Collisions - August 26, 2012

Ground rules

  • This is a safe place, treat it with respect, no Facebook or trashing of someone else in school this week
  • You don’t have to be here every week, but when you’re here, be completely present. Leave the drama outside, and bring your brain in the room
  • If you have a Bible, bring it. Don’t rely on your phone, I’m very guilty of this but it’s too easy to get involved in other things on your phone.
  • Speak up! This will be really boring for all of us if it’s just me standing up here talking for an hour each week. I’m working in lots of questions so please answer them as best you can. I intend to learn from you as well!

Collide

Introduction

Words are powerful. One of the things you’re going to learn about me this year is that I LOVE words. Some of my favorite words are the ones whose sounds capture what they mean.

Onomatopoeia - BUZZ, BARK, VIOLENT, FLOWER, what if the meanings were reversed?!

Anyway, one of those is COLLIDE.

- When you hear the word COLLIDE what kinds of things come to mind?   
- Is this a positive word to you or a negative one?  
- What are some bad collisions? (Cars, concussions)
- What are some good collisions? (Waves on the beach, ideas)

Powerful word, but not inherently bad. It’s really about the power to change.

When two things collide, one of those objects will change.

  • small collisions, small changes - when I collide with someone a lot like me or just in passing, there’s not much change
  • big collisions, big changes - when I collide with Gina, or a child...bigger changes

CHANGE feels better than COLLIDE. Obama got elected on the word change. We spend a lot of time in church talking about how to change, read verses about it, sing songs about it, pray prayers, join youth groups about it. All of us can identify things in our life that we’d like to change.

- Corny joke: 4 frogs sitting on a log, 3 decide to jump off, how many left?
- Is easier to change or to talk about changing?  Why?
- What are some things about you that you wish you change?  Think internally
- What is keeping you from making those changes?

Deciding to change doesn’t make the change, you have to collide with something to change.

Tension

- What could you possibly collide with this week?
    - Those possibilities determine the change that is available to you.
- Every day God gives you things to collide with... 
    - What would happen if you said yes and started colliding with everything?

Truth

Jesus collided with people all of the time. Sometimes that change is good, sometimes not, but there is always a change when you encounter Jesus.

Sometimes they get a brand new perspective, a brand new body, or a brand new start. This woman got all three! This story is found in all three Gospels, but we’re looking at Luke today.

Someone read Luke 8:40-48

  • “Power has gone out of me”
  • Luke is a doctor, no one could help this woman. Lost cause?
  • 12 years?! How could she even move?
  • What did she have to overcome to find and get to Jesus?
  • She knew her condition wouldn’t change without a COLLISION

Application

This woman gets something very important: Regardless of what is at stake, our reservations, our fears, our concerns, if we let those things rule us and guide our actions, then we are in danger of missing out.

- What would this woman have missed out on had she decided not to collide with Jesus?
- What would we be missing out on if we don’t collide?

You have to put yourself in the position to be changed...or collide.

Be intentional about colliding. What does colliding look like for us? Does it have to be a big move?

Why do you think we tend to want to stay the same instead of changing?

If we don’t collide, we don’t change. Nothing will

Landing

We need a collision to get where we want to go. If we don’t, things will stay the same, and that isn’t healthy. Look at what this woman, what if she hadn’t collided?

You weren’t meant to be the same forever...you’re meant to change, be changed, and change others. You need to collide. Starting now.

What are some circumstances we need to work at putting yourself in, in order to really collide this coming week?