Last Sunday at The Church at Arkansas, we began a sermon series entitled, “You and Your Life.” We’re taking a look at six key areas of life that all of us are dealing with. We started with how to determine God’s will. We asked the question, “Am I making this up or is God really speaking?”
This Sunday, I’ll be answering the question, “Why do a lot of single people wish they were married and a lot of married people wish they were single?”
In the coming weeks, we’re also going to answer questions like: Does God want me to be rich? How can I stop doing the things I don’t want to do? And why is this happening–is God punishing me?
What’s interesting is that the answers to each of these questions are very simple. It’s basic, easy to understand stuff. That doesn’t mean change won’t be difficult. It just means the answers are simple to understand.
I’ve always felt like the Christian life is easy to understand, but hard to live. Maybe you can relate. Or maybe for you, it hasn’t been easy to understand. Maybe what’s obvious to others hasn’t been quite so obvious to you. If that’s you, you’re not alone.
In Mark 3, Jesus has been drawing large crowds. He’s healing people, answering questions and calling His disciples. One day, things get so busy that He and his disciples can’t even get in a meal.
Verse 21 says:
When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”
Then the teachers of the law show up and accuse Jesus of being possessed by the prince of demons.
So his family thinks He’s crazy and the religious folks think He’s demon-possessed.
And yet the truth was that God Himself was right in front of them. He was at work in their midst and speaking to them, but they didn’t recognize Him.
Could God be at work in your life, but you’re missing it? Could God be speaking to you about your life, but because you’ve been too busy with other things or just not interested in what He has to say that you’re missing what He’s saying?
If you stepped back from the busyness of life…if you turned off the TV, the computer, the phone, the whatever…if you found a quiet place for an hour or two…and listened to God…what might He be saying? What if most of what’s happening in your life is really just a distraction from the few important things?
Do you remember the story in Luke 10 when Jesus goes to the home of Mary and Martha?
As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
Maybe the answers to the most important questions about life are right in front of us. Maybe we find them when we just stop long enough to sit at the feet of Jesus and listen to what He has to say.