The Pizza Maker

So what does God, Pizza, and our lives have in common?

This was the question that was answered last night for Ignite Student Ministries at Spring Creek Assembly in Edmond Oklahoma. Pastor Phil Freeman asked me to preach for him while he was at camp with some of the students. I was surprised when I showed up last night because the Ignite Students showed up in force. Even though Pastor Phil and some of the student were gone, the students who didn't go to champ showed up. There were what looked to be about 35 to 40 students! Thats Awesome!!!

Well anyways, I just wanted to thank Pastor Phil for allowing me to preach. Check out the sermon below.

“Pizza Maker”

Jeremiah 18:1-6

How many of you have ever made your own pizza from scratch?

How many think making your own pizza is ordering from Pizza Hut, Dominos, or Mazzios and having it delivered?

What are some of your favorite ingredients?

Pepperoni, Sausage, Hamburger, Cheese, Extra Cheese, Anchovies?

There are tons of different ingredients that we like on our pizzas. Some people love Pepperoni, while others hate Anchovies. So when we get to make our own pizza’s we put what we like on them.

Tonight we are going to look at how God, Pizza, and our lives fit together.

Think about this for a second, if God wanted a pizza what would he want on it?

If you were the pizza God was making, what would be the ingredients he would want you to have?

While your thinking about that, please stand and lets read tonight’s scripture out loud together.

Jeremiah 18:1-6 (Pizza Revision) 

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: “Go down to the Pizza Maker, and there I will give you my message.” So I went down to the Pizza Makers Restaurant, and I saw him making some pizza. But the dough he was shaping for the crust became to thin and ripped; so the Pizza Maker started over and formed the dough into another crust, shaping it as seemed best to him. 

Then the word of the LORD came to me: “O house of Israel, can I not do with you as this Pizza Maker does with the pizza?” declares the LORD. “Like the Pizza ingredients in the hand of the Pizza Maker, so are you in my hand, O house of Israel. 

God told Jeremiah to go down to the potter’s house so that he could reveal a message to Jeremiah. But due to tonight’s Pizza theme we are changing things up a little.

God’s power over his creatures is represented by the Pizza Maker. God announced that the Pizza Maker and the Pizza illustrated His relationship to His people. That’s why He sent Jeremiah to watch the Pizza Maker working. While Jeremiah is watching everything, God comes to him with two things:

1. God has the authority, and power, to form His creation as he sees fit. He can dispose of it if he wants to, and it would be crazy for us to argue about it. It would be just like a pizza that fights with the pizza maker.

2. The second thing is that God always goes by fixed rules of justice and His goodness. When God judges, it is because of sin; but a sincere faith in Jesus will prevent the punishment.

You see in Jeremiah’s time, God promised that he would bless the Israelites, but because of the evil they were doing He would reconsider the good He had intended and instead bring judgement on them. But, because of God’s goodness, He decided that if the Israelites turned from evil and asked for forgiveness, then He would not punish them the way he planned. Now your going to have to go and read the rest of the Book of Jeremiah to find out what happened to them.

Lets see how God and pizza to apply this to our lives. If you look at a pizza, there are four basic layers. There is the Crust, pizza sauce, cheese, and the toppings.

Our lives are represented by the pizza crust. As we start to grow older, we get rolled out. We learn and experience all kinds of things. One thing that happens is that we all fall at some point or another. We end up sinning by doing bad things such as lying, stealing, treating our parents badly, or by breaking any of the other10 Commandments. This causes us as dough to become to thin and rip. At that the point where we sin, God the Pizza Maker makes a choice. He either chooses to throw us away or rebuild us. If we don’t accept Jesus as our Lord God and Savior then when our time comes to be Judged, God will look at us and say, (Matthew 7:23) ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’

But if we accept Jesus into our hearts as our personal Lord God and Savior, then we will be reborn and God will reshape us into the Crust.

Once we’ve accepted Jesus, we have the Pizza sauce poured all over us. The Pizza sauce like the Blood of Jesus that covers up all of our sin, which is all of the mistakes that we’ve made.

Ephesians 1:7 (Message) 

Because of the sacrifice of the Messiah, his blood poured out on the altar of the Cross, we’re a free people—free of penalties and punishments chalked up by all our misdeeds. And not just barely free, either. Abundantly free! 

Because of what Jesus did for us on the cross, if we ask God for forgiveness from when we messed up, we don’t have to face the punishment for it. It goes even further than that,
Psalm 103:12 (NLT) says,
He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west.

That means that when we ask for forgiveness, God no longer associates us with the sin or the bad things that we have done.

Once we’ve accepted Jesus, and we have had the Pizza sauce added to our lives, then we get the Holy Spirit that is added on top. Listen to what Jesus says about the Holy Spirit in…John 14:26

John 14:26 

But the Counselor, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. 

Jesus sends us the Holy Spirit to help us in our daily lives, to teach us the things we need to know, to empower us, and so that we can also be filled with the Holy Spirit and be able to use the Gifts the Holy Spirit has to give us.

Once we have a good crust that has been reshaped by God, have the Pizza sauce from Jesus, and have plenty of cheese from the Holy Spirit… Then we receive the toppings. The toppings of the pizza are like a training program. This is where we become devoted learners and followers of Jesus as the Holy Spirit starts to teach us.

While God adds the toppings to our lives, we start learning all kinds of things.

We learn how to study our Bibles, how we should act, we learn about Prayer, how we should live, how we should serve, how we should give, we learn how to tell others about Jesus, and we learn so much more. This is also how we get to know God on a much deeper level.

Jeremiah 29:11 

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 

God wants you to succeed in life, and He wants the very best for you. But in order for that to happen you have to submit to God as the Maker and Creator of your life. You have to allow Him to shape and mold you into the person He wants you to become.

If you allow God to shape and mold you, like a Pizza Maker makes a pizza, then your life will change. You will see God in a way you might not have seen before, and you’ll learn about things you never knew before. When you submit to God and allow Him to take control of your life then you will see things and go places that you never thought were possible. And if you submit to God, and let him shape and mold you, then he will call you to do something Extraordinary with your life.

Leadership Principals From the Life of Moses: Leadership Devotional

Have you ever been asked to do something that you lacked the confidence to do because of something that stood in your way?


If you have, your not alone. God called Moses to free the Israelites from their misery in Egypt. After God called Moses, he immediately started asking questions to avoid what he was being asked to do. "Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?" Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them?" "What if they don't believe me, or listen to me and say, 'The Lord didn't appear to you?'"


Each time Moses asked a question God answered him. When God answered, he taught Moses exactly what to say so he could do what God was asking of him and the Israelites would listen to him.


Lets look at what happens in Exodus 4:10-17:

Moses said to the LORD, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.” 

The LORD said to him, “Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.” 

But Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else to do it.” 

Then the LORD’S anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and his heart will be glad when he sees you. You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. But take this staff in your hand so you can perform miraculous signs with it.”

Now we see in verse 10 what Moses' real excuse is. Moses was not eloquent, and he was slow of speech and tongue. Some Bible scholars tend to think that Moses has a speech impediment. What I think it comes down to is that Moses was embarrassed by his inability to speak well in public, and was afraid that he would fail at the task God had given him.


I don't know about you, but I know exactly how Moses felt at that time. When I was in second grade my mom noticed that I couldn't read, so she had me tested. We found out that I have a learning disability called Dyslexia. In fact we were told that I had the worst case of Dyslexia the state of Oklahoma had seen up to that point. Because of my Dyslexia, I had to repeat second grade, attend special LAB classes to help me learn to read. Needles to say, I hated reading and had not confidence to read out loud.


I had to tell you that so I could tell you this story. You know how teachers love to ask their students to stand up and read in front of the entire class? Well, in third grade my teacher asked me to do just that. She wanted me to come to her podium at the front of the class and read from our book. At first, I just ignored her hoping that she would call on someone else, but that didn't work. So, she called me to read again. This time I asked, "Didn't you skip over the girl in front of me? I think its her turn." Then my teacher got a little mad at me and told me to get to the front of the class and read. I stood up, grabbed my book, walked to the teachers podium, and started reading. After just a little amount of reading some of the kids in the class started laughing at me. Then the teacher asked me to stop, she told me that I had read the same line of text like 5 times, and on top of that I wasn't even reading the right paragraph. Let me tell you, I was embarrassed! What was even worse what that then my teacher came over and helped me read like a baby! It was mortifying! I never wanted to read in public again.


Thats how I know what Moses was feeling at the time. Even though Moses was afraid he would fail, God assured Moses that He would help him. Even with God's help, Moses still asked for God to send someone else to do it. (Thats what I was trying to do the day the teacher asked me to read out loud).


This kinda made God a little mad with Moses. So God said, "You know what, I'm still going to use you. I'll send your brother Aaron to help you. I'll tell you what to say, you'll tell it to Aaron, the Aaron will speak it as if the words were coming out of your own mouth. Not only that, but take this staff with you so that you can perform miraculous signs with it.


You see what Moses lacked here is confidence. He had no confidence in  himself to do what God said He would help Moses do. Moses thought he would fail at Gods plans because of his difficulties. But what he didn't understand is that God's plans never fail. God ended up giving Moses confidence through his brother Aaron. God used Aaron as Moses' spokesman. When Aaron spoke to Pharaoh and to the Israelites, they know that he was speaking for Moses.


As church leaders, we must have enough confidence in ourselves to do whatever it is that God is calling us to do. After all, it is God who called us to do what we do, just like he did with Moses. We all have difficulties that stand in our way. Moses wasn't a good speaker, I'm not a good reader, and you may have other difficulties that stand in your way. But no matter what it is, God will help you through that difficult thing so that you can do what he has called you to do.


In the book "Developing the Leader Within You," John Maxwell points out that there is a large number of leaders out there that have had some sort of difficulty that they had to overcome. Franklin D. Roosevelt was in a wheelchair due to his poor health and paralysis, and he lead us through World War 2 as the President of the United States. Albert Einstein had Dyslexia and never finished school, and today he is know as one of the greatest scientists of all time. Napoleon was a very short and scrawny man that lead a huge army at the end of the French Revolution, concurred Europe, and became the Emperor of France.


These are just three out of many world leaders that had confidence and overcame their difficulties in life so they could do great things. Now think about this, God has called you to be a leader in his church and within His people. That means that he will help you to do what ever it is that He has called you to despite whatever difficulty you may face. Think about how much more you will be able to do than the greatest leaders of the world because God is with you and helping you do what he has called you do to.


This reminds me of two verses:
Philippians 4:13 (Message) "Whatever I have, wherever I am, I can make it through anything in the One who makes me who I am."


Romans 8:31 (Message) "So, what do you think? With God on our side like this, how can we lose?"

Things to think about:

1. What has God called you to do?

2. What difficulty stands in your way?

Once you've taken the time to think about those to questions, pray and ask God to help you overcome your difficulties and give you the confidence it takes to do what He has called you to do.

The Greatest Story Ever Told

“The Greatest Story Ever Told”
Matthew 1:18-2:23 & Luke 1:26-2:40
Compiled and Paraphrased by Adam Weatherly

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To tell The Greatest Story Ever Told, we have to go back in time 2009 years to year 1 AD. This story starts around the Arabian Desert. That is where there were some Magi studying the stars. The Magi were know to be wise men, priests, and astrologers who were experts in interpreting dreams and other “magic arts.” One night while studying the stars, they notices something different. They found a new star in the sky. Because of the new star, they knew that something special had happened. They knew the King of all Kings had been born, and they needed to go worship him. So that night the Magi set out to follow after the star.

Around the time the Magi first saw the star, God sent Gabriel, the angel, to a town in Galilee named Nazareth. God sent him to speak to a girl named Mary. Mary was a young woman probably around 13 to 17 years old. She was a virgin, and was engaged to a carpenter named Joseph, who was a descendant of King David.

When Gabriel went to Mary he said “Hi Mary! You are the one chosen women, and the Lord is with you!”

This shook Mary up a little, and she didn’t know what to think about what Gabriel had said.
Then Gabriel spoke to her again, “Don’t be afraid, Mary. God has chosen you to be blessed. You will become pregnant and will give birth to a baby boy, and you will name him Jesus. The boy will be very great, and will be called the Son of God. God will give him the throne of King David, he will rule over Israel forever, and his kingdom will never end.

Mary heard what Gabriel said, was still kinda shaken up, and now was probably a little concerned about getting pregnant without ever sleeping with a man. So Mary asks the Angel, Gabriel, “How exactly is this going to happen? I’m still a virgin, and plan on staying that way until I get married to my Fiance Joseph.”

Gabriel answered Mary, “The Holy Spirit will come on you and the power of God the Most High, will overshadow you. Because of this the baby will be called the Son of God. You see Mary, nothing is impossible with God.

Then Mary said, “Yea, I think I understand, I see it all now: I’m the Lords servant, and am ready to serve. Let it happen just like you say it will.”

Before Mary and Joseph got married, Joseph discovered that Mary was pregnant. He didn’t know that the baby came from the Holy Spirit, so he decided to divorce her. But, because of Joseph’s upright and moral character, he decided to take care of the situation quietly so that Mary wouldn’t be disgraced.

One night, Joseph was up really late and troubled about what was going on. While trying to figure out how to deal with Mary and the Pregnancy, he fell asleep. Then he had a dream where the Angel of the Lord appeared to him. “Joseph son of David,” the angel said “Don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife! The child she is going to have has come from the Holy Spirit. The baby will be a boy and you should name him Immanuel – which means, ‘God is with us.’ This baby will save his people from their sin. This will happen to fulfill God’s message through his prophets – watch for this sign – A virgin will get pregnant and bear a son; They will name him Immanuel.”

When Joseph woke up, he did exactly what the angel told him to do in his dream. He married Mary, but did not sleep with her until she had the baby.

About the same time Joseph had the dream, Caesar Augusts (the Roman Emperor), said there was going to be a census taken. Every man was required to take his family and return to their home town. Because Joseph was a member of King David’s royal line, he had to go to Bethlehem in Judea. So Joseph took Mary and traveled 6.5 miles from Nazareth to Bethlehem.

When they arrived in Bethlehem it was time for Mary to give birth, but there was no room at the Inn. So they found a near by cave, that was being used as a stable for animals. It was there, in that dark and dirty cave, that Mary gave birth to her first, a baby boy. Mary wrapped the baby snugly in a blanket, and laid him in an empty feeding trough (manger).

That night there were some Shepherds camping right outside of Bethlehem, guarding their sheep. Out of nowhere and angel appeared to them and God’s glory shined around them lighting up the are around them. The Shepherds were terrified.

“Don’t be afraid,” the Angel told them. “I’m here to bring good news that is meant for everyone all over the world: the  Messiah had just been born in Bethlehem. He is the Savior and Master of the world. God look for the baby, he is wrapped in a blanked and lying in an empty feeding trough.”

Then they were joined by a choir of Angels who were singing praises to God. They sang out “Glory to God in the heavenly heights. Peace to all men and women on earth who please him.”

After the Angels went back to heaven, the Shepherds talked about what just happened. They decided to go into town as fast as they could so they could worship the Messiah. So they ran as fast and as hard as they could to get to town, and when they found Mary and Joseph and saw the baby laying in the feeding trough they worship him. When they saw the baby they believed, and told everyone they met about what the angels said about the child. And, Everyone who heard what the Shepherds said were impressed. Then the Shepherds returned to their camp and praised God for everything they had heard and seen.

Eight days later, the baby was taken to the Temple where he was circumcised, and was given the name Jesus. That day Jesus was dedicated to God to follow the law of Moses and 2 doves were sacrificed as an offering to God.

While they were still in the temple a good old man who was filled with the Holy Spirit, named Simon, came in. Simon constantly prayed that help would come to Israel. Earlier that day the Holy Spirit showed him that he would see the Messiah before he died, and led him to the temple. When Simon saw baby Jesus, he took him in his arms and blessed God, them blessed Mary and Joseph, and said to Mary:

    “This child marks the failure and recovery of Israel. Many will misunderstand him and will reject him, But he will be the greatest Joy to many others.”

When Simon said that, an old woman, who was a prophetess named Anna, came into the temple. When she saw the baby, she began thanking God and telling everyone in Jerusalem that the Messiah had finally arrived.

During the time that was going on, the Magi, from the far east, who set out to follow the star arrived in Jerusalem. The started asking people in Jerusalem “Where is the new born King of the Jews?” They said to people there “We saw his star from the far-off eastern lands and have come to worship him.”

By the time word got around to King Herod, there were already rumors going around about this in Jerusalem. Herod became really mad about the rumors, and the thought that another King had come to take over. So Herod called a meeting with the Jewish priests. He asked them “Did the prophets tell us where the Messiah would be born?”

“Yes,” they said. “The prophet Micah wrote that he would be born in the little town of Bethlehem.”

Then Herod called a secret meeting with the Magi from the east. Herod pretended to be a devout believer, and got the Magi to tell him everything they knew about the star and the new born king. The he told them about the prophecy from Micah, and sent them to Bethlehem. Right before the Magi left, Herod told them “Go find the child, and then report back to me as soon as you find him. When you do I’ll come and worship him with you.”

As the Magi set out towards Bethlehem, the star appeared again. It lead them straight to the house in Bethlehem where Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus were staying. When they entered the house they threw themselves to the ground in front of Jesus to worship him. Then they opened their presents for the new born king and gave him gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
After the Magi left the house, the Angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a second dream. The Angel said to Joseph “Flee to Egypt with Mary and Jesus, and stay there until I come back to you. Do this because King Herod wants to kill the child.” That same night Joseph took Mary and Jesus to set out to Egypt.

When King Herod heard that the Magi disobeyed him, he was furious. So, he sent his soldiers out to kill all the baby boys who were 2 years old and younger. This brutal action happened to fulfill the prophecy of Jeremiah: “People will cry out in Israel, weeping for their children, because they were killed.”

After sometime had gone by, King Herod died. Then the Angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph a third time through a dream. The Angel said “Joseph, get up. Take the baby and his mother, and return to Israel, because the one who wanted to kill the child is dead.” So Joseph took Mary and Jesus and returned to Israel to their home in Galilee in the town of Nazareth. It is there where Jesus grew up, to become a strong, robust boy, and was known for wisdom beyond his years; and God poured out his blessing on him.

The H2O Christmas Party

The H2O Christmas Party was awesome! There were 18 students, 6 adult leaders, and tons of food. We divided the students into 3 teams to see which team could build the best gingerbread house in 15 minutes. Then we had a gift exchange game where everyone went away with some cool gifts.

These pictures are just a glimpse of how much fun it was...

Questions You Should Ask:

So, I was doing some research for a sermon and I ran across something good.

At buzzle.com there is an article "What Did God Design You To Be?" The article has some good stuff in it that I plan on using, but went down a short rabbit trail about Bible Study. The rabbit trail part of the article was about the Question Method Bible study. I want to encourage you to use this in your personal devotional times and see if it helps you.

When you read a passage of Scripture, you should ask yourself these questions:

• What did I like, or not like about the passage?
• Was there something I didn't understand?
• What did I learn about God?
• What did I learn about myself?
• What nugget of truth can I take with me today?

Use a notebook and write out your thoughts and the answers to the questions. It might help you discover more about God's Word, yourself, and God's purpose for your life. Someone once said "The Bible isn't a dry book – if you know its author." So get to know the author better by reading his book and applying it to your life.

New Blog

Over the past few months I have been getting an error on my other blogger account when I try to log in. On top of that I am unable to change my email address from my old at&t email to my new gmail account. This poses a problem due to the fact that my at&t has been deleted because of a change of service.

So this is the answer… a new blog.

Now, this blog is going to be different from the last one. The old blog was centered on H2O Student Ministries of Sunset Chapel in Miami Florida. Although the new blog isn't centered on H2O, H2O will still be blogged about.

There is a 5 fold focus of this blog… God | Ministry | Leadership | Life | Media

Here's the reasons:

1. God - I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord God and Savior. Part of that entails studying the Word of God to grow closer to him. So I'll blog about what God reveals to me through His word and the Holy Spirit.
2. Ministry - God has called me into his service as a pastor. So I'll blog about whats happening in ministry in my personal ministry, and about whats happening in ministry around the world.
3. Leadership - Part of being a pastor is that you also have to be a leader. I read a lot of leadership books and will blog about what I learn from them. What works and what doesn't.
4. Life - I'm also the husband of a very beautiful girl named Bethany. We live in Miami Florida and our families are in Oklahoma, Togo West Africa, and Indiana. So from time to time I'll blog about whats happening in our lives to let them know whats happening.
5. Media - Before becoming a pastor I was a Graphic Designer and Photographer. I still am. So I'll blog about my design and photography, and some stuff that I find or learn about it. There will also be blogs about video, marketing and advertising, and illustration.

The hope is that other ministers, leaders, families, and media people will gain something from this, and that God will be pleased with it.

Let me know about what you think about the posts, and what you would like for me to blog about with in the 5 fold purpose of this blog.

Through our Love and Faith in Jesus Christ our Savior,

Rev. Adam Weatherly