Last week I preached a sermon called Do you have the Guts? I really challenged the students to step up this year and be gusty when it comes to sharing our faith at school and inviting their friends to church. It says in isaiah "Forget the Former Things do not dwell on the past. See I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; Do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland.

My first point

1. Forget the Former Things
People are always going to try and get you to remember who you used to be before Christ or before you stood up for what you feel is right, so just know that. We can't be a generation that is always looking back but looking ahead so that people around us also can see how we focusing on the mountain mover not the mountain.
2. It's a new thing!
Maybe you have messed up your testimony at school or work or you think you have made a fool of God. The truth is we will all continue to make mistakes, that doesn't mean we should continue to make mistakes but I encourage every single one of you to understand that God's mercies are new every morning and that God wants to do something new with you this year! Another part of the verse says "do you perceive it?" Do we see our schools or work place how God see's it? Do we see how he could absolutely change the landscape of Virginia Beach this year? How it's ready to happen it we will just grab it with faith? I recently went out to Officer Dave's Football team practice where he is helping the green run rec football system by taking in troubled students and helping them by football. It's called the Tuff Program and it's workin. The team was featured in the front page of the paper and they have won back to back championships in the league, not to mention Officer dave has started this league that is reaching hundreds of youth and parents. Just imagine 3 years ago Officer Dave meeting with the Green Run Rec officials and them saying "Hey noone wants these kids, they are losers, troulemakers , and officer Dave saying "I don't want them"! but you see he saw something that noone was else saw.
So let me ask you do you see what noone else see's? Through the negativity and the fronts? Do you see what God can do in your World?
3. Be Gusty and Courageous
I then talked alittle about Joshua and how he must have felt after Moses dying. We love the verse in Joshua that says be strong and courageous but we fail sometimes to read the next part of the verse that then tells Joshua to do everything according to the laws and don't look to the left or the right and you will prosper.
4. Telling someone about Jesus Verbally is just as important as Living it!
We have so many Christians who don't live it flat out. They are right there in the locker room talking about girls inapprotiate, they are right there at the lunch table gossiping about someone, they are right there on the bus cussing just like everything else! The bible says we are to be be of the world but not in it.. How awesome would it be if we have a group of people from our church who Lived it! they didn't look to the left or the right!

Remember that God is with you!! If he is for us than who can be against us! Amen ...

Hope this encourages you and provokes you to be gusty and courageous this season of your life!