Blog da Mari

Mais uma ideia para culto em Inglês:

The Lord is Good!

Prayer: Heavenly Father, I adore you. Be exalted, oh, Lord of all nations. Thank you for being my Lord, thank you for sending Jesus. Jesus, thank you, for dying for me and leaving the Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, you are here in this place and we love your presence. Please come and fill our hearts with your presence and let us learn the English language with your blessings. In the name of the Jesus we pray. Amen!

Sermon: Good evening, church! Peace be with you. Tonight we have the privilege to participate in a service in English. It is quite like the service you will take part in a foreign country, except that you do not have a charming translator like this one. Let us learn these worship words: Praise the Lord. So during the sermon you can say, “Praise the Lord” in English. Make yourself at home. Let’s open our Bibles on 2 Chronicles 7:3 “The Lord is good, and his mercy endures forever.”

In this chapter, the king Salomon was dedicating the temple to the Lord. The people of Israel was worshiping the Lord because His glory had come upon the temple. They could see it. They said, “He is good, and His mercy (some versions of the Bible will use the word loving kindness) endures forever”, which means it never ends. They were recognizing the never-ending love and mercy of the Lord. God loves me; He loves you and loves the world. I think we can repeat in English: “God loves me”. I need to believe that He loves me in any situation. It is hard to believe in someone’s love when you are in a difficult situation. When you are sad, heart-broken, see no future, depressed and even without a single penny in your pocket. When the life has not been good to us, God remains good to us. That is something we have to believe! Believe and believe. Why does He love us? Because He decided to do so. In this verse, the Israelites believed because they saw the glory come upon the temple. Today, we believe because His glory come upon ourselves and we can be sure of His presence in our lives. We are the temple of God. But, sometimes it seems that God is not there, He is not listening. Even Jesus, during his crucifixion, asked, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46). Jesus, the son of God, felt the same way. Then I can ask, “Where are you when it hurts? Where are you in my suffering?” Jesus felt the same, too! However, we can see that right after the suffering at the cross, Jesus was glorified and He rose from the dead and he is now seated at the right hand of God. He talks to God about you and me all the time. 1 Samuel 15:29 says, “He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.” Samuel is telling King Saul that the Lord is the glory of Israel and that He is not a human being to lie or change His mind. It means we cannot limit God because He has no limits. He is God! And God is good! He is so good to me. Can you repeat that in English? God is so good to me. Open your bibles on Psalms 73:1: “God is truly good to Israel, especially to everyone with a pure heart”. We suffer because our hearts are not purified every day. However, there is one thing we should always remember: only the blood of Jesus will be able to truly purify our hearts. That explains why Jesus had to be hung on that cross and pour out all his blood in our favor. His precious blood, the price He paid for our salvation. God is good! He knows what He is doing. Our job is to trust and believe in his love and mercy. Just like Jesus did. Jesus trusted and believed in the Father’s love and mercy, because He had a plan of salvation for all humankind and that included Jesus’ death on the cross. God loves me. He has plans for me and He has dreams for me. My job is to trust and believe in Him. I will suffer because suffering is part of this life. However, if I trust and believe that God loves me and that He is good, I will go through the suffering with peace in my heart. I would like to tell you a short story. A newborn Christian told his pastor that ever since he had accepted Jesus as his savior, there had had two ferocious dogs fighting inside of himself. One was good and the other was bad. They made him make good and bad things. The pastor asked him, “Who has been winning the fight?”. He didn’t know the answer. The pastor then replied, “The one you feed more”.   What have you been thinking about lately? What have you been reading lately? What have you been seeking lately? If I think about heavenly subjects, read the Bible and seek for the Lord in prayer, I am feeding the good dog. If I think of earthly things, text on Whatsapp and Facebook all day long and seek for trouble, I am feeding the bad dog. God loves us. He wants us to be in the right path to heaven, where Jesus said He would prepare a room for us (John 14:2). Tonight, God wants you to repent from your sins, accept Him as your savior, if you have not done that yet. He also wants you to return to him, if you have gone in a different direction. God is merciful. God loves me. God is so good to me.

Prayer: Lord, you are good. Your love endures forever. I know I am a sinner, but you love me and have saved me through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Please forgive me. I want to love you, too. Please help me trust and believe that you are good all the time. Help me think of you, read your Holy Word. Jesus, I want you to be my best friend. Lord, I give you my heart. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.