Key Scripture: Psalm 77:1-13

The first 9 verses of this Psalm is a lament, using words like ‘cried out’, ‘in distress,’ ‘no comfort’, ‘groaned’, ‘grew faint’, ‘troubled’. It is a hard Psalm, but at verse 10 a change takes place.
“ Then I said, “I will appeal to this,
     to the years of the right hand of the most High.
   I will remember the deeds of the Lord;
     Yes, I will remember your wonders of old.
   I will ponder all your work,
      And meditate on your mighty deeds.
   Your way, Oh God, is holy.
      What god is great like our God?”

Introduction:
In Hebrew the word appeal means to recount, to record, to remember.
I will remember= I will mark so as to be recognized, to recount, to record, to be mindful.
I will meditate= ponder, think it through, imagine, study, speak, talk, utter.
   One of the most overriding principles in al of Scripture is looking forward by looking back. It is about seeing the faithfulness of God in the past and knowing that He will be faithful in the future. Moses wrote about the past but also looked forward. Nearly all of Scripture is written looking back and seeing the hand of God. The prophecies have their greatest relevance as we look back.
Luke 24:27 “And beginning with Moses and all the prophets he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning Himself.” Jesus took the past and showed them the future.
John 20:31 “But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.”
   Sometimes we see what God is doing, but most of the time, we can’t see what He is doing. We will stay in that place until we see this principle.
   I’ve been asking people “What stands out in your mind from last year?”
Think for a moment about what you recall. What has stuck with you? Where do you see the right hand of the Most High?
   In October, the pastors took a day to answer the question, “ Where do we see God at work? And we came up with a long list that was very encouraging. Then we asked,
“ What do you sense God is stirring in you, that we should pay attention to?”
   This morning I want to take some time and identify some of those things where we have seen the hand of God. I want us to be looking forward by looking back; seeing the faithfulness of God to us as a people. We did this at our 30th Anniversary Celebration.
   I am friends with the music pastor at First Baptist Church. They celebrated their 185th Church anniversary. This was before Missouri was a state. In those early days they had slaves as members, as equal participants in the life of the church. That was a radical stand on those days. That’s worth celebrating. They knew who their brothers and sisters were.
   It tells me that there are so many more things that God wants to do through His church, and to see ourselves as really having just begun. Pray that God will give us radical things in the New Year, as we look back and see the good things He has done this past year.

1. Messages on the New Community:

Ephesians 2:15- “ that He might create in Himself one new man in the place of two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.” This is a a picture of diversity in the body of Christ.
That is multiple generations, multiple in ethnicity, multiple in race, color, family unit, single, divorced, married, social status, economic status; diverse educationally, intellectually, in physical ability, mental health, spiritual background, spiritual health, gifting, personality; new believers, those who are not believers, and those who have walked with Christ many years.
It is a community of the weak; shaped in brokenness, and shaped by the power of Christ to change us who have a picture of what it might look like to usher heaven to earth.
It is not the separation of the world from God, of the physical from the spiritual, of earth from heaven. It is picturing and pursuing the final answer to the Lord’s prayer, “thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

2. I’m looking forward because in this last year we have seen a growing diversity in our midst, a growing expansion as well in mission. We have Val and Rem going out to Lebanon and Ann Breshears in India, and Theresa Bene’ in Tailand.

The Holy Spirit is giving us a vision of ‘diversity and devotion.’ Diversity in the new community and devotion as in our Mission statement from Acts. 2:

Devoting ourselves to reading, and studying God’s Word, and God’s ways
Devoting ourselves to a growing quality of relationships through sharing our lives together.
Devoting ourselves to worship.
Devoting ourselves to prayer.
Devoting ourselves to those outside our midst; to those who do not know the forgiveness or the love or the mercy of God.
One person said, “ I really like the teaching in Acts about looking outward; to hearing new converts sharing their faith, and their newfound enthusiasm for Christ.; welcoming others in and being involved in their lives.

I am thrilled with the new auditorium; it’s look and feel. God has given this to us.
And with the worship community and the vision particularly that is in David Haasis for this.
I’m looking forward to what will evolve through “Community Compassion”, and a moving beyond our own needs.

One person I asked said one thing that stood out to him was painting at the Bluffs nursing home together with others. It helped him to get to know others better, and to use his time with purpose for the kingdom of God.

I’m looking forward to other ministries like “Friends of International” continuing to reach out.
I’m looking forward to what will evolve with Love, Inc (and to whatever entrepreneurial activity Jane Williams might find herself in next.)

3. It is easy for us to walk through the year and not remember the things God has done. We want to remember those people that came to us and imparted messages to us.

Terry Virgo: “God is looking for believers, like Elijah, who believed when unbelief was all around him. Terry inviting us to “step into my world of faith.”
Bart Brookings- “look forward, move on in the Lord. Give up our grudges, release our grief, to let go of our guilt, and to not go it alone.”
Dan Deeble: He spoke to us of ‘being redemptively entangled in the lives of others.
Recalling the phrase, “learning the art of bouncing back”

4. I also look and see the works of God in the lives of each one of us

In the bravery and faith of Amanda McDaniel and of her family.

Amanda, who in spite of her wrestling with cancer and losing her leg, said “I’m going to walk down the aisle at my sister’s wedding on Dec.27th. And she did
And her sister, Haley Marie, marrying Matt Boyd.
And Larry McDaniel playing and singing a song he wrote for them,
And knowing all the challenges and tragedy that this family has walked through, but seeing in them more of a future and a hope than anything that life might throw at them.

I look and see little Owen Blumenthal, who lived only a few short months and never left the hospital. But his adoptive parents loved him as their own

He did not live in vain and he did not die in vain.
God gave Owen two people who would hold him through this life and as he entered the next.
And though it was hard, painful, anguishing and exhausting, it carried the refrain that we heard on Christmas Eve at our candlelight service---
Four words- God is with us. You are never alone. You never have been
You never will be.

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5. I have sat with couples, as have our pastors, and watched these couples work painfully and with tears through the difficulty of their marriages, because they believed in the vow that they had made, and they put their hope in God. And we said:

When you have lost hope, we will have hope.
When you have no more strength, we will be strength for you.
When you don’t know what to pray anymore, we will do the praying for you.

6. I have watched unnoticed servants who faithfully serve others.

I have noticed those servants who faithfully give rides to others so they can be here to worship with us.
I have watched Florence who works all day Sat. then comes on Sunday and translates the teaching into Swahili so others can be taught.
I have watched Matt Ari ,who took French 20 years ago, pull that language out of his past and have seen God use it to help in translation for our French speaking African brothers and sisters..
I’ve watched Derek Stott faithfully serve in that sound booth, being the first to get here and the last to leave. And he always has a pleasant and positive attitude no matter what we throw at him.

This is all the work of God in our midst. And so I want to encourage us to take time this week and look forward by looking back; to recall to mind, to remember as much as you can of the good things of God that we have experienced together.
One friend shared with me that he so often sees the five things that aren’t going well and does not see the 95 things that God is doing. He said when I began looking to the 95 things, it changed my whole outlook and I began thanking and worshipping God.
Assignment: write down the things you see God doing. Come up with a number equal to you age.: 22 yrs old=22 good things. Over 50= come up with 50 good things. Do it as a family or as a small group

Lamentations 3:19-23
“Remember my afflictions and my wanderings, the wormwood (bitterness) and the gal
My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me.
But this I call to mind, , and therefore I have hope;
The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, His mercies they never come to an end;
They are new every morning;
Great is your faithfulness.

Discussion questions

Name three experiences that come to your mind where you saw God ‘s hand moving in our church.. Tell which thing impacted you the most and tell why.

How does looking back on the things God has done affect our view of the future

Why is it easy to miss what God is doing when we are in the middle of it?

How would you describe the process of God making our church a new community, growing rapidly in diversity this year? Has it been a planned or programmed change? Has it been.easy and smooth, or a constant challenge to meet the needs of our new members? .
Can you name one way in which the new diversity has touched or changed you spiritually?

What area of our growing expansion and mission have you participated in.