River Oaks Community Church – Raleigh, NC

We began a series titled “90:17″ today, based on Psalm 90:17.

The Pattern

Psalm 90:17 was written by Moses. He was probably about 100 years old at the time, and he asks for God’s favor. Furthermore, he asks God to establish the work of his hands. Moses freed the Israelite slaves from bondage to Egypt. During Moses’s first attempt to do this, he tried doing it his own way and ended up killing an Egyptian worker. This was not the way God had intended Moses to carry out his calling.

Being a follower of God is not about our work for Him, but His work through us. There is a difference between doing good works for him and doing great works through him.

Many people think that being a follower of God means doing good things for God. The result is simply good works. Moses was not talking about doing good works when he wrote Psalm 90:17, and Jesus did not speak about simply doing good works, either. Jesus wanted to see God work, not just good work. When we work, people see us doing good things, but when God works, people see things only God can do. Which do you think is more important?

The book of Acts records a series of events that only God could do. The disciples and other apostles were to receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them. Jesus tells them to wait and they would receive this power. First, the disciples ask about the timing of Jesus’s return. Too often we want God to work too quickly in our lives – it takes time for God to do his work in us. When the disciples obey Christ, God begins to work through them. The receive power through the Holy spirit, and they begin to speak in tongues. This meant that they spoke in other languages than their native languages, and this allowed everybody to hear the Gospel. There was a gathering of people from all over the world in Jerusalem when this took place, and they all heard the good news in their native language. This could only have been of God. Peter preached a message to them, and about 3000 of them accepted the message of salvation. In all, there were 12 different language groups represented. We are hear today because of those 120 apostles who obeyed Jesus and allowed God to establish the work of their hands.

Like Moses, you and I should pray that God will establish the work of our hands. And when he does, may we follow God and may God accomplish through us only what He could do.

This Sunday we celebrated the Lord’s Supper. It really was a powerful time of worship for our church body.

We started the service with the following songs:

• Happy Day – Tim Hughes
• Enough – Chris Tomlin
• Doxology
• Hungry – Kathyrn Scott

After worshipping in song, Bill opened the message by reminding the church of the prophecy in Isaiah concerning the coming of Christ and His sacrifice for our sins, including the following passage taken from Isaiah chapter 53:

He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces, he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, yet we considered him stricken by God, smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon him, and by his wounds we are healed.

Next we watched a video that included scenes from the Passion of the Christ with scriptures narrated over the scenes. To hear the prophecy about Christ and then to see a depiction of what happened was a very powerful experience. Finally, as a church body we took part in the Lord’s Supper.

We concluded the service by singing “Sweetly Broken” by Jeremy Riddle.

This Sunday was part 10 of our Experiencing God series, and Pastor Bill presented a message titled “The Next Step In Our Journey”.

Bill reminded us that life is full of high and lows – mountain tops and valleys. We have to be extra careful coming off a high place.

• When you go to a high place, you want to stay there.
• We cannot stay on the mountain top forever.
• Life is full of mountain top and desert experiences.

Revelation 2:1-2 talks about the church in Ephasus. This church was on a spiritual high. Here are three characteristics of a church on a high.

1. An insatiable desire to learn, especially with respect to relationships.
2. Heavy investment of time.
3. Intense preoccupation of the heart.

In verse 4, we learn that the church in Ephasus has lost their first love. Not a work or theology problem, but a love problem. Slowly, they started drifting from God, even while on a mountain top type of place.

River Oaks is on a spiritual high. Through the experiencing God study, we have not only been listening for God, but hearing from Him. He has spoke through the body, and we know that our next step is to make the move to Evergreen. Following Jesus is a series of small but significant steps, all in the right direction.

It is important for us to remember as a church that, while we are experiencing a spiritual high, we must keep our focus on Christ and obey him by walking with him.