ESV

Several years back, Paul Harvey told about Duane Cowgill, a barber in Marshall, Michigan.Duane had an overabundance of produce from

his garden one year.He gave away as much as possible to friends,

neighbors, and family but the produce was coming faster than he could eat it or get rid of

it.He couldn’t figure out what to do with it all.

Finally, he came up with a solution.He piled a small mountain of leftover produce on the bench that sat on the sidewalk out in front of his barbershop with a sign that read:

“Free – Help Yourself.”By the end of the day, all of the produce was

gone.The only thing was Duane forgot to remove

the sign from the bench.When he arrived at work the next morning, the

bench was gone.

Sometimes we put too much stock in our own solutions to problems.

We usually find out that we lack the wisdom, the strength or the force of will to adequately

solve the problem

Why do we insist on working out,thinking out,

or determining out a way for ourselves?ESV

A young couple with a two-year-old child went to visit some wealthy relatives.

While the adults talked, the two-year-old got bored and wandered away.

The adults heard the child yelling and discovered him in the room across the hall

with his hand stuck in a very expensive vase.

The adults worked feverishly to get the young child’s hand out of the vase.They tried to twist and turn it.

They tried pouring oil around the little boy’s hand and the rim.

Nothing they tried worked.The man of the house said, “Obviously, we’ll

have to break the vase.I’ll be right back.”

He left the room and came back with a hammer.

Very carefully, he broke the vase and the child was free.

They all knew then why the boy’s hand was stuck in the vase.

He had reached in to grab a penny that was in the bottom of the vase and in his childish

ignorance, refused to let go.

ESV

Let’s hear what the apostle Paul says about trusting in our own efforts.

Human strength is amazing!Watch the Olympics, acrobats in a circus, the

speed a baseball is hurled.As impressive as those feats of strength are,

they’re nothing compared to God.Our brains can devise machines that can

apply thousands of times more strength to a project than we could ever hope to do on our

own.Think about a simple machine like a lever –our bodies can’t stand the stress that simple

machine can handle.

God’s powerESV

He has power over the natural elements.Calmed storms

Walked on waterTurned water into wine

Separated the sea for the Israelites to escape from Egypt

Stopped the sun in its orbit

Paul’s comments

.I didn’t rely on my own strength but

.

Why our efforts fail.

We need to stop depending on ourselves and depend on the One who can overcome all

things!

ESV

ESV

How many times have you heard these gems of human reasoning:

“That’s not smoke, it’s steam.”“We should have enough gas to get us where

we’re going.”“It’s supposed to make that much noise.”

“The boss won’t mind.”“I don’t need to unplug it. It’ll only take a

moment to fix.”

Consider these quotes as reflective of human reasoning:

“Everything that can be invented has been invented.”

(Charles H. Duell, commissioner, US Patent Office, 1899)

“I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.”

(Thomas Watson, Chairman of the Board, IBM, 1943)

“This ‘telephone’ has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of

communication. The device is inherently of no value to us.”

(Western Union internal memo, 1876)

“The wireless music box has no imaginable value. Who would pay for a message sent to

nobody in particular?”(financial advisors to David Sarnoff in response to his

urgings to invest in radio in the 1920’s)

“Who wants to hear actors talk?”(H.M. Warner, Warner Bros. Studio, 1927)

“Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.”

(Irving Fletcher, Professor of Economics at Yale Univ., 1929)

What the Bible says about human reasoning:ESV

ESV

What the Bible says about God’s wisdom.In , Nebuchadnezzar has a troubling

dream.None of his advisors could interpret it. King ordered that all of his “wise-men” be put to

death.Daniel wanted to know why?

When told about the problem Daniel said that God knew the answer.

Before appearing before the king on this matter listen to Daniel’s prayer after God

revealed the answer to the dream.

ESV

ESV

ESV

ESV

ESV

Paul compares trust in the physical life with trust in the spiritual life.

He says that we haven’t received the spirit of the world but the Spirit of God.

The Spirit of God is:The Spirit of holiness

GuidancePeace

TeacherIntercessor

Provides for us the “ ”

We cannot understand the things of God without the aid of His Spirit.

ESV

ESV

The Bible tells us that we can’t trust in our own effort, the only way to receive the help of the Spirit of God is to come in faith to the Son of

God.

We can’t earn our salvation nor can we work out our own solutions.

We can only trust in what God does for us.

ESV

ESV

Timothy Smith: “One of the truths of the Bible given over and over again is you can never be

good enough on your own to earn heaven. Because once you sin one time, you can’t brag

to a perfect God how good you are.”“I mean, you don’t impress the engineers of Boeing with the airplane that you made from

paper.

You don’t brag about how far you can drive a golf ball in the presence of Tiger Woods.

You don’t look Michael Jordan in the eye after shooting a jump shot and say, ‘I got game.’

And you certainly can’t boast about your goodness in the presence of a perfect, holy

God.”But thank God, He provided the way through

His Son, Jesus the Christ.