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Roparna

Star Falls

Joakim Hjortland

01 Star Falls

The text, as we heard, therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.

Now I thought I knew what I was going to preach about until like this Thursday, but then I basically felt impressed to change the topic.

It would have been easier to stick with the original plan, and it's a good sermon that I preach many places.

I would have gotten significantly more sleep this night if I would have chosen the original plan.

But I believe God led another message on my heart that I want to share with you.

And I'm sure that he has a message for us today.

He has something he wants us to hear today.

I don't know what I don't know exactly what our needs and what is for you what is for me whatever and but I trust that the Holy Spirit is going to speak to our minds and to our hearts through this message.

The title of the message today is Star Falls, Star Falls and How to be Safe.

But before we get into that, I would just like to have another short word of prayer.

Dear Holy Father, I ask, pray again that your spirit may guide in a special way, lead my words, lead our thoughts.

Pray God that you may tailor make this message and that you may help us understand what it means to us individually.

And I pray that it may inspire, strengthen and help us and that these truths, these principles may also help other people we know, our loved ones, families, friends, that this can be a big blessing in many ways.

I thank you that you will lead, we pray in Jesus' name.

Up throughout the history of the Bible and up throughout the history of Christianity, there are many examples, many sad examples of stars for God if you will, of powerful people of God that God has used mightily that have eventually fallen away, that have eventually walked astray from God.

We see also in more recent history, for instance, in the history of our church, we have some of the most powerful people in our church that God really used mightily were stars that fell, sadly, eventually.

Canwright, and many people that God really used.

Jones, for instance, he was a very influential leader in our church.

He oftentimes preached at the general conference sessions, the sermons for all the delegates from around the world.

He was also strongly endorsed by Ellen White.

She said things about him like, he was a chosen vessel of God in 1888 and the years after to share a message that the church really needed to hear.

A message that if properly received by God's church it would basically lead to the finishing of the work.

She said like God has chosen him as a vessel to preach his message that the church so desperately needs.

He was so powerfully used by God but yet that man and many others eventually left the faith, left the church.

And when I hear these kind of stories and I read these kind of stories and it makes me wonder, it makes me ask myself, if these people that were so close to God, that were so filled with God's spirit, if they could fall, how can I make sure that I will not experience the same?

How can I make sure that I can stay on fire till the end?

How can I make sure that I can have the real and growing experience with Christ until the end?

Unfortunately, this is not only something that happened thousands of years ago or hundreds of years ago.

2 weeks ago, I heard 1 of my former teachers, I heard a sad news from him that he was disfellowshipped from the church for some, yeah, basically you could say similar to the story of David in some ways.

This man had been powerfully used by God, a mighty speaker, a mighty leader, a powerful author, that was a mentor for a big international, very impactful ministry in the Seventh-day Adventist church.

And he, yeah, basically similar to the story of David, he got into some sexual activities he shouldn't have gotten into and so on.

The difference seems to be that it's happened many times and It seems like the deep confession that David had has not been there like it should.

And even closer to home, a few days ago, a person that I and some people in this room know personally was sadly arrested by the police in his home.

His wife had called the police and many newspapers talk about this thing, this active Christian, how he, you know, they talk about how, in their words, they said he lived a double life and he did some serious, serious crimes and it will affect him and his family and others for probably the rest of their lives.

There was also, I think, powerfully used by God.

And yeah, went to a mission school and was working for God and God used him powerfully.

And that was 1 of the things that inspired me to really change the topic.

And the topic of today became an even stronger burden to me than it was before this week.

That begs the question, you know, how can we be safe?

We're also being told through inspiration that many stars in the church will fall in the time of the end.

I believe I will probably the next time I speak I think I will do a part 2 of this message.

Today The thought is I will focus a little bit more on that question, how can we be safe?

And I think the next sermon I will preach, I will talk a little bit about, and how can we help?

How can I maybe help a brother, a friend, a family member that is maybe taking some steps in a direction that may lead to something like this?

How can I help and maybe have an influence that maybe can hinder them from experiencing something similar?

So this is what we're talking about today.

Please pray for especially people that God is using powerfully.

Please pray for this friend of ours here in Sweden and his family in this difficult time right now, that God may be with them and God's spirit may work on their hearts.

I want to share with you today 7 key, 7 principles, 7 points.

Some of them will go through pretty quickly that I think are very important for how we can be safe, how we can stay strong until the end.

And the first principle I'm going to share is this.

It's important to realize that it happens gradually.

A fall like this, those kind of falls, doesn't happen overnight.

You don't go from overnight, really powerful use, but on fire, everything is good, and then overnight, you are completely off.

People go to hell on a mock belt basically, not in a fast race car.

Generally when people fall away, when they go to hell, when they get lost, generally it's more like a turtle than a hare.

And it may be useful for us in several ways to realize that generally people are lost inside of the church before they are lost outside of the church.

There is a period of time when they are in the church, yes, they go through the emotion, yes, but they do not have a saving relationship with Christ.

And that's where it starts usually before they come that far that they leave and they go out and things go down and down and down.

Now listen to this quote about Solomon from Prophet and Kings.

Gradual Was Solomon's apostasy that before he was aware of it, before he was aware of it, can you imagine?

He had wandered far from God Almost imperceptibly Almost, you could almost not see it.

It was so gradual, almost imperceptibly he began to trust less and less in divine guidance and blessing and to put confidence in his own strength.

That's the tricky thing, that's the scary thing, It happens so gradual that you may be kind of in that process without really being aware of it.

That's why he thinks he stands, take heed lest he fall.

Jesus said, Luke 16, verse 10, he is faithful in that which is least, he is faithful also in much.

And he is unjust in what is least, he is unjust also in much.

Before you are unjust in much or unfaithful in much, you are unfaithful in smaller things.

The decisions we make today is what determine our destinies tomorrow.

The decisions we take today, and usually start with small things, is what determines our destinies tomorrow.

Now Daniel 6 is an interesting example, we will not spend a lot of time there, but it's an interesting example of, I think in a sense you can see some of the slippery slope of sin which is gradually leading us downward.

02 Star Falls

So last time I preached here, some weeks ago, the topic was star falls and how to be safe.

I was talking about the sad reality that many Christian stars, powerful people of God, men and women of God up through history, in the Bible and throughout the history of Christianity, unfortunately have eventually maybe fallen away and walked astray from God.

And not only in the Bible and in history, but also more recently, in very recent times, and also significantly closer to home than that.

So we talked a little bit about that last time, and I believe it's an important message.

And if you didn't get to hear it, I encourage you to listen to the recording of it.

You can find it on Audiovers, for instance.

The good news is, though, even though many people have fallen and met that sad destiny, it doesn't need to happen.

And by God's grace, may it not happen with any 1 of us or any 1 of our loved ones.

I like how my friend Daniel Pell put it reflecting on a recent fallen star if you will, Ravi Zakarias which was a very famous Christian apologist.

Daniel Pelley put it like this, the recent investigation revealing the astrocious double life of the public Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias, has shaken the Christian world.

1 of Ravi's books is titled, Has Christianity Failed You?

So that was 1 of his books, Has Christianity Failed You?

And then he says, Now his own legacy is causing people to feel that Christianity has failed them.

People can fail us deeply, but true Christianity, rooted and grounded in the person Jesus, does not fail.

Jesus lived the most consistent life anyone has ever lived.

So even though there are sad examples, there are also many good examples of Christians that have been faithful until the end, But most importantly, our God never fails us and he always keeps his promises.

I also like how our pastor Jonathan Carlson said it a couple of weeks ago.

You know, that someone is fallen does not mean that the message they preached is not true, right?

I think it can be good to keep that in mind as well.

1 good example of that is Balaam, which used to be a prophet of God, but even though he wasn't a prophet of God, he apostatized.

That doesn't mean he was not inspired by God in the past when he shared those messages.

That doesn't make those messages less inspired than they were.

Anyway today's message is basically a continuation of what I shared last time.

I call it Star Falls 2 or you may call it Star Falls on how to help.

So last time we kind of asked the question, if all these people, if all these powerful mighty men and women of God could fall, how can I be sure that I will be able to stand?

What can I do to help maybe a family member, a friend, a brother or sister in Christ to be safe, to avoid that sad destiny of walking astray, of falling away from Christ?

So I believe it's a relevant message, I believe it's a useful practical message and an important message And I believe that these principles, these lessons we look at are relevant in a number of ways.

It's also relevant in relation to people who already have fallen maybe or backslidden, how we can maybe try to help them back, you know, to where they used to be.

People that have already lost that living, saving relationship to Jesus Christ.

But before we get into the message for today, I would like to have another word of prayer, so you can just bow your heads where you are and pray.

Dearly father, Thank you for this opportunity to come together, to worship you together.

And God, I just pray that you may lead this time.

God, this is your message, these are your people.

I pray that we may be inspired and strengthened and that you may help us to more and more be able to truly apply and live these principles in our lives, and that you may use us powerfully, and that we may become more and more like Jesus.

I also pray, I pray, God, that As a result of this message and the ripple effects of this message, I pray that there will be people in heaven because of it.

I think it's possible when you, through your spirit, help us to truly do these things and to be inspired to let you use us as you want to.

Thank you God for hearing and answering this prayer.

Many years ago, the gospel was preached to a number of tribes in Central Africa.

And many people there, they responded to the message.

They accepted the gospel message, you know, by the grace of God.

God was working, and after they accepted the gospel, after they accepted the message of Jesus they started naturally to you know worship God together as groups but also individually.

They started to to personally spend time with God, to personally spend time at the feet of Jesus, you know in his word, in prayer.

And they did not have a church building at this place So what they did was they cleared an open spot kind of in the middle of the jungle there.

They cleared an open space, an open spot where they could go to worship either together or individually.

After a short time there would be many paths going into that open spot, kind of in the center of the jungle there, and people would come from different directions, walking through the high grass there to get into that open spot where they would worship God, either as a group or individually.

Now what then happened was, if some of these converts, if some of these new Christians, if they eventually would be losing their first love and enthusiasm, another believer would come to them And they would encourage them and they would say to them, brother or sister, the grass is growing on your path.

I don't know, it's maybe not so often we do these kind of things and we may think something like that may seem somewhat contrary to our our culture but the question is, is this biblical?

Let's look a little bit what the Bible says about that.

First of all, the first verse I put on the screen here, from Hebrews 3.

It says, Hebrews 3, 12 and 13, Beware brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God, but exhort 1 another daily while it is called today, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin." We live in a wicked world.

We live in a world with lots of temptations, many ways, Satan is trying to put us down and make us walk away from Jesus, lose that first love.

And we are here in the word of God encouraged to exhort 1 another daily.

So our fellow believers will not be hardened in the deceitfulness of sin.

I want to notice another passage here from the Word of God on this note.

Hebrews 10 And let's notice verse 23 through 25.

It says here, "'Let us hold fast the confession of our hope "'without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.

"'And let us consider 1 another "'in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting 1 another, and so much the more as you see the day approaching." Powerful passage here.

We are encouraged here to exhort 1 another.

God wants us to fellow believers to come together and encourage each other, to help each other on the Christian walk, to strengthen each other, to help each other to look to Jesus, you know, to walk on the right path.

You know, there are some things in life that you can't really do on your own or it's pretty hard.

I haven't really tried it so much, but my, 1 of my teachers from last year, Pastor Don McIntosh, he told this story when he tried to play tennis with himself.

And if you ever try that, you can imagine it doesn't really work very well.

Well, if it works, it's probably not very fun.

And it's not like, I don't know, you have to play very differently, just shoot it very high up in the air and try to run around, I don't know.

Tennis is kind of, you kind of need to be more than 1 person to play tennis, right?

Certain things in life, we can't really do on our own.

And 1 of those things is the Christian life.

We need each other in the Christian life.

The Christian life is not designed to live as a hermit, to live in isolation, just on your own.

Maybe by the miraculous power of God, if you come in a situation like that and you can't meet any other Christian, maybe you're not sure, he can maybe give you what you need.

But God tells us that we should come together.

Now, unfortunately, that it's a little bit harder in these recent times, you know, with all of these COVID restrictions, right?

But I encourage you to at least, well, Zoom is a good alternative.

At least try to tune in there when you can.

And if you're able, also meet in person with fellow believers in different ways.

I want us to notice also the important thing it says here in verse, what is it, verse 25.

It says that we should do these things so much more as you see the day approaching.

In other words, the closer we come to the end of time, the closer we come to the second coming, the more important it is that we, as fellow believers, strengthen each other, that we help each other, that we exhort 1 another, that we encourage another, that we help each other on the Christian walk.

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Star Falls

02 Star Falls

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01 Star Falls

1h 8m

02 Star Falls

1h 2m

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