God Loves Doing the Impossible - Santosh Poonen - August 7, 2012
http://rlcfchurch.org/god-loves-doing-the-impossible RLCF Youth Conference 2012 River of Life Christian Fellowship 1306 N Lincoln Avenue Loveland, Colorado - 80537, USA
Summary
The central message is that God loves demonstrating His glory by accomplishing what seems impossible to human standards. This power is accessed through the Holy Spirit, which enables the impossible to become possible in our lives. The sermon uses the story of Abraham to illustrate that God makes covenants and promises, but He often works out the details in ways that require complete trust in Him.
Outline
The message in plain words, in the order it unfolds. Select a time to jump the video to that moment.
Why does God want to fill you with the Holy Spirit?The speaker asks why God wants believers filled with the Holy Spirit, turning to the story of Abraham in Genesis for the answer.
God loves doing the impossibleThe primary reason God fills us with the Spirit is because He loves taking impossible situations and showing His glory through them.
Abraham's life as an example of trusting God's promiseThe story of Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac serves as a practical example in the Bible of what it means to trust God for His promise.
Trying to help God fulfill His promiseAbraham looked at God's promise of descendants, looked at Sarah's age, and tried to help God out by having a child with Hagar.
Giving up our own effortsJust as Ishmaels resulting from human effort caused long-term conflict, believers must forsake trying to produce righteousness in their own strength.
Why self-effort ends in discouragementTrying to overcome sin or please God through personal effort might work temporarily, but it never lasts and ultimately leads to deeper discouragement.
God shifts the focus to SarahEven after Abraham made Ishmael, God redirected his attention to Sarah, representing the hopeless and dead circumstances in our lives.Genesis 17:15
Abraham's laughter of disbeliefFaced with the idea that an 89-year-old Sarah would bear a child, Abraham fell on his face and laughed in his heart at the impossibility.
Then the Lord took noteRight after times of darkness and personal failure, God stepped in to fulfill His promise to Sarah exactly as He said.Genesis 21:1
Mary's response to the impossibleLike Mary asking how a virgin could conceive, believers face impossible spiritual realities where God declares that nothing is impossible with Him.
Staying in a place of helplessnessTrue spiritual usefulness requires staying in a constant posture of helplessness before God, relying entirely on the Holy Spirit rather than past experience.
Receiving the promise by faithBecause God waits until human standards make things too late, believers must consider Him faithful and receive the Spirit's power by faith.
