Pastor Jerry L. Lewis
Drawn from over thirty years as a Christian, teacher, pastor, and missionary, the ideas presented in "What God Can't Do" will help the reader experience the joy of overflowing prayer, and achieve unparalelled growth and freedom by focusing on what God will do.
Jerry says, "I love to ask God questions, and He never seems to get tired of answering them. One day I started putting some of the things we talked about down on paper, and realized that He was using me as a "voice" to bring hope, healing, and encouragement to both Christians and to people outside the Church." Written in a light-hearted, easy to read style, he presents totally unique and original insights into God's purpose and design in our lives.
Pastor Jerry shares from his heart the "secret of happiness," and talks about some of the explanations of God we have heard in church for years that are not accurate, and which hinder our prayers. His experience shows that most of our sickness, frustration, and relationship problems ultimately have a hidden spiritual root cause that can be readily discovered and addressed.
Other topics include: hands-on prayers that work for physical healing, Forgiveness 101, exploring and listening to God, unconditional love, and much more. Also included is the prayer that God always answers immediately, and the one question we should never let God hear us asking (or even thinking).
Pastor Jerry Lewis' ministry focus is "Encouragement." He is a retired Ohio public school teacher and licensed United Methodist minister. Jerry is still very active in his local church, and has been married to "the same girl for 40 years."
The story of how God took Pastor Jerry from "the reigning town hooligan" to missionary and pastor is in Chapter two. It is the story of how God was able to take a scarred life, turn it into something beautiful, and then use it to help others. Check out his website at http://pastorjerrylive.org.
From Chapter 7:
"I kept hearing that word “happy” over and over again in counseling sessions, and kept wondering how one word could cause so many problems. One day I came across an alternative definition to the word “happy” that changed everything I thought I knew about happiness and how to find it.
We get the word happy from an old Norse word “hap,” which I am told means luck or chance. It’s where we get words like happening, haphazard, happenstance, and happen. Some times we have good “hap” and sometimes we have bad “hap.” It just seems to happen that way.
Sometimes others can “make” us hap-py for a while, but no one can do it forever. Even Prince Charming will eventually mess up and let Cinderella become un-hap-py, and vice-versa. Let’s face it. No one can live 100% “happy-ever-after” if another person is involved.
People look for happiness in all kinds of other places besides love. They may try money, success, sex, power, drugs, alcohol, fame, knowledge, or any combination of these and other potential sources. They seem to work for a while, but the Law of Diminishing Returns says we will need progressively stronger doses of our “happy” to reach the same level until we ultimately reach the point where our "happy" becomes useless, or it kills us.
During the wedding ceremony I preformed for my nephew and his fiancé, I briefly mentioned the problems of trying to find happiness together and then told them to forget trying to find happiness in their marriage; that it wasn’t going to work. Now I hadn’t told them about this part of my blessing because I wanted it to be so shocking that they would never forget as long as they lived. From the look on their faces and of those in the audience it was having the desired effect.
I continued, “Happiness comes from the world, and frankly, it comes from a world that doesn’t care if you are happy or not unless it can sell you something to help for a while. Now before you get discouraged, I have good news for you. There’s something that is even better than happiness. It is called JOY! People think joy and happiness are the same thing, but they are actually opposites.
“You see, happiness comes from the outside, but joy comes from the inside. Happy comes and goes, but joy just keeps hanging in there. Joy is one of the fruits of the Spirit. Jesus never told anyone to be happy; He told them to have joy.
“The world can only give happy; joy comes from within. God is the inventor and source of joy. He has placed a measure of His joy in each of us, and the world can never, ever, take it away. Happy always costs you something, but joy is a free gift. Happy is a trap, but joy is freedom.
I continued “Search for joy in your love for each other, and rejoice in the unique creation that each of you are, knowing that God rejoices when He thinks of you both. Search for joy in the gifts and talent He has given you both, and the things you will accomplish together in life.”
By now you probably know another thing God can’t do. God can’t make you happy. If He can’t do it, does it make sense to look for it in the world or from someone else? Forget about looking for happiness. It comes and goes like the wind; find joy instead."
Read the guidelines for finding joy at http://pastorjerrylive.org/ .
