Give God Thirty Days

I’m here today to ask a simple question. Can you give God a chance? Can you give God thirty days of your life? There are times in our lives when we just have to step out on faith. It is hard to do. The world says that we must also understand why and how everything happens to us. The logic of this world says that life must be fair.

Let us accept on faith that there is a God. We can spend all of our lives trying to use logic to explain away God or we can just believe that God exists and that God is our God. We can also believe that we are children of God. We can also choose to serve God for thirty days.

The minds of this world claim that we must have a nice and neat answer to how the universe was created. The logic of this world says that we must know the day and hour that the world was created. We can spend all of our time searching for the exact moment that the universe was created or we can just believe that God created us and the beauty that we see all around us. Mankind has been searching for the answer of how this world was created for a long time. The Bible provides an answer that God spoke it into existence and that creation was good. Let us accept creation on faith.

I was challenged with a lot of tough questions several weeks ago. I had a conversation about God with someone who asked a lot of hard questions about God. They were challenging questions. He was using those questions as justification for avoiding building a strong relationship with God. I wasn’t sure that I had all of the answers. In fact, I didn’t. God provided the answers through me. God provided the scriptures to back up the answers. God is an amazing God if we just listen.

I am inspired when people are touched by God. God surprises me a lot. I love it when God does the unexpected. I share my love of God with a lot of people. Not everyone is ready to hear about God or God’s love. I believe in planting seeds and seeing what comes up. My favorite gardening style is to let God blow the flower seeds and plant the seeds where he wants the flowers to grow. In the spring, I strain to look at the leaves of the new plants to try to guess what flower will grow from that small seed planted by God in the dead of winter.

I also strain to look into the hearts of people to see God growing stronger in their garden of life. The faith journey is different for different people. For some, the journey is short. For others, the journey takes a long time. For most of us, we will spend our entire lives on the journey to get closer to God. We will have spiritual growth spurts along the way and then we will have periods where it seems like we are making no progress at all. The journey may require a lot of prayers from our loved ones to God asking that we receive God’s anointing, favor, and blessing. In fact, someone else may have planted the seed of faith that sprouted when I watered the seed with God’s word.

There’s a story in the Bible in Matthew 13:1-23 about seeds falling on different kinds of soil. That soil is really descriptions for our hearts. [Read Matthew 13:1-23] We must prepare our hearts to be fertile ground for God’s word. If our hearts are full of stones or weeds, then we must change and build a place for God to grow within us. We need to build spiritual roots that are deep and strong so that we will stand firm when the storms come in our life. We also need to withstand the thorns and weeds in our life which try to chock our joy and our relationship with God.

My job is to know about God and to share the good news about him as your pastor. God is the one who helps me with the words and with the spiritual guidance. I’m just the guy willing to open his mouth and to let God’s words flow out. The amazing thing is that I can’t guess who has the fertile heart where God’s words will grow and flourish. I just go around planting seeds. It is so much fun. I don’t know what kind of ground that I’m sowing on when I sow God’s word. I just share God. Did you catch that? I just share God. It is that simple.

Recently, I shared God with a guy at a time when I hadn’t planned on sharing God. God just provided the situation to happen. Just sharing God provided joy for me and the guy receiving God. Two hours seemed like two minutes for both of us. We didn’t know what was happening we just talked like we were talking about a baseball game. The difference was that we were asking and answering questions about God.

Satan has placed a lot of reasons in our heart why we should not be in relationship with God. All of Satan’s reasons are lies. One of reasons may be that you lost your job because God was mad at you. One of reasons may be that you are sick because God wanted you to be sick. One of reasons may be that you aren’t happy because it pleases God. It is all a lie. Don’t listen to Satan. Listen to God.

I’m here today to ask a simple question. Can you give God a chance? Can you give God thirty days? Here’s what I’m asking you to do for God:

1. Speak with faith for thirty days. Don’t speak any negative about yourself or anyone else for thirty days.

2. See with the eyes of faith for thirty days. Look at what God wants you to see for thirty days.

3. Avoid cursing, teasing, and joking at someone else’s expense for thirty days.

4. Avoid any negative comments about yourself, your health, your friends, or anyone you love for thirty days.

5. Avoid giving anyone a hard time about anything for thirty days. Anyone means your wife, your children, and your friends.

6. Give yourself over to God completely for thirty days.

7. Tell your family and friends and even strangers that you love them for thirty days.

8. Open the Bible for thirty days. Read any scripture that you find. Imagine yourself in the Bible story or scripture.

9. Share the love of Jesus Christ for thirty days.

10. Do something unexpected for someone for thirty days.

[Go through each of the main points above in more detail.]
1. Speaking with faith for thirty days means speaking the unseen before it is visible. Speak with boldness that the impossible is possible. Stop saying “My son is lazy.” Start saying “I thank God for my son who is faithful, loving, smart, and hard working.” Stop saying that “My health is declining.” Start saying “I thank God that I’m getting better every day.” Speak only positive things about yourself or anyone else for thirty days.

2. See with the eyes of faith for thirty days. Look at what God wants you to see for thirty days. God has a plan for you. Open your eyes to the potential that is in you that God has given you. Open your eyes to see work in a new light. Open your eyes to see your spouse or children the way that God sees them. Open your eyes to see a sunset like it is the first time after you regained your sight. What would it be like to see God’s beauty for the first time? What would it be like to see your child’s face for the first time? What would it be like to see the smile on your loved one’s face for the first time? Let God guide you to see the mysteries of the gospel for the first time.

3. Avoid cursing, teasing, and joking at someone else’s expense for thirty days. We are snared by our tongue. Our spoken word has so much power over us. Scriptures warn us about the danger of the spoken word used in the wrong way. Scriptures also explain the power of the spoken word to confirm blessings in our lives. Joking at someone’s expense is really easy, but the hurt stays long after the laughing ceases. Don’t do it. Don’t tease. Don’t curse. Think about what you are about to say before it comes out of your mouth. Only let the positive and spiritual words be spoken out of your mouth. Don’t say “You are trouble.” Don’t say “You are a pain in my side.” Don’t say “You will not account to anything in this life.”

4. Avoid any negative comments about yourself, your health, your friends, or anyone you love for thirty days. This goes along with the third point. Only speak words that are loving, encouraging, and uplifting for thirty days. Don’t say that my back is getting worse. Tell your loved one how special they are to be in your life.

5. Avoid giving anyone a hard time about anything for thirty days. Anyone means your wife,
your children, and your friends. Don’t say it if you don’t mean it. Don’t say it in anger. Say your words in love. Say your words in joy.

6. Give yourself over to God completely for thirty days. Pray to God and say “God, you are my God and I am yours. Guide my steps in the way that you want me to go.”

7. Tell your family and friends and even strangers that you love them for thirty days. This is probably the hardest of all. It gets easier once we say “I love you” for the first time. It is fun to see the reaction of friends or strangers when you tell them that you love them. It is tough to see the reaction of family who haven’t heard those three words for too long. At first, a wall begins to fall that separates the two of you. A place of joy and love replaces the wall that separated the two of you.

8. Open the Bible for thirty days. Read any scripture that you find. Imagine yourself in the Bible story or scripture.

9. Share the love of Jesus Christ for thirty days.

10. Do something unexpected for someone for thirty days.

These points tie very nicely into Ephesians 4:25-5:2. The main goal is not to give the devil a foothold into your life. We were given the advice not to let the sun go down while you are still angry when we got married. It is still good advice. The scripture is asking us not to let bad language come out of our mouths. The spoken word is very powerful. The spoken word can bless our lives or it can curse our lives. Don’t voice your fears out load. Speak in faith instead.

The scripture from Ephesians 4:25-5:2 is so important. The scripture says “25Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26"In your anger do not sin"[d]: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27and do not give the devil a foothold. 28He who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with his own hands, that he may have something to share with those in need. 29Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. 30And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. 1Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children 2and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”

The person who was given this challenge to give God a chance for thirty days is seeing a difference in his life. His coworkers want to know what happened to him. He is not cursing. He is not looking at other women. He feels the fullness of God in his life. He is about to burst open with God’s love inside of him. He doesn’t know what to do yet, but he knows that life has changed for him. Are you willing to give God a chance for thirty days, too? Amen.