LIVERMORE – At the North Livermore Baptist Church May 15 service the congregation was welcomed by Pastor Bonnie Higgins at 9:30 a.m. to begin the service. The Call to Worship was read and the Invocation/Lord’s Prayer was recited. The hymns that were sung was “Footsteps of Jesus”, “The Love of God”, and “They will know we are Christians”. The service ended with “Go Now in Peace”. Linda Lyman is the organist each week. Janet Diaz is the pianist each week. Lew Lyman leads the music for the congregation each week.

The sermon, titled “Good from the Bad” and reading the scripture from Romans 8:28. Pastor Bonnie began talking about how a butterfly goes from a caterpillar to a beautiful butterfly. Something that goes from something that isn’t great to look at to something that is beautiful. Just like God can take something in our own lives that aren’t pretty to look at but God can show the beauty in it.

In our lives, we get ourselves into some bad situations by the decisions we make, but God can take those times and work it so at the end He will get the glory when things work out the way God wants them to. We can never do anything in our lives that will disrupt the plans that God has for us. We might take a longer route to get to where God wanted us to be, but He will get us there.

We sometimes will tell people who are going through a rough time in their lives that “everything happens for a reason”, that God is the author of the hardship they are going through. This is not true. You will not find that everything will happen for a reason in the Bible. The Bible says there is a season for everything, not a reason. God does not cause the bad things that happen in our lives, we make those decisions when we don’t stay focus on what God has for us. God gave us free choice, and part of that free choice is consequences when we take our eyes off of Him. We must remember that evil is not part of God’s plan for our lives. Yes, we will go through tough times, but we should always give thanks in all circumstances. Our gratitude to God during our rough situations allows God to bring the good out from the bad.

Pastor Bonnie gave some examples of where God brought the good out of the bad situations. She talked about Joseph. His brothers selling him into slavery, God used that situation to save them when they were reunited in the years afterwards. Another example was Daniel. Daniels integrity and faithfulness to God put Daniel in a lion’s den with very hungry lions from his enemies. God protected Daniel in the lion’s den and his captors were then thrown in and eaten. Ester and Mordecai saved the Jewish people from being destroyed, as Ester was made queen. The best example we have is Jesus. From the trial, to the beatings, to the crucifixion, Jesus was in the worse situation. We all know that on the third day, Jesus was resurrected and proven to be alive. God took the death of Jesus and made if good through the resurrection. Because of Jesus, we were reconciled to God, something wonderful. We can go to God anytime we want and know that He is always there for us. We know that God has said he would never leave or forsake us, no matter what is going on in our lives.

We know that sometimes God allows bad things happen to His children. We saw that with Job. God allowed Satan to take everything from him, but in the end, and because Job stayed faithful to God, God gave Job everything he had before and more. Job might have lost his first family, but God blessed him with another. God will allow bad things to happen to us because He wants to change our character. God wants us to transform so we can be more like Jesus. God also allows it because he is preparing us for bigger plans in our lives. We don’t see the bigger picture of our lives, but God does. He sees things that we can’t, but knowing He is in control we should be able to leave it up to Him and follow Him. God sees our entire life so He is preparing us for our future self, not like ourselves where we only see bits and pieces of our lives. Sometimes, God allows things to happen to us to show us how big He is. We can really mess up our lives, but God can always get us back on the right path towards Him.

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We know that God is good in and of Himself. And He wants to show that in each of our lives. God only wants the best for His children. God is for us, not against us, because He loves us. God will reveal how good He is to us by the blessings He gives His children. God intervenes in our lives more times than we really know. He is always there. God took our sin, something bad, and through His Son, Jesus Christ, He showed us the good in His love for us.

No matter how bad a situation in our lives is, God is always there to make it better. He can take the sin from our lives when we repent and live our lives for Jesus Christ now and through eternity. No matter how bad life gets, there is an offer of peace and love through a relationship with Jesus.

Announcements listed in the bulletin was that the congregation will be collecting any kind of crackers for the Food Pantry in the month of May. The church will be collecting for ABCOM in the month of May. Bible Study will be Tuesday at 1 p.m. Advisory Board meeting after church on May 22. The AA meetings are held on Friday nights at the church.

For information, check out our website at northlivermorebaptistchurch.org. You can email the church at nlbcmaine@gmail.com. Pastor Bonnie’s office hours are Monday and Tuesday’s from 9 a.m. to noon.

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