01/04/26 - Pastor Kelly - A New Thing Is Better

But, new things can be better! – even if it’s not what you expected!   -        Isaiah 43:18-19 (NLT) “But forget all that—It is nothing compared to what I am going to do. 19 For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.   I am about to do something new– bringing forth a new thing!   But, sometimes loss is the way to gain. Sometimes pain is the way to purpose.   Some people might be better at some things, it doesn’t make them better –   The religious people could quote the laws (and thought they were better than everyone) but Jesus was not happy with them.   MATTHEW 23:1-7, 11-13 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, 2 “The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees are the official interpreters of the law of Moses.3 So practice and obey whatever they tell you, but don’t follow their example. For they don’t practice what they teach.4 They crush people with unbearable religious demands and never lift a finger to ease the burden. 5 “Everything they do is for show. On their arms they wear extra wide prayer boxes with Scripture verses inside, and they wear robes with extra long tassels. 6 And they love to sit at the head table at banquets and in the seats of honor in the synagogues. 7 They love to receive respectful greetings as they walk in the marketplaces, and to be called ‘Rabbi.’   11 The greatest among you must be a servant. 12 But those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. 13 “What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you shut the door of the Kingdom of Heaven in people’s faces. You won’t go in yourselves, and you don’t let others enter either.   Better depends on what you need; what you are using something for–   Better is relative to purpose. And each of us have and serve a different purpose in our jobs, in our lives, in our families, in our churches, in our ministry, in our relationships   Better is perspective   God is better. But sometimes life might get worse.   What if better is not what God is doing FOR me– but what God is doing THROUGH me.   Sometimes we think we know better–   We think we know better than God, and it causes chaos.