future

Preparation for the future

One of the big questions that I am sure many of us ask might be
What’s really going on in our world?
Why has God not intervened?
Perhaps we ask these questions because we have some wrong ideas about the work of God.
Anyone on earth control the weather?
Can anyone on earth control the sea, the wind, the waves?
God said to Pharaoh
Romans 9:17 
Pharaoh was powerless to control what happened during the time of the plagues.
Everything that was happening was outside of his control
Psalm 115:3 

We might not see him, we might not understand what’s happening
We should know that God is working
We heard of Moses encounter with God, he has been commissioned by God to go and lead the Israel nation out of captivity.
Moses is having an argument with God, telling him all the reasons why he was not the right man to fulfill what God has called him to do.
God finally, gently, lovingly, asks Moses what he has got in his hand,
Moses answer : a staff.
God instructs Moses to throw the staff down, it is transformed into a snake then when he picks it up, back into a rod.
The staff which Moses carried was not just a stick, it was a shepherds staff, it was his shepherding tool, used for many of his responsibilities as a shepherd.
The staff represented everything that he had become.
Moses the Prince in Egypt.
Had run away when he tried to defend an Israelite
He went and lived in the desert, became a shepherd, and learnt all the skills required to take care of a flock of sheep.
40 years later
Exodus 3:1 
This verse might not sound very exciting, but when we trace the journey Moses undertook from Midian to Horeb, we will discover that this journey equipped and prepared him for leading Israel to the promised land.
So without Moses realizing it, he was being prepared by God to lead God’s people to freedom.
The staff which Moses carried, represented who he was, represented his training, his experience.
God instructed him to throw it onto the ground.
God was saying to him, lay down your identity, your skills, your training, experience.
When he picked the staff up again, the staff became the Rod of God.
God was declaring to Moses that everything he was, everything he had done, would now be used for the deliverance of others.
Many times we are also faced with challenges,
God has also called all of us to his perfect plan, perhaps we are also arguing with God about the call.
God is calling us accomplish something, powerful, live out kingdom life, by starting a business, beginning a new career, moving to another country.
We constrain ourselves like Moses did by looking at everything that we don’t have, make excuses that we could never accomplish anything great.
What should we do?
Let me ask you this question?
If God called you to become a person like Moses to go and accomplish something great like the things I mentioned.
What would your answer be?
Yes But : I don’t have ………
This is one of the lies which we have believed about ourselves
God used what Moses did have, not what he didn’t
Ask yourself
What have you got in your hand?
Will you allow God to take what you have and use it for his glory?
Ephesians 2:10 
Many people get confused about works
We should know that there is absolutely nothing we can do to earn salvation.
It is the gift of God
God has a plan for all of us to do good works
These works are our Christian responsibility, we do not perform them to gain anything,
We don’t give anything for the purpose getting,
Everything we do is an outward expression of love towards God for what we have received.
What we have received comes from what love accomplished for us through death Jesus on the cross, and his ressurection.
Something similar occurred when Jesus called his first disciples
Mathew 4:19 
He was saying all the skills which you have learnt for catching fish, I am going to teach you how to use those same skills to catch men.
As they followed, Jesus made them, he shaped them into becoming what he had already called them into.
When we think about catching fish, most people would not consider this work as having any good skills.
What possible skills could a fisherman have?
Catching fish requires Patience
Catching fish requires being in the right place at the right time
How to find fish
Jesus had called these fishermen to be Apostles
The calling came then the preparation followed.
Are we any different than Moses, or than the 12 ?
Could it be that everything which you have experienced in life has been preparation for the responsibility which God has called you too?
To do good works
2 Peter 1 v 3-4
Everything which we will ever need to fulfill what God has called us too has already been given.
We are living in exciting times, lets not look at what we don’t have, lets recognize what we do have.
Moses was told by God to throw down what he had.
God raised him up to be a mighty leader
The fishermen left their nets
Mathew left his Tax booth to follow
All the other disciples lay down what they had been doing to follow Jesus
Jesus used them powerfully to establish his Church.
Haggai 2 : 9
The scripture says that the Glory of this present church will be greater than the church of the past.
I encourage us all today to live in this truth
The best is yet to come
We are called to be part of this work of God

Jesus is building and preparing his church
Nothing can stop this building process, because the church is not a building, its us, we are the church.

Moses was prepared by God for the responsibilities which he would take on.
Jesus prepared the 12
He is preparing us, you me, his people as his bride
Gods workmanship, created, chosen, equipped, prepared by God to finish the work he started.
What have you got in your hand?
Give him what you’ve got