The 6 Question Quiz for Class of 2005

Exodus 20:12 and Deuteronomy 5:16 Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, that your days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with you on the land which the Lord your God gives you. the best advisors you will ever find are in your mom, dad and grandparents. Remember that. They may not seem to be up on all your ways of thinking, but they bring to you years of experience that are much of the time necessary to make wise decisions. As the years go by you will find a striking similarity in your thinking and theirs. Fact is, it won’t be them changing. Try and recognize the extreme value in your parents’ counsel. And while you are at it, pray for them. Pray that God will maintain the fire of His passion in their hearts. Question 1: Are you going to try and do this? Will you do your best to honor and respect your parents? Deuteronomy 6:4&5 Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is One! And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. This is the backbone of our faith. Christ repeated this when he was asked the trick question, ‘What’s the greatest commandment?’ Being God, He recognized this command and the second—to love your neighbor as yourself—as the most important commands of our Christian walk. With these two in hand, you will successfully walk God’s way. Everything in our Christian walk revolves around these two. Remember Christ said, “Do this and you will live” It’s the foundation of the Christian life. We are meant as Christians to give it up for God. 100% It’s definitely not an easy command; but it certainly is the most fulfilling to complete. Question 2: “Are you willing to obey the two commandments? Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. Remember the saying: “Life is hard and it’s going to get harder. But hard isn’t bad.” You will go through some extremely difficult challenges in your life. Challenges that would make a grown (wo)man cry; guess what -- you now are grown up. Much of the time the ONLY way to fight through the difficult times is by laying it on the Lord. You are going to have to trust in God, without understanding the why’s much of the time in life—and that precisely is what faith and trust are about. You must KNOW He’s there guiding you , walking with you and loving you—sometimes without seeing or feeling Him. Question 3: “Will you trust Him?” Micah 6:8 He has told you, O man, what is good And what does the Lord require of you But to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God. There are so many questions in life as to just how to serve God. At times, the answer is so elusive, at times so simple. God does not need our sacrifices—he wants our lives. Remember the verses before this one? “What does God want? Sacrifices? Burnt offerings? Thousands of rams? Rivers of oil? Nope! He wants your life! Go look up the two commandments again! Question 4: Will you strive to do justice, to love kindness and walk humbly with your God? Colossians 3:23 Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord. Our day to day lives, our education, our work, our family—whatever--we are taught to do it ALL for the Lord and not for those looking on. No matter if you are off to LeTourneau or Yale or Cal Poly or LBCC. No matter if you are heading overseas on a short term missions trip. No matter if you are going to go bag grass seed. No matter if you are going to pump gas. You’ve gotta do it for the Lord. Everything you do, everything you say is for Him. HE is the one that’s watching and will give you the ultimate approval. The approval others give you is needed and sometimes important – it’s called encouragement. Ultimately though, His encouragement should be what we strive to attain. Question 5: Will you play for the audience of One? Romans 12:1&2 paraphrase: I beg you, in the light of what God has given you and all He has done for you, that you give your life back to God. Make sure that you are giving him back something good, holy and acceptable. It’s an act of worship to your creator. Don’t get caught up in what the world around you is trying to get you to do – they’re just pulling you down. Instead, be transformed, be changed, by getting close to God and His Word, by renewing yourself. And the cool thing is, when you cuddle up with the Lord, He will show you His good and perfect will for your life. You know the line: Sacrifice to God Reject the world Be transformed by God Live His will Easy words, hard to do sometimes. You have to start now and make a commitment to it. In the 80’s Steve Camp wrote a song called Living Dangerously in the Hand’s of God: There's safety in complacency but God is calling us out of our comfort zoneinto a life of complete surrender to the cross. To live dangerously is not to live recklessly but righteouslyand it is because of God's radical grace for us that we can riskliving a life of radical obedience for Him. Question 6: Are you ready to Sacrifice, Reject, Transform and Live? Will you live a life of complete surrender to the Cross? Will you live dangerously in the hands of God? This stuff is just words on paper until you accept it. I want to read you a quick story; maybe you’ve heard this, maybe not. During the presidency of Andrew Jackson, George Wilson, a postal clerk, robbed the federal payroll from a train. In the process he killed a guard.The court convicted him and sentenced him to hang. However, because of public sentiment against capital punishment at the time, a movement began to secure a presidential pardon for Wilson. After all, it was his first offence. Eventually President Jackson intervened with a pardon. Amazingly, George Wilson refused. Since a refusal of a presidential pardon had never happened before, the Supreme Court was asked to rule on whether someone could indeed refuse apresidential pardon. Chief Justice John Marshall handed down the court's decision:"A pardon is a parchment whose only value must be determined by the receiver of the pardon. It has no value apart from that which the receiver gives to it. George Wilson has refused to accept the pardon... We cannot conceive why he would do so, but he has. Therefore, George Wilson must die." The scripture is just words on paper for you until you receive it. And it’s like a pardon from a death sentence. Your life will only be lived when you fulfill God’s Word. I pray for you often, more often than you might think. I pray that you will above all, live your life fully and radically for the Lord Jesus Christ. That is after all the most important goal in life.