Introduction

The Men of Cook’s Memorial Presbyterian Church

These guys know how to fix things

It’s funny, they’ll be rattling off things and I just sit there and smile, gratefully.

I have no idea really what in the heck they’re talking about but it’s just cool to listen to experts, even if you’re clueless

I’m a problem solver at heart. A fixer

Ask my wife, there’s always a thing or three hundred I’m trying to repair.

But there is a way to fix problems. There really is.  A series of steps taken to reach a repair. 

Wanna know what the first step in fixing a problem it?

IDENTIFYING IT and understanding it more fulsomely.

That is exactly what we’ll do today, linking it all to Jesus Christ, as the Bible and our Lord would obviously have it.
Well, as we come into this second Sunday in Advent, as omicron variant leaps from our screens into our communities, icily reminding us that we’re not quite done with this pandemic yet, possibly.

Although we’re outside of the political season, we remain a deeply divided country with little hope presently of reuniting.
The Cook’s community has changed, once a family-farming area, we’re now fully enmeshed in city life with our fair share of country-minded people.

They’ve seen Charlotte encroach like a weed, disrupting their community and their peace.

So, how’s your PEACE level?

Not so good, eh?

Well, we may have just identified one really, really big problem.

No Jesus, No Peace

Episcopal church written on the walls. Funny, they don’t really believe that but, okay.

I do.

True, but not in some fundamentalist manner.

When there isn’t the awareness of Jesus, we’re going to struggle with our tranquility levels.

Why?

Because apart from relationship with him, we are bound to be tossed to and from by the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune

Jesus is the means by which we find peace.

We find peace in Him by accepting some difficult but obvious truths about ourselves, this world and its 7 + billion other inhabitants.

Step One – Accept You’re Not Perfect

Perfectionism material
We are a nation striving for a perfection that will simply never come

We might see kids not punctuating properly or doing things perfectly like we did back in the day but those aren’t the real problems with perfection anyway.
As a nation we strive to be

Perfect in our appearance
Perfect in our beliefs
Perfect in what we consume

Marketers know of our love for being perfect, they count on it every single time they make an advertisement.

Best Buy even said it best one Christmas – You, BETTER.

Nothing more life draining than this tendency.

What’s worse, a lot of people have it that don’t think they do.

I’m not a perfectionist, look at my house

Okay, that’s not an area you struggle with perfectionism in but that doesn’t mean that you don’t have it.

Do you every feel guilty when you relax, knowing you’ve got a lot to do?
Do you ever feel dissatisfied or discontent with yourself or your situation?
Do you have the tendency to see something wrong with things rather than what’s right?
Do you ever find yourself using these phrases regularly – “I have to…I must…I ought to…I should be able to…”