PDL Week # 5 Oct. 21, 2012 Abridged teaching by Rick Warren

SHAPED FOR SERVING GOD By Rick Warren The Purpose Driven Life 1.Worshp—Expressing our Love to God 2.Fellowship—Lovng God’s Family 3. Discipleship-Becoming like Jesus in our character 4. Serving God by serving others—Cheerful service Sermon Notes 1. “Elvis never came to terms with who he was meant to be or what his purpose in life was. He thought he was here for a reason, maybe to preach, maybe to serve, maybe to save, maybe to care for people. That agonizing desire was always with him and he knew he wasn’t fulfilling it. So he’d go on stage and he wouldn’t have to think about it.” --Priscilla Presley 2. “Let your light so shine before people, that they may see your good works, and give glory to your father in heaven.” Matthew 16 “ 3. MY 4th PURPOSE IS TO _______ God by _________ __________. 4. Jesus: “Your attitude must be like My Own, for I did not come to be served, but to serve...” Matthew 20:28 (LB) LEARNING TO SERVE LIKE JESUS 5. Serving others requires giving our TIME. • Barrier to serving: SELF-CENTEREDNESS “Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.” Philippians 2:4 (MSG) 6. SERVING LIKE JESUS MEANS BEING GRATEFUL. “Serve the Lord with gladness.” Psalm 100:2 (KJV) 7. “It is he who saved us and chose us for his holy work not because we deserved it but because that was his plan...” 2 Timothy 1:9 (LB) 8. “'Well done, good and faithful servant!...Come and share your master's happiness!” Matthew 25:21 (NIV) SERMON TRANSCRIPT If you look closely ths Halloween, you wll probably see the Kng walkng around. Ths time I am not referring to the King Jesus. No, I am talking about Elvis. Even after he’s been dead for 30 years, you will see his impersonators walkng around in their sun glasses, combing their greasy hair, just like he taught them. Now in spite of enormous success, Elvis was, according to friends, an unfulfilled and unhappy man. He died of obesity and drug dependency at 42. And in an interview with his wife, Priscilla Presley, she said this about her husband. If you would take out your sermon notes, and follow along at point # 1, Mrs. Elvis Presley said “Elvis never came to terms with who he was meant to be or what his purpose in life was. He thought he was here for a reason, maybe to preach, maybe to serve, maybe to save, maybe to care for people. That agonizing desire was always with him and he knew he wasn’t fulfilling it. So he’d go on stage and he wouldn’t have to think about it.” Elvis didn’t have a clue where to begin to look. In a sense, he was lost. I don’t want you to make the same mistake. And today we’re continuing our 40 Days of Purpose, and we’re going to look at God’s fourth purpose for your life, there on the top of your outline…you were “Shaped to Serve God.” Jesus said to his disciples what He says to us. Let’s read power point # 2 together, saying, “Let your light to shine before people, that they would see your good works and give glory to your father in heaven.” You and I were made to do Good works. God made you to make a difference. To be a true Christian, not a fake one, your beliefs and convections must be reflected n your deeds of serving others. We’re all meant to give something back. We’re all meant to make a contribution. The Bible says we’re created to serve, we’re saved to serve, we’re gifted to serve, we’re commanded to serve God back. So looking at point # 3, “My fourth purpose in life is to serve God by serving others.” You want to know why you’re alive. That’s why you’re alive. You weren’t put here just to take up space, consume and get a free ride through life. You were put here to serve God and the way you serve God is by serving other people. Now the good news is that God not only created us for service, he gave us a model. He came to Earth himself as Jesus, who came to serve you and me. Notice the next verse at # 4. Matthew 20:28, “Jesus said, ‘Your attitude must be like My own, for I did not come to be served, but to serve.’” So, how do we do this? Well, if we are growing n discipleship, which as we heard last week, is growing to become more like Jesus in our character, then serving others is not optional. And if serving others s not optional, then, the logical conclusion, as we see in pt. # 5 “Saving others requires giving our TIME. Time, that precious treasure for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Inside your bulletin, you wll find a deep blue insert, which I encourage you to take home and read. If you would please take that out, you wll see that it challenges you to Let your love of God guide you in your use of time. Please turn to the white side, and let’s read together the 3rd paragraph from the bottom: Everybody needs a helping hand, at one time or another. There are needy people n my neighborhood, community, & church. Also, my church needs my help, because other people serve to make CCQF run, and I want to do my part. Now, a lot of people think, “O, just don’t have the time.” Now, I can sympathize with that. Some of us n ths church family may have a surplus of time, but others of us feel like each day is an exhausting rush. But let’s get serious here. If I am always, always, always making excuses as my rationalization for not serving , then maybe serving really is not very important to me. There are times God confronts me with this truth, and I have to ask myself,” If serving is not important to me, then am I being a little self centered?” Can’t I help others, the way have been helped? Now, many of us work hard at work, work hard in our homes, and feel like we are always doing something for somebody. But the service that Jesus is talking about is where we go beyond our nuclear families and immediate circle of friends. The Bible says, “Forget yourself long enough to lend a helping hand.” (Phil. 2:4) You see, we can make the time to serve others when we are grateful for the way that god and others have helped us in the past. To serve like Jesus, we have to serve with grateful hearts, BUT ALSO BENGGRATEFUL THAT WE HAVE THEHONOR to serve. And the Bible talked about our attitude of gratefulness in Psalm 100:2. Let’s read this verse “gratefully” together: “Serve the Lord with gladness.” You did sound grateful in that! CHHERFUL SERVICE Why do we serve God with gratefulness? We serve him with gratefulness because he’s given life, and hope and forgiveness & love to us through Jesus Christ. You see, if God never did another thing else for me, and I lost everything I have, would still have the greatest gift of all times—His eternal love. Now, I am going to interject own thoughts here—these are not from Rick Warren. I find that there is another important reason we serve God with gladness, and that is this: When we do something nice for someone, or help out at church, it makes us feel good. It feels good to make a contribution. It feels good to help someone out. It feels good to know that we have gone out of our way, putting aside our own agenda, to be kind and helpful. Now if you feel compelled and coerced into serving someone, you may or may not feel good about that. But when you serve you feel good, because your Father in heaven feels good about you. The goodness you feel is that your are fulfilling one of the purposes for which you made. I remember the thrill I felt when I figures this out. It motivated me to go and do more. To this day, it motivates me to be less self centered in my family, in my relationships, and here at church. Now, if you get thanked for serving, that’s all the better. But if you don’t, God thanks you. Please look at point # 8. I want you to hear from God , himself, the thanks that He gives to His servants, which you can experience on earth and in heaven: Let’s read it together “Well done good and faithful servant! Come and share your master’s happiness.” Returning back to Rick Warren: You know, that this message began in talking about Elis, A curious fact about Elvis – the only Grammy award he won for an album out of 250 million sold, was for a religious album that he recorded called, “He Touched Me.” Now, you are going to have the opportunity to hear this song as today’s “Offertory.” But , in this song, Elvis describes his desire to hear God speak the very words that we just read. Looking at # 9, it reads: After the last bell has rung, I want to bow down before Jesus And hear him say, “Well done, my son.” He is my reason for living, He is my everything. AMEN. **