We arrived with only a handful of adults and a lot of children sitting in their plastic chairs eagerly awaiting for church to start. I explained to the team, most church members will be walking to church and they normally do not start at nine o'clock. Probably will be starting closer to nine thirty. So soon after I shared this others starting pouring into worship the Lord. Mike was asked to read out of Psalm 40:1-10. We proceeded in singing hymns of praise unto our Lord. There was an observation from the team, there was no hymnals but yet everyone knew the hymns from memory. Church member Paula welcomed everyone to church. One of the teen age girls led the music for the worship service. This was also another observations from our young people from North America. The teen agers and younger children led in the worship service. Their friend Victor from the job site and another young lady name Iris took up the offering. This church family was strong in the Lord and was teaching their young people early on how to pariticpate in the worship service. Training them up in the way they should go, literally.
The team was asked to come up to do their special, "Amazing Grace". What a beautiful job they did. They sang it in English first then in Spanish. Everyone was praising the Lord through their hard work and practicing. It was worth all the practice to see the joy on the Honduran faces as they were singing in their language and not their own. They knew these folks had put their heart and soul into this all for the glory of God.
Paula invited other specials from the congregation. There were several very young children coming forward singing unto the Lord. Victor got up and sang from his heart and shared how nervous he was singing in front of his new friends. But what an amazing job Victor did throughout the entire worship service. What a gift of friendship in Victor, which was given to the team from God. After all the children completed their singing Mike was asked to come forward to present the Word from God.
Mike preached out of Matthew 7:13-14. The Narrow and Wide Gate was his topic of the sermon.
The narrow gate is the only way to eternal life with Jesus Christ.. Jesus explains to types of roads we can travel on, the narrow road and the wide road. The narrow road is the road which leads to Jesus in Heaven and the wide road leads to Hell. It is not difficult to follow the narrow road because we have Jesus to lead our way. Without Jesus it is very difficult. When we are traveling on the wide road we do not need to focus like on the narrow road. On the wide road there are many things pulling you this way and that way. While traveling on the wide road you may get confused on which way to go. So what we need to do while traveling on the wide road which leads to destruction is to get focused back on Jesus by reading His Word daily, be in constant prayer and fellowship with others. Mike compared building two houses from verses 22-27. They may look the same but the foundations were built differently. This week Mariel's home was build from concrete, blocks and rebar. It has a firm foundation. But if you were to build a house from the ground up, from the sand, literally laying the blocks on the sand the home would collapse. Jesus is talking about two different lives. The home built from the concrete, blocks and rebar is built on a firm foundation from God's word, prayers and fellowship with others. When we build a house on the sand it is like someone who does not rely on God's word, or does not pray or spend time in fellowship with other believers. Their foundation is not strong and you cannot do it without God.
So in closing what road are you traveling down today? How firm is your foundation in Jesus Christ? Jesus Christ is the only way for all of us and if we do not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ and are grounded in His Word daily the road to destruction is coming our way. The wide gate is of the world and will lead to destruction.
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