Wednesday 5/6/15 Old Man, Old Story! (3)

Dear Father in Heaven: I love You very much. Please forgive me of my sins and wrongdoings and wrong thinking. You are wonderful and I really appreciate all You do for all of us. Please on this our Salvation Wednesday help me to get Your message of Good News on Salvation out to those who are not saved or who over the years have turned away from You. Thanks for helping us through this day and putting people in front of us to witness to about Your grace and love. Thanks for taking care of families and friends. Please, dear Lord, be with our President and all of our other leaders. Please bless and watch over our military, our police, firefighters and all other first responders. Please be with those men and women who are so faithful at coming each week in their big trucks to pick up our trash and recycled things. Lord, they work so hard as servants to all of us. Please, Lord, bless them and keep them safe hanging on those trucks. Please help me now with the message and then to get it dispatched. In Jesus' Name, I pray this day. Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, I do really love to tell those old, old stories, and they just never change. I also love the song about that and we will be singing that chorus each day. So today again we will start out again by singing that chorus. Let us get to the message, Old Man, Old Story.

Salvation Wednesday: May 6, 2015: Old Man, Old Story (Day Three)

I Love to Tell the Story: (Catherine Hankey, William G. Fischer)

Chorus:

I love to tell the story! 'Twill be my theme in glory.
To tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

I love to tell the story! 'Twill be my theme in glory.
To tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

Genesis 2:15 - The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the Lord God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die." (NIV)

One of my favorite stories from the Bible comes from the book of Genesis and is built around that very first commandment given to man. Do not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God even told Adam why. He said if you eat of that tree you will surely die. Now God was very good to Adam. If you read the story of creation, you will see that everything God created He gave over to Adam to have control over. He set up a very few rules. One was that Adam was in charge, God gave him a mind of his own and gave him free will. All the plants and animals were given to Adam and God even made a woman to help keep Adam happy and better still God placed them in the Garden of Eden naked!! How about that, is God good or what? God is good. But with all those tings, God only had one commandment for Adam at the time. Adam, do not eat from that tree in the middle of the garden.

Now I learned several things from this story and that is why this "Old Man" loves to tell the "Old Story." I must tell you that I learned most of the stories, those Old Stories, from my dear mamma. But God called mamma home early in my life so God has opened up some of the same stories and gave me a different slant on things.

On the story about Adam and that commandment from God not to eat from the tree, my mamma taught me that man really messed up here. She also taught me that if I did mess up I should own up to what I did wrong right away. When God questioned Adam about if he had eaten from that tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Adam blamed it on Eve. God, that woman, THAT WOMAN You gave me, well, she made me eat from the tree, she picked that fruit and she fed it to me. But wait, God more than likely said to Adam, I put you in charge, not Eve. And men, if we really MAN UP, we are still in charge of what goes on in our homes if we indeed are Christians. So mamma taught me if I mess up I should man up and not lie about it. Then God gave me another story from that same story. Do not blame others for things you did wrong. In fact, MEN, WE NEED TO COVER FOR THOSE UNDER OUR COVERAGE. Do you folks know that a pastor is responsible for his flock that God puts in front of him? That message is for another day. All pastors should preach on that one.

Now Eve, being no better about the truth than Adam was, put the blame on the snake. So how many sins did Adam and Eve commit that day? They broke the commandment not to eat from the tree, then they lied about it, then they placed the blame on someone else. AND SIN IS OFF AND RUNNING.

So from this story today, what did we learn? One, let us listen to God and obey Him right from the start. If we do mess up, fall short of His glory by sinning, we need to confess up and then ask to be forgiven. We also need to repent of our sins, we need to repent of our sins and go and sin no more.

I Love to Tell the Story: (Catherine Hankey, William G. Fischer)

Chorus:

I love to tell the story! 'Twill be my theme in glory.
To tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

I love to tell the story! 'Twill be my theme in glory.
To tell the old, old story of Jesus and His love.

Dear Father in Heaven: Thanks for the message today and for those wonderful stories from the Bible that still hold true today. Thanks for them, dear Lord. In the name of Jesus, I pray. Amen.

Now pray and go forth sharing your blessings and your love for Jesus and also 'fessing up when you are messing up. Love ya.

Pastor Dan