Don't Look Back - SHIFT Series - May 24, 2020 - a podcast by theCrossroads, UPC

Don’t Look Back!
SHIFT Series Week 4

Get on the straight and narrow path with Jesus and Don’t Look Back!

On February 19, 1519 the Spanish explorer Hernan Cortes set sail for Mexico with an entourage of 11 ships, 13 horses, 110 sailors, and 553 soldiers. The indigenous population upon his arrival was approximately 5,000,000. From a purely mathematical standpoint, the odds were stacked against him by a ratio of 7,541 to 1. two previous expeditions and failed to even establish a settlement in the New World, that Cortes conquered much of the South American continent. What Cortez is reported to have done after landing is an epic tale of mythic proportions. He issued an order that turned his mission into an all or nothing proposition: Burn the ships! As his crew watch their fleet of ships burn and sink, they came to terms with the fact that retreat was not an option.

Luke 9:62 (NASB)
But Jesus said to him, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”

1 Kings 19:19-21 (NASB)
19 So he departed from there and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, while he was plowing with twelve pairs of oxen before him, and he with the twelfth. And Elijah passed over to him and threw his mantle on him. 20 He left the oxen and ran after Elijah and said, “Please let me kiss my father and my mother, then I will follow you.” And he said to him, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?” 21 So he returned from following him, and took the pair of oxen and sacrificed them and boiled their flesh with the implements of the oxen, and gave it to the people and they ate. Then he arose and followed Elijah and ministered to him.

The problem with most of us is that we are too Christian to really enjoy sin, but were way too sinful to completely enjoy Jesus Christ.

We’ve got just enough Jesus to be informed but not enough to be transformed!

Romans 11:29 (KJV)
For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.

It does not matter what the addiction is from your past, it does not matter what the goal is that God has for your future life… until you burn the ships you can never leave the past.

This was a Elisha’s deciding moment. Elisha wasn’t just buying in. He was selling out. That is how you get on this path of commitment with Jesus Christ! A huge decision followed by dramatic action!

Proverbs 23:23 KJV
““Buy the truth and sell it not.”

Here’s a line for you to remember: I choose to lose!

I choose to lose my life in Christ, so that I might find the greatest life possible.

I choose to lose because losing is winning with God.

If you get back more than you gave up, have you sacrificed anything at all?

The eternal reward always outweighs the temporal sacrifice.

At the end of the day, Judgment Day, our only regret Will be whatever we did not give back to God!
If you have not surrendered your life to God through repentance and water baptism in Jesus’ Name – that is where you need to start today. Turn your life over to Jesus and He will fill you with His Spirit – He wants to give you a better future than you can even imagine right now – but first you must give all of yourself to Him.
When God calls you out of darkness into His marvelous light, He does it for a reason. Whenever He places HIS SPIRIT within you it is not so that you will ever return back to the way things used to be.

Luke 17:32 KJV

Remember Lot’s wife.

We have NO GREATER CALLING OR PURPOSE in our lives than to live to the fullest the LIFE God has called us to. Since He filled us with His Spirit, things will NEVER be the same! We have to make up our minds that we will never go back, and at the same time if there are temptations and strings that would pull us back to PLAN B or cause us to look BACK, we must ELIMINATE those things from our lives.

James 1:8 KJV
A double minded man is unstable in all his ways.

Mark 10:29-30 (KJV)
And Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, There is no man that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, and the gospel’s,
But he shall receive an hundredfold now in this time, houses, and brethren, and sisters, and mothers, and children, and lands, with persecutions; and in the world to come eternal life.

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