What Happiness & Contentment Must Not be Linked To

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on February 4, 2010

Happiness that is linked to the stock market will ebb and flow with the condition of our portfolio.  Economic recessions and depressions have often deeply affected people psychologically.  If our happiness is directly tied to our economic situation then we are vulnerable emotionally. Economic issues are usually out of our control so our joy may be hijacked at any moment when our bank account staggers during financial adversity.  If our hearts are tethered to the stock market our joy goes up when the market goes up and our joy goes down when the market plunges.  You as a person are worth more than your portfolio.  You are made in the image of God.  You were made to have a deep and abiding relationship with the Lord.  He loves you and has not left you regardless of where your financial situation is today.  No manner of adversity can separate you from his love and care.  Your value and self-worth must not be tied to what you possess but with who possesses you.  The great news is that God loves you.  He is crazy about you.  Paul said in Romans, “If God be for you who can be against you.” (Romans 8:31)   Someone once said, “If God had a refrigerator your picture would be on it!”  Drink in these words from the pen of the Apostle Paul as he wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?  As it is written: “For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,  neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:35-39

What gives us emotional buoyancy in life is not what we have but who has us.  Meaningful living flows out of a personal relationship with Christ.  An abiding relationship with Jesus will ground and sustain us through the vicissitudes of life.  Jesus succinctly summarized where we find our worth in life.  He distinctively stated that our worth and identity as people should not be built upon possessions but upon our connection with himself. 

Then he said to them, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions.”  Luke 12:15

You Cannot Help Others Without Helping Yourself!

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on January 18, 2010

Ironically when we help others we get helped ourselves.  Perhaps it would be a selfish motive to just help others so that you can get encouraged – but when we help others we are blessed in the process.  Selfishness and being self-absorbed leads to depression and emptiness.  When we are going through a tough time the tendency is to draw a circle around ourselves and place all of our attention to what is inside that circle; ourselves!  The more we self-focus the emptier we become.  When you find yourself in a hard spot resist the temptation to become preoccupied with your needs and wants.  R.C. Sproul recently said if you make the word JOY an acrostic it would mean this:  J = Jesus first, O = Others second and the Y = Yourself last.  When we live life in that order we have Joy.  Proverbs underscores this principle of placing others above yourself. 

“A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed.”

Proverbs 11:25  (NIV)

Watch the video clip below of an interesting story I told Sunday of someone that was in a challenging time and yet thought of others instead of herself.

Reaching Out to Rehoboth

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on January 11, 2010

Today Bay Shore Community Church will sign papers to lease property in Rehoboth, Delaware to start a new campus.  The Rehoboth Campus will feature a Sunday 6 PM service that will be exactly like our current two Sunday Morning Services in the Gumboro/Millsboro area.  It is our desire to provide contemporary worship as well as a creative multi-media venue to seek to communicate with this generation.  I will be preaching live each Sunday evening in this location the same message that is shared at our current campus. For the next three months the leased property on Route One will undergo extensive renovations to turn the facility into a contemporary worship facility.  We are very excited about reaching out to the people of Rehoboth with contemporary services that will lift up Christ and give practical guidance for living the Christian faith in a modern world.  The property that is to be leased is a 5000 square foot area under the Al Casapulla’s Restaurant that is located right behind Ruby Tuesdays.  Please stay tuned to my blog and website www.bayshorecc.org for upcoming information.  Our primary needs at this point are:

• People that will begin to pray over the town of Rehoboth and the adjacent areas.
• People that will join this service to serve in various capacities to welcome families to this new campus.  We will need ushers, greeters, nursery workers and a host of other areas to serve.
• People that will financially invest in this new outreach.

Please continue to track our Rehoboth campus information on this blog.  We will soon provide pictures of our renovation project as it gets underway as well as hear about some brave pioneers that will be going with us to impact the very special community of Rehoboth.

What Young Leaders Don’t Know

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on January 4, 2010

The famous Chuck Swindoll, radio Bible teacher and an infamous American Pastor, was recently interviewed by the Catalyst organization.  Swindoll said something radical in the interview.  He said, “I have never seen a wise young person.  Wisdom comes from experiencing some failure.”  Swindoll went on to say that he has seen a lot of gifted and talented young people but never has he seen a wise young person.  It is almost impossible to have great wisdom in a short time span.  Wisdom is accumulated by listening to others that are older and more experienced than you.  It is also gained when we experience failures and successes in life.  In addition we also gain wisdom by consistently walking with God year after year.  Recently a young staffer at BSCC asked me to do a monthly leadership mentoring session with him.  I immediately said “yes.”  I could see in his eyes a hunger to learn.  I also saw the humility that made him realize that the old guy on the other side of the desk may have learned something in the last 30 years of ministry that could be helpful to him.  The young staffer had humility and people with humility have open ears to learn from others.  Pride and arrogance make people of any age unteachable but they especially make young leaders closed to seasoned input.  When we are proud our ears are shut but when we are humble they are wide open.  Craig Groeschel of Life Church TV recently said at a conference I was attending, “many young leaders in their 20’s are not open to learn from seasoned leaders.”  I could hear the frustration in his voice which I totally resonated with.  He cited that when young leaders came to talk with him that they did all the talking and seldom asked any questions.  Being teachable expresses itself by its inquisitiveness.  Even Jesus asked questions of the spiritual leaders of his day. 

Luke 2:46    After three days they found him in the temple courts, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. NIV

Luke 2:51-52   51 Then he went down to Nazareth with them and was obedient to them. But his mother treasured all these things in her heart. 52 And Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and men. NIV

John Maxwell, now a leadership giant in the church and cooperate world, used to take his vacation each year in some city that had a great church and consequently a great church leader.  He would make an appointment to ask questions of the successful leader. Maxwell would walk in with a tape recorder and note pad to ask questions.  This tells me something about the character of John Maxwell – he was teachable and his openness to the wisdom of others propelled him into incredible success.  None of us are born wise – we gather wisdom from others that know more than we know. The most important thing to know is that you don’t know everything but you can know by asking somebody that does know.  No leader knows everything but there are certainly some seasoned leaders that have low hanging fruit that is within the reach of younger leaders that can reach out and pick it.

You Believe in God; Big Deal!

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on December 29, 2009

That won’t get you very far.  It is interesting that the Greek word used for “knowing the Lord” (Philippians 3:10) is the word ginosko. That Greek word means literally “to know absolutely or to know fully.” Often we speak of people that believe in God and people that do not believe in God. Some people take great comfort in the fact that they believe in God. Mere belief produces little impact when it comes to our salvation. In fact the Bible says that the devil and demons believe.

You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that — and shudder. James 2:19 NIV

Satan’s full recognition of the existence of God will not insure his place in the presence of God for eternity. In fact, scripture says that he will be “cast into the Lake of Fire” (Revelation 20:10). Consequently believing in God is not the same as really knowing the Lord. Ironically there will be many believers in God that will be eternally lost. Knowing the Lord intimately by having personal salvation will lead to a fulfilling and satisfying life here on earth and give us eternal life in the world to come. Watch the video clip below for a humorous illustration of our need to really know the Lord versus just believing in his existence.

Flexibility

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on December 17, 2009

How do you lower stress and have more peace in your life?  One of the keys to more peace and less stress is learning to be flexible when life delivers changes to your door. Two kinds of change we experience in life: expected change and unexpected change.  Expected change is change that I initiate and unexpected change is change I do not initiate.  Expected change is produced by a proactive decision I make such as deciding to go back to college, changing jobs or adopting or having a child.  Unexpected changes may be an illness, a divorce or some unexpected thing that happens in your life that causes you to adapt to a new life reality.  The Lord is sovereign over our life and can help us adjust to the new realities that come.  Nothing takes him by surprise and when we are faced with an unexpected change we must be flexible and not let stress overwhelm us.  Below is a clip of a story I told in a recent message of how to adapt to changes.

Don’t Just Sit There – Go For It!

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on December 7, 2009

I really believe in being proactive in life.  Recently I preached on Peter getting out of the boat (his personal comfort zone) and walking on the water.  I am intrigued by this part of the story found in Matthew 14 – Jesus didn’t ask Peter to get out of the boat but Peter brought the idea up.  He initiated the whole idea of trying to walk on the water – not Jesus.  I said in the message we shouldn’t always be waiting for God to nudge us to do stuff we should play “Father may I” and introduce our cool ideas to God and say Lord can I do this?  God rewards and smiles at people who are willing to try extraordinary things in this world.

Jesus Is Where I am the Most Nervous

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on December 4, 2009

This past Sunday I talked in my message about Jesus and Peter walking on the water (Matthew 14).  Big idea is the boat represents our comfort zone while stepping out into the places that are scary is where Jesus usually shows up in our life.  Jesus was not in the boat “the safe place” but he was out there on the water in the scary place.  When we play it safe in life we will rarely encounter the power of Christ.  It is when we step out and do things that scare us that we see the power of the Lord working.  Here is a little story I told in the message about something I did recently that scared me but the Lord showed up and did something neat.

God & Dog

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on December 1, 2009

Can dogs teach us anything about God?  I love dogs.  Although Karen won’t let me have one – I am still campaigning.  I take that back she gave me a ceramic dog for my birthday a couple of years ago.  Anyhow I have some great memories and stories of dogs in my life.  My heart sort of warms as I think of each dog I have owned in my lifetime.  Please watch the video below and if you love dogs and are interested in God you will love it.  It is one of my favorites.

Relevant Lessons From the 1993 Movie Groundhog Day & Deer Hunting

Posted in: Uncategorized by DannyTice on November 24, 2009

I recently shared in a sermon about the unpredictability of life. In my series called “Unknown” I said there are four emotions that usually manifest themselves when we are entering some unknown or new territory in life. Those four emotions are: uncertainty, insecurity, fear and excitement. In the movie Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray – he played a cynical weatherman from Pittsburg. We see how tormenting life would be if it were always the same. New experiences in life can be scary but also exciting. Watch the clip from the sermon below on a story I told about deer hunting. Although hunting can be controversial with some people the clip below gives a little perspective on how refreshing the unexpected can be.