Happy New Year to everyone this morning! We usually have a special new year worship on the first of January. However, the very next day was to be Sunday, so this morning, combined to it, we offer our special New Year's Day worship to our Lord God.

On the first page of our bulletin I have added a new slogan for us to concentrate on this year; "Making up a healthy church - Turn your direction." I had been praying and asking for the guidance of the Lord for this coming year when I was given this reading from Deuteronomy 1:6,7. It is said that this book of Deuteronomy is the last book written by Moses! In this book, Moses looked back on all of the 40 years he had spent in leading his people through the wilderness to the Promised Land. He was also recalling the last 40 years he had spent with the Israelites in waiting to enter the land God had sworn to his ancestors. Suddenly, he heard again the voice of the Lord saying, "You have stayed long enough at this mountain. Break camp and move on."

The Israelites could have left that place earlier. They wanted to stay there probably for many reasons; it was too nice a place to leave, or even perhaps they were just too lazy to get started. When I received these verses for the New Year, I thought of our church, and the churches of Japan as well as my own. In Chapel Noah, we have been facing all those same people for years now. Most of us must be staying at the same spiritual level that we were first at when we received our salvation many years ago. We've got to break through that old wall before we can step ahead.

To enter a new world, a firm faith in God is necessary. To remain at the foot of Mount Horeb does not do us any good. We are to stand up and go. No matter how well a person can fish, if he stays indoors, he will never be able to prove his prowess in fishing. The same is true with us, unless we start for a new goal with faith, we can't experience God's works or blessings.

Let's turn to De.11:11-15. God Himself says and encourages us to go out and stay there, for the place He sends us is full of mercy and grace. You might be easy going in various areas of your lives; spiritually, in waiting on the Lord and people around you or in loving people. You may have a barrier in your lives however, so that people can not step into your lives. You may have a door firmly shut that others, and God, cannot open.

Now see De.1:12-15! As you know Moses had numerous people that he couldn't control by himself. It was his father-in-law, Jethro, who gave him the idea to choose leaders among themselves who could work with him. This is very true of our church also! To be honest, I have known this fact for years, since the gathering of the "Church Disciple-ship" program that I attended. I just knew it, but I have failed to put it into action. A certain pastor who is well-used in the area of building up a church always says that it is not the pastor's job to reach out to the lost, but the whole church's. Pastors, he says, must have the responsibility of keeping the sheep. Of course, they are sent to the people in the World, but their main work is to keep their church people healthy in their spirits so that they can be sent to the World.

St.Paul said, in the Bible, "I am weak, but with the strength of the Lord, I am strong." <2 Co.12:10> It's alright to be weak, for God can work through us perfectly.

In this new year, we must let God work in us, and also let Him walk with us.

Sermon translated by Junko Okamoto - Edited for the Net by Shido
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