LIFEchurch El Paso Messages

Sermon Transcript:

Okay, we are blessed to have pastor Larry Floyd back with us after a week out. Please give a warm welcome to pastor. Larry Floyd,

well, I just want to say I had to be at another church this past Sunday because of something that was already on the calendar before I knew it was coming here so

But Dr Kremer, I heard, did a fine job last week, advice from God was his sermon title. Now I have to go back to

my brother just harped a lot on my favorite team in all of sports,

in the original Stadium in Irving, Texas when it was built in the 60s,

there was a hole in the roof. They didn't have no cover like they have now, and the reason being is so that God could look down on his team and pray for them as they played every Sunday.

I thought you all would like that.

So today's message is called no other Gospel. The Gospel for all. We're our whole sermon series is no other gospel, and this is called the gospel for all. We're going to move into Galatians chapter two. But I want you to know that the good news of Jesus Christ is for everybody. It's not just for you, and it's not just for me, but the gospel was created so that it could be for everybody, and so the globe, the world, our community, our nation, needs the gospel of Jesus. It's for everybody. We can proclaim it wherever we go. And sometimes we think we're in places that we're not we're unable to do that. I work for the government, or I do this, or I go to school. Listen, if you're willing to preach the gospel, to give advice, to talk about the Jesus, he's going to open up a door for you to spread the Gospel. And I think the problem is sometimes with us is that we don't actually pray for an opportunity. We're talking about prayer this morning. We have to pray for an opportunity for God to open that door. Because if they ask us, even, no matter what situation you're in, that gives us the ability and the availability to spread the gospel, to tell people about what's what's going on with us. This is our mandate. Before we get into our text. I'm going to read Matthew chapter 28

I know I might say 20 up there, but Matthew 2816

through 20 says this. Then

the 11 disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him. But some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me, therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you and surely I am with you always to the very end of the age. That is our mandate as believers. Jesus gave that as he was leaving this earth, and He said, This is what I want you to do. So disciples listen to the voice of Jesus. We follow Jesus in verse 16. And then he also says, there's always going to be those that doubt among us, right? It is not our job to say, well, if they don't come to Christ, if I share the Gospel, then that means I did. I failed at what I was supposed to do. No, no, that's not your job. That's God's job. He said, there's always going to be doubters among us. There's going to be those that just don't believe. They're going to be among us. But Jesus has given us our marching orders in verses 17 through 20 word, where we go we preach and we tell everybody about the gospel, and we need everybody to hear that. That's our marching orders. That's who we are. So with that in mind as we read this text in Galatians, two I want you to be reminded of, Hey, am I doing what I've been called to do? See if you've placed your faith in Jesus Christ, you've made him the Lord of your life, the King of kings, and the Lord of lords into your life, then you must obey what He tells us to do. It's not an option.

You see, there is no optional. Christian, well, I'll do it just in case. You know, if I have to, no, no, you must listen. If you're not aware of what's going on in the world today,

I don't know about you, but there's not that much time left on this earth. The worlds are colliding all around us. The nations are coming together. And there's this preparation for the end to come, and it will come. It may not be in my lifetime, but it may be in the lifetime of Gen Z, Gen alpha, or Gen Z, you know, I'll be 60 in January, so I may be out of here before that happens, but it is percolating right now and marinating all across our globe. Nations are coming across against nations, and there will be an end to this chaos on this earth. But while we're here in the meantime, let's spread the gospel. Amen. Let's do what God has called us to do, because people need Jesus more than they've ever needed him before.

The Gospel is spreading across the globe. South of the equator, like fire, everybody is coming to Christ. There's tons of people coming to Christ, hundreds of 1000s of new believers every year. And sometimes we say we don't see that in the United States. Listen, let's change it. Then we don't see that in an El Paso. Well, let's change it. God placed you here to do that. That's what we're supposed to do. So as we think about that, when we read this text, you're

going to understand so let's stand to our feet. It was read Galatians, chapter two, verses, one through 10.

Galatians, two, one through 10.

Then after 14 years, I went up again to Jerusalem, this time with Barnabas, I took Titus also along. I went in response to a revelation, and meeting privately with these esteemed as leaders, or those esteemed as leaders, and I presented them. I presented to them the gospel that I preached among the Gentiles. I wanted to be sure I was not running, and had not been running my race in vain, yet not even Titus, who was with me, who compelled me to be circumcised, even though he was a Greek.

This matter arose because some false believers had infiltrated our ranks to spy on the freedom we have in Christ and to make us slaves. We did not give in to them for a moment so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.

I want you to catch that for a moment the truth of the gospel has been preserved for you.

This again, this letter was written at about 45 to 49 ad, right after Jesus had died in 33 ad, so it's a very, relatively new letter that was circulating among the community of Galatia. In verse six, it says, As for those who were held in high esteem, whatever they were makes no difference to me. God does not show favoritism. They added nothing to my message. On the contrary, they recognized that I had been entrusted with the task of preaching the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been to the circumcised, for God, who was at work in Peter as an apostle to the circumcised was also in work at me as an apostle to the Gentiles. James Cephas and John, those esteemed as pillars, gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship. When they recognized the grace given to me, they agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcised. All that they ask is that we would continue to remember the poor, the very thing that I had been eager to do all along, father. Thank you for your word, and I pray this morning, it will penetrate into our bone marrow, dividing the good from the evil, as it says in Hebrews in Jesus name. I pray amen. You may have a seat.

My first point is the gospel is available for all. And verses one through three

in our in our text, James Paul's talking about these leaders that he went to go see, and these were leaders that he called pillars, esteemed in what they do, and they're leaders of the church. And he said, I wanted to go there just for this thing. I wanted to make sure what I was doing was on par with what they the original gospels. Intent was because they had been separated, he'd been going to the Gentiles, and these leaders were preaching to the Jewish people. And he said, I wanted to make sure our Gospel was the same.

You see, sometimes we go from church to church and we hear things and we go, I'm not sure that's the same gospel. The only way we can know that is to know what the Scriptures teach us, amen, because there are other gospels being proclaimed from pulpits across America that kind of stretch the truth.

They say things that are not biblical. And so we can only go by what the Bible says. Paul says, I always want to go check up on my leaders. Is basically what he's saying. He wanted to make sure that they were still telling everybody that they can be saved by accepting Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. That's number one. If you step out of here and go to another church and they don't ever preach that Jesus is the only way, I say run from that church as fast as you can, because they're trying to teach you another gospel. Every week, there should be an opportunity for people to receive Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, so that you can bring your family, your friends, your neighbors, to the church to know that there's going to be an opportunity for them to be saved. That's what church is for. That's what Sunday morning is for. It's not for us to Yes, we go deep into the scriptures sometimes, but it's really discipleship. Happens as you live life, as you live out the scriptures in your life, and then you bring somebody alongside you, and you make disciples of them. Sunday mornings are for the unsaved and for us to encourage each other, but it's for an opportunity to bring us, bring people to Christ and to teach us how we can be better people of God. So he wanted to make sure that everybody was still preaching that in verse one, he went to follow up with his good friend, Barnabas and Titus and the guys that he could count on, that people that Jesus is still the way, the truth and life. That's what he wanted to make sure nothing has changed.

Is about the gospel. It's still valid today.

Listen. People are trying to change the gospel all the time. Don't listen to them. Make sure that you know what the Bible says. If you're going to be a minister of the gospel of Jesus, there's no way that you can do it alone. You can't we need accountability partners as we go through this life. Amen, we have to have people come alongside us to keep us in check. Listen, before I went to seminary, I got saved when I was 25 years old, the only thing that I had was a study Bible, and I was studying on my own. That's great, but I wanted to go learn by biblical scholars so that I understood the gospel, so that I could present it in a way that was receiving the truth every time that I preached it. And so I had to have accountability partners for that. And that's what that was, what my seminary experience was. So if you're a lone ranger Christian, one that's walking through this life on your own, and say, I don't need anybody, you know, there's some people they've been watching online, you know, say I need to actually go into a body of believers. That's not That's not biblical. We are supposed to go to church, encourage each other and bring people to Christ. That's what it's for.

In verses two and three, the great, mighty Paul gives us insight to this accountability that I'm talking about. Verse two, he says I went because I had a revelation. Now sometimes this statement actually scares people. You know, you all God gave me this great revelation. Listen, don't be as scared of what God's trying to reveal to it to you. Amen, don't be afraid. But when he does talk to you, and when you're not sure about what he's telling you, make sure you go and ask some wise counsel and say, Hey, I think God is asking me these and there's where Paul's he's out on his own planting churches. He he went back to the leaders, and he wanted to make sure that what he was preaching, what he was receiving as a revelation of God, was biblical, was what needed to be passed on. And we need to do that. And we need to make sure that our doctrine is sound, that is founded in the scriptures. You see, there are a lot of people saying different things that God told me this and God told me that that are not biblical. They must go with what Scripture says. So sometimes it's an outright lie that's being told to you.

So I want to qualify that. Second Corinthians chapter 11, verses 12 through 15. Second, Corinthians, chapter 11, verses 12 through 15, says this, I will keep on doing what I'm in doing in order to cut the ground from under those who want an opportunity to be considered equal with us in the things that they boast. For such people are false teachers or false apostles, deceitful workers masquerading as apostles of Christ, and no wonder for Satan himself masquerades around as an angel of light. It's not surprising, then, if his servants also mask around as servants of righteousness, their end will be what their actions deserve. Listen, there are wolves and Sheep's Clothing among us all the time trying to present their own light instead of Jesus's light. We must know what the Scriptures teach us. The key to is to stay the course. Paul says, Keep on doing what God has called you to do, as long as it lines up with the right doctrine. Amen.

Listen, I know that all of us want to have this great testimony. Oh man, God did this for me. God, listen your testimony is to be faithful and accountable and and and sound in what you believe and knowing the scriptures. Sometimes we want to champion one of our own causes. It could be a great cause, but it may not be the right season to do that. It might not be the right time be patient. Verse two says, here's the accountability part. Paul says, I want to make sure that I wasn't alone in what God was revealing to me. I don't hear that a lot from ministers. They don't have accountability partners. I have a group of 85 churches, and I have what I call an executive leadership team, and I surround myself with 12 pastors that are actively seeking God and so that make sure, as I guide pastors and what they're doing, that I am still also being accountable to what I'm doing. Well, God is revealing to me. It must line up with the doctrine and the scriptures. I don't want to get ahead of God and make sure that we're on the right page. And that's what Paul's just trying to teach us here. He says, Why does he do that?

Why would Paul go to such lengths to go back to Jerusalem after being gone for 14 years and to visit with these esteemed leaders so that the gospel can be preserved for us, to make sure that it's exactly what Jesus wanted us to hear. And he goes to great lengths to make sure that that happens so the gospel is available to everybody, not just some people. So the same message being portrayed back in 45 ad is still being portrayed today in 2024 Amen, the same gospel, same message. Verse three is really strange, if you look at that verse, unless you understand the law of circumcision,

male Jews are.

Circumcised on the eighth day. And there's some young people here. I'm not going to go into exactly what that is. You know what that is? Titus was a Greek, and he was not part of that culture. But the reason Paul makes mention of this is they asked him to be circumcised because they thought being circumcised after you became a believer, said, Well, now you really want a part of us listen. You don't have to do those things. Jesus is the only way to God. I'm the Way, the Truth and Life. We only have to come to Him. We don't have to do extra things. We just sang this song called grace upon grace upon grace. And that's really where God is at in our lives. Is, you know, we say God is a God of second chances. He's not a God of second chances. He's a God of second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, as many chances, as many times as many graces that you need Amen. He is not just one time. And if I mess up, I'm going to go back to who I was. No, you mess up and you come back to the altar. We give an altar call. Get your life right, come back to Jesus, reconnect with God. He's a God that will say, grace upon grace upon grace, as many as graces as it takes for you to get your life with God. He doesn't care that you fail last night. The point is that you're going to get up this morning and say, I love Jesus again. Amen. That's what we have to do. That's why it's important. As important as the we have this thing called baptism, and we'll have that in about another month, as God has led you to be a become a believer, that's the next step that we call obedience. But listen, I want to be absolutely clear, baptism does not save you. Do

I need to hide? Is somebody going to throw something at me? It does not save you.

Jesus' death on the cross and His blood shed for you and the forgiveness of your sins is what saves you. Baptism is the outward expression of what he's done on the inside of your life. It's important. It's an act of obedience. We have to do it. But listen, you don't have to be baptized to go to heaven.

I'm an advocate for baptism because I want you to proclaim your faith in public of being baptized, and that's what it says. We we say this statement, buried with Christ in His death, raised to live a new life. We want to bury our old self, and we want to raise and start living for Him. That's the purpose of baptism. It's an important aspect, but Jesus's death in reality, is what saves you from your sins. Am I

confusing you all this morning? Alright,

there's no way Paul was going to allow circumcision

to be part of salvation. It

just wasn't biblical. It's not biblical. It's Jesus, and only Jesus, and only the scriptures. That's what he proclaimed. Since the gospel is available to all, have you received Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior? Have you opened up your life? You may be one of those ones. He's talking about the what we call fakers in church. You know it's like you just go, just to see what's happening. Imma, see what they have to say today. Listen, if you're here, just get your life right with Jesus. Give Him your life. Say, I want Jesus. I want that. I want what the Bible's talking about, how to become straight with God. Secondly, the good news is preserved for all. The gospel is preserved for all. In verses four and five, the matter came to arose false believers had infiltrated. So you know, you can know for sure,

for a fact. We're always going to have those that proclaim to have to have a relationship with God, but truly don't.

They're there for their own agenda. They want to make sure they sit in their own seat. They want to make sure they sit by their people. They want to make sure the color of the carpet is the correct color they want. To make sure the songs that are sung are what they want. You see, it's all it becomes about me,

and you have to be very careful with what we expect of here in life, church. Listen, when you come to church, we come for him. We don't come to get some fantasy fulfilled in our lives to say, well, I'll just go there so I can be a good person. No, we want your life to be changed. We want your life to be in filled with the Holy Spirit, so that you can live for him and and so that we're always going to have those that like to come for their own agenda.

They want to know if what we say is true.

It doesn't, doesn't line up what they've been taught. They're not going to believe it. You see, we have people that have been taught crazy things in religion, and they come and they go, Well, that's not what I was taught by my grandma.

Well, my mama didn't teach me that. Well, your mama didn't write the Bible, neither did your grandma. If she was saying something that doesn't line up with scripture, then it's up to us to say, this is what we believe. I believe in what the Bible says. And it's hard to stand up to your family when their faith is not biblical, amen. It's hard because it must be in a fight. Don't get in a fight. Love em, Grace em, grace upon grace upon grace. I learned that from a good friend in Del Rio.

She was always being attacked by people. And all she did a mission house, where mission groups would come in and stay at her place, and she'd feed them, and people used to always say bad things about her. And I would go, I would say her name. I'm not gonna say sorry. I know we're on video, but I would say, how do you how do you deal with people like that? She said, I Grace them.

And I said, What? She said, You know how water on you know, if you've ever seen a duck, and they get up all the way going to water, but the water just kind of rolls off their back. She said, That's what grace is, is you just allow it to roll off of you and you continue what God has called you to do. And I was like, but I want to get mad at him. I want to have an argument with them. No, that's not going to save them. That's not going to bring somebody to Christ. And so many times we get in these religious arguments. She never did that, and she taught us so much by the way she lived her life, because not everybody agreed with what she was doing. And she said, I just Grace them. And it's become a model of mine. It's like, Man, I deal with people sometimes, go, man,

are you sure you're in the ministry?

I have to Grace them, because I want them

to have a real encounter with Christ as well. You see,

the Scripture says those people infiltrate our ranks for you military, that's kind of military talk. We would never let somebody in our military coming inside that or an outsider to say we're going to start doing things this way. No, no, we have our marching orders. We have our this is who we are, even when we don't agree with what our leaders are telling us, we must line up and be in agreement so that in totality, we can march together. Right? And that's what ball is saying here. So listen, I'm the interim pastor here. I'm your temporary shepherd, and my calling is to make sure that people here are protected. I will not let somebody infiltrate the ranks here. Somebody tries to say, I want to do this. I want to do that. Let's say, if it lines up with Scripture and how we are they going to be accountable. That's the only way you're going to be handed a microphone or the stage, we have to make sure that you're in line with what we're doing your pastor, your previous pastor, would have never called me to come and preach to you if he didn't know who I was, because you don't just give the pulpit to anybody you want, people that are preaching the gospel. And that's what Paul is trying to say. There's only one way to protect you, sound teaching the truth about Jesus, about the Bible, and so when you're called to go, go out somewhere else, and some of you will not stay here permanently, you'll, you know, if you're in the military, they're going to call you and go somewhere else, you get to take Jesus with you. I consider that a mission ground. I consider that our our call. And verse five, this verse is a game changer. Listen, look at verse five. I want you to remember the day you had this verse explained to you. Okay? I want you to remember how precious the Word of God is. He says this, we did not give in them. Give in to them for a moment so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you.

Paul goes to great painstaking links to go and visit make sure he's doing the right thing. And then he says this. He says, Listen, the gospel as we have it today, has been preserved for you and mana for you to hold that in your hand, for you to say, I get to hold God's word in my hand. I get to see God's word for myself, because they went through so much trouble to make sure that the gospel would be preserved for me and for you, so that we know that what we hear is true. When you read the Bible and you stumble across verses like verse five, it's hard just to pass by. It's you need to go, Wow. Thank you for all the guys that went before us, all the ladies that went before us, all the pastors that went before us, that preserved the gospel for us so that we can know the truth.

Hard to imagine that what went into a preservation of the Bible, right? It's amazing.

I've been to seminary and been to different things and everything. It's amazing the preservation of the Gospel for us to have it correctly. It's exciting to be able to study and teach something that's beyond us. That's so amazing. Don't pass this book. Stand on it with confidence, knowing that the Gospel is true. It's been protected for you and for me. So we don't have to make up clever things about who Jesus is. We don't have to make it up. It's all here. I

want to illustrate this in a text for you. Second Corinthians, chapter four, seven through 14. Second, Corinthians, chapter four, seven through 14. You may have a subtitle in your Bible that says Jars of Clay

for you old school guys here, there was a Christian group called Jars of Clay back in the past, but it says this, but we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all surpassing power is from God and not from us. We're hard pressed on every side, but not crushed, perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not abandoned, struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may be revealed in our body. For We Are we who are alive are always being given over.

Death, for Jesus's sake, so that his life may be revealed in our mortal body. So then death is at work in us, but life isn't at work in you. So listen, when you wanted to hide something back in the the biblical times, something of value. It was crazy to think that they would put something of value in these breakable clay jars that were worthless, but they did it so people wouldn't actually look for them in there, because you would go, well, they're no, they're not going to put anything value in something that's breakable. But that's exactly what Jesus does with the gospel. He hides it in this breakable mortal body that is so valuable. So when we break Jesus is revealed, so that something of value is revealed. And that's when Jesus, when Paul wrote in Corinthians as well, he said, he takes the

the weak things of this world to make them strong. He takes the the things that are that we think are wise in people's eyes, to shame them, to show them that this is what the gospel is really about. Listen, it's amazing what we have that God has bestowed upon us in this jar of clay that we are we're breakable, we're weak, we're not strong. But when a when we do break, the Gospel comes out from us. Jesus is revealed. The Bible has been preserved to everybody so that they can understand who Christ is. Have you had a breakthrough with Christ? Have you asked Jesus to be the Lord of your life? Have you allowed your body to be crushed for him so that Jesus can be revealed? Listen, he's available to you today. He's available to me. Ask him to be the Lord. Lastly, the gospel is preached to all. In our last verses, six through 10, the gospel is preached to all. Paul breaks it down in these last verses. Let's look at verse six. If you've ever wondered why God seems to show more favor on some people than he does others,

well, don't

God says? Paul said, God doesn't show favoritism.

God doesn't have teacher's pets. Now, if you're a teacher's pet in your class, or you were sorry, we didn't like you people,

right? You guys got away with everything, everything they did. The teacher was like, Oh, just be like, little Bobby over there, Susie or whatever, and you're just like, why?

Listen, God doesn't have teachers pets. What we see is people who are more obedient to God and responding to the obedience of what they've got called to, you see, and we think God has showed favoritism on them. What we really see is that God people being obedient to the call of God on their life, and we go, well, they God must like them more. No, he doesn't.

I want to talk to you, mom and dads for a minute. Those of you that have children more than one child,

don't show favoritism to one over the other. If you don't think that those kids can't sense that they will

listen. Everybody responds to love in different ways. You have to figure out how your kids respond to the love that you give them, and that's what God does with us. He shows us the same love, but each one of us responds differently to it, and so he's not showing us favoritism. But many Christians are satisfied with just this one thing, I'm just glad I'm not going to hell, right? I just want Jesus to be in my life so that I can go to heaven, because I don't want to suffer. And what the Bible describes in the things that will be going on in hell, hot body parts falling off,

endless, eternal separation from God, I don't want those things, so therefore I want to go to heaven. And it's like, it's like we as Christians walk around going, well, thank God, I'm going to heaven. At least I'm not going to that place. That's not all there is to this life. Listen, if heaven was the goal, when you gave your life to Christ, he would whoosh you away and you would be out of here right away. If that was the goal, it's not the goal. The goal is that's our that's where we're going to spend our eternity. But the goal is to really is to take people with us, take as many people with us, so we have to share the gospel. He doesn't show favoritism. What I see is this,

hopefully some of you all have your steel toed boots on,

but this is what I see, ungrateful Christians are disobedient Christians, and what I mean by that is they're not grateful that God has entrusted the gospel to them because they don't share with anybody. They hold it for themselves. They're these secret agent Christians.

Verse six, God doesn't show favoritism, so even those pastors who are held in high esteem

and add something to the Gospel, says, Paul says it doesn't matter. It

doesn't matter. Paul knew that even pastors like myself are going to stand just like you before a holy God, and we're getting an account for the life that we've lived as well.

God, even as pastors. So don't hold us any higher. Yes, respect what we do. Respect the office of the pastorate, but listen, I need to be accountable for the gospel just like you do. I'm going to stand and give an account for my life. So will you. In verse seven, Paul makes a case for the call of God in a person's life, and he says to leaders that I've been called and entrusted to preach to the Gospels, and Peter's been called to preach to the Jews. We have a calling to preach or share or reveal the gospel to those that he's entrusted us with, whether they're Hispanics, angles, African American, Korean, whatever he's entrusted you. If they're in your circle of influence, it's your job to tell them about Jesus. You must do that. And that's what Paul's trying to call us out. He's like, listen, Peter had his call. I got my call. Matthew had his call. Everybody had their own call. They preached to their circle of influence, and you have yours as well.

Who has God entrusted you with?

If you're married, you have a spouse. He's entrusted you to lead that spouse. Men,

yes, I'm calling you out. Men, you are the spiritual leaders of your household. Your kids are looking for a leader they're looking for. What does my dad believe?

What does my father believe? That's your sphere of influence, your kids, your parents, your brothers, your sisters, your friends, your coworkers, your classmates, your neighbors, your grandchildren, and the list goes on and on. God has entrusted you to share the gospel with them.

Why would he have given you that family? If that wasn't the case,

we all have a sphere of influence. No one is exempt,

and man, sometimes our influence, our people that God has entrusted us with,

that's tough, isn't it?

You just go, I can't God. You just don't know. Yes, I do.

I know exactly what you're going through, because I have them in my family too. I have them in my friends too. I have them as pastors too. I have that sphere of influence that I wonder, why are they in my life?

I'll tell you why, so that you can be an obedient Christian and be a grateful Christian that God has given you somebody to share the gospel with. That's your job. Look at what Paul says in verse eight. He says, the same God who was at work at Peter was also at work in me, the same God,

not a different god, the same God.

And I love that. Paul says that there are, there is no other gods. They're just false gods out there. But he's saying the same God that was in work in Peter is in work at me, and he's at work in you, the same God you have, the same power that I have to preach the gospel. I may have studied a little more than you, but that doesn't omit, that doesn't negate the fact that you still have to preach the gospel. And you said, Pastor, I don't know what the gospel teaches or says, well, then learn,

figure it out, because you've been called to do it.

The Real God is at work. So

I want to say this, the same God who's at work in me is available to be at work in you, same God.

I don't have any more anointing than you do.

I just try to be obedient

each day because it's a daily struggle. Remember, I've said this before. Sometimes we wake up and we don't feel like we're in the kingdom of God or in his work, because we just start doing things that aren't godly and that gets in our way. Same God who has preserved the gospel for me, has preserved the gospel for you, the same God who I that I preach, is available for you to preach to your family and your sphere of influence, your circle and my circle are not the same. So it's not my job to go tell your family about Jesus. It's your job to tell your family I got my own family to worry about. Amen, it's your job. God entrusted you with them. So do it. Verse nine, James, Peter John, known as pillars of the New Covenant, they extend their hand to Paul Barnabas and Titus, and now they're extending their hand to me and to you, and say, Listen, we preserve the gospel for you so that you can share it, because it's in breakable jars of clay.

We don't have to create anything new. We just have to extend the hand of fellowship to those around us. Verse 10 keeps everybody humble. Look at Verse 10 with me.

I want you to study that verse i

all i all they asked was that we should continue to remember the poor, the very thing that had been eager to do all along. Listen, we can do all of these things for God and all of these people are around us that have a need. And it's not just the poor financially. They're.

Poor in spirit.

Paul says, Listen, if we go and preach the gospel, but we will meet those that need it the most. We're not doing our job. We're not doing what God has called us to do.

Oh, church, do you hear Paul crying out to you today,

I went to a dinner last night

at the rescue mission of El Paso. Have you never been there? If you don't know who Blake burrow is, you need to meet him. He's a trial lawyer. 27 years ago, God called him to start serving as a homeless administrator.

He has no experience doing that, and he'll tell you that himself.

But last night, he was faithful to preach the gospel to those that need it the most, those that are among us on every corner in El Paso, those that we see and we go, well, that's not my job. It is our job.

And he's doing amazing things there, and you guys need to get connected to him. I know that Life Church has been down there as well, but some of you, not everybody, has been down there. But God, Paul is calling out to us today to preach the gospel to those that need it the most. It's easy to preach to those that already know the gospel. It's hard to preach it to those that need it the most. Second, Timothy, I'm going to close with this four. One through four says this

second, Timothy, four, verses one through four, in the presence of God and of Christ, Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and His Kingdom, I give you this charge, preach the Word.

And I know Paul was talking to Timothy as a young pastor, but I believe it comes to us be prepared, in season and out of season, correct, rebuke and encourage with great patience and careful instruction for the time will come. We're here, we're there, we're already at that time, the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, they're going to suit their own desires, and they're going to gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.

They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths, old wife's tales, a different gospel, other than Jesus. All roads lead to Jesus, right? All religions lead to the same God.

We're all the same. We're all brothers and sisters in God's eyes. Listen, all roads do not lead to the same God. There's only one road that leads to the God, and that's Jesus. He said, I'm the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through me. There is no other way except through Christ. Are you telling others about Jesus?

Have you shared the gospel this week? What's preventing you from doing so if you don't know how to I will give you my personal cell phone number, and you can call me this week, and I will teach you how to share the gospel in a moment of three minutes, I will show you what the Scriptures say, and I will teach you how to share the the Scriptures. And for you to let the gospel speak for itself, you don't have to come up with these magic words in this magic potion or these great testimonies. All you need is a few verses from God's word, and you let God do his work. And I will show you, if you want to know if you're serious about it, you see me after church, I'll give you my cell phone number, and I will teach you how to do it. I will send you messages on how to do it, and you just try it, see what God does. So I

want to give you this time to respond to the gospel. Listen,

I know there are some here in the room this size that have never given their life to Jesus. There are some here that have been sitting next to people that are saved, hoping that the salvation rubs off on them, right? Let's be honest.

I call that osmosis, right? We just rub up against people and we think it's going to rub off against on us. It's great to be around people that are blessed. It's awesome because some of the blessings do fall your way. But wouldn't it be something if you could have Jesus for yourself and not having to be relying on other people to be blessed? You can have Jesus as your Lord and Savior. You can have the Lord of your life, change your life. Listen, this is an opportunity. We call this an invitation, because I want to invite you to come.

Hey, I know that this is new for this church. Man never had done this, you know, a lot of times. But listen, what an invitation does is it allows us opportunity to get serious with our Creator. It gets an opportunity to say, I want Christ in my personal life.

And the way you do that is simple. It's called, we teach this to kids ABC. You admit that you're a sinner. God, I'm a failure. We can all say that I'm a sinner. You believe in your.

Heart that God did what he said he was going to do.

And the third thing is, C, A, admit, B, believe. And C is confess. You confess Him as your Lord. You say, Jesus, I believe you are who you say you are, and you invite Him into your life.

And the Bible tells us this. In Romans, 10, nine and 10, it says, If you'll say that Jesus is Lord.

He says, Imma, come into your life if you believe that he was raised from the dead. He says, I will give you a testimony. If you'll just believe that and ask him to be the Lord of your life, you too can be saved, and it's not a salvation for today, it's a salvation forever. And as you're saved throughout your walk, you'll be sharing the same message with your sphere of influence, but you can't do it if you don't have Christ for real in your life. You can't base your testimony on somebody else's salvation. I say this all the time as I preach, I say, I wish I could accept Christ for you. I wish you knew what I knew about what how Jesus has changed my life. I wish that you could see what God has done in my life. All you do is hear about it, but my family's had a front row seat to the transformation in my life, and I want that for you.

You can't do it based on my testimony. It has to be your testimony. It has to be you receiving Christ. So this morning, as we sing this song, you have an opportunity to come and kneel before this altar and say, Jesus, I need you. I know that I'm a sinner. I know that I'm broken, and I want when I get broken, I want Jesus to come out of me, not the Satan that's in me right now. I want that out of my life. I want the real Christ, and so you come this morning, and maybe they're here this morning. And you know for a fact that you have Christ in your life, but you've walked away from him. You have not been walking with him. Come and reconnect with Jesus.

Come and reconnect with them. Maybe you've been saved here, and God is calling you to something bigger than just being here. There's opportunities to volunteer. Maybe God is calling you into the ministry. Wow. Could you imagine?

I'm a guy from Northeast El Paso, went to Irvin High School, left here in 1985 unsaved, and God called me to the ministry.

It doesn't matter where you're from, what your environment is, what your circumstances, God can use you. Maybe God's calling you to do that. Say, Pastor, I don't know what that is. I did the same thing. I said, God, if you want me, you're going to have to show me. But I surrender. The first step is saying I surrender. And that's what the altar call is for. Is for you to surrender your life to Christ, your life to reconnect with Christ, your life to the ministry. Maybe you're here and you've never been baptized, or maybe you've been baptized and you really haven't been saved. You thought baptism saved you,

it doesn't. Jesus is the only one that can save

you. So as we sing, you come and when the altar call is over, if you've made a decision for Christ, or you've made a decision for something else, please stop by the prayer room. Stop by there so that we can help you on your next steps. Let's pray,

God, this is your time. We thank you for the opportunity you've given us to hear Your word this morning. And I pray this morning, God, as we come to this opportunity to respond, I pray that you would work in the lives of these that are here and father, no matter what decision needs to be made, I give I pray that you give them the courage to move from where they're at to where you need them to be in Christ's name, I pray amen. Let's stand to our feet and sing. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

The 82nd Psalm reads like this. It's only eight verses long. I'd like to read it to you first, and then we'll talk through it.

It says God has taken his place in the divine Council.

In the midst of the gods, he holds judgment.

How long will you judge unjustly, he says, and how show partiality to the wicked,

give justice to the weak and the fatherless, maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute, rescue the weak and the needy, deliver them from the hand of the wicked. They have neither knowledge nor understanding. They walk about in darkness. All the foundations of the earth are shaken.

I said,

You are gods, sons of the Most High all of you,

nevertheless, like men, you shall die and fall like any prince. Then the last verse, arise O God, judge the earth, for you shall inherit the nations. That final statement in verse eight, you shall inherit the nations. You can understand why it has such an impact on those of us who know God, who know the Lord, and I don't mean by that we understand him, and you don't. I mean who've been brought into His family without any merit whatsoever, who've been allowed to just claim his name and be accepted by him.

We know he will inherit all the nations of the earth. And so for us to be able to sing the words with all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings is meaningful. It shakes us. And we want, with all of creation, to lift up God

and for him to receive what he's do, having created this world and having the rightful lordship over all of us, as he demonstrated through His resurrection.

And so I sing the words, and I'm motivated by them with all creation,

we sing praise to the King of kings, and then I think of the creation with which we are lifting up that song today. And I am

somewhere between discouraged and ashamed. You know, you live in the same world I live in. You know, what a mess we're in. We'd like to think of it in the pristine way, like I'm going to go out into nature and see the glory of the mountains and the sky and see before God all the beauty of His creation. But instead, it's, you know, beer cans and

paper trash everywhere. And I don't mean about the esthetics of our scenery. I mean about us, our politics, our pettiness, our anger, our selfishness, you know, just all the stuff that we actually are. And I think, you know, we wad all that up thinking we've created this beautiful craft and lifted up to God and say,

here's what you made God. And expect him to look at it and say, Oh yeah, that's all I was really looking for. This. Do we think this is all he was really looking for all that we've become as a world to this point. I'm not going to tear you down all day. Don't worry. Don't Don't leave yet. Hey, hang in there. But I, I do want to be honest about where we are in the world. The world's just crummy in a lot of ways. And I mean, for those of us who are blessed and protected and sheltered, and you've got everything you need right now, and you're like, Well, what he's thinking is wrong with the world, all you have to do is turn on the news, which I don't even encourage you to do, and just see where all the people are who are facing the consequences of the way The world is as we've left it at this point. And so we would look at it and say, you know, what are we supposed to do with this world? It's not like we're going to come up with the solution and now it's going to get better. I mean, we've been headed this direction since the beginning of humanity, and we've all the time prayed and said, How long is it going to be this way? Let's fix it this way. Let's fix it that way. Oh, we'll try this, and surely that will make it better. And yet, here we are in the same place we've always been with the same kind of suffering and loss and the other things that are talked about in the Psalm that have.

Always been. So what are we supposed to do? Well, this is when, if we were an individual, as you as an individual, I as an individual, when we get to a certain point, we look outward and we say, I think, I think I need to talk to somebody. You know, I had an employee. I'm the president at Criswell College, and we, you know, I have people who come through my office and talk to me about what they're going through, and they're trying to figure out what to do next, not just with their job, but with their life sometimes. And I said to them, you know, I I think you probably need to see someone who has a little more knowledge about this and and and have some conversations with them, see a therapist, a counselor, somebody, and give them a chance to give you some input. That's a normal thing. Now, in fact, my chief of staff at the college also earned while she was there working, she earned her Master of Arts in Counseling and is now a licensed therapist, and started providing a day's worth of therapy for our students every week. And as soon as she did it, her roster was completely filled with students lined up to get in and see a counselor that they could actually afford. You know, I mean, we all need it. We We all, if we didn't have to pay for it or admit to someone we were doing it, we would all go see a counselor and and if you are hallelujah, that you've actually gone and sought help, and if you did, you know you would go and see them, because you would say, Look, I've, I've had years to figure out my life and get where I am, and this is where I am. And so I kind of want to turn a different direction at this point, especially when people are bringing up the Cowboys. I mean, I came to church to get away from that. This is, I don't need to remember that. Or Baylor. I graduated from Baylor. I'm I'm wounded today. This, this is coming through in the sermon. Anyway, the point is that as we read this psalm, what we see is the Lord coming into now, this is a a place of judgment. He's uttering judgments. These are some of you will know this word. It's just a common Jewish word that we use, Hebrew, word that we use, mishfat. These are judgments that he's offering. And so he makes these pronouncements about the way things ought to be. That's a key word throughout the Psalm. And I think the way we think of that is different, not because we're wrong about the word, but because our way of experiencing the world has changed. You know, in their world, when you came into a crisis in your family or your personal life or whatever, you would go and see the judge, you would go and see the person who, because of the way their world was ordered, and they had a more, a greater sense of community, and being possessed, so to speak, by your community, they would go to the judge, and the judge would do more than just give casual advice. We talked about this message today being called, you know, advice from God. It is that, but it's because, you know, when God gives advice, it's slightly stronger than just, well, you can think about this, you know. But the reality is, in their world, when they needed the same thing we need, when we go to a counselor, they would go to a judge. And so this setting where God is showing up in the council and giving his judgments is equivalent to what we would experience if we went into a counselor and said, How am I supposed to deal with this? What am I supposed to do with this? And it is about the world as a whole, and you'll see why it's about the world as a whole, but that makes it very much about us personally. And so that's why I want to read just these eight verses, and there are three parts to it, in the context of us having come to God as our counselor, and working through really three of the very basic things I think you always work through when you're trying to counsel someone through a crisis. And I'm not a professional counselor, don't take anything I'm saying as a statement about what professional counseling would be, that's our legal, you know, language there to keep us safe. But I have done years and years of pastoral counseling, and like I say, I'm around counselors all the time. We offer a master's degree in counseling. That's not an advertisement for the school, although, if you're looking for a great school, okay, so anyway, so I'm going to read the psalm to you again, but one section at a time, this time, and I'm going to ask the Lord to teach us what we need to know so we can be closer to what he wants than what we are right now. And Father, I pray that You would bless that in Jesus name. So starting in verse one again, this psalm of Asaph God. This is the these first two verses are just profoundly beautiful. I love poetry to begin with, and if you don't know poetry, or you haven't read very much of it, that sounds like a softish kind of thing to say. But in reality, poetry is really powerful language. I mean, it can break you down. And so this is a magnificent poem. These first two lines, especially.

God has taken his place in the divine Council. That bothers a lot of people when they read it, because the implication is that there's our God and then there are all these other gods that he's going to judge. You can't even really make it work in terms of God coming into the Council of all of his angels, because he's clearly not speaking to angels here. He's not even speaking to his fallen angels here, in some way, it's, it's, you know, our God, and then there's all these other gods that are supposed to be in this council. And that is the poetic language that's used. It's used for a powerful reason that we'll get to when we get to verse six. We won't be able to answer it until we get to verse six, but if you'll just go with me and accept the way the language is written. You'll see He intends for us to understand it exactly that way. So here are all these gods, all these Baals and Ashtaroth and all the gods other nations worship, and they're doing their thing. And then our God, Yahweh, he saunters into the room. He comes into the room he had. He takes his place, not a place. He takes his place in the divine Council and in the midst of all the other gods. He holds judgment. He's the one who says, this is the way it should be. This is the way you are going to be judged. So among all the other nations and all the other gods, this one God shows up and actually brings judgment. And what he says to them in verse two is particularly important. Hopefully you'll recognize this in other language that you've read in the Scriptures. In verse two, God says to all those judges, because it says he's holding judgment. So here's what he says to them, how long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? Here's the God of Israel, just Israel, Yahweh, coming to the gods of all the other nations and saying to them, I'm going to judge you for how poorly you're ruling all of your nations. How long are you going to judge unjustly? How long are you going to show partiality give favor to those who are actually wicked in your nation? So here's Yahweh declaring that the entire world is his place for judgment. And he goes on to say, in verses three and four, what the measure of that inadequacy that they have is, and this should be pertinent to us. What is it that God looks at when he says, Are you measuring up to what I expect? And the answer is no. And then he says, Well, this is what you ought to be doing in verse three, give justice to the weak and to the fatherless, maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute, rescue the weak and the needy, deliver them from the hand of the wicked. So what you end up with is injustice and oppression and inaction being the things God looks at to say, you're not measuring up to what I expect of you, therefore I'm going to pass this judgment on you. In verse two, when he says he's going to pass that judgment, He says, what they've done is inadequate. He introduces it with two words. These are also present in the Hebrew text. It's not just a translation of it. This is, this is what he says to them. How long is it going to be like this? And for those of you who are not familiar with the Psalms, that may not sound like much. For those of you who've read the Psalms over and over again, you know how often Israel's prayer in their sorrow, in their loss, in the mess that they encounter, in the failures that they have. And then they repent of they come before God and they say, how long? Like, if you want to look one up, Psalm six is a good illustration of this, because it actually says it to God Himself, How long, oh Lord, until? And then it's always followed with whatever he needs to do to make things right. How long until you hear our prayers? How long are you going to be angry with us? How long are the wicked going to prosper? How long are you going to overlook the sacrifices of your people? How long is this world going to be messed up? When are you ever going to come it's the most important question throughout all of the Old Testament. And Yahweh God walks into the Council of all the false gods and says to them, how long are you going to bring about the destruction and evil and sorrow and misery that you're bringing into the world. It is an irony to top all ironies when he says that to them. Now hang with me just for a second. In verse five, there's one other statement that he makes before we can really hit this point. They have neither, and this is the first of the three points. We're already through verse five. You see verse five, we're.

They have neither knowledge nor understanding, they walk about in darkness. All the foundations of the earth are shaken.

You know, it's ambiguous when we're reading it first time through, Who's he talking to? Is he? He's talking to the people who are suffering. Who's God talking to? When he says, they have neither knowledge nor understanding, they walk about in darkness. All the foundations of the earth are shaken, but in the context of this psalm, and then later, how it's taken and how that vocabulary is taken and used, it's clear he's speaking to the gods themselves. And this is him. This is the psalmist taking his first jab to say God walks into a council of all of the gods. But of course, they're all not seeing, not hearing, not speaking, not walking, not doing, because they're not anything. I mean, we know that, and all the people who sing this psalm know that they are nothing. And He's declaring here, they're nothing. They don't have any knowledge. They don't have any understanding. So still personifying them, he says they're not able to do anything what? What Isaiah does a few 100 years later, probably. Now this is written by Asaph, so it could be similar timing, but Isaiah picks up on that language, and we're used to it from Isaiah. And the two examples I'll give you are in Isaiah, 41 he really emphasizes the fact by saying to the false gods. He says, would just one of you tell me what's going on? Would one of you just any false god? Would you just open your mouth and declare to us the things that are about to be someone just tell us what direction are we supposed to go? What are we supposed to do? But instead, in response, all we get is silence, nothing, because they have no power. They can't speak, they can't do anything, and that's because they're carved from trees. They're made from metal. They're not real gods. They don't have ears. How are they going to hear? You can carve something that looks like an ear, but that doesn't make it an ear, right? So this is what he's saying in isaiah 41 for instance, or in isaiah 44 when he really drives it home in sort of a mocking fashion, and he says, explain to me how this works. Isaiah says, you take a piece of wood and you carve it up, and you take the shavings of it, and you throw that into your fire pit, and you light it on fire, and you cook some meat over it, and you eat. And you say, Ah, I like the warmth of this fire. You're comforted by it. You enjoy the taste of the meat that you cooked over it. And then you bow down and worship the rest of it. Explain to me how this is supposed to be helpful. That's what this is summoning by saying they don't have any knowledge or understanding. They walk about in darkness, and that's why all the foundations of the earth are shaken. Understand the imagery. He's saying all the Earth is shaken by injustice and oppression and inaction. All of the wickedness of the world is filling it. And why is that? Because nobody's tending the store. There is no there. They're all saying, Oh, our God will make things right. And they're bowing to a tree stump. He says, you're looking in the wrong direction. So when we start the first part of the Psalm is all about us, looking for our answers, looking for our hope, looking for resolution in the wrong direction. And in terms of Israel trying to blame someone, they're blaming things in the wrong direction. And when we you know, when I've dealt with people who've come to me for advice as a pastor, when counselors have people come to them, because I've talked to enough counselors to know this is pretty universal. I mean, the first thing people always say is, well, my spouse is a problem. You know? This is this is clear that you had days like this, right? When you get up in the morning

and you realize on your way into work that everybody is a bad driver, everybody else is a terrible driver, and that all the people at work are in a bad mood, you realize they're all messed up completely.

It takes a day for me to get from that to go, huh? If it was everyone else who was doing it wrong,

no, couldn't have been me. Sure, surely it wasn't me. We really do not I mean, it's why we're aggravated. It's why we get frustrated, because we do see the problem being outside of us, and we want somebody else to have to take the blame. We don't want to have to accept the blame. And in that context, what this psalm is doing is saying, okay, so you want someone else to be judged. Here's what you do with that. Now there are a bunch of things we want to say here, because in other parts of the scripture this.

Becomes important, and later in this psalm, it's just barely alluded to, but it's not the big point for us today. But you know, one of the other things we want to say is you have to stop judging other people right? We recognize we shouldn't be accusing other people or saying things to them. This is how James uses that concept in James four, when he says, there's one lawgiver who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another? So in that context, we would say, don't, don't go about judging others. But that's not the big point. And James does make this point that I'm about to make also, when he says, Look, there is one lawgiver, there is one judge. He's the one who's able to judge. And behold, he says in the very next chapter, that Judge stands before the door, trust him to judge those people. How has he gone for you? So far?

I'll ask you sincerely, how has it gone for you so far, trying to control everybody else is that? Is that working out for you? I just I've watched it, and if you think it is working out for you, we probably need to talk after church. I would encourage you to have a conversation with somebody about this, because you're fooling yourself. None of us are good at controlling anyone else, because we don't have power over them. We have economic power. We have, you know, you're the boss, and so they're laughing at your jokes. You think we have control, we think we have power, we don't. There's only one who's got real power, and that's Yahweh. He's the one who walks into the courtroom where everyone who thinks they have power resides, and he alone begins to pass judgment. That means we're commissioned, in this passage, to hand all the other people and their problems over to God and say, You're going to have to deal with that. I can't. I'm not able to do this. So you know the first response from the counselor to the person who comes into them. So you go in to see the counselor and you're like, oh, this person's that, and this person's that, and this person's that. They're going to say, I'm going to need you to trust whoever's dealing with them, to deal with them. I want to change the direction that we're going right now. And so I want to say the same thing to you. I'd love to fix the world. I grieve over the horrible things that are happening in the world right now, here in America, overseas, always, and throughout all of history. And I wish so much that I could just say I'm going to go fix it. I'm going to commit to this or that, and that's going to fix the problem that's in the world. Now get it. Inaction is one of the things that's condemned here. So not doing anything. That's not okay either. So don't, don't go that direction on me, but thinking I'm going to control it and bring about the result that God wants, finally, to happen in this world because of me is just not realistic. So the first step here is for me to hear God saying to me, you're going to need to trust me with the rest of the world. You know, you're going to need to hand it over to me. So that's the first question for you. If you're sitting in the counseling chair and getting advice from God today, the first word from Him to you is trust the rest of it to me, I need you to have confidence that I really am the lord of this world. I know our first response to that is, it's a mess. Lord, why aren't you doing better? And I know you're thinking to yourself, Man, I'm back up. I think that preacher's gonna get struck by lightning. I don't think he should say things like that. The whole book of Psalms is filled with those statements. We're not supposed to be dishonest with God. We're confused. Our God is what we sang this song about, and yet our world that belongs to him is not that. So we know something's got to give here.

What on earth has to give? This is the point. Work with me from verse five into verse six. So we can do the second section now, because in verse five, the really subtle transition that happens, and it hits with profundity. When we get to verse six, it'll be crystal clear. But in verse five, it's very subtle. In Isaiah, it's more obvious as you're reading it in Isaiah, and he describes the Gods not being able to hear or speak or offer any prophecies or anything like that. He also switches the language a little and begins to say it about the people who are creating the gods. And so he says, My people are as vain as the gods they worship. Vain, meaning empty, having no content whatsoever. And so they're empty. So my people are empty, and that's the real problem. It's, you know, it's not that you're worshiping a false god. It's that you are worshiping a false god. It's the people who are looking to those gods that are creating the.

Way their countries are, the way the nations are, the way this inequality and oppression and inactivity permeates the world. It's about the people who are there and so very subtly, he's introducing the transition to say, Yeah, God stepped in to judge among all the gods. And you know who his judgment actually fell on

you can read it in verse six, when God says, Now we know that he's talking to people here, men here, humans here. In verse six, because of the way it comes into the New Testament. And in John 10, Jesus quotes this line that we're about to read here in verse six, he quotes this line, when the Pharisees, the scribes, the chief priests, everybody is upset that He's declaring himself the Son of God, that He refers to Yahweh as his father, that he's doing the will of his Father. And why should you trust my testimony? Because I'm doing the works of my Father. And so they say to him, Well, you're making yourself equal with God. How dare you? And his response is to say, Well, now let's think through this. And he gives them an argument about the scriptures, where he says, I mean, your scriptures say, I said God said you are God's and you shall die every one of you, just like the princess. So if the scriptures can't be broken, then who's violating God's Will here, me or you? And he's pointing back to them and saying they're doing it. So we know how he uses it in the New Testament. But it makes it clear here that if we're looking for context, who God is speaking to here, if we didn't have that context at all, we would still have to, we still end up reading it this way. So look at it with me here in verse six, when it says, I said, You are Gods Sons of the Most High. So let's just say we're reading it completely oblivious to what Jesus does with it in John 10, hundreds of years before, and just trying to make sense of this poem where a God who says, There are no other gods, is now giving us a Psalm where he walks into the room where all the other gods are and begins to speak to them and says, Okay, so I said, You are gods, sons of the Most High all of you, nevertheless, like Men, you shall die and fall like any prince. So

even if you didn't know it from John 10, you would read this and say, well, by the end of the verse, He's clearly talking about people. They're just dying. They think they have control. Then you think about this whole history in the Old Testament, where when God speaks, when a prophet speaks to a nation, it speaks to their God by speaking to their king or their prince. This is the person who represents that God in their nation, and so he's just saying to them, that's all there is. I mean, you have you people. You're the ones who are creating these problems. You're the ones who are promoting injustice and oppression and the lethargy or inactivity or apathy that allows people to remain in their suffering. So God walking into the Council of all of the gods is actually God walking into this place in the world where he looks at us as human beings and says, I gave you the authority to make this right. I gave you the ability to do the right thing. You you want to say, well, our demons are causing this problem. Demons are real. I don't doubt that one tiny bit the activity of Satan is real in the world and real in our lives. No doubt about it. But everything when it comes to moral responsibility falls first on us. This is the point in a counseling session when the counselor looks back at you and says, So, let me understand you think this person and this person and this person and this person is wrong. Do you think anything wrong resides in you? Do

you think there's any of this that could be your responsibility? And we, we don't, we don't like that at all. You know, it's like, yeah, we have in logic. There's a fallacy. I teach logic when I when I teach courses at the at the school I was a professor before I became my current position. And logic is one of the courses I teach, and we have, there's a fallacy in logic, a common fallacy. It's called the tuquoque fallacy.

You've heard it a million times in the political world over the last, I don't know, eight years or so with, and people refer to it as the, what about fallacy? What about isms, that's, that's what they say. What about this or that? That's called a tuquoke fallacy, to quote way in Latin, is you also, you know, so you do Tom bien, kind of thing, you know, something like that. So you.

You too, yeah. So it's when your wife says, Oh, you left the kitchen a mess, and you say, oh, yeah, well, you you've gotten fat.

Not the smartest thing to say, you know, for your own health and safety, but also really illogical. I mean, it has nothing to do with whether you did what you were supposed to do or not, right? It doesn't matter. It's like you're eating too much. Oh, yeah. Well, you smoke.

Yeah, but, but, I mean, what does that have to do with whether you're eating or not? It has this to do with it. I can deflect the attention off of me and put it back on you. I don't want to think about whether I'm doing something wrong or not, that's nobody's business. I don't care when people say things about me that aren't even remotely true. I've had insane interactions because of this kind of stuff I do, and I'm not a it's not like anybody knows me outside of my little circles, but in my little circles, you know, I have some leadership responsibilities, and so people pay attention to what I say and do. And I've had people say, You're a communist, and I just fall down laughing on the floor. I mean, if anything, I'm a libertarian. By the way, for anybody who cares to know I'm a radical advocate for liberties, I think that's what we need to advocate for anyway. The point is, I hear that I just laugh. Somebody says, you know, your nose is a little big for your face, I get a little defensive. It's like, mind your own business, buddy.

Y'all don't, don't even look. It's none of your business. So my point is, I'm being silly about it right there. But I mean, when somebody says something to you about how I think you were a little angry in that exchange, if you were a little angry in that exchange, and you know you were irresponsible with it, that's when you're going to get angrier. None of your business. I don't think I was. I deserved it because you don't want to hear about the things that really are wrong with you. None of us do. We don't like that. And so here the challenge for us is God turning his finger to us. And again, nobody reading the Psalms in their day read verse two and didn't think of the number of times the people had said to God, How long, oh Lord, until you come and make things right in this world? And by the time he gets to verse six, he's pointing his finger back to us and saying, I gave you the authority to do things right. I gave you the responsibility to do the right thing. I gave you the responsibility to care for the people who are suffering around you. I gave you materials, power, resources to meet people's needs, and you're asking me why I'm not meeting people's needs.

This is God saying to us, you are going to have to get things right, and that's it's just not pleasant. When I pastored, I pastored for I started preaching when I was 16 years old. I started pastoring full time in a, you know, a stable established church when I was 24 years old. I pastored in between, but it was kind of a campus church that we just started up ourselves. It was glorious. We had a great time. But as far as really pastoring a church with some structure to it started when I was 24 years old, and I remember man having people just they would respond in the services, and we had teenagers and singles who would respond, and

they had things going in their life that were way or I mean, I'm 24 years old. It's like I don't even know what you're talking about. Let me, let's hire a counselor and let you talk to them. And so I remember sitting in my office one night at a window out that I could see over a courtyard outside of my office,

and this young lady, really outstanding, smart young lady, but who had been through some horrendous things, was seeing a counselor that we were providing for and so she, I mean, you know, she had come for, I don't know, two or three or four weeks. And after that, this next session came up, and I was sitting in my office, and I was looking outside, and I saw her burst out the door of the building and go over behind a pillar where she thought nobody could see her, and I could see her. I'm, I'm, you know, saying I was trying to stare at it, but it was not, it was hard to miss. And she leaned back against the pillar and just crumpled and cried, because what was going on with her, but I knew what was going on this way. When you do real counseling, you know you have, I don't know what the technical term is, but breakthroughs, you know you have a moment when you really do have to confront the realities of things they've been trying to put off. And those are hard. If they weren't going to be hard, we wouldn't need a counselor to get to them, you know, we wouldn't need somebody to help us get to them. And so she, you know, she cried and wept, and by the way, just so you'll know,

she is now in her four.

Has a beautiful family, has had two decades of a really fantastic life, and the Lord has blessed her after she worked through all those things that were in her background when she was a teenager.

My reason for saying that to you is this all sounds, you know, fine, okay, stop blaming everybody else for the problems that are going on in your life and in the world, and start acknowledging that we're the problem. And again, I I could just take you to one passage after another in the scriptures that makes this point when they ask Jesus in the Gospel of Luke, hey, when's the kingdom of God going to come? That's this question. When is God going to make everything right? And Jesus answer to them is, look, the Lord's going to there are a lot of intervening parables that he gives to make this point, but when he gets to the end of the point, he says, this is the lesson you're supposed to have learned. God is going to be faithful, God is going to come. God is going to make things right. That's not the question. The question is whether he's going to find anyone here who is faithful. Is anyone here going to do what they were supposed to do? Or think with me about Psalm 14 or Psalm 53 these two psalms that begin almost identically, where men are on the earth making a declaration that there's no God. There's no God, but God is looking down from heaven and saying, No, that's not the problem. The problem is there's none who are good. That's the issue. So it always comes back to us. So the close of it comes in the next verse, verse eight, and what Verse eight says is and it changes the whole tenor of the Psalm. Everything else is descriptive, and then God making declarations. It's this narrative. But then when we get to verse eight, it says, arise, oh God, judge the earth. Now we're looking up to heaven and saying, We need help, Lord, we need help. We need you to intervene.

And so at the end of it, at the end of the verse, it says, After, arise, oh God, judge the earth, for you shall inherit all the nations. That declaration that God will inherit all the nations is comforting, because God can oversee all of those terrible things that we see going on in the world. But for us, it's much more important than that, if you could change on your own. So look, we've said three things. Number one, we'd like to blame everybody else, but we have to hand them over to God. Not like everybody else isn't wrong, but we have to hand them over to God. They're up to him. They're not up to us. We're not their judge. Number two, we have to acknowledge that we are the problem. I myself am the problem

number three, I have to realize I'm not going to change on my own. And let me just be crystal clear about this. You can think you're going to but you're not. All of your life and circumstances, all of the history of the world, plus everything you've been through personally, has extruded exactly what you are right now. That's what you are and have chosen. You can say, Oh, this is not what I want. This is not what I choose.

This is what you are. Here you are. If you wanted to be different, you'd be different. I know how offensive that language is, but talk with me after church, you'll see it's just the way it is. This is how we are. If you want to change, if you really want to change, you have to ask for help. And where do you turn for help? Well, what we're told is we turn to God, and he, as Judge of the whole earth, can change the whole earth. Well, I'm part of that. And while I can't be responsible for changing the rest of the earth or knowing how or when God's going to change that, what he's going to do with it, I can be responsible for throwing myself at the Savior's feet and saying to him, I need to be different. Will he be painless? No,

you will cry next to a pillar one day when he's changing your life,

but you will emerge with something completely different in your heart and life. When we get to the end of the service today, there will be people down here who would love to pray with you. These places to kneel are at the front,

and I encourage you, before you leave the building today, to make the resolution number one, to give all of the other things that frustrate and disappoint you back to God. Let him deal with those. Number two, admit that you're the problem that needs to be dealt with. Just see what needs to happen in you. Let him bring that to you. And number three, say to him, Lord, I need your help. If you've never met Him as your Savior, He will first transform your entire life and make you a new creation, brand new. Give you a brand new start. If you know Him as your Lord and.

Savior. You know what I mean by this? He will immediately show you the things he's going to begin to change, and then he will bring about those things that will cause you to move in a direction you never would have moved if you hadn't asked him for help. Let's ask him for help. I can't change the world, but I can change the part of it he holds me accountable for, and that's right here, Father, I pray that You would bless this congregation. You have blessed me through them, and so I pray that you would pour out that blessing on them. And I pray that in each soul here, there would be a recognition

that you care about what's going on in the world, and you will make all of that right in the end,

but also that you care about us individually, and you want us to see where our flaws, weaknesses and failures are, but also that you love us as your children in that state. And then finally, that you just want us to ask for help, that you won't even rebuke us when we ask you, just want us to ask for help, so that you can begin to produce in us what we wish we were seeing in the rest of the world. May it begin in me today, in Jesus. Name amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, good morning, good morning. You all ready? You got your seat belts? All right? I know the Cowboys are playing. This ain't gonna be a short sermon, so don't worry. I hope you got it on DVR.

Imagine all the Prescott jerseys that are out now that he signed a two, $40 million contract. Now I almost wore mine last week, and I get home and I realize right before the game, he signed his contract. Man, I should have wore it last week. I didn't want to jinx it. You know, when you hear the word supernatural, what comes to mind with you? For me, it's always superheroes. Right? For me, it's Superman. Only one weakness that he had was kryptonite, right? And Lois Lane, right? I always thought she must be his kryptonite. Sometimes, that's us. You know, there was a show called supernatural that aired for 15 seasons, 327

episodes. How many y'all watch that?

It's okay. You don't we're in church. We gotta be honest, right?

Well, my daughter, who's going to be 20 this next week, actually, she decided last year she started watching it, or she might have watched it, starting during covid. But I said, Honey, how you going to get through 327

episode? She did. She's like dad. They got characters that are biblical characters, that got Michael and and Moses. They had all these kind of So, yeah, but it's still fake. You know,

Spider Man, Superman, all those guys are great. We love a hero, a superhero. But I want to talk about something that I don't know, that we equate with God, this thing called supernatural. You see, the gospel is good news for all, because it it's not from man, it's from God. It's called it's a supernatural thing. We can't explain it sometimes, but we know what it does to people. It transforms them. It saves them. It gives them hope. The sister was talking about and during her prayer and through the music, listen, if you're here and you've lost hope, there's always hope with a supernatural God, because we don't have to rely on somebody to tell us about that hope. We can we can go right to the text and go, God is my hope. God is my hope. I know

you didn't come here for all this information this morning. And by the way, I want to say this for all you Marvel fans out there,

there would be no Marvel without DC Comics. You know that, right.

But man, do they have the best movies, right?

But they all are the same. You watch one, you've seen them all. Just kidding. I'm a DC guy. I grew up that way. I didn't know what Marvel was until, you know, Spider Man was kind of popular, but it was always Superman and Wonder Woman and, you know, all those, all those guys and but I do watch the Marvel movies. But you know, the guy came from DC Comics, right? So he didn't like what they were giving him, so he made his own. I actually think Marvel is better in the way they created it. They've done well.

So I want to tell you what the definition of supernatural is. This is the Merriam Webster definition supernatural. And I thought man, even a man made thing like that, they got it right. Listen to what it is manifestation or an event attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature. You can't explain it, and science can't explain it. That's the definition of supernatural. It is not man made, and it comes from something outside of us. And they call it attributed to some force beyond scientific evidence. As Christians, the plan of God that every believer walks in is in the supernatural. You see, we are good at walking in the flesh, aren't we? Somebody does something, somebody cuts us off. We find our sign language real quick on that person that cuts us off, right? You know what I'm talking about. We find choice words, especially if no one's in the room or in the car with us. We get to say whatever we want. We operate in the flesh really well. What would it look like if believers actually operated in the supernatural. If they walked by faith and not by sight, what would that look like? How many more people would come to Christ? Because what they saw was not of man, what they saw was of God. And they were wondering, what is going on with these crazy Christians, walking by faith and not by sight? You see first, Timothy 117 says this

now to the king, eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God in honor be honor and glory and forever and ever, amen. So we have an eternal, immortal, invisible, and only God that we worship, amen. That's who we worship. See, that's why we are here today. That's why we're listening to text, listening to Scripture. That's why we come to church. We don't need some human form of whatever. We need a supernatural power that transforms us into who God wants us to be. That's what we're doing here. So we're going to be in our text again. Galatians, chapter one, we're going to end.

Okay, 11 through 23 that will last 14 verses there. So I'm going to read from the New International Version you read with whatever version that you come with, if you don't, if you have your device or your actual hard copy of your Bible, I want you to see the word of God for yourself. I know it's going to be up on the screen, but I've told them sometimes, just put whatever up there and see what happens. You can't rely on us inputting information on the screen. You need to see the word of God for yourself. Amen, alright, Galatians chapter one, let's stand as we read God's word 11 through 23

I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel I preach is not of human origin. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, whether I received it by the revelation of Jesus or from Jesus Christ.

For you have heard of my precious way of life or previous way of life in Judaism, how intensely I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, and was extremely zealous of the for the traditions of my fathers.

But when God, who set me apart from my mother's womb and called me by grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me that I might preach him among the Gentiles. My immediate response was not to consult any human being. I did not go up to Jerusalem to see

those who were apostles before I was but I went to Arabia. Later, I returned to Damascus. Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to get acquainted with Cephas and stayed with him for 15 days. I saw none of the other apostles, only James the Lord's brother. And I assure you before God that I, what I am writing to you, is no lie. Then, when I went to Syria and Cecilia,

I was personally unknown to the churches of Judea that are in Christ, they only heard the report. Listen to the report. The man who formerly persecuted us is now preaching the faith he once tried to destroy.

And they praised God because of me,

Father, this is your word. We receive it this morning. In Christ's name, I pray amen. You may have a seat.

For those of you that don't know I'm a creature of habit. I have a three point sermon this morning. Sometimes I do two, sometimes I do four, and other times I just do bullet points. But I have a three point sermon this morning. God is a giving God is my first point. God is a giving God, and the first two verses in 11 and 12 talk about that. He says, when you think about God and all the amazing qualities that he has, it's literally unimaginable that God is going to share his ministry with us. Could you you know that it's a it's unimaginable to the human mind to think, how is it that God's going to share the supernatural power with us? I mean, you think about that, you can turn into a superhero yourself. For Christ,

God's supernatural state comes to baffle even myself. And I've been to I've been educated and still doing school study, lots of theology, and it's still amazing. The thing that allows us to share, He gives us His supernatural power to do His work. God cannot be explained in a lot of instances. Yet we know what he does. We see his work in people's lives. We see what he's doing. We seek transformation. We see how he gives that to people. And how is it possible to go from a sinner to a saint,

from hell, bound to heaven, bound

from a nobody to a somebody. How is that possible?

Well, I'll tell you how, by the super working power of Jesus the Christ. We just sang about his name being so powerful among us, it's only by that name that men may be saved, that women may be saved, that children may be saved, that grandparents may be saved, that soldiers may be saved, that mom and dads may be saved, that anybody may be saved. It's only under that name that you can be saved. It's a supernatural power of Jesus. Paul, the author of the book of Galatians, tells us plainly that this gospel that he's preaching is not of human origin. He said, I didn't get it from any human being. I only got it from the man himself, and that was Jesus in a supernatural way. In other words, it's a gift from God. He gives it to us. Did you know every time you open the Scripture text, and I pray that you do on a daily basis, every time you open it, the Holy Spirit can encounter you so that you can hear from him. Do you believe that this morning, if you read the scriptures and you ask God, and you pray through that, and God can speak to you in only a way that he can and he can, it's almost as if the letters are coming up off of the page and going, you know, that's me. That's for me when God was calling.

With me to the ministry. I was studying the First John, and I remember going, how are you going to use a guy like me? And I got all this stuff in the closet who I used to be, and he kept on reminding me, you're not that person anymore. That person died once you gave your life to Christ. Now you're a new creation. Second Corinthians, 517, you're new.

This is not our home.

This is not our home. This is Earth.

This is we are heaven bound. Our home is not here. We are just like the millions of migrants that have crossed our borders, we're just passing through. You can say what you want about that system. I work with migrants all the time. We have a migrant center. We help them and we share the gospel with them. Did you know 4500

migrants have given their life to Christ through the apostle migrant center that we helped establish three years ago? Listen,

we are the same way. We're just passing through. This is not our home. Stopped acting like this is a permanent stop for you.

I don't care how texting you are, or how all passing you are, or how 915, you are, this is not our home. We're only here for a little while, James says, and then we vanish and we're on our way to wherever we're going. It's either heaven or hell for us.

Paul wants us to know the gospel is from God. Did you know that Paul cannot offer you eternal life? I cannot offer you eternal life life. Church cannot offer you eternal life. Nobody can offer you eternal life. Only Jesus, the Christ, the Messiah, can offer you eternal life. And that's what the gospel is. That's good news. That's what good news sounds like. Only a supernatural God with a supernatural gospel can offer you eternal life. That's it. In verse 12 of our text, Paul takes us deeper when he says this, I was not taught by man. I did not receive the gospel from man. It came as a revelation from Christ.

And I go, Well, Paul, weren't you in school when you were a Pharisee? Didn't you go to the super religious schools and learn how to all the different laws of God and learn all those old texts and the Talmud and the Septuagint, the first five books of the Bible? He knew all those things. And I thought, Paul, you kind of knew who the Messiah was. You were taught by the other religious leaders,

but now, when God reveals Himself to you, it's not anything that any man can teach you, it's only by the the supernatural power of Jesus. And that's why, as we talked last week, no one can offer eternal light apart from the true gospel. Only the true gospel of Jesus can offer you eternal life. There were some here that came, you're going to be offering an opportunity to be invited to come this morning. There were some that came last week, and one that I know of that gave their life to Christ, first time in church. Came here, just moved here. So, you know, there's, there's this

attitude out there that it takes 7.8 times for someone to hear the gospel, for them to come to Christ. And I always wonder when they get to you know, and it's because somebody comes to church so many times they hear the Gospel. This lady was in church one day, first time she heard the gospel, and she said, I need Jesus in my life. She gave her life to Christ. And you can do that this morning too. I don't care if you've been here 20 years, you can still be sitting in the chair and never have given their life to Christ because you're here because it's this is where I go. This is what I do. Now, listen, you need to be in Christ so that you can know this is who you are, amen, and you need to be assured of your salvation. It's Supernatural. Paul said he had done enough and lived enough to know what happened to him, and It's Supernatural. And he says it was from Jesus. God is giving a giving God. He's a giving God. He gives you all these things. So I'm going to read a text for you,

and I think it was appropriate that sister was talking about those of you here that may not have hope, I want to really explain to you what hope is. According to the scriptures in Romans, chapter eight, verses 24 and 25 it says, For in this hope we were saved, he's talking about Jesus. But hope that is seen is no hope at all.

You see, sometimes you're you have no hope because you're relying on what you see. But he says, hope that is seen is not really hope at all. You can't see it here. It won't help you with your hopelessness. Because he says, and continues on in Romans, 824, he says, Who hopes for what they already have?

But if we hope for what we do not yet have we wait for it patiently? That's what real hope looks like. When God is going to have a breakthrough in your life, you're going to be you're going to know it, you're going to be waiting patiently for Him to interact with you. That's what hope is. Have you trusted God with your life? Have you given your hope to him and all of your cares?

Yes. Have you had an experience when whatever was happening from you has kept you away from you? Have you asked Jesus to be the Lord of your life today, as you think about your life, do you want that as a human message or a supernatural message? Do you want my words or do you want the words of the gospel? I pray that you want whatever God has for you that he's going to be speaking to you today as you think about your life, think about this supernatural gospel. My second point is, God is a living God. First, he's a giving God, but God is a living God. In the verses 13 through 17,

Paul starts to describe God as this, not only a giving God, but how he gives good gifts, but as a living God. I don't know if you know this, but God is alive and well, amen, he is doing things around this globe that will amaze us. Did you know that people are coming to Christ without ever being preached to?

You say what Pastor

Jesus is revealing himself in people's dreams across this globe, people that have denied Christ, and Jesus appears to them in a dream, and they realize that Jesus really is who he says he is, and they come to Christ. They don't need me to go tell them. I mean, it's helpful. We go, we surrender the missions or ministry or whatever, and we tell people about Jesus. We need to do that. But in reality, the only message that we can preach is the actual supernatural gospel, and one that is a teaching of a living God. In verses 13 and 14, Paul says this, I know my audience. He says, you know who I used to be. You know everything about me. He said, Now I'm trying to convince you that man's dead, and now this man's alive. That's who he's trying to convince his audience, because he's like, Dude, we know who you are, Paul. You're the one that didn't like Christianity. You're the one that watched Stephen in Acts chapter six. If you haven't read that, get stoned to death, and afterwards, they laid all of his garments and possessions at the feet of Paul, who, at the time, was Saul, and he approved of that because Stephen stood up for his faith in Christ. Did you know that in that text, in Acts, chapter six, it's the only place that says Jesus was standing at the right hand of the Father. Everywhere else that you read in the Scripture, it says Jesus is seated at the right hand of the Father. We know that right. He's seated at the right in that text alone when, when Stephen was really making that possession a proclamation, I'm going to stand for Christ Jesus, he saw Jesus standing at the right hand of the Father, listen, if you'll take a stand for Christ, I promise you, he'll take a stand for you. He will give you his supernatural power. He's a living God, and Paul's trying to convince this audience of his that he's not that person anymore. He's not the person that was at Stephen stoning, because Jesus had transformed him. And he even tells him, he said I was climbing the ladder of success in my former religion. I was so bold, even though I was so young, and people listened to me. I told him this Jesus is a bunch of baloney. He's not who he says he is. You

had to be so convincing that of this living God that he had inside of him to convince those that had seen him do those things now. You may be here today,

like me. I gave my life to Jesus when I was 25 years old, I had a whole bunch of baggage that people knew who I was prior to my conversion, and it was really difficult to explain to them. I don't do those things anymore.

I wasn't perfect, but I had to change who I was. According to the Scriptures. I had to be become somebody else. I had to put the old man to bed. I had to actually put him to death. Did you know when we were baptized, the water represents a grave. That's why we say buried with Christ in His death and raised to live a new life. We bury the old person. And Paul was trying to tell them that's not me. He's dead. I'm alive because of Christ. And he says all these things, and he wanted them to understand so they could believe it. But I want you to look at verse 15 with me. Look

at your Bibles, look at your phones, whatever. In verse 15,

he says this,

But when God,

who set me apart from my mother's womb, called me by His grace,

was pleased when you see those words, but God, don't just skim over them in the Bible. God's fixing to reveal himself in that. And we see that, and we look at different verses that say these things. So I'm going to go through a few verses with you that talk about when the when the Scripture says, you know, we're talking about something else. And it says, But God, and he says these amazing things. And so look at Matthew 1926 Matthew 1926

Jesus looked at them and said, with man, this is impossible. But.

With God, all things are possible. So we can't skip over those words, but God acts 2224 Acts 224,

but God raised Him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death. Because it was impossible for death to keep its hold on him, death could not hold him, is what we sang this morning, right. The grave could not hold him. The tomb could not hold him, But God raised Him from the dead. Romans, five, eight. But God demonstrates His love for us in this that while we were still sinners. Listen, if you're trying to clean your life up before you come to Christ. You can't do it while you were still sinners. Christ died for you, is what Romans five eight says, while you are still doing whatever you're doing, while you're still womanizing, while you're still watching pornography, while you're doing whatever you do in your life. And you think, I gotta clean my life up before I come to God. Listen, He died for you while you were doing those things. You cannot clean yourself. He's the only one that can clean you by the supernatural gospel. He can. You can't. You can't do it yourself. And I think that's what Paul's trying to teach us this morning. Listen, only Christ can do that for us. You see, you come as you are, as filthy and nasty as you are, so that Jesus can clean you by the blood of the Lamb. And then we become somebody that wants to change. Then we realize this is what God wants me to be. And we start reading the Bible, and we start realizing we serve a living God. He's alive inside of us, and we want to do what he asked us to do. First, Corinthians 127 says here's

one of my favorite verses,

but God chose the foolish things of this world to shame the wise. God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. Listen, Jesus came at a time when nobody believed that the Messiah was the Messiah. He came to a place Nazareth. It's like no good thing comes from Nazareth. What the Scripture says, He did things that people would never believe that this is the Messiah. How it did my God, my Messiah, allow himself to get arrested, allow himself to get beaten, allow himself to hang on a cross, allow himself to bleed, allow himself to die and say he's my Messiah, because the grave couldn't hold him, because the tomb couldn't hold them. He was raised and he conquered death by his resurrection. But God chose the foolish things of this world to shame the wise. He chose the weak things of this world to shame the strong. That's the God we serve. When the living God of this universe has a mission and a plan for your life, supernatural things are going to happen.

I'm telling you, if God could take a kid from El Paso like me to serve Him in His kingdom, he can take a person like you to serve in his kingdom. I was a nobody. He made me somebody, not because of what I did, but because of what he did. Listen, you too can have that supernatural power, the living supernatural power. Paul says it set me apart while I was still in my mom's womb. Listen, God has had a plan and a call in your life, from the day you became a fetus in your mom's room, in your mom's womb, when you became a baby that you weren't even even outside the womb. God knows who you are. He has says, I know who you are. Just read Psalm 139 if you want the text for that Psalm 139 before you were born, he had a plan for you. God calls us to his side and to his service. Listen, I hear people talk about calling all the time. There's only two callings in the Bible. God calls you to his side, to himself and to his service. Now, there's different kinds of things that we do in His service. We have a music team that plays the music. We have this guy that pretends to be the pastor. He's I'm the interim pastor just but he had. We have a guy that preaches the gospel. We have people that run the media. We have people that are going to be afterwards in the prayer room. We have all of these different services. It's all the same calling, though. We're called to his side and to his service. That's what we get called to. And why does God call us to himself? What possibly could he want from us? He doesn't need us, right?

I hope you believe he don't need you, right? He doesn't need you. He can run this world without you.

The cool thing is, is he willing to let you come and be part of the kingdom? He said, I will let you come in. I want to use you so that others can see who I am.

Listen to this. In verse 16, Paul tells us that we can reveal his Son in our lives. You see he he said this. Look at what he says in verse 16,

the reason that God called him and set him apart, he says, to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach among the Gentiles. Listen,

God isn't calling you just to sit there and do nothing. God is calling you to his service, and whatever that may be. For Paul, it was preaching.

It to the Gentiles. If you don't know what the word Gentile means, it was everybody else besides a Jew. It was the rest of the world that were not chosen by God. But after Jesus rose from the dead, he changed the world, and Paul preached that gospel, a supernatural gospel. You see, when the living God of the universe has a mission and a plan for your life, that's what happens, the reason we know and allow a supernatural God to come and live inside of us is so that Jesus can be seen in us.

Is Jesus being seen in you? Do people see Jesus in your life? Can they tell there's something different about you? You see, Paul says, so that I might preach among the Gentiles, my immediate response was not to consult any human being. You see, he didn't need any human to tell him. Yes, I think that's from God. Only you and God can understand what God is speaking to you about. That's why we said you have to confess with your mouth, you have to believe in your heart, and only God knows your heart, only God knows your mind, when a supernatural God is evident in your life. And listen, I understand there's different gifts, and there are, there are different theologies that are out there, and sometimes speaking in tongues is considered one of these things, so that people can see that the Holy Spirit is inside of you. But I want to say that's not true.

I'm not against speaking in tongues. I think that it's one of the gifts. But listen, the biggest thing that people can see inside of you is a real, supernatural Jesus that speaks for you. And what I mean by that is intelligible words, so that people can understand what he's done in your life. Listen, all of those things are great. All of the gifts are great, but if they don't see the real Christ in you, it doesn't matter. He's the one that reveals Himself to us. Paul says, I don't just want to, I just, I just don't want God, and I don't want to just keep him for myself. We want to give God away. There are no secret agent Christians in the kingdom.

There's a lot of you that think you are, though, if I just they won't know that I'm a Christian. Imma hide behind this right here, just in case. You know, listen, why would you not want somebody to know that you're a Christian? Why don't you want your family to come to Christ? You may be the first in your family to give their life to Jesus and to show him to the rest of your family. Why don't you want that for them? Do you not want them to come to heaven with you?

You need Jesus in your life.

Paul said, I'm going to where God is sending me. In verse 17, he received the supernatural gospel, and he said, I gotta go. I don't need to consult with the apostles. Nobody needs to tell you what to do. In Ephesians two, chapter two, verses four through seven,

it says, But God, being rich in His mercy, because of the great love with which He loves us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you have been saved and raised up with Him and seated with us in the heavenly places in Christ, Jesus so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of His grace and kindness toward us in Christ, Jesus isn't that a beautiful piece of text of Scripture, but God shows us his kindness and his greatness so that that can be seen in us, so that others can come to the kingdom as well. Listen, the kingdom of God is not for you to hide. It's not for you to only for yourself. It's for you to share it with others. We have a giving God, and we have a living God. Do you have the living Christ living inside of you? Is he real in your life? Have you made him the king of your life? Is he reigning over your life? Is every decision taken at the feet of the cross. And say, This is what I want to do. God, what do you think not this is what I did. God, can you bless it now? Oh, we like that prayer, don't we? I'm just going to ask for blessings after I do whatever I want to do,

that's not the God I serve. I hope it's not the God you serve. You take it to the cross and you say, God, I feel like I'm being lead, led to do this. What do you think? Would you show me? Would you help me?

Lastly, God is a forgiving God. We have a

a willing God, a living God, and now we have a forgiving God. In the last couple verses of our text, Paul is trying to convince others of the supernatural conversion, conversion in Christ. He spent three years preaching all over Galatia. Like I said, Galatia is a lot like this area here in El Paso,

El Paso and horizon and and Anthony and and Chaparral, and even going to Las Cruces. It's a vicinity. Paul's preaching all around this vicinity. He says, I did it for three years. And he says, I want to tell you how God has saved me, changed me, and transformed me. He had to prove to the people how God had changed him. Now, listen, if you're been a heathen like I was before I was 25 and you give your life to Christ today, people ain't going to believe it at first. Oh.

Man, I know what that guy used to be. That's what's going on in our Texas mornings. Like there's no way Paul changed his life. I know exactly who he used to be. This dude was a ruthless Christian killer, and now you're going to tell me he's now for Jesus. That's what can happen to you. You can be the first in your family. You could be this terrible person doing crazy things. And today, God gets a hold of your heart. You say, I want that supernatural power the pastor was talking about this morning. And you're going to walk out of here and people are going to go, I don't believe it.

It takes time for people to see a resurrected Christ in your life. So don't just go, man. You don't have to believe it. No, you just continue to do and love on them, because it's hard to love unlovable people, isn't it? Ain't no unlovable people in here, right?

I was one of those. I know he went to visit with others and proved himself worthy of the calling verse 23 the people heard of the transformed Paul, this man who was against God as now is for God. In other words, God forgave this man of all of his sins past, present and future. Could you imagine

Jesus forgiving Paul of all the sins that he committed against all the Christians in that vicinity, all the people that had been killed at his feet on his watch, and he was a superhero for the Pharisees. Paul was Paul, and he was in charge. And they were like, how is it possible for this man to be saved now and for him to be speaking for the person he said he was against?

Listen

again. You could be here today and you'd be like, Man, I just don't know about this Jesus thing.

Yesterday, we spent all day at a unapologetic conference understanding how to defend our faith. And

one of the things I learned is the material our body will let us down,

and we think about our brain and how amazing it is, but it's material our thinking is outside of our brain.

So think about that as Jesus is outside of who we are. It's not that we can't we do invite Him into our life, but we invite Him into our heart and in our soul and in the way we think it's not about the material, it's about the immaterial, which is the spiritual world. That's the world that we want to tap into this morning. You see, we all have a choice to make today. We can either follow Christ, or we can deny Christ. We can either ask Jesus to be the Lord of our life, or we can say, I don't want him at all in my life. Or we can say, Pastor, I've been here today. I've given my life to Christ, but I've walked away from him. Well, I tell you coming back and reconnect to him today. Say I want what you're talking about this morning. Listen, we all have a calling in our life, and I'm going to read six more verses for you, and I want you to listen very carefully. Ephesians, chapter four, verses one through six. Ephesians, chapter four, verses one through six,

Paul's talking to the church at Ephesus, and he says this as a prisoner for the Lord,

I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.

Be completely humble and gentle, be patient, bearing one with one another in love, make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. There's only one body and one Spirit, just as you've been called to one hope when you have when you were called. There's one Lord, there's one faith, there's one baptism, there's one God and Father of all, who is overall and through all and in all. That sums up the gospel in six verses.

Did you know as I was studying this text when I was in seminary, preparing my first sermon to preach to a group of pastors, because we had to preach to each other in class. You know how scary that was for a guy that had didn't grow up in church, had only been saved about eight years, preparing a sermon to preach the guys that probably grew up in church probably been preaching since they were little, and I was preparing this text of Scripture and this word

worthy. I wanted to understand what did live a life that's worthy of the calling you received, and did you know in the Greek context? And I looked it up, and I was like, I want to study. What does exactly mean? It talked about these scales being in balance. Now, when we used to go to the grocery store, and there's somebody that was old, you that are as old as me or older, here, we used to, we used to put our vegetables and fruits on a scale to measure how many pounds we are. We that they were so that we could see, well, it's 29 cents a pound. I got three pounds, it's going to be about 90 cents. And then we would bag it up so we knew how much we were spending.

Uh, well, today they just usually go by the piece of fruit or whatever. So that's the that's the image that we have here. Live a life that's worthy of the calling. The worthy is in the middle our life versus our calling? Is it in balance?

And he goes through and talks about all these onenesses, one God, one faith, one baptism, one one hope, and he, and that's what I call the seven onenesses. Those are what we can agree on as the body of Christ. And listen, if he, if your life is not in balance with who Christ is, then today, make it in balance, live the life that's worthy of the calling that you've been given and received.

Have you experienced the life saving grace of Jesus, the Christ? I want to ask you today,

as we pray, to really consider what it means to follow Christ. Remember, it's not of any human origin. It's of a supernatural origin. It's by the Spirit of God that we can have Jesus in our life. Maybe you're going to be you're here, and like last week, some people came and they gave their life to Christ. And this is this altar is going to be open, and I want to invite you to come and make a decision for him. Maybe you're here and you just need to pray for somebody. We have, we have kneeling

places all across the the front here. Don't be afraid to ask whatever you need. So I'm going to pray for you, and then we're going to sing this song. And as we sing, you come so would you stand,

Father God. We, thank you for the day that you've given us. We, thank you for the gospel that you've allowed us to hear this morning, and so Father, I pray that by the power of your Holy Spirit, that you would move in this place as we continue to worship you God. I pray that if there are here, those here that need to receive the supernatural healing of Jesus the Christ, that they would not be afraid to ask, that they would come and say, That's me. If there are some here that say, I need Jesus, and only Jesus. I've been talking about all these other things, but now today, I want to make Jesus the Lord of my life. I pray that you would give them the power to come and father for the those that are here, that have walked away from you, that have said, I don't want anything to do with Jesus, but I came because somebody told me to come. I pray that you would bring them back into their kingdom. God, not that they're not saved, but you would reconnect with them and so, Father, God, whatever you want to do during this time, I met some here, Lord that need to surrender their lives to missions, to ministry, to the God, whatever God that you want to do. I pray that we would not be afraid to do it. I pray this in Jesus name amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you. Well,

here we are, right.

I'm going to begin this by saying how important this in between time is. When we're in between pastors, you're going to have a pastor. A lot of churches don't get that opportunity. They don't have what they call an interim pastor, the in between guy and so they have different people come in, or leaders step up and everything, but you're going to be blessed to to have that leadership team still in place, and you're going to have this voice with you to our longer we need, uh, I'll miss one Sunday in about two weeks. But other than that, I'll be here through the holidays for sure. But we're going to actually be going through a book called Galatians, if you're not familiar with the Bible, Galatians is one of our New Testament letters that Paul wrote. And he wrote that about the year AD 49 which means, if we believe that Jesus died in the year 33 ad 33 this was only about 16 years after Jesus's death, we have this incredible letter filtering around to all the churches in Galatia, because the word Galatian, there is no church and there is no area. It's an area or a specific spot. It's an area called Galatia. Now think about it this way, when you talk about El Paso a lot of times, we just put everybody in the big we brought them all, bundle them all together. Well, there's horizon city, there's kind of Theo, there's, you know, all different places, Anthony. And sometimes we even say, well, Las Cruces is just north El Paso, right? You know, it's 45 minutes from here. So that's kind of what we're talking about when we talk about Galatia. It's a vicinity of churches where Paul is addressing and the purpose and the reason that he made this or sent this letter was in the short time. Just imagine, 16 years after Jesus's death, they're preaching the gospel. They're telling everybody about this Messiah, and yet, there's other people already talking about other gospels, about other things that are supposedly be the real gospel. And so he would leave these churches that he started, and then these people would come in and talk about other gospels. That is why your pastor that just finished leaving asked me to step in for him. He knows what I'm going to preach. We were both seminary trained. We know exactly what we're going to talk about, and so he doesn't have to fear how what's going to happen after I leave. But that Paul had to start telling the churches, Hey, you can't believe everything. Some people tell you, you know they're going to come to your door and tell you about this other Testament or this other gospel about Jesus. Don't believe it. You have to look at the Scripture text, and you have to study and understand what it is that we're going to learn through this this time. So it's high time for the believer to know what they believe. And if you're here today and you've never stepped out in faith and given your life to Jesus, and I mean a full fledged, I want to surrender everything to him. You're going to get an opportunity to do that today. You're going to have an opportunity to say, You know what, I believe, what we're talking about this morning. And I want that for my own personal life. And so there's going to be this time of, we have all these kneelers here, this time of what we call an invitation, and you'll be welcome to come and give your life to Christ, or just come and pray and say, You know what, I haven't been living the way that you've asked me to live Jesus. But I want to start today. I want to make a change today and say, from this day forward, I'm going to live, talk and speak what I say I believe, amen. I'm going to do what I what I hear the Gospel teaching me to do because I haven't been doing it. Oh, I like the idea of going to heaven, but I'm not too sure about that living out my faith in front of others that may make fun of me, that may not understand who I am. Well, it's up to us to teach them who Christ is, and how are we going to do that if we don't know what the text says? So, I pray that through this series we understand that we need the letter of Galatians today. We need it more than we've ever needed it is known as the Magna Carta of the Christian gospel because it's so close to the resurrection of Christ, and it has so many things that Paul is telling us, and we're going through these very similar things in our churches today? Well, we're not sure what we believe anymore. We got preachers, even from our own pulpits, talking about some of the gospel. They're giving TED talks to places that need an actual presentation of the gospel. Listen. You can get all that stuff on YouTube. When we come to church, we want to hear what God has to say, that's enough of my spiel this morning. So let's let's hear what God has to tell us. We're going to read from Galatians, chapter one, verses one through 10. Would you stand with me as we read God's word and say, Pastor, why do we stand? We stand so that we get all the dirt distractions away. It's because if you get on your phone and get on Facebook. Going to see you unless you're recording it right? You don't have to do that, because they do that already for you. Here I'm going to read from the New, New International Version you read along with what other version that you read from. But this is Paul to the churches in Galatia. He says, Paul, an apostle sent not from men, nor by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead, and all the brothers and sisters with me to the churches in Galatia, Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins to rescue us from this the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. I'm astonished that you're so quickly deserting the one who called you to live in the grace of Christ, and are turning to a different gospel, which is really no gospel at all. Evidently, people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. I want you to listen to verses eight and nine very, very carefully. These two verses are what hinge this entire letter. And he says this, but even if we, Paul's talking about him and his entourage that are preaching the gospel, even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preach to you, let them be under God's curse, as we have already said, so I now say again, if anyone is preaching to you a gospel other than you accepted, let them be under God's curse. And am I trying to win the approval of human beings or of God, or am I trying to please people? If you were, if you were still trying to please people, if I were still trying to please, please people, I would not be a servant of Christ, let's bow in prayer, Father, we receive this message this morning. Would you work on our spirits and our souls and our hearts and our minds this morning, in Christ's name, I pray amen. You may have a seat. My first point, I'm going to talk about the salutation that Paul gives to these churches in Galatia, and said, there is only one Jesus. Now I want to encourage you, if you're not a note taker, to take even if you take out your phone and you start using your notes and whatever, that's cool, to start becoming a note taker. Listen, I know the day and age we live, we're we all want to call ourselves visual learners, right? We say, well, we just need a screen up there. We're going to, I'm going to remember that title. No, no, you know, no other gospel Galatians, right? Got a picture of the El Paso mountain there with the star. Listen, it's a known fact that if you're a certain way or a certain way of learning, a style of learning, that if you only utilize one style, you only retain about 10% now if you start learning two styles, which could be audio See, most of you are audio learners, but you come to church, you don't take notes. You think that you're going to turn into an audio an audible learner, all of a sudden when you come to church, right? I believe in the power of the Spirit. I do. It can happen. But in reality, if you're not an audible learner, then you're a calisthenic learning, where you learn with your hands. Start taking notes. Listen. It's important to know what's being said Sunday by Sunday. And so you can go, you can go about your daily routine throughout the week, and you can absorb the things that are being taught to you.

So Paul says there's only one Jesus in his first five verses. He states, in this opening monolog many facts. He says, verse one, he's an apostle. Verse one, he was sent by Jesus, not just any Jesus, but the Jesus who was raised from the dead. He makes sure that he puts that in his salutation, it was he was sent by other believers. He says in verse two, there is grace and peace when we know Jesus. In verse three and verse four, he says, Jesus gave himself for us to be forgiven for our sins. All throughout our worship, we were talking about that through our prayers and through the musicians that we're even talking through that we're here to be forgiven of our sins. Amen, we want Jesus to forgive us of all the things that we have not measured up to. Romans 323, says that everybody has sin, and we fall short of God's standard. You know, there's a standard of holiness that God has, and we fall short of that. We have to admit that he also says that Jesus has delivered us from evil in verse four. And in verse four, he says everything is done according to God's will. And in verse five, Jesus will be glorified forever. You see only one Jesus could have made all those orchestrated facts that Paul just state. Usually Paul states his salutation that in letters and. Says Paul, an apostle of Jesus, writes to this church, and then he gets into it. He made it a point, because he was talking about a bunch of churches, including us here in El Paso at Life Church, how we have to rely on Christ and Christ alone. And he wanted to make sure we knew that, how often do we just skim over the salutations or the intro of a passage of Scripture, we

go, well, that's not really going to apply to me, really.

Let me challenge you this morning,

if you were going to write a letter to somebody,

a group of people that you knew were going to read it,

and you had to give an opening salutation about your life in Christ? What would that look like? How would you go about doing that? Would you just say, Hey, I'm a Christian. I

go to Life Church.

Man, could you imagine writing the letter just like Paul did? I'm going to I'm a follower. I'm a disciple. I'm a Christian in Christ, Jesus, Christ is the only one that did anything for anybody in order for them to secure their salvation. He died for my sins and for yours so that we can live forever. That's the God I'm serving. And you start with this amazing salutation, and all of a sudden you have people looking at this going, who are you? Right? Who is this person? And that's why I look at Paul when he writes that, because shortly after Jesus's death, here's Paul the Apostle, who was a Pharisee, not only a Pharisee, the chief Pharisee. If you don't know who the Pharisees were, they were the religious teachers of the the people of God, the religion, the religious people. And he was the head guy. And he was condemning this new messiah in this new way of living. And he said, This is not the truth. It wasn't until God got a hold of his life that he understood who Jesus was. And so shortly after, he's writing about this really amazing thing that has changed his life. And

so I would just say to you,

if you're not able to write a letter like that, would you consider what's going on in your life today? And you say, Am I really following after this Jesus that Paul talks about? The truth is, I

don't know if you know this, but we're actually writing our letters right now.

Your life is your letter. You are writing a letter every day that you come into contact with those that don't know Christ, your opening salutation is who you are. When you meet somebody that doesn't know Jesus and listen, everything can make a difference. And so I wrote a couple notes here. I just want to say, sometimes it's what we don't say, right? Sometimes it's our body language. I'm horrible with body language. I know when people they can read me from a mile away, because it's just the way. I mean, I grew up that way, and I don't know how to say a word. I say things with my body, and I know that we do that a lot, and so let's be careful in who we are as we present the gospel, in the way we live our lives. So we are doing the same thing Paul was doing sometimes, just without words, just by the way we live. It's our if we're going to have a true gospel message, we have to understand who we are in Christ. So let me ask you this question this morning. Do you believe there's only one Jesus? Why are so many people trying to present somebody other than we know that's in the in the Word of God. This is another testament of the of the New Testament. They you know, you let people come to your door, right? Do you? I had one come to my door yesterday, just getting to sit down watch the Texas Michigan game. I was like, Really, God, I know who they were. My wife, we just put some big wreaths on our front door. And so I just hope we have these windows that you can just open up. My dog. My dog is, is 14 years old, and sometimes he hears the doorbell. Sometimes he doesn't. Well, of course, he heard the doorbell this time, so he's going crazy. And so I said, I'm not going to open the door. I'm just going to open the open the the window. And so the lady asked me this, we're out going around telling people about the Lord's Prayer, because we want the kingdom of God to be the kingdom here on heaven. Don't you believe that too? Well, I said, Of course I do. I believe in the Lord's Prayer. It's in Matthew chapter six, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy will be done on earth as is in heaven. You know, I know that prayer. And I said, Yeah, I want that. And she said, Well, we have the Bible, and we believe in the Bible. And I said, that's wonderful. She

said, What about you, sir? I

said, I'm a pastor.

Little bit of silence I have ever recorded on my doorbell, too little bit of silence there and I go, I believe, totally I've spent my life studying the Bible. I've been to seminary. I'm still going to school right now. I'm a theologian at heart. I want to know exactly how to understand I want to. Like Paul says, For me to die is Christ, but for me to live is gain. I want to live for him. I know exactly what they're talking about. And so she says, this one, and she says, so what I said, What

church are you from?

We're Jehovah's Witnesses.

Now listen, if you're here and you've had experience with that, and you may yourself be one. I want to tell you something. As a theologian, I know for a fact, in the New World Order testament that they have, they've changed scripture not to agree with the original Greek context. Some of the scriptures are supposed to say in Christ. They say beside Christ or with Christ. We are in Christ to have in a relationship with Jesus the Christ. So so I didn't bring that out. I wasn't there to make them feel little, and I'm here to do that this morning with you, either. But I want you to know if we don't know what it says and what it means, we're not going to be able to have a defense for our faith. We're not going to be able to know what it is that they're talking about. And she said, What denomination are you see, I didn't ask her what denomination she was.

I said, What church do you go to?

But she said that. And I said, I'm Baptist.

I said, but really I'm a person that believes in the scriptures. I mean, we gotta put a label on certain things, but I'm a Christian. I follow the Bible and the Bible only. That's our only textbook. I can go and get all this training from specific scholars and everything. She was with somebody, and you know what this person? She said, I understand my family and me, we I grew up Baptist. And I looked at her and I said, Are you sure about that? I said, Do you know exactly what they believe? Oh yes, oh yes. See, the truth is she probably didn't have a foundation so that she could have stood solid on what the Word of God says, because Paul's already made it very, very much in our face this morning. If, if another gospel is being preached, let them be eternally condemned, is what the scripture says. We're not talking about the same Jesus from the scriptures that we believe. We're talking about people that have literally on purpose, changed the doctrine of Jesus. We must know, no, we have to know what the word of God says, so that we can live our lives for Him. Amen. So do you believe there's only one Jesus.

Have you been dabbling in other spiritual realms?

Have you been wondering, well, maybe

they're right, or maybe they're right,

at least with the Muslim nation, they

say they don't believe Jesus is the Messiah. These people, I'm not talking about, they're saying that this is the same Jesus.

It's impossible.

There's only one Jesus, there's only one gospel, there's only one salvation, there's only one baptism, there's only one forgiveness of sins, and it all comes from Him. Today, you can ask for forgiveness and become a follower of this real Jesus. Stop thinking about those other things and start knowing what you believe. Secondly, there's only one gospel. My first point was, there's only one Jesus, there's only one gospel. And then verses six through nine, this is where he says, I just really can't believe you're falling for all this malarkey. I don't know a better word to say in church, right? Baloney. Here's Paul planted these churches, and he goes, I'm astonished that you're being so confused by these people preaching another gospel. Did you not hear the gospel that we presented to you when we were with you? Oh, he's like, Oh, wow. You know, today we would say, Wow, really? Or the young people, that's all I hear in my house. I got 20 year olds in my house right now, and they say this for everything, bro,

you know what I'm talking about. I

would say that's probably what Paul was telling those churches. He said, bro, how can you do this? You know, if we're going to be serious about our context today, that's what he would say today. Wow, really, No way, man. I mean, I'm just really astonished that you're so confused. You see, we live in a confused world. We live in a world that's so confused we don't even know who we are anymore. We don't know that we were born a certain sex anymore. We don't know that we're a man or a female anymore. We're so confused today, we have a misunderstanding of who we are. And so it's going to be easy for somebody to come to your door and say, Hey, let me tell you about this other Jesus. They'll never present it in an other Jesus, but they're going to tell you who they are, what they believe. Today, there's attraction about other spiritual things. Wow. You know Gen Z supposed to be the most spiritual generation on the planet. They just don't want anything to do with you in church, if you're a Gen Z, I don't know. I know there's a lot of young people here, but now we have the new generation coming up called Gen alpha. So. Those that are 13 and below right now, what do they believe? I believe there's going to be a resurrection of that generation. There's going to be a resurrection of the real gospel. They're going to tell Gen Z millennial and us that is not what the gospel teaches. And I believe God is going to be raising up out of Gen alpha, these amazing presenters of the gospel, and they're going to they're going to present the gospel in ways that are going to go back to what the original text really meant, and they're going to show us who Jesus is, because they can see the confused world that we say we live in, that we say we believe in, we want. Anything goes in this world. Whatever is right for you is not necessarily right for me. So now we get into the point of, there's no absolute truth. There's nothing that's concrete. And says, Hey, would you believe that lying is absolutely false 100%

of the time? Yeah, but

my life, my job, depends on it. I have to tell a lie.

But does it still mean that it's right? No, it's one of those absolutes, you should not bear false witness, one of the 10 commandments we should all know that we should not lie. But yet you do a survey, 99% of people tell lies every day. If you're a part of the 1% You just lied. Listen, what could it take for somebody to be so distracted that they fall away from the real gospel? Look

at what Romans, 1617, through 19, says

Romans 1617, through 19.

I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them, for such people are not serving our Lord Christ, but their own appetites. By smooth talk and flattery, they deceive your minds. You naive people. Everyone has heard about your obedience. So I rejoice because you, because of you, but I want you to be wise about what is good and innocent about what is evil. Paul's not telling us anything new today, is he? He's telling us, listen there. There are some wise smooth talkers out there, right? They're trying to convince you. There's another way. I'm not just saying I want you to be he's not saying I want you to be open to other religions or other spiritual realms. No, he's saying this is an indictment on our faith. He said, How is that possible that you can just fall away that quick? Why would you it's not another gospel of Jesus. It's not another gospel altogether, basically, is what he's saying. It's not even good news. Did you know The word Gospel means good news? That's what we are. We are good news presenters.

It's great news actually, right?

I mean, come on, if you can give your life to Jesus, be forgiven of your sins and have a guarantee of an eternal life forever and ever. That is the best news that you could ever hear, ever and yet we have all this good news around the world going today, and it does not guarantee eternal life. Nothing does, except for a relationship in Christ. That's the only thing that you can depend on. Everything is letting us down today, right? Even our 401, Ks are going down the tubes, aren't, isn't it? I mean, it's like, how much the other day, I bought a donut at Krispy Kreme 229 I remember when they were two for $1 you know? And I'm just like, really, for a donut, give me a panduce instead.

They're cheaper and better. Listen,

Gospel means good news. There is no good news if you cannot attain eternal life. None, none of us can live a moral life. We need Jesus to live that morality for us. Isn't that great that we have somebody that took our pain and took our iniquities and went to the cross and said, I believe in you. I love you so much that I'm willing to give up my life. I'm willing to come from a throne of heaven, come down here to this nasty Earth and give my life for you so that you can live forever. Nobody else can make that claim but him. In Verse seven, Paul says, As if there really is another gospel out there. He says, It's not good news. Here's what Paul's saying. In the historical context, Galatians were visit had visiting pastor, and I told you about that, but they were trying to convince them of two things that they had to do to be a believer. Number one, they had to be circumcised to be a believer, because they come from the Jewish history, historical context, and the other one is that they had to work out. They had to obey the Word of God.

How's those 10 Commandments going for you?

Huh? How they going for you? You know what they are, right? You shall have no other god, no idols. Do not you. Is my name in vain. Keep the Sabbath. Holy. Honor your mother and father. Don't steal, Don't lie, don't cheat, don't covet your neighbors, don't have adultery. How are those going for you? If, if those are the actual things that we have to do so that we can have a relationship with Christ, we failed, because Jesus said it, and when they try to corner him, the Pharisees, probably Paul was in there with them, and he said, which is the most important commandment?

And I thought, you know what you're talking to. Jesus

says to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and spirit. And he said, the second is the same, to love your neighbor as yourself. Not only are we supposed to love God, but we're supposed to love people. And Jesus turned the world upside down, and he said, Listen, you can't follow those 10 Commandments. Matter of fact, those 10 Commandments were there to point to Jesus to say, we need a savior. Because if that's what it takes to get to God, we fail. And the other one is circumcision. Circumcision was mandatory for male, Jewish men, to say that we were God's chosen people. So, you know, it's hard to talk about that in church, I know, but it was one of those things that these false teachers were coming in and saying, you have to do this. Well, once you become a believer, there is no have to. It's only about Jesus and him alone. You don't have to be a person that says, Man, I I've failed these two of the 10 Commandments, but what am I going to do now? Jesus is going to forgive you and you're going to try harder the next time, but he knows you're going to fail again, he's going to forgive you again. You see, we like to call Jesus the God of second chances. No, he's not. He's a God of second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth. Some of us need 200 and more, right? Why do you think Peter came up to Jesus and said, How many times do I have to forgive these people? Seven? As if Peter was a forgiveness machine, right? Seven?

Jesus said, No, 70 times seven.

Could you imagine Peter going say, what?

490 times? No, it wasn't about the number. He was saying, as many as it takes, as hard as it is, as unloving as those people are, you still love them. You still forgive them. You see, I'm here as your interim pastor for the next months, or whatever time that is, and Pastor Brent knew when he sent me, sent me to come, that I was going to preach the gospel. He knew it. He said, I don't have to worry about what Larry's going to preach. He's going to just take the text, he's going to explain to the people, and that's what we're going to do. You see, I believe pastors have a have to have a call on their life. I believe there are pastors today preaching the gospel that do not have a call in their life. God has not called them out to be separated, to be pastors, and it's unfortunate because there are churches dying all around us. Did you know that every Sunday, every week, every month, there are churches closing their door all around the globe because the gospel is not being presented. They wanted to make sure they had all the things that they thought would attract people. Listen, I'm grateful for this place, but if it was just a tent with metal seats, if the gospel was being presented, I know what that looks like. I started a church with metal chairs in my living room. Listen, people crowded our house because we didn't lie about the gospel. We didn't try to present something that wasn't there. We just took the text and read it and we explained it and we studied it and we believed it and we lived out our lives. City Church dot real is a church of three to 400 people. Now it'd be bigger than that, but a lot of military that go in and out of there, just like Brent was saying last week, every 18 months, there's a big turnover here because of the military. We're grateful for our men and women who serve this country. Amen. We're grateful for them. I'm a veteran myself. I know what that means.

But everywhere we go, we take Jesus with us.

Obedience to the law was how people were judged in the eye of God, Eyes of God, and that didn't go so well the gospel of the One True JESUS. That's why, as a pastor, I can't say things, I can't do things that go contrary to the gospel. Now I fail just like you. There are days I wonder, you wake up and you go, Man, am I? Am I actually saved today, because the thoughts that are going through my mind and my head, you know, just go, I'm I'm not even thinking about God. I'm supposed to be sold out for the Kingdom. And I know that's what we all go through. We have so much stuff coming at us every day. So let's look at these two verses, verses eight and nine. I want us to really, really hone in in these two verses. These are key to the book of Galatians. There's no sugar coating. He says it as it is. But even if we are an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preach to you. Let him be accursed. See Paul put himself in that first one. Even if we preach something that we remember, there's a lot of people. It just like the lady that came to my door. She said, I used to be this. Now I'm this. He said, even if you do that, let them be eternally condemned. And the second one, he says, as we've said before, so now I say, if anyone is preaching a gospel contrary to the one you receive, let him be accursed or condemned or sent to Hell. Listen, it's not a game with Paul. He's trying to tell us, we have got to stay true to who Jesus Christ is. We have got to no matter what happens in this in between time, I'm begging you to stay faithful to the to Christ. And if your friends ain't here, if some people decided they're going to step out until you get another pastor. You get on the phone and tell em, listen, now is not the time to step out. We want to make sure that we're filled up and ready to go, so that when the new pastor comes, you're going to say, Man, this is amazing church. These people are are telling everybody about the gospel. They're doing exactly what they're supposed to be doing. That would be amazing, wouldn't it? So these two, key verses. You have two choices with these verses. You can run when somebody presents somebody like or you don't even answer the door, right? We look through our phone and we see Kukui. You know? We know they're either Jehovah's Witness or Mormons, right? They're going to try to tell me about something else that's contrary to what the gospel is. We can't, we can't not open the door because you don't know what the Gospel says. Maybe that's why you don't open the door, or you don't want to engage in a theological discussion because you don't understand it. You haven't studied I have a I know I have an advantage, because I sometimes my family will say dad, or my kids will say, Dad. They're here go answer the door. And I'm like, didn't you grow up in the same house? You can do it. Just tell them who Jesus is in your life. It's not the one they're going to present to you. You can run, or you can have conviction for your faith when another gospel that's presented. You can tell them exactly who Jesus is in your life

and what the Scriptures say about him.

I choose number two, what do you choose? You're going to run? Are

you going to have conviction? A conviction for your faith?

That's what I'm choosing. Now I ask you, are you choosing that? Are you going to have a conviction for your faith? Are you going to be able to defend what you believe? Listen, we have a conference coming up next Saturday at First Baptist Church. And so apologetic conference. They're not apologizing for anything. Apologetics means how to defend your Faith. And so I would convince I would inspire you, or encourage you to sign up for that. You can go to our website, El Paso and it's on the front page, and just click on that. There's a QR code, and you can go and register for that. We have 150 already registered, but first Baptist Church can fit about 500 you all could go if you wanted to listen, they're going to have it's going to be bilingual. We're going to have apologists from all over the country descending on El Paso to teach us how to defend our faith, how not to be afraid the next time somebody rings your doorbell or confronts you in Sam's parking lot, right? You get those two, you know, hey, we're having a Bible study. Oh, yeah, what church is it at? And then they tell you, Oh, well, it's

not a church, it's, it's, it's a cult,

it's a religion, right? We're doing other things,

but it's the same Jesus, the same Bible. That's the one we believe in. Listen, I've used these two verses several times on people that come to my door and I just say, I ask them, you take your Bible out and read me Galatians, one, eight and nine, I want to hear you read it out light Romans, 1017, says, Faith comes by hearing the Word of God. So we want the Holy Spirit to do its work, his work. And so they read those verses. And I say, Now, how did your leader receive the revelation? I'm talking about Mormon Joseph Smith, he received his revelation from an angel. Let me read that verse again, even if an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one that we preach to you. 16 years after Christ died, he wrote this letter to the church, and here we are, modern day 2024 and we still have people going, Well, I'm not sure. Joseph Smith, if you can go to their website, lds.org, Latter Day Saints, and if you're a Mormon, here, Listen, I'm not telling you anything you don't know. Joseph Smith was motivated or asked to marry several wives, 40, to be specific, their leader was married to 40 women. He received a revelation from an angel to present the book of Mormons that they don't have the original ones because they were banished. Poof, guess where Joseph Smith is right now

in the grave. He.

One day, he's going to stand before a holy God and give an account for all the millions he led astray. Listen, this is serious business. This is serious about who we think Jesus is. If we don't know, we need to know. If you don't know, I encourage you, I beg you, just like Paul would say, I want you to know as well.

Those two verses are key.

Listen first Peter 315 says this, but in your hearts, revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who ask you to give a reason for the hope that you have, but do this with gentleness and respect. Now it is not. Now is not the time to be lazy in our defense of the gospel. Now is the time to be the gospel. Let us not be easily distracted. Eternity lays in the balance. There's one other former group of people that I want to talk about in this group called none, N, O N, E, not, N, U N. Don't get me confused with that. But there's people here that believe in nothing. You know that that's the fastest growing group of people. They believe in nothing. They believe that when you die, nothing happens. In spite of all the people that have given their lives all over this world as a martyr for the gospel of Jesus, they believe that That's hogwash. That's bunk Listen, even believing in none takes faith, because God is all around us. We see people healed, we see people saved, we see people baptized. We see people give their life to ministry. We see people doing all kinds of amazing things. And you want to believe in nothing. You believe that we're all crazy. We're not. We are crazy for Jesus, right?

What do you truly believe today?

Who are you worshiping?

Who are you telling people about the word, the Jesus that you serve, that you say you serve, today, you can make sure that you know the true gospel and his true name in your life. Lastly, there's only one truth. I'm going to be real quick. This is verse 10. Verse 10. He says, Am I trying to win the approval of human beings? There's only one truth, or of God, or am I trying to please people? If I'm still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ. Preaching the gospel can be difficult, amen, it can be difficult. Most of the time. There's nobody to give you an accolade or a trophy or an award for being a Christian. Nobody's going to pat you on the back and say, good for you. Sometimes being a Christian is lonely, especially if you come from a family that may be part of these other groups, and you finally break out and go, Man, this is really what I believe. I believe this is the only truth. It can be a lonely place. You see, as believers, we don't get to do a lot of things that other people get to do. Sometimes we check our religion at the door, don't we, when we go to our family's house, we don't get to talk about the Jesus we believe in, because they have their religion and we have ours. But you know what I would tell you, continue to love them, continue to be who you are. Don't be afraid to afraid to pray, because when it all comes down to it, I always get to pray at my family reunions, because they know I'm a pastor, and they finally go, Well, we're just going to let Larry pray. And I always pray in Jesus name. Who do you pray in? In Jesus name? That's who we pray. That's how we pray. We don't get to watch some certain movies or listen to filthy music. Sometimes. We don't get to go to social events and parties that we would like to go to because we know they're not good for us. We don't get to go clubbing. You know, I got saved at 25 so I know what clubbing is. I was in the army for seven years. I know what we go through as people. Listen, if you're going to be truly a seeker of the gospel, then our service to God is more important than our service to man.

And it's hard.

It's hard we lose friends and family over our conviction for the for the Gospel we do because they think you've joined a cult. He's raising his hands. She's kneeling at the front. They're doing this.

I don't know what happened to them.

Did I raise them right? You know, all these questions go through our family and friends mind, and yet, here we are in this moment, saying, What do I truly believe? See, there's a whole army of believers out there that are for you. If you're here today and you haven't received Christ as your Lord and Savior, or may you believed in some other Jesus that you didn't know you believed in today, you get to decide who's your God, who's Your Jesus. There's all of us here that are believers, that are going to be cheering you on. There's an army of heavenly hosts that are watching and looking and being having a party when somebody comes to Christ. Listen, don't be afraid to make a public statement for Christ. You know, when Jesus went to the cross, He spread out his arms, and he died for you and for me in the presence of many. He did it publicly. He didn't go in some closet so nobody would know. And that's why we give opportunity to say, we invite you to come publicly and say, I want Jesus for myself. You see, you could be here as a young person, and your mom and dad are believers, but you're not. You cannot become a believer because your mom and dad are believers. You have to make a decision for yourself. You have to say, I want Jesus in my life. Listen, your mom and dad want you to do that. But so many times, our young people grow up and right underneath the umbrella of their mom and dad speaking about Christ, and they said they think that's enough. I never, they never taken a step of faith for Christ. You can do that today. Are there some of you here that your spouse is a believer and you're not, and you think that you're covered under the blood of their conviction? Listen, Jesus wants you and his army as well. You have to enlist yourself. You have to voluntarily come and say, I want Jesus to be the Lord of my life. Or you may be here today, and you've experienced this Christ that we talk about, and you have not given yourself fully to what we call a surrendered life. You, see, lot of us like to say, as long as I'm not going to hell, I'm good, right? I just want to go to heaven. So I'm going to confess Jesus as my Savior, but not my lord. Making Jesus your Lord, makes him in charge of your life. He can never be your savior without being your Lord. You must surrender fully to Christ. So if you're here today, we're going to sing a song of what we call an invitation, and I pray that the gospel message has been made clear to those of you that are here that don't have a relationship with Jesus. The relationship doesn't come through your family or through this church. It comes through Jesus and Jesus alone, he's the only one that can save you. I'm grateful for Life Church. I'm grateful for parents that are raising their kids in the right way, and for spouses that are trying to convince their spouse that they need a relationship with Christ. Hey, listen to me, spouse. If your your husband or wife is not saved, pray for them. That's the best thing you can do, and maybe this morning, that's what you need to do, is come forward and just pray. Amen. Pray. Say, Father, would you get a hold of my wife's heart, my husband's heart, my kid's heart, or kid? You could be young person. You could be the one none of your family is a believer, but you're the one that has come to faith in Christ, and you want your mom and dad desperately to have the same faith that you have to know that you're in contact with the true gospel of Jesus. Maybe you're the one who's going to grab your parent by the hand and say, I'll go with you. You see, public invitations are difficult. What are they going to say? Or think I'll tell you what we're going to say, or think we're going to be so excited for somebody coming to faith in Christ, and we're going to give him a standing ovation. We're going to clap for you. So it's something that will remember on September the eighth, 2024 that's the day I gave my life to Jesus for real. The other times I don't know what happened, you might have been playing around, but this is for real. So today, don't hesitate when we sing this song. If you want to come, you come and I'll pray a prayer with you all that will come. We'll pray a prayer of salvation. We'll pray a prayer of rededication. Maybe you're here and you say, I want to come back to Christ. I just want to get my life right. I know beyond the shadow of a doubt if Jesus were to come right now in this service, and I would go with him to be with him in eternity. But I got a lot of work to do in my own life to tell others about Christ. I got a lot of family members that need Jesus, and so maybe that's you today, and say, You know what? I want to reconnect with Christ. And say, I'm going to do it for real this time. I know that we don't have a pastor that's our full time pastor yet, but we're going to. Could you imagine your spiritual life being way up here? When the new pastor comes in, he said, Pastor, we've been waiting for you. I want to serve. What can I do? But it starts today. It starts by saying, I need more of Jesus. Or for you that haven't been saved, I need Jesus. And maybe you've never been baptized. You've seen people baptized, that's an act of obedience. I want to say this, and I know Brenda said this, baptism does not save you. Baptism is an outward expression of what Jesus has already done on the inside. It's important, but it doesn't save you. The thief on the cross told Jesus remember me. You. When you come into your kingdom, when you come into your and Jesus looked right at him and turned in and said, Listen, man, today you're going to be with a paradigm. He knew both of them were going to die. And he says today, that man never got baptized, that man never went to a discipleship class. He died that day and immediately was with Jesus. Listen, today is the day of salvation, is what the Word of God says. You can come to Christ today. So would you stand with me? I'm going to say a quick prayer, and I

just want you to listen with your heart,

Father, I pray this morning that everybody that within the sound of my voice would understand what it means to be a believer in Christ, and so Father, would you convict hearts all across this room this morning. Father, I know in a room this size, there are those that do not know you as their Lord and Savior, but I know that you want to know and father, I know it's a step of obedience. It's an act of humility, and so I pray that you would give them the strength this morning, God in Christ's name, I

pray Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much. Thank you all for being here. Thank you for being online. We are finishing up our series on First Corinthians, and it just so happens that some of Paul's exhortation, salutations, the way he wants to kind of end this letter is exactly how I'd love to to end and leave you guys this morning we're going to look at so if you have your Bibles, we're going to have most of it on the screen. But first, Corinthians, chapter 16, I want to remind us where we've been in 15 though. We just sang a beautiful song about how at the end, the dead in Christ will rise and that death will be no more, and the idea that death, in its literal sting will be taken away. We just read about that and encourage ourselves in that in the previous chapter last week. So I just want us to be reminded kind of where we're coming from exactly as we jump into chapter 16 here in the book of Corinthians. It begins in verse one. It says this right here. It says, Now regarding your question about the money being collected, remember, he's always addressing issues that he knows are something for the church at Corinth being collected for God's people in Jerusalem, you should follow the same procedure I gave to the churches in Galatia on the first day of the week, you should each put aside a portion of the money you have earned. Don't wait until I get there and then try to collect it all at once. When I come, I will write letters of recommendation for the messengers you choose to deliver your gift to Jerusalem, if it seems appropriate for me to go along, they can travel with me. First point, I wants to see this morning that it maybe isn't a new slash, maybe isn't new to you, if you've been around church or the things of God, and that is just that whole idea of setting aside a portion of your earnings for the church. And this is Paul's exhortation. This is exactly where he's going. And so why? Why do we go there? And I know many of y'all come from traditions where you and your family, y'all didn't grow up giving a regular portion of your actual salary to the church. And one of the things that we ask here is that we would covenant together, and many times, at least once a year, and when you go on to serving teams, we ask you to sign a covenant where you're moving towards the tithe or 10% of your income. And I know, again, that's not normal, or that's not easy, that's not something you had in your regular pattern growing up. So again, just like anything else that you're starting, whether it's a new diet or a new trend or a new way to better yourself, in the beginning, it is very hard, but then after you get used to it, then you recognize and that discipline becomes so much easier for you. And I would just say, please consider this right here. Life, church is not connected to any other, you know, church or denomination. We are a non denominational, autonomous church. Many of y'all, again, I know you have different backgrounds, where maybe you were part of a Catholic church and you dropped a few bucks in, you know, the passing of the plate. We stopped the passing of the plate during covid. And what we've sort of moved to is exactly what you see here, either digitally scanning the QR code or obviously dropping a check in the back. But what we understand God has for us is regular giving to where. If you know, okay, this is what I know my paycheck is during this season, first of the month, or middle of the month, or whatever. Or every week that you go ahead and you have that drafted so that you can be faithful to what God has for you. That's just, that's just really Christianity 101, that I know, again, is not a pattern or not something easy for a lot of us, but you can always tell where your heart is with your checkbook or what now we call our digital readout on our phones, so you and I, we know the verses For where your treasure is there, your heart will be also. But I just want to get real practical and real real with you here as we sort of transition here at Life Church. And that is that Life Church only exists if you decide you want it to exist if you want to keep going. So if you want to just take out all the spiritual aspects of what is going on here, and there's all kinds of spiritual things going on when you think about giving. Jesus had a lot to say about money, just on a real practical base level, if you want the church to give, you have to give. I mean, if you want the church to survive, you and I have to give to it. That everything has to be funded. What we care about has to be funded. And I just would say again, this is true about country clubs, if you're a member of it, or if you understand like private schools, or you understand that that organization, it only exists if people are committed to it and give a portion of their income to it. Otherwise it would cease to exist. And that's why I think even the word commitment and membership, and even, as I say, the word covenant together, these are all such foreign concepts that are not anywhere in our culture right now. Think about it, your grandparents generation, not so much your parents, but your grandparents generation and all that. Before that, there was company loyalty, there was commitment to a certain place.

And a certain organization or a place of employment, normally for a long time, and we know those days are gone, I'm not asking that they come back, but what ends up happening is that seeps into all kinds of things in our life. Right? Think about how finicky we are with relationships. Think about how quick we are to sort of move on in terms of jobs and communities. It's just out there. It's just a reality. But you have to ask yourself, then, how tethered Am I to the gospel? How tethered Am I to a church? So this isn't optional for Christians or believers, and I would just say that Life Church only exists if the people who attend here right now commit to give. I'm not going to ask for a show of hands, but every 18 months, the half the church is new again. I can ask for a show of hands. Say How many of y'all were not here 18 months ago, and I know half the hands would, would would go up, because that's just how it is here at Life Church. And so that's fine. That's That's great that we have a place of light here in the borderland and on the east side of El Paso, but just know that we're counting on as we all come and go, that while we're here, that we're committed to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, and we're committed to this church, this body, while we're here. And sometimes it's hard. He knows that. He's saying, don't wait until I get there, right and let's just ground together. See what we have in our pocket. What does he say here? He says, set aside a portion the first day of the week, which is what Sunday, so that, you know, man, I'm going to give before I because if I wait till I've already had what my my taco tote, and I've had all these other things, right, then I know that I'll just give kind of what I have left. He's saying, don't do that, because it won't be adequate. It won't be enough. And I thought about showing kind of where all the money goes. We have a lot of integrity here in terms of how we use our finances and, you know, our partnerships in the city and even around the world, but just know this is a biblical principle that I would encourage you on. To be honest with you, the majority, the vast majority, of regular lifers do not tithe. Okay, and that that has always been an issue in our church because it is so hard because so many of y'all did not come from homes in which that was practiced. And I just want to raise my hand. I didn't come from a home where it was practiced to where my parents tied or encouraged tithing at all. They were always like, Oh, I'm sure someone else has got it. I'm sure the rich people got it. I want you to look around. Ain't no rich people here. It's just normal people who love Jesus Christ, who decide to come together, to give what they have so that this place can function and be a light for the gospel here in the borderland on the east side. So do not neglect this principle for the testament of your own soul. It just, it just is so bad when you and I find ourselves because we're scared a lot of times, aren't we? I mean, it's not just this economy. It's always something there's always another bill, there's always another cause, there's always something else. And so we're scared to let go, but that's why it's called faith. Alright, set aside a portion of your earnings for the church. Let's keep going here. And this is an interesting section in the scriptures, because it you can tell it's very personal. I'm coming to visit you. This is Paul, after I've been to Macedonia, and I'm planning to travel through Macedonia, perhaps I'll stay with you for a while, possibly all winter, and then we can send me on my way to my next destination. This time, I don't want to just make a short visit and go right on. I want to come and stay a while, if the Lord will let me. So he's just, he's saying, This is my desire. This is what the Lord has for me. In the meantime, I'll be staying here at Ephesus. These are all little places you can see in the ancient biblical world. Ephesians, you probably know that until the festival of Pentecost, again, that's a regular festival that would have been practiced and you saw there in Acts chapter two. There's a wide open door for a great work here, although many oppose me when Timothy comes and you've heard that, that's another book, that's his protege, that's who Paul's mentoring. Don't intimidate him. He's doing the Lord's work just as I am. Don't let anyone treat him with contempt. Send him on his way with your blessing. When he returns to me, I expect him to come with the other believers. Now about our brother, Apollos. I urge him to visit you with the other believers, but he was not willing to go right now. He will see you later when he has the opportunity. Be on guard. Stand firm in the faith. Be courageous, be strong. So those are all like things that we would say militarily. I know many people are connected to some sort of government agency where we go to battle. We go to war. This is how they would have even talked in the ancient world. But here's something that Paul adds that's so gospel centered, and do everything with love. So we know that stephanias and his household were the first of the harvest of the believers in Greece, and they are spending their lives and serve it to God's people. I urge you, dear brothers and sisters, submit to them and others like them who serve with such devotion. I'm so glad that Sania and fortunes and archaicus have come here. They have been providing the help you weren't here to give me. They have been a wonderful encouragement to me. They've they and as they have been to you, you must show them your appreciation to all who serve so well. Second point, I just want.

For us to see, because then again, is do everything with love. And that's just a quote that I took straight from the scriptures. One of the things I want you to see in this letter, a lot of times we sort of skim over the personal aspects of letter, because we're like, I don't think I know these people, or I don't know these places. I'm not sure what he's talking about. I think again, understand that the letter was first written to the people of Corinth, but it is for us, right, the church, the Christian believers, and so there's some personal aspects that, even that is nice to see that Paul's not just doing this out of like duty, or doing this because he feels like he has to, or makes a little money, or whatever it is that you may think he's doing this out of an overflow of a heart that actually loves these people here at Corinth, and he writes them multiple letters, as we see, that's how we get Second Corinthians and other letters that we don't have. But he's saying above all these things, as you stand firm, as you do what God calls you to do. And I would say this as your pastor at Life Church on this last day, but do everything with love, whatever your hand finds to do. Do it with all your might, set your hand to the plow and do not look back. There'll be so many distractions. You know, one of the things you get to see is you get to see when you shepherd people that so many things happen that sort of choke out the word of God, or come and pluck it, or any of those kind of things, or, or just, or just all these things, where we we bury talent, or we struggle in faith. And he's just saying, Listen, do everything. Encourage those. Pull people up, call them back to Christ, all these things, but do it all with love. So whatever it is you find yourself to do individually and corporately in the next season here at Life Church, do everything with love. Last and final section I want to look at here is 19 to the end of the book. It says this, the churches here in the province in Asia send greetings to the Lord, as do Aquila and Priscilla and all the other who gather in their home for church meetings. All the brothers and sisters here sing greetings to you, greet each other with a sacred kiss, or sometimes you would see greet each other with a holy kiss. That's that's the same way that we do greetings. That's why, again, we came out of covid. I was like, hey, love each other, embrace one another. So so little that going on sit shoulder to shoulder or kneel shoulder to shoulder with people and go to the throne room of God together. This is, this is good. This is how God designed us to be is to have relationships in the flesh, just so that we can see and touch and know one another. Here is my greeting in my own handwriting, Paul. It's just this whole idea that he's writing large in some way to let him know this is me. I love you again. I know we got the texting and all these kind of things going on, but you and I, even as believers, we need to find ways to always have that sort of personal touch. If anyone does not love the Lord, that person is a curse, our Lord, come May the grace of the Lord Jesus be with you. My love to all of you in Christ, Jesus, this is Paul's sort of exhortation ending, and it would be very similar to me in my understanding as I come to a close. It's that whole idea of the same thing that was the benedictions, that was the giving of the Word of God to people from centuries, both Old and New Testament on. Throw up that final sort of bendiction and don't go anywhere. We got about 1015 minutes. We're going to introduce the the interim guy, as we do transitioning here. But this would be something I would think, in my own heart, if I was going to say anything to you, if I was going to leave you with anything, I can't do any better than the scriptures and what they say. And so this is my rendition with a couple different translations. Comes from numbers six verses, 24 to 26 you may have heard some version of this as ministers or people who are up on this stage say something close to this when you leave or when you depart, may the Lord bless you and keep you, may he have his face to shine upon you, be gracious to you and give you peace. That is my hope, that is my prayer and really my blessing for you. And you know to know too that we're all connected with the Lord, and that the Lord will be faithful to both of us wherever we're at, to sort allow us to engage in Him and to figure out exactly what God has for us in the next chapter, in the next season. I told you this was a time of transition. I knew it short lesson because I wanted to leave opportunity for you to get to know a guy named Larry Floyd. So Larry, I'd ask you just come on up real quick and yeah, give him a give him a good life. Church. Welcome, man.

It looks like you've been working out. Man, I know. Well, we gotta get up his stools. I I didn't want the people to not be able to see you. Come on, let's, let's take a minute, and I want, I want them to be introduced to you, and because you're going to be their pastor for the next couple months. And so just start out with, man, tell us about yourself. Where are you? Where are you from? And who are you? Well, I was born in Iowa, home of Caitlin Clark, you know,

man, is she popular? Or what? No, I got here. I came to El Paso when I was nine years old. Uh, my dad worked for the railroad, so we moved here in 19, whatever, you know, a few years ago.

And we moved to a house with my uncle, and then we moved we bought a house in the Northeast.

Logan heights. So I went to urban high school.

I'm sorry. I know we're on the east side. Let me tell you,

Joe battle, the loop was not here when I grew up. It just, you know, my sister, in 1984 bought a house off of George Dieter, and we asked her why she didn't ever want to see us, because it was way out there when she got married, you know, George Dieter. We were like, where is that? Yeah, and so I understand the east side is, is the up and coming place? I still live in the Northeast. I was in the military for seven and a half years. Go Army, right? Any milk, alright?

And I'm just like, like, Brent was just telling us, you know, growing up in a religious home does not necessarily mean you have a relationship with Jesus, because I did go to church, I did do certain things. We were given $1 to throw in the plate.

But it wasn't until my venture through the military, I went to Alaska and Indiana, and it was in Indiana when we were there, where the the Lord first really came to our door and and we understood what it meant to have a relationship with Jesus, how to how to give yourself and your heart and your soul and your life, your spirit, to Jesus and have a connection with him. So I got saved in 1990 I was 25 years old. And what does save mean? Larry, I actually made a commitment. I confessed with my mouth that I believe that Jesus Christ is who he says he is, and he actually went to a cross, that He actually bled and shed his blood for us, and that we are actually forgiven of every sin that we've ever committed, the sins that we're currently committing and the sins that we'll commit in the future, because we are not a sinless people. We are a sinful people with forgiveness, and that's salvation to me. Now I didn't get baptized till about seven or eight months after I was saved, because having been baptized as a baby, I thought I had that part covered. I wanted to know from the Scripture text, why would I get baptized? So I was baptized about seven or eight years or months after I was saved, because I finally I went to a class and I understood what it means to be totally immersed. Because the you guys have seen baptisms here it represents the grave. You die to the old self, and you're raised to live a new life. And that's what we say, buried with Christ in death, raised and to live a new life. I had got out of the military. By the end, I was working for the government. We moved to Fort Hood, Texas. I wasn't even in the military. Worked for the government, Uncle Sam for eight years. But it was during that time that God really worked on my life and made me a disciple. I got ordained as a deacon. The guy asked me, Hey, have you ever thought about becoming a deacon here? And I literally got up and looked, and I was looking for who he was talking to. Yeah, I thought of some old geezer that there was going to be a deacon there. You know, I was a young guy in my 30 or, you know, late 20s, early 30s, and I thought, why would I want to be a deacon? That's for those old guys.

I accepted a call to do that. And during that time is when God started working on my heart about ministry. So in 1998 we packed up everything, sold our house, and we moved to Fort Worth, and we went to seminary because I had no Bible background. It was like I had to go and be taught by by some professors, people that had some time in their feet in the actual ministry, because I wanted to know, how do I do this? How do I operate this? My pastor was great. He met with me for months. He let me preach. I preached at a Korean church my first service. Oh, wow.

There were people spoke English. It wasn't English, but they had a Korean service and an English service for those that were from there, that were connected. I get there, they don't have a worship leader, brother from Phoenix. Thanks for coming here. And I'm like, they're like, Hey, we're ready to start. And I go, Yeah, me too, let's go, yeah. And they said, No, you're leading us in the music too. Yeah. I said, well, and if Brent was my pastor, I will thank Pastor. Brent. Yeah, I didn't even know that, yeah. Like, I'm not a music guy. That's for those guys to do, but they have this little box that you type in a hymn, and it would play the music electronically. This is before YouTube, man, you know, and karaoke and stuff. And so they did that. And so I led the music time, and that was my first experience in preaching the gospel to a group of people. And from there, God has just been amazing. I was gone from El Paso for 34 years. My wife and I have been married for 41 years. That tells you how young we are. We have a 40 year old. We

have a 40 year old that was born at William Beaumont Army Medical Center when we were stationed here at Fort Bliss, we went to Alaska and Indiana and came back in 2019, the Lord called me to be the executive director for the El Paso Baptist Association. And I know, as Brent was, was talking about non denominational he said, We don't have any connection. You're your own church. So is every Baptist Church. They're autonomous. They get to do whatever they want. They get to call whatever pastor they want. They get to give to who they want. But.

We work together for the body of Christ life. Church is actually part of our association. So we're able to start new churches, have events, Pastor luncheons, we do all of these things to connect to pastors and churches to say, hey, we're in war together. We're all together doing God's Kingdom work here in El Paso, in our community. So Brett and I actually got here about the same time. In 2019 I was just more familiar with El Paso than he was, you know, but that's my story. Yeah, no, I appreciate that so much. So the other thing I was going to ask you is just a little bit of follow up. You're talking about ministry and all that. So then I know you were in a, you were pastor of a, of a borderland church in Del Rio, right for a little while before here,

talk a little bit about just your your hope for El El Paso and for this season. I mean, you'll be here at least two or three months and and so just talk about, because we, we're moving forward. I mean, you saw that we had, you know, 10 plus people baptized a week or two ago. Oh, I know places full people. These people love Jesus, and they're ready to ready to move forward, even though I'm not going to be here and they don't have a pastor. So help us understand how you're going to help us do that.

This actually will be my fourth interim pastorate since I've been here in El Paso in five years. And what that means is an interim pastor comes in and just kind of fills that gap. So you don't have to have a guy come in every Sunday and have different there's some consistency there. And being from El Paso, we understand the culture. My wife is was actually born in Juarez, and we met

when we were in high school, so we're high school sweethearts,

and so we understand the culture. We've always come back to El Paso. Our families are from here to visit, to do mission projects, to help encourage this community to say, Jesus can be Lord of El Paso if we want him to be. That's right. I mean, he really can be. And that's my hope, is that in the you know, I don't know how Lucy asked me this morning how anything will be here. I said, who knows, but maybe to the end of the year. I don't know, whatever it takes, but I want to be here and be consistent.

I'm going to preach the gospel. You can bring your friends knowing that they're going to hear a gospel message just exactly like Brent did every Sunday, and have an opportunity to ask Jesus to be the Lord of their life. That's right, I will always be a person that preaches the gospel

unashamed, I go verse by verse, just like he did. Imma I do. I'm going to start with the book of Galatians next week. So my hope is that each week you're faithful in receiving the word, that you're faithful in understanding who you are in Christ, because you're going to hear the the truth about the gospel, just like you have heard for the last five years that Pastor Brent's been here, yeah, and so my hope is just to continue that legacy, and so that we don't skip a beat. Now is not the time to quit. Yeah, all these all y'all volunteers and everybody that's working continue to serve the Lord, because you're not serving the pastor, you're helping the pastor, but actually you're serving the Lord Jesus Christ, and that's what we come to church for. You see, anything can happen to your pastor. I understand that he's leaving on his own will. God is asking him to step down, and you know he's released him from here. But you never know in the world that we live in,

people don't like Christians. You never know what's going to happen with those doors on Sunday morning. You just don't know it happens all the time. So you can lose your pastor the next day. So if you're coming to church because of a person, don't, yeah, come to the church because you want to serve and you want to worship the King of kings, through music, through prayer, through baptism, through communion, through the word of God, take the past. Yes, you need a shepherd. Tony Evans, one of my favorite pastors, said this, you never listen Tony Evans. Listen to him online. He said this. He said, hey, if the church knew where to go, they wouldn't need a pastor.

I'm not saying that the flock doesn't need a shepherd. We do, but what I am saying is is our our everybody's pastor is Jesus. So I was in Del Rio for six years. We started a church called City Church Del Rio, and

we didn't really we thought we were actually glad that we went to Del Rio before we came to El Paso. I'd always wanted to come back to El Paso as a new person, as a safe person, as a minister, because I believe that these are my people. This is my community. And I want to do something. I want to make a difference. And so we went to Del Rio for six years. And I'm actually glad that we did. Del Rio's a lot smaller community. I don't think I was ready for the big community that El Paso is. And so God prepared me with border ministry to come here. We started the Valverde border humanitarian Coalition. We started a new church. We were community players. I was a DJ on the radio there. Did you know that? No, I did not.

You're a man of many talents, or what is it? What is it? Yeah, I know a lot of things, but I'm not a master of anything. Yeah, we just know a lot a little bit of that, yeah? But.

But we really got involved in the community there, and we and that's the way I'm trying to do here in El Paso. We started the El Paso migrant Center.

We are partners with other community ministries. We just moved to the northeast. Our campus is on the northeast. We don't actually even have a church. We have a sanctuary, but we want to put a church plant in there so we can actually the first place to find for a church plant is always the most difficult, so we want to start them there for three years, and then we give them the boot, kick em out. Hopefully they save their money and they can afford their own place and start a new one, and continue that replication. I pray one day Life Church becomes a church that plants their own churches as well, because you're way out here, and there's a lot more to El Paso than just right here. You could start planting life churches all across this this city like Del Sol. Del Sol has four campuses. Other churches have other campuses, not because they want to hog all that. No. Do you know how many people are lost in El Paso that don't know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior? The North American Mission Board, or IMB, did a, I think it's North American Mission Board, did a survey on how many churches are needed in El Paso in the next 20 years, 250 churches. Yeah, that's, that's 100 churches a year. Or, I'm sorry, 10 churches a year. That's a lot of churches. When you think about it, to to plant 10 new churches every year, we need everybody in the body of Christ, and that's what I I'm coming here to hopefully inform you about what's going on in our community and how Life Church can be part of that that's so good. So thank you so much. Just one little thing, I want to just let you know, just so you understand kind of how things will work. We are, we are governed by a board. We have a board of directors, and so they'll help, also, not just kind of help with Larry, but also what they do is they help with the next pastor search. And so that's that's through a company called slingshot. And we'll put all this online, hopefully this week or the next week, so that that's clear, or if you want to go back and and reference it. But thank you, thank you for being here. I don't know, should I pray for you? Should you pray for me? Or should we pray for each other? Pray for each other. Yes, alright, let me pray for you, and then you pray for me. Alright, father. I just thank you so much for my brother, Larry. I thank you for his willingness to come to El Paso and come to life church and help us during this interim transition time. I just pray that Life Church receive him and the bless him and embrace him. And I just thank you again for his willingness to do whatever you calling to do and thank you for him in Christ's name and father, I just pray for my brother, Brent. I know that you have great plans for him, and he may not know everything that you have in store, but I know that you already have that path carved out for him, Lord, guide his direction, guide his heart, guide his family. And I pray for just a double portion of your Holy Spirit to anoint him and whatever calling that you have for where, when he leaves his place, and I know that as he leaves here, he carries a piece of El Paso, and he leaves a piece of himself here with this congregation, Lord, I thank you for the amazing things that has happened here at Life Church. I thank you for his leadership, his guidance. And I know there was a lot of work to be done here, and I'm grateful that you brought him here for such a time as this. So I just pray as he leaves this place that will remember him in our hearts and minds and souls. I know I will, Lord, and I know this church will in Christ's name, I pray, amen. Thank you so much.

Okay, we're so grateful that you prayed for our pastor, but now as a church, we want to pray for him, and I'd like to preface this prayer with one thing. I started out my journey with the Lord when I was 16, and I have never had as good a pastor as I've had this past five years. You

father, we are so very grateful for having you, having sent Pastor Brent to us, God, God, he has shown us a deeper walk with you, shown us how to have an outreach in our community. God, he has just taken this church to a new level. And we thank you for that. We thank you for his life and for his family, God. And we just want to send him away with a blessing. God with your blessing. We know that your favor rests upon him, Father, God, and God, as he starts a new journey, we just ask that You, Holy Spirit, will continue to keep him close to your heart, that he will walk out the plan that you have for him in this next portion of his life. God, close to you and be used of you. God, you will see the people that you have given to him in this new place that he can minister to, that he can be light to God. And so we just thank you for that, and we ask that you would be with Courtney and each of the children. God, we thank you for their lives, and we just ask for your favor to rest upon them, Father, God, that they will continue to grow in you and that where they're planted, that they will shine for you and be an example. Father, their journey is just beginning a new season.

Father, as we begin this new season, God, we are trusting you for great things here in this church. God, we're trusting you that as a family, we are going to grow and we are going to pick up the mantle he has left us with, and we're going to see great and mighty things from you. And we ask you for that, for Pastor Brandon, his family, God, that they will see great and mighty things and will be used of you and know that they are in the very center of your will. And we thank you for all of this. We ask it in the name of Jesus, and we ask it for one purpose, Lord, not only for our good, not only for their good, but God for your glory, that we will be those who glorify you, and that we will be those who will meet you again one day to be with you for all eternity. We thank you for this in Jesus name amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

I do hope and trust you've enjoyed this series on First Corinthians. We'll finish up next week with chapter 16, but first Corinthians 15 is a long, long chapter. It's actually the only chapter that I'll teach or preach from here where I won't read the entire chapter, and it's not because I'm ashamed of certain things. Sometimes preachers do that. They'll skip over certain parts because they're either ashamed of the text or they're not quite sure how to preach it or teach it. That's not the case. It is just so long. It is just so many verses that if I was to read the thing in the entirety, it would take up half of our time together. So I'm going to hit the highlights. I think we're going to hit all the subject matter that we would need to know about in order to understand first, Corinthians, 15 and what God has for us. It is a clear reminder, and even talking about the resurrection in the Gospel. And so I'm excited about this message. Let's start in verse one. This is Paul talking, and most of the time he has addressed certain issues. And now he's going to say, I want to give you the foundation. Let me remind you, dear brothers and sisters. And brothers and sisters is a familial term of the idea that we are brothers and sisters in the Lord. What does he want to remind us of the good news? Right? And we understand that we come to church for good news, the gospel. That is that same word throughout the New Testament I preached to you before you welcomed it then, and you still stand firm in it. So again, it's just that whole idea of that is our foundation, the Gospel. It is this good news that saves you. If you continue to believe the message I told you, unless, of course, you believe something that was never true in the first place, then he's going to really tell us, sort of the elements of the gospel in terms of a fact, since I passed on to you what was most important and what has also been passed on to me, Christ died for our sins, just as the scripture said. He was buried. He was raised from the dead on the third day, just as the scripture said, and he was seen by Peter and then by the 12. After that, he was seen by more than 500 of his followers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have died. Then he was seen by James and later by all the apostles, last of all, as though I had been born at the wrong time. I also saw him, for I am the least of all the apostles. In fact, I'm not even worthy to be called an apostle after the way I persecuted God's church. So a couple things I want to remind us of as we're reading this passage again. This is sort of the elements going all the way back historically. What are the elements of the gospel? These, these things are it right here? But one of the things you need to understand about the way Paul speaking is he's saying, Listen, I'm an apostle. If you remember about the New Testament, Jesus walked around with 12 followers whom He called disciples, and when he left to ascend into heaven, he really commissioned them as apostles. And then Paul saying, I was an apostle in undue time. What he means by that is I wasn't part of the original 12. I was on the road to Damascus, and I was persecuting the church, and that's when I saw the resurrected Lord. One of the passages we use to understand that an apostle is one who is an eyewitness to a resurrected Lord is a passage like this. Remember how I talk to you about how apostleship, as an office, the gift of apostle is really limited to those who were eyewitnesses to the resurrection. Alright, so what are these four elements? I want to go ahead and put those up there. I sort of try to number those off as we were going through them. And again, I know you probably know this. If you've been a part of a church, you say, Man, this is, this is what I understand. Well, good. This is the good news. This is the gospel. If you go to any church beyond ours, hopefully they are emphasizing these elements of who God is and who Christ is. It's that whole idea that he was crucified, our Lord and Savior was crucified, that he really was buried three days later. He really did come back in what's called the resurrection, and then he was seen by numerous people. That's why, again, people who are Christians are not people who are duped into believing something that is not reasonable or is not scientifically true. 2 billion people on the planet adhere to Christianity at some form, and they all hinge on this idea of the resurrection. So you have the the straight up facts that he died for our sins, and also that he rose again according to Scriptures. And we have the proof in the numerous witnesses. And again, Corinthians would have been written pretty early on, uh, 33 ad, or thereabouts, is when Jesus, of course, would have left us here on Earth. And these letters are written anywhere between 45 and 60 ad, that's why he can say with confidence. Listen, many of these witnesses, up to 500 are still around. So it's just so we can kind of remember this. I want to give a couple of pictures just to sort of so we could get in our memory a couple of things. First one is we understand bad news. You remember the news boys?

That was sort of the idea of the The Paperboy on the corner of the city streets, sort of having the news for the day. And so this was back when World War Two broke out. And what this is bad news, war is declared, and I understand that we needed to maybe get into it because it was a righteous cause. But at the end of the day, let's just be honest, wars bad, even if it's necessary at times. And so this was bad news. We also have, this is kind of a funny little picture, fake news. I'm not sure why he's so happy about it, right? But, but fake news. And then finally, we have good news, right? So this is a a picture of a of a newspaper that shows that the war is over,

and you can see, peace, it's over. This is the good news. And again, this is where we knew we were heading, all the way back to the Christmas story with with Mary being told who would come and his name would be Emmanuel, all the way to the Easter story, which is really the Gospel itself, the evangelical message. This is true, and this is good news. And if these things are true, and if the things define ultimate reality and daily reality, because a lot of times we think about heaven and Christianity as some sort of understanding of knowing where we're going when we die, that's part of it, but it begins now, and that's the gospel. So if these things are true, they define ultimate reality now and the future, and that changes everything about our lives, and so therefore we're called to walk in that. And I know you probably know that as Christians and as believers, alright, so skip a couple of verses and we'll pick it up in verse 12 of the same chapter. Again, I told you, it was a long chapter, hopefully I sort of touch on whatever thoughts or or problems or questions you might have, but tell me this, since we preach that Christ rose from the dead, which is what we've been talking about, the resurrection, why are some of you saying there will be no resurrection of the dead? For if there's no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised either. And if Christ has not been raised, then all our preaching is useless, and your faith is useless, and we as apostles would all be lying about God, for we have said that God raised Christ from the grave, but that can't be true. If there's no resurrection of the dead, if there's no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then your faith is useless and you're still guilty of your sins. In that case, all who have died believing in Christ are lost. And if we hope in Christ is only for this life, we are more to be pity than anyone in the world. But in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead. He is the first of a great harvest of all who have died. So you see, just as death came into the world through a man, now the resurrection from the dead has begun through another man, just as everyone dies, because we all belong to Adam, everyone who belongs to Christ will be given new life. But there is an order to this resurrection. Christ was raised as the first of the harvest. Then all who belong to Christ will be raised when he comes back, and after that, the end will come when he turns the kingdom over to God, the Father, having destroyed every ruler and authority and power for Christ must reign until he humbles all his enemies beneath his feet, and the last enemy to be destroyed is death. Alright, a lot there. So I want to kind of take it slow and maybe help us understand exactly what is going on here. I think first and foremost, let's just be honest that if the resurrection isn't true, then Christianity isn't true. That Jesus wasn't who he said he was. He isn't really the Son of God, and you and I are still stuck in our sin. That's why, when we are doing things like communion, the reason why we do communion regularly, and the reason why we do baptism regularly, is that we're proclaiming the death, burial and resurrection of our Lord and Savior until he comes again. So we see a picture of that, that we are actually dying to self and raised to walk in newness of life. And so if this is true, if the resurrection is true, that changes everything. If it's not true, we can see a lot of things that that bring about great hopelessness. Now, second point I want us to see is resurrection means hope. Resurrection means hope. Now, I wanted to find the word hope because, you know, Jesse and kidding us about the Cowboys, was talking about the fact that I hope the Cowboys win. We all do that. But I just want to, I just want to recognize that there's more than Cowboys fans in the room. There's a couple 40 Niners fans, and there's a couple of Eagles fans, okay, and so, yeah, okay. So there we have diversity here. Okay, so we're an equal opportunity offender here at Life Church. So, but one of the things I would just say is we all do this on Sunday, or whenever we watch our teams, we say, I hope that they win. And what we mean by that is that we, we would like for them to win. We really, we really want it to happen. That's not biblically the way the word hope is used. Hope is a foregone conclusion that we know is going to happen, and we're waiting for the day for that to come true. That's what we're mean by resurrection. Means hope. We know it's going to happen. They say, Well, how do.

Know what's going to happen, Pastor, because Jesus himself raised from the dead. And then also something else is going on here. Theologically. Did you see this? They reference Adam, and they say we're all of the seed of Adam. And some of y'all are sitting there thinking, I don't know. How does that work? Well, you understand that Adam and Eve were the first humans on Earth, and so biblically, we all come through the seed of Adam, and Adam and Eve messed up, and we all know that we're going to die. And so now he's saying, but if you're in Christ, then you have hope of the resurrection, because if you die in Christ, then resurrection is real, and it means hope. If it's false, then we have all kinds of concerns. He says this here, I want to read, I want to give you the list if, if it's false, if the resurrection didn't occur, then our message is empty, our faith is in vain. Then we're all just liars. We're all lost in our sin, and the dead are lost, and we are to be pitied more than anyone else. He'll go on later and say that if the resurrection isn't true, then we should all just eat, drink and be merry til we die, because, because it doesn't matter what happens in this life or in the next life, either we're just all just sort of floating beings in the universe. But if the resurrection is true, and if Jesus really came, and he really showed us the way back to our Father, and it was to have faith in Him, then that changes everything. And resurrection means hope. I want you to see this in this life and in the life to come. I told you a lot of times, Christianity is simply just alright. I went to some sort of church, and I know now where I go when I die, because I made some sort of commitment, or some sort of pastor or a priest told me something or baptized me in some way. No, that's not the point. That is ultimately reality. Yes, we want to go to heaven when we die, but resurrection and hope begins now. So it just really brings up the most basic question, do you and I, as we sit here in this room, do we actually believe that people can change? I know this is thrown out in all kinds of classes, sociological classes, philosophical classes, obviously theological classes.

Can any of us really change? Can we go from darkness to light? Do you believe that? Do you believe that about yourself? I know many of y'all have experienced it as I have. Now I want to be honest, some things aren't meant to change. I don't know if you've ever been in one of those meetings, whether it's with a loved one, a spouse, or maybe at work, and they're trying to, like, make a round thing go into a square hole right, or reverse a square thing going around hole. It doesn't matter. It's like, Man, this just isn't working. This just isn't me. I'm not good at numbers or in front of a group or whatever it is that you're being asked to do that really goes against everything in your story, your background, how God wired you and how experience wires you. Some of those things I don't think are meant to be changed. Some of those things are meant to be seen in their redemptive light. So you have to ask yourself, are there things about my personality and story and upbringing that really God is never going to call me to change. I may always be a strong willed person, but I but you have to ask yourself, am I using how God wired me for His glory, or am I just all about self? That is a good question to ask, and you can change how you are utilizing your gifts for God's glory instead of for your own glory, but we understand that we can change when it comes to morally what God is calling us to do, because Christ is working in us for His will and for His good purpose. So here's the deal. Oftentimes we we meet the moral law and all we feel is like death. It's like a dagger to us, like, oh, I failed again. Okay, the 10 Commandments, okay, I messed up there. Or my teacher had me do all these assignments I messed up there. Or at work, they had me do 15 things, and I could only get to 10 em by the end of the day. Or at my home, I can't get my kids to all these different functions, or I can't afford to pay for these extracurricular activities, like our neighbor, or I had 15 things to do that. I didn't even cook a good meal. I just gave him ketchup and packs and Okay, well, just slow down. Alright,

there's grace for all of that. The goal is not to be sinless. Sometimes we think that with Christians, right? Okay, I'm going to go to church, I'm going to clean up, I'm going to get my life right, and I'm going to be, I'm going to be one of those good people. I'm going to be, you wouldn't really say this, but you're sort of thinking like I'm going to I'm going to figure out a way to get over this hump of all the bad stuff that I do. So I don't do this bad stuff anymore. I don't think these bad thoughts anymore, and I'm just here to tell you that won't happen this side of heaven. The goal is not to be sinless, because only one was sinless, that's Jesus Christ himself. But the goal is to sin less. You see what I did there, if you want to know if you're being the next word we're going to see is transformed more into His likeness day to day, ask yourself, not, am I all of a sudden sinless? Because that's not going to happen. But am I fighting sin? Am I really? Am I really?

Really getting over some things. Are there mile markers in in my life that I can point back to in months and years ago, I was a part of this, and I'm no longer doing that. I was sinning in this way. I'm no longer sinning in that way, in the same way anymore, that because, why? Because God's working in me. He's got me. He's doing good work in me. And so I'm not sinless, but by gosh and by God's grace, I am sinning less. Resurrection means change is possible. Please. Do we believe that this morning, cuz so many people in your life and in my life and my workforce and your workforce and home and school, they're like, Oh, you're always going to be that guy or gal who just struggles with this, or can't do this right? Or he's like, no, no, no, no, God's wired me and made me and so what would he have for me, and how can I do this world, this life, in such a way that brings honor and glory to Him? Resurrection means change is possible, not only in this life, but in the life to come. So I do want to really mention because resurrection at its core means that something is coming back to life. I got another picture I want to throw up here. This is Concordia, seminary. Cemetery, not seminary. Sorry, cemetery.

So sorry. I went to seminary. And they used to seminary, and they used to always say that's where preachers go to die. It was always really hard. And it's like, oh my gosh. And so no, this is right here. This is our local cemetery. It's our old cemetery. Got a lot of gunslingers in there. I'm sure if there were stories to tell. And from what I understand, there are some some people who do like little tours of the of the of the graveyard at night and try to scare you or whatever. But you have to ask ourselves, why is it Historically and traditionally we have put people in the ground? Do you know? Why? Do you know why, as Christians, we do this, we do this in hope you understand this, right? The reason why we bury people Six Feet Under is not just for tradition. The reason why I put headstones, and a lot of times, if we have the money, we'll go ahead and put a put a whole slab to show their whole body. Is why? Because we're saying we believe the grave is not the end for this person, that they're going to be raised in judgment or raised to life. And so resurrection is the hope. That's why, when you and I go to cemeteries, the reason why we'd even go back to a cemetery and visit our loved ones is because, why we actually believe? Because it's true that we will see them again, that this isn't the end. And I'm remembering whatever good memories we may have had with them here on Earth, but we know, my gosh, that they will be raised from the dead. He's like, Well, how do you know that? Why do you believe that? Because Christ Himself was and he was the first fruits. And it says this here, and it gives us whole illustration. I'm not going to go into it about how things grow, and how we put a seed in the ground, and at some level, that seed dies, and that creates a germination for a plant, and then it's able to provide whatever fruit or shade is there in that plant, in the same way Christ Himself had to go first, and that we have to die in order to be raised. That's why Christianity, we believe in resurrection, because we believe it's worth it to come to a community to say that old man, that old woman, we want that person to die so that when I'm raised, when I am come out of the waters of baptism, that I'm ready to walk a new life. We are hope as Christians and as believers. Is in the resurrection. If this is not true, right? We're to be pitied. We're a bunch of liars. We might as well just kind of let it all hang out and do whatever we want, because there's no real hope in this life or in the life to come, which is obviously not what we hold to. Third and final thing I want us to look at is transformation. We're going to skip a lot of verses, but it really is a more fuller understanding of the resurrection. And it says this beginning in verse 41 let me reveal to you a wonderful secret. We will not all die. You say, Wait a second. No, no, no, I've been to the hospital. I've been there with grandma or grandpa, my aunts or uncle, or even maybe my child, they really died. We will not all die, but we will all be transformed. It will happen in a moment, in the blink of an eye, when the last trumpet is blown, for when those trumpet sounds. Those who have died will be raised to life forever, and we who are living well will be transformed. For our dying bodies must be transformed into bodies that will never die. Our mortal bodies must be transformed into immortal bodies. Then when our dying bodies have been transformed our bodies that will never die, the Scripture will be fulfilled. Death is swallowed up in victory. Oh death. Where is your victory? Oh death. Where is your sting for sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power. Remember how I told you that the law gives sins its power, because what will happen is you and I will hear law, and we'll just hear judgment, or you're not good enough, or you don't measure up, and so it kind of gives it power, but thanks be to God. Grace does what Thank.

God, He gives us victory over sin and death through who not our own power, not our own willpower, but through our Lord, Jesus Christ. So my dear brothers and sisters, be strong and immovable, always work enthusiastically for the Lord. For you know that nothing you do for the Lord is Ever useless. Boy. That's such good news. He tells Jesus he wants to reveal this, this, this wonderful secret, which really just means a mystery that he's now sort of beholding. He uses this phrase elsewhere in Ephesians. He's saying, You won't die. And again, you think, man, no, no, no. Like pastor, what do you what are you thinking? We people die? Yes, but if you've ever been there, and I know many of y'all have, and some of y'all haven't, we've ever been there at the end, when a believer goes, it is a much different experience than if you've been there at the end, when someone who is uncertain about their future goes. And what it's saying here is that in the cosmic realm, Jesus Himself, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to God, our Father, they will come and when death comes to provide its final sting of death that is snatched away and your loved one, my loved one, is now caught up into heaven to be with Christ forever. He said, How do you know that? And how would you believe that? Why do you believe that? Because Christ Himself was the first fruits of that. And so when the trumpet sounds, we will see the graves open up. And I know some people have been cremated in the ashes scattered. I mean, that'll all work itself out, but we know that the picture of going into the grave and coming up out of the grave is biblically what's going on here, this idea that when the trumpet sounds, those who have died in Christ will come back and we will be transformed, transformation. And so then what happens is, is that, yes, we may get through a lot of pain in this world, as we as we take our dying breaths, and you and I have been there in the hospital with the tubes surrounding our loved ones, and we've watched them kind of fight and fight and fight until they until they give up their spirit, right? We've, we've, we've either been there or we've seen it, or we understand it. And so what it's saying here is that biblically, the hope is that man death doesn't come in and give them a second death that they are now caught up with Christ. Why? Because death lost its power because of the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. That's why we can be strong and immovable. It's not because we've sort of gritted ourselves by you know, you understand what it is to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and sort of grit yourself through a certain season in life. Maybe you've done that in a marriage or in a schooling or in a workforce, but But you also know what it means to be able to rest in confidence because someone else has got you, and that's what's going on here in the scriptures. It says the reason why, dear brothers and sisters. Verse 58 we can be strong and immovable. And the reason why we're able to work enthusiastically for the Lord and come and worship and give of our time and money is that we know that nothing that we do for the Lord is Ever useless. Third and final point I wants to see this morning is transformation is real. Boy, it's so real. And just like resurrection, power, transformation, power and the reality of what it can do. It is for the now and the hereafter. I love that because it gets to the heart of our desire

to be transformed, to change. So we're going to see the three sort of overarching points from this scripture this morning. Number one, gospel is real. Number two, resurrection is real. If it happened for Christ, it's going to happen for us. And number three, what transformation is real?

We all want to be transformed at some way into a watching world, right? Even if it's just in minor ways. All of y'all, you got up this morning, you try to put your best foot forward, you know. And you got yourself dressed, you maybe took a shower if you're lady, you put on makeup, you did your hair. Why? Because you want to transform yourself in the best sense of the word to be what to prepare yourself to engage a watching world. I think there's something healthy and normal about that.

But I want to see too, like what you may also think of transformer this again. You know, when I was a kid, you know, this was a big deal, and of course, it's made its rounds and several movies, and they get worse as they go. I just want you to know that, so just watch the first one or so, and then they get worse as they go. But

if you go back and think about this, and again, I don't know what it is for little girls, whether it's, you know, with with makeup and dress ups, with with with dolls and all those kind of things. But for a guy, when we were running with our transformers, and we had them in our hands, and we were running in the in the field or in the playground, we really thought, somehow I'm going to transform, right? I mean, that's how we sort of thought, and we did this a number of different ways, even if we didn't do this with transformers. We did this with like cowboys and Indians or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Jedi characters or whatever it was. Why? Because we had that sort of childhood, sort of imagination that maybe somehow I can transform to jump high enough or be.

Strong enough to defeat, you know, whatever enemies I have before me, I think it gets to the heart of identity questions we struggle with today. I mean, one of the things that's so true about the Bible is is that it really does address all that we need to be addressed for a life of godliness. I mean, think about just some different trans arguments that we're seeing in our culture today, and they're not new. The Bible speaks to identity issues. We have a new identity in Christ, and therefore are being transformed. And if people don't know about the gospel, or they're not thinking rightly about who God is and what Christ has done for them, and that can include us as well, then we'll think we'll have to somehow change our own identity. And Christ is saying, I know what you're going for there. You're going for this idea that something's not right in you and something's not working out right, and you're trying to find your identity. But if you only look to self, or you only look for the world, you will find that that will lead to a dead end street. And so that's why we have the gospel power to say, Okay, what do we as Christians have to offer a world that's confused, even in issues such as well, but I have this desire to be transformed, and we can actually come in and say, good, good. But, but you don't have to do all this other stuff you can let Christ Himself transform you into the image of His Son. Where do I get this from Romans 12, one and two says And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies right? All these arguments really come down to who has control over our bodies. I plead with you to give your bodies to God, because of all he has done for you, let them be a living and holy sacrifice, the kind he will find acceptable. This is the true way to worship him. Don't copy the behaviors and customs of this world. See how relevant the Bible is. Romans, 12, one and two. But let God What if you know this verse? But let God transform you. Let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think, then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Boy, we're all sitting here asking God, what do you have for me? What do you have for me today? What do you have for me this week? Maybe some of y'all are thinking a little further ahead, months and years to come, and I'm here to tell you, here's what He has for you, he has for you and me to be transformed more and more into the image of His Son every day.

See the resurrected life, the transformation life, the Gospel, life, it doesn't begin at some distant part of the future. I just want you to hear me say this. It begins now. And so that's when we have a moment here to pray, and we have a moment here of a song of response, and the kneelers are always open you and I need to ask ourselves, God, what are you working on me on how is it that I need to be transformed into the likeness of your son, not by my own strength, but you working your will and your way in me as I surrender to You, everything, my mind, body and who I am, everything that'll be our prayer this morning. So let's pray, Father. We, thank you for your word. We, thank you that you care enough about us to

come to earth in the form of a human,

and that that human, Jesus Christ, showed us the way to get back to you, I just pray right now for those around the room that are struggling for hope, really just hanging on,

struggling to believe in this transformation.

God, we just pray right now that you grant faith and hope, real hope all across the room

and enlarge our hearts. Calls our hearts to soar in love and affection for you, because we know when we do that, that we will not be able to not be changed. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much. Thank you, Joy. So we are in a study on First Corinthians, and we are at First Corinthians 14. I want to be honest with you, I have been in ministry since I was 16, and heard all kinds of sermons. I've never actually heard anybody brave enough to preach the chapter I'm going to preach on. So I don't know what that says about me or about preachers or teachers at large, it is in the Bible, and I'm not afraid of it. I think we can come to some really clear conclusions. And so we're going to we're going to do that today. We have started a section, and just think about this in terms of the Bible is a lot of times in the New Testament, it's written in letters, and letters were to specific churches and places. And so this letter was to a real city, the city of Corinth, and it is Corinthians as the First and Second Corinthians. But we know there were other other letters that are not included in the testament. We know that also that he is addressing specific things that were occurring at that church. And so he's trying to address those, Paul is, that is, but he's doing that with the authority of an apostle. So it has relevance for the original church at Corinth, and it has relevance for us today. But again, very I think, important to see that he began a section on exercising of the gifts in the church, in the body of Christ in chapter 11, and he's going to finish it today at the end of 14 last week, was a very famous passage on the love chapter. And hope you enjoyed that, and just how we maybe even thought about that in a way that you haven't heard of before, where love is not meant to be a be a burden, but it's, it's what God enables in us as we walk in him. So he begins, and I will begin today in verse one. This is a long section of scripture I'm going to read. So you can either follow in your Bible we read from what's called the New Living Translation, or you can follow it up on the screen. But I just want to, want to let you know it's a long passage that we're going to look at, and I'll try to go as slow as I can, and to help us to see what God, God has for us today in it. So love, let love be your highest goal. Now keep in mind why he's saying that, because he just finished chapter 13 on the actual love chapter. So he's saying that's our goal when we think about our spiritual giftedness or spiritual abilities, but you should also desire the special abilities the Spirit gives. By spirit there, it's capital S, I take it to mean holy spirit, especially the ability to prophesy, or prophecy. Now prophecy, I just want to make sure we're real clear on this. In the Old Testament, a lot of times, a prophet or prophetess, whether it was a male or female Prophet, they were speaking directly for God, because the scriptures weren't complete yet. And it's very obvious that God would, from the heavens, tell a prophet or a prophetess something, and then they would go communicate that to the people. When you get into the New Testament. After Jesus comes and he has a sent out from Jerusalem and Judea and to the uttermost parts of the earth, you'll see that churches are established all throughout the known area, all throughout the Mediterranean Sea. And the way prophecy is used in the New Testament, and up to this very day is that, do you have a prophetic word which just really means a word from the Lord. That may also be because you studied and you have wisdom that you're giving that is a truth. And all truths can be examined by scripture, but it takes wisdom to sort of examine if prophecies from the Lord, and you're going to see him bring that up. But I just want to be real clear on what prophecy is. A prophet is a truth teller as a prophecy is speaking in such a way where you're giving good biblical truths, and if you want to know if they're from the Lord, you can you can test them, and you can see, okay, is that consistent with who God is in the scriptures, or is that something else? Okay, so prophecy,

for if you have the ability to speak in tongues. Now, we talked about this last week, but you're going to see that tongues, or languages, has to do with what I think are known languages that you can interpret supernaturally. You will be talking only to God, since people won't be able to understand you. You will be speaking by the power of the Spirit. But it will be but, but will all be mysterious. But the one who prophesies strengthens others. Why? Because they can understand it. Everybody can understand it. It encourages them. It comforts them. Strengthens encourage, comforts a person who speaks in tongues or languages, maybe strengthen personally, but the one who speaks a word of prophecy strengthens the entire church. Why? Because prophecy can be understood by everyone. A language can only be understood by whoever knows that language. I wish you could all speak in tongues. But even more, I wish you could all prophesy, for prophecy is greater. Than speaking in tongues unless someone interprets what you are saying, so that the whole church will be strengthened, dear brothers and sisters, if I should come to you speaking in an unknown language, how would that help you? But if I bring you a revelation or some special knowledge or prophecy or teaching that will be helpful, even lifeless instruments like a flute or the harp must play the notes clearly or no one will recognize the melody. And if the bugler doesn't sound a clear call, how will the soldiers know they're being called to battle? It's the same for you. If you speak to people in words they don't understand, how will they know what you are saying, you might as well be talking into empty space. There are many different languages in the world, and every language has meaning, but if I don't understand a language, I'll be a foreigner to someone who speaks it, and the one who speaks it will be a foreigner to me. And the same is true for you, since you are so eager to have the special abilities the Spirit gives seek those that will strengthen the whole church. So anyone who speaks in tongues should pray also for the ability to interpret what has been said. For if I pray in tongues, my spirit is praying, but I don't understand what I am saying. Again, that's supernatural. Well, then what shall I do? I will pray in the Spirit, and I will also pray in words. I understand. I will sing in the Spirit, and I will also sing in words I understand. For if you praise God only in the spirit, how can those who don't understand you praise God along with you? How can you? How can they join you in giving thanks when they don't understand what you are saying, you'll be giving thanks very well, but it won't strengthen the people who hear you. I thank God that I speak in tongues more than any of you, but in a church meeting, I would rather speak five understandable words to help others, than 10,000 words in an unknown language. Dear Brothers and Sisters, Don't be childish in your understanding of these things. Be innocent as babies when it comes to evil, but be mature in understanding matters of this kind. It is written in the Scriptures. I will speak to my own people through strange languages and through the lips of foreigners, but even then, they will not listen to me, says the Lord. So you see that speaking in tongues is a sign, not for believers, but for unbelievers. Prophecy, however, is for the benefit of believers, not unbelievers, even so if an unbeliever are people who don't understand these things, come into your church meeting and hear everyone speaking in unknown language, don't think you're crazy, but if all you are prophesying and unbelievers are people who don't understand these things come into your meeting, they will be convicted of sin and judged by what you say. As they listen, their secret thoughts will be exposed, and they will fall through their knees and worship God, declaring God is truly here among you. I told you it was a long passage. Thank you for letting me get through that. Couple things that are very evident to me as I read this passage, when we think about the word tongues, or languages, which is the same word in Greek. And I told you that you can go back and look at Acts, and it's very clear that that in Acts chapter two, that when, when the gospel starts to go out, that people stand up, and all of a sudden they understand the gospel in their own language. That's what's going on here. So let's just use the language of of French. I was it's hard to use the word, it's hard to use the language of Spanish here, because what ends up happening is over half of us in the room know a little bit of Spanish, or even if you're Spanish speaking only you know a little bit of English. So we'll, we'll sometimes fudge on this, on this principle, and we'll have people who pray in Spanish or sing in Spanish, so that that's not what he's talking about, because in our culture, we understand a little bit of both languages. That's why here on the borderland we have Spanglish. They made a whole movie about that, okay, but, but, but, let's show. Let's just take that away for a minute, and let's just talk about French, because we have very few French speaking people, although we've had them. We had one last week, and we had one who used to be a member here years ago. But if we were all up here, if I was up here teaching or preaching or prophesying in French, that would not be a benefit to most, if not all, of y'all in the room, unless I had an interpreter here, and so you can see that that's what he's going with. He's saying, Listen, if you have people who are praying or prophesying or speaking in some way, but you don't have an interpreter there, it will be nonsense. It won't help you any, right? I mean, that's where we get the phrase. It's Greek to me, uh, there's very few of y'all probably in the room that can read or understand Greek, so that's where we come up with that phrase. So in the same way, any language that you and I don't know, if someone starts speaking that to us, it doesn't do us a look of good, right? We understand that, and that's what Paul's talking about here. He's saying that when you exercise these spiritual gifts, understand that they have to strengthen, encourage and comfort. First point I wants to see this morning, our spiritual gifts must be for edification. So I don't want to complicate things, whatever God has gifted you and me in whether you have the gift of administration, you have the gift of teaching, you have the gift of numbers. You have the gift of languages it there will both be a natural aspect to it and a supernatural aspect to it. If you're doing it by God's grace. Here's what I mean by that. You won't find yourself if I if I pulled one of you up on stage and I asked you some real clear questions. I was like, Hey, are you good with numbers? No, I stink at numbers. I'm always getting them all mixed up. I can't really keep a good, you know, checkbook. In fact, someone else in my family does that, and I was always bad at math and, you know, but I'm really good at painting and art and these kind of things. I wouldn't say, Well, God may have gifted you with numbers. No, it's just not how it works. We understand that God uses our our natural abilities and abilities that we have honed over time, and he really blows wind on those. It's kind of like a sail in our sailboat to to propel us forward with what God has for us, our spiritual gifts that go along with our wiring, because God made us and He wired us and who he wants us to be, our spiritual gifts are for edification, and that's a big word. Why didn't I just use the word like encouragement or strengthen or comfort? Because edification encompasses all of those. Let me just show you Webster's definition of what does it mean to edify someone. It is to instruct and improve, especially in moral or religious knowledge. It is to uplift, it is to enlighten, it is to inform. So then you get to ask yourself, Who decides if any of y'all or me or anybody else is gifted in admin or in singing or in teaching, etcetera? Well, it's two things. There's always a sort of a sort of a double thing going on. Number one is an internal desire and just evidence, right? We know this. If you're terrible at keeping things organized and straight, you yourself ought to have enough self awareness to know I may not be gifted in administration and organization, but all of a sudden you may find yourself, man, I think I'm gifted in singing. I think I'm getting and sometimes we find this right. You think, man, I'm gifted in singing, for the church, singing for the Lord, whatever. So then that's that's the first inclination that you may be gifted in singing. But there's another part to play. Someone else has to affirm, and preferably more than one, someone else has to affirm that gift in singing. And so what will happen in like our setting, is, if you say, I think I'm gifted in singing for the Lord, you may think that, but then we will give you a child, or we'll sort of figure out, okay, can you lead in worship? And guess what? If you're if you're leading in worship, if you're leading and singing isn't edifying to anyone else in the room, then we would conclude, well, you may not be gifted in singing. You may think you are, but if you're not blessing anyone else with that gift, then you aren't gifted in singing. Why? Because spiritual gifts are for edification. It encourages and people who are around you will recognize those gift sets, and they will say, Yes, more of that.

It's obvious that you're good at that. It's

obvious that you're good at teaching, because when you do that, people understand the concepts you're trying to bring out. And in the same way, let's take an issue like prophecy or tongues, which sometimes have some controversy around them for reasons of like miraculous and healing. These are often called the the charismatic or the charisma gifts. It's just that whole idea of things that God uses. I don't want us to be confused by this. It's no different than any other gift. I know it's exercised in different ways, but but the purpose of all gifts, I'm just saying it right here, is for edification of others. If it's just about you, if it's just about me, if it's just for show, then we're not dealing with something that is spiritually edifying. So when it comes to the gift of tongues, what is the gift of tongues? What's one of two things? It's either going to be for interpretation, like, oh my gosh, someone is up here speaking French, and I can explain that to someone else, or it is the supernatural ability to either speak French when you haven't been formally trained on it, or you've been formally trained on it a little bit, and languages just come easier for you. We all know people in this world who speak multiple languages, not just sort of understand Spanish, but they understand English, and really are good at Spanish, and also really good at some other romantic languages, whether it's, you know, French or Greek or whatever, we could keep going you, you know, people like this. And so what ends up happening is that God uses those things, and again, he puts wind in the sails of those gifts for the edification of the church. It's both supernatural and natural giftedness, and people recognize it. And I was like, my gosh, I was in the audience, and I didn't understand what was going on, and I needed someone to speak French to me if I was to understand the gospel today. And all of a sudden someone stood up and they spoke French, and then for the rest of the people in the audience who didn't speak French, an interpreter got up and spoke the interpretation so that no one who was there would be confused, right? You see, what's going on? Here. And this is true in large settings and in small settings. The Corinthian church was probably the same size as the average church in America today, somewhere between 50 and 100 the average church is about 75 to 80. And so that's what's going on here. So second point I want you to see from this same passage is the gift of tongues is publicly gifted tongues, publicly is the speaking and interpretation of known languages. I can't get around this. Any other way of reading the text. You guys just read it along with me. How many times did you see in there just this whole idea of speaking in an unknown language? Someone understands it because an interpreter, and then they're encouraged, edified or comforted you don't see in here. In fact, it's actually said, Please don't be one of those people who speaks French when noone in the group understands French. What are you doing that for? I mean, guys, this would be so obvious. If you and I went to work tomorrow, y'all will have a roundup somewhere at your at your job site or at your office, and there'll be 567, or eight of y'all standing around. If someone just came in and started speaking French, how would that encourage any of y'all you won't even know what's going on. Why are you here? Why are you speaking this? Right? And that's what that's what Paul's saying. It's just very obvious that if none of us understand this language, what do you what are you spouting this, this French language for so the public use of tongues is always the speaking and interpretation of known languages. Now, I know some of y'all come from the more charismatic backgrounds, more Pentecostal backgrounds, and you may have had a preacher or teacher at some point say, Now wait a second. God has gifted you to to speak to the Lord in this private prayer language, and God gives that gift to you, and you're to exercise that, some would say, in a large crowd, which we've already seen from this passage and others, that's chaotic. If you walk into a church and they're all sort of speaking in this language that's unknown, and everyone is sort of speaking in it, and someone from upstage is speaking in it, but it's not done in a decent, orderly way with interpreters of a known language. You can say, Man, that's not what First Corinthians 14 was talking about. But what it may be alluding to, and I'll say the word, what it may be alluding to is some sort of private prayer language. Now, what's this? And you may have heard this some of y'all in the room, because I know y'all claim that God has gifted you to have this sort of private prayer language where, when it's just you and the Lord, and you're praying in your room or in your prayer closet, that all of a sudden the Lord will give you words that you don't understand. And it's not a language that's a known language, it's not even a language that you've been educated in, but it's a private prayer language between you and the Lord, and you don't know what to pray, but God comes in and supernaturally gives you some sort of tongue, some sort of language that only you and him sort of communicate with one another. Now I don't think that's what this passage is talking about. Now, what if you like, but I think I really have that gift, which I know people in this audience who sincerely think Man, because of my background or because of what the Lord has given me, I believe I really have a private prayer language between me and the Lord. And I would say, Okay, I believe that you might have a private prayer language between you and the Lord. However, let's make sure that it stays private in your exercising of it. Why

do you say that? Brent? Because

think about what this passage is saying. If you're going around in a large group setting, or even a small group setting, and you're exercising this gift, it doesn't do anyone around you any good. So if there is such thing as a private prayer language, which I'm going to say there may be, I don't think I have it, but I know others who do and feel like it's been given to him by the Lord. I think that is best understood as something that comes from a different passage. So if you like flipping through your Bibles or through your digital Bibles, I'm going to give you one passage that I think more clearly articulates these sort of utterances and groanings and private prayer language that some of you may have and that you may have friends and relatives who do. And that's Romans eight verses, 26 to 27 says this. This talking about prayer. It says the Holy Spirit. Romans, chapter eight verses, 26 and 27 and the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. He says, For example, we don't know what God wants us to pray for, but the holy spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. And the father, who knows all hearts, know what the Spirit is saying for the spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God's will. So you guys, maybe have been there. How many of y'all have been there in desperation with the Lord in prayer, and you've hit your knees, maybe in maybe, maybe in the wilderness, or maybe in the woods, or maybe by the by the bedside of your table, or whatever, and so you've you've been desperate for the Lord, and sometimes you and I don't know what to pray. I know that some people in this room say. At that moment, something takes over, and they're giving some sort of groanings and utterances that aren't even in any sort of known language. And somehow the Lord comforts them in that. I'm not here to dismiss that that may be what God is doing. I don't see that as the gift of tongues. Some would from First Corinthians 14. This pastor doesn't, but I'm not going to say that that gift is illegitimate. I'm just saying I see that best express in terms of Romans, eight verses, 26 and 27 it's this it's these groanings when you don't know what to pray, the Lord takes over and he expresses our prayers for us. I would say for me, when I have those moments of what I don't know what to pray. It becomes more like meditation, where I'm just sitting there in silence, and I'm asking the Lord to do something, or I'm asking him to give me something, or to show me something. And so I'm just sitting there silently, and the Lord himself, he comes and he comforts me, and He speaks to me in the sense of not audible, not like a voice from heaven, at least that's not how he does for me, but just a sense of where he brings around things to mind, that the scriptures are true about him, and he's using that to minister to me in those moments. So for me, when I have those private prayer moments and I don't know what to pray, I sense that the Lord comes and he ministers to me anyways, others of y'all in the room may feel like the way that he ministers to me is I begin to cry out to the Lord in unknown languages that I myself didn't learn, and he ministers to me in that way. I think that maybe legitimate, but I don't think, as I understand this passage in tongues, that that's what this passage is talking about, because I can't get around that tongues in this passage is about known languages that are then interpreted for the edification of the body. So third and final point, let's call to orderly worship that he's going to help us sort of wrap all these things together. And the end of 14 says this, well, my brothers and sisters. So he's addressing us as as this familial term, because that's what we are. We're brothers and sisters in Christ. Let's summarize, because he's coming to the end of this, this idea of, how do we do orderly worship together? When you meet together, one will sing, which we had that right? We had singers, one at a time, or harmony together, like he already talked about, another will teach. Another will give some sort of special revelation which is, which is similar to a prophetic word, which we have that happen here. I can name the people who come up here on this stage and and go to a microphone and do these various things God has given. One will speak in tongues, and another will interpret what is said, but everything that is done must strengthen all of you, right? What good would it do to to speak in some sort of unknown language here in a public setting? No more than two or three should speak in tongues, right? We

don't want to be here all day. How

many of y'all came from traditions where,

you know, brother, so and so or sister, so and so we just stand up, we're doing one more hour, right? I mean, y'all, I know that's true about some of the traditions you, you guys came from, or you've heard of that. Because why? You don't want to go beyond two or three people sort of, sort of speaking into this. Otherwise we could be here all day and all night, and it could turn into not edification of the body, but about a show of who needs to say something, or who needs to do something. And y'all have all been there, right? You've been part. Been part of one of those prayer requests sessions that turn into some sort of gossip session. So what can happen? They must speak one at a time. You can't speak over each other, and someone must interpret what they say otherwise. What's the point? We've all been this is true whether you're in the office or in the church. I know what's going on, but if noone is present who can interpret they must be silent in your church meeting and speak to God privately, or speak in tongues to God privately. Now would I take this to mean again? Could it be a private prayer language? Maybe, but I think it could also be that you and I sometimes we pray in our heart language. That's why I said that. Going back to Spanish, sometimes we'll have people who come up on this stage and they'll pray in Spanish. Why is that? Because that was their heart language. And by heart language, I mean that was the first language they learned as a child, and so they're most comfortable talking to God in that original heart language. So I take it that listen, if you're in a room where literally 0.0 understand the language you're about to pray in, I'm not sure how much edification that's going to be for those around you. That's what he's talking about there. Let two or three people prophesy and let the others evaluate what is being said. Remember how I told you that prophecy? Anybody, whether it's me or anyone else comes to you and wants to say a word, and it doesn't have to be in some big setting like this. I do pastoral care. I think there's elements of prophecy there. Sometimes prophecy is planned words, sometimes it's spontaneous words, but it's all based off of God giving you these gifts. Let the others evaluate what is said. But if someone is prophesying and. Other person receives a revelation, lowercase r, not the book of revelation from the Lord. So using this term of prophecy and lowercase revelation interchangeably, the one who is speaking must stop. Okay, we don't anything chaotic going on like, let's figure out what's going on here. In this way, all who will prophesy will have a turn to speak, one after another, so that everyone will learn and be encouraged. I told you again, think about the way the Bible's tried to help us just order relationships and order meetings. It's the same thing you and I practice at work. How many of y'all have ever been to one of those work meetings where you didn't get anything done because everybody talked over one another, where they kept interrupting one another and they we couldn't move forward with the project or with the understanding of what our boss wanted us to do. Same way in the church. In this way, all who prophesy will have a turn to speak one after another, and everyone will learn and be encouraged. Remember that people who prophesy are in control of their spirit and take turns. We know what we're saying. It's not just like supernatural tongues, where we oftentimes, or sometimes we'll speak in a language we weren't trained in. For God is not a God of disorder, but of peace, as in all the meanings of God's holy people. So we, we are, we are in a passage on the order of worship, and that God is not a God of chaos, but he's one of peace, because he wants things organized in such a way to where we all benefit from it. Can we all agree on that? That's what's going on here, and he's helping us to understand that and set up a church in such a way, and future churches in such a way for the edification of the saints, of everyone. Now he's going to now go into something that may be confusing at first, and I hope to bring clarity on it again. This is why people don't preach through First Corinthians 14, right here, this verse I'm about to read, they're gonna be like, that'll kill you. Okay, so, but I'm gonna read it, and I'm gonna explain to you what I think it means in its context, because we live in a time and age, and Paul is in a time and age when people love to take things out of context and make them mean whatever they want them to mean. How many of y'all have seen on Twitter or on whatever social media thread you and I look at, it's called x Now I realize that, but on whatever social media thread that we look at, where something could be taken out of context, a phrase or a paragraph, and then you can make it mean whatever you want it to mean. We do this with our politicians. We do this with our businesses, and we do this with our spiritual leaders. You and I know better. Okay, so we're still we're still locked in. We're still learning. We're still good with what God's showing us here in First Corinthians says this right here, women should be silent during the church meetings. It's not proper for them to speak. They should be submissive, just as the law says, if they have any questions, they should ask their husbands at home for it is improper for women to speak in church meetings. Or do you think God's word originated with you Corinthians? Are you the only ones whom it is given? If you claim to be a prophet or think you are spiritual, you should recognize that what I'm saying is a command from the Lord Himself. But if you don't recognize this, you yourself will not be recognized. So my dear brothers and sisters, be eager to prophesy, and don't forget, don't forbid speaking in tongues, but be sure that everything is done properly, and in order go back two slides there to where we address that right there. Thank you so much. So what is going on here? Now, let's just say what we know is not going on here. We know that he is not saying that women have to be silent at all times in the church, because that would be in direct contradiction to what he spent almost an entire chapter going over in First Corinthians 11. So if you are here with us several weeks ago, went through First Corinthians 11, those were instructions about orderly worship. And we said, this is one whole section here, and he gives very specific instructions for when a man or when a woman praise or prophesy, make sure they do it in a proper and orderly way. So let's just say right from the get go, that he does not mean that they cannot participate in worship, period, because he's already sort of given instruction for how that should go about. Now, lest you think, no, I'm not convinced, because, because I can read the black and white, he's saying that the women, I'll be silent in the meetings. What are you talking about? Brandon, okay, let, let me. Let me say it to you a different way. If you and I were trying to get our book published on any given subject, we would have multiple chapters, just like the book of Corinthians has multiple chapters. And if in chapter three, we said something that was the exact opposite of what we said in chapter five. You and I both realized that no publisher would publish us. You understand that, right? Because there are, there are certain ways of understanding how publishing a letter or a book works, and you can't self contradict yourself in any given book or noone will touch it. I know you can self publish it, but that can be anything, alright. But I'm talking about because why they'd have to say you have to bring clarification either by context or footnotes. I think Paul brings clarification by context because he's talking about orderly worship. So here's the best way I would say, it's just like there were standards for publication. In our day, there were standards for Paul as well. He can't self contradict himself. So what's he talking about? I told you that Corinthians is one of those letters where he's addressing specific issues that were coming up. So evidently we know this because he's addressing it. Evidently some women were interrupting worship with even possible legitimate concerns. So before I go here, let me, let me go back to the workplace. Okay, actually, Imma ask you to raise hands. I very rarely do this. How many of y'all work at a place of employment that has 50 or more employees? Raise your hand if you work at a place of employment 50 or more employees. Okay, so if not, you've, you've, you can imagine if you do, or you've seen movies or shows that, where they do now, when you have 50 or more employees, because I know how it works, because I've worked at a church that had 130 employees, every once in a while, the big boss will come and he will address everyone, or she will he, or she will come to address everyone, and it's 50 or more people in a room. And those of y'all who work in a place of employment of 50 or more people, this happens at least a couple of times a year, if not regularly. And what will that what will that boss? What will he or she do? They'll come and they'll address all of us, okay, and wherever you're at in the organization chart, whether you're kind of a newbie or middle management or upper management, you're all there in the room. And what does the boss, what does he or she do? They present what, what they're supposed to do as a company. And they'll always ask, Do you have any questions now? What does a newbie do who literally doesn't understand authority? What will the newbie do? Well, I got a question. Okay? And what they do is they raise their hand, they say something. They think it's a good question. They're real proud of themselves. Oh, great. The CEO wants to know what I think in a room full of 50 plus people, what happens those of you all who working in a place like that, what happens nine times out of 10, or 10 times out of 10, your direct supervisor pulls you aside and says, hey, hey, that does anybody have any questions he or she was just asking that they didn't really mean for you to speak up. Okay, if you had any questions, you should have asked me your supervisor, because I supervise seven to eight. Remember, in our modern day world,

we don't have any more than typically, 12 reports. A lot of times, 789, 10 reports, you should have asked me. You should have been silent in that setting, because this wasn't your time to speak up. Same thing happens with some of y'all may not know this about me, but I love Robert's Rules of Order. That doesn't make me weird or sick, just go with me on this. Okay, I just love it. I think that's it's so cool how things are done in a decent and orderly way. And our government, a lot of times, if you ever go to the to the chamber floor and see our house of representatives or our Senate, no matter how much of a fool they act out and about and on cameras, they follow Robert's Rules of Order to a T in our Congress to this day, and they always have, since they were established and since we were established as a country. But Robert's Rules of Order goes something like this. It says only one person's able to speak at a time, and until that is thoroughly understood or dealt with, we don't go on to the next person. There's all kinds of other things. You can table things, and you can kick things the next meetings, I get all that. Some of y'all have maybe been to large business meetings, and I've been to business meetings at church, even our church, sometimes we have, every once in a while, and we'll set up a microphone, maybe one in each aisle, and we'll say, Hey, if you got something to say, come up and say it at this time. But, but you can't just do it anytime. I mean, y'all know that right now, if one of y'all decided to just stand up and start talking to me, arguing with me, or just you thought you had a word from the Lord, you know, we have security that would come and put their arm around you and say, Hey, we're going to walk you to the back and because it's not that they may not be legitimate, you may have questions about what I am saying as I'm speaking about it, but it's now the right time to stand up and ask that question, Is now the right time for, if you're in a 50 plus employee place to ask the question? Or Is now the right time to circumvent Robert's Rules of Order and just go chaotic and just say and do whatever you want? The answer is always no. It doesn't mean they're not legitimate. So I think that somehow, and I don't know what it was going on here, somehow you had, evidently, some women who were interrupting worship with possible legitimate concerns. They may have been legitimate. And then the sort of thing says they ought to remain silent, as the law says, I don't know what law they were thinking about, because it wasn't in the Old Testament law. Maybe it was just common law and common understanding in their setting. Just like we have a common understanding, right? We have a common understanding that on the organization chart, if you're an intern or a newbie, are you allowed to address the boss in these large, 50 plus group meetings? Are you No, if not, you're reprimanded for at least, I always was. I don't know where y'all work. Why? Because? Why? Because we have authority structures. I mean, even as I say that, I know that some of us are even uncomfortable with that. You're like, well, the boss is no better than the than the entry level employee. Well, they're no better, but they're on a different part of the org chart and on a different part of of of salary. Okay, it doesn't mean they're better in terms of individual worth, but it does. That there's an authority structure here, and that newbies don't get to fire bosses, but bosses get to fire newbies. You know, I understand that, and so that's what's going on here. This leads to my third and final point this morning, is that church gatherings must be done orderly. We know that's what he's talking about. So So if anyone ever like uses a passage like this and wants to beat you over the head or say the Bible's irrelevant, because the Bible says that all women must stay silent in all churches at all times like No, no, no, I went to Life Church had a pastor there. He explained something to me. It's called context. It's the same thing that you and I, we can't fall for these different things on social media, when someone wants to take a phrase or a paragraph and go against what a certain politician or a certain religious leader or a certain company and say, Listen, there cuckoo out there. I want you to, I want to pull this phrase or this paragraph out and show you what they think or believe. You always need to say, what's the context? What's the context and what the context is of this is orderly worship. Evidently, there were some women who were interrupting the worship, maybe with legitimate concerns, but they were out of order. So, closing thoughts, I want us to see that the scriptures are meant for our edification. Remember, in that passage that we looked at, we looked at that passage about tongues and prophecy, and the way he ends here is like, Listen, you ought to desire these things, because these are really cool, and they can be used for God's glory in the church, but over and over again is meant to strengthen, to encourage and to comfort, if that's your aim, in what God has given you, right? And what is God given you? We think of gifts as what God has given me in my tool belt, what God has given me in my hands, what God has laid on my heart, and then it's affirmed by others. Man run in that church, whatever God has given you, however he's gifted you, and we have people in this congregation who are gifted, I think, legitimately, with the gift of languages. Some of y'all can interpret both Spanish and English quite fluidly. Some of y'all can only understand your auntie and uncle, and I understand that too, okay, but that's not fluency, and that's the gift of tongues, okay? That's just getting by at dinner time, but, but God has gifted Some of y'all, and we need you in this church to to help with prayer and for for other things when people come, because a lot of times we'll have, because we're a multi generational church, we'll have maybe a different generation that will come in who doesn't understand Spanish, and we need people to pray. Might even need someone to we have the ability to for interpretation, but it hasn't been utilized, because we just haven't had a lot of people who have asked for it or who have felt like they needed it. But whatever God fills you up with, whether it's prophetic words, whether it's the healing, whether it's prayer. Whether it's just all I've got in my hands is the gift of administration and numbers, or all I've got is my ability to paint or to sing, whatever God fills you up with, whatever he has gifted you and me with, we're not meant to hold it in, right? You know that old thing from from from elementary school where you learned about Jesus, and it's like, hide it under Bush. Oh no, I'm going to let it shine. How to interrupt? You know that's what God means with our gifts be and if your gifts are all about you, it'll be evident pretty quick, and God won't use that. But if it's all about him and his glory, if you understand that the reason why God fills you and me up in our times of worship is to pour it out for others, well then this is amazing and beautiful life, indeed, isn't it that we get the privilege and the opportunity to take what God has given us, just like that, just like that boy who had five loaves and two fishes and God just multiplied it to the crowd, because he's super your life and my life in The supernatural hands of the Almighty God, the church has just there's no limit. There's no limit to what God may want to do as we submit ourselves to Him, let me pray, Father. I thank you so much for your word. I thank you that you bring such clarity to things that may be confusing upon first reading, I pray for life, church and myself, that you would encourage us this day, encourage us to live for you. Encourage us to be serious about our gifts, whether it's prophecy, tongues or other things, so that we can live and honor you all the days of our life. We ask this in Christ's name and for your glory. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you, Terry, appreciate you. Alright, we are in First Corinthians, and we're at First Corinthians 13. We're going to be on what's called the love chapter, which may be familiar to many of you, if you've been to any weddings. It is familiar. It's also familiar in our culture at large, a lot of people like the middle section of of this chapter, and I want to kind of really articulate what I think that means and how it fits in the broader context. Remember, while we're in First Corinthians, We are the church, and what it's doing the whole book is it's helping us to establish what the church should be like, how it should function, everything from spiritual gifts. You've already seen many spiritual gifts exercised this morning, whether it was Shelby through prayer, or turkey through administration and leadership, or George and others through leadership of the band and worship. So all these things are exercising the spiritual gifts of the church. This section in the scriptures is all about the spiritual gifts. So when you think about First Corinthians 13, for sure, everybody's going to think about it as the love chapter. But I think you can also think about it in its context of chapter 12, chapter 13, chapter 14, of a conversation around the spiritual gifts and the exercise thereof. And I think that will become important as I read the first section, First Corinthians 13, beginning in verse one, if I could speak all the languages of the earth and of angels, but didn't love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging symbol if I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn't love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it, but if I didn't love others, I would have gained nothing. Again, in this context, he's talking about these three spiritual gifts of prophecy, of tongues or languages and of knowledge. And what he's saying is that these things are important because he's already talked about him, he's already addressed them. He's going to address them again. But let's be sure that our aim is love. Let's be sure of our aim. Now, aim is just what you would think of what are we pointing towards? What's our goal? It's going to become very, very evident when you look at the next chapter, the very first verse, it really says, Let your goal be love. And then he begins to tell us about how prophecy and tongues are used. Now, I brought this up last week, but I want to be real clear on, what is prophecy? What is tongues? I don't think there's a lot of question about what is knowledge, but prophecy is that speaking in such a way that when it is spoken, that our hearts are pierced, and that can be in private setting, that can be in a public setting, or a platform like this, but prophecy, which is a prophet, if you're a male prophetess, if you're a female, but anyone who has the gift of prophecy, they they speak in such a way that it's poignant, that you it touches your heart, and you're like, oh my gosh, that seems like that's a work of the Spirit. Now, we've learned last week, and we'll continue to learn, that you test everything according to God's word. So there's never a time where you write things down from a prophet or prophetess as if it's the very words of Scripture, like, Okay, this is something I can add to the end of my Bible, no, but it is something for you to contemplate and think is what they're sharing with me clear from the rest of the Scriptures and what I know and what others are also helping me to understand. That's why you need the church, because we're not isolated, we're not alone, that we even even in interpretation, and how we go about coming to certain conclusions about our own lives is done in the context of community, the gift of tongues. I've already sort of talked about this last week, and I think it's going to become evident that it is really the gift of being able to speak in another known language. And if you go on and read chapter 14, I think that comes out. I know that there is a question about private prayer language and groanings before God. I'm going to address that in chapter 14. But for sure, what sometimes is seen as the gift of tongues, where everyone in a group setting is speaking in unison in a language that's not understandable. That is not the gift of tongues, as I understand the Scriptures, the gift of tongues is a known language that's clear from Acts, and that's clear when you get to the next chapter, 14. So if you have the gift of tongues, either through study or through a supernatural act, you're able to communicate in a language that someone understands and that God's going to use for His glory. Maybe that's a good way to think about gifts, spiritual gifts in general, because when you think about, okay, man, do I have this? I don't know if I've got a gift. I don't know how God wants to use me. We talk about this all the time, that you and I, we're products of nature and nurture and what God's done in our life. And so there's some things that you and I are not.

Really gifted in you can be naturally gifted in administration and leadership. You can be naturally gifted in words, but different kinds. Some of y'all are gifted in words being able to write them down that's meaningful to you, and that's meaningful to others. When you write words down, others of y'all are gifted in words from communicating orally, and you say, Man, that's that's that comes easy for me, or comes easy. Some of y'all are gifted in numbers, right? So maybe you found your way into some construction field or an accountant because you you're good with numbers, and some of y'all are good with your hands and putting things together. All of these things are gifts that when God gets a hold of you and you're filled by the Spirit that He then uses for His glory, it's like, it's like winding your sails in order for you and I to exercise our gifts in the world for the benefit of the church, for the benefit of our family and for the benefit of our community. So don't overthink spiritual gifts. It runs in lanes and in patterns of what you and I are already doing. But what happens is, we ask ourselves, is this for God's glory? Is it spirit filled and ultimately, what this chapter is helping us to see is, is our aim love? Is what we're doing filled with love. Because whatever you and I are doing, if we're doing it for ourself, or we're doing it for a moment, or we're doing it for money, or we're doing it for our kids or our grandparents, or whatever. That's going to fall short if our aim is not love. In fact, this, this, these verses right here. Say, listen, you can have faith that moves mountains, um, you can possess all kinds of knowledge and share it with others. You can even, and he really goes specific here, you can even give all that you have to the poor, you can go and just be one of those people who's who's really generous, and just living like a pauper, like a poor person, because you've given it all the way. You can even sacrifice your body. What does that mean? That means, of course, you know, ultimately it can mean some sort of

giving your your body away, like in some sort of sacrifice militarily or otherwise. But I think it's also you can even be hard on your body, sacrificing your physical health for someone else. But if it's not about love, if it's not about that, it says in these verses, as weird as it sounds, and it would have sound weird to them, and it sounds weird to us at some level, really, I would have gained nothing, because that's something to give to the poor and live like a poor person because you've given everything away. That's something to sacrifice your physical health or your body or anything like that. But if it's just for yourself or just for some other means, besides love for God and love for others, it says in these verses that you've gained nothing. Let's be sure of our aim, first point. Second thing we want to get into is really sort of the sort of the meat and potatoes of this chapter, and where you're probably familiar. It goes like this. Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. Does not rejoice about injustice, but rejoices whenever the Truth Wins Out. Love never gives up. Love never loses faith. It is always hopeful and endures through every circumstance. I want to put up a chart to hear that really, all it's doing is I've just taken the phrases and I've just put them in one or two columns. It's all about love. But is it stated positively? This is what love is, and if it's stated negatively, what we're what we're trying not to do, it's really on the other end. Now, again, when you and I look at the scriptures, if you're anything like I am, you think, okay, I know who needs to hear this boy. I wish someone I worked with, or someone I lived with, or someone I went to school with way back, or I wish my parents would have known this. But like, listen, the word of God is for you and me. Okay, so we can't control them, so we gotta ask ourselves, Lord, what does this mean for you and and for me? Because the other thing you and I probably realize is, man, I can't do this. I've fallen short of this this morning, I was unkind and impatient getting ready for church, and that church was my good deed for the day, right? But here's the thing about this, it's talking about God's love for us that then, of course, works out in love for others. But again, it's dependent on Him and His Spirit working in and through you and me, not that we have to muster it up, right? Because if you and I have to muster up, and you and I have done this before, right? You've gone to your auntie's house or someone like that, and you've gotta muster up the the courage, you've gotta muster up the strength to sit next to that cousin, you know, I'm talking about the one that's really going or whatever they do and when they're gonna they're going to they're going to ask you for money, or they're going to take some money, or they're going to kick you in, something's going to go wrong, right? Because you got a little drama in your family. You got little things that cause you angst, as I do as well. So what we'll sometimes do is I can muster through this. I can I can sort of grip my hands through this.

That's That's not love, that's just trying to get through something. What Love Is is that you because you spent time with the Father, because you've received love from God, because that's the essence of who God is. Then we're able to have a little bit of patience

because of their story and their circumstance. We were able to have a little bit of kindness when they snatched the food first. You know what I'm talking about, you and I all have those friends and relatives, the ones that pile on the plate the most, what brought the least or cooked the least, right? So as you have a little bit of kindness, right? We can have a little bit of of rejoicing when the Truth Wins Out. We try to highlight what is going good in someone's life? Yeah, I get that that they're mean and they may even be a drunkard, but are they doing something positive that I can point out in order to encourage them and even encourage myself? So I'm not just I'm not just surviving in this household for the time being. It never gives up. Aren't you so glad that God never gave up on you and me? I mean, how many stories did we hear this morning about story after story of people, even in their 40s and beyond whom now God is has got a hold of them, and how many people prayed for them? How many people wish they had gotten right sooner? With God, love never gives up. This is how God deals with us. And because God deals with us this way, we can then deal with others this way. This is so this is such an important concept, it's going to become evident as I read the last section. But I want to be real clear here, when we're talking about the strength to love others, it's the idea that we bring Heaven down, right? That's the essence of the Lord's prayer Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's why I talk so much about being salt and light and bears of the kingdom and bears of the cross in our home and in our community and in our workplace, because you and I spend a lot of time doing something for our occupation, even even in retirement, we spend a lot of time outside the walls of our house. How are we viewing these interactions with others? We are viewing this as strength of we are bringing a little bit of Heaven down into these people's lives, whoever's lives they are, because God's brought a little bit of light and hope in our life. Never gives up, never loses faith.

Never loses faith. This is what the essence of love is. It's always hopeful. It's always forward looking that God's got something better for you and me. God's got something better for him or her. Endures every circumstance, and you say, Man, I'm struggling right now. I don't think I can hold up under the weight. You're not meant to you're meant to give it to Jesus, you're meant to take it to the cross, and then he holds it up. And then, as he is working in your life, he then empowers you and me to exercise the gifts of the Spirit, which have to include love, because it's on the top of the fruit of the Spirit. And he allows us to do this and stated negatively and not jealous. How much? How much jealousy have you got going on in your family? We could go, we go Mom, Dad, brothers and sisters, but when we start going extended family, so no, we're all good. We all love each other, really. How was the last family reunion? How was the last funeral when we had to go divide assets? How? How positive was it? Then, how was their lack of jealousy? Then we have to have the heart of the Father, because he has had the heart of towards us first, not boastful, who wants to be around someone who's a blow hard, who, who's always talking about themselves or or always, sort of, we have it though. We have it in our own lives. Not proud, not rude. How many of us are just sometimes rude, rude to people in our own household, people who were supposed to love? And how are we supposed to get out of that rut and out of that pattern of continually being rude to one another and people that were called to love? We're receiving, we're downloading the love from the Father that enables us to love others. If you see any of this love chapter as some sort of aspirational burden, that's all it's going to be. Is a burden, right? Because how many of us have heard one of these sayings at a wedding and we're like, man, good luck with that. I mean, I didn't work out too good with for me. Good luck trying to accomplish this, because we will fight literally as we're going down the aisle. Have you ever seen I've done enough weddings. I've seen fights. I've seen looks that I knew would create a fight later, literally before they hit the door. And my story is not much different. I get that. So then how are we supposed to live and how are we supposed to love? We're supposed to understand that God's already accomplished this for us, and now he's enabling us to be a little less rude, a little more patient, a little more less demanding its own way, cuz, because that's what marriage is, right? It's such a sanctifying process because you and I, we thought we were decent people.

School, we didn't think we were selfish. How many of y'all stood I know many of y'all are married in the room, or you've been married before, you have parents who are married, but how many of y'all have stood up there and thought, Man, I'm a selfish person. I'm so glad I'm getting married today, and I'm such a selfish person. I'm so no, no, you you thought you were decently good, although you wouldn't be standing up there trying to invite someone else into your life. How long did it take you to demand your own way about your dresser or your socks or your clothes or your food or the temperature in the household? I mean, I could keep going, right? Love does not demand its own way. It's not irritable. How many of us use excuses? Well, it's first thing in the morning, and, you know, I'm not a morning person, I've gotta get my cafe, I've gotta get my coffee. And it's like, well, wait a second, do you have the Spirit of God living inside of you or not? And like some of y'all like, not till 9am

but I'm here to tell you, love compels us right when we don't feel like it, right? Because some of us think, Oh, well, I'm being disingenuous if I don't feel like getting him or her their shoes or their cup of coffee or fixing his or her dinner tonight, it's like no walk in love. And then often, what will happen is those feelings will come. You'll never regret loving someone else, right? Who has ever regretted loving someone else? You and I have all kinds of regrets, of sassing people and and talking and being rude and all, but we've never regretted love, not irritable. Keeps no record of wrongs. How hard is this? Cuz we've all got a tally, either literal tally or a tally in our mind of, you know, which cousin did this wrong, or, you know, I let them borrow this my truck, my trailer, it came back a little less working right, a little bit more squeaky, a little bit more broken. Whatever it is love keeps no record of wrongs because, because, remember, this is how the father interacts with us. How many of us want a heavenly father who keeps a record of wrongs? That every time you and I hit our knees to pray that our Heavenly Father is like, well, look at what you did. Look, how can I I'm not going to listen to listen to your prayers. Look, I got this record of all this stuff that you've done against me. Who wants a relationship with the Father in heaven like that, or someone here on Earth, nobody does. So the heart of the Father is he keeps no record of wrongs. And as far as it's up to you and me, we've got to be people who don't keep records of wrongs, because if you and I do that will always lose some of y'all are real strong justice people like me like No, it's not right. It's not right that they always take the last piece of bread or whatever it is, and but I'm saying that like you can have that you can have that and find yourself increasingly alone, increasingly irritable, increasingly being one of those men or women that people don't want to be around or call so keep no record of wrongs. Does not rejoice about injustice. So of course, we don't like it when things don't go the way that they're supposed to, and God's law moral or otherwise, but we understand that God's got things going on, and he knows more than you and I do. We don't just take things in our own hands and try to say, Okay, well, I'm going to figure out how to bend this towards what I think needs to be done. We trust God and endure in every circumstance. So second point, I want us to see this morning, you can have everything. And then I'm saying everything. I'm not just talking. You know, a lot of times we're in a we're in an interesting time in our culture where we're really celebrating kind of about five or 10 billionaires who seem to control a lot, whether it's your whatever your flavor is, whether it's Elon Musk or Bezos or, you know, used to be Bill Gates and others, or Warren Buffett. I get all that, but we sort of hold up these, these, these men and sometimes women. Where was I? Okay? If I can only have their money, I could, you can have everything, but minus love. Guess what? You got nothing. How many of y'all want to be in a big old home? And I don't know what luxury is for you, whether it's a big casita or whether it's some you know, you can't have a boat because you gotta go 12 hours to use it. But I don't, I don't know what it is that that that defines luxury for you, but go ahead and have that in your mind. How many of y'all want that big old house, that big old screen TV, that nice outdoor space, and noone there who wants to be there with you? No one wants to come see you, because instead of exuding the fruit of the spirit of love, you are the one who's irritable, rude, keeping records of wrongs, of your friends and relatives and cousins. See you see where I'm going. You can have everything, but minus love, minus love of the Father first, because it's not in you and me. I just want to be real clear again. I want to be real, real clear. It's not in you and me to love like we're called to love. So all of you have been to a wedding ceremony, even if you're not married yourself, and you've heard these verses read, if not you just heard them read. Love is patient, love is kind. Is not jealous. You heard the whole thing. It's not in you or me to walk out this door and to even do this perfectly for the next 24 hours. But what is in you and me is.

Very spirit of God, he lives inside of you and me. He has saved us. He has rescued us. He set our feet upon a rock, and he's enabling you and me to be a little bit more loving, a little bit more kind, a little bit more hope filled the next day than the day we were before, because he's working inside your heart and in mine. So what? So that we can gain Christ, and then we can be the Roma of Christ. I'm sure it's going to be, it's going to be the stench of death. For some I get that that's not up to you. It's up to you and me to be faithful in loving. It's not up to you and me to control how someone else responds in front of us. But rest assured, you can have everything, but minus love you and I got nothing. Third and final section I wants to see this morning. Again. It's so tied to I told you a lot, it's about this eschatological focus. That's a big word to just say, the future things

prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless, but love will last forever. It'll last forever. Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture, but when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless. When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child, but when I grew up, I put away childish things. Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely. Three things will last forever, faith, hope and love, and the greatest of these is love. So those three gifts that I brought up earlier prophecy, tongues, or speaking in unknown languages, the second gift and the third one is special knowledge. He's telling us that in the future time when all of us die and go to heaven or Jesus comes back, that those things will become useless, because now we will know Christ will be with Him forever. Sometimes people ask, Why study the End Times? Why think about Revelation? Why think about the future? When we think about the future, it helps inform us of the present. That's what he's trying to say. Yes, he wants you to understand prophecy is good. You want people to speak truth in your life. That's what a prophet is, or a prophetess or truth teller. Yes, you want people to understand God's word. So you want them to understand the Bible in their heart language, so they're not translating in their head. That's why we translate Bibles and all kinds of translations. Yes, you want to have people with special knowledge that comes from both studying and supernatural knowledge that God has given them for a time or season. But guess what? It's going to become useless because it's going to go away. Why? Because the new heavens and new earth that we will be up with God in heaven forever and ever, and also Heaven will come down at the end. That's the point of revelation to make all things new. Now we only see part of everything. Now, eventually the whole picture will become clear, and when that day of perfection comes where you and I have no more crying, no more pain, no more cancer, no more aches when we get out of bed, all these things that we will know as we are now, then fully known. He gives us great illustration to talk about childhood. And he says, You remember when you were a child? It's just true. I love how Paul gives just concrete down to earth illustrations they can understand, then we can understand now. He says, when you were a child, you did childish things. You know, we don't, we don't blame little kids for trying to figure things out. We do this a lot, right? This is, this is true, especially here on the borderland. We just kind of send our kids out. They'll figure it out. It's like a wait a second. They just had six Cokes. They'll figure it out that their tummy wake later. You know? It's like, that's just the that's just the way it goes around here, right? And so what is going on there is that we're allowing children to conduct themselves like children. But what happens eventually, you gotta grow up. You gotta grow up. All of y'all have different standards, but eventually you put your hand on your son or your daughter somewhere around 18, like you gotta get out there, you gotta get a job, you gotta go to school, you gotta have responsibility. You gotta and so what's happening here? He's just saying that there's a progression in life. He's saying the same thing with the hope of the Gospel right now, we have a father in heaven. That's why he's very clear to say, I'm the father in heaven. You're my children. This is what this is God talking now. And so that's the state that we're in. We know some things. We've figured some things out. We've got these gifts that God has given us, both naturally and supernaturally. But guess what? Eventually it's going to go away. We're going to grow up and go from being children to full fledged adults. Now it's partially there, right? You're partial.

You're little boy, little girl. You're partially grown up, but soon you're going to grow up for real. He talks about that you can see things imperfectly, like a mirror. Now you think about a mirror in the ancient world, they're not like mirrors like now, right? I can't imagine very foggy, very hazy, very, very unclear. He's saying that's kind of what our life is like. Now, we don't know everything about God that we want to know, but eventually we'll see God face to face, just like Moses. Remember, this is always the hope.

Adam and Eve were walking with God in the Garden right talking with God face to face. People, the 12 disciples and others, were walking with Jesus, seeing God face to face. Moses was able to communicate with God on Mount Sinai, just seeing his backside, he glowed, but it's that whole idea of now we will come face to face with our Lord and Savior, and we will be known completely, and we will know completely, just as God now knows us completely. So that's just that love, and that's why I want to lead to our last, third and final point love will overflow for eternity.

The easiest way to think about this, because it's hard to wrap our finite minds around this, is the whole idea that the Father Son and Holy Spirit are in fellowship with each other for eternity, in both directions, and that love that they have, and we know the essence of who God is is love. Let's talk about that later in first John. But he introduces this concept right now, and he says that faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these is love. Remember that came into to a country song Alan Jackson around September 11. Those y'all that are millennials or older, you probably remember that. So he was using it to kind of bring us together after a tragedy. But the point of the this verse that faith, hope and love remain, saying that even in heaven, even the new heavens and new earth, there's going to be faith that we're faith filled looking at what God's doing, there's going to be hope that God always has hope filled people around him. But more than anything, kind of at the apex at the point is going to be what it's going to be love. Because love, what it does, going back to the fountain, illustration, is that it overflows for you and me, forever and ever. It's it's an unceasing fountain of love overflowing from the throne room of God, and mainly seen to us through the work of Christ. That's what Christ's death on a cross is celebrated and talked about even now. That's why 10 people said, Yes, I want that Jesus that you're talking about, because they understand that the hope can only be found in there. It can only be found in the grave. And the resurrection, it can only be found when we go under the water, death to self, rising to new life. So the reason why we could just indiscriminately give out love, it cost me nothing. I give it out. You can spit my face. You can slap me. You can say, I don't want that Jesus or whatever. I don't want that love you're trying to give me. I don't want the kindness you're trying to show me. That doesn't change the fact that who put it in my heart to even want to do that, and the ability to do that, that's God himself, and that even when we get to heaven, it's going to keep it's going to keep flowing towards us. This is hard for our finite minds to wrap around, isn't it? Just that whole idea of that what begins here on Earth, our relationship with God, through Jesus Christ in Heaven, through the act of love on the cross, will continue on and continue overflowing. Just think about a fountain. Think about a fountain. I know it's hard to find them, but think about a fountain that not only, not only goes like this, but it just, it just overflows, and it never ceases to overflow. That's what he's talking about here, with the idea that the love from the father so that that's very encouraging to us this morning, isn't it? That gives us now application and the ability to love others? Why? Because he first loved us. Let's pray, Father. I thank you for your word. I thank you how you have not left us wondering and wandering to ourself, I thank you for these families and those who have committed to you. And I pray right now, as I know there's spiritual darkness here, as well as spiritual hope. And I just pray that hope and love and faith wins out more than anything, Father, I want to echo back to you the words that you have already given to us, which is the greatest of these is love,

help us to love others as we have been loved by you. We ask these things in Christ's name, Amen. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you all for being here. We will be in first Corinthians chapter 12 as we continue on in our series. In first Corinthians. And I trust you've gotten a lot out of it as we continue, really another difficult passage this morning, but it's really all about kind of helping us to understand how we're to conduct ourselves in worship, in our personal lives, as it relates to how we go about our ways. And so Paul is always answering kind of a series of questions, and he's really entering a time here of spiritual gifts, as you're going to see that in chapters 1213, and 14. He does this in such an endearing way. So we'll begin first, Corinthians, 12, beginning in verse one. Now, dear brothers and sisters. Now he calls them that because they're brothers and sisters in Christ, Regarding your question about the special abilities the Spirit gives us. So he tells us what he's going to address, which is abilities or gifts of the Spirit, capital S, Holy Spirit gives us. I don't want you to misunderstand this. You know that while you were still pagans, you were led astray and swept along in worshiping speechless idols. So he's saying, listen, we've we've all been there. We've all done stupid things. We've all been a part of something that we knew wasn't right. And so he's telling them, you remember, just like you have idols of things that aren't real, he's saying we know that you participated in that. That's who you are, that's what you used to do. So now I want you to know that no one speaking by the Spirit of God will curse Jesus, and no one can say Jesus is Lord except by the Holy Spirit. So what he's laying out for the people and for us, right, all these years later, is what is going to be our foundation for understanding the topics that he's going to address to us this morning. And really the number one thing is the Lordship of Jesus Christ. We understand what lordship is, or what Lord is. And so that is what's going on here, is he's saying that that you need to come up under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. It's going to be the foundation for all that he's going to say. It's very similar to what Jesus said when he talked about that all sins will be forgiven, except for blasphemy of the Holy Spirit. What he's saying is that if you deny Jesus as Lord, you'll miss everything else. Same concept here that Paul's bringing up to the Corinthian church. There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit is the source of them all, capital S, the Holy Spirit. There are different kinds of service, but we serve the same Lord. God works in different ways. So do you see the Trinitarian things? What's going on here? Father, Son, Holy Spirit, God, Lord spirit. That's how the scriptures work. That's how our understanding of who God is. That's how He revealed Himself to us, that we pray to God, the Father, that we're able to do that by the blood of Jesus, Christ, and who he was, and that we do that by the very spirit of God. And he's saying right here, that there's different kinds of ways of serving the Lord God works in a mysterious ways or different ways, but it all comes from the same God who does the work in all of us. Right? Because we understand that when we become Christians, that the very spirit of God lives in our hearts, a spiritual gift is given to each of us so that we can help each other that's going to become key later on. Why is the gift given to each of us so that we can help each other? To one person, the Spirit gives the ability to give wise advice to another. The Spirit gives a message of special knowledge that's interchangeable. We understand knowledge and wisdom sometimes go together. The same Spirit gives great faith to another and to someone else. The one Spirit gives the gift of healing. He gives one person the power to perform miracles, to another, the ability to prophecy or prophesy. He gives someone else the ability to discern whether a message is from the Spirit of God or another spirit, lowercase s still another person is given the ability to speak in unknown languages, some translations say tongues, while another is given the ability to interpret what is being said. Is the one and only spirit who distributes all these gifts. He alone decides which gift each person should have. First point I want us to see this morning is a spiritual gift is given to help one another. They are a gift right now. You understand what a gift is. You can't earn it. When I give gifts to my children, it's not something they earn. They can earn maybe money or something where they do chores, but if we're going to give them a gift, it's being like, Hey, this is freely yours. You didn't do anything to earn this. Deserve this, but it is given to you. We often talk about giving gifts at holidays or birthdays or anniversaries, so we understand that spiritual gift is first and foremost what it's given to us.

By what? But the spirit. I want you to see that capital S all over this passage, the very holy spirit, the very spirit of God. And it is not for show or self that's become so important, because you and I are going to have questions about, How do I know if someone has the gift of healing or has the gift of being able to perform miracles, or has the gift of prophecy, or has the gift of interpreting other languages or being able to speak in other languages. And the question the foundation will always be in what way is it being used? How do you see it being performed, and how do you see it functioning, both in the church and outside the church? Is it all about self? Is it all about show? Well, then that's not from God, but is it there for the edification, which just means lifting up, building up, encouraging of the people around them? Is it to really say, as this verse does, I told you in verse seven, to help one another, that's where I got this application from, straight from these scriptures. So again, I know you're going to have questions about what these gifts are, and I'm going to come back around and hopefully talk about that further on in this passage. But I think this, this foundation, this first point, needs to be kept in mind. Alright, he's going to keep going. He's talking about the the body. Okay, so the human body has many parts. And I love how Paul, he's going to make this so clear, so applicable to you and to me, the human body has many parts, but the many parts make up one whole body, obviously, right? So we have a head, hands, heart, feet. So it is with the body of Christ. So he's, he's, he's equating the two. He's saying that we can use this as illustration to understand how the body of Christ, the church, works. Some of us are Jews, some of us are Gentiles, some of us are slaves, and some of us are free. Okay, so we come from all kinds of different backgrounds, right? We talk about this all the time. Some of us are from New Mexico. Some of us are from Mexico, some of us are from Texas or Tennessee or Alabama or Mississippi or Washington State or Connecticut or wherever, anywhere around the world. Some of us are from Russia. Some of us are from all these different places, whoever we are, wherever we come from, we have all been baptized into one body by what capital S, spirit. And we all share the same spirit, Spirit of Christ? Yes, the body has many different parts, not just one part. If the foot says I'm not part of the body because I'm not the hand, that does not make it any less a part of the body. If the ear says I'm not part of the body because I'm not an eye, would that make it any less a part of the body? If the whole body were an eye, how would you hear if your whole body were an ear, how would you smell anything? But our bodies have many different parts, and God has put each part just where he wants it. How strange a body would it be if it had only one part? Yes, there are many parts but only one body. The eye can never say to the hand, I don't need you. The head can never say the feet I don't need you. In fact, some parts of the body that seem weakest and least important are actually the most necessary, and the parts we regard as less honorable are those we clothe with the greatest care. So we carefully protect those parts that should not be seen, while the more audible parts do not require this special care. So what's he talking about? He's talking about the the private parts, right? So God has put the body together, so it's an extra honor, and care are given to those parts which have less dignity. This makes for harmony. I want you to remember this verse, because it's going to come back later in our second application point, this makes for harmony among the members, so that all the members care for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it. And if one part is honored, all parts are glad. All of you together are Christ's body in each of you is a part of it. Boy, that's such good news to see what, really what church membership is all about or the the one anothers, and what we have here at our church is what's called a church covenant, where we come together, not just as we listen to a sermon or worship, but that we're saying we covenant among one another, that is between each other, and it's between God and so that's what is going on here, as far as we can't help but to all be together, even though we're so different, that we have unity. That's what I love about Life Church, is we have unity in the midst of diversity, because we are so different. We come from such different backgrounds. Not only do we look different, but we conduct different. We like different things. We come from different parts of even the world, Burma, all kinds of places. And so second point I want us to see, though, is the goal is to be so in sync. Okay, not the group, just in sync that care overflows, right? So you got a space there. This is the proper English term of in sync that that the word here used in the.

Scripture. If you remember, I told you to note it is harmony, which is a great sort of musical term that we sort of sort of whimsical. I love that word harmony, but I think NSYNC really sort of helps us to see that this togetherness, that we're moving in the same direction together, that our aim is Christ. And you can hear it right if you come to life church, you can hear it in our prayers, you can hear it in our worship, and hopefully you can hear it in our teaching. So that's why we had a guest worship leader today. I'm so thankful for Josiah to come in and give some of our lead worshiper leaders a break. But what you saw was what you saw the same gospel. You heard the same words, the same praise, the same Exaltation of the same God. Boy, that's such good news. He comes to us by way of Phoenix, but really he comes to us by way of Kansas City. I'm just saying. We all have those kind of stories around the room. The goal is to be so in sync, so now wherever we come from. Because again, it is effort, and it always takes effort for you and I to sort of move together when we have different parts. He talks about that even with our own physical bodies. But you and I know this practically. When we try to do family reunions or we try to do anything as a group, some of y'all loved group projects. Other of y'all cringed at them, because you know how difficult it is to get everybody in the same direction, to get a team to do what they need to do. But as a church body, as we think about that, we are members of one another, the goal is to be so in sync that sure we're going to have all these different backgrounds, all these different diversity things about us, even right now as we stand together, but we have our aim as Christ, so that what overflows, so that care overflows. That's so important, because, again, we're going to ask all kinds of questions and maybe what this looks like, and I'm going to try to give some guidance on that. We're going to maybe have some biblical questions, not only on this chapter, but in 13 and 14 and those that follow. But what we're going to see right now is if that we make our aim, and we understand that as we are so in sync and as we're so united in our diversity, that people will see that that will be winsome and that they will be cared for, it will just overflow, because everything's working together. If you want to see dysfunctional teams, if you want to see toxic environments, you can go and find that anywhere. But we want to be a place that not that we have sameness, not that we all look the same and do everything the same way, but that we have this unity in the midst of our diversity. Why? Because we know who we are. We know whose we are, so we're able to be in sync. We're aiming that as our goal, that we move together to accomplish what God has for us. And then that's how kid life works. That's how student life works. That's how it works when we go out of here and we function in our different jobs and schools, and we go into our homes that have very different traditions and even socioeconomic backgrounds and where we're at and where we're heading, but it doesn't matter, because you will feel loved, right? That's what you want. You want to be a part of a church that if you find a lifer, a Life Church, person that you feel cared for. No, I felt loved. I don't know why I was at the dealership, but I felt loved. Oh, okay, that person that go to Life Church or I was out at school, and why? Why did they have such respect for the teacher, and Why'd they show up on time and have their homework ready and all their ducks in a row, because they care and try to honor the Lord in their doings and in their going about. You see how care will just overflow as you and I are united together in Christ, good things will flow from that all of a sudden, care wherever our hand and our heart touches will occur, because we are together in the main things. Alright, I want to address some of the things that come up, because he's going to list out these sort of gifts, and that's why I've saved a lot of time at the end to really sort of walk through these to help us understand maybe what these mean. So he says, Here are some of the parts God has anointed for the church, he says, first and foremost are apostles. So let me talk about that one for a minute. So what is an apostle? So quite simply, that the easiest way to understand what is an apostle, or apostleship, is it's it's someone who's been commissioned by God first and foremost, you and I don't self declare ourselves to be an apostle be commissioned by God, but the big one that you see over and over again in the scriptures is an eyewitness to the resurrection. That's so important, as we think about why do we listen to Paul? You know, almost 2000 years later, because he tells us, I was an eyewitness to the resurrection, an apostle in undue time, I met Jesus after all the other guys had walked with him on Earth for three years, I met him on the road to Damascus. And I really met the Lord Jesus Himself, and He commissioned me as a apostle. You also see.

Um, not only I went to the resurrection, but the commissioning. So I would argue that the sort of Office of apostleship has gone away. Why? Because the scriptures are closed. All the words that we have in our Bible were completed. Scholars sort of put the latest stage that you can sort of think of as 90 ad that makes sense in 33 ad, these guys may have been as young as 14 or 16 when they first met Jesus, and he he called them to Himself, and so if they lived to be older, which is the only one that we know who lived to be older by tradition, is John himself, as he was exiled on the island of Patmos. The rest of the disciples were martyred to death in the first century. And so we see that the Office of being an apostle, as we understand it, I think, in the scriptures, has been complete. Now you will every once in a while find people who take the title of apostle and Bishop and man. They have to define those things in their own way. I do think sometimes people take the gift of apostle and take it well, that just means someone who's an entrepreneur or someone who has sort of city favor or community leadership, fine, but I don't think that's what's going on here. Those may be apostolic giftedness. Those may be gifts of someone who was an apostle. But I think that the actual office, as we understand it, was limited to those two things. Second, are prophets. Now, in the Old Testament, you know, had a prophet as someone who speaks for God. The New Testament hadn't even been written yet, and there were only parts of the Old Testament. So a lot of times when you met a prophet, you sort of keyed in, because you're like, Whoa. This is one, a prophetess, female Prophet, male, who speaks for God. Now, I think, as you look into the New Testament and how prophecy is used, and this isn't all that we're going to say on it's going to come back again in First Corinthians 14, but I want to give you sort of a taste of what I think the office of a prophet is, it's one who's a truth teller. A prophetic word is someone who says a word to you, whether it's from a stage like this, or a one on one conversation or a group conversation that pierces the heart because it's true about who God is and his nature or character, or true from who he is from the scriptures. Let me say it a different way, when you find yourself asking, Did I just receive a prophetic word or a revelation? Lowercase L, not not biblical, not authoritative, but someone who just says, Man, I think God has shown me this, or he's revealed this to me to share with you. Or I think this may be something you need to consider, or I have an inkling, or I have a hunch, that this is something you ought to think about. You may be engaging someone who's trying to give you a word, a word from God. Now here's what's great about prophecy, so that you don't get all weirded out about it. It has to coincide with who God is in the scriptures. So if you feel like, whether it's a communicator, a preacher up on stage like me, or someone on a one on one setting, and you ask yourself, man, I'm not sure that's from God. Number one, you can just ask yourself for anyone, is is that true about who God is in the scriptures? Is there a verse I can go to that pretty much says the same thing? Well, then that that's that maybe, or probably, is from God. Or you just ask Council of wisdom of people you trust, who you know are Christ followers. Hey, someone said this to me, or I heard this. Do you think that sounds right? And then by that, you can test to see if those prophetic words are true. So that is what I think is the gift of prophecy. It's the ability of an individual to proclaim truth in such a way where it resonates, it hits you in your heart, it it scratches where you're itching, so to say. But it can all be tested. None of us are sort of in that age where we're like, Hey, I'm going to tell you something I just heard from God. You can write this down. It's like whoa, unless you're about to quote Scripture, we don't, we don't talk that way, we don't think that way, because that's not how God has given people prophecy in our day. Third, our teachers, I think that's a little bit more self explanatory, but those who have the ability and the gift to be able to make things in the scriptures, understandable, clarity, all those kind of things, and so you can have teachers at Sunday school level, or what you would call small group level, or from the stage level. Then those who do miracles. Again, I take it from the scriptures that we're reading the scriptures because we believe things still occur. Things are still around remnants of even from the first century on forward. Of course, there's miracles. I mean, we've, you've heard, you know, testimony already of something that man that can't be explained scientifically. If a doctor says, Listen, you, by all scientific means, should either be in great pain or dead, but we cannot explain it. We don't under.

Standing, but somehow you're healed. Somehow you're okay. Somebody was praying for you, somebody came by and said a word, somebody came by and even touched you like Jesus would touch to heal. And so what happens is, is that there is still around the gift of healing, or miracles. I think I've already just kind of explained the second one as well. Those often go together. When people have questions about miracles, they often have questions about healing. Again, it's not going to be for show. So if you see things on TV where people are zapping people, or they're falling over or it's a big show, that's not how these things work, any of the spiritual gifts, because we're going to get into one that I'm sure you have some thoughts on here in a minute, on the area of tongues and but I would say in all these what is called, often the charismatic gifts. And charisma just means by the Spirit. So I'm not afraid of that word, but different denominations, Pentecostals and others, have sort of taken it to mean something that I don't think it means. We're going to talk about why I see it that way. But right from the get go, we're not the people that say, Listen, healing and miracles aren't around anymore. Oh, they very much are, but they're done in the quiet places. They're done not on stage, not as a show, but to say, man, look at what the Lord's doing. Look what he's doing in my life. Look what he's doing in your life. That is nothing short of a miracle, and I experience it, you know, on a weekly basis, on things that should not be so, right? If you kind of have that idea, it's like there's a favor of God on your on your life, or on someone's life around you. And you're like that can't be explained by natural means. All of a sudden you realize that that God is doing something in the life of maybe yourself or those around you, miracles, healing. Next verse, it says, Those who can help others, that's just the gift of helps, right? Um, it's the only time it's mentioned in the Scripture, but I think it's a great understanding of those who come alongside those who have the gift of leadership or administration, again, those are real gifts, right? People who have the ability to sort of put things together and lead others towards a goal. We can look at this both historically biblical and extra biblical, and understand that those occur. But he's saying in this special way, these things are given to us by the Spirit to lead the church. And you can have one gift, you got many gifts. And this can also be talked about talents. Jesus talked about them. And then finally, this phrase here that I'm sure some of you have questions about those who speak in unknown languages, or what is often called the gift of tongues. So I want to talk a little bit about that. I want to take a pause. And I don't know how many of y'all are interested in this, or kind of want to know what I think the scriptures sort of say about this one. Well, here's, here's my best shot at trying to explain it. So first and foremost, let's just look in the Bible, when you go back to Acts, and you understand how was the gift of tongues originally, sort of expressed, and it's so clear that at Pentecost, right the day that Jesus goes up and Holy Spirit comes down, and you see the whole idea of like tongues of fire and all this stuff going on Acts chapter two, what is going on there? And what's going on there is that someone is addressing a crowd, and all of the sudden people begin to understand what is being said in their own language. And so all of a sudden we understand this to be a miracle. But what is going on there? It is a known language that the people are all of a sudden hearing from whatever platform or stage they had in the first century there in Jerusalem. So it seems to me that what's going on there, for sure, is this sort of language that is known now. You see here that similarly, you have people gathered who, by somehow miraculous, by the Spirit of God, can speak a language that they haven't been trained in,

and because there are other people who maybe don't speak that language in the crowd you have an interpreter with them. So be real clear. I think it's very clear in this passage. Now I'm going to punt for First Corinthians 14, where we talk about, maybe that idea of utterances and and what about things that aren't understandable, but in terms of a public platform and those that other people are hearing and listening. It seems to me that what tongues is is an unknown language by the person who is there who all of a sudden speaks in such a way that if you're of a different language, that you can understand it. You can understand that tongue. Now the one caveat I was going to say is that there may be sort of a utterance, some sort of language, some sort of prayer language, some sort of private prayer language that that God gives people when they are so overcome by the spirit that that all of a sudden what comes out isn't clear.

Right? That may happen, that may occur. I'm not sure if that's tongues or not. We're going to talk about that further in First Corinthians 14, but I think that may occur. That's not what's going on here, because what's going on here is a sort of orderly public way to do ministry. It's very similar to what we talked about in the last chapter, right? That whole idea of, here's how we do worship, decently and orderly. Make sure people are are cleaned up. They're right before God, before they before they lead others, I think, in similar way that we don't want to find ourselves sort of speaking something that that has no understanding to most of the people or everybody, but we're, all sudden, speaking in what is often called by charismatics or by Pentecostals tongues, where you might have a whole congregation just bust out in

all these utterances that nobody understands. I don't see that anywhere in the scripture you always have one person, maybe orderly, saying something that someone else then interprets for them. And so so we as a church don't practice that. Now, the other thing to know about that historically, if you're interested at all, is as we understand the Pentecostal or charismatic movement that has swept through a lot of I know understand Hispanic culture and even South America and across a lot of America, that did not exist until early in the 1900s early in the 20th century. So that's something you consider historically that was never really understood as tongues. That was something that occurred in those days under that tradition. So if you don't that's not a full enough explanation for you. We'll readdress that when it comes up in First Corinthians 14, are we all apostles? So now he's going to ask this question of whatever you think about the spiritual gifts, or whatever you think about these different offices. He's saying, We can't do all this anyways. He's actually asking some rhetorical questions, almost sarcastically, are we all apostles? Are we all prophets? Are we all teachers? Do we have the power to do miracles? Do we have all the gift of healing? Do we have all the ability to speak in unknown languages. Do we all have the ability to interpret those unknown languages? Of course, not exclamation point. So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts. But now let me show you a way of life that is best of all. So

unknown languages do have? Yeah, okay, so that's the same thing. It's just giving just giving the reference there. So third

and final point this morning, put yourself in a position of love for others,

and you'll be the most helpful.

So again, wherever you land, and thinking about these different spiritual gifts, which we believe God's given them to us, we think that God, who's the same in the first century. Is the same today, but put yourself in a position for love for others, and you'll be the most helpful. I don't know what you what you think about what Paul was doing there. At the end, he says, I'm going to show you a better way. He's teamed up to the next chapter next week, which is that great love chapter, First Corinthians 13, that's often read it weddings, that whole idea of love is the greatest of all, and that's really what we're aspiring for. So he's teeing that up. And but before we get there, I think this is the point. Put yourself in a position of love for others, and you'll be the most helpful I get that from that last verse. So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts. How is it that God has wired you and me? Let's lean into that. And if you don't know what that is, start somewhere. Right. Start somewhere. That doesn't mean everyone can do anything, right? I'm not about to to say that, because some of us are better at some things than other, both naturally and supernaturally. So. Again, it's very hard to divide sort of natural giftedness, which can be learned and taught. You guys know people who are communicators, who are speakers, who have nothing to do with the Spirit of God, but I do think what God loves to do is he loves to use our wiring, which your wiring consists of, both your your your upbringing and your environment, right? So leaders aren't just born, they can be formed and shaped and made, right? So he loves to use that, along with the very spirit of God inside you and me to make something beautiful and great. So it doesn't mean that you and I can do everything, but we can put ourselves out there and loving others and good things will come to them and to yourself. I don't know if you've ever thought about this in terms of serving.

When you think about loving others and serving, I mean this in the most small ways, whether it's a spouse or a roommate or someone you live with, family member or otherwise, or I mean this in the way you do this in your work environment or school, and of course, I mean this in the way you do your your your serving in church.

It doesn't work the way we think, because what we naturally probably think is, man, I don't want to get up and serve them because just.

Make me tired, or I don't really want to, I don't really feel like it, or they're going to ask more of me. Or we even go even further. We're like, man, they don't really deserve it. Why should I take that paper off the copier to that employee? He or she never does anything for anyone else, or, you know, why should I make my boss look good? He doesn't give the opportunity to make me look good, and so we just don't want to serve. And what we're doing when we do that is we're doing the opposite of love, which is we understand this is being selfish. But here's the cool thing is, if we'll just lean in to figuring out, okay, I'm going to help. I'm going to help. God help me to know where you want me. Help me to know where I can be used. Help me to know where I can love. I'm just going to step into that by faith. You can dip your toe in. That's fine. We're not asking you to to dive in or jump in head first or feet first, or whatever. But what you'll begin to see is they get the blessing, right? So if you're good to roommates, spouse, family member, bring them something, do something for them. Again, it's not based off of whether they merit it or deserve it, they probably don't, because they're a sinner, just like you and me, but they get the blessing. Now here's what's cool about the way the kingdom of God works, then all of a sudden you get the blessing, right? Because you feel better about yourself because you've done something for someone. Why? Because you're doing it for God's glory, if you're doing it all for self, you and I will always have some sort of exchange, tit for tat, right? Just that whole idea of like, you do this for me, I'll do this for you, and somehow we'll do this exchange, and we'll be both better off for it. Those are transactional relationships. We often have those at work environments and all that. I mean, I'm not saying to do away with those, but I'm talking about loving and helping, expecting or knowing you're not going to get anything in return, but you really will, because they get the blessing. You get the blessing. And who gets the glory? God? And I don't know if you've ever thought about this before, but our acts of serving in love and helping

is a way for God's glory to be made much of and for us to be satisfied, for us to feel like man, like God, you're doing something in me. You're You're the hope of glory. The very spirit of God lives inside you and me. So obedience and your happiness are not at odds, right? That's another reason why sometimes people kind of stay away from church, because they'll be like, if I go to church and I get cleaned up, I'm going to, you know, lose all my fun, or something like that. It's like, that's not it at all. Your life's really chaotic and a mess. You thought you were okay, but you and I really weren't. But all of a sudden, as we step into what God has for us and we're we're faithful to just serve and love, just a little bit more obedience and our happiness are not at odds. They tend to go together. People who are faithful in the same direction

that is good and honoring to God get the good things that come with us, selfishness, which is what really a lack of love, it kills yourself and those around you. Have you ever noticed that love snowballs into more love in your environment? If you start doing this at your at your home or at your workplace or at your church, it'll snowball into more love, but also the the reverse is true. If you and I have lack of love, and we're the ones perpetuating selfishness and lack of love in our environment, that'll snowball itself and it'll kill yourself and those around you, do you want to rob yourself of blessings? Do you want to rob others of the blessings of yourself if you're if you're doing what God has you to do, not in a showy way, not in a look at me way, but just in a way. He says, Man, this is what God's put in my hand. This is what he's given me, and I want to share it and give it to others as much as I can. And so we just get out there, and we put ourselves in a position of love in our home and our sphere of influence in our church. We're about to enter a time of interim leadership at our church, we haven't been there before. We never have been there before. In this church, we had the founding pastor, and then I came in right after the the founding pastor, five years ago. Now I want you to know that there's a plan and there's a process, but those plans and processes are dependent on Life Church being the church, being us that that lean in and serve and love this church, because, why? Because we're all members of one another, that we're all interdependent upon one another, and God loves us, and that if we'll just step out and love and be a blessing and serve, not only will those around us get that, but then we'll get that in return. I want to say it again, God's glory and your satisfaction and happiness, whatever words you want to use, are not at odds.

What would make me the most happy is in the months to come that if I could, you know, somehow round the corner of kid life, or you round the corner of kid life, student life, or maybe a worship meeting before the service, the greeting team gathering before the service, and all of a sudden, everybody's just doing their own thing. That I'll be I'll be gone months from now, but everyone's just doing their own thing. They're doing what they're they're just loving each other, they're just smiling, they're just shaking hands, they're just leading worship. They're just taking care of the kiddos, the little ones among them. They're praying for our students. They're engaging with our students and.

All these kind of things. They're just being a member of the body, as we just talked about, because we all need each other. We're all interdependent on each other. We're loving others. We're serving God. We're being happy in the process, in helping others as well. That would be amazing, because that's all that this is about. Anyways, it's never about me or any main leader, communicator, speaker up here. It's about God and His glory, and God's glory rests among us, because God's glory, the hope, is where it's in you and it's in me. And that's a great thing and a comforting thing and a hopeful thing. So yeah, we'll move into time. We'll maybe be sad to depart, but it's to what is to see each other again, if not in this life, in the life to come. Let's pray, Father. We, thank you for your word. We, thank you how you teach us to help one another and serve one another. I pray for Life Church right now that we would just be men and women who lean in, lean into what you have to for us this day and all the days of our life. We love you, Lord. We ask these things in Christ's name and for His glory. Amen

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Sermon Transcript:

Please join me in welcoming our very own Pastor Brent to continue the first Corinthians series.

Thank you so much. Appreciate that Hannah and Sally and the band. If you have your Bibles, please turn with me to First Corinthians chapter 11. If not, we'll have all the Scripture up on a stage, give him on where we've been. And while we're going through this series, we see similarities between the ancient city of Corinth and our own modern day, El Paso and culture and in the West. And we have already looked at Chapters one through four, where he addresses leadership and divisions and calls for unity, we've addressed issues of sexual immorality and singleness and marriages, we've addressed the law, your issues with litigation, we've talked about idle food, and just our calling in Christ. And today, we're going to turn into a new section on corporate worship, really how we are to function as worshipers within the body of Christ within a church community. Now, the passage that we're going to read today, I just want to be honest with you, it's one of the most difficult passages that I've talked through since being your pastor five years this fall. And so it's difficult and so even as you read it, you're gonna like, I don't like that I don't like the sound of that. And I would just say in my name, and like my interpretations of it, I would just say hold off on throwing your fruits and vegetables to the end. Well, as we're in El Paso throw off from holding, you're throwing your coffee and burritos at me to the end, because you might like the interpretation when it gets to the very end. So Revelation, I mean, that revelation, First Corinthians chapter 11, beginning in verse one says this, and you should imitate me just as I imitate Christ. This is the apostle Paul,

who wrote the majority in the New Testament wrote First Corinthians, he's just saying, Imitate me as I imitate Christ. I'm so glad that you always keep me in your thoughts, and you're following the teachings I pass on to you. But there's one thing I want you to know. The head of every man is Christ, the head of woman is man, and the head of Christ is God. A man dishonors his head if he covers his head while praying or prophesying. But a woman dishonors her head as she prays or prophesies without a covering on her head. For this is the same as shaving her head. Yes, if she refuses to wear a head covering, she should cut off all her hair. But since it is shameful for a woman to have her hair cut, or her head shaved, she should wear covering man should not wear anything on his head when worshipping for a man is made in God's image and reflects God's glory. And a woman reflects man's glory, for the first man didn't come from woman, but the first woman came from man, and a man was not made for one, but a woman was made from man for this reason. And because the angels are watching, a woman should wear a covering on her head to show she is under authority. But among the Lord's people, women are not independent men and men are not independent of women. For although the first woman came from man, every other man was born from a woman and everything comes from God. I guess, as you understand this, and as you sort of are getting an inkling of what we're going to talk about this morning, you can understand the difficulty, and maybe even the hardship that we may have in thinking about this this morning. But I want to throw up the first sort of point that I see in this passage, which is men and women are different. And you might say, Well, I think there's a lot more going on here than that. And I would say yes. But we are grappling with distinctives and similarities. How are men and women? How are they equal, yet different. And then we're also going to look at this principle of leadership or authority that word is used in here. And we'll talk about what that means. And what are the implications for our home life or church life, which is obviously what he's addressing here, with talking about how we pray or prophesy, and then living in the culture at large. We're going to punt that to the next section, but I'll, I'll work through that. Alright, so let's um, if you don't mind, in the back of you'll go back to the beginning of the passage here, I'd really want to go slow enough so that we can really sort of again grapple with some of these distinctive, some of these differences that are being pointed out by Paul, between men and women. The first thing he says, He wants you to know that

the head of every man is Christ, and the head of woman is man and the head of Christ is God. This is a very difficult even section from the get go. But it seems to be that as you saw Christ here on earth, that He was led by God, you saw him driven out by God the Spirit into the wilderness, you saw many times him submit his will to the Father, that you see that even though God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit are equal, it seems to me that while he was here on earth, there were implications of some differences and even some ways in which he deferred being Jesus deferred to the Father. And so you're gonna, I think, see that in what I would say marital relationships. So when you see this whole idea of of man and woman

Ask yourself, are they talking about all men? For all women? Are they talking about something that is in marital relationships, and often I think it's going to be in marital relationships. So let's see how he goes on to talk about this. So if he covers his head, while praying, or prophesying, that's probably not good. But a woman does honors, if she doesn't have one on there. Now, I'm gonna go ahead and tell you that it's obvious that these are cultural ways of distinguishing men and women, right. And we even have some of this leftover from our culture in the Middle East, right. So if you go, and you take a plane to the Middle East, and I don't know, if some of y'all have served in those areas, as military, you're gonna see women's and full garb and all that kind of stuff. And so you're gonna see that they're keeping some semblance of these cultural things that have been going on for centuries. I would even say, in our culture, we have kept some of these similarities in our church or spiritual environments, because how often have you been someplace, and when you go to pray, you'll see a man take off his bald cap or take off his, you know, cowboy hat or whatever, maybe hold it over his heart or hold it down to the side and say, okay, and we're entering a time of prayer, just out of really some principles that you've learned here, I'm going to do that. And oftentimes, still, we see the idea that women tend to have their hair long, and men tend to have it short. I don't think that's the full point here. I'll talk about that in a minute. But that is something that's brought up here. Okay. So again, what's going on here? I think it's cultural things that then have spiritual implications. What's obvious, though, is that men and women are praying or prophesying. Amen. That's important. Because you think about what we just did here up as a church, we had women praying, we had membrane, we had men leading in worship, we had women leading worship, you had them saying a word from the Lord, both men and women. And really, we're going to ask ourselves, how is he helping us as a church, make sure we're doing this in a correct, orderly, decent manner. And I'll get into that in a minute. So if she refuses to wear a head covering, she should cut off all her hair. Why? Because in that culture, right, the only people who would have had their hair completely shaved like that, maybe like a temple prostitute or something like that. So you're saying you don't want to be a part of that kind of thing. Make sure your women look like women and your men look like men. And not only that, but that they have done what they're supposed to do to not be what shameful. So one of the things you're gonna see in this passage, and stick with me, I know, this is hard, but we'll get there. One thing you're gonna see in this passage is this whole idea of honor and shame. And so we don't live in an honor, shame culture, again, you can go to different parts of the world. And they have a more honor and shame culture, it was definitely one in which Paul was speaking to go and go the next slide.

I mentioned it wear anything on his head when worshipping for he's made in God's image and reflects God's glory. That's good, we understand that. So where he's gonna go next is all the way back to the beginning. He's gonna go all the way back to Genesis, and he's gonna talk to us about the idea that you remember the story, you remember how it came about that God made Adam first. And then he made woman or he made Eve from man, that's all he's talking about here. We know that he's not talking about this in some sort of inequality. Because we're gonna go on in the passage and see how both men and women are interdependent on each other. They're different, but they're interdependent on each other. So that's what he's saying here. He said, the first one didn't come from one but the woman came from what his rib his side. And he goes, the next one is idea of why was she even brought the next slide. Why was even brought to Adam, and you know this from the story, if you know the story, well, what that there was no suitable helper, there was no suitable companion for him, among what the wild animals are beasts. And so what did God do, he brought the two together. And you can see very clearly from Genesis on forward, that they're created in the image of God, because he says that in Genesis 126, and he even goes on in this passage, we'll see here in a minute, that he's not setting up some sort of hierarchy of like, what we'd often call patriarchy or something, that idea that, that men are in charge of the of the country, in the culture in the world, and the woman just has to do whatever the men say, in a country, culture or world, I get that we've had that at different points in history. And you can find that at different points of the world. I don't think that's what's going on here. I think he's talking about some distinctive differences. And he's really helping us to see that whoever's worshipping up on stage, whether they're praying or prophesying. And let me just say a word about prophesying here. Prophets, which you understand that prophets in the Old and even New Testament, if they're a female, they're called a prophetess. Just like we call a waiter, if it's a male waitress, if it's a female Deacon, if it's a male servant, Deacon, so if it's a female servant, you get all this. So what was a prophet in the Old and New Testament? What was a prophetess? In the Old and New Testament? It's what it's one who speaks for God. And so when you see this in the New Testament, asking, Okay, do we still have prophecy around today? We'll get into that

In First Corinthians 14, but I would just say the short version is that yes, we still have men and women who speak a word for God and maybe even from God. But the way that's gonna occur is that's gonna curve it straight from the scriptures, because we now have the Scriptures. And so now, if someone claims to be a prophet or a prophetess of God,

they make sure that what they're saying comes from Scripture. And if not, then they're not a legitimate Prophet, or prophetess. So what he's concerned about and what we should be concerned about, and we make sure things occur decent and orderly up here, is that the men and women who are up here praying, or their lives, right, if they're married, do we know anything in their life that would disqualify them from being up on stage? I think that's what it's all about. And how do we know this? Because this is how Jesus talked about when he gave us practical advice. He's all concerned about our hearts. But he's also concerned about it being done in decent orderly way. Because how we present ourselves says something about ourselves in third culture, women would have had head coverings and men would have not women, all women would have had long hair. So you're saying, okay, can women not have short hair now? No, but I think the point we have to ask ourselves is, well, but women have to look like women and men have to look like men. And those are some cultural things that we figure out because we know it when we see it. Right? So we don't want to say, Okay, we're going to become a church, like some churches have, where all the women wear skirts, and all the girls don't cut their hair at all. They went past their rear or whatever like that. No, I mean, there's churches that do that, because they're trying to obey some of these passages. I don't think that's what that's talking about. That's cultural. But I do think it's talking about, make sure that when you're presenting yourself in praying or prophesying, whether a man or a woman, that is your man, make sure you look culturally like a man in your culture. If you're a woman, make sure you look culturally like a woman in your culture, and make sure that there's nothing going on in your life that would disqualify you from leading us in prayer or prophetic work. Make sense? All right, because here's what he's saying. But among glorious people, women are not independent of men. And men are not independent of women. That's why I say it has to be that there's some sort of equality here for although the first woman came from man, every other man was born from a woman and everything comes from God. The second thing I would say is that we don't like that word authority. I talked a little bit about shame and honored culture, and how we want to make sure we honor each other in worship, and that we want honorable men and women to lead us whether it's preaching or, or whatever, right, prophesying or praying. But I think the other thing we need to understand is that leadership and authorities, okay, we live in a time right now, where authorities fallen on hard times, those of us that are in classrooms, or those of us that are in the workforce, we know this, that when we start to tell someone that is wrong, you failed that test, we often feel like oh, man, I can't talk to someone like that. We because we don't like the idea that the teacher has the authority of the classroom, and has the ability and the authority to give you an A or an F based off performance. Now, that was true for most of world history. But authority has fallen on hard times, right? Same thing happens, whether you are a manager of a pizza store, you feel almost guilty or bad as the person in charge who owns or manages the pizza store to say, hey, you cannot turn the pizzas up to 600 degrees, you'll burn them every time I'm in charge, turn the temperature down, you're burning too many pizzas. And if you can't figure this out, you're gonna get fired. Like, whoa, oh, my gosh, that sounds so harsh. How can you say that to him or her your employee? Why? Because you have authority. So I'm gonna use also another word that we're more comfortable with, as long as it doesn't rub us the wrong way, right, which is leadership, which I think is a lot of what's going on here. That men and women and even men and women in the church, we all understand that someone's gonna have to be in charge, someone's gonna have to lead. And again, I think he's given us some guidance, not only in this passage, but in other passages of the Bible to figure out what does it mean that you have a home setup? Because I think it starts first in the home, where a man is a leader. And the woman can be a leader too. But there is some sense in which he is leaving the home. What does that look like? And I want to say that the church and culture have really botched this at times, because we've we've focused too much on the roles, okay, well, a woman cooks and a man does this or whatever. It's like, no, what if your husband's a chef? What if he's a five star chef? Well, okay, well, then I don't know. You know, you want him cooking. Same thing with money. It's like, well, the man handles the finances. What if he married an accountant? You see where those things break down? Because those are cultural things that we think well if you lead or you're in charge, you handle you know, the money or the going out and working or whatever. But I will say that you and I have to figure that out both biblically and culturally and in our homes, and ultimately in our church. What does it look like to keep some semblance of

male leadership in the home and in the church, and we can disagree about some of those things, and we can find ourselves having to figure those things out. But ultimately, that's what this passage is talking about. The other thing it's talking about, is also going back to that shame and honor culture aspect is what are you and I doing when we represent Christ out there? Because it's so important that when you pray, or prophesy, or do anything in worship, that you're in a right place, and you're gonna see that later on, we talked about the Lord's Supper. And I think it's most easily said maybe in an old country song, I say old because it's like 15 years old. I don't know if any of y'all know Dirk Bentley, but he's a country artists and one of his songs is called my last name. I think it's some of these lyrics are interesting. And it really talks about what I think the other aspect is going on here in this passage of the idea of shame, and honor it with Christ. This is Dirks Bentley's song, my last name, he said, I learned to ride it, talking about his last name. When I first started school, some bully didn't like it. He said, It didn't sound too cool. So I had to hit him. And all I said, when that blood came down, is my last name. And then he goes on, he says, my grandpa took it off to Europe to fight the Germans in the war. Nobody wears dog tags anymore. It's written on a headstone in a field where my grandpa is laid, and he says, It's my last name. And he talks about it's traced down, it's given to him. And he talks about how his father tells him, he first comes to this conclusion, he says that my father tells me, may I never bring it shame. It's my last name. Daddy always told me far back, as I can recall, saying, you're part of something you represent us all. So keep it how you got it, as solid as it came. So this word that's repeated throughout this passage of head? I think it has with it two aspects, I think it does have authority or leadership. So whether we like it or not, I know authorities fall on hard times the words in the Bible, it is still exercised in our culture by our police and government and our teachers, and definitely in our workplaces. And I think it has to be exercised somewhere in our home life and in our church life. Because someone's got to be in charge. Someone's got to lead in biblically, the way I've seen that God set it up is we've got to figure out what does it mean, to have male leadership in a home, that doesn't mean that all women listen to all men or anything like that we're talking about a home thing. And then I think it has implications for the church. But the other thing that's going on here is that as you and I go, as you and I minister, as we, as we go about our work in the church and outside the church, know that who do we represent, and who do we not want to bring dishonor or shame towards the name of Christ, or to our family, since the other thing I think that's going on here that because we have a head, it's just like, in my family, we have more family, we have more kids, and that when I send my sons and my daughters Shiloh out, I say, act right? When you get out there, right? If you go to someone's house, don't be rude. And I mean, if you go into school, don't be this kind of person, be the person who leads out in doing righteous things and good things because of why, because you don't want to bring dishonor and shame on the head of the household. And we even think about this, even in terms of right now, when you're signing up for school, or you're signing up for even the way different documents work. They asked us even on your taxes, whose head of the household, so we don't, we don't need to be afraid of those kind of words, and that kind of lingo. And again, it doesn't have implications, I think, all throughout the workforce. So we can have women CEOs, we can even have a woman president. But the idea is, what are their policies? What are they about? Are they more towards godliness, and righteousness or less towards godliness and righteousness? Whether they're a man or a woman? All right. So I want to do about that. Maybe that's as clear as mud and helpful to us. Men and women are different. I'm gonna say something more about some distinctiveness here in a minute. next passage is 13 through 16. And it says this, Judge for yourselves, is it right for a woman to pray to God in public without covering her head? Again, that's a cultural distinctive, that we have some aspect of still in our day and age. Isn't it obvious that it's disgraceful for a man to have long hair? And again, is that what I'm saying today? Now I'm saying what is the equivalent cultural thing? And I think it's that men look like men and women look like women, and isn't long here, a woman's pride and joy, for it has been given to her as a covering. But if anyone wants to argue about this, I simply say that we have no other custom than this, and neither do God's other churches. So what is he trying to do? He's trying to bring order the worship order for what we're trying to do up here. So this is my second point this morning. masculinity and femininity matter.

Now, again, this has fallen on hard times in our culture to in the last 20 years, whether it's been authority and leadership issues, I don't like to be told what to do masculinity and femininity has fallen on hard times as well. So these are not political issues, first and foremost, although they seem like that at time, right because they're almost

charged up, I can almost feel the angst that you feel sitting here to hearing this, like, oh, man, I don't know where he's gonna go with this. But it should have just been basically understood for 1000s of years. It is a philosophical and ultimately theological statement to talk about how men and women are similar in some ways, but different in other ways in every culture, in every time period has had to grapple with, what do we think those differences are? What are those differences for our own culture and 2024. And so it's time and where we live, everybody has to grapple with it, you can't just deny that reality. The debacle at the opening ceremony of the Olympics is a good example of this of what happens when we're confused as a Western culture, about what is going on with men and women gender confusion, when we're not certain are clear about masculinity and femininity. I don't know if you saw that. But it was just that whole idea of not only did you have kind of what happened there with the Lord's Supper, and kind of what all was going on to the left and right of that, but you had, again, someone who looked like they were in a swimsuit, or a bathing suit with a beard on skating through the place is like what is going on here? There's just confusion on masculinity and femininity. And you might even push back and say, Well, Brian, I thought we're supposed to love and accept everyone. Because then when they asked the Olympic people about why did they do that, all those things, and the blue man was nobody knows what he was doing. But but the idea is why why aren't we supposed to love people are different than us? Isn't that a Christian trait or attribute or characteristic? Yes, loving people who are different than us. That is a good thing. But loving people is also warning individuals inside the church and outside the church of danger and stupidity, right? I mean, if you and I are walking in downtown El Paso, El Paso like I often do, I would want somebody if I'm staring down at my smartphone and going across the crosswalk before it's time to pull me and snatch me back. He said, Well, that's not very cool. You shouldn't really, you know, be touching people. You don't know what I know, you and I will be thankful for that. Right? Because why they're snatching us from danger. They're also snatching us from the stupidity of trying to look at our smartphones while we're going across the crosswalk. The other thing I would say is that mocking the things of God is insulting and dangerous. Right? So again, we're outside the category of just simply loving someone who's different than us. We're actually warning those in the culture in the church outside the church, that we are not simply existing to live and let live, right? Because that's what we're being told is that, man, let's just let all this stuff go. Don't worry about these kinds of things, if you find it insulting, because you know, someone else is different than you. And you've got to embrace all that. It's like, No, when you find someone or something, or people trying to take down all that is sacred and holy, and replace it with something that's dimmable and unholy, you and I have to be wise enough to stand up, say, watch out. There's danger there, if you go down that. And I will also say is that God will not be mocked, and that he will ultimately have his way in this world. And in the next. So you said, What does this have to do? Because you seem like you're going off politically, I'm not meaning to I'm trying to say that what's going on here that we're observing around us is really, really theological. What does this passage have to do? What does that have to do with this passage in church conduct? So we're to conduct ourselves as men and women who are honorable, right? Who makes sure that there's not anything up in our lives as we're up here praying or giving a word from God, that would really be a hindrance to the very word we're trying to share. And that we conduct ourselves that you when you look at me, or you look at a female, you'd say, okay, I can tell that's a woman, I can tell that a man does that again, say, Well, you're not welcome here. If you don't have that figured out yet. No, man, we have all kinds of people come from all kinds of places. If you're, you know, I know we all have we all have, at least I do, I'll speak from so we all have cousins who have different persuasions, on sexual issues that maybe you are, I do not speak for me. That doesn't mean that I can't go and be with them or hang out with them at times. It just means that we understand that when you put yourself in a position of helping conduct worship, you better figured some of those things out. And you better figure out a way to honor God in your home life in your church life. And I think it does have some cultural implications, as I'm sort of talking about here. All right, that's a big first two points. Now we're gonna get Lord's Supper. By the way, the hanging we go. All right, let's go the Lord's Supper here. And it really has similar aspects that we're getting to but in the following instructions, I cannot praise you, which is not good. I'm kidding. Imagine that Paul himself when he's writing a letter to us as he wrote a letter to you and me at Life Church. Hey, I don't know what you guys are doing down there. But I cannot

praise us and wow, that's what he's saying. For it sounds as if you're more harm than good is done when you meet together, man, that's another blow. First, I hear that there are divisions among you when you meet as a church, and to some extent, I believe it. But of course, there must be divisions among you, so that you have God's approval will be recognized. When you meet together, you're not really interested in the Lord's Supper. For some of you heard eat your own meal without sharing with others. As a result, some go hungry, while others get drunk. What? Don't you have your own homes for eating and drinking? Or do you really want to disgrace God's Church and shame the poor? What am I supposed to say? You want me to praise you? Well, I certainly will not praise you for this. For I pass on to you what I received from the Lord Himself. On the night when he was portrayed the Lord Jesus took some bread, and gave thanks to God for it, then he broke it in pieces and said, This is My body which is given for you do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, This cup is the new covenant between God and His people in agreement confirmed with my blood, Jesus talking here, Do this in remembrance of me as often as you drink it. For every time you drink this bread and drink this cup, eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord's death until it comes again. So anyone who eats his bread, or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthy is guilty of sinning against the body and the blood of the Lord. That is why you should examine yourself before eating the bread and drinking the cup. For if you eat the bread and drink the cup, without honoring the body of Christ, you are eating and drinking God's judgment upon yourself, as many of you are weak and sick, and some have died, have even died. But if you would examine ourselves, we would not be judged by God in this way. Yet, when we are judged by the Lord, we're being disciplined, so that we will not be condemned along with the world. So my dear brothers and sisters, when you gather for the Lord's Supper, wait for each other, if you're really hungry, eat at home. So you won't bring judgment upon yourselves when you meet together. I give you instructions about the other matters after I arrived. So this is still about how to conduct things in worship. And that's why again, I wanted to go through first Corinthians because I think it really helps us as a church know how has to be set up and solidified.

Third point this morning, want us to see is that equality around the Lord's table matters, equality around the Lord's table matters. You can see this here, because we're equal at the foot of the cross. You see this over and over again, in this passage, he wants them to be united around what around the Lord's Supper, he wants him to understand that listen, you don't want first class citizens and first class people in the church, and then coach and then the ones that are all the way back to the bathroom where they can't lean back. And after the flushing the whole time, you know, I'm talking about on the plane, you don't, you don't want to have all these different classes in the church, because we're all one. He talks about this also in James, where you see that he says, Listen, you don't want to always have these places of honor for those who are rich and that kind of thing. He's saying, if you've got to eat, do that at home. But when you're ready to come to the Lord's table, know, this is a symbolic and a holy act that you better be ready for, and said, Well, how do you get yourself ready? He tells us make sure you're right before the Lord. Because if you're not, what does he say you're in the passage, you're actually drinking judgment or condemnation? on yourself? Boy, that's scary, right? Because he says that's why some of you have gotten sick and even die. That's why when I pray, and when I talk, I say, Listen, God's gonna have his way for good, or judgment, or discipline for us in this world, or in the next or both. So who is communion for when you and I take these elements, and we do this once a month? Here, some people do it regularly, like every week, and maybe you're used to if you come from more Catholic background. It is for repentant believers. And again, that's why you'll see this sometimes in the Catholic Church. They understand this. That's why oftentimes, you'll see various Catholic priests around the country who will withhold communion from either Nancy Pelosi or Joe Biden, because they for they see in their mind that these are not people who are what in right with God's I can't in good conscience or faith as a Catholic priests, give them the elements or communion. He's saying, make sure that you're united with Christ and united with one another before you take these elements. Again, we're doing this from a lord suffer believer perspective, you can also tell that there was real fermented alcohol in the first century. And we talked about this all the time that I think symbolically we can have the fruit of the vine, whether it's grape juice or real alcohol, but you can see it's alcohol, at least in this passage. How do we know that? Because they got what they got drunk. They were taking too much of it. They were hoarding it, those who had more, were taking more or those who got to the table first. Were stuffing their faces. So again, who's coming in for and how are we to approach communion in our own lives? We are to be repentant believers. That's why we always examine ourselves here always say hey, listen, if you don't know Jesus, please hold off from doing this. That's why the Catholic church they said go through confirmation before you take command.

Onion, we want to make sure you've been a believer that you understand what repentance and belief is. And then you can partake of the elements with us here at Life Church or really any evangelical or Bible believing church. Communion is for who, for repentant believers, that means repent for the first time, but also that lifestyle repentance. That's why you often Examine yourself, say, Lord, if I have anything in me, please help me sort of get right with you or with others. Before I do this, the warnings are real, because the worship is real. Right? You saw that. So that that would be another thing, I would say that you saw on both passages here, that we make sure that we want to conduct ourselves in such a way that we're honoring God, it actually says angels are peering into this, did you see that little passage in their talks, there's all kinds of little tidbits if you wanna go back and read it later, of things that are interesting in that passage. That's why I say it's somewhat complex. And there's even disagreement about some of the things that I was talking about. But one of things it's kind of cool is that angels themselves are peering into this. And I really think that's just the whole idea of, of, they're enjoying how we worship the lamb, how we rejoice and sing and lift up our hands and our voices to Praise the king. Because they're peering in to these things. I get that from other passages about how angels long to him. So the warnings are real. He warns us in this passage, to not do praying or prophesying in a way that's not honoring because of your loss of masculinity or femininity, or because you're living a lifestyle in your home or in your community that's not honoring, you really should take a seat. That doesn't mean you don't get to be in the congregation, it just means that you're not at a place where you need to be leading others in worship, praying, prophesying. Same thing with communion, doesn't mean you can't ever take communion every time you're a sinner, because otherwise, none of us would ever get to take it just means Have you come to the Lord, as a repentant believer. So that leads me to a final point. And we'll close here that where are you at? Are you ready to repent and believe, either for the first time, or for the first time in a long time, I'm gonna lead us in a prayer. And I just want us to think about that, because that's really the call today, there's a lot in here about men issues and women issues. And I know we're going to even disagree on some of how that plays out. But we understand that we're all equal and level at the foot of the cross, to where we come to that Jesus that we also desperately need. So let's pray.

Father, I thank you for your word. I think you that even when there's hard passages, difficult passages, maybe even confusing passages that you give us enough clarity to get the big points to get the big picture. So I just pray that for us as Life Church that we see you for who you are, and that we see that you love us and that you care for us and that you are calling us to yourself. I pray for those right now that are struggling to just

to just bend the knee and bow the heart. Just help us we pray, whether it's to come down front, this last song or to find someone afterwards, but also pray for those who are just considering the claims of Christ. And as they're peering into this thing that we call church and that we call life church here at 15 at Joe battle Boulevard in El Paso, Texas. This is different. This is unique. This is not what I am seeing and experiencing weekend and day in and day out on my television and on my screens that I flipped through. Father I just pray that You give many the gift of repentance today so that they may come and repent and believe for the first time and I pray you also just help him do that in their own way as these things in Christ

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Sermon Transcript:

Give a warm, warm welcome. Put your hands together for Pastor Brent. Yeah, thank you so much.

Appreciate that. I want to welcome those who are online. Thank you all so much for being in the room. We had a great time last week with Dr. Berry creamer from Cristallo college is bringing First Corinthians nine. And really that whole idea of I Buffett my body and make it my slave list. After it's all said and done, I'd be disqualified. What I love about First Corinthians and the reason why we're doing this series is it's so practical for us as a church, it's really week in and week out is just giving us practicalities of how we're to conduct ourselves, as Christians as believers in the body of Christ, and how that affects the world and the people around us to our closest neighbor, right to those who we live with, and those who live on either side with, but also to anyone else in our community and our world. And so first Corinthians 10, he is going to bring up things that he's already sort of brought up. That whole idea of even meat or food offered to idols, there's going to be warnings, there's going to be blessings, there's going to be the idea of there's God makes a way out when you feel like you're tempted or things are heavy on you. And that's gonna happen all here in First Corinthians 10 today, so we're gonna put those scriptures up on the screen. So that way we can go through it. And as we go through it, I'll try to explain really where Paul's coming from. And if there's any allusions to the Old Testament, we'll try to reference those as well. Let's go and get started this morning. You have a Bible, First Corinthians chapter 10, beginning in verse one says this, I don't want you to forget Dear brothers and sisters, and that's the people of the church, about our ancestors in the wilderness long ago, all of them were guided by a cloud that moved ahead of them. And all of them walked through the sea, on dry ground, in the cloud. And in the sea. All of them were baptized as followers of Moses. Now I want to stop right there. What is he talking about? He's talking about that story of the Exodus account, were the people of God, who were known as Israelites back then. And we know that when Christ came, it's very clear that God didn't just come for the Israelites, but that he bless Israel to bless the nations. Jesus came a Jew, but he came for the Gentiles as well. And so here we look back at our spiritual ancestors, and we're seeing that they crossed through the Red Sea, all of them did, as they escaped as they were exiting from Egypt. And how were they guided, it was a cloud a pillar of cloud and pillar by a fire at night. But what did they do, they walk through dry land, all of them got to do that. So the waters were held back. That's what's going on so far. And these verses, all of them ate the same spiritual food. And all of them drank the same spiritual water, for they drank from the spiritual rock that traveled with them. And we now know that that rock was Christ, yet, God was not pleased with most of them, and their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Before we go the next slide, go ahead and keep that one up. I want to explain kind of what's going on here. Even when you're part of a great community of believers, whether it's this one or you've been a part of another one, or God may lead you to another church, because of moving or whatever in the future, you get real blessings. You get to be around people who look you in the eye, love you. And you know, say they're glad you're here. And we get to worship a real God and we get to have professional band people and even someone to maybe communicate with us who's done this before. But all that to say we all get the same spiritual meat or food. But guess what, in that desert, or in that wilderness, it says many didn't believe many sort of died right there in the wilderness. Even though everyone got the opportunity to partake of these spiritual blessings. It says most of them were were ended up dying there in the wilderness keep going. He says, Well, why why did this occur? These things happened as a warning to us so that we would not crave evil things as they did or worship idols as some of them did. We go all the way back to you remember that when Moses was up on Mount Sinai to get the 10 commandments? What did the people of God do so quickly? Give us an idol make us a golden calf? Let's throw everything we have in worship that some of them did, as the Scriptures say, the people celebrated with feasting and drinking and then indulge in pagan revelry. And we must not engage in sexual immorality, as some of them did, causing 23,000 of them to die in one day. Now, what happened there? If you go back to numbers 25 You can read the story that God told them very clearly. Don't engage in sexual immorality, don't take pagan women and do what you want with them sexually. And they had one that just did that right there in front of everyone in front of the tent and all of a sudden a sphere comes through both of me saying and then because of that, apply

spread out and killed 23 or 24,000 that day. That's what he's referencing. He keeps going to say these are warnings, isn't it so great that our God says, Listen, there's people before you who have not done the things of God. And that tells you in warnings, nor should we put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and then they died from snake bites. You may be familiar with some of these stories in the Old Testament, don't grumble as some of them did, and were destroyed by the angel of death. You see them falling in the wilderness and that, Jake, that Caleb and Joshua, they were able to come through these things happened to them as examples for us. They were written down to warn us see that second term of warning to those of us who live at the end of the age into the age is just the Church Age, when you see that in the scriptures. Don't get alarmed if we have been in the Church Age, the end of the age since the first century, since Jesus came the first time. If you think you're standing strong, this is such a good example. And I remember I would try to repeat this to myself and I was a young man, because I don't know if you were a young man like I was where you just thought you could take on the world. You thought you knew it all you knew better than your parents, you knew better than your teachers, you better than just about everyone. And so you thought you were strong in the scriptures are saying here. Listen, if you think you're standing strong, be careful not to what, what is the old accent, we always say it's biblical pride cometh for what? The Fall, right? And so be careful not to fall, why the temptations in your life are no different from what others experience that's so important. Because we often think that no, if you had to live with him, if you had to live with her, if you had to be with my boss, and this toxicity that I experienced, or if you had to go to this community or be a part of these people, I mean, you don't know and you're not you don't know what it's like to go through what I'm going through, someone in history has gone through something similar. The temptations in your life are no different than what God or what others experience and what does it say there who's faithful God and God is faithful, we'll go to the next slide there. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you're attempting, he will show you a way out so that you can endure this is so important. And again, these are verses I remember reading as a young man and just holding on to them and saying, God won't fail me, he won't fail me, people around me may fail me, people may disappoint me, I may be scared, I may be hurt, but God won't fail me. And then you get here and you actually have a promise that anytime we're tempted, and we've all been in multiple situations, you might have been tempted multiple times this week with a host of things, not just sexual immorality, but some opportunity for maybe financial or whatever it was, or to say a word that was unkind to your boss or your spouse or whatever. And all of a sudden, we realize that yes, a test comes for all of us every day, maybe every every week for sure. There's always a way out. I think about this in terms of Joseph, and how he fleed sexual immorality, that term has already been used in First Corinthians six, it's gonna be used again, that idea of move quickly away from things that tempt you and me, let's not hang out there. That's not going to be good for us remember that story of Joseph and Potter for his wife when she wants to go to bed with him and he flees from her. Same things going on here. When we talk about idol worship. In a minute. There's always a way when you and I think we can't stand or we can endure, God always creates a way. There's always a way of escape. There's always a way that we can get out of temptation. God does not tempt anyone, he does test us at times. Right? We know Satan and his demons, they tempt us. And we don't want to fail the tests. And even if we do, God gives us other opportunities. First point I wants to see this morning is that warnings are real. Did you see that in the verse verses this couple of times where these things these stories ever how horrendous they sound? 23,000 people died one day because of sexual morality. And people died in the wilderness and God led them out of Egypt to die in the wilderness. It's like, well, but why did that occur? It has consequences for their actions. And the scriptures are always calling us out calling us for it to say don't be like that. Those are written to warn you and me. And then we are given an opportunity to walk in the truth walk in the way that God has for us. So first point wants to see this morning is that warnings are real. Let's continue on in the passage, and already said that that word flee would come up again. We've already seen it earlier in Corinthians about sexual immorality. Now we turn a corner and says about idols. We've already talked about food offered to idols, he's going to bring that up again. So my dear friends, flee from the worship of idols, that seems reasonable. You are reasonable people decide for yourself if what I am saying is true. Now, we would know that that that idol worship is bad. It was bad for Old Testament Jewish people. It's bad for Christians and believers. It's part of the 10 commandments. It's the second one I

Hey, the first one is, you know the Lord your God, he is one. The second one is make no idols before me. And so we have this idea here is you understand this is reasonable, decide for yourself if what I'm saying is true. When we bless the cup at the Lord's table, aren't we sharing in the blood of Christ? And when we break the bread, aren't we sharing in the body of Christ? And though we are many we all eat from one loaf of bread, showing that we are one body? Think about the people of Israel, weren't they united by eating the sacrifices at the altar? What am I trying to say? Am I saying that food offered to idols has some significance or that idols are real?

No, they're not real Gods at all. I'm saying that these sacrifices are offered to demons, not to God next, slow down what in the world is going on here, Pastor, we went from talking about God and maybe some good things. And we got some more warnings going on here. We went real quick, right? Hard turn for a lot of us to demons. What's going on here? Well think about what we do at the Lord's Supper, we all try to come together, whether we kneel together, whether we take it in our own chairs, or whatever. And we all try to break from one piece of unleavened bread or one loaf if we want to celebrate it in a New Covenant sense, the new heavens and new earth will all break bread with Christ forever and ever. So what's going on here? It's saying, well, that's real. That's worship, we know that that's how we are connecting with Christ and one another. But if you find yourself partaking of food offered to idols, this is what you're participating in. We don't want you to participate with demons, you cannot drink the cup of the Lord and from the cup of demons to you cannot eat at the Lord's table and at the table of demons to what, Dare we rouse the Lord's jealousy? Do you think we are stronger than he is? So what is kind of going on here? Now, this is the same thing that you and I sort of think about, we can go there pretty easily, if you and I go out to eat afterwards, and we go to a steak place. So maybe you're doing pretty good this week, or this month. So you can afford to go to a steak place right after church on Sunday, and you gave to the church first, of course, you know, but, but you can afford to go and it's gonna be about $35 A piece and whoever you got around the table about eating some steak plus tip and drink insides and all the rest, but you're gonna sit there and you're gonna have a steak now, you didn't ask where it came from, it was just brought to you at your favorite place, whether it was Logan's or Outback or Texas Roadhouse, or wherever it is you like to go. But if someone comes out, I am telling you if if you find out because the chef, or the waiter, or the waitress says, Hey, listen, before you enjoy this steak, I want you to know that we did a ritual back in the back. And we were we cut the blood towards the demons. We had a little we had a little ceremony. And so don't don't you worry, I think it's okay, but just know that before you eat the steak, that that was sacrifice, to bail or to demons or to demonic activity, I just want you to know, okay, by the power of God, you just put that sacred on back say I'm good, right? That's what he's saying here. Now, if it was done, and you didn't have any knowledge of that, well, you're not you're not held accountable to that, right. We don't always know how our food comes to us. He's saying though, but if you know, if you know that it came to you by unrighteous means by by sacrificing first to an idol, you need to push that back, you need to stay away from that. It's very similar to the wisdom that he had called us to earlier. As far as like food offered to idols. We're doing all of this so that we don't cause our brothers and sisters to stumbled so that we can all move towards love. And that'll become clear if it's not already in further passages. But it wants to see the second point this morning as it relates to idols. He's warning us about idols that some of you are saying, pass, I don't think I'm in danger. Yeah, I had some ancestors who maybe were part of Native American tribes and I think they worshiped at idols or totem poles, maybe had some aunts or uncles somewhere, you know, from Chihuahua or Bladez. And I think some of them maybe had some idols, you know, and an altar. But you know, we don't do that in our home. We're out here on the horizon, or on the east of the Far East. We're good, okay, we don't put that up in our manuals anymore. Well, here's the warning about idols. What you and I may not realize is that idols have everything to do with the heart. It often is manifested in an actual being or things that we put up, right we know it's not real, like a wooden idol, or stone idol or something we fashioned out of our hands, or someone else fashioned out of their hands. But that's not the issue. The issue is the heart and how we view things and put things before God. So I want us to see this as far as how we can identify and understand idols, modern day understanding of idols hear in 2024 for many of us, and again, I know that some of y'all may have even come from ancestors and backgrounds that put these up in their homes, but many of us maybe did not. And even still, whether you

did or didn't? What is an idol? And how do idols manifest themselves in our life, mostly in a secular sort of 2024 Western world? An idol is anything that you and I will send to get, or sin if we don't get it. So what do you mean by that? So, think about anything that you want so bad, whatever it is, and it can be a good thing, right? A relationship, a promotion, certain car or house or whatever. You want it so bad, that you're willing to bend the rules, you're willing, you're willing to go against God's moral law, your own conscience, and what everybody knows is right and wrong to get it. Or if you don't get it, you're gonna grumble and complain and pout, because why you didn't get your way. This isn't clear. Let's go to the next slide. I think this will become abundantly clear. Now, this isn't meant to be too discouraging. But I think it's helpful for us to understand the heart. When the Bible talks about the heart. That's the central thing in our lives. We understand our heart pumps, but pumps blood throughout our entire body, biblically, and spiritually, the heart is how things Enter, and then they pervade our whole body. Jesus talked about this, that when you and I are mad at someone, and we say an unkind word to them, Where's that coming from? That has nothing to do with what we ate? Stomach is for food, good, fine. But he's saying that where does this come from? These words, these thoughts, who we are, it comes from our heart central to who we are. The bad news is that all of us because we're born in sin, and because we're born wandering, that we in our hearts, we have a factory of idols, and we have opportunity all the time, whether you're in this room, or you walk out in the community, to what to be envious of another person's house, or car or spouse, or to do what to say, Okay, I need love and because you're not giving me the love that I deserve, I'm gonna let you have it. Right. That's what it that's how we know an idol exists and what an idol is. So you think about all of us have some right now I sort of, before I got up, I sort of filtered I kind of know what my two or three are right now. Because I know that when I don't get my way in that area, there's hell to pay, right? I mean, somebody's gonna hear about it. And that's how we know that something's an idol. Because if, if we don't get it, we'll send to get it. And if we don't get it, we'll, we'll we'll sin because we haven't got it. So it can be respect, these things are good. Money's used in a world system. I'm not against money, God's not against money. But he talks a lot about it to say that that's where your heart is that your treasure is there, your heart will be also loves not bad, some bad to want a spouse or significant other or to date or to, you know, want somebody to respect you. But what do we do and we don't get our way in the workforce? How are we going about in pursuing our careers? Are we doing that with integrity? Are we doing it the way everyone else does it? Whether it's right or wrong? Sex isn't a bad thing. God talks a lot about that. We've talked about that because it's in the Bible. But what are you doing to say, Okay, I deserve this, I need this. So I'm gonna go out and get it. However I can. Or we talked about this house and family family can be an idol. Can you believe that? Where you don't prioritize with your family worship of God, that it's really an end in and of itself, or it's a means in and of itself. And God is saying whatever your idols are, and I can't I think I gave you a good way to sort of identify two or three in your heart in your life right now. He's saying, Be careful, he's warning you and me about idols to say why it's second on the 10 commandments for a reason. It will trip you and I up and it will not lead to where we think it will lead to how we conduct ourselves. Great question. I think he gets to that into the third part of the passage today.

All right, so

he says starting in verse 23, of the same chapter, chapter 10. I say I'm allowed to do anything, but not everything is good for you and me. I'm allowed to do anything but not everything is beneficial. Now, we all still do this today. I'm free. I'm free to watch I want to watch your day to one a day or to do what I want to do or to say what I want to say. Yeah, but is it all beneficial? Is it all good? Don't be concerned about your own good but for the good of others now wait a second. No, no, no, no, no, no, it's about me and what I want right now this is me time. I've done that. No, no, no, listen, I'm not saying be a doormat to people. I'm saying what Jesus is saying, which is Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. What's the second commandment that Jesus gave remember these two commandments really all of them come under that what is it it's love your neighbor as yourself

to the degree that you're concerned that you're clothed and fed and taking care of your to do that for others because Christians are people who do not only seek out their own good but what the good of others so you may eat any meat that is

sold in the marketplace without raising questions of contents. So that's what I'm trying to say when you and I go out to eat. We don't need to, because don't do this should be real weird. Don't go to the person at our back and be like, hey, was this meat sacrificed to Satan back there in the back? Don't do that. Okay? He's saying you don't have to. You don't have to question all that. But now if you find out it was right, first point remains, you push back, okay? For the earth is the Lord's and everything in it. So however your meat, fruit and vegetables came to you, unless you know it came from Shady means you're good to just take them. If someone who isn't a believer ask you

for home, as your home for dinner, except the invitation if you want to write. We talked about this last. Well, two weeks ago when I was talking about the type of homes that I find myself in, in my family and in the El Paso area, eat whatever is offered you without raising questions of conscience, it's just good, you know, being a good person at the table. But suppose someone tells you this meats offered tonight don't eat it out of consideration for the contents of the one he told you, it might not be a matter of conscience for you. But it is for the other person, right? We've all run into this test. So now as we talked about this in terms of alcohol, you know, is alcohol good or bad. And Christians have kind of been all over the page on all that for the last 100 years or so since prohibition. But the deal is our aim is love. We know drunkenness is bad. But what about just having a drink in public there? Probably all that. Those are good questions to ask. But he's given us some good wisdom principles to how to think through that. For Why should my freedom be limited by what someone else thinks? They thought about that. And Corinthians, we think about that, too. I'm not gonna, I'm gonna limit myself. If I can thank God for the food and enjoy it. Why should I be condemned for eating it? He's saying, Listen, there's, there's a, there's a way, there's a way to think about all of this. So whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God. And that's really kind of the culmination, you may have memorized that verse before chapter 10, you can really memorize two verses in chapter 1010 13, and 1031. And they'll really help you out even in your walk this week, that 1013, we've already went over that this idea that God won't tempt you beyond what you and I can handle. And even if he does, he provides a way of escape. First Corinthians 1031. So whether you eat drink, or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God, these are good, like verses that you and I can write down and put it in our pockets, or put it on our phones and have them pop up throughout the week so that we can be reminded about what it is we're supposed to be about. He said, Well, how do I do that? Well, again, it's like, there is a way and you know, this, when you sit down to have a meal, or even if you're by yourself, and you had cereal and orange juice like I did this morning, you're gonna say, God, thank you for this, thank you that there was a fridge. And that was there, and I was able to pull it out. And thank you that I had a cup and not to drink all the carton. And I think I was able to pour it and you gave me the strength to do that. Thank you for this cereal, that's just enough. And I was able to cut some strawberries and put it on top. And thank you that was able to eat this. And thank you for, you know, my digestive system working right and all that. And thank you for the strength to be able to get up and give God's word to God's people today. So you see where I'm going that were just I didn't say I thought through all of those. But I thought through a few of them. And I'm thinking through them now and praising God for him. Now, that's how we eat and drink to the glory of God. Same way you do when you're thankful at a meal. That's why we pray. I know, even at a very basic level, many of us pray before our meal. So we know at a minimum we know we talked to God and thanked him at least once today for what he's done. Don't give offense to Jews or Gentiles, or the Church of God, right? Because we're all together. I to try to please everyone and everything I do. I don't just do what is best for me, right? We've already seen this principle, I do what is best for others so that they may be served or saved. So you saw this before this whole idea that Paul is giving up his rights and you and I he gives us a great model for this. That's why I remember distinctly when I was 20 years old and I spent a lot of time over in Europe and I had to go to not had to I chose to go to pubs in Scotland and England, I would always make sure that there was at least a beer at the table even if I just sipped it because they would think I was crazy if I was in a pub and I wanted to have a conversation with another man and I didn't at least have a beer in front of me even if I didn't know what to do with it. Okay, at least had it there Right? Because why that was loving to them I didn't even like it right? But that's that's a way to serve. Now another sense I've been in the deep south at times, where to even have one publicly could get you fired from your church shop so that you shouldn't I'm saying those are two different scenarios. And I don't care either way. Bring the beer to the table. Don't bring the beer the table. I don't care. I'm just trying to make my angle and my means is to love and care more about someone else to try to love them instead of what I may want or not want. Lisa third and final point this morning. You and I are to use our freedom for love

We oftentimes what we're told by the world is use your freedom to express you and your identity. And again, nobody's asking you to like stifle yourself if it's if it's honest before God about in your God honoring and who you are and what you want to do, nobody's asking you to be a doormat. But what God is asking unite to do is to consider others more than ourselves. And he's really asking us to lean into the second commandment, if you think and say you really love God, you and I will know that's true by our what, by our fruit by our lives. And so when we think about our freedom, I'm free to watch that I'm free to play that I'm free to go there. I'm free to spend my money on this. Yes, that may all be true. But keep in mind, we've already talked about of making sure before God, you don't have that as an idol in your life. Just ask the Lord, how bad do you want this car? Are you willing to send to get it? Or send if you don't? And can you drive it and, and drink this drink? Or eat this food to the glory of God? And have you thought about that you're using your freedom? For what for love not so that you can say, Hey, look at me or not, so that you can spend your money on that before you've you know, given to the church or given to others, but that you really after you've sort of gone through those sort of things. After you've asked the hard questions of yourself and of your heart, you say, No, I really do think I just want this vehicle for love, I need to get from point A to point B, it's a decent ride. So then you're free to buy it, you probably should buy it if it's just a decent ride a good, reliable vehicle to get from point A to point B and you need one. That's good. You're trying to love maybe yourself and your family by by providing you maybe because you have a job that or whatever, we could go through the whole lineup, food, whatever it is, whatever it is, we're thinking about right now. Go through and ask yourself, Okay, can I honor God with this purchase? Or with this way of thinking with this lifestyle? Okay, next, is it an idle? If it is, it still may not mean you can do that you shouldn't have it like family is good, good to have family. But where is that in place of God? And then ask yourself, Okay, whatever I feel like I'm free to do. Am I filtering this through the means of love?

First Corinthians 1031 says this, and this is rule leave with a challenge. And we're gonna have a fun song here at the end. So please don't leave. First Corinthians 1031 says, so whether you eat or drink whatever you and I do, let's find a way to do it for the glory of God. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you care for us. We thank You that You give us means and abilities to worship you. We've already worked with you this morning. We want to continue to worship You. We thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you never leave us nor forsake us. We thank you for these warnings. But I pray right now for those in the room that need to be shaken, shaken out of their sin. I pray for those who need to be encouraged, who are faint hearted and I pray for all of us that we may find ways to glorify you and whatever you have for us today, this week, and all the days of our life. What is this in Christ's name and for His glory? Amen.

Hallelujah. That was awesome message. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you all very much for having me back. I appreciate it. I flew in this time. And when I landed, your pastor picked me up. And he said to me, when we sat down, he said, Now you heard about the attempted assassination. Right? I was, I had no, I was just flabbergasted, had no idea what had happened. And we still don't know a whole lot. I mean, I'm sure some of you all have kept up with the news and the things that are going on there. But, you know, if, if I could contribute just one word to all of this, it would be to say something like this, that, you know, if if you come to a point in your life, where you think you need to use violence, in order to preserve a society, or in order to do something to defend a society, you just don't understand what a society is, you just don't get what it means to live in a society. Society is a community that exists together with stability and security and has a sense of what it means to maintain that being without having to do it at the end of a gun. So I could say, oh, you know, what a terrible person. And of course, it was a terrible person who tried to do that. And we all give thanks to God, that he preserved Donald Trump's life yesterday, Donald Trump is a man who bears the image of God, and we're grateful for him. And we should be that that concerned about any person who would face anything like that's ridiculous that we would think that we're going to find a solution in something like that. And so whether you're on one side, or the other of the politics doesn't make any difference to this, you should be on the one side of society that says the way we exist doesn't allow us to resolve things that way. That's, that's just not okay. So, thank God for having stifled that and, and put it down. And we're glad for where we've ended up with it. But you know, if I'm talking to any individual, I'm gonna say the same thing. If you have to use violence, to preserve what you think is valuable to you, you don't understand what it means to be a part of a society. That is not who we are. And it's not what we're supposed to be. And I say that to you now, not just neutrally, but because as we're going into First Corinthians nine, you know, Paul starts out the chapter by any rights, this whole chapter, it sounds very defensive, like, Hey, I'm Paul, I can preach to you I can tell you what to do. And I can take money from you if I want to. That's kind of what the chapter sounds like when you read it just on the surface of it. And it's actually quite the opposite of that, because what he ends up doing in this chapter is not defending himself as a person who communicates the message of God. But instead speaking to all of us, and to this congregation, they don't know it yet, but it's coming in the next chapters. He wants to turn the whole conversation into a talk about them, and what it means for them to be a messenger of God to carry to people, this news about god that's so important, just this news about what God is doing. So what he starts out saying is, what what is it essentially mean, for me to be a person who tells you about what God is doing in the world? Just like I would say you what does it mean to be a part of a society? Well, in this case, Paul is saying, what does it mean to be the kind of person who talks about what God is doing in the world, and what makes that important, so it starts out being about him. So what I want to do, it's a fairly short chapter, we can get through it pretty easily. But I want to take the first half and just kind of push it aside, I want to mention it to you run through it and read it to you. But it's point is so simple. It's just Paul saying, well, it's not this, you know, it's not about this. And so I want to show you that. But then at the end of the chapter, I want you to hear him saying what it does mean, for us, for any person for him, for all of us, to be the messengers of God to be the people who stand in this world, and tell people what God is doing in the world. Because what God is doing in the world is amazing, as you've heard in the prayers, and as you've sung, as we worship God for the things that he does, are amazing. So what is it? What would it mean for us, essentially, at the core of it, to be the people who are able to talk to other people about what God is doing in the world? So first Corinthians nine, the first two verses, he just introduces the question, Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Have I not seeing Jesus our Lord? Aren't you my workmanship in the gospel? I mean, because he's the one who led many of them to be followers of Christ, if to others, I'm not an apostle, at least I am to you, because you are the seal of my apostleship and the Lord. And it's in that statement that we're aware of where he's going in the chapter saying, you know, you're the evidence that God is using me as His Messenger, I'm, I'm speaking on his behalf and of all the people in the world, he should know it, you should know it. That's what he says to them. So essentially, what he's saying to them is, what what does it mean that I'm the person who talks to people about what God is doing in the world. So in verses three through 15, the next section, part of the first half of the chapter that we're just kind of blowing through right here. He offers the option of saying, Is it because and we would say it this

way in our culture, I think, is it because I wear a collar? Is it because, you know, a clerical collar? That idea? Or is it because that's how I make my living? You know? So I have the title, well, he's a priest, or he's the pastor, and you should go to him to find the answer. Is it that kind of answer? Obviously, I've already told you. I mean, this is not a spoiler, because I'm telling you, it's the point, he's obviously going to say, no, that's not why I'm a messenger from God. So starting in verse three, he says it this way. So this is my defense. And first, he's gonna say this, I could do that. I can be a messenger of God, who makes my living off of the fact that I'm communicating the message of God. And he says, Indeed, some people have to do that. Or you wouldn't have messengers who are able to lead your congregation, for instance, and things like that. So he's going to start out saying, it would be perfectly justifiable for me to say to you, of course, you know, I'm a messenger of God. I mean, that's how I make my living. What do you think I'm gonna do? He could do that? So these verses say that this is my defense to those who would examine me? Don't we have a right to eat and drink? Don't we have a right to have a believing wife? Or do as the other apostles and the other end? And the brothers of Jesus himself or Peter himself does? Or is it just me and Barnabas? Are we the only ones who don't have a right to refrain from having to work a living now for people who are insulted who are in ministry and say, so you're not working or living if you're working in paid ministry, that would miss the point, that in their culture, working a living meant being a day to day workmen, you know, going out making tents or something like that, it's a skill set that had to do with manual labor. That's how they're using the language goes on to say this, that wouldn't make any sense. Because I mean, what soldier serves his own expense, he gives three different examples here, or who would plant a vineyard and then not eat any of the grapes that came from it, or who's going to tend to flock and not get any of the milk that comes from the flock? And so it goes back to the Old Testament and explains to them why it makes perfect sense that they do have a priestly class in the Jewish culture, that they do have people who are going to give themselves to the ministry, and that's going to be their job. And that makes perfect sense. It's fine. So in verse eight, he says, Do I say these things on purely human authority with those examples? Doesn't the law say the same thing? It's written in the Law of Moses, don't muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, you get the ideas and trade and out the grain? You let it eat from the grain because it's trading out the grain, that's the idea of workman's worthy of his labor. So is it or is higher? Is it for oxen that God is concerned when he says that? Isn't he speaking it for our sake, it's written for our sake, because the plow men should plow in hope of, of the crop that comes from it, the thresher should thrash in hope of sharing in the crop. If we've sown spiritual things, to use it too much that we reap material things from you, if others share this rightful claim on you, don't we even more. So Paul says, look, if I wanted to come to you and say, I'm the messenger of God to you, and you should take care of me, give me a bunch of money, something like that. That'd be perfectly fine. But then he says, but I don't do that. And there's a reason I'm not doing it. And it doesn't have anything to do with not being able to do it with perfect legitimacy, it would be fine. But it's not what makes him a messenger of God. So he goes on to say that, that it would be strange if what we said was, well, here's how you can know I'm a messenger of God, because I have the sign that says, I'm a messenger of God. Or you can know I'm a messenger of God, because I mean, after all, that's what you paid me for. So I must be telling you the truth. I couldn't do that. But that's not going to do it. So he says, Nevertheless, there's in verse 12, at the end of the verse, Nevertheless, we've not made use of this right? But we endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the one thing that matters, the message of God, the gospel of Christ. Do you do you not know that those who are employed in the temple, these would be the priests who are the messengers of God historically, in Judaism? Don't you know that those who are employed in the temple service get their food from the temple? Those who serve at the altar, a lot of us don't, aren't aware of this, that when when the when the in the Jewish tradition when you would bring the sacrifices and this is how it's described in the Old Testament, when you would bring the sacrifices you didn't to bring the sacrifices in, and then go back, you brought the sacrifices and it was sort of like a barbecue, you know, you a the priests ate, everybody ate, and you were having communion with God in the process. That was sort of the benefit of it. That's what he's referring to. So don't you know that those who are employed in the temple service get their food from the temple and those who serve at the altar share in the sacrificial offerings in the same way, the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel.

But I have made no use of any of these rights. Nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision. He's not criticizing the people who do he's not second guessing it at all. That is the right way for things to be but he's saying to them because of a lesson he wants them to learn from him. Indeed, one chapter hints

By the time you get past chapter 10, he's going to say the words Imitate me, as I am also imitating Christ. That's where he's going to arrive. He says to them, I don't use any of these options or any of these things as a ride, I would endure anything rather than put an obstacle in the way of the gospel of Christ. In verse 15, I have made no use of any of these rights, nor am I writing these things to secure any such provision, because I would rather die. And he never says that lightly. When he's saying those words, he's imitating Christ, I would rather die than have anyone deprive me of my ground for boasting. And what he says is the pride that I have in the Gospel, this is the point his boasting is that he is here to represent the message that God wants to give. And so he's, he's not told us why he does it. He's not told us what the value of it is yet, but he has made clear to us why he's not going to do it, he's not going to do it for whatever he's going to receive from it. I'd love to spend time on all of that what it means we don't have time for it today. But the end of the chapter, this is what I want us to get. So he introduces the idea in verse 16, through 18, saying it this way. And I'm just going to tell you, what this means is being a messenger of God, being a person who can tell people what God is doing in the world does mean giving something up, always, it always means giving something up. And so it means that for Paul, so he only find something to celebrate in this in the fact that he's given up the right that he had to benefit from what he's doing, going around and sharing the gospel with people. So he says in verse 16, if I preach the gospel, that gives me no ground for boasting. Because I was already obligated to do that necessity is laid upon me. In fact, Woe to me, if I don't preach the gospel. This is a common theme throughout all of Scripture, Moses is that way, I don't want to do it. But he has to do it, Jeremiah, I tried to quit, but it was burning in my bones. You know, if you read the Old Testament, all the way into the New Testament, the, the apostles, everybody, they all have this crisis, I don't want to do it. But I have to God has put this on me. And so I have to carry this forward. It's the same thing that happens with all the disciples, by the way with Jesus. So anyway, he goes on. So necessity is laid on me, well, if I don't preach the gospel, if I do this on my own will, And he doesn't mean by that of my own free choice. What he means by that is for my own benefit, if if the things I'm interested in are the thing that drives me to carry this message, then I'm not really committed to the message. This is the core of what he say, the message itself is so valuable to me that it doesn't matter what it costs me, it doesn't matter what I would have to give up, it doesn't matter what I would have to lose, I would have to be faithful to this message no matter what. If I did it on my own, will, I it would be no reward to me. But if I do it, and it's not of my own will, then I realized that I've been entrusted with a stewardship, what then would be my reward, what, what then is my interest in it, because we always have an interest in things. And he says that in my preaching, and don't misunderstand preaching, you think of me preaching today, because I'm standing up here on the platform, and I've got a microphone. And you know, preaching is just a generic word, declaring these truths about God and what he's doing in the world. And the word is used about every person, every person who's a follower of God, that we communicate these truths about God, but he's using it about himself right now that in my preaching, I might present the gospel FREE of charge so as not to make use of my right in the Gospel. That is, you can't serve your own interest and then just tack on God as a side effect of it. You know, I was really trying to build my business they weren't working out very well and then then I got saved and my business did great. So I think gods are pretty good tack on to your life, you know, you ought to become a Christian to you do that with 1000 different things and it just doesn't work that way. When I was and I and when I say that doesn't work that way I mean, in your heart and life and certainly in the Gospel, that's not what God has given us to do.

You know, my my example of this would be in my in my own in my own I like to do a variety of things. So I've told you all I do Astro photography, it's why like, I love West Texas and dark skies and all that kind of stuff. And one of the things that I did with my son in law a few years back quite a few years back now was we kept bees for a little while I don't know if you have any individual kept bees but there's a whole lot involved in it. So if you and we put up a couple of hives near a

tree farm so that so that we would get good really clean honey from it and we did we got beautiful honey from his fantastic but the truth of the matter is, I mean if you're really going to be a beekeeper if you're going to keep bees, you have to do things you know, you don't just set up the hive and leave them alone you set up the hive and you check for molds or pests or you check the health of the queen or to make sure the brood is coming out right and all this stuff you know

I didn't want to be that kind of Beekeeper. I just wanted to be a beekeeper who kept bees. Number one. So I can tell people I kept bees because I thought it'd be cool. You know, he's the guy who kept bees. Look at that, what a courageous person anyway, so I would keep bees and then I could harvest the honey as we say, rob the rob the bees of their honey, you know, twice a year or so, because I love honey, I just I love sweet things. So I love honey. So I wanted to get honey. And we did get honey gallons of it from these two hives as we kept the bees. But for me, it was just attack on. I mean, I had my job, I had all the other things I did on the side and twice a year, I'd go down with my son in law, and we go into the tree farm and we find the hives and see how they were doing and collect the honey and then spin it all out and do all the stuff you do when you're collecting honey, which is a major ordeal. But really, it was two full days a year that I was giving to keeping bees and I heard a guy one time explain what that actually meant, he said, so you have beekeepers, and those are the people who do all the stuff I was telling you you ought to do when you keep bees. And then he said you have bee havers. And I realized that I was a bee, however, I have bees, I don't keep bees, you know what I'm saying? I didn't actually take care of them. That's how a lot of us treat the gospel. It's the thing we do on Sunday, we show up and we get this tack on to our lives, that makes our lives a little better. Maybe we get a little, a little taste of the genuine sweetness that comes with God. Because worshiping God is always a beautiful thing, no matter what. finding peace in his presence is always a beautiful thing, no matter what. So maybe that's what it is to you. You just show up on Sunday, you know, you get your harvest of honey, and you go back home, and you're not tending it during the week or doing any of this stuff. And I'm glad you enjoy the honey. But that's not what the gospel is intended to be. It is more than that the way I kept bees is not the way for us to keep the gospel. Now the point we get to is two parts that come in the conclusion of the chapter for Paul. And he says it first in verses 19 through 23 By telling us all the things that we shouldn't give our attention to because they will distract us from the one thing that actually matters, which is the gospel. And here's how it shows up very negatively starting in verse 19. Because he says this is why I only want to focus on the gospel, I want to keep the gospel, I don't want to just have it, I want to be a person who attends to it. And he says one of those reasons is because even though I'm free from all I've been redeemed in Christ, and I am free in him without any obligations, that's all true. I have made myself servant to all. Now he can literally use this expression in his political context in his society, because he's a Roman citizen. Nobody has any authority over him beyond any other Roman citizen. And yet he has and he uses the word made himself a servant to all he has enslaved himself to weird thing to say, I have made myself a slave to other people. This is the do last word for those of you who know, these Greek words that are used for servants. This is not Dr. conosce, which is a slightly more respectable form of the word servant. This is the do last word, I enslaved myself to a person so that I'm obligated to these people, whether I like them or not. That's what he's saying it. So I have made myself a servant to everyone, so that I might win. And he means by winning, sharing with them the good news about Christ so that they experience what God is doing in the world, also, the more of them. Then he says, what comes across to us kind of like a random scatter of ideas about who the kind of people are that he's willing to serve. But it's not random. It's not a scattered set of ideas. These are the people who would be the most obnoxious to him for one reason or another. And they do cover the range. So starting with the Jews in verse 22, the Jews I became as a Jew in order to win the Jews. Now he is Jewish, but at the same time, he's been redeemed into Christ. And he knows that doesn't separate him from the Jewish people. But he's alienated pretty much everybody who's Jewish by this point in his life, because he's a follower of Christ. And they view that as a cult, so he's doing crazy things in their eyes. So he chooses two examples of the kinds of Jews he chooses to serve. Starting in verse two, the second half of verse 22, those who are under the law I became as one who was under the law, and then he puts in parentheses to make it obvious to us. That is not the case about him, even though I myself was not I'm not under the law at all. But I want to win those who are under the law. For him. These are the people who are going to persecute him and bring him to beatings, they're going to end up being the reason he is arrested and put before Caesar and ultimately most likely loses his life during that episode.

All of that's coming from these people, the ones who were under the law. And then he says in verse 21, to those who are outside the law, Now you would think he would be saying about them, well, the ones who are like me, they're not like him. These are the people who are outside the law in their Judaism, before anything was being talked about regarding Christ. These are the people who are irresponsible in their Judaism, the people who were Roman sympathizers, or Greek sympathizers, the ones who were naming their kids, if you'd lived in France in 1933, this would be a kid, a family in your neighborhood, naming their kid, Adolf. That's the kind of people these would be. And he says, But I made myself a servant. To those who were outside the law. I became like them for their sake. Even though I wasn't outside the law of God, I was under the law of Christ. But I wanted to when those who were outside the law, I was willing to serve the people who were trying to have any executed, I was willing to serve the people who are antithetical to everything I stand for in our society, I was willing to serve them because I gave up my identity, so that I could represent the message about what God is doing in this world, to everyone. That's how important it was to it. So he goes on to the week, I became his week so that I might win the week. Now the week is in the context of the meat that Joe talked about last week. And the meat we'll talk about again next week, probably in chapters eight and 10. And who can eat it, who can eat it and the poor argument of the people who are saying, well, you can't eat meat, that stuff's been offered to idols and sort of the weakness of those who have a poor way of thinking about the truth. And Paul, now, I mean, he is a brilliant logician, and thinker. And in his right, I mean, I teach logic at a collegiate level. And I use some of Paul's arguments from his epistles to give illustrations of the logic that he's using when he makes his points. He is a strong thinker. And you know, when we're around people, we think we're a stronger thinker than they are, we have a tendency to just start throwing names at them, not because we don't think we're smart enough to make our point. But because we're so disgusted by their stupidity, that I can't believe these idiots are allowed to run our country kind of thoughts, right? That's how we are Paul said to the week, I just decided to become as weak

so that I might be able to win them as well. To people who are wrong on the face of it, he's saying, I attended to them where they were, instead of lording my superiority over them. So in verse 22, he concludes it by saying, Look, I became all things to all people. So that by all means, I might just save some of them. And I do it all, for the sake of the Gospel, so that I can share with them in its blessings. For those of you who are listening very carefully, you think there's a contradiction going on? Well, I'm not doing this for myself, but I am doing it sharing the blessing of the goodness of God's blessings on us. But his whole point here is I would give up any of those blessings so that I could share the blessings with them. I want them to have it. That's why he enslaved himself to anyone, if he can just tell them about what God is doing in the world. So when I was keeping these bees, after two or three years, we began to recognize the distinctive personalities in the two hives that we had there were right next to each other, but they didn't mix you know, they they separate themselves. And so in the one hive, he was fantastic, you know, I mean, you could walk up to it with you and have to have a suit on, you can walk up to this hive, take the top off, take out one of the one of the hives, one of the combs and you can steal the honey right in front of them and they wouldn't care there. They were just that those kinds of bees, they were super peaceable. They just didn't ever attack. The other bees were the opposite. The other bees you would get within 50 feet of their hive and I'm not exaggerating, you get within 50 feet. And we you know, I suited up I wore a suit I was a baby about the whole thing. I'm not one of these guys that's going out with their bare hands in like, oh, I have steak doesn't bother me. I cry like a baby. When I get stung. It hurts me now. I don't hurt more than I thought it would hurt. And I got stung a bunch anyway, I'm wearing I'm wearing my whole suit and I'm telling you, you know, I'm thinking well, okay, so Jonathan says this hive has turned out mean it's probably interbred with some other bees somehow or whatever. So but it won't be that bad. So I'm going out there by myself one time. And you know, I've got a smoker. So the smoke desensitizes them to the pheromones they use by scent to decide to attack or do whatever it is changes their mood all together. So I've got a smoker, it kind of goes out. I'm thinking I'm suited up. I'm just taking one comb out. It's not going to be that big a deal. I get within 50 feet of the hive and I'm thinking oh, yeah, now they're gonna come and they're gonna start and I hear a bee I hear two bees. I hear three and you're thinking oh, they really get around you know, like, do those terrible bees terrifying. That's not what it's like. I'm telling you I got 50 feet from the hive and it was like, by the bees are attacking

Me, I mean, they are completely covering my suit. And I'm a reasonable person I'm, I'm, so I'm not saying this braggadocious Lee, it's just my personality, I will probably end up dying because I'll see a bowling ball bounce on the highway, and it'll come through my windshield, and I'll just go, Oh, look at that. And it'll hit me in the head. I just don't react to things very strongly. They just don't, they don't do that to me, and this was freaking me out is like, that is too many Bs to be in one place, there is no way this is safe. I do not like this. I taught myself I taught myself calm, you know, it's like, oh, go over there do the job you need to do I did the job I needed to do, I closed up the beat thing, I was never so glad to get away from a bunch of BS in my entire life. I'll tell you more about that episode in just a minute, because I didn't quite get away that cleanly. But I'll tell you that in a second. My point here is that we're, we're so obsessed with so many different legitimate distractions in the world. Some of them are political, some of them are personal, some of them are social, some of them are economic. Some of them have to do with a job, you got people that you hate, who are attacking you from the outside, and you got circumstances that are coming at you and diseases that you're hearing about. And everything in the world is just

getting your distract you distracted from the only reason that you would go down there to begin with, which is to get the honey. I mean, we're here in this world, because we've seen what God can do in the world. When he takes a person's life and transforms it, we've seen that. And it's worth getting through all of those distractions, without focusing simply on them. And that's what we have a tendency to do. And that's what Paul is talking about here. He's saying, I did I don't allow myself to be distracted by the fact that be over there is one of those law keeping Jews and that be over there is one of those ones who never understood what it was to represent the righteousness of God in the world. And that'd be over there was a Democrat, and that'd be over there was a Republican, and that'd be over there. He's at work, and he's undermining the things I'm doing it my job. And all of those are legitimate attacks from bees on you, and they come in this world. And Paul says, I don't want to pay attention to any of that, because all I care about is Barney. That's why I'm here. And the gospel is the honey. That's why we're here. That's the first part is for him to take all the other distract all the reasons you have for paying attention to something else. And remember how much better the gospel is than that? Are those things legitimate? Are they real? Do they have to be done? Yeah, they are. They're real. But none of them is even on the same level, as the ultimate purpose for which all of this is here, which is him the gospel, the good news that we have. Alright, that's the first part. The second part of what he says, comes in the form of an illustration, he starts another illustration in chapter 10. And then he takes us off in a different direction, we're not going to go there. But in this first illustration that he gives, at the conclusion of the chapter, he really makes the whole point of this chapter. So in verses 24, through 27, the illustration He gives us about running a race, don't you know that a race all the runners run, but in in that race, only one person receives the prize, so run so that you can receive the prize every athlete exercises, control and everything, they do this to obtain a perishable wreath that's put on their head, but we were running for an imperishable crown. So I don't run aimlessly. I don't box as one beating the air, I discipline my body and keep it under control as after preaching to others, I myself should be disqualified from running for the prize that I'm trying to obtain from staying focus on the honey. But in this case, it's not saying don't be distracted by all of those things out there. But instead, don't allow any individual thing at all to keep even the pain that's involved to keep you from being focused on the one goal you have in front of you, which is the honey so when I had all those bees swarming around me, and they never stopped, I mean, they were just it was just persistent. When I had them swarming around me and I was trying to find a way out of that situation. I had my truck parked probably 100 yards away in a pasture on the other side of the tree, the tree farm and so I you know, I decided I close up the hive and I'm all done and I want to get so I'm just calmly gonna go back to the to the truck. The windows are all open but I'll get in the truck and I'll drive and we'll get the wind going and you know, the bees be gone and then then I'll be good. So I'm so I'm walking back towards the truck.

1000 10,000 I don't know a million. I'd like to say a billion bees are on my suit and just terrifying. And then I realize there's one bee in my suit.

It's in my bonnet. You know that guy as they call it. You know what I'm talking about the headgear that you have on. I have a headgear on and there's a beat bumping into my face. So it's like it's just, it's just bumbling around in there, just bumping into me. I'm sweating so much. Hopefully that's what's keeping it from

be motivated to sting, but

I just I can't explain to you how terrifying it is to have a bee inside your bee suit. You mean you have a bee suit so that bees can't sting you. And here and I'm not, you're gonna think I'm making I'm not making this up, it bumped into my eyeball. And I'm like, I don't want to get stung in the eyeball. And it went up my nose, and I snorted it back out my nose, I'm not exaggerating. I again, I'm a fairly rational person, in most circumstances, I was terrified. So I get back to my truck, and I got a drive and I'm going to drive across this pasture. And when I'm clear of all the other BS that I can take my bonnet off, and everything will be fine. And so I get in the truck. And I mean, there are still 1000s of bees with me when I get in the truck. I know they're still attracted to me. And so I drive I'm driving as fast as I can across the pasture. The bees are all in the truck, they're all around me. I'm like, this has got to stop this bee is just bumping into me, I know it's about to sting me. And the stupidest thing in the world is I'm afraid of being stung by one bee while I got 1000 Bees outside trying to get to me through this suit. I'm telling you, though, I can't keep that hat on. So I'm like, Okay, I'm stopping the truck. So I did the thing, I stopped the truck, I hop out, and I start running from the truck as if I can run faster than the truck was going. And I take my hat off. And I think to myself in that moment. This is it. This is this is when they find the truck running in the middle of a pasture and the door open and a dead body with his hat off. And they're like, why did he take his head off? You know, and I'm like, You should have been here. Just that's why. And I end the bees are starting to bomb my head. None of them stung me. I have no idea why they're bombing my head. And I'm terrified. So I run all the way across the field, there's a this is by the way, if this ever happens to you get to a water hose. Because when you spray these, they lose all the pheromones that make them want to do anything. They just don't care anymore. And then they dry off and they go away. They don't care. So I found a water hose. I knew there was a faucet over by the bar and I sprayed start spraying the water the bees all go away. They leave me alone, everything's fine. I lived. So yeah, if you're not sure I did live.

But man, I'm telling you, when you have literally I learned that day what the expression having a bee in your bonnet means when that B is in your bonnet, nothing else matters. That is the only thing that matters. And that's what we do. Unfortunately, with things aside from the gospel, we get one thing. And we think that's why we're here. I'm going to focus on I'm going to work on politics, I'm going to work on education, I'm going to work on being the best in my business, I'm going to work on wealth, I'm going to work on whatever it is, whatever you want to work on, all those things have to be done. All those things end up being important, it's good. Get to be out of your mind, that's all fine. None of that matters at all. If you don't get to the honey, if you don't, that's the only reason I would bother putting on the suit, or even caring about the rest of it. The honey is all that matters. That's what people want to find in jars. They don't want to find a little rolled up scroll that says here's how I got away from the bee that was in my bonnet. I paid five bucks for this. No, you pay five bucks for a jar of honey, we live in the world to provide people not with the one thing that's most important to us, I've got to get that taken care of. But to the one thing that ought to be most important to us. The gospel, that good news, the reality of what people encounter when they're alone and realize Christ is with them. The reality of what happens when you think you're trying to solve all your problems. But the truth is God is holding your hand through the crisis. The reality that when you're weeping, the Holy Spirit consoles you the truth of encountering a transcendent God in this lowly world. That gospel, the good news that Jesus is in charge when we are not that our sins were laid on him in the death and suffering that he gave freely on the cross, and that our hope is restored in the power of his resurrection. And that we're given that sovereignty forever. The good news of the gospel is a sweetness that we should be attending to, and the only thing that should motivate us, all of us, as the messengers of God in this world, what makes you a messenger of God in the world, that you have the sweetness of the message that this world needs. Father, I pray that you would draw our attention to living all of our lives not from the distraction of the whole hive of interests and compelling fears and motivations that would drive us otherwise and not on the one cause that we think is highest in our lives outside of the gospel. But instead on the truth that the sweet honey, which is your good news that

Jesus is Lord and cares about us. That that would be the only thing that motivates us. Every day of our lives with heads bowed and eyes closed, I want to give you an opportunity to respond. Even now, I'm not gonna ask you to stand right now, just for the moment. I just want you to hear this. If you don't know Jesus as your savior, if you don't know what it means for him to come for you when you're desolate, for Him to guide you, when you're lost. For him to save you forgive you, redeem you, when you know you have failed, for him to give you hope, when it all seems lost. If you don't know what that is, Jesus Christ has that for you, we would love to share with you, I encourage you to come down and talk with one of us at the front here. And just say, Yeah, I need that I'll be standing right here at the front view.

But if you know Christ as your Savior and you're a follower of him, then I asked you to take stock of all of the other things that are buzzing in your life, all the other things that are distracting you and put them in the back, put them on the side. Go straight to the hot to the to the Gospel itself, to the honey, the sweetness that the world needs, in knowing what God is doing in this place.

And I would ask you to get on your knees and say to the Lord, take those distractions and put them in their right place. And help me be a faithful servant to your good news. I mean, you have kneelers down here where you can kneel. You can turn around and kneel in your seat where you are. You may just need to in your own heart quietly kneel before God and say to him restore to me that commitment to live for your good news make that the center of everything I do. Those are the two things I leave with you as you continue in your attitude of prayer and obedience to Him and hear this closing song

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, we are in Corinthians. And we've tried to be very practical because this book is practical. The reason why I chose to go through this series and to really go a chapter a week is because I am keenly aware that as I look at the people and what's going on in the Corinth church in the first century, I find ourselves back there again, as a people, it really helps us set up really what should a church be like? And how should we function as a body and as a Christian community, and all these things are covered, really, by Paul, the writer of most of the New Testament, let's think about Corinth for a minute, let's make sure we go there mentally, in our heads, it is a modern city. It is a city filled with temples, these are pagan temples for worship, there was food offered to idols in this culture in the setting, they would have had food offered to idols, and he's really going to answer the question today of what are we gonna do about that? And how are we to understand our responsibility before God and before others and our freedom that we now have in Christ. So this food offered to idols, really three things could happen to in terms of how they understood it. In the first century, it could be eaten right there in the temple, right after the sacrifice to the pagan deities, or gods or idols can be sold in the marketplace. So again, any leftover meat that occurred through the sacrifices in the temple can be sold in the marketplace, or it can be taken home to be eaten inside the homes of various people, the Corinthian, folks, they came from a certain background, just like we do, they came from a certain background and background is just a way of conducting ourselves pre conversion. We all have families and history and things of origin. And we all know that we're a combination of our nature and our nurture. And we understand as we rub up against other people that we have baggage, and so the Corinthian people would have had baggage as well, what is that that stuff left in the basement? I realize we don't have basements lock here in El Paso, but stuff left in our heart that continually trips us up and really pulls us back in you and me, right? We all have things that we take into any relationship, whether it's relationships, when you think about romantic relationships, or relationships with your family, or relationships in your church or your workplace. We all come with, with baggage and if it's bad things, we're all tempted to sort of go back to what we knew and what we experience. But he's gonna answer the question I told you, he's answered all kinds of questions, you can go back and hear his various thoughts on even last week on marriage and singleness. Today. Paul's going to answer the question about what do we do about this food that's offered to idols?

verse one of chapter eight. Now, regarding your question about food that's been offered to idols. Yes, we know that we have, we all have knowledge about this issue. Right? So let's just connotes is just that idea of like we all we all know, this is this is going about in our community, in our town in our city. But while knowledge makes us feel important, it is love that strengthens the church. Anyone who claims to know all the answers doesn't really know very much. But the person who loves God is the one whom God recognizes. And I want to just kind of start off with a joke someone from the church sent me this week that really sort of encapsulates some of our feelings about this. Here's a joke that someone texted me this week from church. Here's the joke. Those of you who think you know, it all are really annoying to those of us who actually do. And so I thought that was a good joke. And I think it's very applicable to when you think about this knowledge here. Because the question is, remember verse one, here's the question on the table, can I meet offered to idols? Now, we could modernize this question with our own gray issues. You know what a gray issue is, it's not black and white. In the Bible, there's some things that are real clear. It's often told us in the 10 commandments, don't steal, don't kill, don't lie, we understand that's black and white, don't do these things. But we all have areas that we interact with, in our own lives that we find. Well, it's not real clear, it's a gray issue. And really, Paul's going to help us today. Think through that. So here's one of the questions you and I may have that are gray issues. After we are converted to Christ. That's what we become a Christian. One is Can I drink publicly with all my buddies? Or should I be drinking alcohol at all? You're like, well, I'm free. I understand that I'm free in Christ. But what if your buddy struggles with alcohol or used to be or is a current alcoholic? Right? It complicates things right. Now. We have to have some wisdom we have to have some thought that comes into this. Another question you may you know, I may have in terms of gray areas as a Christian, what can I watch on Netflix or other streaming channels? What about video game systems? Are there good ones are there ones that are bad are there What about the

ratings. Should I pay attention to those on the entertainment that I consume? Or that I let my children consume? What age is appropriate to let my children or my nieces and my nephews, young people around me consume these things? What about smartphones? Is it supposed to be till eighth grades? It's supposed to be till they're 18? Should we never give it to them? Whatever? What about grandma's house around the American Day? Or my auntie's house, my uncle's house and my grandpa's house? What about those weird things that are still hanging out? In your family of origin homes? I'm not just talking about alcohol. What about those weird spiritual pieces that are still hanging out? In maybe some of your ancestors or your extended families homes? What do you do about that when you're invited over for family meals, or, again, maybe a time around do them work day and maybe they have them just like, over the mantel or over certain walkways? And maybe they kiss it for luck? Or pray towards it, or talk to it? Or ask you to maybe touch it or pray to it? See, these aren't easy. And Paul, when he's asking these questions and things that we're grappling with, right now, as we live in our own culture in 2024, we have to learn with the tension of things that are gray and take a lot of wisdom and a lot of responsibility. As we think about our newfound freedom in Christ. It's not as simple as just yes or no, right? A lot of times we want that right. But just just tell me what to do. And I'm I understand where the line is, I know, am I supposed to cross it, I'll either cross it because I don't care. Or I'll make sure I stay back. Again, we know that that's clear. In some things in the Bible, there is black and white issues. But there's also things that in this case, we've got to figure out for ourselves. What is our aim, though, and I hope you saw it from the passage. The first point I wants to see this morning is whatever you and I decide on some gray issues on the Christian faith. Number one, our aim has to be love. Our aim has to be loved. You see that in the verses? I'm not just making this up. This isn't just you know, Brent's thoughts. This is right there in the church. He says, How do you strengthen the church, according to verse one, he tells us it's love. It's not knowledge that that puffs up. Who is the one whom God recognizes? We often think, oh, okay, when I go to these parties, or I go to these gatherings, you know, I'll just let the smartest person in the room talk. But the one whom God recognizes, according to verses one through three of this chapter is what the one who loves God, and it's evident, how do we know if they love God? Because they just tell us a lot and they pray a lot, or they sing a lot? No, because of their lifestyle. Because what if we love God, it will ultimately bear fruit. So when you and I think about this, let's just start here, point one, wherever we land on some of these issues. It's not just, you know, meat, or food offered to idols, but anything that we find ourselves sort of living in that tension of what am I supposed to do with this now that I'm a Christian, and I'm still in the world but not of the world. We have to make our aim love. Paul talks about this in other areas, we could go to a First Corinthians I'm not First Corinthians, We got to Romans, chapter 14. And he really lays out some of this idea of freedom and freedom of conscience and how we love our brothers and sisters in Christ isn't the only place this principle is talked about. But this is the only place that's talked about in reference to meat or food offered to idols. All right, so he's going to continue on verse four. He says, so what about it? What about eating meat that has been offered to idols? Well, we all know that an idol is not really a God, and that there is only one God. There may be so called Gods, both in heaven and on earth. And some people actually worship many gods and many lords. But for us, what there's only one God the Father by him all things were created, and for whom we live, and there's one Lord Jesus Christ, through him all things were created, and through whom we live. Second point I want us to see this morning is everyone else may be aimless, but we know whom we live for. Now, the Holy Spirit isn't mentioned in this passage specifically, but it is in other parts of Corinthians. And so we understand that this is a Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and we could go all the way back to Deuteronomy six and we can look at here Oh, Lord, here. The God is one right here, O Israel, the LORD our God is one that's often called this Shimon Deuteronomy six. And so he's really repeating this theme here, that everyone else may be aimless around us and we find ourselves what in a culture in a time where people aren't sure about who God is and what they're supposed to worship. Now this idle concerns and sharing life and friendships and meals together, this isn't some sort of hypothetical exercise for me and I hope it isn't for you either. Because we can see some real practical applications I can say for me personally, I see some real practical applications for these principles.

For me today, and I'll say this because as a El Paso in, there are all kinds of people from all over the world that find themselves settled here. And as we interact with them, and as my family interacts with them, we get invited to meals over to people's houses, and we return that favor, and they come back to meals at our houses, but they're not all Christians are not all believers. And in fact, they all don't even have the same sort of worldview or perspective that myself and my family may have. That doesn't mean we don't share meals ago. So I'm gonna give you the first image here, I in the last 30 days, so that's why I say this is real. For me, this isn't just, you know, some sort of theory or theological exercise for me this morning. My family and I, we were in a home of someone who is Vietnamese, they invited us in a, they had my children there and fed them and all that. And as I walked around their home, they would have statues like this. Why? Because they asked, and they're Buddhists. And so that makes sense. But here I am, and I'm eating with them. And was that okay, was that a good thing? I thought it was and I returned the favor and they've come over to my house and they've eaten with me, but how do we process that as our as our families now interact was what my family our family interact with, with people who literally have idols in their home that we are sharing meals with together and I don't know what they did before they cook the meal, I don't know if they, you know, rubbed Buddha's belly or what I don't know what they did. I know, they didn't ask me to, I would have gotten up and left. So we have, we all have lines, we all have boundaries of how far we're willing to go. Also, in the last 30 days, our family and I, we were in the home of someone who is Indian from India, and they had this very small version, they had a big, huge Laborat

really idle to their Hindu God, because they were from India. And so we came into the party and I was ushered into the kitchen where the food was. And before I got to the kitchen, there was a whole room that was set up with this huge idol that was much bigger and more elaborate than this. Now, I was okay, pretty quickly on because I saw that they had catered Chick fil A sounds like praise God, Christian chicken. Um, okay. Now Now they had also they had also catered the pizza joint, which I think is a subtle way for me to be okay with marijuana. But I just looked past that I just looked past the pizza joint, I did not partake, if I wanted. If I wanted to be, you know, forced to think about marijuana, I would just drive to New Mexico. And so that's not, you know, I didn't want to do that. And so, so I but I stayed, and I ate. And it was Saturday night, and they had an open bar. And I didn't drink because you know, I want to be fresh for you guys today. But but but it was just that sort of, I don't drink anyways, by the way, but but he's just showing you like, like that we have to sort of interact with each other when we're at these gatherings. And what do we think about this? How do we interact with that? How are we Christ in those circumstances. And again, they didn't ask me do anything that I thought went against my conscience, or against my religion, but I'm also keenly aware of what kind of things go on in their home. And then finally, we might be very, very aware and accustomed to these kinds of religious things that are in many homes around here in El Paso. And so I myself, when I go into someone's home, who's maybe a first generation American, where they're very, very fresh from coming from Mexico, a lot of times, they'll bring many of these artifacts, then sometimes they still have sort of a religious connotation for the people whose home I am gathered in now sometimes they're like, listen, that was just grandma grandpa's folk art. We just, you know, we just put it back in the closet. I just want to remember grandpa grandma or auntie or uncle, I have good, you know, thoughts and feelings about him. But sometimes, and you and I know this, we find ourselves in homes of some of our friends and relatives and ancestors, and they're still what, they're still using these things, and things like this as idols that they really have some sort of divine power in their mind. This is what Paul's talking about. He's saying that we're here we understand that this is not that this is not really God, that these are gods. That's what he says here in this passage, because we serve the one God, but he's still asking, What are we supposed to do? And that's why I said our second point this morning is everyone else may be aimless, but we know whom we live for. And I felt being okay being in their homes and having them in mind. Why? Because I was sure of where I was, I had a solid SHRM foundation and I really saw myself as being a light in a dark place and I was able to not compromise or say or do anything against my conscience. He's going to continue on the verse seven he's gonna say, however, not all believers know this. So now

He's going to shift and he's going to ask you and me to make accommodations. Even though we're free in Christ. Some are accustomed to thinking of idols as being real. So when they eat food that's been offered to idols, they think of it as the worship of real gods and their weak consciences are violated. It's true that we can't win God's approval by what we eat. We don't lose anything, if we don't eat it, and we don't gain anything if we do, but you must be careful so that your freedom does not cause others with a weaker conscience to stumble. For if others see you with your superior knowledge, eating in the temple of an idol, will they be encouraged to violate their conscience by eating food that has been offered to an idol. So because of your superior knowledge, a weak brother, believer for whom Christ died will be destroyed. And when you sin against other believers by encouraging the do something they believe is wrong, you are sinning against Christ. So if what I eat causes another believer to sin, I will never eat meat again. As long as I live for I don't want to cause another believer to stumble. It's the same principle. I told you. This was repeated in the book of Romans chapter 14 and fallings if you really are interested more in these things, you can start Romans 12, and go to the end of the book and you'll see this principle repeated that you don't want to do anything against your conscience because even then, it'll be sin because you have an understanding that this is not right. This is not something you want to participate in, because you're trying to honor God. So what he's really laying out for us, and I've been using these terms, but I want to kind of make it clear for us, is this sort of this sort of how are we aiming towards responsibility, and freedom? And, and so I've got little bullet holes is just I'm sticking with the aim theme, right? So shoot, fire aim, that kind of thing. So how do we understand because we all have a spectrum of this, right? Think about this in terms of, we all make choices along the spectrum of, I'm trying to be responsible, but man, I'm ready to you know, I'm ready, I'm ready to be free. So people quit jobs, and you've probably maybe been one of these people, people quit jobs, when there's tons of responsibility, right? But there's little to no freedom you ever worked that job before? Right? Where you know, you know that there's tons of responsibility, but you're not empowered to make the decisions you need to make in order to do whatever job that you're called to do. So that's high responsibility, little freedom. But people also lose their jobs, when they take advantage of freedom. Maybe you were young, or maybe you know, a young person where, you know, you give them a lot of freedom. And all of a sudden, they think that freedom is don't show up, you know, or, you know, texts, you know, when it's five minutes till the hour, they're supposed to be there and say I can't make it today. There's a lot of freedom that they've been given, maybe you've been given, but you're taking advantage of it. Because why? Because you don't want to be responsible. So we can take this. And again, we all run the spectrum. So think about this, if you're going to be responsible tonight, you're going to say, Okay, I'm not going to numb myself with alcohol, or that glass of wine or that glass of scotch at the end of the night. So I'm gonna be real responsible. So you may you may aim yourself there. You say, I'm going to be sort of responsible, okay? So I'm going to limit my, my intake of maybe food or drink or entertainment, right? Or you're gonna say, no, no, I'm gonna move a little bit more towards freedom, and be a little bit less responsible. Why? Because I'm free. Depends on what that what we're talking about here. So we understand there's a spectrum. Or you say, Oh, I am free, man. I'm good. I can always make it up later. tomorrow's a new day. I can be going to the gym tomorrow. What's that word that we hear all the time? In our choral culture? Manyana Manyana. Come on, we're free. But you see the different aims, right? So you're still you and I still were saying, okay, Brent, Pastor Brent. Paul in New Testament God. So can I go out drinking with my buddies or not? Can I watch that movie by myself? Or not? Or should I show it to minors? Is it appropriate for them? Or is it appropriate for anybody? Can I go out to eat with them? Or not? Can I go in their home and, and eat with them and sit and have their food and then return and have them in my household? Well, it depends what your aim is. That's the point this morning. So third and final point is the aim is to have a life pulling yourself and others towards Jesus. So we have to ask ourselves, what are we doing this for? Why are we doing this? How are we just doing it to relive the glory days to do something I know I'm gonna regret tomorrow to put off tomorrow what I know I should get done today. Well, then that's not really aiming your life towards love for self or others. You and I are aiming to aim to have a life that's pulling ourselves and others towards Jesus. Here's another question I want you to ask is, what's the price you're willing to pay for Christian

community. That's what we are here live church is one expression of a Christian biblical community in the, in the town in the city of El Paso, what price are you and I willing to pay for Christian community because love causes us to voluntarily limit our freedom. This is very hard for us to think through because we, we are Americans, and we have our rights. And we talked about our Bill of Rights and our human rights, and I can do what I want to do when I want to do it. We love to demand our rights. But this text is saying, don't do that, when it causes other fellow Christians to sin. That's the whole point. Why else would Paul say I'm free to eat meat, but I would even go my whole life and become a vegetarian. That's pretty strong. Paul, I don't know if I'm there yet. But I'm willing to go my whole life and become a vegetarian, If it means that you won't stumble in sin, because why what he's doing there is he's limiting himself of real freedom that he has, why for the cause of love. So you have to ask yourself, when you're interacting, and you're eating meals, and you're, and you're participating in certain kinds of entertainment, you're going out and you're doing certain things, why are you doing it, just be honest with yourself, you have to talk to yourself a lot and preach to yourself a lot. Don't, don't do what we were all taught in the 80s and 90s, through Disney and say by the bell and you know, back to the future of just follow your heart. You know, you've got to lead your heart and guide your heart, especially when you find yourself in a community that does not have biblical standards. And that's the community they found themselves in in court. That's the community you're gonna find yourself in El Paso and 2024. Aim to have your life pulling yourself, lead yourself first, this is the hardest person to lead and analyze pulling yourself and others towards Jesus. Here's what it means. It means that I actually call and check on a person I haven't seen in church in a while. You look around, you shake hands from and I get all that but we want a strong biblical community here at 15 at Joe battle Boulevard at Life Church. So we have to get to know one another's exchanged phone numbers hang out a little bit before and afterwards. That's why we're, we've been giving away free drinks here lately, not the alcoholic con The other con here at Life Church, right? Because we want you to feel like man, I can stick around here.

And if I don't see someone whom I used to love with and fellowship with, I'm gonna call him. It's actual sacrifice, not getting something I want financially so I can be faithful at Life Church. Listen, there are always other things that we could buy and spend our money on, than to donate towards righteous causes, whether it's Life Church or other nonprofits. But what we find is, is that when we give our firstfruits to the Lord, and when we give to him, when we're faithful to Him, when we actually sacrifice, right, all of us wherever we're at financially, it is always a sacrifice, to give a portion of our money towards a nonprofit called or a church. But it's saying that it's worth it. It's worth it to create the type of Christian biblical community I want to be a part of, or number three, that I'll actually serve somewhere, not just a 10 life churches, not just 10 Life Church, that I won't make excuses anymore, the however long I'm here, whatever I've got in my hands in my body, whatever I've got to give, I want to give a portion of that and part of that here at Life Church when you're doing that. And when we're just being the light out here in El Paso was we gather at certain gatherings and, you know, I haven't answered all your questions about I know family and friend gatherings. But hopefully, I've given you some principles that Paul gives us here of how to think about these things on the spectrum of the responsibility you have towards God and others and the freedom that you have in Christ. But again, make it our aim to pull ourselves and others towards Christ. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you for the attentiveness of people online and in the room. And I just pray right now for those that are struggling with what to do with certain relationships with certain habits that they're trying to kick or how to have hard conversations or how to draw boundaries, how there's many things that are confusing and harmful and hurtful to us. But there's also many things that are good for us to enjoy. So I pray for those in the room that are struggling to enjoy your good gifts and I pray for those in the room that are struggling to know what to give up for the sake of Christ. Wherever we're at father, lead us we pray, we ask these things. In Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you, Terry, I want to welcome you guys who are online and those y'all that have joined us this Fourth of July week. We've come in the middle of a series on First Corinthians, and we're on First Corinthians seven today, if you want to turn there, there's gonna be a lot of Scripture, but it'll all be on the screen in front of you if you want to follow along. We've talked about this with Corinthians. But Paul, who's the primary writer of the New Testament, especially the letters, he understands the times, and he realizes that the church is new. This is, of course, a letter written early on, he's having a dialogue with these people at Corinth, which was a real city, a real place, a real church, really a church that was probably even smaller than ours. And he understands that they're under persecution at times, you understand that in the first century, that Rome was really over everything that the known world touched at that time. And he understands that the things that he is telling them are definitely at odds with the culture with the people around them. So if you feel yourself saying, Okay, how do I navigate my Christian faith? Or if you're here today, and you're considering the Christian faith? How do I go about doing that, when it feels like everything that I'm trying to do that's good, and of light and of God is being pushed back or not being celebrated or not being praised. And the good news for you and I today is, that is the type of people and the type of land in which Paul is addressing the Corinthians and trying to help them to see So today he's gonna give instructions on marriage and on singleness, and how to think about that, and relate in those given situations, singleness and marriage. A couple of things to consider, as you read this section along with me, and you'll see this as we, as we read along, and we'll break it up into three different sections. Number one, it's obvious that he's answering their questions or concerns. So we would have a dialogue among maybe zoom, if we had an expert coach, or teacher or CEO who was sort of dialing in to us. This is the ancient world. And so if you wanted to communicate, you would send a letter. And so Corinthians is one of many letters that it's obvious that Paul and the church at Corinth, were going back and forth with so it's obvious first point that he is answering some of their questions and concerns. And now it's relating to marriage and singleness. Number two, he goes back and forth between what he says or said, and what the Lord Jesus said, or says, Now, this back and forth dialogue that you're going to hear in the text, as we read today is not like saying, oh, okay, well, if Jesus really said it, then that that really means something. And Paul, you're just sort of giving your suggestion, that's not what he's talking about. What he's doing is he's saying, when the Lord Jesus was here on earth, He gave clear instructions on this. And so what I'm doing Paul saying, what I'm doing is I'm sort of filling that out. And when I when I say things that are in addition to what Jesus already said, I'm gonna let you know about it. And so that's, that's what's going on there. And you're gonna see him do this in the dialogue, in First Corinthians seven today. And then number three, I want you to sort of pay attention to and you're going to notice is that he's really going to commend singleness, he's really going to do that. And you're gonna see that He commends this as a good option for believers who are single, but it can't be true for everyone he writes about right. Plus, historically, whenever a, a Christian people or even a sect of Christians or even go so far as a cult of Christians, they all raise their hand and they all say, Okay, we're all going to be celibate for life. Or once we become a believer, we're, we're going to abstain from sexual relations for the rest of our life. What ends up happening to that sect of people, those those groups, maybe even that cult is they die out in a generation or two. Now, for those of y'all that have a neighbor next to you, a person sitting next to you that didn't quite get that. Just Just look at him say, Hey, this is you know, I'll explain to you how and where babies come from later. But that's what ends up happening. Right? So we know, we know he can't mean because you're gonna see him come in singleness here. We know he can't mean that that's going to be true for everyone. Because then you would run out of babies. All right. So now I think with those three things in consideration, I think we're ready to dive into the text this morning. beginning of verse one of chapter seven, it says this right here. Now regarding the questions you asked in your letter, I told you that's what he's going to do here. He's he's already taken up some issues of last week we talked about suing about later on with issues of love. Yes, it is good to abstain from sexual relations or sexual immorality because he knows that's the culture. He's reaching the city of Corinth very similar to our culture where it's kind of free love and free sex, but because there's so much

Extra one morality. So he knows that that's what he's speaking to, each man should have his own wife, and each woman should have her own husband. The other thing I love about Paul is you're going to see this in the passage, he's going to equate men and women together, and he's going to give instructions to each. Again, in the ancient world, this would have been huge, this would have been novel, that he's putting them on equality in terms of their own responsibility. So if he's gonna address the man, watch it, he'll always address the woman as well. And that and vice versa, the husband should fulfill his wife sexual needs, and the wife should fulfill her husband's needs, the wife gives authority for her body over to her husband, even in the ancient world, they may have thought, yeah, I get that. But he actually says the reverse is true as well. And the husband gives authority over his body to his wife, Do not deprive each other of sexual relations Unless you both agree to refrain from sexual intimacy for a limited time, so that you can give yourselves to more completely to prayer. Afterward, you should come together against that Satan won't be able to tempt you because of your lack of self control. I say this as a concession, not as a command. But I wish everyone was single, just as I am. There's that commending of singleness, yet each person has a special gift from God of one kind or another. So I say to those who aren't married, and widows, it's better to stay on marriage just as I am. But if they can't control themselves, they should go ahead and marry, it's better to marry than to burn with lust. But for those who are married, I have a command that comes not from me, but from the Lord. So that's that idea of all of it's from God. And he's saying when Jesus was here, he said, these kinds of things, a wife must not leave her husband. But if she does leave him, let her remain single or else be reconciled to Him, and the husband must not leave his wife. Now, I will speak to the rest of you, though I do not have a direct command from the Lord. Right. He didn't say something when he was here on Earth. But I'm telling you, Paul says, If a fellow believer has a wife who's not a believer, and she's willing to continue living with him, he must not leave her into believing woman as a husband is a believer, and he's willing to continue living with her, she must not leave him for the believing wife brings holiness to her marriage, and the believing husband brings holiness is marriage. Otherwise, your children would not be holy, but now they are holy. But it's the husband or wife who isn't a believer insists on leaving, let him go. In such cases, the believing husband or wife is no longer bound to the other, for God has called you to live in peace. Don't you guys realize that your husband's might be saved because of you. And don't you husbands realize that your wives may be saved. Because of you long passage there. I told you, it was a good long passage. And I'm hopeful that those handles that I gave us were helpful as we read through that, that you saw a couple things, I'm gonna point them out here. But I want to give sort of a a bullet point chart about the tension that you and I are gonna feel as we read these verses, and I'm gonna show that right there. Here's the tension. Here's what Paul is doing. He's affirming the goodness of sex within marriage, that's obvious. So if you want to say that in a real short phrase, here's what he's saying. Marriage is good. Marriage is good, but it has its issues. He's going to talk about this later, say, Hey, listen, go and get married if you want, but you're gonna have worldly concerns, you're gonna have to worry about the interests of your spouse and children if God brings or blesses. Number two, though, the tension, because they're both true, he affirms the goodness of the celibate, single life, singleness is good. But he's gonna say those are gonna have issues too. Because Where are you going to have your sexual intimacy, that's going to be something that you're going to give up in order to be single or celibate. So that's sort of the tension I want you to see. Now, one of the things I want to show us next is just a picture when we think about sort of the battle of the sexes, because any of us who've been married for any amount of time, we realize that there's all this push and pull that that men and women are different, and we have different desires, we have different thoughts and different ways about going about things. And we don't have to be married very long before, you know, we have conflict and these kinds of things. Couple things that I think he's trying to help us to see principles that I got out of this passage. Number one, I think a lack of sexual relations can give satan a foothold. That's, that's no question. And again, you can get this from just general therapeutic wisdom about couples, right, that, that oftentimes what goes on there, whether it's good, bad, or indifferent or not happening at all, is sort of a temperature of the rest of the relationship. Number two mutual love and respect for each other's body and needs. Because you can see this here, and that's what's so interesting about the equality that Paul is putting on men and women and again, would have been novel in the ancient world. We assume it today. And biblically, of course, that's true that, that there's mutual love and respect for each other's bodies and needs. And then the third thing I would say is being a believer matters. He's going to repeat this theme over and over again that those of us who have faith in God, that's what allows us to not just endure a marriage but to really thrive in a marriage. And when you're unequally yoked or you find yourself or once a believer in one's not. There's just certain things that go on there. And you saw some of the ways in which he's trying to help us sort of grapple with that if you find yourself in

A relationship where looks like one's believing or one has faith and the other doesn't. Now, a lot of times what we'll do only gets a passage like this. And even the way I was taught, it is always sort of asking the question, okay, when can I leave? Or how can I get out of this? Right? If I find myself sort of in this battle of the sexes in it, and it won't go away? Well, you're saying, Come on, man, I don't have a category, I want to know what the category is to where either she can leave, or I can leave, or he can leave or whatever I want to know. It's not that simple. Lots of counsel and, and wisdom is what's needed. But here's what he's concerned about. And this is our first point this morning. First point is, those walking by faith in the home have a purifying effect. I don't know if you saw that in the passage. But in your Bible, it says, either that the the other spouse, or specifically the children, the way that they're going to have a hope of prayer in this world is if they only have one believing parent, is that they will then have a way in which they may get to God, the two unbelieving parents is gonna be very hard for them unless someone takes them to church. But what he's saying is, is that those walking by faith in the home have a purifying effect. And we know this, right? That when there's at least one person in the home, that's acting rightly, that's acting righteously, that's doing what God calls him to do, it really does have a purifying effect. Now, it could have said that if you have one believer in the home that that for sure your children are going to be holier sanctified. And that's exactly what he's saying. He's saying that it will have that sort of effect. Also, if you live long enough with someone else, you'll realize that that you'll go through ups and downs in life, and sometimes one has more faith than the other you ever been there? Like even though you both believe God, are you both sort of done the minimum of understanding? Yes, I'm a, I'm a Christ follower, you'll have different degrees of faith at different points in your marriage. And so that's why I say, walking by faith in the home. It's great if both do it. But if just one does it and the other one's like, Hey, I don't want this I'm out, saying, Hey, you can let them go. But what is faith? Keep in mind, we got a real clear definition from Hebrews it says that God exists and that he's a rewarder. And that's all what we're talking about here is that oftentimes we think, we look at our given situation, good, bad or indifferent, worthy, okay, I'm doing okay. Because we're not we're not fighting each other today, we're not yelling at each other, whatever it is, you're sort of sort of understanding of how you have a good marriage. And when he's saying is, no, it's more than that. It's knowing that what we're doing has eternal purposes, and that God exists. And because God's in our lives and in our relationship, he's going to bring about good things, if we seek Him if we believe in Him, if we have faith in Him, that really helps us to understand our Christian faith to say we're not here by accident, right? Because the alternative to the Christian faith is some version of paganism or unbelief. We're all just like atoms floating through the universe. But if you believe man, God has a purpose in my marriage. Yes, there's times when it falls apart. And maybe one has to go or both part and go the other ways. We, again, I'm not gonna give you all the details of that. That's a lot of biblical wisdom. But he's saying, understand that if you have a marriage today, that that God has a purpose for that. If you have a spouse, God has a purpose for them, you have a kids, God's got them, and he's going to use your good conduct your good faith, to have a purifying effect by those around me. So again, it's not as simple as just saying, well just tell me to stay or to go. Now, he says lots say about singleness as well. And he's going to deal with that going back and forth. So let's pick up verse 17. It says right here, each of you should continue to live in whatever situation the Lord has placed you, in remain as you are when God first called you. This is my rule for all the churches. For instance, a man who was circumcised before he became a believer should not try to reverse it. And the man who was uncircumcised and became a believer, should not be circumcised. Now, for him, it makes no difference whether or not a man has been circumcised. The important thing is to keep God's commandments. Yes, each of you should remain as you are when God called you, are you a slave. Don't let that worry you. But if you get a chance to be free, take it. And remember, if you are a slave, when the Lord called you, you're not free in the Lord. And if you were free, when the Lord called you, guess what, you're a slave of Christ, God paid a high price for you and me. So don't be enslaved by the world. Each of you, dear brothers and sisters, should remain as you were. When God first called you he again, he gives that great sort of sort of familiar terms, right? Brothers and sisters, that sort of family of God. Language. Now, this is so hard to think about, but this is really the whole point. I think of this, this whole section, this whole idea of, of trying to figure out what it means to remain as you are in the way God called you. So I'm gonna give a couple of movies that I've thought about in the last several

decades. So we have Mr. Destiny, which is really from the 80s. You have family man from the 2000s. And of course, you have a wonderful life from 1946. But all of these movies, what they all have in common is that the main character, the protagonist, they're looking at their life around them. And they're saying, I want out, I want different, right? If you go back to the first one, Mr. Destiny from that late 80s, that that blue sheet character, and he's like, yeah, man, I don't like this, this this awful house and this awful life, and I want something different. And so he gets an opportunity right throughout the two hours of the movie to see what his life would have been like if he had never met his spouse. And all he wants to do is is is go back to the family that he knew, very similar in the family man, the reverse happens that he's sort of living it up in his own singleness. And he has shown what would have happened if you would have settled down and become a family man. And then, of course, finally there, when you have George Bailey, who sort of saying he literally wants his life to end, I want to jump off a bridge and kill myself because it's got to be better than the misery that I feel. Now I'm better off dead than alive to my family. And he again, has shown that all these things as he's looked around him, he had the wrong perspective. And God right size is his perspective of what he is supposed to do and how he's supposed to conduct himself. This leads to my second point this morning is live by faith. And whatever situation you find yourself in, I'm using the same term again, because I think it's so important for us to again, see ourselves whether we're married or single, or somewhere in between, because he's going to even address engage people here in a minute. He's just trying to say, Listen, go stay, get married, don't get married, whatever you decide, understand that you're gonna have to live out your faith, and whatever situation you find yourself in. He's saying, you're gonna get married, that's fine. If you don't, that's fine, too. So then we ask questions sometimes of like, Well, God, does this mean that I can't switch jobs that I can't better myself that I can't do things that sort of would advance my career, I don't think he means that at all. Sometimes you should go, sometimes you should stay. Sometimes you should advance yourself, sometimes you shouldn't. He says, in this passage, the important thing is, is that you're gonna have to realize that all these things around you money, relationships, people, all that you're gonna have to be stewards over that realize that that that's going to fade away. And what's going to remain is your heart for me, and others. And so what he's trying to say is, is that you and I, we ask these questions, and that's why a lot of times, just like man, I, I just want to know, the answer, like in the previous passage, you know, do I have to stay in a marriage? Or, or or am I free to get out? And it's like, well, that's the wrong question. It's just like, you're asking here, it's like, well, am I free to move to a different home? Or to buy a better car? Or do I have to stay in this job, he's just gonna say whatever you find yourself, whatever you walk in, do by faith. You're, that's what you're gonna have to do.

He says that that verse references his verse 31, and this is the verses, those who use the things of the world should not become attached to them for this world, as we know it will soon pass away. So what you and I are telling ourselves and what I tell myself, whatever I decide to do for the day, for the month for the year, for the next five or 10 years of my life, I'm asking myself, Lord, am I doing this by faith? Am I walking by faith, and then I'm sitting here telling myself, God's not done with me yet. If I woke up this morning, and my eyes are open, and I have breath in my lungs, God, you're not done with me yet. You must have a purpose for me, I actually have to preach or take teach or talk to myself. And I will say, God, you have a purpose for me, God, you have a purpose for me? What is it you have for me today? And so we all want to go back to well, are you pro circumcision? Or are anti circumcision? These I don't know. I'm in the keep God's commandments camp. And that's what he's trying to say, Are you and then you have these questions about, you know, slavery or or servitude. Now, again, I've talked about this before, but in the ancient world, there were there were many kinds of slavery. And I understand that, that none of them are good, but But it wasn't always sort of the 1800s A chattel slavery that we think about. And so sometimes it was just really just servitude. Were they more like what we see, sort of in England a couple 100 years ago, not always had cruel masters, I get all that. But sometimes, it was just simply someone who was a servant in a household. And what he's saying is, is that listen, I don't know if your lots going to change here in this world or in this life. But if you get an opportunity to be free taken, of course, but what he's saying is that what's it to you because whether you're slave or free, we're all level at the cross. That's gonna become even more clear when you look at a book like Fleeman. And unless he is and when he's being told, yeah, yeah, of course, you are to be received as a brother and sister equal and Christ as everyone else is. But the thing is, is that God doesn't always change our circumstances. But what we you and I do have control over is how are we going to live by faith, wherever and in whatever place we find ourselves in and it may mean that you have to have

Faith to go or faith to stay, right or faith do this or faith to, to hunker down, right? To both? There's no There's no sort of easy. Um, get out of difficult situation card. Last section here, verse 25. And following says, says this. Now regarding your questions, remember, he said I'm telling you he's just, he's just sort of repeating back to them issues that he knew they were asking about had come up in the church, regarding a questions about young women who are not yet married, and do not have a command for the Lord from them meaning Jesus on earth didn't directly address this. So I'm about to dress it. But the Lord in His mercy has given me wisdom that can be trusted. So I'll share it with you because of the present crisis. And I think that's key to to understanding Corinthians is that when you're on the run, or when you find yourself in hostile culture to the Christian faith, you better way seriously, your decisions to marry or not marry for a lot of times throughout Christendom, especially over the last several 100 years, it was assumed you would get married and have kids and that that would be a stable relationship and stabilizing effect in the community. That's now an oddity. And it would have been an oddity in first century here for the Corinthian people. So make sure you understand that you are you are however, and whatever decision you make, you're going to make it in a present crisis, I think it's best to remain as you are, if you have a wife do not seek to end the marriage, if you do not have a wife do not seek to get married. But if you do get married, it's not a sin, that a young woman gets married saw sin, however, those who get married at this time will have what they'll have troubles. And I'm trying to spare you of those problems. But let me say this dear brothers and sisters, the time that remains is very short, which was always true in the church age. So from now on, those with wives should not focus only on their marriage, those who weep or who are joyous or who buy things should not be absorbed by their weeping or joy in their possessions. Because why you got to hold loosely to the things of this world. Those who use the things of the world should not become attached to them. We're just stewards of this bit until the Lord comes back for this world as we know it will soon pass away, I want you to be free from this concerns of life. And I'm a man can spend his time doing the Lord's work and think about how to please Him. But a man has to think about earthly responsibilities, and how to please his wife. His

interests are divided. And that's why I gave that those illustrations of those movies. Because all of us in whatever situation you find yourself in, whether you're single, you're daydreaming about being married, and a lot of times if you're married, you're daydreaming about your sacral days. And then you have to sort of play that out, though and say, Well, what would that lead to? He's helping you think through that to say, Listen, there's advantages and disadvantages to both. But understand that if you get married and have kids, your interest truly are divided. Because now you got to think about each other. And you got to think about these kids, you have a long, right. And so

in the same way, a woman who is no longer married or has never been married can be devoted to the Lord and wholly embodying spirit. But a married woman has to think about earthly responsibilities, how to please your husband. And I'm saying this for your benefit not to place restrictions on you. So he's all the time saying, Paul, you sound schizophrenic. He said, I'm pro marriage, one sentence and pro singleness, another. That's the tension he wants to remain so that we have to process it by faith, not some sort of dictatorship from Paul or me to say, Okay, this is what you're to do in your situation, because every given situation is different. I want you to do whatever will help you serve the Lord best. That's what he wants. That's what I want for you. That's what Paul wants for you is what God wants for you, with as few distractions as possible. But if a man thinks that he's treating his fiancee improperly, and whenever we get into his Passion, let him marry or as he wishes, it's not a sin. But if he has decided firmly not to marry, and there's no urgency and he can control his passion, he does well not to marry. So the person who marries his fiancee does well, the person who doesn't marry does even better wife is bound her husband as long as he lives but if her husband dies, what she's free to marry anyone she wishes, but only if he loves the Lord, that's sort of making sure you're not unequally yoked, but in my opinion, be better for to stay single. And I'm giving you counsel from God's Spirit. When I say this, he's always sort of either talking out of both sides of his mouth, or he's really trying to help us to live in that tension. Back to that first chart I showed you here. This is the tension He wants us to live in. Marriage is good, has its issues. singleness is good, but it has its issue. Last and final point I want to see here is from one of my movies, one of the things that was one of my favorites growing up and that was City Slickers. And so if you remember this movie again from early 90s And sorry Generation Z you have to go back and look at a lot of movies on streaming services okay just understand your your what I what I'm called an older millennial pastor.

But that pic of the one thing if you remember that character, their curly or or Jack palates is the

actor's name, you know, you always kind of held up that one finger and he had his, his cigarette in his mouth and he's trying to help them and they're sort of processing their own little middle midlife crisis is there with Billy Crystal and others. And he says, You got to figure out that one thing and of course, the whole movie is like, well, what's the one thing what's the one thing and it's it comes back to well, you've got to figure that out for yourself. And so I would just say this, I think you can say it however you want. But you and I got to figure out a way to say it. Third and final point this morning. Be single minded, wholehearted in knowing Jesus. Be single minded, wholehearted, and knowing Jesus, then you might say I didn't see the word Jesus or knowing him in that last section. Now you might be didn't but what you did see what you and I did see was we saw this whole idea of find a way to serve Him, find a way to serve Him, that's best for you, given your situation, find a way to know that what I'm saying to you is by God's Spirit, that's what Paul's saying here, the very spirit of God and so, so I would say, if it was me, I'd say be single minded, wholehearted, in what in gazing upon your beauty, Lord, because for me, when I sort of elevate my gaze upward and think about God and Christ and what He did for me, that always sort of propels me to think and to move and to act in the right direction. Some of you you might say, No, I would place this with be single minded and wholehearted in serving Jesus all the days in my life, you would go right with what Paul was commending here. Or you might say, No, be single minded, wholehearted in keeping God's commands. That would be also in this passage. I just wanted to say, and this is just as an example, we got to figure out what that one thing is whether you have a spouse or not, because something may happen where you don't have a spouse tomorrow, and you and I are still called to be faithful, or you may gain a spouse tomorrow. So be single minded, wholehearted in knowing Jesus. And I'm very clear on that. Because what happens is, is that when you and I sort of get to know our Savior, and the best way to do that, of course, if you've never done it before, is read the four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And Jesus is very clear that if you want to know the God of the universe, the God who reigns and lives in heaven and interacts here on Earth, look to Jesus. And so when you sort of get to know this, Jesus, I can also say, get to know the Trinity, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But how is it that we know any of that it's through the blood of Christ. That's why when George prayed, he said, Listen, if you're here today, and you're far from God, or you don't know Christ, I pray that you would receive Christ as your Lord and Savior. That's why we regularly do baptisms and baby dedications because we're sitting there saying, we want to be a people who bring up our children, to know God, through Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we ourselves. If we're a first generation believer, we want to be baptized because we want to tell everybody and we want to show that we have really done this right here. We have decided to be single minded, wholehearted in knowing Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. Well, that's our that's our closing. That's our finishing today, and I'm going to pray for us in those regards. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I pray for those who are thinking about how to articulate or say their one thing. Brother, I know that in the sound of my voice, there are people who are hurting in their marriages, there's people who are hurting in their singleness.

There's people who are doing okay or think they're doing okay, but something's about to happen that's going to call them to have more faith than maybe they had before. So if I just pray, I just pray for hearts all around the room, that you would increase our faith, to love and trust you not only these days, but all the days of our life. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, if you have your Bibles turned in First Corinthians six, if not, the whole passage will be up on the screen and another difficult passage from First Corinthians But it's great because it's a word to us. It's a word originally to the church at Corinth in the first century, and it's very much Word to us. So I wanted to read the intro to the series. In case you're sort of catching up or just need to be reminded, we put this in the email every week it says this, the city of Corinth was at the heart of an important trade route in the ancient world. Like many cities that thrive on trade, Corinth had a reputation for sexual immorality, religious diversity and corruption. The church that Paul planted there floundered under all these influences. First Corinthians addresses many practical questions about the church concerning such things as spiritual gifts, marriage, food offered to idols, and the resurrection. The book also calls for unification encourages us to work heartily for the Lord and shares with us how to love. So again, the reason why we're going through this right now is I know of no better book to really kind of help us process what we experience in our own culture today. And so we're going to begin First Corinthians chapter six, beginning in verse one, it says this, when one of you has a dispute with another believer, how dare you file a lawsuit and ask a secular court to decide the matter instead of taking it to other believers? Don't you realize that someday we believers will judge the world? And since you are going to judge the world? Can't you decide even these little things among yourselves? Don't you realize that we will judge angels, so you should surely be able to resolve ordinary disputes in this life? If you have legal disputes about such matters? Why go to an outside judge or outside judges who are not respected by the church? I'm saying this to shame you? Isn't there anyone in all the church who is wise enough to decide these issues, but instead one believer, Susan other right in front of unbelievers, of watching world? Even to have such lawsuits with one another? Is a defeat for you? Why don't I just accept the injustice and leave it at that? Why not let yourselves be cheated. Instead, you yourselves are the ones who do wrong and cheat even your fellow believers. So first point I wants to see today, which is a spiritual principle you maybe haven't thought of before, is suing is bad among your spiritual family. Now, we can even say this, if you want to take out the word spiritual. And the reason why we know this is bad not only because the Scriptures say so. But we know this experientially, I can go around the room or even if you've heard stories, or maybe you've had it in your own family, where there's been some sort of war or faction where maybe someone dies or something like that. And there's some money to be had and the brothers and sisters or the aunts and uncles, they don't get along, or even among business, and you'll have falling outs among family and business. Uh, we know that suing is bad among normal family, our immediate family, our extended family. And he's just using that principle to say, suing is bad among your spiritual family as well. Why? Well, first, it leads to disunity and pain that is so great. I've given some examples thinking about family. But maybe you've experienced this in a church where there starts to be factions. And there starts to be people who war and talk against one another because they're doing things in the courtroom. So the disunity and pain is great and confidently to a split, where everyone takes sides. Second reason why sealing is bad for your spiritual family is because why are we going to unbelievers when God has equipped the church to be wise and to grow in wisdom in matters of dispute? Now we're going to talk about when do we bring in the civil magistrates are when do we bring in a different authorities? Because I think there's reasons for that. And we'll talk about that in a minute. But just on this matter, what, what are we kind of talking about here? Let's just say that, that someone in the church hired someone else to do some plumbing work for them. And it either went bad, and they didn't perform the work they were supposed to, or they ran out on their bill. That's the kind of thing we're talking about here. We're not talking about criminal but so why are we going to unbelievers, when God has equipped the church to be wise and grown wisdom? I hope you saw that in the past is they're talking about the wisdom of believers that God gives us. Third, shame comes from airing our dirty laundry. We know this right? So anytime you have some sort of public spectacle, we have some sort of public unraveling of a family dispute. What does it do? What does it bring upon the family in the community or if they're nationally known in their nation or city at large? It brings shame, doesn't it? What are they doing? Are they fighting among themselves? They couldn't work this out. They couldn't figure out a way to sort of get over this

And so it shows shame. That's why he Paul's saying I say this to your shame that you're bringing each other to court about matters of money and suing. Number four, it shows where our hearts are, it shows where our hearts are, and that we want to sue either to get back or create vengeance or vindictiveness or just want the, the money. And we're doing this to what, in this context to a brother or sister in Christ, someone in your own community. So again, this is my first point saying is bad among your spiritual family. Now, I want to be real clear, we're not talking about criminal cases. Again, I'm sure you look at headlines from time to time that show different churches, whether they're evangelical churches, or Catholic churches who have tried to hide or cover up sin of maybe sexual abuse or some other form of abuse. That's not what we're talking about here. And when those things arise, yes, we're to call the proper authorities. We're talking about things because it's very obvious when you read the whole passage where we can, we can take that insult, we can take that loss. It's like Jesus, when He said, turn the other cheek, if somebody wants to insult you, and slap you turn the other cheek, if someone in the church wants to do a bad plumbing job or a bad electrical job, and, and kind of, you know, maybe skip out on the bill. That's something you can take in, in fact, he's encouraging us to go in and take that hit, because of the unity of the faith, the body handle it internally, just like we would as a family. Nobody wants to see uncles and nephews and cousins fist fighting out in the front yard. And we don't want to see this either with the church. Let's keep going. Verse nine, it says this right here. Don't you realize that those who do wrong will not inherit the kingdom of God? So he's given you some assurance that if you find yourselves among the different kind of people, you're going to talk about here swindlers and, and people who are doing things wrong, don't you realize that, hey, if you continue in that wrongness, they're not going to hurt the kingdom of God, which is what we're about. That's why he says, ultimately, you and I are going to judge each other and angels, because that's going to be in the coming Kingdom. Next sentence, don't fool yourself, for those who indulge in sexual sin, or who worship idols, or commit adultery, or male prostitutes or practice homosexuality, or are thieves or are greedy people or are drunkards or are abusive, or cheat people. None of these will inherit the kingdom of God. Key word here. Some of you were once like that, but you are cleanse, you are made holy, you are made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, by the Spirit of our God. So number two, second point I wanted to see this morning is you used to be screwed up. Okay, we talked about all this pulling it back at us. Yeah, we used to be screwed up, we're meant to leave that behind. So he's calling out the Corinth church, we are to see ourselves in these verses that I think guilty of some or many of those things. And you're meant to say I am meant to bring or to leave that behind. Because I'm no longer a part of that. I don't want to be that any more. Now, since you see this. You might think Man, I don't like Paul's list. It's either too long, it's too short and include something you didn't want it to include or exclude something you didn't want to to exclude. But I just want to say here from the get go, that there's no inconsistencies in the moral ethic of what's going on here in the scriptures. It's been very consistent in the Old Testament, you can go back to the Levitical law, how Jewish and Israelites saw themselves. Religions for 1000s of years have been against these kinds of things. And so so we like to cherry pick our favorite sins. And what I mean by that is sometimes you're like, Yeah, this is mine. I'm sort of guilty of this little thing. Here's my little, here's my little vise, but no, but I don't do all those other things. So I'm, you know, I've got I've got the scales sort of tipped in my favor, or we do that with other people like, hey, really what they do, yeah, I get what I do is bad. But what they do, it's kind of worse than what I do. So he's just saying no, let's just knock all that down and say a couple of things about if you are a part of these kinds of things. You're not going to hear it the kingdom of God. I realized some of you were like that you've been called out of that. You've been cleanse, your feets been put on a rock, you've now received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, leave that kind of stuff behind. What kind of stuff? Are we talking about sexual immorality. We don't have to define that we know what that is. That is any sort of form that is outside of God's design for sexual intimacy, which is one man and one woman in the context of marriage. And so any of that outside of that we understand he's saying, Don't do that. Leave that behind. Other things about worship of idols. This shouldn't be a shocker. I told you, it's consistent. This is the second commandment. Remember the first commandment worship Lord your God. Alone is one. The second one is do not worship any idols any graven images, adultery, you'll be hard pressed to find a culture and a people who are going to highlight and magnify adultery for 1000s

1000s of years among all cultures, and among all people adultery has been wrong. It's seen as a negative. It's seen as something that unravels the family and society. Prostitution, again, another one of those things, that it's hard to find cultures and peoples and religious groups that are going to be pro prostitution. Although there were in terms of the ancient world where you had prostitution temples, although there were in the Roman world where you had prostitution tents outside the Colosseum games, homosexuality, for most of world history has been seen as a perversion, I get that that may be controversial, it's gets into political things, but but it's very clear here that that you and I can be freed from that we can turn back from that and to leave that behind. And I'll talk about maybe that one, if that's the one that is a stumbling block for you. Stealing most people are against stealing. And I think that's very clear. Even when we're getting confused in our day and age of what to do with people with different backgrounds who find themselves stealing, we understand that there ought to be repercussions, and consequences for stealing greediness. I've never, I've never met a club. That's the pro greediness club. So we understand that that is a vise, drunkard or alcoholics again, our culture and religion across the world would say yes, alcoholism or drunkenness is a problem, abuse, slander, or revisers. That's what that word error means abuse. And some of your translations may say slander errs, or some of them may say revisers. What are we talking about here? It's using words for harm. How many people want that done to them? How many people want somebody throwing out words that are meant to harm you and me, I don't, you don't either. So he's saying that's wrong, or cheaters, whether you're not just cheating at cards, but any sort of theft, or any sort of cheating people out of what is rightfully theirs. Now, if you say I don't like the list, because I cherry pick, even though you tell me I don't cherry pick, I end up cherry picking or, you know, I just don't like Paul's list because it's too long or too short. What you and I will sometimes do if we find ourselves in that situation where we want to sort of go outside of Scripture to sort of find our moral ethic is we'll sort of figure out what's right and wrong from the gut test, right? You may have friends and relatives like this, you may find yourself and this from time to time, it's like, man, that doesn't pass the gut test. Or you'll say, okay, that just doesn't smell right. And the problem with that is it depends on what you're putting in your gut. And it depends on what you're smelling. And the other thing is, is so goes the environment that you're around, you've got to decide, can you still stomach that? Or can you still smell that? Case in point the last several years when you've had teachers who have to call children by certain avatars, when they're in the classroom about certain pronouns as they change day to day, many of you on the room say, Man, I can't stomach that. I can't, that doesn't pass the smell test. It's like well, little bit if that's all you're going off of, you have to realize that then it can go, you're an eyes moral ethic, can swing the pendulum, with and along culture. So if you don't like Paul, or the biblical Judeo Christian values, ethics in terms of figuring out what you believe about human sexuality and other things, what are you going to be left with your gut tests or your smell tests? The reason why people were envious of the people of Israel in the Old Testament, I've already told you that, that God was calling the people of God out of just horrific circumstances around major paganism and idol worship, and in temple prostitutes and all that was going on in ancient world. But the reason why they were envious of Israel is because God spoke to them. He gave them the 10 commandments, that was actually seen as something as oh my gosh, you have a God who speaks to you from heaven, and he gives you on tablets of stone, a moral ethic in which you can live in and if you live in the that you will prosper. Boy, that was that was a big deal in the ancient world, and even big deal for us today to be able to say, man, what do you Christians do over there? And that church, what are you able to stand on, you're able to stand on the rock, you're able to stand on truth, you're able to understand, even with grace and love, where you land on certain issues, because God Himself revealed these things to you. That's cool. And that, again, creates some sort of in Venus from those around us, because what are they using to understand right and wrong, some form of gut check, or smell test?

So what if you still don't like the stance that Paul has on sin? What alternatives are you going to end up using? Because everybody in every culture has lines and standards I sort of got into this last week when I was talking about when we are to remove someone from our midst it because they're caught up in sin and will repent of it. Everybody in every culture has lines and standards and we don't get a pass. If we find ourselves with a propensity towards certain sins over others what I mean by this, so you may be looking across at these sins, and you may say, Listen, I mean, I've got a cousin or I've got a friend or I've got family members that they really do struggle with this sexual issue. How

I only want to process that and think through that. Now, I want to tell you that it's not much different than what you may be hearing, which is everybody has a combination of nature and nurture, a combination of how they are wired, how they come out of the womb, and what their experiences are. So this shouldn't be a shocker that sin can be pervasive. And it shouldn't be a shocker that some of us struggle with certain sins more than others that says, You don't have to be in this world very long to look at yourself and look at those around you and be like, Why in the world? Do they struggle with alcoholism? That's so stupid, I take one sip of it, and I'm kind of done for the night and, and then you look at other people's like, why do they keep running around on him or her? Why do they, you know, so I, you know, I'm good with just kind of one, one partner, and you know, you look up he was like, why do they why do they steal? I mean, they have money, they have a job, why are they taking things when it's an opportunity to do so. And so what we're doing when she does, we're starting to see that men we look around us and in their sin and me and their sin and others, and we get like, what, oh, man, what am I supposed to do? And I'm telling you, biblically, we're all called to a high standard, a high moral ethic, a high virtue, even if you and I find ourselves saying, man, but but they really do struggle with this sin more than I do. So yes, of course, they might. You know why? Because sin is pervasive. And we all have different struggles, and different things, that we may have a more easy tendency to, because of what because of maybe how we were brought up, or because of the very nature of how we're wired,

the remedy in our heart and mind, for sexual perversion, and all the other ones that we've talked about, it is theological, not merely external, right, so you're not going to hear from me up on this stage that, okay, if you struggle with any of these things, just sort of grit your teeth and grip your hands and say, don't do that anymore. Don't do that anymore. I don't want to do that anymore. I don't know, you're gonna see that God is gonna give you an eye a beautiful picture about how we are to walk in Him and walk in freedom because of what he's done in us. But don't let's not forget the second point that we used to be screwed up. He says that all this list of sins as such, some of you were, but God has redeemed us, God has saved us. And he's calling us to leave that behind. So let's pick up in verse 12. The third and final section we'll look at this morning, you say, and he's just saying this, now that he's talking to the Corinthian church, this must be a phrase that was either said, among the church or among the culture, I'm allowed to do anything sound familiar in our culture as well. Not everything is good for you, though. So he's saying, I've heard you say these kinds of things, I'm allowed to do whatever I want. But not everything is good for you. And even though I'm allowed to do anything, he's quoting this, whether it was a proverb of the day or something, they said in the church. He's telling them, I must not be become a slave to anything. You say, food was made for the stomach and the stomach for food. This is true. The Sunday God will do away with both of them, right? So one day, we don't have any more need for food and our own bodies. But you can't say that our bodies were made for sexual immorality. So we all have ways that we want. We all have gymnastics and little tricks that we play, to try to justify whatever sin we want to be a part of, or we want to get someone else out of jail free in terms of a moral, oftentimes sexual ethic that our bodies were made for sexual immorality, you can't you can't play those kinds of games. They meaning the bodies were made for the Lord, and Lord cares about our bodies, and God will raise us from the dead by His power just as he raised our Lord from the dead. Don't you realize that your bodies are actual parts of Christ? Should a man take his body, which is part of Christ and join it to a prostitute? Never. And don't you realize that if a man joins himself to a prostitute, he becomes one body with her, for the Scriptures say the two were united into one. I don't take that to mean that you get married every time you have sex with a prostitute. But what he's saying here is, don't you understand that that's a picture of the one flesh union the sexual union is a picture of the one flesh union that God intended for marriage.

But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him run or Flee from sexual sin. It's the same word used by Joseph leaving part of his wife flee from it, Ron, get out. No other sin so clearly affects the body as this one does. For sexual immorality is a sin against your own body. Don't you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself for God bought you with a high price, so you must honor God with your body. All right, so maybe that even gives some more color or fruit to a more complete sexual ethic. That's theologically what I think Paul's trying to do here. So third point I wants to see there is in your literal being he says body but I wanted to say being because it's holistically we often think of the body just as our flesh that you know, I

get hurt or cut on my body, I gotta go see the doctor. But biblically, the body is holistically. It's, it's who I am as a person, there is Brent and Brent, when he gets cut, he cries, he not only bleeds from his flesh, but he cries because he's actually hurt inside. But what he's saying is you're and I's literal being is where God dwells, that's huge. That's why sexual immorality doesn't make any sense. And it brings great harm to us in the short term and long term. And because there's something going on once you become a believer, and that is old school, easy to say that you ask Jesus into your heart, that God lives in your heart. But it's just that whole idea biblically that the Spirit of God lives in the heart in the mind of believers. And that spirit of God is pervasive. So it's a theological vision for our problems, not simply stop this and start that. Oftentimes, people think about church as some sort of rules of stop this and start this. And that's not what's going on here. It's a transformation from the inside out. So if you really realize who you are in Christ, and that's what he wants for us, He wants us to realize that you and I will wash you and I will redeemed, your nice feet are now set on a rock, you and I are now connected to the one who was raised from the dead, you and I went for baptized and we come out of that water, we are now raised to walk in newness of life. He's saying that's a theological vision for your life. And mine, I can get behind that you can get behind that what you and I can't get behind is some sort of gritting our teeth, pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps to say, Oh, I don't want to do that anymore. Oh, I want to stop that. Oh, I want to start this. That's not what Paul's saying. He say, Man, I need you to rest in the freedom that you have in Christ. But what that'll mean, is not permission to do whatever you want, is to know who you are and who's you're. So in Corinth, just like the west today, they had sort of what we would call a too high view of sex and a too low view of sex. What I mean by that, well, they either viewed sex is like everything, like we often do, sometimes you'll hear this in our culture, in our, in our news streams, and in our, in our entertainment at large. Of how can you live a full life without doing it all the time? Right. So that's sort of Highview to hive of you have sex as if sex is everything as if we're nothing more than just bodies and beings that have to sort of do this all the time. So that's, that's too high, or too low of a view of sex, sex has absolutely nothing. Why does it matter who I have sex with, it's just an act, just a physical thing. That's why we can get on all these apps and switch all these partners all the time, because it's just nothing. And the Bible was trying to call carve a way for us to have a vision, a good sexual ethic that's rooted in him to understand that there's more going on here than just merely that physical act. And that's why if somebody talked to you about sex outside marriage, and all they ever did was simply point to practical matters, like, well, I don't want you to get, you know, unwanted pregnancies, or I don't want you to get an STD. Or if you wait, and just have one partner for life and somehow be better, those things may be true, maybe I'll avoid and enjoy some of those things. But those are sort of secondary practical issues. Paul's not addressing it in that way. He's going far above that to say it is because our bodies are members of Christ. That's a huge deal here. And because that's true, and because we have resurrection power, then holistically, we would want to honor God with everything he's entrusted us with, because he's changed our heart from the inside out. That's so important, right? Transformation is what's going to have to occur because if you and I are just told these outward things that we got to keep up with rules, whether you do that to someone else, whether it's the children or people in your care, or you feel like that's all God's trying to tell you Israel, we're not going to keep those even if we do keep those rules. We'll do it in a way that's that's prideful, and we'll pump ourselves up. But if we see men because God of who you are, because you have made me and because you desire for me good things, I want to walk in that I want the fruitful life, I want the blessed life, okay, that's the way to get it. Okay, I submit to that God, because I realized that if I just do things your way, that I will really achieve all those things in a healthy godly way that I say, I want and I'll be what I call our true self. When we work on ourselves holistically, our lives, they just get better. Right? Because we'll have this resurrection power and the physical effects. I would just want to make this so clear, because often times, especially in you know, generations gone past we would sort of talk about God and spirituality and Jesus as something that was just spiritual as if it was kind of floating out there. And maybe you can sort of tap into that and get it on the inside. And who cares about our bodies you can be you can be fat, you can be whatever and it didn't matter. It's like no, no God, He cares about who you are. And he recognizes that if you're

Mental health as well, then your physical health to be well your physical health, your mental health, and your spiritual health. They're all sort of working together there to make you you and to make me me. And so therefore, if we want our lives to get better, God is calling us to work on ourselves holistically, physically working out diet, sleep, good hygiene, these are, these are important things to help us feel better about ourselves physically. And again, just like the other sins we talked about, is there going to be some people where this is easier for them than others? Absolutely. But that doesn't get anyone off the hook. Right? I mean, that's, that's why you would come to church because you don't want to just be told the same thing that anyone else would tell you in the world, you want to be called up. And Paul is calling us up. And I as a conduit of Paul's words, which are really God's word is calling all of us up to say, we can do better, we can live better, yes, we will. We will stumble, but we will stumble forward church, we're not going back. I don't want to go back. You don't want to go back. You've seen the list, you understand what's going on here in Corinthians, you understand that? Who wants to go back to, to greediness and, and sloth and stealing and talking bad about one another in sexually doing whatever I want? No, I want to move and fall forward to physically I think that's important spiritually. That's why you're here in public worship. And we try to greet one another and we try to have opportunities to gather. And, you know, I know it's bittersweet to send Chris off. But it's another opportunity for us to sort of gather after the service. So we have public practice of spiritual encouragement, we also have private practice. And we understand that if we don't have any sort of private spiritual life that has any sort of vitality or life to it whatsoever, that we will struggle in our public spiritual life, because the two are intertwined. We can't separate them any more than the physical. What about friendships? Oh, my gosh, how hard has it been post COVID world to really foster good friendships. And because there aren't natural ways that we run into each other as often anymore. So we have to work towards that, because that's part of being a holistic believer is that we care and love one another. Marriage, if you have one, it takes work, anybody who's married and has any sort of decent marriage, nobody will tell you, you can just canoe or coast into a good marriage, you've got to fight for that you've got to work on that it's takes a lot.

But God, God's grace, we can do it. It's from the inside out. It's not sort of some sort of outward performance. Nice thing is money, stewardship to all this stuff, our physical bodies, our spiritual lives, our friendship, life, our marriage life, which includes children or, and also our financial life. It's all God's calling us. Obviously, this is not your own, I've given this to you, I've redeemed all of this. So now walk in love in these areas, walk in truth, walk in wisdom in these areas, and your life will get better, my life will be better, because it's all stewardship of what God has entrusted us with for this season. Because God is with us this last and final point I'll kind of make, because God is with us. Where we go, God goes, I don't know if you ever thought about this before. I've mentioned this before that we don't need air conditioning and lights and you know, screens to do church, we just need a person of God with the Word of God to be able to speak to the people of God. And we could do church under a shade tree or whatever. Because why we saw very clearly here that the Spirit of God lives inside of you and me if we are Christ's followers, and I want you to know that you have to take that to its full understanding that when you and I go out, because we're all gonna go out into the marketplace this week or school, you're gonna go the marketplace or school, even if you have a zoom or stay at home job or remote job, you're going to be interacting with other people, even if it's through writing or technology. But most of us are going to go into the workplace, the marketplace or school, some version of it. And you and I have to think because this is what Paul wants us to understand. When you and I walk into a room and walk into a setting only have that meeting on the phone or have that meeting on Zoom, that God is with us and that we are representing God right in that moment. How can I say that? Because he's in you and me. And so therefore, when we do that, we have to ask ourselves God, why do you have me in this room?

So I know we have in this room because I've got to get this, you know, report done, or I've got to ask them about this. No, no, no. That's secondary. Yes. You've got to get your job done. Oh, no, I've got to get on the framing side. I've got to get the cabinet's in. Yeah, no, I get all that. But you are now interacting with another person who is creating the image of God. You have to be asking yourself and your representative God and chances are if you're here in El Paso that they don't go to a church regularly and they don't worship the true God regularly and so now your God or Jesus to them because God lives in you and you have to ask yourself, Okay, God, if you're in me, why do you have me here? What What kind of word you want me to give to this person in this moment? How do you want me to interact with them to show you to be great to show you to be amazing?

This sort of thing will only occur you and I will only have the mindset in that moment and the strength in that moment to view our life in that way if Guess what? If we've taken care of ourselves physically, we've gotten enough sleep, we're not worried about what we're gonna eat next. We're not worried about our own little problems. We're not worried about who all this and that because why? Because you've probably met with God, you're okay, because you went to church at least once this week, and you got spiritually refreshed, and you got marching orders on what you're supposed to do this week, you can see how this makes a huge difference. If we will just lean into this concept of if God is in you and me. Let's ask ourselves, when we go into any given situation that we're going to go into this week, God, I have open hands right now. What do you want me to do? How do you want me to respond? How do you want me to lead out? And as you lead God, I'll follow. Because I can't go backwards. I know what that life led to. I know how empty those sins were. Yeah, they felt good for a moment, right? That's how sin works. It's fleeting pleasures. It's, it's good for a moment. But then it tastes like sand in our mouth pretty quickly. And so he said, I can't go back there. You and I can't go back there. And so as we stumble forward, and that's literally what I mean by that as we move forward, knowing that we're going to still be tripped up by our old sinful habits, Lord, but because you live in me, what do you have for me today? That's the prayer. That's the ask. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you do care for us. I pray for those in the room who are hurting right now who are even thinking about friends and relatives who struggle with sexual immorality or struggle with theft or alcoholism, or whatever it is, I just pray that You would give much grace and wisdom in these days, and how we interact with Father more than anything. I pray for ourselves. Because we see ourselves in that list we see.

Yeah, I was real screwed up. I acted in really, really, really destructive, unhealthy, sinful ways. Oh, Lord, helped me to leave that in the past because that's not who I am anymore.

You have recreated me you tell me that I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. You tell me. I'm enough. You tell me I am loved. You tell me that I can do this. I can get up one more day that Satan that one, because there's still breath in my lungs. So Father, I pray for us, individually, that you help us corporately as a body. Be the church you called us to be this week, and all the days of our life that says In Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

We could have gone a couple of different ways today, we could have had a standalone sermon on Father's Day, but I decided to stick with our series on First Corinthians, we're gonna be in First Corinthians five. But before I get there, I do want to say a little thing about dads, I am a father, I'm a father of three, I have young children in the household, 610 and 13. And I would just say, you know, from the get go, that you and I, as dads as Father, your father figures, we're gonna get little to no encouragement to be a good father from the world. You can just kind of feel it or sense that in the air that we breed, much less a biblical father. Most of us stumbled through father who was whatever we got, or whatever we observed in our own lives for good or for ill. But I want to take just a few moments to encourage you, as I encourage myself and what is encouragement, it's to impart literal courage. In these days, we've already sang about it. We've already prayed. We've already celebrated I think, in appropriate ways. But I just want to say one more thing about fatherhood, that you and I, we can walk in the straight and narrow of good fatherhood in a time when healthy manliness or masculinity is in short supply. I think that's so key you and I, we can walk in healthy manliness or masculinity when it is obviously in short supply. And we can do that by avoiding kind of two main ditches that I see we can fall into in the modern day, quest for manhood and fatherhood. First is the machismo or macho ism, right? We're all familiar with that. That's the idea that I'm a man, hear me roar that we can power up over those in our life, you may have had portions of that and your own dad or grandpa or a boss that you've had. But that's how we get things done. Right, this sort of overbearing attitude to those around us. That's the first ditch I want us to avoid, because I don't think that's biblical manhood at all. So avoid machismo, but just as much, it's kind of the horse of truth is to fall off on either sides and fall off into one ditch which is machismo, the other ditch you and I can fall off into his passivity. And passivity is quite simply whatever happens is going to happen. And you're just going to accept it without any sort of active response, or push back or resistance. But biblical authority, which is just a fancy word about saying that to walk in the power that God's supplies, it requires a kind of humble strength. And that's what I want to call all of us to as men and fathers, whether you're a father figure whether you're maybe a man who has influence on others, I think about Chris up here and I think about Rick in the back and all kinds of guys who are around the room who may not be a father yet, either by consequences or choice but but nevertheless have such an influence over young people. Avoid machoism.

Avoid passivity, strive for humble strength. What is along those lines? As you're sitting here thinking like, wait a second pastor, I'm a man. And I do stupid things at times, or I continue to do stupid things at times. Well, that's good news. That's why we're staying in Corinthians this week. That's what we're saying in the scriptures. Because he's going to address all of that. And I want to tell you, hang on. Like, you know, one of the things I told you about Corinthians is the reason why I wanted to go through a book like this is that it really speaks not only to the first century church and coins, but it really speaks directly to us. And so if you hear things today, and you're like, Well, I'm not sure I like that, or I'm not sure I believe that, take it up with Paul in the Scriptures because all I'm going to try to do is explain and maybe bring illustration or application to what I think is very clear here in First Corinthians chapter five. So let's get into it. Beginning in verse one, says this right here, I can hardly believe the report about the sexual immorality going on among you. Something that even pagans don't do. I am told that there's a man in your church is living in sin, right? Sexual immorality, with his stepmother. Man, that's bad. So this is how bad off the church has gotten. You are so proud of yourselves, but you should be mourning and sorrow and shame. And you should remove this man, from your fellowship. Even though I am not with you in person, I am with you in the Spirit, because the very spirit of God the Holy Spirit lives in Paul lives in this church and among the people. And as though I were there I have already passed judgment on this man in the name of the Lord Jesus, you must call a meeting of the church, I will be present with you in spirit, and so will the power of our Lord Jesus, you must throw this man out and hand him over to Satan, so that his sinful nature will be destroyed and he himself will be saved on the day the Lord returns. So I want to talk about this and, and really talk about what I see is the key issue here which is really right from the second verse. The

problem here is not necessarily I mean, it's an issue. The issue is that in the Korean church, they're so off in their sexual ethic, their sexual immorality that they're doing things that even people around the world think is kind of a little bit off a little bit shady a little bit weird, which is that a man is now sleeping with his stepmom. And you can see right here that the problem is not that sin occurs sin is going to occur in a church all the time. Paul knows that. What is the problem? This leads our first point this morning. The problem is the pride when there should have been grief. Did you notice that in the passage? Because if the problem was the pride when there should have been grief, why are they so proud? Why are they not willing to deal with this issue? They knew it was wrong, right? So that doesn't seem to be the issue. They knew it was like wrong, because even the people in the culture even the people in first century Corinth, right, yeah, this is too far for us. And yet y'all are allowing this to go on, even in your own church. One of the things that is going on here, that word of of pride is the same word from last chapter, that whole idea of puffed up with ego and pride, you remember how I had that balloon last week and we deflated the balloon. That's what Paul wants to do. He wants to deflate our ego and pride in the same way he's calling him out. He's calling him out on the pride of not dealing with sin in their minutes. Now, we have to surmise a couple of things. And I don't think it's too far off to think this way. Number one is that they just had a wrong view or a distorted view of Christian freedom. And we all get there and start there. And this is really the air that we breathe. It's just like, hey, let's I don't want to offend anybody. I don't want to battle anyone, I don't want to deal with this kind of thing. And God's grace can cover everything. And so therefore, it's just kind of a distorted view of Christian free him to say, just let that behavior go, that we can just, we can just kind of let that behavior go for whatever reason that they thought that that was okay. Maybe they were just lacking in a good biblical sexual ethic. We're going to teach about that in the coming weeks because Paul's going to hit that head on in chapter six and chapter seven. Or maybe they were just thinking, you know, this person is they're important in our community in our town. They couldn't do what John the Baptist did. So this isn't new, right? You remember, John the Baptist. And we've talked about this passage maybe several weeks ago that, that there was some Hanky Panky going on there. And you know, someone else is taking his brother's wife, and John that was preaching against that. And she didn't like that. And so that's how his head got cut off. It's obvious that the Corinth church was not able or willing to do what the prophets of old were willing to do. Now, I want to be very clear about who we're talking about. And it's going to become clearer as we keep going through a passage, but I just want to set it up right here for us, because he's gonna make this real clear later on. When we're talking about this, we're talking about the actual true believers, the the inner Church, the actual church, people who have claimed the name of Christ and say, I'm a believer, that's what we're talking about, it's gonna be real clear that he's not talking about people who are just onlookers. Maybe you're here today, and this is your first time in church the first time in a while you're just kind of kicking the tires and considering Christianity. That's not who he's talking to. He's talking to those who are serving who are giving who know better, who are part of the ecclesia, the actual Church, the actual fellowship, and that's gonna become, I think, more clear later on. Also, the problem, I just want to say real clearly, the problem is not that you and I are gonna mess up. I mean, what a sermon for Father's Day to talk about something so kind of icky and shady like this. But but that the you know, you and I were gonna mess up in all kinds of way as as men and women alike. That's not the issue. The issue is how we think about it, and how its dealt with by our brothers and sisters in Christ, it is the response. Do you see that's what he's getting onto him for pride when there should have been sadness when there should have been regret over our faults and over our sin? This is so key to interpersonal relationships, right? I mean, how many of you all if you're in a spousal relationship, or, or a serious relationship like that, you and I, we have to come to the conclusion that man, I have to lay down my pride and admit that I was wrong sometimes, if you and I don't, and we just kind of dig in our heels and continue to what kind of give our side and give our side that won't make for a very good marriage for very long. Think about this with a child and parent relationship. God set it up to where the parent has authority over the child until they're kind of gone and 18 or so in our culture. And so what if, you know, we just we just don't have ways in which we can reconcile and when we're trying to talk to our children, if they continue to sort of pump themselves up and dig their heels in that they're right. How can we really help them to grow? What are we supposed to do instead of being puffed up with pride? Paul's trying to deflate that and say, No, all you have to do is just grieve of your sins. See it for what it is be sad that he sinned against God and Heaven Earth and

then you are able to move on. Think about this with a supervisory employee relationships. Man, it is so hard out there in the workforce these days to find anybody who's going to admit anything wrong when something hits the fan, right? Nobody wants to do that we all just want to shift blame, or it's his fault or her fault and just be like, Hey, listen, I messed up. This is what happened. That's how we can move forward in our product or in our work environment. What we need to cultivate is a humble strength of I mentioned that for men in our day and age, it's really true for all of us, that we have this sort of resilience, we have this sort of strength, this power that comes from the Lord. It's real, it's there. But it's clothed with humility that only comes from Christ, the people of Corinth aren't there yet. Maybe you're not there yet, either. But Paul believes in them. He's giving this letter because he believes they can rise up. He's saying, Listen, I know there's going to be sin, but But you got to deal with it in an appropriate way and not just let it run like this. We're gonna talk about what happens if we don't deal with sin. But Paul believes in them. He believed in Corinth, I believe that God has not done with you and me yet we can get there we can have. And we can clothe ourselves with humility and strength that only God supplies. That's the first point. Let's look at the second half of the passage this morning, beginning of verse six of st chapter, you're boasting about this is terrible. Alright, just that you're not dealing, don't you realize that this sin is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough, get rid of the old yeast by removing this wicked person from among you, then you will be like a fresh batch of dough made without yeast, which is what you really are. Christ, our Passover lamb has been sacrificed for us. So let us celebrate the festival, not with the old bread of wickedness and evil, but with a new bread of sincerity and truth. And you guys know that I love illustrations. And I love object lessons if I can do them, because I know this about myself. And I know this about many of you that you'll remember things. So I made some playdough this morning, okay. And maybe here on the stove, you know, it's like cheaper and easier. And so what you do is, is you think about this, just like regular dough. And what happens, what happens here is that when we just add a little bit of lemon or food coloring or whatever, that what ends up happening is as as we as we need it as we continue to have that just little bit, just that little bit of food coding in there. What ends up happening, we all know what happens here. And as I continue to press on it and and to work the dough, the playdough go, I'm sorry, I just don't I don't bake. It's not 1800 Sorry, I don't have a local baker, maybe you do. But um, but I couldn't make some playdough this morning. And so what we do, and what we know is that eventually, whatever color I put in there, it will permeate the entire dough.

And so what's happening here is that for good or for ill, whatever is in here, this is just the color red, it'll go throughout the entire dough. Listen, the second point, goodness, or wickedness will permeate. Now if you're like me, when you even see the word like wickedness, even though you know it's in the scriptures, and you know, God's trying to use words like that for our good young

pastor that's a little bit strong. Like cannot Can't you just say goodness, or neutral. He just say like goodness or cruise control. I mean, I really want to do good. But can this just be the day where I just kind of kind of lay around? It's like, No, the Bible doesn't allow us to get away with that kind of thing. Because did you not see this from the text? So let us celebrate the festival we're going to talk about that is the Passover meal, not with the old bread of wickedness and evil. So that wasn't even my word is straight from the scriptures, but with the new bread of sincerity and truth. Again, Paul is being so loving here because what I would do, and you and I might do this, sometimes we have a brother or sister caught into sin, we just want to quote the quote the law term, whatever it is, and you might say, you know, don't steal, don't, you know, sex for marriage, or whatever it is, you're going to try to say to them and sort of shake them out of it. That's not what he does. He doesn't just quote the law. He brings up Passover, he goes all the way back to the Exodus account. And other people of God are brought out of Egypt and they leave so quick. If you remember, they don't put leaven in their bread. That's why we celebrate Passover with unleavened bread and we break it in front of each other and eat it. And we know that was redefined as communion when Christ came in his sacrifice. And that's even clearer from these verses and later on in verses that we'll see. But one of the things that we have to be okay with is we have to be okay with the fact that there is no neutrality in this life. That we are either sowing good seeds of the spirit, or we are wilting and dying and succumbing to the wickedness and the evil of this world. Goodness is the quality of being virtuous. This is just straight Webster's Dictionary folks. Goodness

is the quality of being virtuous? Does anyone in this room want to be virtuous? I do. Does anyone want that for their children and their spouses and their household and their church? I do. And that's what he's calling us to. He's calling us to virtue and to goodness. No one wants to be a bottom dweller, who wakes up in the morning says, Man, I just want to kind of waste my life away, how can I waste today away?

Whatever the wasting of your life plan is, nobody wants to do that we don't get on that intentionally. That's what I'm trying to say. When we think we're just gonna sort of buying time and kicking the can till tomorrow, to get right with God or to pursue goodness, or to pursue virtue, or to pursue what we know as a healthy sexual ethic. We're fooling ourselves, because we're really just what we're just like just a little bit, just a little bit of laziness, just a little bit of wickedness. And we don't realize that it's permeating our entire lives. And in this case, it can permeate the body of Christ, the church itself. That is why communion is reserved for believers. We do this here in our church. And there's other communities where you go through some sort of confirmation are steps but but we ask that listen, if you become a Christ follower, whether an art tradition or another, it's fine, the tables open to you. But if you're not yet a believer, what would be the point of communion because there's nothing to commune to or with not with each other, not with God himself, because by your own profession, or lack thereof, you got nothing there yet. And so that's why we understand that communion is reserved for what believers and that again gives us a good indication of kind of the insider outsider perspective, right? He's gonna make this real clear in the last section, if you don't know what I'm talking about. But even in our context, we have those of y'all who are here, you're all in, you're giving, you're serving, you're coming every week, you have already made a profession of faith for Christ. And so, man, you are a believer, and you have found your home and your place at Life Church, whether it's for nine months, nine years, or 90 years. But then I know at any given week, there's 1215, families, maybe more, who are just what observers they're part of, of the crowd, just you're just kind of looking in, you're kind of considering the claims of Christ. And that's fine, too. But you can see the distinction here, in this scripture in this passage, if you don't see yet it's gonna become real clear on the last passage, but we can be people of sincerity and truth, or what I said, goodness, not wickedness and evil. All right, last section told you we were kind of leaving here and what's it say? says when I wrote to you before So Paul, evidently, even though this is called the first letter to the Corinthians, he had written to them multiple letters. But he says, When I wrote to you before I told you not to associate with people who indulge in sexual sin, even though he knew that's where the culture is that that's where the people are out, but I'm trying to help you be a pure body. But it wasn't talking about unbelievers who indulge in sexual sin, or are greedy or cheat people. So why people lie, steal and cheat or worship idols who have other gods or gods, you would have to leave this world to avoid people like that. I meant that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a believer yet indulges in sexual sin or greediness, or worships idols or is abusive, or is that a drunkard or cheats people, he says, don't even eat with such people. That's where I get that word of fellowship. I'll talk about that here in a minute.

It isn't my responsibility to judge outsiders, but it is certainly in your responsibility. So it's not Paul's responsibility. It's not the preachers responsibility, it is the church's responsibility to judge those inside the church who are sinning, God will judge those on the outside, so he will take care of them. But as the scripture say, you must remove the evil person from among you. And we've already seen what happens with a little bit of love and in the entire dough. So what's going on here? What are we meant to, to learn from all this? First of all, let's just back up with the because sometimes these can be really charged because I know some people have had bad experiences in churches or they've heard of bad experiences, or they've heard words like excommunication and church discipline, this all sounds, you know, horrible at some level, but I just want to talk plainly with you here for a minute. We are okay, with standards, protocols and repercussions in so many other areas of our lives. Okay, let's just be honest with that. Let me say it again. We're okay with standards, protocols, and repercussions in so many other areas of our life. And we get squeamish when we start talking about church and standards and holding the line. That's more on us than than the Bible in the church. But I just want you to talk about that. But think about this in terms of travel or competitive sports for our youth. So if y'all are a part of that, right, you're part of a travel, baseball team or cheer

You're a volleyball or whatever it is. And you and I both know that there are high standards to those leagues, you can only miss so many games or you get kicked off. And to even get on those leagues, you have got to have some sort of skill. I'll never forget, this just tells you how bad your pastor was a basketball, I'll never forget that. I was gonna, I was gonna get on this, this basketball team and I was in sixth grade. And so I went to the tryouts. And he was just like, drove around the cones. It wasn't that hard. Shoot a couple shots. I was in sixth grade. So you think, Man, this is easy, good. They're gonna let everybody in. So I remember my dad like writing the check for whatever it was to get on League handed to them in that little box. And I remember that when I dribbled. I just kicked everyone to me cones cast will be honest with you. And I can remember because it's traumatic to this day, I can remember the lady giving the check back to my father and saying you can take the boy home now. And so it was just like they had already decided they had said he doesn't have whatever it takes whatever we're looking for. He ain't got it. Take him home. Okay. And he did. And he got his check back. So we're okay with that. Think about this in terms of jobs, especially jobs, where things when things go wrong, people die. I don't know about you, but but I don't want a pilot, who on the flight simulators over and over and over again, keeps crashing. Okay, now I'm talking about, there's Oh, well, you know, you I don't want to I just put their arm around, like, hey, you know, you keep crashing the simulators, but we're gonna put you up in a couple of helicopters and airplanes and see how you do that. We're gonna throw some people in the back too, and just see if you can do it. Okay, because we believe in you. Okay, none of that stuff's gonna happen. We don't do this with our doctors. I don't want my doctor or their teachers to like, push them through. Yeah, you don't know how to do any of these exams or doing surgery, but we're gonna push you through, or your lawyer. I don't want the ones you only know how to like, put it in chat GBT. And all the sudden you're going to jail in the waters like, well, I don't even I didn't really pay attention or study that much. I just find it in jet. GBT, whatever popped out is what I, we don't want that. Even the Catholic Church. I'm not Catholic at all. We're an evangelical church. But they understand a little bit of holding the line. And this isn't a political statement. But you guys are aware that that people like Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden, there are different dioceses and parishes around the country that will not serve them communion because of their stances with the life and abortion issue. That's just showing you that we accept this at some level in other areas of our life, and even in some of our religious understandings. So if we can accept that, in other areas of our life, can we at least give the scriptures a chance and scriptures are true and, and beautiful. And for our good to realize this last and final statement, that is it is our job to maintain the purity of the fellowship. I think this is so important. And I've chosen each word carefully. And I think it's straight from this last section of the scriptures that really goes to the whole, which is that idea of of course, we're not. We're not judging or worrying about people who are just considering the claims of Christ, if you've just come for the first time, but I'm here to tell you that if you claim to be a Christ follower, and you are an insider, we have ways in which we ask once a year for people to sign a covenant membership. And we have that too, when you begin to serve in our various ministries. So there's things that we try to do formally for you to be able to say, yeah, man, I'm in I'm all in. Obviously, we have baptism. And that's just a way to say, Yeah, I'm all in with Christ. So we, we have certain things like that. But you and I understand that, that our job as a church, and you want to be real clear, so the priests job or the pastor's job, but it's the church itself, because we care enough to what to maintain the purity of the fellowship. Guys, this is just normal. I mean, this is just normal. I mean, think about this right now. What if this was your friend, and you knew your friend, this guy who this this was talking about in this passage, and you knew he was sleeping with his stepmom? And y'all kind of knew each other in the neighborhood and in the church? I mean, dinner is just gonna be weird. I mean, isn't it I mean, when they come over to your house, and you guys have had this before, you've had this before, where, where you've had friends who have gone off the deep end and their business practices because they've, what they've been greedy, they've stolen, you've had friends who have gone off the deep end in their relationships, and they begin to have perpetual adultery, and they just go off the deep end and their sexual ethic. And you know, that it's very weird at a minimum, to kind of pull them back at your table. Because you can't have fellowship with them the way you used to before because maybe they they, they went off the deep end. That's what he's saying here from the church perspective. He's saying that they are now showing by their actions, that they're not one of you. Now, we don't judge hearts. We don't know if this guy is a believer or unbeliever. Paul's not making that assumption, either. He's saying that when you turn them over to Satan, which is just a way to say when you turn them over to the wilderness when you turn them over to the world. When you give them over to the chaos of their life. God will use that situation to either bring them back to him

them, or to allow them to keep going headlong in their sin. And you guys know this over and over again, how many of y'all have prodigal brothers and sisters? Or? I hope not. But daughters and sons, would you understand that sometimes you just gotta let them go. And that's what he's saying here to maintain the purity of the church, the purity of the fellowship. Now, they have to still come to church every once awhile and sit in the back and maybe be part of the crowd. But they're not going to be able to be the insider that they once enjoyed, they're not going to be able to sit at the table, enjoy the fellowship until they get right with God. That's what he means by saying, put them outside the camp.

This goes back all the way to an Old Testament principle and also a New Testament principle. Now, why are we doing all this? We're doing this for the sake of the kingdom. Because guess what, we actually have something here that special. Don't you want to go to church and experience something different from the world? Why even gather if I'm just gonna say the same thing you can hear anywhere else and everywhere else. But here, we're gonna lift you up. We're gonna encourage you, we're gonna turn your eyes and your gaze heavenward. And we're gonna say, Senator, though you are, you are accepted here. It's okay to not be okay. But it's not okay to stay there. That's the point of the scriptures. That's what Paul's trying to say, and that you and I should be ashamed that we don't grieve over our own sin. And we should be ashamed if we don't grieve over the sins of our brothers and sisters in Christ. That's what he's saying, because we have something here. If not, we'll look just like the world. Or be some form of a club, right? Some sort of club is you kind of pay your dues, or you walk in the door, nothing special here. We're all just kind of here. But you and I understand that the exclusivity that comes with, with full on membership, or full on commitment and fun jumping in to who Christ is and what He has for us. And what we're saying here is that we're not a perfect people, but that we're a people who fight sin. That when when sin is is crouching on our door and wanting to to overpower us and overpower our brothers and sisters in Christ. We're saying fight that. That's why we're making such a big deal here at Father's Day. If I could, if I could find in the budget ways to lavish dads with more stuff I would, because I just want you to know, man, we love you here. We love men here. We want real good, healthy biblical masculinity here. We want real good, healthy femininity here. Those kind of words that kind of talk. It's just not happening right now. So we want to be a refuge, a strike, we want to be life, we want you to come in the store and Life Church and and just feel it man, I walk away change because of who God is, and what God's done. And there's something there. But there wouldn't be anything here. If all of us live just like the world, then you'd be like, I don't think there's anything appealing there. I think it's just like anywhere else I've ever been. So that purity the job of us is to love each other enough to maintain some sense of accountability, accountability, impurity, in the fellowship. Last kind of thing I would just say on all this is we got to grow up sometime.

Man who wants to be in perpetual adolescence? I don't I adolescence was fun. But it had its disadvantages. Because you remember when your adolescence you didn't you know how much money you got kind of kicked around, you only kind of went where you were accepted, right? You kind of move from one house to another or one club and other whatever you and I did were young. But don't you I want to be men and women who make a difference in the community because our roots go deep, that were planted deep and who God is. And we have some substance. The only way that's going to occur is if we really step into this humble strength.

Why not today? I mean, let's not just do it sometime come on Life Church, let's be beat men and women who have humble strength today that will step into that, that by the power of God not in our own strength, because you and I ain't got it in a centers that we are but that we lean on God in His Spirit, say, God, I want more virtuous living, I want more goodness in me. I want to care enough about the people who sit to the left and right of me that when I see them struggling and when I see them fall down or when they're not here, I'll get their number or text him and say, Where are you I miss you. I care about you come back. We love you.

We want you to be part of the fellowship that can only occur if you and I decide today. That's what I want to do.

And I want to put it in neutral zone of you know your man, I'm sure to witness wickedness and I need to repent of that. That's fine. That's you. But for many of us, we have been Lord to sleep. I think it's okay and that we're doing okay, just because we're in neutral. We don't we're not as bad as someone else. We're not as wicked as someone else in the scriptures are constantly warning us to say no, it's not just the absence of bad and wickedness that you and I mean in our lives, but it's the presence of God in His goodness. Let's be men and women who do that. Can we do that? Let's pray.

Father, you're so good to us. You care about us.

A much. I pray for those under the sound of my voice and those who may listen later that you would encourage them. I pray a special blessing and encouragement on dads this morning, who just desire to be men who either keep the trajectory of Christian tradition going for their family, or create a whole new path of life and love and leadership and safety and strength as they come up under the strong branches of a godly family.

Pray for those in the room who struggle because of a broken relationship with their dad or desire to be a dad out there or a single mom who would love to have a godly dad, anybody who's just kind of hurting in this brokenness. Father, you are enough. So draw near to us wherever we're at. As we draw near to you when asked us in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript

All right, First Corinthians. So first Corinthians is one of those books. It's written by Paul. It is written to the church at Corinth, and Christians are people who are Christ's followers and the reason why we're Christ's followers and the reason why we listen to the words of Paul into the scriptures is people like Paul were eyewitnesses to the resurrection, he calls himself an apostle and undo time, that just means he wasn't part of the original 12 he met the Lord Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus, but he for sure saw the resurrected Lord and God set him on a path to start churches all in the known area at that time. And Corinth was a real city and the Corinthians were real people. And they were a church there. And as we are reading and studying and going through this book, one of the things that you might feel is you might feel exposed, like, man, like, as you're reading this, I feel like you're just really opening up some some things and wounds, I just feel exposed, that you're talking about maybe me and my sin and my problems. And that's normal. It's that kind of book. But I want to say as you feel exposed, know that the purpose of a book like this is to bring about healing. Paul is all about just making sure that that the Corinthians know Yes, I understand how screwed up you are, or how screwed up you've been. But there is healing in Christ. The other thing you may feel as we go through a book like this is you may feel judged. And it depends on what you mean by that, if you understand judge to mean always condemnation is coming around the corner, then then that's not what is healthy or helpful. But if you mean judge, as I think this is exposing something I may be doing wrong, well, then yes, it is a book like that. But again, there are always the remedies, the solutions in Christ the way I think Paul wants us to really grapple with the text is almost like understanding how a surgeon when we have a problem, whether it's a tumor or something that needs to be cut out, will often have to undergo anesthesia. And then there will be some sort of surgery and but they're doing the best they can delicately and with a scalpel to take out whatever is there. That is how our Lord Jesus Christ wants to come to you and I today in order to heal us, it's not like a hatchet, right? None of us would want a doctor or a nurse or anyone to come at us like a hatchet, even though you might say, well, that that may get rid of the problem. But that gets rid of the problem in a way that we don't want it at all. And so I think that'll be helpful. The other thing that I hope that you grabbed, as you came in was a balloon, okay? And so it's just for illustration purposes later, we're going to talk about this. I will say this, if you're over the age of 12, and you somehow blow it up during the service and pop it I am judging you, okay, you can control yourself. Okay, so but it is for illustration purposes only. And we will pull that out later. Well, let's get into it. First Corinthians four.

And beginning in verse one.

So look at a palace. Now a palace would have been another one of those Christ followers who are leaders in the early church that Paul would have brought along with him, you're gonna see another name later, Timothy. And what he's really concerned about is he's concerned about what often happens. And that happened in the first couple chapters of Corinthians is some form of celebrity worship, okay, I got this done by Apollo's or Paul or someone like that. And you know, it's not much different than our culture in day, right? If you notice, a lot of our gods lowercase g, are what their celebrities, whether it's celebrities and athletic world, or celebrity billionaires, or celebrity rappers or whatever, we find ourselves a lot of times, sort of grappling or looking towards those with money and power. And we have specific names in our heads that we talk about, whether it's Musk or Bezos, or whoever it is. So he's, he's grappling with that with the first century believers as well here in the church at Corinth. And he's saying, so look at apologists, who's just a believer like me and a leader in the early church, as mere servants of Christ who have been put in charge of explaining God's mysteries. Now, again, that phrase explaining God's mysteries, it's just that whole idea of not like Sherlock Holmes, like we had to go figure out exactly what God's saying. But it's that whole idea of something that was hidden that is now revealed, and that is the way to God or the way back to God was now through Christ, that Christ was God's plan from the beginning and has now been fulfilled. And Paul and Apollos and all the early church leaders were going about telling this news and

They're just servants put in charge of explaining and servants is a good word there. It's stewards, it's people entrusted with God's mysteries. Now a person who's put in charge as a manager must be faithful, we get that. As for me, it matters very little high might be evaluated by you, or by any human authority. I don't even trust my own judgment on this point, my conscience is clear. But that doesn't prove I'm right. It is the Lord Himself, who will examine me and decide. So don't make judgments about anyone ahead of time before the Lord returns, for he will bring out our darkest secrets to light and will reveal our private motives, then God will give to each one, whatever praise is due. Now, again, Paul saying, Listen, I'm the real deal. I know who I've got to stand before the judgment seat of, but he's arguing that his authority doesn't isn't self proclaimed. Where does it come from? We already talked about this. He's an eyewitness to the resurrection, who appointed him as an apostle, he didn't appoint himself, God Himself does, and God himself will judge him. And that's why I saying don't get into these various factions and worshipping of certain celebrities or certain personalities or thinking one's better than the other, because we're all servants of Christ. You and I, we can't see motives. And so what they're beginning to say is there's a Okay, well, you know, maybe your motive and preaching this is not exactly right. And I don't know if you've ever done that before, to someone you've worked with, or to a spouse or to a loved one where you start assigning motives to their actions. How is that gone for you? Not very well, right? Because why? Because we can't see hearts. And so he's saying, Listen, you can't see my heart. You don't know what I was doing, or why I was doing it. I know that I stand before God. And I know the reasons why. And even if there was any sort of misplaced motives in my heart, God's gonna take care of that. And so he goes into saying that, like, don't make judgments about anyone. before. It's time though, what he means that before it's time, he says, before the Lord returns, because he understands that in the kingdom that come that we as followers will be able to, and we don't know exactly how this work, but will it be able to stand judgment with the, with the original disciples and elders at that time they get, I don't know how that's all going to work. Because it's all gonna be under the Lordship of Christ. But he's saying, Listen, you're jumping the gun too soon, okay, we're not sitting on seats of judgment for each other, or for anyone else in the world right now. Because God's gonna reveal all these things, he's gonna make things come to light. And then when that happens, what everybody's gonna get there, do so you and I, we're to be concerned about is that phrase of, of what of explaining the mysteries of God, because he's saying, This is what I've been entrusted with. This is what I'm a steward of this is what I'm a servant of, along with Paulus, and along with all the other people, the Christians, Christ's followers, that we have been entrusted with explaining the mysteries of God, it was unknown, now it is known is now revealed in Christ, another way of saying, the the known now planning purpose of God is the gospel. So this is our first point this morning. We are entrusted with the gospel, if Paul was entrusted with that in the early church, and he's giving it now to the people of Corinth, the book of Corinthians is written for that, and to sort of kind of help them as they've sort of wandered around and trying to establish himself as a church in the first century. We now and El Paso, Texas in 2024, we've been entrusted with the gospel here at Life Church, what are we gonna do with that? Now entrusted, if you just look it up in the dictionary says this, it's assigned the responsibility for doing something, right, you guys have all had this, you've been entrusted with a pet, or you've been entrusted with an assignment. So we understand that we have been entrusted with the good news of the gospel. Along with Paul, we have been entrusted with what explaining the mysteries of God. And by that again, we mean, what is now known and revealed in Christ's first point. Second thing let's see what he continues to talk to us about here. Do you brothers and sisters, I've used Apollo's and myself to illustrate what I've been saying, if you pay attention to what I have quoted from the scriptures, you won't be proud of one of your leaders at the expense of another for what gives you the right to make such a judgment. What do you have that God hasn't given you? And if everything you have is from God, why boast as though it were not a gift. Now Paul is about he's already sort of started he's gonna go into sarcasm. So if if, if that's hard, it's there. It's in the scriptures. You'll see the Old Testament prophets use it at times. It's a powerful piece to illustrate

At a point, here, he goes on, you think you already have everything you need? You think you're already rich, you have begun to reign in God's kingdom. Without us, right? You're already thinking, Yeah, I'm on the throne. I got it. I'm gonna live in the good life. I wish you really weren't raining already. For then we would be raining with you. But that's not where we're at. Instead, I sometimes think God has put us apostles on display, like prisoners of war at the end of a victor's parade, condemned to die, we have become a spectacle to the entire world, to people and angels alike. Our dedication to Christ makes us look like fools. But you claim to be so wise in Christ, we are weak, but you are so powerful. You are honored, but we are ridiculed. Even now we go hungry and thirsty, and we don't have enough clothes to keep warm. We are often beaten and have no home, we work weirdly with our hands earn our living. We bless those who curse us. We are patient with those who abuse us we appeal gently, when evil things are said about us. Yet we are treated like the world's garbage like everybody's trash right up to the present moment. What he's really saying is, we are carrying the same burden, and we are under the same disdain that Christ was under. Because Christ was ridiculed. Christ was misunderstood. Christ was ultimately beaten and taken to the cross. And so again, that's, that's what they should expect, as Christians, Paul saying this, this is what we should expect. But that's not where you guys are at. That's what he's saying that for the Corinthian churches it. He's saying, you guys, you guys are all puffed up, you guys are all puffed up with pride. And so you see this, even in the very verse six, it says, you won't be proud of one of your leaders, you won't be proud of one of your leaders at the expense of another.

And so what he begins as is he asked like these these questions here, doesn't he? He has all these questions here. And we'll go through those in a minute. But But Christianity was not an advantage to worldly pursuits. Right? It wasn't an it wasn't an advantage. It wouldn't help you in the marketplace, in the first century, to necessarily be a Christian and to go to church. Paul and his buddies were treated the way Christ was treated.

But how did Paul respond and how is he calling you and me to respond? Do you see in the passage, he's called us to be patient and to bless and and to let the pride go and to to deflate our egos and then we can be filled with the Spirit. So this is the point I wanted to show you with with our with our balloons here again. What is he talking about? Here? He asked a series of questions in saying you have you have big big pride big ego.

Exit from you. Oh, yeah, I can vote up Yes, I can bla bla bla. And I don't know if that's worth typing. Please don't clap for that. That's really sad. If I was a 90 year old preacher, I could I can take that I'd take that clap, but not not at 42. But

this is this is ego on it. Okay. So what happens is Paul, what he's trying to do is he's asking the series of questions. What is the first one he asked in verse seven? Maybe, maybe go back to that slide there. What does he ask Him? Verse seven. He says, I know your motives. I know your motives for what gives you the right to such judgment. Right? You see this here?

For what gives you the right to make such judgments. So what are you trying to do when he's asking you and me those kind of questions. He's he's trying to come at our heart that says things like when we're in our workplace, or we're in our homes, I did this. I earned this. What did they do? Where did they go? How did they contribute? And he's saying he's trying to deflate their ego, right? All right. Yes, he's 12. It's okay. He's on the front row, it's fine.

What's the next question that I asked him? What was the next question I didn't hear says, What do you have, that God hasn't given you? What do you have that God hasn't given you? And what kind of heart do we often have and that the Corinthians probably had? I think, God, I'm not like them. Right? I follow Jesus. I'm not sure what they're doing out there. I follow Jesus. And again, what he's trying to do is he's trying to deflate their egos and all

Our egos. And then the last thing here

if everything you have

is from God, why do you boast as if it were not a gift? Right? Where do you where did you and I get anything that we have the clothes that we have the money in our pocket the car or the house we have or whatever? Why are we boasting as if this is something that I accomplished. I was good enough smart enough whatever, to somehow do it. He's deflating that. Now some of y'all are like, no ways like I don't see it that way. I don't know why you're going to this ever to talk about this, this ego and pride because I really did do the right thing at work. It wasn't him. It wasn't her. They didn't turn in their assignment on time, it was me or they didn't really get it you don't understand you don't live in my household, you don't know how little he or she does, you don't know what they did or didn't do to me or for me or you don't know what it's like to be to be in a group assignment at school and someone's not pulling their weight in the group. And all that he's trying to say here all that Paul wants to say to them at Corinth and to us today is listen, let that go. Like like deflate that pride deflate that ego. And so he's using all these sort of sort of the these these huge things as sarcasm to say let it go now, what have you and I say no, I'm not gonna do that. I'm gonna claim to what I know is right? Because Because I know who did it and I know who accomplish it. And I know what's right. And I know what's up, I will tell you, it's just like, what happens with pride is if you don't take care of pride, if you don't kill pride, pride will be killing you. And in the same way with ego, if you and I won't deflate our ego and pride, what will God do? What will life happen? What will happen if I knows

a pop? Right? Eventually, you and I will come to a crash. So in other words, if you and I don't humble ourselves, if we don't find ways to get rid of the ego and pride in our life, it will be taken care of it will be gotten rid of, but it'll be gotten rid of in a way that sometimes can be very painful and harmful and hurtful to ourselves. And to those around us. This leads to my second point today, an appeal gently appealed gently when you feel you are wronged. But then trust the Lord. I see that in this text. I don't know if you saw that we already went through the first part about how I think Paul was trying to deflate our egos. But then at the second half, he tells us how to respond. When we really do feel like no, I'm under the gun. It's not fair things aren't going right or going the way I feel like are supposed to. And I feel like I'm innocent before God and before others. He's saying, Okay, if that's going on, you can appeal to those

gently when you feel like you are being abused or done wrong. But then we have to trust the Lord. There have been many times I'll just speak for myself. There's been many times where I thought I was right. And I felt very justified in going before a conversation before meeting and declaring my innocence or my rightness. But here's the thing is sometimes we don't know everything. If you ever you and I ever thought about that before, we don't know everything. And so we think we're right, but we didn't know all the facts. So we're we're looking at those who are over us or under us or beside us. And we're thinking man, they just don't know what's going on. And in fact, I feel very slighted or judged or or even abused or wronged. And maybe you were so you can address that and maybe a gentle way. But whatever happens you and I have to trust the Lord. Because sometimes even when we want to address those things, we we just can't see everything that's going on. We're not God, we don't have the luxury of of pulling back the curtain and saying all that God's doing. And so what has to happen is that, that our ego, our pride has to be deflated. That's what Paul wants to do. He wants that to get out of our lives. He wants us to know that we can appeal gently when evil things are said about us. But no, but know that if they mistreated Christ, they will mistreat you. This is what Jesus said almost word for word. And he's calling us to to bless those who curse us and to be patient with those who wrong us. But how can we do that? How can we actually do that? It's only when we are then filled by the Spirit. Because it's not just the deflating of pride that we have to

To get rid of and deflating of our ego, it's also it's also putting on the armor of God. It's putting on Christ Spirit himself, which lives inside of us as Christ followers, otherwise, we're constantly left asserting our way are our rights. And this is so hard for us, even as Americans, because it's almost ingrained us from time we were little kids in school that we have, you know, human rights. And now we have, you know, different kinds of identity rights and cultural rights and all these kinds of things. But it's like, what about God's rights? And what about the fact that that clinging to our way, and our rights can lead us down a place that we don't really want to go? Because God's saying, why don't you find a way to humble yourself and to Bless those who persecute you, even when you find them to be your enemy? Sure. I'm not asking you to be a doormat, I don't think God ever is either. He's saying listen to appeal, do this with patience, do this consistently and even eagerly, but understand that at a certain point, early on you and I have figured out a way to trust the Lord in those situations. Let's continue to go verse 14, and following says this.

I'm not writing these things to shame. You know, why would he even say that, because he's just sort of, kind of run them through the mind a little bit about how crazy it was that they were acting of having the, you know, their favorite factions or favorite persons. And it's led to all kinds of divisions and, and then thinking that they're right about their perspective. So he's saying, Listen, I don't want to shame you. And listen, God doesn't want to shame me. I said, from the early on that that you may feel exposed, and you may feel judged, which I just take it to mean that you may feel like, okay, I've done some things wrong, and I'm starting to see it. But shame, right? If you have shame and guilt that can come from your conscience, but you're not meant to live in that and to stay there. He wants to say, Listen, I don't, I'm not writing this to shame you. Because I've got I've got a way that I want to come alongside you in this, but to warn you, as my beloved children, for even if you had 10,000 others to teach you about Christ, you have only one spiritual father and somebody himself, for I became your father in Christ Jesus, when I preach the good news to you, there it is the gospel, the good news. So I urge you to imitate me, he's able to say that because he's been with the Lord Himself, and the Lord has charged him with this. That's why I've sent Timothy another name, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord. He will remind you of how I follow Christ Jesus, just as I teach, and all the churches wherever I go, some of you have become arrogant thinking, I will not visit you again. But I will come. And soon if the Lord led to me, and then I'll find out whether these arrogant people will give pretentious speeches, or whether they really have God's power, for the kingdom of God is not just a lot of talk, it's living by God's power, which do you choose? Should I come with a rod to punish you? Or should I come with love and a gentle spirit? Right? So if you've gotten this far, and you thought, man, all this sounded a little, a little harsh, a little much. He's saying, Listen, I didn't want to produce guilt or shame on you. But who wants the rod of punishment? I mean, there's gonna raise your hand for that, who's gonna say, yeah, that's, that's how I want to be taken care of, at work, I want the hammer to come down on me out, or that's how I want to be taken care of in the home, I want just the rod to come down on me know, what do we want. We want somebody to come alongside us. And this is what Paul saying he wants to do here. And try to reason with us and to love us in a gentle way with a gentle spirit.

So we don't want to be weighed down by guilt and shame. And Paul doesn't want us to be. We are meant to say okay, but then what's the alternative? Well, the alternative is to confess our sin, then we can walk in Him and be free. Don't you just want to breathe freedom? Lift your head up. Hi. Listen, you and I, we come to church, we carry in our burdens, and myself, too. I don't want to stay there. I want to be able to walk out and say, You know what, it's not that, that I've figured it all out. But I know who to take my sin and burdens to. I don't have to carry them anymore. And so that's where we want to do so that what leads to my third and final point, so that we can live in God's power. Do you and I want to live in God's power? I do.

How do I do that? How do I do that? Well, the first the first part, and that's why I want you to leave with a balloon is to deflate your pride. That's for me, too. I'm speaking to myself. Right? deflate your pride. And if not, God will do it for you.

Right, haughty spirit. I cannot stand a humble and contrite heart I will not cast out. These themes are consistent throughout the Old and New Testament and

In the Bible, and it's just true in life, right? No one wants to be around someone who's an egomaniac blowhard, I want to say something about ego and pride just so that we're all on the same page. Sometimes we think of ego and pride as simply those who are loud and boastful. And that is one form of ego and pride. But keep in mind that that's just an extroverted form of ego and pride. You and I can also be ego and prideful and be quiet, right that we can be ones who sort of manipulate behind the scenes. And it's what we don't say, instead of what we do say, you guys understand this, right? That, that our heart, our human hearts are irrespective of our given personalities, or our introvert anus, or extroverted and so I just want to say that, that wherever we're at, we're on a level playing field, here at the cross, I say this over and over again. But first of all, if you and I want to live by God's power, and I know I do, we've got to deflate our pride. If not, God will do it for us. And secondly, we've got to be filled with the Spirit. Now we say spirit filled living. What do we mean by that? Because we're not, we're not a church that, you know, we all sort of speak in tongues and have different things going on like that. So what do we mean by filled with the Spirit, it's simply men and women who understand that to live in this world, just like it would have been in the first century, just like it is today in 2024, in El Paso is that we are going to be a little bit odd and peculiar to a watching world. Because we got up on Sunday and came to church, we're filling it up, that we're raising our hands, and that we're teaching our children a message that may even be contradictory to what they're going to learn in their school system, or where we're coming together as family as the family of God to want to have life and to have energy and have motive and have purpose for how we see our life for the week. So even that as of as I'm begin to talk about walking in the Spirit, and having the power of God in your life in mind, we have to be okay, with it being a little bit odd and strange, because it would have been in the first century, and it is very much so now, in 2024. But your superpower, let me just make it real clear, is not some sort of extroverted charismatic gifts. Although I think God uses all the gifts, I get all that. But your your superpower and my superpower is walking in grace and love.

Hope you see that from passages like this, where he's saying, Listen, there is a better way, there is a way to live your life in such a way not that you are going to avoid pain. That's very clear. Here. He's saying, Listen, we were put on display, just like Christ was put on display. But it's the idea that how we respond to our situations are with grace and love. Because why? Because it's been shown to you and me through the power of Christ. That's what, that's what it is to live by God's power, it's being able to respond in kindness, when you have just been ridiculed or shamed or mis spoken about, or whatever. Because you and I, we're gonna go out this week, and I guarantee you, if you interact with any humans whatsoever, even if it's through zoom, even if you just have a remote job, you and I are we're gonna get stepped on, we're gonna get misunderstood, we're gonna get quoted wrong, we're gonna get hurt, we're going to I mean, all these things are going to happen. And so you and I have to ask ourselves the ways in but I but I want to walk in God's power, okay? Then go to the source. And know that your superpower in those moments is as a God, I need you every hour, I need your grace, and your love right now in me, so that I can give that in this given situation.

Because none of us get to escape the hardships of this life. And it's going to be doubly so. Because why because we are the odd people out. We understand that now. Right? We're back at the first century in terms of, you don't have to go to church or have a religious preference, or much less a Christian religious preference in order to have some sort of status in society. In fact, it may even harm you or hurt you in days that we're living in. And that's exactly where the current church was in the first century. So let's be those people. Let's be those people who live and move and walk in God's power. Why? Because we're connected to source we're leaning in. We as much as God is revealing to us our ego and our pride. We're confessing that before him or hitting our knees and then we're saying God, oh, filming, because it's gonna be tough. I'm about to walk into what I'm gonna have to interact with that with that human. I'm gonna have to enter in that situation. I have to go to that meeting. I'm about to see

them, and I need you, I need you, God. I need you God to do some work in my heart so that I can then be the hands and feet of you. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you how you have shown us how to walk in how to move and I pray and pray for those under the sound of my voice that they may be able to walk in your power this week. Not because they're puffed up with pride or their I'm a man I'm a woman hear me roar, but just that whole idea of I'm going to be okay.

Because Christ has got me God's got me.

And just help us to be men and women who as we go about the city and as we go about our jobs this week, that or school, or whatever it is that you have for us, that we are able to make a difference because you made a difference in our lives. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon transcript:

Come on now. Can we give God some praise in his house? No, no, you got to do better than that. You allowed for me? Come on. We gotta be louder for God.

Hello? Yeah, there we are. Yeah. Come on. I love this house. I'm back. I told you we're family. There's no getting rid of me. There's no getting rid of me. I'm still waiting for invite to a cookout, no pass. So that's what I'm, that's where I'm at. I'm gonna have to book a trip to come down here just just to kind of make a house tour just because oh my Hey, I'm a cousin now. I'm here. I'm here. Third time, here's a rule of my house. The first time you come we show you where the cups are, and the plates on everything. The second time, you gotta go to the frigerator you know where everything is. So I feel that way. I'm glad to be here. It's an honor to be here. And I would love to honor your pastor, your leaders, Pastor Brent, man, what a phenomenal man and God and who he is as, as a pastor. And you know, there are some things that you don't even know he does. He calls me randomly, just to check in just to encourage us. There's been some hard things we've gone through. As church planners, we lost the church by the way, January 21. We had our first Sunday or 18 weeks in

come on the teams back home right now killing it.

I love what God is doing. He calls he encourages we went through a hard time in the beginning and and he just he just kept calling and encouraging. So can you guys give some some honor to your pastor to your leader?

I've been given a tall task this morning.

To to break down and into cover. First Corinthians chapter three.

I'll tell you this right now as this is this is how you know we're family because as a guest coming in,

to be asked us preach on First Corinthians. Any Corinthians is like, Oh, all right, we want to get into some business. Okay, Lord, we want that we want to step on some things and do it and talk about some things. But I believe this, I believe that if you came expecting or believing whether you're in the room or online, for God, to open your hearts, open your minds to a new perspective and revelation of who he is, and his goodness for your life. I believe that you're going to leave this place, you're going to leave this this this moment. And your life is going to be impacted, not just for tomorrow, but for the days to come.

Not just for what God's gonna do in your life today. But for the years to come and the encouragement. So I do encourage you to just press it, to lock in, until allow not my voice to be the loudest voice in the room, but the Lord's voice to be the loudest voice in your heart and your mind and in your soul. Can we do that? Come on, let's pray. Father God, I pray right now that you were blessed this time, Lord, that you did, you would reveal yourself to us

in a way that we need you to this morning.

I pray that as I'm an instrument in the orchestra, that you are leading. Lord, I pray that you will allow not the focus to be on me. But the focus to be on you Your Word, and the revelation and a breakthrough that we all need to receive this morning, whether we're in the room or we're online.

God thank you for what you're doing. And thank you for what you're getting ready to do in Jesus name, a man. All right, so we got we got we got to talk about it. First Corinthians Chapter Three of the I'm gonna break it down. And I'm not going to read all of it, because it's pretty long, but I'm gonna lump it into verses so you can track with me. And then on the back end, I'm gonna give you three life changing steps. I believe that we're learning from this, this chapter in First Corinthians. And just to give you some context, the Corinthians First and Second Corinthians, and this is for all my Bible, theological theologians in the room. It was actually if you look at the order of the New Testament, it goes, it goes x into Romans in Romans into First and Second Corinthians. However, that's not the original order. It was written in first and second Corinthians was written first. Paul was ready to come in and he was ready to check some things and do some things. But I believe that as Paul was reading it, he said, Wait a minute. This is a little harsh. So let me write Romans and put Romans first to soften the hearts to receive the truth of the matter. The fact of that the way we're living as believers and Christians are not necessarily up to the par to the level that Jesus has called us to live. And so as we as we step into this, have that perspective and understand that this is Paul, correcting the people, the believers correcting the people saying, Hey, what the way you're doing this is not right. This is the way you need to walk it out and do it so in Corinthians Apostle Paul is addressing the Corinthians about the spiritual maturity. Here's the breakdown.

Know the chapters verses one through four Paul criticizes the Corinthians For their spiritual maturity saying they are still worldly and not ready for solid food, but only for milk. Come on somebody.

Come on. That's that's real. I like me some some heavy food now. verses five through nine Paul talks about how God is the only one who gives growth. And he and apologists are just servants working in God's field building on the foundation of Jesus Christ. Verses 10 through 15. Paul discusses the importance of building on the foundation of Christ, which qualifies with quality materials that will that will withstand the test of fire on the Day of Judgement. Verses 16 through 17. Paul reminds the Corinthians that they are God's temple and should not destroy it with division and conflicts. Verses 18 through 23 These are the last verses Paul contrasts the wisdom of the world with the wisdom of God using the Corinthians to not boast in in human leaders but only in the Lord

the overall mean the importance of the of the spiritual maturity building on the foundation of Christ and the danger of division and pride within the church. Come on how many people can agree with me by the end the room online that that those three things are pretty well we would call immature. They're pretty things that that happened that we would look at and say man grow up.

We will look at it say why are you acting like that and doing that? In my household? I have four kids, three girls and one boy.

I am the Sophos stuff is dude in my house. My daughters know that my daughters know that they they take advantage of daddy, they they know I have a nine year old, a three year old and a two year old. They're probably watching right now they're probably here. And I'm probably shaking their head like yep, we know.

We know. We know we we get it. So So what happens in my household sometimes is my daughter's would would go and they do this sweet little thing. Like my oldest. She's nine and I was getting a haircut yesterday. And I was at my brother's house and I didn't know my my brother and my sister in law. Were gonna go pick her up and bring her over. But they did and she ran into the room. And she said, Hi, Daddy. I said Hey, baby, I said do you need these? She said no, just a kiss. I was like, oh, okay, here's 20 bucks.

She knows how to play the game. Like she gets it like she knows that if I can get dad in this, this soft place and all hugging him and loving on him. She knows that whatever she asked for besides makeup. She will get she will get it. And my youngest are picking up on that. Because here's what they'll do. They'll go to mom, and they'll ask mom, and I say Mom, can I have it? She will say no.

Or they'll go to my mother in law and they'll ask my mother in law. Hey, can I have grandma can I have and they will say no.

And then she'll come. Ayanna, Ziaja they'll come and let's see, dad.

I'm working in typing and doing some things come and give me a hug. And I was like, I love you.

I love you.

Hey, can I have some hot Cheetos?

I'm not sure why.

You got some hot Cheetos. You go get them sick. I can't get on. Can you get a formatic? Director? No. Can you get them? Yes, sir. Get out. Go get him slide. Like what are you doing? I'm getting a on this month. I just told her

why she can't handle hot Cheetos.

Why she got

me into having a combat with my wife and it's just hot Cheetos. The worst is, is sleeping in our bed.

My wife will go put our daughters down. And they know they don't want me for anything else other than to get them to what they want. They're like, can I have daddy? I'll go upstairs and I go to the room.

By way, can I just can you just can you just hold me in your bed?

Here's what says she knows her bed is uncomfortable for me. I'm like, Yeah, sir. Come on. Go. And now he's like, Hey, what are you doing? This is why they don't sleep in a room and like she just wants to cuddle. What's wrong with her wanting to cuddle with her that? I'm not gonna get these years but one day she's gonna grow up and she's not gonna want to be around me. I just I just want to hold my three year old what? Why don't you love your three year old enough to want to hold her

what do you what are you doing? Man? Maybe Maybe there's something wrong with you and I know for me like

she's watching right now.

As we listen, I'm gonna get text messages.

But but but my kids have learned how to play this game. They've learned how to work the system and work things out and, and say just enough and know what to say and how to say it and when to say it and, and how to apply it and what to do to get what they want. Which, which then sometimes oftentimes, which puts me and my wife at odds, because we find ourselves in a space where, where we both want what's best for our kids, we both want to see them when we we both want them to feel loved, welcomed, and instruction and obedient and all of these things, but yet, we are operating on two different spectrums. Because one is operating on this, like we're going to do this, and the other one is operating out of color what it is manipulation.

pride, arrogance, or, or just wanting to be right, or just wanting things done my way, or just just wanting to feel fulfilled the way Don wants to be fulfilled. And then what causes this thing in our kids is, they begin to see this and they begin to know how to work it, they say wait a minute, it worked one time, it'll work again.

And then all of a sudden, the system is structured. And the things that we put in place, are now being blurred.

And the lines are being compromised. And the morals that we stand on are no longer being stood on. And the things that we're supposed to live by walk by, are no longer being led by water by hope you hear me is saying about parenting, I hope you hear what I'm laying down.

When we begin to play this game

of manipulation, or understanding or, or doing this and, and going behind and making things happen to where we want it to happen, or because we want our pride and we want to feel tough and macho, or we want to feel loved and fulfilled or, or we got trauma and insecurities that we try to cover up and hide, or we got things that we're trying to deal with and navigate that we don't want nobody to know. And so we begin to move and do and be in and walk and talk and do and I don't know, we ended up doing the one thing that enemy wants us to do.

And that's the only scheme if the only thing you get from me this morning.

I want you to hear me say this, the enemy only has one scheme,

one game plan.

Nothing else. He's not great at anything else. But there's just one thing.

And that's causing division.

The enemy wants to cause division in your life, he wants to pull you away, he wants to isolate you. He wants to put you in a space to where you're by yourself or you're going against your pride or, or your air like this, this tension in you. There's something in you that's that's pulling you away from what God has for you, to isolate you and to put you in a place to compromise.

Well, damn winning some Bibles. Let me give you some Bible in the beginning.

When God created man, he said what he saw that man was not fit to be alone. So therefore Eve was then created. And from that moment, man was never alone. until Satan shows up to the sea. And she He isolates Eve into the garden. And he asked her a simple question.

Did he really say that?

But can I tell you where Eve compromised first? By being alone?

Can I tell you what then took place? She said that God said we couldn't eat or touch of the tree. Can I tell you that? That's not what God said. God said that you couldn't eat from the tree. See, here's what the enemy knew. The enemy knew that if evils was willing to add to it, she'd be willing to take away from it. Why? Because the law was already blurred and compromised. The line was already corrupt. The line was already was already messed up, messed up and jacked up. So he said, Wait a minute, if you're willing to add touch to it,

you'll be willing to take away eat from it as well.

And so he gets her he deceives her he wins her over why? Because she was alone, she compromised the line and then all of a sudden it trickles down to them.

And they both become compromised.

Division is cancerous, it spreads.

It destroys.

It's not healthy, it's not good.

And it's something that has to be nipped in the bud right away.

It's something that has to be stopped immediately. It's something that has to be addressed immediately and sometimes in a harsh way, in a real way,

in a loving way, but in a direct way.

And what Paul is saying when we just read, In the beginning of the Corinthians, he says, Hey, your spiritual maturity

is not mature enough to handle food.

You need milk?

What time I've been coming to church for 10 years. I know all the books in the Bible.

I can quote all of everything.

Give me a Bible trivia.

As great

but instead of zero division in your life,

have you compromised the line?

Whether it be for your own personal gain or or hiding insecurities, or or anything else is there division in your life?

See, I believe that Paul's writing this letter, not to not to necessarily come down hard and beat down the Corinthians and beat down the believers. But he's writing this to say, Hey, you got to check your heart.

Hey, I need you to I need you to self evaluate what's in your hearts. I need you to look at yourself and be honest and be true to what's in your heart. Because Because what's in your heart, if it's not pure, if it's not until the Lord if it's, it can't be unto me posing it to me or policy. It can't be both of us enough. We don't even pose it. I don't even want the credit. It has to be unto the Lord.

Because anything else causes what? Division.

When you begin to compromise the line,

we begin to justify sin.

We begin to say, oh, you know what, it's okay for us to do. We're forgiven God's grace.

We begin to do the same thing the enemy does. All throughout Scripture, where he takes scripture, he takes verses and he twists it and manipulates it in such a way that he then he uses it in a way to sound enticing to sound good to sound the way it's supposed to be. But in all reality, all it is is out of context.

We see this in Matthew

chapter one, when Jesus in the world has been tempted.

He says surely he'll send the angels they're concerned about you.

And Jesus respond with what God says don't put him to test

if we're not careful, we fall into the line of division.

And we cause lions to be compromised.

And here's the truth of the matter like there's a couple things that that causes this that leads to this and I just want to throw out there and again

that's the Holy Spirit convicts you you need to take it over there don't don't email past and present Don't ever bring him back. Because he was all in my business. We family we family in a me is the Lord didn't take it out with him now taken.

But here's some of the things that we do in pride or arrogance, or cockiness, or, or out of insecurity or, or just maybe we don't even know, and maybe going to run today and you have no idea that these things are wrong. Well, I'm here to help you see that again, what Paul is saying is there's a right way to do things. But but sometimes we what we'll do is we'll take things and we'll label it something just to justify to make it right.

gossiping.

Will they bless I'm just venting.

That's all I'm doing. I'm just venting. Grad I gotta vent to you today.

Man, you gotta tell I gotta tell you some

will start gossiping.

Gossiping causes division.

Here's the thing. Just just take this, this free, this little nugget.

If you're venting to anybody that's affected by what you're talking about. It's gossip.

If you're venting to anybody that can cause a productive solution, to set a fix or to move forward, it's gossip.

If you're venting to anybody that just says, Oh, you're right.

He shouldn't have done that. seasickness said that girl.

I have cut friends out of my life for this for me simply going to them and having a what I call a spiritual brother conversation. And if the whole conversation there

bring with me and that helping me see my blind spots. My blind spots are the ways that I can do different or be better or better husband a better father a better pastor better leader. I have cut them out of my life.

Because I found myself going back because there's just guilty pleasure of gossiping.

This is guilty pleasure of have got some tea.

I love some tea.

PuTTYgen cost division

meant, did you hear what Pastor Brian said? Hey, we really gonna do that. That's crazy. I don't even think we ready for that as he must be wild. I don't know what he talked

about some given when we talk about giving every weekend person.

That's gossipy.

That's monitoring. We see it in all throughout the Bible. Jesus tells the Kenyans come down. I'm going to your house for dinner. I'm giving I'm giving a lot of Bible right now. I'm sorry, I'm, I'm in the context, I'm in the Word.

And what do we see the believers the mother and said he's gone to have dinner with his son? Should we be celebrating that?

Should we be in all of that? Should we be yes to that?

Should we should we sit and wait whenever a leadership says or or a leader or somebody that says hey, we're going to take over the city of El Paso for the kingdom should we all just rejoice and get excited and be on the on the same page with that? Should we all be excited to see the everybody know Jesus in El Paso or or whatever city you live in.

And we're gonna raise X amount of money to do X, this shouldn't increase your faith to believe that you've seen God do some crazy things. And you're believing that he's going to continue to do the impossible. But what happens is, we allow doubt, or fear or insecurities, or our past hurt, or what this church do to us or what this person said to us or what this leader did to us, or what this done all of this. And we begin to doubt.

And we begin to doubt.

And we begin to have what I call the faith of the 10 spies.

And we begin to mutter

and spewed

discord among one another because we were gossiping.

Here's a healthy way to vent. Find somebody who's gonna hold you accountable.

Find somebody who's not going to just let you throw up on them and let you stay where you're at.

Find somebody who's willing to pick you up

and say, Yeah, I hear you. And I understand you thought that way.

But

have you thought about looking at it this way?

Have you tried this perspective?

Maybe you're looking through the lens of offense? Have every one of you just forgave them? Well, I just can't forgive them what Jesus says what?

Forgive

Jesus on the Way to the process. Father, forgive them for they don't know what they're doing.

Surround yourself with people, spiritual leaders, spiritual brothers and sisters

that are gonna, that are gonna hold your hand and hold you accountable that you can vent to, but they aren't gonna let you stay there.

If they're fueled by your gossip, you need to cut them out of your life.

I get it. I may be your best friend. I get it. I grew up childhood friends. And I understand that some healthy boundaries and being able to meet me and my wife we vent girl did you hear that? Maybe Did you hear it? I didn't know that.

But let it be healthy. The second thing is is control

wants to try to lead I'm just a leader.

But we're really controlling.

We're really controlling we really do what I say as I say because I said so.

apparents we do this a lot.

We got to control I'm a control I'm a control and we labeled it leading.

Hey, you should be God's will for your life.

I wish to be praying for God to give wisdom and discernment to the individuals that we're leading or that God has blessed us with to steward whether that's sons and daughters or employees or friends or or any relationship God would you would you give me wisdom to how to how to how to lead this individual.

Now parents I'm not telling you to let your let your kid go out here and be big in the world. That's not what I'm saying.

But I

saying is oftentimes we can use control

in a way, and we label it leadership.

And the truth of the matter is it causes division. Because people then end up walking away from God.

They walk away from his will, and its purpose for life. Because I can tell you this, anytime that you get get put in somebody's life can I tell you, it's because the Lord placed you there? And when you use an abuse that can I tell you this? Yeah, they may not trust people again. But you know who else is on the line of them not trusting God,

the Holy Spirit.

And what Paul is adjusting, as Paul is saying, hey, based on how you're living your life, and what you're doing, you're not living by example. That way people want to follow you

gotta be somebody that somebody looks and says, I want to be like him. I want to be like her whole my life to be changed not by because they told me this and that but because they live by example, the way he loves his wife, man.

I want to love my wife one day like that. The way she just loves her as her husband, man.

Girl, I know it's hard, man. I know it's hard. But man, the way you push through, it motivates me. The way you your family that you don't got a lot of money, but maybe I'll make time for your family. I want to be like that.

That's what it looks like to truly lead somebody.

You got to lead yourself before you can lead others.

And Paul is saying What are y'all doing? You're getting so caught up in following a man that you're not even unto the Lord.

Another thing we do is we take manipulation, and we label it love.

My daughter is the queen of manipulation. The Hot Cheetos thing is just one of the 1000 things that happen in my house daily.

I promise you she's just she's just a queen at it.

And the way she disguises it,

is by getting all lovey dovey.

Say, Daddy, I love you. Now my oldest, I think she's just naturally just wanted to give me a hug and a kiss. And I just was a softy. And I just gave her $20

versus that's just, that's just that's just the truth of the matter.

But the youngest thing they know the tactful

because they want what they want

and they're willing to compromise and blur the lines

and good thing I love them unconditionally.

Because because I don't never my love for them will never run out.

But can I tell you that people

can smell and see manipulation over a long period of time.

And eventually

what you present as authentic

will eventually be perceived as fake over time.

And phone stopped being answered and text messages stop being answered. And things stop being the game division in the relationship

be authentic and honest and real. You don't have to manipulate to get your way

you can just love people genuinely

there's times where I call pastors and I say hey, I don't need nothing from you I'm gonna change planets everybody every time I talk to somebody they always think I want money or resources or another from you as well that you know I love you

I'm breaking the barrier down

I could call and be like hey pastor you know I love you you know we could use about another 1015 $30,000 Now you know

but guess what? If I do that I can be blocking what God has for me because I can manipulate this over here and get something and God could be saying but I was gonna give you so much more I was gonna do so much more for you but you're over here manipulate and get the promotion but I was getting ready to to give you a business you over you're manipulating to get this relationship but I was getting ready to give you multiple relationships with multiple people who can who can impact your life in a positive way

you got to understand love least away

and when you genuinely are genuinely and you're genuinely loving people and you're authentically doing it it makes a difference

here are three again are closing with these three things I'm sorry we good y'all we are still love me all right. I'm gonna ban some people not clapping

leaves now he Are you out

In Gaza, you talked about T I was done, you gotta left.

You could have been out of here. He talked about his manipulation, love.

Lesson and I'm just I'm just I'm on assignment. I wish I could come up here. I'm a faith guy. I love increasing faith. I want us to be running around this room and believing for the miracle signs and wonders of the Lord I'm, I'm a Holy Spirit filled guy. And, and yes, like, boom, but but this is this is true, we got to we got to know the word.

We got to know how to live the Word, we got to know how to apply the word to our life. Because there's a lot of believers in the world as a lot of people in the world who are catching tick tock revelations, or Instagram theology, or podcasts, just just goodness truth for their life. And they, they take that and it just planted in their world. And they never dig the hole and plant the seed and water it. They never do anything to it. And they find out they figure they want to they, they get to a place where they, they they're frustrated with the way their life looks. And that's because nobody ever took the time to do the hard work.

We got so caught up on this popularity thing.

I love you and passive really loves you.

He loves you enough to say hey, we got to talk about the we got to talk about the solid.

We got to talk about the truth the realness of the word.

Hear me say there's there's nothing wrong with the Tick Tock revelations, or the Instagram theology. I am a pastor I posted encouraging things on Tik Tok all the time.

But just that alone,

was not enough.

Just that alone was not enough. Some of that will keep you where you are feeling good.

And the thing is not Jesus don't want to leave you where you are. He wants to take you on this path of sanctification.

And on this journey of being sanctified. There are some things that have to break off and come off of us. There's some things that we have to realize, wait a minute, I didn't know this was wrong.

Wait a minute, I didn't know I was in the way.

And maybe just maybe the truth today would be the truth that you need to get out of the way.

And to allow the Lord just to start flowing in your life.

The thing you've been praying about maybe, maybe it's I just I just went, Oh, wait. There's division in my life. I need to get rid of division.

Wait a minute, there's this bitterness in my heart, this offense and I need to I just need to get rid of

what I've been in all of a person I need to be in all of the Lord.

I just move out of the way and just open up the floodgates.

Just open up to heaven gates over your life.

Miracle signs of wonders peace that surpasses all understanding.

Mercy that's new every day.

These are all things that the Lord has for you. That if we're not careful, will allow these things to just camp out in a heart,

combat in our mind, combat in our soul.

And we'll walk around digging, it makes us tough. It means we have endurance. It means we're macho, that we're strong enough that we're tough enough.

But my Bible says

that when we're weak,

he's strong.

My Bible says that if we will be humble enough

to lay ourselves down

at the feet

that he will that he will lift us up.

My Bible says don't grow weary in doing good for a proper time you will reap a harvest.

But it does take some hard work. So here are three truths here are three life changes things I just want to encourage you to do three things, and we're gonna get up out of here because it's time to eat.

The first day, hey, we need to make sure that we're building we need to make sure that we're building on a solid foundation. In verses 10 through 15. The apostle Paul uses the analogy of building to describe the importance of building our lives on a solid solid foundation, which is Jesus Christ. He emphasized that our work will be tested by fire, and only those built on Christ will withstand the test. This reminds us to prioritize our relationship heavy with Christ and ensure that our actions and efforts are rooted in him. This point urges us to reflect on whether our lives are aligned with Christ

and to make adjustments where necessary.

We got to make sure we're building on something solid. I'm a big I'm a big man.

Everything I step on

I don't know if you saw me but I even did this over here. Like I'm like, everything I step on get a get a get a test step.

I sit down I sit down. Okay, let me sit down.

Because I want to make sure solid

Can I ask you a question? Can God trust you with the heavy things?

Can God trust you with the big things? You're asking for big press? Can he can he give it to you?

You want a solid foundation?

Or if he gives it to you, when it cause you to fall and stumble, and either one hurt yourself, or to embarrass yourself?

These are these are real questions. So you got to be asking yourself.

God, I need us break through I need this big miracle God, but

can you can you handle it?

Can you withstand it?

If not fine, it's good. It's all good.

Today, we get to make myself for forgetting check in our hearts

getting aligned with Christ and making the necessary adjustments in our lives.

making the necessary adjustments, the necessary little things matter.

You'd rather do it on the front end in the back end, I promise you I was at the DMV for seven out no, not DMV, the car dealership for seven hours is a long day. Because I didn't do some work on the front end.

It'll never happen again. I'm gonna do some work on the front end now.

I gotta make some adjustments that are put my pride away.

The second thing is unity in the body of Christ.

Paul addresses this issue of division among the Corinthians believers. In verses one through nine that he highlights the danger of jealousy, strife and boasting and causing division within the body of Christ. Paul emphasized the importance of unity and working together for the common goal of building up the church. This serves as a powerful reminder for us to strive for unity and harmony within the body of believers focusing on our our see our shared faith in Christ rather than allowing division to disrupt our fellowship.

Come on, if you're sitting on this side of the room, because you can't stand somebody on this side of the room, we got to fix that.

Ain't nobody here. If you're online because you can't stand nobody in the room. We got to fix that. There's nobody here like church, right?

We got to make sure there's no division in the house.

I just told somebody this this week. God is holy.

Holy means set apart.

And this is a message for a whole nother time. But I'll give you this little nugget. That when sin steps in, God steps out.

There is nothing in your life that can be holy when there's sin among you. Your marriage, relationships, work, your finances,

your children,

your church.

When there's sin among you,

classes I can't I'm holding them set apart.

We have to daily be asking the Lord God, would you forgive me what you cleanse me once you forgive me of the sins that I've committed today?

We all sin.

Don't be too big to ask for forgiveness.

And don't just think you walk in forgiveness.

Go to the Lord daily, daily.

And let's get rid of division. Let's serve together let's get on fire for what God is doing at Life Church in El Paso. Let's say Hey, God is doing something crazy here.

This church has even since I've been here ever been this church has grown. Since I've been here.

God is doing some amazing things. I hear about all the stories of what of what God is doing through this discharge through this church and now in the city of El Paso and God is moving this kid's camp. It's amazing to get kids off the street into the house of the Lord God is moving here. This is good soil. This is a good place to be planted rooted and together working together to advance the kingdom. I get it most people I talk to you the level No Pass. Oh say oh, I want to be here.

I love our paths. Oh

this is a beautiful place to be.

So amazing place to be God is good.

He's working. He's moving. He's using you to advance the line.

on the front line.

On the front line, I was talking to Mr. Jim last night.

He works down at the border.

That's what I said, thank you for what you do.

Because every day you hold the line.

Every day you hold the line

for our country, for our kids,

for our community,

for the kingdom.

If you work at the border, and then I just want to take this moment to say thank you for what you do.

Thank you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you,

you matter.

This is an amazing place, let's be unified. Let's love what we do. Let's love how God is moving. Let's love what God is what God is what God is breaking through and breaking up.

The last thing is the temple of the Holy Spirit. And the bank can load and I'll lend a plane here.

Towards the end of the chapter, Paul reminds the Corinthians that they that they are God's temple, and at the Spirit of God dwells in them. This profound truth highlights the significance of our bodies as a vessel of the Holy Spirit. It challenged us to honor God with our bodies to live in a way that reflects his presence within us and to avoid the flooding. defending ourselves with the society filling ourselves with sinful practices. Understanding that we are temples of the Holy Spirit can transform our perspective on how we live our lives, guiding us to make good choices that honor God and uphold the sanctity to sanctify of our of our bodies, the sanctity of our bodies.

I talked about being set apart.

You were made in the image of God.

God didn't make a mistake on you.

God didn't mess up on you.

There's nothing wrong with you.

Your past is not defined you the mistakes you've made. don't dictate who you are. You are God's son. You are God's daughter. Hear me say that.

He loves you.

What time you have no idea.

He loves you. Well, dama what I did by Baba he loves you

Tom I messed up so much. I've done so much wrong.

He loves you.

He didn't make a mistake on you

have a DOM

so many things wrong with my body. I don't look good. I don't feel you remain in the image of God.

Perfectly made.

He made an atom he stepped back and he was well pleased.

He's well pleased with you.

You just have to start believing it

is started understanding that because you were made in the image of God there's a responsibility you have to be what set apart

as a as a Christ follower.

To be set apart,

set apart.

We're talking about serious sin and holiness can't

can't mix.

You got to be set apart.

You got to allow the Holy Spirit to give you that wisdom and discernment. If you didn't check in your spirit as you shouldn't be talking to this person. Maybe I shouldn't say that.

And I gotta say this.

It's baby steps.

Okay, one step at a time.

You walk out here, you may remember I'm not gonna gossip for a week.

You get today five. Thank you.

I was talking about that girl. Talking about that. That guy went okay. I'm proud of you for doing four days.

Now let's let's do it. Let's do another week.

Most people think because when we fall, we gotta get up and start over. That's not how it works. We get to fall and keep moving forward.

Church, can I challenge you to keep moving forward.

Keep moving forward.

And I strive to be like Jesus, keep moving forward.

I'm gonna keep my eyes fixed or keep moving forward.

Keep just keep moving forward just keep going

I get it and even fun dental insecurities. This week my ice wall up and it's been swollen for the last four days the iPads on got to the hotel as long as I'm not wearing his iPads tomorrow

I'm not doing

my eyes while anybody's gonna be looking at my eye like oh, what's wrong Bobo?

Mr. Jim says some so good to me.

He said da

tomorrow they're not gonna care about your eye.

They're gonna come for the word.

Coming to church for the Lord.

You know what I did? I said, Man, you right?

God

I'm here showing the nine all

who cares

about Dawn

and Hill about you.

It's about what the Lord is getting ready to do through you.

Church can we be a church. So when we say hey, we don't allow the vision to creep in and to creep up

to get in the way in a stop what God is wanting to do through this church.

What God wants to do through your family through your life?

Can we not compromise the line?

Because first Corinthians simply sums up this it offers valuable insight on building our lives on Christ, fostering unity within the body of believers and honoring our bodies as temples with the Holy Spirit.

Reflecting on these points can lead to transformation.

It changes we can change our attitudes, our actions and our relationships.

Ultimately, come on drawing us closer to God and strengthening our faith

that's what happens

when we apply the hard NISS

of First Corinthians Chapter Three to our life.

Let's pray God I pray right now

that you would equipped us with the things that we need

in order to walk out

it's a walk in what you've called us to do,

and live a life

and be the people that you've called us to be.

Lord, I pray right now that needed division in our hearts and the division in our and our minds or our soul that's been created

either by accident or on purpose

lowered to allow us to make the necessary adjustments

to get rid of the division

as you allow us to stand on the firm foundation

of the goodness of the love and mercy and the grace that comes with being your son with being your daughter

Lauren and I prayed for this house this church

what would you stir up

a fire

in this house

that would be so contagious.

This house would be a beacon for the city of El Paso

that it would be lights

that we put on a nightstand giving light to the whole house

and got any division that causes us a bowl or anything to try to cover that later.

I pray that that would no longer be

rooted in this place.

Root rooted in the kingdom, rooted in our hearts

Lord, that all offense,

all bitterness, all hurt. Any transgression, any transgression that's been made against us that we've been holding on to nor would you allow us just to release it now.

Just to release it now.

To chores

source

Once you allow our focus, to be building a life

that's on the firm foundation

of who you are

that we would declare that we would go to life

on the firm foundation

that way with any store may come

any trials or tribulations that may spark

that we would know that we are rooted and safe in your presence

that we don't have to blur the line. We don't have to compromise. What are the bins bend the knee to be anything outside of who you've called us to be.

Thank you, Lord, for what you're doing.

And thank you for what you're going to do. In Jesus name.

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All right before we begin this one, I love to pray for us. Father, we are so thankful for those who gave the ultimate price so that we can sit in a room like this and be in a country like this where we have freedom to, to worship and to move about. And so Father, I just pray for those in the room right now who are hurting, because they know someone, they loved someone who did not come home. And I pray that you just give such peace to our hearts this weekend, as we thank God, for those who loved us and that we loved and who have gone before us. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen. All right, well, let's begin our part. Second part of our first Corinthians series was really just chapter two, we're going to be in this book for a while, but don't worry, there's a lot of variety. And First Corinthians was written by Paul the Apostle, Paul, and you can follow along every week, we'll, we'll have the scriptures up there. But we'll also you can open up your Bible. And so we'll be in First Corinthians Chapter Two today. But this was written to the church at Corinth, and the church at Corinth is a lot like our city that we find ourselves in here in El Paso. And so there's a lot of parallels a lot of similarities. And I'm going to do my best to try to explain the Scriptures to us so that we can then decide what God has for us today. Well, Paul, is all about the message of wisdom today. And we're going to figure out what that means in First Corinthians chapter two. But I think we can all start out and say, Man, I understand what wisdom and philosophers are. And so we think about this in terms of all the way back into school, and some of y'all may have even had a couple of philosophy classes in college or in other intellectual pursuits. And so you might think of kind of the Great's of the Western tradition, which was Socrates, and then Plato and Aristotle. And so they were sort of in a row there. And those would have those kind of thinkers would have been in the background of Paul's message as he begins in First Corinthians chapter two, because he's gonna say, Listen, I know there's all kinds of intellectual arguments out there, all kinds of philosophical arguments out there. But I am here to tell you about Christ. And so he's going to start out first grade, the attempt to beginning in verse one. And here's how he begins this morning.

When I first came to you, dear brothers and sisters, you see this term of endearment here to the men and women of the church. I didn't use lofty words, and impressive wisdom to tell you God's secret plan. So again, he could have Paul was when he was saw, especially He was educated at the best religious schools, he would have known how to have some sort of intellectual argument and sort of cut everyone down and have them in the floor. But he did not do that, in talking to them about God's plan. For I decided that while I was with you, I would forget everything except Jesus Christ, the one who was crucified. So again, talks about that last week, if we're going to boast, we're going to boast in Christ, we're going to exalting Christ. That's what Paul wants us all to sort of be on that same page. And specifically, not just Christ, but his his crucifixion and resurrection. And I can do and weakness, timid and trembling. And when you see that, at first glance, you might be asked yourself, what is Paul talking about? What does it mean I came in, in weakness, that's not the way to, to interact or to, to persuade people. Well, think about this, he is following Christ, and he's calling us as he is following Christ to follow him. That's gonna be a big theme throughout this letter. And that whole idea of weakness and also that similar word, meekness, it's that coming and modeling ourselves after Christ, not toughening up in lording our wisdom or power or authority over others. We have to see that in the Scriptures. And for all of us at any given age. We're all tempted to what power up over people in terms of our intellectual prowess, and so he's trying to say, Listen, I wanted to come to you low. I wanted not to rely on my own strength in my own wisdom. I think that's why he's saying, I can be really quite, quite fearful in the good sense of the word. You know how sometimes you have good fear when you go and you stand before an audience and you're not, you're not, you don't want to mess it up. That's really what Paul's saying here. He's coming in that sort of meekness and weakness, and he's coming with a little bit of trepidation because he knows this is a big deal. And I want to get this gospel, right. He didn't want to be clever and persuasive, but he wanted to rely on the spirit. So we'll see this clear in verses four and following and my message and my preaching, we're very plain. That's what that's what we want to do here at Life Church. We want to make sure that the messages that we give are clear to all of us in the room if we have ears to hear and eyes to see right

isn't using clever and persuasive speech, which we've already said Paul could have done, and they would have been used to. They already had Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, and many others who would have been hundreds of years before this 300 BC, or so. We're sitting here talking about 55 ad when Paul's writing, I realized, this is Paul, on the power of the Holy Spirit. I did this so that you would not trust in human wisdom, but in the power of God. First point I want us to think about this morning is, be careful. What you hook people with now this is sort of a word I went back and forth is this really the best word I wanted to talk about in order to apply this section of Scripture, and I'll give you some reasons why I sort of stayed there. Well, another way of saying this is whatever you win people with is what you've got to continue to do to keep them. We used to say this, and I was a youth minister for many years before I was a senior pastor. And one of the things that we used to always talk about, we always had to be careful with even though we'd love to have fun, and we'd love to do things like we've talked about, and that we do here at our church is we didn't want that, that that sort of dog and pony show that sort of three ring circus to be what we lead in our ministries, because we were keenly aware as youth pastors, that it we sort of always sort of had all these bells and whistles. And we always sort of had this show these these plates that we were spinning to try to amaze and wow, we would have to sort of thing up in order to keep the students coming back. That's why I say we need to be careful what we hook people with. We don't want to do this with intellectual prowess. That's what that's what His concern was. Right? That's what Paul's was. He's I don't want to do that.

And again, I think it's an okay word. Because I think about what Jesus said when he called his disciples his followers out, remember what he told them, he said, I will teach you to be fishers of men and women. And so it is that idea that God is snatching us out of an environment that we're sort of used to think about this evening, quite literally, I know, it's really hard to go fishing in El Paso, you have to drive many hours in certain directions. But I think you understand the concept of being a fish and you become a fish out of water and you are snatched from the pond or the lake or the ocean, or whatever it is, I think it's a good word. And I think we understand this even in other professions, I mean, people who are in sales and all these kinds of things, they understand that whatever you promised people, you better be able to come through with that or to keep that up. So Paul saying, I want to make sure you understand that what I want to lead with what I want to be in the middle with and what I want to end with is the cross of Jesus Christ. I remember how you said last week, we have to be Christ centered in our understanding of First Corinthians and all we need is the word of God and the power of the Spirit that becomes so important. Because here we are, we're seeing in a great place the air conditionings on the lights are working. You know, there's no leaks in the river away from the winds and the elements. And we, we might begin to think, Okay, this is what we need to do church. And it's just simply not true. You know what you need to, to do church or to be around the people of God and to be edified and encourage it. You need the word of God, and you need people.

And preferably people who know and worship and love God, I think about this in terms of yesterday's funeral, I had the privilege of helping late arrest,

or tutto. Okay. And Terry and Amber, they helped serve here and Kid life and other ways. And so, Terry's father, he passed away recently. And one of the things that was so sweet about that service, is that even though Yeah, we had cushions and we had chairs, we had the air conditioning on yesterday, what made it so great and special. It was the fact that we had gathered, the power was in the fact that we had gathered as family and friends that we worshipped, that we prayed, and that we celebrated. We need power. And it comes from the word of God and the people of God gathering together. And again, I'm okay with some of the things that we use to sort of AMP things up and hype things up. But that that is just the aftermath of what our message and where the power really lies. I'm going to illustrate this now for some of y'all. I've got one movie I'm going to use to illustrate my three points today. And for some of y'all who are not born in the 80s or do not know this movie, I am sorry, I am going to use Back to the Future. Okay, is a great movie Robert Zemeckis 1985. The second one was in 8089. And the third one was in 1990. I tried to use a modern day movie with the DC Comics and Shazam and the Marvel guys, I couldn't figure it all out. So I just went back to what I know. Okay. And so the first thing this is, this is a cheesy illustration, and I'm gonna use it this morning. Go ahead. And so if you remember and back to the future, too. He's got that hoverboard, which all of us are still waiting for the hoverboards to come out. They told us that we were only a couple of years away. We're still a couple of years away evident.

Really, and so a member he gets over water and he gets stuck in these, these these pumps, they're sort of saying you need power. And so then they come in the, the antagonists, you don't have to know much about this movie to know that the antagonist is going to come in and sort of punch his lights out. And so he has this, this this power hoverboard and he actually says students, you know, little hinge men and women hook on right, so so they hook on, and I'm using this to say, I want you to think about the power. And the idea that where is the true power found this is just illustrations, all illustrations break down if you push them too far, so I'm not gonna push it any further. This is maybe so you can remember it when you go home. The power is that we need Jesus and we need the Spirit of God living in us. That's where true power is found. If you and I try to move in the world, and persuade people with the claims of Christ, King, anything else besides Jesus, and Him crucified, we will fail is so important because it's not hard to gather a crowd with, with tricks and with simple things. And if you make it comfortable enough, and if the coffee is good enough, and if the people are beautiful enough on stage, or if there's healing going on, or the money's flowing, high number, there's all these different things that you and I could do in order to gather a crowd. But I'm here to tell you history. And Bible tells me that that will ultimately fail. If our emphasis if our power is not on Jesus Christ and Him crucified, it looks like you're succeeding for a little while. But

it is not where the power lies. And we have to realize that what we're talking about here, and this is gonna become clearer as we continue to unfold this passage is the idea that we were not smart enough to somehow discover these things. Remember how Socrates and Aristotle and Plato and all the philosophers and and thinkers think they're like, Hey, I'm going to kind of help you navigate how to view the world self helps all that way, all these kinds of things. And where this is saying, Oh, my gosh, there was came a day there came a time in your life and in mind where God snatched us from the fire, from the idea that we were going the wrong direction, it is not something to be discovered. It is something that is revealed and illuminated to our hearts and minds. That's where the power lies. That makes what we'd said last week, make a lot of sense that there are people who hear the claims of Christ the death, burial, resurrection, say, Yes, I want that Jesus, there are others who think that's foolishness. There are others who find it as a stumbling block. Let's continue on in our passage this morning, verse six says, this right here. Yet, when I am among mature believers, this is Paul saying that listen, when I'm around you, I really want to kind of help you think through these things, these deep things of God. I do speak with words of wisdom. So I'll elevate my language. We all do this. We all have times where I teach academic classes, sometimes I'll teach a small group and the language might be elevated. But when I do that, I do speak with words of wisdom, but not the kind of wisdom that belongs to this world, or the rulers of this world, who are soon forgotten. No, the wisdom we speak of, is the mystery of God, his his plan that was previously hidden, even though he made it for our ultimate glory,

before the world began, but the rulers of this world have not understood it, if they had they would not have crucified our glorious Lord. That is what the Scriptures mean when they say, No, I have seen no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love Him. Second point I wants to see this morning is God has given us future promises. God has given us future promises. And that last verse there I'm just gonna tell you, that's my favorite verse. That's my life verse I, I really picked that out of the scriptures. I believe God kind of showed that to me at first Corinthians two nine, some people have lied versus some people don't, I think you don't want to make too much of it or too little of it. But I want to show you the next picture there, where

I have taken a picture of this, this is this is little brands, handwriting. favorite verse 16 years old, and I read it right here on this Bible, I still have my Bible. This is a circa 1997. This was the student Bible that I began to read at 16. And really, God began to speak to me and this was one of the verses that spoke out to me. Now, why did I love that? Well, I can tell you, I think back and I can tell you, I loved it as a young kid because to me, it was all forward looking. I don't know how you are when you are a young man or young woman, but I was ready to take the world by the horns, right? I was ready to lasso the world. I mean, you know, I'm just ready to go I'm ready. Launch me out. And I'm ready to take this on. I don't know who's done what, but I'm gonna make my mark on this world and God is with me and there's nothing that's going to hold me back then. I can't even imagine right

If that's what these words say, I cannot conceive or imagine what God has prepared because I know that I love him. And I don't think that was a wrong way to think because as I walked with Christ, I really do believe that God blessed me in my efforts forward. But now I'm reading as a middle aged 42 year old man, and I'm thinking this verse is still true, I still love it, I still hold to it, in some ways, even still cling to it. But I'm seeing it to the idea that God has chosen and he did reveal the mysteries of the kingdom to me, I'm looking at this sort of now, what is this all mean, this whole idea of, of? No, I have seen no ear has heard. And I think it's true for anyone that's a believer, obviously, the claims of Christ are yes, in Christ Jesus, when we see this, whether they're Old Testament, this is an Old Testament quote from Isaiah 64. Four. But all the promises of God are yes, in Christ Jesus. But what does this mean, this encourages me in my middle age of life that he's not done with me yet. And then I'm beginning to see this and I wanted to sort of break it down to what does this actually mean? Theologically? It's that whole idea that, that that things were hidden, and I say hidden, it's not a mystery to be discovered, right? Sometimes when we think hidden, we're saying, okay, like Sherlock Holmes, like, let's get an investigation, let's go find out. And if we do the right steps, we have enough logic, we'll get to the end. No, it's more the idea that there's a curtain that's been pulled, and that curtain is opening up, God's plan is being revealed. And it's the same way with our minds in our hearts, that God is revealing and showing things to us more and more and more, more revelation, more illumination, as we walk in him as we have faith in him as we look to him. That's why the negative sense of the idea that people who couldn't see and couldn't hear who were they in the New Testament, those were the religious leaders, and those were the people who just couldn't get there. But he's saying to you, and to me, this verse can be true, no, I see, no, yes or no mind has conceived what God has prepared for those of us who love him. Now, I've also sort of gone one step further. And I can imagine it 70 or 80, because I think about this, this was early on in life, I had this verse, I still have it here at 42. I'm thinking about myself at 70, or 80. And I'm speculating here, but I've talked to and listened to some older people and wiser people than me. I think I'll still love this verse. But I think the meaning will probably be most focused on glory on heaven. People who are in the last chapter of life who've been walking with Christ, their whole life or for a season are starting to think, oh, my gosh, God, you've got something prepared for me that's more glorious than I could ever imagine. And thank you, God, and you're beginning to prepare your heart for what's next, you see how a verse like this. And this is a good biblical interpretation moment for you. A verse like this has one interpretation that we're trying to get at. I tried to use Old Testament New Testament, and I tried to show you what I think it actually means in terms of something that's hidden that's now revealed. And I can also get that from the context. But also it has a myriad are numerous applications. So you could read this verse, my verse, If I want to say it that way, my favorite verse, and you may have a different way in which God is using that in your life. Beautiful, great. That's what's so amazing about following Christ is that there's a numerous amount of applications that can come from the scriptures once we begin to understand and ask God to give us wisdom, and illumination to even understand what this means.

All right, here's my next Back to the Future. pic. So this was at the very end of Back to the Future three. And again, illustrations break down if you push them too far, but this is when doc says to them, because really, it's just it's one of those coming of age stories. It's an adventure story. And Marty is supposed to be 16. And he's gotten his car and he's gotten his girl and he's trying to figure all these things out. And he's got his own insecurities about people calling him names and all these kinds of things. And so an accident is avoided. And he's thinking about his future now. And he's wondering, you know, has it all been written? Is it all just fate is it all sort of planned out? Whichever way I'm gonna go, and he sort of says, you know, guess what, you know, your future hasn't been written yet. So make it a good one. And so again, they're thinking about it from a purely movie secular perspective. But I think in Providence, we can understand this in a good sense of the word to say, lean into what God has for you. No matter what mistakes you have made, or think you've made in the past, God's not done with you and me yet. And if we lean into him, and we love him, there is nothing that we can think or imagine, that he may want to do with us. I want to give you one last thing to think about in this section of verses here. Because in our quest, to live for God, viewed put back up the application point in our quest to live for God. Again, what's what's our application when he was a god has given us future promises. In our quest to live for God and the life God has for us we can be tripped up and seduced by the wisdom of this world. You think about this, what we've already here in verse six yet when I'm among

mature believers, I do speak with words of wisdom, but not the kind of wisdom that belongs to this world, or the rulers of this world who will soon be forgotten. What is worldly? How do I know if my pursuits are worldly, and I just think about sort of the classic things that have tripped, major leaders up and people in their homes and everybody in between. And that is that sort of a law or that sort of going after power, sex money. If these kinds of things are your aim and my aim, one combination, there are just one of them.

Rest assured, they all make terrible gods and idols right, how many of us could testify over and over again, it may look like people of this world are winning, who are pursuing those things, or who have got those things in some combination or form thereof, but they make for terrible gods and idols and age old sins trip us up. That was true for the religious leaders in Jesus's day. That's true for government, governmental leaders, who served Caesar think about this in terms of how he's saying, that's how Jesus himself got crucified, he's referencing the religious leaders, and the governmental leaders who serve Caesar whom they had to bring Jesus to in order to crucify him. And it's true of our governing leaders. But guess who else this is true of guests who else can get seduced by the lies of greed or power, or sexual promiscuity?

And you write these things that can be whispered in our ears. So we have to have power, we have to have something else that we're combating. That's why we have to hold out to ourselves, the future promises of God that what he's given to us, but who are we? Who are we, we're the ones who are messed up, we're the ones who are screwed up, you're gonna see this true for the Corinthian church, you're gonna see it true for your life, and in my life as well. We are the ones whom Christ has revealed and illuminated our minds to him and our hearts. And what you remember that and were to be woken up by that, and then we're to walk in that second,

here this morning beginning of our sin. But it was to us that God revealed these things by His Spirit. Now I want you to notice capital S spirit is a referencing to the Holy Spirit here is a lot of times this word is used for his spirit. Second time searches out everything and shows us God's deep secrets. No one can know a person's thoughts except that person's own spirit. Now that lowercase spirit is somehow what you and I have is like our inner man or inner woman,

and no one can know God's thoughts except God's own spirit. Third time and we have received God's Spirit for time, not the world spirit. So we can know the wonderful things God has freely given us. When we tell you these things, we do not use words that come from human wisdom. Instead, we speak words given to us by the Spirit, either fifth or sixth time using these spirits words, some time to explain spiritual truths. But people who aren't spiritual can't receive these truths from God's Spirit. I mean, we're up to eight, I don't know how many times I can count, it all sounds foolish to them, and they can't understand it for only those who are spiritual. Understand what the spirit means nine, those who are spiritual can evaluate all things, but they themselves can be cannot be evaluated by others, for who can know the Lord's teaching, who knows enough to teach him.

But we understand these things for we have the mind of Christ. What are we talking about here?

All right.

Third and final point this morning, we have a mind that is different because Christ has been revealed to us. I hope you've seen that throughout this hope as you don't just take my word for is that really the application point for this? It absolutely is. Because if you kind of follow the train of thought of Paul's argument this morning, it's exactly where he's heading. You and I are different. Not because we're smarter, not because we figured out how to piece worldly wisdom together, not because we had great teachers or mentors, or we were born in a certain time or culture or city, but because God has chosen to bestow His blessing, love and mercy on you and me. Now we can see. Now we can know what God has for us. All right, this is a really stretched third and final Back to the Future clip this morning. Thank you all for your timing on this. This was a third one or second one fifths there. A lot of people think that they were trying to make him look like Donald Trump. That's the sermon for another day. But here we got Biff here. Marty has to go to him to find out exactly when he took the Grays Sports Almanac Back to the Future, which was in the past, they had to find out a certain date. And so only he knew that date. And only he could reveal that to Marty and then he tries to shoot him and he throws a Frisbee at him. So I told you it was loose. I told you illustrations break down, but you're gonna remember this one I think you're gonna remember about the power. You're gonna remember about understanding and elimination. So please get back to the to the third and final practical point this morning which is we have a mind that is different because Christ has been revealed to us

Spirit was mentioned I told you about 10 or 11 times there more than anywhere else in the book. And this is important because those of you who have read first Corinthians or perused it and are interested in sort of things of church and how the spiritual gifts and all the prophecies sort of all works together, that's going to come up. And we're going to address that in first Corinthians chapter 12, in First Corinthians 14, but the spirit is used more hear that actual word, Holy Spirit, capital as Spirit, then those two places at all, because those places are concerned about gifts and service. And like I said, we'll get there in chapter 12. And chapter 14 of this book, here, the Spirit's work is around what I'll give you three things, I think it's around lowercase revelation, that God is revealing stuff to us knowledge, and discernment. This is so important. And Paul's being so intentional here with his language, as you would expect him to be very careful theologian that God has eliminated himself to the heart of the Spirit's work is to make much about Jesus, Jesus told us this right, that he would go, and then the Holy Spirit would come Trinity action here, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, Jesus would be what he would ascend up into the heavens, the Holy Spirit would come down, and that Spirits work was to make much of Jesus. Do you ever find yourself in a setting where they're all about trying to always worship and uplift the spirit, that's not the Spirit's job to make much of Jesus, Jesus told us that would be the case, it will lead

us away from division and pride and towards humility and unity, this is so important. If we really tap in to the very spirit of God that lives and reigns in us and moves throughout the earth, we will find ourselves moving away being led away from division and pride and towards humility and unity. How can I say that? Read the whole book, just the chapter before the chapter, we're in the chapter afterwards. And you're going to see that Paul is so concerned about these kinds of things, that he wants us to be united, he wanted the Corinthian church to be united. He wants us to be humble. He wanted the Corinthian church to be humble. That's where the power lies. See, we think the power lies with with money and capital P power that we can lord over people, or with sexual promiscuity, or whatever. And he's saying no, listen, that's not what Jesus modeled for us. That's not what I tried to model for you. If you want, what you say you want, which is peace, love, and joy, and all these fruits of the Spirit, keyword, their spirit, the way to achieve that is to lean into one, lean into humility, and unity and push away division, and pride, we cannot just follow our heart.

I hate to say it, I'm a child of the 90s that was over and over again told us and still in some form is a lie that's out there, we have to understand that there's the true self and the false self. You and I were creating the image of God. And the whole point of Corinthians is he's trying to call say, remember who you are, I know you're way off base. But remember who you are. The true self and the false self, the Spirit's work in the flesh is work. We can make choices every day, am I going to lean into what God has me with by the by the Spirit of God? Or am I going to resort back to what my flesh wants? Or the wise and the foolish? Remember our series on James, I know it was a while back. But if any of us lacks wisdom, what do we do? We are to ask him God who freely and generously grants all things and it will be given to him or to her, James one, verse five. Not only is there wisdom and foolishness, but we understand that there's evil hanging out there, too, I get that. It's not a secret code sort of reserved for a priestly class. But what I'm talking about here is the power, the elimination, the revelation that we would want to live our lives God honoring, it's not some sort of secret code that's reserved for the super spiritual, these truths are able to be found and to walk in for you and for me, is able for a little, little brand at 16 years old to grab his Bible and, and to understand and God was speaking to me get then nameko right now at 42. God's still speaking to me, he's still using me, but by God's grace, and I pray that he uses me until he takes me home. But it's revealed to those of us who just have faith, who have believed if you want the ticket, if you want the ticket, it's believed it's faith. Want to have a mind that is different because Christ has been revealed to us. Those people can't see it.

And we look like fools to the world and we want to be real clear here. What are we doing right now? We're gathering together on a Sunday morning. Many of our community in our city has slipped in. That's why it's always so easy to get to church. The Highways are free, except for construction because they say well, no one's on the roads. We'll do construction at this time.

Or we're the ones who give our money to the church.

or to the cause of Christ, it looks foolish to the outside people Wow can leave you do that, where the time people that come to other gatherings besides Sunday morning, we take elements of bread and wine. And we're gonna do that until Jesus returns that was still scoffed at in the first century, no doubt, scoffed at today were the ones who believe in the resurrection from the dead. And we believe the grave is not the end again, that was questionable in the first century. That's questionable today, even though we have to be in adherence of Christianity or so around the world. We can't live and think and submit ourselves anymore to the moral ambiguity of unbelievers. That's why he says in that in that verse there, I don't know if you if you saw that, verse 15, those who are spiritual, can evaluate all things, but they cannot be evaluated by others. You see what he's saying that he's saying that like, it makes no sense for us to submit ourselves in terms of understanding our moral responsibilities to those who don't have the mind of Christ, you don't have the Spirit of Christ. That's why Paul, he's going to address things like sleeping with relatives later on in the book, he's gonna address things like shooting people in the church, by what, by dragging them into a governmental authorities, because I hear you deal with this because we can't or I can't make some sense. Why? Because spiritual spirituality, which is what he's talking about here, what you really means clinging to Christ is something that God has done in your heart and mind, and those who are outside Christ, they don't get it. Now, we don't want to use spiritual like the world's definition, like, Oh, I'm open, I'm spiritual. I'm not committed to any one religion. Now, again, there's nothing wrong with seeking, we've all been there. But at a certain point, we won't ask God, what do you want to do in my life, I want to believe helped me in my own belief, we've all been there in terms of seeking but we're not meant to stay there.

But that's not what Paul's talking about here. He wants you and I to see that we are either seeing with the eyes of Christ or either having the mind of Christ as you were he closes this morning.

Or we don't, and that makes the difference for everything. But if you find yourself thinking, Man, I get this. The more you talk, the more I come around your church and other churches, the more I listen about God and things of God through Christ, by the power of the Holy Spirit, I'm beginning to get it things are beginning to click, I think it's good. And I think it's in fact, good news. Beautiful. That means God is working in your life, by grace through faith, but get this realize, you and I didn't come to Christ, or you're not even being drawn to Christ right now. Because one day you and I got smart enough to figure it out. No, it is because God in His mercy revealed Christ to you and to me, I go back to where I began. First Corinthians two nine, no, I've seen no ears heard. no mind has conceived or imagined what God has prepared for those of us who love him. If that is hooking you this morning in the good sense of the word, if that's drawing you this morning, that means Jesus is calling right connect the soil we learned last week and what we're going to learn next week, some will think this is foolish, that we cling to this word to this Christ. Some you may be included, might find this a big stumbling block, I just can't I can't get over whatever aspect it is of Christianity, but to some. And I know for many of you, maybe some of you are considering this morning, it is the power and the wisdom of God. Oh, may that be true for us this day, in all the days of our life. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you didn't leave us wandering or wondering what you have for us but you have revealed your place and your plan to us in Christ. We ask that as we continue to consider your claims and that we desire to walk in wisdom that you began to give us more and more elimination revelation. The father were keenly aware that as we have received you as Lord, we are called to walk in you. So Father, give us give us right now, right now in our seats, where we got to come to the altar give us the grace and the belief and the faith to walk in obedience to that which you've revealed to us thus far. And we trust that that faith and that belief will carry us home. We ask this in Christ's name and for your glory. Amen.

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Sermon transcript:

Well, we are beginning a new series on First Corinthians and you can turn your Bibles there or we'll have the whole chapter. We'll read through it today. And this is probably going to turn out to be the longest series that we've ever done. Since I've been your pastor, we're going to probably go a chapter a week, we might be able to combine a couple of chapters. But here's the thing, it has such variety. First Corinthians has such variety. So there's never going to be if you were like, Okay, that was chapter one. What's Chapter Two gonna be about? Is it gonna be the same thing I heard last week? No. First Corinthians is one of those books that Paul in him writing it is really instructing us holistically and how to function and really takes us to kind of warts and all and shows us how to move forward as Christ followers. Well, again, I've already kind of said that this letter was written by Paul in around 55 ad.

And lots of problems in this church, lots of problems in the church at Corinth, you can go on an ancient map and kind of see where that was then and is today, but where there's lots of problems I want you to see over and over again, in this book, there's lots of grace, because one of the things that we know about ourselves once we live on this earth long enough is man, I've got some issues, and I need some help. And First Corinthians is going to help us with that. I know many of y'all get the email. And so I spent some time kind of thinking about how can I say in a paragraph, what First Corinthians is going to lead us through and why I think it's so pivotal in the life of our church right now. And here's what I wrote this paragraph this week with some obviously outside help in understanding the book. The city of Corinth was at the heart of an important trade route in the ancient world. Like many cities that thrive on trade, Corinth had a reputation for sexual immorality, religious diversity, and corruption. The church that Paul planted there floundered under all these influences. First Corinthians addresses many practical questions about the church concerning such things as spiritual gifts, marriage, food offered to idols and the resurrection. This book also calls for unification and encourages us to work in the Lord and shares with us how we are to love is that great chapter first Corinthians 13. We'll get there on love. But think about the description of what First Corinthians addresses. Does that sound familiar to any city that we may find? Or reside in? Yes, so many parallels to the first century, and to also the environment, the world that we find ourselves in today. So I want to get right into it. First Corinthians beginning in verse one. And here's what it said, This letter is from Paul, who's Paul, he was an apostle of God, he'll share that here in that first sentence. He used to be Saul, he had an experience with Jesus on the road to Damascus. In the book of Acts, you can read about that this letter is from Paul, chosen by the will of God. So who chose Paul to do this great task to what to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and from our brother saw phonies, and that's probably a writer or a scribe. I'm writing to God's church in Corinth. So it's a real location that you and I can see if you have a Bible, it's in the back. You can look at maps until just about 55 ad, to you have been called by God to be his own holy people. He made you holy, by means of Christ Jesus, just as he did for all people everywhere who call him the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, their Lord and ours. May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace, I always thank my God for you and for the gracious gifts he has given you. Now that you belong to Christ Jesus, through Him, God has enriched your church in every way, with all of your elegant words and all of your knowledge. This confirms what I told you about Christ is true. Now you have every spiritual gift you need, as you eagerly await for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be free from all blame on the day when our Lord Jesus Christ returns, God will do this for He is faithful to do what he says, And He has invited you into partnership with His Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. Now a lot there. I'm going to try to break this down and go real slowly through it. But the first point I want us to see is, let's think how Christ centered. This is about our faith. Let's think Christ centered about our faith, because that's really where Paul starts out. I mean, in these nine verses, I want to go through this and I want you to see just how centered he is on Jesus. If you would, please go back to the sides and beginning in verse one of this chapter right here. So let's see the first one first thing you see here is that he is called by who to

be an apostle, called by who? By Jesus Christ Himself Christ centered. What is the one who has made them holy, the people of God, who made them holy, who by by who by means of who? Christ Jesus. Now the next slide, who is the who is the giver of all grace and peace who gave who gave this to us who gave this to, to us, Jesus Christ in Christ centered This is, who is the one and who Grace has been given. So you see it up here, but then now he has given you because you belong in Christ. Let's continue on it says, who is the source of all riches? Who through him? Go the next slide God has enrich. So who is who is the source of all riches Christ? Who's the subject of Paul's preaching? So who is the subject? This confirms what I told you about? Who? Who are we talking about here? Christ, who is the basis for Christian hope? Who is the basis for Christian hope? It is Jesus, who has all of history pointing towards go ahead and go from this day until when? What next slide? Who is all of this pointing to who we are waiting to return? Jesus? In the meantime, who has God invited us into partnership with Jesus, man, that's good. We got there at the end. I just want y'all to see just how Christ center the first point, I want to bring that back up, how Christ centered. This really is, and the implications for that. And I really want us to camp here and start here because well, first of all the letter does, but also there's gonna be a lot of hard things said in the next several weeks, and you're gonna see yourself in the Korean church like oh, okay, they struggle with sexual immorality, oh, I struggle are hamstrung. Or, oh, man, they struggle with singleness. Oh, well, so do i or they struggle with marriage? Oh, so do I, I struggle to understand how to love my closest neighbor, those in my household, and also my literal neighbors. Oh, so today, I struggled to understand prophetic giftedness and what it means that we have the spiritual gifts within the church. And you're going to find the Corinth church does too. So if we don't have this foundation, this basis of understanding that our assurance that God's got us does not reside, a rests on who we are, what we've done, but who Jesus is and what he's done. That's why I say we have to make sure we think Christ centered about our faith. It's not about me, and myself and I and what I can do and all that, for sure, we have a response to God's good grace. But it's just that idea that is so Christ centered here. And these first nine verses, here's the implication. And I think maybe you saw them in these verses. First verse was that we are genuinely saved. Let's go back through those verses. Go back to verse one. Here, I want you to see this, that what that we have been called by God. So first thing I want you to see is we're genuinely saved. Go to the next slide, that we are in rich last word right there. So we really are endowed with what next slide, spiritual riches, that we're securely establish, because of who Christ is and what he's done, that we're spiritually gifted, and that we can be prophetically alert. So that you and I, when we walk around our community, we begin to see both good things and we begin to see darkness and we're not surprised by it. And we can enter into pain, whether it's our own pain, or our neighbors pain, or just out in the communities pain, because we understand who Christ is and what he's done in us. And we're learning how to love. So again, first point, let's be Christ centric, or Christ centered about our faith. Let's look at the middle section here beginning in verse 10. It says, this right here, I appeal to your dear brothers and sisters, right? And those are, those are familial terms. We understand what family is, we're a, we're a family of God. That's what this whole series is about. It's teaching us how to function as a congregation as a New Testament Church believers. While we're here, I appeal to you Dear Brothers and Sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church rather be of one mind united in thought and purpose, for some members of Chloe's household have told me about your corals, my dear brothers and sisters, some of you are saying, I am a follower of Paul, others are saying I'm a follower of Apollo's or I follow Peter or I follow only Christ. Has Christ been divided into factions? Was I Paul crucified for you? Were any of you baptized in the name of Paul? Of course not. I think God that I did not baptize any of you. Except Cypress and guys, for now. We, for now, no one can say that they were baptized in my name. Oh, yes, I did also baptized the household of Stephanus. But I don't remember baptizing anyone else for Christ.

didn't send me to baptize but to preach the good news, and not with clever speech for fear that the power of cross would lose its power.

Next point we need to see here is focus on exalting Christ. Focus on exalting Christ. That's where we need to put our, our thoughts on. Because if not, if we start turning around and asking, Okay, who gave me the last good best advisor, who's my favorite communicator, who's my favorite teacher, or, let's see how I can pit one against the other, or I don't really like sitting next to this person, I don't like the way they look or do things I don't like the way that impacts me in my thinking, that will get us all bent out of shape. Every time he's talking to a local community. You think about this in Corinth, the church he established, it was probably 100, maybe 200 people, there's no such thing as a mega church in those days. And he's talking about this whole idea of how can I help you promote unity, you can say the negative aspect, which is don't be divisive, or you can state it positively, which is focus on the main thing and the main thing, because what does partnership mean? It means being pulled in the same direction, you have a partner, if you have like a, if you have like a like a pair of horses or oxen or whatever I know, we don't live in an agricultural society anymore. But we understand that whole idea of of going the same direction, together. The key to promoting unity, and avoiding divisiveness is the focus on Christ instead of exalting human leaders or your your favorite, whoever. And that's his point here. He's not minimizing baptism, he loved baptism, we do baptism, we baptize in the name of Jesus Christ. But who doesn't matter. There's some sort of like special touch about who actually does the baptism know that you have your church leaders who lead through that. But if you notice, even last week, if there were certain, you know, dads, and we've had certain moms that they, they they take seriously their role as the spiritual leader in the home. We allow them to take part and actually do the baptizing. Why? Because I don't want to sit at the end of the day that oh, okay, well, my baptism was special, because, you know, that special pastor or that special, you know, Pope or priest or whatever, you know, he was the one who did that, or she was the one who did that. Know, the purpose is to focus on exalting Christ. In doing so we are driven to the cross. And it promotes, always promotes humility. Rather than arrogance and rivalry, I want you to hear that we don't have our crosses set up anymore. We may, in the future have different crosses kind of behind us in the room. So we can focus on this. But it's so important that we understand that none of us can be arrogant at the foot of the cross. Amen. I mean, that's why we have these kneelers here, if you come and do yourself and humble yourself, before the mighty hand of God, and before Jesus and what He did for you and for me on the cross and what that blood meant that was shed for us there. That takes away arrogance, doesn't it, it takes away divisiveness, it takes away rivalry because we understand that we're all level, at the foot of the cross. And that's what's so important. We talk about exalting Christ. And we're gonna get into this in the next section. And Terry already talked about with the wisdom and the foolishness and, you know, trying to be wise by God's standards, and not wise from the world standards. But I want you to I don't want you to see that the most important thing is exalting Christ. And when we exalt Christ, we're exalting who he is and what he did for us. That's why you can get to later on and it says, Man never boasts, but in the cross of Jesus Christ. He's like, Well, no, but you boasted and some other things. Paul, what do you mean here? He understands what was bought for him what was wrong for him at the cross? And He wants us to understand that as well. Does that make sense? Unity does not mean saying this. Look around. You look around El Paso. I love the beauty and the diversity of El Paso. I love the beauty and the diversity of our church in terms of different cultures and different ethnics in different races. And all that that is, is that is showing you it's a good picture of what we're to be about. We are united. But do we all like the same food? Do we all go the same path to work? Do we all sort of drive the same thing? Do we all sort of like the same family traditions? Do we all sort of do things a certain way? Do we all spend our money in the same way? No. So we're so diverse and all that and how we even think about ourselves, in El Paso and in the world, in the community at large? Do we all vote the same way? Same way. Now, we talked about that a couple of weeks ago, and how we should have principles for faith and politics knowing that we don't all vote the same way. But what are we united in church? We're united in this Christ. And if we focus on that everything else will take care of itself. And we're not ever going to achieve saying this. And I don't want to achieve saying this. What what Paul wants for the believers at Corinth and what I want as your pastor here at Life Church is that we have unity, unity, the beauty of being part of a local church is so beautiful, whether it's long or short. That's what was so neat about the baptisms last week and what we

experience in this church every single week is what's that we have people here for a season, we have people who are here for the long haul. And we're all in this together. And we understand that we need the church, we need the community, it keeps us from being isolated. Anyone want to go back to the days of COVID, where we're sitting in our rooms and staring at the walls and trying to figure out zoom and not able to talk and interact and to eat and to fellowship and enjoy one another. No, Christian should lead the way out of isolation to the community of each other. And that's what we're doing by your very presence here. Whether you're here in El Paso for a long time, or a short time. Otherwise, what will happen to all of us will all tend towards self and falsely believe that Jesus and I are right. Why don't we, even if you try to be a really, really good Christian, he's okay, I'm gonna, I'm going to read my Bible, and I'm going to study in my room, and I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna listen to some sermons online, and I'm gonna, you know, do some some writing and journaling. That's all fine and good, I promote and love all those things. But if it's not done in the context of where you rub up against someone else, you and I will falsely believe that, that we're good, and that we're promoting unity, and that we're not divisive. But what happens as soon as you and I walk out of whatever study we've done, if you've ever prayed by yourself, or even read your Bible by yourself, what happens, not 20 minutes after you get up and leave your study, or you get up and leave your knees, you butt up against someone else, right? And someone rubs you the wrong way. And all of a sudden, we understand that we are not individualistic, isolated people, but that we're part of a community, community, in your little community, in your home and in your neighborhood and your workplace. And then you come to church on Sunday, we come to church on Sunday, because we gather as a community of believers, knowing man, I need you and you need me to sort of smooth out those rough edges so that we can continue to look and to focus on Christ. And that more of me, keeps getting further and further and further away until I am in glory. next passage here this last section of chapter one, beginning in verse 18, it says this right here, the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are headed to destruction, this is so true, but we who are being saved? No, it is the very power of God, as the Scriptures say, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligence. So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, the world's brilliant debaters. God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish, since God in His wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him their human wisdom, he has used our foolish preaching to say those who believe it is foolish to the Jews who asked for signs from heaven. And it is foolish to the Greeks who seek human wisdom. So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended, and the Gentiles say it's all nonsense, but to those who are called by God to salvation, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God in the wisdom of God, this foolish plan of God is wiser than the wisest of human plans, and that God's weakness is stronger than the greatest human strength. Remember, dear brothers and sisters, that few of you are wise in the world's eyes, or powerful or wealthy when God called you instead, God chose things the world considers foolish, in order to shame those who think they are wise and he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful, God chose things despised by the world thinks counted as nothing at all, and use them to bring nothing bring to nothing what the world considers important. As a result, no one can ever boast in the presence of God. Remember what I said there, no one can boast at the foot of the cross. God has united you with Christ Jesus for our benefit, God made him to be wisdom itself. Christ made us right with God, He made us pure and holy, and he freed us from sin. Therefore, as the scripture say, if you want to boast, boast only about the Lord, third and final point I wants to see this morning is that God chose the foolish things of this world to shame, the wise. Who, what were the what were some of the foolish things that you saw here? First thing that was was foolish was the preaching itself. Did you see that? That the preaching itself is considered foolish from the outside world looking in? I mean, you guys know this, when you were here in El Paso, when you drove to church this morning, you didn't have too much trouble. There wasn't much traffic on the road, right? Because, because why? Because 90% or whatever percent or 75 or 80% of everybody is still sleeping in the city. But you decided to do something that the world considers foolish, which is to gather among the people to worship an invisible god to to soak our minds and our hearts in truth, and to do that through preaching and worship. So preaching itself a while. Why was it such a stumbling block it was a stumbling block to the Jews. Why? Because they were looking for signs if you know anything about the New Testament there

We're always like, hey, Jesus drum up something so we know you're for real. And then that's what they were seeking. And now the signs didn't add up to what they wanted to see. So they're lying. And I'm rejecting that chief cornerstone, I'm rejecting that, that Jesus that savior. What did the Greeks think? Or the Gentiles or the non Jewish people? This is a bunch of nonsense, who follows a leader who died a criminal's death on a cross? And then rose three days later, it literally makes no sense that the preaching was foolishness. banali was the preaching. Did you see that in the verses that the message itself was thought foolish? So it wasn't only that the preaching was thoughtfulness, but this but that the message itself was thought foolish? Because why? It just doesn't make sense to worldly wisdom. It's counterintuitive. It's countercultural, that that why would why would you mess around with people who aren't what it sounds talks about this politically savvy or really financially well off, are really powerful. These are the ones whom Jesus loves to save and to grow in him. It's the opposite of the world. Right? Did you see that in those verses that none of us were of these these high statues, but he gave us the message. He entrusted a bunch of us, a bunch of us who just have you know, a car to and, and a roof over our head and enough food to get by and not much else. He's entrusted that with Corinth, and he entrusted the message of salvation with us Life Church here in El Paso in 2024. With us, and that's the third point I was trying to say is it wasn't just the foolishness of the preaching, it wasn't just the foolishness of the message. But it was, as I've already alluded to just the foolishness of the type of people that God was choosing to use in order to bring about this great movement of God. So when you consider all this and you consider what Christ has done for you, and for me,

it's just like God to do this, isn't it that he chooses what he chooses the things that the world ridicules, doesn't think that's important things to say, these are throwaway. These are these are throwaway people, this is a throwaway message, this is a throwaway gone. And what does he do? He shamed the wise, by what? By strengthening us by encouraging us so that now how do we have unity? And how are we promoting humility in our own lives? It tells us how by boasting only in Jesus, which was really all the points could be any part of this chapter. So church, you're in a good place, you're in a good place. Because what you are experiencing, what you're hearing is, if you are thinking, No, that is the answer to my problems. I've been one of those people who have drifted who's been away, who's gotten mired in sin. He's gotten all tore up all bent out of shape. I've been the one who said major mental illness, major sin problems, major sexual depravity, major financial turmoil, and you're saying that that's who Jesus came for. And you're saying that, then that's why you and I find this so appealing. Did you see what it said in there, it said that the whole idea that to those who are called, that's what we're trying to do here week in and week out is we're trying to present the clear message of the gospel, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, among whom I'm the chief for the foremost just quoting what Paul said, and that that is appealing to those who are called. So if you find yourself just drawn to this message drawn to new life and new birth, that's God's grace to you. But if you find yourself, I don't know about this, I need something with a little more pizzazz a little more, show them or I need some signs. Okay. Well, there's been people who've been there before they're called the Jewish people and Jewish leaders of his time and maybe today, or you're saying no, I just think this is all bunch of nonsense, a bunch of gooey goo I can figure out things through I can read certain books, I can go to certain health things, I can go to certain conferences, I can watch certain Netflix documentaries, I can do this. And I can kind of figure out and navigate a path for my life to achieve that which I want to achieve stability, money or, or relational, whatever power political otherwise is, okay, well, then you think it's a bunch of nonsense. But if you're hearing what I'm saying, right now, you're saying man out if that's true, Pastor, I want that Jesus you're talking about, then you're part of the select the few that are called. And that is good news for you and I this morning, if your heart is strangely warmed by this message of redemption, of the redeemed of those who are called and those who can find hope and faith in him, I pray that you would do so and you would respond. The altar is open, there's going to be the band to come back up and they're going to play a song. I just want you to think wherever you're at.

Need to boast in the Lord. What does that mean? Boasting Another way is to exalt and eat or to Glorian if you're glorying in anything else, exalting anything else boasting and anything else, then you and I have to know that that will also

really fail you or lead you to places you don't want to go. That doesn't mean you don't financially plan or you don't do things relationally I get all that. But I'm saying that flows from a heart that is exalting him. So that's what we're gonna do here in a minute. But the altar is open, you can come pray, you can pray in your seat. And so after I finished praying, we're gonna sing a song. And so whether you find yourself on the outside looking in, you're saying, Man, I want that Jesus that you're talking about you and I can all kneel at the foot of the cross, we're all in a level playing field at the feet of Jesus. Or you can say again, in your heart, oh, Lord made it be true of me, that I'm exalting and glorifying you, and not anything else. Let's pray.

Father, I pray for those under my care, those who are listening in later and I just pray that You would help us to do this to walk in this way.

In a time, and in a moment when there's so many other messages that seem somewhat appealing seems sort of right, but we find ourselves just desperate.

Because we've tried many of those other things, and they've been dead ends. So Father, I pray for those right now that are considering the claims of Christ. May you view them and you draw them. May you do what you've done for so many people in this church and throughout the centuries that that they would receive that they would receive you. And then I pray for the others who have received you but they're struggling right now. They're struggling with a host of things. They've come in with a lot of burdens. Help them to leave those burdens at the foot of you for the cross.

And then help them take up this call to exalt to boast and to glorify, only. We ask these things in Christ's name and for your glory. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Good morning, church. Good to be with you. Thank you Pastor more for having me here.

You know, I was looking at this setup here and I noticed your electrical cords and water all over them and a metal stand and and I thought man, you know the Holy Spirit's here protecting us, right? I was like, What's going on here, the first guy comes up to you, and I'm looking, there is nine more people to go. And then the people got smaller and there was less splash, you know? Good to have everybody here.

My name is Larry Floyd, I'm the executive director for the El Paso Baptist Association. And many of you may not know, but we actually affiliate with non denominational churches like Life Church as well. And so you guys are part of that group of about 85 churches, and we're glad to partner with you. So thank you so much for doing that. So today's Mother's Day.

We're forever grateful for the roles that our moms play in our lives. I'm gonna tell you right now, if your mom is alive, and well, you better hug her neck and tell her how much you love her today. Because some of us don't have our mamas with us no more, I buried my mama, April 29, just a few weeks ago. And so this is a first for me.

And it's really weird not being able to spend the day with her because we always do every year. So if your mom is alive, and maybe you're separated and you're not reconciled to her, today is the day to do that. Don't let another day go by without going to mom and saying whatever the your differences are. Make make it right. Love her.

So, you know,

men have often said this. And men you can agree with me. If you think women we cannot live with them

or without them. Right.

So one day, there was a guy, three guys walking along. And they came to this raging river. First guy comes along and says I want to get to the other side. But I don't know how. So he bends down and he kneels down and he prays and he prays this prayer, please God give me the strength to cross this river. Poof. God made him have big arms and strong legs and he was able to swim across that river in about two hours. Second guy saw and said, Hey, I'm gonna try something else. He said, I'm gonna pray to God. And I'm gonna ask him, not only to give me the strength to do it, but also the ability to cross the river. And poof, God gave him a boat, a rowboat. So he was able to roll across that river and about an hour. Third guy says, I'm going to add a little something to it. And he prays God gave me the strength give me the ability and give me the intelligence to cross the river. Poof, God turned him into a woman.

She looked at the map, and she found that where the bridge was, and she crossed across the bridge.

Today we honor our moms and women in our lives as God would have us to do Amen. I'm going to read a text from First Samuel chapter two verses one through 10.

Preachers all across the nation are preaching on Mother's Day and they're gonna probably be using this text a lot because it's hard to find a lot of Mother's Day passages. In the Bible. There's there's a few and but this is one of the most popular ones is called Hannah's prayer. She's praying to God about this thing that was going on in her life of not being able to have kids. So see she has a kid and she prays this prayer.

Second set First Samuel chapter two verses one through 10 says that Hannah prayed and said, My heart rejoices in the Lord. And in the Lord my horn is lifted Hi, my mouth boasts over my enemies For I delight in your deliverance. There is no one holy like the Lord. There is no one beside you. There is no rock like our God didn't do not keep talking so proudly, or let your mouth speak such arrogance for the Lord is a God who knows and by his by him deeds are weighed. the bowels of the warriors are broken. But those who stumble are armed with strength for those who were full hire themselves out for food, but those who are hungry or not hungry, no more. Those who were barren, has born seven children. Excuse me, she who was barren has more than seven children, but she who has many sons pines away. The Lord brings death and makes alive he brings down the grave and raises up the Lord sends poverty and well he humbles and extol exalts, he raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the ashes of actually, he seats them with princes and he has them inherit a throne of honor for the foundations of the earth.

Are the Lord's on them he has set the world he will guard the feet of the faithful servant, but the wicked will be silenced in the plate place of darkness. It is not my strength that one prevails. Those who oppose the Lord will be broken. The Most High will thunder from heaven. The Lord will judge the ends of the earth he will give them strength to he will give strength to his king and exalt the horn of his anointed. Father God, we thank You for Your Word. And this morning, we asked Holy Spirit to speak to us. Thank you for being here this morning. Thank you for those that have given their life to Christ and have honored view by obedience and believers baptism. Lord, what an awesome sight to see, Lord, would you give them a great day today? They'll always remember when they were baptized on Mother's Day 2024. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.

So number one, a faithful woman always praise a faithful woman always praise and you can put in there a faithful person, always praise but we're honoring moms today. So we're gonna say faithful woman. If you want to be a person of faith, you have to pray. Amen. You have to pray. Nothing happens without prayer. If you think that you can make God move without praying to Him. You got another thing coming. He can do what he wants. We must pray if we're going to be faithful. Praying elevates our relationship with the Father. Praying elevates our relationship with the Father.

As Hannah prays, we see here that her heart is joyful, and her heart rejoices. And Hannah is enjoying her time with God. Can you hear it in that prayer? She's just enjoying telling God how awesome he is. She says you're the rock, your everything you're in. She's just having a great time praying. It's an exciting time to spend with God when you're praying and honoring and exalting his name. What a beautiful picture of prayer.

It's not a burden to pray.

Amen. It's not a burden to pray.

It is not a time when she decides all I can do is pray.

You know, sometimes we hear that, well, we've tried everything else now. Well, we're going to pray.

As if that's the last stream of thing that we do, and should be the first thing that we do. We get to pray. It's not a burden. It's an honor to pray. The vision we see is privilege and excitement and confidence that Hannah's doing here, and then his prayer, Hannah prays that her horn is filled, which means that her strength comes from the Lord. It's this strengthening that that she gives us. And she even says this my strength. Basically, when she's saying my horn is filled, it's actually supernatural. She's like, I'm not getting my strength from my husband, from my children from my church, I'm getting my strength from him. He's the one that's filling my horn. It's a strengthening thing that comes from God. I want you to know that my God and I hope your God supplies all of our needs, amen.

10 new people into the kingdom of God today. I know they came to Christ earlier, and today was just an expression of who they were.

But the kingdom of God is growing. People are coming to faith. It was such a beautiful thing to see young people saying yes to Jesus, amen.

He supplies all of our needs. How does the HANA know that? If you go back to chapter one in First Samuel, she's reading she's praying this other prayer about how barren she is that she can't have children, just in chapter one.

And people are mocking her. And they're saying things and she says, and this is what they think. And back in those days, if you couldn't have kids, you were actually shunned by the community. They thought God must not love this person. They're unable to be fruitful and multiply, as it says in Genesis, and that's not the case. After much prayer, she continues with the relationship with the Father and she gives birth to Samuel, we have First and Second Samuel because of this, which means name of God. That's what Samuel means. So this prayer in First Samuel two is a result of God's faithfulness in her life.

And Psalm 37 Four says, this, take delight in the Lord. And He will give you the desires of your heart.

take delight in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart. Now I know a lot of times we hear that verse and we read that verse, we study that verse, And we hear he will give us right, we that will kind of just jumps out at me, he will give us and I'm going, Oh, wow, what should I ask God for?

He says, take delight in the Lord. First is what the psalmist says, Therefore, when our prayers come, they're going to be in the Lord. They're going to be delighted because of the Lord. And we're going to ask something that's of the Lord. That's when he says, He'll give you the desires of your heart. So the first point we have to make is we have to give God everything. And we delight in being with him. And then he will give us that thing that we ask for. Because we know what we ask. It's going to be what it is what God is doing in our life. So Hannah has this real prayer life with God. I hope that you really sense this

If you've never read the book of First Samuel, and Second Samuel, it's amazing things that she just talks to God as if he's right there. Because he is a man. He's right there with us. He, we have him with us, we take him with us everywhere we go. And he's guiding us internally. And we talked to him, just like another person. There's no such thing as a certain prayer language that we have. When we pray to God, we just speak to him as if we know him, because we do know him. So from now on, and if you think about your prayer life, it's not if it's not going the way it should be. Just start talking to God. Start, you know, it sounds crazy. Sometimes when I'm in the car driving us go, man, thank God for you know, and I'm just thanking him for different things that I see. Especially if you see a sunrise or a sunset or something in nature. And we know that there's a creator, because He created all things. And so when we're praying and having that desire of the Lord taking delight, we can pray something like my heart's desire God is, you fill in the blank, my heart's desire is this.

And name it. Don't be afraid to name it. I think sometimes we fall short of asking God for things because we're afraid that if we ask him something that is going to be selfish, not if you're taking delight in the Lord, not if you're asking him for the things of him, you can go ahead and ask it, name it.

We have to be careful

when we do that,

because sometimes we get in the habit of not being in communion with God. And then something happens in our life. And we just asked him we don't we're not really delighting. We're just getting that one season of life where we're just asking God for whatever we want. But we really haven't taken delight in the Lord. And we have to be careful when we do that. Because I just don't think God answers those prayers. Because they're very selfish. This is what I need at this moment. No, God's going to tell you what you need at that moment in your life. And you'll just need to trust him. Where the breakdown is where with God is this We asked him for something, we emphasize the we. And it almost we expect them to give it to us because we go back and we say his word back to him. I'm taking delight in you, Lord. You said, You're gonna give me the desires of my heart. It's almost like we're demanding God to do what His Word says. That's not a praying God's word back to him means this coming with a humble spirit and a humble heart so that when we ask, we want him to answer, we can never expect God to do the things that we want to do, because he may have something bigger in mind for our lives.

So I want to be careful with that you should be careful is that as well? And so use scripture in your time of prayer, acknowledging what God has said in his word. Absolutely. Because that helps us in our prayer life. Amen. It helps us. And Hannah, Hannah says in verse one, she's boasting over her enemies. Since God has redeemed her dilemma. I first read that and I said, I was like, Man, she's kind of boastful in her prayers. And I thank God for smashing down his head, you know, he took care of my enemies. And, you know, you guys have never prayed those prayers.

Come on you. We got to let's be honest, we've prayed those prayers. Thank you, God for taking care of that situation, right? We do it. And we're grateful for that because it eliminated something that we didn't need in our life. And she's thanking God for but she's not really boasting. She's talking about the Lord's faithfulness and how he brought her out of this dilemma of being childless. And now she has seven, seven kids. Incredible prayer. She was not criticizing. She was being grateful. She is giving credit to God and verse two, she says, this is the anthem for the for all of us that proclaim God, God, there is no one like you, God, there's no one besides You, God, there's no rock like you. I think there's a couple of songs that we've made out of that one verse there, there's no one like you no one besides You, and there's no rock like you. And that says, that's the anthem of behind Hannah's prayers. Translation. God, you're it. You're everything. No one, no thing. No other thing. Nothing. Suppose that no other God can even come close to who he is. Amen. Nobody can come close to that. Did you see what happened here that today? It was a, an amazing miracle that young people said yes to Jesus, and I want to, I want to be obedient and publicly proclaim Him. When in the public squares today, that's like, we're not doing that anymore. We're almost afraid to say Jesus is our Lord.

We like him as a savior, but we don't like Him as our Lord, right? He saves us from an eternity in hell. But when we make them the Lord of our lives, all of these types of prayers come true for us. He becomes everything to us.

We don't have to worry. When we pray with God. He's there and he's listening to us. We can count on him. On February 28 1944, a young woman and her family were arrested by the Nazis in effort to stop the smuggling of Jews from the Netherlands. These Jewish people were able to hide in the underground so they don't have to go to concentration camps, where most people would die. The

Family was separated and transferred to a Nazi concentration camp. It was during that time that the drawing of closeness to God happened. And they took on this whole new meaning of who God was. You see, one family's name that was in there and one of the families was Corrie 10. Boom.

Now, Cory refused to be a victim of the circumstance, what was going on, she chose to be a prayer warrior. And she shared Christ with many of the prison guards that were there, she shared the gospel. And after 10 months, she was released, Cory realized that God had spared her life. She went on to be an a ministry of 30 years plus testimony and speaking to crowds all over the world. She once said this,

if you look at the world, you will be distressed.

If you look within, you'll be dis depressed. But if you look to God, you'll be at rest. So if you look at the world will be distressed. If you look within, you'll be depressed. But if you look to God, you'll be at rest. In that awesome. That was her quote, that's what she had to go on. God is the one who we place our faith in and Cory knew that she went to be the with the Lord and her 91st birthday in 1983. If you haven't read the book, the hiding place, I highly recommend it, read it, and you'll find out more about what happened. And this is one of the things she said, Never be afraid to trust an unknown future, to unknown God. Never be afraid to trust an unknown feature to a known God, because our God is known. We see him all around us. We just witnessed him this morning, and we're still witnessing him. When was the last time you were faithful to pray. For something that was just so big, you knew only God could deliver that. Don't ever be afraid to ask him for something big in your life because we serve a big God. And he wants to do amazing things in your life. Secondly, a faithful woman always gives glory to God. See, God deserves full credit for everything that's going on in her life. He deserves full credit for all of that. You may think the prayer of Hannah is a strange because some of the things she says. And she says things that are right over that always seem she mentioned that there are people who were once full.

Once they had a lot, and she says now they're trying to just make ends meet. And then she said others will who wants stumble, who I believe is translated struggled are now making it. She's praying this to God and going, you know, I seen this and now I see this, I watched witness this and now I am seeing this. Others do this. And she says she was once barren. She adds that to it. And now she has seven sons. And she says no, the other people are getting old, the other woman is getting older,

should happen boasting about herself. And she said in verse one, she's rejoicing in the Lord and what he's doing all around her Hannah's giving glory to God. So I'm gonna go back and read a couple of verses from First Samuel chapter one so you can kind of understand the context. This is for Samuel 110, through 16

says in her deep anguish that Hannah prayed to the Lord, weeping bitterly. And she made a vow saying, Lord Almighty, if you will only take on your servants misery and remember me, and I forget your servant, but give him give her a son, then I will give you I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head. And she kept praying the Lord and Eli observed her mouth. Hannah was praying in her heart and her lips were moving. But her voice was not heard.

Eat I thought she was drunk. And he said to her, how long are you going to stay drunk?

Have you ever prayed so hard to somebody? He thought something was just incredibly wrong with you.

He said, Put away your wine. Verse 15. No, my lord Hannah replied, I am a woman who's deeply troubled. I have not been drinking wine or beer. I was pouring out my soul to the Lord. I do not take your servant for a wicked woman. I'm not been praying here out of I've been praying here at a great anguish and great grief.

Can you hear her prayer?

Somebody thought something was wrong with her. And yet she's saying I'm just pouring out my soul to God.

Have you given God your soul? Have you given the glory to him during your prayer time? And lastly, a faithful woman believes God could do all things. Do you believe God can do all things? A faithful person believes God can do all things. And I know that he can and the last few verses of our text for Samuel, chapter

two and verse nine and 10. A faithful woman, a faithful man, a faithful child, always believe that God can do what he says he will do. We always have to believe that. The verse, the verses that Hannah's prayer says this.

She talks about what he will do.

He will guard the

feet of His servants, not just any servant, but the faithful ones are definite of servant is actually kind of skewed. Sometimes we think serving God is showing up the church, or praying over a meal. And we say, Man, I, I got a relationship with Christ, right? You're blessed by my presence here, man I showed up, right? I think God for what He's given us what his provision is, for us. A hand isn't talking about that kind of service. She means something, someone who is sold out for the sake of the call, someone that says, I'm going all in, I want to know everything there is about Christ. I mean, matter of fact, Paul said this one time, and

don't get me Don't quote me, I'll tell you the text later. But but he said this, I want to know Christ, in His death, and in his suffering. I remember reading that and I said, why would you ever want to know what it felt like what Jesus was going through on the cross, and he wanted to know Jesus so intimately. He wanted to know about his sufferings, and his death, so that he could have a better relationship with Him. Now that's going all in. And I think that's what Hannah's talking about here. Someone that has decided that Christian service is more meaningful than just meaningless tasks, faithful servants. We serve a God on purpose, amen. We serve them on purpose, because we can not because we have to.

In verse nine, Hannah knows the plans God will has for her and she will not place them. And she talks about the plans that people have placed their faith in Jesus. And she says,

that did not play through I'm sorry, did that place their faith in Jesus, she says, The wicked will be silenced.

You don't ever have to worry what's going to happen to those people that don't know Christ, that hate Christ, that this are disgusted by Christ, that don't believe that he's the savior of this world that don't believe that he believes changes lives.

They will be silenced one day, not by us, but by him himself.

Amen. He will.

Let them talk, let them laugh, let them live their heaven here on this earth. Because that's all they'll know.

Because in the end, God will be done, his will will be done.

Our prayer should be the same God, I can't change anyone. I can't do anything. But I know that you can. You see so many times even in a marriage, husbands and wives were trying to change each other.

Stop trying to change your spouse and let God change the spouse. Could you imagine trying that in your marriage, what it would look like?

And say, Well, if that's what he has to does, well, if that's what she has to do, I'm just giving them to God letting God do the work, right? I believe that there will be a whole lot more better marriages today. If we just let God do the work. He's the one that does the work. And like she continues to do, she says the Lord will thunder from heaven. The Lord will judge the earth the Lord will give strength, he will, he will, he will, he will be known.

When Jesus returns His coming, will be very thunderous. Matthew 2427 says this, for his lightning that comes from the east is visible for me in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. Everybody's gonna know you don't ever have to worry. When Jesus is coming back the whole world will know. They will all know, Thunder is is the sound that you hear after the lightning. Did you know that lightning happens? You may see it in a distance. And all of a sudden, two or three seconds or however far along it is the thunder comes afterwards. You see, when Hannah prayed to God that the strength would he would give to his king, the first promise of the prophetic implications of that prayer. Saul and David, Solomon, King David were the first kings of Israel. David was the Messianic linnets to Jesus. And Samuel was the one that anointed them as kings.

What

this is Hannah's prayer, I can't have kids. Now I have seven sons. I have Samuel and he anoints the first kings of Israel. This is what happens when we trust God with for big things. It's an amazing thing. And Hannah, Hannah may not have known what she was praying, but God sure heard the prayers, amen. And sometimes we don't know what to pray. So what does the Bible say about that? In Romans 826, and 27. It says, in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. Sometimes we don't know what to say. And so we allow the Holy Spirit to speak for us. I don't know what that looks like for you. But sometimes it's just sitting still before God because we have no words, and we let His Spirit speak on our behalf.

He says, We do not know what to pray for. but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with wordless groans. And he searches our hearts and knows the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for God's people in accordance to the will of God.

And now we can go back to Hannah's prayer and go wow, look at what God was.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, we just finished a series last week I talked about that with anxiety. If you weren't here, you can always go back and catch that and really culminated last week with giving our anxious hearts to the Lord. Because we're not meant to carry that anymore, we're to leave that at the foot of the cross. So we had sort of an opportunity for a life lesson between now and Mother's Day, Mother's Day is next week and been thinking about and praying about what would be a good kind of one topic thing to talk about. And today, I've chosen to talk about faith and politics, faith and politics. And we're all sort of feeling this at whatever level you're at. Whether you're talking about, you know, the campus protests or election cycle coming up, or however you and I sort of process this, this is something that is on the front of our minds, even if we've tried to ignore it. Now, I'd say first and foremost, that churches and religious leaders, we serve a higher purpose than to align ourselves with a singular political party. So if you're worried that this will be one of those sermons will all champion the political party you don't want me to? Or if you're excited that I'll bash the party you want me to? This isn't this kind of sermon, and we're not that kind of church. So so you can just ease that tension right now, I hope to give you I've thought through this for for a long time, really thought I may go into politics, I was a political science minor. I went to Washington DC, with with my school, met a lot of politicians and really thought that might have been the path that the Lord had for me going into law school after that, but but the Lord had ministry for me. And so I just thought a lot about this. And so I think that the three principles, and the three questions that I tried to answer, I think, can be used wherever we find ourselves.

We do have a warrant to talk about politics and political leaders. Some of you may be thinking, Well, does this even belong in church or church talk or Sunday morning? Service, I think so. I look to the Old Testament prophets. And oftentimes, they found themselves having to speak to the political leaders and the authority figures of their days. And they and they dealt right with issues that were coming up for the people. So you see this in Old Testament prophets, I'm not going to go through all those. But there are several times where the prophets of God had to stand before the kings and the queens of whatever culture country they were a part of, and speak the word of God on his behalf. Also, you see Jesus in the New Testament, He spoke a lot about religious leaders and to them, but he also address political or governing authority. So I'm gonna go to a passage that I think you can't get around. It's explicit that Jesus wants to talk to us about how we are to relate to our religious or governing authorities. And then finally, I think Paul, who wrote the majority of the New Testament letters, he addresses Government and Authorities, we have an interesting history with the government and religion here in our country. One of the primary influences early on was Thomas Jefferson, he had made a name for himself with states rights in Virginia, and had already of course, written most of the Declaration of Independence. And remember, in order to ratify the Constitution, they had to promise the original 13 colonies that they would follow that right up with the first 10 Bill of Rights are what we have come to know, as the first 10 amendments to the Constitution. And so I just want to read amendment number one, and it says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the government for redress of grievances. So what his primary concern was, which by the way, the amendments are really short, the first 10, they don't get longer and more complicated until modern day times, just fascinating. They kept it short, sweet and simple.

They were concerned, when they established America and the original colonies that became the United States. They were more concerned about the state government, establishing a certain religion or speaking into religious entities, primarily churches or Jewish synagogues at that time. They were concerned about that aspect, the arm of the government reaching too much into the church, keep in mind, they're coming out of England, they're coming out of Europe. And all those sorts of concerns are on the front of their mind. They assumed and this is what's interesting, they assumed more religious people would speak into the state. And that's important because somewhere along the last 70 plus years, many believers even Christians have sort of bought into the lie that we are not able to or we're not supposed to take our moral convictions, our Christian convictions into the public square or into governing jobs. And that's not what that's

Talking about at all it's talking about the fact that we're not to have a government tell churches, or religious entities stick their hand too much into those affairs. So how are we to think about it since we are bombarded with so much political news, specifically national now, again, it's been 3040 years or so since you had the 24 hour news cycle, beginning with CNN, and then Fox News, MSNBC, and then others that happened first, okay, a lot of people would point back to the original Iraqi war, which is when we start having those 24 hour news cycles. And then, of course, we had the internet. And we had smartphones, which really just kept us connected 24/7 to the news cycles of the day. So that's, that's just the air we breathe. And so we know that it's in front of us. So I want to try to help us think Christianly or biblically about faith and politics. Number one thing I want to say is that politics makes for a horrible God. The first one I was going to say this morning is that politics, politicians, you and us favorite politician, United's favorite political party, you and I's favorite cause of justice, because a lot of times what will happen is, is especially if if you're a millennial, or Generation Z is that we'll take up causes that are even right or righteous, but we'll think that's the end all be all whatever they are, whether they're environmental causes, or whether they're Palestinian causes, or Israeli causes, or host a number of humanitarian causes.

But what will happen is that those God's lowercase geek G will let you and I down every time eventually. How did this even occur? Just real briefly, in thinking about the history of our country, in the absence of God, rights have we've just kind of gone along sort of very secular and very kind of godless over the last 70 plus years? What do you think will happen to humans, humans in the Western world, because we're all created with a God shaped hole in all of us, I believe that both experientially practically, biblically, we will fill that hole with something else. Because keep in mind, what is told us, they're all our advertising through all of the the images and through the rhetoric, and through the talk that comes through our smartphones and televisions and all kinds of screens, it's some version of relax in the sun a little bit, right are here in El Paso, try to chase the shade, especially from this time of year forward, eat some tacos taken out, have a nice car and a house and try not to hate your family. This is the American life in the American dream, right. And so that's kind of where we find ourselves. And what we realized quite quickly is if that's all there is, this is lacking a lot. And so what ends up happening is the absence of God, if no one is telling us the truth, no one is telling us about Jesus Christ and His death, burial resurrection, and that that's the only place where hope can be found. And then from that, we then engage the world. And we have the tools to be able to understand who God is and the universe and who's made us to be in the absence of all that, why would any of us be surprised that we begin to fill that space in our hearts and in our lives with something else. And so political and social causes have taken up a huge amount of space and time in our hearts, because we have to be passionate about something. We have to worship something. This is just a statement that I understand just as a human humanity has to worship something or some one. And so this has obviously affected us as the church as well.

But what about the things I'm passionate about pastor? I mean, because because some of the things that I'm passionate about, I think align with scripture, I think so I think sometimes that can be true. And I think God cares about them, too. And so then you might ask yourself the question, well, how can I care about God, and then simultaneously do the right thing? Because that's what we want to do, right? Because we want to be citizens of this world and citizens of another world. I'm so glad you asked because Jesus address this kind of thing. I want to start off with these verses here, in the book of Matthew says this verse 15. Then the Pharisees met together to plot how to trap Jesus into saying something for which he could be arrested. So who the Pharisees are the religious leaders of the day, they don't like how Jesus is taking away power and control from them. Their perception of that they sent some of their disciples along with the supporters of Herod to meet with him. So who are they appealing to? Caesar or the the person who's in charge of that day? Teacher they said, We know how honest you are. Okay? This is what we call flattery. Okay. You teach the way of God truthfully, you are impartial. And don't play favorites. Now tell us what do you think about this? Is it right to pay taxes to Caesar or not? Now this was a good question for them to ask because they're trying to trap him.

Caesar Rome is ultimately in charge. If you know anything about your history, whether secular or biblical, you know, that was the Greeks and the Romans. The Roman census is what pushed Jesus to end up in Bethlehem. All God ordained I believe that but that was movement going on at that time, Rome is in charge, well until about the fourth or fifth century AD. And so here we are around Jesus's time 33 ad Herod, even if he's there at the temple, ultimately, bowels and bends and knee to Caesar. So they're asking Jesus to trap him who was supposed to serve Jesus Caesar or not. But Jesus knew their evil motives, you hypocrites. He said, Why are you trying to trap me here? Show me the coin use for the tax. When they handed him a Roman coin. He asked, Whose picture and title are stamped on it Caesars, they replied, Well, then he said, Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and give to God what belongs to God,

His reply, amaze them and they went away. So what's going on here, you've heard this term, maybe before into Caesar, that which is Caesar's and rent to the Lord that which is the Lord, the Pharisees they did not care for or like Caesar, you have to understand that, that they've already gone through in their minds the humiliation of having someone else, that they have to go to hat in hand, in order to really do what they want to do, you're gonna see this again, when they want to crucify Jesus, they want to sort of pass the buck and appeal to the political or the governing leaders to do their evil deed for them. But they also remember the days of their theocracy, or members where God and

government are intertwined in the early days of Israel. And so they're sort of wishing and dreaming and thinking that needs to come back. And they wanted it back. Because what that meant is that they, as religious leaders would have both their hands in the political process and the religious process. Jesus knows all this, he's come to say, Hey, listen, guys, here's how things are working. Now, I'm going to be the savior of the whole world. And you don't have to worry about political power going away, you'd have to worry about something greater than that, which is your own soul being thrown into hell if you don't repent and believe. And so that's, that's where he's going with all that. And you don't have to worry about me starting some sort of insurrection here on Earth, because I've got a kingdom, and I've got authority beyond that.

But he's giving them a better vision for how to be good citizens of this world, while your allegiance and heart is in another. Because if Jesus would have said,

well, you don't have to serve Caesar, we serve Jesus and we serve. We Yeah, we serve either himself or, or God in heaven, the Father in heaven. They'd have been like, good, good, we trapped him, Go get the authorities real quick. So we can we can arrest him, but

and if he had done the opposite, which is? Yeah, no, no, we pay all our taxes, and don't worry about God. And they said, okay, good, well, then, well, then, then you're not really of God, because we're supposed to get back to God that which is his, he gives them a vision for a better way of being citizens of this world. While our allegiance and heart is with another. Paul picks up this theme in Romans 13. He talks a lot about that the governing authority doesn't bear the sword in vain. And as long as you're not an evil doer, typically you don't have to worry about the government kind of messing with you too much. And he says this, this is also why you pay your taxes, Romans 13. Going into the book of Romans, For the authorities are God's servants who give their full time to governing, give to everyone what you owe them. If you own taxes, pay taxes, if revenue, then revenue. If respect, then respect, if honor, then honor. So United is now catching just a little vision here of understanding that we have a duty to do something in this world to to be a part of the governing system and that we don't get out of, of doing our part just because we are citizens of heaven. So the question that you may have is, is it ever appropriate to disobey governing authorities or to overthrow governing authorities? That's a that's a difficult question and something to think about. But I will say this, when there comes time to resist governing authorities, the way to win them over typically, is through humility and not violence.

This is probably most clearly seen in recent history, with the civil rights movement of the 60s were where those who participated and really won the day. Were not those who tried to push up against governing authorities with force but found themselves peacefully doing the right thing in the midst of being slapped, kicked, or even sometimes murdered for doing the right thing because what ends up happening is if you are truly innocent, and you're

halls is truly just eventually that wins the day. That's, that's that's kind of how that works a lot of times eventually, either in this life or in the life to come, but I think that's one thing to consider. But then the other question is, is it ever okay to overthrow the government? That's an interesting thing, as we're all sitting here, most of you all Americans, or at least in the country of America, I guess we thought it was appropriate at some point in time, didn't we? And you can go back and read some of our history and Patrick Henry, and, and they had different reasons why they thought, it's a just time and a good time to throw off the British crown in order to establish our own colonies, or what ultimately became our own states and the United States of America. So the answer is, yes, but with much wisdom with much patience, and always, if possible, pursuing the path of peace as long as possible. It's one first thought on faith and politics. Number two, here's my statement in order to maintain their prophetic edges, or edge, churches must be able to be an equal opportunity offender. And this is important, I think about this a lot in my own calling, as a pastor, or sometimes as a prophet, is this whole idea that we have to be able, as religious leaders and as a church, faith based community to be able to call balls and strikes, that's an old baseball term, but it's just the idea that, that that's what we need to be able to do, because what we'll do is we'll find ourselves looking at the landscape, and we'll see how some things in this political party align themselves with the heart of God, but some things really don't. And then we'll look to the other political party will say, I can see how that sort of aligns itself with the heart of God. But then I see other things that caused me great concern, in order to be able to do this, and probably the best example of one who kept their prophetic edge, in order to be an equal opportunity offender was John the Baptist. John the Baptist was critical of the king and queen of his day, and he lost his life because of and if you're not familiar with the story, we're going to read it right now, for Herod, and we've already talked about him and around the time of Jesus in the New Testament, for Herod had sent soldiers to arrest and imprison John as a favor to her odious. Now this is being told this is going back and looking at the story in past tense. She had been his brother, Phillips wife, but Herod had married her so you understand what's going on here? You have a female, she's married to someone. The brothers thinks, oh, yeah, I like her. I'm gonna take her from my own. John had been telling her that it is against God's law for you to marry her brother's wife, especially because she's an American. So erroneous, she bore a grudge against John and wanted to kill him, right? She didn't. She didn't take too kindly to that sort of talk. But without Herod's approval, she was powerless for Herod respected John. And knowing that he was a good and holy man, he protected him. So you just have all these different dynamics going on here you have a woman that rightly so doesn't like the fact that there's someone going out and talking about her sin on the public square. It's public knowledge, what they did together. And so he's saying, that's not of God, you shouldn't have done that. And then you got Herod here, who is also a little bit superstitious and a little bit concerned. Herod was greatly disturbed whenever he talked with John but even so he liked to listen to him. Roti is his chance only came on Herod's birthday, he gave a party for his high government officials, Army officers, and the leading citizens of Galilee. Then his daughter, also named Herodians, came in and performed a dance that greatly pleased Herod in his guest. So you got all kinds of screwed up things going on here, right? He's getting his daughter to dance for his guests. Probably scantily clothed if at all asked me for anything. You like the king said to the girl and I will give it to you. He even bowed. I will give you whatever you ask up to half of my kingdom. ingresses sure. I'm sure the wind was flown as well. She went out and asked her mama, what should I ask for? Her mother told her she saw her chants asked for the head of John the Baptist. So the girl hurried back to the king and told him I want the head of John the Baptist right now on a tray. Then the king deeply regretted what he had said. Don't you make some rash vows because of the Vows he had made in front of his guests. He couldn't refuse her so he immediately sent an executioner into the prison that cut off John's head and bring it to him. The soldier beheaded John in the prison, brought his head and an entree and gave it to the girl who took it to her mother. When John's disciples heard what had happened. They came to get his body and buried it in a tomb. So you can see there that

that the edge John the Baptist had that he was willing to speak the truth, even if it cost him his life. We need to have freedom as a church and as religious leaders to speak the causes of truth and justice, that becomes more difficult, right? Follow the money, follow the power, whatever, that becomes more difficult when we're wedded to one political party. From this stage, I spoken out again, once it became public, I spoken out against theft from city council members with gas cards, I've spoken out against corruption and the DHS office. And I've spoken out against human trafficking. So Newsflash, you've got a pastor who's against theft, against corruption, and against human trafficking. And so that's, that's why he called for that.

But, but that shouldn't be that shocking, right? Because what are we we we are people who are Christians, and that we hold the moral line, and we're not afraid to be an equal opportunity offender. And we can only do that if we're not tied or wedded to one political party. So the question may then come up, well as a Christian, or can a Christian or should a Christian, run for political office? My short answer is yes. But know that you're entering a sea of compromise. You can't be a pastor, at least I don't see how you can't be. You can't be a pastor, prophet, and a politician. That doesn't mean you can't be Christian, and be a politician. You don't have to necessarily compromise who you are at your core, or who your core what your core beliefs are. But realize that when you and I enter the political sphere, when we try to go for public office, whatever those public offices will be, we will not get everything that we desire from you. And I understand that right? That we all end up in rooms, or we end up in meetings, or we end up you know, in the town hall square, and the nature of politics is compromise, that whatever you and I all have our list of desires, they will not get done. Now that that I don't mean that to be discouraging, you and I can take up political calls if we want to or feel so called. But I want to encourage you. And this leads to our third and final point, real political change is extremely local. And this is why you and I are not be so discouraged about the political landscape, we find ourselves in every four to two years, because there is always going to be some sense of political unrest. But we can do a lot more change. And we can be a lot more effective in our local lives. And when I say extremely local, I mean, extremely local. So I want to talk about two verses here. And then I want to tell you what I mean by this, when I say real political change is extremely local. First thing is Titus three, one, remind the people to be subjected to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, and to be ready to do whatever is good.

Now about your love for one another, we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. And in fact, you do love all of God's family throughout Macedonia. Yet, we urge you brothers and sisters do so more and more and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life. You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anyone. So what you and I are starting to see is we're starting to see a vision of how to be good citizens here in this kingdom, while we ultimately live in our hearts are in a nether that we're ready to do good. And that we make it our aim and desire to lead a quiet life where we're not dependent on anyone else. That just means don't, don't be a bomb, there's a time that we will take some sort of assistance from people, but then ultimately we'll find ourselves being able to help others because we began to get wiser with our resources. And guess what that means. And so what I am saying, though, when I say extremely local, and here's the good news and the bad news, because you can do the most about this right now. Is that is that it starts right here, in your heart and mind. So what I mean is, is that there's the old saying that people used to say is Lord, let revival begin in my in my country and in my land and in my city, and let it begin in me. So one of the things that we have to really come to grips with is that if we want real lasting change in this world, or whatever our spheres sort of effect, we have to ask ourselves, Lord, what is it you want to do with me? What is it you want to do with me? Then what you have to ask yourself is what do you want to do with my household? Whoever's in your household and in my household, we have to ask ourselves, How can we be instruments for good? How can we be people who lead a good life?

eyes, that we are able to store up enough to not only have for ourselves, but be able to share generously with others. So that's asking about your own household, then you have to ask about your neighborhood. Do I care who my neighbors are? Am I looking out for one another? Are we having, you know, neighborhood block parties? Are we concerned about some of the things that are going on around us in such a way that we begin to care for one another, and not just hate one another and be mad when the music's too loud? Or when they have the party or when they park in front of your street? Or when their dog does something to your order? All the little things that we can get all angst and riled up about that we begin to say, man, God put me in this neighborhood, how does he want me to be a blessing to those around me outside of my household, then you have to ask yourself, if I have kids, than my school? How am I supposed to be involved in my school? I can't just complain and be upset about what they're doing in my school? How can I get involved in order to affect real change and care about what's going on there? If you say, Well, I don't have kids, well, then how can you get involved in your local associations, or your local affiliations, or something that's going on in your surrounding area that you can be a part of, for the force of good How can you volunteer, whether it's volunteering with your with your hands, or with your mind on boards or whatever, take up a call or two. Right? Many of you all have different things that you're passionate about, but you find it so much easier. And I find it so much easier to stay at the house and stay on the phone or stay watching TV, don't do that. Think about city government, local government school boards, how we can serve those beyond them if the Lord calls you and me to do them local legislation and causes for what good things that you and I say we all want better roads, better schools, better security, better parks, less human trafficking, less drugs, more kids taking care of through nonprofits, and governing agencies, then within that faithfulness and framework, every once in a while. And I want to emphasize it is very rare. But every once in a while, you'll see someone who comes up through that local governing body. And this somehow given a platform on a national level called to greater service. And that's what all good governing authority is meant to be about. It's about serving others not serving self.

And engaging in national politics is so rare, it does happen. But there's rarely an opportunity for you and I to do something about it. Unless God calls us as one of the few out of our faithfulness at the local level into some sort of national stage. There's only two times if you see it different you let me know. But I want to see really two times that us in the room, unless you find yourself again, one of the few who has a national platform or stage. And that is the presidency every four years, or the midterms and or the midterms. Other than that, guess what's open 24/7 local. I mean, this is so important. And I'm telling you the reason why I bring this up is everything that you and I are consuming from our national news cycles. Even our local news cycles, like half of it is is obviously reading some of the national news. It it tells us that's the most important thing in our life and in our universe. But what's the truth? How often can we vote for presidency? How often once every four years? How often can we vote for midterms or regular, you know, Senate or House representatives and that's every other year. So think local, it's open 24/7 and change happens from the inside out. That's so important. It's that's how we can be salt and light. In this world. I think about that think about how Jesus talks about this. We're a little leaven leavens the whole dough. And that that good. It has it has a rotating effect. It has a way of affecting everything around it. This is true for good or for ill. And know that if we are faithful with the few things will give in charge over much. This is so hard for us in an instant gratification world. How many of us have little children who loved the YouTube stuff and the YouTube stars and they're trying to figure out a way how to, you know, spiked the ball and somehow didn't become a superstar overnight. That rarely happens. And it's rarely good if it does happen to you. Because why? Because your character often doesn't match the spotlight on you if you're given that sort of spotlight too early. But what is the way that God has for us, we've all read it to lead quiet, productive, faithful lives, work with our hands or work with our minds, whatever God's given us and do good to others. And when we are faithful in those little things in our little world, what ends up happening is that God will give us charge over much research. My third and final question this morning is how do I vote?

So how do I vote? I've thought about this. I didn't put it on slide but but I've chosen every word very carefully. Here's how we vote. We

vote for the candidate that will most accurately or fully enact causes of righteousness, aligning with biblical principles. That's a mouthful. I know, I tried to shorten it I couldn't, for the candidate who are most accurately or fully enact causes of righteousness, that align with biblical principles. If you want to say it negatively you learned about this in school, which was the lesser of two evils. I think that's the negative way of saying it. I think this is a lot more positive way. And it brings in Christian truth, or biblical principles. It's not based off of gender ideology, or race ideology. And this is the tricky part, we have to weigh what the candidates say about themselves and their own expression of Christian faith. I think about this historically, when you had people like Jimmy Carter, who was probably a more faithful Christian in terms of his own prayer, life and Bible reading life than a Ronald Reagan leading up to the 1980 election, but one had the ability to do something about Iran and the other one didn't. Or you think about this in our own political landscape over the last couple of cycles, where you have Joe Biden and you have Donald Trump, and you have Joe Biden, who claims a Catholic faith, that's very real to him, yet, he's not able to take communion in some parts of the country because of his stance on abortion, or you have, you know, Donald Trump, who will say the Bible is a good book, but he doesn't claim that he's humbled himself to believe it or read it. So I'm just saying we have a lot of things that we have to consider. And that's why we have to come back and say, What are we to do? And I think the way we can vote, vote your conscience, I get all that. But it's a conscience that's informed by what God has showed us and told us in His Word, knowing that you and I are going to always vote for flawed men and women, but we're going to vote for the best one that we can discern most closely aligns the causes of righteousness, aligning with the biblical principles. So how am I gonna close? I'm gonna pray, there's something to think about. Don't pray here just a second.

Ask yourself, Lord, what do you want me to do? Okay, I've tried to make it real clear that as much as your phones and our TV screens want to tell us to be consumed with the national political sphere, you and I need to think local. And we need to ask ourselves, what part do I need to play in Christian influence at the local level. So that's really what the what the response is going to be the the altar is open, you can pray right there in your seat, Chris may read something to kind of help set our hearts. But really, we need to ask ourselves, Life Church, because there's so much we can do. There's so much that we can do with the Spirit of God can do in us and through us. If we will just say, Lord, here's, here's my hands. Here's my feet. How do you want to use me? I want to be faithful. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you didn't leave us wondering or wondering exactly what you have for us. But you have shown us that there is a way and a path

to peace filled, honorable living in this life that affects the life to come. So I pray for those in the room, men and women who are thinking, Lord, what would you have for me?

And I pray for those that need to get right with you that first and foremost they need to humble themselves. Under your mighty hand. I pray for those who are thinking about how they can be faithful in their neighborhoods. I pray for those who are thinking about how they can be faithful in their schools and at their workplace. I pray for those who are ready to step up into different roles on nonprofit boards and in school systems, on city councils. And, well, I just pray that you would send believers out into all these places to be a light in a very dark world that needs you. Oh Lord, we ask that you do this in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you guys for being here. Thank you guys for being online. I just want to start with just asking a question this morning, which is, have you ever been let down? Have you ever had someone or something or some organization offer you something, some sort of promise they made something to you and it just didn't come around? It didn't come to fruition. So I want to begin by just thinking about some categories. If right here, as far as some broken promises, maybe maybe it was a coworker, how many times have you been there where they said, I'll get that done? I'll turn it in for you. I'll make sure that that we can move this project along. How many times have you had a classmate? Some of y'all the most dreaded word you could ever hear when you were in school was this is a teamwork assignment, because you knew the dynamics were of all these different things that were going to go wrong. What about a friend, so they were going to be there so that they would do something for you? What about a parent, maybe they said that they would always be around that they wouldn't leave your mom or your dad or they, they would promise to give you maybe a portion of inheritance or whatever. Maybe it was a spouse, again, just through little little things, little things that are broken promises, or maybe some major ones. I think about this with a kid, maybe you all have agreed with something or you've said, Hey, you are going to do the dishwasher, you are going to clean your room before you get this and you decide. And they decided that that's not going to happen. What about an organization that you are depending on this? You are depending on this to come through? Or Or you heard that you had a guarantee? And it didn't come out that way? Or what about a car and you think that how can a car be a broken promise? I'll tell you how it is if you've ever been there, and you've gone to get your car worked on, and it still breaks down on you. What are you doing? You're talking to your car? No, don't do this to me right now. Right? You do not want that it has broken down on you. It was supposed to get you from point A to point B and it didn't they broke down. What about a house? Same thing? No, no, don't flood? I don't I can't call anybody or I don't want to spend any more money on the fix whatever that is. What about a pet? Okay, I'm not talking about dogs here. I'm talking about cats. All right. But yes, we understand right now we all even the animals themselves. You had an agreement. You don't poop here, you don't have accidents here. And somehow, you've let me down and it does create real angst in our heart, doesn't it? Think about city? How many times have you had city officials that's come through and said, you know, we're going to clean up this area, we're going to give you guys this, we're going to do this and there's not going to be any sort of, you know, raising of property taxes, and we'll go and fight for you and Austin or whatever. Think about this in terms of government, where you were told that you were gonna get some sort of, you know, windfall, or you were told you, hey, we'll give you all this stimulus money. And that's gonna, everything's gonna be great. And they didn't tell you that three to five years later, it would all be taken away in more by the raising of inflation. We have all kinds of broken promises. But here's the deal, God makes promises to us called covenants. And God keeps His promises. I want to go all the way back to one of the original promises and covenants, and that is the call of Abram and Genesis chapter 12. Genesis chapter one through 11, you can read that there's a lot of stuff in there. But when you get to chapter 12, of the book of Genesis in Genesis is the first book the Bible actually means beginnings or new beginnings. And what you end up seeing there is that men and women begin to call upon the Lord. And we get a clearer understanding of history and where it's adds about 2000 BC with the call of Abraham. And here it is Genesis 12, verses one through three, it says this, The Lord said to Abram, leave your native country, your relatives and your father's family, and go to the land that I will show you, I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make you famous and you will be a blessing to others. I will bless those who bless you and curse those who treat you with contempt. All the families on the earth will be blessed through you. If you know anything about that story, a lot of things look like they're going to make that go off track, a lot of things go haywire. Abram, who becomes Abraham does some foolish things in the midst of all this, but God keeps His promises and that we ourselves are recipients of some of that promise because we are Christians, we are believers, and we claim the faith that Abraham had. And so what you end up seeing here in Genesis 15, is he repeats this, this covenant promise to Abram. And you'll see this in verse 18 of chapter 15. So only two or three chapters later, and it begins with this right here. So the Lord made a covenant and we already talked about what a covenant is. That's a That's a promise, but it's even bigger than that. You understand what contracts are because we have a contract for our house or our car, but a covenant

is sealed by something greater than ourselves, namely God Himself. God made a covenant with Abram that day and said, I have given this land to your descendants all the way from the border of Egypt to the great Euphrates River, the land now occupied by the Canaanites and the kids sites and kind of my CAD mo nights, Hittites, parasites, Rafi lights, Amorites, Canaanites,

gear guy shots and Jebusites. And so all he's saying here, and the reason I wanted to read all that is to see that not only did he give you a covenant promise, but I want you to see that with their eyes, they would have said, no, no, someone else lives here. All those people, all those nations live there. And he's saying, no, no, that's going to be given to you. So this is Abraham, who becomes Abraham, Abraham and Sarah eventually have a child in their old age. And that is the promise child, Isaac, and Isaac has his own dealings with the Lord. And this is what God tells Isaac in Genesis 28 says, this right here

are Genesis 26. I am the God of your father, Abraham. So he's saying, This is who I am. I've created a lineage of creative family. That's who I am. Do not be afraid. We've talked a lot about fear, worry and anxiety, for I am with you, and will bless you, I will multiply your descendants and they will become a great nation. I will do this because of what what kind of thing? Is there a promise. In all the Old Testament you're gonna see promises made to Abraham, my servant. So it doesn't just go from father to son, it goes to grand son. So look at Genesis 28, verse 15, says this, what's more, I am with you and who we talking to. So remember, Abraham and Sarah had Isaac, and eventually we have Jacob and Jacob stamens is going to be called Israel, because he's gonna be the father of many nations, what's more, I am with you, and I will protect you wherever you go. He's talking to Jacob, one day, I will bring you back to this land, and I will not leave you until I have finished giving you everything I have promised you. So now not only do we have a covenant, or do we have a promise, now we have the guarantee the assurance that the God of heaven will be with us. This is huge. And this is going to continue on in Exodus 33, the second book of the Bible with Moses, and he's told this, The Lord replied to Moses, in Exodus 33, I will personally go with you, Moses,

and I will give you rest, everything will be fine for you. Then Moses said, If you don't personally go with us, he's talking to the Lord, don't make us leave this place. How will anyone know that you look favorably on me and on me and your people, if you don't go with us, for your presence among us, set your people and me apart from all the other people on the earth. Moses knew what was so special about the nation of Israel. And it wasn't that we would eventually conquer many people or any of that kind of thing, that it was the fact that know that the Lord God is with us. And then we get to the New Testament, I think about Jesus, when he's praying and talking on our behalf. He says this in John 14, verses 16 through 18. And I will ask the Father, this is Jesus now and he will give you another advocate, we understand what an advocate is, we all want one of those in our lives, who will never leave you Who is this, He is the Holy Spirit, who leads into all truth The world cannot receive Him, because He is looking for him and doesn't recognize him. But you will know Him because He lives with you now and later will be in you

know, I will not abandon you. This is huge as orphans, I will come to you. This is the book of John, chapter 14, verses 16 through 18. I think whether it's again, at the end of Jesus's time here on earth with His followers, His disciples, He said, What lo or Behold, I am with you always, even unto the end of the age. Paul in the New Testament, He is very clear on how we can really get practical with our fear, worry and anxiety and how we can work through this. Not only knowing God's presence, but this and Philippians, four, five through seven. Let everyone see that you are considerate and all you do. Remember the Lord is coming soon. Don't worry about anything. Don't worry. Don't worry about anything. Instead, pray about everything. Anytime. That our thoughts and we're going to talk about this that we all have different levels of anxiety, none of us none of us get to get out of it completely on this side of heaven. And When thoughts come in that create anxiousness in our hearts, we are told quite clearly, here's what we do and we have something that is going to help us to know what to do with it and that is pray about it. Pray about everything. Don't worry about it. Tell God what you need and thank

him for all he has done, then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything we can understand his peace will guard your hearts and your minds as you live in Christ Jesus, then you say, Pastor, this is easier said than done. I've heard some of those verses before, I've tried that I've, you know, tried to do a little things and say a few prayers. And yet I still am riddled with anxiety about some of the things that you talked about whether it's parental issues, or work issues, or family issues, or whatever. And I just want to say that fear and anxiety, they seem bigger and more confident in our mind than they should be. I get it, it feels so real. It's literally in your bones. And we talked about this in terms of our bodies, we're holistic beings. So things that are coming in our head and our hearts that affects us holistically. And we understand that that's where some of our depression and concern and anxiety come from, certain bad things will happen, for sure they will. And what we think is, I will not have sufficient grace to get through that. And that's the exact opposite of what the Lord is telling us. He's actually saying, yes, you will, yes, you will have grace to get through that I will supply and give that to you. How do we how do we know that? How can we trust them? What has he told us, that gives us any hope that that can actually be true. He says, I will never leave you. Or another thing that God is repeating to us over and over again. That's why I went through all those verses and wanted to go through Old Testament and New Testament and Jesus and letters and all that leads to the first point I wants to see this morning, I will be with you. The God of heaven says this to you and me this morning. That is huge. That is He is just that he would not remove his presence from us. On this side of heaven.

He pulls back the curtain to see the realities that we can't see that, that depression or what seems so real to us, my fear, my concern, what we all talked about fear of man or people are our fear of others, and what they think and what they'll do my lack of funds, those are what seems so real and so tangible. And the Bible is calling us always to a greater reality to a greater truth.

He's saying God is saying there is manna from heaven, that will come there is grace for tomorrow because the Lord promises to be with you and me. I mean, that's where we go back to these passages that you and I have heard before, we thought before we've maybe heard someone else tell to us or not, I'll tell you, to you right now. And that just whole idea is that Today has enough trouble of its own. Do you not worry about tomorrow, the Lord will take care of us. But the truth is, we still get so fearful. I want to share with you another story that you may not have read before and this is about Elijah servant. And if you remember in the Old Testament that there is Elijah, and then after Elijah, because he's caught up in a chariots of fire up into heaven. We see Elijah becomes the prophet of God here in Second Kings. And so what ends up happening is that this king of Aram, in chapter six of Second Kings, he is really concerned because every time he goes to war with Israel, it seems like they're already prepared for him. And so he gets all his henchmen together, and he says, Hey, what's going on here, that every time that I try to sneak attack Israel, they seem like they're ready for me. And they said, listen, they've got a prophet of the Most High God, Elijah. And he's able to tell them, even if you don't tell anyone, even if you're just talking about it in your own secret chambers, because he talks to the Lord Almighty, the Lord Almighty warns him, and therefore he knows whenever we're coming, so he does whatever any vengeful wrathful the my way, or the highway king would do, which he says, well, I'll just cut his head off then. So he says, Why don't y'all get a whole army together and you go kill Elijah, because if he's the one causing me all this trouble, let me go get him. And so that's exactly what this king of a room does in Second Kings chapter six. And he's he goes to kill Elijah. And, and of course, Elijah has an entourage and one person in his entourage is a servant. And he says, Hey, I looked outside this morning, and there's troops and horses and chariots everywhere. We'll see that here and go ahead and put that slide up here in verse 15.

The servant of the man of God got up early the next morning, went outside and there were troops, horses and chariots everywhere. Oh, sir. What will we do now? The young man cried out to Elijah. Don't be afraid. Elijah told him for there are more on our side. Then

On Thursday, you got to understand the reality if you were the servant and put yourself in the position of the servant, because that's what you and I will be doing, we'd be peeking out the window. And we'd be saying, No, it's just you and me, maybe another couple of servants around but but there's just you and me, and there's a lot of them.

And Elijah prayed, oh, Lord, open his eyes. He's so confident. This is how the people of God act. Once you and I start walking with God and moving in the Spirit, we begin to see that nothing can stand in our way in terms of the purposes of God, and we are more than conquerors in Christ. Jesus allows you to do that. And he prayed that his servants eyes could see the Lord open the young man's eyes. And when he looked up, he saw that the hillside around Elijah was filled with horses and chariots of fire. As the Aramean army advanced toward him, Elijah prayed, oh, Lord,

please make them blind. So the Lord struck them with blindness, as Elijah had asked, now, if you Amir there, what are we going to do next? We're gonna be like, Okay, it's our turn, right? And I got God on my son. Look out. That's not what he does. Elijah takes pity on them. He feels sorry for them because of their stupid king, and he leads them to another city. He's like, Oh, you're blind. Let me take you down the road to Samaria. And this is the city where, you know, you're gonna do whatever find Israel find Elijah. And so when they get there, Israel's army is there. And so they're like, hey, they're blind. Do you want us to just go ahead and kill them? And Elijah is like, no, no, no, don't do that. It's not their fault that they're blind and stupid. It just literally says in the scriptures, they he says, Don't do that. We don't kill prisoners of war, let's give them some food and drink and send them home again, to their master. You can imagine just the almost just the heightened sense of like, Oh, we're gonna show them kindness, we're gonna feed them well, and send them back to the master. And so not only they feed them, well, that says they made them a feast, and sent them back to their master. And then I love this last line. And it says after that the Aramean Raiders stayed away from the land of Israel. I mean, you want to write I mean, like, I don't know what does happen there. I don't know why I got to live. I don't know why it was turned blind and lead to another city. And I don't know why. The people I was supposed to kill through a feast and a party for me. I'll tell you why. Because they served a greater power. And they were not afraid because who because the Lord was with them. Second point I want you to see this morning is things are not always as they seem, that servant had to realize that there are armies that are backing you and me for spiritual purposes. Remember what Jesus says, He's saying, Oh, this is just Old Testament prophetic stuff. This isn't for you and me. Remember what Jesus said that I've already read the book of John, that we ourselves that the Holy Spirit lives in us, because we're believers, we're Christians, that we ourselves have an advocate, we have the very spirit of God living in us. But the problem is, is that you and I have whispering lies in our ears all the time. My mind is, well, it's just telling us what kind of things you can't trust them or anyone.

You're gonna die today, you're gonna fail. Good things don't happen to me. So why do I even try? Everybody hates me, right? Nobody likes me, I guess go home and eat worms. best days are behind me, right? We believe all kinds of things that are whispered. If anyone knew the real me, they would reject me. I say that, that we often talk about looking behind the curtain and we we understand spiritual warfare. And we often see yes, there are dark things being done behind the scenes, but there are greater things being done by our Father who is in heaven. I want to give you an image of how deceptive ideas work. And this is not original with me. I've showed this before during our spiritual warfare series. I got this from a guy named John Mark comer, who's in Portland, Oregon. And he talks about and this is how all of us sort of live that, that we are born. We are born with our backs towards God or what the Bible says that we're born into sin because of Adam and Eve's choice. And, and so that means we're born with a propensity towards self, not with a natural inclination to hit our knees and seek the God in heaven. And so because we're born that way, then these deceptive ideas, where we don't see so readily what's going on behind the scene that God's got your back. We're believing that everything is very defeatist, we're not going to be able to do this. It's not good for me. And so it takes our disordered desires because we're thinking of the flesh. Satan can come in with those deset deceptive sort of ideas.

thrown in our ears, and then it's normalized in a sinful society, because how many of us are gonna get encouraged to turn our gaze towards heaven, in times of trouble from any sort of social media accounts or any television or even in the workplaces that we frequent or school places that we frequent, we're gonna get very little to nothing. So all these things come together, Satan in his lies, our own fleshly desires, and then the lies of the world and it creates for us such such crippling effect on our spiritual lives. And I would just say, we need to understand how Satan works in his schemes. It's not hopeless. That's why I wanted to share a good story that maybe you didn't even know about before, from Elijah and Second Kings. So then we're able to what give our cares to him. But before we get there, I want us to think about a psalm, Psalm 4610. And we shared it, we shared a couple of songs, I think they're really helpful if you are ever struggling with find, find something in the book of Psalms because the psalmist is often struggling and suffering and seeing things surrounding him or her and then they come to a conclusion of who God is and what he's done. Here's what this psalm says in Psalm 46. God is our refuge and strength. Do we believe that this morning Life Church, always ready to help in times of trouble? It looks bad, it looks bleak. So we will not fear when the earthquakes come, and the mountains crumble into the sea. Let the oceans roar and foam, let the mountains tremble as the waters surge. And then there's maybe in your version, or in this version up here, it says, interlude, or it says pause or say, law. That's an important statement, because it's just a time that was like, do we realize what we just read? If this was put to music, what's the Psalter would have been in 1000 BC and even after that, do we understand that even in times of natural things around this looking like it's going to take us over? It is not true, let it go because I am protected by God. beginning of verse four, it says this, a river brings joy to the city of our God, the sacred home of the most time. God dwells in the city, it cannot be destroyed. From the very break of day God will protect it. The nations are in chaos in their kingdoms crumble. God's voice thunders and the earth melts. The Lord of Heaven's Armies is here among us. Where have we just seen that or heard that? The God of Israel is our fortress, and it says, interlude, pause, c'est la vie.

And again, just let's take that in church. Let's just take that in that this is written for us, for us to draw comfort and strength, because we're looking around and we're saying, it doesn't look good for me, in my family, or my city, or my job, or my lot in life or whatever.

Keep going, verse eight, come see the glorious work of the Lord. See how he brings destruction upon the world, he causes wars in throughout the earth, He breaks the bow and snaps the spear, he turns the shields or he burns the shields with fire. Verse 10, I think it's gonna become important for what God wants to do for us this morning. Be still and know that I am God. And I will be honored or exalted in every nation, and I will be honored or exalted throughout the entire earth or world. The Lords of Heavens armies is here among us, the God of Israel is our fortress. This is huge as we think about what God wants to do in us that we would just take a moment and say, God, because you're God, I'm gonna be alright. I mean, whatever is going on in our heads and our hearts. They're huge. I get that they seem bigger than our God because we can teach, we can touch and it feels tangible. And it feels so real. I said, that I know for many of us in this room are anxious hearts. That's what we have this right here. It's symbolic of our anxious hearts, that that are anxious hearts are riddled with all kinds of anxiety that we feel so acutely. But here we have God saying something else, another message to us and he says this right here in the book of First Peter, give all your worries and cares to God. For He cares about you. We've talked about this before, and I think it's where we want to end in a series like this and what's going on here? Well, think about putting it all together. The first week of this series, we gave some general general introductions about fear, worry and anxiety. Second week, we really got into what many of us have which is people pleasing fear of fear of man or woman just fear of others fear of what God's going to use. Others to

harm us or hurt us. And then we, then we got into just fear of lack lack of of things for resources, money, things from my hands, my family. And we talked about some scriptures there. And here, we're saying, wherever you're at in that spectrum, whatever your concerns and worries are, and we've all got them, we all have little anxious hearts or big anxious hearts. And wherever they are, they are not meant to stay in here. Part of the discipline that we have seen from the scriptures is that we pray and ask God to take them, that where we can take our fear, worry, and anxiety, it seems very clear from the scriptures is to the foot of the cross, because he takes care of them there. Um, you understand that, right? However, these things came about. And we're all products of a little bit of, of human nature, a little bit of how we were nurtured, and a little bit of the experiences and what you've all had, I get that we're complex. But at the end of the day, however, we got there with this anxious heart, I can assure you, you and I are not meant to leave the room with all that anxiety in our hearts. And the only way that it's gonna be taken care of is that the foot of the cross, I mean, there's really only two choices when you have anxious anxiety in your heart, right? It's you can either trust God or someone or something that is going to be taken care of, or you can continue to carry it. And for many of us in this room, we have carried in a way entirely too long, and maybe a week, it may be a month, it may be your entire life. So I'm going to give you an opportunity to give your anxiety to him and in the band is going to play and I'm going to give you some some instruction, you may have noticed that we have kneelers, up in the up in the front here with these were these were built by some men in our church, thank you so much for doing I want to give them a round of applause.

In the coming weeks, we'll have enough kneelers throughout the entire stage. But we wanted to kind of bring these out today to say, You know what, we're a praying church. And we're not ashamed of that world worshipping church. We're not ashamed of that. We're a church that believes the Bible, we believe God, we believe His Word, we're not ashamed of that. But one of the things that we have to do is we have to get there. For many of us in the room. Part of what is happening is we haven't we had God. God wants to do so many amazing things in your life and in mind, but that requires us to bow the heart and bend the knee and actually humble ourselves enough to be like, God, I need help. I can't do this on my own anymore, I don't want to do it on my own anymore. So we're gonna give you an opportunity, you can come and come to the kneelers, you can be in your seat and do business with God. But we're going to ask that either way, you come from this side or this side. And we have a little pool that we've covered here that we're asking you to drop this heart, this anxious heart that you and I have right here we are asking you to symbolically put it literally put it at the foot of the cross, I'll move out of the way and I'll move my podium out of the way so that you and I can have an opportunity to pray and to look to the cross. And to say God, I don't want this anymore. I want to leave this at your feet. Now as I say this, I know that there's a couple of different people in the room. There's some of y'all in the room, you do not want to do this, you intentionally pass the heart table, you passed on Jesse's announcement to go back to get the heart. And I'm just here to tell you that you and I always have a choice. And that is that we can continue to carry the junk that we've been carrying around with whether it's been a week or years or all our life, or we can choose to give it over to Christ. And so what I'm asking as your pastor, but really because I think I have the full weight of the Bible behind me is to say, you don't need to carry this anymore. He said, Well, I think I can just do this home privately, I get that you can do that. But some things take the community of faith to say, even when I'm so weak, I might need some help. And so yes, I know that some of y'all this isn't your thing. This creates you uncomfortable, I'm asking you to do it anyways. Now what if you say, Pastor, I'm for real, I'm not giving my anxiety, I'm not coming up for it. I'm not dropping in anything, I'm not hitting my knees, well, then you carry it home with you. However you want to do that you carry it in your pocket with you. But realize you're taking it with you realize whatever burns, you came in here with your bag in your heart, that you're continuing to say, I'm gonna still carry that. And if you need to do business with God and come back and drop it off next week, I get that there's a little little category I want to say. So if you're all like, I want to keep this because this is my Ebenezer that God did something in my life today, we'll have an opportunity to give it to you next week. So don't worry about that. But I'm asking everyone in the room to come give whatever you've got at the feet of Jesus.

And if you're in the other category, if you take it with you just know you're gonna take it with you. And that's going to be

Still anxiety in your heart.

I will say one last thing. And I get this to some of y'all are sitting in your seat right now. And you're like, Pastor, I don't even know if I have the strength to move to get up. You understand what I'm saying that you're sitting there saying, I know I need to give it up. And there's a big part of me that wants to give it up. But I don't have it. I don't have it in me right now. And I understand where you're at. I've been there too. And I'm reminded, if you remember, at the end of Return of the King, with Frodo and Sam are going up that mountain to destroy that, that that ring of power for the last time, he said, I can't carry this burden anymore. And he says, Mr. Frodo, if you can't do it, I'll pick you up and I'll carry you. And I want to tell you, if there's anyone here, you look around and you see someone who you know, is struggling and needs to come forward, but they can't for whatever reason, you say if you need someone to go with you, I'll go with you. I'll go with you. Because I am telling you, I am fully confident that God does not want you to carry this any more. Let's give it a to put across where our hope is found and where real life can spring forth. Because the root of anxiety is gotta be gotta be ripped out so that God can place in what he wants to do in your life and in mind, and namely, trust him more. I'm going to give you all plenty of time he's going to play you can process and you see they come and drop you can come in kneel, then come and drop a please don't leave. I'll give you guys plenty of time and then I'll come and close us in prayer.

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Sermon Transcript:

We are in the middle of this series, we have at least one more week next week don't want to miss sort of the culmination of it all next week. But I want to kind of tell you where you've been. So we can kind of know where we're going. We had our first week on this series a couple of weeks ago, where he talked about an overview of fear, worry and anxiety and how we all habit even if it's just a little bit, but for some of us, it's absolutely debilitating. It can lead to depression, and anger issues, and just all kinds of things that can throw us out of whack. Last week, we looked at the idea of what if we're a people pleaser? What if we have the fear of man or the fear of people? And we kind of talked about that, again, it's in all of us to different degrees, and is it debilitating. And in all this whole series, I really do want to be helpful and practical and trying to give us some steps and how we can get out of this and continue on. In our journey. Nobody wakes up in the morning says, Boy, I wish I had more fear, worry and anxiety as I go throughout the day. But yet we find ourselves there we find ourselves, looking up looking at the horizon and seeing problems and issues and wanting to know how we can deal with it. Today, we're going to look at fear, worry, and anxiety around the issues of money, or what the Bible sometimes calls Mammon. It's really asking the question of God, and anyone who will listen is will I be taken care of. Now, to be honest, when we think about any of the issues of fear, worry and anxiety, it can feel such pressure on us. I mean, that's why we have panic attacks isn't it's that whole idea of where our physical bodies literally revolt against our mind, because our mind is going one place and our body is at a different place. And we and our body begins to convulsing, we go into panic attacks, I realized that we all have different degrees of that. So I'm not making light of any of that, I think we can get help wherever we're at. I haven't mentioned this, but you understand that sometimes, there are different ways to sort of help us with the symptoms, whether it's just breathing, I mean, just that in and of itself, can help out a lot when we are under attack with fear, worry, anxiety, whatever, even if you wake up, you know, from some sort of nightmare, or some sort of demonic force that you feel like has come upon you just breathing. But then we also understand that, that some of you maybe have been prescribed drugs at time to help you with the symptoms of that. But let's just be real clear. That's all they can kind of help us with that he can help us with the symptoms. What we really want to do here at Life Church, and I think biblically, is to help us are there things that need to be removed, things that we're believing that are not of God that are not helpful, that need to be removed? A way to say it is that if you have set on a thumbtack, and I was your medical doctor, and I say, Hey, listen, we've got two choices here, I can either continue to numb the area around your bottom where you have set on this thumbtack or I can remove it, and it'll hurt a little bit, but you'll get better eventually. And so that's in the same way, when we think about our hearts, and what has taken root in our lives. It needs to be removed. And I will say this, too. I don't mean this in some sort of simplistic way, like, throw up your hands and say, take it Jesus, and you'll walk out of here. And it'll all be better instantly. Sometimes that does occur. But keep in mind, a lot of times, however long it took us to get into whatever it is we're believing and thinking it may take that long to get us out of that. And this is a journey that we may be on for a while. But where do we want to go? Psalm 23. One, you've heard of Psalm 23. It's very famous at weddings and funerals and in times of comfort that we need. The first verse of Psalm 23 says, The Lord is my shepherd, I have all that I need. Or you may have heard it more traditional saying, Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. That is really our aim. When I think about my own Christian life and what I'm aiming for this morning. And what I want, all of us to kind of come together in is wouldn't it be nice if we can just be okay with the fact that the Lord is our shepherd, he'll take care of me, and he'll provide for me all that I need and want. So that can be without fear, worry, concern, and that's where we want to head that's our aim. This morning. I want to live a life like that because it is true. Now, I said that today we're going to talk about issues around fear of money or Mammon. So I'm gonna give some examples that I've thought about in terms of kind of what do we sort of concern what brings us angst at the minimum? How's our bank account looking? I'll think about schooling for ourselves, our children, our loved ones, think about our own comfort, man. I like these kinds of things around me that bring me comfort to think about medical care, medical bills or getting the best medical care possible. I don't want to die early because I didn't have the right medical care furnishings just What I actually surround myself with I'm tired of that old whatever Can I can I replace it hobbies, I like to do fun things I like to spend money, like spend money dining out. That's a lot of where our money goes, if we're not careful. I like certain amount of clothes. I don't like this, I can fit this way. I like to be in style like it'd be this brand. Vacations Have I gone on the right amount? How do I look on Instagram or Facebook and try to figure out what's everybody else doing? Am I going to Disney enough? Or whatever? fears around retirement? Do I have enough? Have I saved enough? Do I have a pension plan? No, that's a long time ago. That's what my daddy or mama had? What about retirement? What about helping family? Should I do this? Should I not I really have a concern or desire things to pass on? Right? Influence, I want to be in the right spots to be able to get that right job. And in the right relationships. If I can be around this type of person or have this kind of income, then I can maybe find a significant other or friendships that have this think about all these concerns that we have. These are all legitimate. I've felt almost all of these if not all of these, and you have as well as you've interacted with these at different points in your life, Jesus knows that. That's why he shares this passage with us this morning, a familiar passage in Matthew chapter six, beginning in verse 25, often called the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus says that is why I tell you do not worry about every day life. As soon as you start with the pastor, it's easier said than done. I understand this. But don't forget the lesson that I taught us last week, because I know we all have family of origins and things that were done to us that that we can point to and say this is why I'm screwed up. And this is why I think that way or this is why I feel that way. And I understand all that but here's the deal. You may not have caused it but it is your and eyes problem to deal with. Right? We talked about that last week, it may not be your fault. But it is our problem that we have to deal with. That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life. Whether you have enough food and drink or enough clothes to wear isn't live more than food and your body more than clothing. Look at the birds. They don't plant or harvest or store food in barns for your heavenly Father feeds them.

And aren't they you? Aren't you far more valuable to him than they are? Can all your worries at a single moment to your life? And why worry about your clothing. Look at the lilies of the field and how they grow. They don't work or make their clothing at Solomon in all his glory was not dressed as beautiful as they are. And if God cares so wonderfully for wildflowers that are here today and thrown into the fire tomorrow. Well, he certainly care for you. He will certainly care for you. Why do you have so little faith? So don't worry about these things saying What will we eat, what we drink? What will we wear these things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, but your heavenly Father already knows all your needs. Seek the kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously and he will give you everything you need. So don't worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring its own worries. Today's trouble is enough for today. Again, a passage that if you've been around church, or even sometimes culture long enough, you may have been exposed to something like this kind of the idea of what Jesus is talking about. So what is important, just ask yourself right now as we're going to go through this process together. And I'm maybe I can be some help this morning, as we just do this in our minds. And I'll give some examples. But what is important to you right now? What is it you're thinking about? Man, this is something that's on the top of mind, for me in my life right now that it's just on the forefront that I've been thinking about it is something that does bring me angst, which is anxiety and, and concern and fear. So just think about that. And then also, I think the other thing that we need to think I'm just walking through the passage is know that your father cares for the needs of the birds, as well. It's that's one of the first points you see here is just the whole idea that listen, Jesus gets it, God gets it. And remember that the sermon on the mount is a New Testament ethic. It's a way that we are to live and conduct ourselves in light of who God is and what he's done in light of the kingdom, which is what we'll talk about later. But what is important know that your father cares for the needs of the birds. And the number three that I see arising out of this is just the fact that you and I are more important than the birds. That's what he says in very clearly you and I are more important than the birds. Fourth thing I'd say is he close non humanity, creation and beauty if that's what he does, right. So if he if people are not humans, if he makes them beautiful, he will certainly do the same and more for you and for me. Then he says something we don't like to hear which is Oh, you have little faith or why are you so faithless? One of the things that we have to grapple with is that anytime we are gripped with fear, worry and anxiety, we are having trust issues. Now maybe sometimes for legitimate reason, then you thought this in terms of your own interpersonal rules. externships The reason why I get all concerned about them is because I can't trust them. And I've got evidence and facts or you know, you think about this in terms of because I've had a relationship with someone else who was similar whether it was in a job setting or relationship setting. I'm already coming in with baggages, to where I have trust issues. Same thing can happen with our Heavenly Father, I'm sure we're aware of this. That's why we spent a whole series on fatherhood just to sort of unpack are there issues that are in between us and God, that are acting as roadblocks to even be able to say, God, I trust you? Or to just be honest and say, God, I don't trust you. I'm struggling with faith. That in of itself is progress forward. Remember, that's, that's what was cried out by the centurion, when he says, I do believe that helped me in my unbelief. Third thing we sit here and that third, several lists on down that I saw coming out of this passage is seek first his kingdom. We're going to talk about that. But we need to recognize that all of us, every single one of us in the room will prioritize our life and look to something. Christianity, the reason why we're Christians, Christ's followers is that we strive to look to God, we strive to literally put our heads up. That's why we look up to worship, we raise our hands up to worship, the alternative is to what look to self, but to mammon, look to money look to success. I mean, there are other alternatives or other gods little gods in terms of all the the Mini and Hindu and other kinds of religions or Allah, God, whatever. But that that is not what we understand here in Christianity, why do you think we come to church regularly week in and week out? He said, Well, I went one Sunday, I think that should be good enough. I'm 42 years old, I've been in church regularly, my whole life, there's never been a long season, where I've ever been out of church, I still need him. I need him every hour, because why I need my literal eyes to look up. Because all of us are prone to wander and we feel it in our hearts. So that's where you might want to seek first the Kingdom, if you're not going to intentionally seek first the kingdom of God or look to Christ, look to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we will be enslaved. And that's I'm using that word very specifically, we will be hooked to something we'll be, we'll look to something because we're made to be worshipers. So he says all this and you know, you're supposed to seek first kingdom of God and, and trust me and know all these things that I've said here, therefore, don't worry about tomorrow, because that's literally what we're doing when we are worrying. Have you ever thought about this, it's just that basic. Okay. I was concerned about the past, I'm concerned about the future. And so he's saying just just today, just focus on today. This is so hard for all of us around the room at different levels. And at different times, and even around different issues. Some of y'all may say, Well, I'm good at trusting God with my money, but I'm not going to trust him with my relationships. And we'll talk about that as well as terms of why we always seek control. So I want to close with actually the close the first point with the actual, verse 24, which says this, No one can serve two masters for you will hate one and love the other, you will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and be enslaved to money. This is actually the verse that started this whole this whole passage off, but I wanted to sort of show it here at the end. Because I think we're seeing the implications if we say, No, I'm going to reject that paragraph that Jesus just spoke to us. Well, then just know that you are not going to be able to be divided this I am Pastor, yes, I'm only able to have one foot in the world, and one foot in the church. And what he's saying is no, that's, that's not gonna work that well for you. So first point, I want us to just think about, which is another way of saying what is important to you and me right now is, What do you lack?

What do you like? I mean, let's just be honest, I mean, because we know that God will provide for us the basics of food, shelter, and love, if we are in his will, if we're just if we're just doing what God has for us. If we're being what God has for us, we will have that food, shelter, love is what the church is for another way to say that as community. And so what is it that you and I feel like we are lacking because the passage is over and over again, gonna say let the Lord be your shepherd, I shall not want or seek first the Kingdom. And again, I know this can feel debilitating at times, not just financially, but all the different ways that we've talked about fear, worry and anxiety in this series. And that when we think about our fears, like a lot of things perception defines reality. Right? So for one individual, they'll look at another individual and say, Why are you so scared of flying or why you say scared of being on a motorcycle? Or why are you so scared of doing whatever public speaking or whatever it is like, that's easier? I don't have any concerns about that. And then you've seen other people do it. Like, it's logical, like, what, what in the world are you afraid of? And what we have to realize is that perception defines reality for a lot of us, right? That's why we'll have physical responses to the anxiety that wells up within us. Whether it is a fear that's rooted in legitimacy or not, and give them on their little anxiety is not bad. Like, if there's a deep dark hole you want me to go into, I think it'd be like, Hey, I'm good to go. Like, I don't need to do that. I mean, even if you got a flashlight, and maybe if you give me a gun or source of maybe, but you know, there's good anxiety, I don't think I want to go there. And we're, you know, snakes are in or whatever. So there's a good sense in which we God wired us and designed us to have, you know, these little antennas that go up to say, No, I don't think that's a good idea. I don't think I want to go down that path. But what happens is, is that our mind is so powerful, that will elevate fear, worry, anxieties, to heights that they were meant to have. And it begins to distort our view of reality. That's why fear and anxiety works like a lot of things we're trying to get over it. There's both the head and headspace that we have to wrap our heads around, no pun intended. And there's the practicality. So let's say let's take this issue of money. So I could, but I'm not going to talk a lot about how you can get certain apps to help you track your spending. Or you can have a notebook where you can track your spending and make sure that you're giving the first 10% A guy and making sure that you have enough money allotted to all these needs and concerns that could be a concern for us in our life that we live here on Earth. That's the practical aspect. But you and I both know that if we don't get our head, right, that will surely fail. I mean, how many diets have you been on or known someone who's been on or tried yourself or new routines, whether it's exercise routine, and it failed, not because you couldn't put one foot in front of the other, not because you didn't know that the way to get healthy is to eat right and to exercise more. But because there was something that was blocking you mentally from being able to get there. That's why it's not just enough to say, Stop it. Don't do that. I mean, because there's more going on here. And so that's where I'm trying to go for the head in the heart. And of course, there's gonna be all kinds of practicalities and little tools that we can do. But if you try to use the tools to sort of fix you in terms of your financial situation, being out of control, or your you know, lack of good diet and exercise, being out of control, if you just say, Oh, I'm gonna go join the gym and download the app. And you know, that won't work. It may work in the short term, but it's not gonna work in the long term. Because why? Because you haven't, you haven't figured out what is it that I'm believing that needs to be shifted. And that's what Jesus is talking about here. He's saying, that's what I want to go after. And so I know that we have generational setbacks, we've already talked about those a little bit. But keep in mind that if you were reared in a home, that lived paycheck to paycheck, you were probably raised in a home that had somewhat of a scarcity mindset, right, that maybe we were just trying to survive, you know, whatever we got, we were just glad to have food on the table and a roof over our head. And so that plays into how you and I even view money, which therefore it plays into our fear, worry and anxiety issues. Why? Because that was given to us again, maybe not your fault, but it is you and I's problem. So we have to think about how does the Bible talk about right living or, or even right living when it comes to things such as finance, or even interpersonal relationships, there are the foolish people and The Foos people. It's just always, always a problem. There's always some issue always broke, never being able to do anything, always just never able to rise above circumstances because of the choices that they ultimately make. There's, there's some foolishness there, and Proverbs talks about that. There's also evil, some of us are scared of financial conversations, because it has been used as power over us, whether it was by your parents, whether it was by a boss, who was a bully, and that they sort of use that whole idea of your very livelihood or your pocketbook to be able to Lord authority over you. And you've felt that and so you didn't want anything to do with that. And so you just kind of wanted to do your job and go home or you just kind of want to stay away from that or you want to stay away from money because you yourself thought well if I try to grow money, or I try to do all this, that in of itself is evil. Why? Because you are given a distorted view of how to deal with money issues. And so it created a lot of angst, a lot of fear, worry and anxiety why because someone was evil to you, and how they interacted with you around the issue of money. But the third vision which is I don't want us to have and by God's grace, we can walk in that. And that's the way of wisdom. Proverbs talks about this a lot. The rest of the scriptures talk about this, that we want to be wise with our money, we want to be wise with our relationships, we want to be wise with our hearts and our bodies. Why? Because we're stewards of it, as God has put us here on Earth. But here's the deal, we're gonna need to get a new vision about money, we're gonna have to root out some wrong thinking, some unbelief. And what are we going to replace it with? It's very dangerous to go rooting things out. If you don't know what you're going to replace it with. The Bible actually talks about this. And when you try to, to get rid of evil spirits in your home, and you try to sweep them out, if you don't come along and figure out what you're going to replace that with, you'll be worse off than what you started because more will come in and take root. Here's the new vision, Jesus gave it to us. And it is a kingdom vision, give you a couple of parables on the kingdom of heaven and then talk about maybe a working definition of the kingdom. Verse 31, of the book of Matthew says this right here of chapter 13. Here is another illustration Jesus used the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes a largest of garden plants, and it grows into a tree. And birds come and make nests in his branches. So this is provision. You see this here is that that we understand that it grows in that it provides when we think about people who we admire, and then we want to look at who live wise lives patriarchs and matriarchs of families where they can have enough to not only take for the care of themselves, but to take care of others under their care on a rainy day. Another way to think about this and kingdom of heaven use this illustration and given heavens like a yeast, a woman used to making bread even though she put only a little yeast in three measures of flour. It permeated every part of the dough, why it's expansive, that whatever you and I touch, it reminds me of Psalm one that God blesses this is the righteous man or woman. And here's really one that's directly related to finances. The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure. And we know what that is, right? We all watch little treasure shows and movies, when we were kids, that a man discovered hidden in the field. In his excitement, he hid it again. So everything he owned, to get money to buy the field.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant. on the lookout for choice pearls, again, financial, when he discovered a pearl of great value. He sold everything he owned and bought it what is going on here. It's really saying the infinite value of the kingdom of heaven, and how that is where our hearts and our mindsets have to be. I know what you're saying, easier said than done. Pastor Brian, I get that. That's why it's a journey. That's why we're working towards that. We're asking ourselves, what are the lies that we're believing so that we can replace them with the truths of what God says this leads to? Our second really major point in question this morning is what kingdom are we living for? Now, again, I told you, I would define the kingdom of heaven. So let me try to do that. For us. Real quick. We hear this phrase all the time. In our in our prayers, and in our worship, and even around church or churchy type things. Think about this in terms of the Lord's Prayer. I know some of y'all grew up in liturgical settings, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. I think that's the best way to maybe give a good explanation of what the kingdom of heaven is, the kingdom of heaven, is ultimately that place where we will go to be with God and where everything is set, right, and everything is perfect, and everything is the way it should be. However, the kingdom of heaven starts here. And now the moment that we say, we want to be a Christ follower, the moment we say, I'm not going to look at my own problems, own ways anymore, but I'm going to look to you God, to be my source, and author and you are in control. And I submit to that, that is when the kingdom of heaven starts. That's why in the Lord's Prayer, it's very clear that we are ushering in the kingdom of heaven that we, and wherever we go, we are bringing the kingdom of heaven because we're bearers of it. And that's why Christians, by and large, are the people who bring about, you know, relief, and we're the ones who bring about a place to worship to come, but not just that, but we're the ones who bring about schooling and helping the poor and all these sorts of things flow from a Christian life. Why? Because we're bringing the kingdom a taste of it, to whoever and whatever we touch while we're here on Earth. Another way to say it, if you like little phrases is the kingdom of God or the kingdom of heaven. Same understanding, is a sense that it's already here. Like we're getting a taste of it right now that we're worshiping together and we're hearing God's word together, which is what we'll do for eternity forever. We're never in heaven together. So it is that idea where it's already occurred. But it's not yet. That's why we still cry out for justice. That's why we still cry out for things not quite right. That's why we still cry. I'll say it's not fair. I live in a world where people who do wrong things, the unrighteous seem to prosper while I am doing the right thing. And I'm still kind of love. And God's saying, Listen, I'm gonna set all things right. You don't worry about them. You keep your eyes on me. That's what the kingdom of heaven is. And so we have to ask ourselves, what are we living for, because we will live for one kingdom or another, even if you go to the highest good of what secularism offers, and secular is just a word that says anything and the absence or devoid of God is some version of humanity. It's just some version of live your best life now and be about human flourishing and, and get the best you can in terms of here and now in a life and be live a life of service and calls and all of that, and that will get you far. But that won't answer everything that won't do everything. And at some level, you will be brought back to self and what the self want, and you'll try to actualize and push forward your own self, and you will be enslaved to sin still. Only Christianity is the only way that we can look to the Father say, Okay, I'm going to intentionally choose that kingdom because you first love me. And you chose me before the foundation of the earth. I'm going to choose that kingdom and not wander or be enslaved to this thinking, or this kingdom or this world anymore. I am telling you, it's especially in 2024, in the West, which is anything in America and Europe, the West, there is no more straddling the fence, you and I realize this every time we walk out these doors, and we go into work, we go into office, we flip open our phones, we understand that. And so let's be the people who worship God who look to God and not worry about tomorrow, it's got its own worries enough on its own, not just look to the past and be anxious and fearful about that. But say, I'm going to live for the kingdom of God, I'm gonna seek His kingdom first. And then I'm going to trust Him that these other things are going to flow because you and I know you and I know that if we figure out a way to be generous towards God, that we figure out a way to be generous towards God with our money, then we'll be okay. It'll come back to us. I've never met a Christian yet, or someone who even claims the name of Christ, who did what they were supposed to do with their finances, and all of a sudden found themselves out, down and out. Because you realize it goes hand in hand together, once your mind starts switching and you really figure out that I'm looking for the kingdom of God, then these other things are coming into place where you now have a better understanding of your finances, a better stewardship and responsibility over what God's giving you. And he grows that because the biblical principles that lead to growth in finances are the same things that God's calling us to it's it's one in the same. But our concern is that scarcity mindset is so deep for many of us in this room. I mean, every study says that 50% of people live paycheck to paycheck, or may have no more than 500 to $1,000 a month in emergency savings. I assume that is true for many in this room. And so I understand that what I am calling you to is hard to even think about much less to wrap your head around yet. God is saying you and I can do this by His grace, if not will continue to be enslaved to something it's a it's not money. It's this political calls, I get it. But we'll be enslaved to something but what kingdom are you living? For? That's the second question. I think I've defined what the kingdom of heaven is have more questions or concerns about that we can always talk later, let's take this pick that I've been throwing up or putting up here for the last several weeks. And that is that you can you can do this with anything with fear, worry, anxiety, desire to be rich, realize you aren't rich, you start experiencing fear because you're looking at someone else around you, they get to take their children to Disney World, he or she's got those clothings they've got that choose, I'm going to try to control that. And whatever way I can, I'm gonna try to look good, or I'm going to even steal if I need you to, to make sure that I can have what everyone else has. But that still doesn't satisfy me. And so all of a sudden I find myself angry, isolated and depressed. Because even when I got that, let's say you got all these things legitimately that you you know, you did the corporate job and you were able to have your own self employment and you were able to control enough to where you're able to get this things that you wanted by not unrighteous means, but you did them all. Without even thinking about God or His kingdom. You will still in some way it will eventually lead to some sort of anger isolation depression. Why? Because it won't taste the way you think it's going to taste once you get it. And you and I have all been there, you and I have all spent too much on some item of clothing or some car or some house and we thought, okay, this was going to solve all these problems, or it was least going to solve these, I'm sorry. And you realize you got it home and still went in the closet, or it still ripped, or it still didn't quite bring about everything that it promised to bring you about. And so eventually, this happens to all of us, even if we try to get what we want by legitimate means apart from God. And then we realize we're really not in control, we've tried to control it, now it's spinning out of control. And so what we do, instead of bending our knees and our hearts towards God, is we just clamped down more, okay, what I need to do is I need to store more, I need to lock down more, I need to make sure he or she doesn't hurt me anymore. Remember, that's why we can have a distorted view of finances because of someone who's been evil to us manipulated us use money against us. And so we find ourselves just in this cycle. And the only way to break out of this issues of fear, worry and anxiety, whether it's with people, whether it's with finances, or anything else, is to look to Christ. Is that really a good idea? Is he really big enough to be able to handle this? Are his shoulders really wide enough? leaves my third and final point, give all your worries and cares to God, this is from First Peter five, seven, give all your worries and cares to God for he cares about you.

I mean, he really does. And that is God really does care for you and me. That is the starting point where we have to believe that we have to internalize that, then we have to ask ourselves, God, how Now shall I live? Because I've got some things that are being exposed in a series like this, I got some roots of anxiety that I know need to be dealt with. Don't be like an unwise person who looks at themselves in the mirror and then goes and lives the same way they were before. That is always a temptation for any of us, when confronted with anything. You can do this at the end of, you know, annual reviews. And you'll wonder why am I never getting you know, raises or promotions at work. It's because whatever they tell you about in there you go. And you continue to do whatever. And we need to be people who are wise. And as far as it's up to us with whatever we have in our hands, we need to say I'm going to hit my knees and I'm going to pray to God, I'm going to actually read scriptures, because I need my mind set on things above. Because you know that left to our own devices, literally our phones, but our own devices, we will we will not float into righteousness, we will not float into discipleship, we will not just float into thinking about the right thing will just take in whatever's around us. And we have to be honest to say that most of what is downloaded to us in 2024 in the West is godless. That doesn't mean it's all bad. It just means it's devoid of God. It is as secular as we've ever been in our country, knocking on us. That's just the reality of, of where we're at. So then we have to come back and cast all of our cares on God. Because why? Because he really does care about us. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you didn't leave us wondering or wondering what you have for us. But you have shown us in Your word. I pray for those in the room that are just gripped by fear, worry and anxiety that it almost feels too heavy on their chest right now to even breathe. I pray you give them much grace in this moment. And in the days ahead as they seriously consider your claims as they seriously begin the work. I'm trying to root out fear worrying anxiety that I'm under no illusion can be generational and to live a life that honors you, that looks to you. And that values what you think above all else, because your kingdom comes first and believing really, really believing that if we seek first the kingdom of God, that we can trust that everything else will be given to us. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, before we get started with the message, there is something that's going on in our world that may create some angst and fear, worry and anxiety. And that is just sort of what happened over the last couple of days in the Middle East. And so we are going to pray about that situation. Because here's what we know in this room. And I've already had conversations with some of you all over this past week knowing if you're connected to government work, specifically the military, but then all kinds of other even contract gigs around the world, that you may be called to service in some of those parts of the world or even in countries nearby because of the unrest there. So I'm gonna be real clear about because a lot of times we start praying for Israel and Jews and church, it just gets all sorts of confusing or, or those kinds of things. I want to be real clear that that the reason why we pray, and the reason why we're concerned about this is not only because of what I've already said, Zona does have some real angst because we know that, that we may have to get involved as individuals and as a country later on. But it's just that whole idea that we understand that there is goodness in this world, and there's evil in this world, and that believers err on the side of good. And the reason why we pray is because we know that goodness comes from our father truth, goodness and duty. And so what we're doing is we're saying, God, we want peace in that area. We think it's bad that people have bullets and rockets aimed at each other and actually shooting them off causing destruction. And so we pray against evil. And we pray for your hands of protection and guidance in that area. And so that's what we're doing. So again, wherever you land, on the theological spectrum, about what's going on over there, you and I can for sure be united around the fact that we are for good in this world, and we are against evil in this world. So let's take a moment before we go any further. And let's pray.

Father, we are concerned. So none of us have more than concerned we're straight up anxious in this moment, knowing that we'll have fathers brothers, mothers, sisters, who may be called to service because of the political and war unrest in the Middle East. And so Father, I pray right now for your hand of protection among those who are connected to our church body and connected to our country. And Father, I just pray that You give those in charge much wisdom and how to respond. And Father we do. We unashamedly ask for peace, and an area of the world that has had unrest for as long as we can all remember. And Father, we ask that you bring your hand in that situation in such a way to where calmer, cooler heads prevail. And the father, we trust you. We trust you to bring about your purposes and your ways in whatever way you see fit. But we ask for goodness and truth and beauty terrain, not only in that area, but in our area in our lives not only this day, but all the days of our life. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen. Well, thank you guys so much for give me a moment to do that. It is straight up about what we're talking about today, which is this whole idea of fear, worry and anxiety. And really, there's different aspects we're going to take as we're going through this series, and today, what I'm going to focus on is what is often called the fear of man or the fear of people. And you may think I don't know if that's me, I think as we keep going, we'll see how we all have tendencies in this area. But I want to start off with a verse really that kind of helps us as a jumping off point into this topic of fear of man or fear of people. It's this right here. Proverbs 2925 says this

fearing people is a dangerous trap. But trusting the Lord means safety. Other verses would straight up say, fear of man was just generic humanity you and I understand that but fearing people is a dangerous trap, other words would say a snare, that we understand that when we live our lives when we're operating out of fear of what others think or care about, rather than what God thinks or cares about. It is dangerous. And then trusting. We've often said this faith and trust is the opposite of what we are so concerned or fearful about in the counseling or therapeutic world. Fear of man is often talked about, in this sense, people pleasing, if you've ever heard that term, or somebody says he or she or maybe even talking about you, you're just a people pleaser, peer pressure, that whole idea of because the crowd does it that I am susceptible to that at times and I want to go in with what others are doing to be accepted or what is often termed in therapeutic or counseling settings as low self esteem. So just want to say that as you think about these things, and I'm not afraid of any of those words that overlap with biblical meaning and biblical truth, that this whole idea is rampant in our own hearts and in those that we love around us.

So next I want to see is that fear of what people think fear what people think. And so I'll start out kind of on the, on the on the left side, what you might think of when you're sort of younger. So you're sort of a young person in the audience or you consider yourself young. And we don't define that anymore. You may sort of think about your haircut. Have You Ever Have you ever had a teenager, whether it was a guy or a girl, and they were afraid to go out of the house, or they were absolutely crying, because of a bad haircut, it didn't come out, right? And I've got to go to this event and or this prom, or she or he is gonna see it. And anyways, right? Close, oh, how important is it to have the right clothes, when you're younger, you want to fit in. And even like the brand name, it's important and how it fits. And even looking sloppy is cool at times. I mean, it's just all over the place, we understand that. But we really care. And then the fear of being ordinary. So you don't want to be too ornate. You don't want to just kind of blend in but then you but then you know they're being different. See, this is how it works, right? That's why young, our young years are so so tumultuous sometimes. And it's so hard to navigate through it all. Because we really, we feel this and those of y'all going back to middle school in high school, you feel this and you can actually, you know, your heart is starting to get a little bit heavy knows you're there in that you know exactly what I'm talking about. Or just complexion. You remember when you cared so much about just you know that pimple and who was going to see that or just how that was going to work. As we get older, similar fears, but they just changed a little bit, our fear of maybe baldness, or fear of getting fat, just carrying a few extra pounds or scared of germs or dentists or crowds or whatever. So we have all these different things. We talked about that a little bit last week. But even still, we see all these different things that we are concerned about. And that can cause us such a fear and angst as as we get older thinking about what others think it will go the next slide if you don't mind. We

this is the main thing. We're skipping a few slides around, if we could kind of go back there for just a little bit. There's one that says the Brookside from last week, and even the for the for harms slide. So somehow we got a bit mixed around, it's okay.

But I introduced a book last week that was talking about the anxious generation, again, not a Christian. And this Jonathan guy, he really goes through some of this and he comes up with for things that harm young people as he sees it in 2024. And if we're able to find that slide, that would be helpful. As we think about different things that we are concerned about or even consumed with, at a young age. The first thing would just be that that whole idea of our social lives have changed because of the phone. So his whole argument is that our phones have created such angst and anxiety in us as young people and even as older adults. And he really can trace everything kind of around 2010 forward, you see it just a great just increase in some of these issues. So one of them was social issues. And again, just that idea that that typically young people hung out with other young people throughout most of world history during those key times, especially 13, to 18, always around other people and other kids. And that's really taken a big freefall in the last 10 to 15 years. Other things that were and a concern is not just the social things, but just the what technology does itself in terms of the addiction to it all. And we've told you this before, and you may find this with you and your children, that you have this addiction to the phone. Now. And this isn't a kind of church where we're against technology. And I'm not that kind of Pastor, we understand that when things roll out that we all have a tendency to run them wide open. I think about this in terms of cars, when cars first came out, you probably aware of this, there wasn't any speed limit, there wasn't any licensing people were just getting in and going down the road as fast as I'm sure they could take them. It was a long time well into the 50s and 60s until they started using seatbelts. Does that mean that for the first 30 and 40 years that there wasn't depth on the road? Because of accidents? Does that mean that people always knew the rules of the road and follow them the way they were supposed to know? And so what ends up happening is that when things are introduced into any society and culture early on, those of us who are wise and thinking have to be wise and thinking through these things to ask ourselves, okay, how is it worth to interact with these new technologies? And so that's all we're doing when we're asking ourselves, Hey, what is it that we need to think through in terms of as it relates to these devices? If we're on the younger end of the scale, or even on the older end of the scale of what is it doing to our social life? What is it doing to as we think about addiction, because it's all leading to these issues. We're talking about fear, worry and anxiety which does lead to the first point if we

can at least find that one. And that is, it may not be your fault. But it is your problem. I think this is a really good phrase for us to think about when it comes to fear, worry and anxiety issues, because oftentimes we'll look and we'll go at some point into the Sermon on the Mount. And we'll see, the Lord calls us to not be anxious about anything or do not worry

that the flowers of the field are taken care of you'll be taken care of. And oftentimes, they will come back to us we feel guilty, because we are worried. And sometimes we need to figure out okay, is there a sinful pattern or sinful habit that we need to really root out in order to not be worried and concerned and replace it with trust and faith in God? Absolutely. That is the case some of the time. But some of the times, let's just be honest with ourselves, we're not sure why we're so anxious. We're not sure why we're so fearful. And so one of the things that I love about this phrase is it frees us up to say, You know what, it may not be your fault that you are riddled with anxiety, because you are addicted to your phone so many hours of the day, it may not be your fault that you posted something on social media, when you were younger, and you regret it, it may not be your fault that you are having all these sorts of health or whatever issues may be going on, even if they were financial or otherwise. But I think it's a good phrase to say, but it is your problem. In other words, yes, there's times where we have to go to therapy and counseling and kind of figure out what is the root problem? Why do I believe this and think this and act this way. But even after you get to that, even after you get to the bottom of that, whether it was given to you because of your your heritage, because of your family of origin, or because of other habits, you picked up, good, bad or indifferent along the way, it may not be your fault. And I think about this in terms of where we are probably going to need to go to keep our sanity and these issues of fear, worry and anxiety with really monitoring and clamping down on the phone use for ourselves and for certainly young people around us that it may not be your fault, but it is your problem. In other words, once you and I realize that we're addicted to anything, you know, phone, cigarettes, pornography, or whatever, it's just 1000. Okay, I have identified the problem. And I can even trace that back I'm I'm this way, because I can remember my mama acting this way, or my daddy acting this way, or bringing this into our home, I get it.

It may not have been your fault, you may not have introduced that to yourself, you may be a product of multiple generations of people who were sinning against you and they were sinned against and they were hurt, and I get it. But what are we going to do about it now? And I think that's what we need to ask ourselves right here from the get go soberly, at the outset of a talk like this is it may not have been our fault, but it is our problem. So how do we want to now interact and deal with it? Well, I want to talk about a story today in the Old Testament where the people of God are given an amazing opportunity. And because the majority went a certain way, the rest of the group had to suffer major consequences. I'm going to talk about the numbers 13 and 14, about the 12 Scouts going out and exploring Canaan, you may remember this story, or you may know it, if not, I want to kind of catch us up to speed. You're aware that Moses led the people out of Egypt, to worship they were wandering around in the desert. And the whole reason He led them out of Egypt is of course, to worship but also to give them a land, give them a promised land flowing with milk and honey. And so they get to the edge of that. And Moses sends out

the spies are these people to go and kind of kind of make sure what the land looks like. And they come back with some amazing reports. They say this, this place is wonderful. It's got huge clusters of graves. It's got amazing things that are going on here. It's going to be a beautiful area. But But many of the reports came back to say but also there's there's big people there. Yes, they're like giants, and we seem small to them because we are small. And so they began to doubt whether God has really given them this land. And so if we're able to find in our slides, let's look at verse 30. It should say but Caleb but Caleb tried to quiet the people because what are they doing? They're grumbling and they're complaining. And you really have two figures in the story that are saying, no, no, we can take it God has given us this land and it's gonna be Caleb and Joshua. But Caleb tried to quiet the people as they stood before Moses. Let's go it wants to take the land. He said we can certainly conquer it. But the other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. We can't go up against them. They are stronger than we are. So they spread

it spread rumors

and so they they struggle, they spread this bad report about the land among the Israelites. The land we traveled through annex

Lord will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we saw were huge. We even saw giants. They're the descendants of aina. Next to them, we felt like grasshoppers. And that's what they thought too. So then the people began to rebel, the whole community began weeping aloud. And they cried all night, their voices rose in a great course of protests against Moses and Aaron. Remember, that's his brother. If only we had died in Egypt, or even a year in the wilderness, they complained. Why is the Lord taking us to this country, only to have his die in battle, our wives and our little ones will be carried off as plunder wouldn't be better for us to return to Egypt. Then they plot in among themselves. Let's choose a new leader and go back to Egypt. The Moses and Aaron fell facedown on the ground before the whole community of Israel, to the men who had explored the land Joshua, Sam Nunn, and Caleb, son of Jephunneh, Torah, their clothing, they said to all the people of Israel, the land we traveled through and explored is a wonderful land. If the Lord is pleased with us, He will bring us safely into the land and give it to us. It is a rich land flowing with milk and honey, do not rebel against the Lord. And don't be what afraid. Don't be afraid of them. Don't be afraid of the people. And then they only help us pray to us. They have no protection, but the Lord is with us. Don't be afraid of them. But the whole community began to talk about stoning Joshua and Caleb, than the glorious presence of the Lord appeared to all the Israelites at the tabernacle. And the Lord said to Moses, how long will these people treat me with contempt? Will they never believe me, even after all the miraculous signs I have done among them. It always goes back to that, that we ought to be people who can trust God and have faith in God because He has shown up before in our lives. And that's how we have to think about this even in our own lives. How many times have we doubted the goodness and the favor of God, even though we've seen the goodness in favor of God in our lives or in our family's lives? So we have to tell ourselves, these stories over and over again or otherwise, we'll be just like, these people, when they hear the report that it's big. Yes, it's what God promises. And yes, he told us that we can have this land, but oh, my gosh, they're just so big. And so at the same time, you can see that they are going to pay the repercussions for their disobedience, you're gonna see that the Lord contemplates destroying all of them with the plague and, and starting over with Moses and creating a whole new nation. And it's interesting, Moses, his prayers, He doesn't stop and say, no, no, I don't destroy the people. The they're just they're just awful little bit or, you know, you know, they're really good people or whatever. No, he says, Listen, Lord, this is how Moses prays. He says, he says, What will people say of you and your name and your glory, when you want your prayers to be answered, when you are desperate for God's ear, and whatever it is, you and I got going on in our life, we've got to angle our prayers to God's glory, His name and His fame. And so he begins Moses to pray and say, No, don't destroy these people. Because your name, your fame, and your glory is at stake. And that's exactly where God wanted Moses prayers to go. And of course, he relents his anger, and he doesn't destroy them. But he says they will pay the repercussions. We don't like it. There's always a consequence for our disobedience, and we don't like it. But there's always consequences for us staying stuck in our fear worrying and anxiety, I go back to my first point, that it may not be your own eyes fault, for the lot that we're in it may have been given to us. Let's just say it, let's just say it was all given to us. But now what are we going to do? What are we going to do with the fact that that we're struggling with depression and anxiety issues inside the church and outside the church? How are we then can going to respond. And you can see that the consequences for them not walking in the ways that God had had for them, he didn't destroy them. But he said, all of you who are adult age, you're going to wander in the desert and other 40 years, your children will get the opportunity to go into the Promised Land, but you won't because of your faithlessness. And I'll spare Caleb and Joshua, they're gonna be real old. Now by the time they get into the promised land. But for the rest of y'all, you will wander and you will die. Right here in the desert now your children, I'll take care of them and make sure they go into the Promised Land. We don't like to think that way. But there are consequences for us staying stuck in our fear, worry and anxiety. What are we to do? How are we to think second point I wants to see this morning is that love conquers fear. I'm going to I'm going to kind of explain what I mean by this. This is a verse from the book of First, John, but just that concept, because oftentimes, I think why I'm so afraid, and I'll just speak about my own experience when I think about why I struggled to move forward and what God has for me to do out of what I call legitimate concerns, and we'll talk about those in a minute. Is that I'm to say

Duck staring and looking at my own problems. I almost call it navel gazing. I don't know what word you have for that it's literally where you're you're thinking about your own stomach your own problems you're staring at, well, what about me God? And what about this? What about, you know, my concern for for my money and my food and my comfort in it, just what does it all become about? And how do we then combat that? And we can't combat that was saying, well, just don't think about yourself so often, is you combat that biblically, I think by saying, Okay, well, God, you've called me to love. And if I step out in faith and just choose to love, like you loved me, then what you'll see is that these these fears, these worries, these anxieties, these concerns, they grow dimmer and dimmer and dimmer and the reason why they've come to the forefront of our our stomachs or our minds is that because we fed them, we fed these things in our mind. And so what are we going to do? Love conquers fear. This comes from the book of First John, chapter four, beginning in verse seven. It says this, dear friends, let us continue to love one another for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love. You may have heard that before. God showed us how much he loved us by sending His one and only Son the world so we may have eternal life. This is real love, not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent his son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friend, since God loved us this much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us and His love is brought in full expression in us. And God has given us His spirit as proof that we live in him, and he and us. Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes, and now testify that the Father sent His Son to be Savior of the world all declare that Jesus is the Son of God, have God living in them, and they live in God, and we know how much God loves us. And we have put our trust in His love. God is love, and all who live in love living God, and God lives in them. And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. And so we will not be afraid on the Day of Judgment, that we will face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world. Verse 18. This is the one I wanted to highlight for us. Such love has no fear, because perfect love, expels all feared, if we are afraid in severe punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced His perfect love. We love each other because he first loved us. That's verse 19. last verse, last two verses if and when someone says I love God, but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar for we don't love people. If we don't love people, we can see how can we love God whom we cannot see. And he has given us this command, those who love God must also love their fellow believers. So how does this get all out of whack in your life in mind, I can only speak from my own experience, but I also see it and other's lives as well. It's when we begin to say good things like, Okay, I just want this, whatever it is, I want, I want this job, I want this paycheck, I just I want her love or I want his love. And then what ends up happening is somehow that was just was a desire that could be good or bad, kind of morally neutral, we would say all sudden becomes a need. Okay? No, no, I don't just want this, I need this. Now, keep in mind what give me some examples that, okay, so if you say, Okay, I just want a spouse or someone to love and to take care of me, that's a good desire. And it's like, okay, but I need her or him to make sure that when I come in the door, that my socks are this way, or my shoes, or this way, or my food is prepared or fixing this way, or that the kids are acting a certain way or this picked up a certain layer, whatever it is, all of a sudden, we've taken a good desire or maybe even a morally neutral desire a want, which may be why we even got married or why we called someone into our lives and say, No, now all of a sudden, I need this. And when it goes to that, not only does it go from a need, it'll eventually kind of go to a demand. I don't know if you've ever been there, where all of a sudden you take something that you thought was good and beautiful and and you've now distorted it, because you've gone from it's nice to desire this or want this to now I need this like that means I need it to survive or to take my next steps to I demand this no, this is me, like I deserve this. And I've done this so then I deserve this. What are we doing what we're doing that we are playing into this, this fear, worry and anxiety, and we're thinking about what I need versus what I give, we can do this in social settings. How many of us don't raise your hand I can say I'm guilty of this where you sort of keep track of like, okay, who's paying for what when we go out, it's always him or her? That's a

It's a moocher. That's a loafer, and they never pay their their fair share. Or maybe you're the one that's kind of a moocher lover, you're like, I don't see any problem with this, I'm living a good life. But, but it's just that idea of if you and I play the game of trying to make sure it's sort of fair, even at the end of the day, or to make sure even worse that we that we're getting more than we give, we will continue to be plagued in the cycle of, of fear, worry and anxiety, why because we'll always be concerned and consumed with what I didn't get, instead of what I did get, or even more. So what I'm trying to say is, we'll not be concerned about what I can give you. And I know that when we're giving and when we're loving. And when we're serving, we're literally taking our eyes off of ourselves, our own problems, our own stomach, our own nasal gazing. And we're out there on our knees serving or doing something for someone else, we're loving someone else, we're looking outside of ourselves, and we're looking towards someone else and their needs, and we're moving towards their needs. That sort of love that we can have for one another. That is what will help combat these fears. Why? Because we're stepping out on faith. And we're saying, Lord, I'm not sure how you're gonna use, you know, these dollars to make a difference in this nonprofit or in this church, but I'm gonna step out in faith and give that over to your Lord, I'm not sure how you're going to use me and on the football team or on the baseball team to you know, I just bring snacks or or I'm just, I'm just the measly one who's second string are where I'm not sure how you want to use me for joining and bar to this gym, or I'm not sure how you want to use me, Lord for being a part of this office. But when we begin to have eyes of faith, and we just begin to say, I don't know why you have me here, God, but I'm gonna get about the business of loving, I'm going to get about My Father's business, because that's what Christians do. Christians love others, then you and I will find that the things of earth will go strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace that will begin to move forward and what God has for us, there will always be, there will always be an imbalance. And what happens is, is that we have to seek a better path to love others more. Always, even if he goes too far, I was reading a commentary this week, it says always even strive to have an imbalance in your heart, where the desire to love out distances our desire to be loved. I think that's a great challenge for us this morning here, what I'm saying are that I read and thinking about this issue, that we actually turn it on its head and that we strive for an imbalance in our heart, a desire to love outdistance, our desire to be loved. And I just asked, what choice do we have? Because we've all been down that path of get or getting while the getting's good, or make sure I can take what I can out of him or her out of this relationship or out of this situation. And then what ends up happening, we're still left with the same fear, worry, anxiety, just angst in our heart, when it's all said and done. And I've used this image before, but it's just that spiraling out of control in our fear. And this is what happens for all of us when we give ourselves over to these kinds of desires. And we say, All right, I hear you Pastor, I hear you preacher, but but I think I'm just going to keep on because what we begin to say is, well, I don't want to be, I don't want to be a doormat, okay, I don't want you to be a doormat, either. There's ways to push back in love to say, hey, I don't want to be talked to or treated that way. So so I'm not talking about being a doormat or abuse. Or even as I say, why I don't want to power up over people. I don't want to, you know, I don't want to go overboard and love. I don't want people to be like, Oh, that's one of him or her. They they lavish too much, you know, gifts or praise or whatever ain't gonna happen. Like, you can't outgive God, you can't be one of those people were like, oh, here, here comes him or her. They just always want to love me. They just always want to invite me over to their house. And when I get over there, they feed me good food, and they're nice to me. And you know, they make me want to come back next time. But

then people, it's like, no, that's not gonna happen. Right? And so I just think that we need to, we need to have faith, we need to trust the Lord. And he said, Well, what choices you have, we know where this path leads, that we desire to control our relationship, or our or our money or this situation. And, and then we realized that Newsflash, we're not really in control. So then we experienced fear, and then we try to control it again. And this is where we've all been, and we've all lived here for seasons at times in our life, haven't we? Anger, isolation, depression.

And that's what I was trying to say. Even if you're a young person in this room, or you have young people that you have carryover. It's, you know, it's not okay what what maybe occurred, but we can by faith, go down different paths. Because we don't need to be stuck in this anger, isolation and depression because eventually our lives are spinning out of control. And that leads to more efforts to control and we do

Start back where we began. On reaches the final Psalm for the day, Psalm 34. And it really gives us I think, hope as we think about a vision for what God may have for us, as a community of believers in this community and throughout the entire world. Psalm 34. And we'll read the whole Psalm in its entirety. You can follow along if you have a Digital Bible or paper Bible it's going to be the New Living Translation says this. I will praise the Lord at all times. I will constantly speak His praises, I will boast only in the Lord, Let all who are helpless take heart comm let us tell the Lord's greatness. Let us exalt his name together. I prayed to the Lord and he answered me, he freed me from all my fears. Those who look to him for help will be radiant with joy, no shadows, shame will darken their faces. In my desperation, I prayed and the Lord listened. He saved me from all my troubles. For the angel of the Lord is a guard he surrounds and defends all who fear Him, taste and see that the Lord is good. Oh, the joys of those who take refuge in Him. Fear the Lord you his godly people, for those who fear Him, will have all that they need. Even young, strong young lions sometimes go hungry, but those who trust in the Lord will like no good thing. Come my children listen to me and I will teach you to fear the Lord is anyone who wants to live a life that is long and prosperous than keep your tongue from speaking evil and your lips from telling lies. Turn away from evil and do good search for peace and work to maintain it the eyes of the Lord watch over those who do right. His ears are open to their cries for help. But the Lord turns his face against those who do evil. He will erase their memory from the earth. The Lord hears his people when he calls to him for help. He rescues them from all their troubles. The Lord is close to the brokenhearted, you may find yourself just overwhelmed by some of these things and just brokenhearted not even sure how you ever to get out that even the fear and anxiety just weighs heavy, heavy on you and your chest. He rescues those whose spirits are what crushed. The righteous person faces many troubles but the Lord comes to rescue each time. For the Lord protects the bones of the righteous, not one of them is broken, calamity will surely destroy the wicked, and those who hate the righteous will be punished. But the Lord will redeem those who serve him. No one who takes refuge in Him will be condemned a lot of good stuff in their church, a lot of things you may want to mark in your Bible or on your notes. If you have to take notes digitally and say, Man, I need to go back and really contemplate this. I could have also said instead of Love conquers fear, I could have made the second point. Fear the right thing. Fear the right person, fear of the right one. And that whole idea of fear of the Lord is beginning of wisdom. You may have heard that from Proverbs, but also fear of the Lord really pushes out that fear worry and anxiety that we have it was brought up in the book of First John is brought up again here in Psalm 34, the psalm of David where he understands that God will not be mocked, He will make all things right. And that we are a people who have tasted and seen that the Lord is good. Are you there yet, church, I want us to be there. So here's my third and final point, something greater is going on here.

And we know one thing is about experiencing God's love and also just then loving others. We can't take that from someone else. We can't hijack it from them. Does that make sense? Like like you and I, when we go are around amazing athletes or amazing leaders, just by being in their very presence, we don't hijack their skills. And all of a sudden, I'm an amazing, you know, basketball player, baseball player or soccer player, whatever that is. I'm not just an amazing leader or CEO, because I'm around someone else who's an amazing leader, or C and CEO. It's that whole idea that we have to experience God's love first. So we have to be transformed. And then we have to actually figure out how to walk in him. And around this room, God's calling us to do all these different things. We're all at different places in our spiritual life and spiritual walk. But here's what I know. Everything can become an opportunity for you and me to trust him more. Everything. Everything can become an opportunity for you and I trust him more. That's why we don't have to get to the root bottom of why am I so anxious? I'm so worried. Oh, so why am I so downcast? We may need to and that's why I was saying use friends, counselors or others. But at the end of the day, it doesn't matter whether you started it or someone else started it to you. You have now an opportunity. I now have an opportunity to trust him more and to love Him more something greater is going on here. I want to get in on it. I don't want to stay stuck. I don't want you to stay stuck.

First pray

Father I thank you for your word.

I thank you how you don't leave us that you give us truth you give us friends you give us family you give us community.

Father right now as

was the think about this room and I think about

multiple people who are struggling

myriad of ways. But these issues of fear, worry and anxiety father, I just pray you bring

you bring calm hearts, that you bring just trust and love and favor.

That maybe many of us have never even known or experienced yet up to this point in our Christian life.

Father, what choice do we have we know and believe you are good. And that because you love us, we're free to love and tomorrow I pray for others in this room that need to just be nudged towards ways they can love their neighbor more their spouse more their kids more, their city more. Probably give us just

Hope and Grace.

Because we've been shown so much as these things in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much. Yes. So we're gonna be talking about fear, worry and anxiety over the next several weeks. And, you know, one of the things that is true and even as I discovered about myself, as I was studying through this is that we all have it, even if we think we don't, we all have different degrees. And I get that, and we'll talk about that and different symptoms. But we all have it, because what we believe and what we think and how we respond to this issue of anxiety, and it's sometimes called fear or worry, it tells us what we believe about the future. Because that's really what worrying is, isn't it? It's, it's, it's over concern. It's maybe thoughts about the future, it's letting our mind run amok. And so it reveals something about us, it reveals what we trust in how we process and think through the future as it relates to these topics, fear, worry, and anxiety. It tells us something about what we value, what we think and ultimately what we believe. Now the idea of fear, it really goes back to all the way when we were a little kid. So in other words, even if you and I came from good, stable households, and you know that somebody kept us away from all the scary, you know, cartoons and movies, even as a little one, we would have been scared of something, we would have heard some sort of thump or noise in the dark, we would have still maybe wondered like, where is my nightlight? Where is my comfort? Because why we didn't have to learn it. We didn't have to be told even though there might have been things that fanned the flame of fear in our hearts, whether it was older brothers or sisters or cousins about, you know, something scary in the basement or in the dark or whatever. But it was always there. Then pretty early on, we began to see it and maybe the cartoons we watch whether it was Scooby Doo, or maybe it was Winnie the Pooh. And so I'm gonna throw up a pic that I remember early on his little piglet. Remember a little piglet, such a worrier, we just call him like a worrywart just someone who was always worried sometimes he he would even have a twitch in his ear in his eyes, or even he would stutter over his words. Because while he was always concerned about what was right around the corner, or what tomorrow may bring, as adults, we're not much better we have all kinds of things in society that we're scared of, or that we have a phobia of, I'm gonna kind of list a couple that I thought of that are sort of out there. Common fears are fear of heights, fear of snakes I went by get scared in the room. So please, these are just example some of y'all like it's so on the surface, like you can literally feel your blood pressure rising, flying, some some of y'all may be scared of flying some you may be scared of the dark. These are phobias, needles, cancer, whether it's in yourself or those you love. baldness, right? So we want to stay, we're gonna stay looking good. getting fat, germs, dentists, crowds or water. And I was specific because swimming because I've never known anybody who was actually scared of like water, like I couldn't drink it or whatever. But the idea of like, so there's, there's people that maybe you know, you don't want to go swimming, you don't want to get in a boat, you don't want water separating between you and land, that kind of thing. So we understand that, that fears and phobias. They're out there. Now we have to ask ourselves, why is that? What is it about these things? And what is it about us that makes us think believe or even like process that even go down that path of fear. If we need admiration for our attractiveness, in other words, that's something that we are overly concerned or consumed with, we will fear getting fat. If we need love, we will fear rejection. If we need comfort, we will fear what physical pain if we need approval from others, we will fear being critical criticize. So these things can sort of come out in all kinds of ways. Alright, we're talking a little bit about some physical manifestations of fear. And keep in mind that sometimes we physically respond to situations whether they are truly of danger or not, right? I mean, you've known this in yourself, or in other words, that that you'll respond a certain way, even if there's no real danger. I mean, the easiest way to see this is if you're in a theater or at your home, watching a scary movie, and something like jumps around the corner, you don't know what's coming, you're really going to respond, even though there's no truth to that. Or maybe you're scared of one of these things that the majority of the population is not. And so it is a real fear. It is a real physical thing that happens inside of you to a perceived danger or real danger. But just throw some things out. That might be a clue to some of the fears you and I might have dreams can be a clue. And have you ever thought about this? If you've had a recurring dream or a dream, where you wake up in panic, maybe you haven't turned something in at work or you haven't done this or you haven't talked to this person or you're afraid of someone maybe finding out something or speaking and so dreams can sometimes be a clue Have some sort of fear worry or anxiety, you have already talked a little bit about physical cues, or stress that can make you respond physically in all kinds of ways. We all have different ways that we respond and have physical manifestations of anxiety and depression. Sometimes it creeps up. In other words, just like just like anxiety, I don't think anybody says, Hey, I'm waking up today, please, Lord, give me an extra dose of anxiety, I'd love to worry about some more things today. That's not how we think about it. That's not how we often think about anger or depression, either. It just creeps in, it creeps up like anxiety. You and I don't ask to be angry or depressed or anxious. But if you find yourself saying things like, I can't take it anymore, or things are spinning out of control, or underneath all this pain is terror, which is, in other words, saying I'm scared or you find yourself angry? Why do sometimes we get angry I mean, we talked through the book of James about a year ago. But I want to remind us James chapter four verses one and two says this, what is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don't they come from the evil desires at war within you what you want, what you don't have, so you skim and kill to get it, you're jealous of what others have, but you can't get it. So you fight and wage war to take it away from him from them yet you don't have what you want, because you don't ask God for it. So we're even seeing that, that our fear and anxiety and our calls to sort of take the reins or take over control or get things done our way, my way is sometimes, or even oftentimes, especially for mowing other people over to do it. Because we're fearful or anxious about something, think about this in terms of superstitions. Again, sometimes we make fun of these, whether you got to sit a certain place, or wear a certain shirt or have a certain way that you touch a, you know, the doorframe of your house, or all these kinds of things, or maybe a certain creature figure that you have in your house, that you're really superstitious. Why because you are overly concerned about the future. And you think that by doing some sort of outward act, that you're somehow going to affect the future. Why would you even do that, because you're worried about it. Now every age has it. Every Age has fear, worry and anxiety. But I will say this, the dial in our hearts and in our lives can be turned up by certain surroundings. In other words, think about this. I mean, one of the things that you know, I'm not going to promise in a series like this, because it's just not true on this side of heaven is that we'll no longer you know, struggle with anger or fear, or depression or those kinds of things. But what we can do and what the subtitle of our series is, is breaking the cycle of fear, worry and anxiety, I think that can be true, and in fact, should be true for those of us who are Christ's followers. And that's what I'm gonna really seek to do in this series. But I want to be honest, that that one of the things that we can do is the dial can be turned up on fear, worry and anxiety, if we have certain tensions, or we have certain stressors, and we have certain things going on in our lives or in our culture. There's certain things that can turn the dial up of anxiety in our lives in our hearts. But also what's true is there are things that we can do that we can control, some things are outside of our control, we realize that there's other things that we can do to turn the dial down on these issues of fear, worry and anxiety. But let's just talk about some things that are going on, even though every age has it. What are some things going on right now that may have caused us extra angst and anxiety that may be needed or necessary. First thing I wanna throw up is a book that came out in the last 30 days that he was on Domeier just talking about these kinds of issues with children. He is not a believer. He's a psychologist, he teaches at New York University. And we're going to I'll probably quote some more out of this book throughout the series. But one of the things that he talks about in the very beginning his premises he wants to help us get not as a he's not a believer whatsoever. He wants to help us as a psychologist in the West, I think through these issues of smartphones and children because of the anxiety issues that we all know, I don't even have to give stats on that. But here's his solution. He has a four part solution. Number one,

he says no smartphones before high school. I've talked about some of these things before I think they are biblical things that can be helpful to us. Okay. No smartphones before high school, no social media before 16, which, as you're probably aware of California just passed that law, maybe Florida as well. I'm not sure he pushes for phone, free schools, which I think are important. I know that even in our school, I think a couple of years ago it wasn't and this year it has been and that's been really helpful that it goes in the backpack in the morning and it's not pulled out again until school is over. And then the last one which I thought I wasn't I was a little surprised that this I mean, in my gut, I knew this would probably be true, but he says it's so interesting. He says for children this is under the age of 18 Far more unsupervised play in childhood independence. He says that these four things kind of put together will just help us put a dent in fear, worry and anxiety in our young people in our children. And so maybe I've said this before, you know, my wife and I, we made some decisions on some of these issues early on, and smartphones were holding off all the way until three months before college, and we're going to train all our kids how to get on social media, and they're gonna just think us that they have zero pictures of themselves on social media from zero to 17 and a half. We taught them from a young age that tablets and smartphones were for adults. And so we've tried to keep that at bay. And, you know, again, I told you that our schools kind of move there. But one of the things we may not realize is you think, well, not my school pastor, what am I supposed to do? Well, the power is in us. In other words, like, if enough of us in our school begin to speak up and say, Hey, I don't want my kids assignments, texted to him in class anymore. I want them to be done the old fashioned either print it off or email it to him. So they can receive it after hours. And this unsupervised play, I can, I can tell you for my wife and I and even for many of y'all around the room, I can I can, I can feel the angst coming up inside of you, right, whether it's bike riding, or whether it's, you know, having a fire pit, or whatever it is that a soccer weight, maybe at the park. And so you're just trying to figure out and I know, this isn't easy, but I think there's just studies after studies that show that somehow under our care, our children have to figure out how to sort of manage themselves and sort of work through issues so that they are less anxious. Number two, I want you to see up here, this is true about us as adults, the World Health Organization, and we can talk about that politically or not, that doesn't really matter. This is just a study that they did that COVID 19 pandemic triggers 25% increase in prevalence of anxiety and depression worldwide. Okay. So I know we have people from all over the world here, worldwide. And as you notice here, the World Health Organization, you can see the snake wrapped around that. As you know, that course points to Moses himself when he talked about that in the first five books of the Bible, and Jesus picks that up, too. So that's just talking about World Health Organization, probably no surprise there. And then the third thing I want us to see is just isolation and lack of community. And again, it was already going on pre COVID. But But COVID sort of sped this up. And I am telling you the reason why I'm so glad that we're gathered here today, and that we try to do more and more things, whether it's having meals together. And I know we had communion together. But even serving together and having, you know, fellowship around Bible study or life groups, whatever we want to call them, or even things that we're doing at Western Playland. All of this is to push us towards community because nothing is going to push us towards community right now, with the rise of some technological things, but we know we need it desperately. Everything is showing that church attendance and community involvement and civic organizations are in a freefall downward. And so one of the things we have to tell ourselves is, we need it, it's good for us even when we don't want to do it. So I'm so glad that you're here today. But but we have to tell ourselves when I don't feel like being around other people, when I don't feel like going to church, I don't feel like serving out of a empty tank or whatever it is, we tell ourselves, do it. Especially so right. I mean, even as even as your pastor, there's times that I don't want to get up and do something, whether it's worked out or you know, come to church or come to worship or whatever. But I do because I know it's good for me. And we've got to get back to just some healthy sort of seeking out community and in pushing away from isolation, no matter how much we want to just kind of go get in a corner and put our head down it is killing us and of course, adding to our fear, worry and anxiety. Well, let's get to some scripture. Psalm 56 Is, is really, really good at sort of helping set a base and a foundation. I love this psalm. I've been looking at this Psalm and thinking about it for years in terms of this issue of fear, worry and anxiety. We'll begin in verse one again, chapter 56 of the book of Psalms. Oh, God have mercy on me. For people are hounding me, my foes attack me. All day long. I am constantly hounded by those who slander me, and many are boldly attacking me. So just think about that again. Just you just don't have you ever been there where you felt this at work or at school or in your own home? Verse three, but when I am afraid, I will put my trust in you. I praise God for what He has promised I trust in God. So why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me? Now, there are some verses in scripture that are worth highlighting worth underlining, worth writing down on through a five card or sticking out and putting on your mirror or putting on the dash of your car? This would definitely be two verses that would be when I'm afraid I will put my trusty You praise God for what He has promised, I trust in God. Why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me? They're always twisting what I say they spend their days plotting to harm me. They come together to spy on me watching my every step, eager to kill me. Don't let them get away with their wickedness in your anger, oh, God, bring them down. You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle, you have recorded each one in your book, my enemies will retreat when I call to you for help. This I know God is on my side, I praise God for what He has promised. Yes, I praise the Lord for what he has promised. I trust in God. So why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me, I will fulfill my vows to you, oh, God, and will offer a sacrifice of thanks for your help. For you, you have rescued me from death, you have kept my feet from slipping. So now I can walk in your presence, oh God in your life, giving light, just beautiful psalm that we can just kind of roll over our hearts. And oftentimes, we don't like to think about the idea of of us and them or enemies and all that. But it's very real in the Scriptures. And if you've ever been surrounded, or in an unjust situation, verses like this have new meaning in your heart. But let's get to our first point this morning that when I am afraid, I will trust in you many of us just need to just to start there, that we understand that that there are things coming our way that we can't control. We're giving our teenager keys where we're fearful that we're not going to have a check next month that we're fearful of not having a significant other or whatever it is fearful that dad's going to go off the rocker get me whatever it is, but that we find ourselves saying, Lord, when I am fearful, and I'm fearful, and I'm scared, I'm worried, I have anxiety. I'm just going to do this, I'm going to trust in you. I'm gonna have faith in you that you think well, this is a Somis psalm of David, he needs some sort of super Christian we just got done talking about him in First Samuel? No, no think about this, that when this was written, they didn't even have the full scriptures, not just the rest of the Old Testament. But of course, no, none of the New Testament. And really, more importantly, there's no indwelling of the Holy Spirit when this was written, says we look back on this, there are ways in which the Lord could use these truths of verses like this. To really let these things kind of sink in Jesus all the time talks about fear not, don't be afraid, God Himself, fear not, do not be afraid. My favorite verses from the book of Luke chapter 12, verse 32. So don't be afraid, little flock, I think about that. Just the the intimacy, the care the love that Jesus has for us. It says, Don't be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father's good pleasure, or he gives your father great happiness to give you an idea of the kingdom. It's the same thing that we do when we say, you know, don't run with scissors to our little kids, it's that care that we have, we're not trying to come down on them, we're not trying to punish them. We're saying these things because we care about them. And this is exactly what our Father in heaven is doing. Now, when it comes to these kinds of things, fear, worry and anxiety, there's all kinds of opportunities for it to creep up. And one of the things that we don't like, is we often and I'll just speak for myself, and our natural tendency, we don't like it that God waits to the last minute to come through for us. I don't know if you're like this, but when I think about my prayer life, and I think about my own personal life, I think God, could you just come through a little bit earlier. And whatever it is, maybe it's a job, maybe it's a financial situation, maybe it's a relational situation. And so you and I are thinking, can you just go ahead and fill up? You know the storehouse? Can you go ahead and just make up the bank account, get it, get it quite large, and then I'll be ready to step out God, I'll

be ready to do what you have for me. We've already referenced in communion, the story of Moses, and I think about the Israelites when they were coming out. And you remember that, again, they were going out to worship on Mount Sinai. And if you remember the story, in Exodus 14, they're leaving quite quickly in and there's ways that they could have gone around the Red Sea, but God called them to go straight towards the Red Sea. So then it would be a trap for Pharaoh to come after them. So we're gonna pick up the story today, in verse 11 of chapter 14. And this is what the people are beginning to say when they realize that Moses has led them to a place right in front of the Red Sea, and that Pharaoh and his chariots are coming after them. They said to Moses, why did you bring us here to die in the wilderness? Weren't there enough graves for us in Egypt? What have you done to us? Why did you make us leave Egypt? Didn't we tell you this would happen while we're still in Egypt? We said Leave us alone. Let us be slaves to the Egyptians. It's better to be a slave in Egypt tend to be a corpse in the wilderness. But Moses told the people don't be afraid. Just stand still. And watch the Lord rest. You you today. Just just one of those things where the Lord is just using Moses. And he goes on he says that the Egyptians go in the Egyptians you see today will never be seen again, the Lord himself will fight for you. Again, this, this idea of just stay calm. If you know this story at all, God Himself parts, the Red Sea, they go through on dry land, and then what happens afterwards what happens after the people of God escaped through the Red Sea, the chariots of Pharaoh go after them. And what ends up happening is that even though the people of God are able to go through on dry land, that God in His mighty power, unleashes his judgment on the Egyptians. And it says, At the end of this chapter, in verse in chapter 14, the people were filled with all and they put their faith in the Lord and in His servant, Moses. The second point I wants to see this one is that the Lord will come through. Man, I am telling you, I have testimony after my life over and over again, when I felt like my back was up against the wall. And I felt like I couldn't take one more step forward. And the people of God, same thing the Lord will come through. Oftentimes, though, we think we got to help God out. We think we got to grumble and complain, we think we got to, you know, have fear, worry and anxiety, and the Lord is telling us, just wait, calm down, have faith in me. And I'll take care of you. Do you believe me? Do you believe I'll take care of you. That's what God's saying to me and to you. He's saying, I'm gonna do it. And I can tell you, this has been true in my life. I have asked, Lord, why don't you just make it a lot easier for me and my family? Why don't you just just make a lot lot easier so that I don't have to depend on the last moment for you to come through for me, and Lord has just told me over and over, it's okay. It's enough. I've got you. And I will come through. I go on a little bit later in the book of Exodus 16. And the people feel like, man, God, you've abandoned me again. And so you get to Exodus 16. And beginning in verse one, it says this right here, that the whole community of Israel set out this is a couple of chapters later, from Elam and journeyed into the wilderness is sin between Elam and Mount Sinai. So this is kind of the wilderness wondering if you know that about the story. They arrived there on the 15th day of the second month, one month, so just one month after leaving the land of Egypt, there to the whole community of Israel complained about Moses and Aaron, if only the Lord had killed us back in Egypt, they mound there, we sat around pots filled with meat, and we ate all the bread we wanted. But now you have brought us into the wilderness to starve us all to death. Then the Lord said to Moses, look, I'm going to rain down food from heaven for you each day that people can go out and pick up as much food as they need for that day. I will test them in this to see whether or not they will follow my instructions. On the sixth day, they will gather food, and when they prepare it, there'll be twice as much as usual again, because it's the Sabbath day, and they're not to work on what they put on the Sabbath or not to work on the Sabbath day, in the Jewish Old Testament here. And this is amazing that God already is saying yes, even in their grumbling or complaining or what worried pneus I mean, they're straight up worried they're straight up saying we'd be better off back, you know, under slavery or dead. But here we are in God in His kindness. He says, this is important, though, you're going to trust me and how I bring this down. Because we often say no, this is how I want it. Lord, I've already told you some of the things I've thought when I talk to God, Hey, God, this has been nice this kind of this month, this amount this way. And he's saying no, no, you trusted me and all this. And I want to make sure you know how to follow my instructions. And he gives them bread. And that would have been enough that would have sustained them enough. But I want you to know that the Israelites still combined some more. Because they're still thinking about well, oh, yeah, now I've got bread. Well, what about some meat, and I love this about the Lord. And He does this over and over again in lives of Israelites and he'll do it again in our lives, is that he hears our cry, and he comes through with things that are even sweeter. He does this at the bitter water and Mora when he takes water, and not only makes it drinkable, but he makes it sweet and he does it right here with the people of God. When he says okay, you want to meet I'll make sure to have quail for you as well. So you'll have the morning dew and this this morning dew will be these these wafers, these flakes, these bread that are sweet like honey, and I'll make sure that quail come in the evening. But listen, you don't need to gather too much because it's only gonna be good for a day and some of you who didn't listen and it spoiled or you give you enough to make sure on the last day that that you'll have enough for the day after that. And guess how long the Lord does this. You think he does this just for a couple of weeks? Couple months? That would be really cool. No, he does this for 40 years. The Scripture say that their whole wilderness wandering he wants to teach the people of God I got you like that. You can really trust me, even when you freak out even when you're afraid. Even when What does fear worry and anxiety, do fear worry. And anxiety says it's really bad over there. Like, like, if you step out, it's gonna be really bad over there. That's what the spies did when they came back in and told those lies. Or even if they were truth, it didn't matter. They're telling you something that is contrary to God's word, or they're telling you something to get you riled up to get you fearful to get you anxious to get you worrisome. That's what fear worry and anxiety always does for your life in a mind, doesn't it? It tells you that what is over the horizon, you should dread so much. And even though God's taking care of you in the past, there's no guarantee that God will take care of you in the future. And that's just not true about our God at all. Is it? So here's my third and final question that we have to ask ourselves when we get into this sort of series, who holds the future? What do we really believe Life Church? What do we really believe at this question? Who holds the future we've already seen a classic him and amazing grace. There's one that's a little bit newer than that, but still before I was born, called because he lives. And this is the chorus. And because he lives this is because he lives I can face tomorrow, because he lives all fear is gone. Because I know he holds the future. Life is worth living just because he lives. And guys, I'm telling you, when we get into a series like this, and we get into the Bible, and we think about things, yes, I'm, I'm not going to promise you the moon that you and I will never have fear, worry and anxiety or question God again. But there is a real way that we can break the cycle in our lives and the lives of those under our care our loved ones. In this issue of fear, worry and anxiety, I want to throw up another image for you and or put up another image. And this is one of a spiral. I introduced this three or four years ago when I did a one off series on fear, worry and anxiety, but the think about how this happens for you and me. We desire to be in control. And we're going to tell ourselves, this is a good thing. Like I need to make sure my child doesn't get an accident. So I'm gonna lock the keys down and not you know, do the permanent thing and not do you know, the driving thing because I just can't handle I want to make sure so I'm gonna, I'm gonna desire to be in control, I'm gonna lock things down. Then what do you realize quite quickly in this world, and in this life, you aren't in control, then something happens, something goes wrong, something goes awry. And anything that we sort of try to try to clamp down, try to hold on to, then what do we do we experience fear. And so what do we do, then? None of this is turning to God, by the way, then we experience fear, then what do we do we try to control it again. Try a different way. Oh, I think I need to do it this way. Then what does this lead to? It leads to those three things I sort of introduced in the first part, anger, isolation, depression, we've all been there, we've all felt this, then all of a sudden, we find ourselves spiraling out of control. And so then we try to clamp down with more efforts of control. God has a better way for us.

I think about the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. This is in the book of Daniel. Well, I think of Daniel and Daniel in the lion's den. But there were other figures in that book and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego had Hebrew names. And it says in the scriptures that, that they were given the best education and the best things that the land of Babylon would have had to offer in its day. Yet they found themselves believers in the one true God, if you remember that story, that, that when they refuse to bow down to the idol, they're thrown into the fiery furnace. But before they're thrown in, do you remember what they say? They say, you know, our God is able to save us. But if he does not, we we will not serve your god or bow down to your idols. And I think that that's what we have to have whatever life throws at us, we have to have that kind of faith that says, I know it's gonna get rough. I know it's gonna get bad. And guys, we've done everything. We've been there when people get that cancer diagnosis. And we realize this is the end, my days are numbered, how are we going to process that? And we don't have a lot of choice other than to trust in the sovereign God, or rely on our own strength. And I'm telling you, Shadrach, Masonic and Bendigo. They give us great models here to say that, even if God doesn't heal me from this, even if God doesn't save me from the fire or this cancer yet, I will praise him. What are the choices that you and I have? You want to go down that that deep, dark hole of nothingness, or secularism or no belief at all. God reigns over the world, and it gives grace to people when they need it. That's also true. It's not just that God gives good things. He literally gives the grace in our hearts and in our hands and feet, right when we need it. He will deliver his people. But sometimes it's more sophisticated than we I understand. And I have testimony. And some of y'all may have testimony in the room where you thought it was really bad, because you got a bad performance review. And so now you're out on the street, or you got a pink slip or a boss, unrighteous Lee or unjustly ran you off of the job site, or you got in a bad accident and you lost your arm, or you lost your ability for whatever, or you saw a loved one die, or you have a bad marriage or a bad job. And what ends up happening is that when we trust God, and we hang with him long enough, it has shown for it that he had purposes and all that he had purposes and all that, and he will make it plain, and He will deliver us in ways that we don't fully understand. So it was that testimony on this side of heaven. We're like, I can't believe it, it was an awful situation. And God delivered me not have even better job. It was just awful situation. But God used the losing of my arm to bring me to faith. It was this awful situation. But God use that to really humble me to bring me to him to wake me up in my life or in my marriage. I think about Jeremiah 2911. We know that maybe as a believer if I know the plans I have for you. And it was possible to give you a hope and a future. And we often kind of, if we're not careful, we turn that on and says I got I know the plans I have for me, I know how to give myself a hope and a future. So I need you to bless this or I need you to do this for me. But God is always saying I'm gonna bring about my purpose, and it is going to be for your good for my good. And it's also gonna be about his glory, won't kind of end here and how I hope to help us in this series. And when I say us, I really do mean us when things you may not realize about biblical communicators, preachers, whatever you want to call us, is that we are getting the help that we need as well. We don't come up here as experts were people who are processing this, and God is working on us in these issues as well. And that's true for me in a series like this. But here's how here's how I think we'd get help in this series, I think we can hone our spiritual instincts that when we're anxious, we're going to be able to turn to Jesus rather than trusting our ability to solve or even deny those problems. I think we're also gonna get help in this series, when we want those promises His promises to go deep in our hearts, like that Psalm 56, that we can just we can begin to feel that not just know that but begin to feel it and begin to believe it true. When his promises go deep in our hearts. That's what's gonna help us through anything in this world, that we're gonna be less fearful and less anxious. And we're gonna be more content. Contentment is a great gift and hopeful. Right? Because when we're not content, and we're not full of hope, what are we come on? What are we, we're bitter. We're honoree we're really anxious, or depressed, angry when all these things were really fearful. And then finally, I think it'd be more confident. And I want this to be true for all of our lives and all these issues. But we're gonna be more confident that the Bible speaks meaningfully meaningfully to all the struggles of our life. Do we believe that church, we can hold on to these kinds of things, and we can walk through this life with real meaning real purpose. He doesn't make everything plain on this side of heaven. I get that. But that we can know that because he lives we can face tomorrow. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you that you didn't leave us wandering or wandering in the desert. But just like you fed the people of God for 40 years and provided for them as they trusted in you that you would provide for us as well. Father, we ask that you give us enough to have our daily bread. Give us enough grace to be able to have that difficult conversation. Give us enough grace and mercy to be able to bear up under whatever trial or temptation that we have. Father, we ask these things. We ask these things in your name and for your glory. Amen. He would just stand and sing with us before we head out today.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, we've already worship this morning and I just get the privilege of sort of shepherding us through the next few moments as we are concluding, really a week of celebration and mourning on Friday and learning new things on Thursday. And really, today, celebration day Resurrection Sunday. And so, we've had the privilege of walking those of y'all that joined us for our Monday, Thursday meal and even Good Friday service of walking us through the book of Luke, where we really started back on Thursday night talking about that feast of unleavened bread that was redefined for us as Christians and believers as the Lord's Supper, the last supper or what we now partake in, celebrate in communion, then Good Friday, it's really all about the cross and what was wrought for us there and what was bought for us there and really how God made a way that sinners that we are, to get back to him. Today, we're going to begin and end exactly where you think we would and Luke 24, talking about the resurrection. So I want to read these verses you can follow along with me, on the screen or in your own scriptures I'll be reading from the New Living Translation says this. But very early on Sunday morning, the women went to the tomb, taking the spices they had prepared, they found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance. So they went in, they didn't find the body of the Lord Jesus. As they stood there puzzled, two men suddenly appeared to them clothed in dazzling robes. The women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground. Then the man asks, Why are you looking among the dead for someone who is alive, he isn't here He is risen from the dead. Remember what he told you back in Galilee, that the Son of Man must be betrayed into the hands of sinful men and be crucified, and that he would rise again on the third day. Then they remembered that he had said this. So they rushed back to the tomb to tell his 11 disciples and everyone else what had happened. It was Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary, the mother of James and several other women who told the apostles what had happened. But the story sounded like nonsense to the men, so they didn't believe it. However, Peter jumped up and ran to the tomb to look, stooping. He peered in and saw the empty linen wrappings, then he went home again, wondering what had happened. We didn't have to wonder we know and it's gonna become clear later on first point this morning is that Jesus has risen. Jesus has risen. That is the good news. That's why we gather your Sunday and after Sunday, that's why we're gathered here today to celebrate that on this Easter mourn. But what does that mean? Just real practically? What does that mean? Because we hear that we understand that springtime and rising from dead, it's just new life and that things are coming for us. But what does it literally mean that Jesus was risen, or that he has risen? Well, I'm gonna throw up an image of probably something like this is what Peter saw the women first, but Peter saw when he went to look, and of course, he's still wondering, what happened is, I know, it's been very clear. And we're gonna see that later on. Jesus had talked about this, the, the angelic beings confirmed this. And the women's testimony confirms this. But this is what's going on here. So when we say that he is raised, and we're just really practically saying, as well as start here, because it's just real basic to our understanding of theology and everything else that we have in our lives moving forward, that he's not there, Jesus is out there in the grave that he is very much alive. And you cannot go to anywhere to find them that you might find these linens like Peter saw, and that the women were able to see. But that's what it means that he has risen from the dead quite practically, that he's not there anymore, that he is alive. And that means that we have hope for life. So let's continue on in our story in the book of Luke, it says this, that same day, to Jesus followers were walking to the village of Emmaus, seven miles from Jerusalem. And as they walked along, they were talking about everything that happened. And they talked and discussed these things. Jesus himself suddenly came and began walking with them, but God kept them from recognizing him. Jesus often does this in his resurrected state, he can reveal himself when he wants to. He asked them, What are you discussing so intently as you walk along? They stopped short sadness written across their faces, then one of them clear this replied, You must be the only person in Jerusalem who hasn't heard about all the things that have happened there the last few days. What things Jesus asked the things that happened to Jesus, the man from Nazareth, they said, he was a prophet who did powerful miracles and he was a mighty teacher in the eyes of God and all the people, but our leading priests and other religious leaders handed him over to be condemned to death and they crucified

I had him, we had hoped that he was the Messiah who had come to rescue Israel. All this happened three days ago. Then some women from our group of his followers read his tomb early this morning. And they came back with an amazing report, they said his body was missing. And they had seen angels who told them Jesus is alive, some of our men ran out to sea. And sure enough, his body was gone. Just as the women had said, that Jesus said to them, You foolish people, you find it so hard to believe all that the prophets wrote in the Scriptures wasn't it clearly predicted that the Messiah would have to suffer all these things before entering his glory? Then Jesus took them through the writings of Moses, and all the prophets, explaining from all the Scriptures, the things concerning himself. Second point I wants to see this morning is that all the Old Testament points to Christ. That's so key that's so important, because we now understand the Old Testament, through different lenses through different glasses. Every once in a while in Christianity, people will want to go to a to a rabbi, or to Jewish leaders in order to really understand who Jesus was and what he did. And although you can learn some historical things from Jewish teachers and Jewish rabbis, they have different ways of looking at it than we understand as Christians, Jesus was so clear now that you understand who I am, and that I'm the Messiah. Now that we look back, we can see that all the scriptures really pointed to Christ. What do I mean by this? Well, you go back to Genesis, the first five books of the Bible, historically, we understand that was written or compiled by Moses. So all the way back to Genesis, you see that? How did Genesis open up that God Himself created in six days? And what did you do on the seventh day, he rested? And that's why historically Israel would have had a Sabbath and even to this day, in the nation in the country of Israel, they have a Sabbath on Saturday, because that's the day that they recognize what God did in the Old Testament. But Jesus comes along and he says, What did I do? When did I rise from the dead? I rose on the first day of the week, behold, I'm doing something new. Yes, there was something going on in the Old Testament, for sure. But I'm there all the way through. Now you understand that? I'm the fulfillment of this. What was he talking about there? What does that mean to be fulfillment? What's going on there in Genesis in the opening five books of the Bible? Let's think about it. Genesis 315, that first what we call messianic promise, the first promise of the Messiah, that, that there would come one who would want who crushed ahead of Satan. Yes, it would bruises hill that would crush the head of Satan, that there would come one from the daughters of Eve that would do that. And so what you see there is Eve very early on when she gets pregnant has a child. She's wondering, is this the man and of course you see all throughout Genesis, you see all these crazy things that go on, to show us what to show us that the Messiah has not come. And that chaos reigns on the earth, sin really rains on the earth. And then you get to the end of Genesis and you find a, a people Israel in what they are in Egypt, by the time you get to the end of Genesis, in the opening pages of Exodus, the people of God are stuck in what bondage slavery? Why does God do this, so that we would understand what it means to be brought out of bondage and slavery. You guys understand that when we sing the songs that were understanding that, that there is a broken sinner in the room, and it's me. And that's why God had the people in bondage so long so that he could show his awesome power, amazing glory and lead them out of Egypt the same way that Christ has come to lead us out of sin, and darkness. So it all pointed to him. He said, What about other passages? Think about even still first five books in the Bible. They had set up what a tent or a tabernacle, God brought him out of Egypt to what just hang out, no to worship him. And they talked about on Mount Sinai and then went up there and he brought them out to worship, and how are they going to worship they're going to worship through a tabernacle or tent. Ultimately, they were going to build a permanent temple. We saw that with David's son, Solomon, but what goes on in this tabernacle and temple sacrifices. Why? Because there has to be a blood sacrifice for sin. Everyone knows that all cultures, all people groups, and all times realize that we do things that we know our own conscience condemns us for, and there's got to be payment or remission for that in all kinds of culture. And people groups and religions come up with all kinds of things. But God had set it up in the Old Testament in such a way to say that we're going to have the blood of turtle doves or lambs or bowls or goats, um, at least annually and sometimes more often than that to do what they your sin.

My sin is so heinous, that it has to be a blood sacrifice for sin. But all those things we understand now, because Jesus is going to show us and the author of Hebrews is going to show us were mere shadows of the reality, what's a shadow me when you're a young child, we're always fascinated with a shadow, whether it's from a lamppost or by the Sun itself, we're always sort of either looking at or chasing or moving real quick, we understand that the shadow is not the real thing. I'm the real thing. If I'm standing in front of a light or, or in front of the sun in a certain way, that's the same thing that the tabernacle in the temple, they were all mere shadows of the reality to come with Jesus Christ on the cross. But he doesn't end just with Moses, what does it say? It says, it takes them through the prophets. We've already gone through two chapters in the prophets this morning. Isaiah is so clear, there's a suffering servant, there's one who will come who will bear the weight of sin, even though there's no sin in him. And we could go to other passages. Nehemiah, we do all through the Minor Prophets, Daniel, all of these things are meant to show us we need a savior to take care of our sins. That's why when Jesus comes along, he's mainly concerned about that. They're concerned about a national revolution, or they're concerned about, hey, this guy can't walk, or she can't do this. It's like, wait, they need forgiveness from their sins. Yes, they need these other things, tangible things, I get that. But first and foremost, we need that. So that's what he was doing. Somehow, he was explaining through Moses through the prophets. Hey, guys, listen, all the Old Testament pointed to me. And that's how you need to understand what was going on there. The religious leaders, you're right, they didn't get it. And they turned Christ over to be condemned, crucified. But you're now able to get it. I love this picture I want to throw up here, this is an artistic rendition of a modern one, by a guy named Daniel Bunnell, we'll go ahead and throw up the, the the artistic rendition there. And this is called the road to Emmaus. Now this has been painted or etched multiple times, or last 100 years, I get that, but I like this one, this one is about artists who still live in 1955 was his birthday. And he really does a lot of stuff with with color and imagery, a lot of the road to Emmaus paintings that are famous come out of Europe, and I'm gonna, I'm gonna throw up a European painting later on. But a lot of those are just a reflection of what the artists were experiencing at that time. That's what we all do, right? When we get on our phones, and we sort of manipulate something on Instagram, and then put it up on our, on our screens to be to be displayed to the world, or when we actually sit down. And when we were a child, and maybe even older, and we paint something and we draw something, there is a piece of us in that, right. And oftentimes, we'll put in our paintings, or drawings or pictures, either how we see ourselves, or how we aspire to see ourselves, right, that's what we're always doing little touch ups and angles, and all of a sudden, all that. And so in the same way, you're gonna see in a lot of like European paintings that we, that we look at, and we sort of admire from a, from a contemporary world nightmare, like contemporary art perspective anymore, but a lot of what's in our art museums, if you look at me, like I don't think that's silly. Jesus looked or walked around, you're like, you're exactly right. It's the way people looked coming out of the Renaissance in Europe, because that's what we all do. But I like this one, because it allows us to use our imagination and picture ourselves on that road to Emmaus, because again, we understand if you go to Israel today that there's there's not a lot of greenery and trees, there's some but there's not a lot of green and trees, it looks very similar to what what we see here in the border land. And so this allows us to really focus on what needs to be focused on which is these two figures, these two images, walking with Christ and hearing these things. Can you imagine what it would have been like? They talk about it here in a minute. And so we'll continue on in our passage, verse 28. But this time, they were nearing a mass, right, so the miles outside of Jerusalem, and the end of their journey, Jesus acted as if he was going on. But they begged him stay the night with us since it is getting late. So he went home with them. And as they sat down to eat, he took the bread and blessed it. Then he broke it and gave it to them. Suddenly their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And at that moment, he disappeared. They said to each other Didn't our hearts burn within us as he talked with us on the road and explain the Scriptures to us. And within the hour, they were on their way back to Jerusalem. There they found the 11 disciples, right, because Judas betrayed Jesus at this point and the others who had gathered with them, who said, The Lord has really risen, he appeared to Peter and if you want to continue reading on you can see that that Jesus has a moment there with the 11 disciples and calls him to things and he ultimately ascends back to heaven, but I want to focus on the scene.

here this morning, and that is this, this breaking of the bread is breaking into bread that that's what Jesus chose to do. And, and we talked about already how we we do communion we break bread together because it's really a picture of what Christ is going to do with us in the last day. He broke bread with people while he was here on earth as what a picture of what he'll do with us in heaven. And so I told you, I would give you a European painting. That's probably one of my favorites. I've shown it here before. And that is the Supper at Emmaus. This isn't 1601. This is done by Caravaggio, if I'm not pronouncing that right, I'm sorry. He's an Italian 1601. It's in London, you can go see it today. But again, I told you that, of course, how does he How does he paint as he paints it as what people may have looked like, in that early Renaissance period. But the reason I want to show it to you is because I love the surprise on the two guys his faces. Because what he's trying to capture here is he's trying to capture that moment when we get it. It was like it was like all it took was was was eating that meal, the breaking of the bread. And all of a sudden they realize this is Jesus in front of us. Of course, he allows himself to be revealed to and it's not even about a moment that this lasts, right. That's why the artist is trying to captured here. And of course, again, he has food that would have been popular in Europe feast at the time. And all of a sudden, you see Jesus here. And he's he's teaching and even even the way that there's also religious when they kind of go like this. So that just tells you again, that he is the the religious figure with authority, something they would have thought of, again, around the Renaissance period. Now why don't why do I bring all this up? Because I want us to see our third and final point this morning. Does your heart burn within you when you hear Christ? Does your heart burn within you when you hear Christ? And I'm not just saying that you hear about Christ, or that you know the story. I assume if you're gonna come here on Easter that you're at least familiar enough to know that there was a man named Jesus and he was born and we celebrate that at Christmas. And then we recognize that His death, burial resurrection on Easter, okay, that those are the facts. But where do you find yourself in your heart when it comes to hearing Christ, again, not hearing about him, but actually hearing from him. That's what we have to ask ourselves. And that's why we have things on the calendar. And that's why he has seasons like Lent. And Easter comes around every year just to again, allow us to evaluate our hearts to say, God, what do you want to do in my life? And if my hearts grown cold, or it's gone, lukewarm, and that this is a time for us to evaluate that that's a problem, right? If you and I are hearing the scriptures read if we're trying to sing the songs or we're just seeing the lyrics of the songs or we find ourselves hearing from the Word of God from a communicator or reading the Bible on your own and you got nothing like you feel nothing. That's okay confess that to God, we all have seasons of, of dryness or coldness. But but in this moment, when they were with Jesus, something changed, something changed in their hearts and, and they talk about it, they talk about how their hearts are, are warmed or, or burning when they start to understand who Jesus is and what he's done for them. So I just have to ask you, does your heart burn within you when you hear Christ? He said, No. What do you mean by that? Pastor? Do you mean like literal audible, like God talking to me? And I often say no, it's louder than that. Remember, that's the way Jesus communicate things like, listen, it was all clear. In the Old Testament, you have all those scriptures, you can go back and read them or listen to them. And that God has already clearly communicated with you and with me what now? It's not just the Old Testament we have now we have the New Testament. And so when you and I hear from Christ, what do we do is that earlier at the 9am service, we had two baptisms. We had two baptisms. Here. I am telling you, anybody who is walking with Christ is no more special than you or me. It's just that they said yes. They said yes. They said, Yes, I'm gonna walk in that I'm gonna walk through that, no matter how difficult it be, no matter how many troubles I may have, that God has spoken to me and I want to be obedient in that. That's what it means to hear Christ is that he has already spoken clearly through His Word, obviously. Then he uses community friends, prayer, church, all those things together for us to want hear God and then we know how to walk then we can say, Okay, I want to walk in him. But if our hearts are indifferent, or cold or dry, we need to this is a time where we need to check ourselves to be like, man,

God do something because I don't want it to stay that way. I want to be like these, these men on the road to Emmaus, who

their hearts burned within them when they heard from Christ.

So when you hear, see believe, this Easter story, once again, we've talked about it, if you're in the room, you've probably got the facts down. But does your heart do anything? Are you moved to do anything, or we change in any way to walk in obedience to the degree that God has revealed Himself to you, we haven't talked about that in here around the room. And when we're listening later on different stages and parts of our journey, spiritual life, that is fine, perfect, God can handle all that. Don't worry about to the left and the right, or the front and behind. But just what is God showing you in whatever he's talking to you about whatever he's clearly showing you through His Word, or through his prayer through friends or community or whatever, let's walk in that let's be that kind of church, because 11 people who were scared and doubted and had problems, but eventually made themselves up to the upper room when they got on fire for Christ. I know that term was overused maybe in the last 20 or 30 years. But I think biblically what we're talking about here, when your hearts are warm to move forward on what God has for you, what did they ultimately do? They turn the world upside down, post resurrection. Why? Because he's risen. He's risen. In the end, all the Old Testament Scriptures point to him. That's why we read the Old Testament and find such encouragement and hope. And what does this now mean for us? What does it mean for us, I want to pray for you. And the band's going to come, we're nowhere near done. We've kind of split up the service in an interesting format today, we have more scripture, more song, you'll be blessed. So please, just hang tight. I want to pray for you. And then we'll continue on in our service. Father, we thank You for Your word. I thank you for how you're moving in the hearts and the people of Life Church. I pray right now for any of our hearts around the room that are cold in different dry, just struggling season. God encouraged us this day. Help us to see who you are in your word. Help us to receive it. Help us to believe it. Help us to walk in it. Help us to, to know what you have for us individually. What you have for us corporately as a body of believers here at Life, church, love, we love you. We thank you that you did not leave us that you you got through. You got through to Taylor and Alexander and so many others in this room and in the sound of my voice and we thank you for that God that we're not left floundering flailing about wondering who you are what you're up to in the universe, and if you exist, what are we supposed to do God you have shown us clearly in your word. So Father, I pray for all of our hearts, all of our hearts myself included, that you would warm our hearts so that they would burn for you. Were asked us in Christ's name and for your glory. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you guys, I hope and trust y'all had a good spring break those of y'all that follow the school calendar because you still have children in the home like I do. And thank you all for being so kind to the speaker who was here for a couple of weeks while I was away. And I understand that he went long one week, but I thank you so much for hanging with him. Also, today is Palm Sunday. And so I am excited about that we do have a finishing up our series. So it's not directly talking about the narrative that Hannah so beautifully read to start out. But it is in the back of my mind, and should be in our hearts this week as we prepare ourselves for Holy Week. And I do want to say a little something about the Thursday night meal we are doing in El Paso style, and so it is going to be a last supper, but it is going to be a taco bar. So that's not what Jesus ate with His disciples. Okay, but that's what we're gonna eat in El Paso in 2024. We will take communion as a family at the table. But I just wanted to throw that out there because I just don't think that was sold well enough during the announcements. And so that is something we can look forward to, to kick off holy week, this week. Well, we're gonna continue on in the narrative of first aid on I hope you've enjoyed this series. We're finishing up today we're going to go back to a topic. After Easter, obviously, next week being Easter, we'll we'll talk about the resurrection. But I hope you've enjoyed this. And one of the things that maybe you've sort of been learning as you've been hearing the narrative and you think about the famous story of David and Goliath, and, you know, you've heard that before, you know that even being in our culture, he think, okay, was this a story that I meant to learn something about David and his heroism? Or is it something that points to a greater reality of God and His purposes? And I just want to say yes, yes to both. First Samuel is one of those books that's obviously history, and narratively have characters we're familiar with, and characters that we're learning and getting to know. But always keep in mind that there is a twofold purpose, there is something we can learn from their lives and how they interact with God and His purposes and plans. But there's also a sense in which what we're learning points to a greater reality points a greater need points to a greater King who is coming. That's why I love the image that we've chosen for this series, because it's yes, we understand that David's going to be crowned king, not in First Samuel, but in the coming books in the Bible, but that ultimately it leads to the King Jesus. So let's just get right into the narrative. Today, we'll be in First Samuel 22 will sort of highlight multiple chapters, I'll try to story it the best I can, which is just retell the story, and then hopefully give us some points that we can hang our hat on. So if you remember, last week, David and his men, they found themselves hungry, and with the priest of a maliek. And so they were able to partake of the food to give them some energy, which is kind of unusual because normally that food was kept for the altar and kept for God's purposes but but the priests and God allowed David and his men to partake of that. So now we have this guy in dough egg who was there? And he comes back and he tells Saul here in chapter 22, hey, guess what, Amelia and all those priests down there they sort of helped say David and kept him going, when he and his men were hungry. So saw as we're gonna see, he's angry. We've already seen him. Realize that he's been rejected. But today we're going to see how he really really really goes downhill quick. And so say, saw in his anger, go straight to kill, Amelie Act, the priests and all of his family, before Saul, just like any of these guys. They have other people who are henchmen to do their dirty work says, okay, these guys, even though David didn't do anything wrong, and his men didn't do anything wrong, because you were associated with David, I want to kill David, you guys all need to be killed. And it's interesting that Saul's mentoring but like we're doing that we're not killing a bunch of innocent priests as they're sit here and clothed in their priestly clothing, and all their family and kids. And so don't act like I'll do it. I was the one that snitch on David. I'll do it. And so he slaughters all these priests in their family and everything. And only one child of Amelia is able to flee until David and David's like, Listen, man, I'm so sorry. This is my fault. So you stick with me, and I'm going to protect you from Saul and his anger. And so then David and his men, they're already feeling like man, we're trapped in our own home country. Like we're in Judah, but like, we feel like the hammers coming down on us quite literally Saul chasing us. And all of a sudden the Lord speaks to David and says, Hey, why don't you go to this town next door, Kayla, and why don't you save that city? And the Lord tells David, this, he's like, Are you sure God? And because his men say, we don't know, this doesn't seem like a good idea. So again, David goes back to the Lord and was like, Yes, go on down, and I will help you, the Lord says, I will help you conquer these Philistines. And then he says, he asked a question to God, he says, No, God, I'll go on down, and I'll help this town. And me, my man will help the town of Kala, but will they betray me back to Saul? And I love the Lord's answer, yes, they'll do that don't betray you, but going down there and help them and save them anyways. And one of the things that we're meant to see is think about David being the chosen one being the anointed one at this point in the series, and that he is a type of Christ doesn't mean he's one to one equal with Christ. But we understand that David speaks for God. He's a man after God's own heart. And we're meant to see ourselves in the narrative in the story that just like David was betrayed, when he tried to help, just like Jesus was betrayed to those who was trying to help, we can also learn the lesson that oftentimes God will call us into things that are not fun, they're not enjoyable, and that even when we're doing the right thing, we'll get wrongly accused, or we will be betrayed. I think it's interesting as the Lord just tells him that right out from the get go. So where does David go? After he does what he's supposed to do, he now flees to the wilderness, and he is there rolling with his men. Now, the wilderness is always us, whether it's all the way back to the people of God coming out of Egypt. And it's a time of wandering and pruning, or whether it's Jesus himself who's driven out to the wilderness to go back into the world to deliver a message. It's always used as that sort of time of pruning. And I often get this idea that you get this idea of you read this narrative, and I always want to encourage you go back and read because I'm trying to store it as best I can. But all we get the idea that they're wandering the countryside, doing the right thing, almost like Lord of the Rings, if you remember that movie now 20 years old, where it's like, remember how they had these men that kind of go around there, they're armored up, and they're going around and doing righteous causes wherever they can find those until they get to their destination, I kind of feel like that's what David is doing. And he's getting discouraged. So who does God's sin He sends Saul's own son, Jonathan, who you're introduced to last week, a friend of David, one of his best friends, and he says, Listen, you need to be encouraged. And here we are in chapters 23 says, You need to be encouraged David, because my dad, he's never ultimately going to be able to get you because you're the Lord's anointed, everybody knows you're going to be king. He's raging with jealousy. I understand that. But you're going to be okay. And I love how again, we're meant to see some practical things here. How Yes, we may be betrayed. Yes, we may find ourselves in really sticky situations that we didn't ask for, we don't want but that God always sends someone to sort of give us a word, a friend, a Christian, someone who loves us enough to put wind in our sails. And that's exactly what Jonathan is to date. And eventually, Saul and David, they're kind of playing this cat and mouse game. And they find themselves on opposite sides of a mountain. But God kind of calls us all away to go fight the Philistines. And eventually Saul comes back, and he's still chasing David, he wants to he wants to kill him. There's songs that are out there that say, you know, Saul may kill his 1000s. But David kills his 10s of 1000s. And so all of a sudden saw was chasing David and he goes into a cave to relieve himself. It's the very cave that David and his men are hiding out in. This is in First Samuel chapter 24. And so David has this opportunity to kill the Lord's anointed, even though he's altering it to become king. Remember, Saul was still anointed to be king. And he didn't do that. But what he does is he cuts out a little corner of Saul's robe, just to sort of let him know right, that I could have done something. But as soon as he does that, David, he's so sensitive to the things of God into the Spirit of God at this point in his life, that he feels conviction, he feels bad. He's like, I can't even believe that, that I even sort of thought about bringing harm or disgrace upon the Lord's anointed. So as salesfish Were leaving himself and he goes back out of the cave, and he tells us Ben, we're not going to kill Saul today. We're not going to touch the Lord's anointed. He goes out and he says, Saul, Saul, I could have killed you. Look, I have a piece of your robe. You were in the very cave that me and all my men were hiding out and we could have jumped you right then and there, but we didn't why? Because I'm not here to harm you saw. I'm not I'm innocent. I I'm just here. And Saul's like, man,

you're a better man than I am. I was seeking evil against you, but you're seeking my good and so he even you know, cry. He's a little bit and you know, you're great and I promise you, you know, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna harm you more, but make sure you swear to me David, you're not gonna kill me either my descendants and, and David, of course doesn't he goes back to his place of fortitude. Now again, there's things to learn here. One of the things that we don't often like to think about is that there are evil people in this world. There's foolish people in this world. And there's wise people in this world. And the first point I want us to see here is Saul is mad. Saul is mad. Anger consumes him. And I say mad in both senses of the word. You know, mad can be used as like, Okay, I'm so mad at you, I could, I could just punch you or punch something. But it's also that idea of man, you're so consumed with self, or you're so mentally off that you're just back crazy. And so I think that's also a sense in which Saul has come to, and how does this happen in our lives, we've seen it, we've maybe experienced it, you may have even been there yourself before. When you have something that you focus on, it consumes you, and that you're angry all the time, or it's just right underneath the surface, or you blame everyone else, or you blame someone else, or a specific thing for your problem or your lot in life. That's where Saul's out, and it's utterly consuming him. And you're gonna see that this, this sort of lowercase repentance that Saul has is not real repentance at all about going after David, because he's gonna do it again and again and again. And how many times have we had people in our lives or maybe you've been that person where you felt bad, you even felt sorry for what you did. But in your heart, or in that person's heart, you knew they haven't changed. They're not changing. In fact, they're still after me. They're still evil, they're still foolish. We have to have wisdom in when we deal with people who are what who are running from the very thing that God has, for them. So knew he had been rejected. He had been told by Samuel, he knew over and over again, man, he messed up in such a way that the Lord said, Okay, your time is over. There's now a new one who is the Lord's anointed? And how often do we do this to is that God's told us something very clear, we understand who God is and what He has for us. And yet, we say I'm gonna go the other way, where I'm gonna bump my head up against this, this call or this command that he has for my life. That's where Sol is and, and we'll see it doesn't ultimately end up too good for him. All right, so that goes to 24. Let's go to the next slide here, that First Samuel 25 through 28. And we'll try to summarize this for us as well. Lots of good things in here. And I hope this encourages you to go back and read narrative and read the scriptures. You read Second Samuel First, Second Kings, First Second Chronicles, all these things are recorded there. So has one verse in here starting verse in chapter 25, that Samuel has died. And now what ends up happening is David finds himself on the countryside. And he finds himself and again, him and his men and Anita, some supplies in need of some food. And so they've been protecting this guy named naval. And Nabal is a cruel man. And he's not very bright. He's foolish, and maybe even evil. And so Davidson's his men down there says, hey, look, we've been protecting your people, we haven't stolen anything. Even though we've been an army that occupies this area, we've actually not taking anything of yours. And you guys know how big deal that is. If you've ever thought about how when men and others go into a country to occupied for a little while, how they go out of their way to to not take anything, or damage the land or damage anything in the area, and even go as far as to protect that area from others. That's what David and his men have done. So all they're asking is, hey, can we get a little help? Can we have a little hospitality kind of coming back our direction, since we're in a foreign land enables like, no, like, I don't know who you are, you could have just been some people who ran off from your master. And you know, I don't know who you are. And so now I'm going to give you anything. And so, David, when he hears this message brought back to him by his men. He's like, Okay, well, here's gonna get what's coming to you. So he likes to enter his men bind, it takes him and 400 men, they're gonna go and they're gonna kill Nabal and all his guys. Well, Nabal like a lot of people, even though he's mean, he married well. And so he married this girl named Abigail. And so one of the servants goes back and tells Abigail, hey, listen, you know, your husband is kind of an idiot. And he always rages. And he's ill tempered, and, you know, just kind of flies off on the handle. Well, he did it to the wrong guy today, okay. And so this guy is going to come, David, and he's going to kill you and your whole household, and it's going to be real bad because of the way he insulted him. And so Abigail goes, and she meets David on the way and she's like, listen, listen, my husband, he is an idiot. He is ill tempered. He is not right. But please don't kill everybody because of his foolishness. Just please don't Do that. And so, um, David has pity on her. And he's like, praise God that you that you came and you told me this today, I tell you what, I won't deal with your husband, but God's gonna deal with your husband. So just be prepared. And so, so Abigail returns home and she tells her husband not that night, because when times he gets home, he's drunk. And so she waits until the next day, when he sobers up was like, hey, you know, that foolish thing you did, you know, your ILL temper, you know, your anger, and all that thing? Well, it went to the wrong guy, and he was coming to kill you yesterday. And I put a stop to it. But I just want to let you know that that information throws him so far off mentally, that he goes right into a stroke, and says 10 days later that he died is is that the Lord ultimately struck him then, and dealt with him. That's fascinating stuff. Here again, you see the anger of Nabal. You see the anger of saw and the destruction it brings upon themselves and those around them. And so David, what he does is he sends word after he finds out that Abigail's husband is dead, and ask her to marry him. Now, it's interesting, because when you look into the Old Testament, you see, again, that they didn't always follow God's law, even the best of people didn't always follow what God's law and intent was. David was already married to another woman from Jezza. Real. And in fact, if you remember, he was given a Michelle or Michael as his wife by Saul himself. So he's really the son in law of Saul. And Saul is like, he takes her back and gives her to some other guy, maybe to broker a peace deal or something like that. And so you just have a lot of things swirling here that aren't necessarily good and of God, but it's just the way it sort of transpires here, and we'll talk about that in a minute. Why I think that is. But before we get there, I want to talk about one other time in chapter 26, where similar scene where Saul's coming after David David could have killed him. He goes, and he finds Saul and he literally takes his spear and jug of water and wakes him up and says, Listen, I could have killed you. But I didn't stop chasing me. Right? And so saw, what does he do? He's like, Oh, thank you, David. I know No, no, you're my, you're my son in law. I you know, you're better to me, I, you always do good when I do evil against you. It's the same old story. And so, so I'll confess, I've sinned, and I'm so sorry. And all this kind of say, all this kind of stuff. And so David went his way, and Saul went his way. But David, now he has to find himself in chapter 27, hanging out with the Philistines. And so it's an interesting sort of narrative that sometimes the very enemies of God, you can find refuge. And this is interesting, because Egypt, if you think about this, the people of God found refuge in Egypt, Joseph and his family for a little while, until they didn't. And they found themselves under the yoke of slavery and Moses leaves them out. You see Joseph himself, when he is told in a dream that his son Jesus would be killed, where does he flee? Egypt becomes a refuge for Joseph and Mary and Jesus the child until they're able to come back. Same thing kind of happens here with David where he's able to find refuge with the Philistines for a little while they tolerate him because again, it's like, you know, a friend of my enemy is my friend, right? So

are the enemy of my enemy is my friend. I think that was probably a little bit what was going on there with the Philistines because Saul was always attacking him. Of course, David was too. And so he finds himself among them until they get tired of him. And then ultimately, we have this really interesting passage and I want to pull back here for a minute just showing you how far saw sort of goes down hill in First Samuel 28 were saw begins to consult a medium because we know what mediums are we have we have Tarik cards, and we have people who claim to know the future and crystal balls and all that even in our own town, you can go to certain parts of town and get people who supposedly communicate with the spiritual world we have ways in which we you know, sort of even celebrate this or kind of have fun with this in our culture. I think like the movie Ghostbusters that came out this week very kind of harmless. I think it's a fun little movie to sort of think about and go to I don't have anything against that if it's all in good fun. But what's happening here is that David is actually entering not David. Saul is entering into this to consult an actual medium, to know the future and to call back up Samuel and to try to get his life back on track because he's trying to pray to God and guess what? God's not talking to him because he's like, No, you know, what's going on here? So God's not answering his prayers he can't get back he's clamoring for that throne and and you guys know this when someone is consumed with anger and even madness it almost like rolls it snowballs in their lives begins to snowball out of control. And that's where solace saw had already sort of gotten rid of all the mediums and out of Israel, which is what he was called to do. It's what the Old Testament talks about all the time. So but then now here he is going to seek one out. And that's hard. I think all the mediums are kind of undercover. But he goes and finds one, he finds this woman and he's like, No, we're gonna resurrect Samuel who's died, and I'm gonna try to get him to talk to me because God didn't talk to me. This is a bad idea, okay. It's just a bad idea to try to bring someone up from the dead. There's all kinds of you know, Edgar Allan Poe points about this, I think about this in terms of even how the dead come and visit Ebenezer Scrooge, you know, around your Christmas, Carol, it's not good news. It's never like, hey, guess what, like, you brought me up from the dead, and you're gonna get millions of dollars and all these kinds of things and houses and cars and great vacations and trips, they never had that kind of news for you. Okay. And so Samuel, he is about to tell some news to saw that he wouldn't want to hear either. And so it's interesting how this occurs, we we often know that those who claim to talk to the dead are oftentimes just charlatans. It's just a way to get money because they're just good at reading people. You saw this in the movie, ghosts with Whoopi Goldberg, where it's like, he didn't know the metrics, he was really gonna come and talk to her. And she's kind of shocked at the whole thing. If you remember that movie. It's a really old reference. Sorry, for you Generation Z and younger millennials. Very sorry, I'm an older millennial. There was a time when people watch movies, and we followed movie stars. It was a crazy time not not tick tock or YouTube stars. Anyways, so that was an old movie 1993. So but I think you understand the point that that often times those who claim to connect with the Spiritual World, nine times out of 10 They're just people who want your money, it doesn't mean that there's oftentimes not real demonic stuff that's going on there. But sometimes it's just, it's just a game. So she's as shocked as anyone when Samuel actually comes back from the grave. It says that the the woman who claims to be a medium, she's as shocked as anyone, like, oh my gosh, I can't believe this actually work because this is really just kind of something that that I do to make a living. And so she realizes what's going on Samuels, like, Hey, listen, you call me up from the day what you're not supposed to do. But I want you to know that here's what's gonna happen you and all your family, you're gonna die tomorrow. And so sounds like right, what I'm gonna call this guy up for. And so he doesn't eat. And he kind of goes over to the corner and kind of pallets and eventually the mediums like, listen, I know I'm a medium and like, I was supposed to be like banished and like killed and driven from the land. But even you need to eat some salt, because you're like a king, and you need to kind of get your act together. And so the medium like convinces you know how to get something to eat, so you can go out to the battlefield. Second point I wants to see this one is David wises up, and saw continues to spiral down hill. Now, I already brought up that point that, you know, what do we do with the fact that David is a man after God's own heart, and yet he takes on multiple wives. And we see you know what he's going to do later on with Bathsheba. I want us to be clear, and how we understand Old Testament narrative. Because I think sometimes we were maybe given some misinformation and how we understand Old Testament stories in tech. Sometimes, stories in the Old Testament are purely morality tales, like pure morality tales. What I mean by that, you remember, like Aesop's Fables or little tales that you were told when you were a kid, whether it was the tortoise and the hare, or, you know, the Lion and the Mouse and the thorn, it always had a very clear morality point to it, or the point that we would tell with, you know, George Washington, not chopping down a cherry tree, whether that happened historically or not, didn't really matter. It was a morality tale about, you know, I cannot tell a lie. That's not the way the Bible presents itself. The Bible, right is a biblical text is a biblical narrative. And the point is, the purposes and promises of God will not fail. And we're seeing how people respond to a God who is faithful to himself and to his people. You understand what I mean by that? It's because when we think about our own lives, when we think about the lives of even heroes that we love, men and women alike, historically, are people that you love and admire right now. There's areas of their life where you can see in areas of your own life that you can see or not see, that are inconsistent, that have some gaps that have some holes, that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be revered doesn't mean you maybe shouldn't be revered, or maybe people historically shouldn't be revered. It's just a recognize that we have these spots. But the point is, that is meant to point to a perfect King, who has no spot or blemish. So again, when you see this kind of thing, the Bible is not some sort of isolated morality tells us a long thread, a long story, ultimately talking about the promises and the purposes of God and how his people respond. That's why I say the narrative works on both levels, right? You're learning real things that are true about how people respond and in hope and anger in war and battle that are true then right 1000 BC and they're true today, but you're also seeing how this utterly can't satisfy or fulfill me. Because this has to be something better than this. There has to be something greater than this. And that, of course, leads us to Christ. It works on both levels. The story, as we think about it today, but David wises up, was he finally says, Listen, I think this hall is going to kill me, right. And then some of y'all have maybe thought that before too, you're like, you know what, I think I don't need to go over to my auntie's house anymore. Because seems like every time I go over there, there's always a fight and somebody throws a shoe or whatever happens, right? You just eventually say, I understand that, even though they always kind of come back and say they're sorry, or apologize in some way, I need to distance myself from that individual. And that's where David finally kind of comes to the conclusion to install, who continues to spiral. And I think his lowest point here is obviously calling up this medium. So I'm, like I told you, eventually, the Philistines, they kick, David out. And what now happens is David is going to go back into battle, and he's taking along, you know, his, his wives, and he's going out, and so his men are too exhausted to fight, but he still goes, and he, he fights. And then eventually, he finds himself. And saw, finds himself fighting the Philistines. And so all of a sudden saw is surrounded, it's interesting, because it's so clear in the scriptures that the hand of God is either on you, or he has removed his blessings from you, and saw it has had his blessings removed. And all of a sudden, the Philistines are closing in on him. They kill his sons. It grows very fierce. And so Saul calls his armor bearer and says, hey, it ain't gonna be going on make it through this battle. Of course, Jamie had told him you're gonna die. And now his children are slaughtered before him. And so he says, Hey, armor, bear, can you kill me? Now? Berries, like, these guys were like, No, I ain't doing that. Like, I'm not gonna sit here and kill you. And so they fall on their own swords. And of course, their bodies are just scattered by the Philistines. And eventually, the people of God, they go, and they take down and they bury the bones. And they grieve, that Saul has finally died. So this story third and final point on wants to see this morning is, this story ends in tragedy. The story ends in tragedy. Again, this story works on both points, there is the sense in which we need to take the warning from Saul's life enables life, or like,

oh my gosh, am I running from things of God? Am I ignoring God? Are there things that God has told me to do? He's asked me to do. He's made real clear. And then I'm not doing Am I consumed with anger, or hate or blame? Are there things that I need to do to turn to God, and not continue to have my life? End up? Are there patterns of destruction in your family? I mean, guys, many of you all come from such broken this, I've come from such broken this, where you realize I want my family heritage to be different than what was handed down or given to me what steps you're gonna have to do to make that a reality. What is God calling you to do? Because at a certain point, we're all morally accountable for ourselves, irrespective of your story, how horrendous it was, how much people have sinned against you, that is awful. We all have stories to tell, but ultimately, are we going to take responsibility for our own lives? And so it doesn't end in tragedy, like Saul's does, because why? Because there's a greater hope and reality to come. I love that we're going to talk about the resurrection this week, it's all about the resurrection is going to be about the cross first, I get that, but it's all going to lead to the resurrection, because the resurrection is such hope, isn't it, that the grave is not the end that no matter what evil has been done to us that it will all be made right in the end, and that God gives us literal hope. That David is great as he was as magnificent as he was as as anointed as he was as righteous as he was as as well as he made these good choices over and over and over again. He's an imperfect King. Is there going to be one is there going to be a messiah one to come that has no blemish that has no frailties that has no blind spots and has the ability to forgive me and you have our sin and to prove that he is God to not only die for our sins, but to rise three days later? Yes, there is one there is a king to come and he's coming again. That's why I mean, you understand that the main reason why people of the Jewish faith reject Jesus as the Messiah and King is because they're looking for a David like figure. And Jesus when he came, it was obvious that he was a prophet and he spoke for God. A lot of people sort of thought that, but he didn't come In triumphantly, we talked about it today that he came in on a donkey. Well, that's not how kings come into their city, they come in one huge white horse and that day or you know, some huge Rolls Royce or some big yacht or whatever it is the equivalent, just the best that we can see humanity have. And here he comes in on a lowly donkey. Why? Because he's coming again. And yes, he came the first time as a humble suffering servant, to die on the cross for our sins and to braise again to prove that he is God. There's hope there's resurrection there. But there's also hope that he is to come again. And that's what the whole book of revelations about and all the eschatology askatasuna things to come. And that's where we put our hope. Because no matter where you're at in your Christian life, no matter where you're at, and we're all in different stages, let's be men and women of hope. Because we don't want our stories to end the way solved in such such tragedy, such destruction. Let's be men and women of hope, and who put our hope in God. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for Your Word. We thank you for the story and the narrative of David and Jonathan and Saul and Samuel And, Father, I know that around the room there are many who are taking this in in all different levels and ways. I pray that wherever anyone's at in their faith journey that they would turn to you right now in this moment, whether it's freely to worship or to pray to you for the first time in a long time or to pray to you for the first time ever. encourage us this day. encourage us in Your word. encourage us with your voice. Just speaking wisdom and encouragement over our lines. We asked us in Christ and for His glory. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you all so much for the welcome. It's really nice to be back with you today. Last week we did David and Goliath. We talked about David Goliath if you weren't here, we concluded after three exchanges of armor garments were sold tries to give David his garments, and David rejects it because David never takes all this place. And then David takes gulyas armor, and he takes it on the battlefield, making it clear that David really is the champion that he always appears to be in the scriptures. We describe it as a scanning scrawny little kid who couldn't have won the battle. And what a miracle is that it happened, it is a miracle that it happened. But it's not a miracle. Because he was so weak, he was a great warrior already. He already knew how to fight, he just hadn't been involved in wars, he'd been killing animals. And so when he killed Goliath, he took his armor, he became the great champion. But what he concludes with the most important part, and the part that leads to all four chapters that we're covering today, although we'll cover it very briefly, I know you don't believe me when I say that, about anything but as possible. The most important exchange of all, is the exchange of garments and armor between Jonathan and David, because Jonathan gives Jonathan his sole son, Saul is the king Jonathan will inherit the kingdom. But instead, Jonathan gives his royal garments and his armor to David, acknowledging that David is the rightful person to be the next king. And the really remarkable thing about that exchange of garments at the beginning of chapter 18, which is the beginning of our passage for today. The really remarkable thing about that is that Jonathan deserved to be the next king, Jonathan did everything to earn the right to be the next king. And this is what I was pointing out to you, at the very end of our time together last week, that Jonathan had already shown that he was courageous, just like David is courageous, he was skilled in battle, just like David is skilled in battle, he is faithful to God, and to God's people, just like David is faithful to God, and to God's people. I mean, everything about him makes him a hero. That's why he has the event at the Philistine garrison, where Jonathan goes up by himself with an armor bearer carrying things for him. But he's by himself fighting this battle against the Philistines that he wins. And then all of Israel joins in the victory that comes from that conquest that Jonathan has. It's exactly like David standing there by himself and having this conquest with Goliath, and then all of Israel joining in the victory that comes afterwards. And we're not we're told those two stories, only four chapters apart. And we're told the two stories right next to each other, so that we will see that Jonathan deserves to be king, even though Saul has failed miserably. Jonathan deserves to be king. But David is going to be the next king. And to be clear on what I was concluding with last week. All of this is to come to the point, that there's only one that God chooses, and anoints and crowns, the one who's going to be king. And in the Old Testament, that figure is David, at the very beginning of the of the message last week, I made the point to you. Even Jesus is not called the son of Solomon, even though Solomon is closer to Jesus than David is. And Solomon's kingdom in Israel is greater than David's kingdom in Israel. Solomon is David's son, right? But Jesus is the Son of David, that's how he's always referred to. Because David in the Old Testament is the chosen one, he's the anointed one. That doesn't mean he can save us. It doesn't mean he is the Messiah for eternity. But it does mean he's the image we're supposed to go to, if we want to understand what Jesus is called to do, as the Son of God Himself, who comes down into this world to be our king, and then demonstrates that in what you will be celebrating an Easter in just a couple of weeks in the resurrection, and it's not just a joyful celebration, it's a declaration that he is still, Lord, because he is the only chosen one. I mean, the real question, in all of these passages that we're looking at is whether you're in or out whether you are in the in group, right or out. So I'm I'm not from here, y'all to figure that out, I suppose. But it all been extremely welcoming. And all of El Paso has been extremely welcoming to us. My wife and I were in Colorado in the intervening week, we were just taking a break. And when we came back, we came back Friday night, spent all day yesterday in El Paso and everybody was extremely gracious to us. When you're an outsider, it matters how people treat you and now they receive you. That's why I appreciate that you all do the thing where you stand up and say, Hey, let's have a time of welcome and let's shake hands and find somebody you don't know and greet them. I turn around. I don't know anybody. So I'm really happy when somebody greets me. I appreciate it. The whole point is it's nice to be on the inside, but we don't think as clearly as we might need to about what it means to be on the inside. In terms of our relationship with God, we, we do think of it more in terms of what we can do to wedge our way in. And if I had offered somebody a gift in order to give me a handshake this morning, that would be wedging my way in so that somebody would think I could be a part of their group. And that would be absurd, that would be missing the point of you being a welcoming people or something like that. So what I want to show you in these parts of the story in First Samuel 18, through 21, they if you have a Bible, and you look on with me, that's great. If you don't, I'm going to try to just give you enough so that you can make sense of all these stories. And it is four chapters, they're not long. And they are really interesting chapters. And they are critically important in understanding what happens with David from this day forward. Because as soon as David kills Goliath, you know, now he's a national figure, everybody kind of understands who he is. As soon as that happens, all the lines in Israel divide between those who are with David, and those who are against him. And that becomes the only thing that matters. And so if you look at chapter 18, verses one through four, verses one through five, I'm sorry, you see the whole story of Jonathan giving his armor to David exchanging his armor. And at the end of that, you see, it says this was good in the sight of all the people, and also in the sight of all of Saul's servants. So it sounds like, every everybody's got to be for David. But but that's not the way it goes. I mean, the very next part of the story is how Saul becomes jealous. And I'll kind of cover just a little highlight of what those stories are about in a minute. But right now, just just grasp this that right after Jonathan favours David, and all the people love him, immediately, Saul becomes jealous, nervous that David is going to draw away the loyalty of Israel from him. And he goes through these couple of different efforts to kill David. And then Jonathan tries to reconcile things at the beginning of chapter 19. And, and saw even responds and says, Oh, okay, I'll stop trying to kill him, you can count on it, it's going to be fine. But then immediately after that, Saul becomes jealous again, and tries two more times, two more ways to try to kill David. And then at the end of chapter 19, you have the passage I want us to start with today, which is chapter 19, verses 18. And following, this is what it says, Now, so what happens is Saul is trying to kill David, he tries to throw a spear at me, he tries to kill him in his house at night, David sneaks away, as David sneaks away. This is what happens in verse 18 of chapter 90. Now David fled and escaped, this is a weird story. This is why I'm reading it to you in the in the holes in the in this whole section of four, four chapters. Every story is basically Jonathan loves David. Saul hates David. And so Jonathan is doing simple things to express how much he cares about David. And Saul is doing terrible things to try to kill David. And then there's this weird story in the middle. There's always a story like this, and these really important parts of Scripture, by the way, and it's there for a reason to make the most important point. So here's this point in First Samuel 19, verse 18. Now this is weird, David fled and escape, and he came to Samuel at Rhema. You remember, Samuel is the prophet that had anointed David before he was the prophet that anointed Saul to begin with, and then Saul just betrays his anointing choose to be himself. So this is the Samuel the David comes back to So David runs to Samuel, he came to Samuel at Rhema. And he told him all that Saul had done to him. And he and Samuel went and lived at Neha. And it was told Saul, hey, David's at Neha in Rhema. And Saul sent messengers, to take David, when they saw the company of the prophets prophesying, this is the weird part part of the weird part, when they saw the company of the prophets prophesying, because Samuel has all the prophets with him. And so they declare the word of God and the will of God, and they sort of show this kingship of God in the midst of Israel. So Saul sends messengers to take David out of that group, so that Saul can kill him. But when the messengers come, it says, they see the prophets and they see them prophesying. And Samuel standing as a head over them, the Spirit of God came on the messengers of soul, and they also prophesied, so they just kind of fall into the group and they're like, glorifying God and acknowledging, you know, of all the things that are being acknowledged. He doesn't say what's being declared. But I mean, clearly Samuel has anointed David to be the next king over Israel. So they're joining in the chorus, they're singing the songs that acknowledge that this is not going souls way this this is going David's way. So that's what happens to souls messengers. Well, that's not gonna go well with Saul. So in verse 21, when it was told Saul, he sent other messengers, and if you are familiar with scripture, if you're not you will recognize this, but if you're familiar with scripture, all these things are just bouncing off your head to say, oh, man that happens over and over again. They send messengers to take care hija Oh, well, let's take Elijah and then the messengers end up dying. And so he sends other messengers to take Elijah, and then they send other messengers. It's like that. That's what's happening here. So they come the messengers of Saul, they also prophesied when it was told Saul, he sent other messengers and they also prophesied. And Saul sent messengers again the third time, and they also prophesied, he didn't say nothing yet, listen to this part. Then he himself saw, he's like, nobody's gonna bring David back to me. I can't trust anyone, I'll do it myself. He himself went to Ramah and came to the great well, that is in sick you. And he asked, Where are Samuel and David, and once said, Behold, they're now in Ramah. And so he went there today off in Rhema. And the Spirit of God came upon him also. And as he went, he prophesied until he came to Nazareth and Rhema. And he stripped off his clothes, and he to prophesied before Samuel, and lay naked all day and all night. Thus it is said, and then they give us this expression, we don't use the expression. So we don't know how it means this, but it says is Saul also among the prophets. Now, it's obvious from the context what that phrase means. It means even the person who is most determined to undermine the message of the prophets, because the Prophet Samuel, and all of his people have said, David is to be the next king, even the person who is most dead set against that ends up falling down, humiliating himself, in nakedness, meaning there's nothing about his own pride that he can retain. Remember, he's so concerned about protecting the kingdom, he has said to Samuel, oh, just pray for me so that I can keep the kingdom he wants his dignity maintained more than anything else, he loses all of his dignity, and all of his self will to fall down on the ground and acknowledge that everything the prophets are saying is true. That's what happens to Saul, the person who wants most to undermine what's happening with David, he can't do it. So the statement is Saul, also among the prophets, is a way of saying in this sort of snarky tone, or sarcastic tone, it's a way of saying, Nobody can stop what God has determined to do. No one can stop it. So it's coming, no matter what you can choose to be with it. You can choose to be against it. But you can't stop it, no matter what you do. That's the one thing we're going to see inevitable here. And it has to do with David's anointing, because David is the chosen one. So the first and clearest and most important expression of what it means that there's no stopping what God has determined to do, is acknowledging that everything about being chosen, is about being in, as we would say, now in Christ in Jesus, who is the Messiah, in reality, for eternity. In the Old Testament, the division is simply who's for David, and who's against David. That's why all of these chapters are about that. Now. And I'll show you that in the clear words of the text in in at the beginning of chapter 18. Here's Jonathan, Jonathan, I'm looking in verse one, and I'll be following and I'm just going to be skipping through a lot of verses. So if you want to keep up, like raise your hand and I'll tell you the verse otherwise, I'm just gonna skip through these real quickly. So here's Jonathan, Jonathan loved him as his own soul. And because he loved him as his own soul, Jonathan stripped himself of the robe and gave it to David and so on. And all the people felt the same way good in the sight of all the people and also all the side of soul servants. Then you get to Saul Saul's response Saul is in verse eight of the same chapter, Saul is very angry. The saying that David is killed his 10s of 1000s while soldiers only killed his 1000s the saying displeased him dead Saul's responses to say what more can he have but the kingdom and Saul I, David from that day on that same that next day, it says a harmful spirit from God rushed upon Saul, and he raved within his house while David was playing the lyre. And Saul hurled his spear at David in order to pin him to the wall to kill him. But David evaded him twice soul was it goes on to say, afraid of David, later in verse 815, it says, And he stood in fearful all of David, but all of Israel and all of Judah, loved David. Then Saul goes through different efforts to kill David aside from just throwing his spear directly at him, where he can run away he decides to say, Oh, I actually love David, let me say, I love David. I want to give him my daughter in marriage, but cuz then he'll have to give me a price for My Bride because the idea of a bride price was common thing in their day. So he'll have to give me some kind of price for the daughter that I'm going to give him. And I'll have him go out and fight the Philistines as the price and then the Philistines will kill him. And I'll finally be done with David. So he tries that he wants her to be literally in the words here that she may be a snare for him. She wants to kill David with him. And it says, As a result, if you don't know this part of the story, Saul basically says to David, hey, if you'll kill a bunch of listings and give me proof of it, the proof is gory. Go read the details yourself. I don't feel like explaining it. So he says, If you'll go kill the Philistines, and then I'll give you my daughter to marry, and David goes and kills twice as many Philistines as Saul requires. And he comes back having won the victory, and he gets Micah and met Michael in marriage. And what it says about Saul is as a result of this, Saul was even more afraid of David. Saul was David's enemy continually. Then the commanders of listings came out to battle. And as often as they came out, David had more success than all the servants of Saul so that his name was highly esteemed what us all do in response to that he tries to kill David two more times, and the rest of chapter 19. He tries to sneak he, he tries another time to throw a javelin at him and kill him that way to pin him to the wall. He He sends messengers to David's house to kill him in his house. Michael, lets David out the window. And so he's able to sneak away and then we read the chapter we read, what comes after that in chapter 20, after the part that we just read about soul being among the prophets, what comes after that? Is Jonathan telling David, I think my dad's trying to kill you. David's like no da, I think I've noticed that this is happening. And Jonathan says, but let me work it out. So that if he really is trying to kill you, I'll warn you if he's not than you, then then then you'll be able to come back and everything will be fine. But in the process of doing this, this is what it says about Jonathan, that he establishes a covenant with David, and this is the part of the story we all know Jonathan loves David. And so they go out in the field, and they establish this covenant. And I'll give you more details about that part of the story in just a minute. Right in the middle of that Saul is so angry, that this is what he does to Jonathan it starting in verse 30. This is what he says. Saul's, so Jonathan is favoring David. Saul wants Jonathan to become the next king. Because Saul wants his kingdom to go on forever. He didn't care about God's Kingdom or the people of Israel, He cares about himself. And so in the process of that Jonathan comes to Saul and says you, why are you why are you after David, don't be after David reconcile with him. And the result of that is that Saul says to Jonathan, how angry he is with him. He says to him, You are the son of a perverse and rebellious woman. I don't have to have a men's from the room. But I mean, basically, women always get the blame. She's not doing it, his mother's not doing anything. This is all Saul's fault. But anyway, he blames the woman anyway, you son of a perverse rebellious woman, do I not know that you've chosen the son of Jesse, to your own shame to the shame of your mother's nakedness? For as long as the son of Jesse lives on the earth? Neither you nor your kingdom shall be established? Jonathan, you're not going to have a kingdom. If you favor this, David, as long as he's alive, our kingdom is threatened. That's what he's saying. So send him bring him to me so that I can kill him. And then when he's dead, your kingdom will be secure. And Jonathan says So why, why my father, why should you be put to death? What is he done, but Saul hurled his spear at Jonathan, his son, he hurled his spear at him to strike him, then Jonathan knew that his father was determined to put David to death.

So Saul's, it's very confusing. Saul is so angry with Jonathan, that Jonathan's Kingdom is not going to be established because Saul hates David so much. And David is going to take the kingdom, because God has given it to it, that Saul is willing to kill Jonathan, over the fact that Jonathan has chosen David. Jonathan has established a covenant with David, everything in this, we've only said one thing so far. And the one thing we've said is, there is no stopping God's purpose, and he's going to take it where he wants to take it. There's nothing you can do about that. That means everything is going to be divided over our involvement in God's purpose, which in this case, is the chosen one always is the chosen one. David in the Old Testament, that's the example that we're being given so that when Christ comes in the New Testament, will understand what's happening. And what happens in the New Testament. In fact, Jesus uses these very words describing something that probably points directly back to Saul and Jonathan and their conflict. This is how Jesus says it. When disciples come to him and say, Well, you know, we just we Want to be your followers too? We just don't want to create a bunch of conflict with other people. And And Jesus says, Do you think that I've come to bring to give peace on the earth? Jesus comes to bring peace on the earth. Don't get this wrong. He says it in his opening sermon in the Sermon on the Mount. Blessed are the peacemakers. They're the ones who receive the kingdom that God has given. He is a peacemaker. That's what he's about. So what on earth is this statement? Jesus saying in Luke chapter 12? Do you think that I've come to bring peace on the earth? No, I tell you, but rather, division. And listen to the example he gives For from now on in one house, there'll be five divided three against two and two against three, they will be divided, first example, Father, against son, and son, against father. It's not about Jesus coming into the world and saying, I need some people who want to fight. I don't want people who want to be soft and create peace. That's not at all. He wants us to be peacemakers. But it is about Jesus saying, when you choose to be in me, you're going to choose to be in a place that other people are going to reject. Because being in Christ makes you someone different from the people who are committed to the rest of the world. To once we're in Christ, the division is created and the division is only and always about whether you are in Christ again, the way Paul says it and I mentioned this very briefly at the end of the sermon last week. The way Paul says it in the New Testament is that we are chosen in Him. God has chosen him before the foundation of the world, that he would be the one slain for us. But we're chosen in Him meaning the only difference. So while I was up in Colorado, I'm still you know, I'm Dallas Fort Worth not a lot of snow. I don't know how much snow y'all get here. Doesn't matter. Your place is beautiful, no matter how much snow you get. But for us snow is still a mystery, you know. So when we get to be around snow, we love it. It was weird. This week, there was a bunch of fresh snow that fell each day and then every day it melted, right? So we were we were in this friend's cabin. I don't have a cabin in Colorado, we got a friend with a cabin in Colorado. So he lets me stay there. So I stayed at this friend's cabin in Colorado, it's up on the side of a mountain. It gets snow all over the roof. It's really beautiful scene. And then we hear you know, we're inside the house we hear. I don't know what it is. Whatever it is, we go outside, there's a mound of snow next to the house. Well, lo and behold, snow falls off the roof of the house as it begins to melt does take rocket science to figure out that was gonna happen. But it happens, you know. So we're inside the house. It doesn't bother us at all. Our my son in law, he walks outside the cabin. And he as he's walking out this giant line of snow falls off the roof right next to him. So he didn't land on him. Could have, but it didn't land on him. It landed right next to him. And he was mortified. You know, it's like, oh, what's coming, it's like an avalanche. It's coming down. Look, if you are in the house, there's no snow going to fall on you. If you are out of the house, you're at risk. And the truth of the matter is if you're outside the house, you're gonna get snowed on no matter what you do. If you're in that area, right? It's come in no matter what. That's the point of this statement. Being in Christ is the only thing that matters for us to be sheltered from the snow that comes to be sheltered from the judgment that comes from the coverage from the death from the pain from the separation, that comes that's the only way being outside means you will be snowed on being inside means you will be protected. And that's the only difference that matters. So everything from this point forward. And in the story, this is clear. Everything from this point forward is about whether you are in him or outside of him to be in him means you're going to be cursed, you're going to face the judgment that comes and to be out to be in him means you don't face that to be outside of him means you face that judgment. That's the only absolutely the only thing that matters. Okay, so you have the picture so far of what's going on in chapter 19. That's what's happening with Saul. It's also among the prophets. So the second part of this is just to recognize the difference between those who are against him, and those who are for him, and Saul represents those who are against him. We get one more example of it, by the way, at the very end of this section in chapter 21, when the king of Gath Acas refuses to let David find shelter there, but that's a different part of the story we won't have time to get into today. So here, this is the one thing I want you to notice about. It's at the very end of Chapter 18. So right after David marries Michael and gives Saul this proof that he's killed 200 Philistines and that He's the great champion. I read this section to you a moment ago. It says in verse 30, then the commanders of the Philistines came out to battle and as often as they came out, David had more success than all the servants of Saul, so that his name was even more highly esteemed than before. The point here is, you can be against Christ. But what you can't do is be against Christ and succeed, because he's the chosen one. Saul can be against David. But in every effort that he has to be against David, David just becomes greater. And Saul becomes even less secure than he was before. Again, when you have time go and read it yourself. Now I, you know, again, I'm a professor of philosophy and history, those are the two disciplines that I got my final degree in. And so that's what I teach. When I teach, I teach in one of those areas normally, and when I teach philosophy, one of my one of my things is, I think it's important that human beings have freewill, not everybody has to think that there are other ways to think about human agency and how we obedient to God, I'm just telling you that the way I think of it, the funny thing is when I say that people have freewill, and you know what I mean by that, like, you can make your own choice, you come to a fork in the road, you're gonna make a decision to go one way or the other, I get it, there are reasons to say, well, it's fixed, you're gonna go one way, and you're not gonna go the other way. And every time you'd go that way, there's a good reason to say that I just think you can go either way, again, doesn't change anything, theologically to know either way you can go. But here's the point that I owe, you can go either way, when I say that people offer a reasonable rebuttal to me. And this is a reasonable statement, they say. So you just think human beings can do anything, you just think people can fly if they want to fly. And that's not what I think at all, I don't think I can step off of a tall building, and not fall to the ground. I just think among the choices that God gives me, I have freedom to choose whether I go this way. Or that way, he doesn't give me the choice not to have gravity applied to myself, when I step off of a tall building. That's not one of the choices that God gives me. But one of the choices God does give me is whether to step off the building or not. That's what I'm saying about being in Christ. You don't have the power to deliver yourself from judgment, you simply don't. But I can promise you that on this day, God is extending the invitation to you to be in the Chosen One, to be in Christ. If you choose to be in Christ, if you accept the grace that God has given to you, then you have this protection, you have this blessing of being in the chosen one. And I'll tell you more about that in a moment. But if you don't, you can choose to be against Christ, you can choose to fight against him, you can choose to pronounce curses against him, and chase him down and tell other people that they shouldn't believe and you can do whatever you want to to fight against him.

But he's still the chosen one. I mean, he's still and I could, we could raise hands around the room. And I could point to the people, because in every body of Christ, this is the case, he is still the one who came into lives who are in this room, and transformed them from the lostness from the waist that they experienced before, into something with meaning and purpose and direction. Not perfect. No one's arrived. But knowing we are in Him, we are part of the family. So on this first step, we acknowledge this, that even those who are against him, end up furthering his cause. And I wish I could just go story to story and point out the different examples of this through here and how this happens. Because every time Saul tries to do something against David, David just becomes more powerful. God uses it as an example of just how thoroughly he is blessing David, and how much everything else is about that. So the opposite half of that, you know, if, if there's no stopping God's purpose, and God's purpose is to divide everything on Christ, you're either in Christ, or you're not in Christ, then one side of that is you're not in Christ, okay, you're gonna oppose him, but you're never going to stop him. And you're not going to change the reality, that he's the one about whom all the blessings exist. The evidence of that, by the way, I just have to say this part. I mean, the evidence of that is so clear in the resurrection. That's the whole point, the curse that all of us are facing, that none of us can deny that from the beginning of history until this moment has been true about every single human being that's ever lived, is that they're under the curse of death, that when the grave opens, its MA and consumes us we are gone. There is no coming back. And then Jesus, the one and only chosen one, and this is the point of Peter sermon at Pentecost, by the way, the the one and only chosen one, Jesus gets put in the grave by the people who don't want to admit that he's the king who oppose him the same way Saul oppose David. So they put him in the ground, they crucify him, and they put him in the ground. And then he comes out so that all of creation, and God his Father, and Jesus himself and the spirit within us can declare to everyone that Jesus is the chosen one. The resurrection makes it obvious. The blessings reside completely in him. The curses reside entirely outside of him. That's why the curse is what he overcomes in the resurrection. That's who Jesus is. So being outside of him terrible place to be the other half, to be inside, to be chosen in him to reside in the Messiah. And this is what's modeled for us in Jonathan, we all love Jonathan and David's story, if you don't, if you're not familiar with it, read it in chapter 20. And you'll get the whole picture how much they care for each other, Jonathan is willing to give up everything else, in order to be loyal and faithful to his friend David. And David trusts Jonathan completely. I mean, they have a beautiful friendship. The point of it isn't that Jonathan and David have a beautiful friendship. The point of it is that anyone who commits to David is blessed in exactly that same way. And if I could read your stories through the rest of First Samuel, you would see David doing exactly the same thing to one person after another, including Ahimelech, who is a priest in chapter 21, the last chapter that we would cover if we had more time, in that chapter when David goes to his temple and needs bread for his men, and he needs a sword to carry Ahimelech helps him out when Ahimelech comes to him later, after his entire family has been destroyed him like family has been destroyed. When Ahimelech comes to David, David says, stay with me. It's on my account that your family ended up dead because you were faithful to me. So I can guarantee you, you and your family are now going to be safe with me, I will provide for you from this day forward. It's always being a bit about being in him. And so when Jonathan and David have this beautiful friendship, that they have the covenant being established between them, it's an invitation for us to understand what we have with him, when we commit our soul to him. So here's here's how Jonathan enters into that covenant. In chapter 20. It says, Jonathan says this to David, may the Lord be with you, as he has been with my father, meaning God had anointed my father to be the King Saul. But God has taken that away, I can see that. So now I just pray the Lord blesses you, and I'm with you. May the Lord be with you, as he has been with my father, if I am still alive. And by the way, it's really important here that Jonathan's not choosing this for himself, hey, I don't trust my father's family. So I'm going to side with you. Jonathan is the champion who could win the battles. Remember, he goes into the battles, he just knows that David has chosen. And so he goes with God's choosing? May the Lord be with you, as he's been with my father, if I'm still alive, show me the steadfast love of the Lord, that I may not die. Do not cut off your steadfast love from my house forever, when the Lord cuts off every one of the enemies of David from the face of the earth. And Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David saying, May the Lord take vengeance on David's enemies. He's blessing David, and he's cursing David's enemies. He's all about being in David, then. So Jonathan made David swear again, by his love for him, for he loved him as he loved his own soul chapter ends the same way in the middle is the section where Saul tries to kill Jonathan, because Jonathan is so committed to David, that section I read to you earlier. But when you get to the very end of this chapter, chapter 20, it says, Then Jonathan said to David Go in peace, because we swarm both of us in the name of the Lord saying, The Lord shall be between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring forever. And he rose and departed, Jonathan went into the city. The point is that Jonathan has committed himself and his posterity to David. And just so you know how the rest of the story plays out. All of Saul's family is destroyed after this. They're all cursed and destroyed, except for one descendant of Jonathan. one grandchild lives the battle and David provides for that descendant, you know, it goes through is Prussia, and then the fifth shaft. And if you know the story, you know, what I'm talking about. Everybody else is everybody else in souls family ends up being cursed and put out because they have rejected David. But Jonathan chooses David. That's how the story is told to us. I'm giving you all of this so you can understand what's happening here is not new. This is not a new part of Scripture. When God gave the great promise to the first father of the Hebrews, you know, Abraham Avraham, the father of multitudes, his name, when God first speaks to Abraham, about leaving the place where he lived, and going to a land that I will show you and making him the one who would be the blessing to all the families in the earth. He says, and I will, this is the Lord's words to Abraham, he says, and I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you. And you will be a blessing to all the families of the earth, meaning from anywhere on the earth, people can come and bless you, and they will be in they will be the ones who are being blessed. That's all that matters. And when we take that into the one who fulfills all the promises to Abraham, and David, all the promises to Israel, are the one who fulfills that is Jesus Christ, the only thing that matters is being in him or not in him. Now, my dad died about three years ago at the end of the year in December. And so I've not told this story. So I'm going to try this. And if I, if I crumble, then I crumble. And we'll just run to the end. Okay, so I'll do the best I can. But I think I can do it today. I've thought through it enough, I think I can manage it. So So here's, here's the thing. My dad was a real, you know, I, in his eulogy at his funeral, I compared him to the 10 commandments, that's what he was to us. You know, he was the rules. And so very strict, very high expectations is what he had. And, you know, he was he, I loved him. And I love his example. He and he's just he was a Patriarch who took us our family out of just sort of poverty and penury, into responsibility and just trying to be good, good citizens. You know, he just changed our entire family's trajectory. So I love my dad and everything about his heritage. But man, he was hard nosed, and he was intimidating. You know, when it came down to it. He was a boss over a lot of people. And that's sort of how I acted does sometimes. So that's the attitude I thought about. And when I was growing up, later, I realized it was different than that. But what happened was, a couple of things happened. I got married when I was really young. We still didn't have any money. I mean, I was fortunate my my parents provided for me to go to college. So I got a college degree. As soon as I got out, we needed a place to live. We couldn't afford to buy a house. I mean, we didn't we just chuckled when people said oh, you need a 15% down payment on the house.

When we're at maybe we'll have a 15% down payment on a house. That's how we thought about it. Okay, so it's just a kid got married when I was 20. So it was doing the best I could. So we just started renting a house. Well, it turned out that we were good renters. So you know, we paid our rent on time, all the time, and so on. And the owner of the house, I ministered to him a couple of times, I was already in ministry at the time and and you know, as he approached his own death, he decided to sell us the house using all of our prior rent as the downpayment on the house. extremely generous, right? So I mean, it's not like I earned anything out of this, but extremely generous man made this possible. And so when he did that, I'm like, I'm gonna be a homeowner. So I go, and I brag to my dad. And he's proud, like, you know, just as proud as a dad could be. And I felt like a million bucks. Now, I don't remember the order in which these things happened. I just know, these are the two things that happen that shaped me for the rest of my life with him. And I thought, Ah, I'm in with my dad, because he knows I'm responsible. Now, I'm not just living in a rent house and not able to provide which isn't a bad thing. By the way. I was. I should have been proud. I was able to do that. But you know, when you're proud, your dad has expectations. You want to measure up your dad's expectations. So whatever. So I tried to do that I did. Ah, I'm in. My dad loves me. It's almost like he patted me on the head, you know, and said, good boy, something similar to that. I felt great. Then I got, I went to that house. My car is parked there, I back up. And you know, it's one of those days when your mirrors are fogged back then not everything default automatically. And so I backup and as soon as I back out of the driveway, I crunch a car across the that had parked across the driveway from me just right behind our driveway, I'd love to blame the car. But you know, I was the one backing up, it was my fault. So I backed into this car, of course, I talked to the people who own the car, and we're gonna work it out. And we didn't we didn't do insurance. We just I just gave him some money for it, whatever. They didn't want the insurance and I didn't want the insurance. So we got it all taken care of. But my car has got a crunch in it. Right? It's visible. My I'm around my dad on a regular basis. He has pretty high expectations of how we drive to I know I'm married, I'm out of the house. You think I wouldn't care? But you'd be wrong. I did care was like, oh, man, my dad's gonna see this. What am I gonna do? I didn't, I just found a way to weasel out of the conversation. I just worked in my mind. I'll change the subject this way. Sure enough, my dad asks about it, hey, whatever the car, you know, and I change the subject and we go a different direction. And he doesn't ask you and he just leaves it. And I feel like such a he'll, you know. And so I carry I mean, I'm like, I'm 24 years old at this time. I'm already pastoring a church. I should be capable of telling my dad, you know, I backed into a car. It was the hardest thing I had ever done to that point. I mean, I got in my car, and I drove down to my dad's office where he was working. And I interrupted his workday and walked in and sat down with him and said, I gotta tell you something. It's the dumbest thing in the world, but it's like I lied to you. And I don't know why I did. But I have a dent in my car because I backed into another car and it was just stupid that I did it. But it's stupid that I that I wasn't willing to tell you and I'm just really ashamed that I did that. And he just he said, I don't even remember that. The exact words that he said to me, but what he said to me was to this effect. I don't care about that. I don't care you back, anybody can back into somebody, I love you. I'm proud of you, I care about you. I carried that for the rest of my life, all the way until his death to know that my dad was going to be proud of me no matter what happened. And you know why he was not because I'm a bad driver. I don't think I'm that bad a driver anymore. Your car should be okay out here. I'll try not to swipe Sideswipe anybody on the way out of the parking lot. It's not because of that. He loved me because I was in his family. I was in. That's all I was in his family. And I'm promising you you can think to yourself, Oh, I think I'm good with God today, because I didn't sin as much yesterday. I think I'm good with God today, because I didn't get stoned last week. I think I'm good with God today, because I didn't fight with my wife or, you know, do something terrible at work or curse or whatever it is you're afraid of doing. You can think that and God is proud when we do the right thing. And when we exemplify the things he's commanded us to do, and it matters that we obey Him, that's all important. But when you get on your knees, and stand before Him or kneel before him and say instead, I don't know why I did this father. But I, I failed. I can guarantee you, all he's going to say is, you're in Christ, you're part of my family. That's all that matters. He will embrace you and receive you and love you and care about you. And that will never change. Because from the beginning of this book, until the very end, a book with all the commands that intimidate us, a book with all the acts of judgment, that bury us in these mounds of death and snow, in the midst of all of that is this one declaration from God that is constantly opening the door and saying, just come in here. Come in here. If you come in here, if you come in Christ, I promise you, you will always be safe in him, because I will always bless those who are in him. My prayer for you today. And my my whole reason for being able to be here for the last two weeks is to share with you from this story, what it means for everything to be divided about David, are you for David or against David, and the invitation for you today is to recognize that everything is about whether you are in Christ, or not in Christ, if you're not, right this moment, there's no magic formula. There's nothing. There's nothing. There's nothing confusing about it. Right? This moment, you have the opportunity to say Christ, I need to be in you. He wants you more than you want to be in him. That's why he came to the cross for you. So as I pray and finish I invite you in your own heart simply to look at yourself and know whether you are in him or not. Father, I pray now that you would help us to remember the simplicity and truth of the reality that our eternity and our blessing in this life is determined entirely by one truth that Your Son Jesus Christ, who died on the cross for us and rose from the grave is your chosen one, and that you invite us to be in Him. May we all be in him today. In his name we pray amen.

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Well, all right, thank you very much for having me back. I kind of assumed you didn't remember I was here before. And that's why you invited me back. So it's really nice to be able to spend the day with you. And what a privilege today because as you're going through the book of First Samuel, your pastor, a lot of pastors won't do this. They won't share a series, you know, with a guest speaker, but he invited me to just continue our journey through First Samuel with you. And I know y'all heard about the decline of Saul and the current, you know, the completely wrong direction. He's taking his kingship at this point. I know y'all heard about that last week, I'm picking up from there starting in First Samuel 16, and 17. That's what we're doing today. And if you're not aware of it, I'm also going to be back next week. So I should tell you now that the good sermon is next week's sermon, just so you will be back for that one, regardless of today, right? Today can't go wrong, though. Because we're covering David and Goliath. I mean, who doesn't know the story of David and Goliath? So if you know the story, as you heard it in vacation Bible school, you probably have a few images in your head like I did. If you're, for those of you who are older adults in the room, you'll know what I'm talking about. I mean, you know, you we learn this as kids and you got some scrawny little David and giant Goliath over there, fighting the battle. And the great news is God loves underdogs. And the weaker little kid is always going to win the battle. It's something along those lines. That's not at all what's actually going on in this story. And there are 100 different ways to come at it and try to figure it out. I just want to show you in the text itself, as we read through three little parts of the story, what obviously, our attention is supposed to be drawn to. And then the very obvious message that that conveys for us as well. And your pastor is right pastor Brent's exactly right, that there's nothing more important about the kingship of David. And that's what this whole book is about. Launching David as the king of Israel. There's nothing more important about that than the fact that David himself is a pointer toward the true King who's to come, who is of course, Christ, that's who we want to arrive at. And David plays a unique role in getting us to that vision about Christ and what we're supposed to understand about Jesus. And it becomes really obvious in what we look at today that this is the case. But I mean, like no one else in the Old Testament. In fact, I even mentioned to you the last time that I was here in passing one thing about David, I mean, he is the Old Testament Messiah. That's how he's understood, even when he's talked about in the New Testament. Now, that doesn't mean he accomplishes what Christ accomplishes. He doesn't. But there is no figure in the Old Testament closer to Jesus than what David is throughout his ministry. Good side, and bad side, he's pointing to what Jesus is. And there are a lot of reasons for that, three of which, at least, we'll bring up briefly today. One, you know, what I want to mention, though, is how close he is to Jesus in this way. Because I you know, so I know the normal thing to do to go to El Paso from DFW Dallas, Fort Worth is to fly, but I still haven't. And as you know, it's not for any particular reason I'm meeting kids and grandkids this time. And, and so we're on our way to something else this week. And I'll come back through here on the way back from that. And so driving for me is the way I've gotten here. And the thing is, I got on the highway. So 10 minutes, I leave my house, and 10 minutes later, I'm on the highway, I pull on to authority, I've got it in my GPS. I don't know how to get anywhere anymore. I'm just like you guys, right? You just put it in your phone and you get there. So I put it in my GPS. And the next thing the phone says is jog. I mean 10 minutes from my house, I pull on the freeway, and it says next turn 576 miles or something like that. Now I know y'all see that all the time. I don't see that very often. So I pointed it out to Jones. Like, look at this. My wife she rode with me today. Shot I'm like, I mean yesterday, I said, Look, we have 576 Miles till we make another turn. I mean, how many times do you see that on your GPS? That's it like That's insane. David is 1000 years removed from Jesus, but he is one turn from Jesus. And I mean that like this. David has a son Solomon who has a son Rehoboam, who has a son, and we could go all the way down the list to get to Jesus. We do that in the genealogies of Matthew one and Luke three, I mean, you can find the genealogy of Jesus. So it only makes sense that people would talk about David in terms of him being the son of Joseph, for instance. Now you and I know there's a lot of complexity to that story, but that's still how he would have been regarded in his day or the son of Mary or whatever. No Nobody calls him that much, much more importantly, nobody calls him the son of Solomon. Jesus is, and he's called this all the time. It's one of the most important titles he receives. Jesus is the Son of David. That's how he's known. Because David fulfills the calling of the Messiah. In the Old Testament, there are so many messianic figures in the Old Testament, I couldn't even begin to name them all. And then I, and then I'm tempted to start to begin to name them, you know, Moses, Esther, there are bunches of Messianic figures in the altar, every prophet is a messianic figure, every king turns into a messianic figure of some kind or another, every hero, every significant figure, Elijah, Jeremiah, every single one, you could name Samson, for crying out loud. They're all messianic figures, but none like David, because Jesus isn't the son of Moses, Jesus. I mean, he's just not he's not the son of any other figure. He is the son of David. So what we learn about David today is central to what it means to be like Jesus, because there's no story that launches the life of David, in the public image of Israel, and in our own recollection of who David is, and this is intentional than the story of David and Goliath, this is what starts the whole issue for us. So we're going to pull onto the highway with David. But we're going to get off 1000 years later, and it is 1000 years from David to Jesus 1000 years later, at Jesus, that's where we want to end up nothing contrived about it, you'll see in the text, there's no way to miss the points that are central to this passage. So how do you know the story of David and Goliath? So I mean, the big thing that's going on with Israel, and I'm going to be reading from First Samuel 17, in just a moment. Now, what our goal is this week is just to cover these two chapters. First Samuel 16, and 17. I'm not going to talk about chapter 16. Very much except just in passing, it's a really important chapter. It's the one where Samuel knowing that Saul has been rejected by God goes down to Jesse's house and anoints David to be the next king. I'll read you a few little sections of that in a moment where it's appropriate, and how we're telling the story today. So I'll come back to it. But most of you know, he goes through and he meets Jesse, and they're all terrified that the profit is their profits are pretty terrifying in the Old Testament, and when they show up, there is often the hack everybody into pieces are as likely to hack everybody into pieces as they are just to offer a word of prayer or something like that. And he's just a different category of representing the Lord. So they're terrified when he shows up. But he says, Hey, I've come peaceably, just give me an opportunity to talk with your man. And he speaks with Jesse. And he says, show me your sons. And they bring out the sons and they marched them in front of him, and none of them are supposed to be the king. And then he says, Isn't there another one, and they get David, and he anoints David to be the next king over Israel. Now, it's not fulfilled yet. But he has said, you're going to be the next king over Israel, you're the one that the Lord has chosen. All of this is transpiring at the time when Saul is still the king. I mean, he's still reigning over Israel, but he's abdicated any real authority that he has. He's, he's a terrible king. He's a self serving king. He's all the things we'll be talking about in a few minutes are the kind of the opposite of what David David is in this story. So as we're, as we're coming up to David, he's been anointed, he's been selected as the king, all of Israel is kind of doing the same thing that they've been doing for the last several months or years, it's kind of hard to tell the way the story is being told. But they're hiding from the Philistines. They're living under oppression from the Philistines who are in the land. I mean, you know, part of the story that's gonna come out in just a second is, none of them even have swords. They don't have anything because the Philistines are afraid if the Israelites get swords, that they'll fight against them, and they will somehow conquer them or oppress them. So they will let them have any swords and there are no blacksmith in Israel. That's one of the descriptions is given to us earlier in the book. And so, yeah, what do they do? They have to go to the Philistines and ask for help, hey, I need my plow fix. They have to get their plow fixed by the Philistines. Nobody's got a sword except, except Jonathan and Saul. They do. And there may be a handful of other people around somewhere who have them but David doesn't have a sword. Nobody else has a sword. So they're all just hiding out. And in the process of doing this, all of Israel knows the oppression of the Philistines and they gather up for battles against each other every once in a while. But it's a pretty intimidating battle when the enemy has all the swords and you don't have any swords. You got a bunch of people who are willing to fight. I mean, it's not really distinct from what you see going on right now kind of in the opposite direction in Gaza, with Israel. You got you have an army that's equipped empowered, not picking sides not trying to like politics today, I'm not jumping into it. It's hugely important. I hope you pray about it. Every day Christians and Muslims and Jews are suffering in that area of the Levant immeasurably. So I hope you pray about it every day. And I hope you pray for God to bring it in to injustice and a lack of peace and the violence that's harming children and fellow believers right now in the land. I hope you pray for that. But you can understand the intimidation that comes when the enemy's got tanks, and you've got nothing. In this case, the enemy has swords and chariots and you've got rocks, you know, that you can throw and that's about it. That's what's going on in Israel. So you know the story of how Goliath comes out and they bring the line of the Philistines and they're ready to fight. They're willing to fight, but they just bring out their great champion. And they say, you know, we can take you guys, but instead of taking you as a whole, we'll just put our representative out. We're not much this way. But in the ancient world, this was a common thing to do. You had a champion who represented all the people. That's why Saul was such a perfect candidate for King. When they selected him. Remember how it describes him head and shoulders above everybody else? I mean, he's powerful, and that's what's being bragged about Goliath. Now he's a giant. So Goliath comes out and says, Give me Give me a champion so that I can fight him. If he beats me. We'll submit to you, we'll stop oppressing you. You can take over the land. But if I beat him, you have to submit to us. That's what you have to do. And they're terrified so they won't come out. We all know the story. David ends up showing up willing to fight Goliath slays Goliath, Goliath is dead and it's not over. That's not the end of it. gulyas dead. Israel comes down from the mountains. Man. They are flowing down. I've been in the valley of Isla. I've stood there collected rocks for my son's like everybody else does. Whoever goes to the Valley of Isla. That's where this battle was fought. I've seen the hills where Israel would have been lined up and standing. And I've seen the hills, hills opposite, where the Philistines were, and they come down to meet in the valley after the Philistines dead in the Philistines turn tail and run all of Israel wins this massive battle, they chase off the Philistines, they become the conquerors in the land, because they have a new champion. They have David so we all know that story. You've heard it 1000 times you've heard since you were young. Here's the thing in the story that we just sort of glance past or draw these trivial conclusions from let me let me just read it to you. I mean, I'm reading it from First Samuel 17. Now I'm going to get to the part of the story where David shows up, right? So what's happening is Israel is lined up as an army against the Philistines. And again, you need to have this perspective at some point anyway. So as as the Israelites are lined up, they have Jerusalem to their back. And they're looking south towards what's called the shift Failla, the the low lands where the Philistines would have been if the low hilly land. And so as they look south in this direction, they're all lined up, and they're in the battle. And so our Jesse's oldest three sons, these are David's brothers, his oldest brothers. And you'll remember that Jesse says to his youngest son, David, who keeps the sheep mean, somebody's got to tend the sheep at home and David's young. So David, staying home tending the sheep, Jesse says to him, hey, on a regular basis, you take this cheese, you take this milk, you take whatever it is, that needs to go to the battle lines for your brothers, and for your brother's commanders. So they'll take good care of them. And by and we don't think about logistics, but it's not like they have logistics arranged the same way. The US Army has logistics arranged right range right now. Somebody's got to get food to them. And so it's a lot and this happened during the Civil War Two, you know, when the battle is in your backyard, you just send food from the houses, you know, somebody's gotta go take food to the troops. And so David is doing that. So he's just this kid that's showing up to do it. David shows up, you know how this happens. Here's the cry of the great champion, Goliath, you know, give me a champion so that I can fight and David hears it, and he's dismayed by it. You remember, right? David is dismayed. They have one man that wants to fight. And they're doing it and y'all are doing this every day. And nobody's going down and fighting this. This Goliath. Goliath big. Admittedly, his armor is 100 pounds or so. So he's a big man. He's capable of handling big things. He's got a sphere that has a head on it. That's something like 10 pounds. That's significant. I know. We describe him as sort of a caricature. Maybe he really was nine feet tall. It's possible. We all know that's possible. But more likely because they're shorter in that day, the way we would see him he'd be probably seven feet tall or something like that. I don't know that for sure, but nobody else knows either. So just go with my estimate. That's the one little word. So gulyas out there, this huge man, you can understand why Israel is afraid of him intimidated. David sees it. He's not intimidated. And so he says, Well, why is anybody going down to fight him? And the soldiers around now David's just there to deliver cheese to his brothers, right? So he shows up, and he's all acting like, Hey, I know how to fight this battle. Why don't you people modified it, so you can understand why his brother gets upset with him. But David says to the men who are around him, why isn't anybody going to fight him? And they say, Yeah, have you seen the man he's huge. And I'll tell you this, he's so big and so powerful. The King Saul has said, if anybody is willing to fight him, he'll give him his daughter to marry and he will become part of the royal family. And that's pretty big deal. And David's like

he, somebody's got to be given something to go do this. I mean, why wouldn't somebody just do it? So his brother gripes at him? Go take care of your few sheep in the wilderness? What are you even doing here? You know how all this happens. But David just reiterates it and somebody gets word back to Saul, that there's this young guy who has shown up who's willing to go fight Goliath. So they take David, to see Saul. And when David sees saw, you know how the conversation goes, Saul is like, like, I mean, I know you're willing to fight. I appreciate it. But you're just you're young, you don't have any experience. So all of this is happening starting in verse 31. And following, and Saul is hearing the words you really don't let any man's heart faint in verse 32, or fail because of him, your server will go and fight the Philistine. And Saul says, Yeah, you're not able to do that. The Philistines have been fighting since from before you were born. And David says to Saul in verse 34. Now, I'll read you this section in a moment, but in just in just he says, I've killed a bunch of things. I'm pretty confident I can kill Goliath as well. Just give me a shot at him. It'll be okay. And Saul doesn't have any other options. So he says, Okay, go. And then this. Now listen to this part of the story. I'm going to read you all three parts, and then we're going to go back and clarify what they're about.

Then saw, this is verse 38. Then saw clothed David with his armor, he put a helmet of bronze on his head. Now, this is not a loose reading. I love to do narrative analysis. I don't have time. I'm for those of you who don't know, I'm the president of Criswell College. I'm the president because I was a professor before that, and I didn't die. And so they needed a president and so I became the president. So but I'm, you know, I like to teach. So I'm not doing that today, I want to I want to preach this passage to you. But I want to teach is this tiny little bit narratives have a fixed structure. And so in the same way, you can analyze sentences and compare them with each other. You can compare narratives to each other objectively and see what the key elements are and where they break down and how they relate to each other, how they're parallel to each other. So these parallels are really strong. They're not just hey, I happen to notice something here. They're really built into the way these stories are told they all culminate with this event. So this is the first time this event shows up I saw clothed David with his armor that we all heard we've all heard this before. Saul gives his armor today. This just sounds so dumb when you're in Vacation Bible School. Yes. Like you got a nine year old kid and a giant man. I mean, he's a head shaved head and shoulders taller than anybody else in Israel gives this little kid his armor to go fight the battle. That's all wrong. It has nothing to do with it not fitting David could wear the armor. He can he can handle the armor. David is a powerful man at this point. I'll come back and talk about that in just a moment. But the reality is he doesn't want this armor but David's giving him as I mean Saul is giving him his armor. Why is he giving him his armor? We talked about it. The second is the image of the story. We don't have to be told this part David doesn't even use it. But the author thinks it's really important for us to notice this saw clothed David with his armor. This is the first exchange of armor. He put a helmet a bronze on his head and he clothed him with a coat of male This is not medieval armor. This is an ancient armor so don't don't have the medieval picture is not that stifling. And David strapped his sword over his armor. David doesn't even have a sword. Now he's got a sword. I mean, you're gonna go fight Goliath. You want a sword, right? So he's got a sword. Now he's got some protective armor, David strapped his sword over his armor. And he tried in vain to go for he had not tested them. It was a waste of time. That doesn't mean he got out and gave it a swing or two and realized it was too heavy for him. It's not too heavy for him. He's gonna take Goliath sword shortly and use that and he never has a problem with that. There's nothing to do with that. It's just not his stuff. This is not who I am. So why would I put all this stuff on to go fight a battle I've already seen in my own head. He already has a way he understands this is gonna go So David's strapped his sword over his armor, and he tried it in vain to go free and not tested them. And so he said to Saul, I can't go with these for I've not tested them. So David put them off. That's the first exchange of armor in this story. The second exchange of armor happens over in verse 4054, I'm sorry, of chapter seven teams just right over across the way, and it's right after they fight. So David fights with Goliath. I mean, it's, you know, it is fighting with Goliath. It's just not hand to hand combat. You know, he slings the stone. David gets hit in the forehead falls, collapses. And then I'll tell you more about in a minute, verse 54. And David took the head of Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem. Now this is after he's fought. David Goliath has fallen, Israel's chased the Philistines down, David stays the battlefield cuts off Goliath head, we'll, we'll talk about the details of that in a minute with Goliath zone sword, and takes his head. So he's got his head, he's got his helmet, David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem. But he put his armor in his own tent. David took Goliath armor, second exchange of armor that happens in the story. Then we're going to read into chapter 18, just enough to conclude what's going on in chapter 17. And you will hear how important this section is. Next week, we'll get to the details of it. But in chapter 18, we have to get to this part today. As soon as so all this battle is over, and they all come back from it, and so on. And Jonathan, it loves David at the beginning of chapter 18. And then you get to verse three. And Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul. Jonathan is Saul's son, he's the next king. Jonathan is the next king. He's in this Asal is really upset about everything that's about to happen, because he knows what it implies. Because Saul wants Jonathan to be the next king. Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David, and his armor. And even his sword, and his bow and his belt. That's three times in this story, that we have an exchange of armor going on with David. The first one is Saul trying to give his armor to David, and David, giving it back. This is not mine. The second time is when David takes it from Goliath. I mean, I'm sure Goliath is, he's dead. So I'm making this up. But I'm sure Goliath is lying there saying that's not yours. And David is like it is now. And he's taking it with him. It's his armor. So he takes gulyas armor. And the third time when Jonathan, Saul son who should be king next, after Saul dies, after Saul gets old and dies, Jonathan gives his armor, to David, to go and continue to fight his battles. So what I want to do is understand what those three exchanges of armor of garments have to do with what we're supposed to learn about David. And as it turns out, they really are the central feature of what we understand about David, from from the beginning to the end of his ministry, I've been working my way through the Psalms, I mentioned this to you back in October, when I was here, I think it was October. And as I have, I've gone through 72 Psalms. So far, that's almost halfway through the book of Psalms. And I mean detail by detail, really understanding for the first time myself what the psalms are about, which tells you what the heart of David is about. Because these are primarily David's Psalms. They're all figured after David in some way. It's been a, it's been a profound journey going through the Psalms. And that's the case here. By the way, if you want to see how David thinks of all these events around Goliath death, and around Jonathan, and Saul, if you want to think about all of that Psalm 68, go read it later. And you'll see him describing in terms of all of Israel's history, what God is doing in Israel, during this period of time. So what's the big event going on with these three exchanges of armor? What does it reveal about David? And let me just clarify from the beginning what that means for us. If we understand what it means about David, and what we're supposed to have learned about David, then we understand what we're supposed to have learned about our Messiah about Christ. And if we understand what we're supposed to know about Christ, then we know what we're supposed to know about ourselves. Because we're supposed to be Christians. We're supposed to be little Christ's. We're supposed to be like, the Messiah. And I can guarantee you in every one of these three ways, we're supposed to learn how to be like Christ by seeing well, in this case, what it is to be like, David. So what are the three things that happened with David Okay, the first one with Saul's armor. This image is so easy. I mean, I'll just hit it real simply. Saul is the king. He should be fighting the battle with Goliath. But he's not. Instead, he's giving his armor today. Even and saying, you take this you be the one who's in charge. And he's giving away any any respectable sense of his own kingship to David in this process. We're looking at it from the outside knowing in the previous chapter, Samuel already anointed David to be the next king of Israel. We should be thinking, this makes sense. So I was giving away the royal armor to David whom God has already chosen to be king over Israel. Saul needs to be displaced. David will take Saul's place. You know the weirdest thing about him, you can read this in Samuel or in the Book of Chronicles, or in any place, any place you see David and Saul, David never takes Saul's place. He never take Saul's place. The only person place the person's place he takes is Jonathan's, he takes that. And Jonathan gives it away freely as well, Jonathan, on purpose, we'll talk about that during the third garment exchange that we have in just a moment. But in this case, David refuses to accept the Armor Assault, it's what we're gonna see repeated When David's hiding in the cave when Saul is chasing him, you know, and David's hiding in a cave, and Saul goes into the cave to go to the bathroom. And while he's exposed there and completely vulnerable, David has the ability to kill him. David doesn't do it. He refuses to raise his hand, as he says, against God's anointed, he refuses to do it. David never steps in to take what isn't already his he never does that. So this first little section that we're going to be talking about has to do with what David doesn't do. Let me also clarify that what it does reveal is who David is, because the very next line after what I read to you in verses 38 and 39, you know, 38, Saul gives him the armor 39.

David gives it back. So it's, I can't go with these. I've not tested them. So David put them off. Then he took his staff in his hand, not his sling, he's gonna take up his sling, and he's going to kill Goliath with the sling and the stone. But he takes up his staff. In his hand, there's no more important line about David in the Old Testament than that he is the shepherd of Israel. That's how he's always referred to. He was a shepherd boy, keeping sheep out with the flocks for his father when he was anointed to be king. He's keeping sheep when he's running cheese, to the armies who are fighting the battle. And when Saul says, Hey, become a soldier, here's a sword, here's my armor, you can be the king as far as everybody else is going to be concerned. David's like, I'm just gonna stick with my staff. That's what I'm going to do instead. Because there's a thing David doesn't do. He doesn't try to be who he is not. In fact, he completely rejects any idea of becoming who he is not. And so consistently, and repeatedly, he chooses the humbler position. And there's a specific way this is humble. He's not he's not humble in the sense, again, that he doesn't have the ability to kill Goliath. He's not going out against Goliath, you know, on a song and a prayer. He's going out against Goliath because he thinks he can kill him. That's when he tells Saul, he doesn't go to Saul and say it like Esther, when she goes to the king. She says to everybody, fast for me, because I have no idea where the king is going to accept me or not, that would work fine. That's not what David does. David comes to Saul and says, I'm gonna fight him. I've killed bears. I've killed lions. I'm not worried about this guy. You want me to kill the guy, I'll go kill the giant. I'm not worried about the giant Let me kill the giant duck has nothing to do with this timidity, some kind of tremulous nature in David that he's unwilling to step into the limelight, he's gonna go fight the great battle. It's not that, but he knows who he is. And that's what he's going to be satisfied with. As you read every part of the story leading up to this, it's all making this point. So if you go back to chapter 16, the part of the story that I didn't read do before, when they have the sons passing by Samuel, Samuel again, the Prophet, he's going to anoint the king. So they have the sons who come out, he says to Jesse, bring me your son, and he brings him a better dad, the oldest son, and he says, Oh, this has got to be him. I mean, look at his stature, and he's powerful, and he's your oldest son, he's bound to be the one. And he says, No, the Lord did not choose this one. So he makes Shama pass by and he makes all other seven sons pass by and then saw Samuel has to say to him, is this all of them because the Lord hasn't improved any of these? And he says, well, there does remain the youngest, but I mean, look, he's out there keeping the sheep we don't even invite him to this meal. And Samuel said to Jesse, send and get him for we're not going to sit down until he comes here. Are this humiliating and it's not humiliating in the in a grievous sense, like there's some injustice being done against them. But it is humiliating. He's the baby of the family, he doesn't have any rights or privileges. And so hey, you go take care of the sheep, we'll take care of eating the meals and welcoming the profit, right. So in that position, David is serving faithfully, and that's who he is. When the Lord says that's the person, I want to make the next king over Israel, the shepherd, the one who's out in the field, and this image has been given since Moses was leading the people through the wilderness, God is searching for a shepherd, not someone who, like you heard last week about Saul is going to defend his territory in his interest. And while I was afraid the people were going to be scattered from me, he's doing it for himself. He's concerned about his own game. David is the opposite of that David is doing whatever service people put in front of him. In fact, at the end of chapter 16, there's an insertion is not part of the flow of this overall story that we're reading. The author puts it in, though, so we'll remember this about David when he was younger, that when Saul had terrible temper tantrums, you know, his mood would go south, so to speak. They wanted to find a musician to help him out. And they picked David. They said, Oh, man, this guy can play like nobody else in the country, you should get him. He'll come and play for him. Well, who is he is a young man. He's Jesse's son. He's a shepherd, you know, he'll come and play, and he served. So in fact, the very language that's used is this. Therefore Saul sent messengers to Jesse and said, Send me David, your son who's with the sheep. And Jesse took a donkey laden with bread and the skin of wine a young goat, because he's not, he's like, Well, you're not gonna like David enough. So I'll send you a bunch of gifts, and maybe he'll be okay then. Then he sent and he sent them by David, his son to Saul and David came to Saul and entered his service. And Saul loved him greatly, and he became Saul's armor bearers. He's this young man that's helping out Saul for a time d for a while, that story is inserted. So we'll see how much David is doing just to serve exactly the same thing is happening when the Goliath is coming out and making his claims and they're all in a raucous about it. And David shows up on the battlefield because David, the youngest, who was, you know, the three, all the three eldest were following Saul, they were out of the battle. But David went back and forth from Saul to feed his sheep at Bethlehem. So David is going home to Bethlehem feeding the sheep. And then he's running to the battle lines to feed his brothers. And then he's running back to the sheep to keep the sheep. That's who David is, in the story, not a powerful person, not a well represented person. He is young, he is disenfranchised. And that's just who he is. And he's okay with it. He's just doing the job that he's been called to do when alive is angry at him, his brother says, just don't take care of those tiny little few sheep that you take care of in the wilderness and get off the battle lines. I don't even know why you're aggravating everybody like this. David's response we take to be sarcastic. It may have been I mean, we don't know how to read tone into things like this. But his response is simply Hey, all I did was say a word. I wasn't trying to pick a fight with somebody. I'm just, I'm just speaking words, right now. He is just a servant, who has shown up to try to help. So when they bring him to Saul, what does he say to Saul, David says, Don't let any man's heart fail him. Your servant will go and fight with this Philistine. And Saul said to David, you're not able to go against this Philistine to fight with him. You are but a youth. And he's been a man of war from his youth. This whole story, by the way, doesn't culminate when David defeats Goliath. But like I said to you a moment ago. Instead, after David has killed Goliath, it culminates with this. And this is in verse 52, of chapter 17. And the men of Israel and Judah rose with a shout and pursued the Philistines as far as Gath and the gates of Akron and it goes on with a slaughter that they have. It's about the people of Israel. David is serving his father. He's serving the sheep. He's serving Israel. He's not serving himself on that drive that I told you I had on the way here, don't think I'm a bad driver, because I tell you this story. I mean, you might think it but just don't say it out loud. If you if you don't mind, because I don't think this was my fault. I'm confident it was not my fault. I'm absolutely certain it was not my fault. And I am I'm a safe driver. Whatever. The point is, I'm feeling a little defensive right now. So I'm on the road yesterday you know, it's an eight hour nine hour drive whatever. So I'm on the highway or trucks everywhere. Hallelujah. Thank you for delivering product if you're a truck driver love you to death unless you're this truck driver. It's so I'm just I'm you know, I'm going faster than the truck that's, you know, we're climbing through the hills coming towards El Paso. Now we're getting out west and there are some hills out here and you know, there's some inclines, and this truck is having a hard time getting up the incline. And so I'm just gonna go around it and even got a blinker on he had got anything going he's behind another truck, I'm looking I'm going 20 miles an hour faster than he's going. And so I'm sure I was going the speed limit and he was going 20 under just to be clear, in case any of you who are DPS anyway, the point is, I'm, you know, what do you got to do, so I put my blinker on, I pull over in the left lane. I'm going up past the truck driver, the truck, and he just decides he's gonna start coming over into my lane. My wife is climbing the inside of the cab of my vehicle. I mean, she is freaked out and she ought to be and I'm not saying he came a foot over into our lane. I mean, he took our lane while I was next to his, you know, trailer, the big part of the truck. And so I'm, you know, I'm there's no going back. It's like, I got one way to go. And it's out there. So I'm using the shoulder and I go around him and I did honk at him. It was not in anger. It was a little frustration. There may have been a tiny bit of anger I just held on but I mean, the guys just kept coming over. There was no reason for him not to stay in his lane. He just kept on coming over. And so I'm like, What on earth are you doing doing the same thing all of us do. We just decide the world is about us life's about us. It's about promoting ourselves, we have our ambition, we know the lane we're gonna get into. And it really doesn't matter who's in that lane right now we're just gonna push them out of the way. I don't know who that truck driver is. He's not a bad guy, I'm sure he just wandered over into the lane or did something I'm not trying to pick on him. But I am trying to say to you

once you become a Christian, and I know not all of your Christian, some of you just hear somebody invited you to church. But for those of you who are following Christ, for those of you who want to be like David, David didn't choose to be the king. David didn't choose to pull into the lane. David didn't choose to run everybody else out of where they were. David was just serving where he was supposed to serve. And what the Lord did with him is what the Lord did with him. That was up to the Lord. In fact, if David was doing anything, he's just clearing the way for everybody else. The whole point at the end of this story is that Israel goes and wins a great battle. He's making everybody else great. So the first thing about David is simply that he's a shepherd. And the idea that he's a shepherd is the acknowledgment. He's not trying to be what he's not. He's not trying to become something he's not. He's just trying to live out what he is. And what he is, is a person made by God, so that he can make other people better. So he can give them room to do the things God's called them to do. And he does that through the rest of his life, even when he is the king. That's what he does. That's what messiahs do, by the way. And it's obviously what Christ does. And it's what we're called to do. So the first part of this is just learning, you know, selfish ambition, the idea that we're supposed to carve out a place to make space for ourselves, is the opposite of any value. We're supposed to have learned from David, or from Christ, you follow Christ through His entire ministry, you will never find him doing that. Follow David through his life, you never find him doing that. He has time and time again, that he would be able to kill Saul and take his kingdom. And he refuses to do it. Now, we'll let the Lord take care of that even when Saul is trying to kill David. David says, No, I'm not going to raise my hand against the Lord's anointed. I don't know why you're chasing me, Saul. I don't think you ought to. But I am not going to take your position. So there's the first thing is what David doesn't do. He doesn't take what's not his he doesn't try to be who he's not, which means he's always a shepherd. The second one, this one I'll be brief run. But the point is massive. The second one is this exchange of armor with Felicity, this exchange is huge for us because David becomes Israel's champion, in this moment in the songs that you will acknowledge your your pastor mentioned it in his message last week, Saul has killed his 1000s. David has killed his 10 1000s. It comes out of this battle, this battle when Goliath dies. And then the Philistines are chased and routed. The whole point is that they're celebrating David now as their champion, the evidence that he's their champion, when Goliath goes out on the field, He's the great champion. And when Goliath is killed by David, David is the great champion. And while we would love to skip this part of the story, because, you know, we just don't think about the responsibility it puts on us. This part of the story is hugely important. This is the part of the story where instead of talking about what David didn't do, we talk about what David did do, and I will repeat for you what he says back in chat earlier in chapter 17 And verse 34. When it says, David said to Saul, you know, when he's telling him hey, I can kill this this giant let me go fight the battle. This is how he says it. You're servant He says to Saul used in this is when Saul says to and you're just you're a kid, you're a youth, this man has been fighting for longer than you've been alive. David says Your servant used to keep the sheep for his father. And when there came a lion or a bear, I don't like doing astronomy in the dark, because I'm afraid there'll be a lion or a bear, where I know there aren't even any lions or bears. I'm still terrified of it. He looks at him in the daytime and says, Yeah, I think I'll go take you. That's, that's a different kind of person. This is a courageous man. So your servant used to keep sheep for his father. And when there came a lion or a bear and took a lamb from the flock, I went after him and struck him and delivered it out of his mouth. Maybe he used the sling to do that. But listen to the rest of it. And he rose against me. I caught him by his beard and struck him and kill them. Your servant has struck down lions and bears, and this uncircumcised for listing will be just like one of them because he's defied the armies of the living God. David said, The Lord who delivered me from the paw of the lion and from the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine. If you look at what actually happens with David, he's already an accomplished fighter. He just hasn't been in war. He is a powerful man. You read this story. For those of you know, classical literature, David is Achilles in Israel's history. There are great mighty warriors in Israel. And when it tells the lore of their unbelievable victories, it will always conclude with saying none of them were as mighty as David. David is the great warrior in Israel. He is a champion. When he fights when he fights. We again we read the story like oh, I can't believe this little scrawny kid could beat the great giant. He's not scrawny. He's not a giant. So Goliath has a huge advantage. But David has a little bit of an advantage, too. It's not like David goes out and says, Okay, Goliath, we're gonna fight here, Goliath, I'm gonna pray. Oh, God, please, cause the decline of this giant to the earth. Lord, soon. Now, he doesn't just pray and wait. David knows exactly what he's gonna do. He goes down to the creek. He gathers five stones, he puts them in his bag. He, some people say he gathers five stones because Goliath has four brothers, as we know, in a different part of the text. Maybe, maybe he's aware of how things go in battles, and that people have shields and that he might need five stones instead of one, I don't know. But I know he picked up stones and a sling. And in Israel. When people were good with slings, they bragged about it. Like we brag about how well a person can shoot a sniper can shoot, they talk about the Benjamites, who lived in this one city, being able to throw with a sling and hit something at a hair's breadth from 100 yards away, and so on. That's how they talk about it. So David is an accomplished technician with this method of taking down an enemy and he's used it against animals. And now he's about to use it with Goliath. He knows what he's gonna do. He is a mighty warrior. And he's a smart warrior. And he has technology on his side, he's got a projectile weapon that's not just thrown, it is slung at a high velocity. And so when it sinks into Goliath forehead, yeah, Goliath drops dead. And David is the one who did it. I know, we don't like this part. We just skim over this part. So that we can say, you know, God is the one who fought the battle. God does fight the battle, and David gives him credit for it. But at the same time, here's what the author says about it. So David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and with a stone, he struck the Philistine, and he killed him. And there was no sword in the hand of David. So David ran and stood over the Philistine and took his sword and drew it out of its sheath. And he killed him, finished the job and cut off his head with it. Not super excited about the decapitation. I'm just saying, it's what David did. And he holds up the head and he carries it all the way to Saul to say, look, we've done this, we have won the battle and he takes gulyas armor from that point forward. My point here is just a pause and say, David does do what David is supposed to do. David is courageous, He is powerful, and he is skillful. Those are three of the ideas that are built into the story that we're supposed to recognize. And David doesn't talk like he's not. David does not go to Saul. Now again, I'm not against any of the things I'm about to say he could have said they become hugely important in that Next point, which will be briefer than this one, believe it or not. The point is, when David goes to Saul, he doesn't say to him, but Saul, I can pray better than everyone else. He says, I know how to kill things. Give me a chance to kill this guy, and I can kill it. And he does. We have a responsibility that we're supposed to do. It does require courage. But it also requires a strength and a skill that God has given you. These are not things that are outside of what David can do. They are what God has given David that he can do. God has given things you can do. I know students and adults who sit on their hands in their life, saying, I just can't wait to see what God is going to do with me. What God is going to do with you is give you all the things he's given you right now, so that you will step through the doors that he's opening for you, so that you will take responsibility for the opportunities he's giving you and creating you. And that's what David does. David has the courage and the skill and the strength to go and do the thing that's open before Him. And God is the one who blesses it. If he doesn't, nothing would have happened with it at all. So the second exchange of armor, David takes gulyas armor, and it becomes his he goes to his tent, it's a celebration for his victory. And he ends up with that sword again later, as we'll talk about next week. Last one, and this one's this one is very direct. What happens with Jonathan?

Let me just keep it super simple. David, great champion, right? He's not the only great champion in Israel right now. Did you? If you didn't read it, you should go back and read First Samuel 14, two chapters before we started in chapter 16. Two chapters before this. Do you know what Jonathan does? Jonathan by himself while his father just like now, in this story about Goliath, while his father Saul is sitting on his hands and waiting for God to provide some kind of deliverance against the Philistines? Saul isn't doing anything profitable at all. In fact, he has all of his people fasting, Jonathan is unaware of the fact he takes his armor bear. And he says, you know, there's a Philistine garrison up on top of this ridge. I think we should go up there and fight them. It's exactly it's the story of David and Goliath. But it's Jonathan and the Philistine garrison garrison. It's exactly the same thing. So Jonathan gets his armor bearer, and he says, Follow me. Just see what happens. And so they go, and he gives us a little test, you know, are they gonna say, come down, they'll come down, or we should come up, and then we'll know whether God's for it or not, and they say, Come up here. And so he knows there for it. And so Jonathan on his hands and knees, climbs up this route to get to the top of this ridge, where the Philistine garrison is where the Philistines are taunting him and say, Oh, come on up. Oh, yeah, sure, we'll come up, we'll show you a thing is what they say. And Jonathan kills 20 of them. He alone with his armor bear who's not a warrior. It's Jonathan by himself, kills 20 of the Philistines. And as a result of it, Israel hears that there's this great victory taking place with Jonathan, and they chase the Philistines. In chapter 14, go read the story. It's exactly like the one we just read about Goliath. Jonathan is every bit as qualified as David to be the next king over Israel. He is courageous, he's powerful, he's skillful, he's obedient. He does everything he's supposed to do. Why isn't he the next king over Israel? I mean, he's the one who should inherit it from his father. And you know, there's only one answer to this question, because, and we know this is important, because Jonathan literally gives his robes and his armor to David, and says, You take this, this is not mine. This is yours. You know why? Because David is the chosen one. We say that, like it's magic words, like we're watching some old movies, the Highlander or something, there could only be one. There's only one who's chosen, the one who's chosen by God. That's what Messiah means. Anointed means chosen. You are the one who is blessed by me to bring this conclusion. This is the thing. David is the only one who's chosen. Jesus is the only one who's chosen. Your question is whether you're in him. If you are not in Jesus right now, choose Him as your Savior. If you know Christ as your Savior, then know that you are chosen for one reason, because you are in Christ, just like Israel found themselves in the chosen one. Who was David Father, I pray that you would teach us to be patient as shepherds to be obedient as champions, but most importantly, to trust our one champion, you Jesus Christ, our Savior. It says his name that we pray, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much, Jesse. And so yeah, we are actually on the third today's we're gonna do our third sermon on First Samuel, we're in First Samuel chapter eight. And again, we're going to cover a lot of ground this morning. I think this stuff is fascinating reading. So for any of y'all in the room, that enjoy adventure that enjoy movies, than joy, fiction and joy, true things, all that kind of stuff. This is stranger and even more exciting, because it's true and better than any fiction you'll ever read. And so First Samuel chapter eight, all the way through 15 today, and we're really going to look at the life of Saul. And we're going to consider him there's some other things that are going to happen in the story today, but it's really going to be focused on him and his life. Well, we talked about how we have Samuel, Samuel again, was the last judge if you know where you are in the scriptures. First Samuel comes right after well, there's the book of Ruth in between, but right after the time, or the period of judges. And so Samuel is this last judge, he was called by God as a little boy, the beginning of this book, we saw that with Hannah, we really saw how he came to be last week, and we talked about the Ark of the Covenant last week, it was some exciting stuff. No less exciting this week as we get into the life of Saul. Well, one of the things you need to know right from the get go on chapter eight is Samuel. He has some children, and they have some of the same misgivings and misfortunes as Eli's children. And it's really sad. It's sad that sometimes the great people who are used by God that their children sometimes do not follow and I'm sure there's a myriad of reasons for that. But it says that Samuels children were not like their father. They were greedy for money, and it says they accepted bribes, and they perverted justice. So the leaders of the city come to Samuel and they're like, Hey, listen, your children aren't like you. And we're concerned because the Aryan Nations, they have kings at this time, we you give us a king to judge us, like the nations around us. We'll say, Daniel, he doesn't like this, because he's like, I tried to teach you to be near the Lord, to count the Lord as your King. So he goes, and he pleads before God. He's like these people, just like Moses pleaded before God, but sandals pleading for God's sake, these people they are rejecting. They are rejecting this whole idea of just having a judge and God talks to Samuel and says, Listen, they're not rejecting you, they're rejecting me, go in and give them a king. But I want you to tell them, what will happen if they get a king, tell them what will their life will be like, if they get a king, just like all the other nations. And again, we know where this story sort of ends up later on with David and all that, but we're not in that time period yet. That's gonna be next week, if you'd like the story of David and Goliath, and all that comes up with the rise of King David, that'll be next week. This week, we're talking about Saul, Benito told Samuel Warren, what's going to happen, because if you get a king, he's going to tax you and he's going to take your your best men and he's going to make them warriors, he's going to take your best ladies, and he's going to force them to cook and to clean and to do all these kinds of things. He's going to take the best he's gonna take a 10th of what you have, and all this is gonna occur, you're gonna take a 10th of your flock, don't you realize what's going to happen? So Samuel tells the people this, what are the people do? They're like, Oh, are bad. Oh, we don't really want to King we didn't know it was that kind of thing. We didn't know what you're signing up for that. That's not what they say at all. They say no, we understand. And we still want a king to judge us and to lead us into battle. And so first point I want us to see this morning is that the people of God don't want God to be their king. This is really where things start going awry. But one of the things I think is interesting is how God in his sovereignty, he tells them what's going to happen. And yet he gives him a king anyways, he says, Listen, I'll give you a king, but it's gonna go bad. And it's all in the handiwork and design of God. Because think about how the people are thinking, the people of God in the Old Testament, there are waiting for a king to establish a kingdom here on this earth. And it goes, ultimately, we know that Jesus comes in he established his kingdom on earth and in heaven, but that's not what they're looking for. They're looking for some sort of military leader. And so they're looking at the surrounding nations, and they're starting to fret and they're starting to worry. And I think it's interesting that even in the sovereign plan of God, He allows these things to occur, so that we would know and be thankful for King Jesus when He comes so that we would know and be thankful that we have a Sovereign King who's not like any sort of rulers we get here on Earth, because one of the things we're going to realize in the story today is we're going to see a lot of how human nature doesn't change. We're going to see that a lot in the story, but I just want to say right from the outset, that God designed us in a god

Pardon to say that he would walk with us and he wouldn't be our Father and He will be our God and we can have perfect fellowship with Him. And that will arrive very early on, the hope of every Christian unbeliever is that we will be with him again, and the new heavens and new earth. But in between, there's a lot of heartache. And there's a lot of missteps. And there's a lot of things that go wrong. We're seeing that in our own lives, we see that in the lives of our own culture, our own nation. And we're gonna see it here in First Samuel today. But don't be confused. Because God, in order to accomplish his things in the universe, he always works with sinful and imperfect people, always guiding, always leading, even when we don't see it, even when we don't understand it. And what I love about the God of the universe is I remember an old mentor used to say this, he used to say that, that God loves to hit straight licks with cricket sticks. It's kind of like that old stick ball, that old baseball, right? And that's how God works in the universe. And he is forced to do that. And you're gonna see that today in our story, but rest assured that what's wrong with the people in this story, and what's wrong with us oftentimes, is, we don't want somebody else in charge of us. We don't want someone telling us what to do. We don't want a Sovereign King, and says, Okay, that's where the people were at that time, as well. Well, who do they pick out? Chapter Nine, Saul and Samuel they meet. Saul is what kind of guy it says he's the most handsome man in Israel, head and shoulders taller than anyone else. And so what you begin to see is in this story, it starts off on the wrong foot. Because they're more concerned about the outward appearance, instead of the character and the nature of the individuals who are going to lead them. Does that sound any familiarity with some of the ways that we have had trouble in our own lives, or in our own culture, we don't live in one of those cultures where we judge people by their looks, or we try to elect people who are the most handsome or the most fit or the or the biggest, or the tall. So we don't do anything like that. We're much more sophisticated here in 2024, than it was in 1000 BC. But now we understand that so Saul, he's just one of those normal guys, he's of the tribe of Benjamin, he himself understands that he's nothing special is the most insignificant family and the insignificant tribe, and he's out chasing donkeys. Now, what's interesting about this story, and I want you to go back and read it if you're sort of following along. And I'll just sort of summarize what's going on here in chapter nine, is that Saul is just out chasing donkeys eventually runs into Samuel, Samuel is like, Listen, you and your family, you're gonna do great things. In fact, you're gonna do great things. And so I want you to come, and I want you to eat with me tonight and be the guest of honor at a banquet feast that I'm fixing to go bless that and pray. So Saul becomes Samuels, guest of honor that night and gets the best meet. And the thing that I wanted to see point to this morning at the end of chapter nine is that they found a king who is tall and handsome, and was a good warrior. That's what they were looking for. Oftentimes, that's what we do, too. And we think about our elected officials think that's what, that's what I want. That's what we need. That's what's going to help us and, and be something that's going to save us. That's what they were looking towards. And again, God saying, listen, for the people that go after these kinds of things. It doesn't mean that they are rejecting you, Samuel, they have rejected me, but they found one in saw character, those are going to be some issues that you're going to see in his life. But for sure, they found one who was tall and handsome, and he's gonna be able to fight for them. So chapter 10, I want you to see that Samuel anointed Saul as king with oil that often occurs. And then you begin to see in chapter 10, that Saul has this life where it is obvious that God's hand is upon him, okay? So I want you to notice something, some spiritual principle that he thinks is good for us to understand that often times we ourselves find ourselves and as we look around at others, and we think, man, they're kind of a mixed bag, it looks like God's doing some cool things, some special things in their life looks like God's doing some cool things, some special things in my life. But I've also got all this this baggage, I've also got all this heartache. I've also got all these character issues that keep bubbling up and coming into play. Well, that's what's going on here in the life of Saul. So you see in chapter 10, that he begins to prophesy powerfully. And so he's he's obviously given words by God, but the people around him are like, Who's this guy? Like, oh, should we listen to him? He's from that town. That person can even be a prophet. But later on, he is made king but even as he is made king, there's people who are grumbling under him. There's people who don't want to follow Him whether he's too young or they got mad because he wasn't picked these kinds of things. And he goes through this and eventually in chapter 11, he defeats the Ammonites.

And again, this is a time where he goes out in battle and you think, okay, good. Now they'll start respecting him now they'll start following him now things will start smoothing out for song. No, that doesn't occur. And eventually Samuel is like, Listen, I've done all I can do, you're in Saul's hand. Now he gives what's called a farewell address. And eventually, we get to chapter 13. And this is where things really start shining the light on Saul. And we'll show how his reign begins to unravel. Chapter 13, beginning of verse one says this, so I was 30 years old when he became king, and he reigned for 42 years. So he's 72, he ran till he was 72. And the endings not good folks, if you want to turn ahead and see that, but Right, here we are in chapter 13. And this is when Saul is 30 years old, and he begins to be king. And he has this great battle. And so at the end of the battle, the people are getting restless, his men, his soldiers are getting restless. And so Saul says, I know what I'm going to do. I'm supposed to wait on Samuel, who is the person who speaks for God at this point in history to offer sacrifices, but but I'm going to, I'm going to help God out. I'm going to rush ahead, I am going to be brash, and I'm going to take matters into my own hands. He hasn't come back at the time he said he's going to. And so he says, I know what I'll do. I'll offer the burnt offerings and the burnt sacrifices, even though I'm not supposed to do that. As soon as Saul starts to do that, after this great battle, guess what? Samuel comes right around the corner. And he's like, saw, what are you doing? Why are you offering these burnt sacrifices? I told you, I would do it. I told you, I would come back. Of course, he had excuses. Oh, well, the main we're getting restless. And I didn't know when you were going to be back. And and so I felt compelled to do this so that I could have a sign so that they would see the smoke and know okay, we're all good. Every God's with us. And Samuel says you don't realize what you've done. Now, your kingdom is going to come to an end,

man, it's just think about that. I know, we know how this story maybe ends, and that David's going to come up and rise up. But just think about that, that someone has to come to you and say that mess up what you just did. Your president, your CEO, you're the dad of the household, you're the king, but because of that act, that that you didn't think was overtly sinful. But it was and it was foolish, and it was brash, and you got ahead of God, and that's going to cost you everything. So he tells him that he says Your kingdom must end. This is in chapter 13, verse 14, for the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart, the Lord has already anointed him to be leader, the people because you have not kept the Lord's command. This leads to the third point I want us to see that we're going to unpack for the rest of our time together. And that is that Saul begins to mess up. And it cost him dearly. We don't often like to think about this. But we need to camp here at this at this point, this morning, that that sometimes we don't like to think about the fact that one foolish decision, one foolish act can cost us so so dearly. That doesn't mean you're unredeemable that you can't get to God or go to heaven. That's not what we mean by that. But just that whole idea that whatever it is that you are a part of whatever it is you are pursuing, whatever it was that God had his hand on your life, that can be removed, in an instant.

He's offering a sacrifice to the Lord, like a priest wasn't supposed to do that. Let's continue on the story and see if there's anything else that goes on. I want to start with a bright spot in chapter 14. We get introduced to he's really been introduced before but we get a story about one of Saul's sons named Jonathan. Jonathan is going to come back into play against the remember him he becomes best friends with David later on in the stories that you're going to hear next week in the week after. But it says that one day, Jonathan said, I know what I'm gonna do, we're sitting here, we're fighting the Philistines. This is the time in history where they're fighting the Philistines, because the Philistines want to want to wipe the people of God off the face of the earth. God's people always have challenges. They always have oppressors. It could have been the Egyptians in the day. And in this time, it is the Philistines. And so Jonathan says to his armor bearer, let's go over to where the Philistines have their outposts. And let's do a skirmish. Let's do a fight. And the armor bearer is like, listen, Jonathan, if you want to go, I'll go. I don't know what God's doing. But if you want to go, I'll go. And so Jonathan has some faith in the Lord and he says, perhaps the Lord would give us victory. And he says, Well, no, by the way that they respond if these guys when we go to attack them, if they say come on up, and we'll know that the Lord has given them into our hands. And so all the sudden Jonathan, his armor bears are two men, against a lot of men in a field about a half acre, it tells us exactly kind of the size of the field, begin to go up to attack these Philistines.

It says that when they had to go up that the Philistines had the higher ground, so they have to actually crawl on their hands and knees up a rocky cliff, as they're doing that the Philistines taught them. They're like, look, these Israelites are coming out of holes, you know, to come up here, they're just crawling out of their literal holes. And so they say, come on up here. And he said, and so then Jonathan says, his armor bearer, the Lord will help us defeat them. And so they go up, they climb on their hands and feet. And it says that the Philistines fell before Jonathan, this is in chapter 14 Here, fell before Jonathan verses 13 and 14. And the armor bearer killed those who came after them, they killed some 20 men and all and their bodies are scattered over a half an acre.

Now, I want you to know that this scene, again, this is why I tell you, the Bible is so cool, and we need to read it and digest it and think about what God wants to show us to this. I mean, this is better than like John Wick. I mean, I know we know these John Wick movies where he has these like high body counts, okay? But you think about this, this is better than that, because they don't even have the high ground. They don't even have the cool guns. They just have the Lord on their side. And one of the things that you want to see in this section of Scripture, and you'll see it in Judges, you'll see it in other parts of first and second Kings in Second Samuel is you have a lot of these stories, you have a lot of misfits, you have a lot of people who are sort of a mixed bag, yet God is using them, yet God is working through them in spite, in spite of their circumstances. And that's exactly what's going on here. Now, what's interesting is because of this little incident, where Johnson and his armor bear come up to people, and they defeat about 20 of them. It says that panic broke out in the Philistine army, both in the camp and in the field, including in the outposts, and raiding parties. And then an earthquake shook. Because God's in charge of the sea and the mountains and everything in him. And everyone was terrified. And so all of a sudden, what ends up occurring is that there's a great upheaval and that the Philistines are so confused, and so scared, and so shocked and so terrified that they begin to kill themselves. And so Saul and his men go like what's going on here, who's left who left the camp to call since the servants they're like, it was Jonathan and his armor bearer and like, what's going on? It's like, we can just stand up on the hill and watch these people kill each other, and they will be defeated. Why? Because the Lord is with him and the Lord is doing it. So you would think Saul would use this opportunity to sort of steady the ship to sort of write some of the wrongs that he has done before, but he doesn't.

He comes up with what's called a foolish oath or a foolish vow. He says, I know what we'll do. It's war season. So let's, let's let's starve ourselves. Let's fast. And so he tells all the men I know, we're on a fighting day. But let's fast let's not have any food in our bellies. And let's let's go about and see how that goes for us. Well, Jonathan, he and his arm bear, they just fought pretty hard. So they see some honey, and they start eating it and they're nourished and refreshed and other grounds like, why are you guys so droopy? And then I also made us promise that we wouldn't eat today. And he's like, Well, that was that wasn't very bright, but doesn't do good on the day of battle. But saw all of a sudden, he's like, Wait, he hears that someone has eaten. He's like, whoever's eaten. Let them be killed, even if it's my own son. And so they cast lots, which means, you know, dice and they throw it I'll send it lands on Jonathan. Jonathan is the one who's eaten in the camp. He's like, okay, let's kill him. And then the other people have to come and be like, so what are you doing? You can't kill your own son. He's the one that calls all this great event to happen so that we can even defeat the Philistines. So he said, Okay, I guess I won't kill my son today. And he's just so crazy guys hasn't really read this, we see that God's having to work with these sinful people making some foolish decisions, and he's guiding the people of God and he's working even in the midst of some of this stuff. But it is so obvious that Saul's days are numbered, and that his decisions are costing him dearly, says at the end of chapter 14, that not only are his decisions, but so goes the leader, so goes a nation or people group or who is under their care. That's why there's a high cost for leadership. That's why it matters the character of the men and women that you and I follow, because there's a high cost and says at the end of chapter 14, the Israelites constantly fought the Philistines throughout Saul's lifetime. So whenever saw observed a young man who was brave and strong, he drafted him into his own army. see exactly what's going on here. It's just a never ending, ceasing fighting that's never gonna have victory because the Lord's even with him anymore. And he's doing exactly what Samuel warned the peoples as a you want this guy saw. This is what's going to occur.

Chapter 15 And the final chapter I want you to look at here which is really the death blow the nail in the coffin for Saul and his law.

I, in his ministry, he goes up and fights the Amalekites. And Samuel is still in the picture. And he tells all listen, you can go fight these guys. But these these people, there's a certain treachery about them. And so what you need to do is you need to just kind of wipe everything off the face of the earth with this culture with this people group with who they are. And so Saul says, Okay, I'll do that. So he goes in, and he defeats the meal kites. But what he does is he decides, I'm going to keep the choice animals, and I'm going to keep the king alive, so I can sort of taunt him and bring him back as spoils of war along with the sheep, and along with the cattle that are good. Now they're worthless, I'll go ahead and slaughter them. That's no big deal. And so they do that. And they come back into town, and Samuel meets them, and he's like, What are you doing? I can actually hear the buying of the sheet. I can hear the hoofs of the cattle. Why is that you're supposed to destroy everything. And Saul has excuse after excuse. He says, Well, listen, I was gonna I was gonna sacrifice him. Well, I really did. You know, I really did sort of get rid of everything. In fact, he's sort of saying, I did exactly what God told me to do. And, and he says, No, you didn't. God was very clear. I was very clear in communicating God's desires to you. And Samuel says, he was just very sorry for this whole thing is downcast. And he says, What is this is verse 22, of chapter 15. What is more pleasing to the Lord, your burn offerings and sacrifices or your obedience to His voice? Listen, exclamation point, obedience is better than sacrifice. And submission is better than the offering of fat of rams. rebellion is as simple as witchcraft. And stubbornness is as bad as worshipping idols. So because you've rejected the command of the Lord, he has rejected you as king. And saw he understands exactly what's going on here as he begins to plead out, I know I messed up, but please, please, somehow, you know, let it all be okay. I'll go ahead. And you know, what do you want to do with this king that I drove back King a gag, he says, Bring them to me. And Samuel, of course, takes care of him. But, but it's awful in the way that this chapter ends. Okay, the way that this chapter ends in first gen 15. It says, this last verse of chapter 15. And the Lord was sorry he had ever made Saul, king of Israel. Can you imagine the Lord putting that in the Scriptures about you or me or anyone else? Sorry that he had made King Saul over Israel in that game. We know that God's sovereign, but it shows his interaction with creation, you know that God cares about you and me, you know that we can grieve the heart of God, that we can quench the spirit of our Lord and Savior, we can quince the very spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, by our actions that's showing the we have our humanity and that God has a heart for us. In the last verse year said, He's sorry he ever made Saul, king of Israel, I just want to say a couple of observations for us this morning, saw was full of excuses. He acts the way we act sometimes when we've been caught. Or we like to say, I'm just a little bit off, right? Sometimes we also I'm not as bad as them, or I know I kind of messed up, but please, let's just smooth this out, somehow get rid of that bad credit score, I had a really good time on that vacation, or z. So I'm gonna get rid of all these ailments. To my body. I had a really good time and my 20s or 30s, or whatever. were full of excuses. Saul's full of excuses. Think about this in terms of some of the verses we've already talked about. Verse 20, he sort of says, Look what I've done. But I did obey the Lord Saul insisted I carried out the mission he gave me. I brought that King Ahab Sure, sure, sure. I did that. But I destroyed everything else. He was not even being truthful there. Because he brought back animals to the choice animals and it because he says, oh, like no, I had a plan with those animals. I was gonna sacrifice them right here to the Lord, right? We have these little ways that we give ourselves outs.

He passes the buck to those who are under him, the soldiers. If y'all ever worked for someone or been a part of a team, where you had a bad leader or a toxic leader, that when things went wrong in the organization in the company, they just pass the buck down. That's exactly what he's doing here. He started to blame the soldiers. Verse 15. It's true that the Army's fared the best of the sheep, goats and cattle. Well, the army did it. I mean, I was there. I was leading them, but I it was it was them. They did it. Verse 21. The troops brought back the best of the sheep, goats and cattle. But I did it to sacrifice to the Lord Aragon

verse 15, it seemed sensible and right to me. It seemed like I was doing what was good to

I've destroyed everything else, though, like I seem sensible and right. Or I just did it for DOD, we've already sort of talked about that, that that's what he says. Because that's a good way to come at the after my afterwards and sort of sort of put that situation on an event that we know we did wrong. Because we do this from the youngest age, I watch my little six year old daughter do this all the time. When she gets caught red handed, she makes up a narrative to get her off the hook for whatever it is, we just caught her in. last verse here that he was afraid of the people. There's a lot in this First Samuel and that's why I would say go back and read these chapters. I'm summarizing them for you. I'm trying to bring out some highlights. But at the end of the day, I think that Saul was afraid of the people. He feared man or he feel he feared people more than he feared. God. He's got all kinds of goofy things and they're trying to anoint him king, he's like hanging out with the luggage. He's constantly worried about the donkeys I mean, I just an interesting couple of chapters there where it's like, man, he's been told he's going to be king and he's always asking where's my donkeys? Where's my donkeys? Because luck, says Uncle that he was crowned. He was crowned kings like, but he forgot to mention that he's like, Well, where's the donkeys?

He's just focusing on the wrong things. He's afraid of the people. He says this in verse 24. This chapter saw admitted to Samuel Yes, I've seen I've disobeyed your instructions and Lord's command, for I was afraid of the people and did what they demand in this section. This section of Scripture, this sermon is going to end on a low note. We're gonna have a high time here in a minute, I hope you stay around for this wedding because I've never met people who've known each other or they know when Clinton was elected. That's how long they've known each other. Okay, so you do that math in your head.

The first one bill when Ross Perot was running for president, that's when they met each other. Okay.

But but we have to end on a sobering note today in this passage, because that's where it is. I mean, I just can't I mean, can you imagine the God of the universe writing in the scriptures? Just put your name there. In your stupidity, I'm sorry, that whoever made Saul king of Israel is very sobering. Because why? Because the people had some in some weird way. They thought Saul's gonna save us. Right? I mean, that's the only explanation that we would do. If like, we're electing somebody or we're, we're asking for someone and we are, we're sure we know, we're gonna have all these faults, it's going to cost us all these things, but give them to us anyways.

Because this is somehow going to save us. That's what they thought about saw, that's gonna be a disappointment. So then they're gonna say, no, no, David's gonna say this, you're gonna hear these phrases. And these chants later on this year saw his slaughtered his 1000s of the Philistines. But David has slaughtered his 10s of 1000s. David is gonna save us.

David, you know, his reign, his kingdom doesn't last very long, either. It's all meant to point us to a Savior who can save us. This whole idea of kingship, this crown, it's, it's symbolic and is very purposeful in how we're, we're situating this series to say, David is the one coming but even David, even the man after God's own heart, who truly does repent, when he goes astray, cannot fully bring about this kingdom that has no end, only Jesus can do that. So Life Church was sober up this morning. Let's think about the fact that sometimes one foolish act or a continual going down the road of disobedience can ultimately harm what God wants to do in our life. But let's also serve up to the fact that there's nobody in this world, there's nobody we can elect, there's no political system, there's no spouse, there's no money, there's not anything that's gonna satisfy what ultimately you and I need to be satisfied in this world and in the life to come. Only Jesus can do that. So let's worship together. I'm going to pray, we're going to sing, and we're going to close out our time together. But again, sobering, sobering, sobering, sobering this morning. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you for

the example in the life of Saul that even in the midst of a lot, a lot, a lot of foolish decisions that you

somehow worked it out to where we are sitting right here worshipping you, the real God, the real savior of the universe. I thank you that you care for us. That you're not done with us. But Father, help us to be mindful and to take the warnings that there are consequences to our sin. Lead us the Lord we pray. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you all so much for being here we are in a series on First Samuel. So excited to get there. And we're really in our second part to that, but I just want to float something out to you guys. And that is just to kind of let you know about something you may not be aware of, I wasn't aware of it until I came to be your pastor, which is that we had a debt on this building that is 17 years old or so. And so it was inherited all this this is I've been your pastor for about four years, but just want to make you aware of this as something to pray through. A lot of times, you know, you'll have a leader or pastor who will get up here and they'll say, Hey, I know how we can do this, we can do this. And we can do this. And you know, we can get rid of our debt. I don't have that sort of Spiel or speech for you guys, today, I just want to present this to you, as a matter of prayer to say that in three years, this loan runs out and it'd be a fully, you know, 20 year loan, and we are just praying and thinking through Lord, how might you be pleased that this $1.2 million would be gone over the next three years, we don't know how that's gonna happen. I don't have any, like I said, big plans. But I wanted to put that before you, as you go out. There's a TV to your right, that we've set up to just kind of let you know where it's at. And we are trusting and believing that God is not done with Life Church at all. But this is what you have debt. And you guys know this, whether it's personal debt or family debt, it really holds you back. And so we believe that yes, it's been going on long enough, it'd be 20 years in February 2027. And we're just praying and asking the Lord, how might you be pleased to help us to rid ourselves of this debt? So I just want to throw that out there. And then before we get into our series today, so where is this in the Bible, and again, whether you're here last week or not, we have moved out of a period in the Bible, that's called the period of the Judges, Samuel is going to be what we call the last judge, if you want to look at this, historically, we're moving around 1000 BCE, we're gonna move into the time of Saul and David, and all those characters are going to be introduced in coming weeks. But before we get there, we're talking about the Ark of the Covenant today. And yes, I know there was a movie about that. So you understand that at 1400 BC or so God led the people of Israel, using Moses out of Egypt, put them to worship on Mount Sinai, and in the Ark of the Covenant was a couple of things, and one of them being the 10 commandments, and all those kinds of things. And it was very important to the people of God. And so we're going to pick up in First Samuel chapter four today, where Samuel last week went from a boy to becoming a judge, you're gonna see that very clearly in the text today. And right now, it says in chapter four, beginning of verse one, it's a time where Israel is at war with the Philistines. And if you know anything about even just cultural or biblical history, Philistines are is where Goliath is going to come. So we're going to catch that story here in a couple of weeks. But that's who this is. These are people who really terrorize the people of God. And so they decide to attack Israel, and end up killing about 4000 men. And so what the troops do is they man, how can this happen? How can this continue happening, that we're being defeated by these Philistines, and so they come up with a plan, they say, we're gonna we're gonna go into battle with this Ark of the Covenant, we're gonna go into battle with this with this beautiful thing that maybe is gold over it, and the share of them on the top and, and again, holds our artifacts that we have, they're so important to us. And so one of the things that they're doing here is they're not doing this out of faith. They're doing this out of fear, and just hoping that God will bless them as they go out and use this this item. They're almost using it as what we would call like, a, like a rabbit's foot in our culture in time. But they think, bless, let's just take this arc. And I know God will save us from our enemies. So they bring this arc and who is leading in time as a is a guy named Eli. He's gotten a lot older. He was a judge that we introduced last week. And remember, he had two evil sons, and they weren't doing right by God. They were taking advantage of women at the tabernacle, they were taking advantage of the Lord's offering. And so you got Eli and his sons, you got all these Israelites. And so they're saying, Oh, good. We've got this arc that we're going to bring before us in battle. Now we're going to do great things. So they began to shout, and it says, They shouted so much, that it began to make the ground shake. So the Philistines like what's going on? And so they figure out that oh, my gosh, the Ark of the Covenant is with the Israelites. And what's amazing about the people of God is there's enough stories that go around even over hundreds of years, that they know what's true and what's not.

Right. And so the Philistines start thinking to themselves, we know what happened to the Egyptians.

They were ultimately taken over by the people of God. And we don't want that to happen. So what we're going to do is we're going to fight as hard as we can for our very lives, and see what happens. So the Philistines come in and they fight Israel, and instead of Israel winning, even with the ark, it says that 30,000 Israelite soldiers died that day. And it says that the survivors fled to their tents. And it says the ark of the Lord was captured, and that Eli's two sons were killed. And so what ends up happening in those days is someone is going to now send a message to let us know what occurs. And so we have this guy from the tribe of Benjamin because again, how is Israel sort of designed in this ancient world? It's, it's designed by 12 tribes of Israel. So representative, from Benjamin runs to go to Shiloh. Now, what's Shiloh significant? Remember, that's where the tabernacle is, at this time where Eli was and where Samuel grew up. And so Eli is waiting on the side of the road to hear news of the battle, because he's concerned about this taking the Ark into the battle. And Eli asked, What's the noise all about? And all of a sudden, this representative comes to Ilan. Eli's old at this point, it says he's 98 years old, and he's blind. And it says, And he asked what happened. He says, Israel has been defeated by the Philistines. But there's lots of things you need to know. Number one is lots of people were slaughtered, your two sons are killed. And third, and maybe most devastating, is the ark of the Lord has been captured. And when this messenger told us to Eli, it says that he fell back and broke his neck and died. And there was also this little side item that says he was overweight. And so he had judged Israel for 40 years. Now, I'm gonna stop right there. And I'm showing you guys the references, there's a lot of passages we're gonna go through, you can read this in your Bible later, you can just listen, I'm trying to store it as best I can. But it's a crazy scene. Again, they were using the ark, like we would think about pagans using a witch doctor to say, hey, look, I'm gonna make sure that this thing goes the way I want to, I'm gonna get this thing on my side so that I can have victory. It's about me and what I want. And that's exactly what they're doing here. Lots of death 30,000 on top of the 4000 Initially, is a lot, Eli's faults are shown. You remember in the last passage that we looked at last week, we said that it was pronounced by Samuel because God told him that Eli sons were going to be punished for their wickedness and Eli's failing to deal with it. And so now all this comes to fruition, the sons die, Eli himself dies, and it shows you that he was at least sloppy towards the end of his life. Well, how's it going? Let's continue on in the story of First Samuel chapter four. Before I get to my first point this morning, it goes on it says that Eli had a daughter in law, and she was near the time of delivery. And so hearing that the Ark had been captured and that her father in law and her husband were killed. Her father in law died and her husband was killed. It says she immediately went into birth. And she is just silent at this point. But all of a sudden, the midwife says You're having a boy, and the boy cries out and says, What do you want to name this child? And she says, I want to name him, it Gabbard, which is, without glory, or where is the glory because Israel's glory is gone. She cannot think of a reason to live because the Ark is gone. Her father in law's gone, her husband is gone. And it says that the glory of the Lord has departed Israel and she herself dies in childbirth. First one wants to see this morning is that the glory of God has left us. That's the point this morning, the glory of God has left us and there's, you say, Does this really happen today? And I am here to tell you I have experienced it. I have seen it and I can show you biblically that you and I can conduct ourselves in such a way individually and corporately, where the winds of favor are no longer with us because we're no longer with God it's not that God has left us is that we've left him and we're now going to pay the repercussions for our actions. I've seen this in my own life. I've seen this in my family's life. I've seen it in churches before where all the sudden, too many steps have gone away from what God had for them too many running through stop signs and warning signs to all of a sudden you find yourself no longer in step with the Spirit no longer in step with what God has for you and for me. Now this idea of Erykah Badu you may have recognized that name I don't know if any of y'all like to read short stories or like to kind of pay attention to certain movies and TV

These shows, but you remember around Halloween a lot of times, they'll talk about a guy named kebab crane. And there's a famous story that sometimes gets done into TV shows and movies about The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Maybe you're familiar with this. It's nice to have a short story from 1820 by American author, Washington, Irving. And if you remember anything about that story, it's about a headless horseman that has sometimes they have a pumpkin for their head and sometimes they hold a pumpkin in their hand. But it's this idea of, of IK Abad crane is sort of a gangly, old school teacher who runs into the wilderness and into the forest. And he runs into this, this headless horseman. And I often wonder, why did Washington Irving named him it Gabon? I mean, he obviously got it from this part of the Scripture. And I think that, you know, there's a lot of stories he didn't tell us why. But I think at a minimum, we can say, just like that short story, just like at this point in Israel's history, the times are gloomy. You ever been that you ever had a point in your life where you feel like, it's not only raining, but it's pouring? And all of a sudden you find yourself very vulnerable, very hopeless, very heartless. And I think that's exactly what's going on here. I think he was trying to pick up on that. That is Washington Irving, when he named this, this character, ik Abad crane, because he knew what it meant. It meant that the glory of God has left us there's darkness over the story right now, there's darkness over the land. I also think it's significant that a child is being born here. You often notice in stories in the Bible, even though it's true, it's also a really, really good literature to understand how good storytelling works. And what sort of helps us to keep engaged in the story, even though it's true. I think about this in terms of you guys know, I'm huge Star Wars fans. And so I think what is in the terms of the End of Episode Three, do you remember that that was one of the prequels, whatever you think of the prequels episode three, but if you remember, at the very end, Padma is having a child and she's dying, during childbirth, and she thinks this is the end, like, my husband has gone crazy, he's probably dead, and everything just looks very, very hopeless and bleak. And we end that narrative with what the birth of a child not only a child, but children, right twins. And in fact, there's no hope to be found, until what episode four, A New Hope. And so I think it's just interesting how, again, we pick up on these stories. And you know, one of the things we talk about here, as well here at Life churches, we understand that you can go back and look at ancient stories, whether it's Roman culture, or Greco culture, or biblical culture, extra biblical culture, and say that there are certain themes, and there are certain stories that tend to repeat themselves. But one of the things that we always I think, understand is we have to ask ourselves the question, is there a story that defines all other stories? Is there a true story that is superior to all the legends and myths that we've heard about? And I think that there is and that's why I find myself a Bible believing Christian. Let's continue on the story, though. So we keep that in our mind that there is a possibility that the glory of God has left us just like it did for Israel. First Samuel chapter five, here's what happens the Philistines, they take this ark of the covenant, and they take their victory, their spoils of war, and they take it and they put this ark into the place where their pagan god is set up. Now, who's their pagan gods at this point, it is Dagon, which is probably related to Bale, maybe bales father, and so they put this ark in their temple with Dagon. And they go to bed, and they get up the next day to go see what has occurred. And all of a sudden, Dagon has fallen down flat on his face. Now you can imagine this. And so these Philistines say, Well, I don't know what happened. Maybe it was something natural, maybe it was, who knows, let's just settle Dagon back up. And so that's what they do. Then they come out again, and all of a sudden, Dagon has fallen down. But now his arms in his head has come off as well. And he has nothing left. But idle trunk. Just a humorous little story here. But it's not it's not gonna get funny for very long because all of a sudden, disease and pestilence breaks out wherever the Ark is taken with the Philistines. To make a long story short, they sort of take this ark and they say, well, listen, it's not good here. It's obviously superior to our pagan gods. And all of a sudden they start getting plagues upon them like the Egyptians did. And so they say, let's send it out to another city. So they took out from this city, and they went to another city and guess what, everybody there breaks out in tumors. There's great panic.

So then they say, No, let's take it to another city. And so they take it to another city. And all of a sudden, they were like, no, no, like, so many people have died. So many tumors have occurred, they begin to cry out and actually get their city leaders together to say, what are we going to do with this arc, because bad things keep happening to us, as we have it in our possession. I just think that's so ironic that God is God, and the Philistines know it, and the Israelites know it. So the Philistines come with this plan, like you and I will come up with let's send it back. You ever have something that's not really a gift, it brings more cursings and blessings. And so that's what they're thinking about this art. And so they send it back. And so it had remained in Philistine territory. I'm now on First Samuel six, one through 18, in the remaining Philistine territory, for about seven months. And they say, how are we going to return it back? And they say, Okay, let's do this. Not only have we sort of messed up by taking the art, but we better a piece and sacrifice something to their God. And to even then let's offer some peace offerings, right. I mean, you've done this before, too, when you've messed up, maybe you bring back some things for peace offerings, whether it's flowers, or candy or chocolate, or you mess up at work, I not only am I going to pay back, but I'm going to offer some retribution, I'm going to pay back with interest because I know, I'm messed up. And that's exactly what they're thinking that they messed up and taking the arc. And they're tired of three different areas, three different cities, going into massive, massive chaos, because the arc was with them. So they come up with this idea of let's come up with five gold tumors and five gold rats, let's form them, let's put them on a cart, because this is what we broke out with. We broke out with tumors, we broke out with disease and pestilence given to us by the rats. So let's just make those out of gold, put that,

that arc on the cart and send it somewhere. And we'll know that their god is really gone. If it goes back to their country. So they take two cows that just had calves, they hitch this, these two cows to the cart, and all of a sudden it starts making its way to a place in Israel. They see it from a distance that people are farming, they see it from a distance, and they become overjoyed. I mean, Joshua comes and he takes this ark, he's rejoice, they sacrifice there, they offer the wood from the cart and a fire and then several men, they go and they place this ark on a rock. And they take the the offerings and all that as well, which represented these different areas that had been decimated by the ark that God had done, then, here's what happens. 70 people decide, maybe it's a good idea for us to look at this arc. Let's open up. Let's see what's inside. And if God had told them very clearly not to do this, so if y'all had been around, I wasn't gonna show but it's very old. 1981 Indiana Jones, we know what happens, right? Then we open up the ark, bad things happen. So that's what they do. They go in and they open up the ark, and all of a sudden, 70 people are killed. And so now they're like, What in the world are we supposed to do this thing seems like it's it's bad blood for the Philippines. Now, it seems like it's bad blood for us. And so they go and they take it to a hillside home. And they just kind of leave it there says for 20 years and all its going to come back later on in Second Samuel, but just know that they leave it at a house. Point to you, I want us to see this morning is that the glory of God is not to be trifled with. We understand what that means, right? Because one of the things that we often think of in our own hearts is I've got more time to deal with this. I'll kick this can down the road, Eli thought I got more time to deal with my disobedient sons. I'll kick this can down the road. Israelites thought, man, we'll just take this, this rabbit's foot and we'll figure out a way to beat the Philistines. Not by relying and trusting in God not by repenting of our sin, but by just pushing through what we want to do. thinking our way will be okay. So the glory of God was not to be trifled with from the Philistines perspective. He is over the pagan gods he showed this so clearly. That's why there's 10 plagues in Egypt. He shows us so clearly in this story as well. He shows in other stories If you love to read the Scriptures with Elijah and all that, but the glory of God is not to be trifled with even by the people of God. And so both the Philistines, the Philistines, and the Israelites suffered in their ignorance and disobedience, that's the other thing is sometimes we might say, but I didn't know. Like I didn't know I wasn't supposed to look at that. You'll see later on when they put it on a carton, it begins to maybe pop off that someone puts their hand down and they're dead. And I didn't know. But ignorance and disobedience a lot of times leads to the same thing which is just death and destruction. But what's going to happen Samuel is going to come to the rescue as a judge and kind of help them get some things right. So let's look at the last part of our narrative. Our story this one and that's first shaming.

You'll chapter seven beginning in verse three. And he says, Listen Israel, if you want to return to the Lord with all your hearts, so now we're getting it right. Get rid of your foreign gods and your images of Astra eth, turn your hearts to the Lord and obey Him alone, and then he will rescue you from the Philistines. So the Israelites got rid of their images of Baal, and Astrid, and worship only the Lord. Then Samuel told them, gather all of Israel to Mizpah and I will pray to the Lord for you. So they gathered in this pot in a great ceremony drew water from oil and poured it out before the Lord. They also went without food all day and confess that they had all sinned against the Lord. And it says in parentheses, it was that Mizpah that Samuel became Israel's judge. When the Philistine rulers heard that Israel had gathered at Mizpah they mobilize their army in advanced so they can we lick them before we can lift them again. The Israelites were badly frightened when they learned that the Philistines were approaching. Don't stop pleading with the Lord our God to save us from the Philistines. They begged Samuel, Samuel took a young lamb and offered it to the Lord as a burnt offering. He pleaded with the Lord to help Israel and the Lord answered him, this is what we just need to learn over and over again, in our Christian faith in our Christian life, a humble and contrite heart, He will not cast out.

Just as Samuel was sacrificing the burnt offering the Philistines arrived to attack Israel, but the Lord spoke with a mighty voice of thunder from heaven that day, and the Philistines were thrown into such confusion that the Israelites defeated them. The men of Israel chased them from Mizpah to a place below Beth Carr, slaughtering them all along the way is that can you imagine this, that you've already sort of game victory, you've already sort of had the upper hand, but just to continue on with that, as they are going as they are leaving as they are fleeing. They're continuing to slaughter them all along the way. And then Samuel took a large stone and placed it in between the towns of Mizpah. And Jessica, Hi, Anna, and named it Ebenezer, which means the stone of help for he said, up to this point, the Lord has helped us that isn't that interesting. And you may have heard that term Ebenezer before it is famous in a song that we'll sing here in a minute in our closing, but just just see the bookends of this story. And I know it was a long story. And I appreciate y'all hanging in with me. But I thought it was important for us to see it and hear it in the narrative, you can always go back and read it later. But you sort of have this lowest of lows, don't you? Oh, my gosh, the arc is gone. And we are literally naming one of our children.

It combined, that the glory of God has left us and now all of a sudden, what was the linchpin that sort of turned the tides for Israel or the people of God? That's what we find ourselves right? Where we are. Now the reason why I read Old Testament stories and see ourselves in those stories, is because we're Israel in the sense of not by natural blood, but because we follow Israel's God because we follow the Jesus Christ who was born a Jew. And ultimately, he said, I'm here for the whole world. And so that in that way, as we look back on the Old Testament, and we see ourselves as the people of God, what was the linchpin that turned the tides in their life? Was it playing around or messing with the ark? Was it you know, running down an aisle or, you know, cleaning some things up? No, what was it? It was massive repentance. That's what turned things around for them. And you can see this sort of bookends here that you see darkest, lowest of low, gloomy times for Israel. But all of a sudden, there is now hope there's now now the Philistines aren't ultimately defeated here, right? We know they're going to continue to cause trouble for Saul, and they're ultimately going to cause trouble for David. But there has been a victory this day. So we stop, we pause, we celebrate again, some of y'all are gonna think this is cheesy, but let's go back to Star Wars. Right? It all comes back to that. If you look at episode three, get to the end. Padma has these promised children, they go they go out they are in seclusion to their about 18 or so. And then who rises from that to help deal a blow to the Empire and defeat them by blowing up the first Deathstar. Look, but was that an ultimate victory? No, they got to celebrate it though. They got to go down, you know, and have a couple of medals and say, Hey, this is good. But what's gonna happen in Episode Five, The Empire Strikes Back. And so what we're gonna see next week, if you hang with me, is you're going to see that the Philistines they're not done yet. I mean, they've been dealt a little blow, but they're not done yet. They're gonna they're gonna strike back. But for this moment, though, let's pause. Let's celebrate let's worship that the people of God got something right

They got something right and we can get something right did they? They they denied themselves food they they poured out an offering they, they really begged upon the Lord. They begged the leaders of them a judge at that time Samuel to Why don't you and treat the Lord for us so that the Lord would help us. Let's keep going. Verse 13, says, The Philistines were subdued and didn't invade Israel again for some time. And throughout Samuels lifetime, the Lord's powerful hand was raised against the Philistines, the Israelite villages there Ektron and Gath, the Philistines had captured were restored to Israel, along with the rest of this territory that the Philistines are taken. And there was peace between Israel and the Emirates in those days is the same, you'll continue to judge Israel. For the rest of his life. Each year, he traveled around setting up his court first at Bethel and Gilgal, then Miss POM. And he judged the people of Israel at each of those places. Then he returned to his home at Rama, and he would hear cases there and Samuel built an altar to the Lord

Rama. So what's the final call for us? We can see here third and final point that the glory of God is celebrated. And so how do we get there? How do we get there today? Because I know, you know, you know, didn't build Rome in a day and you know, aren't gonna get fixed in a day probably, although I think Lord can touch us sometimes with a divine touch and set us on a different path. But we have to get rid of those things that don't help us run with Jesus. Did you notice that's what he called them to do. In those days, what he said is he said, I need you to smash your pagan altars, I need you to get rid of those things that are, are attracting you to bail into the things of this world. And those of us who are believers, we have to do something, there are things that we have to get rid of when we get to the New Testament it calls it put off and put on. It's that whole idea of these are things that do not help me run. Hebrews calls it, you know, why don't you throw off not just the sin, but also anything that easily sort of entangles us keeps us from running the race that God has set before us. We have to get rid of some of those things that don't help us run with Jesus all of us do. It begins with always me, right. That's how we understand repentance, right? Oh, Lord, let there be repentance in my household and in my church. But we have to always say and let it begin with me so that we can do what so that we can celebrate the glory of God, that we don't have to be fearful that he's gonna strike us dead, that we don't have to be fearful because we're not viewing it flippantly or without respect, or, or reverence or all, but that we're able to celebrate who God is and what he's doing in our life. Because our Ebenezer ultimately is the cross of Jesus Christ. I don't know if you ever thought about that. If you play this forward, they have a little small, tiny victory. And so they set up a stone and they say, here is my Ebenezer, hereby they helped I come you helped me Lord at this moment. But we have the cross of Jesus Christ, that we can lean on that we can grow in that we can say, this right here took care of all my sins, and the fact that you rose again, we can declare victory because he has declared victory in our lives. So now, that's what we're gonna do, we're gonna celebrate, I'm going to close here in prayer, the band is going to come back up, we have a couple more songs that really sort of help us lean into whatever God's doing in your life, wherever you're at whatever it is that you feel like you need to throw off whatever it is, you need to repent of whatever you feel like you need to, we've talked about fasting before, you'll see this the people of God, there are moments and times in their life where I'm gonna do without something that's not necessarily bad or evil. For your sake, oh, Lord. And so maybe God's calling you to do any number of those things or a combination. But as the band comes, I'm going to pray. And then we're going to sing, and we're going to be grateful for who God is. And then we're going to be people who don't continue to kick things down the road. Don't continue to not deal with whatever God is asking you to deal with. But we come to Him and we celebrate him. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you didn't leave us wondering or wondering what it is you're doing in the universe, you have clearly told us, God we have questions about individual issues, individual problems, maybe even some church issues or, or work issues, family issues. But God you have promised that you are sovereign over them all. You can cover them all.

That your hand is not too short to save.

Hands not too short to move in our life. Individually and at life, church, Father, we're praying would you do that? Would you not just leave us be would you not just let us stay? Would you move us towards that cross which is where the only hope can be found for us. We ask these things in Christ's name and for your glory. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much, Hannah, we are going to be in the book of First Samuel and really kind of starts out with several characters, one of them being Hannah, who I assume her parents named her after this character, we're also going to see a town such as Shiloh, which is where I came up with my, my wife, and I came up with our daughter's name. And then we'll get into Sol First Samuel is that book, if you're not familiar with it, that is going to have that famous story of David and Goliath. And so that's coming as well. And so just really look forward to studying this with you. First, Samuel is one of those books that we call the narrative or history books. So when you look at your Bible, let's just make sure we kind of know where it's placed both in our Bibles and also kind of chronologically, because I'm not going to have all the scriptures that we're going to read up on the screen, because it's narrative, and it's large chunks that we're going to be dealing with. In terms of story in history. If you haven't ever sort of brought your Bible to Life Church, or you've never really pulled up your app, this may be a series you want to do that in because again, I'm not going to share everything, read everything that's in these chapters in this book. And so you may want to do that. Obviously, if you have an app, the YouVersion app is one of those, it's easy to find, we'll be in First Samuel, we typically read from what's called the New Living Translation. So if you want to pull that up, we're going to be looking at First Samuel, chapters one through three today. And I'll talk a little bit about those characters. If you want to kind of know where it's at. in your Bible, you have the Pentateuch, which is the first five books of the Bible. And then right before this, you have judges and Ruth. And if you remember anything about judges, judges is the book in our Bibles where it talks about how everybody's does what's right in their own eyes. Fascinating. It's a time where there is no no king and no authority that they want to come under. So they have a various series of judges, some good some not so good. A three get the famous stories of Samson and Gideon and those kinds of people. And then you get to Ruth, you may know about that one. But when you're here at the opening pages of First Samuel, what I want you to have in your head, and that's why we have this image of the crown behind us is this is the one we're going to learn about the coming King, we're going to see as King that's going to be rejected. And we're going to see about the coming King David who ultimately points to King Jesus. So a lot of good stuff in here. But it's narrative. So I just want to prepare you for that. Because a lot of times when you think of preachers and what we're what we're doing, as I'm y'all will read a little passage and we'll say, Okay, now take this, you can write it down, you can put it on your mirror, and you can memorize it and, and it may be encouraging to you. Narrative is bigger chunks is by nature story. And so that's why you'll see when I begin to read here, or I begin to story, these verses in these chapters, I'm not going to necessarily share everything that's in all of these verses, you can go back and read it or you can have it in front of you and follow along, as I'm going along. So let's get right into it. First Samuel chapter one beginning in verse one. So there's a man Elkanah. And he lives in a region of Aetherium. He has these children, but the thing you need to know is that he thought it was a good idea to have two wives. Okay, so he has Hannah, and Vanessa, and Vanessa had children, but Hannah did not. And each year Elkanah would travel to Shiloh to worship, I told you, there'll be a city called Shiloh, and to serve the Lord's armies at the tabernacle. And again, if you kind of know where we're at in history, the temple hasn't been built yet what's called Solomon's temple, which ultimately gets destroyed and ransacked and then rebuilt again, and what's called Herod's temple, which is the temple that you see, in Jesus's day. We're all pre temple here, we're in tabernacle times, coming out of the tents of Moses. And so that's where we're at. So that's how they're going to worship here. In the area of Shiloh, it tells you that the priests of the Lord at that time and you had priests who were go betweens between the people and God and and receive people's sacrifices. The priests, at that time were the two sons of Eli Eli becomes an important character in our story today, so healthy and thin A's. And so on the days, and alcanada presented his sacrifice, he would give portions of meat, and he gives one to his one wife, nya, and each of her children, even though he loved Hannah, he would give her a portion as well. But when you have this one wife and she gets more portions because she's feeding all this other children, and you have Hannah, who gets just one portion because it's just her. It's a reminder even and going to worship. That one is more favored if we can say A than the other. And so, Vanessa, she picks up on this and she would taunt and make fun of Hannah because she had no children. And you can see again, having two wives here probably wasn't the best, I Diem, it would even reduce Hannah to tears and she wouldn't even want to eat her portion of her sacrifice. He says, Listen, you know, the husband's like, well, let's don't you know, I love you. Isn't that enough? So let's say it opens up this story firsthand, like opens up with a screwed up family. So if you're in the room, Don't nod your head or raise any hands. But if you feel like you're part of a screwed up family, whether your immediate family or extended family, you're in good company this morning, okay, in First Samuel, and how to screw up, he screwed up, I think rather than to go he had two wives. Now, oftentimes, in Scripture, people who want to discount the scriptures will say, Hey, man, they were all messed up there that kind of did whatever they wanted. Now, listen, God told them what to do very clearly in the garden. And he reiterated it when he gave them the law, that is surmised in the 10 commandments. And what they had is they had people who did their own thing, and they always paid the price for it. That's why when Jesus comes along, and they start talking to him about marriage and divorce, he says, Listen, I get that you people figured out a way to send your spouse's off by giving them certificates of divorce. But I tell you, in the beginning, it wasn't meant to be that way, too. We're meant to come together in as one in some sense of permanency. So when you read the scriptures, sometimes what happens is, and I've introduced this concept before, it's just descriptive of how everything gets screwed up, when there is no savior or worshipping of the Almighty. And that's why we need Jesus, it's not always prescriptive, prescriptive is why we go to the doctor, and we get a prescription, take this medicine, and you will get better. Like what I was talking about, we read phrases from books such as Galatians, Romans and other places. Those are oftentimes prescriptive verses this is just describing to say the sin has always had its problems. And you're gonna see it kind of played out here. In First Samuel, she had one wife who's mean to the other, but God had a purpose for her womb being closed. And that's what's hard for us to wrap our heads around is when we're under such torment or pressure, we feel like God has abandoned us, he's forgotten about us. Something's not going right in my world. And so God, you must be asleep, God, however, I need to wake you up by you know, dancing around or coming up with some things to do. I'll try to do them because it seems like you're ignoring me. But here's the deal. God has a purpose and a means and something he wants to bring about, by holding back Hannah's wound from being opened yet, why what's she going to do? Let's see, and he's falling verses. She's gonna pray for a son. So after they had this meal at the tabernacle, what Hannah does is she goes in and she begins to cry out in anguish and in prayer. She's She's praying, oh, Lord, give me a son. And if you give me a son, I will give him back to you. He will be yours for his entire life and as a sign that he has been dedicated to Lord, I will never cut his hair. Now, Eli being the spiritual man that he is being the preset he is you would think that he would come along and just sacredly and just reverently, just Oh, bless those prayers. Bless you, my dear sister know, what does he do? He accuses her for being drunk. He says, must you come drunk? Throw away your wine woman. And she's like, listen, and I you guys have been in situations. I don't care if you're at the store or at church, where you get accused of something that you aren't doing. What is a lot of our first instinct I don't know about y'all. Y'all may be more holy than me. But mine is to look kind of fight back, snap back. She doesn't do that though. She says no, sir. I haven't been drinking wine or anything stronger.

I'm very discouraged house pouring out my heart to the Lord. Don't think me being one of those wicked women, the one that's even women that does something so, so dumb. I've been praying and crying out in great Anguish and Sorrow if that's the case, Eli says, and again, I don't know if it was genuine. If it was flipping, if he did an out of routine because of his priestly duties. He says, Go in peace. May the God of Israel grant you the requests you have of him? And she says, Oh, thank you, sir. And she went, and she was no longer sad. Interesting, interesting. So then what happens? The next morning, they go back, he, the husband slept with Hannah, and she had a son. She named him Samuel. And again, names were significant in that time, and oftentimes in our time, says, I asked the Lord for him. And so then they go up to offer their sacrifices to the tabernacle. And they said, We're going to wait until the boy is weaned, which really just means that he no longer needs to be taken care of of his mother, he can kind of stand on his own two feet, which still would have been pretty young, right? Maybe three or four years old, maybe a little bit older, but not too much older, probably three or four years old. And then they brought along a bull and they sacrifice. And after they sacrificed the bull, they brought the boy to this priest, Eli. And he's, she said, Sir, do you remember me? Hannah asked, I'm the very woman who stood here several years ago, praying to the Lord, I asked the Lord to give me this boy, and he is granted my request. Now I'm giving him back to the Lord, He belongs to the Lord, his whole life, and they worship there. So first point I wants to see this morning is us missing the Lord's work, doesn't keep him from working. US missing the Lord's work doesn't keep him from working, how did I bring that up? Who wasn't paying attention when something spiritual was going on? Honestly, it was Eli, and you're gonna see that Eli, let a lot of things slide in his household, and it's gonna bring about some trouble, it's gonna bring about some problems. But I just want you to know that you and I missing the Lord's work doesn't keep him from working. That's why we often say we have to have eyes of faith, we have to see God's at work all around us. But are we aware? Are we seeing it and not only is he at work all around us, that our lack of faith or awareness doesn't keep him from moving and working? The priest thought she was drunk, I think about that. In fact, we have something that that he's not dealing with with his sons. And so that's coming up problems over I mentioned. And I also want to say that God's not a rabbit foot. Oftentimes we think about this in our spiritual life, we'll take a story like Hannah's and we'll say, Well, that means that God wants me to, you know, have a son is like, what does that also mean? God wants you to, you know, share your husband with another woman. It's like, no, no, no, no, no, I don't want to take that part. I want to take the part of like giving me a child of I pray, see how you can, you can't, you can't do that with the scriptures. You have to see that this is narrative meaning meaning to show us ultimately our hope and need for Christ. And it's also showing how God works. And God is not some sort of rabbit's foot, he's not some sort of Genie, he's not obligated to do for us what he does for someone else. That's where we get all out of whack. Sometimes we're looking to the left and right, we're saying, Well, he did it for him, did it for her, gave them a spouse, give them a decent job, give them a decent house, give them a decent car. Where's what's coming to me. And I would just say one of the things that could free you up as a Christian as a believer, as someone who's considering the claims of Christ, is embrace your own story and figure out how God is moving in your life and join him. I get this phrase figure out where God is moving in, join him from a theologian called Henry Blackaby that died this week in his 80s. But he just always said, Hey, if you want to experience God in your life, figure out where he's moving in your church and in your community, and join him there. That's why I wanted to bring this first point up, you and I missing the Lord's work doesn't keep him from moving doesn't keep him from working in many people are able to get in on the blessings, hopefully many of us here at Life Church, but if you don't, that train will pass you by but it will not pass by is the Lord working and doing things don't wish for someone else's story or someone else's life. I am telling you, this is the source of so much anxiety and angst. I mean comparison game, not only will not do anything, but it'll bring discontentment in your life instead of contentment. And Christians historically have been people who are content. Are you saying, Are you saying that I shouldn't aspire to anything or want anything more? No, I'm not saying that at all. Please don't see that. And what I'm talking about, I have high views of leadership and growth and ambition, all those kinds of things can be good in the right place. But what I'm asking you is but to what end? If you start praying and asking for, you know, a home or a spouse or a child or whatever it is, or a different job? What is your end game? What is your thought process in that? What is your purpose? I want to tell you, God loves to answer prayers that are bent towards his glory. Did you notice when God answered We answered Hannah's prayer. And when he opened her womb, when she prayed out and said that whatever child comes out of me, I will dedicate to you and give right back to you. And when she does that, you're going to see later on the passage, she's blessed with all kinds of things. That's how we have to think about our prayers to even if you and I finagle something and go out and get it that's all No, no, I don't need the Lord to go out and get this car this house this woman this man, I can make this happen on my own. It'll it'll not it'll not be right. It will not it'll not taste right. It won't produce the outcome that you and I think that it should produce but when we start orchestrating our lives and aligning our lives for his glory and say, God, I really Do you want this thing and the reason why I want it is to spend myself for you. Those are the kinds of prayers God loves to answer. And those are the kinds of things that God's like good now your hearts aligned with me. Now I can move and work in your life. And I still don't say that to say that God's gonna necessarily give you everything you asked for. We know that's not true. But we know that he's good and that he has a plan and purpose for our lives, even when we don't understand it. You're not going to always, always, always trust and pray. And that will always lead to praise. That's why we come and we worship Matt reminded us of that this morning. So that leads right into the second chapter of First Samuel, where Hannah begins to pray. And she says all these things, she says, The Lord has made me strong, I rejoice in the Lord. He has answered me he has even exalted me over my enemies, he's rescued me, no one is holy like you God. And he she calls out for us to stop backing proud and haughty and, and that the Lord knows what we've done and he will judge our actions and those who are, who are starving are now fed and those who are fed are now starving, and the child is one now has many children, and the Lord gives death and life he brings down to the grave but raises others up, he makes some rich and others poor. He lives supporting from the dust and the needy from the garbage and he places them among princes and places them and seats them honor for all the earth is lords and he has set the world in order. He'll protect the faithful ones, but the wicked ones will disappear in darkness, no one will succeed by strength alone. And goes on says those who fight against the Lord will be shattered. He thunders against them from heaven, the Lord judges throughout the whole earth, He gives power to his king, he increases the strength of his anointed one. And so all this to say is she is overflowing in praise and trust. And she's saying the world system that we still grapple with now. Why is it that that the wicked prosper or seem to prosper? Why isn't that I get my dear. When I feel like I'm owed. She's saying all these things to say the Lord will will work it all out in due time. And in fact, he will turn things upside down often to show his power, his reign and his glory. This is this is her praise. This is her trust. It's not the song or the prayer, we would pray if we were finally given our child, right? Ours would just be it'd be a little bit different. But she knows that she is praying and representing Israel at that time, the trials that they are having, not only individually, but corporately as a nation on this earth. The same thing will happen when Mary comes along. A Mary the mother of Jesus when she has that what we often call the magnificant. In Luke chapter two, what's going on there, she's just praising God in the midst of such struggle, saying that those who are often poor and downtrodden are going to be noticed there are going to be seen by the Lord and He is going to bless them because what is she believing? Same thing Mary believed same thing. All the men and women of all believed that God is doing something barren women somehow get children happened to with Abraham and Sarah, do

you remember this? The promise child, Isaac, and we've already mentioned Mary, the virgin birth, and here we are with Hannah. It's this whole idea that something is stirring, and someone is coming. And in this sense, who's coming, Samuel, this beautiful baby boy named Samuel, who is going to be the one to anoint the king. It's just a beautiful, beautiful story. But before we get there, we got to talk about Eli's wicked sons and boy, are they scoundrels. Okay, so we're in chapter two. We're moving now to verses 12 through 26. And they had no respect for their duties as attendance with the priests. Okay, so Eli's the dad got two sons. And instead of taking their duty seriously, really what they're doing is when people come to offer their sacrifices, they're saying, Hey, don't burn up that good meat to the Lord. Let me stick my fork in the good portions. It's kind of like saying, you know, hey, I know you're bringing that ribeye, that really, really expensive cut of meat and to show your praise and honor to God because a sacrifice has to be made. Why don't you just leave it right there. And instead of like, burning it up on the altar, give it to me, and I'm gonna roast it on the grill out back. That's literally what he lost sons are doing. And they said, If you don't like that, we'll just take it by force. To man, that's bad. But that's not all. It says that they are taking advantage of the women who are working there in the tabernacle, and they are having sexual relations with them. And it's just bad. It's just real, real bad, what they're doing. So again, we know this to be true. You guys have heard headlines before that, that maybe you're coming to a church and the Lord and somebody says supposed to be safe, and instead of safety and security, you find predators such as Eli's sons And so all of the sudden, they're gonna have to be dealt with. But Samuel, he's in all this mix. Can you imagine this? He's in this sort of screwed up situation. And Eli, he was aware of all this. And so he tried to say, hey guys, why don't you just kind of stop sinning? Because you know, I can't do anything if you kind of wronged someone else. Yeah, we can maybe fix that or work that out, but you're rolling the Lord. You're defaming God. And it says in the text, that Eli sons are gonna get their due. But it says that, that Samuel grows up stronger in favor with God and with people. Who does that remind you of Jesus Himself, I remember that phrase, he grew in stature and favor with both God and men. And if you want to see people whose God's hand is on their life, men and women alike, you can always contest. It's like, oh, my gosh, they're growing up in the midst of even screwed up situation, there's something special about this little girl, something special about this little boy, because God's hand is on them. And somehow they have favor with both people of the world and with God him self. So he lost sons not good. It's a big deal when we let our children get away, not only with stupidity, but mocking and taking advantage of the things of God. He couldn't change hearts. And we know this, come on, we've all had instances where we've had to interact with our children and, or maybe we've been interacted with when we were doing something stupid, and we weren't gonna change our ways. Nobody can change hearts, but he they could have been removed from that situation. We have to know at certain times, it's bad enough that you actually need to be removed from that situation, and no longer in that context. And Eli doesn't do it. But God still uses Eli. And he uses Samuel in the midst of a screwed up situation. I say that as hope. Because I didn't ask for a show of hands, and I and ask for an amen. But I did start out by saying who feels like they may have had a screwed up home life. Currently, maybe the one that grew up with or extended family. And I would assume, if we're honest with ourselves, that would probably be most if not all of us, in the room at some level. And in the midst of all that. I just want you to see this this morning, because I think this is important. We can look to narrative to see how God works in the past as a way that he may work in the future. Samuel is able to, to grow up and stature and favor with God and people, he's able to grow up in the midst of a screwed up situation. It's all reminds me to of Jesus, you remember when nobody thinks anything's good is gonna come out of his family. Do you remember that phrase, where people are beginning to say, does anything good come out of Nazareth, Jesus, the Nazarene does anything good come out of Nazareth, everything gets dealt with eventually, in this life or in the life to come. Oftentimes sin is dealt with here. I mean, no matter how much you try to cover it up or hide it, it eventually kind of plays itself out. But even if not, even if it's has to be dealt with in the age to come, it will come out. And it will always come out in your descendants or those who are in your care in your charge. So then all of a sudden, a warning comes for Eli's family, profit or somebody, I don't know who it is. It says one day a man of God came to Ilan, he said, Listen, I want to tell you that I've been here and I've been an Israelite, so long I was there, or my family was there when we were taken out as slaves of Egypt. And I want you to know that what your sons and doing are doing is not good. And not only is it not good, but they will pay the price. And not only will they pay the price, but all of your relatives will pay the price, nothing good will now happen, your whole family's going to get kind of cut off and pay the stupid tax, they're going to pay the penalty for your sin of neglect, of not doing something about this, but really for their sin of being predators and taking advantage of the people of God and the women of God here in the tabernacle. And to know that this is coming from God. He says both of your sons are going to drop dead on the same day. And so what does Eli respond? We don't know. We don't know what he says. We don't know what he says to this kind of talk. What would you say? Right? I mean, we've all had those moments where you get called into the principal's office, because one of your children did something wrong, or you yourself were and all that. But can you imagine it going so far as to say because of these kinds of activities that have gone on for too long, there are now going to be instead of generational blessings, there's now going to be generational cursings what can Eli say at this point? How can he respond? I want to give you just an interesting thing I was thinking about this week. Some of y'all maybe in school you learned if someone called Jonathan Edwards in American history, Jonathan Edwards, helped with the first Great Awakening. We're talking pre we were a country. So we're talking about like 1740 and he was the first president of Princeton had all these daughters, and he and his wife they were Christians and again An influential early early early in American history. Now this is interesting from all these daughters he had, here's what his heritage looked like. And somebody in the 1800s, late 1800s, went back 120 530 years. And he found this about Jonathan Edwards, again, working as an adult and about 1740. In America. It says from his marriage, he had 729 descendants some 130 years later, of this number 300 became preachers. 65 became college professors. 13 became university presidents. 60 of them became authors of books, not modern day, this is pre pre 1800 pre something in 1800s, three United States Congressman and one Vice President of the United States, all under one Union had many daughters, and this is kind of their descendants 729. They also he's from New York, they also took a guy named Matt Jukes, he lived in the same state in New York. By the same time he and his wife, not Christians, not believers. So they both had a similar character. They found that he had 1026 descendants 300 of them died prematurely. 100 were sent to jail. For an average of 13 years each 190 were public prostitutes, and there were 100 Drunkards in his family, the family cost the state in the late this study was done in 1877. At that time, they figured that the family had cost the state $1.2 million because of their stupidity. Now, I just want to throw this out here. If you don't like those kind of Americans sort of interesting interest stories. Maybe you'll remember the 10 commandments. And remember that when God gave the 10 games in Exodus, he repeated them again in Deuteronomy when he gave me an exodus 20. This is the second commandment talking about idols. So remember how the kindness goes, I now know that God before me, you'll have no other idol says this, I lay the sins of the parents upon their children, the entire family is affected. They only hear that many of us and that's not fair. But isn't that how it works out just in reality that our parents choices for good or for ill affect us, of course they do. says this in the scriptures in Exodus 20, verses five and six, I lay the sins of the parents upon their children, the entire family is affected, even children in the third and fourth generations of those who reject me. But verse six, this is important. And this is my second point this morning. I lavish unfailing love for 1000 generations, on those who love me and obey my commands. Guys, this matters. It matters what we do with our children. That's why we have you know, things like we've done up here where we dedicate our children to the Lord.

Another way we can say it is it matters what we do with those who are put under our charge or care. This is not one of those sermons, and I'm not that kind of preacher says, Okay, you must get married, you must have a gazillion children or anything like that. No, I'm trying to help us to see what does God have for us, all around the room wherever we find ourselves. And here's what I'm here to tell you is if you live long enough on this earth, and you do enough things, right, you will have people who are under your care or under your charge, whether you're single or married, childless or have plenty of children, everybody has that. In what I'm saying is it matters what we do with those who are put under our charge who are put under our care. And what we are meant to do as Christians as believers is figure out how to have our lives that are not self centered, but others centered. I mean, this is so basic in terms of how we understand the first and second commandment, Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, strength, and love others as yourself, the charge and the call is really given to us in every generation, but never has it been more strong the pull of our culture and our world to say spend it on self, you need that you need that. It breeds discontent. And there's billions and billions of dollars that is floating across our screens and in our minds and in our hearts. That is meant to what to get our affections away and to say this thing will satisfy. And it's the same old thing just like we talked about in Jeremiah twos, like when we've hearing for ourselves sisters, which is wells, broken systems that can hold no water. It's the same thing we've done when we've sort of tried to find ourselves our identity in anything but God and then when we try to say, self can satisfy myself or if I can just get one more toy. If I can just get one, whatever it is. It's self centered. It's not other centers. But what an impact when we recognize and take seriously and our responsibility to raise our children in the Lord. That's what's going on here. And I think I've already sort of said what happens if you don't necessarily have children? That's First Samuel chapter two. Let's go to First Samuel chapter three. Where's all Samuel? You He's a boy. He's serving the Lord. He's assisting Eli. And it says in those days, I mean, chapter three verses one through 21 says in those days, messages from the Lord were rare. And it says visions are quite uncommon. So oftentimes we think, Oh, now if I could have gone way back then it was a little bit different to follow God. No, no. We're gonna talk about that in a minute. But it says he lied. He was almost blind by now. He's gone to bed. And suddenly the Lord called Samuel, Samuel. And so little Samuel things is he lost and he runs. He says, you know, I'm here. What is it? He said, I didn't call you boy, go back to bed. So again, the Lord calls out Samuel, Samuel, go runs Eli, you call me? No, no, I call you go to bed. Third time, Samuel Samuel. So he runs his, you call me he said, Listen, I didn't call you. But if you hear it again, it is the Lord and say, speak, Lord, for Your servant is listening. And so at that point, Samuel went back to bed. And of course, God called out to Samuel for a fourth time, Samuel, Samuel said, Speak, your servant is listening. And he says, here's, here's what he told Samuel, you can imagine this being told this as a boy, in some ways, orphaned, not really, because he has Eli and God, but this is what God tells him. I'm about to do a shocking thing in Israel. I'm going to carry out all my threats against Eli and his family from beginning to end, I have warned him that judgment is coming upon his family forever, because his sons are blaspheming God and he hasn't discipline them. So I vowed that the sins of Eli and his sons will never be forgiven by sacrifices or offerings. So Samuel stayed in bed till morning, he didn't go back to sleep that night, okay. He just met God. And God told him something wasn't fun. And so Elon said, Hey, Samuel clear. Sounds like I'm here. He said, what did the Lord say to you now? Now? Eli, he's, he knows this isn't good. I mean, he's been warned. He's been told, he knows he's, he's, he knows. And but he still says, Now listen, listen, boy, tell me the truth. And if you don't tell me the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, may God kill your strikey dead, don't hold anything back. And so he says, All right, I'm gonna tell you. So Samuel told him, everything that he heard, he didn't hold back. And finally Eli says, we'll let God do what he thinks is best. And the chapter three closes, as as the Lord, the Lord is with him. And everything Samuel did and said, proved to be reliable. And it says that all these things were confirmed that he was a prophet from God, and the Lord continue to appear at Shiloh and gave messages to Samuel there at the tabernacle. Third and final point I wants to see this one that you and I maybe have on our minds is okay, so how can I do this? How can I hear from the Lord and I want you to I told you, I was going to come back to that opening phrase there, this chapter that these were the days that it said that messages from the Lord were rare and visions were quite uncommon. And then I want you to see the closing of the chapter, it says, The Lord continue to appear to Samuel at the tabernacle in Shiloh. And the only thing that I can sort of come out with all this is just to say that man, it looks like that the people who cry out to God really cry out to Him not just a generic prayer, not just to throw up a prayer before dinner or lunch or whatever. It is not just a bedtime prayer, not just whatever, but they really cry out to God. They say, God, I need you to do something, I need you to move. That's how this story opens. Hannah was that way? It seems like that those are the people who get to hear from the Lord who else gets to hear from the Lord. Seems like those who lean in Lean ends a lot. What What is God doing it God? Are you are you speaking? Are you speaking is that you talking to me, it's the people who want to see, rest assure, if you don't want to see God and you want to live for yourself, and you want to ham it up in this world and eat, drink and be married because tomorrow you die. You can find plenty of people to join you in that endeavor. But it appears to me that if you look in the Scriptures from beginning to end, and you see men and women who lean in who want to see who cry out, these are the people who get to see God and be a part of what God's doing in the universe. Now, here's the deal, we got to clean up the basement. That's not really that's not really what we have in El Paso is it got to clean out the garage, got to clean up the casita Outback, kind of make some room somewhere. And that means that like, you know, you know, you see that you see this in this passage, and this is often true about the Old Testament. It's true about narrative a lot of times you see sort of the highest of highs, the amazing things that God can do through Hannah and Samuel. But then you see come to the lowest of lows, the ugliness, the despicable acts of Eli and his sons and what God's gonna do because he's gonna punish them and judge them because of their, their, their lack of cleaning up their house, their lack of what we would call them. quickly repentance, then, how can we hear from the Lord? And finally I say this, then wait and see what the Lord would be pleased to do in our lives and in the lives of those around us. That's how we do it. It's a simple, it's hard I get that may include. We've already talked about fasting a couple of weeks ago, I get all that, but it's just how much do we want it Life Church, individually, in our families, personally, corporately? How bad do we want to see God move. And if you and I are desperate for God, and if we're desperate for a move of God, don't be surprised if God moves. But the reverse is true as well. And if we just kind of shrug our shoulders, we just don't care. We just, we want to do our own thing. We want to tick a certain box, we want to please a certain person, we want to just come, then don't be surprised if he doesn't move in your life, in my life, in our church, or in our community as well. Let's pray. Father, I feel like the cries of many of our hearts is we do want to hear from you. God I know for many, many in this room, that is true. And so Father help us, help us to not let this just be a sermon that lands somewhere and is tucked away by the evil one, but that it that it that it lands and that it lands on good soil, and that it that it grows and it bears much fruit and that the cares of the world will come but that this is that this idea, this message this, this idea that you're worth it. You're worth relying on and leaning into and listening to that it won't be choked out by the cares of this world that it won't be run over and stomped out that it won't be dried up but that it will grow and bear much fruit not only for our lives, but for all those who come after us and are part of our care. We ask this in Christ's name and for His glory. Amen.

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Sermon transcript:

Thank you so much for being here. And those that watch online, we are finishing up our series on fatherhood. I don't know if it's been a difficult journey for you and encouraging or an up and down journey. But it has it has been a journey, hasn't it? We wanted to highlight the importance that what we saw in the scripture that God in how He reveals Himself to us, is as a heavenly Father. Quickly though, we had to talk about we had to deal with the fact that we've got earthly wounds, by our own fathers, even if they did the best they could, or even if they were decent, fellows, or even if they were absent, or gone, it all left a mark on us for good or for ill, which tells us we have to look to our Heavenly Father, we we looked at that great, famous story of the prodigal son, and we just really saw the overwhelming love that the father wants to bestow on us and indeed does bestow on us. Last week, we talked about a topic that maybe you've never thought about, or haven't thought about in a long time. And that's just that whole idea of fasting, fasting from food or fasting from anything that gets in the way of your relationship with God for a season right, so that you and I can discern God, what are you up to in my life. And if you're up to something, I want to take a moment to set apart some time to pray and to seek you. Today, we're going to speak in light of what we know about God revealing Himself to us for as father and then kind of how that works with what now what are we supposed to do. Now, as we conclude a series such as this? Well, I want to start with some scripture. Maybe you know, this passage or not, it's in the book of Luke, we looked in the book of Matthew last week, the Gospels a lot of times and how they reveal God to us is as our Heavenly Father. And so again, I've tried to underline where I see this pointed out. So this is in the book of Luke chapter 12. And don't be concerned about what you eat and what you drink. Very similar to that passage in Matthew, what's called the Sermon on the Mount. Don't worry about such things. These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers, those who don't know God, all over the world, but your Father already knows your needs. Seek the kingdom of God above all else, and he will give you everything you need. So don't be afraid, little flock free gives your father great happiness to give you the kingdom. Wow, that's such a sweet little phrase that that that phrase, right, there was one of the first tiny little verses I memorized and maybe that would encourage you a lot of times, just like when you start anything new, you want to kind of start small, be encouraged and kind of roll with that. And so I remember in high school, memorizing this little verse, Do not fear little flock for it is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom or it brings your father great happiness. And as I've gotten older, and I've thought about that term kingdom, you understand that kingdom or the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God, it's used over and over again, in the Gospels. And what is that? What do we say? And what do we mean, when we see the word kingdom in the Bible? Well, I think what is obvious as talking about a rule, and arraign, just like we understood when we were little kids, and we watched those cartoons with a king and a castle or a queen and a castle, we understand that someone's in charge here, there's a rain, there's a governing authority here. So it's the idea the kingdom of God is the idea that God is ruling and reigning in the hearts and the lives of us who are yielding our lives to Him. You saw that already as a pitcher of baptism. What are we doing as individual men and women of God, when we go through the waters of baptism, we're trying to say, God, I'm yours. And a lot of times, we've tried everything else, we've done everything else, we've come to the end of ourselves, which means we're a great candidate for grace. And we're a great candidate for repentance and belief. But that's the whole idea of the kingdom of God. First and foremost, I think is people very talked about that people who are what who are yielding themselves to this rain, we're not fighting the kingdom of God. Because it fights with us. It's wind in our sails, but it's not fully realized in this world. So the kingdom of God has a sense in which we can realize it in this world, we can taste it, we can say man that was good for my heart that was good for my soul, whether it was a worship, or a great message, or great testimony, or God did something cool in your life or in the life of your loved one we're tasting, we're getting a foretaste of heaven. But what we often recognize is we're not fully there yet. It's not fully realized. So I just want to be real clear the Kingdom of Heaven has a sense in which we can be a part of it because Jesus has already come as a baby in a manger lived life here taught us how we are to go and then ultimately what died and rose again and showed himself Vic Dear, but everybody, I've talked to you if I was to talk to all of you, you'd say, but listen, I still struggle with sin. I still have things and areas of my life that are not quite right yet. And that's exactly normal. Why? Because it hasn't been fully realized the kingdom of get God has an already sense to it. But it has a not yet that we wait until the time to come when Jesus comes a second time, or what we see the consummation of all things.

So, but what does this passage actually say, and suppose he says, our first point this morning, it gives your father our father, great happiness to give you an i the kingdom. Again, this is such a great phrase. And when we understand all that, that means that it's not just a throwaway phrase that, that is that idea that we can have what God has not not in some weird things like oh, you're like, you know, like your mini gods. And I don't mean it like that. I just mean that the power that God supplies can reign in us that becomes very important when we think about the concept of fatherhood. Or oh, my gosh, that who is in us, the Spirit of God, the hope of glory, so that I can now do the things that God is calling me to do. But not only is it just interesting, or neat or fascinating that God now lives in us. But it's this whole idea that it gives our Father in heaven, great pleasure, great happiness to give you and I, the kingdom, we've kind of talked about what kingdom is about. But I want to push a little further and say, how, how does this all work? That's neat. And you've often maybe heard like, especially depending on your different traditions and backgrounds that that he said to Peter, thou art, Petros, the rock, and upon you, I'll give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the gates of Hades or hell will not be able to overcome it. What is he talking about there? He's not just talking about Peter, he's talking about all those who would follow after Peter and Peter is God, not simply reserved for the super spiritual, or for those who are simply priests or Pope's. But for anyone who leans into what God has for him, or her can have access to the kingdom? How? Let's look at First John, I mean, John chapter one, not first, John, John chapter one. So early on, in what's called the prologue of that book of the book of John, it says this, but to all who believed him talking about Christ, and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God, that becomes important, because how are we relating to God in this series, understanding that he's the father, and we're His children, they are reborn now with a physical birth, resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God. And that's the kind of thing that we celebrated this morning. It's a new nature. It's the same but not the same. And listen, guys, this doesn't get any easier as we get older. We're constantly asking ourselves, God, you've given me unique gifts, possibilities, wiring, personality, gotta How can I best been that towards your glory? If we're not careful, we tend to mimic someone else, or we just do what our mommy told us or our daddy told us here on Earth. And when we have to understand is that maybe that was some good wisdom. But we're always pushing forward and asking God, what does it look like for me to be faithful to you? For constantly looking to the left and the right, we won't get that answer. Why? Because we are all fearfully and wonderfully made. We're all unique, and how God saves us and how he wires us. So it's the idea that when you and I are saved, we become a Christian, we become a Christ follower. We are now bearers of a new kingdom, we're in some ways, we're still the same old person, but in other ways, we're not. Right. So it's that idea of new nature. Same but not same. God is breathing new life into us. And that's why the older we get, what will happen is, is that new life will continue to work its way in us and out of us, or will walk away, or that fire will be greatly diminished, or will get better instead of better. Does that make sense? This is how the Christian life works. This is what it means to be born again, new birth. We don't see that. Let's see this further on in passages such as this, Romans chapter six, verses six through 13. This is a great passage, really talking about what is occurring as we come out of the waters of baptism. We know that our old sinful selves were crucified with Christ so that sin might lose its power in our lives. So it's not that we'll never do anything wrong again. But we understand we're fighting from a position of victory instead of a position of losing all the time. We are no longer slaves to sin. We understand what slavery is, we understand what that yoke means. We understand what chains mean, we understand when we're chained to something. We're no longer slaves to sin. For when we died with Christ. We were set free To set free from the power of sin, and since we died with Christ, we know we will also live with him, we are sure of this, because Christ was raised from the dead, He will never die again, death no longer has any power over him. When he died, he died, wants to break the power of sin. But now that He lives, He lives for the glory of God. So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin, and alive to God through Christ Jesus. Do not let sin control the way you live, do not get into it sinful desires, we're all tempted this way. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you are dead. But now you have life, new life, use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God. This is why it's so important for us to understand that when you and I interact with each other, we're looking at a holistic being men and women that we all we're looking at someone who is not just what I can see in touch, but that inner man, that inner woman, and if we are redeemed, that whole idea of I love this picture that we have here a baptism which is it's it almost looks like a coffin. It's like the old one, you go down, we're saying that old person is gone. And then that new person is raised to walk in life. Not not bound to sin anymore. We're not going to be slaves to sin anymore. We couldn't help but to keep doing it. And we couldn't help but to keep going back to But now Christ has freed us he has set us free. In deed, I'm gonna show you a couple more verses to illustrate this point. Second Corinthians is just a letter written to the Corinthian church and guardians 517. This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person, the old life is gone, a new life has begun this is what's so important. Because as we interact with one another, sometimes we think men that pass me by, like that ship has sailed if you knew how old I am, or how much water is under the bridge, whether it's with my marriage, or with my relationship with God, or others. And what he's saying here is, listen, it's never too late. As long as you and I have air in our lungs, it's never too late to come to Christ, it's never too late for him to begin that, that story of redemption in our hearts where the old life is going away, and the new life has begun or is beginning Galatians 220. You may know this as a passage, this was another verse I remember memorizing as a 16 year old, the old self has been crucified with Christ is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. So I live this earthly body by trusting in the Son of God who loved me, and gave himself up for me. So if you're thinking about baptism, if you're thinking about the claims of Christ, is that again, if you are perfect, or if things have passed you by and you know, some of y'all think, well, I was baptized as a baby, maybe that's good enough. And it's like, well, wait a second, have you decided to follow Christ? The reason why we do it this way in this tradition is because we're saying there comes a moment in all of our lives as men and women or as young girls or young boys, as a man, I want that Jesus I've been hearing about not just my parents faith, which is important. That's what we'll recognize it next week, as we have our little children that we are, you know, showing to the Lord into the church. But it's not everything at a certain point, we decide man, I'm going to follow Christ and what that means, but it's no longer I who live the old self has been crucified with Christ put to death. See this language here that's being used? We understand it, we really do. We understand it quite clearly. That's why a lot of times we stay back from spiritual things, or from Christianity, or from church for so long, because we understand what it's going to cost us and what it means for us. Again, Christians are not perfect people who've got it all figured out. But we are people who say we take seriously that we're going to fight sin now. We're not just gonna give into it all the time, like we used to, or like those around us may continue to do a fusions 317 says this, that Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in Him. That's what a lot of times we'll talk about Jesus being in our hearts, which is again, by the power of the Holy Spirit, your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong. We all know this. This is how anything works. If we want things to go deep. We want things to be strong. We've all seen trees fall over because the root system was bad. And it's just an ongoing process that happens throughout our life so that we can do what God has for us. This this change of nature. It's such good news, those particular characteristics that constitute the sin nature that can be broken by the power of life and death and the resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus, this whole idea that all life has passed, the new life has begun because we are sons and daughters of God. That for real changes everything second point this morning, I just want you to see I just pulled it right from the scriptures. The old life is gone. A new life has begun. To begin for so many of the people that have gone through the waters this morning, I know it's begun for so many of you all around the room. But it for some of y'all don't sit on the sidelines anymore. Don't sit on the fence anymore. Say God, what do you have for me? Because you mean that like, who I am and how I'm wired. That can be okay with my personality and all that, yes, of course. But God came to redeem that, not to squish over that. And we're gonna talk a little bit about identity here in a minute. But just know, second point wants to see this morning is that the old life is gone, and the new life has begun. And Jesus modeled this for us on the view. And I've ever thought about this before. But let's go back to the book of Matthew. And it talks about Jesus himself, he went down Matthew, chapter three, from Galilee, to the Jordan River to be baptized by John, this would be what we call John the Baptist. But John talked to him out of it, or tried to talk him out of it. I'm the one who needs to be baptized by you. He said, so why are you coming to me, but Jesus said, it should be done. For we must carry out all that God requires. So John, agree to baptize him. After his baptism, as Jesus was coming up out of the water, the heavens were open, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove. So you have this Trinitarian act going on here. You're seeing the Spirit of God descending like a dove, some of y'all who, who like art or have seen pictures, you'll see the very spirit of God coming as a dove, and settling on him. And a voice from heaven said, here's God. So you have Jesus being baptized Spirit of God descending like a dove in the voice of heaven, saying, This is my dearly loved son, who brings me great joy. Do you see the love of the father that he bestowed on Jesus Himself? We all longed to hear these words, don't we? How many of us would longed to have our our dads when they introduced us to others that this is my daughter, this is my son, with him, brings me such great joy and pleasure. Again, what we're saying over and over again, is that if we did not get that in this earthly life, we have a father in heaven, who will give that to us if we will yet turn to him. We're no longer slaves to the old way of life. But we're now a son and daughter of the Father. Let's see this again, in Romans eight, just kind of how this works itself out.

How does it work itself out that we would begin to be men and women who are okay with hitting our knees and crying out, I need help. I need help from my daddy, I need help from my father, I need help from God above for you and I have not received a spirit that makes us fearful slaves. See, the opposite of fear. We're not fearful slaves anymore. Instead, you and I receive God's Spirit when he adopted you and I as his own children, now we call him what Abba Father, for his spirit joins with our spirit. Remember, we talked about that, that now Christ lives in us the hope of glory, to affirm that we are God's children, and since we are His children, we are His heirs, we understand what heirs means, in fact, together with Christ, we are heirs of God's glory, if we are to share His glory must also share in his sufferings. So we understand it's not always going to be easy. And in fact, as we are faithful to God, sometimes that is when hard things come. As I was listening to the testimony of at least three of the people that you saw getting baptized this morning, at least three of them. As soon as they made the decision, I'm gonna follow Christ and believers baptism, it was immediately spiritual warfare began coming on them. And immediately they began to having dreams and nightmares that were of horrendous nature, pointing towards death, why we should not be surprised, because what happens is, is that even when we decide to do the right things, there is opposition against us. And so that doesn't mean we should Oh, well, it's hard, it's tough. I'm going to tap out. So many of us, we now feel like we have the freedom to just sort of what it used to be called in my neighborhood, take your ball and go home. You remember that when you would go to your buddy's house and y'all would go play basketball. And there was always one kid who really had the nice ball, that's what you wanted to use, or that was the only ball you could find that hadn't been flattened. And all of a sudden, when things didn't go his or her way they got elbowed in the side they fell down, they just retired or when to give up, they would do what they would just take their ball and go home. And then that was guys who play basketball anymore, or soccer or whatever it was that we were playing in the neighborhood. And I would just say that that call that temptation is true for all of us at all times in our life, whether we're seven or 70 I just want to give up, I just want to tap out. It's too hard. I just want to go home I just want to take my ball and go home and kind of get up under the covers and you know, throw it up over my head and just say I'm done. I'm tapped out but we understand that that's not what God has for us. That if we understand that we're Kingdom bearers and kingdom bringers that that's not what God has for us. He doesn't even I have bad days, dark days, but that we don't lay there We don't stay in the pit in the mire. So let's look at the benefit of God's plan. last passage wants to look at his hearing Galatians. Great book Galatians reintroducing of the gospel Romans has it Galatians has a clear understanding of the gospel. But when the right time came, God sent His Son, born of a woman subject to the law, God sent him to buy freedom for us who were slaves to the law, so that he could adopt us as His very own children. There's that language again, we've seen in Romans, and because he, we are His children. There's that that language of Father, Son, Father, daughter, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, right? We've seen this theme over and over again, prompting us to call out Abba, fathers. Are you reading the same passage? No, it's reminding us again in Galatians. Now you and I are no longer a slave, but God's own child. And since you and I are His child, God has made you his heir. Third and final point on wants to see this morning, is our identity is that of a love child. If you don't get anything else from this series from these passages, I just want you and I to understand that so many of our issues that we're getting sideways with right now, in 2024, and El Paso and across our land are around issues of identity, we are struggling because we haven't got the first things, right. We haven't done the first thing. I'm not just talking about baptism, although that's how we start out our Christian life. I mean, just that we're organizing and orchestrating our lives and lining up our lives to say, Where does my identity and hope come from. And if you and I pick any other thing, but Jesus, it will be found wanting, it'll be found longing, it'd be found to really make us crash, I mean, all these kinds of things, because our identity is that of what of loved child, a loved son and daughter of the king. But in order to get there, we've got to be okay with recognizing, turning our back, turning our hand to say that I'm no longer a slave to the this abandonment. How many of us just feel that that we were abandoned by our earthly fathers or maybe our mothers as well, that we're no longer a slave to fear? We sing that we, we praise that but yeah, how many of us are starting to actually believe that that's true, we have to understand that of our identity as a loved son and daughter of the king of our Father, we're no longer a slave to abandonment, we're no longer a slave to the fear. We're no longer a slave, to be doomed, like our damaged dads, how many of you and I have thought, Man, I'm never going to be able to shake this. Because my daddy acted this way. My mama acted this way. My grandpa acted this way, my grandma acted this way. I mean, it goes way up the family tree pastor, and we've been screwed up people for a long time and my family, and I'm not gonna be able to shake it, I am doomed to repeat the errors and the mistakes that were handed to me. We're no longer a slave to that that's not true. You're no longer a slave to the wall that we've put up in our hearts. We've already said that many of us are like, I don't need this. I don't need this sermon. Only this fatherhood stuff. I don't need this father talk. I figured out how to accomplish things just fine on my own. Thank you very much. Well, that wall in our hearts, that spills over in all kinds of relationships, whether we're aware of it or not indefinitely with our relationship with our Heavenly Father, we're no longer a slave to addiction. How many of us could say Man, we turn to all these other things to try to satisfy? As the Bible says it was like BROKEN CISTERNS like broken wells that could hold no water yet we went there, but we're no longer a slave to addiction. Our identity is as a loved son or daughter of God. We're no longer a slave to the numbness. We've let our hearts grow used to play. It's so easy for us to just be lulled to sleep, isn't it? We can loll ourselves to sleep and we could be lulled to sleep. You know, just one more diet one more fad. One more little piece of this one little more little piece of that. I'll just numb myself. I'll just put one foot in front of the other at my job or I'll just put one foot in front of the other in my home or I'll just scroll one more time or I'll just watch one more show. We just numbed ourselves and we've gotten used to it. But here's what the Bible says you are no longer a slave to that. We're no longer a slave to dread. How many of us just kind of go freeware, say we go around there and we just dread we dread running into that person in the community. We dread having to go to our homes, we dread having to go face this face that we're knowing our slave to that we're no longer a slave to the thought that you'll never have your father's embrace. How much of that has just really contributed to so much of the damage that's in our wake? You know, I understand that right? Just that because of the lack of maybe a father LeighAnn Lovering embrace that we felt like man, it's never gonna go right my my times done my days, there's nothing, there's nothing everything's just in the rearview mirror and it does not look good that you're no longer a slave to that. Because here's the deal. You and I, we are free. We are free if this is true if we can get this right if we can just understand and pursue God and His Word and prayer and community and you know, even if fasting if we need to, can we get this right? So, if identity is of a loved child of God, then what happens is we're free. We're free, not free to do whatever we want, but free to reflect our father's heartbeat for the world and others. Because if we don't get here, we'll always do some form of navel gazing, worrying about ourselves what I do or don't have. And that's how the past has began in Luke chapter 12. He says, Listen, your Father knows what you need before you even ask for it. Do not fear, little flock Do not fear Life Church. It is your father's goodwill and pleasure to give you an eye, the Kingdom Do not fear life, church, you have gone from darkness to life. If you've made that decision for Christ, that old life is gone, the new life has come and do not fear Life Church, you and I are free to reflect our father's heartbeat for the world and for others. Because why? Because our identity is now being found as a son, or daughter of our loving father. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. Thank you how you do love us. I pray for those who are struggling with connection right now. As I'm talking as I'm praying. I pray that you would restore hearts that you would restore marriages that you would restore the love. For others, I know they have no connection. So Father, I pray that they begin a new connection that they like these eight or so who came forward this morning they said I want that new life. I'm done. I'm tapped out. And now I need you God to do something or I angle make it. So Father I pray whether it's restore, renew, or begin anew. I pray for those in the sound of my voice and under life churches care. In Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon transcript:

Thank you so much for just hanging with us in this series. And as I hope it's been joyful, hopeful, I know somewhat, maybe even painful at times. But we're kind of coming out of that I think it's important that we realize just that the language of fatherhood is all throughout the scriptures, specifically when it talks about our relationship with God, and the Gospel. And so this is week four, we'll finish up next week on week five. But when we start out, we kind of introduced this concept and made sure we sort of hit the the highlights of why this is such an important thing, you can always go back and listen to this. Second week, we looked at fatherhood issues. So we began to really kind of cut open our own hearts and expose some of our wounds. Last week, we really looked at that idea that when there are gaps in our relationship, because we just have some space, not only in our earthly relationships, but in our heavenly relationship with our Heavenly Father, that it creates problems. For us personally, professionally, all kinds of different ways you don't hear anything else out of this whole series is just that whole idea that we have gaps. We all have different ones. Even if we had a good dads, none of us had perfect Fathers earthly fathers that is. And so what we're trying to do is we're trying to say, okay, maybe whatever we had, as much as we can corporately, can we close that gap? Can we can we come to some conclusions in the scriptures that help us as we move along in this life, understanding that we're to relate to God as Father Are there ways in which we can move towards health and hopefully we'll experience some of that today. And again, next week, and maybe you've already experienced some of that. We're gonna look at one gospel today. From the Gospel of Matthew, as I've already said, if you just did a word search of the word, father, and how much Jesus has us, talking to our Father in heaven, I mean, the Gospels is just all over. And, you know, I don't check me on this, but I'm pretty sure that more than any other word in the gospels, it's just this whole idea of father. So we're going to begin in Matthew chapter six today, Matthew chapter six. This is in the middle of what's often referred to as the Sermon on the Mount, very famous passage, you're going to see the Lord's Prayer sort of brought out in this passage. But again, because we're in a fatherhood series, I want us to note how often Jesus calls us to address God as Father. So this is Matthew chapter six, beginning in verse one, watch out. Don't do your good deeds publicly to be admired by others, for you will lose the reward from your Father in heaven. When you give to someone in need. Don't do it as the hypocrites do. blowing trumpets in the synagogues and the streets to call attention to their acts of charity. I tell you the truth they have received, all the reward they will ever get. But when you give to someone in need, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing. Give your gifts in private and your Father who sees everything will reward you. When you pray. Don't be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners. And in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth and that is all the reward they will ever get. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private then your Father who sees everything will reward you when you pray. Don't babble on and on as the Gentiles do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating the words again and again. Don't be like them, for your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him pray like this. Our Father in heaven May your name be kept holy May Your kingdom come soon may Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today the food we need and forgive us our sins. And we have forgiven those who sinned against us as we have forgiven those who sinned against us. And don't let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one. If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, Your Father will not forgive your sins. And when you fast, don't make it obvious that the hypocrites do for they try to look miserable and disabled. So people will admire them for their fasting, I tell you the truth, that is the only reward they will ever get. But when you fast, comb your hair wash your face, then no one will notice that you are fasting except your father who knows what you do in private and your Father who sees everything well, what will reward you. I know a long passage, there's some familiarity, maybe some new concepts, new phrases you haven't ever heard before, or thought about before. But one of the things I want us to see right from the get go is when we think about certain things that are brought up in here, whether it's charitable giving or the idea of prayer and then really ending up on fasting. It may have brought up something that was repeated if you notice it In the text over and over again, and that is that we do these acts of faith for the reward. Have you ever thought about that before?

Sometimes we say, well, I'll just do it, you know, because and you know if you know if God rewards me great, if not, that's not why I do it. And we have to understand that's not what Christianity and Christian faith is, in fact, we'll get later on to a book called Hebrews. And it is very clear that what it means even have Christian faith is the belief that God is and that He is a rewarder. That is the that is what necessitates faith, leaving. It's very honest in the scriptures that if all of this is fake, or not real, or God doesn't exist, and Jesus wasn't Lord, and he didn't really come and raising the dead, and forgive us for our sins, then we should be pity most of all, when you and I give of our time of our finances, of our love, in spite of people not maybe returning that we're doing that as an act of faith, knowing that our what our heavenly Father will reward us, as we brought up before this whole context of why we want to think about God in fatherhood terms, not only is it true that this is how He reveals Himself to us in the scriptures, oftentimes, but it's so that we can worship so that we can know the true God. And when we have gaps, right, we have space, in our relationship with our Heavenly Father, we have to ask ourselves, where's my heart? Where's my worship? If I don't feel like worshiping? Why is that that should be as believers as Christians, that should be red flags to our relationship with Him, and how do we bridge that gap? One of the ways is, of course, fasting. But before we get to that, I want us to see the first point that you may not have thought about until I started articulating it in this passage, and that is that daddy is going to reward us, dad, he's going to reward us. And we've thought about this in terms of our own earthly lives as well. I mean, how many of y'all, you know, sort of gritted through and you know, did those good grades or achieved that act in sports, or, you know, went on a job that you didn't feel like doing because your dad or your parents said, Hey, if you do this, I'll reward you, I'll give you you know, so many dollars for every day, or I'll make sure if you go out and work today, and do this, I will take you for ice cream afterwards. And you were quite honest, when you were a 6789 10, maybe 18 year old kid, I'm not doing this because I love it. I'm doing this because I know that my daddy or my parent will reward me. And in the same way, that's how we are to understand faith, it takes faith because you don't get it until you what to you walk through whatever it is your earthly parents had for you. And a lot of times, we don't see the fruit of the results that we have here on Earth, living a life of faith until what until we again partake with Christ at the Last Supper at the one that is to come. But I want to don't want to overlook this concept of fasting, it's going to be important to our discussion today. In terms of intimacy with our father and worship of our Father, what is fasting? Fasting is that whole idea of saying to God, man, I want you I'm going to do without something, I'm going to deny something of my flesh, because I want to know you, God, my Father in Heaven more. It's about a relationship. Now, again, it's not about why we often fast sometimes we fast because we're too busy. We're working through lunch. If you've had those kinds of fasts before, sometimes you fast because your nutritionist or your doctor says you need to go on some sort of cleanse, some sort of juice cleanse, like you got a lot of bad stuff in your system. So you need to go through a fast, those may only be legitimate fast at certain points in periods of your life. I'm talking about a spiritual fast. Again, people outside of Judaism and Christianity fast. You've heard of Gandhi, fasting, maybe for political reasons. But what we're talking about what Jesus is talking about is denial of the flesh for a spiritual purpose for a higher purpose. It's not political. It's not to get your way on Earth right now. Sometimes we'll try to make exchanges with God, God, look how much I sacrifice for you so that you'll give me this, I've done this Lord, I've I've denied myself this. Now God, you owe me this. We might not say it out loud that way. But that's how we functionally think about it and operate. That's not what fasting is. Fasting is a desperation to have our Father, to have guidance from our father. That's why he teaches us to pray this Lord's prayer here in a minute. It's the idea that we not only take food, it could be food, but we take anything that we are recognizing or God reveals to us individually, is a hindrance is something that's blocking that relationship between us and God or maybe not blocking it completely, but diluting it or not able to see clearly and again, this is how fasting was you If you even think about it in the best sense of the Old Testament saints, I think about this in terms of Esther, when she knew she had to go into the king and the king had the ability to kill her for the requests that she was going to make. And so what does she do? She calls her maid servants around, she says, I'm gonna fast you fast for three days, and then I'll go into the king, because why? Why is she fasting here, she needs God. Like she needs him. She needs his favor his to beat him the Spirit of God to be the wind in her sails as she moves forward, and whatever it is she has to do. And that's oftentimes how we need to think about fasting as well. This isn't the only time fasting is discussed in the scriptures, I want to show you another passage that is going to teach us about fasting and again, you might be called to fast from your phone, you might be called to fast from anything. Oftentimes, it's something though that is directly related to our flesh, and oftentimes it is food. One day the disciples of John the Baptists. So we know John, let me just set the scene here. We know John the Baptist is he is that precursor to Christ. He is the one that comes to prepare the way. John the Baptist came to Jesus, the disciples came to Jesus of John the Baptist, and asked him why don't your disciples house like we do in the Pharisees do so what they're claiming is, okay, these, these sort of disciples of John the Baptist fast and the Pharisees, they fast, why don't you? And why don't your disciples fast? Jesus replied, Do wedding guests mourn? While celebrating with the groom? Of course not. Right? So this is very obvious. None of us have ever been to a wedding, where we're told, okay, now we're just going to deny all of you food. All right, we don't do that none of us ever been to a party, where there's nothing that served, if you ever show up to a party, and they say, no food is available here, get up and walk out. That's not a party. I don't know what that is. That's a gathering of some people who are hoping for something I don't know what it is. But it's not a party. Because when there's a party, you got food in volved. And it says, Do wedding guests more and more sobering with the grim Of course they don't. But Sunday, there will be taken from them. Go back just one passage, I didn't get the whole phrase there. But someday that will be taken from them. And then they will fast. Doing good Besides, who would patch old clothing with new cloth for the new patch would shrink and whip away from rip away from the old cloth, leaving an even bigger tear than before and no one puts new wine into old wineskins for the old skins would burst from the pressure, spilling the wine and ruining the skins new wine as sort of new wineskins

so that both are preserved? What he's basically saying is that the old ways of doing things that are not going to work, this is entirely new, just like when Jesus came in, he established a new covenant. He uses every day earthly language, to help them understand that there is something different going on here. When Jesus is with us, okay, and he was with us for 33 years, really three years in terms of ministry with his followers at that time, and when he was raised from the dead, he was visually seen by hundreds and hundreds of witnesses. We know it's all true. We know he was with us, but it was just a short season a short time. And what he's saying is when he's with us, he represents a new kingdom, a different kingdom, a new mindset. And he's saying, why on earth while I'm here, would you fast and long for God? Because God in the flesh is right? In You mean right in your presence? You don't have to. But he doesn't do away with the fast what does he say? He says, Sunday, the bridegroom, ie himself, he's talking about himself will be taken. And then you'll fast but why would you fast is the same thing I introduced from the earlier passage in Matthew, it's that whole idea that this much Oh, God, I want you I want my relationship with my father in heaven, to be heightened, to go to another level. And so therefore, I will deny myself for a season nobody's calling anybody to fast forever, then you die, right? That is starvation. We're talking about denying yourself something that may even be good for a time for a season. So that you can want have a spiritual purpose, pursue your relationships with God. Now he uses his illustration about, you know, patches and clothing and patches and wineskin. What I love about Jesus is he's taking things that they would have seen and understood, and he's saying, think about the ridiculousness of this. Okay, so they would have understood that back then they would have put wine in some sort of animal leather, it would have been easy for that to do, but you wouldn't have reused that old leather for new wine because it would just busts open because leather dries and cracks and that kind of thing. It's just like I could use an illustration that may seem kind of silly, but we get the point. How many of y'all grew up in a household where when you had a bag that too Good chips, okay, and it got down to the crumbs. How many of y'all had a mother's only the mother was my mother. And she would take those crumbs. If you tried to open a new bag of chips, she would pour those crumbs on top of the new bags. Okay? Because she was trying to what she was trying to say, those are still good chips. And I want you to eat those hours, you know? And I would I, you would I would not eat him, I would I would shake it. And then that would the crumbs go to the bottom, and I would eat the good chips on top. And eventually, it would get just way down to nothing but crumbs, and I would toss them. And it was awful, because you would take good chips, and then you would have another chip and it would be stale. Okay. So that was just ridiculous. It's like putting stinky clothes with your folded clean ones who in this room takes their old sweaty stinky clothes that they got from the gym that are wadded up and combines them in even the same vicinity with your clean, fresh tide with little bubbles on top. No, none of us do. Why? Because we would see the ridiculousness of that. And that's what he's saying. He's saying, Don't Don't think about this in some sort of old way. Don't think about this in terms of, well, we're still we're still fasting for, oh, you know, maybe a Savior will come? He's like, No, I'm here. But when I go, when the bridegroom is no longer with you, then you better think about fasting, at least my second point, he says when Jesus is not around us in bodily form, His followers fast. And now some of y'all are thinking around there. Wait a second, whoa, I don't do this. I've never heard I maybe I have heard of this before. But this isn't like fun. This is an exciting. You've already read a passage that even if I'm called too fast that, you know, I can't really tell anybody, I can't make a show of it. It's supposed to be secret. It's supposed to be private. Why on earth? Would I do all this. And what it does is it helps us in our spiritual muscle. We've all already admitted that we have gaps in our relationship with our Father in heaven. If we want to close some of those gaps, what we have to do is we have to voluntarily shake loose some of those things that are still lingering in our hearts, about attachment to this world because we live for another world. That's what the faith based community does. We don't fast all the time. But we have to find out. Are there times individually and even corporately as a church that we're called to fast. And I when I look at the Scriptures, the answer is a resounding yes, of course there is times. And you know, there's all kinds of other things you can come up with to say, Wait, my doctor says I have to always have at least a little bit of crackers or juice, I get that. And that may be that may be you and that but I get that or I'm a diabetic. I understand all that. But are there ways that you and I can deny our flesh? In order to ask God God? What in the world do you have for me? Because you're really shaking my world, God. I mean, you're really exposing some things, not only and maybe what I'm communicating up here on stage, but your own private, quiet time or with friends or wavey out in the community, and what God is trying to say to us, maybe you ought to consider fasting because my followers, when Jesus is not here on the flesh, they fast from time to time, you're still not convinced I want to show you how just how much strength that we need in order to do maybe what God's called us to do. Jesus tells a story in Matthew 17, beginning of verse 14, he talks about this right here. He says, at the foot of the mountain, a large crowd was waiting for them. A man came and now before Jesus, and Jesus said, this is the quotations. He says the Lord, have mercy on my son, he has seizures and suffers terribly. He often falls into the fire into the water. So I brought him to your disciples, but they couldn't heal him. Now this is bad, right? Some of y'all think I've often thought this Come on, I've often thought this man, I would be a stellar Christian, or I would really believe or it would be really great if I could hang out with Jesus, because then I can know I've always got Jesus with me. So therefore I know that wherever I go, and whatever I do, I wouldn't have the power to do it. Because I've always got the man with me in right here. So people are coming to Jesus and saying, I don't know what's going on Jesus, but your followers, they couldn't do it. And Jesus said, You faithless and corrupt people. Now wait a second. If you were with Jesus, you had to hear those words like whoa, I want to go back in time and I want to hang out with Jesus, but I don't want him talking to me like this. I don't want to be around when he says these kinds of things. I'd like to you know, avoid that. How long must I be with you or put up with you? How long must I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me. Then Jesus rebuked the demon in the boy, and it left him. From that moment the boy was well so again, we understand what he's doing here, Jesus, he's performing what oftentimes we sometimes call an exorcism, which is just the whole idea that he is rebuking a demonic spirit so that would leave this poor boy, this poor child alone. afterward the disciples asked Jesus, why couldn't we cast out that demon? You don't have enough faith? Wait a second, I can I can hear them in the back of their head and like their mind be like, no, no, I got faith. I go to church. I know you, Jesus, we believe you're the Son of God like me and you, God, we're good Jesus. Yeah, no, your God, and we're good, right? What did I already say about what is faith essence of faith is that believing not only that God is but that he's a rewarder, that he can do what he said he's going to do. And Jesus told them, I tell you the truth, if you had faith, like I'm talking about Jesus saying, if you have faith, like I'm talking about, even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain move from here to there, and it would move for nothing would be impossible. older texts, older versions, go into verse 21. And it says, this kind does not come out. But by prayer and fasting. The reasons why it's not included today, up here in this text, is that they think that was a later addition that the scribes sort of wrote, that kind of thing. But that's not to lessen the impact of the Word of God. It's just to say that a lot of times in biblical study, they always go with the older translations, the older manuscripts. But this idea, I think, is in there, because we've already talked about that this idea of faith is how can I have more of you, God, I want more of you. And I'm telling you, the way we can have more of God individually and corporately is to deny ourselves some earthly pleasures now, because we say this much, oh, God, I want you. And that's what he's talking about here. So third point I want us to see here is we pray, and we fast, and we exercise our faith. So we're ready. This is so important, we think about our spiritual walk,

because so many times, so many times when difficult situations come personally or in your family, or in your job or your workforce, or even within our church at large. We don't have the power. We don't have the power. It's like we're shooting a blank gun. It's like we're shooting a gun with no bullets in it. You ever thought about that? Sometimes, in your in your home life or in your spiritual battles, whatever it is, you're going through personally, you're thinking, Oh, my gosh, this is too difficult. I can't figure it out. Or it seems like whatever I'm doing is not working. And you say, Yeah, that's right. Whatever you're doing is not working. Because you and I are shooting blanks. We've got to go back and ask ourselves, why are we praying? Why are we fasting? Why are we exercising our faith so that we're ready, I know that about a third of y'all in the room, have government contracts, whether you're with police, or whether you're with military or border patrol are all these Homeland Security, all the things and I know how they train you, they train you over and over and over again, with your weapons with your bullets. So that one day when it happens, and I don't know how many hours that you end up training, as opposed to hours on the field, but it's a lot more training than when it's on the field. It's the same way in the Christian life. You and I are meant to exercise our faith. That's why he's saying, listen, people, listen, followers is what Jesus saying. Let's say if you just had a little faith, a little bit, and just a little bit like a mustard seed, you can say from this mountain, this mountain would move and they would move. That only happens for us if we want to see great things that God does in our life and the life of those around us. Church, we just have to be prepared. We have to in times that aren't crazy and chaotic. We have to get ourselves ready. Am I right, though? That's a question because that that verse that I sort of shared with you as a sideline, verse 21, that wasn't in the oldest manuscripts, am I right? To connect spiritual vitality to fasting? Because that's really the question here, because this is a series about fatherhood. And one of the things I'm proposing today on this series on this day on this sermon is that if we want to increase our spiritual vitality, our spiritual life, one of the ways that we can do that is through fasting, am I right to make that connection? Because you if you wisely saw what I've done today is I've shown you something on the book of Matthew, But fatherhood was really talked about a lot there. Then fasting was talked about, of course, when Jesus leaves now we're talking about the faith of the disciples or the lack thereof in order to be able to exercise this discipline. Is there still a connection between spiritual vitality and fasting? I think so. So we'll share one last story with you from the book of Matthew strayed from really the experience of Jesus. Matthew chapter four, beginning in verse one, all this is in Matthew, you can find it very easily. Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted there by the devil. For 40 days and 40 nights he fasted and became very hungry. First thing a couple things I want you to see in this first sentence here. Who led Jesus to the spirit Who? The Jesus to the wilderness? I get my answer, sorry, Jesus through the wilderness, the very spirit of God. Like we often think, Wait a second, I didn't sign up for this junky job. I didn't sign up for this crappy marriage. I didn't sign up for whatever it is. I didn't sign up to be in El Paso, Texas in 2024. What in the world am I doing here? And what it's saying here is God leads his people. The very spirit of God leads us sometimes into a wilderness. Not always, but he does at certain times, Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. And then he's like, wait a second, I don't want the devil messing with me. I don't want the devil messing with my family, making things heightened heated in my workplace. He's saying he was like, to the wilderness, and there he was tempted by the devil. And in that time, what was he doing? Was Jesus just playing ball? Was he just kind of, you know, kicking the can was? Was he doing these kinds of things? Now, what was he doing for 40 days and 40 Nights? He was fasting. Now that would be the opposite of what you and I would think, because you and I would think if we're in a difficult situation, if we're in some wilderness, or wandering time, wandering years, wandering months, I need to make sure that, you know, I'm taking care of I need to make sure I get my kittens while the getting's good, because I don't know what's around the corner. And what Jesus did was he made his flesh extremely, extremely weak. And it is possible, you can read medical journals on this, it is possible to fast for 30 days, and even up to 40, at about 30 to 40 days. It has some really detrimental effects on your health, but it can be done humanly speaking. And so that's what Jesus was doing is in his flesh. He was getting ready for this temptation. Let's see what happens. During that time the devil came and said to him, if you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread. But Jesus told him, No. The scriptures say, people do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God, then the devil took him to the holy city, Jerusalem, to the highest point of the temple and said, If you are the Son of God, jump off. For the scripture say he will orders angels to protect you, and they will hold you up with their hands, she won't even hurt your foot on a stone. But Jesus responded, the scriptures also say, You must not test the Lord your God. Next, the devil took him to the peak of a very high mountain, and showed him the kingdoms of the world. And their glory, I will give it all to you. He said, If you will kneel down and worship me, get out of here, Satan, Jesus told him, for the Scriptures say, you must worship the Lord your God and serve him only then the devil went away, and the angels came and took care of or ministered to Jesus a lot there. And a lot of things to think about in terms of our own life and spiritual vitality. But I just want to throw up here, just this concept, this is my last sort of slide I want you to see this morning. And that is that the way in which Jesus is tempted and the way in which Jesus would have struggled in his flesh and his humaneness, he's 100%, God and 100% man is the same that is broader to the human struggle, since the dawn of time. What is that? Number one, just that desires of the flesh? And all that that includes right? Not just not just food, but any sort of temptation that we might be faced with? That is just feeding the flesh? What's the second one out there? Is that lack of trust in God? That's what he does when he's saying that, hey, why don't you just go up there and throw yourself off of this roof that would prove there's really a God, right? You may have run across this when you have antagonistic conversations with your uncle or your aunt at the dinner table or at your next party and say, Oh, God really exists. Why did he do this? So and So listen, listen, listen. Whenever we say we need proof, we need some sort of fleece. We need something to let us know that God really is who He says He is beyond what he's already showed us. In his word, we're showing a lack of trust in God. We're showing that not only in a big sense of coming to Christ, but in anytime we're walking with God, and we're realizing I'm just really not trusting Him. Because I'm still just holding on to whatever that is. That's another temptation. There lack of trust, we need proof. The third and final one is just a temptation towards worldly power, and success. See how what what the devil tempts Jesus was and what the devil tempts you and I with it hasn't changed since the dawn of time. If you don't like those sort of categories, you'd like to think about them in terms of another category. You guys know the seven deadly sins. If you've been around our culture, around church at all, just a general idea of, of what would fall into desires of the flesh easily. Gluttony would possibly sloth, for sure loss would what falls into the lack of trusting God, for sure pride would for sure, maybe sloth would possibly envy what would fall into temptation towards worldly power and success in the would anger would probably Would you see him? Here's a simple message that's being shown to us over and over again. We said, what what? How do I grow stronger pasture? What? How do I get more tools in my tool belts, I'm able to withstand the wiles of the devil, I'm able to withstand his fiery darts. What are we to do? Well, we combat the kingdom of darkness with the kingdom of light, just like Jesus taught us. I go back to that first passage that is talking about the Lord's Prayer. And I know many of you all in the room came from liturgical settings where you memorize the Lord's Prayer, but have you ever really thought about that, in terms of really strength, faith filled strength, that gives us the ability to fight our own temptations in our heart as we move forward and what God has for us, our Father, that right there sermon on fatherhood, I didn't make it up Jesus did. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. It's that idea that God your holy, I know your holy, I'm not that kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That's that whole idea of Wait a second, when I'm going about and doing the right thing in the midst of the world throwing out its junk. I am being a kingdom bear and a kingdom Bringer. It's

another world. It's another thing that I'm bringing a taste of heaven, to my environment, whatever environment I find myself in, how am I going to do that? How am I gonna have the strength and power to do that? Potentially fasting, prayer, exercising faith, but keep going, where does it go after that? I father out and having helped me in a kingdom come Thy will be done on earth, as in Heaven, Give us this day, our daily bread that takes me and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And that whole idea there is that that idea that we understand that we have harbored unforgiveness in our heart, it's very hard for us to move forward and what God has for us, it's assuming that we as believers can forgive because God's first forgiven us and I got a whole series on that. I know it's difficult at times. And then what's the final thing? It says here? Where did it where does the Lord's Prayer end, which is where we're ending in this passage today? And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us, not just from evil, but if you look at the Greek there, it's the evil one, ie Satan himself. Of course, maybe you learn tonight in this the kingdom and the power and the glory forever? Because why? What is it we're doing? We're putting ourselves on a rock. We're staking ourselves. We're reading ourselves for battle, not just repeating the Lord's Prayer over and over again, although it's good to repeat and understand on a daily basis. It's that whole idea of I want God himself. I want that relationship himself. I want to know God, the way Jesus knew God and talked about him here on Earth, and I'm saying that's good. That's what that's what Christians are. We're little Christ followers. So what do we do? We're to believe he's a good good father, which is begin to start getting rid of some of that junk that was put in our lives, some of the gap, and how do we close that gap? It's believing what is true and it's letting goes of lies that have held us back or wait us down? believe he's a good good father and exercise our faith, strength and stretch our spiritual muscles. That's what it's going to take Life Church. If not, we'll continue to shoot blanks. We'll continue to live our life outside of victory, because we're not exercising the very thing that will bring us life. Oh, may not be said of us individually. May that not be said of us corporately? Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I think you how you don't leave us wondering are wondering what you're up to. I pray for those in the room right now that are considering fasting. Because they're coming to some conclusions that this much they want you to move in their life. I pray you give them the time and the grace and the means to do that. Not just withholding food, not just denying their flesh, but having opportunity to be with you. I pray you give back the years, the months the days that the locusts took and allow us to be men and women who can stand and sing the song freely. Knowing that you are a good, good Father. We ask this in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon transcript:

Thank you. Thank you so much Chris and band. And if you're not familiar with that song it is by Grammy Award winning artists Eric Clapton, very famous over 20 years ago wrote tears of heaven, he wrote that song almost 20 years ago as well. And reason I liked that song is it really helps us to set the stage for what we're going to talk about today. And, you know, artists like Eric Clapton, or even Bob Dylan and others, like them who are brilliant in and of their own right, you know, they're not necessarily writing a Christian message. But what they're doing is they're writing out of their own experience, as they understand themselves in predominantly a western world. And so for Eric Clapton, he very much lost a child outside of a window when he was very young, and maybe you know that story. And then he never grew up with his father. And so as he's expressing this, we can see multiple meanings. He uses biblical imagery here, restore my soul, again, the foundations of my feet of clay, it's grief over the loss of a father's love, or technically, maybe never having it. It's the idea of a joy between fathers and their children, it's longing for a perfect relationship with your daddy. We've talked about this in the last two weeks that we've been very honest that as we have dealt with a series like fatherhood, that we've opened up some wounds, even if you and I had a good dad, maybe he's not here anymore, or you still see his deficiencies, which is true of all earthly dad's wine, because they're human, and they're sinners. This is the third in our series. And maybe you're thinking you didn't have to open me up very much. I was already bleeding out, I came into church with knowing that there were fatherhood issues on the front of my mind, in my heart, maybe your relationship is fractured, it's strained, you see very much the space, the distance between yourself and your earthly father, and maybe you're starting to see it with your heavenly Father as well. I want to come back to that idea of relationship. Because that's really what we're thinking about today. Even with setting the stage with a song like looking into someone's eyes, we understand that that's a highly relational thing that we're doing as we interact with each other in our communities and in our homes. But before I get there, I want to say something about imagination, and memories, we all have an imagination, we all have memories, think about it memories, good bad, whether you look back at them with regret, or you look at your memories fondly. They're there you understand sort of what a memory is imagination, though, it can be used both for empathy, or it can be used for inspiration of what you hoped or thought. Or maybe it should or could have been. What do I mean by that? Well, you and I use imagination with empathy all the time. Because if someone tells you maybe about their horrendous past, and you're sitting across from them, and you're looking in their eyes, and you're maybe holding their hand, you may be have never experienced that yourself, maybe to that degree, maybe they're telling you something that is really, really hard and even vulnerable on their part maybe of past abuse, or just a horrendous accident or something that caused them to have some sort of PTSD. Maybe you didn't go through that in the exact same way. But because we're humans, and because we have all the range of emotions at our disposal in our heart, and we've experienced all the range of emotions, being human, even if we haven't had that exact same experience, we can imagine it right. And you've maybe done this when you've sat across from somebody. I mean, I, I can't imagine how awful that might have felt. But I don't know if you've ever thought about this in terms of the other way, which is using imagination that can lead you to inspiration lead you to inspiration, like a song like Eric Clapton wrote or just lead you to inspiration in terms of imagining your life different. You already sort of heard some of that may be in our facilities prayer, but it's just this whole idea that, that you can you and I, even if we didn't have good dads, we can imagine what a good dad is like, so that you can be something for someone that maybe necessarily wasn't there for you like you and I, even if it's never occurred for you, you can imagine what it's like for a father to pick up their children and to love them and tell them that he's proud of them or professionally. I don't know if this occurred when you were growing up in your career, but you might have thought, Man, I wish I had a mentor or a friend or a coach or a counselor who entered into my life at certain points in my adolescence and helped me Early on in my career, so you can do that for someone else, you and I understand that we can imagine how they're feeling because we knew how we felt when we were that age. And so therefore we enter into situations and bring the best that we can have or muster. Even if someone didn't do it for us, right. I mean, I can do this. So imagination isn't just sort of bad things are bad memories or things working to the past. But it can be something that we can use for inspiration, and for even laying out how we hope our lives will be. Because here's the deal, history and past are not determinative. This is so important. I mean, all of really Christian truth is sort of this whole idea that we're redeemed, and he saved us from something and he set us on a rock. But I just want you to think about that for a minute. Because so many of us feel trapped in patterns of destruction. And I just want you and I to hear that, that, that history and past is not determinative for ill, it's not determinative for good either. I mean, many people maybe come from good stock or had good opportunities and yet found themselves squandering their opportunity. It's about relationship. It really is. It really is about relationship relationship with God and others. The great reformers, when they were thinking about Christianity, they would talk about the idea that if you want to truly know things, and how you are to conduct yourself, know thy God, and know thyself, but how do we know God? And how do we know ourselves? That is done in community, we don't, we don't live the Christian faith, isolated, we're here gathered, but hopefully, we also are scattered in our community. We may gather in a sponsored Bible study a group here, but we have other groups that were a part of both personally and professionally, whether they're explicitly Christian or just people who are coming together for Goodwill for common cause a common purpose. But rest assure we are meant ie we are designed to have a good relationship with our Heavenly Father. I think we're learning that if nothing else in this series, this has not been a series where we've beat up on dads or we've, you know, just talked about any sort of, you know, maybe the deadbeat pneus of it all, no, we are meant to see in the issue of fatherhood, that you and I are designed to have a good relationship with our Heavenly Father, when it is fractured, when it is absent, when it is distance, distant, it throws everything off. And it keeps us from being all that we were meant to be as sons and daughters of the King of our father. I mean, that's, that's what we want. We want that intimacy, we want that relationship. We all crave it. And we talked about this the first week, even if we're sort of staunchly, like, No, I've done what I've done, or I've accomplished what I've accomplished, I don't need my dad that in and of itself is a statement about our current state. And so what ends up happening is if we're so thrown off by our fractured or hard or distant relationship with our dad, we never get around to imagining what it's like to crawl up in our father's lap. Or look into our father's eyes, because we don't even want to go there. We're not even thinking about that relationship. We're just thinking about the rules, the rules that we're trying to live by, or that we know we've broken, we sort of maybe oftentimes think about our relationship with God, like, Okay, did I lie this week that I cheat this week that I still didn't get angry? Did I act unloving? Did I didn't do anything stupid, okay, took that away, the next time I talk to God, I need to let him know. I'm sorry. Then we're surprised when our lives not just our very lives are not working, not growing in our relationship with God and certainly not growing in godliness. Because we're not dealing with the fact that we've broken a relationship, we've broken a relationship, we not just done wrong about something that we feel guilty about, and that we maybe got caught with even if our own contents condemned US for it. Here's what I mean. Think about this in terms of a relationship you have with someone who you're close to probably in your home, maybe it's a spouse, or a brother or sister or a roommate. So think about some of your closest relationships. Let's say you do something stupid, you yell at them, you don't tell them the whole truth, or you know, whatever. And so you sin against them. And then later on when you're at the office that day, or when you're on your way to work or you're on your way to school, you give him a call. And you say hey, listen, I'm

sorry. I yelled at you or, you know, I, I feel bad. I I'm sorry that I did. And maybe even you might say, I sinned against you in that way. You might even go so far as to ask for forgiveness. And that's fine. That's a start. And that's where the moments of reconciliation begin to occur, but the damage has been done. Right? That's why if you do something really hurtful to someone you love, they will often express themselves and men that that hurt my heart like that, that cut me to the core. Why? Because you and I, when we've done that to someone we have a relationship with here on Earth, we've created a wound, you and I just haven't gotten angry or said something stupid or done something stupid, what have we done in that relationship? You and I have fractured that relationship, we've created a distance, even if it was very small. And now that needs to be healed. And yes, acknowledgement and saying you're sorry, is the beginning of restoration of that relationship. But you and I will know that that's not the whole thing. And people are gun shy and act certain ways around us. Because, you know, the whole idea of, you know, fool me once Fool me twice kind of thing. And you might say, well, no way. I've, I've said that kind of thing to them many times, or I've done that kind of thing to them many times, and they seem fine. Well, no, what's happened there is that they've hardened their heart, right, they've come to expect it from you, that sort of sinning against them, that sort of coming at them in that way. And so what they've done is that they've hardened their heart towards you and those kinds of actions. And it can work both ways. You can also harden your heart to where you don't even feel guilty about doing that certain thing to them. Now, you might be sitting there thinking, Wait a second, I didn't realize my sin was creating such relational damage with my father in heaven and others. And I just want to start off by saying that's okay, this morning, because guess what, there's a story in the Bible of someone who it took a while for them to come to that realization as well. And I want to open up with a story that may be famous, you may know about it, but maybe we'll read it in new light this morning, as we understand what it's like to have a relationship with the God and Father of the universe. This is Jesus. He's telling this parable, this story, and he's illustrating what point further the whole point of lostness and what lostness is like and what it does to you. Jesus told them this story, man had two sons. The younger son told his father, I want my share of your estate now before you die. So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons. A few days later, this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land. And there he wasted all his money in wild living. About that time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land and he began to starve. He persuaded the local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into the fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs look good to him. But no one gave him anything. When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, at home, even the heart servants have food enough to spare and here I am dying of hunger. So I will go home to my father and say, father, I've sinned against what I've sinned against heaven. He will, He believes in brings into his own broken relationship, that he has severed something with above the Almighty, the celestial place of the universe, Heaven and not only has he sinned against heaven, he sinned against his father, and I'm no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant. So he returned home to his father, and while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming filled with love and compassion. He ran to his son embraced him and kissed him. His son said to him, he repeats this phrase, Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you and I no longer worthy of being called your son. But his father said to the servants, quack, bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet and kill the calf. We have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast for this son of mine was dead, and now has returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found so the Party began. Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working when he returned home hear music and dancing in the house and he asked one of the servants, what was going on? Your brother is back he was told and your father has killed the fattened calf. We are celebrating because of his safe return. The older brother was angry and wouldn't go in. His father came out and begged him but he replied, all these years I slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me and in all that time, you never gave me even one young goat for feast with my friends. Yet when the son of yours comes back, after squandering your money on prostitutes you celebrate by killing the fatted calf. His father said to him, Look, your son you have always stayed with me and everything I have is yours. We had to celebrate this happy day for your brother was dead and has come back to life. He was lost, but now he is found. So many good rich things I want us to see In this passage, I just want to highlight a couple of things. Several ways we could go in this passage. I'm not naive that many of y'all know this story. You may have even heard sermons or had teaching about this story around the room. But have you ever thought about it in terms of this intimate relationship between the Father and the Son, both sons, and we're going to talk about the second son at the end, but this idea that how does it start out? It starts out with a son, who literally tells his father, I want to sever my relationship with you, you have not done anything wrong, you're still alive on this earth. But I really wish you were dead. And so I can't really say that. So I'll just say it like this, give me my half of my inheritance now, like you're not gone yet the way that would work back then, as you would have waited until and then it would have been passed on to you. And so the Father, in His love and compassion, I said, Okay, I'll give it to you give me your half. And what does he do with that, and he doesn't do it wisely. He doesn't invest. He doesn't. He doesn't do what he's supposed to do with it. It says very clearly, even though he's a son of his father, he goes and does a lot of stupid things with it. And it takes him a while. Listen, it takes him a while to come to his senses. We don't get the idea that it was like 24 hours away from home and then like, oh, yeah, I think I need to, I think I need to go home. Now. He goes ahead and squanders all the money he had on loose living on buying frivolous things on sinning against God and sinning against his family in his good name. So he does it so often, so hard and so long, that eventually he thinks I'm done. I'm done. I'm no longer, I'm no longer son of my father, maybe, just maybe, if I'm repentant, he might, my daddy, he just might make me like one of his heart servers, because they're doing better than I'm doing. That's the situation here. The other situation that's going on is you have a father. And you have a father who is not looking at his son, through the eyes of what he has or hasn't done. There's just, there's just love. There's just compassion. There's just mercy. There's just understanding, there's just this desire to pick him up to see him again, to love him again, in spite of whatever he's done. So the so the big fracturing came from the son, but the father is out. And what is he doing? Is he just sitting in his recliner is he going about his work as he goes on about his business? In this story, and again, this is where imagination really helps us. Because we can maybe even fill in the gaps. Because I think it's able to do that sometimes you can able to take liberty with text when you see that the spirit and the attitude of what was going on here. We can imagine as the sun came back into town, into the village or whatever, that there was already Oh, look who's back. He's back. He's back. I didn't look that good. He wasn't cleaned up. He wasn't showered. He wasn't neat. He was dirty. He had obviously ran out of money. He looked rough. You guys have seen it. You've had friends and family members who look rough. Look again, as Sharon No, I look like you things haven't been going your way in a while. So that has to occur. According to verse 20. It says that while he was still a long way off, the father saw him coming. Now again, since this whole idea. Many of us even though we consider ourselves maybe pretty good people, we would have waited on the porch. Like we're gonna, we're gonna let that awkward walk, keep coming right? We will let him eat a little bit of crow we would have let him sort of feel the judgment, the penance that he would need to have, after already being the one who severed the relationship. Is

that what the father did? No. It says that while he was still a long way off, and again, we understand that culturally, you wouldn't have Daddy's taking off sprinting, what that would have taken when you think about in the Scriptures when it says they girded up their loins. It's just that idea they would have to he would have had to pick up that long what you see and even Middle Eastern attire today. Oftentimes he would had to pick that up and he would have had to take off running so while he was still way off, his father saw him coming, filled with love and compassion. So what's what's the heart of the Father here? Just this is his heart, just just beating with love and compassion, because that's how our Heavenly Father's he ran to his son ran, embraced him and kissed him. And then of course, the son repeats what he had already said that he had in his heart. He now repeats it this whole time. Did you know that he understood that his sin was a fracturing of the relationship between heaven? Right, so between Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the Trinity, the triune, God, and also, of course, his dad. Now this is why we why we began this series. And the way we're continuing to weave this series is it is about worship Life Church, it is about our relationship and our worship of our Father in heaven. And one of the things that we're all trying to do is we're all trying to lean in to what God has for us individually, family wise, and corporately as a church. But one of the things that we have to recognize is that when we mess up when we sin, it not only creates damage among each other, but it has created a fracturing, a severing a distance between us and our Father in heaven. That's why if you look to places like First Peter, when he's talking about husbands living with their wives and understanding why he says, so that your prayers may not be hindered, because we've all been there, we've all felt it, when we've had our sin that we want to hang on to that our prayers. It's like they don't even go up because they're not because we're not acknowledging whatever that is in the room. And if you think this is just, oh, we got this from just one small story. No, this has been a theme throughout Scripture into the old into the New Testament, I want to tell you again, about a story that you may be familiar with in the book of Genesis. And the book of Genesis has a lot of things recorded but one of the main characters in the book of Genesis scouting Joseph, if you know the story of Joseph, yes, he was a favor by his father. And that creates issues as well, that's a sermon for another day. But what ends up happening is, of course, he sold into slavery in Egypt. And as he's in Egypt, because God has his hand on Joseph, he begins to be prospered, he begins to be blessed, even in the midst of really, really horrendous situations. That's why don't buy into the lie that you and I have to change our situation or change our family in order to achieve what God has for us, thrive where you are planted. That's really the Christian idea here. And Joseph thrived as a servant as a slave of Potiphar. So we're going to pick that up here in Genesis 39, in verse six, so Potiphar gave Joseph complete administrative responsibility over everything he owned. This is as a slight with Joseph there, he didn't worry about a thing except for what kind of food to eat. We've all been there. We've all had those kinds of leaders. We've had those kinds of people under us that we don't have to worry about a thing. Joseph was very handsome, and a well built young man, and part of his wife soon began to look at him. lustfully come and sleep with me. She says she demanded. But Joseph refused. Look, he told her, my master, trust me with everything in his entire household. No one here has more authority than I do. He has held back nothing from me except you because you are his wife. How can I do such a wicked thing and what it would be a great sin against who? against God? Again, we often think of our lives as man, I messed up, I messed up with my wife, I broke the rule. You're not supposed to get angry, you're not supposed to, you know, beat people or you're not supposed to, you know, whatever. Or, you know, I've, I've done this, I've done that. And we think even among church, okay, yeah, I've got to give some penance of some sins and some Sam's, I'm sorry, or whatever. And it's like, know that, yes, that needs to occur. But more than anything, do you and I realize that we've created a distance and fracturing between our Father who is in heaven, unless you think it's just in Genesis, it's just in the most probably one of the most famous stories that Jesus ever told, we can see it and one of the greatest leaders of the Old Testament and that is David as well. And the third and final star I want to show you this morning, this whole idea that our sin creates a fact of fracturing between us and God is this famous story in the book of Second Samuel about David and Bathsheba again, culturally, you've probably heard of these characters in King David. He sent Uriah the Hittite, who is married to Bathsheba to the frontlines so that he would be killed so effectively, he murdered him. He was the one that ordered the hit. And then he took Bathsheba in and slept with her. And she produced a child and he just he couldn't he couldn't cover up his sin. And so God sent Nathan the prophet, and Nathan told this story and he told the story about this rich person who had all kinds of sheep, but he went after the person who had just won. And David of course grows indignant says, We got to take care of this. We got to you know, we got to kill this man. And Nathan, of course, gives the one two punch or really just the one punch and says, You are that man. And so as soon as David hears this because he is a man, after God's own heart, it says this Right here, David confessed to Nathan, His Prophet and his friend, guess what? I have sinned against the Lord. The mini building I don't know, like, like, Isn't against Uriah and Bathsheba. And he wasn't really even thinking about God. He was thinking about himself, and he was thinking about his urges. And yes, all of that is true. But more than anything, David cuts right to the heart, that I have sinned against the Lord. That's why even when Jesus comes around on Earth, and you think about the fact that people come to him who are paralyzed, or crippled, or ruined, or big, fat centers, and what does he always say to them, some version of your sins are forgiven, and everybody around them is thinking, Jesus. I don't know if you know this, but they can't walk. Or they're blind, or someone who's a big center is touching you. I don't know if you know, I think she might be making you unclean, because she's unclean. And Jesus is always cutting straight to the heart. David, in this moment, he knows that what he did created a fracturing between him and God. Nathan replied, Yes, but the Lord has forgiven you and you won't die in sin. Nevertheless, this is huge for us. Because you have shown utter contempt for the word of the Lord. By doing this, your child will die. There are consequences for our stupidity. A lot of times what we want to do is if we can't figure out a way to cover it, once we get caught or once we come to the end of ourselves, we want to say to the Lord, Okay, Lord, I'm ready to do business with you. Okay? But listen, I don't want to pay any stupid tax, like, I just wanted to kind of all be back the way it was, I

want you know, you and me, I want it to be all good. I want the intimacy there, or all these kinds of things. And yes, God can forgive us. Yes, your spouse or your loved one, they can forgive you. But you and I know that there are consequences to our sin, there can be restoration. But oftentimes, there are consequences. And there are repercussions. And you think, my gosh, I see myself in these stories, Pastor, so what am I supposed to do? I realized that I'm hurting, you've exposed some things in my life and the life of those around me. And I realized that not only I'm hurting that I've hurt people. And I would say that what we are to do, myself included, were to run to the Father, were to run to the Father. We're gonna sing that song in a minute. But I just want to show up an image for you real quick. This is Rembrandt's the prodigal son, Rembrandt famous painter couple 100 years ago, this is a very meaningful image. For me, personally, I had a poster of this printed out when I was in college, and it sat right above my bed all throughout college. And then when I got out of college, and I had my first ministry job where I had an office, I had it framed, and it has said in every church office that I've served that since leaving university, and why, because the image is so powerful to me. And this story in this idea is so powerful to me, and it reminds me what am I supposed to do? Because the I don't know if you know this, but even us as preachers and as communicators, we sit in our office with our Bibles in front of us, heads down, arms together, and we're like, Lord, I don't know what to do. And then as soon as I look out, I see this image, and I've looked at it for, you know, good probably 20 years now. And I see what is going on here. Well, you have a father, and you have a son who looks as pitiful as I told you he looked and of course, it is influenced by the the wardrobe of what Rembrandt may have thought it looked like then you have people looking in judging probably right? Potentially, the older brother is in the picture. But more than anything, what do you have, you have a person who realizes their only hope is to run into embrace the Father. Now, I want us to hear that really clearly. Because so many times we get done with church, we get done with a service like this, and we we see our own inadequacies, and we begin to tell ourselves, okay, I'm gonna try better. I'm gonna do harder. And we have to ask ourselves, what are the action steps though, that we need to take in order to love our father more and to receive the love of the Father more. And I want to tell you, this is the hard work of Christendom. Some of y'all been in church for a little time. Some of y'all been in church for a long time. It doesn't really matter. It never gets easier. It gets different. The challenges get different the the obstacles get different, but to move from one degree of glory to the other, whether you're 2212 or 82. It just takes different shapes and different forms. But it never in some ways gets easier because what we have to do at every stage of our life, is we have to lead our heart, not follow our heart. In other words, we have to do the hard work. We have to do the hard work of training ourselves in the way I have righteousness, you often hear this in terms of our culture, I remember this growing up in the 80s and 90s, every show I watched Saturday morning, or even in the evenings to, was this whole idea of following our heart or trusting our gut, and that's fine to a degree, if we've been walking with God in that area of our life, you know what I'm talking about. You can trust your gut like sozialer, our engineers, or your nurses or your doctors or your contractors, you can trust your gut on how to put that wall back together, if you're a contractor, because you've done it enough to be able to trust your gut. You've walked in that before you've had that experience before. So that's okay. I'm not saying that, of course, you are able to follow your heart and trust your gut and those kinds of things. But what about those areas of your life that you haven't yet given over to the Lord, you understand that you and I will never have whatever breakthrough you and I are looking for spiritually, physically relationally or otherwise, unless we're doing the hard work of training. It's not trying, I just want to say this so clear, because so many of us we even say this sometimes our loved ones, I'll try to do better. Don't try do. Is that a latest thing? That's hard? It's a yes, by the power of the Spirit. It's very hard. I mean, I'll be honest, he's right now, but for over 100 days, I've been meeting with a physical trainer. And so we meet together every morning, five days a week for an hour. And what he does is he helps me lift weights. And so we're at the gym, and he helps me lift weights. But you know what he says to me, every time, he says, How are you doing on eating on your diet? And I tell him, you're not going there. He's gonna die for me. And I that is an area of my life. I'm not going there yet. I like my Coca Cola. I liked my mic. And I liked my Snickers. And I let my gummy bears Okay, thank you very much. This is where your pastors at. But I said you're not going there. And then he says, How's your cardio? And I say ready for that? Yeah. He says, Well, I tell you what you've accomplished, you're a very strong, overweight man. After 100 days of being with me, I'm like, Fine, I'll take it. Because that's as far as that's, that's, that's as far as I'm, I'm allowing him to train me and guys, that's, that's a true story, those that's 100% True. I'll arm wrestle anybody, but we're not gonna go on any races right now. But that's exactly how we have to deal with our relationship with God. We're all at different spots, all different places, different things that we're trying to do and to give over to God by grace and to walk in things by grace, professionally, personally, relation and all these things. But guys don't expect there to be real change, lasting change to occur. Unless we're saying, God, I run to you, I let you have everything. Like all the crevices of my heart, and let at least let's be honest enough with ourselves. Just like I'm honest enough with my trainer five days a week, I ain't lying to him yet. And just to say, you can go in there? Or why don't we just finally say, God, you're gonna have it. I'm tired of fighting you. I'm tired of fighting you come, come, I run to you, I come to you. Your ways are higher than my ways. And so therefore, I surrender. And what you will you and I will come to realize is that we're realizing, yes, the same problem is that I'm hurting, and that I've hurt some people or put another way, we'll come to the end ourselves, and we'll realize something really basic. I'm a sinner, and I've sinned against others, and they've sinned against me. It's just like Isaiah, you remember what happened to Isaiah and Isaiah six, when he met God, he saw the Lord high lifted up, he got a vision of who God was, remember what he said? He said, I have unclean lips. And I live among a people of unclean lips. It hasn't changed, guys, if we encounter the God of the universe, Our Father who is in heaven, we will continue to see that but what we now need to do is we need to train ourselves to walk in new paths. We need to train ourselves and understand what is going to take and the work it's going to take. But God is with us. He's leading us. He's moving us to walk in godliness. It's that whole idea that Clawson says that as you and I have received Jesus Christ is Lord, church. Let's walk in him. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you for a ton of years. I just pray right now for myself and those that are listening that you help us you help us to walk in the faith that we profess, Father, I know. Because there are areas in my life I know that there's areas in everybody's life in this room that we're thinking I got I'm not ready to give yet. I'm holding on to that. At that area. That's mine. That's my little, little special thing. For there help us to realize the freedom that will come if we just run to you and that you don't have judgment for waiting for us, you don't have condemnation, you don't have whippings that you are filled with love and compassion. And if we'll just turn if we will just come to our senses if we'll just realize what we have, if we'll just imagine, even if we never had it ourselves before, just imagine what a loving father could do and would do for us. Oh, Lord, we pray. Let him be true for so many of us in this room. We ask these things in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, thank you all for being here. Thank you all for listening online. Of course, we began a series last week on fatherhood. And I, I trust that, if you haven't heard that you can go back and listen to that. But one of the things that came out of it is just the truth in the reality that we all long for a fatherly blessing. Our earthly fathers and we talked about they may be good, bad and different are a mixed bag. And we are just admitting that for many of us in the room, we've got a lot, a lot of baggage, a lot of water under the bridge on this issue on these issues of fatherhood or daddy issues a lot a lot of miles on these tires on this journey. We recognize that there are many ways in which our relationship with our earthly fathers has been broken, even if we felt like we had a pretty good situation. There's aspects, there's things that we've taken on, from our dads that we recognize as we get closer to God. And as we look at the scriptures, that that's not of Him, and that God may have us taking a different path. The relationship with our Heavenly Father, a lot of times is broken because of some of these swirling issues that are still going on in our heads and our hearts. That's why worship sometimes is so hard for us, or non existent. That's why we began last week with the psalmist just crying out one thing, one thing that I asked that I may gaze upon your beauty, oh, Lord, what is that whole idea here, that whole idea is to say that the reason why Father issues are important is because it directly correlates and relates to how we relate to God in worship. And so whether it's worship, through singing through songs, through parent prayer, through Bible reading, oftentimes, it's hard or non existent, because that relationship either isn't there, or it's extremely, extremely fractured, broken. One of these we talked about last week is that there are gaps, there are holes in our relationship with our Heavenly Father, because of the actions whether positive or negative, from our earthly fathers. It is about a relationship, though I want us to see that because even when it comes to church, sometimes in your home, but even when it comes to church, a lot of times we think about laws and rules, and about the fact that okay, maybe I've broken, something broken, something that I know is wrong, because my conscience says so we're because I know that's what the Bible says, yes, that may be true. But first and foremost, we have to understand that it is about a relationship, do's and don'ts aren't the primary problem. They are always byproducts of our hearts. If we just stayed in the realm of law and do's and don'ts, we are not getting a full picture of the gospel. And we will not have the power to do what God is calling us to do by the power of his Spirit, to create for ourselves, new lineages, new family trees, new paths for our hearts, and those that follow behind us. What we're talking about here, of course, again, is mainly our heart towards our Heavenly Father, and again, your heart. I don't I don't know where it's at this morning. I mean, sometimes you think, man, that was just oh, he was just okay. Or he was bad, or I thought I had a pretty good one, whatever it is, we need to at least acknowledge the reality and be convinced that our relationships with our earthly fathers make a difference in our interpersonal relationships and our romantic relationships in terms of how we relate to our kids. Even if you say no, I've moved on from that, like I've had some issues I've taught through with some some counselors or some professionals or some children, or it's, I mean, some, some different people who just helped me along to see that you have, I've got all that and I've moved on from that maybe you moved on from your dad physically, mentally, or both. But if you're not honest about the roles that that environment played with our interaction with God or others, we will always be severely handicapped hindered, and what we can do in our relationship with God and others, even if you have a staunch you know, sort of clench your fists and like, I don't need him, me and mom, we did okay, or we did fine without him that is taking a position. So what I want to do is I want to move through some ways in which we may have experienced our earthly dads and one of the first ones I want us to acknowledge is that you and I, we may have had an absent father. We may have had an absent father. He wasn't there, either through death, divorce his own indifference. It doesn't matter. He's not there. There was no playing video games with dad there was no throwing ball or catch. There was no hugs.

There definitely wasn't any sort of blessing that you're talking about a fatherly blessing A dad buzzin or anything like that. And so in the absence of Dad, how did you and I try to fill that void? What did we do? What did we ask of others? What did we, what did we try? What failed us or what even lead us to grace, because here's what we're going to find as we think about our relationships with our earthly fathers, when we think about how that affected us for good, bad or ill or whatever, we're just going to always kind of rub up against the fact that God has a lot of grace for us, as we have come to him. And a lot of times, he God is able to navigate through In fact, he must, through our imperfect families in imperfect lies. But yes, we must acknowledge that an absentee father it is an issue, you may have had a season with him or you may have been supplemented by having some other earthly dad figure in your life, or you may have had to step down for a little while.

What did it do? What did it do the absence of a dad or at least absence of dad for a season? Did it? Did it make you tough? Right? Sometimes that's what we'll do. We'll, we'll say, Okay, if dad's on here, I've got to I've got to toughen up, did it cause any of us to spiral into addiction? Did we try to fill that void somewhere else? Or with something else? wherever we find ourselves? How does God ultimately reveal Himself to us as the present father, wherever we're at with our circumstances? What is it that God is trying to show us in His Word that will help us fill in those holes and gaps? We're going to start with a couple of verses today. Psalm 46, verse one says this, God is our refuge and strength, a what an ever present help in trouble. So right there from the get go. If you had an absent dad wasn't there for whatever reason, he wasn't there for big chunks of time, in your childhood life or in your adult life. Good news is we have a heavenly Father who is always there. And so one of the things that we're just thinking through as we're thinking through the fact that we're not going to be able to go back and untwist any of our stories, that's not how life works. But we're going to understand how God wants to interact with us as a heavenly Father, and how that can help heal certain parts of our lives and our hearts. First thing I want us to see Psalm 46. One, God has a there, he's an ever present help in time of trouble, even if daddy wasn't, let's go to another verse. This right here, maybe you're familiar with this passage, Jesus right before he goes back up into heaven. And what we often think of as the ascension of Jesus Christ ascending back into heaven after he had been here, and be seen by many witnesses after the resurrection. He's giving his disciples some instructions. And it says, as I'm teaching them, to obey everything I've commanded you, that's what he's talking to his followers. And he says, Surely I'm with you always, always, even to the very end of the age. And so one of the things that we're seeing, Father, Son, let's look at the third and final passage I want us to look at in terms of absenteeism of an earthly dad, but the helper the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance, all that I have said to you. You know, one of the things that we may not thought about in terms of the Trinity is the relational aspect of the Trinity Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, in relationship and communion with one another, and how we worship a Triune God, that we pray to the Father, how, through the blood of Jesus Christ, by what by the power of the Spirit. And so again, as we get deeper into these issues, and thinking about how we're to relate to the Godhead, how we're to relate to our Father in heaven, one of the things I want us to see is just the idea that, that how God reveals Himself to us were to enter into that and that's why, again, worship becomes important. And we think about, okay, here's some gaps. But who is God? What does he promised to do for me, in the presence of some real absenteeism? Number two, your dad could have been an abusive father

could have been an abusive father, it could have been with words. Again, we know so much about this. And we have felt this in terms of words are tough, maybe being cut down or it can even be debilitating after a little while. So you have the idea of, of abusiveness with words or emotional abuse. It's a real thing, right? It's the idea that we felt condemned or we felt humiliated. We were always kept off balance. Sometimes we don't recognize emotional abuse right off the bat because it's not as obvious as as physical abuse or sexual abuse, but it is that whole idea that there were these these spikes these this Oh,

bend down, and you're always sort of off kilter in your home or around. Dad, you think about this, of course, again, with physical abuse or sexual abuse or spiritual abuse. I don't know if you ever thought about this that, that your earthly dad maybe didn't take you to church or even if he took you to church every once in a while it was sporadic, or he didn't really lean in, or maybe he wanted it for you, but he didn't want it for himself. Or he may have led you astray by believing in new ageism, or some other world religion or just totally indifferent, apathetic, it may have led you down the road, wrong spiritually. Maybe you never knew where you stood with dad. And what does that often lead to, but just your head and your heart, it can lead to outright depression, it can lead to anxiety, defensiveness, anger, maybe even suicidal issues. No doubt though, if you and I have had some abusiveness in our past, as far as how our earthly dads related to us, we're going to have some trust issues. Why? Because life becomes a game of survival, right? How's it going to be what's going on? Who, what, what dad am I going to find when I walk into the door today, and then well into your adulthood, you'll find that close relationships are hard, or they elude you, or they tend to burn out quick because this idea of intimacy and vulnerability, they're just too hard. You literally like if you think about the old stick shift, you literally don't have that gear that you can get into because in order to survive in any sort of abusive relationship, you just didn't go there because you didn't want to get slapped or you didn't want to get burned. And so if your dad was an abusive father, we have some gaps, not insurmountable ones. And even if you hear all these things, and you think, Oh, my gosh, I see myself in some of these things. God has grace for that. We'll talk about that in the end. But let's look at some verses about how God relates us think about Hosea two for me what that all is just how, even though we walk and go astray, it's God pursuing us. Here's the truth about who God is. I myself taught Israel how to walk. This is God speaking in the first person, leaving him alone, by the hand, but he doesn't know or even care that it was I who took care of him, I lead Israel long with my ropes of kindness and love. I lifted the yoke from his neck, and I myself stooped to feed him. What are you and I seeing here? We're seeing the opposite of an abusive father. We're seeing one who cares, one who pursues in the midst of what of sometimes those who are trying to lead not caring, or spinning in our face, you understand what I mean by this, you're gonna see that the way God often interacts with us, is in the same way that we as good parents, even though we're trying our best, it doesn't always go as planned. Because why? Because we're oftentimes still dealing with children and childlike states, we're gonna see this again, with Jesus. So that's God the Father, this is Jesus. He is standing over Jerusalem, and he's looking over the city and he knows he's about to go and be crucified. And he says this, oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones, God's messengers, how often I've wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn't let me again, what's going on here? It's the love and the pursuit of not only the Heavenly Father, but of Jesus himself. But it's in the midst of what have often of the people that were in care for not wanting it or fighting that or even spurning that. So where that's again, this is good, just kind of parenting one on one, where's the heart come from? That we can love our kids, even when they're not very loving towards us, we have to look to Heavenly Father, otherwise, what we'll do is we'll, we'll start duking it out at their level, and will will stoop down to immaturity, and we'll say and do things that can lead to all kinds of problems. The third final thing I want us to see in terms of this issue of abuse and how

the Holy Spirit's not like that at all says this right here. This is at the end of the book of Romans, and he's giving some hope. And he's saying, I pray that God, this is Paul talking to the church at Rome, I pray that God the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace, because why? Because he trusted him. This is why I'm telling you it's it's almost a direct correlation that if you had some form of abuse, whatever it was, you will have trust issues with others in the Father in heaven, then he will overflow with competent hope, then you will overflow with competent hope. Through what through the power of the Holy Spirit. You see the Trinity and all this. That's exactly what we're talking about. Here. We need the full godhead, to pull us out of the mire and issues we find ourselves and maybe it

wasn't absenteeism. Maybe it wasn't abuse, maybe it was passivity. Maybe passivity had a grip on your dad.

You know what I'm talking about here he he, you might have been a household where it didn't do much. It was in the couch, he was waiting for a beer, he was always looking to escape whether it was go to the bar or go hang out with friends or whatever, that mom sort of had to take up the slack or mom ruled, maybe it was always too busy, maybe he was always too distracted, he didn't enter in whatever it was your dad, he was very, very passive. He didn't bring strength, he didn't bring encouragement, it was almost like a non factor. Right? We didn't need him in the household. Because even when he was there, he wasn't really there. Again, if that's your background, you can see where it can lead to all kinds of different things and struggles that we may have. But that is not how God presents Himself to us at all. I think about Psalm 139, it says, this right here, Psalm 139, I can never escape from your spirit.

Capital S the whole very spirit of God, I can never get away from your presence. If I go up to heaven, you're there. If I go down to the grave, you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there, your hand will what guide me and your strength will support me, in the opposite of any sort of passivity that we may have found in our earthly fathers, Jesus Himself, He came in the flesh, he was not passive in his interaction with us as humans here on earth, He was active, and he took the initiative.

Next one I want to bring up as maybe dad was performance based. And again, as you see this, we talked about this last week, I brought this whole idea that like many of us are going to see different aspects of our dad don't look at this as some sort of chart to be like, Okay, I had the Yeah, just just 100% I just had the abusive desert. No, no, we see aspects of ourselves and of our earthly fathers. And again, I know sometimes you could throw in Mother's Day, I get that, but it's just this whole idea that maybe your dad was a performance based ad, how do you know that is the whole idea that if you do this, then I'll love you. Right? If you do this, if you jump through these hoops, you'll get that you'll get the praise, you'll get the high five, if it's if it's my way, if it's the way that that I say it comes with conditions, and what ends up happening is that withheld love becomes a motivator for you to do certain things. And if you don't do certain things, I'm going to continue to withhold my praise my love. Here's the problem, though the hoops or the goalposts, they keep getting moved. Do you think okay, if I jump through this hoop, then he will care love notice if I just reach this goal, and what you find is in in performance based parenting, or performance space that you can't ever do enough, and you often feel crippled or beat down, he feels like you have to earn your way, not only to your parents approval, but then you often which is natural in our own immaturity will come to God with this kind of trying to seek God's approval, just on a different treadmill, just on different train.

You think No, thanks. And good. No thanks. I don't want that either. Because that's not the gospel at all. And again, we're talking about the gospel message at the end. But it's just that whole idea. There's just a lot of resting and trusting even in the midst of a lot of betrayal, and distrust that's been handed down or given to us. Let's look at a verse here.

Think about this. This is how God interacts with us. This is getting to some of the heart of the gospel. This isn't the book of Romans, and it says this when we were utterly helpless. Christ came to us at just the right time and died for us sinners.

So how are we doing? Are we are we are we the captain of the football team? Are we the champion of soccer, gymnastics, or academically? Or, you know, that's the video game? No, when we were utterly helpless, that's when Christ came and died for us sinners. Now most people would not be willing to die would not be willing to die for an upright person. So while he's saying there is like picturing yourself as some sort of like bodyguard right and so what you're gonna say is if you were a bodyguard to someone on the streets of El Paso and even if they were a bride

i don't know i think when push comes to shove if they're gonna shoot them or me I think I'm just gonna kind of sit by the way that's what it's basically saying is saying now most people would not even be would not be even be willing to die for an upright person. He was a good person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good to say, oh, maybe you know, maybe he's just you know, some sort of really, really great philanthropist or person that just okay, maybe, but here's the deal.

But God showed His great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were white. While we were champions. While we were amazing, while we look good while we struggled know why, what, while we are still sinners, this is how God interacts with us. It is not like any sort of performance based parenting that you might have experienced. It is not like the passivity that maybe gripped your father. It is not, of course, the abuse at all, but it is the idea that he comes

in enters into our lives. Next thing you might have been stuck with is some sort of antagonistic daddy, you'll know this if you had a father and he's always sort of fighting within you fighting you to remain the top dog. You're not that great, and he's better than you. And you kind of have to be on the defensive, because it's always sort of this combativeness between you and your father, dad is an adversary, it's a very kind of like hostile presence when he enters the room, he may suck up all the oxygen, you may have had a dad, if he's antagonistic, you'll know you have that kind of father because he's just constantly pointing out your flaws and your failures, not in a way that's helpful, as far as they'll say to I'm just trying to be be helpful. Okay, always that way. You try something new, you stick your neck out there, you get slapped, or get your head, chopped off. This antagonistic data, of course, is not the way to go. And you know, I was thinking about First Corinthians, I mean,

yeah, First Corinthians, second Corinthians chapter three. And it just talks about this whole idea of like, we understand that in the Old Testament, that when you went to worship, that, you would often have this this law in the back of your mind, because Moses would have brought down the 10 commandments. And when he saw just the backside of God, the glory was so great that it had to have a veil. And so he gets into verse 16, of chapter three, and it says this, but whenever someone turns to the Lord, this is just you and me. This is New Testament, New Covenant stuff, the veil is taken away. In other words, that sort of barrier between us and God, the Father is taken away. This is New Covenant stuff, new spirit stuff for the Lord is the Spirit. And wherever the Spirit of the Lord is, there's freedom. Now, this is so important. Now, a lot of times, freedom can get a bad rap in Christian circles, because you think, Okay, now I'm free to do whatever I want. And what you mean by that is I'm free to kind of sin and let it all hang out. That's not what this kind of freedom is. It's that freedom from the oppression of never doing anything, right. It's that freedom that you and I find ourselves under because of some abusiveness emotional or otherwise, it's that freedom to be able to get into that gear of love and kindness and pity and compassion and empathy for others. Even it wasn't wasn't shown to us or modeled to us, because we have a heavenly father who has and has done that. That's the freedom we're talking about. And don't you and I want that. Because so many of us, we walk around with our heads hung low, because of our daddy issues. So all of us who have had that veil removed, can see and reflect the glory of the Lord. This is what we want for our lives. Do you go in there next next slide.

And the Lord who is the spirit, I told you, it's all Trinitarian. There in terms of our worship and growth and interaction with God, the Father makes us more and more like him, as we are changed into His glorious image. There is hope for you and I, because so many of us, we think we're stuck. Because this negativity and this abuse, I can see it in grandpa, I've heard stories of great grandpa, I see it in my dad, and I see it in myself. And I'm just here to tell you about by the power of the Spirit, things can change. Things can change, and we need to ask ourselves, what's the best case scenario?

Last one I want us to see here is Daddy was empowering and turned our hearts and affections towards Christ. Now I've told you already, that as you have looked at this list, as we talked about ways in which we may have had fathers that weren't the best examples. We're not meant to just always sort of launch bombs that direction. Because if we live that way, you and I know that's a losing game as well. were meant to ask ourselves now what about me? How am I now to live because I see some of those bad tendencies in me and, and even if you had a pretty good dad, they many of us in the room would say I got nowhere near some sort of empowering dad, who's turning my heart in my affections towards Christ. If you and I didn't have that, that doesn't mean we can't be that for others. Right doesn't mean that we can do that and you think

Man, the wounds are too great. Like, pastor, I'm still I'm bleeding now, these kinds of sermons are hard to teach and hard to talk about and they're hard to receive. I know because what we're doing is we're putting a spotlight on wounds. We're putting a spotlight on pain. Jesus gets that too. He was a spectacle outside the city in the streets where he literally had wounds on his side and nail pierced hands. And What do the Scriptures say about those moments? Looking forward and looking back? Isaiah 53, talking about the suffering servant says This right here was fit 3436 Surely took up our pain and bore our sufferings, yet we considered him punished by God. So even right now you think, man, I'm hurting, I'm suffering. Sure, the Lord Savior, He took that up. But we considered him punished by God stricken by him and afflicted, but he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds, we are healed. There is hope there is real messianic hope, weigh in the past, in the present and weigh in the future for our wounds. We all like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned our own way. But the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. This is tough, this is tough, when we begin to know our shortcomings, or the shortcomings of our fathers around us here on Earth. So what do we do right now, because you're sitting there thinking how much was be sustained till Monday, or Sunday night, even for many of us Sunday afternoon three, maybe even some of us, what we have to do is we have to drink deep of the truth that you and I are a son and daughter of the king. That's what we have to do. If you look at all this as rules, or if you try to put up a chart and say, Okay, I'm going to unplug that unhealth that my dad did. And I'm now going to plug in and try to be the best darn mom or dad that I can be, you and I are missing the point. Because it's about a relationship. And it's about worship. And it's about us, resting in the truth, that we have a daddy in heaven that loves us, and that we are son and daughter of him acknowledgement in knowledge, what it can sometimes do is it can sometimes help us to see this is the first part of the process. This is a second sermon in a series on fatherhood. And what I would say is stick with the process don't quit. So in other words, like a lot is what we'll do is we'll take a little bit of learning, and you may have heard this from your mentors, or wise people, a little bit of learning can be a dangerous thing. It's like we're on the operating table. And the surgery hasn't been done yet. But we've started to be exposed to where we know where the problem areas are, or where some of the wounds are. And I would just say, Don't quit now in trying to lean in because we're just starting this series. Next week, we're gonna go even further as we explore even deeper about our relationship with God, and just how deep are those wounds, but how amazing and miraculous can be that healing. But I feel like for many of us, what we'll do is we'll start a training. And we'll get a little bit of a little bit of hope, a little bit of, of good things sort of rolling in our life. And then we'll quit. How many of us have done this with, with new, like workout routines, a little bit of healthy eating for a couple of weeks? A little bit of training down at the taekwondo place or whatever, it's okay, I kind of got this I'm good. I can go out and get in a fight. No, you can't. No, you can't. I think about this in terms of one of my favorite movies, you know, Star Wars where Luke Skywalker and Empire Strikes Back, he gets some training from Yoda. And he's like, I'm running off and I'm gonna go face Darth Vader. Now, don't do it, you end up with your arm chopped off and down a deep, dark hole.

You've got to cry out to sister in hopes she hears you.

So I would just say lean into this. This is our assignment this week Life Church, for all of us, myself included. Let's lean into this sonship this daughter ship idea. Because we fall short as I promise you if you did this exercise like I did this exercise, you see your family of origin and yourself scattered across in many ways across all these sort issues. I don't want issues. And I didn't want you to just just take a moment and say what is it that God's called me too. He is calling you and me right now to rest in the truth that you and I are loved sons and daughters of him if that's true for you. Now, some of y'all may still be stuck on what Chris prayed and what we've saying and what Romans talked about where you and I haven't even received that truth that He died for me, a sinner and ungodly one who was far from him. Of course, we got to get that right first. But once we have come to some conclusions and some satisfaction with that, in that area of our life can

When it's time for, it's time to grow, it's time to lean into what God has for us. And what He has for us right now. And this season is to bask in the love of the Father so we can get there so that we can get there and sing along with the psalmist. One thing I asked that I would seek, that I may gaze upon your beauty, and dwell in your house all the days in my life, let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you don't leave us wandering or wondering what it is we're supposed to do.

That we're supposed to curl up into your lap and call you Abba, Daddy, Father, and I know for many, there's still so many hindrances to getting there.

So Father, I just pray that wherever we're at around the room, that we just acknowledge that we acknowledge that our family of origin may have done a number on us that we acknowledge that we may find ourselves lashing out in anger for those around us right now.

But that you've got grace for that. But you've got covering for that, and you've got hope, for that, that we can get out of it.

By your grace, by your strength and by Your Spirit. We pray all these things. In Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much, Chris for doing that. You'll see why we're doing that here in a minute as we are looking at the scriptures today, Psalm 27. But before we get there, I want to introduce to you a new series that we're going to be working through the next several weeks, and it's a series on fatherhood. Now, what's this series all about? And why are we going there? Well, the truth is, is that God revealed Himself to us as a father, we're probably familiar with that, whether it's through understanding of the Lord's Prayer, or understanding exactly how Jesus talked to his father in heaven and all these things. But the reality is that we have to come to grips with the fact that our earthly fathers shaped our view of God, for better or for worse, there's no doubt that as you consider yourself and to your neighbor to your left and right in this very room, or if you're listening later, many of us in the room may have had bad fathers, absent fathers, or mixed bag fathers. But whatever we find ourselves, we need to understand right from the get go that that has left a mark on us in terms of how we relate to God, and how we worship, and how we even understand this concept that God wants to be our Heavenly Father. I was probably better said that as we think about the American landscape, the current American landscape that we have just a wreckage that is all around us, because of the absence of fathers and real fatherhood. Now, that's not going to be a series that we're going to go on, we're gonna beat up on dads or anything like that. No. And it's not a political rallying cry of what we need good fathers in the home, although that's true. It's really just a recognition that as we consider our own lives, our lives as we try to interact with people in this world. And as we consider our lives as we are to interact with our Father in heaven, that we've got some real gaps, we got some real gaps in our relationship with God, primarily caused by a lack of a fatherly blessing. And as you consider your life, we're not going to ask for a show of hands, but I dare say that there would be few of us in the room that could raise our hand and say, Yeah, my dad, he was a reflection of my heavenly Father, and he gave me blessings. He was wind in my sails, as I strive to follow God and His ways in His kingdom and His Church. My guess is, if we were to ask for any show of hands, it that would be few and far between. And this is a problem. This is a problem in our Christian walk in our worship. And as I've already stated in our life, in general, we're gonna read a psalm together. But the reason why we had Chris sort of start us off by really quoting Psalm 27, a portion of that, and that one thing and that needs to be sung over us in worship in our lives, is because that's where the struggle really begins. And it's going to end there, too. But what do you mean by that, Pastor? What I mean by that is that we struggled to believe that we struggled to cry out to Abba, Father, many of us are thinking as I even introduce something like this a series or a topic on fatherhood, whether you're here just this day, or you stick was with us through the entire series, you're thinking, I don't want to go there. If I'm honest, Pastor, I do not want to go there even mentally, as I sort of go through what you are going to discuss this morning. And through the scriptures. I've buried those thoughts deep down, I don't want to resurrect them. No pun intended, right? But, or you're thinking now wait a second. I've shown him I've shown my dad, yeah, he never thought I'd mount anything, or he was never around or anything like that. So I've shown him, I don't need his approval. I don't need his blessing. This is not a big deal. It's just that in and of itself, that we're saying those things in our head and in our hearts, that reveals the very truth that we do need it and that we do actually care what he thinks even if he was never around or you never met him. It doesn't change the fact that we do need a fatherly blessing. You and I were designed and made to have a father's love and blessing. That's not fun to think about, especially as we think about the gaps in the holes that we may have. You might think Well Mom and I did just fine. And maybe you did or maybe she did. But that doesn't negate the fact that someone was still missing in your life or maybe the presence of your father caused real damage. Many of us are still thinking, I don't know. I don't even know what you're talking about. When you talk about a father's blessing. I don't know what that is. And I'm sure I didn't get it or I'm Not sure if I got it. And then you might think, are you sure we're supposed to talk about this pastor? Because? Is there any way we can get around it? Is there any way that we can just not go there? We talk about these father topics. Well, the way God presented in the New Testament by Jesus, this idea of our Heavenly Father loving and caring for us, he modeled for this. He modeled this for us, Jesus modeled us, for us, this idea that our Heavenly Father cared for him. And in turn, He cares for us. Yes, God has revealed as sovereign and Redeemer and Almighty in the great IAM, all those are true, but much more in the New Testament, Jesus makes sure that we understand that you can pray to your Father in heaven. Guys, think about this, even culturally, many of you in the room or maybe ex Catholics, or you have Catholic friends that you know, of the reason why you are calling your priests a father, right is because you understand that he's a go between between you and God, and He speaks for God. So we understand this culturally, and we need to understand it biblically that literally hundreds of times in the New Testament, Jesus wants us to understand that we have a father, again, I don't know what context you grew up in, or this is maybe your first time at church. But when we were taught about the Lord's Prayer, well, how are we taught our Father who art in heaven, primary way, the relationship between us and the God of the universe is express is that between a father and a child, and you might think, man, I'm not sure I can accept that. And that's a hard pill to swallow this morning, Pastor, I know it's a new year, I know I should go to church, I'm glad to be here. But this is a hard pill to swallow because of, as we're gonna think about and talk about in this series, some of the damage that's been done. And I just want to pose this question to you if you're even struggling with this concept, even if you can be shown this biblically. And even if you can be shown the hundreds of passages just in your gut right now your responses. I don't know what I think about that, or I literally do not like that. Think about how the enemy loves to work. That is Satan, the serpent, the devil, he loves to distort good things, or he loves to destroy. Remember what Jesus said, The thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy, but I've come that you may have life and having to abundance, don't us think, if the devil was going to mess us up in our relationship with our Heavenly Father, if he was going to mess us up in our relationships with others, that he would go after the very vital relationship that was so important to how God would relate to us? I think so. Because here's what we need to understand that we are sons and daughters of a father who loves us and gave His Son for us. That is the simplicity of the gospel. And so you're thinking, Well, why are you saying I can't go back? You're thinking just like Nicodemus did in John chapter three, where I quoted some summary of John 316. And you're thinking, how am I supposed to go back into my mother's womb? When we were here? We're most of us are well into adulthood. And Nicodemus was asking the same question, am I supposed to go back to the birth canal? And he's like, No, you were born once, through the breaking of water through the birth canal, you and I must be born of the Spirit, which is where we're heading this morning, because it's really all about worship. But you think about man, Pastor, what about the relationships, the loss, you don't understand the wounds, the hurt, the neglect, I'm not here to say I understand some of it. Good earthly fathers are meant to be a reflection of our heavenly Father, not perfection, or we're gonna learn throughout this whole series is that we do have a perfect Heavenly Father who loves us, we've got to get rid of some of the hindrances that are hindering us from worshipping Him and freely in spirit and in truth, but the reality is, we do have a perfectly Heavenly Father. And the reality is the way God set it up, is that we all have a father, for better or for worse, we didn't come here into this world, just through one individual, it took two. And what was meant to occur, the way God set it up is that we were meant to have an earthly father who was a reflection of our Heavenly Father. But many of you may have or had a bad dad, an awful dad, a deadbeat dad and abusive dad and neglectful dad, all of that. And you would say, more, or many of you may have had what's called a mixed bag.

You know what I'm talking about where there was some good stuff, but there was some not good stuff. That would be my story. I have a mixed bag in terms of my own father and how he conducted himself and treated me there's some good stuff in there, my father, he taught me how to swing a hammer. I'm the son of a contractor, he taught me how to fix a lawn mower. I mean, he was an old farm boy and tractors and all that he took me on some trips, I had some great experiences with my father, but I had some not good stuff in there, too. It was his way or the highway, you had to jump through certain hoops for any sort of love, praise or approval. And here was the deal. Even if you got up to those hoops, or jump through those hoops. The goalposts was moved, the hoop was actually moved on and on and on, and I gotta do this, and I gotta do this never gonna do this. It was never ending. And the praise never came or disapproval of any decision that I was to make not just as a child, but well into adulthood. Any decision you make towards a career towards a spouse, or any even small decision like that will be wrong, because it's not what I would have done or not what I would have made and for sure, I never had any sort of blessing where there was any sort of sense in which you are my son, and I am well pleased in you. So I had a mixed bag in terms of my own earthly father. Now here's the deal about mixed bags. I don't I don't like mixed up items. I don't like mixed bags. You know, I'm talking about where there's good stuff and there's bad stuff. I think about this in terms of right now. along the highway since we had an Amazon distribution center. Have you noticed that people are trying to sell us mystery Amazon boxes? Have you seen this on the side of the street? It's like $20, come get a mystery Amazon bucks. I'm here to tell you as your pasture. This isn't prophetic. Don't fall for it. Okay? Because if you do that, what you're gonna do is you're gonna pay 20 bucks, and you're gonna open it up and everything. Now there's gonna be more good stuff in here than not, no, there's not, there's going to be the value of less than $10 worth of good stuff. And everything else is going to be junk. I don't even like half the stuff that I intentionally ordered off of Amazon, much less do I need someone else's mixed bag of junk. Think about this in terms of candy. You know, when I was a kid, I used to be okay with a mixed bag of candy. And I'm talking about where you would sort of get excited because it was candy, you'd get your hands on your and you dig in and you would find the candy that you liked. And you'd begin D daddy and sort of leave the rest behind? well into adulthood. I can't even take the mix candy anymore. I don't know if anybody else is there as an adult. I can't do it. I can't dig through around the Reese's and the KitKat to get to the Snickers. It's too much effort. Just give me the good stuff. I just want the snickers or the Hershey's at a minimum. I don't want all those other candies that I don't like. And don't get me started on the mix that simple tray at parties. These are so so so bad. Where does it go wrong with a mixed vegetable tray. It goes wrong when you go and pick one out at the store. That's where it goes wrong. And then what do you do? What do I do if I bring the mixed vegetable tray to a party? I bring it out and I set it in the middle of what meatballs on one side. Nice hotdogs on the other spread out from that is nachos with cheese, maybe some good tamales always got stuff in what did you bring you brought a vegetable tray. So then you think for a variety of reasons. I'm going for the vegetable tray today. If you've been there, if you've been there at a party where your significant other punches you you need to go for the vegetable tray. So then you do it. And what ends up happening you first start with those carrots you grab the carrots, what's the first problem with the carrots? They're frozen? How did the carrots get frozen in the vegetable tray because when they stored the vegetable tray before they brought it, they pushed it to the back of the lettuce crisper and it got frozen in the frigerator. Then what you have is you have celery with brown tips at the end. Why? Because it was cut days and days and days it goes anything No no, the ranch dressing will be okay. So then you have the little thing of ranch dressing I'm talking about it's like a tablespoon or two max of ranch dressing. So you're the first one there if you're the first one there you really get all the ranch dressing whether you meant to have a little or not. She poured out there. He said good. I got to the vegetable tray first and I got the ranch dressing. But guess what? It's bad because it's not Hidden Valley. It's some sort of off brand no name stuff. And so then some of you are thinking No, no, no. The cheese and the crackers will save the vegetable tray. No they don't. Because what happens you go for the cubes of cheese. And somehow even though the carrots were frozen the cheese or lukewarm room temperature, the little cubes, and somehow they're dried out and hard on the outside. It wasn't even good cheese to begin with. Now we have the lukewarm cheese and the crackers. They're soggy and cold. And there's never time How many of y'all have ever been to a party? I'll ask for a raise of hands. How many of you have ever been to a party where everything else is demolished? All all everything else is the man All this in what is left? What is left? That broccoli that never had a home? No one was going to take it. What is the point of all this? Nobody likes? Nobody likes a mixed bag. Where do you go wrong? You go wrong when you see the vegetable tray in the store, leave it. Let it be someone else's mistake to bring to the next party. Mixed bags, they hurt us too. It's not just the idea of well, you had a good dad who did some good things. But no, wait a second, there was a lot that was left to be desired. And there's a lot of gaps in our lives with relationship with God and others. So let's see how the psalm is dealing with this because I love how Psalm 27. And really all the Psalms. Many of them are written about 1000 BC before Christ, and you're gonna see how God and even how you relate says it hasn't changed. And so here's, here's how Psalm 27 begins, it says, The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear, the Lord is the stronghold of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? So he's trying to convince himself as he's praying and writing these out, when the wicked advance against me to devour me these are bad things. It is my enemies and my foes who will stumble and fall. Though an army besieged me, my heart will not fear, though war break out against me, even then I will be confident one thing I'll ask from the Lord, this only do I seek that I may dwell on the house of the Lord, all the days of my life, you see it, you see what we just did what we just listened to, and worship and praise. And what is it to gaze on the beauty of the Lord and to seek Him in His temple, David's writing this where the temple is not yet built, he's viewing a tabernacle, he's looking forward to his son, and others building the temple. For the day of trouble, he will keep me safe in his dwelling, he will hide me in the shelter of His Sacred tent, and set me high upon a rock, then my head will be exalted. Above the enemies who surround me at his sacred tent I will sacrifice was shouts of joy, I will sing and make music to the Lord. I told you where we were going this morning, where we were going to start in the series on fatherhood. And it's now point number one, which is ongoing to worship. So you and I have to decide for ourselves individually, and corporately are we going to be men and women, sons and daughters of our Father who worship him? Just very clearly, like goes back to John, chapter three? Have you been born again, have you and I've been born at the spirit where the very spirit of God now lives and reigns in us to where we now are what compelled to worship and talk to our Heavenly Father this way. Worship is important, it is the connectivity of to the God of the universe. Now, some of us right now, we're struggling with all this because we don't even trust God. We've had the whole father deal, and it didn't go good for us. And so we're thinking, Wait a second present help in time of trouble. That's not my story. No one helps me, no one comes through for me, I take care of myself, I have to do it. I'm the only one that I could ever count on. And again, what is that saying that saying more about you and your relationship with God and others than it is about the God of the universe? Because yes, I understand that your experience but have you leaned on the father? Have you ever started the journey of worshipping? Have you ever been there where you say, Yes, single minded, wholehearted one thing I asked the Lord, I would just gaze upon your beauty that first and foremost that I didn't be caught up in who you are, first and foremost. And then that leads us to prayer. That leads us to prayer that leads us to acknowledgement that yes, I'm afraid. Yes, there are some people surrounding me yet I will praise you God. But he's not out of the woods and he knows it. So then he begins to pray and plead and where does he go? The psalmist says this, hear my voice when I call Lord, be merciful to me and answer me. My heart says if you seek His face, your face, Lord, I will seek I don't know where else to go. Do not turn your face from me. Do not turn your servant away in anger, you have been my helper. Do not reject me or forsake me God my savior, though, who, though my father and mother forsake me,

some translations say abandon me. Even if that happens, even if that's true or not true, even if I feel that even if that's the reality, what will you do, Lord? Will you abandon me? Will you forsake me just like he did know, says very clearly the Lord will receive me. Teach me your way, Lord, lead me in the straight path because of my oppressors Do not turn me over to desire my foes for false witnesses rise up against me spouting malicious accusations. We've all been there. We've all been there again, with very few exceptions in the room where you maybe had a Christian dad who was a reflection of your heavenly Father, we've all been there we've had things hurled at us that were not true by people who were supposed to love us. So at least my second point this morning is, I've got some problems, we've got some problems, you've got some problems, we've all got some problems, because here's what ends up happening is we understand very clearly when we have enemies without right even think about this in terms of war, get your gun, we've got to go shoot them, we've got to go take care of them, we got to go take care of business business over here. But what happens when we have enemies within, and you and I have been there to where we have this just this rage inside of us, we have this confusion inside of us, we have this turmoil inside of us because of things that have been done to us, mainly because it seems like we have nowhere to turn. Because we say to ourselves, even my mother and my father have abandoned me, I'm in the pits, I'm in the dark, I'm in depression, whatever word you want to say. And it seems like you and I have nowhere to turn in. It's just us and our thoughts and our feelings. And we feel like we're silly, because you have a roof over your head or you have a job or you have somebody that loves you. But you're thinking, Wait a second, I'm still hurting, I've still got some problems. And what you and I need to start to start on our journey is you and I need to just realize and really receive the truth that the Lord has not abandon you. He has not abandoned you, wherever your father was, in this whole range, whether he was absent minded, and that caused some things for you, or whether he was abusive, or whether he was a mixed bag. The Lord has not abandoned you and me, which leads to the last part of this song. And how does it go? It says this right here. I remain confident of this. How does he remain confident of this, I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. Third and final point, I want to say this one is we can and will see the goodness of God in this life. Here's where most of us sort of get bent out of shape is that we think this is my lot in life. I've got some issues and things that were done to me. But I've also got some of my decisions that I've made. And so yes, I know that the Lord will ultimately take this away in glory. But I'm going to be stuck with this in the here. And now. And I want you to know, based off these promises that I'm reading to you in Scripture, what did it say at the end of Psalm 27? When he gets to the end of it after he sort of walked through all this worship, but then he's also walked through all these questions and problems and pain. He says, I remain confident that I will see the goodness of God. What when I die? When I glory someday Way LA in the distant future. No. But while I am still alive in the land of the living. Many of us are like, do you remember when Lazarus died and Jesus went to visit his friends? And they were still sort of just like us thinking? Oh, yeah, I know that we'll see him again, at the resurrection. And Jesus is trying to say no, no, no, while you're alive. You're going to see Lazarus come to life. And I'm just here to say to you, even though you're thinking right now, Pastor, the wounds, they're too big, like, like, like lots and lots of damage has been done. And in fact, I can even go back further to my grandfather and his grandfather. Now. The when the wounds are too big, and they're too deep. You wouldn't understand and back no one understands. I've been on the pills. I've been to the psychiatrist. I've been to the psychologist. I've been to the counselors. I've been to the therapist. And I'm here to tell you that the Father Himself, He sent His Son, and what did he say in the first Trinitarian act as we see Jesus going to be baptized? What did the Father in heaven say the Spirit came down as a dove. God opened up the heavens and what did he say? He said, This is my son with whom I what I love, and with whom I am well pleased. It's already been done for us. It's already been modeled for us. It's already been shown to us what will happen? He said, No, no. I got the wounds. Pastor. What about my wounds? When Jesus came to earth and he was with us for three years. I know he hung out with us but what ended up happening He got some wounds. He got some wounds, really big, deep wounds in the side in his hands. And what did those wounds become? What did they become? Did they stay wounds? Did he stay in the grave? Did he stay in the tomb? No, the wounds became scars. And we know that we all struggle with this because Thomas himself said, I don't believe it. I don't let me see the scars. No, no, that's Jesus. That's the guy who I saw have the wounds. And now they've been turned into scars. Guys, we know about bleeding out. Some of y'all are in, you know, military or border patrol, or some sort of enforcement, law enforcement, government enforcement, where you see battle, you see wounds, and we know that we don't keep our wounded out there. Right, we don't keep them out there leading and advancing the charge, we don't keep them out there on the battlefield. Why? Because you've got to go get healed up. If you're bleeding out, pull him or her in, let them get healed up. But you and I both know that those wounds become what, over time, they become scars. And I'm telling you, there are so many of us in this room that are bleeding out, we're bleeding out, people around us know it, you know it in your heart of hearts, in your darkest moments and your highest moments when you try to pray. And you can't quite get there through that ceiling of even addressing God as your Father in heaven, as you've never really crawl up into your father's lap and called out Abba, Father, and felt like there was anybody there to hear you or to care for you. But I'm here to tell you, that you and I do not have to stay there, we do not have to continue a legacy of destruction. If that was your heritage and story, you and I do not have to continue a legacy of even mixed bag, where we told ourselves the same laws that our dad told us well, I you know, I taught him a few things I taught her a few things are, you know, I provide a roof over their head or, you know, I didn't get drunk too often running too bad, or I'm gonna let it go. That's all leading to death. You and I must be born again. You're not going to be worshipers, not just at the king, not just of our Redeemer, but we must be worshipers of our Father in heaven. And Jesus showed us and taught us how to do that. Now if you're thinking my I don't even know where to start. I'm listening to the pastor, I care what you're saying. But I don't know where to start. Think about where the psalmist was, think about where you and I ought to be this morning. Cry out to the Lord in the midst of your fatherlessness because you and I got big gaps and we got small ones. And here's what I'm telling you this is the final point is what I'm telling you, God will come through, he will come through he didn't want his blade now. He didn't want us bleeding out forever. He will turn those wounds and scars and you will be able to hold your head high. You won't ultimately drown. Even if your oppressors surround you even if the mockers surround you even if no one else understands or get it that there is a God in heaven, who will not leave or abandon or forsake you. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you that you didn't leave us here on this earth wondering if anybody cares. Because you care. God, I pray for those in this room that had really really horrendous fathers. And then a topic like this hurts on multiple levels. I just pray right now that they lean in. They stick with you that they that they truly cry out to you gotta I need help. I need help because I don't want to keep doing this. I'm gonna keep going down this way. Help us to be men and women who see ourselves as sons and daughters of a father who one day will say to us even if no one else here on this earth says it. Well done. Well done, daughter. Well done, son. Enter, enter into the kingdom that has been created for you. As he says in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, you guys are in for a real treat. Today we have a guest pastor with us. It is David Hogg. He is the president of Phoenix seminary right here in the southwest. And he has come to be with us and give us a word. And so I want to get you guys to give a big live church. Welcome to David Hogg.

Well, thank you very much, Brent. I appreciate the opportunity to be here. As I begin, let me just clear one thing up. I've discovered I need to do this wherever I go. As you continue to hear me speak, you may begin to wonder and even be distracted. Where is this guy from? Because occasionally, oohed and aboot make their way out of my mouth. And I was raised in Toronto in Canada. I then lived in the southeast. So occasionally, you'll hear a little bit of a drawl. And then now I live in Phoenix and Arizona with my family. And we very much enjoy that. So let's dispel the where in the world is that guy from, we now know, he's from nowhere and everywhere. So if that helps you, I hope so it is a privilege to be here this morning. I love the opportunity, whenever I have it to share God's Word with God's people. And so it's wonderful to be able to do that here with you this morning. However, you have a Bible, you can either follow along here on the screen, the text will be there for you. But if you have a phone or a tablet, or if you're as old as I am, and you still have this thing with pages in it, feel free to use it. But we'll be in Mark's gospel, chapter five, Mark chapter five, this is a part of the story in the life of Jesus. And as we'll see here in this story, this is a part in which Jesus comes to a man who has been demon possessed, and he frees him of that demon. So follow along with me, as I read for you from Mark chapter five, beginning at verse one.

They came to the other side of the sea to the country of the gara scenes. And when Jesus had stepped out of the boat, immediately, there met him out of the tombs, a man with an unclean spirit.

He lived among the tombs, and no one could bind him anymore, not even with a chain, for he had often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart, and he broke the shackles in pieces. No one had the strength to subdue him. Night and day among the tombs, and on the mountains. He was always crying out and cutting himself with stones. And when he saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him, and crying out loud with a loud voice. He said, What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God, I adjure you by God do not torment me. For Jesus was saying to him come out of the man who unclean spirits. And Jesus asked him, What is your name? And he replied, My name is Legion, for we are many. And he begged Him earnestly not to send them out of the country. Now a great herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. And they begged him saying, send us to the pigs, let us enter them. So he gave them permission, and the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs and the herd, numbering about 2000 rushed down the steep bank into the sea, and drowned in the sea.

The herdsmen fled and told it in the city and in the country. And people came to see what it was that had happened. And they came to Jesus and saw the demon possessed man, the one who had had the Legion, sitting there, clothed, and in his right mind, and they were afraid. And those who had seen it described to them what had happened to the demon possessed man and to the pigs. And they began to beg Jesus to depart from their region. As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed with demons begged him, that he might be with him. And he did not permit him but said to him, go to your friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how he has had mercy on you. That he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and everyone marveled.

Gracious Heavenly Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you for its power. I thank you that we have sung already of the powerful name of Jesus, the name of Jesus, that is able to dispel sin that is able to forgive us of the debt to the depths of our hearts. Lord, we give you thanks for this Gospel we give you thanks for the one who was not only born as a baby, as we just finished celebrating Christmas time, but were the one who went to the cross. For us, who died taking upon himself all of the punishment, do my sin, do our sin, because we have rebelled against you and disobeyed. But you have not left us as orphans. You have drawn us to yourself. You have gathered us to yourself and you have called us sons and daughters. For that we give you that

I pray this morning Father, I pray that you would enlighten the hearts and minds of all of us here that you would teach us that you would guide us that you would lead us. The Lord, we do not need the words of a man for that will leave us empty. We need the word of God, delivered by the Holy Spirit centered on the person and work of Jesus Christ, for that alone will change us and make us evernew. We ask all of this in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Well, I want to begin by saying that as we look at Mark chapter five, I want to initially affirm very clearly that the events that we have here in Mark five are real events, they are true events. This is not here, because somebody made this up. It's not here, because the mark thought this would be a nice little story to add into things. Now this actually happened in the life of Jesus. Now, I mentioned that this actually happened in the life of Jesus. Because I also want to make it clear why Mark included this story. The story is not included in all the Gospels, but it is included here in Mark chapter five. And I think part of the reason that Mark included this is because he wanted to show us very clearly and very starkly that what it means for humanity to be under the bondage of sin, and to know the glorious freedom of salvation. This man was under the bondage of sin in a way that most of us would never even could never even imagine. He was demon possessed. That is the bondage that he experienced under sin to an extreme degree, but you and I experienced the bondage of sin, and have experienced that in other ways. The point is that we need not remain in that bondage. But this is a wonderful story in which we see that the person and work of Jesus Christ is able to free us from the bondage of our own sin. And as we look at this together, I want to notice three things with you, I want to first of all look at Satan's plan, because we're showing a little bit of it here. Second, I want to look at Jesus power. And then very briefly, at the end, I want to consider our peace, Satan's plan, Jesus power and our peace.

Well, when you think about Satan's plan, what is his plan to try and and dissuade us from following Jesus? What is his plan in terms of dealing with humanity? Well, I think we see it here. In the experience of this man, you say, Well, I don't know how to enter into the experience of this man, I don't know this is something foreign to me. Maybe for others of you. It's not but for most of us, this is something foreign to us. I don't really know if I can connect.

But let me ask you a few questions, and they might help you connect a bit more with this man. First of all, have you ever in your life felt lonely?

Just a moment ago, Brent was saying that as we stood up and gathered around, you've got the introverts like me, who run to the corner and hope nobody notices. Then you have the extroverts, like some of you who run to the corner to say hello.

We have introverts, we have extroverts. The funny thing about introverts and extroverts as an introvert has the incredible ability to feel lonely, even in a crowd.

Maybe that's been your experience, I don't know, maybe you felt lonely as an extrovert, because you're at home, and nobody else is there and you need people.

Or maybe you've known profound loneliness in other ways. If you found loneliness, if you've know that experience, and if you're human, which I think most of you are, then you've known loneliness at some point in your life. And therefore, you can connect to some degree with a man who had no friends, no family, no one and lived in a cemetery.

This is part of his experience. I wonder if you've ever felt helpless?

Maybe you think well, I don't know if I felt helpless.

Well, have you ever been to the bedside of someone that you love? And you know that they're dying? And there's nothing that can be done?

That's a moment of helplessness, isn't it? So moment when you're sitting there, I remember when I was pastoring. In North Carolina, I went to the bedside of a six month old.

There was nothing that could be done. And I stood there with the parents and I knew there's I mean, I can, I can try and encourage them in some way I can stand with them. And the only encouragement I could offer were no words, I had no words to say in that moment, but to just be with them. And we all felt helpless. There are these moments when we get are not powerful enough in ourselves to do anything. And if you've ever felt helplessness in any way, then you can enter a little bit into the experience of this demon possessed man. We see here that he he roamed amongst the tombs in a cemetery, and he cried out,

who knows, but he felt helpless. He wanted freedom from the possession of those demons. Have you ever felt afraid?

Maybe when you were younger, maybe now I don't know. Maybe being afraid of the dark is a thing. You just don't like it. You're not sure you're uncertain. There may be other fears that you have. I don't know if I have a fear of scorpions, but I've been introduced to them.

And it's interesting just the way that we can respond when we feel fear. That seems almost silly compared to this man. But again, this man would have known for

near the sum total of Legion of demonic activity within his being.

And finally, have you ever felt inexplicably angry or agitated?

Maybe it's because you're going through a period of stress, maybe your job, maybe your family, maybe your life circumstances are suddenly shutter stage where you're just there's a lot of anxiousness, a lot of anxiety, a lot of agitation that sometimes boils over to anger, and all the wrong times, if you've ever had an experience like that. And again, if you're human, I think you have in some form or fashion, then you can enter into this man's experience. He was a man in whom there was anger and fear and helplessness and loneliness.

And you see, Satan, in a larger than life way had done that to this man.

The Satan's Derrik call the minions his demonic horde had entered into this man's life however that happens. And you see what Satan's goal there was in dehumanizing him is to rob that man. And what sin does to you and me is it robs us of the purpose for which you were created.

And you say, Well, what was the purpose for which I was created? You were created to know life.

You were created, to have joy. You were created to be in relationships, in fellowship in front have friendships and community you were created for happiness. You were created for freedom and goodness and gentleness and kindness, and all the things that make life worth living. And Satan as we see here, and sin in your life and mine robs us of that in one way or another. It diminishes that in one way or another. You see, we have all been as it were dehumanized by sin.

So if you're here this morning, and you are not a follower of Jesus Christ, yet you have not come to the place of repenting of your sin, turning to Jesus, the one who died on the cross and rose again, left the tomb, empty on your behalf. That I'm telling you this morning, you do not know what it is to fulfill God's purpose for your life, because you are still bound by sin.

You may not be demon possessed as this man was, but your situation is no better. Because sin still has dominion over your heart and mind and your life. And if you're a believer, let me ask you this question. Are there times when you return to those old those old ways?

When you fall to temptation, when there's that moment where you want to make sure people understand your right bit of self righteousness gets in there, a bit of of condescension gets in there. Perhaps you struggle with other sins, whatever it may be, why would you return to the old ways, instead of returning as we've sung this morning, and we've read here of the possibility, turning to the mercy that Jesus offers in freeing us from sin. So Satan's plan is to dehumanize you to fall to sin, to live under the bondage of sin is to be dehumanized. Second, Satan's plan is to mimic God's word, or God's work to mimic God's work. He said, What does that mean? I don't know if you've read through the Bible or not. But if you read through the Bible, it's kind of interesting when you get to the Gospels, because something starts happening with tremendous frequency, by comparison to everywhere else in Scripture. And what starts happening with with higher frequency noticeably so in the Gospels is that people are possessed by demons.

You really don't read much or anything at all of this in the Old Testament, you read through the whole Old Testament and okay, there seems to be that there are comments about those who should not engage in the occult, and those who should not try and do those sorts of things and all the rest of it, then you get to the Gospels, and Jesus is casting out demons, it seems like every fourth page, and then after Jesus ascends again, you'll be continued with the book of Acts, and you're reading through the rest of the New Testament, like, for the most part, all of that, with a few exceptions, it all disappears again. Why?

seems kind of odd. Why have all of this activity right here, and I think some of the reason for that is the timing. You see what happens at the beginning of the Gospels? What happens at the beginning of Matthew and Mark and Luke and John, is what we just celebrated a few weeks ago, Christmas. It is the coming of the Son of God taking on human flesh, a completely unique act in history, that the second person of the Triune God, the Son of God, took on put on human flesh became human, while still reigning, still remaining fully God, the most amazing thing in history, fully God and fully human, bound together in the person of Jesus Christ. Well, you know that Satan's not going to like this. Every time Satan sees God moving forward, he seeds with rage, because he hates God.

And so what is it that Satan does Satan doesn't have the power to in flesh himself. Satan doesn't have the power to do that. But what Satan up

Apparently can do is he can send his demonic hordes for those who are not believers to enter into under obviously bizarre and strange circumstances to enter into people. So it gives the impression that he too is as it were in fleshed.

So as deity takes on humanity, so the demonic dwells in human. And Why would Satan do that? Because he's mimicking the incarnation.

And he's doing it to try and convince people, convinced the people of his day convince you convinced convinced me that demonic forces are as or more powerful than gold.

Because if he can do that, then he has you in the grip of fear. And he's got you where he wants you.

As I thought about this, I was reminded of a friend of my mother's my mother still lives in Toronto. And she goes on walks with a lady that we grew up with a number of families in the community, and she still goes on walks from time to time with this other lady in the community, they're about the same age. And they for some time, when they started doing this, they would walk down this one street, and eventually my mom thought, Well, why don't we turn right and go down this street, because it's one of the old streets in Toronto that has these enormous oak trees and pine trees. It's just gorgeous, walking through all this and the wind blowing through the leaves, and she had to be beautiful. Let's let's walk through there. She began to turn down that street. And the woman stopped and said,

Do you want to walk down that street?

My mother was a bit surprised. She said, Yes. Yeah. Is that okay? She said, Well, I prefer not to.

It's a perfectly safe Street. There's no reason to think that anything bad would happen. And so my mother asked her, Oh, I'm sorry. Is there something is there, something I should know. And the woman said, You see, what you don't understand is that demons live in the trees are so she believed.

And she was in such fear of the demonic powers that she believed dwelled in trees that could then attach themselves to you that she would go nowhere near certain kinds of trees.

My mother, of course, had in that moment, the opportunity to speak to her about the power of Jesus. That because she is filled by the Holy Spirit, by the wonderful grace of God and the mercy of Jesus Christ, and all that's done, she would never be filled with demonic powers, nor could they attach themselves to her because she has the presence of the Holy Spirit, not because she's special, not because she's wonderful, but because she has repented and believed in Jesus Christ.

There are people who still wrestle even as in Mark's day as he's writing the story, even as in the days when Jesus walked on this earth, there are still people today who live in the fear of the demonic and they need not to they need to hear the wonderful, merciful, gracious and almighty powerful gospel of Jesus Christ.

So you see, Satan's plan is to dehumanize Satan's pant plan is to mimic God's work in order to instill fear. But what is Jesus power? Let's get to the good stuff.

What is Jesus power want to know two things here as well about Jesus power. First of all, Jesus power is real.

Jesus power is real.

You can consider the extraordinary power of these demons.

You can either look at it now or I would encourage you to read the story again when you get home later today. But in verse four of chapter five, we read that he this man had been often been bound with shackles and chains, but he wrenched the chains apart.

Now, I'm not I mean, I'm no expert, but I'm guessing taking metal chains, and just pulling them apart is a little bit different than abnormal.

It's unbelievable this for this for this man. Because of the power that was in he was able to wrench those chains apart. We read in the second part of verse four that no one had the strength to subdue him. Some English translation said no one had the strength to tame him. The idea the picture here is that this man is like a wild beast. Now since coming to the southeast, I've enjoyed something we call rodeos. This is very exciting for me. And I remember watching the first one we went to and watching these crazy people get on these bulls and horses and just be tossed around like a I don't know what

the next day at church after that my first rodeo I was talking to a guy in front of me said, oh, yeah, he said, I grew up in Oklahoma. He said, My whole family's in rodeos. I said, but you're not. He said, No, there came a point when I was about 17 that it dawned on me this isn't a smart move.

You get really hurt there. So here's this picture. Imagine if you will, an untamed bull.

And in fact, in my mind right now, I'm actually thinking of this first rodeo I went to and it was amazing because these guys are trying to tame this bull. Literally, these enormous men are being dragged around three or four of them dragged around on a rope as they're trying to pull the ball back in and the bull just shakes its head the all three of them get flogged. go flying.

That's this

God,

no one.

No one contained this man, not even Jack Reacher, such as no hope.

Then verse nine, Jesus said to him, What is your name? And he replied, My name is Legion, for we are many. Well, in the Roman period back in Roman times, the Roman Empire and so forth, a legion was 6000 soldiers.

If this demons name at this time in history is Legion, it stands to reason his name is Legion, because that's the term that was used to describe a group of 6000.

You may say, how can 6000 Demons possess one guy? Well, their spirit, they're not for that flesh. So they, you know, the whole business of physics doesn't matter to them, I suppose. I don't know how this happens. But you'll also notice that that when they're cast out, they asked to be cast into the pigs and 2000 of the pigs are possessed. So there's at least 2000 of them.

That's extraordinary.

Now, if this were turned into a TV show, or a movie,

I suspect it would go something like this. Here's this man who's tearing apart chains who nobody can tame, and they figured how to film all that stuff. Then Jesus shows up and you can see it, there'll be lights from behind him with a smoke machine.

And there's a sort of a shadow and Jesus is there, and he's getting ready to deal with me that will get the stamp your feet shoulder width apart, you know, getting down getting ready. And here comes the guy and he's getting ready to take on Jesus and all the rest. And it would be very tense, the music would play, we'd all be drawn into this. But that's exactly not how it happens in Mark five. I love the way it happens in Mark five.

Because what happens in what in verse 13? Here, these the demons are pleading with Jesus.

He says, What is your name? And the answer, my name is Legion. Then verse 13, I love these these words, they'd asked to go into the pigs and Jesus gives permission

6000 demons,

they need permission to do anything. 6000 demons, and dare I say it, I don't want to be. I don't want to make the little anything here. But if Jesus had had pockets, they did not have pockets in that day.

pockets or development of the Middle Ages, we can have that lecture later. If Jesus had had pockets, it's almost as though he'd be standing in his pockets on one foot, the other one ahead. So I'm nodding his head, get out.

And they scream at him. Don't send us into the abyss.

And he says, Well, where do you want to go? Into the pigs?

Okay, and they go, and they're gone

forevermore.

That's power.

He doesn't have to try. He doesn't have to hunker down. He doesn't have to get ready. Jesus has real power. And what I love about this, as I said, this is a real story. But it is also a real story that gives us a picture of our lives with sin.

You see, when Jesus deals with your sin and mine? It's not as though Jesus has to come at it and hope that you can win and battle it and all the rest of it. No, no, Jesus has power over sin in your life, just like he had power over 6000 demons. And this is a reminder to ourselves that you and I we cannot overcome the power of sin. Much like this man could not overcome the power of these demons. We do not have it in ourselves. You don't I don't nobody does to overcome sin of our own accord. Now, yes, there are times in which you can do things to help yourself not be tempted by sin. Man, if you're here today, and you have struggled with pornography, then one of the things you should be doing is giving your phone to your wife,

saying here, I'm not going to be alone for the next four hours, I would like you to have my phone, please do this. There's just some sensible things you can do.

But the real power that comes that frees you from sin only comes from Jesus. on that. Notice, again, I teach church history when I have the opportunity to teach. And so if you go back in time to the fourth century, the guy named Jerome, if you if you grew up in the Catholic Church, you'll know the Catholic church for many years, you had to follow the liturgy in Latin till about the mid 20th century and then you're allowed to do it in English and other Latin, Spanish and other languages and so forth. But for a very long time, everything was in Latin and the even the Bible that you heard read was in Latin. Well, that Bible that you heard read, if you grew up in the Catholic Church was the translation that Jerome did way back in the fourth century. So that helps you contextualize that's the Jerome I'm talking about.

Well, Jerome struggled with lost.

So he thought I know how to defeat this.

He, first of all, he took his flip phone and put it away for century. He then decided I'm going to go out and live like a hermit in the middle of the desert

and he

did and he ate, he actually tells us in a letter, he tells us I went out there, I had no shelter, I only had the water, I could barely scrape up wherever I could find little bits of water, I ate scorpions, I ate grasshoppers, I ate whatever I could find mean he was and he was punishing himself for his sin. And then he said something interesting in this letter, because he reflecting on it later in life. He said, You know, for everything that I did myself, for everything that I tried to impose upon myself, externally, as it were,

I would still fall asleep at night, and he said, quote, I found myself among amongst a bevy of women in Rome.

And it's at that moment that he realized I can deny myself everything go out in the desert, leave everything behind. But nothing has the power over sin in my heart like Jesus. And so he had to turn to Christ and ask Christ to deal with them, and Christ did. Why, because Jesus power is real power. Second, not only is Jesus power real, it restores me fully. Jesus power restores you fully.

If you read Mark five, from a Jewish perspective, as of course, was the context there, Jesus was wandering around Israel. If you read the story, from a Jewish perspective, it's kind of different. Because there are at least three ways in which this man is unclean. The Old Testament has lots of laws about what is clean and unclean. This man was unclean in at least three ways. First of all, he was possessed by demons, that's sort of a given, he is not considered clean in terms of, of the of the temple. Second, he lived amongst the tombs, and connections with the dead directly, were considered unclean. And then third, it appears from everything that we know about this man that he was a Gentile, he was not a Jew. And they, in that time, they considered God didn't, but they considered the Gentiles to be unclean. So this man is three times unclean.

But what I love is that after he's met Jesus,

he's no longer a man who's full of demons, he's now completely free and full of Jesus, which means he's clean on one account. He then tells the man go home to your family. Jesus has restored relationships, he's now clean in a second place is no longer in the tombs. He's now with his community. And then third, Jesus accepts him.

He actually commissioned him to be an evangelist, when he says there at the end, go home and tell your friends.

I love the fact that a man who begins this story unclean three times over what hope is there for him,

ends up being clean,

tap, absolutely wonderful. And in fact, it's wonderful, even in the bigger picture of what's going on here. I didn't read it. And I'm not going to take the time now. But if you look at the story just before this one, it's a story of the disciples who were in the midst of a storm there on August, when we started reading, as I said, they came to the other side of the sea, they're on the other side of the Sea of Galilee. And on that night, when they were going over on the boat, and enormous storm whips up, and they're all worried they're going to die in the storm and drown in the storm.

And Jesus stands up. And he simply says, Peace be still. And immediately.

The water is like a mirror.

And the winds have died down, Jesus demonstrated his power over creation.

After this story, there are a couple of other things that take place, there's a woman who has an issue of blood, and she's unhealthy, and she can't do anything about it. And Jesus simply heals her. And then a story after that Jesus meets somebody who says, his daughter has died.

And he raises that daughter from the dead

is the most remarkable part of Mark's gospel apart from Jesus own the story of Jesus death and resurrection. Because we see that Jesus power is a power that restores it restores chaos and creation to peace. It restores broken fellowship, broken relationships, broken community, so that people now have family again.

And it's absolutely wonderful how it restores those who are dead to life.

And that's what you and I look forward to eternal life.

So in other words, if I could put it this way, when we think about Jesus power restored you fully, I want you to consider that regardless of your situation this morning. Jesus has the power to heal you. Jesus has the power to cleanse Jesus has the power to restore. Jesus has the power to say

I don't know the song but while I was wondering about outside in the hallway there there's music playing and I just happened to catch some of the lyrics I thought it was amazing. One of the lyrics actually said, even if you have I'm not gonna remember because I just heard it but even if you have like 1000 10,000 scars,

he can heal you.

He can heal you. Doesn't matter what you come to Jesus with. He has

The power to heal. So you see Satan's plan is to dehumanize you and leave you in fear but Jesus power is real. And he restores you fully. And that leads us to third and finally, our peace.

And here I simply want to say that our peace sometimes comes with a struggle.

There is some confusion actually in this text.

I'm not going to read it all well, I'm gonna tell you what I mean by this. It's kind of interesting the way the text deals with describing this demon possessed man before he's healed by Jesus. He uses the term we use is me he we they let me just tell you what I mean, Here, read this. When he said that's the demon possessed man saw Jesus from afar, he ran and fell down before him make sense. And crying out with a loud force. He said, What have you to do with me? Jesus, Son of the Most High God, I drew you by God, don't do not torment me. For Jesus was saying, come out. And Jesus asked him, What is your name? And he said, my name is Legion, for we are many. So now it's getting confusing, is it? Amira, we, and he begged Him earnestly not to send them out into the country. And you go on and on and there's a them there's a we there's a he, there's a they, okay, like what's going on here? What's the confusion here.

And the problem is, of course, that we're trying to the mark, as the author is trying to distinguish between and differentiate between the man himself, and then the demons in the man.

And that's something that we need to make sure we do as well.

We need to understand that sin is both a part of us. But it is not all of who I am.

So often, people will say, and I've lived in different parts of the country, and for example, in Alabama, and I discovered in Alabama, apparently, they have a small love affair with football.

If you know anything about Alabama, don't be offended. Roll Tide.

Lots of stories. Yeah, sorry, for those of you who are Eagle fans, but at any rate, what's amazing to me about that is, is you will ask somebody tell me about yourself. And one of the things they would say in a church setting when they'd say, Well, I'm an Alabama fan, or I'm an Auburn fan.

I don't think I ever said it out loud, because I tried to be careful.

But I know what they're saying. And I know the conversation that context and all the rest of but there was always a part of me that wanted to say, no.

You actually believe that some part of your identity has to do with the thing that you love in sports. What you need to say is, I'm a Christian, I'm a follower of Jesus. I'm one who has been redeemed by the blood of a lamb. However, you want to say that if you are a follower of Jesus, if you are a Christian, that is your identity, period.

Other things can follow.

But that's always what you should say, first, I am a Christian, I'm a follower of Jesus Christ. Because to get back to the original point that I made early on, this is a man who is bound by sin.

If you hear nothing else, and remember nothing else from this morning, and these few minutes that I've been speaking here, remember this, for those who are Christians, for those who are in Christ, for those who are followers of Jesus, you are no longer under the dominion of sin, you are free.

Now, you may say, But hold on, I still wrestle with sin.

Let's because the presence of sin is still in you until Jesus comes again, or until you die and go to be with him. And so you wrestle with the presence of that sin. But the thing that is so different about you and me is for those of us who are believers in this room, if you're not under the dominion, you have the power to say NO to temptation.

You have the powers, we sung to say, the name of Jesus, I love that line till every addiction is overcome.

You have that power.

You see before you didn't have that power.

I remember when I was at seminary sitting in a class, it was a counseling class, and I'm no counselor, but I thought I should at least take a few classes to kind of figure this thing out.

And sitting next to me as we started the class was a guy who was a fair bit older than me. And we went around the class at the beginning the first day, and that presser wanted to know why you taking this class.

And one of the interesting thing is is this, this guy said, Well, he said I've been a social worker for years.

And he said for years and years and years as a social worker before I came to faith in Christ, I was really frustrated because he said I could help kids with a certain in a certain situation. Usually it was some sort of violence. And he said I couldn't get them to pull back on that violence. I could get them to calm down, but he said you wouldn't believe it. Kids of a certain violent nature. I could help them with that. They'd be back within a year or two almost always and they turned into arsonists. Burning everything they could find.

And he said I could tell you story after story after story but it dawned on me all I'm doing I don't know if you've ever been to the county fair or something, you know that Whack a Mole game. The moles come up, you take the hammer, you whack them all.

The more you act and the more that come up, and he said, I realized that unless there's something more than what I can offer, and what all this world has to offer, when it comes to the sin and comes to the plight of these kids, these high school kids was his specialty. He said, then there's nothing, there's no hope. And it's at that point that he found Christ. And he began to see that the only hope for these kids was Jesus. And as he began to change the way he dealt with those kids, he said, it is absolutely marvelous. I'm no longer playing Whack a Mole. The violent kids who come to me and I work with them, I share with them the gospel, we read through the Scriptures, and the ones who come to faith. They've never yet come back with as arsonists.

They don't desire to burn anything. Instead, they burn for Jesus.

You see, that's our piece.

When whatever your sin may be the the violence subsides, the anger subsides, the loneliness can can dissipate, the helplessness is given help and strength.

So yes, this is a picture of the fact that sin can bind. But it's a wonderful picture, fabulous picture

of the mercy of God, in helping us come to that place of peace, and live like it was intended for us to live. You see, God's mercy is relentless.

You know, Psalm 23, The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

And if you do read it this afternoon, and then if you don't know, but the last verse says, surely, goodness, and mercy will follow me. All the days of my life follow is a is actually a poor translation.

It's actually Surely goodness and mercy will pursue me

all the days of my life.

And that was written by King David, he knew that that pursuit of Jesus after you didn't just begin before you were saved an end when you're saved. That pursuit of his goodness and His mercy. And his kindness is unrelenting until the day you appear before him and see him eyeball to eyeball.

He will not let you go the one who has power to do the demonic forces, the one who has power against your sin, to simply say, you're forgiven, be gone, is the one who doesn't leave you nor forsake you.

You may say, Well, this man wasn't allowed to be with Jesus. In this case, I suppose you're right, in one sense.

But he did something even more. And that's what I want to leave you with this morning. Verse 19, the very towards the very end of this story. Jesus did not permit him to come with him. Instead, he said, Go home, to your friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how He has mercy on you.

This morning, that's exactly the same word to you. Because this is not just a story about this man. This is not just a story that we read and go home and say, Well, that was interesting. It's in the Bible because it is a directive for us. So when you go home this afternoon, when you show up to work tomorrow, when you're with your family on Tuesday night, when you're visiting with friends on Wednesday morning when you're having coffee with someone on Thursday. Remember these words, go to your family and to your friends, and tell them that the mercy of God has come to you.

Our gracious heavenly Father, we give you thanks that your mercy has come to us. We give you thanks so Lord, that You are the one who has power over sin, real power.

You are not struggling against sin as though it is hard for you.

Just as in creation, as we read it in the book of Genesis, you spoke and there was light, you spoke and the earth came to be you spoke and

animals were created. You spoke

and Adam and Eve became what they are.

You need only speak against sin. You need only speak against Satan.

And they have no power. Lord, I pray that You would help us to live in that power in that reality that we might truly know your redemption. And Father, I pray especially for anyone here this morning, who does not know the power of Jesus over sin over Satan over this world, that today might be the day of their salvation, that today might be the day in which they can go home and they can say to their family, I have received mercy and that mercy has come from Jesus. Let me tell you what he has done for me. And we ask all of this in his powerful name. Amen.

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Thank you so much. Appreciate that. Well, I appreciate you all being here so much. Thank you so much for spending your New Year's Eve with us. Of course, sometimes we need a little extra time to get the TV out here. And I'll now I will say, you know, Jesse, I'm a little disappointed that you mentioned Turkey to an El Paso audience. I mean, I've been here now it'd be five years in 2024. There's Tamales in my house. And so I don't know what's going on in your house. But, but we're busting out those well into time to go back to school, when we have a life lesson that we're going to look at today. And that is to look forward, don't look back. And so I hope and pray and trust that this will be a good timely message for all of us as we think about 2024. And beyond. First thing I want to say is that we are fascinated by time travel, we're fascinated by time traveling, we really have been for the last 100 years or so in terms of story and what we get caught up in and what we enjoy for entertainment. And so this really began in 1895 with the publication of a book called The Time Machine, the Time Machine by HG Wells, again, well over 100 years old, but he really set the stage for what we would come to know as time travel movies or stories. Up until that time, you really only had stories that were fairly linear. You would have people who had flashbacks, and no question, but you really didn't have someone who said no, I'm gonna get into something. And the term time machine literally comes from this book in the late 1800s. And he began to talk about things that we often talk about with time travel movies, which is fourth dimension, right. And so when you're in school, you learn about the three dimensions, length, width, height. And then there's the fourth dimension, of course, called time that really came out of again, this and other movies that followed. Now, what you and I know about story is that anytime we read or hear or watch a movie that's really trying to tell us or teach us something about our own lives or about the present. And that's exactly what HG Wells was doing. He goes well, well, 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of years in the future. And he he meets these mythical creatures and that kind of thing. But the point of that little story that becomes a movie, also, is that there is different classes in society. And they're sort of the haves and have nots, he was observing this coming out of the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s and early 1900s. And that's what he was writing about. One of the most popular movies when I was a child is this one right here it is back to the future. So if you're a 1980s kid or 1990s Kid, this was, this was our this was our movie, to sort of understand time travel. And again, we watch this over and over again. We had the old VHS tapes, I remember having this poster, back feature two on my wall from November 1989 on forward. And so what is this movie all about? Again, it's really the first one's primarily about a dad. It's really about a monument fly's dad, the Michael J. Fox, his character, George and he has just some fear worry and anxiety issues that have to be overcome so that he can change his trajectory and path and become a writer in the last two movies back to year two and three, what is it really about? It's really about Marty trying to overcome this fear of man of being called Chicken or whatever. So again, what is it it's these are futuristic sort of time travel movies, but it's really telling us something about our present. Now we get to the modern ones that have time travel, and they really I just want to I'm gonna throw these up here with these just totally lose me. Okay. Now it's not that I haven't seen some of them. I don't understand it. But I tapped out after Avengers endgame because it there was one movie where everyone died. And then you know, Robert Downey Jr. snaps his finger and then a whole movie, everybody gets to come back. So it's just, you know, it just gets kind of weird. And then a spider man again, they take all of our Spider Man's we've seen last 20 years, they throw him in a movie. I can't even begin to explain quantum mania. I tried to get my 12 year old son to explain to me he said that I don't really understand it either. I've seen it twice. And then you get to the end. And they put 127 Batman's in the flash. And so what is doing though, is it's really trying to bring together story about in a complicated way. If you have to pull out charts in order for me to understand your movie. You've lost me I've tapped out. But this is still that idea that we're toying with even on our modern storytelling of what of time travel. Why? Because we all have regrets. We all look backwards and we think, man, if I could go back and change something about my past, some of you would go back and you would want you would undo something or you may go back and you would reverse an action. You might even tell are yourself if I knew then what I know now

I would have gone about that differently, I would have gone through high school differently, I would have gone through career choices differently. And this makes sense that we have a desire to go back because we recognize that our past has a lot to do with our current reality. And if we're honest with ourselves, our past a lot of times has a lot to do with our future reality, we recognize that and it's interesting that we talk about this at the dawn of a new year. Why? Because we're all hopeful, or we're all thinking about maybe next year, we'll be better maybe next year, I can finally lick this or take care of this or not have this going forward, I want a new, better future. But you and I can go back. And even if we could, what are we doing? When we say we would like to go back, we are desiring to change something so that what so that our future lives would look different now that we do have some control over, we know Who holds the future, but we play a part in our lives. The gift of the Bible, what it does for us is it really tells us that we need to be future thinking, we need to be future thinking all other cultures and religions, with the exception of maybe Islam has some form of circular history, you understand what I mean by that, that really even if you go back to the ancient world, it was only Judaism that was sort of forward looking that had a very clear beginning in the garden in a middle of you know, chaos and waiting for the Messiah, and then the Messiah coming. And then now we look forward to that second coming. Only Judaism and Christianity are forward thinking and forward believing this idea of a linear history with a beginning and a middle, and an end. Now while we're in the middle, we get turned around, we can write, we get confused, and we feel like we're in a wilderness or in a desert, because that's literally how the Bible describes our lives at times. But we know where we're headed, that if we're Christians, if we're believers, we understand that we're headed to a promised land, we're headed to a new city, a new Jerusalem, a new heavens and a new earth. We look back early in Genesis, and it really starts to give us lessons about how this is to look for us as the people of God. Here's again, what are we talking about here, we're talking about that our need to look forward and not to look back, ever how tempting that is, for any of us in this room. We'll start out with Genesis 19, the famous story of Sodom and Gomorrah, you know, you've probably heard about it even in culture, we a lot of times know the story, but maybe it's never been read you I want to give you a synopsis before we get to these verses. And basically what ends up happening is this is a city in which a man named lat is a part of with his family, to strangers, come into town, and he wants to show them hospitality while he's doing that. The town has grown so evil and sideways, that they want to bring those two strangers out and do with them sexually, whatever they want. And so what you see now is God sends to angels to really confront this situation. That's where we want to start our passage this morning. And so let's go in and come to the passage here and read our passage says this in verse 15. So what you've seen here is the angels have come and they said, You've got to get out of town. And they said this at dawn, the next morning, the angels became insistent. And why is this going on here? Because God has told Lot and his family through His Messengers through His angels, I'm gonna destroy this place, get out. And just like a lot of us, they're dragging their feet they're taking their time about getting packed up and getting out of town. Says hurry, they said the lat take your wife and your two daughters who are here. Get out right now. Are you being swept away in the destruction of the city incidentally, they tried to take the daughters fiance's. They didn't believe they just laughed a lot off when lots still hesitated. The angel seized his hand in the hands of his wife and the two daughters and rushed them safely outside the city for the Lord was merciful and it's so cool how the God just takes care of us and He takes care of Lot and his family when they were safely out of the city one of the angels ordered Run for your life and don't look back or stop anywhere in the valley escaped to the mountains or you'll be swept away

Oh no, my lord. Lat beg. You've been so gracious to me and save my life and you've shown such great kindness but I cannot go into the mountains disaster would catch up to me there and I would soon die now I've thought about this in El Paso I think I have sort of like a similar things like okay Lord like okay, I get it you're gonna destroy the city or whatever, but if I gotta go up into the Franklin Mountains, I don't know how that's gonna work out too good for me. And so that's basically what lots saying here. I'm gonna go up high in that rocky sort of not I don't

understand that's not gonna go well for me, the Lord is kind again, he says, see there is a small village nearby, please let me go there instead, don't you see how small it is, then my life will be saved. Alright, the angel said, I will grant your request, I will not destroy this little village. But hurry, escape to it, for I can do nothing until you arrive there. This explains why the village was known as Tsar, which means little place, lot Reidsville it's just as the sun was rising over the horizon, then the Lord rain down fire and burning sulfur from the sky on Sodom and Gomorrah, he utterly destroyed them, along with the other cities and villages of the plane, wiping out all the people in every bit of vegetation. But Lot's wife looked back, as she was following behind him, and she turned into a pillar of salt, again, maybe a story or something you are familiar with at many different levels. But what was her crime? Or what did she do that was so wrong? She looked back sound that was just innocent. What's what's going on Aries. She's saying something. And we'll get into that later. Now, if you keep going in the story. And one of the things you'll you'll learn about the Bible is oftentimes in Genesis, it's really to show how far things have unraveled. That's why in the times of Noah, you have great destruction of those who don't want to follow God. You see in Sodom and Gomorrah, great destruction of cities that don't want to follow God. And then even lot in his daughters. They have things that they participate in right after this in Genesis chapter 19, that are less than holy, for sure. And so what you often see in the Bible is just descriptions I hear this out is this is how screwed up things can get when you have no Messiah, or when you refuse to follow God or a savior. But rest assured, what is the point that we're supposed to get out of this as we understand this story? Well, the great thing is when you get to the New Testament, it brings back up the story. I'm gonna read this to you here in Luke 17, verses 30 through 33. And he's Jesus is talking about what's going to happen when he returns. He says in chapter 17, in the book of Luke, verse 30, yesterday, business as usual, right up until the day when the Son of Man is revealed. On that day, a person out on the deck of a roof must not go down into the house to pack a person out in the field must not return home. Remember what happened to Lot's wife. If you cling to your life, you will lose it. And if you let your life go, you will save it. The first point I want us to see this morning, if you claimed your life, you'll lose it. And if you let your life go, you will save it. Now listen, as soon as we read these words, and some of y'all maybe heard this because you've been around the Bible, or church or God or whatever, it doesn't seem right or practical. Because you and I are thinking I know how to get things done. If I need some money today to take care of this, I grab it, take it, grab the bull by the horns and get it done. Or you and I might find ourselves paralyzed by fear. So we don't step out to do what we know we want to do. Does that make sense? Now, I mean, this is very simplistic, but a lot of us in the room, we probably lean one way or the other in our self sufficiency. Either we're, we're sort of I can, I'm gonna grab the bull by the horns, I'm gonna make this happen, I can do it. I'm gonna get might get in while the getting's good, or, because we're paralyzed by fear, worry and anxiety, we decided not to get out there and do it. And we sort of regrets those who step out there and do it as well. Well, what is going on here? When we're doing this when we're trying to get our own while we fear, a scarcity mindset, what we're doing is we're, we're working out of the flesh, that's what I want you to see that Lot's wife, what did she do? That was so horrible. what she was doing is what God is constantly saying, Don't do that. Don't be like that, which is that we think we're not going to be okay. I mean, even in that story I read, did you see at least twice, I saw with the grabbing of the hands and urging them and getting them out of town. And by letting them go to a little small town saying, I won't destroy that little place. You just see the kindness of the Lord, just taking care of them, just taking care of them. And yet still, in the midst of all that, you have an individual that's looking back and we can understand that as working or living out in the flesh to say, but, but oh, I so want that or miss that or think about that or need that. Adam and Eve were the same way. Think about what they did. God told them Be fruitful and multiply again when they sin and because they send all of humanity fell with them. They're now banished from the Garden and they're thinking when do I get to go back? And that's what they're sitting there thinking it's like, Oh, I'm sorry, that ship sailed. You're on a new trajectory and a new path now.

The flesh is powerful. Think about what we're talking about when you think about the flesh. And again think about this in the context of what we're talking about here New Year. I know we're gonna get there we're gonna talk about whatever you want to call it. New Year's resolutions goals. You don't want to eat as much you want to exercise more what

Have, we all have things well read the Bible or want to be more godly, we want to have different way of interacting with people at work or in our home. We all have these things. But one thing is we got to recognize right in the outset is how powerful the flesh is. Think about what makes sense to think about our own physical bodies, just that, that we have certain things that we do, literally out of routine, you didn't think about hopping out of bed this morning. So you're like, I didn't hop out of bed. I kind of crawled, I get that but like, but you didn't think about that. It just occurred. I think about driving here. I didn't. I didn't ask myself. Okay, how do I drive again? What is that? I gotta get keys, I gotta put my foot on the brake. Turn it I'll hope I figured this out. Hope I get to church today. And I haven't forgot how to drive. Now. I've been doing this since I was 15. And so it just comes almost naturally you think about this, you have a mind you have certain tracks that you've gone down that I've gone down habits good, bad or indifferent. We have a nervous system, all products. We are all products of our nature, and our nurture because we have a past. I'm not saying and neither is the Bible saying ignore your past. We can't do that we understand that it has in some way, affected who we are today. Because again, whether you're looking at this biblically or extra, biblically, we're all product of nature and nurture. But here's the truth of the matter is we can't go back. As much as we enjoy the stories in these movies. It is not a reality that we can find ourselves in. Jesus understood this. That's why he told a story. In Luke chapter nine that really again reiterates this point that we cannot look back, we cannot go back. As they're walking along. Someone said to Jesus, I will follow You wherever You go. But Jesus replied, foxes have dens to live in, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place even to lay his head. He said to another person come follow me, the man agreed. But he said, Lord, first let me return home and bury my father. But Jesus told him let the spiritually dead bury their own dead. Your duty is to go and preach about the Kingdom of God.

Another said, Yes, Lord, I will follow you. But first, let me say goodbye to my family. But Jesus told him anyone who puts a hand to the plow, and then looks back is not fit for the kingdom of God. Second point I wants to see this morning is anyone who puts a hand to the plow, and looks back it's not fit for the kingdom of God. Now, when you read this passage, or you hear this passage, sometimes we in our flesh, we think this sounds cruel God, Jesus doesn't seem right. I mean, I thought we're supposed to take care of our family and our parents. Yes, there's other passages in the Bible that make it very clear that we're to set up our family with care. And if we don't, then we're worse than an unbeliever. What is going on here? Well, if you dig a little deeper, and you really understand where these questions are coming from, they're coming from a place of, yeah, I'll do that later. Like, like, like, I don't know, if mommy and daddy is on death's door, but I want to sort of take care of what I want to take care of, and then God, I'll follow you, or then Jesus, I'll follow you. That's the mindset that he's confronting right then and there. And so you're also like, when you're looking at this, you're like, wait, I think that was the first point. Right? Exactly. This is the way the Bible works oftentimes is that is that in talking about discipleship, which is what this is, discipleship is just how we as believers grow. Jesus says over and over again, saying, Here's what it means to be a part of the Kingdom of God, this is the same point different passages because we need it. We all try to do things out of the flesh. And we all try to talk to God like this, we'll all have our own ways of doing it and saying it, whether we do it quietly in our heart, or we literally say it out loud, will say God, I know that you said this. Whatever this is, whatever the command is, whatever the law is, whatever it is, we know that God has called us to do will actually say to God, either in our hearts or out loud, God, I know that you said this, but I am the exception.

We all sort of do this in our own way, we sort of find ways to say I knows what the Scriptures say, or I know this is what God's clearly told me to do.

And I am the exception or will try to exchange one habit in the flesh for another. This is very key. Okay. Now this is where a lot of what I've said so far, you could throw into good conventional wisdom, whether you follow Christianity or not. But now you're starting to see that wait a second, what is this flesh thing? And what does it mean to try to change and do things in the flesh as opposed to in the Spirit? Because what we can all do is we can all sort of power up over our will and say, this is going to be the year that I'm going to master my weight issue, time management, my spouse habits the way I talk to my kids, whatever the truth

Is this new habits and better habits they can and may lead to better results. But the truth of the matter is we cannot fight flesh with flesh. Right? You and I, we cannot power our way through our goals or New Year's resolutions this year, whatever they may be good or neutral, morally neutral, because you'll fail even if you succeed. Now, what do you mean by that pastor, because I'm pretty sure that if I go to the gym every day for 90 days, or 180 days or whatever, that I will lose weight, especially if I change my diet. But if you do that all in the flesh, I am here to tell you that even if you succeed, you will fail. Why? Why? Because it's back to the first point that I showed you this morning, that if you cling to your life, you will lose it. And if you let your life go, then you will save it what I mean by this, I can Jesus talk this way all the time. He also said in discipleship take up your cross and die

for lessening dies, it cannot bear fruit. See, we're not robots, we're human beings. So think about this. I mean, even if you find a way to, let's say, you know, let's say you're trying to be a better husband or wife, he's okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do date night, I'm gonna have romantic evenings, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna spend some money on this, I'm gonna buy flowers, I'm gonna, you know, write a note, I'm gonna say these kind words, all good things that will produce some results, or even what I would call better results, your life can be more peaceful, if you have good time management or good, loving nature towards your, towards your spouse, or to your kids. But here's the deal. We're not robots, we're human beings. And so you cannot control all kinds of other factors. And if you try to you will fail miserably. Or even if you somehow do so, okay, no, no, no, I know what I've accomplished. I've made this this stellar body, or I've made this stellar marriage, or I've built this business, this is my company, this is my my money, I've been able to do it. Even if you do that, even if you say, Well, I'm tired of being fat, miserable. These kinds of things with you fight flesh with flesh, if you go through your newer New Year's resolutions, or goals, or whatever you want to call them, and you do it in the flesh. I'm here to tell you that understanding love, compassion, empathy, they're not going to flow from a heart that is self dependent. Here's what I mean by that. And maybe you've known people like this that, that they've decided that they're going to eat right? Or they've decided that they're going to exercise, right. And so now they're the, they're the skinniest one in the room, or they're the healthiest one in the room or whatever. But if they've done that all in the flesh, they're now what their male may be looking down on you, or trying to help you ever had somebody try to help you. And that guy name is not really help at all. Why? Because they're not thinking about what Jesus told us. We're all to think about. Don't cling to your life, you'll lose it. If you let it go, you'll save it, it seems seems so backwards seem so topsy turvy, what am I trying to say? Trying to say you think you've won, but you're losing if you try to fight flesh with flesh, and it's not the way the Bible prescribes it. So even if you win, you say, no, no, I'm gonna be one of those, and I'm gonna be able to power up, I'm gonna be able to have a better marriage, I'm gonna be able to have a better diet, I'm gonna be able to have a better opportunity at work, I'll be able to have a better career, and I'm going to be able to do it, I'm gonna be able to do it this year, and I'm gonna stick with it. Because I've got this app, or I've got this coach, I've got this trainer. And I'm here to tell you that even if you accomplish that, in the flesh, you will lose. Why? Because even if you never utter words of condemnation towards others who have, who have not done what you've done, in your heart, you will despise them. Because here's what I know. Things Done in the flesh do not produce love, understanding, compassion, and empathy. You all tell me one time when it does, no, it doesn't. Why? Because you think this is what I did. You're thinking this is what I did. This is this is me, this is about myself. And this is about making me better. what'll end up happening is that you are not connected into the power source and you're not really living or walking by the spirit of all the answer to all this is living a life in the Spirit. And of course, it's going to lead to all these disciplines. So I hope you have goals. I have goals for the next year, whether their weight loss goals, or relational goals, or career goals, or whatever they are. I have those as well. It's going to require discipline, but first and foremost, it's going to require me living a life in the Spirit. Now what is that? I'm here in church and Father, Son, Holy Ghost, I get it spirit. What do you mean by that? Well, it's hard to define but you know it when you see it. I want to read you a passage from Galatians five, and it's literally called in the title of your Bible probably

The Living for the spirit. Here's what it says Galatians five. So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Now you're seeing if you combine what we've seen all the way from Genesis and how Lot's wife messed up and how you're seeing in the gospels, how Jesus calls us to a better way. Paul is now being prescriptive. Remember how I said lot of times in Genesis is just descriptive. That's just describing how screwed up things are. You go through judges, look at Samson, other judges, this is just descriptive of how things get screwed up when you try to go your own way. Now Paul, is being prescriptive, he's saying so I say, in light of the gospel, in light of Jesus Christ in light of what he's done, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives, then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires, these two forces are constantly fighting with each other. So you're not free to carry out your good intentions. But when you are directed by the Spirit, you're not under the obligation to the law of Moses, when you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear. So I want to stop right here. There's these lists, and there's going to be two lists here. So you have to ask yourself, what is my life marked by? I don't care what it was marked by in you know, 2023 1982 all the way back. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. We know that it affects things but in terms of your future, you're asking yourself, what is my life going to be marked by and if it's marked by these things, that I'm still living in the flesh. So desires of the sinful nature results are very clear. If you're living in the flesh, sexual immorality, impurity. lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition. So if you're having these, in your workplace, in your home, in your own heart, dissension division in the drunkenness, wild parties and other sins like these, let me tell you, again, as I said, before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God, something that's harsh. Now, this is what Jesus is trying to say. He's trying to push us towards righteousness. He's trying to say there is a better way to accomplish what it is you want to accomplish on this earth. And it is a life in the Spirit, not in the flesh. It seems right, there's a way that seems right to man, but in the end leads to death. But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in your lives. Remember, I already brought up the idea of, of how you would, if you lost weight, by the power of God, by the very spirit of God, of course, you're going through the same motions, the same goals, maybe using the same app, maybe using the same trainer, as somebody who doesn't know God at all. But I'm telling you, your heart and my heart matters, and how we accomplish what it is that God has for us. If we're walking in the Spirit, what kind of person will we be, as we are working through what God has for us will be people of love with people joy with people who have peace, real peace in the midst of craziness going on in the Middle East craziness of election season, that is surely to come in 2020 for patients, patients with our kids, patients with those people at work, patients with whoever we run up against will be kind will be good, will be faithful will be gentle. And we will have self control. You think my gosh, I don't even know I got one of these me. This is what the life of the spirit looks like. And again, these are produced by disciplining yourself enough to come up under the mighty hand of God through all kinds of things, prayer, Bible reading, being around others who want to do that, and of course, your own individual walk of God. But this is what the Holy Spirit produces. And if you have this going on in your life, you can know little by little, I'm a more loving person this year than I was last year, I am more joy filled this year than it was last year. It's because God's working in your life. And when I was up here, or when I was down there, and I was worshipping, just like you guys were, I was going around the room and I was thinking about how these people who are up on stage leading us in worship are just normal people just like me. And what ends up happening is as God works in all of their lives, that they are able to produce fruit. But if you knew their history, if you knew their stories, you'd realize, Oh my gosh, they're just a little bit further in than I am. They're just keeping in step with the Spirit. And God has worked in their life so that they're able to serve Him in all kinds of ways. Those who belong to Jesus Christ have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his crawls and crucified Him there.

Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the spirits leading in every part of our lives. Let us not become conceited or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another. Best thing I can give you and give myself this New Year, gleaning into 2024 is not to look back not to wish I could go back in time and do things different, which is a futile effort anyways, because nobody can get in a time machine and go back anyways. But it is to begin to live my life slowly but surely faithfully, by as much

As I can just show things in the Spirit, and believe that God will work in my life because he will lose the third and final point, which is really straight from these passages, all these were, since we're living by the Spirit, let us follow the spirits leading in every part of our lives. That may be sort of what we need to pray about and think about around the room. Because so many of us have areas of our life where we're saying, God, you don't get to touch that. That's mine. That little area, that little relationship, that little bit of money, that little bit of land, that little bit of thing that I got going on over here, that's not something I want you to touch, I want you to talk about, that I want you to confront me on God. And that we need to be people who say, You know what, I've tried it my way, I know what self help can do. I know what self control can do apart from thinking about God, and it only gets me so far. And even if you can take a goal, and you can get through this whole year and lose that weight or accomplish that promotion, or whatever finished that project, those will have some what I call some general Grace effects, your life may be easier, you may have more money in the bank by doing those kinds of things, I get all that. But if they're done in the flesh, I can rest assure you that even if you win, you'll lose the house that pasture I don't know. But it'll eventually come out. If you've ever seen this in people's lives. You ever been a part of someone's life, and they finally get what they wanted. And then they get to the top where they get what they wanted. And it's not all that it was cracked up to be and they begin to unravel, they begin to fall apart. Or sometimes it takes a long time, and they get to the top and they're able to accomplish that in their own strength. And then what ends up happening is these relationships under them and around them begin to unravel. Because all of it was done in the flesh. It was all about them. It had nothing to do with God and what he wanted. We reminded again of these first two points, that if we want to save our life, we have to lose it doesn't say this literally even as I say those words, it doesn't seem right because you and I think no like, like that, that that's a cantaloupe. That's a fruit right there that I want now, I'm gonna take it, get my getting while the getting's good, that doesn't make sense to trust God to be okay with what he has for me. But this is the way God wants us to live. Again, the three verses that I think are helpful as we tried to be dependent and trust in the Lord and 2024 and all the days of our life. Let's start with this one. This was one I memorized as a young boy, I trust the Lord with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding. Seek His will and all you do, and he will show you the path to take or he will make your paths straight. It's what I remember memorizing. Proverbs 1921 You and I can make many plans, but the Lord's purpose will prevail. Again, sometimes we think we can hijack for good or for ill right. Sometimes we think no Pastor, I've gone too far down the bad path, the dark path, it's I'm too far gone too far out of the reach of God's understanding or mercy. And I'm here to tell you, you're not none of us ever are. As long as we have breath, we are able to do and accomplish God's will and purpose for our life. There in front of us, I want you to sort of tuck away and you can memorize as you can write these on a three by five card, that's what I used to do. And then you can also type them in and put them on the home screen of your phone. Any of these three verses would be great going into 2024. This is really my prayer for you as a church that Paul prayed this at the end of Romans as he had given them the gospel. He says, I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust him. That was really all about those three verses. Going back to to

Proverbs three, verses five and six, then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit. Don't you want to live that life? I want to live that life. I want to be a man. And I think you may want to be a man or woman who is able to know not to have perfect lives. That doesn't happen on this side of heaven, but that we can constantly get up in the morning and we can take steps and that we can really say man, I think I'm doing what God has for me. And as I look back over three months or 12 months, I can see that the outbursts of anger are lessening in that the joy is rising. I can see that the lust fulness is going down. And the love for others is going up. I can see that dissension is coming down at work and peace is rising. I can see that division is lessening in my family and that coming together in faithfulness and goodness is rising. Oh may it be true for us church not only this season, but all the days of our life. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you how you show us a path.

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I want to add my Merry Christmas to you guys as well, thank you so much for being here and spending Christmas Eve with us with each other. And we have spent the last several weeks lighting what's called the Advent candles. And through that we've had, we've had a theme for each candle lighting and for each message that we've had throughout the four weeks of Advent, and so we started off with hope. And again, that's what this kind of whole series kicked off as you've seen the videos and the screens, then love, and then joy. And then this week, we'll be looking at Pease, as we sort of, finally at the end of our service tonight, get to like what's called the Christ candle. Well think about that word though Advent, I don't know if you, you know, we hear these words, every once in a while we know they have to do with church and calendar. But what does it literally mean? It means arrival. It signifies the start of an event or specifically for us on arrival of a person. And of course, we're celebrating the arrival of Jesus. But one of the things we need to think about is that the mood of the day in which Christ came may not be different, much different than the mood that you feel in our given day. You think about the fact that there was hopelessness, there was questions of where is the love? Where is the joy, and it seemed like there was no peace in the first century. And think about this, because they had not heard from the prophets. They hadn't heard a new word from God for 400 years or so it looked like when they looked around with their eyes that Rome was in charge, because they had conquered the known world at that time. And you may be familiar with that in terms of what's going on there in Jerusalem in the first century. But they are to be reminded of the prophets of old and so are we, as we think about what we've read already what we've been reading these last four weeks, and what we're going to read this evening, this Christmas Eve as well. So let's start out with maybe what might be a familiar passage in the book of Isaiah, Isaiah is writing about 740 BCE, and he says these words, for a child is born to us a son is given to us right maybe familiar language but but written and prophesied some 740 years before Christ saying this, the government will rest on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, in what Prince of Peace. That's what we're going to focus on this evening. His government and it's peace will never end he will roll with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor, David, which we talked about, it's so important that we understand that Christ comes from that lineage, that family, but not just temporarily, he is going to be on the throne of his ancestor, David for all eternity, the passionate commitment of the Lord of Heaven's armies will make this happen, exclamation point. So we can rest assured, tonight, as we think about what we're even gathered to celebrate, in this Advent, this arrival season, that piece has arrived. And it's arrived in a person, right? Now think about that. Because we often think of peace. Right? We think of an event, we think about kind of what peace is, this is post battle, we've had some sort of great conflict, and now we're at peace, or we think about peace in terms of post hustle. Again, I want to say that first point you want to put up there a piece has arrived in a person. And we often think about this in terms of to just the classic sort of dictionary definition of peace, which is freedom from disturbance or tranquility, a state are a period in which there is no war war has ended. So So you might have in your head, okay, I know what peace is. And it may be what you see on some of these commercials where there's, you know, a laying out at the beach and a and a reclining chair and a cool drink with a great view or, you know, you think about this around Christmas time is I know what peace is. It's when, you know, the cooking just got just right. And everyone sort of arrived from all their different places, and they're all around the table together. And there's no, you know, bickering or fighting or no burnt suppers or anything like that, that everything has sort of worked out just so I've got all the right presents, and they all came in on time. We often to think of I think peace in terms of sort of sort of me time, right sort of time that I can sort of have all these sorts of distractions or things that sort of irked me to be put aside, but that's not what's going on here. When we're saying that the Prince of Peace has come and that he will set up a kingdom of peace that will have no end. We know that that begins in the incarnation. That is the first coming that big word incarnation just means that God Himself took on

flesh and dwelt among us. And that is the start of something, even if we don't feel it right, even if we don't feel very tranquil or peaceful, even if we know that we're going to step into, you know, Christmas meals and dinners and times, that we go back to work, and there's still going to be conflict or misunderstandings, or all those things that know it's real, because a person has come. And if it's not fully realized, in this age, which we know it won't be, it will in the age and the time to come. And he goes on, we're gonna see also the New Testament passage if you were paying attention to the reading, and um, I didn't plan on Gabriel reading from Gabriel, but I thought that was kind of cool. But one of the things that you notice there is that we're talking about Elizabeth, and if you know anything about sort of that story, which is before what we think of the traditional Christmas Story, Elizabeth is the cousin of Mary. So you have cousins of Jesus and John the Baptist, and that they're going to have a significant child, and that this child is going to prepare the way for Jesus and that that in and of itself was a miraculous birth where she had a child in her old age and Zechariah had a child in his own age. So let's see this from the New Testament, the book of Luke, chapter one beginning in verse 67. Then his father, this is not my John the Baptist, his father, Zachariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and gave this prophecy. Praise the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has visited and redeemed his people. He has sent us a mighty Savior from the royal line of his servant David, just as He promised right? Through the Holy Prophets long ago, we will just read about some of those. Now we will be saved from our enemies, and from all who hate us, he has been merciful to our ancestors by remembering his sacred covenant, which is what promise, the Covenant or the promise that he swore with an oath to our ancestor, Abraham, we have been rescued from our enemies so we can serve God without fear, in holiness and in righteousness as long as we live, and you my little son will be called the Prophet of the most high because you will want prepare the way for the Lord. You will tell his people how to find salvation through forgiveness of their sins, because of God's tender mercy, knows the language here. The morning light from Heaven is about to break upon us to give light to those who sit in darkness, and in the shadow of death. And you might know that from Psalm 23, a famous passage, and to do what to guide us in the path of peace, there's that word again. John grew up and became strong and spirit, and he lived in the wilderness until he began his public ministry to Israel. So what do we see here? Second point this morning, or this evening? Sorry, is that God will guide us in the path of peace, He will guide us in the path of peace. And we often don't think about this around Christmas time you think well, okay, that's I understand the proclamation of peace on earth and goodwill to men. But But what do you mean, pastor, he says that he will guide us in the path of peace. Will you notice here that oftentimes when you read the scriptures, and you read it slowly, and you try to figure out what's going on here, you'll see the work of the Trinity, you'll see prayer to the Father, you'll see that Jesus the Son, enabling things, by what, by the Holy Spirit, and so maybe that in that passage, so it's just this Trinitarian effort. It's the Trinity, that we often think about, okay, I understand Jesus came as a baby in the manger. But what's that to do with me here now, what it means is, is that you, those of us, who received the mercy of God, and who are believers, who are Christians, now have the very spirit of God living inside of us, that we often say, Jesus lives on our border, we mean by that we really mean the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and that spirit, right by the power of God will guide us in the path of peace. He might say, that doesn't mean everything's gonna be hunky dory on this side of heaven. It just means that we're gonna know how to walk in wisdom, we're gonna know how to walk in the Spirit, because He will show us but we have to lean in. That's how we talked about prayer and Bible study and asking God for wisdom and asking God for peace and joy and love and all the things that we've been talking about this Advent this season, which leads to that idea that we can celebrate that Christ has come. We're gonna look at one final passage here and it's gonna be Psalm 98. And this is the psalm in which the famous hymn Christmas hymn Joy to the world is based off of and again, that's one of those songs or hymns that anybody might know of just from turning on the television or being in Western culture. Western society was inspired by this text. Isaac Watts in the 1700s.

I was reading this and he wrote that famous Joy to the world and you're gonna see in a minute how he was inspired by such a passage and then some 20 years later, Handel's Messiah, which if you've ever heard of that it's often played around Christmas time again, was inspired by Isaac Watts in this text. What does it say? Psalm 98 says this, sing a new song to the Lord, for He has done wonderful deeds. His right hand has won a mighty victory, his holy arm has shown his saving power. The Lord has announced his victory and has revealed His righteousness to every nation. He has remembered his promise to love and to be faithful to Israel, the ends of the earth, have seen the victory of Our Lord of our God. Shout to the Lord all the earth, break out and praise and sing for joy. sing your praise to the Lord with the heart, with the heart and the melody, a song with trumpets in the sound of the ram's horn, make a joyful Symphony before the lord the king, let the sea and everything in it Shout His praise, Let the earth and all living things join in, Let the rivers clap their hands and Glee, let the hills sing their songs of joy before the Lord for He is coming to judge the earth. And He will judge the world with justice and the nations with fairness, you can see that you can see the the signs and the symbols where we understand that even though we may have troubles in this life, but that someone has come, that someone has come to give us peace, someone has come to guide us. And that is worth celebrating third and final point I want to see this evening is this is worth celebrating. That's why we've gathered. That's why you've decided to come on Christmas Eve and you wanted to yes, you're gonna go and you're gonna leave, you're gonna open some presents, and you're going to

have some of your favorite things to eat. But you've decided to set apart some time and set apart some energy and set apart and some worship of the true King of what he's done. And that this idea of all that he's done, and what he has brought, is worth celebrating. And so that's what we're gonna do this evening is we're gonna, we're going to finish up here celebrating in worship, understanding that we are the bearers and the Bringers of the light, already mentioned that if you are a believer, if you're a Christ follower, that the very spirit of God lives inside of you, we pray to the Father, by the blood by the power of Jesus, but it is the Holy Spirit that enables any of us to move into work and to do God's will. And so we understand that this light that we're about to

light here, first, the Christ's candle in celebration of the birth, and this light that we carry is true. It is true. And it is true that as we go and as we have this light in us that we are to take it to the world that we are the light we are the carriers. Somebody told you somebody told me about Christ, somebody celebrated Christ before me. So we're Christ before you and you and I believe this is where suffering so I want to call back up the Saudis, our family, and as you guys come up to help us in celebrating they are going to have a scripture reading and light the Christ candle. And then afterwards, we'll come back and lead all of us in the lighting of our individual candles.

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All right, I want to add my welcome to already a glorious day. I mean, we have sang Joy to the world, we've really gone through the themes of what we're going to talk about this morning, whether it's through the advent calendar, whether it's through the point reading, or again through song. So Joy to the world that we just saying, The Lord has come Let earth receive her King, Let every heart prepare Him room and heaven and nature same. But what if you're sitting here today, or you're listening in online later, or live and you're thinking, I don't feel it master, like, I know, I'm supposed to I know, I'm supposed to get into the Christmas vibes in the Christmas spirit. But I don't feel any joy or really happiness, or it's on the low end. I mean, you say I have it, but on the thermometer or on the thermostat, it's on the low end. Some of you are like, well, there's a difference between joy and happiness. And you think, well, happiness is fleeting, you can be happy when you you know, get a surprise or a little piece of candy or something. It makes you happy for a moment. But joy is something that's sustainable, that lasts forever. And I sometimes even those definitions, though, aren't that helpful. Because you think at the end of the day, call it joy, common happiness. I don't feel either, because some of y'all are thinking there's a lot of stress coming up. And so here we got this great image of one of my favorite movies and and there's gonna be some some rendition of this going on in your home, you may have already experienced it at Thanksgiving, or you're looking forward to it at Christmas, a movie like Christmas vacation, because one of the reasons why that movie indoors, and not just for the humor, but because it is so rooted in the reality, isn't it that we're all going to gather and there's going to be bickering and there's going to be fighting and there's going to be people who are out of it. And there's gonna be things said that are inappropriate. And there's going to be things that are spilled and things are not going to get cooked rides, and all kinds of things are going to happen around the holidays that are going to create such angst for us. And a lot of y'all, you know, you have you have a cousin Eddie, you got one I know you do. And so you're thinking I don't have a cousin Eddie. And I've said it before, maybe that's because it is you. And so that's something you ought to consider when you think about your holiday rendition in your holiday traditions. But you may be asking yourself, What am I going to do? What am I going to do? Because we are going to enter into this we're going to gather we're going to have holiday things and festivities and have the people of God been here before. One of the reasons why we look to the prophets of old the prophets in the Old Testament is because they show us and they remind us how God works. That if you're in a funk, or even if you're doing well, he, the prophets, they often remind us how God works. And if you're proud, he will bring you low, and if you're low, and if you're faint hearted, He will fill you up. Here is what he has done. Here's what he is doing that is God. And here's what God will do. We're gonna look at the prophet Isaiah, which, if you've read any of Isaiah, we've been reading him a little bit in the Scriptures through the Advent season, and I've even read him up here, we're gonna read him again, because he's often the prophet that the foretells and foretold a lot of what is going to happen with the Messiah. Isaiah is writing about 740 BC, so 740 years before Christ was born. And he's going to speak to the Babylonian exile that happens in 586 BC. And when you hear these numbers, remember, you only have to remember a couple of things about this. And that is that whole idea that you had the United Kingdom around David, that's sort of the height of the Israelite empire. And then you had Solomon who built Solomon's temple very quickly, you have a divided kingdom, northern kingdom falls to the Assyrians in 722, southern kingdom vows to the Babylonians and 586 BC. This isn't, these aren't really faith things. These are just things to understand in terms of history, and your Bible. And so what Isaiah is gonna do is he's going to give them hope, in the midst of that, and we're going to see this in Isaiah 55, beginning in verse one, is anyone thirsty? Spiritually, literally, come and drink even if you have no money? Come take your choice of wine or milk, it's all free. So you see this idea that that the Prophets saying that God Himself is opening up the table for us and saying, Here Come Why spend your money on food that does not give you strength? Why pay for food that does you no, good, right? So just merely earthly Why do that? Listen to me and you will eat what is good. This really harkens to what Jesus says from

Remember when Jesus comes, he talks like this to this whole idea of I provide water springs of life and you will never thirst again. Isaiah though in 55 says this, listen to me, and you will eat what is good, you will enjoy the finest food, come to me with your ears wide open, listen, and you will find life I will make an everlasting covenant with you. And we know what covenant is. It's a promise for the people of God, I will give you all the unfailing love, I promise to David. Now that's huge, right? Because that is the height of the Israelite kingdom, as I've already said, that Davidic kingdom, see how I use him to display my power among the peoples, I made him a leader among the nations, you also will come in nations you do not know and peoples unknown to you will come running to obey. So he's foretelling what's going to be about Israel and the people of God, that people are going to come up to Jerusalem, and they're even going to go out from Jerusalem to praise Israel's God, because I, the Lord, your God, the Holy One of Israel, have made you glorious. Seek the Lord while you can find him, calling him now while he is near, Let the wicked change their ways and banish the very thought of doing wrong. Now he's saying that because he knows that's where some of us are at, we're gonna mess around and playing with things that we know are wrong. And he's saying, Listen, I'm giving you an opportunity, open your ears. Let's put those very things behind us. Let them turn to the Lord, that He may have mercy on them. So that's what's so interesting, over and over again, right? In the prophets, you will see that God Of course, condemns certain acts in ways of acting in this world. But he's always saying, Come to me, while you still have life, I used to have breath. And what do you find from our Heavenly Father, you find mercy, not wrath, not judgment, not cut your head off. But it is the idea that God will give you mercy if you'll yet turn to him. Yes, turn to our God, and He will forgive generously. Same idea that Jesus says when he comes, my thoughts are nothing like your thoughts as the Lord. And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. Now, again, we've all been used that idea as a man God's ways, man, they're higher than my ways. Yes, that's true. But look at what it's really talking about. Here. It's talking about the contrast of living righteously and living wholly, in contrast to the wickedness in which we have left that we have turned from that we have repented from, and that God has forgiven us for you can see that maybe from the text clearly now. But that is that whole idea that his thoughts are higher than ours, that just means that his expectations and what He desires, and what flows from him is righteousness and purity and holiness. My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts as the Lord, My ways are far beyond anything you can imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, right, so spiritual thinking, higher thinking. So my ways are higher than your ways and my thoughts higher than your thoughts. This is so encouraging, because God is calling us up into this, not not using us as some sort of separation between us and our Heavenly Father. But he's calling us to realize what we can partake and be a part of, if we will yet turned to him. The rain and the snow come down from the heavens. Now again, when you see the word heaven in the scriptures, keep in mind, it can be talking about the abode of God where God dwells or lives, where we go, when we dive we're believers. But he also could just be talking about when you look up, you look up at the night heavens, that's the stars and the moons or just the day heavens idea of the sky, where the clouds are in the rain in the snow. But here they come, the rain, the snow come down from the heavens and stay on the ground to water the earth. They cause the grain to grow, producing seed for the farmer and bred for the hungry. So what he's saying is he's taking something very basic, they would have lived in a primarily agricultural society, just like we would have experienced up until the last 100 years or so most people were only one step from the farm or they actually lived on a farm. So he's using illustrations that they would understand that we can really understand as well that when those things come, what does it produce? It produces fruit or veggies in it's the same with my word, I send it out, and it always produces fruit, it will accomplish all I want it to and it will prosper wherever I send it. You will live in joy and peace. There's that word and I underlined it. Next week, we're gonna be talking about peace. But today we're talking about joy that we'll be able to live in this now again, we're still thinking let's still hold my first point. Some of us right now but I'm not right. I don't feel it right now. He's saying, you and I we will live in this. The mountains and hills will burn

bursts into song and the trees of the field will clap their hands again, something that we get a sense of we get excited about, but we realize it hasn't fully been revealed, and even realized yet that also came true in our songs that we sang, right? Come Jesus come to all that, right. That's where we were going. Which leads to our first point this morning is that Jesus is coming. And so therefore joy is coming. Right. And we're going to see this in the announcement of the angels to the shepherds, that familiar story that we've been thinking about and syncing them singing about this Advent season. So let's go and go straight there. First point, Joy is coming. And now let's see how joy has come in Luke chapter two, beginning in verse eight, you may be familiar with this story. But don't let your familiarity with the story. Get over maybe what God wants to speak to you about it this morning, or whenever you're listening to this. That night, there were shepherds staying in the fields nearby. So you guys have gotten the picture. You might be heard the story, guarding their flocks of sheep, suddenly an angel the Lord appeared among them, and the radiance of the Lord's glory surrounded them. So there's an announcement to normal people doing normal things out in the dark night. They were terrified. But the angel reassured them. Don't be afraid. He said, I bring you what good news that will bring great. Here's that word again that we're focusing on today. Joy, to what to all people, the Savior. Now again, Israel would have thought maybe Israel centric just the idea that yeah, we're gonna prosper. But what the prophets are trying to tell Israel all the time, is that the Messiah would come through you for the whole world. All people the Savior, yes, the Messiah, the Lord has been born today were in Bethlehem, the city of David, right, that's significant. That's important. And you will recognize him by this sign, you will find the baby wrapped snugly in strips of cloth lying in a manger. Again, familiar words to us. If you've been in church during Christmas season, suddenly, the angel was joined by a bass host of others. So it would have been enough for the announcement to come, it would have been enough for them to say this. And these normal people just doing the normal job, day to day which was tending sheep, but he says no, suddenly, more is going to come. The angel was joined by a vast host of others, the armies of heaven, praising God and saying what Glory to God in the highest heaven and peace on earth, to those to whom God is pleased. We're going to talk about that piece. Next week. When the angels had returned to heaven, the shepherd said to each other, let's go to Bethlehem. You think right after you've not only had an angel, but our whole heavenly angels, armies come and sing for you and to proclaim to you, let's see this thing that has happened? What's the Lord has told us about? They hurried to the village and found Mary and Joseph, and there was the baby lying in the manger. After seeing him the shepherds told everyone what had happened, and what the angel had said to them about this child, All who heard the shepherd story were astonished. But Mary kept all these things in her heart and thought about them. Often, the shepherds went back to their flocks, glorifying and praising God, for all they had heard and seen, it was just as the angel had told him. So what's happened, we know the story. We know the Christmas story, we've seen it, we've read about it, we're hearing about it again, Joy has come just like the song. But it doesn't end with him in swaddling clothes. So let's think of maybe this image that we have in our heads that, you know, I just pulled from one of the latest renditions of movies called the nativity story. But it's just this whole idea that either in a cave because there was no room for them in the end, or some sort of stable that this is where the king of the universe was born. And we have this whole idea because we see it in the scriptures that he was there among the animals and among the shepherds, and that he was wrapped in swaddling clothes. But like I said, just because joy has come, we're coming back to where we feel today, what we're thinking today how we're processing this Christmas season and every Christmas season. It's just the beginning of the new work that God is doing in the world. That's the proclamation. That's why it's so good to come to church and to sing the songs and that we need to be reminded every year of similar themes and similar scriptures, because it's what gives us hope. That's what we're talking about. That's why this whole series is Christmas series is talking about the hope that is and the hope that is to come. Which leads to my final passage this morning, which is in Revelation, chapter 21, beginning in verse one. Then I saw a new heaven and

A New Earth. So what's going on here? It's a redeemed Earth. So one of the things that we may not realize when you're talking about what is ultimately God doing in the universe, what is the story of the universe? It is linear. So there is a beginning, the idea that the Earth was formed out of nothing, right out of chaos. And so we have that whole idea of Genesis, chapter one, verse two, three verses there. And then what do you have, you have the whole idea that Adam and Eve, the first representatives of humanity were placed in a paradise in a garden, and that quickly, they made decisions and affected the rest of humanity than the rest of the world. And so when Jesus comes along, one of the things we're meant to see throughout all the Old Testament is there hasn't been redemption yet. We don't know what's happening. God, what are you doing in the world? How are we supposed to find hope, joy, and peace? And then Jesus, we find Jesus is the answer. The prophets didn't know that there'll be a first and second coming, they just knew the answer was Jesus, the disciples knew that Jesus was the real deal, they just didn't know that there was going to have to be a second coming, that the first coming was going to be the idea of a baby born in a manger and dying on a cross for sins. But at the Second Coming, there would be the whole realization of what was started 1000s and 1000s. And 1000s of years ago back in the garden. So when he says, the Prophet John here in Revelation, the bat, last book of the Bible, I saw a new heaven and a new earth he's talking about finally, it's that realization that we've been hearing about that we get to go back to a fully perfect garden in humanity. The old heaven, the old Earth had disappeared. And the sea was also gone. Again, that whole idea of the chaos being gone, I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. Makes sense, right? And he's had this height of glory, this height of beauty, that he's able to peer into see, to give us hope that it's really coming, that it will come that Jesus, when he first came in a manger, that that joy that was proclaimed, it is going to be fully realized, in a later day to come. I heard a loud shout from the throne saying, Look, God's home is now among his people, he will live with them, and they will be his people, God himself will be with them. So we saw that with Jesus. Remember, Jesus said over and over again, if you want to see the God of heaven, look to me, I am. And I was there before Abraham and all these things. And so now what he's saying is, look, there's gonna come a day, when we're all gonna see, right, it's talked about in the Bible, and other places where every eye will see, every knee will bow. And so this is what's happening now is that we're seeing the full realization that God himself will be with them, and He will wipe every tear from their eyes. And there'll be no more death, or sorrow, or crying, or pain, all these things are gone forever. Now, that's what we're really waiting on. Right? Because you and I, when we gather around the table, whatever table we gather around at some point during this Christmas season, we will still feel the angst, we'll still feel the tension, we'll still realize that man, I mean, yes, we are happy that we're together. And yes, there's a joy that we look forward to, with the birth of our Savior. But but we also just feel it's it's still not right yet. This isn't what I signed up for, this still hurts all these things that are going on in our heads and our hearts. And what God is saying to the Lord Jesus Christ as he gets that, and that there is going to be a day in a time in which the joy will be fully realized, because these things will be gone forever. And the one sitting on the throne said, Look, I'm making everything knew.

And then he said to me, write this down for what I tell you is trustworthy and true. And he also said, It is finished. And the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, just the Greek alphabet, the first and the last letter, so it's just that idea of the beginning and the end, to all who are thirsty. Where did we hear this before? Wherever we heard this before about thirst, and about the next line? I will freely from the springs of water of life, give? Where did we hear that before? We heard it in Isaiah, we saw it in the life of Jesus when he came in he was on earth. He talked about this whole idea that anyone is able to come that the shepherds themselves, what is it just just a normal in some ways lowly occupation, they were there for the pronouncement. Even at the end, you'll see that anyone who's thirsty, anyone who's hungry can come, All who are victorious will inherit all these blessings and I will be their God, and they will be my children or my people. So what's the third and final point this morning is that our joy will be made complete. It will be and that's really the hope is that you

Even if you and I don't feel very happy or joyful right now, or even if we know we're going to step into situations this holiday season, that are going to be hard because it's the first one without our loved one around the table, or it's gonna be hard because of the way my mommy or my auntie or whoever acts or it's gonna be hard because of it's been tight this year because of inflation or because of some other event that happened in your life and money, whatever it is, we have a hope that our joint will be made complete that now we see partially, but soon, we will fully see and fully know, which gets us to this image that we get to go to, which is some idea that we will get to eat back around the table with Jesus Himself. Right? You remember he when he was with his disciples at the Last Supper, and when he really shared meals, even in his resurrected state, on the road to Emmaus, you always get this idea, all the way to revelation that we will be at the banquet table with the lamb, and that he will come in and eat with us and that we will eat with him. That is when our joy will be fully complete. Do you ever thought about that? When you sit at the table? It is and it may be a Clark gridwall moment or some sort of family situation like that. But where are we heading, we're heading to a table in a banquet table with our King and that whether we can afford this, this drink that's at the table, whether we can afford this food that's at the table or not, it will be freely given to us. That is the hope. And that is the prayer. I don't want to end there because we are in El Paso. So as you look at this, you may think I don't know about the grades. And I don't know about the wooden drinks. I want to go to the final passage and so we can really understand this this morning. Okay, this is what it's gonna be like, Okay, some version of this is what we're going to be able to eat and partake of together at the marriage supper with the lamb. It will not be boring, Heaven will not be boring you and I will not be lacking or wanting anymore. Everything will be perfect and beautiful and in place for us to enjoy forever and ever with him forever and ever. And doesn't that bring you hope and joy this morning? Whatever it is that you and I are going through. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you, that you love us that you care for us that you give us Inklings and Taste of Your glory right now. That as we pray and as we sing song, and as we've heard your word that we have hope, and we have joy, even if it is a hope and a joy that's deferred right now that we know it's coming, that you are deliver are coming you have come and you will come for us again. We thank you for that. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, I want to add my welcome to you live church. My name is Pastor Brent Moore, I get the privilege of being the senior pastor here at Life Church. And thank you so much Alfredo and others who have been a part of the worship service so far. Alfredo left out some things in his story, just like we all do, we have an opportunity. But one of the things is that, since his time in the service for last several decades, he lives in perpetual pain and has to have all kinds of things that help alleviate that, which it never really does. He always has a low level of pain, we weren't even sure he was able to make it this morning. That's why he needed a seat and all those things, he's going to have surgery, mid December, to maybe potentially alleviate some of that pain, some experimental surgery. And so we're gonna pray for him. And I want you to pray for him as well that the Lord would use this to give him many, many, many more years of life. There's been so many times when the doctors and everybody else said, there's no hope. And you know, they've called family in several times whether it was because of this perpetual pain or cancer, previous pastor, as I've been his pastor, and but he's still here, and God's not done with him yet, and he's not done with you, wherever you're at in your journey. Also want to make note, as you have seen up here, Shane, Shane is helping us out with his expression of faith working itself out in love and, or the idea that God loves us. And we're going to journey to Bethlehem today. And so I love this Christmas season. I love the love that the father bestows upon us. And so we're going to look for that in the passage, as we read today, we've already seen it through worship, through the Advent, through the testimony through the painting, and now we're going to see it through God's word. And so if you have a Bible, you can turn to it. If not, we're going to look at the birth narratives from the three gospels that significantly speak to it a mark goes right into Jesus's adulthood. So we're going to start with the book of Matthew. And we're going to see that love comes from the incarnation. And that's a big word. But it's the idea that, that God came down and took on flesh that the act itself is an act of love. And so we'll begin right here in the book of Matthew. Now one of the things I've done, which is kind of unique is that I have underlined and put in red, those that are passages or highlights phrases of how I think God loves us, then I've underlined in white aspects that you see of faith. And so keeping those color schemes, I know, you could argue that it's all love or all faith, I get that. But I saw when I read these passages, just some specific instances where you can see the love of God for us, and then the obedience of faith for Mary and Joseph and those in the narrative. This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. So right here in the book of Matthew, one of the recordings that we celebrate, and we read at Christmas time, his mother, Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph, so we understand what engagement is not quite married, but Botros are engaged, they're going to get married. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. Now, again, I've underlined that, and I put that in red, because I see that as an instance of God loving us in the story in the narrative in the Christmas journey, Joseph, to whom she was engaged, he's already been brought up. Matthew really does give Joseph's perspective. He was a righteous man, and did not want to disgrace her publicly. So he's already got sort of a foundation of some sort of wisdom or righteousness that is not his own. So what does he do? He decides to break the engagement quietly, he's not going to humiliate her. He's not going to bring her before the court, possibly even in that culture and time that could have been a stoning. Doesn't do any of that doesn't desire any of that. So this in and of itself, is an act of faith in their journey. He decided to break the engagement quietly, as he considered this, though, an angel the Lord appeared to him in a dream, Joseph, son of David. Now, those aren't throwaway words, we understand that, that Jesus Himself comes from the lineage and the line of David that Joseph himself is in that line, that lineage, the angel said, Do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child within her was what conceived by the Holy Spirit, love itself. God come down, we can see this right here in the passage, and she will have a son and Yorgen name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. Now all the time we think, Oh, wait a second. I got bigger problems even when Jesus was walking around.

On Earth, if you notice time and time and again, people would come to him with sickness or ailments, or, you know, I've got this kind of problem or this kind of problem where I can't walk, right, and Jesus would often look at them or touch them or engage them or talk to them. And he would say something along the same lines of your sins are forgiven. He thinks, oh, wait a second, their biggest problem is, maybe here's his finances, or you can't walk or you have a terrible marriage, or you have a terrible, whatever you want to get married to your singleness, whatever. But what we see is Jesus coming what is our biggest problem, our biggest problem is that we need our sins forgiven. And that's what Jesus has come to do. This in and of itself is why it's an act of love. All of this occurred to fulfill the Lord's message to the Prophet, we've already read from Isaiah, this is coming from Isaiah as well. Look, the virgin will conceive a child, she will give birth to a son. And they will call him what we sang about this, a manual, which means, here's love again, God is with us. Beautiful. Sometimes the manual is with an eye, sometimes it's with an E, same, same word. Same idea, here, passage from the Old Testament brought forward in the new. When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife, again, these faith based decisions that Joseph is making. And you're going to see in the next passage that Mary's going to make these come out of a heart that knows that God is with them, that God has his best for them. But he did not have sexual relations with her until when, until they had Jesus was born. And Joseph named the boy what he had been told, which was Jesus. First point I want us to see this morning, is that God is with us. Now again, I just took that straight from the phrase of Emanuel what does that mean that he's with us that he came, and that he very much wanting to be with his people with his creation, you're gonna see that he was there in the beginning, when he looked at the book of John here in a minute. Again, I've already mentioned that this is from Josephus perspective that Jesus could have come a lot of ways if there's a God in the universe, if there's a deity that wishes to engage humanity, it could have occurred in a lot different ways. God did it in this way, so that he could be known, and that we can know Him and that he could come again, mentioned Isaiah, the fulfillment of prophecy, it is something to be meditated on, not a truth to remain at a distance. But the idea that he was brought nearer to us, it's not just a truth, it is an actual what it's a person. The implications are salvation from sins and make keep in mind, and we're looking at the book of Matthew, this idea goes all the way through to the end of the book, when we get the Great Commission. Remember the great commission when he sends his followers out. He says, What lo or Behold, or wake up, I'm with you always, even unto the end of the age, we're seeing the love. And we're seeing the love from the Father. And we're seeing how it works itself out first in the faith, of Mary and Joseph and the Christmas narrative. But then ultimately, for us, let's continue to look at these passages, these Christmas stories this morning, Luke. So we've already been a Matthew, Mark, as I told you really enters in to Jesus's adulthood at those opening chapters. Luke has a narrative that is from Mary's perspective, in the sixth month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, who's Elizabeth, Elizabeth is the cousin of Mary. And you can go and read that story about even her miraculous birth in old age. God sent the angel Gabriel to Nazareth an act of love. Why? Because he sends messengers that he speaks and engages with humanity, US, a village and Galilee to a virgin named Mary. She was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph summer we've already learned a descendant of King David, we've learned that that's important. Gabriel appeared, who's that? An angel, a messenger from God appeared to her and said, Greetings favored Woman, The Lord is with you. You see the love and the narrative here, the Lord is with you, confused and disturbed, right, which is what happens when you have these sort of angelic moments. Whether you're afraid or confused or disturbed, Mary tried to think what the angel could mean, don't be afraid, Mary, the angel told her for you have found favor with God, You will conceive and give birth to a Son and you will name him Jesus. Again, I saw that as an act of love, he will be very great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor, David, this lineage that they've been waiting for this redemption, and he will reign over Israel forever. His kingdom will never end. So it's not just a nation and a land state that God has come

meaning to redeem, but it's the whole world, and it's in a kingdom that will have no end. This is love, love for you and for me, Mary asked Angel, but how can this happen? Some of those go I'd be a miracle because why I'm a virgin Angel replied, The Holy Spirit will come upon you, God himself and the power the Most High will overshadow you. So the baby to be born will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God. Love What's more, your relative Elizabeth has become pregnant. in her old age, people used to say she was barren, but she has conceived a son more miracles more miraculous, and now is in her six month for the Word of God will never fail. Boy that's love. Some verses would say, verses, one, verse 37, that for nothing is impossible with God, Mary responded, there's a response here, I am the Lord's servant. That's an act of faith, May everything you have said about me come true, an act of faith. And then the angel left her. Boy, I know we're familiar with this passage. But hopefully, some of the aspects that I've highlighted this morning, or if you're listening to this later, maybe it brought new meaning and new hope for you and me this day, leads to the second point that I want us to see in our lives, God will come through God will come through, it doesn't feel like it. Sometimes it doesn't seem like it at times when we have trouble at work, or we have concerns about maybe our nation, or whatever it is, that is vexing us. But it's just that whole idea that we understand that God will come through that even the Israelites themselves at this point in history had had not heard from God or had Prophets for hundreds of years. And yet they are told here in Luke narrative, and that nothing is impossible with God that He will do what he says he will do, he will come through that is the key. What God says not what you and I want, or what I think right? So don't take these kind of verses are these kinds of truths, you know, and then you decide what that means. No, it's what God says. It's about his truth. We don't use the scriptures. We don't believe the scriptures or some sort of modern day rabbit's foot where we decide what we want. And then we bring it to God and ask Him to bless it or give it to us. No, it's the whole idea of what has God promised you in His Word. Think about Alfredo's testimony that he gave, that is true for any of us, because it's straight from the book of James, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God and he will freely and generously give you all things. So it's that whole idea that that that is something we can ask for and expect God to come through. Not cherry pick our list. So it's what God says not what you and I wonder what I do. And I think it's also in God's timing. You know, a lot of times we just think, man, instant gratification, or I just, this isn't working out the way I wanted it to work out. So I'm out. I'm gonna take my ball and go home, I'm going to quit, I'm going to tap out. And what we see time and time again in the scriptures is it is about God's timing, not my timing and not my way. And this takes faith. This takes faith not blind faith, not stupid faith, but real faith to understand that we are tied to the God of the universe, and it is about his way, not ours, but he will come through rest assure he will come through our deliverer is coming. Alright, third and final passage I want us to look at this morning is from the book of John Bucha. John is more philosophical in some ways, he goes all the way back. So you see a Matthew, we skipped over, we could have looked at the genealogies which is really tracing that heritage or lineage from David or even further back to Adam and Eve. But John goes even further back in what he calls Jesus is what the Greek calls the Lagace was really just a fancy way to say he was there in the beginning, capital W capital, Word, in the beginning, the word already existed. Jesus Himself, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. Now this is again, we see in the in the Christmas narrative, a Trinitarian sort of idea what I mean, I'm not trying to use big fancy words, Trinity Father, Son, Holy Spirit, we've seen all the Godhead in display in the Christmas narrative. We see it here, the Word was with God, and the Word was God, equality with God. He existed in the beginning with God, God created everything through him through through Jesus, and nothing was created, except through him and I realized I could have underlined all that and put it all in red. But I chose to highlight this passage. The word gave life to everything that was created in his life brought light to everyone. Boy, that's huge, right? This idea of

What's happening here in the Christmas there to the Christmas season the Christmas story, the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness can never extinguish it. It may seem like, but it's not true. God sent a man John the Baptist, I see this as love to because it's a messenger to tell about the light, underlined in white, because why here's our faith, so that everyone might believe because of his testimony, we often think over and over again, I would believe in this God, or Jesus, or maybe my aunt would or maybe my uncle watermain, my cousin would, or maybe my childhood, if some sort of sign would show up. And we see over and over again, that it's been given to us everything that we need for life and godliness, everything that you and I need, as humans to believe has occurred. It can't occur any more. It is obvious. And so everyone can believe because of the testimony of John, there was a pointing there was all kinds of pointing where the Old Testament and then there was the reality that Jesus took on flesh and came, John himself was not the light. He was simply a witness to tell about the light, the one who is the true light, who gives light to everyone was coming into the world. So this again, who was Elizabeth's child, John the Baptist, he was the one preparing the way. Miracle upon miracle. He came into the very world he created, but the world didn't recognize Him, He came to His own people, and even they rejected him. And again, you can see this over and over again that he came as a Nazarene He came as a Galilean, he came tangibly, as a baby in a manger, but to all who believed him, here's the faith aspect. Here's the journey to Bethlehem that we're on, but to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God, new birth, they are reborn, not with a physical birth, resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God. What love that we have that God Himself does this so that the Word became human and made his home among us he was full of unfailing what are these two words we've been talking about all morning? love and faithfulness? Where does it come from? I mean, that's what's so interesting is you might say, I don't even have the faith or the grace to get out of bed in the morning, or to believe this or to do this, or to walk this out this Christmas, because the heartache of whatever, losing a loved one or the heartache of just the drudgery of life, or my work, or my school, or whatever, or my lack of friendships, or just to the betrayal that's occurred. And what he's saying here is that where do you think this even comes from? Jesus himself became human and made his dwelling his home, his tabernacle among us, he was full of unfailing love and faithfulness, that even the faith in the grace that you and I need, and that you and I have, that in and of itself comes from God. It's all God. And it's all grace. And it all comes from Him. Last thing I want us to see here in terms of our response in our faith, and we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father's one and only son. That's our response. And that leads to the third and final point that's straight from the scriptures this morning, and that is that God made his home among us. Now, we've already seen I thought we already had this point with the incarnation and the fact that, that he took on flesh. Yes, that was part of it. That whole idea, but now we're being told something even more intimate and personal, that he decided to dwell among us. Now that word dwell we don't really use that very often. Sometimes we use it in legal terms when you have a document and you have to say this is a dwelling that lies on this lot, or this area, or this place. But that whole idea dwell I remember the first time I ever heard this word I I grew up watching the 10 commandments with Charlton Heston. I remember that when he came to Jacobs, well, as he was leaving Egypt, he said, I will dwell here and that was the first time I understood that that was harder that he was saying, I'm going to live here. This is someplace that I have found that is worth dwelling worth living. We're staying around the idea that is the same idea of that I will tabernacle or tent here. Remember what the tabernacle was, or we understand what Tinting is now, right? When you go to a site, he's I'm going to set up shop here. I'm going to I'm going to live here, I'm going to dwell here, what are you saying? You're saying that I'm gonna camp with you? I'm gonna be right here with you. So not only did he take on flesh and sort of wave, sort of see us for a little while. Do some feelings, do some all kinds of ministry but that he stayed that he, the Son of Man says he had no place to lay his head but yet he had a place among us where people could actually live with him. And why did he do this? And what was he full of when he did this?

last passage, I told you, it would come back. It's the two key words we've been using all day. And that is that he did this because he was full of love. And he was full of faithfulness, that he walked it out, to show us away, and to be the way that's so fascinating that he does it. That's why we worship this Christmas season. We've tried to do that in all the elements that we could think of it we could pack into service and be faithful to God. And that's why we pray. And so that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna continue to worship and we're gonna continue to pray. And then we'll close the service. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for Your Word. We thank you how you have been with us already this morning, that you have worked in all of our hearts in various ways, and just the fact that you can do that. Just the fact that you can bestow love upon us and that you can bestow faith upon us.

Father, I pray for those in the room that are struggling to believe struggling to walk out the faithfulness that you have already gone. I just pray, pray for those who need to be healed. And pray for those who are sick. I pray for those who are discouraged. Pray for those who are doing well. That you would continue to be wind in their sails as they walk out their journey with you. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, I want to add my merry christmas as well, it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. In fact, it's been there for a little while. I know, as you go to the stores, and as I go to the stores, we've seen it for a while they started pulling them out, right after Halloween, and many of us have been ready for weeks. If you remember, when we came out of COVID, there was a trend that started as far as you know, let's let's bring on Christmas, let's bring some hope. Let's bring some cheer. And I felt like in a lot of ways, that sort of idea has kept rolling through the years. But others of y'all are not ready, as Danny already asked, Who's done their shopping and who has not. For some of y'all, this whole season is a struggle for all kinds of reasons. And maybe you just sort of let it go, you're just like, I don't really want to think about it. I've been disappointed so many times around this time of year, whether it's through relationships that have gone bad, or, you know, a lot of times it is a thermostat or a thermometer of where your relationship is at. You think about some family, things that you've already maybe gone through with thanksgiving. And there's anxiety, sometimes that's created with that, who goes to whose house and where we're going to sleep and what we're going to give and how much we're going to spend and I can't really afford to give that kind like my other aunt, uncle, cousins, brothers, sister. All these kinds of things, bring all kinds of feelings and thoughts, whether they're warm, fuzzy thoughts, or anxiety thoughts, or something in between, but it is here it is upon us. And one of the things that we need to think about is that all of this is leading somewhere. I love how Joy began the service and our worship team, where we understand why we're here, we're here to worship the God of the universe, and that none of us are here by accident, whether you're in the room or listening later on in that all of our lives are leading somewhere. That's hard to really sense at times, when we feel like things are cyclical, right? We feel like okay, nother year. I mean, we just, we understand that we have seasons, and we're in a Christmas season. And we can believe falsely that this is just Okay, another another time to go around the wheel. But history is linear. So we understand and believe as Christians and even in Western thought, in general, coming from Christendom, this, this whole idea that everything bends towards redemption, it's all leading somewhere in that is meant to bring us comfort, even if our current situation is less than ideal or less than what we would like or desire. There's always hope, even in the midst of times and circumstances that seem quite hopeless, whether that's on a personal level, or you feel that at an economical level, or a national level, or whatever it is that you feel, and understand and see and perceive. whether it's real or not, it makes us at times seem like me, and where's the hope this feels like a pretty bleak situation. But there's a long history of God coming through in the darkness. You think about this, that, that God himself when he created in the beginning in Genesis that that he created light, and that light shines in the darkness and that darkness does not overcome it as we're told in John when Jesus Himself comes as the light. So that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna start by going all the way back and looking at the hope that was laid out right there in the beginning, you see Genesis chapter one where God talks about creation. And then you see Genesis chapter two, where Adam and Eve are put into a garden and it is paradise and they have all that they need and all that they could ever want. But of course, we understand that in there was also the knowledge of good and evil tree and that ultimately that they are tempted and they partake of that fruit. And when that happens, they fall they are going to be banished from the Garden and then all of humanity falls within that we are now born under the curse of sin born under what Adam and Eve's choices were in that moment in Genesis three. God he delves out what we understand is the threefold curse that he's gonna say, because of your choices, Adam and Eve, here are some gonna be some things that are going to come your way. And he talks to Adam and he talks to Eve and he talks to the serpent and that's where I want us to look, because in this sort of condemnation of the serpent because of the deception that he participated in, there's also some hope. And so go ahead and the first slide in Genesis 315 says this, this is God talking to the serpent The personification of Satan here, and I will cause hostility between you and the woman. and between your offspring and her offspring. That's all of us, right? We're all worn of a woman somewhere, all of us are Children of Adam and Eve, He, there's going to be one that's gonna come, he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel. So way back in the beginning, I don't know if you've ever thought about this or seen this in the scriptures, all the way back to Genesis chapter three, verse 15, we see what we often called the first messianic promise or the first glimmer of hope. Messianic just is just a fancy word to say the Messiah was who would come to redeem all things and put all things right, not just for Jews, but for Gentiles for the whole world. If you read a little bit further in the scriptures, in Genesis, chapter four, verse one, Adam and Eve, they know each other, and then all of a sudden Eve gets pregnant, and she has a child, and his name is Cain. And she says very clearly in the scriptures, I have created a man with the Lord's help. And what she's thinking in that instance, is good. Maybe this will be the one to reverse the curse that has been given to me and my husband. And if you know the story, it doesn't go so well for Cain who comes first. And then his brother Abel, because what happens, Cain kills his brother, because of jealousy and because of sin. And it's interesting, because right there in the opening pages of Genesis in Genesis chapter four, beginning in verse seven, you'll see that God warns Cain, that sin is crouching at your door, eager to control you, but you must subdue it and be its master. This is devastating to Eve who's thinking, I thought there would be a man that would come through me through Adam through our lineage that would come and take us back to the garden, allow us to go back to paradise allow us to not have all this pain and struggle, and by the sweat of our brow, be all these things that are occurring. And of course, it did not come with Adam and Eve children or their children or their children. And we begin to see all throughout the Old Testament, how things begin to unravel on Earth, and God's there, and he's working, and he's moving, but there are times of great war and famine and darkness. And so what's going on here? Well, he cane wasn't the one and neither were his children or his children. But there is going to be one who comes. And I want you to see this other image that maybe you've seen or thought of maybe not this exact image, but it's just that whole promise that there is going to be one, there is going to be one who is going to crush the head of Satan and in that his own heel is going to be bruised. If you remember the movie, The Passion of Christ, it's now almost 20 years old, that opening scene is there where the actor of Satan is there and a snake Sluis across. And Jesus says he's in the Garden of Gethsemane, he crushes the head of that serpent right there as a character in that, in that screen, in that movie, we can go to the New Testament writers they pick up on this theme I want to show you one in the book of Romans, Book of Romans is one of those books that you can go to, and you can really see how we are to understand our salvation, this gospel that we believe in that we preach as Christians as believers, and it walks through and maybe you've had someone walk through sometimes what's called the Roman road where they go to chapter three, and they go to chapter five, and six, and seven, and eight, nine and 10. And they show you exactly what God would have for you and me in terms of getting back to him or getting to him for the first time how to have a relationship with God. Well, in the end, after Paul has laid all this out, he starts giving some concluding remarks. And here's how he concludes it are part of what he concludes at the last chapter of the book of Romans. He says, The God of peace will soon crush Satan, under your feet. Now, why

is this important? I thought, I thought Jesus had done it. I thought that that messianic promise occurred when Jesus came not only as a baby in the manger, but ultimately died on a cross for your sins and mine. Well, yes, that took care of it. But we as we are sitting here, we don't feel the full effects of that redemption, do we? Why because we still had aches and pains and fights this morning and this week, and we had things that we had to overcome just to even get to church this morning. And we have things we have to overcome just to pay the bills or to go about our daily task. Why does it have to be that way? Why does it have to feel that way? Because what is promised for us in the scriptures is yes, Jesus came. And yes, Jesus is going to come. But we live in this tension of something has already occurred with the hope of the baby in the manger, and with him dying on the cross for our sins and rising and three days later, but it's not fully realized yet. Later on first point, I want us to see this morning, which is our deliver is coming. We've sort of thought about this, we prayed about this, we've taken elements and we sang them out this, but do we believe it? Do we understand what that means that you saying, Pastor? What does this mean? Does this mean our deliver is coming? The first time that we look to the hope that we're talking about here at Christmas? Are you talking about some sort of second coming, where he's going to come in the clouds and set all things right? The answer is, yes, it's yes. And that we understand that he has come and that He will come again. And that not only has he dealt the Satan, the death blow, but that ultimately we will be okay. And that's what Paul's trying to say, at the end of this book that, that God will soon come, Jesus will soon come and Satan will be crushed, your enemies will be crushed underneath your feet. Our hope it starts in Genesis, but it obviously doesn't end there. We can look at other Old Testament passages this morning to think about our hope that's coming that we're celebrating in this Christmas season. I think of the book of Micah, Micah is another Old Testament book, there's a time in which they're not feeling very victorious. If you know anything about the history of the Jewish people, there's, there's wars, there's the Assyrians who conquered the north, and the Babylonians who conquer the south of Israel. And there's a 500 year period called the intertestamental period, just between the time of Jesus and the last hearing of the prophets have four or 500 year period. But in the midst of that you have the prophet Micah. And he says this in verse two, but you owe Bethlehem, and breath are only a small village. Among all the people of Judah, yet a ruler of Israel whose origins are in the distance past will come from you on my behalf. So you see all the way back hundreds of years before Jesus was even born, that there are passages talking about him coming. Of course, there's numerous others if you know anything about your Bible, or the old or the New Testament, there's all kinds of scriptures we've already sort of given one from Genesis that is a what it says it alludes to it is allegorical, as we understand how the scriptures work, but then sometimes you have things that are straight up in black and white to say, This is what God said. And then you see it again and say, This is how God full filled it. Now, that's what you're going to see fall from a passage like this in the book of Micah, because what happens if you know anything about the Christmas story, we eventually get to Matthew, chapter two, and the Christmas story as we sort of traditionally understand it is told in Luke chapter two, and in Matthew chapter one and two and and what happens when you get to Matthew chapter two, we get a verse very, very similar to what you just read, because they're quoting that Old Testament passage, and it says this, and you are Bethlehem in the land of Judah, right? Because there's that line, that lineage that Adam and Eve and then ultimately you get to the 12 tribes of Israel, and it's gonna be through the line, the lineage, the tribe of Judah, that the Savior, the Messiah would come and you owe Bethlehem in the land of Judah, are not least among the ruling cities of Judah. Now, when we hear a phrase like that, what do we mean, right? You've seen this, when you begin to pass out things or somebody passes out things to you, you get to these last but not least, right? Because when we will make you feel bad, right? Because everybody knows, we feel like, Hey, I was an afterthought, that I was not thought about at all. So we have to be told, hey, look, you're not you're not least there's nothing wrong with you. You just happen to be last to receive whatever it is we're handing out. And so again, just like in the Old Testament, and the New Testament, which is just a quoting from Micah saying, and you are Bethlem and Lana, Judah are not least among the ruling cities of Judah, for a ruler will come from you who will shepherd for my people, Israel. And it goes on in that passage. If you know the story that the wise men, they're the ones who have seen this verse, and are the ones who are heading to Bethlehem in order to worship the King of the universe. And so they're meeting with Herod and they tell him this and so here it says them. You can see this in Matthew chapter two, beginning of verse eight. Go to Bethlehem and search carefully for the child. And when you find him, come back and tell me so that I can go and watch To him too. Of course, Herod has no desire or means to do that he wants to kill the child because he wants to be king. After this interview, the Wiseman went their way in the star that they had seen in the East guided them to Bethlehem it went ahead of them, and stopped over the place where the child was, when they saw the star. They were filled with joy, they enter the house and saw the child with his mother, Mary, and they bowed down and worshiped him. Then they opened their treasure chest and gave him gifts a gold, frankincense and myrrh want to show a little pictorial representation of that. And so you're like, wait a second, this isn't what's on my mantle. This isn't what I think I when I think of the nativity story, whether it's the movies or the cartoons that we've seen, well, oftentimes, what we'll do is, we'll put everything together. And I do this at my house too, and it that we want to tell the whole Christmas story. So we'll tell all the elements and sort of put them all together. But when you read the scriptures is, it seems apparent that it has been some time, there's been some time that has passed beyond the manger scene, when the wise men come to see Jesus. And that's the whole idea. They enter the house, and they saw the child and, and so it seems to me that he was a young, little one, it also makes sense, because after they're warned, Joseph has warned in a dream to flee to Egypt, again, we get the idea that he takes a child, not a brand new newborn baby, that doesn't mean that we have to get rid of our nativity sets, it tells a holistic story, it's just I think this helps us to see probably what occurred, they had already established themselves and had a little home there in Bethlehem until, again, Joseph has warned in a dream to go where to go to Egypt. It's fascinating when you think about this historically, because Egypt was kind of always the place that the the people of God would go to, to kind of be there for a little while, but then to be what to come out of Egypt, to come back into the land that God had given him, please. The second point I wants to see this morning is that God consistently uses people, places and things that are seemingly insignificant, even today, if you go to Bethlehem, and there's a lot of hoopla around there now, because everybody knows that that is the place where Jesus was born. And if you look, and you go there today, that throughout the Middle Ages, in some of their crusades, they built a huge ornate churches kind of on top of some of these sacred sites. So it's kind of hard to, to envision it. But again, it would just be a small village, it's not very big, even today. And so this is important because all of us have a desire to make our lives count. Everyone in the room, if you're breathing right now, and you're up your vertical, so to say that you have a desire to do something to accomplish something to be significant, I think that's put there, by the very spirit of God, in this whole idea that we want to be significant, we then begin to feel our way around you think about this, when you're young, you decide, okay, how is it that I can have significance? How can I make my mark and, and that's why we think about teenage years that social media can magnify or distort our significance. And so a lot of times, that's why we limit adolescents on their social media platforms, because they're literally not ready for the world, right? That you're still in that formation stage. Even us as adults, we have to monitor ourselves to make sure we're not living for some sort of platform or for someone else's approval or likes that we don't even need or barely like or barely know. But we think about this, even if even if there was no cell phones, we could go back 2030 years, we would still have this desire to be known to be noticed to be liked. And so this whole idea that we would sit there and we'd say, Man, I'm just not as famous as him or her.

I don't have what he or she has, how could God possibly use me? I mean, I'm, I'm too short. I'm too tall. I'm too skinny. I'm too fat. I didn't come from the right family. I came from this kind of family and that's a hindrance or whatever. No, that God consistently uses people, places and things that are seemingly insignificant, just like he is Bethlehem. I think about this with people. You think about if you know the story of David, that he was the youngest of all his brothers. They didn't even bother to go get him when they're presenting the brothers to Samuel about who would be anointed king. They had to go get a little old David, insignificant in most people's mind. And yet he is the one who's chosen the most powerful king in Israel until Jesus comes think about this with Mary. Just just just a little girl somewhere that God chooses to reveal himself to her and chooses her to carry the God of the universe. Think about this with Jesus himself and what they say about him. They're like, aren't you just a carpenter's son? And then you just come out of of Galilee. It's just this whole idea that God uses people places and things that are seemingly insignificant. The manger scene itself is meant to point us to that think about this with terms of places. I think whether it's in terms of we've already celebrated communion, and that was, again, a redefining of the Passover meal. That's Moses stuff. Where was Moses, when he was called to go back to Egypt to lead the people out, he was tending his father in law's flock, on the back side of the desert, again, literally being in El Paso where we're five hours from the next major city in the United States. And we know we have our sister city, Juarez, and I'm down but But you think about this from, from a American border perspective, that we're a long ways it can seem like we are insignificant, or that we're just out here in the middle, nowhere Has God forgotten about us, forsaken us and some desert like he has Moses, but did he forsake Moses? What did he choose to do there? That's where we think of the burning bush. And these kinds of things. Think about this in terms of the new world that are America that we enjoy, and of course, the Americas, which includes all of the continents, but just this whole idea that that people would come across on a boat and about 170 would gather in a room in Philadelphia, and they would sign the Declaration of Independence. And they all did it with great trepidation saying that, well, we'll all hang together a wall be hung eventually, because it was an act of treason. And they think this is we're just, we're just some small little people over here in the New World, and God chose to make that nation into something great. I think about this in terms of things, I think about the staff that Moses had, that God used to do many of the plagues of judgment on Egypt, I think about the little boy with the five loaves and the two fishes, seemingly insignificant. I think about the act of Saul being there when coats are late at his feet, while Stephen is stoned to death and Acts chapter seven, all these things that are so seemingly insignificant. And this isn't just from a biblical perspective and a world history perspective, think about your life and mind. I come back to it over and over again, you and I should take great comfort, that it is not just some sort of random thing floating through the universe called Earth collapsing into something else that maybe something got created. And maybe we're heading somewhere, but know that there's intentionality, divine purpose for every single thing in your life in mind, and that God is leading it somewhere. And all the little things whether they're good, bad, indifferent, annoying, or not, but that God placed in there that he uses them that he can use them for His glory, and are good. So let's lean in and believe this Christmas season, that God has something for us, and something better for us. That is the hope that we have in Christ, and for our own lives as well. Well, this was talked about. In many places in the Old Testament, I love reading the prophets and says we sort of begin to understand and have handles on them. Jeremiah 31, is a great prophet Jeremiah is sometimes known as the weeping prophet. And in Jeremiah 31. There's a lot there and a lot there that alludes and points to the coming King becoming Christ and then also in the midst of some real turmoil. Because when you look at the beginning chapter of Jeremiah 31, he says, now there's going to be some pain that comes when the Savior of the world comes, it's going to cause even the people of Bethlehem something because all the young children now all the young little boys are going to be killed because of Herod's anger and hate. It's been done before because all the little children were thrown into the Nile by Pharaoh himself. All these things were done to try to squish the plan and the purpose of God and there will be great weeping and a cry heard and Rama and Rachel weeps for her children. But then he goes on if you keep ringing in Jeremiah 31. And he gets to some good things like we'll talk about here. He talks about the day is coming, verse 31, says, Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah, this covenant will not be like the ones I made with their ancestors. When I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I love them as a husband loves his wife says the Lord. One of the things that I love about the scriptures is God is always telling us, I'm gonna do something great, I'm gonna do something new. I'm gonna do something amazing in your life. And even though you have squandered other chances and opportunities, even though you have rebelled against me, even though you've done some really stupid things, my love pursues you and me and guides us all the way back into the Old Testament. And then we get to verse 33. here and it says this, but this is the new covenant. Now covenant is one of those words we don't use very often we have the idea of contract, but covenant is a promise made between at least two parties. Often in the Old Testament, it will be sealed with blood. But this is the new covenant that I will make with the people of Israel after those days, says the Lord, I will put my instructions deep within them, and I will write them on their hearts, I will be their God and they will be my people. This is such good news. Think about where we've been already in a survey of looking at some things this morning where, you know, Cain had to deal with the fact that sin was crouching on his door, and he was told he must rule over and of course, he failed. But now, what we are being told is that in this new promise in this New Covenant, that God Himself will be able to write on your heart and mind, His love, He will be able to give the very spirit of God Father, Son, how do we experience the Father and the Son? That is the very spirit of God, the Holy Spirit? What does that look like this promise in the New Testament today? Hang with me, Hebrews chapter seven says this, it says, yes. Hebrews chapter seven. Yes, the old requirements about the priesthood was set aside because it was weak and useless. What does he mean by that? He's saying that once Jesus came along, if you read through the book of Hebrews, it's showing that you can go back to the old sacrificial system, but it's gonna keep giving you the same struggles and the same problems over and over again, because you're gonna have to go annually, and continue to offer blood sacrifices for your sin. But when Jesus comes, He takes care of that once and for all, as Prophet as priests, and as king, and He's superior to any other deity or angelic beings. And that's what he's talking about in the first six and up to the seventh chapter of Hebrews. He's saying that needs to be put aside, for the law meant never made anything perfect. It doesn't mean your household or my household either, who is obeying perfectly the rules of your household, not even you, not even me. And of course, certainly not those who we live with, for the Law never made anything perfect. But now we have competence and a better hope. There's that word hope, through which we draw near to God, and the hope is in a person, this new system was established with a solemn oath. Aaron's descendants became priests without such an oath. But there was an oath regarding Jesus, for God said to Him, the Lord has taken an oath, and will not break his bow, you are a priest forever. Because of this, oh, Jesus is the One Who guarantees this better covenant with God. There's a lot there. But he's really talking about this, this Old Testament sacrificial system can be done away with because of the New Covenant because Jesus Himself, He is not only prophet, priest, and King, He is the very sacrifice. He is the Lamb of God. And when that occurs, and what he does, and the obedience that he has his righteousness, is now able to be ours. And this is a guarantee what he does the what he walks, what he teaches, the very idea that he came, and we're going to celebrate in the coming weeks ahead, him being a baby in the manger, why do we celebrate that because it really does represent hope. It really does represent light for your life and mine. And we really do get to carry that with us. So it's not exterior there. So when you're out and about, and when I'm out and about in the community, we don't have to say, you have to come to life church experience, God, if you say no, let me tell you about God right now.

Let me show you God right now. Because the hope of glory resides in you. And me, even in the midst of our struggles. He said, Well, wait a second, I can start sharing and I can start giving and I can start serving and I can start growing. Once I get everything right. We'll never get there. Because there's always going to be elements of struggle and resistance, as long as we're here on this earth right now, right now. That's why Jesus over and over again, talks about who is fit for the kingdom of God. It's that whole idea that put your hand to the plow and get about your father's business, and don't look back. And that even in the midst of our struggles, and our trials and our pain, we are the people who worship you came this morning, by your own minutes, we could go around the room and we can say what kind of week you've had. And some of it's not that great, but yet you came and you worship because he is worthy. And because God is doing something in your life. And in mind, this isn't all just circular pain leading to nowhere. We're not just, you know, being catapulted through the universe in absolute randomness, but that God Himself is watching over every detail of your life. And mine is leading somewhere. Last and final point it wants to see is that Jesus offers a better and then abiding covenant. We've already said that a covenant is a promise. And this is a promise given by the God of the universe. I get this idea of better and abiding from Hebrews chapter 10. If you read Hebrews and you get to that very end, he talks about the persecution and the trials that are going on Common he talks about whether it was Moses in the Old Testament or other saints, other people of God, that they all look to the future with such an wielding hope, because they believed that they saw who God was and what he had done. And they believed that he got himself that Jesus himself was a better and abiding, prized possession. This is this idea that Jesus is offering you and me a better and abiding covenant, whatever we are putting our hope in this Christmas season, or any day of the week, it will ultimately fail us. Sure, go enjoy Turkey, but you'll get hungry again, go enjoy the tamales, but you'll get hungry again. Right? Sure, go and buy your children, little toys and trinkets and show up, you know, at a guest house and bring what you're supposed to bring. I get all that but know that it will all ultimately go away. But what will not go away is our hearts and souls and they will either reign with God or they will reign separate from him and we can make a choice today. We can choose to believe we can choose to believe this hope and this promise that he lays out for you and me. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you that you don't leave us wondering or wandering that you've shown us so clearly just the hope that you offered us I pray for those in the room who are considering but struggling to believe it. I pray that you just help us to take steps of obedience in the midst of our struggles and our pain and our hurt that you help us to walk in the faith in the favor that you have upon us. And even though it feels like drudgery at a time or just putting one foot in front of the other but that you see us that you watch over us and you are leading all of this somewhere which is ultimately to you. It's in that we hope and we pray in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

I want to add my welcome to you this morning. I hope you had a happy Thanksgiving. A couple of days before Thanksgiving, one of my children asked me, they said, What does Thanksgiving have to do with God? And I don't know if you ever run into this if you have children or young people around you, but sometimes they ask questions about things that you've assumed all your life, and then you have to really start thinking about it. And I said, Well, you know, we say a prayer before the meal, we're acknowledging God to this. Yeah, I know about the prayer. But he said, What does Thanksgiving have to do with God? And I said, Well, it's acknowledging the beginning of our country, and that we're a great nation. He said, Yes, I know that story. But I know about the prayer. But he asked again, what does it have to do with God, and I thought about it a little more. And I thought about the idea of thanks, thanks itself, the idea of Thanksgiving or thankful or thanks itself, is essentially saying and acknowledging that whatever you and I have, whatever it is, right, whatever it is, we're thankful for, whether it's a spouse, or a job, or a kid, or the meal itself, or country, whatever it is that we're thankful for. We're saying it didn't come from our hand. And that's interesting, because you have to really think about what are we saying, or saying that we're thankful, even people who maybe don't acknowledge the God of the universe, the Christian god, they're acknowledging there is some sort of higher power and anytime anyone is thankful. And so that's interesting that when we think about thinks, and why we give things is that we are saying quite explicitly that there is a God, and no matter how you slice it, no pun intended. Alright, so Peter, First Peter, we are in the tail end of our series here, if you have a Bible, you can turn to First Peter, chapter five. One of the reasons why we teach or preach through books is so that we can see how they all linked together, we can see that whole books have messages. And that whole book fits into a greater set of books, the 66 books that we call the Bible, and we can see how certain paragraphs and certain chapters fit into a book, which again, fits into the whole of Scripture. And so we always try to provide the scriptures up on the screen. But I think it's also good for all of us to see how what we're saying what we're talking about here, is plainly in front of us in the texts. So we're talking about Peter, the Peter, he's the one who has been talking to us this whole series here in First Peter, it's many years later, after his walking and time with Jesus, and he has been thankful and is thankful for those people who are scattered abroad. Remember, he always is talking to the dispersion to us, originally to the to the various churches in Asia Minor present day, Turkey, but now is talking to us, all around the world. And he begins by giving us great lessons in leadership leadership in the church, which I think also has implications for leadership. And whatever we're doing. He says, Now, a word to you who are elders in the church is now elders, as I take it, when you read the New Testament, sometimes are called pastors sometimes are called overseer, sometimes they're called shepherds. Same Same idea, same word. I too, am an elder and a witness to the sufferings of Christ, he was there, and I too, will share in His glory when He is revealed to the whole world. He knows this because Jesus told him that, as a fellow elder, I appeal to you care for the flock that God has entrusted to you watch over it willingly, not grudgingly, not for what you will get out of it, because you are eager to serve God, don't lord it over the people assigned to your care, but lead them by your own good example. And when the Good Shepherd appears that Jesus Christ Himself, you will receive a crown of never ending glory, and honor again, Jesus came, given a crown of thorns, we know in the life in the world to come, and for us, and for Him a crown of never ending glory and honor in the same way, you who are younger should accept the authority of the elders. Now, this whole idea of caring for those under your Watts and everybody here cares for someone or something or group of individuals. Another way to say it, if you've been in any sort of leadership class or any sort of leadership development is that we're all leaders, because why? Because leadership is influence. And the idea that if you're a believer in if you have people around you that you are entrusted with that you care for, even if you feel like well, I'm I'm nobody's boss. Well, no, that's not the point. The point is, do you have people in your care you have people that you rub up, shoulders against? And so he's saying care for those who are under your watch explicitly, those who are called to shepherd the church. I get that out. But the implications is for all of us, God has given them to you whoever it is, that is in your care whether it's just your immediate family, whether it's people in your classroom, whether it's people in your job force, or you're a young individual, and you're captain of the football team, or the soccer team or whatever, do it willingly, not transactional, but out of an overflow of your relationship with God, we can all get there, right? We can all grit our teeth and kind of white knuckle it through certain relationships through certain jobs through certain seasons in our life. But we know if we do that long enough, that that eventually harms those under our care why? Because you're doing it grudgingly, right? You're going to this job because you have to, or it's transactional, I do this for you, you do this for me. That's how this relationships works. We all get it. And that works for a little while. But ultimately, that harms people under your care. Specifically, he's talking about here those who are entrusted with leadership in the church. So he's saying, Don't do this. Don't lord it over people also don't be that kind of person. That's the first point I want you to see this morning is don't Lord your authority over others. Well, what's he talking about here? Well, Peter would have understood this lesson well, because, as you may or may not be aware, there are four gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And so the Matthew, Mark, and Luke, those are called the Synoptic Gospels, because they have similarities, John, he has a little bit different way of presenting Christ to us. And so all in Matthew, Luke and Mark, so the Synoptic Gospels, this idea is brought up this whole idea of don't Lord your authority over others, there's a way that Christ followers are called to interact and to lead, interact with others. Always eventually, you'll have somebody that you're caring for whether you're leading horizontally or a leading from the top. And he says this right here. Remember, Jesus said in Matthew 20, verses 25, to 28, Jesus called them together, he says, you know that the rulers of this world, lord it over their people and officials flaunt their authority over those under them, but among you, it will be different, who wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave, For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many. That's Matthew 20, is almost repeated word for word in Mark chapter 10, verses 40 through 45. Luke has a similar concept, a similar idea of what it looks like to lead and to not lord it over others, but he also gives a different twist at the end. Luke 22, verses 25 to 27. Jesus told them in this world that kings and the great men lord it over their people, yet they are called Friends of the people, but among you, it must be different. Those who are the greatest among you should take the lowest rank, the leader should be like a servant who is more important, the one who sits at the table, and the one who serves the one who sits at the table, of course, but not here, for either among you as the one who serves. So I wanted to see this first point here that Jesus wants us all to get, whether you're in the church working, or whether you're outside the church, working wherever you find yourself, don't Lord, your authority over others, it's easy to do. And it's acceptable in many circumstances, and it just works, right. I don't know if you've ever been around that sort of boss that crack the whip or had that fear base parenting or fear based leadership, you get in line for a little while, don't you whether it's at home, or work or whatever, but the fruit will eventually what eventually be rotten, because it won't bear fruit over time. It won't produce the results that we want for ourselves and others, and it will eventually show that it is foolish to continue to lead that way.

Even if in the short term, you get what you think you want. Now, what is this all about? Of course, I brought up this concept before it's not original with me, people talk about it inside the church and even outside the church. And it's that idea of servant leadership. What is servant leadership, I'm gonna give you kind of what I've thought about this, at its core servant leadership is to believe in the dignity worth and value of all people it means that whoever you find yourself rubbing up against, and if you knew this world long enough, you know that you'll be given charge over others, somehow that will probably occur. But when that occurs, don't think you're better than anyone. It doesn't mean that there aren't positions or roles. I mean, I get that I'm talking to people. I tell you this all the time, but about a third of our church has some sort of role with the government, whether it's through schools or through a border patrol or whether it's through police or a military. It doesn't mean that there aren't positions or roles and those things aren't existing. Those things should be respected. Those things shouldn't be sought after, or done. It's just understanding that wherever you find yourself in the chain, that you recognize that anyone above you or anyone below you or anyone besides you, they are creating the image of God. And that's what gives them dignity worth and value and that they're not better than you and you're not better than them. We think about that, and then you lead from that position, it makes all the difference in the world. And guys, I often think about this when you think about Christian truths like this, and we'll talk about how we're supposed to implement this in our lives, whether it's in the workforce or in the home, or certainly in the, in the church. We do this because God calls us to, and he's asking us to, but also church, this is the way that we ourselves will be blessed. I mean, you've heard this already in the story of Diana, you heard it already, through the prayer of Shelby, you've experienced that already in worship, that your hearts are rise to affection for the God of the universe, and you want to follow him at some level, you're sitting here, you've stayed this far in the service, or you've listened this much into the podcast or into the live stream, you're thinking, God has something for me. And I want to step into that, in what we see over and over again, both in scriptures and in life, that when we step into obedience, and have the faith to do what God calls us to do, that there are good things waiting for us on the other side, in this life, and in the life to come. So he says, first off, don't Lord your authority over others. That's the negative way that we can interact with others. Always in the Bible, there's a what we call a put off, take this off, release this sort of burden, and then put on this, this whole idea of this is something negative that you have to get out of your life, we all have these things. And then there's things that we need to put on positively. And we see this in the Scriptures. And it's I want you to see, this is why you might want to open your Bibles will have their scriptures up on the screen. But I want you to see this in the text. And so he follows along he says this right here. Second part of the text, this is this, and all of you dress yourself and all of you dressed yourself in humility as you relate to one another. For God opposes the proud just for one side of you, opportunity. God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. Okay, so you must so in all the dress yourselves, you may as you relate to one another forgot opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. So that's true. So Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God and at the right time, he will lift you up, in honor. Second point I wants to see this morning is clothed yourself in humility. Again, I'm in first Peter chapter five, verses five and six second boy wants to see this morning is closed yourself and humility. And I think it's a great word there says in this New Living Translation, dress yourself and humility, kind of older translations may say, close yourself. And what that means is that you and I, we have to be intentional. We will not happen to fall back into humility. I've never seen that happen for myself. And there's happened to others we don't fall back into it. That we have to be intentional because what is you and I's knee jerk reaction when somebody comes up against us in pride and you will experience pride and maybe in the car ride home, you'll experience it in your home for sure you will experience in the workplace, school wherever you find yourself. You are prideful individual, you'll find yourself around other prideful individuals. So you will not accidentally fall into humility you and I have to clothe ourselves in humility. We have to make a decision as we're literally putting on our boots and buttoning our shirts and whatever it is we're doing that man, Lord, help me, help me I know that I'm walking into places that are going to be hostile to the faith you have given me help me because about midday what's going to happen that tense moments going to come here she's going to come down that hallway here. She's going to meet you in the kitchen or in the laundry room or wherever it's going to be, you're going to have that tense moment. You're asking the Lord, Lord help me clothed me with humility, because here's what this tech says. It says that God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble a lot of times we think God's kind of sitting there, he's outside there. He's somewhere up there. And I can sort of be in neutral I can be a neutral I know we don't have cars that are stick shifting my drove one of my relatives house over Thanksgiving break, but you understand how a lot of times we would go into neutral. Right and if you remember how a stick shift works when you're in neutral and I know we have those in automatic cars as well, but we only use them or getting towed. But but the idea that we go into neutral, and that would happen either accidentally or intentionally and you and I know what would happen if you didn't With parking brake on, we would roll forward or we'd roll backwards. I mean, you say, no, no, we got some level flat area here in the desert, I get that. But the idea is that, that that's not true. That you and I, when we're waiting to do what God has for us, we're not in some sort of neutral state. What does it say here? When we are still acting prideful? In our lives? What does it say here? Is that God's neutral towards that? He's okay with that. He's waiting for you to kind of do the right thing. What does it say? It says, God opposes us in that moment. That may be it that may be the light bulb going on, for many of us in the room to realize that, oh, my gosh, what I'm trying to do in my own strength, and in my own pride, it's never gonna work. Because I am literally being opposed by the God of the universe. We're not in neutral, and God is not neutral. He's opposing the proud. But that also gives you great encouragement for those of us who come up against people who we think are going to ultimately undo us or knock us down door, we can't get back up. Now God's on your side, he's opposing pride, but he's giving grace and strength if you're trying to do the right thing. In the Midst of Opposition. That's what he's trying to say he gives grace to the humble, he's gonna give us strength to do that. That's why when you're asking God, God, help me clothed me with the humility, I'm going to need to go into this situation. God loves to grant that. Why? Because we're literally, you know, bending the knee, maybe quite literally, when we pray, or bowing the heart to say, God, what would you have for me, I want to do the right thing. So if you humble yourself, eventually that will be shown the path of wisdom, no, maybe not in the short term, right? Because all of us like to crack the whip at times, or, or all of us have been in situations where we've been led by people who cracked the whip, and we think, okay, that's how to get things done. But he's saying here that servant leadership will eventually be shown that that's the path of wisdom in this life. And not only in this life, but what what do we learn from the scriptures all the time in the life to come? That's how Jesus modeled for us. So it is doable. And Peter saying you can do this, this was hard for me remember, this is the same Peter, who over and over again, had to be reminded of these principles. He's lived through it quite literally, in years later, he's saying, This is how you should be. And he understands that it's so so so much easier, just kind of go back to what you know, remember, that's how Jesus found Peter at the end of the Gospel of John, just going back to what he knew. And he's saying over and over again, Jesus is calling Peter, do you love me? Do you love me? He loved me. He said, You know I do. He says, Well, eventually, you are going to fully understand the meaning of what it means to be a follower of me. Matthew 18, verses one through four. Same idea here as we clothe ourselves with humility. And back in the gospels, one of the disciples came to Jesus says, Who is the greatest of the kingdom of heaven, Matthew 18, verses one through four, Jesus called a little child to him, he put the child among them, and he said, I tell you the truth, unless you turn from your sins and become like children, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven. So anyone who becomes as humble as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. So what does that mean? Here? We've heard this before come to come to Christ, like a little child, is just that idea of one who is a learner one who is a seeker, one who understands that they understand that they're not in charge that ultimately, God's in charge. So we clothe ourselves with humility. Why? Why do we do that? Because we know where the strength comes from. How do we do that? Well, he's going to continue to tell us, which is why again, I hope you have your Bibles up into First Peter, chapter five, now into verse seven.

Give all your worries and cares to God for he cares about you. Now, this is one of those verses if you have a mirror that you look at every day, or you have a dashboard that's on your car or on your computer screen, this is one of those verses that for many of us in the room, we may need to write down or you know, put it as the screenshot of our phones so that when we open our phones, we see the some version of this verse, because we find ourselves crippled with anxiety and worry and fear. And we need to be reminded that there is a God of the universe give all your worries and cares to God. Why? Because He cares for you. has good news is we're in church. That's where we are been heading in our worship and in our prayers in our testimony, and in our word, this morning that we're looking for first peer to provide beginning in verse seven, do this. Stay alert. Stay alert, watch out for the great enemy, the devil, he prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world, the sky After the dispersed, he's going through the same kind of suffering you are. In his kindness, God called you to share in His eternal glory by means of Christ Jesus. So after you have suffered a little while, he will restore, support and strengthen you. And he will place you on a firm foundation all power to him forever and ever. Amen. So third and final point on wants to see this morning is lead yourself from a position of strength that God provides, lead yourself from a position of strength that God provides, we know there's a lot of anxiety going around, whether it's in you, or in all those around you, because just pay attention to the advertising that is coming to us post COVID, it is full on talking about mental health, and it is full on talking about depression pills to the masses. And we understand that those maybe have their place from time to time, and we need to understand and enter all those, I get all that. But if you enter into all that, whether it's pills or therapy or whatever, without understanding that, you know, his greatest need is to be reconciled with the God of the universe, it will ultimately fail us we understand that the why, because we have to lead ourselves, which is the number one person you and I have to lead oftentimes will come to the Bible and we're thinking about, you know, our friends or relatives or that person we live with, or I wish somebody at work could hear this. And what we're saying over and over again is Peter understands that God understands that I understand that we're seeing in the Scriptures saying lead yourself from a position of strength that God provides. When I get that, did you see it from the texts? He's saying that we can, what first thing we can do is we can say, This isn't my burden to carry your stuff isn't my burden to carry, my stuff isn't even my burden to carry. God can take care of that his shoulders can handle that. Then it says that we can lead from a position of strength because we know that someone's coming at us from left to right to want get us to snap back, get us to back talk get us to say something sharp or inappropriate in an NG God is it? It's the devil, right? It's that understanding of this is easier, bow up against them. This is easier, be prideful, in the position of someone else being prideful. And what God is saying over there was no, no. You can be humble, because you are his. God says you are mining you can know that we are his and when we get sloppy with our tongue in our lives, we think we're only hurting ourselves. What we fail to realize is that there's a path of destruction behind us. And this is true, whether it's in our homes or school or work, where are you and I find ourselves. I know, we don't have boats here in El Paso. But we understand that boats produce a wake, when a boat goes down a lake or an ocean, that awake comes behind them. And that's our lives as well, wherever we're going, we're producing a week of good, or ill. That's how life works. Now isn't that we're gritting our teeth and just kind of doing the right thing all counters do it. He or she doesn't deserve it, but I'll just do it. It's we're looking to the reward. We have to think about this. Remember, it's all about leaning ourselves. And we have to understand that we are doing this from a position of because of what God has done. I talked about this over and over again, the Gospel, the clarity of the gospel, the good news that all is available to everyone is that high idea that because of what Jesus has done on the cross, we can now be forgiven of our sins, and walk in the truth that He has for us. But one of the weaknesses behind our tradition, evangelicals, those who believe in the good news is that we think that that walking in obedience is optional, because they're like, I'm good. Because I've given my heart to Jesus and I've been baptized. And I'm good. I just don't, I don't follow through with it. Because again, you and I believe the lie that is optional, but we're learning in the scriptures that we're not sitting neutral on some sort of flat level ground, that we're either moving towards righteousness, or moving away from what God has for us. That's one of the weaknesses behind our tradition of evangelicalism is for sure we rightly believe that faith comes first. And then works follow. But we also falsely believe that the works are optional. But if you and I believe and if we have faith, it's not optional to live out. This humility that God's calling us to before God and others and we know that there's little lies being whispered in your ear and in my ear that we don't have to It's okay. So I would just say third and final point, lead yourself from a position of strength that God provides. That's why you and I have to spend time with God whether it's morning or midday or in the evening and just just sit with him. Just sit with him, read the Bible, pray, but ask God give me a little word whether it's through. You know, I know we're busy people and some of y'all are in the car lot. It can be done through podcasts or scriptures on audio. I understand all that, but it's is taking time to say God, what do you have for me because again, we talk about this all the time, you and I aren't going to catch Christian truth, through osmosis running and catch up just, you know, through our skin through the air we breathe, we're going to have to catch it and believe it by leaning on each other and leaning on the God of the universe. I'm gonna read the final parts to these to this chapter here and then we'll close at you don't have it in front of you. But it's there in the Bible. If you have a Bible up in verses 12. And through 14 says, I have written this short letter to you. This is Peter talking. I've written this short letter to you with the help of Silas, whom I commend to you as a faithful brother. I love that idea of commending someone to someone. My purpose in writing is to encourage you and assure you that what you are experiencing is truly part of God's grace to you stand firm stand firm in this grace that God has given you in Me, your sister church here in Babylon send you greetings. Now that's interesting, right Babylon, a church in Babylon outside of what would be the known place of the people of God send you grading as soon as my son Mark, greet each other with heavenly kiss, and peace to all of you who are in Christ Jesus. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you don't leave us wandering or wandering. But you have given us such clarity. Although I pray for those around the room that are struggling to lead themselves. Whether it because they feel like they can't get out of bed in the morning, or they feel like their opposition is too strong. You are the one who gives much grace, you are the one who is calling all of us around the room individually and corporately to cast our cares or worries or fears or anxieties on you. Because the truth is that you care for us, that you love us that our feet are on a firm foundation, whether we sense it or feel it in this moment or not because of who you are and what you've done. And maybe for those around the room to that. Don't believe that right now are struggling to believe that right now, Father, give them much grace to lean in, and to give their cares and worries to you as well. And to come to you to come running to you. Whether it's for the first time or the first time in a long time. We ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Well, we are so blessed this morning. I don't know how many of you were here when DOM Simmons was with us last time, but it was a great blessing. And we're blessed to have him here again today. Dom You want to come on up and give us the word of Lord?

Come on, can we give God some honor and praise this morning? Not a golf clap, but he's worthy of the praise. Come on. If he's moved, if he's moved mountains in your life, if he's provided for you, come on, give them some praise. Don't Don't Don't don't fall short of giving God the glory and honor this morning. Come on. I'm so glad to be here today. My name is Dom Simmons a little bit about my life. I am married to my beautiful wife, Allie Smith. She's here. She wasn't here last time with me. But she's here this time. We got to drive around. Got to shore with some authentic tortillas tastes like last night. Hey, back home. We add in a cut up to this. All right. This is great. Okay. Got to enjoy that. We have four kids 873. And one. Pray for us. I'll pray for you. You pray for us. Pray for us. Our kids are wild. They like to have fun like to run around. We are. God has done some amazing things in our life. Since the last time I've been here. We are literally eight weeks away from the launch of I am church. We are planting a church in Fort Worth. It launches in January. It's exciting. It's crazy. It's fun, nerve wracking. But God has provided and done some amazing things. So if you're looking to pray for some things for our lives, that's one of the things to be praying for. For us. I also want to just take this time, real quick before we even dive into anything I want to honor. Give honor honors do. You guys have an amazing pastor and Pastor Brent, and they love you. They care about you. They have sacrificed for Life Church, they have given them not only their lives, but their family. And they moved here and they they love this city, they have a heart we went to dinner last night and I could not stop talking about all the amazing things that's happening driving around showing the the money that the church has raised to donate for the build of a of a kid's Museum, art museum downtown, like all of that stuff. And so my pastor grant to you and your lovely wife is coordinate and your amazing kids. honor you. Church can we honor them? Can we can we give them a praise? In the same thank you thank you thank you know it's to to have people praying for you. When you don't even know what to ask people standing in a gap for you. Just know this, you didn't get here on your own. You're standing on somebody's prayer. Now that okay, God's good. God, it's good. So today, we want to dive into it when he called me and he when we talked, he's like, come in and preach. Absolutely. Last time I came I was a guest this time I'm family. I'm in the house. I feel comfortable and I got the shoes off and I got shoes I got my shoes on. Okay, I got my head laid back, you know, saying we go ready to go. Just a reminder, I may get a little rowdy. If you want to take a lap, go ahead, take a lap, they're gonna distract me. If you want to shout and say amen. And they're gonna distract me. It's gonna get me excited and go because we're gonna press in to what I believe that is going to transform our mindset on what we're going to talk about today. And so, we are going to dive into First Peter chapter four, we're getting ready to read. I'm not I'm not a reader. There's only one book I read every day and that's the Bible. Okay, everything else. I'm like a put on audio, given the audio, but we're gonna read the Bible today. There's 19 verses, stick with me, stick with me. And we're gonna get through it. If you have your Bible turn to First Peter, chapter four. We're gonna start in verse one, if you don't know come up on the screens behind me. It starts Therefore, since Christ suffered in his body, on yourself also with the same attitude. Because whoever suffers in the body is done with sin. As a result, they do not live the rest of their earthly lives for human desires, but rather for the will of God. For you have spent enough time in the past doing the pagans chose to do living into voluntary lust, drunkenness, orgies, core coercion, and detestable idolatry. For that they were they are surprised that you do not join them in the reckless wild living and they heap abuse on you come on somebody that's what it looks like to be a Christian in today's world, they heap abuse on you, but they will this is good news have to give a count to him who was ready to judge the living and the dead for this is the reason the gospel was preached to even those who are now dead so that they might be judged accordingly to the human standards in regard to the body, but live accordingly to God in regard to the spirit verse seven, the end Of all things as near therefore be alert, and a sober and have a sober mind, so that you may pray. Above all love each other deeply because love covers over a multitude of sins, offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God's grace in its various forms. If anyone speaks, they should do so as one who speaks the very Word of God, if anyone's service should do so with the strength that God provides, so that all things God may be praised through Jesus Christ, to Him be the glory, and the power for ever and ever. Amen. Verse number 12. I know you're not enough and going to sleep but wait back up, we almost done, dear friends. Do not be surprised at the theory or the other has come on you to test you as though some something strange were happening to you. But rejoice in as much as you participate in the suffering of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed for the spirit of the spirit of glory of God rests on you. If you if you suffer, it should not be as a murderer or thief or any kind of criminal or even a meddler. However, if you suffer as a Christian, come on somebody, do not be ashamed, but praise God, that you bear the name for it. It's time for judgment to begin with God's household right here at Life Church. And if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And if it is hard for the righteous to be saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner? That stings a little bit. So then those who suffer according to God's will, should commit themselves to their faithful Creator, and continue to do good. Come on, give yourself a round of applause. You just read a chapter in the book, you're done right there and check it off the list like I'm a Bible theology, theology. Now you know, as in, you just got to learn Hebrew and you'll be you'll be good, you'll be good. Hey, today's message title. If you're taking notes, it's called it's costly. It's costly. Let's pray God right now. I pray that as we unpack and dive into First Peter, chapter four today, I pray that your voice should be the loudest voice in the room. I pray that the Holy Spirit or move and do and be in comfort in the areas that need to be confident and reveal some truth to our hearts, so that we may move forward activated, ready to live our life, the way you've called us to live our life. God, I pray that any distractions that the enemy has schemed up, may fall to the wayside. Anything that the enemy has scanned has no authority right here in this moment online as well. You have no authority. Here, Satan. God, move on you can and have your way. In Jesus name, amen, and amen. Now, before we understand First Peter, we have to first understand who Peter is, before we can unpack that we got to know who we're dealing with. See, see this is a man who first was a fisherman, when first when he first stepped into the scene, he he was a fisherman and and he also challenges Jesus in front of the other disciples. Now, I know that some people that were preaching like, oh, he walked on water, but but at first, like he's like, Jesus, that's really you. You know, I mean, call me out there. I'll come to you. He was bald. He was a he was a bald man. He he walked on one. And then we see in Johnson to six, when when all of the disciples were leaving Jesus, when all these 1000s of people were walking away from Jesus, Jesus says, Are you going to leave me too? And Simon Peter was the first one to step up and say, well, where would we go? We're rocking one lawyer. We're all in Peter. Peter was was bold and courageous. And Peter was like, no, no, we're all in. See, when when Peter was also the man that when soldiers showed up to arrest Jesus, Peter shot this man's ear off. Peter one playing no games. Peter was about that life. He were my generations that he stood on business. That's, that's, that's, that's what Peter did. Peter was like, I'm about it. Right? But also in that moment, Peter also got rebuked. And Jesus said, Get behind me Satan, in that moment. And then Peter, also he, he denied Jesus three times. On the way to when Jesus was on his way to be crucified. They're like, wait, wait, you're that guy and Peter's like, No, I'm not. He did it three times. Peter, Peter also was the same man that Jesus came back to. And said, on this rock, my church will be built. See, Peter was a man who do who went through some things. He dealt with some things. He had moments where he was great and we can honor Him and quarterback look at Peter, but then he also had some moments where he struggled it. And it was tough. And there were some sufferings that he had to navigate through. See, Peter was this man who was who very so much so finds himself in a place to be able to talk to us today about what we are going to unpack, see, Peter had the credentials to talk about what it looks like to suffer as a Christian.

See, Peter had the resume to come to us and say, Hold on, wait a minute. We got to we got to address some things. See, Peter knew what it looked like and what it was going to take in order to walk with Jesus and be a Christian. See, in the book, first, Peter, the apostle, the apostle Peter addresses, a group of believers who are facing a intense persecution and living in a hostile world. In chapter four, Peter provides valuable insight on how we as Christians can navigate the challenges of living for God's glory in the world that opposes our faith. I don't know about a better chapter or a better book that describes what it looks like to be a Christian in today's world. I don't I don't know of another of another insight that we have to challenge us on how we navigate to encourage us to how we navigate the challenges that we're facing in today's world. You turn left you turn right, it's prosecution. You do this, you do that it's canceled. You stand on this, you stand on that? How dare you. You believe in this, you believe in that? Who do you think you are? See, see Peters giving us some Hey, I'm about to give you the download. I'm about to give you some some cliff notes on how to navigate this thing. Because I don't know about you, but we're living in a hostile time. Things are rough. For those who Claire who classify themselves as Christians, as Christ believers, as people who have morals, who people who stand firm and believes that there is only ONE WAY, the TRUTH and the lie, that there are circumstances that that I just can't live like this any more. I can't do this anymore. I used to, but not no more. See, Peter knew that it would go it was going to be costly. He knew it. He knew that it was going to cost us some things. He knew that it was going to be tough for us to navigate some things because he had the same experience while he was growing and he was moving and doing and being with Jesus. And so if you're taking notes, I'm gonna I'm gonna hit three points real quick. And we're gonna we're gonna we're gonna dive deep into these three points and, and we're gonna get up out of here. God's team is playing right now. And we're praying that they pull out the victory, right? I'm not saying Okay, listen, if you want to fight, we can fight. Okay, guys, let's say God loves the Cowboys. All right. That's the bottom line. I love the Cowboys. They lose because Satan, alright, that's why I'm not I'm not a I stand on it. I hate I will stand on it. And if you're not a Cowboy fan, come up after it. We'll pray for your salvation. And we'll, we'll get some water in the tank. Well, don't you get you up and put a stone on your chest so you can move forward, move forward the right way in life, believing in the Lord. All right. All right. And if you're an Eagles fan, there's no hope for you, right? There's no hope for you, you might as well go ahead and just just give up now. All right. Number one, in order to live this costly life, in order to in order to walk this out. Peter shows us that we have to embrace the suffering for Christ's sake. See, Peter reminds us that suffering is inevitable. It's a part of the Christian journey. However, he encourages us as believers to embrace suffering for Christ's sake. Rather than being surprised or discouraged by trials, we should consider them as opportunities to share the sufferings of Christ. It is through our suffering that we can grow in our faith and develop press perseverance, and grow closer to God. See, it's in the moments where you say, You know what, it's gonna be okay. It may not look good, it may not be good, but it will be one day, it's in the moments where you're able to say, You know what, I'm gonna strap my boots up, I'm gonna, I'm gonna put my pants on, and I'm gonna go after it. And I'm gonna run and I'm gonna be bold and courageous and stand on being a Christian no matter what it looks like. It's when you're able to do that when you're able to embrace the suffering does the stretching of your faith does the stretching of your belief, this stretching of of how you navigate life begins to take place in your life, and you begin to move and do things and you're like, wait a minute, I didn't even know that I can. I can stand in this room with a bunch of haters and a bunch of people who talk bad about me but still Love them. But look at God give me the bonus look at God give me the race, look at God do this and provide a ways that I didn't know he could. It's because of the willingness to stand in and to take on what it looks like to suffer in those moments. Now, I don't want to I don't want to sit here and paint this picture that suffering is like this, like, you gotta like, every day. Let people just punch you in the face and be like, Okay, I'm a Christian. It's butterflies and unicorns and Jesus loves you and I don't know if I met my man Peter cut a guy's ear off don't cut nobody's here. Somebody said, Hey, man. I gotta wait. You don't do that because he's, he can't put it back on. But, but suffering is sometimes holding your tongue. Suffering is sometimes looking at things and saying. Suffering can be mean that I don't know how our bills are gonna get paid. Me and we just lost somebody suffering suffering, can look in all different types of forms and shapes. Let me let me say this. Your suffering is no greater than someone else's suffering. Suffering your suffering. We're not going to play this tit for tat game. Well, you didn't go through this and I had to go no, no, no. It's hard out here. But when you embrace it when you when you take it on when you say you know what, I got it? I got it because God's got it. I'm good because God's good. Bill the bills are gonna get paid because it's in God's hands. You know, my family is covered because we're covered by the by the blood of Jesus, we were gonna we're gonna be good because God said we're good. God said know what the formula for a prosper against us. He didn't say we didn't hurt he didn't say Winston. But this ain't prospering. In the name of Jesus, I declare over this household, my household over my kids, that we will be safe and covered and be good. Why? Because God said so that's what it looks like to embrace the suffering of which we walked through in life. It's not to stand on your way is to stand on God's way. It's not the standing you're in. You're you're just Oh, my accolades and look at me and my resume. No, no. Forget your resume. What about the resume of Jesus that splitsies in walked on water? And God did this and God did that. What? What about that, right? That's the resume we should claim to. Because that's the resume. That no matter what happens, is always victorious. It's always victorious. You don't believe me? There are 66 books that you can go read. Starting in Genesis, all the way to Revelation. And you'll see the provision. You'll see trials, you'll see tribulations, but you'll see provisions because God always comes through. He always when he's undefeated. He's undefeated. And he ain't waiting to right now to lose, he'd be like, okay, 2024 I'm just gonna take a hell. He ain't doing that. No, 2025 Guess what he goes in? It's election year. He goes 2026 He goes in 2027. He goes in. That's just who he is. So we have to embrace suffering and price for Christ's sake. The second one is honestly when I was doing this, and Holy Spirit was talking to me and I was typing I said, I don't I like this one. This is not I'm not gonna preach this one. Yes, you are. Because this is the one I struggle with God I don't I don't want to I don't want to preach against him. I struggle he said, That's why you need to preach on it. The second one is you got to exhibit self control and love. Hmm. Somebody said Mm hmm. Self control. I mean, I can't just pop off. That mean I can't just tell her about herself when she comes in here talking negative every single day. Put a smile on your face. And Thanksgiving coming up. You know some of y'all got family that you can't stand. It's coming over to your house. It's gonna eat up all your food. Dang, I'm bringing nothing to pitch in. Oh. Self control. Control yourself. Walk you love. Control yourself. I believe this is one of the most the hardest things for us to do. Because we believe that we have everything in our power to check somebody and put somebody in that place sometimes. Like me, my wife, she's so nurturing.

She's so sweet. Our kids love her. Kids like, Mommy, can I have this? On? My wife has daddy, because we know you're gonna say no. You gotta ask us if our room is clean, you're gonna ask them to, they will take the trash out and we feed the dog. I want the conflict. I want to know what did you do what you're supposed to do. But oftentimes, I wonder if that pushes people closer to God, or pushes them far further away from him? I wonder if our lack of self control paints a picture of something that's unattainable, or something that's attainable. I wonder if if we would do a better job in this area of having self control and walking in love. I wonder I wonder if people would would want to be more like us. versus us trying to change them. Maybe maybe they would just change because of what we're projecting what we're exhibiting from our hearts. You know, in the world, in a world filled of immoral, immoral immorality and sin. Peter urges us to exercise self control, and live in holiness. He embraces the importance of loving one another deeply, even in the face of opposition by exhibiting self control and demonstrating Christ like love. We can be a powerful testimony, come on, somebody received that. By demonstrating Christ like love, we can be a powerful testimony to the world and show them the transformative power of the gospel. healthy things produce fruit. We're living in a time and age that because I said so no longer works. Because we have people have we've grown tired of him because I said so. And seeing no fruit be produced from it. We want to see some fruit. But the only way to produce that is to be healthy. And you can't sit up here and proclaim your Christian and cuss somebody out because they got in front of you. You can't proclaim your Christian and your auntie come over to your house and you ready to charge her up? Because I got a list of family members that are not invited to my house for Thanksgiving. So listen, it's just guy working on me. Okay, I gotta say sometimes y'all can come over. You can't proclaim your Christian it should appear and have this attitude. That everything has to be ran through you ran by you. And if it's not your way, it's the highway. We got to walk in love. One of our one of our mission statement, one of our one of our just mission statements and core values within our churches is man, we want to love people beyond what we see. See, sometimes it's hard. Because we see all the messiness. And we see all the above we can see them the way God sees them through all of that. It'll be a little bit easier to love them. It'll be a little bit easy to say, okay, Susan, you got it today. Bob, Okay, love you have a great day, God bless you. And that stretching happens. And self control. But here's another self control, that kind of like your private life matters. Self control, to be obedient, to stop giving into sin to stop giving into these evil thoughts and stop giving into the world we live in and stop giving into the wild. Well, it's just this just this way and, and this and that. No, no. Be different. Let somebody see you and they see Christ. Let somebody see you and say, I don't understand how you're so blessed. But you can just say because I'm living my life. I'm no longer set apart from God. I'm with God. I'm a son. I'm a daughter, and I'm living in my inheritance. I'm not living in hell on earth. I'm living in heaven on earth. I don't I don't sit up here and dabble with the earthly ways. I'm saying no, no, I'm living my life upright and righteous unto the Lord. I'm serving. I'm doing these things I'm supposed to be doing. I'm being the hands and the feet. I'm not I'm not just sitting back being a spectator. I got a helmet on and I'm in the game. Because Because El Paso needs a church that says hey, we're full of people who are in the game. And we're going to exhibit not only self control, but we're going to live in love too. And I don't care about your political view. I don't care about the way you do this. You do the odd Love you. Why because God loves you. The Bible doesn't say only love them if they have the same political view as you. The Bible doesn't say only love them if they walk talking look like you. The Bible says no love everyone. Because why love covers work? A multitude. Somebody's transformation can be in the way you love them. Who? Somebody, somebody, somebody can come in Oh, Jesus simply because you, you send them a text, let them know you're praying for them and you love them every single day. On Monday, it could be an annoying on Tuesday could get on their nerves a little bit more. But on Wednesday, they could be going through literal hell. And that text message will transform them and say, Why do you keep texting me? Because I want you to know God loves you. You never know. Can we walk this out? Because there's the Izmir it's coming. It's coming. I don't know about you, but I want to see all of y'all in heaven.

I'm telling you. My own personal family what's going on? Remember, when you guess what I want to see? I want to see everybody in your family. They're

gonna see everybody in this city. They're gonna see everyone they see the Texas they're obviously everybody in heaven. But unfortunately, it's gonna take some work. It's gonna cost you some things. You're not going to be able to be at the party getting drunk anymore. Somebody laughed like That's funny. Sorry, I'm sorry. But you're not gonna be able to be gossiping at coffee and talking about girl did you hear? Did you see this? As you see that? No, you're not gonna be able to do that no more. You can still be in those environments will be set apart. Be different. Be somebody somebody wants to be like be somebody that your son and your daughter you want your son or your daughter to be like

Can we can we think that far can we think generational? The generational impact that our decisions make? I know I'm harping on this a little bit more because this I thought this one is one of those things. It's just like, Man,

I don't think we understand the generational impact that self control and walking in love has. What he does, he pours down it pours down. Psalms 133 says what gets what pours over the top of the head flows to the rest of the body. Where do you point over your family? Is it self controlling love? Or is it let's move on. We're gonna we're gonna go into point number three. That's it for today. They didn't gave up on me. They didn't say we done okay, we come on, let's let's, let's exhibit this. Let's do better as a body of believers. Point number three. Be a faithful steward of God's gifts. Peter reminds us each of us have been have been entrusted with various gifts and talents by God. We are called to be good stewards to these gifts, and to use them to serve others faithfully. Whether it's through speaking, serving or showing has a showing hospitality Our goal should be to glorify God in everything we do. When we use our gifts to bless others, we become an instrument of God's grace and demonstration of His love for the world. Everybody in this room was uniquely designed creatively by our father. And the image of who he is. There are people in the room that have a gift to love people that people are in the room that have the gift to be in the back and be behind the scenes. There are people in the room that just have a gift to Bill things that people in the room that hasn't given us people online that have some of those gifts do we all have gifts? We need to use them we need to be good stewards of them. I tell somebody that's one of the guys I mentor this week I said hey guys not asked no Satan's not after you're guessing your talents. He's after your identity. Because he if he can rob you of your identity to use your gifts your talents for him. If he can rob you of your day I don't have time to preach that today. I'm about to come back in a couple of weeks and preach identity but but same wants to use your gifts he'll use or whether you What do you think he's using them or not? Let's be intentional. To use them for for the for the Kingdom. Let's be intentional to use them to get people closer to God. Let's be intentional. So you know what I'm going to serve not only in church on Sunday, but Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, I'm going to open a door for somebody. I'm going to pick up a piece of trash So I'm gonna, I'm gonna say, Hey, have a great day, I'm gonna, I'm gonna serve somebody, I'm just gonna take out the trash. When I, when I see it's full, I'm just gonna do something that's a set apart from who I am. That doesn't benefit me. But it benefits other people. I'm going to be selfless. I'm not going to be selfish and say, no, no, they didn't do this, or they don't deserve this. Who cares what they deserve. Let's be like Christ, and give them what God told us to give them. And that's love and grace and mercy and forgiveness. But we do that, not by just saying it. But we do that. But also doing it being the hands and the feet. Hay, the church can never have too many greeters. The church will never have too many parking lot, parking hosts, the church will never have too many prayer team members, the church will never have too many people singing or playing instruments. The church will never have enough people on the production team on the tech team on the social media team on the outreach team on this team on the church. Listen, I know some people sit up and say, Oh, they good. They got it. Let me tell you as a as a political church or lead pastor, no, we don't know, we know. We need you. The Kingdom needs you. When somebody sees you, they don't just see you. They see your story. They get drawn to you. They get connected to you. They find that community. I don't have time. Yes you do. Because if you're being a faithful steward, you're practicing what it looks like to steward your time. The allness of God. Live a generously life not just with your with your finances, you need to do that you need to bring to bring the temperature at the top not for the churches that once he got his testimony this egg and set it up for the floodgates a blessing over your life. He didn't say Pastor brings life he didn't say Life Church. He said over your life is a testament for your life. You want to see checks show up in the mail, you want to see things shake and break you want to see granddaughters and people get healed and and things like getting your family generation test got in this area. Test them I dare you to. I'd tell you today to be bold to testimony your time. I try to put out near you. In 30 days, and 30 days, you're gonna be like man, look at God show up. Look at him show up. That's who he is serving. He says How come to serve not to be served. You want to look like more like Jesus. Start serving. serve somebody. Serve Yes, serve. Serve your city serve. Serve somebody else outside of yourself. I guarantee you begin to look like him. He'll be in a walk. Say who is I look a little slimmer. Oh, I love me. And really, truly you love who you're becoming? Because you're becoming like Jesus. Let's do it our gifts and our talents and our abilities. Let's serve. If you're gifted you paint, you draw you do, there's room for you in the kingdom. There's room for you here. In conclusion, the first Peter chapter four we learned that living for God's glory in a hostile world requires us to embrace the suffering for Christ exhibit self control and love and faithfully steward the gifts that God has given us. As we navigate the challenges of life. Let us remember that our ultimate purpose is to honor and glorify God in all circumstances. By doing so, we can shine a light in the darkness and impact those around us with the love and truth of Jesus Christ.

It's gonna cost you something it's gonna cost you it's costly. It's gonna, it's gonna cost you in the Bible, there are 42 different occasions where Jesus healed one or more people or didn't like some supernatural work, let that that's a lot of miracles.

And he did it all in just three years. But yet that was that was just a sample of 40 words mark indicates on three separate occasions that Jesus healed many people in the Senate at the same time Mark chapter one, verses 33 through 34 March of the three verses 10 through 11 and Mark chapter 656. Where we see Jesus just radically heal people radically do a radically be it as you stand on your feet. I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna read off of a couple more you got to stand with me. John chapter four, verse 4060. He heals the noble man son. In Mark chapter one verse 21. He heals the man with an unclean Spirit. In Matthew chapter eight verse 14 Here Simon's Peter mother in law, he heals the leopard man. He heals the paraphyletic. He, he heals the woman with the issue of blood, the, the Jairus is deceased daughter, the two blind men the mute, the mute, possessed man, the deaf man, the blind man, the man that was born blind. He raised his up Lazarus, he yields a 10 labrets. Jesus walks around for three years, he has these radical encounters, and he heals these people.

And there's one more there's one more miracle seems to take place in the Bible. But the Holy Spirit just put this on my heart to share with this young man who grew up on the south side of Fort Worth. He was influenced by gangs and hanging out with the wrong people. And one day he decided to go to church. He remember being this do you want athlete and he was in charge. And there was a sermon on what it's like to feel like everybody can see your flaws, and everything that's wrong with you. He felt like a pink elephant in the room. And in this moment, there was an altar call that Jesus didn't see you that way that God loves you. And this, this, this guy just starts crying and he comes up to Christ, he gets baptized, and slowly but surely Gods begin to pull them farther and farther away from hanging out with those people and doing those things. And one day he got an internship at a church. And he started he started to be an intern. The Nine months later this this young man came full time as an Associate Student pastor. And this should listen man would go on 10 years of ministry experience from being a student pastor, to a young adult pastor to a campus pastor to outreach pastor, working and doing and seeing God do amazing things, taking a youth group from 100 to 1000. Seeing hundreds and hundreds of students go public with their, with their faith and get baptized, to work and to and to see other young men like yourself come up and give their self

to Christ. But then it cost this young man something because on this journey he had to there were seasons where this young man was lonely.

This young man's family even turned their back. They they didn't want nothing to do with the church. The people he thought was close to him. started calling him names and talking about about this young man would find himself in a space where he was desperate.

So men would also lose his father to suicide. Seven days before it was a meeting for the first time.

This old man had to walk through some things. It cost him something to live a life for Christ. This man told was told that he'd be in jail, or dead. This isn't me, I thought he would never be married.

This young man thought he was just going to be lonely by himself for the rest of his life. But God is something radical. He moves to the city he meets his wife starts his family

ministry, they get called to start a church they moved back to his hometown where everybody read a quote him talked about about him didn't have a relation with his family.

And now this young man family shows up to this young man's church now this young man has an influence in the same city that totally he'll be dead or in jail. It cost him alive that young man is me

That young man is my that's my story. That's that's the things that I had to walk through and navigate through as a as a Christ follower as a as a Christian to believe that Jesus is who He says He is. And I'm gonna live my life for God, even though it may look like

literally hell I'm going to suffer through it. I wonder if the miracles I read, leaving my story. If you were to ask us, I know the answer to it. But for me, but these guys wasn't worth it.

Was it worth it? What's your healing worth it? Or would you go back and say, Jesus, I don't want it. You can take it back. I'll stay blind, I'll stay paralyzed, I'll stay miserable, I'll stay lonely. I'll stay upset. I'll stay mad. I'll just mourn the death of my daughter. I don't care if you can have it back. Because it's not worth it. I wonder if they would say yes. I can tell you my answer. It was all worth it. It was all worth it. To see my brothers and my mom and my kids and my wife, who was told she would never have kids, as have four healthy, beautiful, amazing kids, for us to navigate and do and be it was all worth it church is your healing worth it? isn't worth it to you. If seeing your your grandkids flourish in a life in a healthy community, in a safe community in a church where they can find community where people that they grew up with, he'd come and run around and and there's people starving, and there's more than enough overflow happening in and people say why in the world is happening, a Life Church

in El Paso. And you get to say it's because a group of people decided it was worth it.

cost us something, but it was worth it. And let me tell you about what it costs me. Let me tell you about what I had to give up. But look at everything I have. Look at everything I've gained, look at everything that I've grown from looking at who I am today. It was worth it. I believe this, that if we can be at church, where we declare that it's worth it to look like Jesus, that it's worth it to embrace the suffering, that it's worth it to exhibit self control and love that it's worth it to be a faithful steward of the gift that God's giving us. I believe that we will see a revival take place, and that the world we live in today will look radically different. The news wouldn't be in control, the government wouldn't have a say. So things would just look like this. I told somebody this. I said, You know what, if the church was the church, we would have less hospitals and less prisons. If the church would step up to be the church. That's their stories in the Bible, where people were just getting healed left and right, that people were getting set free from bondage because of the believers they had faith. Not only do you have amazing pastors, but you have a good God. That's on your side. He's the greatest problem solver they'll ever be. He's a way maker. He's a miracle worker. He's a promise keeper. He's a light in the darkness. He'll tear down walls. Don't chase after you. He'll run after you. He'll defend you. He'll fight for you. And he'll stand beside you and say I dare you to touch her. I dare you to touch him. You may think you gotta lick again. But what's coming your way? You ain't ready for it. That's the God we serve. And guess what? You're on that team. And if he can do it for me, he'll do it for you. So let's declare it's worth it. Let's be bold in it. Let's not just show up and be spectators on the sidelines. When we come into this space, let's worship so loud that El Paso hears us. Let's lift our hands so boldly that change form and bonded snaps snaps loose. Let's let's let's sing so boldly and so loudly and declare that he is who he is now in an essay saying hey, we can go over there. Why? Because they know it's worth it. Because they know it's worth it. They about it. They play no games. Believe it? You gotta believe it. We gotta believe it together. Can we do that church? I said can we do that church? I said can we do that church? I don't know about you, but I'm ready. I'm hyped up. I'm ready to go. Save and bring it all ready to go. I've seen God when he'll do it again. I'm ready to go.

I'm ready. I'm ready. I'm ready. If it's by myself. I'm ready. I'm ready. Why? Because I'm a living walking testimony of what it looks like to be in a valley and see drop bones come to life again.

I've seen mountains be moved. I've seen sleep see split. I've seen it. So we're getting ready to Pray. And when I say Amen, if we could let us sound erupt out of this place to put El Paso on notice to say we are ready, we're gonna sing waymaker I don't want you just to sing the words, I want you to believe it. And I want you to declare it. And I want you to sing it. Like you're not just seeing it for yourself, but you're seeing it for your mama, your daddy, your grandfather, your grandmother, your sister, your brother, your kids, they kids, they kids, kids, your cousin, the one you don't like, and the one you don't even know, I want you to see, as if he's getting ready to do something supernatural in their life. Because they need it. We need it. Father God right now I pray that you begin to show us who you are, and supernatural ways that you begin to encourage our faith to grow. God as we take steps closer to you, that is exhausting us, it may be as hard as it may be as difficult as it may be God that we get to stand in knowing that we are victorious in the name of Jesus. And we ain't just stand on a solid line no more. Now we're willing to say we're ready to pay the price. Because it's worth it. It's worth it. It's worth it. For me, it's worth it for the generations before me and it's worth it for the generations after me it's worth it. It may be costly, but it's worth it. That will embrace it. That will exhibit love and self control and, and that we're gonna we're gonna steward the gifts you've given us for the kingdom of God, I pray that whatever healing that anyone joining in this room or online may need, whether it's physically, mentally, emotionally or spiritually, God, I pray that you meet them. And you pour it out for them. And you pour it out not just for them, but for the people around them. They see that they are covered and they are blessed, and they are favored. And I pray that you draw people to them, that when they ask what's different about you that they're able to point them to you, and they get them to this place that's on fire. And that's willing to walk with people through literally life that they have to go through. That I pray that you bring you bring more more of more of more that Life Church needs in order to be the beacon for the city. Let this be the beacon of El Paso. Let it start here, Lord, have your way. God, thank you for what you've done. God, you've you've done so much, all the little things that had to go right for us to be in this place. You've allowed it to happen. It's just God, we give you praise and honor for that. But as our faith rises, and as our anticipation increases, God we give you praise in order for the things to come, that we not only see it, we perceive it and we receive it all together, that we're clinging on to the miracles and blessings ahead that we know that coming we're running with expectation. Knowing that you're getting ready to make a way because you are the miracle worker, you are the promise keeper. You're the light in the darkness. That's who you are. So God thank you for that. In Jesus name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much. Appreciate that. Well, it's been one of those days where we've already been to church, we've already seen what God has done. And it was just an amazing time of worshiping with each other, and then to worship through what God's doing, and just new life and how he's connecting us as a family believers. And we get to celebrate that again, with a taco bar, this this Wednesday. And so I hope to get to rub shoulders with many of y'all there. Well, I

want to remind us where we're at, we're going to series on First Peter, and this is the Peter, the Peter II think about in the Bible, and it is written to the scattered. And what he means by that is in that context, it would have been these cities around Asia Minor, but it's really to us who find ourselves scattered throughout the world. And you know, a lot of people find themselves in El Paso from other places, and it's how to thrive in an area that is not your home, especially if you feel like strangers, and wanders in your own land, Peter understood that sort of disposition of our hearts. And so what he wants to start out with in First Peter, chapter three verses one through 12, is going to address three different groups. And for the sake of time, we're not going to read those verses, but I want to give you a summary of what they are right up here. So again, if you were to read, First Peter, chapter three verses one through 12, you would see this, these three groups being addressed. And here's kind of the summary. So he addresses, wives. And he says, quite simply, you know, let the husband lead. And when you think about this, in terms of our Christian context, you may have wandered into church before and you get this idea that, that in the home that when it's ideal, that, that you have this idea of that men take the lead, and again, that sometimes gets all misconstrued on certain roles in the home. And, and it can get really squirrely pretty quick, because you might say, well, what if you know the wives in accounting? Or what if the husband is a cook? See, those are roles. And what we're talking about is just that disposition of a guy's heart that says, Let's do this. And that even if other people in the family are going to take the lead and certain things, you can see right from the get go that in this passage, Peter is trying to encourage us to say, here's how things are supposed to work. And so why is that the husband lead, pursue godliness, we understand what that is doing what God has for us. And you can see that in this passage, and others just focus on inner beauty, that the world is going to focus on the adornment of certain you know, jewelry, or certain outfits or certain hair and doesn't say Don't, don't worry about those things. Don't be concerned about those things. And saying, Don't let your focus merely be on those things. Focus on your inner beauty. And it talks about being like the women of old and he gives this example of Sarah, who had to follow Abraham, who became Abraham around in the ancient world. And he messed up in a lot of ways, sometimes saying, I don't know who this woman is, I think she's my sister. And yet, it went well, when she just obeyed God. And she didn't follow him into sin, but she obeyed God. And he's saying, like, be like the women of old, where they can do those kinds of activities, then he also addresses the husband. So again, you can see how the Bible is always what we call an equal opportunity offender. And it also gives hope. So you often see in the Bible and you read it, and I know many of y'all have started reading your Bibles in your well on in your Christian journey, you're always gonna see things that look like judgment, or they sound harsh, or they sound like they're hard to do. But if you keep reading long enough, then you'll always see the grace or the hope, or the strength to be able to do those things. Or you'll see if he addresses one group of people, he'll go ahead and address another group of people. And so that's what he's doing here. He addresses wives, then he addresses husbands, he says, You got to honor your wife, we understand what honor is. And again, it looks different in different households. But one of the things I would just say about biblical masculinity and biblical femininity, it's just those things right there, that when we interact in our workforces, and in our homes, that we maintain our masculinity for a man, biblical and holy and good masculinity for a man and as a woman, that you maintain your femininity, and we know what that means. Intuitively now, again, we find ourselves sometimes in a culture that's gone mad and is very confused about those kinds of things. We as the people of God can't be. And I think, again, we've gotten off track if you've been around churches long enough, where they start to define exactly what those roles look like in certain homes or workforces, and that can get confusing, and that can be disagreements. But what we don't disagree on is that God created men as men and God created women as women and then that leads to certain things. So if you're in a marriage relationship, you he addressed his wives, he addressed his husband's honor your wife, treat her with understanding. Again, men and women are different. There is equal, but they're different. And that is also addressed in this passage. She is your equal partner. It says in the passage, fellow heirs to the grace of life, and we say, of course, there's equality. But there's differences. Again, something that wasn't really wasn't up for debate and said for the last 20 or 40 years, distinctive differences between men and women. And then we can kind of figure that out, as we are faithful to God. And he says, Finally, to husbands, the reason why you want to do this is you don't want your prayers to be hindered. And what it basically says is, is if we can't figure out how to live with one another, and understanding way that honors God, then don't be surprised when it feels like your prayers hit a ceiling. I know that's true in my own life as well, in times where I'm not acting and being the husband that I'm called to be. It's almost like my relationship with God, isn't there either, because it's, it's not it's being hindered, because of the way you are treating your spouse she has. He dresses, wives, he dresses, husbands, then he dresses Christians at large, what is he trying to say? be of one mind that's so important. We gather in a place like this, that we're all here for we know what our purpose is, that we worship a risen Savior, that we celebrate the resurrected life that we can have. So it's being a one mine of one accord, that we sympathize and love each other. Now, sympathy in and of itself is in short supply right now. That's what we're talking about when we feel like strangers and wanders in our own land. The idea that we would have somebody who believes differently than us thinks differently than us looks different than us, does things differently than us that we can identify with them and really sympathize with our plot. That is a Christian biblical truth that we are to practice where the sympathize and love one another. This becomes hard, don't repay insult for insult so hard, whether it's in your home life, or your work life or your online life that you want to do, you get a snappy remark, you want to snap back. I do too. That's called our flesh. But as we walk and we live in the Spirit, we learn that what God has for us and Peter is telling us this. Don't repay evil for evil. don't repay insult for insult, ever, how much you feel like you're justified in that Jesus said the same thing. You've heard it said I've heard I. But that's not where we are to live in or personally. Now the rules are different. When you talk about rules of engagement with war from a governing body, I won't get into all that. But I'm talking about personal ethic, how we conduct ourselves to a watching world, in our home, in our work in our school. Last thing says pay back with a blessing and you will be blessed. How many times have you and I've been a part of situations where once we start biting at each other. And we start being snippy. And we start saying things that are insults and vulgar hate or anger or whatever. It's like a rolling thing that we can't stop, isn't it? It just keeps going. And what he's saying is one of us has got to be the bigger man or woman and say, Hey, I'm going to bless even though I've been cursed, I'm going to find a way to, to say the right thing to do the right thing and to bless, even though I've been insulted. And he did. And he says if we do this long enough, in the right direction, that we will basically these are my words, we will thrive. So that's my first point I want us to see this morning of these passages that I've summarized in chapter three verses one through 12. Let's find a way to thrive not simply survive. With any structure, you find yourself a part of this really goes back into last week, he talks a lot about authority. And we talked about authority situations. And of course, we know that if there's abuse, there's proper authorities to sort of report those two, but we're talking about just when you and I find ourselves in any sort of system or structure, be it at church, be it at home, be it in the workplace, being at school, we have to ask ourselves, okay, how can I thrive and not just survive in this and he again, that's why he addresses all these different groups in this passage. Being You guys know this, if you've been to any sort of counseling or therapy worth its salt, they cannot change your situation. None of them can. I've not been to a therapist yet that pulls out a big wad of money out of their pocket says hey, I know how to fix all your situation know, what do they help you? And I do. They helped change our perspective of what we're experiencing. They help if they're good, connect us to the God of the universe and how He cares for us. And what does it mean that he loves us? And that he knows us? And how can you then find a way to not just survive through life who wants to go through life where you just kind of grit and teeth and bear we have seasons like that for sure. I'm just trying to survive. I just tried to survive COVID. But then we find ourselves in a rut. And we need to get out of just surviving, but thriving, and that's what Peter wants for us. That's what God wants for us. And that's why he's giving all these different instructions about how we can do that in our lives. Let's do that. We all have different places we're at around the room. But let's find a way to thrive, not simply survive within the structure you may find yourself a part of again that doesn't And you don't need to switch careers or go down different paths or change. I understand all that. But what can you do immediately, and that is to try to figure out how to honor God, where you're at. Then he talks about, he turns a corner in the passage, he talks about suffering for what? For doing what is right, and he's already sort of brought up this thing, he says, is very basic. And we know this, if a cop pulls you over, and you haven't done anything wrong, by and large. And I know you can find the rare rare exceptions, but by and large, you don't have anything to be concerned about. But if you've done something wrong, then you should have fear of the law, because they're going to catch you in whatever it is that you're a part of that's shady or wrong. And so in the same way, he's saying, I'm not talking about that. But what happens when you're doing the right thing. You're doing what you're supposed to be doing, and you find yourself under suffering persecution, threat. And that's where I want to pick up the passage this morning, verse 13. Now, who will want to harm you if you are eager to do good, but even if you suffer for doing what is right, God will reward you for it. So don't worry or be afraid of their threats. Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your hope, as a believer, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way. Keep your conscience clear, then if people speak against you, they will be ashamed when they see what a good life you live, because you belong to Christ. Remember, it is better to suffer for doing good, if that is what God wants than to suffer for doing wrong. Now, this key passage in here, and you may have memorize this, if you like the idea of like studying to show yourself approved unto God, which is another passage, but you have this whole idea of that, always be ready to give an answer for the hope that is within you. I think sometimes when we come to church, and we think about the pastor, and we think about the spiritual leaders in our church, we think, Okay, those are the super Christians, and somehow, they're the ones leading everyone to Christ are the ones who are being faithful, to read their Bibles and do whatever the Spiritual things are that the church is, guys, it's just simply not true that for sure, we have to lead out in that. But think about who we just baptized, I think easily, we could say, half the people that we just baptized, how did they come to Christ? It's because you, you are in the room, you carry the hope of glory, and you opened your mouth, you held out your hand, you brought someone with you, it says, Look, my life was changed. What about your life, come with me come to know this God of the universe. And what I'm saying here is, you guys are being a part of this praise God, you're being faithful to do what First Peter is calling us to do, which is what second point this morning, always be ready to give an answer for the hope that is within you. Let's just say quotation of First Peter, chapter three, verse 15. It's another way to say this whole idea of being ready to give an answer and doing this with a gentle and respectful way. Again, you don't have to have a fancy book, you don't have to go to a fancy school, to be able to share the love of Christ with others. And you don't have to worry about what you're going to say. Because the Scriptures tell us in other places that when it comes time for you to give an answer or response to someone when they ask you about your faith, who's going to give you the words, who's going to give you the courage, who's going to ultimately give you their response. Well, God, God brings things to mind. And those of y'all that have had any conversation with friends, relatives, strangers on the street, or whatever, you begin to realize and recognize, oh, my gosh, this isn't happenstance. This is an accident. God has brought me here for such a time as this, I'm going to lean into this, I'm going to speak into this, and I'm going to do it in such a way. I don't care what the political pundits say, I don't care what people say about Christians and believers, I've got to say, God, what is it you have for me, I'm gonna be faithful in that. And that's what he's calling Peter. That's what Peter is calling the believers to do then. And he's calling us to do that. Now. Be ready, be ready. And of course, we know whether it's working out or, you know, eating right or whatever, we got to plan ahead a little bit, we ended up sort of coming out with what we take in. And so if your intake is very light on prayer, and scripture, reading and having fellowship with other people who love God and try to are trying to live lives, honor him, don't be surprised that you're well and my well is dry, to be able to give an answer for the hope that's within us. Why? Because we haven't stoke those fires of our hearts to love and to know God with with others and individually. All right. So he says, always be ready to give an answer for the hope that's within you. Then let's go to verse 18. And following Christ suffered for our sins once. All Time, okay, once for all time, He never sinned, but he died for sinners to bring you safely home to God. He suffered physical death. But he was raised to life in the Spirit, and I'm gonna stop right there. And that's what we're symbolizing. When we bring people out of the waters of baptism, you're gonna see this here in a minute because he actually talks about what baptism does for you. And for me, those of us that go through the waters of baptism, but he's saying quite clearly, we understand that Jesus Christ was buried and put into the grave, and that the very spirit of God raised him to life. That's what he's saying here. He suffered a physical death, but he was raised to live in the spirit, capital S, Father, Son, Holy Spirit. So he went, No, let's, let's hold on here to context go back one slide. So he went and preach to the spirits in prison, what is going on what's going on here? Let's read the context of what's going on those who disobeyed God, long ago, when God waited patiently while Noah was building his boat, only eight people were saved from the drowning in that terrible flood. So now you got to put your thinking caps on you got to put on your history that you know of the Bible, which you probably know some basic stories, or at least heard of them, Adam and Eve, that's Genesis one, two, and three, but quite quickly, in Genesis chapter six, so pre Genesis 12, pre Eve and Abraham, you've may have heard the story of Noah's Ark. And one of the things that we know about Noah and his ark is that is that God called him to save all the animals to about two, we know that. But you guys probably also realize if you're familiar with that story, that what happened to everybody else, what happened to all the other creatures and all the other men and women who inhabited the earth at that time? They died with the judgment of the flood. And again, we in our context, they know Wait a second, I mean, these were they poor, innocent folks know, if you go back and read the passage, it's obvious over and over and over again, you'll see this many times in the Scripture, whether it's talking about the time of Abraham the time of lot or the time of Noah, that people are given ample opportunity to do the right thing. And they mock the people of God, they mock God Himself, they don't believe they continue to go headlong into all kinds of sin and debauchery. And he's saying, if that keeps going long enough, and you can see this all the way back, if you look at Genesis, that there will ultimately be judgment that comes in this life, and in the life to come. And so that's what ends up happening is that God destroys the Earth, with water with a global one, I think, flood and you can see that from the Genesis account, but he says, who was saved, who was preserved? Only eight people were saved from the drowning of that terrible flood? Who was eight people? Well, no, and his wife and his three sons and their wives. But I didn't answer all the question who is going back and preaching in Noah's day, you can see this in the context that it must be some form of Noah that he is actually proclaiming what Christ is proclaiming, and what Peter is proclaiming. And that is that whole idea of repent and believe or trust Christ or, or he is the hope, whatever word you want to use. That is, it is obvious that something is going on here that these people who are in shackles, they are being preached to him. And saying here, he said, Well, what are you talking about spirits? Is it talking about a spirit of man or some sort of other ancient spiritual things? We don't know. Because when you go back and look at Genesis, there's some weird stuff that goes on, you have the the sons of God who come down and have relations with the daughter of men, and there's just some weird things that go on pre Genesis 12. But it doesn't matter because the points the same, whether you believe those as some sort of spiritual, angelic demonic beings, or spirits that reside in men and women who were ultimately judged by the flood, the point remains the same. That through Noah, Christ was preached, and yet they did not believe they were not saved. They were not preserved. So what's interesting here is water is used to what drown many people in that terrible flood. But, but let's not end there, because we've been talking about baptism and seeing a lot of water today. And that water is a picture of baptism. He's like, Whoa, what happened here? What's that 180 What's going on here, which now saves you not by removing dirt from your body, but as a response to God from a clean conscience is affected because of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So that's what's so cool about water is that it is used to preserve a people preserve a people know in his, in his wives and, and his children, or knowing his wife and know his sons and their wives. So eight people, but it's also saying that you and I are saved through that same water. So how it's not because I mean, you nobody came here and got baptized because it needed a bath because they were dirty because they had dirt on him and they just needed that washed off. That's not what was going on here. What was going on here. People in their heart in their conscience, were pricked to say, Man, I, I need Jesus. I've done stuff wrong. I need that God that I hear so much about that. I've read about that. That my own conscience a testifies is true. And he's saying that's what's going on here that when we are baptized in his response to God to say, God made me whole, I want to have fellowship with you. It says right here a clean conscience, oh, we all know what it is to live under a burden of guilt. And we understand that that Jesus takes that away initially when we come to Him. But then what ends up happening is that that more guilt and more sin gets piled on and what are we meant to do with that? Are we meant to just kind of bear under that, that guilt and that pressure? No, it's like giving to God and say, God, I want my conscience clean, because I've done things my own conscience condemned before. And then I go to the Scriptures. And as the other things that I've done, that the scriptures condemn me for. And so therefore, we look up to heaven and say, God made me whole. And that's what's going on here. And so when you're baptized, when I'm baptized when we baptize people, they're just saying, I wanted that Jesus, because I wanted to trust him. Because I knew that in myself, it wasn't enough. Because even my own conscience would condemn me for things. And so what is your baptism, it's not a removal of dirt from the body. It's a response to God, from a clean conscience, oh, my gosh, he's made me whole. He's made me hold in this moment.

It's affected because of why? Because of the resurrection Jesus Christ, we know it's true. And we know that it actually has effect on your life in mind, because of the power of the resurrection. Now Christ has gone to heaven. He is seated in the place of honor next to God. So what's going on here, if you know anything about sort of Christendom, it's that whole idea of the death, burial and resurrection. But it doesn't end there does it? There's also what's called the ascension, that they're waiting around at the end of the four Gospels, and they're waiting around to the beginning of the book of Acts for what? For Christ to be ascended. And so after His ascension, he goes where he goes, and to his rightful place at the right hand of God the Father, that's what's going on there. And when that occurs, then all the angels and authorities and powers accept His authority. That's so important. Because again, we find ourselves all jacked up and messed up so often because right oh my gosh, like, I can't believe I have to live with him or her, I have to be under him or her at work, or that teacher and what they're making me do and oh, you know, God, like saved me from all this, like, you know, I just, it's all it's all oppressive. It's all wrong. And God saying, No, I see you, I see you, I hear you. And ultimately, I'm over at all. And what I want to do is I want to work in your life. And my life in the midst of that. He doesn't remove us from whatever situation or plight we have. He noticed that about Christianity and God and the gospel. It isn't we all you know, will, will say, if it was just about removing us from the effects of the fall, if it was just about removing us from sin and suffering, he would take us home. As soon as you know, we said yes to him. But that's not how it works. He's saying you got to learn to trust me in this life, and be ready for the life to come. last and third and final point is how's your conscience? How's your conscience this morning, individually? Christian, for sure. I can say that corporately as a church. But where do you find yourself in this Gospel story? Again, we could go around the room. And even if you're sort of iffy on the Bible, or whether it's true or whatever like that, you and I, we could go around the room and you yourself, would say, I've done things wrong. I know I've done some things that even my own conscience condemns me for. And then when you go to the scriptures in the Bible, again, I've already said this, but you see, oh, my god, like there's other things. And then that what drives us to our need for Christ. Many people, many people this morning already said yes to that. The waters are still here. We do this regularly. God's doing something in our church. But I am again asking you and me the question, how's your conscience? Is your conscience clear this morning? That doesn't mean is it? Is it perfect that you don't think you don't do anything wrong anymore? Don't play that game. It's the whole idea of Do you know, if you're right with God, and right with others, you can get right with God and with others, whether that starting your journey for the first time and going to the waters of baptism, or doing some business with Jesus, and doing some business with others where you have to ask for forgiveness that you have to move towards what's right. Even in the midst of great pain and suffering, even in the midst when you yourself can say I don't think I've done anything wrong in this situation. Yet you still find yourself not okay. Not whole. Jesus can make you whole he can make us whole as a people. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you don't leave us alone, that you care for us that you come to us. I pray for many around this room that are thinking about coming to you that are considering your claims in your word. Father, I pray that you give them much grace and mercy this day to be able to lean in and to be able to do exactly what you have for them. Don't worry about their neighbor or their family member Are someone at work but school just just showing you and them they would get right with you and that that would lead to getting right with others we ask these things in Christ's name amen

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Sermon Transcript:

As you guys have decided to worship with us, or you're listening later on line, we're in the series called First Peter. And it is the Peter, it's the Peter you think about, maybe if you grew up in the Catholic tradition, sort of the head of the church, or if you understand, just even with the Protestant understanding that this is the guy to whom Jesus Christ said that will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and the gates of hell will not be able to overcome it. It's this guy. And he is writing later on later in life, many years after the death, burial and resurrection and the ascension of our Lord and Savior. And he's helped us with a lot of things. First of all, he understands that we're, we're scattered across the earth, he talks about how they're scattered among the known region, at that time of Asia Minor or modern day, Turkey, he talks about a living faith that's rooted in a living Savior, and he calls Jesus Christ, the living cornerstone, we talked about that last week, and because of that, that we are living stones ourselves, representatives of Christ as we go. Today, he's going to talk to us and he, right from the get go calls us dear friends. So let's see that in the passage, First Peter, chapter two, sort of the second half of that chapter, dear friends, I warn you, as temporary residents and foreigners. Now, that's such a key term throughout this whole book. And one of the reasons I wanted to study First Peter, together is that I wanted us to see in the scriptures, what we feel over and over again, that we're trying to do something, and it feels like many audiences or just feels like, Man, I just feel like I'm sort of a foreigner in my own city country, land, he understood that, dear friends, it's not that I did, like I want to come around you and put my arm around you and squeeze you and call you that. Because you are. I warn you, as temporary residents and foreigners to keep away from worldly desires, that wage war against your very souls, that oftentimes we think it would be nice if I didn't tip toe, or dip my butt, or jump right into that worldliness, and we all know what that is instinctively in our own conscience. And then we come to the Bible. And we understand that there's ways of conducting ourselves that is not of God. But he says something pretty strong here, this whole idea that, that that we're to stay away from those kinds of things, because they wage war against our very souls, who we are our inner person, the inner you and the inner me, be careful to live properly among your unbelieving neighbors, then even if they accuse you of doing wrong, they will see your honorable behavior and they will give honor to God when He judges the world. So first point I want us to see this morning and straight from the text is stay away from things that wage war against your very soul. That's our that's our forte sort of first thing that he wants us to understand in the passage this morning. And we oftentimes have to think about this and say, Well, I don't know it's kind of on the line. I don't know if I should go there. I don't know if I should do that. I don't know if I should participate in that or watch that. You know, one of the things that I have sort of tried to do throughout my life as a believer first, not just as a pastor is ask myself, Is this redeemable? In other words, is there some good in this activity in this watching of this program? or participating in this or that with my neighbor or friend? Is there something good? Is there something redeemable in it, then yes, then try to participate in it and redeem it. You and I are the ones who can go as Livingstone's representatives of Jesus Christ, and be able to be about that activity in a good way. But oftentimes, we'll find ourselves in a position like, Ah, this has gone too far. This is a bridge too far, this is something I cannot participate in. And so he's saying stay away from those things that you have come to the conclusion that conviction your own conscience tells you in the word of God tells you this will wage war against your very soul. But if it's redeemable, let's redeem it. The other thing that we are to do is think about this in terms of how the passage has already come to us that we're holding people that were priests of God. And I hope you heard the testimony of Joshua last week, if he didn't, it's worth going back and listening to because no matter where you're at, you can start the Christian life today. You can start it today and living out for him. And we're an example even if you and I don't feel very holy, or priests like that's what we are in the eyes of God. We can live in such a way and do certain things, even if people charge us and call us ridiculous, right? That's what he's talking about here is that there will oftentimes be ways that we try to honor God, you know, whether it's with, you know, having certain restrictions on your screen time or having certain restrictions on your children or minors in your home with whether they should even have, you know, a smartphone or a certain amount of screen time. It can all look quite ridiculous, but we're trying to live an honorable life and whatever it is that you're trying to do to live an honorable life. God will bless that in due time. That's what this passage is talking about. And Peter's coming alongside you and me, and calling us dear friends and saying, This will be good for us. And he's calling us to do good among everyone. Because why we're always being watched you and I can live honorable lives, sometimes we, we give ourselves a pass, because we're like why can't live a perfect life. So therefore, who cares, you know, kick back your feet, sit back in the chair, or whatever. And don't even try. And that's not true, it is true that we can't live a perfect, sinless life. But it's not true that we can't live an honorable life, that we can conduct ourselves in such a way where people recognize and believe in the God that we espouse because of our conduct. And that's what he's talking about here. And he says, Everything will come to fruition in the end, because God will judge the world. All right, let's continue on the passage this morning. Let's look at verse 13. for the Lord's sake, submit to all human authority, the passage we're looking at today, and even in the next week, it's a lot of it having to do with authority, whether the king as the head of state, so you understand that certain countries and cultures then and now may have a king or President or the officials he has appointed for the king has sent them to punish those who do wrong, and to honor those who do right. It is God's will that you that your honorable lives, there's that word again, should silence those ignorant people who make foolish accusations against you, for you are free, yet, you are God's slaves. So don't use your freedom as an excuse to do evil. Respect everyone and love the family of believers, Fear God, and respect the king. It takes wisdom to know when to do what but the second point I wants to see this morning, and I just took it straight from Ecclesiastes is, there's a time to be quiet. And there's a time to speak. And when we think about this whole idea of being under authority, and we'll get into different authorities that we're all under later, it's hard to not always fight for our rights, we think we're right. Or he No, we're right. And therefore we want to let someone have it either with our words, or our offhanded comments, whether online or in person, or in some sort of text thread. But what he's saying here is the freedom from what you and I have been set free for is now we have a new master, it's God Himself. It's not so we can be our own master. And then he has certain requirements for how we are to conduct ourselves, and how we're to live. If we do this, everyone will eventually see the wisdom and how we live our lives. So Ecclesiastes is all about and all the, what we call the prose literature, whether it's Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, this whole idea that there's a time for everything, we have to ask ourselves and ask God give me the wisdom to know, should I speak up in this situation? Or should I be quiet? It's the same question if you want to think about it from an American context that we had to ask all the way back to the Revolutionary War. And we've had to ask it over and over again, not just as Americans, but as people of God, what is it that we're supposed to do? Isn't a time to fight? Is it a time to take up arms? Or time to put them down? Is it time to mend things? Or is it time to tear things up?

And think about this first one, it starts with your conduct and my conduct in our speech and in our lives takes much wisdom, we're going to see that again, this all has to do with understanding the authority that God has put us under, for a time or a season. Let's go and go the next passage, and we'll see this in verses 18 and following you who are slaves. Now, again, we don't live in this context, or in this world anymore. And I'm gonna explain that in a minute. But we understand that we're now slaves of God, he's already used this language. But now he's just, he's just addressing those who would find themselves servants or slaves to their masters, you are slaves must submit to your Masters With all respect, do what they tell you, not only if they're kind and reasonable, but even if they are cruel, for God is pleased when conscious of his will you permanent, patiently endure unjust treatment, of course, you get no credit for being patient, if you are beating, we're doing wrong. But if you suffer if you're doing good, and then direct patient, like God is pleased with you. Every time we get to difficult passages in the scriptures, or in the Bible, you'll often see communicators preachers today, and even in days gone by, they'll either skip over them, or they'll try to twist them or they're trying to manipulate them or whatever. I want to be honest with kind of what I think is going on here and maybe be helpful as we think about difficult passages at times. Again, keep in mind, the whole thing is under the idea of authority, which we know we have authorities given to us that are good and from God and we know that we have authorities that are not good, but they're still there and we have to deal with them. I've already talked about this idea of slavery when I was preaching through the book of First Timothy and over the summer I preached that and I kind of talked about that in the Bible. There are prescriptive passages and there are described passages. Now don't get too technical, but we understand what a prescription is. When you and I are sick, we go the doctor, you end up getting a prescription that we go and we'll get it filled by the pharmacist because we believe it will help us to get better if we take the pills in the way that we're asked to do. So that's prescriptive. Also, there are descriptive passages, I'm just telling you how it is. I'm just telling you what, if you peered into the culture and time period in which this was written in, this is the kind of things they would have been dealing with, just as humans on the planet at that time. And in that culture that's descriptive. It's instructions given to a particular person, time, culture or place. And it may not be directive for how we are delivered to conduct ourselves today, you'll see this all over in the Scriptures. And so we often have to ask ourselves, what is the kernel of truth? What is the nugget of truth that sort of transcends this? Oftentimes, this is hard when we see the issue of slavery come up because of our American context of chattel slavery and that horrendous evil or our modern day context of human trafficking and slavery and that evil. We understand that chattel slavery viewed the slave as property and not human, and that led to all kinds of evil, for sure. And even back then, and 1800s, you would have maybe even had preachers or communicators who would have even defended slavery itself, using the Bible. So it becomes very difficult sometimes for us to even approach these passages. In the ancient world, of course, in Rome, they would have had classes and slavery would have been widely practice for season or for life. But I hope that you'll see that this is really just descriptive of what the culture that they found themselves in. And that we know if you look at other passages, and you think about the freedom that we have in Christ, and if you look at the word itself, that even though we had a horrendous history, with chattel or ownership, slavery, that slavery could have also meant servant, that whole idea for a season, you have a master and there is a servant relationship. And so again, we have to ask ourselves, what is it that God wants us to understand about ourselves, and how we view authority that we are to be under. And I want to be careful, because one of the ways even as a preacher, Pastor communicator, that you understand that I understand that there are such things that are bad in this world, and that people can use the scriptures to abuse those that they have authority over. So be careful with something of what we often call spiritual abuse, what is spiritual abuse, I'm gonna give you sort of my definition of that it sort of it floats around a lot, maybe online, or as you think about Christian churches or communicators. It's making someone do something they don't want to do, often in the name of Jesus, or name a church or name of Christ, but it's for personal gain. And so what happens is, is that you'll see this happen from time to time, and everybody has a history, and now it sort of is coming to light, some of the things that the practice of what you and I may consider to be spiritual abuse. And you'll see this in in verse 19, that you can take a passage like verse 19, that says, For God is pleased when even though you're conscious of his will, you patiently endure unjust treatment, if you find someone who is an abuser, what they'll do is they'll take a passage that God is using maybe to help people endure punishment that they can't do anything about. And they're saying, See, you should have this punishment that I'm giving you, right? That says crazy, that's when you know, you're being manipulated. I'll give you kind of a funny example that I used to use when I was in college. When I was in college, I lived in a dorm room with a bunch of other guys, and most of us were heading towards ministry. And so I knew the Bible, we all knew the Bible, kind of at that age 18 to 22. And I remember that one of the passages I love to read was from Luke 1413 to 15. I don't know if you know this passage was talking about when you have a banquet, invite the poor, invite the cripple invite the lame, invite the blind, and although they cannot repay you back, you will read be repaid back at the resurrection of the just. And so when I used to do is I used to go to my dorm neighbors, and I used to go and I would steal food from them, I'd take their fruit, or their moms would give them really nice care packages with good brownies and cookies. And I would just go and stick my hand in there and take it. And then sometimes I would get caught. I mean, you say like, literally it's not good, random and the guys say, What are you doing? You're taking my food, you're taking my sweet, you're taking my breakfast, let's say Whoa, don't worry, you're gonna get paid back at the resurrection of the just. What I was doing is I was manipulating a scripture, not ever so funny. But I was manipulating the scripture for what for my own personal gain. And you know, there's not just something funny and neat. But if you know that if that's being done to you and us by anyone who supposedly is a leader or authority and spiritual over you, they're doing it for personal gain. You can rest us Your that is what's going on there. So I want to be also clear that abuse is not simply when someone in authority is asking you to do something you don't want to do. We're very confused on authority right now, we're just living in sometimes there's different words for it, I don't even want to use them because they're politically charged. But I just want to use the biblical term of authority, and the saying that all of us, right now, we tolerated certain authorities for most of our existence, or our parents exist in our grandparents existence. But it's not abuse, if simply someone in authority has asked you to do something you don't want to do. Think about this with a parent child relationship. I can't tell you how many times I had to go to my children and say, Hey, clean your room, clean your room, oh, put away the dishes, put away your clothes, or whatever, do your homework or whatever. Now nine times out of 10 your children and my children, what is their gut reaction? I don't want to do it. And so and so some of them who are smart, they'll say, Oh, this is abuse, this is child abuse. Is that abuse? No, it's simply asking you to do something you don't want to do. Same thing happens with teachers, right? We're living in this age, I go, I'll pull up the cell phone, I'm gonna record him. What are you talking about? I'm here to love you to care for you. And I'm not asking you to do something for personal gain. But for your good, do it, right. That's what this passage is all about. But we're hardwired right now because of the culture and the context that we live in. Because they now know that I'm gonna buck up against authority. Think about this was police officers, and we know that they're given to us, and that nine times out of 10 They're, they're doing the right thing. And they're always trying to protect as long as they know, no, I'm gonna I'm gonna pull out the camera, I'm gonna know what's going on here. Are you think about this in terms of my own profession, where I might sit across from someone or I may say, from this stage that, you know, God designed sex for marriage, and they say, Whoa, that's not that's, that's wrong, like you're going against what I think isn't, listen, that's not for personal gain. In fact, for me to say that in modern day context, may cause you to lose a few people, I get that. But what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to help you, if I'm trying to help you, and I'm trying to use any god given authority for good and for your good and for not your ILL, whether it's parents, teachers, police officers, or your pastor or spiritual leaders, it is good. But we have to admit, it's hard for us to take isn't it? It's so hard for us to take. I think there's there's so many practical examples, I'll just speak my own life. I'm in the childbearing ages. So you have, you know, teachers that you run up against. And so we often will find ourselves using man, that didn't seem right, that didn't seem just my kid got caught up in that, I think he was innocent, or they forgot to do this and it caused harm to my child are, you know, all these kinds of things. And I would just say same thing at work, you and I are sort of hardwired to sort of, you know, defend self and to buck up against, you know, our bosses or our authorities over us, we're, we're in a time right now, where we want to shoot those at the top and any institution or organization. What I try to do is I try to ask ourselves, unless it's an urgent need, like your child just got the snot beat out of him at school today. Ask yourself in those situations, can I just wait a week? Let me just process this, let me just think, is it big enough to rise to the level I need to deal with it in terms of addressing that authority?

Then you look for patterns? Has this consistently been true? I'm just saying there's little things that we need to do as believers who live honorable lives, that of course, we have to address things sometimes. I mean, I don't think our forefathers were wrong to eventually go to war, you know, with England, but it's through a lot of different trying of different means. And in same way with us is that, that not only is it true, that will, you know, catch more bees with honey than with vinegar. But to be believers who live honorable lives before watching world, let's be men and women who figure out ways to honor those in authority, even when we have to address things that are a concern for us. Boy, just even that right there is so radical, isn't it? Just this church, if everyone under the sun, my boys would just say, when I address things to authorities, when I think that they are in the wrong or awful little bit, I'm going to do it in such a way that honors them and honors My God. And sometimes what that means is that we let it go. How hard is that? Right? We want to get on our little text thread. We want to get on our we want someone to know how we've been wronged and one of the things you're going to learn as I continue in this passage is you're gonna see we already have one who has wronged in more ways than you and eyes could ever imagine. And yet somehow he was silent before his accusers. Let's continue on the passage and see this. I think this beautiful idea here in first Peter for God called you to do good, even if it means suffering, just as Christ suffered for you. He is your example. We might not like it but guys, we don't have it on the front door but we're Christian. Since I was asked this week, so I'm pulled around the parking lot looking for a hardware store. What is this place? Is this a place where Christians gather? Yes, this is a Christian church. And so we are Christ's followers. He is our example. And you must follow in his steps. He never sinned, nor ever deceived anyone. He did not retaliate when he was insulted. Not you and me right? When you like mama bear, Papa Bear, you come after my kids, you come after someone, I love my friend, I'm gonna let you have it. He did not retaliate when he was insulted, nor threatened revenge when he suffered, he left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly, he personally carried our sins in his body, on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right by his wounds. You and I are healed. Once you were like sheep who wandered away. But now you have turned to your Shepherd, the guardian of your souls. See this, this this strength that I'm talking about? It's not in you and me. Okay? Because we have to admit what's in you and me. When someone comes up against you in me, what we want to do is we're either ones who want to shoot first and ask questions later. Or we we sort of push it in, right, so some of y'all internalize pain and wrong until us outbursts, when we have pain and wrong, and some of us are combination of both, depending on the situation. And what he's saying here is that the only way we're going to respond in different ways to the wrong that's done to us is if we first turn to the shepherd, the guardian of our souls, at least our third and final point this morning, by His wounds, we are healed. Do we really believe that? That what we just did we partook of the cup, and partook of the unleavened bread, that God Himself that were proclaiming something that is true about the God of the universe, that is also true for us that His blood is enough. That it really is enough to cover our sins, cover our brokenness, cover our hate, cover our times were misunderstood. cover our struggles. When we try to live honorably, and we fall and we stumble, we don't even care if we live honorably, we don't have to retaliate. Why not? Because what someone's doing to us is no big deal. It is a big deal. There's a lot of pain and hurt in this room, I get that. But it's saying it's got to be dealt with one way or the other, in the way that I'm able to find comfort is because the God of the universe saved your soul in mind is that it's going to be dealt with either on the cross, or at the final judgment seat. And let's just call it MIT around the room. When you and I have had thoughts of revenge and retaliation, it eats us up inside, doesn't it? You ever been there where you're holding something against someone and they're either clueless or they don't care, or they're moved on to go and destroy someone else's life? What you and I do is we're walking wounded, aren't we, we're walking around with a hole inside of us what some of us are walking around, and that we're actually a shell of who God created us to be. God says you are loved. We don't feel it. We don't see it. We don't sense it. God says you are forgiven. And we're like, I don't know, I don't think that's me. And what we're doing is, we're just denying the reality of the universe that God wants to say, by the blood of Christ, by His wounds by Jesus Christ wounds himself, we can be healed. We're finding all kinds of other things to try to heal us up. Let's spend the money we don't have whether it's addiction to legal things, or illegal things, we're all trying to fill the holes that are there because of the hurt and the pain and the brokenness that we've experienced. And we just don't let God heal us. So this morning, I don't know where you're at in this journey with all this, but I don't want to walk around like a zombie. I don't want to walk around like a shell of the person that God created me to be, I want to be fully his and I want to be fully known. I want to be whole and he promises that he can do that. If we will yet open ourselves up and say, God make me whole. I'm hurting and I've hurt. And I believe that by your wounds, I'm going to count on your wounds. I'm going to count on the scars that you took in order to make me whole may it be Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you don't leave us wandering or wondering who you are or what you're capable of doing in our lives. I pray for many in this room that feel like there is something missing. There is things that we have in our hearts where we're upset because someone's hurt us. Me hurting right now me and I don't even know why we hurt we did hurt. We tried to numb it and so many other ways. The God you've come through are you to say, let me be your God and you can be my people. So Father, I pray that you do that for many in this room as they are leaning in to what you have for him. God help us we pray this day and all the days of our life. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you guys, thank you guys for being here and trust that you've had a good week as we just celebrate various things in our community around the city. Well, we are in the book of First Peter last week we're in First Peter, chapter one today will be in the first part of First Peter, chapter two. It is the Peter, this is the guy that we think about who is the rock, he is the one who helped, you know, birth, the church, whatever tradition you come from, that we understand that to be true about him. And so we're learning about what he wants to say, to those who are scattered to those who are foreigners, to those who feel broken. We read last week in his intro, just that whole idea that he's talking to all these various churches around the cities of Asia Minor, which is present day, Turkey. And if we feel scattered, if we feel like we're foreigners, that we're living in an age and in a time that we do not control whether it's our own lives, or our own city, our own community, our own nation or world. That's who Peter was talking to. So we'll get right into it. First Peter, chapter two, beginning in verse one. And it says this right here, so get rid of all evil behavior, and how was he able to say that, keep in mind what we talked about last week, it was because of who Jesus is, and what he's done in our lives. You remember last week, we talked about Christ being the Living Hope. That's how we can sing that Christ has all of us in all of our heart this morning, is because for many of us around the room, we have a new identity, we have a new life, because of who Christ is, and what he has done. Jesus is alive, and he made us alive in him. And that makes all the difference. So when they say something like this, so get rid of all the evil behavior. That makes sense. Because when you're on a new path, when you're on a new journey, you put some things away, right? We've all done spring cleaning, where we put some things out of our house, we put them by the curb, and how long do they last by the curb in El Paso. Okay, now very long, right? Because we know we got to put that out of our house. I don't need that junk in my house anymore. Why? Because we're going to put some things on but we got to get rid of all evil behavior be done with all deceit, hypocrisy, jealousy, and all unkind speech. Now, how are they able to say that, because God has done something in our heart, but it's also able to say that because that's what we've been about. So if we're honest around the room, we'd have to say, man, there's been a time that I've been a deceiver, there's been a time that I've been jealous. There's been a time where I've been a hypocrite, and I've spoken unkindly, to those in my household, my friends, at work at school, wherever. So he's calling us right from the get go. I know you've been there. I know, as your pastor, you've been there. I've been there. He's saying, let's put that away. It's not that we haven't done that before we've done it. We're Guilty as charged. But let's put that away. How are we going to do that? Look at verse two. Because here's what's going on here. Like newborn babes, you must crave pure spiritual milk, so that you will grow into a full experience of salvation. And I know as I go around the room, this is what many of y'all want, you'd raise your hands. And that's what I want. I want to grow into what God has for me. I want to experience this resurrection power that I hear about so often. He wants that for you and me, but what's going to be the linchpin what's gonna get us there? It says that we're gonna have to crave the spiritual milk like a baby, I'll give up just so you have this image in your head, right? You're like, I don't need a bottle anymore. Basta. I know how old I am. We've got a few babies scattered throughout here. They got bottles, not me. No, that's where we're at. We need that spiritual milk we need to grow and to be strong. Why? Because he goes on in this passage, he says, We've got to cry out for this nourishment, the spiritual milk window, the next slide will see this in the verses here. Cry out for this nourishment. Now that you have had a taste of the Lord's kindness. That's what happens when we come to church, or we experience love and fellowship with community or maybe somebody invited you into their home, or you're part of some sort of group. Are you new? Are you around other believers? You're like, Why do I feel strangely warm inside? Why do I feel kindness coming from this individual or how they served me or loved me? This love of Christ, that's what has happened. We need to not just acknowledge as well that's nice that I got that kindness from God right? through other people. God showed me kindness, but it's this whole idea that we have to cry out for this nourishment. And so let's see this next picture. So we can just make sure you understand that this baby's not happy. Why you ever done this before you hold the bottle, like right there. You're not trying to be mean, like you're fumbling around, right? Because I've been there. I've had the baby in my lap and then sometimes they really get going, they get to rock in and all that and so upset, but they're upset because they know there's something good and nutritious and that's being held back from me and so it

God is calling us to cry out for this nourishment, this spiritual nourishment that He has for us. And if we do, what do we end up being? Oh, look at the happy little baby, right? Just have you can't see the smile, but you know it's there, right? Because they're so tiny that at that age, the smile goes right into the bottom. But because what has happened here, just like babies taste and see the Lord's kindness, that's what we are meant to do. One of my favorite songs is Psalm 34, eight it says, taste and see that the Lord is good. That's one aspect of what I do week in and week out, whether it's through word or through worship, or through testimony, or song or whatever that we're saying, Look, see, the Lord is good. First point I wants to see as far as we are to cry out for spiritual milk were to cry out for spiritual milk. It's just like what Jesus talked about in the book of Matthew and what's called the Beatitudes, those blessings. And we'd all raise your hands and say, I want blessing in my life pastor, it says this in Matthew five or six, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled, or they shall be satisfied, right? What is going on there? It's that illustration in the Bible in the scriptures that we know what babies need, we know what babies are like. And spiritually, we are called to be those kinds of men and women. Verse four says this, in that same chapter, you are coming to Christ, who is the living cornerstone of God's temple, he was rejected by people. But he was chosen by God, for great honor. Now, one of the things I've got up here is I've got a block, okay, not a brick, but a block. And, you know, there's a, there's a little difference for those you guys that around construction. Now one of things you may or may not know about your pastor is, I didn't come from like, you know, some sort of spiritual lineage, a family or anything like that. And I'm sort of a contractor. And so I don't know what it was like, was you growing up, but when you're the son of someone who has an occupation or trade like that, you're out on the field with them, and you're learning what it is to build a house. And so one of the things that was so important was to have a cornerstone, but you just couldn't go out in the middle of a field and put up a cornerstone, I'm gonna show up the first picture here. So I primarily understood construction in the southeast. And here, we have some some desert, and we also do a lot of slabs. But what I grew up with in the southeastern part of the United States in the 80s, and in the 90s, is we dug footings, okay, and so you'd have somebody come out, and if they come out, you know, a lot of times on Monday morning, they had a really, really nice weekend. And it was hard for them to get moving, you know what I'm talking about here. And so that's what happened. And we would be with the guys and they would, they would dig the footing. And then immediately after that, we would pour the concrete. So if you go to the next picture there, you'll see that we would pour the concrete now, now this, this is a misnomer. Here, I could not find a picture of what it was really like for me to be out on the construction site in the 80s and 90s. First of all, I was six years old out there. Okay, so you see the guy holding little thing. My dad, he didn't give me any helmet. He didn't give me any sort of best, okay? It was when that thing starts swinging, you get out of the way. Okay. And if you fall into the concrete get out, it's like, no, no, I mean, you're gonna help me? No, no, because I'm gonna be busy over here. You fall in the concrete, you get out and a porta potty. I never saw one of those on construction sites, you find someplace to go. Okay. And so this is I could not find they did not take pictures of my participation on the construction site with my family as a child because they would have been taken to jail. Okay. Because because there was no there was no, there was no safety whatsoever. And I should have been at school a lot of times, but Dad would pull you out of school, if someone didn't show up. Because again, they'd had a really, really nice weekend. So you'll know what I'm talking about. So. So that's what what happened that we would be there for pouring the footing. We're still not to the cornerstone yet. If you know anything about building houses, eventually

the concrete would harden, go to the next picture. And so then we would use these instruments. Okay, now what would happen with these is you had to make sure it was level now we didn't have the fancy ones with the lasers. Okay, now they have the ones where like one person can do is like, BB BB, and we'd have those. Okay, it was me standing there. Again, ignore the hard hats and pitcher somebody a lot shorter. Okay, and so and then you had to remember numbers all the time. She had to keep numbers up in your head. You had to remember the numbers from I don't know why we never bought a pad out. I'm not really sure. So you'll maybe know that if you got some families or uncle's that take you out on the jobsite and say I remember the numbers. You had to remember if it was level and then you had to remember the numbers to make sure it was square. You don't I'm talking about we would take a nail and so you have the concrete like this. And we would put nails into the four corners of the foundation and feel

Then we make sure that it was the same distance tag, you know, why do we want to make sure it's the same distance. I know if y'all know this from school, that's how you know it's square. And so we would do that, then we were able to take this block, and we would have a concrete nail right in here. And we would put blocks on there. And we would make sure that the corners, all four corners, the cornerstones, were at the right place, and they were level. And oftentimes you didn't have to take a trial. And you would put the concrete here and you attack down just a little bit to make sure that the corners were square, and they were level so that the guys could come in. And even if it hadn't had too much drink, they could build the block foundation. Now I say all that to say that, we understand that we understand that this is this is rock, this is block, this is dead. But what the Scriptures say about all this is, wait a second, Jesus is a living cornerstone, how in the world does that work? This isn't alive. This isn't vibrant. This is dead concrete. But what the scripture say according to verse four, is that, that in coming to Christ, He is the Living cornerstone of God's temple. Now wait a minute, they would have understood the temple was that place that's built up that has rock you can go to one side of the wall today in Jerusalem, Israel, to the Wailing Wall, which is one part of the wall that got to the temple, they would have said, that's a temple. I know what a building is. I know what a building is when this gets all complete, but you're saying that Christ Himself is a living stone? How is it that rocks or stones live? We know it's true, because he didn't die and go into the grave. He rose again. And he's very much alive for you and me today. But he's building something in your life and in my life, and he's building a foundation. And it's different. It's hard for us to get in our heads because we understand sort of dead rock. But Jesus is telling us he is the living stone. Let's go on further though. Verse five. He goes on to say, not only is he the living stone, you and I are. Notice this jump this leap in verse five, you are living stones that God is building into his spiritual temple. What's more, you and I are His holy priest, through the mediation of Jesus Christ, you offer spiritual sacrifices that please God, many of y'all around the room like, I don't know about any of that second part, okay? I can get on board that Jesus is maybe a living stone, I get that He's the Son of God, King of the universe. But me, how am I a living stone? What's true, that's the second point I wants to see this morning. We are living stones, and God is building us up into his spiritual temple. Maybe you've heard this before that, when Jesus came, what he was essentially saying is, you don't have to go to a building, you don't have to go to Jerusalem, you don't have to go to a place to meet God. God now resides in the hearts of men and women. And so when you and I step into any thing, anything into our work into our community, into our homes, into our schools, we are now representative of the king. Why? Because of what God's done in our heart, and he's building us into His spiritual temple. Now, some of you are like, no, no Pastor, I get it, you've got to keep building these blocks all the way up. And then you put bricks on top of that, and eventually you get a house, I get that, because I think I'm on the real, real low rung of all this, okay, I'm just starting out, I'm not even sure I've got the first block or brick or cornerstone. But that's not what he's talking about. Here. He is saying that as soon as you come to Christ, you are endowed. You don't say what endowment is, but you are endowed, you are given you are receiving as Your inheritance all that God has for you and me in Christ Jesus. So that means when you and I don't feel very holy, when you and I don't feel like we're the holy priests, representatives, when you did, I don't think we have any sort of spiritual sacrifices to give to others, much less to God. That's not the point. God is declaring us righteous, even though we might not feel like it's very similar to what Chris was calling us to in that song. Whether you feel like it or not, he is near to you and me, in a very present help in time of trouble. The other thing I want you to see is it's not individualistic, when it says that God is building, go back to the previous slide, if you don't mind for a minute, when he says he is building His spiritual temple, this phrase right here are he said that it exists, that we are the temple of God as soon as we receive Christ, it exists together. So the building block is me and Allah, Sally and Chris, and Joshua and all these different people and Gabrielle and all these people who are around this room being built up together in love. That's the spiritual temple, which is amazing because it means that we are interlocked together, just like walk and just like brick

that is not individualistic. You're not sitting here singing and thinking, Well, me and God got to figure this out. Yes, God is in the picture. But guess what God has given you men and women alongside of you, to walk alongside you in this idea that God is building something here. And that's why we're always calling Do you want to be a part? Do you want to be a part of what God's doing at this local community at this local church? He's offering so much to you and me. Therefore, it leads us into the second point we are living stones, we're not dead stones. God's not done with us. In fact, he's just beginning with us. And he has all kinds of things that he wants to do in your life and in mind, and it's vibrant, just like he has life, that same life that's in Christ Himself is in us, Jesus Christ Himself, the hope of glory. Let's see this continue on the Scriptures. He says, verse six, as the scripture say, We're all in one passage here. 10 verses, Second Peter chapter.

I mean, First Peter, chapter two, verses one through 10, as the Scriptures say, I am placing a cornerstone in Jerusalem, chosen for great honor. And anyone who trusts in him will never be disgraced. Yes, you trust him recognize the honor God has given him but for those who reject Him, the stone that the builders rejected has now become the cornerstone. And he is the stone that makes people stumble, the rock that makes them fall, they stumbled, because they do not want to obey God's word. And so they meet the fate that was playing for them. Okay. So again, we understand that, that, that theologically, and practically, those whom Christ came to many rejected him in this day, and in his day, specifically, first his own people, right, just that holiday, he came as a Jewish man. And many Jewish people rejected him some believe, and he's talking now to mainly Gentiles to say, you know how it works. This is a stumbling block to many people, they stumble, because they do not obey God's word. And so they meet the fate that was planned for them. So people who reject Christ, they're not rejecting you and me. They're rejecting God himself, because we don't want to get our lives in line. Because we like what we like, we like our sin, that's what happens. And we'll meet whatever fate was playing for us. But you're not like that. So he's always given us the positives for you. And I going to the next slide, for you are a chosen people we talked about this last week, he uses that same language that he would have used for Israel to talk about the people of God, you are a royal priests. So I don't feel like that I know, the Royal priests is Pastor, I've seen priests and the callers and they have the tower. And they, they go behind the little doors, and they do the little things with. He's saying, listen, that system was broken down to where you and I are now mediators, conduits of God's grace. That's what it means that now the Spirit of God resides in the hearts of men and women, that we can now go out and do what God has for us. We don't need to go between between us and God. So we are all priests in that sense. We are a holy nation, a group of people who love one another. So Israel was existing in the Old Testament, but that was just to be a light to the nations. Now we are able to go to the nations and we are the nation's God's very own possession. You are God's. As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for He has called you out of darkness into his wonderful life. Isn't that so amazing that we get to now show people, God's goodness, once you had no identity, identity is a big thing. In our day and age, we had no identity as people we were just wandering around. Now we are God's people, once you receive no mercy, now you have received God's mercy is so amazing. This leads to a third point wants to see this point and that you and I can show the goodness of God. Now you might think, man, Pastor, I get it. Maybe it's just easier for you. It's harder for me, you've been walking with Jesus for a long time. And you know, you know a lot of different folks and maybe know a lot different things. And no, no, Hugh and I can show the goodness of God now, do not buy into the lie, that you have to somehow attain some sort of spiritual mark in order to start being about your father's business, you and I can get about the things of God immediately, immediately once we come to Christ. And in fact, we are compelled to do so. And if we don't, our hearts will grow dry. They will grow hard. We have a new identity we have received mercy. So now you and I can show mercy. And I know we struggled to believe that I think maybe in some distant future when I'm older when I'm stronger. Well, I've got a friend I want to introduce to you this morning who didn't wait to get about what God had for him. And so Joshua wants you to come up and adjustment Toronto and he's going to come on up here and and this guy's gonna bring on some souls and, and Josh, thank you so much for being here. You're going to you're going to hear his story about just how he's been able to show the goodness of God in recent days, in the midst of some great

great strife. So, Joshua, thank you for being here. So why don't you go ahead and just introduce yourself to us. My name is Josh. Joshua Medrano. Yeah. How long you've been coming to life church. So initially, I started about eight years ago, it has been on and off, went through some tragic stuff there and lost the job loss of friend to an accident. And

obviously, as we go on, a struggle with drinking and alcohol.

As I talked to pressure grin, when I first started coming back again, he had put it in, in a sense of where I really didn't grow up in a traditional and religious home. Everything is still new to me.

I'm still, you know, trying to jump into the pool of faith. But you know, that's how I initially kind of started with the struggles of those. Yeah. So tell us how long have you been baffled as we're sitting here in October? When did you actually get August 5? I'm sorry. 6/13, August 13? to about two months ago. Yeah, gosh, yeah. So just just months, and just diving all in for Jesus. Now, I appreciate you so much for being here. And I know, it's been a tough week, and I want you to talk a little bit, a little bit about that, and how you've been able to get through it. So again, you know, it was really hard for me, as you can tell, I'm a bigger guy. So growing up, I was a big kid. And it was very, you know, kids can be, you know, tough and mean. And I always felt, you know, alone in you know, out of it, because I wasn't really accepted, you know, at school, and then coming home was kind of tough, but there has always been a constant in my life. And that was my my oldest brother, Hector.

He,

he had he, you know, he got sick at a very young age and was unable to kind of, you know, get oxygen to the brain. And he, you know, got diagnosed with cerebral palsy and, and many other health impairments, but he was a main constant in my life. He never, you know, I got home, and he was always sitting in his chair. And, you know, I was always able to sit next to him and, you know, put on movies and be able to spend some good time without having to worry about, you know, what was going on at school, or what else was going on in my life as a kid.

And he initially was the one that taught me like, what love was, you know, he never obviously could be questioning me, but you know, it just felt, you know, through his own spoken words that, you know, I was loved by Him.

And, of course, as he as we grow, he went through some surgeries and procedures, try to, you know, correct his back, or, you know, if he was having trouble breathing,

at a point, he had to stop eating, you know, used to mouth freedom, you know, as we grew. There are times where he was, you know, going through some hard times in the hospital, when those were the times where I sat in my bed and later and prayed, prayed to God, again, never really knew him knew, knowing anything other than maybe some basic stories, what have you. And sure enough, you know, you know, even even through the doctors told my mom, you know, this time, he's not gonna probably make it again, they had told her told my mom at a time that he wouldn't even be live past the age of three. You know, at that time, he's already 2025 30

You would always come back. And I always knew, you know, God gave me another chance with him. But I, you know, again, I never came to church and never, you know, gave myself to God, you know, I felt selfish and seeing that now. And, like I said, again, as I struggled with my own demons, you know, I went to alcohol for that for that stuff. And I knew that wasn't right either. And so when I lost my my initial friend, he died in an accident. He was one of the first people to kind of show me that love and friendship as well. And one of the main stories I say about that is I remember, you know, getting getting into fun home for the weekend, and then getting stranded in the middle of nowhere. You kind of drunk out of it. And I called him and with no question, he came short slippers, pick me up. And then again, shortly after he had passed away, and I felt empty at that time, and that's when I decided to come. Yeah, that seems to come and then, but then kind of tell us, you know, where we're at today and and kind of what happened in the last 10 to 12 days, and just how we're here right now. So, October 15. I got a call from my sister at 6am. And initially, I knew

they'd never call me.

He was rushed to the hospital, spitting out blood and not being able to breathe.

And at that time, from again, from what I understand, of course, he had

gone without oxygen for 12 minutes.

The human brain shouldn't be going on, shouldn't be going out with the oxygen for at least four minutes. So I initially knew, but I didn't want to accept it, obviously. And through that, through that time, you know, I was at the hospital every day. And I had reached out to the Pastor Brent for some prayers, kind of the first time I ever really reached out to him,

and just asked, you know, if anything to help my brother, find peace, because, you know, he's been through pain all his life.

And it was tough because I celebrated my birthday on the 19th.

And I felt like I didn't have the right to celebrate it, from what was going on, but my family helped me, you know, celebrate it.

And then, three days later, on the 22nd, last Sunday, he took his last breath at 1:05am.

And I remember my parents coming in and told me and I, again, felt empty and alone, and, but I knew I had to come to church. And I came, I came in my shorts and some Crocs and T shirt, which was, you know, something a little about this churches, you can just come. I think that's what God loves is that you guys just come and no matter how you're dressed, and worship Him for at least the hour that we're here.

And then, I mean, I just love you, brother. And one of the things that God was able to do was he was able to use you to really speak into the life of your family and really show the goodness of God I know, you know, again, to this day, your families on big church gum, you know, family, but I was gonna ask you, you know, in light of what we're talking about here, and I'm calling other people to show the goodness of God. Do you feel like like a royal priesthood? A holy person? Oh, no, I

think I'm perfect at this. I know for sure. Yeah. But um, tell us, you know, and kind of closing, how were you able to share the goodness of God with your family and friends, and I think we have a picture of you at the podium there. And I know you were able to share a little bit about the but the love of Christ and your love for your brother. So share a little about what God allowed you to do this week, just two days ago, to finally we laid them to rest on Friday, the was, I'm sorry, the 27th.

The 27th You know, that was something that was really hard for me. And again, be a little try to make it short. But you know, initially, first off, it was family

had been spending the night at my mom's house since last Sunday. So I was there every day. My brother had rushed in. He's from Stanford, Arizona, seemed that he came within two hours once he found out and then he brought his nephews, home, his kids, my my nephews, being able to be around them and trying to keep my mind off of the things, you know, keeping me young,

wanting to play fortnight or playing these games.

They helped me initially again, and then moving forward towards the friends you know, I have, I didn't really get any real friends until like seventh grade. Mikey, Eric, Sean and Daniel, to name a few. Even though we you know, through the years, we don't stay connected, or you know, we're handling on our own demons or what have you. They've always been there when when I needed them, or if they need me, I tried to be there.

And so they've reached out and obviously, you know, tried to put their things aside to be there for me. And of course, newer friends, like I said, growing up being teased and made fun of, it's really hard for me to trust people, something I'm working on. But my newer friends like Megan, Sabrina, Priscilla,

Liz all,

the Vall came to show support. Even a friend, Steve came from Austin just to show his respects.

You know, just helping me trying to not feel empty. And of course, saving the best for last is the church. You know, again, I took a lot for me to come last Sunday after my brother passed. But I knew I needed to. And I know at that time, Pastor Brent was going through a message and I can't remember right now but it was something to do with even this is happening, you shouldn't stop loving.

And that's something that my brother taught me was how to love and how to not judge people or how to you know, be patient and work with things whatever it may have you

and even today, I had signed up for preschool that's something I love the kids such as Lucas and Adeline and Charlotte and you know, you guys have amazing kids. They feel my heart they feel my heart of joy because

like them, I'm learning with them but they don't know that and like teaching, let's teaching them but I know I'm learning.

As I try to, you know, learn from the beginning and learn now I'm trying to handle both. And like you said

Uh, you know, it's crazy. It was my one of my friends had reached out. And I told him, you know, yeah, I'm getting a little overwhelmed trying to beat them. I want to be alone. But I want I'm going to church and we go and talk. And he said, just like you crazy because he's, he's not really a churchgoer, either, but he said, go through your spiritual solo, which was, you know, and you go over that. And so I thought that was crazy. And,

again, Hannah, who's been courageous enough to start a young adult group that I've been trying to go to, she's helped as well, very, you know, you know, she doesn't judge me, you know, I might ask dumb questions, I feel like, but she's always there to answer. So that's been very grateful as well. And then just like today, you know, I know one thing for sure is God does come first, as you said, construction.

With any good construction building, you need a good foundation. And that first foundation is God. And as, as if you make that strong, that building that you build will not tip over, even through the hardest of hurricanes. So good. Thank you so much. I want to I want to pray for you and even get into the fact that he bless others. You're not a public speaker, and he got up and I know, he shared this a long time.

Yeah, I mean, it's like I said,

when I was up there, I was trying to make amends again, with everything. Again, I grew up with a lot of anger and hate. And, you know, again, God has helped me this one is the the first I will be celebrating two years of being sober.

Again, knowing, knowing that my brother is in the arms of the Lord helps me because I know, we carry the Lord everywhere we go. And I know I can carry my brother everywhere I go now. And, and again, I'm just happy that he's, he's at peace. He's healthy, you know, and he's with other loved ones that have passed. And I just want to continue to honor him, you know, through love and you know, just to be a better man than I was yesterday. And that's what I try to do every day.

That's pretty cool. I'm gonna pray for all guests. Let's Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for my brother, Joshua. And I just thank you for the courage that it took for him to get up here this week after already spending just so much time pouring out. And Father, I pray that you would just bless his efforts to continue to love You and to know you and to grow in you. Father, I pray for the words that came out of Joshua's mouth that they may penetrate hearts around the room in ways that I can't or even maybe didn't even come straight from scripture, but just came straight from one man's heart to a people. And I thank you that you're moving in this church, that you're not done with us, that you're not done with Joshua, and I pray God's blessing on him. I pray that you bless him even 10 times more tenfold, because of just his love that He has for you. And then he shows for others and of course we ask all of this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Amen and Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

I appreciate y'all Thank y'all so much for being here. And I know it may be heavy for you this week, I've talked about it before. But at any given time in our church community, about a third of the people here are involved in government job in some way, whether it's military or otherwise, I know this hits home. And then if you're not that, or even in light of all that, we also have our own struggles and brokenness and things that we're working through. So I know you may come to church heavy, you may come to church with questions, you may be just fine. You may have had a great week, you may have gotten a new job found out you were pregnant, somebody got married, somebody got engaged, all this kind of thing, your kid won some sort of honor, that's all good as well. So we come in a number of different ways. As we come to the Lord, we come to church this morning, the book of First Peter, which is where we're going to be reading from today, and we're going to be in this series for the next several weeks. Peter understood all this, he's really coming to us and writing us a letter that would have been circulated around Asia Minor, which is present day Turkey. As a more mature man, if you know anything about Peter, from the Gospels, you see this whole idea that he was close to our Lord and Savior, He was the mouthpiece, a lot of the disciples for good, or for ill. He was the one who got to walk on water. But he was also the one that sunk when he took his eyes off of Jesus. He's the one that denied Jesus, but he was also the one restored by Jesus. He was the one that was called to be fishers of men. And he dropped his net along with his brother, and he followed Jesus for three years, but he's also the one that has to be reminded of his commission and his mission at the end. And now we're about three decades beyond that. So about 33 ideas, when we understand Jesus died and rose again and ascended into heaven, about 30 years after that, Peter, the Peter, the pier that the Catholic Church recognizes as the head of the church, but that even we, as non Catholic believers recognize as a instrumental figure in the faith. This Peter is writing some three decades later, to the churches in Asia Minor, and he's gonna identify himself. And so we'll begin in verse one. And here's how this book begins. This letter is from Peter, and apostle of Jesus Christ. Now even these greetings, this would be something that would raise their hearts immediately up. Oh, good. It's Peter. We know about him. We've heard about him. We know he was with our Lord and Savior. He, unlike Paul, Paul often calls himself an apostle and undo time, why because he met the risen Lord on the road to Damascus, Peter hung out with him. Peter was there as an apostle, he was one of the original disciples that we call apostles. And he's saying, This is who I am, I'm telling you, I am from the front of my letter, I am writing to God's chosen. Now one of the things you're going to notice about the language of this letter is he begins to use Old Testament references to the people of God in the New Testament, or what we sometimes call the New Covenant us, the people of God. And oftentimes, we'll talk about Jews and Gentiles are Jews and non Jewish people. And what you see here is when Jesus comes, he comes for the world. And one of the things that happens is that we now know ourselves to be believers if we've repented and believed. And we understand that, in that faith, that we were chosen by God, that he orchestrated it all behind the scenes, just like he chose Israel as a blessing to the nations. He now is choosing us us as believers, that the hope of God resides in us that we are now what he's writing to God's chosen us, people who are living as foreigners. Now, that idea of foreigners like what is going on here, again, he's referencing Old Testament stuff that they would have understood the same way that James writes, we've already been through the book of James, but the same idea that the dispersion those who are scattered throughout many provinces or throughout many cities, he's saying, I understand that when you live outside of what the Old Testament would say, outside of Jerusalem for an Old Testament person, they wanted to maintain their home the residence in Jerusalem or through the temple, those kinds of things, but what happened to them when they were taken by the Babylonians, they found themselves in dispersion. That's where we get the book, Daniel and other things. We've talked about that before. He's using that same language to talk about us as New Testament believers. We feel like we're lost at times we feel like I'm not sure this is my home. I feel like I'm in my house. I feel like I'm in my city, but I'm not really in it because I don't feel at home. This is what he means when he's talking to some passages call this the

Warners, some call it the dispersion, some call it to scattered. And sometimes we already talked about this, we have scattered lives and we have broken hearts. And that's what he's talking about. And he's saying, I'm writing to God's chosen people, which is us New Testament, New Covenant believers, understanding that God chose us in Christ before the foundation of the world, that's Ephesians. One, we're living as foreigners. That's how we feel we're in this world, but not of this world. And we're scattered, we're scattered this is again, Asia Minor, that they would be talking about all these different cities, these areas, these locations, so he's talking to all of us. Now here's what he gonna say, God the Father.

Know the next slide God the Father knew you and chose you long ago. Okay, so you see how he worked originally through a nation and a people group Israel to bless the world. Now he's working through people. It's the whole idea of Pentecost, we referenced this last week with the guest preacher, the idea of acts that the Spirit of God comes down so that we may go out in the world. God knew you and me and chose us long ago, and His Spirit has made you and I holy. So now, the temple resides in the hearts of men and women. If you consider yourself a believer, a lot of times in the old way, we would say, we asked Jesus into our heart, or God changed my heart. It's Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It's all the same concept, that what has happened to us is that God's Spirit has made us holy, you and I may not feel very holy, let me I feel dirty when they feel abused, and may feel misunderstood and may feel kicked around and they feel lost. Maybe like I don't know what's going on in the world or in my home life. But he's saying, I want you to stick with me because if God has put His Spirit inside of you, He has declared you and I wholly as a result, you and I have a bait him and being cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ. So because of what because God quickened our hearts and many of us in the room made a decision to follow him. And we fall oftentimes in believers baptism to let the world know, I'm in. I want to be a part of this new covenant, this New Testament, He says, as a result of what God has done in our heart, then comes obedience. This is important and understanding the Christian faith, that it's not something we work up or or that we somehow do enough good things to a God accepts us or chooses us no, in spite of wherever we're at.

He does this as a result, we now have obeyed him and been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ. May God give you more and more grace and peace. Peter's just dispensing this this morning. Do you hear the good news? I know this letter is almost 2000 years old, but we're meant to receive it as a church as a letter, say, Peter, saying make grace and peace. I mean, we, you know, we all hear the term alcoholic rageous need alcohol over and over again before they feel like you can survive and get up the next morning. Grace a Holic is a good term for us understand, like in terms of Christianity, that we just needed more and more peace, I need it more and more because I feel the unrest in my heart and in my spirit, and Peter's dispensing it to all who will hear and believe all praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, she see that Trinitarian action their Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, is by His great mercy, that we've been born again, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead. This is the hope this always sing about sometimes when you look at this verse, in other translations, you'll see this idea of living hope. That is the whole point this morning. That is the whole point of chapter one at first, Peter, he wants us to understand that Christ Himself is a living hope. And we'll define all of that means here in the next few minutes. Now we live with great expectation, and we have a priceless inheritance, and inheritance that is kept in heaven for you. And for me, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay. Because why it's not a dead faith. It's a living faith. And through your faith, God is protecting you by His power until you receive this salvation, which is ready to be revealed in the last day for all to see. So be truly glad. There's wonderful joy ahead. And he said, Wait a second, I don't feel this, right. I'm feeling the pain, the suffering, the angst, he understands that he's writing to that very situation. But he's saying in that there can be joy, because it's secure. Our Heavenly reality what we see and what we feel doesn't always define reality. There is something beyond there is wonderful joy ahead. Even though you must endure many trials for a little while. I don't like it Jesus. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. Can there be another way Jesus it is being tested as far tests and purifies gold gold, I like gold, right? Like money. I like I'll be able to buy things I'll be able to do things though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. Wait a second. You're telling me my very

If faith is more precious than that, so that when your faith remains strong, through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. So there's this transaction is going on all the time that we understand that there's a heavenly reality that we don't always feel that we don't always see that we don't always sense because of the real trials that we're going through. And he's saying there's a way to have joy in the midst of the trials and the struggles and the suffering. Because we understand even that itself proves to the world into our own hearts. Well, is this for real? Like, I'm still standing. Sometimes we think the devil's won. You ever been through a season like that, where you feel like, I'm not succeeding? I'm losing. I'm the biggest loser. I'm last. Everybody else is doing better than me. Whatever way relationally financially and work, whatever, school job. But here's the deal. Are you still breathing? Are you still standing? Did you still get out of bed and come to church this morning or listen later on online? Then the devil hasn't won, you're still here, you're still moving forward? It God's not done with you and me yet? This leads to the first point I want us to think about this morning. What is what is this living hope? Because this is what the passage is all about. He introduces this concept, it's going to be important. As we look forward into First Peter, I want to try to illustrate this with a phenomenon a natural phenomenon that is going on, from time to time on our earth. So I'm gonna introduce to you a picture up here of a desert in Chile. Chile, right? The Atacama Desert. Alright, maybe you've heard of this before, right? They had to come out desert and so not not that dissimilar from places that I could drop out in Far East El Paso, or maybe over the mountains of the Franklin Mountains, I get all that. But there's a unique history and story here. Because one of the things that you and I see when we see this picture is I don't want to go get lost out there. And not much to look at not too many pictures I want to take it looks dead. It looks barren. I want you and I realize that when people put Jesus Christ himself into the grave, it looked like the end, right? I mean, we know the story, but you and I understand that it looked like the end, it didn't look like there was much hope. He went to trial that was, you know, made up and all of a sudden, he's dead, and he's in the grave. And so if you look at that, he's okay, he's dead. For three days, you can just be real clear that it doesn't look good. It looks bleak. If you walk out to a desert like this, again, whether it's our local ones, or wanting to lay, you would think not much going on here. But one of the things that we need to realize is there is something going on underneath the surface. There's a natural phenomenon that occurs here that every So couple of years, sometimes every five years, seven years, sometimes it takes as long as 10 plus years, there is a torrential downpour of rain, and what looks bleak. And what looks barren, is all of a sudden going to be revealed. Because there are bulbs underneath there are flower bulbs underneath this barren desert, that doesn't reveal itself unless it is fully, fully, fully immersed in water, there has to be enough water that year in order for something to occur. It looks bleak, it looks barren, it looks dead. But there is hope. There is something beyond what our eyes can see beyond what our feet can touch beyond what our hands can feel. And so would you please go to the next slide and show what happens when this happens in Chile, if you think oh, he's making this up, but this is preacher stuff. No, you can Google this this is this is this is well known and documented that this happens every five 710 years. Plus, who knows it takes a long time. But when the rains start coming, and people think that's not something I want to go out and see all of a sudden everybody wants to flock here. And in fact so many people flock here and try to take pictures and all that kind of stuff that Chile which is not known for you know making things a lot of national parks and protecting has to call this a national park here because too many people were trying to go and pull up the bulbs when they saw the flowers blooming. Listen guys, we do not have a dead hope. We do not have a maybe hope. It is living and active. It is there and God will reveal and make his purposes plain in his time. I mean, it is in his time, but we just think it's hopeless. I'll show you a couple other pictures just so you can see the comparison here. This is what it looks like up close. Not only pink, but if you look there's different. If you look at some wider pictures, you can again, explore this on the internet at your own leisure in time. There's yellows, there's blues, there's purples, it's just a thing of beauty that only occurs every generation or so and then go the next one here. This is again just the exact picture of what they took it who wants to go to that one area right? You wouldn't want to wander there.

You won't want to take some pictures there. But that's what's been done to show us some comparison, I want you to remember this illustration, because it's very similar to what the hope that we have here, it's really not dissimilar, although it's a more stark contrast to the puppies that we get a lot of times in our own area come May, that there may be is not much to look at on the Franklin Mountains. But if you've been here long enough, and enough seasons, we sometimes have some really, really beautiful poppies Well, we can see that there's something going on underneath the surface, and that there is a living hope that Christ has called us to put our hope in, let's continue on this passage, because this is an all that God wants to show us this morning. I go on in verse 13. A couple of verses later, it says, so prepare your minds for action and exercise, self control. This in and of itself is a novel concept and 2023, that we would exercise self control, we would put on your hope, in the gracious salvation that will come to you and Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. So you must live as God's obedient children don't slip up back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You see the temptation, I feel and see the temptation all around me, just like you do, to just live for yourself, to just live with the base instincts of whatever I have, whether it be sexual, financial, or whatever. And that just, that's my mode of operation. But he's saying, No, you were called by Christ, you now have new ways of living new desires, because of who he is and what he's done. You don't know you didn't know any better then. But now you must be holy and everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy.

For the Scriptures say you must be holy, for I am holy, he's quoting scripture here. And what's going on here, we, we oftentimes will sort of gloss over wholly or wholly in his passages, because we want to throw up our hands as well, nobody's perfect, and I'm not perfect. So you know, why try? And that's what a lot of us will do. And, you know, we'll sort of weasel our way out of whatever the scripture say, or whatever God's telling us to do. Because we somehow fool ourselves into thinking, well, he can't really mean what he says. And when he's talking about here, first of all, I think you and I can live a, a holy, blameless life, that doesn't mean sinless or perfect. It just means that we can live life in such a way where we are upstanding, upright people, both in this world and in the next, what it's really talking about here is that we're not participating in evil, that which God calls evil, that which our conscience has condemned US for, like we were in the past. I mean, that's what he's calling us is always calling me too. So it's calling all of us to, and that we now understand that we now have a sanctification mindset. It's a big word, but I'm sure you've ever heard it before. If you've been in church, it's that whole idea that God is making us holy. But it's very important that we remember the principles of Christianity that you and I do not sort of do things so that our god or gods may be pleased with us. No, it's the whole idea that because what God has done in our heart, through the triune, God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, because of what he's done, now we live out our lives. It's a big difference. We talked about this, this little phrase that I say sometimes, are you doing things so that God will be pleased with you, or because of what God has done for you, it makes a big difference. And it makes a big difference in how you view your life, and your sanctification. So

that's what it means that we're set apart for holiness that we have now been put on this journey that God's got us. We need the grace every day, we need the peace every day, to sustain us that only he can provide that we're saying yes to God and no to evil desires, because he's put a new spirit and a new heart in us.

Last Will pester wants to look at this morning, and really take us to the end of the chapter here. And remember that the Heavenly Father to whom you pray, has no favorites. He will judge reward you according to what you do. And I thought he said, Wait a second, I thought that it didn't. It didn't matter what I did that God will accept me and love me. Yes, that's true. But if you have been accepted in love and chosen by God, you and I will change what we do. It's just it's just so clear, that that's what happens to those who are redeemed, those who are believers, that now we understand that we have given a new heart new designers and God will judge us current what we do, of course, he will because now we are have responsibility, moral culpability, so you must live and reverent fear of him during your time here as temporary residents, it's that kind of the other side of understanding for him that we feel like this is not our home. And now Peter is proclaiming Of course it's not your home. Your home is a heavenly reality. You seek the Jerusalem the city, which is to come. I'm gonna use that

language we're talking about the Heavenly Jerusalem, the hope that we have, we are to give to all people indiscriminately, and that includes Jewish and non Jewish people to say, Man, the Messiah has come, the Messiah was born, the Messiah came to redeem, He has redeemed, he has ransom, you and me, let's believe in Him. Now that God paid a ransom, that's what I already talked about to save you and me from the empty life we inherited from our ancestors. We talked about it a lot around here that you and I have the opportunity to change our narrative, we can change our family tree, I know that in this room, there's all kinds of records that you have been a part of whether of your choice or not of your choice, or whether of your doing or not of your doing. And when he sang yours, that peers wise enough, he's 30 years out from the ascension of Christ to say, I get it. You are inherited a certain life from your ancestors. But here's the deal, you've got something better a ransom better, and it was not paid with mere gold or silver, which lose their value. Okay, inflation we get. It was the precious blood of Christ, the sinless spotless lamb. There's that holiness, there's that perfection, who God is and what he did, God chose him this choosing again, as your ransom long before the world began. This was his plan from the beginning, to love you to love me to set his affection on you to set his affection on me. But now in these last days, which is just the church days, you like how long we've been living in the last days, since Christ came, died, burial, resurrection ascension, he has revealed for your sake, he again, if you want to understand what's going on halfway around the world, there's a real pragmatic thing going on, which is we're trying to prevent world war three, and that there's really a hatred of some of the West and things that are going on here, which includes US and

Israel and Judaism. But more than that, something else that is going on here is this whole idea that when God dealt with the world, he dealt with Israel to be a blessing to the nations that was the Old Testament, the Old Covenant, Jesus came and said, Listen, it's for the whole world. And now you don't have to go to Jerusalem, you don't have to go to a piece of land in the Middle East in order to find me, I am bound, and I reside in the hearts of men and women who carry my message throughout the ends of the earth. That's good news, people. That's what's going on here. And in the last days, this has been revealed for your sake in mind, through Christ, you have come to trusting God, and you have placed your faith and and hope in Christ because He raised Christ from the dead. It doesn't seem very hope filled, right. But the puppies will come here every year, and the flowers will bloom and Chile when he decides to pour differential downpour of rain.

He raised Christ from the dead and gave him great glory. You are cleansed from your sins when you obeyed the truth. And now you must show sincere love to each other as brothers and sisters. Love each other deeply with all your heart. One of the things that we're trying to do here at 15 at Joe battle is we're trying to be a place where people come to go out, we come to gather to scatter, this is an original with me, we have to ask yourself that what does it mean, to love deeply and sincerely if we are going to make it through trials and bumps that will inevitably happen in this life, we have to look at each other as brothers and sisters in the faith in the family that were scattered throughout the whole world. But we also have a location at a certain place in time, which is El Paso, Texas in October of 2023. What does that now mean for us to love deeply and sincerely, in this season, it really means that Christian love is rooted in community. That's why he names these cities, he names these towns in Asia, mine are some 2000 years ago. And he God loves and knows about us here and loves us here at Life Church, this community of faith. The other thing that he's trying to say here is that when you love deeply, and we love sincerely, that we don't get a pass on love, because a hardship. Do you often give yourself that pass? We've already talked about the past, we sometimes give ourselves a being holy, because they're like, Well, nobody's perfect. I'm not perfect. You're not perfect. So let's just sort of let it all hang out, or do we want to who cares about self control because everybody else is eating like this, doing like this, behaving like this acting like this going here doing that. He's saying, okay, not only are you to be holy, because I am holy, but you're to love because I loved and this whole idea that we don't get a pass on love because of hardship. In fact, that's when it's needed the most. I mean, you understand that Andrew and Karen Bush who have been our connection for years long before I became your pass

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Sermon Transcript:

I mean, really after last week, the last thing anyone wants pointed out about them is that they're a Cowboys fan. It was kind of a rough week. I am really happy to be with you all today in El Paso in West Texas. And let me just mention to you, you took a point of personal privilege a minute ago, I'll take a slightly lighter appointed personal privilege. I actually grew up in West Texas, so not quite this far west. But of course, nothing else is quite this far west, in Texas, so I don't feel like I've lost the competition. But I grew up actually in crane, Texas, south of Odessa, so about 30 miles south of Odessa. So I love I love this area, I love the love of the Desert Southwest and love being a part of this part of Texas. And I've lived after that once I started growing up and got into adulthood and all that I spent a lot of time in the Metroplex. So I always feel like I've been freed a little bit, when I come back out here where you can drive a car, the speed that it was designed to go and all that kind of stuff. So I really am happy to be out here. And you know, when I was when I was growing up in crane actually, the things that it was funny because I mean, I was just a little kid I was introduced to the world there, you know, this is this is where I found out what life is about, and what life was about for me. And it was fantastic because my dad worked for El Paso natural gas. And so we actually lived in a camp outside of a gas plant, and which meant my life was entirely about tarantulas and catching red and black ants and putting them in a jar together and collecting rattles from rattlesnakes and Jackrabbit. So that was pretty much my whole life. And out of all of those things, the weird thing is, you know, you're just trying to figure out how to live when you're a little kid. And so I was just trying to figure out how to live and when I would go to sleep at night, I wouldn't have nightmares about tarantulas of all the things. I mean, we we woke up some mornings and had tarantulas covering completely covering our welcome mat on the on the floor at the front door. I mean, it was just it was just sort of a second nature thing in our home. And you would think that's what I would have been terrified. I've never had a dream about a tray until I can't ever remember ever having a dream or nightmare about a tarantula, never had a dream about a rattlesnake or anything like that not even a giant Jack Rabbit eating me, the thing I always thought they were pretty big. The thing I always had nightmares about when I was a little bitty kid was one of the tanker trucks running me down, chasing me down. That's what I was terrified of when I was a little kid. And as you know, as it turns out, you know, you go further into life, you figure more things out. And I figured out that most tanker trucks are not trying to run me down. And I realized that all the things I might have been terrified when I was a little kid weren't the same things that I actually needed to be concerned about. Then I became a teenager. And I realized there were other things to be concerned about, just not that. And when I left the home and got married, and all of those things that transpire as your life goes forward, you realize that in every single part of your life, you're still really always working at trying to figure things out, you're trying to figure out how things go. And you go to other people, and you ask them for advice, and they give you their experience, and you learn some things from them. But you're still always trying to figure things out. And that's true about our Christian lives as well. Because as firm and absolute as the answers we have are in Scripture, our grasp of them is always limited. We're always fallible as people and the same thing was happening in the early church. And so the I'm gonna speak to you from a specific passage early in the church's history, it's in the book of Acts, it's an act for, and we're just going to read this prayer that they prayed, not so that we can just pray the prayer, although that would be worth doing. They repeated it regularly. As you will see from us reading the reading the passage, they must have used the prayer regularly. So it was valuable to them for that reason. But the reason I want to read it to you is because they're early in their understanding of what Christianity is about and how to live it out. And what we can gain from looking at believers when they were in the early church trying to figure out what Christianity would look like, is how we're supposed to live out our Christianity as we run into the parts of it that seem like a brick wall sometimes, or that are just unexpected, where there does seem to be a truck or something trying to run us down. So I want to look at a passage that might give us a little better grounding for how we're supposed to act actually practice our Christianity. And so I'm really grateful for the invitation to come and be able to spend the time with you. If you don't know my background at all. When I left West Texas, I moved to the Metroplex and went through school there and became a Cowboys fan there and all that stuff. But also also started was called into the ministry when I was 16 years old, and I've been preaching pretty much every week since since I was 18, usually three times a week or so, because my only real commitment is just to Scripture, and what God has given us in it

And then being able to communicate that and learn how to conform our lives to it. And I, you know, I'm 60 years old now. And the Lord is constantly taking this book, and just pounding me over the head with it and saying, Are you not listening? To me, I am discovering things constantly, that still need to be changed in my life. And so I really invite you to take a moment with me to look at the very beginnings and sort of the foundation of our faith and how we practice it and how we live it. And what those elements are, that will help secure the way that we're following the Lord. And if you don't mind, I know y'all prayed a lot already. But if you don't mind, I want to pray and just ask the Lord to bless the time that we get to spend together in the Word. So would you join me in prayer, please, for just a moment. Father, thank you so much for this congregation. I am blessed by seeing who they are here today and what they've done. I'm blessed to know that you have a body following you in this community just like this, I pray that You would bless their pastor, I pray that You would bless them, then I pray that You would help me not to be a hindrance, a barrier between what you've said in your word. And these people that you love, pray instead that you sort of move me out of the way, and allow what you want to say to be what shines through, because that's the only thing that really matters today. And we prayed in Jesus name, Amen. So what's happening in this passage that I'm going to read to you, it's an X for it's in verse 24, where they actually start and describe going into this prayer. What's happening in this passage is that, you know, the Lord has just risen from the dead, he's appeared to the apostles, he spent time with them. Now he ascends into heaven. And they're left behind trying to figure out how they're going to obey how they're going to follow the Lord, they have the the day at Pentecost, which is a day when he told them, the Holy Spirit would come on them, they, the Holy Spirit comes on them, they preach the Word, and there are 1000s of people who believe and by the time you finish Acts, chapter two, for all, you know, everybody everywhere is going to believe every time the gospel is preached, that that will be the coming of the Kingdom of God onto the earth. And by the way, if you hear that phrase, the coming of the Kingdom of God, and only think of, you know, weird pictures of the future, and horsemen and stuff like that, you're sort of missing the point, the coming of the Kingdom of God, is the answer to the question. Everyone asks about why on earth if God is so good, and if he's so powerful, there's so much evil, there's so much suffering, there's so much pain, there's so much confusion and frustration, and anger and everything else in the world. Why is the world still messed up that question, which a lot of people ask regularly? That question is the same question as when is the kingdom of God going to come? When is God going to make everything right? And so in the process, as they see Christ rise from the dead, they're thinking, Well, surely this is going to make everything right. I mean, the Lord of the universe rose from the dead and made clear that He's sovereign, he's over everything. Surely this will make everything right. And he says to them, Well, I'm not going to answer that question for you, but you will receive the Spirit, and you will begin to preach my word, you will be witnesses to my resurrection, here in Jerusalem and everywhere else. And so he, he gives them that they go preach, everybody that's listening. As far as the story goes, everybody that's listening response. So they're bound to think that's what's going to happen. In the very next chapter, they do it again, they go back to the temple, they have a healing that they that they do, the crowd draws together just like before, and they preach the gospel, just like before, 1000s believed just like before, but this time they run into opposition, and the people who are in charge in the city, get mad at them for preaching a message that's different from what they would have represented because they want to keep the authority under them. So they put these messengers from Christ into jail, and they put them in jail and tell them that they can't preach in the name of Jesus anymore, whatever that whatever you think of that, that command and their rejection of it, and what they do all of that's important. But for us, the only thing that matters about it is they suddenly realize they've still got to deal with problems in the world, they've still got to deal with the reality that their lives are going to be messed with. By a world that's still not perfect. And that's a world we're pretty familiar with. So here's how they respond. They leave the jail, they're told not to preach in the name of Jesus anymore. And what they do is they go back to their congregation. So just like this, they go back to the congregation, when they heard that, here's, here's what they do. They tell them. Look, this is what they've told us that we can't preach in the name of Jesus anymore. And so in verse 24, the congregation heard that and they lifted up their voice to God with one accord in one note, and so it's just like, we were just singing the songs and we all knew the words to the songs. Israel has a long history and they have a book full of songs and messages that they've memorized, and they know how to say to

Gather. So when it says they lift up their voice with one accord, there's nothing mystical about it. They bring up the psalms that they're familiar with. And they sing them back to God, they pray them back to God together. And so it says, when they heard that they lifted up their voice to God with one accord and said, that basically what they're needing to say, is this, your sovereign God, we know that. But this is a mess, because you've told us to do one thing. And all the rulers in the city are telling us to do the opposite. And they're putting our leaders in jail when they're obeying you. So how on earth are we supposed to respond this, that's what you expect them to pray about? That is indeed what they do pray about. And here's how they say it. They lifted up their voice with one accord in harmony. And they said, Lord, You are God, who made heaven and earth and the sea, and all that is in them. Who by the mouth of your prophet of Your servant, David has said, Why do the nations rage? And why do the people imagine vain things? This is the first part of the prayer, we'll read the second part in just a moment. This first part of the prayer establishes something that they assume this is just sort of a preface to the rest of the prayer. And it's an assumption they all hold, which is worth all of us remembering. But they say is first thing to the Lord. They say you are the Lord, Who created the heavens and the earth and the sea, and everything that's in them. So the first declaring your the Lord. And then they're saying that that's a quotation from Psalm 146. I'll tell you about that psalm in a moment. Why, why, why we know they're quoting from there, because there's a phrase that used all over the Old Testament, so that could be quoting it from anywhere, but they're quoting it from a psalm. And then they quote, a different Psalm. And they say, so why are the nations raging? They lifted up their voice and a raging against your servant David, why are they doing that? They're quoting from Psalm two and that song, that's the reason they're able to lift it up and sing it together. They all know the psalm together, they don't need somebody to lead them in it. They just offer it up to the Lord together, the assumption that they have is, you're the Lord. And these men want to be the Lord, they want to be king. But in truth, you're the one who's king. And the thing they use to appeal to that to make that statement is, you're the Lord who made the heavens and the earth and the sea, and all that is in them. And in that statement, what they're declaring is that the sovereignty of God, the power of God, His Lordship is declared from the creation. Even when other people don't like that, it's still the fact that the Lord is the one who made the creation. Now, let me let me give you an idea of where that phrase came from, in their minds. So in the Old Testament, most of us are familiar with the creation story. I mean, even people who don't know anything about Christianity or Judaism know, the creation account in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And we all know that's a statement that God's creating everything right, he creates it all. So here's the beginning. Once you get past Genesis, though, when you say the Lord created everything, unless it's a direct quotation of genesis of that statement, he created the heavens in the earth. Once you once you get past Genesis, from then on, you say more than that, when you say He created everything, you don't just say, He created the heavens and the earth, you would think that's sufficient. But remember, in the creation, He divides the waters that are above from the waters that are below and there's all this weird description of it. So from that point forward, when they want to say he creates everything they say it like this. In fact, I'll give you the example that comes from the 10 commandments, you know, the 10 commandments, when you get to the fourth commandment, the Sabbath day, so remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. You know, in the six days, God creates. So this is how he says it. In six days, you do all your labor in the seventh day, you rest in the sixth, on the seventh day, you don't let anyone in your household do any labor, because in six days, the Lord created the heavens and the earth and the sea. And all that is in them using exactly the same phrase we're using in this prayer. And it's used from that point forward, when you want to say, God created everything. And it's, you know, it's the technical term for this. You know, I'm the president at critical college. So I'm an educator. So every once in a while, I've slipped in something educational, right? So this is it's called a mare ism, it's when you you include the middle but what you're really trying to do, I mean, you're including everything in the middle, because you include the extremes. And the extremes are the heavens and the sea, the thing that's below but what he does is mentioned all three, the heavens and the earth and the sea. And for them, I know we look at it and think well, there are sky and then there's Earth, and then there's the sea over there, right next to the earth. That's not how they think of the sea. The sea is the thing below the earth. It's the water. That's why it's called the deep it's the it's the thing that's beneath so when you say the heavens and the earth, and the sea, and all that is in them, you're encompassing everything in the creation, the whole of cosmos, the Lord created everything in six

Days is the 10 commandments how it says it. And in the seventh day he rested. So you're also going to rest on the seventh day. So they quote that throughout the rest of the Old Testament, by the time they get to the end of the Psalms, a book of songs that they all sing together, and they all pray together. By the time they get to the book of Psalms, Psalm 146, they quote that phrase, and they quoted in this context, they say this. Now remember, these are people in Acts that we're talking about, who've just been commanded by the rulers in their city, not to preach the name of Jesus anymore. And so they lift up their voices, and they quote, the Psalm. And what the psalm says is, Do not put your trust in princes, because they breathe for a little while, and then they perish just like that. But instead, Happy is the nation whose God is the God of Jacob, because the God of Jacob created the heavens and the earth and the sea, and all that is in them. And then it says, and he's the one who freeze the prisoners who releases the captives. So what he does for them in that Psalm is tell them how they're supposed to respond to that circumstance, which is first by acknowledging that even creation itself, this is the point that they're appealing to, you made the heavens and the earth and the sea, and all that is in them. So we fear you, not these rulers who are raging against you. That's what they say. It built into that is the presumption that the testimony of creation itself is that the world belongs to God, and not to us, whether we like it or not, this, this is from the beginning of the creation testifies that now we could choose any kind of example we want. But this is something that's hard for us to remember, sometimes, we think, yeah, I believe in God, but I'm not sure other people believe in God, we all begin believing in something so far beyond us that created all of this stuff. Because we emerge into a world that clearly wasn't our design. We didn't make it, we don't have the power to make it. The way Psalm 19 talks about it. Romans one, Paul talks about it in all these other passages in Scripture, it says clearly, that we understand from the creation itself, both that there is a power over everything. That's simple, right? You can tell by the world around you and your encounter with it, that you don't have all power, because there are things you would do. I mean, the Cowboys wouldn't have lost last week, if I had all power. Clearly, this universe is not mine, right? There is a power in the world that belongs to someone other than us. And you can tell by the enormity of the cosmos that some power is creating it beyond us. And we could go into more details on that. But it's enough to make that point. Everybody wakes up and realizes the world belongs to someone other than them. But at that point, all we all we would need to say is, well, you know, there's something in charge of the universe, and it's the force Luke or something like that, you know, whatever is just some power that created the universe and made it so enormous. This is more than that. It's not just that we know, the eternal power. But we also know that there is this eternal in the way Paul says in Romans, his Godhead, or deity, we know that there's something personal behind that power, that is the order of things, the way things work together, declares not because we make an argument about it, not because somebody persuades us that it's the case, just by looking around when we're seven years old, we go, see, not just some thing made this world that's bigger than I am, but also something that had a purpose in mind. Because they, whoever it is that did this, they made things work in a way that makes sense, you know? Now I know, I know, we can explain these things away. But if you just take biology as the example and you say, how on earth did these animals become so complex? And how are our eyes? And well, you know, I know how I know how evolution works. I understand the theory behind evolution, I understand the idea of natural selection, survival of the fittest and all those things and mutations and blah, blah, blah. I don't even care what you think about evolution, I just want to ask yourself, I asked you to ask yourself this question. Why do we need the theory of evolution? The reason we need a theory of evolution. And again, I don't really give a rip what you think about the theory of evolution, yay. No, you can be a denier. You can be an unbeliever, I don't care about it. What I care about is this. We have a theory of x of evolution, because we need something to explain how on earth all these complex things could have come about. If somebody didn't design them. That means our presumption from the start was, look how well designed this world is. And then we started trying to find a way to

explain it away so that we didn't have to say, well, it's well designed because someone designed it. In fact, we use evolution so thoroughly for that we've personified evolution, all you have to do is just listen to anyone talk about it. Evolution itself is designing us to be a certain way, we've just replaced one way of understanding whoever that personal God is who made us for a purpose, we just replace him with a force that has characteristics to it that create us with a design that makes sense to us, we have to have some way to explain it away. I don't care if you buy the teleological argument is what that's called, I don't care if you buy that argument or not. All I need you to recognize is that when we start out, the world looks so well ordered. And things fit together so well, that it just declares to us by the fact that we emerge in it, that something bigger than us made us and that that something has a purpose in mind. And following Paul's reasoning and Romans one which we won't go and read right now you can go read it later. If you watch Romans one, verse 18, following, but following his reasoning in that passage, it sort of forces us to answer a question. I mean, if I didn't put myself here, if something bigger than me, put me here. And then that something had a purpose for me. And Paul doesn't say the question, he only gives the answer. We're left with this question. Am I doing what that thing put me here for? Am I and I'm not saying we think this because we're Christians, or you think this because you're pursuing God? I'm saying human beings automatically ask ourselves this. Am I doing what I was created for? And the automatic answer to that in everyone's life? Is No, I'm not, I'm not measuring up. I mean, we think there's some arbitrary list of favorite sins that we violate. And so we talk about the word sin as if it's the violation of this list over here. Sin is just any way that it's obvious that your life is not exactly like it's supposed to be. And I can ask around the room and say, anybody here think your life is absolutely pristinely perfect? Anybody, anybody? I'm not, I'm not, I'm not it, don't raise your hand, you would be highly suspected. If you raised your hand, we all know our lives are not perfect. That's all. What creation is declaring to every single person is that somebody greater than you made you and the world around you and expect you to measure up to it. And inside of us, it's an awareness that we haven't measured up to it. And so what a lot of us do is we push back against that, and we try to make ourselves our own king, I don't want to get to answer anybody else, my life, I'll do it my own way. And the way the kings were doing that, in the Old Testament passage I was talking about is they were raging against the anointed one that God had chosen David in that day, and they were in New Testament times. And this is what the church is experiencing, raging against Christ, but the opening declaration is still there. And this is the point not to not to have to have the argument about whether God exists and all of that that's not the point. The point here is that we can go on the assumption that every single person began with an understanding that the creation itself had already declared that God is the Ruler over this world and not us. Whether we like it or not just the way the world is, that's where we start. And if we start there, it puts everything on a different footing. Because we're not uniquely believing in God, we just happen to have returned to this to this awareness that there's a God that we have to deal with, with whom we have to deal no matter what we think about it. Okay, there's the first part of the prayer, the second part of the prayer. And remember, in the first part of the prayer, this thing that I referred to as a mare ism is so important that you created the heavens and the earth, and the sea, and all that is in them. So from the very top of the cosmos, to the very bottom of it, and with all of the ingredients that are mixed in the middle, including where we stand on the earth itself, in the heavens, and the earth, and the sea, and all that is in them, you are the creator, and therefore you are the Lord of it. And so we come to you, because these other people are telling us they're in charge, and we think you are in charge. So we come back to you. That's the first part. Second part starts in verse 27. After they quoted that second Psalm that I mentioned to you literally the second song, they then apply it specifically to Jesus. And this is probably another part of an early hymn that they sang together because they seem to say this together as well. And it's this four of a truth. So in that Psalm that I was quoting to you, it's written about David and all the kings around Israel that oppose David and even people inside of Israel, who opposed David and tried to fight against him in that day, okay. They quote that part and that's just a reminder that those kings oppose the idea that the Creator owns the world that he created, which sounds kind of silly, but we do that

at all the time we'd rather be the King Show in verse 27. This is how it's applied to Jesus himself because Jesus, he's the creator, and he comes into the world. And lo and behold, the people who are in authority oppose him as well. And that's what the apostles are starting to run into. So they want to tell us about that. So in verse 27, it says, For other truth against your, this is a unique phrase. In the New Testament, it's only used right here in chapter four, twice, you'll see it in the passage we're reading, it's used twice. And then once in the very next chapter in exactly the same context, the only time this phrase is used anywhere in the Bible, it says, For a truth against your holy, and then some translations say servant, some translations say child, there's just not a way to resolve that dispute. Because the word means both. It's a Paideia is the word we use for pediatrician, but it's the word they use for a child who you would use as your servant in some way in your home. So this child who worked in your home so the idea here is either Jesus as a little baby or Jesus as the servant of the Father. So here's, I'll give you my resolution to it in just a second. Yeah, it'd be fairly obvious in verse 27, forever truth against your holy child, Jesus, whom you have anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together, but what they accomplished with this for to do Whatsoever thy hand, your hand and your council determined beforehand, to be done. So what are the fact that he raises the names Herod and Pontius Pilate say something to us. Now there are Harrods all over the New Testament. There's a Herod when Jesus is born, and there's a Herod Agrippa. And there's when Jesus is dying, and there's a Herod and tapas and there's a whole list of Herod's that go through the New Testament. And so you might just be thinking to yourself, well, it's just some Roman authority, but this is not some Roman authority, all the other Harrods get their own name. Herod is Herod the Great, Herod the builder, he's referred to as he's the one who established the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, the way the Wailing Wall, the Western Wall in the in where the temple is, where the where the temple used to be, where you see people praying at the Wailing Wall, that's not part of the original temple. It's part of the wall that Herod had built, that built up the mounds so that the temple could be expanded and made greater because Herod did everything magnificently. And it was always greater. It's that Herod that's being talked about here. And he's also the Herod you know, from me, we were talking about Halloween today, we're kind of avoiding the word but we're talking about Halloween. But Christmas is the other, you know, get a bunch of candy kind of holiday, every Christmas, you read the story of Herod, and how he wanted to have Jesus killed, right? So the wise men come to him and they say, oh, where's the where's the one who was born to be king of the Jews? Y'all remember the story of Herod and they come and ask, and Herod says, Oh, well, you go find him. And then when you do bring the word, because I want to worship him as well. But of course, what he wants to do is find him and kill him. And when he can't find him, when he doesn't know where he is, he finds out what the prophets would say about where Jesus might have been born. And he has all the children. It's just so similar to some of the things that happened recently. But he has all the children in that region slaughtered because he wants to kill this one, child, Jesus. That's what Herod wants to do. Why does Herod want to do that? Because Herod is already king. He doesn't want there to be another king. I'm king, you're not. So you come into my world, I'm going to kill you. That's what Herod does. And then who's Pontius Pilate, on the other end, he's the one that commits Jesus to the execution itself, under the authority of Rome. So from Harry saying, you know, and today they've done this same thing to your and I think in the first instance, when he says the words he means child, to your holy child, Jesus, whom Herod in his birth, was trying to kill as soon as he was brought into the world. Herod was trying to kill him, and all the way to the end of his life. I mean, how is his ministry described? He'll do some kind word, he'll heal someone, he raises a widow's son from the dead so that she'll have someone in this world and to fulfill the Old Testament commands that we care for the widows, Jesus does all of that and you know what the Jewish leaders do? They say, how can we kill this man? How can we get him into the ground? Because from the beginning of his life, all the way to the end of his life pilot who actually does this with the execution, the crucifixion that takes place? The kings of this world the people who already have their authority established, are saying

Hang, we don't want Jesus to be king, we want to be king. It's not because in truth, they have something against Jesus, they just have something against anybody who wants to take their authority away, then we can say, we're not the same way. But we're exactly the same way. Everyone in all of history has been the same way. We just want to be king of our own little world, we want to be the ones who determine everything that we do. And some of us want that world to be bigger. And some of us wanted to be smaller. But we all want to be our own king. And so from Herod, all the way to Pontius Pilate, the entire life of Jesus is a testimony that men oppose the idea that Jesus is Lord, they oppose the idea that the creator of the world actually owns the world, and is in charge of it. And so the opposition is natural. You say you're king of this world, you say you have lordship over everything, well, we'll just do the same thing to you that takes the throne away from every other king throughout all of history, we'll just kill you, we'll take your life, because when you die, it becomes fairly apparent, you don't own the world, right? Because the world does the opposite to you. Well we do is we spend all of our lives trying to get our little piece of land, or trying to get the whole land, or trying to get the whole earth to be ours here, the land is mine, I am king. I'm not having a seizure here. I'm just, I'm aware that I'm not I'm saying this is what we do through our whole lives. This is my property, this is my life, this is my decision. This is my career, I get to choose what I'm going to do. This is my plot of land, and then ultimately, every for every single person, every single one, you would think it would be impossible for us not to be aware of this. Every single person in all of history, who has said, This is my piece of land, the land has opened its mouth and eaten them hole when they were put into the ground for their burial. It swallowed them all. Now the general rules of life are that if you are the one being devoured, you are not Lord. This is the general rule of life, right? So the earth opens its mouth and it eats every single person. We all go into the ground dust, to dust, ashes to ashes, happens every single time. So what are the kings think when Jesus starts going around and healing people and helping people and declaring that he's Lord, they think to themselves, well, we'll just prove he's not Lord, we'll put them in the ground. That doesn't every time mean, you're not King. Once you're in the ground, you can say you were a great king. But you can't say the world is yours. You cannot say your Lord, if you were in the ground, so we'll, we'll put them in the ground. This is what they did from the beginning. Why did Herod do it at the beginning, oh, show us the one who's to be the king of the Jews. So Herod says, I'll kill him. They bring Him to Pilate. And what's the declaration that forces pilots hand and causes him to say to them, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to commit him to the crucifixion, I'm going to put him into the ground. It's their declaration that he's telling them to worship a God, other than Caesar. And they can't take that idea that Pilate can't stand that idea. So he says, All right, I will commit him to the crucifixion. What are what's Hara doing? What's pilot doing? What are all the Jewish leaders doing? They're all saying to themselves, we're gonna put him into the ground. And he's not going to be Lord anymore. So they do. They crucify him. They crucify Him, they kill him. They put him in the ground, they the earth opens its mouth and swallows him. He is dead.

And then

the weirdest thing. I mean, three days later, the ground has devoured him and declared along with every other person throughout all of history, you are not Lord. That's what it said. And then Jesus, on the third day emerges whole from the grounds mouth, and has to be saying, Now, who is it you were saying was Lord, because I think I'm the only one who's come out. And you know, the ground knows that Jesus is Lord at that point, you know, that the earth knows.

But the Earth was created by him. It knows. We're the ones who should have come to an awareness in that moment. That he really is Lord. That's the declaration of the resurrection. That's why they are witnesses of His resurrection. They are testing they are testifying to the Lordship of Jesus when they say and we saw him, the one you were trying to displace

rise from the dead. Now all those princes who had put Jesus into the ground are now telling by Princess, I'm using the Old Testament word for just the rulers in Jerusalem, the people who had authority, who are saying to these Christians stop talking about Jesus stop acting as if he's important. They're the ones who are saying that they're the ones who put Jesus in the ground. But they have breath for a little time, and then they're going to perish, and they're not coming back out of the ground. And so these Christians look at, look at look at themselves, and they sing the song together, and they say, Lord, we remember that from creation you had declared, The world was yours, and everything in it, whether we like it or not. And when your son rose from the dead, you said, the world is still mine. And everything in it, whether we like it or not. Now the truth is, some of us are confused about whether we like that or not. Because we've got our lives go on one direction, and we're just trying to get God to conform with what we want to do. And if He's sovereign, that sort of puts a wrinkle in in our texture, it doesn't go exactly where we want it to go. So the rest of this prayer is also important for what it says, here's, here's what it says, starting in verse 29. And I wish I could go back and explain the details, so many more details in this prayer. But starting in verse 29, he says this, and then we'll be done. And now Lord, behold, there threatenings, and grant unto Your servants, that with all boldness, they may speak your word by stretching forth your hand, to heal, and that signs and wonders may be done by the name of your holy child, Jesus, or your holy servant, Jesus. And when they prayed, the place was shaken, where they were assembled together, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit, which is the power of the resurrection, God Himself in dwelling us in the power of the resurrection. That's the Holy Spirit. That's why we have the Holy Spirit to be witnesses of his wretched resurrection testifiers, to the fact that he is still Lord in this world, and in our lives. So it says, and the Holy Spirit filled all of them who are there, they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and they spoke the word of God, with boldness, and then they go on in their obedience to the Lord. So let me let me just illustrate what I'm talking about briefly, and then I'll be finished. So, a long time ago, I mean, 25 years ago, or so my daughter was younger at the time, and she was obviously 25 years younger than she is now. And she was in high school, getting ready to graduate. And she, you know, I had, so I have four kids, two girls, two boys, I have a wife. That's why I have four kids. So it all works out just fine. Until it's the middle of the night. And you have teenagers in your house. Two of whom are.

Don't call me a misogynist, I'm just saying, two of whom are are women, and of the daughters, and then my wife. So I've got three women in the house, and three men in the house. I'm lying in my bed, I'm just trying to sleep. This is a normal thing to do at two o'clock in the morning, and it was about two o'clock in the morning. I'm a very light sleeper. I'm lying in bed, and I hear what no father wants to hear. If you have women in the house. I hear

that sound.

So I'm just thinking to myself,

who's crying, somebody's crying, I care. But I also just want to go back to sleep. So, Lord, please make it brief. And instead I hear it again. You know, like that. It's like, oh, okay, well, it didn't sound like it was in my bed. So it's not it's not Joan, thank heavens for that. So you because that's a long night, you know, if it's the wife, nothing personal. I'm just saying. So I go, okay. All right. So somebody else so I get up and I walked through the house, I walked, you know, I put my head in the doors and I'm listening. I don't hear anything. I walk through the living room. I walk around our dining room is I don't see anybody don't hear anything. I peek over into the kitchen. There's nobody there. I go through the hallway. I don't see anybody. And I haven't heard the sound again. And so I just I go back and lay down in the bed as soon as I lay down. You know, just like,

I go back around.

And when I walked through the house, this time, I go a little further into the kitchen. And when I go into the kitchen, I see over in the very corner between the refrigerator and the cabinets, just sitting in the corner, huddled in a little mass down on the floor. My youngest daughter. So he's thinks she's 17 years old at the time, I think. And, you know, she's just, she's just crying. I mean, her eyes are just filled with tears. And I walk over she doesn't know she had any she didn't even know I'm there yet. I walk over and I put out my hand and I I touch her on the head and I just say her name Leah. You know what's going on? And she looks

she's crying and she can't even communicate, you know? So we go, we go and sit on the couch and I put my arm around her and we just sit there for a little while and she's finally able to tell me the story.

And the story is not that complicated. I mean, the story is she had a paper due the next day, you know, when you're 17 years old, everything is the end of the world. And so I, you know, she, she had a paper due the next day, and she couldn't, she didn't have any good ideas, it was two o'clock in the morning, she will

fail, and then you know, your whole life is gonna be over. It's that kind of thing. And so I'm like, Look, you're not going to write a paper at two o'clock. And it's just a one pager, you know, a creative kind of paper, and, you know, one page, and she just, you know, she was just out of steam, and I said, go go to bed, go to sleep, get up early in the morning, and just try to write something, then it'll be okay. Even if you can't do it at all, it will be okay, it'll work out fine. So she went back to bed and we hugged it was one of the sweetest times I've ever had with her in my entire life, you know, is encouraging and just an opportunity for us to be together for a few minutes. The next the next day, I find out she'd written a paper and she turned it in. And about a week later, she brought it back and gave it to me. And she had an A on the paper that she had written the next morning, and I looked at the words on the paper, and the opening line of, of the paper was, I was sitting on the floor in my kitchen. And, and then this hand came out of heaven, and touched me, you know, and so, you know, as a dad, I'm like,

but it's okay for men to cry. That's all right.

The point is, I mean, this, if I, if I had laid in my bed, and she cried, and I just said, I'm not going to deal with it. You know, I would have lost the sweetest time I've had with my daughter in our entire lives, you know, a wonderful time. But also, she needed somebody to come and help. You know, this is what she needed. If I pulled out my phone, and we just barely had phones at the time, but she did have her own phone. If I'd pulled out my phone and texted and said knock it off.

Or, hey, you need something come and see me, you know, let's talk. Yeah, that wouldn't have been any good.

What she needed was somebody to come and be present with her.

So you're, you know, you're, you're looking at your life. And you're thinking, Man, I gotta I gotta pray together. And maybe some of you do, maybe maybe some of you haven't completely together. Some of you think, man, I'm tough. I don't need anybody to come in and rescue my life. Some of you are so angry, you think you're puffed up and powerful, but in your anger, you are the huddled masses sitting in the corner of your kitchen. You're sitting there and scared to death. That's why you're so angry if you can, if you have anger built into you. You are the person that's saying, I can't solve this problem. Why can't I solve this and you can bluster all you want. But what you are is huddled and alone and frightened and waiting for someone to come. And here's the thing. He did not just sit in heaven and watch our misery and our suffering.

Doesn't matter, anger, fear, loneliness, loss, anxiety, depression, discouragement, frustration, whatever it is that's going on in your life that has you huddled in the corner, God did not say, you know, I'm in heaven. Don't bother me. He did not say, hey, I'll send you something to help. He himself came down, walked all the way into the kitchen, put his hand on our head and said, I will help you.

I will take you out by the hand.

I will lift you up and carry you if you can't do it yourself. And He the Lord of all of this world, the world we wish we were lord over until we realize we don't have the power to control it.

In our anger, we realize we're not Lord.

In the Lord's hand, being honest, we should realize not only that we're not Lord, that the person we're angry at is not Lord.

But that the God who is the Lord

cares about us.

And is good to us.

When we talk about the gospel, we get confused about what it is. In simple terms. The gospel is the declaration that Jesus is Lord. I'm not Lord. You're not Lord. Jesus is Lord. And in that recognition, we know that no matter where our life is huddled up, no matter where we're crying, no matter where we're alone, we have a God who has sought us out to say, the heavens and the earth and the sea. And all that is in it was mine at creation. And my mind hasn't changed about it at all. It's mine in the resurrection. And it's mine in your life. Right now. You're not facing it alone. You have a God who has come into your kitchen to be with you. Father, I pray that you would turn our hearts even this day, so that we stop thinking about fighting the war.

world we stop thinking about owning the world. We stop thinking about solving all of our problems and we start acknowledging that weeping or alone or angry

that closing our eyes to it or opening them to it. The truth is that your Lord, not us,

that you rule this world, not us. And that's the good news. That we don't have to control the things here. The creation knows it belongs to you. I pray we would know from that creation and your resurrection, that we belong to you as well. In Jesus name.

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Sermon Transcript:

All right, well, I'm so glad you have come to gather with us this morning. Or if you're watching online or listening later, I had not obviously any awareness of what was going to be going on in the world stage at this moment. But one of the things that we're working through is different life lessons. And so one of the things I wanted to work through this morning, and I've been preparing for all week, is that idea of covenant. What did it mean that God had covenanted with his people in the Old Testament? What does it look like that he covenants with us now. And so we'll brush on the topic of Israel, in terms of how we understand that nation state in the ancient world and how we understand the people today, and so you don't get all your questions answered, I can always be available afterwards. But hopefully, this will be something that edifies us this morning, as we think about this idea of covenant community. Well, think about what we all sort of are aware of, and know about love and commitment to each other. And even we think about marriage. And we love movies. And we love movies that are of the romantic flavor. Now, they've sort of fallen out of favor in recent years, mostly, what we have is a lot of what I call crass comedies. But there was a time not too long ago for those of us that grew up and cut our teeth in the 80s and 90s. Or even further back into movies of the 60s that had a romantic spin on them. And they always ended with some sort of, you know, great and glorious reunion so that you could live live happily ever after. So I want to remind you of a couple of these things that may be iconic to you and to me, so this one right here, Pride and Prejudice. Again, a movie that came out in the early 2000s, when one of the first movies that I remember my wife and I going to see them before we were married. So you got this idea that they come together here. Finally, after the culmination of this movie, maybe another image that you're familiar with, is pride in I mean, Princess Bride, we've shown this movie here before, it's just quintessential sort of fun and adventure and romantic, this idea of riding off in a white horse with your true love. And again, this is the end of the movie, let's think about maybe this one is maybe more your favorite Beauty and the Beast, right. And so this, this idea that this this man, this hunk of yours would turn into this beautiful prince, and you'd have all this money and there would be a great party and you'd be having a great dress on and he would look wonderful as well, again, something that happens at the end of the movie. And oftentimes when we thought about our own marriage vows, we often thought about maybe this is what it'll be like in this will be the dream, I can't believe this is what I have gotten. But what we come to realize is that anytime we have these moments in our life, however great and glorious they are, they are the beginning of a relationship. And then what comes afterwards. So what is important, though, is that we come together, and we think about something like marriage, that it's not merely a contract, and we'll talk about the difference when a contract and a covenant. The covenant is what what do we mean when we say the word covenant, here's a good sort of general definition I think we can work with a covenant is a chosen relationship in which two parties make binding promises to each other mean like this is for real, like we're gonna do this, for real, whatever it is, it is opposed to a contract, a contract has certain binding, you guys maybe are aware of this, when you get a hold of a cell phone contract is no one else has to buy you out of that in order for you to get a new phone or, you know, you've been in a house contract. And there's a lot of signatures that go into getting into those and getting out of those. Those can be binding legally, we understand this in terms of even marriage documents and divorce documents, and it has certain promises and obligations, right, and a prenup agreement or whatever. But here's the deal about contracts, contracts have no relationship. That's very important. Because again, this is what separates believers and Christians and along the Judeo Christian value system of understanding that it is covenantal. Covenant is relational. It is relational. Not only that a covenant is a chosen relationship. Again, I think about this in terms of marriage, we're going to talk about this in terms of God and church community. And I know not all of us are married or even called to be married. I understand that. But just this whole idea that we understand that marriage is often sort of the best picture or symbol that we have here on earth to understand that sort of covenantal relationship. So it is relational. There is no such thing as two people who are married in any sort of covenant relationship that don't have some sort of relational aspect. Covenant is a chosen relationship. Hopefully you chose that one that you're with if you are married. So that is the idea that you enter into this. Not out of somebody forcing you but it is a chosen relationship and

It always includes some promises, right of faithfulness or clinging to each other. And you can think about this in terms of our wedding vows that have traditionally been said for hundreds and hundreds of years. But we have to ask ourselves, where did this concept of covenant come to us? And does God covenant with us? And what does that mean? Some would argue, and I think this is a good point that the idea of covenant really goes back to creation itself, that God covenants with humanity to say that, that I will be your God, and you will be My people, and I will put you in a garden, you will have perfect fellowship and relationship with me. But we know that that was broken really quick. And again, the language of covenant isn't using Genesis chapter one through three. But you can see that idea already there at creation, what I want to do is I want to talk about a couple of covenants that we see in the Old Testament, maybe give us some understanding of what that has to do with us today, and then move us into the New Testament or what's often called the New Covenant. So let's start with Noah already referenced Genesis chapter one through three, which Genesis means the beginnings is the first book of the Bible, you may be familiar with Adam and Eve, who represent humanity, but you've quickly get to know Him. Now, why is the story of Noah brought about and you, of course, maybe know about Noah's ark, and the idea that animals are kept on the ark and Noah and his family. But there's a covenantal relationship going on here. And this is early on in Genesis, that the world has gotten darker and darker and darker. And God wants to preserve a family. And here's how he does it beginning in verse eight, this covenant with Noah, then God told Noah and his sons, Chapter Nine of Genesis, I hereby confirm my covenant with you. So here's this language that's going to be important for our study today, with you and with your descendants, and with all the animals that were on the boat with you, the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, every living creature on earth. Yes, I am confirming my covenant with you. Never again will floodwaters kill all living creatures. Never again, will a flood destroy the earth. Then God said, I'm giving you a sign of my covenant with you. And with all living creatures for all generations to come. I have placed my rainbow in the clouds. It is a sign of my covenant with you and all the earth. When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds. And I will remember my covenant with you. And with all living creatures, never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth. Then God said to Noah, yes, this rainbow is the sign of the covenant I'm confirming with all the creatures of the earth. You like how the Old Testament is written for memory, so that we understand and for emphasis and repeated what is going on here. A couple of things to think about with this new a covenant or the covenant with Noah, it is preserve a human race by protecting a family and the animals on the ark, while flood what it destroys the other parts of the earth. It is a covenant of preservation. It's new beginnings for humans on the other side, and this will be continued to have life until the end comes. So this idea that God will never again destroy the Earth in the same way that he will never again flood the earth. It is now a promise for us. And when we look to the sky, and we see rainbows and I know we hear no pasa we don't see him very often because of the lack of rain. But we are to remember the promise we are to remember the covenant and even God himself. As he interacts with us his creation is remembering His covenant when he looks down on us and sees that rainbow. That's one covenant that you may be familiar with in terms of a story and an interaction. Another covenant is this idea of covenant with Abraham. And again, we're gonna see is we're gonna see a storyline through the scriptures of how God deals with his people and how he blesses them. How does this work? Genesis 17. Still in the first book in the Bible, it goes like this when Abram because his his name before he gets a name change was 99 years old. So if you feel like you're in the room, and you're not useful anymore, you're useless or you've passed your time you have not. The Lord appeared to him and said, I am El Shaddai God Almighty, serve me faithfully and live a blameless life. I will make a covenant with you by which I will guaranteed to give you countless descendants. In this Abram fell facedown on the ground. Then God said to him, this is my covenant with you. I will make you the father of a multitude of nations. What's more, I'm changing your name. It will no longer be Abram instead you will be called Abraham, for you will be the father of many nations. I will make you extremely fruitful. Your descendants will become many nations and kings will be among them. I will come firm my covenant with you and your descendants after you from generation to generation. This is the everlasting covenant I will

always be your God, and the God of your descendants after you, and I will.

I will be your gun, I will, I will give the eternal land of Canaan, where you now live as a foreigner to you and your descendants, it will be their possession forever, and I will be their God, then Abram, then God said to Abraham, your responsibility is to obey the terms of the covenant, you and all your descendants have this continual responsibility. And here's what's important, you'll begin to see a thread, a theme, aligned through Scripture that goes from the Old Testament and really into the new and this whole idea that those who are part of the Covenant, obey God obey His Word and obey his long primary things. In the Abrahamic covenant. The covenant with Abraham, is that Abraham isn't picked because he's somehow the smartest or the most influential guy in the world, I want you to see that, even in his day and age 99 was old, has been whatever word you want to use, or think of when people are that old. But here he is, at this old age, and God wants to do something with him, not because he's the sharpest tool in the shed, but because God freely in His grace and wisdom, bestows love and grace on him. And that Abraham himself responds in faith. So that says, that's important too, as we think about our relationship with God and what covenant means. But what are the primary things of this covenant, the idea of offspring, that you'll have children who will come to know God, because of your obedience and faith, that you will have land, that you will have a literal land and we often think of as the land of Canaan that was there, that becomes the Land of Israel, and that this will be a universal blessing. The all these things are important because they do play themselves out in New Testament believers. For those of us in the room, there may be a few people in the room are listening those online, who are ethnic Jewish descent, but for the most of us were of non Jewish ethnic descent. So what does this have to do with us? Well, what we see is that all the promises of God are yes, in Christ, Jesus, Jesus Christ Himself, came to earth as a Jewish man. And what did he come for he came for the entire world. So what you're gonna see is you're gonna see this covenant, these blessings, not only be for a certain group of people, ethnic Israel, people, but ultimately for the whole world. That's why you may have gone to a church that they sang the song of father, Abraham, having many children, and you felt like you were one of them, and so is everybody else, because it's that whole idea that we become children of Abraham, because we serve Abraham's God, and that Jesus himself when he came, he says, Before Abraham was, I am that sort of language of that I existed before Abraham did. And this whole idea that not all children of Abraham or Abraham, what that means is that whole concept that it's the spiritual children, it's those who follow Abraham's God. And this is ultimate universal blessing that you're going to begin to see that God chose Israel, he chose Abraham in this passage, so that he and his descendants would be a blessing to the world, not so they could just have things for themselves. Next covenant wants you to see is the covenant with Moses. We are referenced this whole idea of how God when he dealt with Moses in the burning bush, how did he reveal Himself to Moses, the God of your ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Jacob is the one whose name becomes Israel that we think about in terms of a nation state and a people group. But here he is, he's dealing with Moses. And that story of Moses is primarily told in the books of Exodus. That's the second book of the Bible, the exiting of Egypt, Leviticus, Numbers, and then Deuteronomy, it's the retelling of the law. So that's what we're going to look at when we think about this covenant that God made with Moses, who represents God to the people. Here's what it says. He says, understand this, therefore, that the Lord your God is indeed God. He is the faithful God who keeps his covenant for 1000 generations and lavishes his unfailing love on those who love Him and obey his commands. But he does not hesitate to punish and destroy those who reject Him. Therefore, you must obey all these commands, decrees and regulations I'm giving you today. If you listen to these regulations, and faithfully obey them, the Lord, your God will keep his covenant of unfailing love with you, as he promised with an oath to your ancestors. So these are great promises. And these are glorious promises, but you're already may be feeling a little bit of a burden a little bit of I don't know if I can do all that. I'm hearing you read from the Bible and I'm feeling a little bit of a weight and inadequacy and let that stay for right now because Jesus is going to come and talk about that in the new covenant. But this whole idea here is that we understand that covenant people are people

who obey God and follow God? Because He is the true God? Or I mentioned it. But in case you didn't catch it, this whole idea of Israel, where does Israel come from? I mean, we literally are talking about a country of prayed about a country of Israel. But where did all that sort of come from? That whole idea that again, Jacob, his name was changed to Israel, Jacob of the Old Testament, this is Joseph's father, and he had many sons and daughters as well. But he had many sons, and they become what's called the 12 tribes of Israel so that when Moses leads the people out of Egypt, and they go and settle into the promised land, they settle into a land broken up by their by their tribes of Israel. Because why? Because God made a covenant with them goes all the way back, that he was going to give them a land and that he would be their God, and they will be a blessing. And I'm sure you understand these things. And that even Israel being chose itself is all grace. I want to understand this, because sometimes we get all confused about this thing about God's chosen people. And so what does that mean? And again, we've already sort of said that most of us in this room are not ethnic Israelites. So So why we've been talking about this and thinking about this in 2023, not only is it still a world issue, but it's that whole idea that God chose them to be a blessing to the nations, that through Israel, we would come to know the Messiah. That's the point. And it was all grace. So when you think about where we're gonna end, later on, and we talked about our own relationship with God, Himself, it's all grace. And Grace is getting something that we didn't deserve, and we didn't earn that he chose us in him. But for the foundation of the world is what Ephesians says, it's the same way with Israel. It's not that they're smarter or more sophisticated than the other nations. It's that he chose God Himself, chose to bestow His love and grace upon them.

That's the Mosaic Covenant or what's often called the Israel covenant, chosen there in Deuteronomy, I could have picked other passages that is the retelling of the law. We're through the first five books of the Bible, what's called the Pentateuch. Let's go to the covenant of David, which is often what Israelites think of when they think of Jerusalem and sort of the heyday of that nation state. So the covenant with David is this right here, and again, we're talking about King David, that story of David and Goliath if you like timeline if you like history 2000 BC circa right Latin circa there about 2000 BC for Abraham 1400 BC for Moses about 1000 BC for David again affirmed by multiple multiple Archerd archeological digs, then all the tribes of Israel went to David at Hebron, and told him we are your own flesh and blood. In the past, when Saul was our King, you were the one who really led the forces of Israel, and the Lord told you you will be the shepherd of my people Israel, you will be Israel's leader. So they're at Hebron, King David made a covenant before the Lord with all the elders of Israel, and they anointed him king of Israel. David was 30 years old when he began to reign and he reigned 40 years and all he had reigned over Judah, from Hebron for seven years and six months and from Jerusalem, and ran over all Israel and Judah for 33 years. Again, if you want to know the story of David, it's primarily in first and second Samuel, as well as other passages, what's the point of this? It's this continuity of these promises that he's given already to the people of God. But it is a distinction, because David now is going to be a king and ruler in a physical, literal place, Jerusalem. And there's going to be a building of a temple, sometimes called Solomon's temple that his son builds and that Jerusalem in this day, about 1000 BCE, and there abouts becomes the most powerful nation in the known earth at that time. Now, let's be real clear that Israel in the Old Testament, is what we often call theocracy. And I don't want to just use big words, some use big words, but it's that idea that God and government were together intertwined. And that's how we understand Old Testament Israel. We don't live there anymore. And so there's going to be a difference in the distinction we get to our understanding of Israel today, because we live in a democracy in Israel itself as a democratic government. But I just wanted to make sure we understand sort of what's going on here in the Old Testament. And oftentimes, when Israelites, people of Israel, think about the heyday of what they want to go back to or return to, in terms of the nation state of Israel and that city on Jerusalem, they think about the Davidic years, the years of David being king. That's why when Jesus comes, he doesn't come on a white horse, he comes on a donkey. That's why when Jesus comes, he doesn't come to set up a throne in Jerusalem. He comes to set up a heavenly kingdom. And this whole idea here, this would have confused and baffled people in Jesus's day and continues to baffle people in this day. Why? Because Jesus came and He

is bringing forth what's called a new covenant. Let's look at Jeremiah 31, verses 31 and 30. For the day is coming, this is from the prophet Jeremiah, he is looking towards this new covenant, this new day that we are living in the Church Age, the day is coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and Judah, this covenant will not be like the one I made with their ancestors. When I took them by the hand and brought them out of the land of Egypt. They broke that covenant, though I love them as a husband loves his wife says the Lord. But this is the new covenant I will make with the people of Israel after those days says the Lord, I will put my instructions deep within them, I will write them on their hearts, I will be their God, and they will be my people, and they will not need to teach their neighbors, nor will they need to teach their relatives saying, you should know the Lord for everyone from the least to the greatest will know me already says Lord and I will forgive their wickedness and I will never again remember their sins. What in the world is going on here? It's the covenant community. It's the covenant people of God, that what Jeremiah promises and what we now live in, and what many of us have experienced in this room is new life, that our hearts were awakened were quickened to the things of God. And so therefore, we now know God's word and law. And we know we can't keep it perfectly. We already talked about how, even though God talked to Noah and Abraham and Moses, and David, that even those rules those laws, they were too much for them to keep perfectly. And so what does God say I'm going to do something new. Now, I want you to understand this is a new covenant. There is a distinction between Judaism and Christianity, even though some of the values and the moral system is the same. There is a difference here. If you go to Israel today, you can see the distinction. And the difference is that those are coming to what a wait on maybe some sort of future king and leader and those that come to stand and all that their King and leader came through here to give them the hope that the world has Jesus turned the world upside down. But is it fulfillment for sure. But it is something new here is the result of I don't want to just use big words and fancy language, the result is a regenerate covenant people, what does regenerate mean? It's that whole idea of being reborn, especially in a spiritual or moral sense. You think about Nicodemus when he went to Jesus in the middle of the night in John chapter three, and he asked him, What must I do in order to know God, and Jesus, like you would know of all people, because you're studying the Scriptures day and night. You don't have to enter your mom's womb and then come out again, if a Nicodemus was thinking, or he was saying that at least,

that you would bend your heart,

that you bend your heart that you have bow your knee to the God of the universe, and that he himself would give you a new heart. This is what it means to be regenerate, and that we now live as people who have been forgiven, but rest assure, on the other side of forgiveness, we live different. Now, that's important, because oftentimes, we just want the sunset marriage, don't we? Right? And then when it doesn't go well for us, why we went out, we can do this in friendship as well, boy had a great friend, we had a great time, and we do all these fun things, but then it got hard, because he or she offended me or, or it just got too hard because of life, or I just drifted away from God, church or relationship or whatever. But we understand that when God changes our hearts, that we are a different people that we've been marked. That's why we wait on baptism in this church until people have decided to walk with Jesus. This is a distinction among other churches you may have be aware that other churches practice baptism at infancy, okay? And what I'm saying is, is when you do that, you're not really fully getting the idea that I see in the New Testament scriptures, this new covenant that says, There will come a day when people will choose, I follow Christ, I repent and believe I want that forgiveness for my sins. And in that moment that goes through the waters of baptism, but rest assure, that's the beginning of the relationship. That's not the culmination. That is the beginning of the relationship.

Why do we avoid this though? We avoid commitment. Okay, let's just be honest around the room. We avoid commitment when we avoid this even covenant to language. I mean, I don't know how you, you know, grow a church or whatever. But I'm sure you don't just keep talking about promises and covenanting together and doing hard things together. But it's this idea of why do we avoid commitment? We want the blessings think about this. You and I want the relational blessings. We remember Michael Keaton, Mr. Mom, this is an old 80s reference. I understand that some of y'all may not know who Michael Keaton was, but before he was Batman, he was Mr. Mom. I'm not sure why he's so unhappy here. But but any

He lays he's taking all three kids out from the front porch and a classic 80s moment. But we want some version of that we want men helping out around the house, we want them, helping out the kids and all this kind of thing. We want that sort of family environment. I think about this one from my childhood years going way back growing pains. I don't know if y'all remember this one and how they'd have to solve things, there were several movies, or several shows like this, whether it was the Waltons or Andy Griffin before this, or whether it was some version of this in an 80s, where they'd sit around the table, this are family ties, where they would have to solve things. And you would see some sort of talk about homework and food and mom and dad would have to come together. So we want some version of this, or we want some version of this with a significant other at the end of our life, like at the end of the notebook where we see them looking back on their love story. And we see that they're able to hold hands and die with one another. Now we all say we want some version of this. And I understand this may not be your dream, you may have other ways in which you process what the good life is or what the dream is for you. It may not just be relational stability you long for, and it may look completely different than us, I understand that. It may be financial stability, but here's what we know. Here's what the Scriptures tell us. And here's what we know, practically, none of that comes without commitment and covenant. None of that comes without commitment and covenant people do get to enjoy nice cars and nice vacations and nice homes. And I'm not saying that should be your aim. We here have our aim as the glory of God. But understand that once you get your life in order, and you begin to connect yourself with the God of the universe, and you begin to understand and walk as one who is forgiven, that things start working out for you, relationally and financially and all these other ways of blessing, though it's hard. And we understand that those of us who walk through real relationships together and real financial putting away of some things so that we can have and say yes to others. How do we covenant together here at Life Church, we talked about this over and over again, that we want to continue to be a place that makes it easy for ordinary people to connect with God. That's our mission statement stated, given to me long time ago. But we understand that in order to maintain that in order to be that in order for the lights to be on for there be something for us to come to you to be a part of, to be a part of something like a church, which a church is made up of people who are worshipers of God, you know that right that that we come and we gather in this place, so that we may know him better than we may worship Him. Because many of us have gone through the waters of baptism and said yes to Jesus. And as we are committed, and as we covenant together, hopefully, seekers, people who are interested, people who are investigating will be able to appear in and look at that, and be ordinary people who can connect with God, because we're for real, like we're for real trying to live out this life of Christianity together. And so we have a life change team covenant that's been going on here a couple of years, that those who serve on any sort of team around here, we ask them to look over and sign it's not rocket science, this shouldn't be anything that is cultish or weird in any way. It's just saying that we are going to do this together, that we're going to bleed the Bible the Bible together. And it's going to be the final authority of all faith, that we're going to live in community as best we know how. Now we'll pursue this both formal and informal. We say this all the time that we understand that sometimes your time, and I'll pass on maybe longer short, but whatever it is, commit yourself to a local body of believers to a church, if it's not us, somewhere else, Christian conduct that we will strive to fight sin and live a life honoring to God, knowing that we do this from a position of victory, right? Like we're not we're not doing this because if we keep all the rules, okay, maybe God will accept us no, but because God gave us a new heart, because of the new covenant, that we're now able to conduct ourselves like believers, because he's making us new. And we're walking in this together, that we're not doing this alone, I think, well, it's in terms of serving. Those who are called by God and called to Christ will naturally want to serve his body and others. And many of y'all do that well and faithfully an idea of giving that that we move towards this, not only so that it can continue functioning be a church and a place that God's people can gather that because it does something for our hearts, when you realize that not all of my paycheck is mine, but it all belongs to him and I get back a percentage and a portion to him. This is what we have chosen to do, because let's remind ourselves what a covenant is. Again, it's kind of easily or most,

most realistically seen in our marital relationships, the ones that that last night do this before God and others a covenant is a chosen relationship in which two parties make binding promises to each other. But I'm here to tell you that if you want to know what heaven on earth is like, it's like the church being the church, that you and I can have a community apart from community at any given time. A third of our church is made up of people who get their income from some sort of government

entity, whether it's a school system or you know, border patrol or military or otherwise. And so oftentimes we find ourselves here for a season, we may find ourselves here, unattached to any sort of family relationships that are here on the ground. That's okay, because the church can be the family of God for you and for me, but we've got to choose it. Like it's a willing choice that we can say, Yes, I want to be a part of that covenant community for as long as I'm in El Paso, whether it be long or short, and that's why you'll see people all the time when they make their vows to one another. And I know it's hard and it can be trying at times with where it is, it's still death does them part, understanding that they're bound to one another, until death

takes that covenant away? Again, I understand there's reasons to break covenant there are I understand that with a church or with a marital relationship, I get that there's times to break covenant, but it's always meant to be a big deal. And we can't be a people who wander away and wander off and are finicky, or that we don't do the hard things of relationships and asking forgiveness and granting forgiveness and questioning things. And if you have problems going to the person if you need to worship you go worship, whether you feel like it or not, because this is good for us, because our hearts have been made new. And God will bless us and honor us in our going in and are doing that's what he's done for centuries. And I trust that he'll continue to do that he only takes until he takes us home. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you care for us, you love us. Father, I know that around this room, there are all kinds of versions and thoughts of dreams and desires. In the good life, whatever that means. Father, I pray that we find our hope and our strength in you, and that we move about this world from a position of commitment, and covenanting with you first,

then makes its way into covenant community with others. Father, I pray for the people of Life Church. May You strengthen us, may you renew our commitment to you and to this church this day. And in the days ahead.

We thank you we thank you for your word and for your covenants and how you didn't leave us wondering or wondering.

Help us to worship father, you in a spirit of truth

and just reality of what you've done in our hearts as you've taken many, many Hearts of Stone around the room and you've given hearts of flesh. Thank you, father. Thank you for that we pray in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

So let's go to Isaiah 43. Today, I think it's a great passage and talking about new beginnings and new life that God gives us. Just give you a real quick overview of Isaiah. Isaiah is a prophecy book. It's one of those books that is talked about and referenced around Christmas because a lot of times the hope of a manual the hope of the Savior is in Isaiah. Isaiah is also one of those books in the Old Testament that is referenced a lot for the Second Coming. Whether Jesus, we're talking about Jesus coming in the first time as a baby in the manger, or coming a second time upon the clouds. Isaiah is a book a prophet, that was ministering around 700 BCE. Okay, so if you remember from school 700, before Christ, 70 years before Christ, and he's ministering in one of those times, where he is admitting that a dark cloud is coming in the history of the known world at that time, the Babylonians are going to come and they're going to sack Jerusalem, and they're going to take back captives with them. And that happens approximately 586 BCE. And so one of things you need to realize about the people that Isaiah is speaking to, as he's trying to prepare them, for everything that they know, and have known to be turned upside down, to be toppled, to be trampled on, for them to be removed from a situation in which they're comfortable with, and have known all their life. One of the things that is evident when you read Isaiah and other passages in the Bible is that they are very admitted that it's going to get bad before it gets better, but it is going to get better. Is there a lot of life that way, though, isn't it that we have to go through the darkness to get to the other side? The Gospel itself tells us that we have a problem that the bad news is that we're sinners, that we are in bondage to sin, that we have shackles around us that we are broken people that we are messed up people, but God right, so we have to understand the bad news before we can get to what what we call the good news, the gospel that Jesus Christ came to save us to redeem us to buy us back. So you're gonna see that in this passage, and I would argue in a lot of passages in the Bible, so Isaiah 43, do you have a Bible? That's fine. If not, it'll be up on the screen with us. This is what it says. Isaiah 43, beginning of verse 14, this is what the Lord says your Redeemer. Now that word right there Redeemer, y'all know what redemption is? You've heard of redeem something, it's to buy back. So the idea that God Himself reveals Himself to His people here in Isaiah, as the Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, he's separate. He said, apart, He's holy, He is God. Yet he redeems, what does he begin to say? for your sakes? I will send an army against Babylon. So this is coming in the future. They're like, What are you talking about? This is coming in the future that Babylon is going to come and ransacked Jerusalem and take them into a different land. But he says, for your sakes, I will send an army against Babylon, forcing the Babylonians to flee in those ships that they are so proud of. I am the Lord, Your holy one, Israel's creator and King. I am the Lord who opened away now what is he talking about here? First of all, he's talking about the fact that the Babylonians that had great strength in the ancient world, their pride is going to be their undoing. They are your enemies, they are the ones who are hurting you and persecuting you, yet, I'm going to take the very chips that they're proud of, and I'm going to use them to bring you home bring you back into your land, and I in the Lord, I'm going to do it. Because how is that he says, I'm the Lord who opened away through the waters making a dry path through the sea. He's always referencing that what he has done, God is trying to help us to see as people that we can count on him to be faithful in our lives, because he's been faithful before. So if you know the story of Moses and the Exodus of Egypt, and how did they escape, that God made a path when there seemed to be no path when you're staring at rushing waters like the Red Sea, and you're told that God will somehow make a path. It does not make sense to our natural mind. And yet God, he says, I'm the one who opened away through the waters, making a dry path, not a muddy path. It's a real miracle, a dry path through the sea. I called forth the mighty army of Egypt. With all its chariots and horses. I drew them beneath the waves and they drowned. So again, it's just talking about the fact that they may have thought in their pride. I'll go after those Israelites. Pharaoh in his heart and

to heart, he may have decided, yes, no, I'm gonna go and bring them back so that they may be slaves for me once again. Yet what we're seeing here is that God Himself had a purpose and a plan for his enemies. This is great news because a lot of times, we feel like we have to enact vengeance on those who harm us or hurt us. And we're told over and over and over again the scriptures, don't you worry, don't you worry your little head, I'll take care of them. You don't want to be an instrument of vengeance, let God take care of them. That's what he does. He draws them into that area where they think they're gonna be able to crawl safely on the dry land, just like the Israel's before them. But what happened, he drew them beneath the waves, and they drowned their lives snuffed out, like a smoldering candle wick just like that, right? It's going to bring us courage, because God's done it in the past. But Forget all that. Now, he's not saying don't remember it, he wouldn't have recounted that story. He's trying to say I got something even better around the corner. You ever done that before, when you're talking to someone about some great project or some great gift you're about to give them, you remind them of whatever you've done before in terms of project or in terms of gift. And now you're saying but what is again, there's more or forget all that it's nothing compared to what I'm going to do. Here's the point of the passage this morning, for I'm about to do something new. See, I have already begun. Do you not see it, I will make a pathway through the wilderness. Now when you see the word wilderness in your Bible, I want you to always think of chaos. Wilderness is not that sort of beautiful, peaceful, skipping through the park with the birds chirping on a beautiful sunny day. Wilderness is more like those Disney flicks that you see when you go into the danger and there's like, feels like the forest is coming in around you. Or you get lost and turned around. You can't navigate your way out and every every corner that you turn, there's a wolf, there's a snake there's something that is going seeking to devour you or harm you or hurt you, because you're vulnerable in the wilderness. Think about when you have to go way, way, way, way, way out into the desert here in a place like El Paso with no rucksack with no provision with no food, and you are exposed to the elements. That's the wilderness he's talking about in the Scriptures. And he's saying, I will create rivers in the dry wasteland, something that seems impossible God is saying he's going to do for his people. The wild animals in the fields will thank me, the jackals and the owls too, for giving them water in the desert. That's what's so interesting about the scriptures is that when we look to the animals and how they are provided for and Jesus said the same thing, when he talks about the birds of the field, we are to look to them, and they themselves by the very nature that they are being provided for, by God above. We are to see that they are giving praise to God by their very life. Right? And he's saying that just like I provide for them, and that they're praising God for that I will provide for you and you will be able to praise God that even in a desert, we're in a little desert here in El Paso we understand this, that somehow God will make away when there seems to be no way. Yes, I will make rivers in the dry wasteland. Why? So that my chosen people can be refreshed. I have made Israel for myself, and they will someday honor me before the whole world. Now I want to talk about that idea of chosen people. Because sometimes you look at the Old Testament and you're saying No Wait, does that still apply to us? How does this all work? When you look to the scriptures, you really just have the people of God in the Old Testament is very clear that he's dealing with a unique nation,

Israel, but it's very abundantly clear when Jesus comes along that he is here for the whole world. And what is he here to do? He's here to care for us to redeem us to buy us back to center feet on a path just like we talked about, in this beautiful story of this family. He's here to do something new in your life and in mind, not keep us where we're at. Not so we would stay where we're at. But that's so our feet would be on a new path. But why is God doing this? Is he doing this because we're somehow special than everybody else? Because we somehow smarter or figured it out? No, it's in God's nature, to love and to care. So then when it's not something we can brag about or boast about like okay, yeah, I did something so great. That's why I'm the chosen one of God whether you're talking about chosen in Old Testament Israel sense or chosen and a new covenant New Testament believer since it's all God and it's all grace, and it's all God doing it for His glory. That's why he says in the very beginning, I

doing this for my namesake, you can look back on Isaiah 4310. And really the whole chapter from 42 and 43. And you can see that God is all about his glory. He's his name, his fame throughout the whole world. And you say, no, wait a second, I heard in that passage, it's about my good. It's about me receiving these good things from God, these gifts from above, just like the the, the people of old had mana, quail from heaven that I would receive that. And what you and I have to realize as we grow in Christ is that God's glory in our good is not at odds that they come together in the form of the cross, and our redemption. That's what makes this gospel so good news, such good news, that he is our Redeemer, and that he is taking personal responsibility for us. For us. That's what it means to be the people of God. Sure, in the Old Testament, it seems like there was one nation state, but it's so clear when you get to the New Testament that it was really the whole world and everyone will know that there is a God. And what he calls us to do is when he's taken personal responsibility of us, just like people take personal responsibility of their children. He is called and he will release us from every bondage that we suffer in this life, or in the life to come. Now it doesn't feel like that at times does it? Because we've already talked about it. You may have had a tough week, you may have had a tough season, you may have had a tough year, or you may be entering in one of those things. A lot of times it feels like you're being crapped on doesn't it? Just like this doesn't feel very good. It feels like I've been forgotten about. You're talking about a God, whether it's a God in Israel or a god, that's a very present help in time of trouble. Pastor, I don't see it. I don't feel it. I don't know it. When I look around, I have death of loved ones and friends and feelings doesn't seem like good. It doesn't seem like hope right now. Yet God is doing something. And I would argue he's already done something in what he accomplished on the cross, that beautiful cross. That's why we go back to that. And we understand that that something was given to us there some sort of gift was given to us there so that we might live. He's not done with us yet. If you woke up this morning, and you had breath in your lungs, God's not done with you yet. He's not done with me yet. It is not complete. And in fact, it tells us in these verses, he's doing a new thing. Even if we can't see it, he's doing a new thing. He is making all things new. I think about this, this week, I had the privilege of touring some of our public schools, and they're bringing in some of the tech trades back into the public school system. And one of the ones that I found so fascinating was the ones where they were working on vehicles and they would do brake jobs. And they would do different things with cosmetology and all that. It's just beautiful. Some of the some of the advancements we're getting in our city for the opportunities for young people. But one of the ones I've found most fascinating and I've always liked vehicles is when I went to the paint shop, and they would show us these cars that were beat up. And they're they're putting Bondo on it, and they're smoothing them out. And then they're about to show the finished product and the retailing classic vehicles right here in our city, in some of our public schools. But it doesn't look like it yet. It looks like a hunk of metal. It looks like junk. It looks like crap. But what's going to happen we understand that there is going to be a whole process and a whole like new car is going to be rolled out of one of those eventually. You see this not only in this scripture I want to remind us of Isaiah 4319 The main passage today Behold, now that we're behold what do you you and I understand that to mean it's that whole idea of look look up pay attention I'm doing a new thing now it springs forth Do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert you and I have to see that's miraculous. I mean when I when I walk out to Fort Bliss and when I walk out to the edge of the desert two blocks past pebble Hills I don't see any water as oh yeah there is we put some water towers up there and we put you know we we saw the engineers who are sloping the the roads in such a way to gather No, no, I'm not talking about feats of engineering. I'm talking about God Himself, making a miraculous way. When it makes no natural sense supernatural work, miraculous work in your life and mind that cannot be explained any other way. But God that's what he's doing in your life and mind will see this and other passages. If you don't want to see it in I say, you can see this in terms of limitations. That wasn't only true in life, but it's true in grief. We've talked about grief here and we're going to give you an opportunity to go to a memorial service right after this service and and grief real grief is a How can anything

good come out of this. How can anything new come out of this? How can anything that has life come out of this?

Jeremiah when he's writing the book of limitations, that very word means to grieve, lament, the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Do you see the newness there? Then you say, Well, I didn't feel like that when I woke up out of bed this morning, I still felt the pain that I felt the day before. But God, His mercies are new every morning. He's taking care of the birds. He's taking care of you. He woke you and me up this morning, he is up to something. And it's the little things that he's doing in your life in mind, that will accomplish and lead to something great, not only for this age, but for the age to come not only for your life and my life and this generation, but for generations to come. So he's they're doing something new in life in grief. How about in baptism,

we'll go the next passage there in the book of Romans six, for when you're here for baptisms that we celebrate. And it was such a privilege and honor to talk about this family and how they came to Christ over so many years, one by one, making that personal decision to follow him. But if you listen, I'll always say some version of this, buried with Christ raised to walk in white newness of life. That's what it's talking about here. And I get this from this passage. Why? Because you and I aren't the same when we go through the waters of baptism, because of what God's done in our heart. And it's not only true in life and grief and baptism, it's true in the end. It's true in the end, what we call eschatological. It's just that idea of in time. So if you go to that last passage in the book of Romans, chapter 21, verse five, you may have seen this or heard this, and He who was seated on the throne said, what there's that word again, be hold, behold, pay attention, look up. It's something that we say Behold, right. Like, like, like when these, like you when these ladies come down to, you know, and when they're beautiful dress, they're what they're beholding we take pictures of them. And so it said, I did Behold God himself saying, I am making all things new. This is true, guys, this is true. I've shown it throughout the scriptures. And also he said, Write these things down. They are trustworthy and true. Here's the deal, though, as we live, and as we go forth, we live in the tension of the already but not yet. What does that mean? Well, guys, we live a lot of our life this way, don't we? That tension of the idea that, that our house that we buy, it's ours yet it's not quite ours until the mortgage is paid off. I mean, it's the idea that that when you have a child in the womb, it's yours. You have that child, but it's not already born and all these things that we understand it in the same way when you and I are redeemed. We have an understanding that he is creating something new in our life. Yet there's still squabbles, there's still fight, there's still heartache, there's still pain, there's still things that we're trying to work through. Because we live in the tension that God's already done something yet. It's not fully complete until the end, we live in that tension of the already, but not yet. But it's a trustworthy and true saying this final one, I want us to see one point this morning, and then we'll close that God Himself is making all things new that I am, that's God himself speaking these things. We saw it in Isaiah, we'll see it in Revelation. We'll see it on our lives. We'll see it in other people's lives. The idea that he's not done with us yet, praise God, he's not done with me. I look out at you. He's not done with you. If you're listening online, he's not done with you. And this is trustworthy. This is true. This is reality doesn't seem like it because our reality sometimes is what we can see touch and feel. And God says there's a greater reality. There's something else more going on behind the scenes, and I'm taking care of you and my glory, God's saying, My glory, the great I am making all things new, and you're good, the good things that come to our life what we often call blessings, or just this is good for me. They're not at odds, church, His glory are good, come together, we can see it most clearly in the form of the cross. Once you come, let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you care for us, that you have redeemed us that you have set many people's feet upon a rock in this room. I pray for those who are struggling to believe these truths today.

I pray for the Tapia family that you continue to grow them. Thank you for their life and their testimony. For their I pray for our church as we always have great things to rejoice over about how you're working in our life, yet simultaneously great

Things that we grieve over with loss, loss of family, loss of friends, loss of job, maybe loss of income.

If other help us to live in the tension lean and do you lean into what you have for us not only this day but all the days of our life we ask this in Christ's name, Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Your pastor and I send it on to El Paso right about the same time. I got here in October, and he hurried up and got behind me, came here in November of 2019. And we got here just in time for COVID. I mean, right? It was one of those things we just got going and then ministry started going and all of a sudden it was like you're not here. You're about to hear about COVID. Right. Thank you for having me here. Well, today, I want to talk to you a little bit about influencers. And I know that's a topic today that's mostly for young people. I swear the influencers today are getting younger and younger, right? Or are we getting older and older? I prefer the first we're getting they're getting younger and younger. No, none of us are getting older and older, right? But I want to let you know the more influence that comes into your life by whatever person place or thing, you will start to gravitate towards that. Whatever that is in your life. And you may not think while I'm just I'm telling you, when you have influence in your life, you do things and it impacts who you are. And so I wanted to kind of just go over a little couple statistics with you. So you can understand where I'm gonna come from today. The number one influencer in the world that has the most Instagram followers, you probably already know this, but it's Kylie Jenner. She has 399 Instagram followers. Do we have 99 million Excuse me? I think I got 399 399 million Instagram followers. She has 200. Her sister Kendall has 294 million followers. So she has 100 million less followers. So the price between first place and second place, not even close. She has a lot more followers. Kylie has 54 million Tik Tok followers. But this is the statistic that I just blew my mind is that she has 1.2 billion likes. So obviously people are watching her stuff. Kylie Jenner is the most influential person today in the world of social media influencers. But there's a price to be paid. She can't go out into public by herself without an entourage. She probably has to stay at home a lot. They give up a lot to be popular. Well, Paso has a really huge influence. They have a couple but one that's the that's the most Instagram followers. Her name is Ashley solace. She does makeup personal. And she has 672,000 Instagram followers. So if you're one of those, you're helping her out. She's getting rich off of you,

or you've all the likes and clicks and all that and she gets all that right. You may be wondering why what's this guy up? You're telling me about influences. You may be here to say I don't really care about that stuff.

Why did I come to church today? What are we doing here? Well, I want you to be aware of how influenced of people that we are. We are very influenced by the things that we put into our life. They impact who we are even as pastors, we listen to certain pastors, we listen to certain music, we listen to certain things. We read certain topics. We're impacted on how we ministered to people with what we put in our life.

But I want you to understand our biblical text this morning. As popular as these worldly influencers are, they're unable to keep up with Jesus. You know that Jesus has 2.1 8 billion followers all over the globe today.

1/3 and 1/3 of the population believes that Jesus Christ is the King of kings in the Lord of lords. Now, I guess a lot of work for us to do because two thirds of the world doesn't believe that. But 2.1 8 billion followers, he's the greatest influencer of our time. His name is Jesus. That's Believe it or not, is 1.7 billion more followers than Kylie Jenner doesn't hold a candle to Jesus. So I want to get to our text this morning. So you came here to hear what God's Word says and I want you to understand. We'll put it all in the context for you. I'm going to be reading from Mark chapter 10. Mark chapter 10. And I'm going to begin in verse 23. And I'm gonna read down through verse 31. Now, a lot of times I like to say, you know, if you have your Bible or your app or whatever, I want you to open it up, and let's look at it for yourself. I've always tried, I've always wanted to do this. We didn't do that today. But when I was pastoring, and I started the church too. I've always wanted to put the wrong text up on the screen. Just so you can see how I can dupe you into believing that's what the text says. So that's why it's always good for you to follow along to make sure To help keep me accountable, because trust me there are times we got it all electronically, we put it in there. And it's like I've said the wrong address to what that text is, it happens. This is Mark chapter 10, verses 23. Through 31, says Jesus looked around and said to his disciples, how hard is it for the rich to enter the kingdom of God? How hard it is, excuse me how hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God, this amaze them. But Jesus said, again, dear children, it is very hard to enter the kingdom of God. In fact, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God. The disciples were astounded. Listen to the question they asked, then who can be saved in this world who in the world can be saved? Jesus looked at them intently and says humanly speaking, it is impossible, but not with God. Everything is possible with God. Then Peter began to speak up. We've given up everything to follow you. He said. Yes, Jesus replied. And I assure you that everyone who has given up house or brothers or sisters, or mother, or father or children or poverty, for my sake, and for the good news, will receive them and return 100 times as many houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and property, along with persecution. Now, I was good with the first list. And then he threw that in, along with persecution. And then the world to come, that person will have eternal life. But many who are the greatest now will be the least important then and those who seem least important now will be the greatest, then what do you bow your head and pray with me as we pray for God's word to impact our lives. And Father, God, we come this morning thanking you for all that you do for us. We thank you that we can look to you turn to your word, and understand how we ought to live in this world. And so God we're grateful for all the blessings that you've given each one of us. But today, God tune our ears towards you. Bend our hearts towards you. Let us lean in and understand what it is you have for us to take today. In Christ's name I pray, amen. My first point is being an influencer is hard work. Being an influencer is hard work. Only a few make it to that elite status of social media giants known as the influencer. It takes a lot of hard work. In verse 23 of our texts. Jesus said this about influencers, he said, people with lots of earthly riches, will have a hard time entering the kingdom of God. Why would Jesus say that? Why did he say that? I mean, we all have we are rich compared to most of the world as a people in the United States. Why would Jesus say that? He said it because the riches of this world can blind us into believing that this is all there is. When we are blessed beyond measure, when we God has given us so many blessings it can. It can distract us from what the real goal of our life is. And that's to influence others with who Jesus is in our life. It becomes an obstacle to follow Christ. It was believed that a rich person was blessed by God, everybody that had a lot of stuff back in that culture, they believe God was blessing them. Let me say this before we go a little bit farther, all riches are a blessing from God. He does bless us with a lot of stuff here. It's when you believe that only those riches are for people that are blessed. And as if those that don't have them are not. And that was the belief of that culture. And I think we sometimes believe that in our life today. Well, they must want to be out on the street or they must want to be like that, or maybe they don't want a better job. You know, you don't know people stories. People have their own stories. Everybody has a story. Jesus's disciples were not rich. They were from everyday walks of life. They were the blue collar workers of the day. That's who they were. They were fishermen. When you listen to some preachers today, they try to sell us a prosperity gospel. Let me just say this as bluntly as I can, God's Kingdom is not for sale. Well, if I was preaching the truth, I'd say Amen, right then it's okay. You can respond. God's Kingdom is not for sale. It's not for sale. You cannot tell me that you can sit up here and tell me if God is gonna bless you. He's gonna bless you and riches, and therefore you're going to have the kingdom of God. That is not what the Word of God teaches. His kingdom is not for sale. Verses 24 and 25. Jesus goes on and amazes everyone when he says this. Remember, he said it's hard for the rich man. And then he says it's very hard. Not just hard, but very hard for a person of wealth to enter God's kingdom, he compared the difficulty to a camel entering into the eye of a needle. Now some people have that have done a commentaries on the Bible said there was a gate called the the eye of the eye of the needle. But that's not true. I've done a lot of studies on that there was never a gate called that. He was trying to say this is a large animal. And this is a small thing. Getting into the kingdom of God because of who you are and what your riches are. It's very difficult for that large animal to go through the amount of fact, he says it's impossible is not going to happen. You compare the difficulty of a camel going through the eye of a needle, a camel, going through the eye of a needle, it makes no sense does it? Doesn't it? The large animal passing through that hole can't be done your hair today and trusting in the riches that God has blessed you with to gain access to Jesus, it's not going to happen. The only way you have access to Jesus is by believing by faith, that he is who he says he is. And what did Jesus say he is He is the Son of God, and He is the Savior of the world. I have come to save sinners from themselves is what Jesus does for us. In verse 26 of our text, the hearers of this proclamation think, well, then no one's going to be able to make it they say they actually question Who in the world can be saved? And how are those possible that anybody can come to Christ, if not by that. And Matthew 19, verses 21 and 22. This is Matthew's text on the same story. And he says this, Jesus told them, If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow me. He was talking to a young man and he said this, but the young man heard this, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions. I know it's hard. When you come to Christ, sometimes you lose things, you might even lose your family, you might lose influence of who you thought your followers, your followers were because they don't believe what you believe. When the influence of this world convince us that the wealth is the key to life. And we're told that we'll have a hard time being influenced by the one who can truly give you life. It's going to be hard. He will does want to be the top influencer in your life, he does be the one to be the one that you read the most, that you watch the most, that you take heart the most. But he won't share his influence with somebody else's influence in your life. He's not going to share His glory with anyone. It's Jesus and him alone. If you're here today, I want to I just want to talk to you a little bit. Would you try to make Jesus the most popular influence in your life? Would you try to think about what do I really get out of coming to church? And how am I letting the influence in my life impact others?

If you're just coming to church on Sunday, the rest of the time is going to be harder throughout the week, you have to understand what God's word says to us and speaks to us so that we can tell others about the Kingdom of God. My second point has been influenced by Jesus changes your destiny, it changes your destiny. And the last couple of verses are 27 through 31 Tex Tex agenda, different direction. And this another mind blowing statement by Jesus as everyone up in arms. He says humanly speaking, it's impossible, but not with God. Everything is possible. So sometimes we drink the Kool Aid, you know what that term means, right? We drink the stuff that people are selling us. We drink it that tells us how to be happy in life, how to have blessings in life, how to have riches in life, how to gain followers in this life, right? You will be disappointed with the results. I promise you. Because that's not what life is about. It will disappoint you. nothing or no one can guarantee you happiness or success or riches. Nobody can promise that to you. Nothing can do that for you. I don't care who has your eye or your ear. They cannot guarantee anything. It makes them rich when you follow them, not you. They're the ones getting rich off of your following off of you being influenced by them. They're the ones that are living that life. There's nothing in all humanity that can change your destiny of eternal security except for Jesus. Because he said, if you look after those things, he said, It's impossible, humanly speaking. I don't know about you, but the greatest influencer in the world, just made a bold proclamation. He said, It's impossible, humanly speaking. And then Jesus says this,

but not with God. If you go back to Genesis, one of the most famous quotes from all of the texts in Genesis he says, But God,

but God, but God. So Jesus is trying to teach us a really life lesson here. And he says, Listen, everything that you're trying to do, humanly speaking, you're never going to reach that destination. You're never gonna get there because it's humanly impossible. But he says, I have the answer for you. And he says, but not with God. This same text and the Message Bible says this, in verse 27, Jesus was blunt, no chance at all. If you think you can pull it off by yourself, every chance in the world. If you let God do it, every chance in the world if you let God do it, he says, it's not going to happen doing it by yourself in verse 28 of our texts, we can always count on Peter having something to say if you if you've read any part of the New Testament, Peters lace, then through all over the place. And he says these things all the time that are just, you're just thinking, Peter, what are you talking about? And he says this. We've given up everything to follow You, Jesus. Now, if you know, back in Matthew's account of the color of the disciples, Peter and his brother were fishing, and he told him, Hey, lay down your nets and come follow me. And they did immediately. And so for Peter, I think he thinks he thought giving up his livelihood, or giving up what he did to go follow. Jesus was giving up everything. The fact is, Peter still had a house, Peter still had a wife, and he's still fish, because Jesus told him, Go get some fish for us all the time. So it's not like he had to give up all those things. What he had to do was give up control of those things over to God. And that's what he was trying to say is like, Jesus, I've given up everything. And Jesus was so patient with Peter, wasn't he? He never only one time that he tell him Get behind Me, Satan. And that was because Peter was just talking nonsense, foolishness. And sometimes we talk foolishness to God. And we say things that we shouldn't say to God. No one ever said, being under the influence of Jesus was easy. It's not. Can we just be honest, this morning, being a follower of Christ, and today's culture is very difficult. But Be blessed that you live in a country that allows you to follow Jesus. There are those that don't. The difference between following today's type of influencer, all you have to do is follow with no commitment. Just like their page, watch their videos, zero commitment. The thing about following Jesus, though, it takes a commitment. You have to give up something to follow him. And in reality, what you're giving up is control over who you are, and go to putting it under the control and the influence of Jesus Christ. He says, I want to be more like you Jesus, following Jesus requires a commitment. That's why even though he has over 2 billion followers, there are over 4 billion people that aren't following him 6 billion, actually, there's almost 8 billion people on the planet today. We don't have enough we have the right numbers. Verse 29, of our text, Jesus replies to Peter statement. It says, We have given up everything to follow, you know, one can imply that he literally no longer has these things. When Peter was claiming this, I'm following you, as a priority in my life is That's what Peter was trying to say, is I've given up everything and I've prioritized you in my life. Now you're telling me that I can't do these things. I can't attain eternal life. But that's his what he felt like that God was showing him through this text. That's how much God loved him is that he said, with God. All things are possible with God. Sometimes when a person decides to believe in Jesus, they lose their family. I already said that earlier. They lose who they are. If you're another religion, another denomination, and God leads you to do something different. You could end up lose Seeing your family, they could actually disown you. And I think that's why Peter was saying, Man, we gave up everything to follow you, even at the cost of my family. In verse 30, Jesus says that the gain that we gain much more than we lose, we gain more houses, more children, more livestock more everything because we follow Christ. Jesus mentions one more thing that we gain when we follow Jesus. Like I said, I liked the first part of that. And then he says, You also gain persecution. I was like, why did he have to put that in there? It was going so well. But listen, if you're going to be a true follower of Christ, people are going to make fun of you. People are not going to like some of your posts. People aren't going to like not like who you are. People are gonna say, Why do you go to church? Why do you even follow that Pastor more at your church life? Church? Why? What is he ever done for you? I'll tell you what your pastor done for you. He's given his life to the call to exhort the Word of God to you, every week, upon every week. And he says, This is who we can be if we just follow Christ. If we allow the Holy Spirit to influence our lives, we can be who God has called us to be. It's not easy in this culture to be what I deem a Jesus freak. Because man, you're looked at as weird and different. When we really think about it, we're the ones that ought to be doing the influencing in this world, right? We're the ones that should be doing it. In verse 30, Jesus promises eternal life. That's why we do it. He says, there's this comparison of influence the temporary life versus the eternal life, the temporary life is so easy to attain, you can gain riches and gain all the degrees you want and be this great influencer in this culture today. And yet it amounts to nothing when you stand before a holy God to give an account for the life that you live, if you have no Jesus in your life. Eternal is hard work. It's hard to convince a non believing family that Jesus is the way especially like us, we came to Christ in our 20s. And it took a lot of work to convince our family that we were following the True JESUS. Years and years and years, we live in such an instant world instant gratification, we find it very difficult to do that we give up so easily. Well, I told them once, they didn't want Jesus. So that's it. That's not who we are, as people in verse 31, sums up our sermon today. But many of you who are the greatest now will be the least important, then he's talking about the eternal life. And those who seem least important now, and that's us, as believers, sometimes we're the least important person in the room. He says, it'll be the greatest, then today's influencers are great for the here, and now. They do a lot of good stuff for this world. We're not they're not looking at eternity. Everyone knows them. They're famous. Those that choose to be Jesus influencers must follow Jesus, and be the ones doing the influencing. So this morning, you may be asking pastor, how do I do that? How do I have influence over people? When I myself am questioning whether Jesus is influencing me? It's a good question, right? It's a very good question of the day is Jesus Christ, the biggest influencer in your life? Because if he is, then it will be very simple to influence others. Because I promise you the other things that are influencing your life, you're having impact on other people's lives, because those things are coming out, and who you are. We have to switch our influencing or influencers who come into our life to Jesus. So what does that look like? How do you go about being coming one? Everything depends on how committed you are to Jesus. Have you truly given your entire life to Jesus? Because I think a lot of times in life we think about, I just want to go to heaven. Right? I just don't want to go to that place they call Hal. Because they say that's gonna be a spooky place a bad place. I don't want to be part of that place. I want to go to the place that we're going to be doing what we did this morning. Clap clapping and praising God, I want to be in that place. But some people some of us think that that's all there is. We're gonna just go to heaven. And in the meantime, we're just here. I want to let you in on a little secret. Your eternity starts the day you ask Jesus to be the Lord of your life. That's the day that you get saved. And it's not because of Heaven was the the ultimate goal you would go immediately to heaven as soon as you've said yes to Jesus, but because he leaves you here, he says, I have worked for you to be done. I need you to influence this world for me. He started with 12 disciples, and it turned the world upside down. We're here because we have letters, and documentation, and Holy Spirit, and churches that have been influenced by those first original 12 that Jesus sent out into the world. And look at what he's doing 2.1 8 billion followers of Jesus.

But it takes commitment to follow him. Sometimes I think, as parents, I say this all the time, I learned it from Josh McDowell. We tell our kids to behave.

Just go over there you go, that party, don't mess up my name, because you gotta get my last name. Right? You know who you are. Just behave? Well, we ought to be telling our kids and we ought to be telling our family is to believe because behavior could never impact how you believe. You can't behave your way to belief. But you can believe your way to behavior. If you believe that Jesus is the Savior of the world, it'll be automatic that you want to be the best behaved person that there is not perfect. I'm not saying that. But so many times we're too busy trying to behave our way to our belief. That's not what Jesus said. He said, You have to believe first. And then you can behave. Sunday's are great. Pastor delivers a message that can kickstart our week. I don't know if you know this, but Sunday is actually the first day of the week. If you look at your calendar, it's always Sunday. It's never Monday, even though we're convinced that it's Monday, because that's when we all go to work, right? Sunday's the first day of the week, and we come to church, and we worship God and we kick start our week off, so that we can understand who he is so that we can live for him. But what do you do? What do we do in the middle in between, because we have six more days before, we're going to come back to this place of worship again. We got to be under the influence of Jesus, influence the Holy Spirit, we have to read His Word. Your pastor can't do that for you every day. Even if you even if he did podcast every day, it wouldn't be enough. He's not Jesus. He's only going to try to point you to the one who is Amen. And don't ever forget that about him. We put a lot of pressure on our pastors to become Jesus for us. Jesus doesn't need pastor Moore's help. He's using him in his kingdoms for influence. But listen, Jesus is an influencer on his own, we have the text to prove it, the most popular influences that the whole time that has been put into your heart, mind and soul is Jesus Christ. Don't ever forget that. And so today, I want to ask you, do you need Jesus to be the Lord of your life? who's influencing your life? It's easy to tell, all you got to do is remember, what's the last thing you've done? Even before you came to church, a lot of people were on Tiktok, watching whatever, before they even got to church, there was no preparation to come into this place. We did all the things we wanted to do. And now we want to go now Jesus changed my life in 30 minutes. And then I'm gonna go out and live the rest of my hours on my own. It doesn't work that way. So I want to ask you this morning, who you've been influenced by? And the better question is, Who are you influencing because God has given you a sphere of influence, for you to give impact to for the people that he's put in your life. And all the things that we put into our life are going to come out during our relationships of those people. And so we ourselves have to be under the influence of Jesus, to be able to influence others for Jesus, Amen. So this morning, I'm going to ask you, I'm gonna, I'm gonna close in a word of prayer. But as we're praying, I want you to think about this. How is my life with Jesus? How am I impacted with Jesus? Am I really living for Him? Do I really have a relationship with him? Or did I just want Jesus so I can go to heaven. I mean, that's a great perk. eternal destiny with him is great. But you have a whole life to live here while you're on this planet, to be the influencer that he's called you to be. So do whatever God has called you to do. But I want you to be as we pray, think about your personal life. Do you have a relationship with the true living God that I was talking about from the scriptures? Or are you relying on other stuff? Maybe you're relying on your behavior? Maybe you're saying, well, I'll just do a lot of good things so that when I get there, it'll outweigh all the bad things that I've done. That's not why he went to the cross. When Jesus Christ spread his arms out and he died for your sins. He said, I went there because I wanted to die for you. I wanted to give you life. I gave my life so that you would have life That's the influence that he has on you. So I'm going to pray. And if you need to ask Jesus to be the Lord of your life today, for the very first time, so you know what, Pastor? I've been trying this and I've been trying that, but I've never really tried Jesus. Would you ask Jesus to come into your life today, I'm going to be out in the foyer with Pastor Moore. And we're going to have a song here in a minute. But just stop by and say, You know what, pastor? I want to know more who about who Jesus is, as pastor more pastor more, I want to ask Jesus to be the Lord of my life. We will pray with you right then and there. And I know sometimes in a church, they have people come forward. And I don't know what what God is doing in your heart today. If you feel like you need to come and pray, you come and do that. Just kneel here. This is what we call an altar. This is not the actual altar. But we make this our altar because we kneel before a holy God. And we say, I want to do business with you, God, I want to get my life right with you, God. So let me pray for you. And while the band plays the song, whatever you need to do, get right with God. Okay? God, thank you for this time this morning. I thank you for your word. And I thank you that we don't have to rely on our own strength and our own riches to get to heaven, to have an eternal life with you. And God, I pray that you're the greatest influencer amongst us, in our hearts and in our lives. And I pray that as we come this morning, God, deciding for ourselves, who we want to be the Lord of our lives. I pray this morning God that there will be people moved in this place, an audience, this big God, there are people here that have never surrendered their life and heart to you. And so this morning, God, I'm asking you by the power of the Holy Spirit to do so, to allow them to speak those words, that say in Romans chapter 10, verse nine and 10, that will just confess You, Jesus as our Lord, that will have an eternal relationship with you that if I believed that you were raised from the dead after you were killed on a cross, that we would be saved. God, I'm so glad those passages are there for us. We confess with our mouth, we believe in our heart. And it's because of that we are saved. We're trusting in your influence in our life, not someone else's. And so God this morning as we can to conclude this service. I pray that there are many here that need to know Jesus as their Lord and Savior, and that aren't afraid to say, That's me. Jesus, I need you. And so Father God move in their lives, to move from their seats from where they're at. Christ's name I pray, amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Courtney, appreciate you so much. Thank you guys for being here. I can tell fall is among us. We have some supporters of various teams now it tends towards Dallas Cowboys, I understand that. But yeah, so we have some fans out here. And I noticed that there's others as well. And so be sensitive to those who may not support the Cowboys. And then if you are not a Cowboys, fans also be sensitive to the Cowboys fans next week, because who knows what the score is going to be? All right, so and that's not prophecy one way or the other. I'm just a pastor. Okay. And so we'll just go right into the lesson today, of course, is on preparing our hearts for serving the city, I think I talk a lot about seek the good of the city, I might even say the word seek the peace in the Hebrew term, and Shalom. You may have heard that before. But it's that holistic idea of the good of the city, but I'm not sure I've ever shared exactly where that comes from that idea. There's a there's a very clear passage in scripture that really helps us to understand what we're doing, why we're doing it, what we hope to accomplish in these days together. So it will be in the book of Jeremiah and Jeremiah is an interesting book. It's very thick, it's very long. It's one of the longest prophetic books in the Bible. It is found in the Old Testament. When you think Old Testament I know you've probably heard about the nation of Israel, there's a there's a nation state Israel today, I get that it worked a little bit different in the Old Testament, because in the Old Testament, when you think about Israel, it was also a people and the land, right. And so they had, we live in a democracy, they had a theocracy. So the idea of God and government, we're all intertwined. And one of the things that you see and understand in the ancient world is that there were times when other nations would come and ransack places. And so you see, the, the idea of the United Kingdom, the idea of Israel in its glory days would have been about 1000 BCE, around the time of David, that would have been Solomon's temple, you may be heard of Solomon, the wisest man on earth. But that United Kingdom didn't last very long, they became the breaking of the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah, the northern kingdom fell to the Assyrians in 722. The southern kingdom fell to the Babylonians in 586 BC. Now I just saw this as a this is history, but it's also biblical history. And it helps us to understand kind of where the Bible's at when the southern kingdom of Jerusalem fell. In 586 BC to the Babylonians, they decided to take some of them into exile back to Babylonia, them, and they did this very strategically, they said, We're going to take the leaders, the the province, the priests, the the skilled workers, any community leader they could find, and we're gonna bring them for a generation or two into another land, because that would assimilate them. And so when they did that, the Israelites were rightly so thinking, what are we supposed to do? And so their, their gut instinct was, let's, let's huddle to ourselves. Let's sort of build a wall around this community and wait for God to take us back home. And so that was their instinct. And Jeremiah comes along, and he says, no, no, no, you have got to think about your being in a different land a foreign land in a different way. And that is where we're at this morning, in terms of Jeremiah, addressing that whole issue of the people of God being in an area that they don't find, love very much like home. So beginning in verse four of chapter 29 of the book of Jeremiah, this is what the Lord of Heaven's Armies, the God of Israel says to the captives, he is exiled to Babylon, from Jerusalem. So I've already kind of told you that story. It's interesting, the way the Bible looks at things is that everything is ultimately under the plan, and the will of God. And so even though a pagan, non Israelite, non Christian nation came to take these people out of their home says that God, of course, allows all this and so, what's going on here? God digital says to all the captives, he has exiled to Babylon from Jerusalem, build homes, plan to stay plant gardens and eat the food they produce, marry and have children. Then find spouses for them so that you may have many grandchildren multiply do not dwindle away. And work for the peace and prosperity of the city where I sent you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it for its welfare will determine your welfare there. So you can see right there, it's just that whole idea of when a city thrives, you will thrive as an individual this is just kind of basic spiritual things the way it works. Now this would have sound. God, are you sure you know what you're talking about? Because these are a what opposing enemy that has brought us as what people not who willingly left their homeland, but that were dragged out of their homeland, brought to a land that they did not know, not speak the language and understand the culture and are now here for a little while. Their gut instinct and urine eyes gut instinct would be let's, let's retain something of what we have. And let's not go out there and be among these people. They're different than us. They, they do not think like us, they don't do things the way we do. And so one of the first things I want us to see this morning, though, it's very clear, is that when El Paso prospers, you will prosper. Now, that seems so counterintuitive for a lot of reasons. And I'll get into some of those. But I just want to throw that out there. That's what I see from this passage. It's that whole idea of when the people of God go into a city, and they are not only concerned about themselves, but they're concerned about how things work and function in the place that they live, that they would function smooth that they would function, right that they would go into things that would help the city be beautified and to do well financially, when all that occurs, that you yourself that I myself, will get prosperity. Now, this is so countercultural in that day, and in our day, because everything in us, pulls us towards self, right? We don't have to teach little kids to say me or mine, right? We teach them to say, Mommy, we seem to say, Daddy, but somehow they pick up very early Mine, mine me, right? Why? Because we are bent or pulled towards our own individualism. And then of course, this is, this is heightened by all the advertising that you and I are inundated with, not only on television, and radio has in days gone by, but in our own very devices that we have in our pockets. It's all about spending money on self now. Sounds like No, no, no, I have some history here. And so there is a sense of my people, my familia, my family, my ethnicity, my tribe. That's the other thing that we're sometimes pulled to think no, no, I'm not only just pulled towards self, but I have an understanding of my people. But Christianity really smacks both of those down. And what God was trying to say to the people of God, then and he's trying to say to us now is that Christianity is always others centered. It's always other center. It's not just about me, it's about you. It's like, how are you? How are your needs. Think about this in terms of any sort of marital relationship, if you've ever had a relationship with a spouse, or if you've observed spousal relationships, you know, that only takes one to be all about self to really wreck that relationship. But if you're in a marital relationship, and you're not only concerned about your needs, but you're actually caring and concerned about the other's needs, then you have a hope for prospering and thriving, it's already been mentioned, but that is the first and the second commandment. And so the point is, at this passage, you can't get rounded according to verse seven and following, which is make this your home as long as you're here. Now, some of y'all are still like, no, wait

a second pastor, you don't know how I got here. You don't know the social dynamics of what brought me here, I didn't choose to go to El Paso I am married in or I just got stuck here somehow on the side road or the military sent me here or some other job or I was born here, or a generation or two back, we came over through waters and this was just the first place that my ancestors stopped. And so that's why I'm here. And what we fail to see is all of that is over the sovereign. Under the sovereign plan of God, however we got here, whether it was through our own means or whether through our own will or against our will, because that's what the people of God were faced with in Jeremiah's time. They didn't choose to go to Babylon, Babylon chose to come and get them and take them to a place that was not theirs. do this do this idea of making a place your home, even when everything isn't quite right. Now, how are we able to do that we're able to do that because the people of God has all have always seen themselves at some level as sojourners and wonders as exiles in this land. And so that a lot of times will cause us to retreat. You see this sometimes in Christianity, and maybe you are a part of that or you've been a part of a church or faith community that was somewhat scared of the world. And so they wanted to build up walls and say, no, no, no, no world bad. Jesus Christianity, church, our Christian family good. And so we're going to try to create that separation and what is going on here, the book of Jeremiah says, Don't do that. Figure out a way to make this your home to work alongside because when you seek the good of the city, you yourself will be prosperous. But that's a weird thing. Because because we're supposed to do this fully realizing this isn't our home, we're to do this without taking on the values of the culture around us. That's where the tension lies, right? It's almost like that phrase that you've maybe heard before, from a legal sense kind of a resident alien, it's idea that we're residents here, but yet we feel like like, we're aliens, why? And that's just that whole idea of like, we know that it's not quite our home. And that's how the people of God have thought about this world for a long time. But we know that this is not our final resting place that someday will go to glory. So is that all that has to say here? No, it goes on verse eight. This is what the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel says, Do not let your profits and fortune tellers who are with you in the land of Babylon trick you do not listen to their dreams, because they are telling you lies in my name I've not sent them says the Lord. This is what the Lord says, you will be in Babylon for 70 years. But then I will come and do for you all the good things I have promised. And I'll bring you home again, For I know the plans I have for you says the Lord, their plans for good and not for disaster to give you a future and a hope. In those days when you pray, I will listen if you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me I will be found by use as the Lord. I will injure captivity and restore your fortunes, I will gather you out of the nations where I sent you and will bring you home, again to your own land. Now I want to tell you something about the Old Testament is that a lot of times you can see our narrative as the church and as the people of God. It's not a one for one correlation. But you can see the symbolism from the Old Testament and how God dealt with Israel, is how he deals with the people of God to this day, both individually, and corporately. So what they were looking for the Old Testament folks is they were looking for a literal land. That's what they thought God had for them was a literal land. That's why when Jesus came, He came and said that I am a Jew. I'm one of you, I came from you yet I'm for the whole world. It's not about this land here. It's about a kingdom that is to come. It's not about me establishing myself in a literal city. It's about a city on a hill. It's about a city that has become a new Jerusalem. So all that to say that when you read the Old Testament, all the promises of God are yes in Christ Jesus. So that's true about Jeremiah. Maybe you've even heard those phrases before Jeremiah 2911. For I know the plans I have for you. You may have even received that on a card or had that written to you as a note from a fellow believer, how are we to receive that because we understand that was for a nation like Israel, it's because ultimately we come up under the as the people of God when Jesus comes right, because he can not only for the Jewish people, but for the whole world. All right, little side thing there. But number two, God has a plan. God has a plan, we've got to believe that because all of us sort of want to put an asterix on that, you know, I know not me, because I got drug here I didn't, I was just born into this, or I just wandered into this church for this day, or I'm only here for a short time, I'm not sure that it really applies to me that I'm to seek the good of the city. I'm just here to, you know, go to a couple of restaurants kind of get done when I need to maybe buy a house and hope that equity is greater when I leave than when I got here. I mean, I've just got some I got some thoughts. Maybe we have a nicer car than what I used to have before. And all that is is really absent of what does God have for you and me, not just to live for yourself, not just to live for our tribe, or our people but to ask ourselves what does it mean to live for the peace and the prosperity of the city all the while knowing and believing that this home is only temporary that we will ultimately had to glory? Israel story is one of exile and then brought back into the land. Remember, he tells him it's going to be seven years now you can always find someone to tell you what you want to hear you understand. That's what fortune telling is. I mean, there's some sort of not good things about it spiritually even it gets into some demonic things. But a lot of times all fortune telling is is is someone hearing what you're saying and repeating back to you something that would sound good to you She'll continue to slap down money to get you to continue to hear things that your ears and your heart want to hear. They're saying, Don't do that. Because they're telling you this is only gonna be here a little while I am telling you as a prophet of God that you're gonna be here seven years, you're gonna be here a little while. So you better sink on in and figure out a way to create some permanency here. So this is a story that we that we carry with us as believers that were here for a little while. And then we had to glory we had to heaven here is not our permanent home. But we are seeking a city which is to come the idea of Hebrews 11 and 12. But if your synagogues and everything and I don't I don't believe that yet, you'll think I don't I don't know about that heavenly

mindset that sort of is. Pastor, I just struggle with that. Because I remember as a child I heard about Christianity, or I've heard about Christians are all about kind of getting into heaven. What does that mean? Well, if it means that you're have no earthly good, because all we're thinking about is the next world, you haven't got the point of this passage, because the very point of this passage is, is that we live in this world that we engage in this world, while not fully embracing those things which are counter to the world and to the things have gone, we don't build a wall between us in our city, we go in, and we serve, and we fight the good fight among them, when they are doing things that are consistent with what God would have for any community that hopes to prosper and do well in this world. And that's what's interesting is this whole idea of, I know the plans I have for you, they are plans for good and not for disaster to give you a hope, and a future. It's not us taking those and asking God to baptize our plans. I don't know if you've ever been there. Have you ever you've heard the phrase from any sort of person who's been on this earth long enough? If you want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans. Right? You ever heard that before that concept? Or maybe you yourself have thought that God I thought I told you what my plans are, I've got a plan, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna get this job, I'm gonna go this location, I'm gonna marry this person. And it's gonna go, great. It's not in reverse. It's the idea that God's saying, I've got you, I've got this situation. You don't have to worry. If you're in my will. If you're in my hand, if you're doing things my way that I will take care of you. And I will ultimately bless you, as you bless them. I don't pester I don't want to do this. Like you don't realize that in my city. Not only are we politically divided, but they're doing some stupid things, or they're actively against me, or they could care less who I am or what I'm doing. Do you think the Babylonians were pro Israel or pro Israel's God, not in the least, they were trying to bring their leaders into a different land to assimilate them. Babylon was crazy, powerful and crazy rich, if you remember from school that there were seven wonders of the ancient world, one of the Wonders of the Ancient World in Babylon, that they would have seen through King Nebuchadnezzar is the Hanging Gardens of Babylon. But all that to know that God's got this, and that we have the strength to put one foot in front of the other and to do the right thing, even when it's hard, even we don't feel like it. Because we know God has got us and he's got this, he's got this idea, this plan, it's not absent minded. You're not in El Paso in September of 2023, by mistake, he's got you here for a season. And while you and I are here, let's make this our home. And the best that we can. It's that whole idea. There was an old song that was written in the 20th century, because he lives and if you know the lyrics of that song, it's an older song you may have sang it. It's been redone several times. But it's that whole idea that because Jesus came in because he died and because he lives I can face tomorrow, because he lives all fear is gone, because I know he holds the future and life is worth living, just because he lives. Then one day I'll cross the river and fight life's final war with pain. And then as death gives way to victory, I'll see the lights of glory and I'll know he reigns because he lives I can face tomorrow and it goes on and life is worth living just because he lives but you understand that those lyrics directly correlate to what we're talking about today. Then we're not crazy when we go in there and love even in spite of hard things and hard times, even when we're in pain ourselves, even when we're missing certain aspects of relationships or, or we're grieving the idea that our city, our country, our culture, our world is involved in certain things. We turn our eyes towards the city because we believe that as El Paso as the border land prospers, so we will prosper. There's no doubt that cities are going to continue to grow. And our city especially, I was reading some just basic stats that you can find there any Google search online, and we're the sixth most populous state in Texas City, sorry, sixth most populous city in Texas, we've consistently grown anywhere from 10 to 20%. Since World War Two, and we continue to jump in 1920, we were about 100,000 people here in El Paso County. Today, at the 2020 census, we're at 865,000, just on this side of the border in El Paso County, we're the 22nd most populous city in America, just think about that for a minute. And the impact that we can have, I'm going to move into our partners here in a second. But I just want you to think about just what we can have the impact of us we're about 300 or so strong, regularly attend, we're about 600 people who call Life Church home, and just us and the impact that we can have by just being faithful stewards of what God has given us in our hands while we're here. Okay, so let's just look at some of the opportunities we have Fellowship of Christian Athletes, if you're not familiar with this, they are in multiple schools all throughout the city, they help our athletes come to know Jesus and to grow in him, they have an inlet into our public schools are legitimate inlet, so that they can share with people the love and the knowledge of Christ. And so we have actually two opportunities for them, they're going to move from one location to another, and so we're going to help them move, this is all going to happen next Sunday, all these projects are going to happen about the time you would typically go to church. So often we're gonna happen somewhere between 9am and noon. Next Sunday, we're gonna have opportunity to sign up there, or you can sign up online. So Fellowship of Christian Athletes, we're gonna make baggies for all the athletes at Pebble Hills High School, we're gonna have opportunity to deliver them the following week, it's just gonna be a glorious thing. Also, we're going to help them transition some of their services. Child Protective Services, as you may or may not be aware, a lot of times they are sympathetic towards faith based leaders and communities and, and places. And so we have our own faith based representative. She's been here a couple of times, we've done adoption or foster care initiatives. So we're going to work with them to help clean up some of their toys and really be a blessing to them. We did this last year, it's a very family friendly project, they'll pass a migrant center, I don't think I know you're aware that migrants come and go and a lot of them float through the El Paso area, you may not be aware that there are places that share the love of Christ as they helped me tangible needs. And so they'll pass them migrant centers through our association that we're a part of. And so what they do is they help with just basic toiletries, basic food and clothing. So we're going to help sort that that's another family friendly site, guiding star Coalition for life. As you guys know, Christians make no bones about the fact that we are life people. And so we believe in life from beginning to end, because we're all creating the image of God. And so this really helps with some of those issues. They're redoing a whole floor to help just with families, and there's opportunity to kind of help set the stage for a playground they want to build in downtown Paso del Norte center of hope that's our human trafficking organization that helps with that issue. We've partnered with them several times from this stage, as we help combat human trafficking here in the borderlands. They need help with sorting some donated items that they have as well. Salvation Army has a thrift store. And so they're getting pallets of material to come and help with the various migrant surgeons and other people who find themselves in a passive for a variety of reasons to help sort and build bags to really bless people as they come into our city or Reynolds home. That is a place in our city where vulnerable mothers vulnerable children go and they can find a place of home and refuge and rest for however many days they need to be there. They have some areas that need to be cleaned and up kept. And that's going to be something we're going to do kings kids, great organization, national organization, we have a chapter at a interesting ranch on the other side of town from the old 1800s. They were gifted that many, many years ago. So they help with kids doing little kids day camps throughout the year here in our border region, to really help them have a safe place, but they also give them Jesus. And so it's just an amazing organization. We've been down there a couple of times as a church, pre COVID Grace Community Centers, probably our newest partner up there. They're only two years old. And what they do is they help what would used to be what we normally call people who are homeless or vulnerable to really have a warm meal, a place to hear about Jesus. They have a room that we're going to redo and kind of help with painting and fan and putting on some linoleum flooring and then Finally, a Youth With A Mission YWAM. Some of y'all may or may not be aware, we support Tom and Connie hellmouth they're out of our church, they have an El Paso location, they also have a water as location where they help with little kids and so, but at the El Paso location, we can always kind of help tidy up that area, that building that is a launching point for ministry throughout our city for Youth With A Mission, again, a national organization. So these are 11 opportunities, that we have to step into what God has for us as a church

this coming week, and I want to tell you, just in engaging with these partners, this week, and the weeks gone by, they are so excited, and they're so blessed, that live church would do this, that we would care enough to give up our Sunday to come down there and to serve them, it is such a big impact. You just really and I really just have no earthly idea because it just, it has legs. You know, a lot of times we think about how negative things and gossip has legs. But you guys are aware that also leaning into what God has for us and doing the good things that God calls us also has legs and impact way beyond what we could think or imagine. Now, finally, I just want to say that God has a plan, and he wants to do things like this. Okay, I mean, this isn't anything, you know, divinely inspired in terms of these exact locations. It's just ones that we found partners in our city, but he wants us to serve, I can tell you that that is biblical and divinely inspired, and he wants to accomplish it through us. But if you and I don't do this, just rest assure the consequences are devastating. Now, I don't mean that to say the consequences are devastating. If you don't participate and be rich, I think you ought to it's part of our church, if you're consider this your church home, I think you should if you're new around here, great. Come on, join us. I'm not that kind of Pastor, I don't manipulate in that kind of way. And this isn't that kind of church. But I will tell you though, biblically, if we just find ourselves just about self, just about our individual self, just about our ethnicity, our tribe, or whatever, if you and I only consume, if we find ourselves only consumers and not those who give of ourselves, don't pour into others don't give back, we only use our resources to serve self. Here's what I know, biblically. And practically, eventually, even what we do have will be taken away from us or disappear. So clearly a biblical principle in the Bible, and I'm not going to read the rest of the chapter of Jeremiah, but if you were to continue to read the following verses, it's very clear that, okay, there's also going to be great things for those who are obedient to what God calls them to do. But to those who choose not. There's great devastation and destruction. This leads to my last point, which is if you and I squander, we will perish. Again, I don't use this as some sort of, you know, threat to get you to do the next thing that we're doing here as a church. I don't mean it that way at all. I just mean it as a clear, biblical warning, when I read the Bible, I can't get over the fact that we think that we can have some sort of neutrality, okay, I'm not gonna do good to my neighbor, because I can just do good to my neighbor tomorrow. And what we see over in the Bible is, is that what'll happen is, is that if we don't take seriously the first and second commandment, even what we have, will be taken away. I think about the parable of the talents, where you had different people, their hands, their feet, their various talents, both financial and their literal ability to do things, the talents that God had given him. Those that put it to good use, were always praised and those that decided to bury it or to do nothing with it always met destruction. But I want to end on a positive note, but I didn't want to kind of go over that and not not talk about the warning. So verse seven, let's remember what this whole thing is all about this whole be rich project and this idea that we've been doing this long before me, which I do this annually, around the fall of the year, verse seven, and worked for the peace and prosperity of the city where I have sent you into exile. If you're more curious about that whole idea of exile it was talked about living James and we'll talk about it again, when we preach to First Peter, praying to the Lord for it for its welfare will determine your welfare. Do you understand that we're prayer? Think about what we've already done so far with worshipping and Shelby and others leading us in prayer. We are to pray for El pasa. Have you ever thought about that before? Now keep in mind that the Jewish people were called to pray for a pagan nation that drugged them from their homeland. At worst you and I found ourselves in El Paso because we made certain decisions that we weren't quite aware or maybe our parents or our grandparents made decisions that we aren't aware and and so it was I know this is my home. I love this place great. You've already embraced that which God has for you, but are Have you moved the needle in terms of spiritually thinking about the city with spiritual eyes and began to pray for it or to consistently pray for it. It says pray for the place to prosper. Pray for peace holistically, one of the Things that I can't get over when I read the scriptures is just how much that God is concerned about our physical well being, meaning tangible needs, he's concerned about our mental health, right how we are mentally. Again, all we can see is the inside and the outside, people can't see the inside, but we can, we can do some things that are going on based off of the response. How much of us would be helped mentally, how many people would be helped mentally, if we just began to see that it's not about self, that we have to look outside of ourselves? We want holistic peace for our pastor, not only physically, not only mentally, but finally spiritually. And again, we know what our lane is, we know what we're trying to do here at Life Church, that we're trying to help people see and know the love of Jesus Christ. But rest assure, when we pray for the peace of an area, like the border land, we're talking about this holistically. Right? Don't you want that for your own life? Don't you want to be healthy? Mentally? Don't you want to be healthy physically? And don't you want to be strong? spiritually? I know I do. And as we want that for ourselves, what does the Scriptures tell us over and over again, we should want that for others, those around us, when we work for the welfare of the city, the good, the prosperity, we're doing the hands and the work of God Himself? Why are we doing this, you're gonna have an opportunity next week, to maybe you know, paint a brush or certain sorts of clothes, you know, you're gonna rub shoulders with people, we have an opportunity to show them the love of Christ, and also to open up our mouths and tell them about the hope that we have within us. Oh, let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you that you didn't just leave us wandering or wondering why we're in El Paso that you have told us to make this our home. Whether we're here 11 months, or we've been here hundreds of years, generations back. We want to be a people who are obedient to you for the time and the season that you have as here, Father help us to do that when we're struggling with that. When we're struggling with past mistakes, whether it is connected to El Paso or not, when we're struggling with just getting out of bed or struggling to Love You to Know you to pursue you to pray for anything. Much less praying for a city that sometimes seems indifferent towards us or doesn't care or at worse, maybe has opposed us in something help us to lay down our lives because you lay down your life for us. Oh Lord, it's in that Jesus, that we pray and offer up our praise this morning.

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Sermon Transcript:

Thank you so much, Courtney. Appreciate that. We could see the listening later. Well, we are in the middle of a series on forgiveness. And I know that it just creates some mixed feelings. Because I know that many of you all because I've totally understand that. And I know that last week, I talked about how I'm praying for myself, I'm praying for you guys, that we would be able to do the work that God wants us to do, so that we can be free that we can be free to love. And we talked about just the superpower of forgiveness last week, we want to be free. We want to be free in our relationship with God and want to be free in our relationships with others. So but you might find yourself this morning thinking about what I've thought about many times over my life, which is, I want to be forgiven, and I want to forgive others. But what about when I'm just mad at God? Have you ever been there? You've actually admitted it? What about when I'm just mad at God? You just think this is not what I wanted. Or you actually will say the words, or think them I don't I don't want to talk to you right now God, you won't even look up because you are upset at what God did or didn't do for you or for me. And you think yourself, God, I didn't want to keep working here. I had a thought I had a plan. There were some things that I wanted to do. I wanted to get married, or I wanted to have kids by now, or and I didn't want to have that many kids or whatever, right?

You think to yourself, if you've been married long enough for you've had a partner long enough, this is not what I expected, he or she is not what I expected. So therefore, you begin to begrudge your situation I begin to begrudge my situation. And before I know it, I'm mad at my Creator himself. So what happens when life does not go? exactly as planned? Or when God doesn't do what we expected? We don't understand it. It's very hard for us to understand it seems confusing, it seems out of place, it seems like maybe God was out to lunch or God, are you sure? Or did you make a mistake? So what all this does, is this makes it very hard for us to trust our Heavenly Father. Why? Because we're just in that mode of I don't want to talk to you right now, I don't think we can even do this in interpersonal relationships. I don't know if you've ever done this before, where you've had some sort of spat or fight or disagreement or argument or whatever word you want to use. And you just decide I don't want to talk to you right now. But you never circle back around. And that's how a lot of us have our relationship with God. And then we go months and years, and we wonder why our life is such a mess, or we're not able to move forward. Or we don't feel forgiveness, or we because we don't understand and all these kinds of things. Who else isn't telling me the whole story. That's what ends up happening is that subtly, when we begin to distrust the goodness of God that His hand is not really the hand of a loving Father, we then naturally will begin to look around and say, Okay, if God has disappointed me, then who else isn't telling me the whole story, because what we find ourselves in is we just find ourselves in a mess. I don't know if you ever think about it this way. But you and I just know, sometimes I'm in a mess, I can feel the wreckage, I can see the wreckage, I can see the turmoil, and all we really know is I'm hurting, I'm disappointed. I felt like I've been lied to. So then we go from being skeptical. Again, whether it's true or perceived and reality, and then we go into full blown suspicion, you ever been there? And so then it begins to leak into other relationships. And for sure, we know that it leaks into our relationship with God. So we need you to take a minute and think, what have I been looking at? What situation or person or problem? Have I been looking at whatever this person or situation is in the wrong way? That's what the question I want to put forth to us this morning. Can we at least consider the possibility that there's another way of looking at our situation that seems so all consuming and tragic, from our perspective with really no hope out? Think about how we view prayer at times I think that is really telling to why we feel so disappointed and hurt by God even though God didn't do anything wrong. We'll say listen, I hope God God I hope you would give me her or him or I would wish God that you give me this and if you did this when we got I promise you I would use it for for your kingdom and for your glory. Or it would be nice God, if you just send a little extra whatever my way, whether it's a financial thing, relationship thing.

Jumping. So what we end up if we look at our prayer lives, whether we actually write these prayer downs, or we're just throwing them up towards heaven when we think about them, maybe it seems like a wishing well, like if we were honest with ourselves, our prayer life really seems like some sort of wishing well, or if you want to put it in modern terms, like Amazon Prime, right, you know, Amazon Prime works, right? We were told two days, and you know, I don't know what it is, but it turned into like five or six days, and but what do we do we look at that date, and we put it in our cart, and we click and if it's not there on the 16th, or the 12, or the fifth or whatever, how do we what do we do? What do we do we all get real upset, and we get back in our computers, and what can I do? Because we know we can't call anybody, right, because there's no phone number. But that's how we feel sometimes in our own relationship with God is is that we're thinking, Okay, God, I know, this is good. I know this is right. I know that this is what I should have said, I forgot I boarded it. I've sent the prayer up, come on, God, get on with it. I'm ready. And this is how I want to receive it. Think about how we were taught to pray from the time we were very young. We were taught very simply to pray, think about the Lord's Prayer, whether you were in a liturgical setting and you memorize it or you just got it through being in church right Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name so holy as your name God, your kingdom come your will be done on earth, as in him give us this day what? Our Daily Bread. So what are we doing when we're asking for that? And that again, think about your and eyes prayer life, at a basic level, we pray before meals, that's normally the first sort of basic Christianity 101 that we acknowledge that everything that good we have comes from our Heavenly Father. And so we pray before meals. And so we were taught to pray, Lord, give us this daily bread, but the bread doesn't look like what we always wanted at time. So a lot of times we think this is bread. No no veg for before. But that's bread too, for some of y'all in the room, but I get that, but this is bread, right? This is Brad. Alright, so this is Elijah. This is the image I get that was bread. Then going on the next slide. This is this is for the ones that like homemade flour, tortillas, okay, you're like this is bread. And God, when you are going to give me bread? This is what I expect. But what do we often find sometimes in our cabinet, or somebody tells us? No, this is what's good for you. These things aren't good for you, because they have flour and gluten. And if you're over 40, it's hard to digest the time. So we know all these things. So what do we get? Go ahead go the next slide. Oh, no, it has a lot of problems in here has the word flat has the word wholewheat. It's in a package and and what happens is, is that we have to start partaking of these things at times, because maybe our physical trainer told us to our dietician, or we just know, we'd like to live beyond 64. And so we need to have some more things in our diet, besides that good flowered rising bread or that good flour tortilla. And so what ends up happening is that someone puts this before us and says, This is good. This is good for you. And what is our gut reaction? No, it's not. This isn't what I want. This isn't what I ordered. And we have to remember our Heavenly Father says, Know what you pray for was bread. I'm giving you bread. And then if you if you're really in the doghouse, if you're really really bad, you get rice cakes. You remember this one here? Kids? Say, Oh, no. Oh, no, I don't know what I did wrong mom and dad. But whatever it is that I have to eat rice cakes, I promise, I repent, I turn whatever it is I have to do, please, no rice cakes. But we know that certain diets are certain ways in order to get healthy when we don't get to decide what that what the bread looks like. We don't and I think about this in terms of biblically, literally with bread. Think about how the Israelites when they left Egypt so quickly, who wanted to leave Egypt without putting yeast or rise in the bread? I mean, I think there were some people as i Hey, I know this is slavery and chains and bad and all that and they're beaten us to death. But can we at least have some time for some yeast in my bread? And Jesus says, No, I will take you out so you can worship on a mountain in spirit and truth and even think about when they get out there in the wandering in the desert. How are they provided for manna from heaven. And it doesn't seem like that's the way it should be. There really shouldn't be bread that comes down and it forms a do like substance on top of the ground. And even if there is I gotta make sure to store that for extra days. And you guys know the story.

And so what happens is is that we look at our lives and we look at what God has given

So we think this is not what it should look like. And so we begin to question his love His goodness, or even to resent God for not coming through. Even though he has provided the daily bread, it just wasn't like we thought it should be or how we thought it should look like. So what ends up happening then is our lives. Just if you and I live live long enough, we will become broken, right? Broken, this is just that whole idea of because of sin in the world, eventually there will be aspects of our life, or even our whole life, where we find ourselves just literally broken. And so I've got a puzzle image I want to throw up here, just that it is in pieces. And you and I, when we think about aspects of our life, or maybe our whole life that we think I don't know what to do, I pastor I don't know where to start. And if I'm talking to God, God, I don't know where to start. Because when we know, we just know that we are hurt. And so if we've tried the God thing, if we tried the Christianity thing, and we'd been disappointed or disillusioned, or we feel like we didn't get what we want the way we wanted it, how we wanted as quick as we wanted it, we tell ourselves, Well, I've tried that. So I'm going to take back control from God, this is what we do. When we realize our life is in a mess. It's in pieces, and God's not doing things quick enough, right enough along the way that we think it all should go. So we say God, okay, I get you. And so I'm gonna take control of that now.

And so we just ask ourselves, well, what are we trusting in, we're not trusting in God anymore? Because what is he wanting to do with your life to mine, the next slide, he's wanting to put it back together. That's what he's doing. We can't see this. We're never going to be able to put our lives back together our story back together, but we can trust and rely on a God, who is he's working things behind the scenes that don't make a lot of sense to us. But if we will hang with him, will realize that his providence, his ways, are higher than our ways. His provision doesn't come through in the way we expect. We need to trust that God knows something that we don't write. You ever thought about this, even with a parent? I mean, how many times did you and I think that our parents don't know what they were talking about? And it took us, some of us a lot, a lot, a lot of years to come around that, oh, they're not as dumb as I thought they were right. It's the same way when we think about our relationship with God. It even happens sometimes with you and me at work, that we think our boss is making a bad decision. But the reality is, is that you don't know everything he or she knows, and you're not in every meeting that he or she is in. So the quicker we learn this idea that God knows things that we don't, then we can trust him. We may not see it immediately, it may take us a long time to realize what all he was doing behind the scenes. And it may not know it until eternity. This is hard because what we see right here is the mess. Right? This is a house so it's a studs. So we just see this mess. We see the dirt on the floor, we see the the open planks leaning up against the wall, what we need to realize is that God is renovating. Now some of you are like I get it. Like I know that God needs to work on me, I know that I'm a work in progress. I know that I got some things that need to be worked on. And we think is just a little bit that needs to be done. You all ever moved into that house or had a friend move into a house or moved your parents into that house where you falsely thought all it needs is a little bit of paint, okay, just a little bit of tweaking here or there little bit electrical work ain't too bad old wink fix this guy won't be too bad. And what happens when you start getting into that project? What happens sometimes when you and I start getting into that project? What happens is this is worse off than we thought. And that's what happens with our lives as well as we begin to overturn stones and areas of our life that we haven't dealt with for months or years at a time. And we think oh my gosh, it is worse off than I thought. But here's the deal about the way God works if you'll let him take you all the way down to the studs. He's gonna renovate and make something beautiful, right? I mean, that's why we love to watch HGTV and other shows along those lines is that we love to see the beauty the reveal at the end. But here's the deal. Any of y'all who've ever been through some major renovation in any sort of tangible way, like a house or something, when you're in the middle of it, it is not fun, it is stressful. It is confusing. You begin to feel the pain, the real pain at the level of rebuilding that has to be done. So have you all thought about this through companies or projects that you've been a part of?

And some of us just think Man, I just want good enough like okay, yeah, I hear you. This sounds like a lot of work. And so I just weren't good enough. I just want like a little shack. You know, I just want it put together I just want some

I'm pleased to lay my head. And I would just tell you in God's design, what we and I think is all that we need is a little something, God will just say, Listen, if you'll hang with me, if you let me go down to the studs, I can build you something like this, you just have a picture of small, something small that you want to be a part of what God's saying is, I want to build you a mansion, we see destruction, I'm not just talking about in the future, the heavenly reality, although of course, we know that Jesus went to prepare a place for us. But it's that whole idea that we just see the mess and the destruction and the chaos and the heartache and the hurt. And I don't know how this is gonna ever get out, I don't see a way out, where we see the destruction, God sees construction, he is building something, and he is going to restore it all. In the end for those who love and trust Him and to do the great that we're willing to trust him to walk in faith, to believe is the degree that he's able to do things with our life. And what we need to do is we need to just be reminded that we're to connect our story with the story, the great story, because think about how trust was broken between us and God at the very beginning, think about what Adam and Eve did. Adam and Eve received clear instruction from God, they got to walk with God in the Garden, he was able to give them instruction from his very mouth that they heard with his very ears. And it's the first sign of trouble. When a snake or serpent or attempt or the devil himself comes to tempt them. What does he say to them? Did God really say? Did God really say, and then they begin to shrug their shoulders a lot? Oh, no, let's just try this out. And so what ends up happening is they become broken, marred with sin. And of course, all of us are broken and sin afterwards. But do we know how the story ends? It doesn't end in the garden doesn't end in the garden, but it leads to a cross and it ends, and the new heaven and a new earth Behold, God is making all things new, you and I, our lives will be restored in this life. And in the life to come. Tonight, anything I passed, I believe it, I want to trust and believe. But you and I are often like those stories in the scriptures, whether you're like, well help me help me with my unbelief. And so if you're in a position where you're ready to hunker down and say, Man, I want that freedom, I want that forgiveness, I want that abundant life that God has for me. On the other side, God's going to ask some more of you and me. And so I think about this in terms of that forgiveness, we want to bring back up the images that we've looked at in previous week, the image of that whole idea of like God, and forgiveness that he and I have to be reconciled vertically than we have internally where we can grant forgiveness to others. And then we can horizontally offer forgiveness, and reconciliation. This whole idea is sort of comes to fruition of our relationship with God in the book of First John. So if you know anything about how the Bible is laid out, you have the Gospels and you have letters, and John, who wrote the book of John, he writes some letters at the end of your Bible first, second, and third, John, he ends up writing revelation with Jude stuck in the middle there. And so we're going to look at First John chapter one, verses five, through 10. This is the message. So we were trying to hone in on what God has for us. When I see the words from Jesus. This is the message we heard from Jesus, and we now declare to you God is light. And there is no darkness in him at all, I underline that because in you and I's journey, if we live in this world long enough, we're going to be kicked in the teeth. And when that happens, we're gonna we're gonna be tempted or we're really going to look up to the heavens, and we're gonna say, God, I don't think you're a good God. I don't think this is the light that you're talking about this, this seems kind of dark god and what this is saying here is, listen up, remember what was declared to you and me, God is like, there is no darkness in him at all. So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God, but go on living in spiritual darkness. It's a spiritual warfare, spiritual realities. We are not practicing the truth. But if we are living in the light as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other and the blood of Jesus. The sun cleanses us from all sins, you can see this sort of this sort of relational accountability we're to have with one another because we are loving one another and forgiving one another. If we claim to have no sin, you're like, Man, I'm good, right? I don't even I don't even know if I need the tweaks in my house. We claim to have their sin. We're only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth. But if we confess our sins to Him, this is what shall be led us through earlier in her prayer. He is faithful and just to white, what's the whole series about to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all

wickedness are unrighteousness if we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that His word has no place in our hearts. We don't want to be there. I don't want to be there. You don't want to be there? No, you don't. So to ask ourselves, what do we need to confess? Now again, this is where we all get a little squirmy in the service. Because you think that I'm going to ask you to confess to me, I'm not gonna, I'm gonna ask you to confess to your neighbor, I'm not This is between you and God. Because some of us we have some angst because we realize that we have a brokenness, between our relationship and our relationship with our Heavenly Father. You're thinking, Wait a second pastor, I've been listening to this forgiveness series for the last three weeks. This is the fourth week. And what I'm learning is that I am not the problem. I thought he was the problem, or she was the problem, I thought the situation was the problem. This seems a little bit like a little switcheroo. Because now you're telling me I've got some things to confess. But really, I'm the one that's hurt. They did this to me, they hurt me, he did this to me, she did this to me, they lied, they disappointed, they hurt me.

every situation, every situation no matter how unjust. And it is true, that a lot of

injustice has been done to us personally, that we feel down to our core, no matter how unjust because an opportunity for refining. You understand that term. It's an old term, just that whole idea of how we get the purity of any element of any substance that there is a refiners fire that we can then as we go through it, that the gold or whatever substance we want comes forth. And I would just say that God doesn't waste a crisis, he doesn't waste a crisis, he makes it an opportunity to teach us a few things that we need to repent of, doesn't excuse the evil, or the badness that happened to you and me, but it's just to say that when our hearts are down to the studs, it's a good opportunity to what maybe, you know, putting a bathroom over here, or maybe the piping over here or whatever, when our lives are broken down to the pieces, it's a good opportunity for it to be put back together. Again, this is most easily seen in the Scriptures with someone like job. In the book of Job, it's very obvious that you can see that Jove had a lot of things that were done to him that were straight up evil. Some of them were natural disasters, but you also had foreign enemies, and even his wife that called him to curse God and die. And so he goes through the whole book in many, many chapters of just thinking about God, what did I do? He has friends that come and accuse him of things and try to help and say, Well, maybe you did this, or maybe you didn't do this, or maybe you didn't do offering rights and all this kind of thing. And all through this job's thinking, I'm not sure if that's true. I'm not sure if that's true. I'm not sure that's true. And then a lot of ways job was innocent, because it says in the beginning that he was blameless, that doesn't mean sinless. It just means that his outward life was one of righteousness or blame lessness but what happens to job if you get all the way to job 42? What does he actually say with his lips? After God comes and confronts him and lets him know that you weren't there. In the beginning. You don't know everything job. There's other things going on that you have no earthly idea of. You can see that job shuts his mouth. And what does it say in the scriptures? It says that he repents.

And so, again, I'm not glossing over or sugarcoating the first 40 some odd chapters of Job's life. And I'm not sure coding or glossing over the horrendous things that have maybe been done to you and me in our lives. It's just to say that when we get to the end, we have to ask ourselves, Is there anything between us and our Heavenly Father that we need to repent of? And if Joe had some things, as a man whom the scriptures called blameless, and surely you and I do, as well. So we have to ask ourselves, what is God dealing with you about what sin or sins you need to confess, and again, this is this vertical relationship that we're talking about. He says, I know God is in control, but the more and more I go, I just can't understand what's going on. And I want to take back control for myself. And what we what we try to control, we don't trust you ever thought about that before? What you and I try to control we don't trust me if y'all work in a place where you come back behind, don't say any names here. So and so because why you don't trust them to whatever it is put the paperwork there, you know, clean the toilet or or you know, make sure that that's turned in or done right. And so what you and I are trying to do in that moment is because we don't trust him or her to do their job. Then we try

to control it, and that's what we're doing with God. When we say, God, I know you said, you're good, I got I know you said you would provide your daily bread, but it's not looking the way I want it to look, it's not happening in the way I want it to happen. It's not happening at the speed, I want it to happen. And, and so therefore, God, I am going to help you out and try to force the hand of the god of universe towards my will in my way. And how does that go for you and me when we do that?

Maybe that right there is what we need to rippin off, maybe maybe I'm hitting the nail on the head right there that as you think about yourself, you're thinking, you know, if nothing else, in this whole journey of forgiveness, I see that there are areas of my life where I lack trust, where I lack belief, where I lacked faith, it's really a lot of the same word in the Greek. New Testament is written in Greek, it's the same word, this whole idea of trust and faith and belief. And in fact, if we're confused, or we need a greater sort of illustration around this idea, Jesus told a story about this, around the subject of forgiveness, and I want to close with this story we are rounding up, says this right here says, Some people brought to him a paralyzed man on a mat. Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralyzed man, be encouraged my child, your sins are forgiven. But some of the teachers of the religious law said to themselves, that's blasphemy. Does he think he's God? Jesus knew what they were thinking. So he asked him, Why do you have such evil thoughts in your hearts, it's easier to say Your sins are forgiven, or Stand up and walk. So I proved to you that the Son of Man has the authority on her to forgive sins. Jesus turned to the paralyzed man and said, Stand up, pick up your mat and go home. A man jumped up and went home. Fear swept to the crowd as they saw this happen, and they praise God for giving humans such authority.

What's the other way? So some of y'all are thinking right now I'm thinking and if I'm in your head, and what I've thought in my head when I don't want to deal with God, telling me things I need to deal with you and I are thinking, what's the backup plan? You ever asked that before? When you know, you've got to do something? What is plan? B? So you're like, um, I didn't forgive. I mean, I've been harming this for a long time I've been coddling it. I think I've got it under control in an area of my heart. I'm still standing. So what's the problem, Pastor? Well, when we do that, we're like Adam and Eve, when they proclaimed right after they ate the fruit. You remember what they said?

Oh, God went down the trees. We didn't die. We're still standing. You're lucky if you're still there. I'm sorry. I'm still here. So you know, God, did God lie, because they didn't die. So here, here's what happens with sin, that sin sometimes eats away slowly. And sometimes it's quickly, right. We all know stories of people who've, you know, paid a steep price for a quick decision. And we also know stories in our own lives and other people's lives where it took a long, long time for the foolishness of our actions or their actions to come out. But rest assured, going on your own me going on my own, is not the way of peace for our soul. It's just not. Right. That's what we that's what we feel so much angst is that we, we realize we're not in right relationship with God and with others. And that is really the the simplistically, the goal of life is to know ourselves and know what we have to do and to know our God. So do you want it do you and I want the peace that God is offering? That's the question we have to ask ourselves this morning. so simple yet so hard as I stand up here and say this to you. Because I've been there. I've been there where you literally like, God, I don't want to talk to you right now. I tried your way and I'm gonna go my own way. Because I saw that the unrighteous and the righteous, those who honor God, and those who don't honor God all end up at the end the same that's what we tell ourselves. And of course, it's not true or we tell ourselves I can handle this or I can do this. without repenting we use that word already. But do are we sure we understand what Repent means. Repent means a turn the other direction, walk the other way. Take one habit off, put a new habit on, repent of what we need to repent of. And guess what? There is life on the other side. There is life on the other side. That's the hope for all of us this morning, right that we would repent and that we would know that he really is making all things new. And beautiful. Let's pray.

Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you that you don't leave us wandering or wandering. I pray for those in this room right now that are harboring

Haley maybe Kenny put it in words bitterness towards you bitterness towards others or grudge. God I just pray that by

Your grace that you help us to release those feelings, to release those things, those tensions in our hearts and help us to confess what we need to confess to you or to maybe to others that are brought to mind and God help us to be a people that can walk in strength.

Because we've done the hard work of renovating our hearts, thank you that you don't leave us to ourselves. But that you find a way to come after us and keep coming after us and that you give us more chances. And as long as we have breath in our bodies as long as those who we interact with have breath in their bodies that there is oh, oh Father, we pray that You would just grant us life that we so much seek.

We asked us in Christ's name. Amen.

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Well, I just know that as we even say this word forgiveness, and you think about what God may be calling you to do in the coming days, I know that for many in the room, it brings about anxiety. And so just know that I'm praying for you. And I know that none of the issues that we're talking about are easy. Well, I want to begin with a story that is in the New Testament in the book of Luke chapter seven. And it's a story about a woman who is known as a sinful woman because of her choices in life. And she comes to Jesus at a moment when others are around the table. And they began to realize that this sinful woman is going to touch the feet of our Lord and Savior. And as she's doing that she's going to break a jar of expensive perfume over his feet, and she's going to wipe his feet with her hair, then one of the Pharisees that is with them is thinking to himself, why is Jesus allowing the sinful woman to touch him at all? And Jesus, knowing his thought says, I have something to say to you? And so he says, Okay, what is it teacher, and that's where we're going to pick up our story today. And so here it is, in Luke chapter seven, it says this right here. Then Jesus told him a story. A man loaned money to two people, 500 pieces of silver to one and 50 pieces to the other, but neither of them could repay him. So he kindly forgave them both cancelling their debts. Who do you suppose loved him more after that? Simon answered, I suppose the one for whom he canceled the larger debt. That's right, Jesus said, Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, look at this woman kneeling here, when I entered your home, you didn't offer me water to wash the dust from my feet, but she has washed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You didn't greet me with a kiss, but from the time I first came in, she has not stopped kissing My feet, you neglected the courtesy of olive oil to anoint my head, but she has anointed My feet with rare perfume. I tell you, her sins, and they are many have been forgiven. So she has shown me much love. But a person who is forgiven little shows only little love. Then Jesus said to the woman, Your sins are forgiven. The man at the table said among themselves, Who is this man that he goes around forgiving sins, and Jesus said to the woman, Your faith has saved you go in peace. Now, you may be familiar with that story, you may be hearing it for the first time. But I want us to be reminded once again, that forgiveness is all over in this story. And that the point of this story is for us, if we call ourselves believers, Christ's followers were to tap into our superpower, this whole idea that we are people who have been forgiven, so that we can then engage a lost and dying world with that power with that peace means that we can tap into our superpower, this whole idea of forgiveness that flows from our heart, because we've received it first and foremost, from our Lord and Savior. What it does is it means that we are now distributors of peace, because we have peace. I don't want to be flippant, like the old Oprah Winfrey giveaway, but it's just that all I give like, you get a car, you get a car, you get a car, it's like you get forgiveness, you get forgiveness, you get forgiveness. I thought about this in terms of the superhero motif, and I was reminded of a popular movie in the last couple of years. And this whole idea of Shazam. And he realizes with his young friend that I've got power, I've got Lightning in my hands. It's this whole idea that we have to realize that in our going in our very lives in our very touch, that we have the power of forgiveness, we just need to tap into this, because it's already been done. For those who are believers. I'm reminded of this chart that we've been looking at over the last couple of weeks and will be reminded that we can't get this out of order, we have to first understand that God forgives us. That's what those who stepped into the baptismal pool this morning, said and understood it and realize that God's forgiven me, there's a God in heaven and he's forgiven me, then we are then enabled internally to grant forgiveness. And then finally, we're able to offer reconciliation to our fellow men and women around us. We can't get this out of order. I'm gonna hang out a little bit today at that third part, because I know that's been probably one of the most difficult things for us to think about the implications of us knowing have to forgive people that have hurt us so greatly when things we're reminded about is that this takes faith It takes faith that results in forgiveness of ourselves that enables me and you to forgive others. Think about this principle that we learn from this story of this woman. She's forgiven much. She understands the litany of sins that she has done and gone through. And so therefore, what is it say she's unable to do, by the power of the Holy Spirit by the power of God Himself, she able to love much, if you and I don't think we're that bad, or don't think God can forgive us because we've gone too far. Both of these ideas are a denial of the love and forgiveness of our Lord and Savior. Do we see that this morning? See, we can fall off either way, we can either say, You know what, I've gone too far. I've gone too far down the road of destruction. So therefore God, your your, your power, it can't help me. That's one denial. Or, you know what, I've done some bad things, or I'm not as bad as him or her. I mean, like, yeah, I need forgiveness, but they need a whole lot of forgiveness. Both of those missed the point missed the mark. Sometimes you've heard this whole phrase of, I can't forgive myself or, you know, you need to forgive yourself, which is a popular term and sort of self help understanding. Maybe you've even felt that. But anytime we sort of find ourselves hanging out there too long. It is, as I've already stated, a denial of the power of God to be able to do that work in your life. And in mind, it's really being convinced that his forgiveness is not enough. His blood is not enough. And what Jesus is saying over and over again, yes, it is. It's enough for that woman. And it's enough for that prideful, man, it is enough. And I don't think maybe we found ourselves like that prideful man where you think I haven't done anything wrong to be forgiven for not as much as her they are mostly the center or you are mostly the center. Again, this all gets into how we're going to interact with others that we know need forgiveness that that we have received. But the forgiveness not only includes me, and you it does include them. I've said from the beginning, here we are on the third week that we all know situations that we're currently a part of, or that we came out of, or that we're going to go into that requires our forgiveness. It requires our forgiveness. That's what the Scriptures demand of us. But we know it's hard, right? We know it's hard. We know it's a process. But we all have right now that person or that situation, right? You don't even have to close your eyes and you get a picture, you get an image of that which has caused you so much angst, and maybe even driving you mad or hurting your heart. Or you think to yourself, This is the enemy that I didn't ask for or the torture I didn't deserve. Don't think you're so bad. Or don't think that they're so bad that God can't forgive them because they've gone too far. Let's look at the book of Luke again, one chapter back chapter six. And this is really a condensed version of what is often referred to as the Sermon on the Mount. In the book of Matthew. It's also in the book of Luke, in a more condensed version, we're going to look at that Luke chapter six, beginning verse 38, says this Love your enemies, like Whoa, let's just be real clear. When someone has harmed us wronged us hurt us in some way. They are in the category of enemy in our hearts, even if we haven't said that out loud. Love your enemies, do good to them, lend to them without expecting to be repaid, then your reward from heaven will be very great. And you will truly be acting as children are the most high. For he is kind of those your unthankful and wicked, you must be compassionate. Just as your father is compassionate. Do not judge others and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Here's that word. Forgive others. This just happens to be a passage about forgiveness, forgive others, and you will be forgiven. Give and you will receive your gift will return to you in full press down shaken together to make room for more running over and poured into your lap. The mount you give will determine the amount you get back. Love your enemies, man.

That's always a phrase, we know that somewhere in the Bible. And it is just one of those things that we're doing, not to him, right? Not him, Lord, not her Lord. I can't keep doing it. Lord, I don't want to be walked all over. And then you ask yourself, Where is the justice and all that and we'll talk about that. But in the meantime, what about you and me? How are we going to respond because we're we're thinking about those three different levels, our connection with God, our connection with ourselves and our own heart and knowing where our hearts out at the moment and then being able to reconcile with our brothers and sisters, whether they're brothers or sisters in Christ or just fellow man or woman. Key is here's the key second point this morning. Compassion is the key to forgiveness. You See it in that text, we have to understand how compassionate the Lord has been to us in order to then in return be compassion toward someone else to have compassion towards someone else, it realizes that they are hurting to you, and I can't fix them, whoever they are you and I can't change them or the situation, whatever it is, but you and I can be an instrument or a catalyst for them coming to Christ, whether it's a believer who needs to be humbled and hit their knees, or someone who does not yet know the Lord, but needs to know Christ that can only occur though I'm gonna be real clear, that can only occur when you're not been healed first. That's why I love this image of the bandaid over the heart. It's the idea that we have been healed. But the bleeding has to stop for us right before we can dry to go out and help someone else bleeding out, you understand that right? You don't want to be attended to by a medical doctor whose cut open themselves in bleeding out you want him or her to be fixed first, go ahead and sum them up first, so that they can then Sew me up. It's the same way with forgiveness. It's like oxygen on an airplane, you've been on those flights, when they say make sure you take care of yourself, then if you have any little ones are those with you, then make sure they have oxygen. If we don't choose compassion, what did he say, Pastor, I hear you on all that I'm gonna go a different route. If we don't choose compassion, which I'm arguing is the key to forgiveness. What we'll end up with, is trying to control the situation. You ever been there trying to control or manage the situation. And what we're trying to control. What it will always lead to is some form of judging or condemning. And I want you to see that from the text in the book of Luke here chapter six, you can see that in the whole context of have compassion, have forgiveness, do not judge do not condemn. Why because it all come back to you. It's like a boomerang. When you and I start delving out that when you start delving out judgment and condemnation, instead of compassion and love, is ultimately what comes back around and hits us too. That's not karma, folks, that's called reaping what you and I so it's that whole idea you've heard this phrase before live by the sword die by the sword you ever known someone like this? You just ready to get ready to fight ready to rumble ready to have that sword living by the sword dying by the so we've all been there, though. How many times have you and I we've gotten into a conflict with someone. And then we find ourselves full of bitterness, hate we even have a grudge. That's a term we don't think about very often. And you think about this, and they say Man, if they come at me one more time with their dysfunction, their hurt their sin, you know, we're going to take out them with our own out of control actions, we think we're in control. But the more we try to control what happens, the more what blows up in our face, we've all been there before, right? We've all done this before. And that's not going to be true, even if it's just interpersonal conflicts in your home, not not full blown enemies that you are not sure to do with or what to do with outside the home. Because what will happen is, is that when we run across this whole idea of someone's done something, they're offended, I'm offended. We're both offended. What ends up happening is we ratchet it up. You ever done this before? When you're in conflict, the temperature keeps rising. You go here, I'll go here you go here. I'll go here. I'll go here. And we'll just keep ratcheting up. Why? Because we're both trying to what squish the other person and or their argument. But compassion, because we've all been there, right? Is it just my household? I don't know. Maybe it maybe but we've all been there, right? We've all been there. And compassion, though, will lead you and me to a posture of forgiveness. At least if someone says, timeout, I surrender. I'm tired of trying to control this situation. I'm going to be the instrument of compassion because God has been compassionate with me. There's at least an opportunity for reconciliation, or restoring relationship or peace in our own life and the relationships. But what if they don't change? What if they keep harming What am I supposed to do? And how much does I think about that? Well, good news. The Scripture helps us out with that as well. So we're going to look at a third passage this morning. That helps us to think through this whole idea of compassion and forgiveness. Bless those who persecute you. Don't curse them. Pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don't be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don't think you know at all. Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see. You are honorable do all that you can to live in peace with everyone. Difference. Never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the scripture say I will take revenge. I will pay them back says the Lord. Instead, if Your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads. Don't let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good. See, I told you I had to pray for myself and others in the room. Because I know anxiety is rising among our hearts right now, as we're considering and thinking about them that person that situation, because we're hearing again, the call of God, not just from Jesus, but now repeating in some of the Pauline letters in Romans chapter 12. Praying and blessing our enemies, right? That means those that have hurt us that have caused harm to us, Lord already told you, I don't have it in me, I do not have it in me, I want to smite them. My capacity to take this is up to is up to here. Right, whatever that situation is. But what the Scriptures say is don't smite them. Don't repay evil for evil. Why? What is it say here in the text? Why not? They're gonna get away with it. Does injustice prevail when we just allow people to continue on in their sin? No, says the righteous anger of God will take care of them when we are kind, right when they are unkind. It heaps burning coals. Think about what those are. Right? So think about that. So he's burning coals on their head. What that means is it actually shames them, it makes them see how stupid they are, or how they're acting? Because what it does is this kind word, the soft answer, turneth away wrath or the situation, or really dealing with our hearts. So the anger and bitterness we have towards them. That again, is justified at some level, and we feel justified in trying to control it. God's saying to us, no, no, listen, we need to find a way to be kind, even in the midst of their fault. See, the default mode, for your human heart and for my human heart is to maintain control of my life. I'm in control, no one tells me what to do. And we even think about that in terms of salvation. Think about this, all other world religions that besides Christianity is some level of earning your salvation, isn't it? It's just that whole idea of at the end of my life, I want to make sure that my good outweighs My bad. Or even if there's a God in heaven, I'm really working out and doing what I'm supposed to be doing. I don't know about them. But I know I'm doing I'm supposed to be doing. All that does is maintain a heart that wants to control my own life and my own salvation. And that idea of free grace, think about what we did we baptize these people here. We're saying, in spite of all that they've done, and all that they ever will do. They are justified, they're made right with God, God freely gives grace, what is grace, grace is getting something that you and I don't deserve. We've all received grace. What it does, though, is when you receive grace, think about heaping the coals on your head. At first, it is both insulting and unnatural to the self absorbed human heart. Think about that, right? Because that's why sometimes when you try to be kind, it can even blow up in your face worse, can it why because it feels they that even even infuriates maybe the individual even more why? Because it robs them, of the self pity and the self righteousness they need in order to maintain their angry disposition towards life.

I think about this in terms of how maybe I've referenced it once already, but the famous play in the book, and even movie called Les Miserables. And that whole idea of John bow, John, when he goes to the bishop, and he's brought before the bishop and changed because he stoled items from him, even though the bishop had given him a place to stay, and he'd been in jail. What is the response of the bishop? The bishop then says, No, you forgotten more, I meant to give you even more C covers for him, he covers his sin. And even his gracious on top of that, in that moment, John, John is faced with the reality that there is a higher power that there's more to life than to be angry and to be upset. So he has to turn from his wicked ways and receive the grace and forgiveness of God, that was his only choice or to continue to go down the path of self destruction. So what ends up happening is that when you and I engage them, they that situation, and we've emptied all our emotional, physical, financial or relational resources to help another person who doesn't want to be helped, we will ultimately become more unhealthy in the process. So here's where it gets to. What do I do with an unhealthy individual, a person who I don't know what there's reconciliation to be possible, and is bringing me great harm to myself to have them in my life at least to the level and to the degree that they are threatened. What I wants to see this morning is forgiveness releases our need for retaliation, but not our need for boundaries. Think about this from this text I just read, what does it say? Because you know, we want to control and manage a situation or a person, but it says, Listen, turn them over to the Lord, like, turn them over to the Lord, that we are not to. And I'm going to quote verse 21, here of Romans chapter 12. We don't let evil conquer us. But we conquer evil by doing good. And we don't need to keep the I'm making up this word screwed up, and it's going right. In order to be not conquered by their evil, we may need to set up boundaries. Now, I'm not the first to come up with this term, that I think I even got this phrase from woman who wrote a book on forgiveness named Lisa Turkers. But this whole idea of reconciliation and restoration, it's always the goal and hope. Right? So as long as there is blood in our veins, that's always the goal and hope for people to be reconciled with God and to be reconciled with each other. But it's not always possible at the moment. And we're not called in Scripture to enable anyone's bad behavior. You're saying what enabling is, we often talk about this in terms of drug addiction, you don't want to enable an addict when they are hooked on certain drugs. But think about what we're doing and saying we think about enabling enabling is covering up their choices. So don't, don't just think addiction to drugs, it could be addicted to drama, or blowing things up or going down the same evil, stupid path, it's harming you and others. How do you know this is going on, you know that you and I are enabling someone when we're covering up for their choices, when we're rescuing them from the consequences of their sin or bad choices, when we're smoothing over the issues that they cause of destruction. And I think about this in terms of we we referenced last week, a story of forgiveness and how many times we should forgive them. If we kept going in that passage, it gets into the whole idea of church discipline, or when someone leaves the church. And when we understand that when someone needs to leave a relationship when they need to go out from us because they were not one of us, is really giving them over to the world. In the passages of Scripture, it's actually saying sometimes, we need to give that person over to their folly over to even Satan or to the world to be buffeted, because why that's how God needs to deal with them. And if we continue to enable them, what we find ourselves is we haven't set up these boundaries. And we continue to dance the drama with them. Some of y'all work with these people, some of y'all are friends with these people. Some of you all have relatives, who are addicted to this sort of what harming and hurting either through words and actions over and over again, if you're sitting there thinking, because I don't know what you're talking about. I don't know anyone in my life, who is dramatic in any shape, fashion, or form will turn around, and maybe you write all of us know these people, right? They're always a problem, or they always have a problem and you got to fix it. Now you got to fix it immediately. If things are going smooth, if they're going well what happens they throw a wrench in the plan, right, just to cause chaos. And so what ends up happening is that we need to ask ourselves some hard questions sometimes. Because yes, our heart needs to have a heart of forgiveness towards them. Otherwise, we'll grow bitter or angry ourselves, our heart needs to have a heart towards them of compassion. Otherwise, we'll get sucked in to that cycle. But the boundaries that we may have to take will take wisdom and they may take some time to figure out and discerning of some steps forward. But the definition of insanity y'all all know this, I didn't come up with this definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. And some of y'all you're thinking through some of your relationships right now and you're thinking, Wait a second, I may need to interact with these relationships in different ways, in order to honor God, and in some ways, in a healthy way, honor myself and who God is, how he's made me and what he has for me in my life. How do you know that you and I may have a problem with an individual in our life? Do you ever daydream about the day of letting them have it? You know, I'm talking about you ever you ever you got someone in your life or you've had someone in your life, I promise you, you will have someone in your life where you're like, I can't wait to really just let them have it. Right? I'm gonna these are all the things I'm gonna say when I get towards them. And I can say a problem that they've given me or do you daydream about today, they finally admit all the wrong they've done to you. If you ever have that fantasy, where you're like, they come to you and you're like, oh, and they have the list that you have in your head. And all sudden, they're gonna they're just going to confess all that as if that's where it's gonna go. If you and I have those sorts of daydreaming going on. You and I have a problem with someone and we need to deal with it. But we can't wait on them to do their part. We've got to do our part, which is figure out God But how can I have a heart towards them? Well, I don't want to just smite them, and I don't hate them. And I don't want them to just fall off the edge of the earth. But that I can appropriately set up boundaries for my life. And we all know this, this has happened in relationships, you may have had relationships in this room, a marriage combat or whatever, you had to park different ways. Because there was perpetual sin, in the same way against you over and over and over again. But we've all got someone, we need to forgive and at least set up boundaries for a season. Because there's always hope. And that's why I say for a season and it may be the season is for life, I get that. But there's always hope, right? I mean, we don't want to live in a world where there's not hope for individuals, until they have their last breath, there's always hope. For Salvation first, right, and then for reconciliation with others, because here's what we know and believe we believe that their sin will be dealt with. See, that's where we, a lot of times hold on to unforgiveness, because we feel like we're letting them get away with something isn't that true? You think about this in terms of work. And people who take credit for things you think in terms of your relatives or your home life when you know, things just go bad and really, really bad. And they get really dysfunctional, really sinful, really hateful towards one another? And we think No, I, they've got to have it, I've got to let them have it. And what we're realizing in the Scriptures over and over again, is no you don't, because God's gonna deal with them. And so here's how it's gonna be dealt with their sin, your sin, my sin, it's either going to be dealt with on the cross, which is glorious, and beautiful, and our hope for everyone on this planet, as long as they have breath, that they would turn their eyes towards heaven, and finally confess their sin before God and he would forgive them and grant it. And then also, if that's not the case, and if their sin is not taken care of on the cross, where did the Scriptures tell us? How will it be dealt with? It will be dealt with by God Himself in judgment. So we don't need to do it. We need to figure out a way church to overcome evil with good. Because what we can do is we can change our family tree, you guys know this, I talk about this all the time, we can change our family path, we can overcome and there's a lot of evil enrollments been done to us, we can all go through different times of confession or hurt that we could talk about to one another. I get that. But the we need to figure out a way to overcome evil with good for the sake of ourselves. That's why I said we have to have enough respect for ourselves to be able to figure out God, what is it you have me do, because I care about my future, I care about my children's future. And I care about having a legacy of faith that only comes from Jesus Christ Himself. This this stuff I'm talking about here. This is the nitty gritty nuts and bolts, the hard stuff of Christianity. Everybody knows that this whole idea of loving your enemies, being compassion to someone who's doing something in your face, or worse yet, who has been evil and harmed you and hurt you, and your family, and you, other friends in all kinds of ways, but we can do it. We can do it with God. Having that in us. He says that you and I have the hope of glory. You and I can do this. Just like Shazam has those power in his hands. You and I have the power to forgive but rest assure friends, it must flow from God Himself, so that it can flow to others in our minutes.

Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you for how you love us. Hey, you don't leave us. I thank you for these four that made a step today, a journey today that proclaim to this room and anyone who's watching online that they've been forgiven. So Father, as they were reconciled to you, I just pray for a ministry of reconciliation in this church, that we will be men and women who go forth and have relationships that can be restored and that can be reconciled. But father if they can't, Father, I pray for hearts that are hurting right now that are anxious, that are bitter, that are angry, and we feel so justified, Lord, but help us to realize that your shoulders are big enough for this. Your cross is big enough and wide enough for whatever we need to lay at your feet. You will take our burdens upon you and that you will give us a yoke that is easy and light. Father we pray that for ourselves. I pray that for many people in this room so that we obey me, men and women of peace, footsteps of peace Oh may it be true for Life Church, not only this day, but all the days we exist. That's us in Christ's name. Amen.

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Thank you so much for the start of the fall semester that you would come and be with us, we don't take that lightly. And she's already sort of brought this up, you know, the image that is behind me is of a heart with a bandaid on it. And the reason why we have band aids booboos from the time we were little is that we have hurts, don't we? And so I know that for many of you, as you thought about this series, whether you just heard about it a couple minutes ago, or whether you came last week, I recognize there's a lot of pain and hurt there. Because it's one thing to say, Okay, we have a forgiving God who loves us, it's another thing to really grapple with the reality that we've been hurt. And so I just want to acknowledge that right from the get go that I do not pretend that this is easy. And as we walk through this together, we all recognize that we are people in process, I want to start out with reminding us how to think about forgiveness sort of rightly or biblically that'll sort of help us in our journey. So this first image, you may have seen it last week, it's this whole idea that first and foremost, we have to understand that we've been forgiven by God, it doesn't mean that if you've never become a Christian, that you can't have elements of forgiveness and elements of reconciliation, I would argue that we could not have a society at all, if there wasn't some element of okay, I messed up my bad, I'm sorry, let's come back together. This happens in all kinds of ways, both publicly and privately. But in terms of understanding where forgiveness comes from, and being empowered by the Holy Spirit, to be able to do some things and to be reconciled with the God of the universe. First and foremost, we have to have that vertical relationship, right understanding that we love because God first loved us that we forgive, because God forgave us, then we have the idea of internal we grant forgiveness, we spent some time on that last week, sort of a little bit, we really focused on the top part last week, we're gonna focus a lot on that today. And again, this becomes hard because when we then we want to go into the third part of like, I don't know if I can be reconciled with them. I don't know if I can truly forgive them. I don't know what that is the third part, the horizontal aspect. But before we get there, and before we ask questions about whether I'm even supposed to be in relationship with this person anymore, what it should look like and trust being broken and hurt being done. Maybe for a long time. Maybe it's even generational sin, we have to deal with the internal conflict, that we feel the angst that we may even feel in this moment, as I began to talk about pain and hurt and healing and forgiveness. Well, the disciples, the followers of Christ, they were thinking along the same lines. And so I want to begin with telling the story that Jesus told to his followers when they began to ask these questions, because nothing has changed since the fall. And so let's go ahead and begin in the book of Matthew chapter 18, beginning verse 21. We're going to see this right here, then Peter, now who's Peter, he is a lot of times the mouthpiece of the disciples, the followers of Christ, he comes to the Lord and he asked, Lord, how often should I forgive someone who sins against me? Seven times. Now again, he thinks he's being generous. Because like all of us, we feel like yeah, I'll give you a shot or two. But if you disappoint me, or message me over too many times done writing you off, canceling you even we talked about this with our culture and kind of where we're at. So he thinks he's being generous. It's also a number of completion. Jesus replied, No, not seven times. But 70 times seven, if you want to work that out, it's like 490, or something. But that's not the point. The point is that we are not to keep track of wrongs you ever been there before? Or known someone like that before, where you're just keeping every jot and tiddle maybe it's someone in the workplace, making sure their food isn't touched. Maybe it's someone in your home or in your past or in your greater family, this whole idea of keeping track of wrongdoing, figuring out who did what, to who, it's exhausting, and it hurts our heart. So you might ask, well, then, who in the world would commit the same offense seven times and expect anyone who's reasonable to forgive them? And what we have to think of that is the point because we have to begin with the idea that that's how we interact with our Father in heaven. Think about this. Think about how many times those of us that have tried to shake off so the old ways some of our own sinful habits. How many times do we find ourselves looking towards heaven gazing upward and saying, God forgive me or looking downward and saying, God, forgive me? I'm still in this. I'm still struggling. I'm still in bondage to this specific sin. Then what does our father

Heaven dude, as he casts us out, does he condemn us? No, he shows us mercy. Even if we sin in the same way, seven times a day, you see where the power comes from. And I know this is very personal and you think about in your home or in your inner circle, and someone who hurt you and says things that aren't right. And you're to call to what forgive them from your heart. And we'll talk about maybe some boundaries, and if those are to occur, that are appropriate at times, but just right there from the get go, we need to understand that we have to deal with ourselves and with God internally. This leads to my first point that we're meant to see. And it may sound a little harsh or cruel when I first read it, but I think it fits the context of the verses that we're reading. First point is this, the amount of forgiveness we are to show is to be proportionate to how much we want to smite them. A man this took a dark turn quick pasture, what are you talking about? Well think about what we are when we are angry at someone when we are hurt. What do we want to do? What is our gut instinct? What is our knee jerk reaction? I'll just speak for myself. If you're not there, it's to what? Get them back we want even if it was okay, Lord, I don't be the one to do it, but cause an anvil to fall in their head. Like those Looney Tunes commercials I enjoyed so much as a kid, right? It's that whole idea that when we're upset or angry, when we're hurt when we've been sinned against, we want, we want vengeance, and we want it quick. And again, we say, oh, not by my hand, but somehow something make something happen. Jesus talked about this, he was always upping the ante. He was always raising the stakes. When you think about our heart, do we think about anger? Because if you look at places like the Sermon on the Mount, and people are coming to him and saying, Hey, look, you know, Jesus is saying, you know, you've heard it say, Do not murder. Yeah, that's right. We don't need to be killing people. But also understand that when you're angry in your heart towards your brother and sister, you've already gone down that path. And so what's Jesus doing, he's telling us, because I love and care about you so much, recognize where your heart goes, where my heart goes, when we are harboring on forgiveness, your willingness to forgive my willingness to forgive, really is like a portal into our hearts. I love that term, Portal. It's that whole idea of like, whether you're on a ship, or you're looking into something, it's sort of this, this circular glass object that you're able to see through and are withholding forgiveness from someone says a lot more about us than them. And so when we you and I think about how much we hate them, or how much we want them to just be sort of erased from our life or from the earth, we have to replace that with how much love we should have for them and how much we should be praying for them. Now, I don't say that simply and easily. This is very difficult. But Jesus talked about this, right? He talked about praying for your enemies and praying for those who persecute you and harbor all kinds of evil and resentment against you. That doesn't come from inside you and me, right. So let's remember our first points. And the whole idea that Jesus says, we're gonna be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. I'm quoting a lot of the Sermon on the Mountain here that comes from a different place. And it comes from our Lord and Savior, granting us a new heart. That's a lot of what is of the encouragement today is that today, if you hear God's voice, and that's what we want to do, as a people individually, collectively, the call is don't harden your heart. Today, if you hear God's voice, don't harden your heart, you're asking God like in Ezekiel, in the days of old god, take out my heart of stone and give me a heart of flesh. We're not talking about being walked all over. We're not talking about letting them off the hook for whatever evil or injustice they did to you. The Bible is all about justice. And we'll talk about that. But it's that whole idea of, of what about your heart? What about is going on internally with you that God wants to deal with you about and what he wants you and I to have, is a position of forgiveness. So this is the call right? We can't get around to Jesus said this. So then he goes and he tells a story may be familiar with it, but I want to highlight some aspects, you may or may not have heard about it. So Jesus tells this story right after that question and how much we should forgive and how often he says therefore the kingdom of heaven can be compared to a king, who decided to bring his accounts up to date with servants who had borrowed money from him. In the process. One of his debtors was brought in who owed him millions of dollars he couldn't pay. So his Master ordered that he be sold along with his wife, his children and everything he owed to pay the debt. But the man fell down before his master and begged him please be patient with me and I will pay it all that his master was filled with pity for him, and he released him and forgave his debt.

But when the man left the king, he went to a fellow servant who owed him a few $1,000. He grabbed him by the throat and demanded instant payment.

His follow his fellow servant fell down before him and begged for a little more time be patient with me, and I will pay it, he pleaded, but his creditor wouldn't wait. He had the man arrested and put in prison until the debt can be paid in full. A lot of things to notice in this in the first thing is that the King who brings before him that first servant is really an insurmountable debt. It's millions of dollars. It's the income of some small nations and some small countries, it's again to show that this is not a debt that could ever be repaid. And yet, the king has pity pity is very helpful when we think about how we are to forgive someone thinking about their situation, putting ourselves in their shoes, for empathy comes in and comes from. And so yes, this king has pity on him. But what do we see here quite quickly, that he goes out, he finds somebody who owes him a few $1,000 a debt that couldn't be paid, it's not nothing. And he says to himself, well, I'm owed this, I should have this, he'd really did do something that costs me money, and I loaned it to him, and he hasn't paid it back. And so what does he do? He violently comes at him. That's why I say smile is to not it's not too strong of a word of what's really going on our heart some time in this story. What is he doing, he's choking me strangling him. And so therefore, we see at the end of the story,

that even though he asked for a little more time, that he would not wait. So this leads to my second point this morning is that unforgiveness doesn't look good. And it doesn't act good. See, that's the thing is a lot of us are harboring unforgiveness in our hearts. And the way that it comes out is in our outbursts of anger, the way it comes out is in our unwillingness to be patient or unwillingness to empathize our our tough exterior that has led to deceit, that's all over in our wake. You see, for all of us in the room, self awareness, and the consequences of our action don't come naturally, a lot of times, all we see is the wreckage behind us. In fact, depending on our background, vengeance and survival might come naturally, because of the home environment you grew up in, or just really the way you were reared or raised or whatever you had to go through. In order to get here I think about being here on the border land and the wild west in El Paso, in particular, some of the hardships and struggles that you or your parents or your grandparents had to go through in order to attain sort of land or a income, a source of living and even set up house or shop. A lot of hard things happened right here in this area. And in this region, a lot of hard history. I think this is maybe best seen in a movie that is somewhat dated now. But in 1992, Clint Eastwood gave what he thought was his final western movie called unforgiveness may be familiar with anyone best pitcher of the year, it was lauded and praised for a lot of reasons. And one of the main reasons it was praised for is that it really crushed the image of the old west as a simple good versus evil or sort of everything gets wrapped up in a neat bow. And, you know, the cowboy gets the girl and they get to ride off in the sunset in the end. And what that movie does, and in the title itself, think about that unforgiveness is it's about

in the old west, and that he really is feeling unforgiven. And he is delving out unforgiveness with no real hope for himself, or those around him. He's what sometimes we call in literature and anti hero. And so one of the reasons I bring that up is because that sort of defines a lot of us, doesn't it that we feel like we've got to fight, and we feel like that we're not forgiven. And therefore we create a destruction pattern around us because we feel like we've been under some weight of brokenness itself. We've read about it and a lot of us have experienced the brokenness in our own hearts are own homes and even in our city. Then what ends up happening is we have these sort of Inklings these sort of things that are residing in our hearts. And right now we're just in a day and age in which those flames are fanned. You know what I'm talking about. We have a little wicker of, of hardness or vengeance, or I'll show you or I'm better than you, I can't wait to get a hold of you or show them or show him or show whatever you

And that's fanned the flame. And so what ends up happening is that we aren't good recipients of forgiveness, and we're not in a good place to receive it or give it because what ends up happening is that we look around and say forgiveness. That seems weak, it seems stupid. But what's going on in this story, you have a man who is a servant himself, who is shown mercy. And what does he do, he goes and finds a fellow servant, and demands payment and begins to choke him and then ultimately throw him into prison. When he is doing that, he's acting as if he were the king and the judge, to go back to my we wish that we the anvil would fall in their head, we wish we could smite them off the earth, or at least out of our lives and send them to a neighboring town. When we are doing that we are acting as if we're King and judge, we know better, we know better than the king himself. We know better than God who is represented in this parable in this story. So how do we know we still have some of that residing in our hearts? Because we don't want this right? We know that once we go down a pattern of destruction, of hate of harboring unforgiveness towards one another. We know it's like a snowball. Right? And in fact, that's the point of that movie that I've already referenced when he has to go in at the end and Clint Eastwood style and Mo, everybody down with a gun was a how do you and I know if we're still in that situation where there are things in our heart that God of the universe wants to deal in? We have to ask yourself, what is yours? And what is my physical and emotional reaction? When I hear that name? Or that situation has brought up? What are the trigger effects that we are feeling? asked this question, do I cringe? Do I roll my eyes when I hear about them? Do I feel my pulse clicking? Do I clench my jaw or let out a sigh of her? Not them? Do I shake my head at the unfairness of the good things that are happening to them? Do I celebrate secretly when I hear that they're having difficulty with thoughts like finally, they get they're getting what's coming to them? Do I dream of the moment when I get to present all of my proof and hear them finally admit what they did was wrong when I talked to others about their story because a lot of you're like, Whoa, pastor, I'm too sophisticated to think somebody should be killed or wiped off the earth. So ask yourself this question. When I talk to other people about this story. Am I quick to try to convince them how wrong I was hoping to elicit a satisfying sympathetic reaction from them towards me. In some kind of statement affirming how awful my offender's actions really were? If there's still a regular part of my life, am I always expecting the worst from them? Am I easily offended, put off aggravated and annoyed by them? Or people who remind me of them or so if you found any of those things kind of welling up in your heart, which I find welling up in my heart in certain situations, and I'm processing? Or are we on the other side? Where do I acknowledge that was hard? But I'm now in a sense of calmness and peace. Can I sincerely pray for them? When they're facing difficult things? Can I manage my emotions, when good things happen to them? My eager to share a helpful perspective with others facing a similar situation, right, allowing God to turn that for good, hoping to help them get to a better place. Can I look for what is good and other people just period? Because trust has been broken? Do I look for life lessons and click those instead of grudges? Where we where we keep in tabs? What hurt my offender have suffered that would have led them to do what they did? Can I have compassion for the offender's brokenness? Can I be like my Heavenly Father and offer forgiveness with no strings attached? Because we are putting ourselves in their shoe and begin to see them as a human and humanly? And then lastly, can I authentically, be kind to this person who's unkind to me, even though boundaries may need to be drawn? Again, we're not some of those people who say, Well, we have to just rush back into abuse harm, for harm sake, no. But do we have a posture of our heart? Because as long as someone has breath, reconciliation is always possible. It may not be plausible, it may not be likely from our perspective. But we're going to learn that God is up to things that we don't know about at times. And that leads to the next part of our story. Verse 31, says this, when some of the other servants saw this, they were very upset. They went to the king and told him everything that happened. Then the king called in the man he had forgiven and he said, you evil servant. I forgave you that tremendous debt because you pleaded with me. Shouldn't you have mercy on your fellow servant, just as I had more

mercy on you. Then the angry king sent the man to prison to be tortured until he had paid his entire debt. Third point I want us to see this morning that's so hard for many of us I know is let God take care of them.

Let God take care of them. He does your heart and my heart no good to try to scheme up ways to bring about harm to others. In fact, we just got done with a study on the book of James James chapter two, verse 13, says, there will be no mercy for those who have not shown mercy to others. And we don't want that, do we? We want the mercy of our Father in heaven. So we don't want to be people who still have harboring unforgiveness and what that does to us, Matthew five, seven, and the sermon on the mount that I've been quoting throughout this sermon, God blesses those who are merciful, don't you and I want blessing, blessing from God, for Thy will be shown mercy. God is always up to something and man, we cannot see behind the curtain. The reason why in this story that King is so angry is because even though this person was forgiven a great debt, they put themselves in the place of God or even above God or above the king in the story, to enact judgment, we have to trust him. And we don't help out God by trying to get them to see the errors of their ways ever done this in an individual kind of one on one circumstance, and you know that they've offended you, and you're steaming about it. So you go to them, and they have no clue because you haven't brought up really the situation in a helpful way. And you just say, like, I forgive you, right? You know what I mean? What? And because where are that? They don't think they did anything wrong. And so when you do that, that doesn't help. Now, that doesn't mean that we don't speak up in the moment, or we don't work through things that we don't help them to see they're wrong. But it's just knowing when to speak and how to go about it, and to not be one who has to help God out. Do you ever feel that way? Sometimes, I feel that way, a lot where, you know, you see the Ark of the Covenant, you know, being rolled around on a cart. And you know, it's supposed to be on poles, because you've seen the movie, and you've read the scriptures and you think is supposed to be on poles. And so when it begins to shake and come off the cart, you think, Okay, I'm just gonna help God out here and stick my hand under it before it hits the ground. And we don't need to help God out. In those situations, or any situation, he doesn't need help.

So how's the story end? Where does it Where does it all going? It's where we've been going this whole sermon, and this is about our heart. What does it say? So if we're here, if we're understanding this story, and Jesus wants us to, and he's talking to Peter and the followers then and the followers today, that's what my heavenly Father will do to you, if you refuse to forgive your brothers and sisters, from your heart.

So the last question I have for us this morning is how's your heart? How's my heart? Are we moving towards healing, or hate? Last week, I brought the whole idea that's not original of me the idea that when we harbor unforgiveness, we're really putting ourselves in a prison. But I would also bring up the whole idea that when you and I choose to hurt, we're doing double damage. Instead of instead of going to the doctor and the physician and being healed, we're doing double damage, how so? Because what you're saying is, I've been hurt, and I'm gonna hurt you, even if it's just through conniving, and through gossip. And what will happen is, is that we won't have peace. That's what I mean, when you and I are doubly hurt, because we're hurt by the offense. And then now we're carrying that and we're walking around with that, and those who love us and know us the best they're aware of it. That's why I say self awareness is so hard to see. And our consciences aren't often there yet because of conviction or lack thereof. But what we're doing when we harbor unforgiveness is we're doing double damage. We're paying double there, we're carrying the pain. And we're saying things and doing things that we don't want to do or we know God is not pleased with or what he would have for you and me. So that's one way we can live or we can begin to see that are hurt. never justified. I've said that before I started that out. And I will say it again, whoever has hurt you along life's way and we have all been hurt. We either been hurt or being hurt or we will be hurt or in some fashion or form and is not justified at all. And oftentimes the reason why we don't want to forgive and we don't want to internally deal with it, is because we feel like it's letting them off the hook. Not at all. It's doing yourself a favor and how we can be healed.

then reconnected with the God of the universe. What do we want to be church? What do we want to be individually? What do we want to be corporately? Do we want to be people who just get what we get while the getting's good, right? Like every business practice, or a lot of business practices in this city, and in this community, I'll just take it while I can. And, you know, who cares about the consequences? Or do we begin to see ourselves connected with the God of the universe who's helping others connect with the God of the universe, in spite of our pain, and our hurts that we've been forgiven? So therefore, we can extend forgiveness? In other words, do we want to carry the pain? Or do we want to be an instrument of healing? Anyone will tell you that the way you combat pain, the way you combat anger, the anger, the way you combat hate, is with peace, that we show mercy instead of judgment, not because they deserve it. They deserve at some level, maybe to be smiling, but let God take care of that we see the story, this parable in order to let us know, you don't have to worry about it. But what about your heart? What about my heart? What will change our hearts? Well, as we're on this process, or on this journey, it's getting a view of the amazing love that the King of the Universe has for you and me, because what did he do? He's not asking us to do anything that he didn't do. First, he made himself a one. Jesus Christ made himself a what? A slave or a servant, so that others may down? Isn't that such good news that not only does God illustrate this for us, not only does he show us now in his he helped give explanation to us. He then sends his one and only son.

It's other stories in Hong Kong about this whole idea of him sending His Son into the vineyard, Surely no one would abuse and kill him. And you see that that's exactly what happened to our Lord and Savior, and yet, the death when did hurt, when did hate when? No, no. In fact, what is the great news for you and for me that we celebrate week in and week out? It's the truth of the gospel. And as you and I sing songs as we lift our hands, and as we praise or as we hit our knees, we find ourselves in this story, we are being healed. And listen, we have three more weeks of this. Having said all that, I want to say I know we still have issues. What about reconciliation? What about being mad at God? What about myself and how I'm thinking through it, we'll get to some of those questions. But ultimately, let's land at the feet of the cross this week and every week of our lives. Thank God, even when I don't understand I'm going to trust you. Even when I've been around people who have hurt me harm me have shown themselves untrustworthy. I'm going to trust you, God, even though I'm hurting right now. I'm going to choose peace. I'm going to choose love God even though I don't understand exactly why you allow this thing to occur in my life, I'm going to ask you to turn it for good what you want to do, so that I can be an instrument of healing and reconciliation for others as you have healed and reconciled me to yourself and others. Let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you how you love us how you don't leave us wondering, wondering that you've given us just clear, clear instruction. But father, I know that for many of us, our hearts haven't caught up with the holy instruction that you've given us. So help us Father we pray, help us with the hurt and the pain that we feel right now in this moment when that situation when those people when that person is brought up.

God we know you want to heal us, Lord, take out our Hearts of Stone and give us a heart of flesh that can be molded into who you want us to be. Not who our parents want us to be not who our grandparents want us to be. Not carrying around all the hurt and the baggage from being rough and ready but

but being people who have surrendered and open their hands and say wherever you lead, I'll go where else do i turn father but to you? We ask these things in Christ's name. Amen.

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Sermon Transcript:

Wonderful to see all you guys here what a blessing it is to be the pastor of Life Church. So forgetting this man, let's just admit it, it is hard to do. And for many of us, we don't even want to do it. And so some of y'all are trying to duck out now and figure out a way to get out of this idea. What is forgiveness, quite simply forgiveness is canceling a debt, canceling a debt. It's another way to say it, to give you some word pictures is to forgive is to write in large letters over a debt, nothing owed. Right as we think about some of the political things going on where they talk about loan forgiveness is the idea that whether it's millions or 1000s, it would be canceled, nothing owed, to forgive is to turn the key, open the cell door of a prison, and let the prisoner free to good word picture. The other word picture is to forgive is to pound the gavel in a courtroom and to declare the person not guilty, right, they are forgiven, to forgive is to loose or pull up the anchor of a boat and set that ship free to sail, we get the idea of this forgiveness is freedom. It freedom is on the other side, we understand that but there is something that has to be done. We know it does something in our hearts when we forgive, and we really can't get along without it. You think about this, that instinctively our culture and everyone around us even if you don't go to church, we all enjoy some aspects of forgiveness. Think about this offenses happen every day for you and me whether it's at the office, or whether it's a church or whether it's at school, or whether it's in your home. And so when those offenses happen, we have to process that in some way. You and I we all figured out a way to get along, or we'd be eaten up on the inside all the time, or we'd be killing each other right. And so even the culture and the world understands forgiveness and is even marveling at it at times I think about a movie that's almost a decade old now called unbroken where Louis Zamperini he goes over to fight in World War Two, he's tortured by his captors. And later on in his life, he goes to forgive and shake hands and befriend years later, the people who tormented him. So everyone recognizes there's value to forgiveness, but it's hard. Boy, is it hard, isn't it and we're not getting any encouragement. Think about some of the most recent movements that you and I have been a part of in the last decade, whether we want it to be or not canceled culture, think about what's going on when you and I either are canceled, or we cancel someone whether it's with a like or a flick of the pen, or with a typing on our phones, the me to movement and what was involved in that and how far it went. And you think about the racial riots, the mass shootings, all twist distort or just straight up chuck for getting this out the window, don't we? We think about those movements, we think about what we've been a part of and the divisiveness of it all. And we can see why at one level. These things were necessary and even good, man, we even maybe champion some aspects of these movements, because they were concerned about justice at one level. And we believe justice is good, right? Because we look at the Bible and we look at our God, we see that a just God calls us to seek justice in the world. Many of us don't want to or can't be can't forgive because it's hard. Because we feel justified in whatever we're doing to ourselves whether we're inflicting pain on ourselves, or we're dragging ourselves to sleep or numbing our pain. We do this because we either we believe we deserve it. Or they deserve that punishment for the rest of their lives. And so we find ourselves stuck. If we're honest, we stay away from forgiveness because we don't want to let them off the hook, do we? Because we know what we know what a loving and just God we serve. We're like Jonah, right? We're like, no, no, no, I know what kind of God you are. You're long suffering impatient and wanting to forgive and we want to let them have it. We do in our hearts and and things that were a part of at times. The good news is that you and I we can have forgiveness and justice. This is something that you won't hear outside the walls of a church or outside of Christendom, that whole idea that you and I can have both. In fact, we must have both. It is love and justice, forgiveness and justice that we both want to have. And of course it's okay for us to turn those over to authorities who have wronged us in some sort of criminal way. We're going to get into that. This is the introduction to a series that will be on for five weeks. But of course we believe that at times

because we have to turn things over to the civil magistrates, maybe it wasn't criminal, maybe what you and I experienced that hurt us and cut us. So deep wasn't criminal, but it sure feels that way doesn't it sure feels that way. When we wake up in the morning and we go to bed at night. We don't have to be gluttons for punishment. I brought this up last week and the idea of serving Christians and believers don't suffer for sufferings sake. So we don't have to be a glutton for punishment and keep going back to the same setup. And the same situation that has brought us much harm. The Bible demands justice, and we aren't even to seek it. But here's the deal. You and I so quickly, we move into revenge. That's why we don't ever want to put ourselves in the position of being the judge, jury and executioner. Because if we're honest, what we really want and sometimes pursue it is not simply justice. We want whoever offended us to be banished to the ends of the earth, the rest of their days, we want them to pay big, big time because we want to push beyond just the offense. We want them never to be heard from or seen again. So we hold that forgiveness. We got our reasons, don't we? We've got our reasons. And when we think about forgiveness, it's almost like trials or anything else in life, that you and I either are fixing to go into a situation we're going to need to understand forgiveness, we're in a situation, or we're coming out of one but see if any of these resonate with you, they do with me. Here's some of the things we tell ourselves reasons why we cannot forgive. I fear the offense will be repeated.

I'm hanging on to a grudge because it gives me a sense of control in a situation that I have felt is so unfair. The pain that I experienced in altered my life, and yet no one has ever validated what I went through, and that it was wrong. Forgiveness feels like it trivializes or minimizes, or worse yet, makes what happened to me no big deal. I mean, just straight up, I'm not ready to forgive, I still hurt. They haven't even apologized or acknowledged what they did was wrong. It's easier to ignore this person altogether than to try and figure out boundaries. So they don't keep hurting me. They're dead, and or they're gone. And I don't think any good will come from forgiveness. Now. If any of these things resonate with you, and they do with me, we're good candidates for what the Bible says about this issue. Jesus at the end of his earthly life, and we're going to look to him first and we're gonna consider the Gospels and a couple other passages. At the end of his earthly life. He was part of a made up trial in the middle of the night, if you remember, he was falsely accused, wrongly accused. He was beaten, he was flogged, mistreated and understood. And he's made to carry his own cross. And that's where we pick up the story in the book of Luke chapter 23. Right here, and it says this to others. So there if you remember the story, there were two others with Jesus, on his way to be crucified to others, both criminals were led out to be executed with him. When they came to a place called the Skull. They nailed Him to the cross. And the criminals were also crucified. one on his right and 100 his left, Jesus said, Father, forgive them for they don't know what they are doing. And the soldiers gambled for his clothes by throwing dice. The crowd watched in the leaders scoffed, He saved others, they said, let him save himself if he is really God's Messiah, the chosen one. The soldiers mocked him to by offering him a drink of sour wine, they called out to him, if you are the king of the Jews, save yourself assigned was fastened above him with the words, this is the king of the Jews.

And so what you see here is the whole idea that Jesus himself in that passage in that passage in verse 34, it's that whole idea of Father, forgive them, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing. We keep going in the book of Ephesians. And it says this, get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead be kind to each other tender hearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.

First point I wants to see this morning and may not be that novel, but it's so important for us to start here. It's its foundation for everything we're going to talk about over these next several weeks. We can forgive because we've been forgiven. It's just that simple. And it's just that hard, isn't it? It's just that simple. It's just that hard. You're gonna say, okay, that's Jesus. I get it. Son of God, Son of man.

And he's standing there ultimately up on the cross. And He says, forgive them for they know not what they do. And I know that the passage is there in Ephesians. Four, but how does it work? What are we talking about here biblically. And I would just say that, we're going to talk about how we can think through this. But I would just say that think about, again, what we value even as humans, humanity, you and I are never more like Christ, whenever more Christ like than we do this right here, when we forgive others, especially those who have wronged us don't deserve it and can never repay the damage they've done. I think about this in terms of, you know, one of the popular movies and plays that we enjoy with lame is. And that whole idea of when John Bel John goes to steal from the priest, the priest who had what given him a place to stay, and the cops come in, and they're ready to take him back to prison. And what does the priest say? Not only were you supposed to take all these things from me, but you forgot the candlesticks as well. And what does that do to him? What does that do to a man or a woman, when shown such kindness, such forgiveness, we are never more Christ, like, I'm telling you church, we're never more Christ like, than when we forgive because we've been forgiven. But here's how it works. It's our vertical relationship, we understand first and foremost that God forgives us. That's what happened to Diego, he understood that he saw the witness to testimony and his mom, he knew it was gonna go to basic training camp. That's why we had to do it today. He's heading out this week shipping him out, Although who knows where he'll end up in around the world. But now he's got Christ because He knew and he wanted. And we're all meant to come to a point where you say, God, you've got to give me a center. So that relationship has to be established first, then what we have is that whole idea in forgiveness, we have an internal aspect, where we now grant forgiveness to others. Now, I want to tell you, for the majority of my life, even well into my adult life, I did not fully understand this step, because the what I thought was, now listen, I'll forgive if they say they're sorry, right? Because forgiveness is a transaction a lot of times and so. So what we're waiting for is we're waiting for them to say, I'm sorry. We're like children, you remember, when you and I hit our brother or sister, we were brought by a parental authority, hey, you got to say you're sorry. And of course, you know, we wouldn't mean that we wouldn't extend forgiveness or say I'm sorry till he or she says it first. And so we find ourselves a lot of times in that, that we don't want to grant forgiveness, because we think falsely, we don't want to give that power to them, they've already wronged me, we're gonna talk a lot about this over the next couple weeks. But we need to understand that we cannot get these out of our order. First, we've got to be reconciled with the God of the universe, we have to know we're forgiven by God, then we have to do some internal work, to ask God to help us to forgive, especially when it's hard, and especially if they're not even asking for it, then we can look at the horizontal, the offer to reconcile, if that's even a possibility. And I understand that in some situations, it may not be. But what we can't wait for is we can't wait to forgive somebody and say, Well, I would if they would get around to asking for it. I would if they felt bad, or they felt sorry, in any way. Now, some of y'all are sitting here thinking, Wait a second Pastor, I hear this, this is all good, fine and dandy. And I think it worked in children's ministry. And I think it maybe worked when I was real little. And I first started reading the Bible, but you have to understand that my situation is the exception to the rule. That's how we often think, right? We hear something we're like, no, no, I hear you. But I'm in a different situation. You do not know the depth of the betrayal. That happened to me from a friend or family member, you don't know about the years of abuse, you don't know what you're asking of me. When you're talking about forgiveness. You don't know what it costs me and my family, financially generational wealth.

Let me tell you what it's gonna cost us though, if we don't forgive. If you and I, if we say, okay, I hear all this. I think I'm understanding some of it or all of it. And I don't want this I'm going to walk away, what we'll do is we'll stay in a prison of our own making will stay in a prison of our own making. Remember, what I said was a good definition of forgiveness, to forgive is to turn the key, open the cell door and let the prisoner free. unforgiveness is like building a prison and putting ourselves in it. It seems so foolish from the outside looking in. But we do this when we harbor unforgiveness. Now again, we're going to talk a lot about the transaction and the reconciliation all that we're just talking about you and me right now, and our own hearts towards others who have wronged us. But here's the deal. We aren't hurting them at all. Are we

Any, any psychologist or counselor or pastor worth their salt would tell you this, we aren't hurting them at all. Well, who are we hurting? Who are we hurting, we put ourselves in a prison cell, we're only hurting herself. But that's what happens though. When we're hurt and we won't deal with it. At the foot of the cross of Jesus Christ, there's a hole in there. Listen, I am wanting to acknowledge there is a hole in there. When you and I get hurt when we get cut when we get beat, and we don't give it to Jesus and forgive.

What will we fill that hole with what we fill it with? What did Ephesians say we are to put away as we then grant and put on forgiveness to one another. If we do not take it to the feet of the cross, and we're all level. We're all level at the feet of the cross. We will fill it with bitterness, anger, rage, harsh words, slander, as well as all kinds of evil behavior,

won't we? We've experienced this either in our own lives or in the lives of those around us. Listen, I want to tell you something, I want to say that this may be this may be the most important thing I say. And it's for someone here. I do not think

I don't think whatever happened to you was right. I am sorry. I am so sorry for whatever happened. But here's what I do. Here's what I do as your pastor is I just believe that your heart, your heart, my heart is too beautiful to be in chains. It's just too beautiful to be in chains that

this right here, picked up these chains right here. Use this sometimes my truck when I'm gonna pull out bushes, but but your heart Listen, listen, this is this is why I do this. This is why I'm a pastor, when you think about the heart of the gospel, which is forgiveness and reconciliation to God, which then allows us to be reconciled to one another.

Your heart is too beautiful to be in chains. That's why That's why when we were designing this series that we made an image of a heart with a bandaid on it, because what's going on there. We're asking God to heal our hearts. And he can he wants it that unforgiveness. Listen is too much for you not to carry. We're just we're stuck. We're stuck in the prison. We're stuck in the chains. And you and I, we're not meant to be that way. We're not meant to walk around that way. We're not meant to live that way. We're meant to be free. I'm meant to be in chains are meant to be free. Free Free is a bird, right? No one I'm gonna play the song. It's a different generation.

So much so much of the Bible. When I look at it, I think about contemplate it. It's so much about God coming to set the captives free. Were the captives you and me he has come to loosen our chains he has, and he will still be like, Okay, I'll do it. Alright, Pastor, I think you've convinced me logically, biblically, I'm moved. I will do it. I'll go on this journey. I'll make a decision to forgive. And I just say beautiful, beautiful. First step to take. The start of anything begins with a leap of faith, right? We understand this from a salvation perspective that we become saved, we become in a relationship with God, we are justified made right with God as if we'd never sinned. But then what follows immediately after that, sanctification are being made right with God over and over again in terms of our relationship, not from salvation, but that ongoing journey, that decision. So the process starts with saying, I'm willing to forgive or I do forgive. But then what happens what happens to your heart and mind? What happens your heart and mind come on what happens I don't care if you've started a new you know, workout routine or a new diet thing, what happens?

Our hearts and they just don't want to align and cooperate with God's word sometimes do they are hurt feelings don't always want to cooperate, they have to catch up with God's word. But here here's what happens is we can acknowledge the facts. Once we sort of dig enough someone helps us to see enough or we just know we got hurt. Somewhere along the way, there are the facts that occurred and then there's the impact. You know what I'm talking about the impact the emotional, physical, financial toll the repercussions of whatever happened, we feel it don't we? The body keeps told God body keeps score and so does our heart.

That's why many of us are so compelled to forgive and you're like, you don't have to tell me twice preacher. I get it. I live in this misery or I live with somebody who's miserable. I'm living in this prison of my own making.

Well, here's what happens is we're all putting ourselves in prison. If we

Have undealt with wounds hurts now, how do you know? How do you know? If you're moving in the right direction? Well, you need God's help and grace. Listen, it's not just a one time thing to become a Christian, but it's a daily act of obedience to walk into him and ask him to change your heart, help your heart, and eventually your heart can heal. Right? There's a reason why we put band aids on ourselves and on our children. Right? I might have had a paper cut a year ago, and I would put a bandaid on it. But now I'm okay, you can shake my hand, it's okay. That's why we believe your heart can heal. But sometimes we have wounds that aren't yet healed. How do you where you and I know if we're in that case, when it comes to the issue of forgiveness? Here's just two telltale signs I thought about one of the ways you and I know that we're still hurting in this area is that yours? And my response won't match the offense. You know, I'm talking about that when you're really upset. That whatever happens to trigger that upsetness, you know, it's way over whatever the offense was united experiences at work, right? That you move somebody's thing in the fridge or you move the pin over or you know, in the home, I can move my cheese, and all of a sudden there's a blowing up? What is going on there. What's going on there, as you and I are very quick to realize the cheese is not the problem, the pins not the problem, the sleight of hand or the bumping into you accidentally is not the problem. Because what happens is, is those small minor offenses, our responses aren't matching the minor offenses they are so we'll blow up and rage and your harsh words and something so small, that tells you and me so stop, we should stop and say what is going on here. Because I know I can't be mad at this situation. There's something else going on there. God I need to deal with it. The other way that you and I know that we're not quite fully healed, even though we might say we forgive or we're willing to forgive, is that we really do view ourselves as better more spiritual than the individual who we need to forgive. You know, I'm talking about here that that was a Oh, yeah, yeah, no, but But you know, God, I'm really better than them. Right. We're like, the one who is seeking to be justified before the Lord. And we're beating our chests. And we're saying thank you, God, that I'm not like him or her. And what the cross is saying to us over and over again, what Jesus is saying to us over and over again, is that we're all level at the cross. And so if you and I are not at a position where we do not pity that other person, we do not view them through a lens of compassion. We're not there yet. See, here's great hope because you know how we've all heard stories of people getting old and bitter, right? You may know someone like that a bitter old man, a bitter old woman.

You can find yourself bitter for a season or for life, or for a time I get all that. But here's what I can encourage you, if you're finding yourself bitter, or you find yourself living or being around someone who has let unforgiveness and roots of bitterness and resentment, creep in that there's really a lot of hurt and pain going on there. So when you're trying to forgive someone, mentally think, Okay, this doesn't excuse whatever they did. But mentally think Man, they were once a little boy or girl that got hurt so bad, learn to pity someone and learn to see that they need Jesus just as much as I need Jesus, for sure the consequences of our center are different. For sure the repercussions of our sin are different, but we're not any different in our humanity, and our personhood. And so when we begin to see ourselves in the same place on the same level playing field at the cross, then we know we're getting closer to really forgiving someone from our heart and be healed. I haven't said a whole lot about the next and the third part, which is the horizontal relationship. I've got weeks to cover this. So let's get into Colossians three Colossians three, it says this, since God chose you and me to be the holy people he loves, This is what he did for us. You and I must close ourselves with tender hearted mercy. We show mercy because we've received mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience, make allowance for each other's faults. And forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. Next point I have is just that we must forgive.

We must forgive. I didn't make that up. I want you to see it right there in the Scripture. So we've gone from we can forgive to what the Bible says is that we want to claim the name of Christ. And because of what he's done for us, we must forgive. Forgiveness is a command but it's not cruel. It seems that way. I know because in your mind, and in my mind, were flooded with the memories of what they did to us. I know that's what's going on. And so what we tell ourselves is man, God, that seems cruel, but it's not

forgiveness as a command. It's God's divine.

Mercy on our human hearts that are so prone to turn our hurt into hate. That's so true. We talked about this, maybe in anecdotally that hurt people hurt people. But what's the truth of the matter is it's not to hurt people hurt people, hurt people who haven't dealt with it hurt other people who haven't taken it to the foot of the cross, because that's how our human hearts work. When you and I have something that opens up a wound, if we do not fill it with the love and the forgiveness and the grace and the mercy of Christ, let us not be surprised if something different flows out that is repeated in both the passage in Colossians and Ephesians. And you and I know it in real life, because here's what we're doing and we stand in resentment. Here's what we're doing and want us to see this quote, this this morning, as we must forgive. Resentment is like drinking poison,

and then waiting for the other person to die. Isn't that so true? those of y'all that have struggled with this, like I have, where you have so much unforgiveness in your heart towards someone or some situation or something. Isn't that so true? Because that's what we really want. When we resent somebody else. We're like, kill them, Lauren, I'm waiting, right? Let the anvil fall on their head, let them go move a piano in or something like that with a big rope dangling outside a building and let it fall on them. Because what we're doing is we're just not only putting ourselves in our own prison, but we're what we're drinking poison. We're literally hurting ourselves, isolating ourselves hurting those around us that we say we love so much. Why? Because we choose not to forgive. And we do not understand that. And again, we'll work into this in coming weeks. I know this is hard and difficult things. But it's just what Christians do. Christians have always been marked by this, that our hearts are those hearts that extend forgiveness because we've been forgiven. Think about this in terms of Lord prayer. I know as the people who grew up in more liturgical settings, whether it was Catholic, Lutheran, Methodist, whatever. And you said the Lord's prayer every week you had to on a Sunday, think about it, Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and do what? And forgive us our trespasses or debts, or sins. If you want to use a more modern term, forgive us our sins. What? As we have forgiven those who have sinned, or trespass or dented against us, oh, my gosh, it's just right there in black and white. We said it every week. But oh, how hard is it for us to walk this out? talk a lot about and we'll cover a lot of the questions surrounding the issue of forgiveness and coming weeks. So hang on, let's think about this we want to and how do we walk away from a relationship? How do we set up boundaries? What does that look like? When are they healthy? When are they unhealthy? What about forgiving myself? If that means anything at all? Is there any truth to that, as we see that in many self help books? What if I'm mad at God? Might you ever been there? We're like, I didn't want to talk to you right now God because of what you did. It's the way we sometimes talk. Is that right at all? And how are we to process that? What about abuse and long term damage? What about my consequences? What about their consequences? Certainly, as we think about this series, you're just sitting there thinking, I don't know, Pastor, I just don't know, I still, it's not me. I can't I can't do this. That's exactly right. Because you you sit here and you think no one is going to convince me on this planet otherwise, and I would just say, Praise God, amen. Because someone had to come from outside of our universe, put on flesh, the God man, Jesus Christ Himself, and that we can do this, the foundation for us to move forward and grace and mercy and love to others has already been modeled for us by our Lord and Savior. Who among us would say that we have endured more than he has, who among us would say that? None of us because not only did he endure all of that physical pain, rejection, torment and all that, but you and I understand that he carried our sin upon him and forgave us so that we are able to forgive others. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you how you did forgive me, and you forgave so many people in this room. I know that there are many who are contemplating their relationship with you and their relationship with others. I dare say that everyone who is tracking who's tuned in has an image of someone

that hurt them.

Person is a father, I just pray that You give us much grace that you grant us the wisdom and the grace to be able to for Give to be able to loosen those chains and to be able to walk freely and who you are and who you made us to be massive things in Christ's name amen

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Sermon Transcript:

Wonderful see everyone today I trust you've had a good week and it is nice to cool off a little bit and see exactly what the Lord has for us going into the fall a lot of exciting things. And so that is true for our church as well. And so we're going to do a series, just just one part series really designed a series to be a one off one lesson on serving what that means. How can we learn that, really from the feet of Jesus? And so I'm gonna go straight to a passage that is all about this idea of Jesus teaching us His followers, how to serve. Now, most of us in our flesh are thinking great, I'm into serving serve me, right? I mean, let's let's be honest, that's what we like, we get images of, you know, maybe it was old school and you like, you know, somebody dropping grapes in your mouth or just somebody you know, bringing you a drink, or, you know, whatever it is, we like to be served. But then we do we really believe Jesus, His words, and it was repeated in Acts, verse 20, verse 35, Chapter 20, verse 35, that it is more blessed to give than to receive and and you maybe heard that before, right is more blessed to give than to receive. I don't know how you felt about that. But as a child, I remember adults repeating that phrase to me around Christmas time. And I never really felt it right. I never really believed I was like, I don't know what you're talking about. You're out of it. It is great to get it is great to get certain presents. That's why I'm making this list, and all that kind of thing. And so then it doesn't even help when our parents and adults around us repeat it. We just don't we don't get it. And then that message, it seems strange to our ears, if we're honest. And I know you're in church, and you heard of Jesus, and you know, all these kind of things. You're like, no, no, I get it. I've heard it, I believe it. But no, just think about it. It's strange, our ears because what we really want, right is we want comfort, we want ease, we want power, we want fame, we want to be recognized, or we're upset that others have fame power in our recognize, well, if that's who we are, if we're honest with ourselves, that's how we feel some of the time or a lot of times in our flesh, we're in a good place this morning. And so just going to talk right to where we're at right to our hearts and how we're thinking and feelings oftentimes. So Matthew, chapter 20, beginning in verse 20, says this right here, then the mother of James and John, the sons of Zebedee came to Jesus with her sons, she knelt respectfully to ask a favor. What is your request? He asked, she replied, in your kingdom, please, that my two sons sit in places of honor. Next you want on your right and the other on your left? But Jesus answered by saying to them, you don't know what you're asking, are you able to drink from the bitter cup of suffering? I'm about to drink? Oh, yes, they replied, we are able, Jesus told them you will indeed drink from my bitter cup. But I have no right to say he will sit on my right or my left, my father has prepared those places for the ones he has chosen. So what is all this talking about? Some of them may be evident right off. But But what are we talking about here? We're talking about Jesus followers on the way to Jerusalem, and two of his father followers, they have their mom with them and ask this question, seemingly respectfully, right. And if you look at other passages, you can this is the book of Matthew, look at the book of Mark, which Mark is a lot of times a shortened version of Matthew doesn't even mention the mom, it goes straight to the sun. So so they were all in cahoots with this question together. But what are they asking? They're asking something that would make sense from a worldly perspective, right? Think about this, if you'd worked hard for a man or woman to help start their business, their company, their movement or organization, you're thinking, okay, when this takes off, just like I put money in the stock market for a certain company, when it takes off, I want to make sure I get my share, I want to make sure I get my benefit. And so that's what they're thinking is that Jesus is going to Jerusalem, and he's going to set up some sort of earthly kingdom earthly throne. And much like those images we think of as a child in those Disney movies in those cartoons, we see a big throne room and we see, you know, people on the throne and they wanted to be there to the left and to the right, and their mom, of course with them. Because he said because they're asking you very clearly when you come into that kingdom, because we know you've been talking a lot about kingdom and establishment and forever. And that sounds good to us. Now, again, what's going on here? They're just simply thinking here. Now, what if we're all honest with ourselves? That's our natural bent, isn't it? You got up this morning and you were concerned if you got dressed and put one feet in front of the other, you may brush your teeth and ate and all these kinds of things because you were thinking about what do I need to do for the day even to get to church? And so what They're thinking as they're thinking earthly realm. And what is Jesus always calling his followers to do think heavenly realm, there is a kingdom that is coming, but is not a kingdom of this earth is a kingdom beyond here now it has implications for this earth, but this rain that you so much seek, it is not for the here and now it is for a time in a kingdom to come. And in establishing this kingdom, there is going to be a cup of suffering. Do you see that from those verses is that the whole idea of suffering or sometimes in the Old Testament is used as wrath, wrath from God. Now, again, we know that Jesus, remember he said this in the Garden of Gethsemane, Father, if it'd be your will let this cup pass from me, but not your not My will. But your will be done. So we know that that is the cup of suffering, that is the the cup of God's wrath, God turning his back on Jesus as he carries the sense of the world. But we also understand that we have a cup of suffering that we sometimes have to drink. And that's what he's talking about here. And he's like, Hey, do you understand that if you follow me, and you follow my ways, that it is a life of suffering? Like, look, we're glad we're able, right? Which is so interesting, right? How eager would you and IB to claim that? Well,

they're, they're claiming that why? Because they're still thinking, earthly, right? And he says, No, listen, you will, you will be doing this. And, but not what you think. So you maybe know that historically, you know that 11 of the 12 disciples died a martyr's death for the faith. And John was exiled on the island of Patmos. But this so they will drink the bitter cup. But you don't know what you're asking. Now, let's just be real clear. Following Jesus has always been hard. It's always been hard doing what Jesus asked us to do is always hard and being a follower of Jesus. And being puffed up with pride and self sufficiency, or self seeking is absolutely polar opposites. In fact, I don't know if you've ever tried to live the Christian life and live for yourself. You literally feel schizophrenic, right? It's that whole idea of like, I think I'm thinking I'm going polar opposites. Because you are, you're pulling your very heart, soul, mind and body in two different directions. One of the biggest barriers for you and I to lead in love like Jesus, and then we know that's what God's calling us to, and you're gonna see later, I'm not just bringing up that idea of leading, that'll come up later in the passage, in terms of serving, serving and leading, they go together. But if we're going to lead in love, like Jesus, one of the biggest barriers for you and me is self interest. Now, selfishness, and we just want to use that term. That's always been a problem, right? I mean, you can go back to all the way to the beginning, you have what I want, or I have what I have, and you don't get any. Right. That's why one of the earliest things we teach little two and three year olds is will you share, will you not be so selfish. So that's not a 2023 issue. But there are some things that have exasperated head that have made the issue worse, and mostly it has to do with what we now live in, in the Western American context of 2023 with the eroding of community and dependence on one another. And this is what makes it so scary. Because we feel this, we feel like we are like fish out of water. Because we feel like a lot of times where is the community, and if you are struggling before coping with community, it all of a sudden gets amped up a notch. Remember, COVID didn't cause anything it, it amps things up or amp things up to reveal what was already underneath the surface. Now I understand that cause death is not what I mean. I mean, the the issue and what it did to our culture. So we understand that where we are now living, the time that we just find ourselves in is just an eroding of community and dependence on one another. And again, this is an American context. But it's been here for a little while, and to make real simplistic sort of broad brushstrokes of history, but he think about it, what you've heard and maybe heard from your, from the generation that is quickly dying off the world war two generation, which is now 80 years removed. They very much had an understanding of some of these things. I'm not trying to romanticize them, but they had a understanding of some of these things of community and dependence. Now we think about our most recent wars, that some of you all in the room have been a part of Afghanistan and Iraq conflict that was intentionally not disruptive. You remember that? Remember, when we went to war in 2003? And really, we're in it for the last 20 years. It was intentionally Hey, it's not gonna be like World War Two, where there's sacrificing and giving up some things and contributing to the war effort with war bonds and all these kinds of things. Just go on as business as usual. And so that did something to us. That's when we were allowed to just keep going and enjoy what we've always in joy. That's not again, just just to tell us what we understood what used to happen. And where we find ourselves today, there was built in community and dependents, for those that came back from the war. And that really helped to build a lot of what we enjoy today came back in the 20th century, this is well documented from 1945, through the 60s, that that generation built much of the community structures independence that we enjoy today. So you think about all the community lodges, all the all the service organizations, even all the churches, a lot of that was either enhanced or built off of that generation that came back from the war. Now, when he got to the 60s and the baby boomers began to come of age, what did they do, they kept the dish, they kept the structure, but they defined it however they wanted. In other words, what you began to see in my parents generation, and what, now people who are in their late 50s 60s, and 70s is a lot of them. These are broad brushstrokes, they kept the structures, but they just changed all the definitions and meanings of words. You can see this quite clearly. over 20 years ago now, when Bill Clinton was arguing over what was the meaning of is, and then we get this rock quite clearly when we see the chaoticness of our two prominent politicians on either party, where they both accused the other one of being what corrupt, you'll see this was all Biden and Trump they both accused, the other one being corrupt, and criminalization and what are those words, even meaning and all the way up and down the line? Right? So what about children of the 80s? Me a lot of y'all in the room, we knew that there was identity and truth out there. And we were trying to find it. We were trying to harness it, right? The truth is out there somewhere and we wanted to know it and to be a part of it and to live it. But what did we need? Right? We were looking for some sort of Yoda. Right? Think about the movies that we enjoyed growing up in the 80s. And even into the early 90s. We wanted a Yoda we wanted a dark brown right from Back to the Future to guide us on our way in our adventure. We wanted a Mr. Miyagi, right, we wanted someone to just sort of sink this wisdom into us. And it certainly wasn't our parents, right? If you were very, it was very clear in all things that we were told in the 80s, that our parents are idiots, your friends may have some things figured out. So let's go ride bikes with them, and do whatever you want to do. But make sure you have some sort of, you know, wizardry or somebody to speak something into you. Here we are in last 20 years in the 2000s and following, and the answer is self. So we've gone from we've we've we've gone away from community we've gone away from please don't disrupt me and whatever it is I want to do. I'm not dependent upon anyone, the only person I can truly trust is myself. I'm self defining himself expressing no one can tell me what to do or what to think, even though that's hilarious, because we understand that we all get our thoughts and thinking from somewhere, but everything is fluid, and what is the highest value right now for those born in the 2000s. And afterwards, and what the oceans and the waters we swim in it's self expression, and to deny self is to deny your version of reality, right, it's very clear that we need to understand the times that we are living in, it is the exact opposite of what Jesus said and what we're gonna get into. So self denial, which is what the way of the cross is, which is the way of Christianity is in the opposite direction of what we are being told, through the airwaves and through our digital devices. Because we're told, keep in mind, at some level, and it said in a number of different ways is the highest value is self expression. And to deny self is to deny your version of reality, which is your valid truth. Now all these things are collapsing on themselves in various ways. So I'm not too concerned and again, we're not sometimes people will talk back about well, the courageous and the greatest generation was the war two I don't buy that there's there's people have courage and wisdom and strength in all times and cultures and places and generations. It's just to know that when we speak the truth of who God is, when I'm talking right now, what I'm going to call you to which is really straight from the words of Jesus, it is automatically hard for our ears, and then to digest it into our minds and hearts because of the waters in which we swim. So let's look to Jesus. What's he getting at? First point I have this morning is that we are to put ourselves in a position to love knowing it will lead to suffering first point wants to see this morning is that Put yourself in a position to love knowing it will lead to suffering. Now this makes sense when you look back at different callings. Think about the call of Moses, right that he's called out of the desert to go where to go back to Egypt, outside and with that being you killed somebody and you left and you're gonna go back, almost you left in chains and you're gonna go back in chains and try to tell Pharaoh something not gonna be fun, not gonna be pleasant, and you're gonna go outside of Egypt, and you're gonna lead these people who do not want you to lead them. And you're gonna end up wandering in the desert and because of your own shortcomings, you won't even get to take them into the Promised Land suffering.

You look at this in terms of Mary. And you look at the magnifique con right after the idea is just over and over again, just to let her know what kind of heartbreak she'll experience by carrying the Son of God and the Son of Man, Joseph choose either one, right? Think about Joseph in the Old Testament and, and the suffering that he goes through to accomplish what God has for him. And then the Joseph, in the New Testament, the ridicule, he must have felt and actually experience on carrying someone else's child, Paul, he is told, and I think we never read this right when we were little kids, we've already got the road to Damascus to great light, and Jesus speaking to him. But if you remember that passage, he's very clear, Hey, Paul, come follow me, I will show you how much you will suffer for my name. We all signed up, right? Sign up. And that's what's going on here and the disciples themselves, they need to understand that now, think about this in terms of our own lives. Listen, we're not people who suffer for suffering sake, we put ourselves in positions of love, knowing that in all likelihood, it will lead to suffering. Think about this with our own lives, think about what you and I agree to with the spouse, that you and I will stand before God and others and say, till death do us part, I will love you we will be together. Now, we have all kinds of rosy pictures of what that will be. And there's the romanticism of the 90s now is just all crafts, and very few people think about marriage outside of religious institutions or churches whatsoever. But just in our own heads and hearts. Even in the best case, we think this is amazing, I am going to do great, I'm gonna do better than everyone else. I'm not going to have any sort of struggles or trials or even if you think you're gonna have struggles or trials, you have no earthly idea what you're in for the love and the joy, but also the heartache, and the suffering. Think about this with children, how much effort it takes to get up in the middle of the night and help out with teething and crying and changing diapers. And it doesn't get any better with toddlers. And it doesn't get any better when they go into elementary school and then teenage years. And then when they leave the house. I'm not saying there's not joy and excitement and all these kind of things we'll get there. But we understand that in doing these things, in putting yourself in a position to love someone else in a spousal relationship to put yourself in a position to have children of your own or adoption or however means you get them or have them they may be married or brought into the family that it will lead to heartache. Think about this in terms of friendships. If you have friendships long enough in this world, you will experience what hurt heartache, some die, some walk away, some leave the area, some will betray you. And yet, we are called to do this. We know we are to do this. And we're to lay down our life for others cannot all balance I'm not talking about choosing suffering for suffering sake, there is joy on the other side. We're going to talk about that because it's all in this passage as well. We want to enjoy the fruits of our labor, whether it be financial or just the reward we get now and in the life to come we want to get there. We want to lead. We want Joy want happiness, we want good things. And I think this is all part of God's plan as well. There's no contradiction to that. And so we're gonna see this in the passage as we continue on, but we have to be sober minded, and admit to ourselves that when we choose the path of love when we choose the path of serving and laying down our lives for someone else, that there's real heartache and suffering that comes with it. Let's look at verse 24 says this, though, falling in the same passage, when the other 10 disciples heard what James and John had asked, they were indignant. Why Why were they indignant? Because they wish they had thought of it first right thing and I wish I'd have thought of that I wanted to be left or right, Jesus. Jesus called them together and said, Hey, this is teaching moment. This is teaching moment for us this morning as well. You know that the rulers in this world lorded over their people and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you, I remember I told you it was going to come up servant leadership. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant who ever wants to be first among you must become your slave. Again, we talked a little bit about just that idea of slavery, and why that is pictured and talked about in the Scripture so that we understand what we've been saved from the here's what's going on here, that there's gonna be some differences with the people of God, there always has been. In other words, like, we know that most people's default way of leading or getting things done is to push them through to plow it through to Lord authority over others, it happens in our community, right? If you take gas cards as a city, council person and pretend that you can now use that for whatever you want, for your own purposes, why do you do that? Because you falsely believe that you have the authority and the power to do so. I, I did this so that I can now achieve this position so that I can now do what I want to do? This happens in our workplaces, right? How many of us have had bosses that it's very clear that he or she is about themselves, they're not about the company, they're certainly not here to take care of us. But they are making decisions, they are doing things in ways that it is obvious to everyone who works with them, under them, that they are about themselves. And you feel it, I feel it when you feel the authority that is weighed over you this happens in our homes. How often do we think well, it just be easier for me to just make you do this, you get in line or else right now, again, sometimes we have to do that in extreme circumstances. But that not ought to be the default way in which we leave our homes, or our communities or our workplaces, because that's not the way Jesus has for us. Now, aspiring to leadership is not a bad thing it's talked about in here if you want to be a leader, but there is a cost and there's a way to do it. And here's the second point, I want us to see this morning, The way up is down. You may have heard this before, but the way up is down. If you and I want to aspire to things, whatever it is we want to do in terms of our life, or our workplaces, our community, whatever the way up is down. Now that should seem strange. Now again, I know some talking to some church people. Here's your like, I've heard this before. But no, I mean, really think about this, The way up is down. Jesus modeled it, John, the Baptist believed it and modeled it before him. Do you remember what John the Baptist said, He must increase, I must decrease, then some of y'all are sitting there thinking leadership, that's not me. So if you're thinking I know who a leader is, that's my ball. So that may be the person sitting next to me. And that's not true. In the simplest definition of leadership, leadership is influence that's not original with me. And that's a John Maxwell quote. But it's just that idea that think about it. When you're in a neighborhood at eight years old, and you're going down the street, playing basketball, or riding a bike, you are influencing the other neighborhood kids to do something, right, you and I are always either leading or following. And our leadership in any realm is to the degree that we influence others and all of us influence people. So then we have to ask ourselves, what kind of leader am I going to be? And what kind of leadership should I aspire to? What does this principle mean? This whole idea of the way up is down because I want to go up, I know what up is right, more likes more reels, more money, more prestige, greater stability for my family, whatever we know what up means. We all have our definition of that. Now, it says in this passage is way up is down. The term for this is servant leadership that you and I may have been familiar with. But I want to I want to say that the way I'm going to try to talk about this is to play to our own desires and needs. First off, so I would say in servant leadership, the reason why you and I should choose is not because just Jesus said so although that should be enough. But instead, it really is the only way to get what you and I want. In other words, I've sort of rattle off some things you and I have some aspirations, dreams, goals, that as long as they're good, right? There's nothing morally bad about them that we are free to pursue and should pursue.

But there's a way to go about it to actually get what you and I want and that is servant leadership. So you should consider this the way up down. You should just consider this purely because it works because it is true. You and I want generational wealth, we want promotions at work. We want a happy life. We want a happy wife all these kinds of things. And we're sitting here thinking how can I increase my wealth or influence or spiritual vitality, a servant leader? So this is what's so cool about servant leadership. What it does is it seeks The highest joy seeks joy out of those that we serve. Now, this is interesting, because it seems like well, if I'm about other people, then then there's not going to be enough left for me, right? This is how we naturally think, why would I give away my best stuff? Or why would I give away leadership? Or influenza? Why would I empower others? Or why would I do that to make sure they're taking care of I gotta make sure I'm taking care of. But what the Scriptures say is, if you will take care of them, you will be taken care of both in terms of spiritually, both in terms of financially, both in terms of making sure they're happy, if you have happy employees, then you in turn will be happy, therefore, your profits will rise or whatever it is, then the measurement of your organization, your soldiers will perform better your students will perform better your teachers perform, but whatever it is, and this brings honor to God. So this is crazy, if we will just shift this The way up is down, we will really take heart to being a part of servant leadership, wherever we find ourselves in life in any organization, whether you're eight or 88, we will find that this is the way to go. Because here's the spiritual principle here, a rising tide causes all ships to rise again, that's not original with me. But think about that principle that you and I understand that if you've ever been to a dock, and you've ever seen that tide rise, what happens to all the chips on the dock? What happens? They all they'll rise a little bit. And that's what we're talking about is that when we go out there and seek the good of others, and we seek to bring honor and glory to God, not only will will they be taken care of, but will be taken care of not only in elevating others, will they be honored. But then all cells will be honored. So the first thing I would just appeal to is if this is what you want. And I think you should want it the good life, whatever word however you define that as long as it's morally good and honoring to God. First thing I would say is good about servant leadership. Number two, we really get to take our cues from Jesus when it comes to servant leadership. This is what's so cool is that with your Bible, in your humble heart, your desire to say God you speak and to me what you would have me to do, don't look to your neighbor to your left and right. If you look to what they're doing, and say, well, I won't I want to take that. They got a big screen TV, I need a big screen TV, they got this kind of car, they got this kind of boat they got whatever it is, you're off, you need to ask, what do you have for me? What do you want me to do? You and I we don't need a Mr. Miyagi, a Yoda or dark brown, we have Jesus and that really is enough. So the first point is, you should go after servant leadership because it really will get you what you say you want. And you should go after servant leadership because you just get one boss. And that's King Jesus, and he's the greatest boss in the universe. Three, it really is the only way to finish well, how many of us have experienced from parents or grandparents or bosses, or pastors, those that stayed too long. Those that it seemed like they were for our good, it seemed like they were helping us out. But the longer you around them, the longer you're with the company, the longer you were with that church, it just seemed to be that they held on too long. They stayed in the job too long. And therefore, what ended up happening is they were not able to finish well, and everyone in this room. If you're conscious and you care, you're saying yourself, I want to finish well, I don't want to just get my get and while the getting's good, but I want to finish well, so that others around me can be better off because I was in their presence because I was their dad because I was their supervisor. A servant leader anticipates and graciously accepts the time for his or her dig decrease in that so cool remember John the Baptist did this so we have some models Jesus Himself did this but if you if you want not to look to the God man you want to look to a human you could look to John baboons to get he knew. When was it time to decrease let someone else take the spotlight sometimes we need someone to come alongside us and help us to know when our season is ends and as we don't recognize it, but here's the thing I want us to see is that servitude is in. Servitude is in let's make serving hip again right here at Life Church 15 at Joe battle, let's make serving good again. That is the only way that we're going to move forward at work at home at church. You see that? I see it and I think it's so exciting and cool that God gave us a template for how we can succeed not only in this life, but in the life to come. Alright, who we look to and all this stuff. The last verse, even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many. That's what he wants to see is that He came to serve. It's just so obvious he makes it so clear. He says this in black and white. I came not to be served but to serve others. This goes back to what I was talking about. It kind of ties up the servant leadership principle that we are feat washers, we are chief people to love and serve others and delay our life down for something greater than ourselves. And we see Jesus do this first says He gave His life a ransom for me a ransom is everything. And what does that mean? I've heard of that before. But I've heard about that before in terms of like someone's taken and we got to pay him money in order to get them back. Well, that's that is the idea of a ransom in the ancient world. And we sometimes do this today, someone is captured by an enemy, right. And you have to pay off that ransom in order to get your comrade back. That's what's going on here in a lot of ways, maybe even the term of slavery that someone would a slave would be ransom that would be bought out of that slavery so that they were free. That's the idea here. And you and I have to come to grips with that we have been in chains, we have been in bondage to sin, that Christ has set us free. So what it's not about is whatever fantasy that we have. Remember, in the beginning, I said we all have different fantasies, whether it's, you know, being fed by grates in our mouth, or some sort of music video or Tik Tok real or that movie setting or you think about what's on your social media page, in my social media page, in terms of the perfect vacation, or the perfect view, and all those kind of things. We're realizing that that's not what it's all about. Now we can have those things and attain those things. But if you aim at those things that will kill you and kill your soul, and you probably won't get them anyways. And even if you do get them, it will taste like sand in your mouth. But if you aim for God, His glory, His honor, he will freely and generously give you all things. Again, what will happen though is is that as you are more obedient to who God is, in the scriptures, he will actually change your desires. You know, sometimes we like to turn that verse on its head, delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart and so we just we just quickly kind of run run roughshod over real quick over the dial yourself in Lord, okay, desires of my heart. That's what I want, Lord, I'll do this you get, it's like no, no, spend some time the lighting and the father and allow him to influence what our desires are, yeah, then then the rest will come. Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and all these things will follow after you. We were we were all of us in this room. And in some cases, really bad shape. We had to be ransomed. I mean, let's just let that let that sort of sink in for a minute. You think I'm kidnapped? Or drunk? My pastor? I need to be bought back. Yeah. No, you and I need to be rescued from the yoke of slavery and sin and our feet need to be set upon rock. Now, what's this have to do with Life Church, and

what's this have to do with serving, we're gonna have to roll up our sleeves and create the life we want. I says this is this is where the rubber meets the road and, and we're gonna have to roll up our sleeves and create the life we want. Whether it's our individual lives or family lives or workplace lives, and for sure, our church life, what that means is, is that we're in a unique situation, where we have to create the community, we want to be a part of, I mean, I mean, let me say like this, how many of y'all have been to a school or maybe a workplace where it's, it's put together, it's a well oiled machine. And so you walk into this workplace and you know, that this is considered one of the one of the greatest country companies to work for, maybe in the country, or the world or, or you walk into a school and, and they have the best teachers and the highest test scores and the best facilities. And so you're coming to be a part of that because it all works. Well. I've been a part of this organization, there's nothing good or bad about that. It's just knowing where you're at. That's not where we're at at Life Church. Okay. What that means is, is that what we learned and a lot of nonprofits and a lot of churches learn this is that when we came out of COVID It was a time to rebuild and decide who we're going to be so like right now when you hear the pastor me or others up on this dais talked about community are loving one another are serving one another larger. Yes, God, I want to sign up for that. Like I want to be a part of that. So tell me, tell me Where's, where's the where's the small group? Where's the care group? Where's where's all this great things that I hear about? And I just want to say it's in you. It's in you. It's in me right now. You're part of something where we get to create the kinds of things Unity we want to be a part of. But that's a shift, you see the difference that has to occur in our minds and our hearts. One way is that we understand we're coming into something that is already sort of a well oiled machine that we're able to then just sort of be a part of and be a part of something as it's moving forward. The other is, oh, my gosh, this amazing vision, this amazing dream, if it is going to become true, if we're going to realize it, we're going to have to be a part of that to make it occur. And that's what we're talking about. Here, we talk about Life Church. So we talked about the area of serving, it's gonna have to be all of us. And we'll be real clear, it's gonna have to be all of us say, Well, I've only been here one week or two weeks, it's going to have to be all of us. And I'll say it again in the second service, because it's so important to see that the what we desire, this sort of accountability and fellowship and love, and all the fruits of the Spirit and all that we want to experience in the community of faith, the people of God, the hope of glory is in you. It's in me, and this is our church, it's not my church, and is as hard to think of, because we see the building, we see everything sort of sort of put together and air conditionings back on we think, okay, they've got some things going on here it is. well oiled, yes. In terms of facilities, but no, in terms of people, yes, we have people who come you come, our second service comes, but what I mean is that we've got to get in and be a part of creating that which we want to be a part of create the community you and I want to be a part of, and one of the ways I'm gonna encourage you to do that today is I'm gonna give you a key. So when we, when we exit this service, you're gonna see signup tables out there, and you're gonna see keys. And what I'm asking is that everyone is as a member, okay, well, you can go back to elementary school, you made an elementary school where the teacher be like, they would say a word. And I say, repeat after me so much you do. Okay, so I'm gonna say the word everyone, you say the word everyone, you're so everyone arrogant. So everyone is going to go out and they're going to take a key, and they're going to sign up for something. Now, again, all of us, myself included, we all like to sign up for anything. We do it with fear and trepidation, right? How many times when we check out, like, I just want like a, like, I don't know, sheets from a, from a company. And I have to unclick like, please don't put me on the mailing list, right? Because that I've signed up I just wanted to sheets, right? And so many of us, we came like I just want to hear message and you know, whatever. But if your worship, but but here's the deal. When you sign up and it's going to take us all, we're going to make sure that you're shepherded well, to the best of our ability. There's only four, four sections out there, you're gonna see kid life, you're not going to be stuck in a room by yourself with crying babies forever and ever. We need everybody to serve at least once a month in kid life if you're part of the kid life ministry, why? Because guess what, guys, we're going to one service. You can't just be missing service all the time. We don't want our killer volunteers missing service all the time. So that means that if you sign up for good live, guess how often you're going to work only once a month. Think about greeter ministry is that man that's holding a door being hospitable. Think about student life and talking about our Student Life camp. And some of y'all have sixth through 12th graders, others we all love that unique time period in people's lives, you can sign up for that, or worship in production. You've seen some times how, you know, we show kind of with sound and these kind of things so so you can be a part of helping that be smoother. And maybe you have a gift and a talent that you have hidden from us. Shame on you if you can play a musical instrument or saying he had told us right. But no, you know what I mean that we can this is an opportunity for us as a church to say, Alright, here's the keys. Jesus talked about keys before you remember when he was talking to Peter. And he said that I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven and the gates of hell will not be able to overcome it. What he meant by that is to say, Peter, it's going to be in you, not just him, right? Because we're not we're not Catholic thinking that the only the only priests and all of us are in an order like Peter, but we understood and we understood that confession that he made, that you are Christ and Son of the living God. That that hope that Pierre carried out we have in us and keys are really good because what if keys for their for doors are for getting in there for ownership. You have keys right now to your house, you have keys right now to your car, I am giving you the keys to the church because it's yours. This is your church. This is your church. And you're a part of something greater than yourself that I believe is worth being a part of for whatever season you're here. And when you've got to bail out because you got to leave town or something happened. We understand that right? Part of it is knowing when to stay and when to leave and when to when to buckle down and do things and when to pull back. Now is the time to move forward in what God has for us here. Life Church in the area of serving so won't you when you leave, sign up for one of those four areas to serve, take a key and remind yourself is my house. Yes, the Lord's house will be called a house of prayer. I understand that. But in terms of that you have ownership in this place for as long as you're here. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for everyone under the sound of my voice, I pray for those right now. Who are still curious, maybe even hurting, confuse. Help us to see that the way of Jesus is better than anything we could come up with on our own. But I help those in this room to know exactly the power that you have placed in them to be able to tap into that to be a blessing not only to the immediate family, their immediate surroundings, but to our church and then to ultimately our world. Help us So Father, we pray in Christ's name, Amen.

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Join us for a special episode of the podcast where Brent and Chris discuss some topics that were brought up in this past Sunday's sermon.

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Sermon Transcript

Yeah, thank you so much. Appreciate that. Thank you Joi. Well, Happy, Happy Mother's Day to those of y'all mothers that are out there. And also, you know, we just want to recognize that, you know, there's all kinds of feelings that maybe pop up on this day because of the desire to be a mom, or maybe your first Mother's Day without your mother. And so we're very sensitive to that as well. But Happy Mother's Day. Well, we, we thought about taking a break from our series on James, you know, that's perfectly acceptable. We do that sometimes, Easter and other holidays. But the more I studied this passage, the more I thought about this day, and we're going to look at James four verses one through 10, I thought about how great and a loving family we would have if we took seriously a passage like this. And so we are we're going to, we're going to be continuing in our series in James chapter four verses one through 10. And we're going to connect to themes that we've been seeing throughout the book, maybe you're aware that when you read your Bible, and it's broken up into chapter in verses, that those were not original, in the original autographs, those chapters, and those verses were put in later so that we can just find certain passages in the Bible. So that's why we study a book sometime holistically together, sometimes that's why it's good we we read the whole book, or chapter in one setting, definitely would have been that way when they read it to the early church. And so that way, we can see how things relate throughout the whole entire book. So the issue of wisdom, asking God for something's going to come back up. Maybe you remember James, chapter one, verse five, if any of us lacks wisdom, what are we supposed to do? Pray and ask God, and He will freely and generously give us all things. So give us that the issues of faith, we're always asking ourselves, right, in a situation like church, what is faith? How am I to walk in faith? James is nothing but a practical book on the issue of faith. We ended last week with really talking about that, that harvest of righteousness that we all want. We all desire that we all want to be a place where we feel like in our lives and in our family's lives, that we're rooted and grounded in God's word that we provide shade, so that people can come and rest under our branches and our wisdom that comes from God above as we live our lives faithfully to him. So that's gonna come up again today. And then the issues of the tongue. If you were here a couple of weeks ago, we literally set a little mini house on fire to show just the destruction that we know that fire in anger, the tons of fire and that anger can have in our household, it can get us into a lot of trouble. But it doesn't have to be a god has a better plan for ourselves and for our household if we will humble ourselves as we're going to see in the passage today. So James here before beginning in verse one, what is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don't they come from the evil desires at war within you, you want what you don't have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You're jealous of what others have, but you can't get it. So you fight in wage war to take it away from them. You don't have what you want, because you don't ask God for it. And even when you ask you don't get it because your motives are all wrong. You want only what will give you. Pleasure. So a lot there. That's what I told you. I think this is maybe an Abigal Mother's Day message. Because how many of us know that we're gonna have a meal at some point today, and that there's gonna be some some fights and quarrels, right? There's just, there's just gonna be right, and we're gonna sit down at a table with family and friends. And we're going to put more than two or three people in a room, we know that there's probably going to be some conflict because why what's going to happen? Somebody's gonna gonna get real upset that you're eating the last of them all day, right? They had it they had a plan, right? Your aunt had a plan for that moulage she was gonna pour the last little bit on her enchilada wouldn't be so dry the next day. Some of y'all when you sit down to eat, and you begin to think about the food, you begin to think about leftovers the next day, right? So you begin to think, okay, that ribs and brisket, they sure are good, but I hope he or she doesn't take too much because I gotta plan for that tomorrow. My grandma, she was this way. And she would literally take the leftover ribs and she would lick them and put them back on the plate to say those are my ribs. Ain't nobody taking that for tomorrow. Okay. And so I know that there are going to be fights and quarrels among us as we even eat a meal like today on Mother's Day. One of the things we need to recognize that is our desires lead to fights because they're so self centered. Whatever it is that you and I are going to quarrel and fight about today. And in the days ahead in our life, it's going to be because we're being so self centered. Think about fights that happen around the issues of money around spouses or those who are connected because they're roommates or maybe a mother daughter, Father, Son, whatever. One maybe you want something nice, right? So you maybe had this argument before we have some money He, in one style says, Okay, I want I want a nice new car, I want a nice new appliance with that money. The other one the other spouse is like, no, no, like, I want this experience like I want to go on this great vacation, it's gonna cost 1000s of dollars but but we're gonna fly everybody to this destination. And we're gonna have this nice, you know, Airbnb or hotel or place on the beach or whatever it is, we're going to do so you have what you have two competing desires in a household for how we're to spend the money. And what do we begin to do we begin to fight selfishly by using our truth as evidence why we should go with our side and not the other side. So what will you do if if you're, if you're for the day, if you're for the car side, right? What are you going to say about the vacation that your spouse wants to take? You remember that last vacation, remember what your your mom did? Remember how she acted? You want that again? Remember the kids how they how they fought and bickered, remember the rain that we had to get, remember how much money we had to spend at Disneyland and the food wasn't even that good, right? That's what you're going to do. If you want to what if you want somebody to come to your side? And then what will you do? If you're on the other side? It's like, oh, well, you know, it's like, we got this car. And yeah, I know, it dies when you turn left. But you know, whatever, we don't need a new car, right? Or I know that like it just it just collapses. I know, it makes all those knocking noises. And so what happens is that we all will take our side, and we always look with rosy colored glasses on our side, you know what I'm talking about? It's always doomsday for their side, and rosy colored glasses for our side. And so what we do is we just distort the facts a little bit. And if I don't think, don't we, but eventually we get caught, we get caught. And then what happens we get caught? Does the other person whether it's a spouse, or a friend or roommate or a co worker be like, Oh, my bad. I didn't see it that way. No, what ends up happening is what you get caught. And so what ends up happening is they bring up how you're distorting the facts. And what happens is that cycle of fighting, and quarreling continues to go on and on. And this that we think about and we live in oftentimes, we're responsible for this infighting? Did you notice this? What causes the quarrels and fights among you? Don't they come from the evil desires at war within you and me? So a lot of times, we want to say, Well, no, he made me do it. She made me do it. Oh, if you only had to work with him or with her, or the devil made me do it. Maybe you've heard that before. But what this passage tells us and the devil is going to come up later, we're going to talk about how the devil sort of what fans the flames of our sinful desires. But rest assured church for you. And for me, that which is most likely to bring us down is that which is within our heart, we are the ones to blame. Because here's the truth of the matter is, a lot of us have what the Bible calls idols in our heart. And how do you know that

we have an idol and idol is something that you'll send to get it, or sin if you don't get it? I'll say again, an idol is something that you'll send to get it or sin if you don't get it. So that's how you know that you want something too bad. Because when you don't get your way, what will you do, you'll lash out, you'll you'll you'll use that mouth, you'll pop off in anger, you'll you'll take something that's not yours, you'll you'll put things in a different light. Why? Because you'll send to get it or you'll sin if you don't get it. Right, same way. So we all have this sort of version that goes on this narrative in our heart that it's my party, and I'll cry if I want to. I know that's an old old song, but you've probably heard it somewhere along the way. But that whole idea of like, it's my party, this is my house, this is my job. This is my money that I've earned. And so it's mine, and I'll cry if I want to when things don't go my way, I will lash out, I'll push back, I'll let you hear about it. And we follow it up with the other side of that song, you'd cry too, if it happened to you. And I'm gonna live that same song over and over again. But you guys understand that concept, right? That we then seek to justify ourselves by bringing others alongside with us? Well, if you had to be married to him, If you had to work for that boss, if you had to have that kind of child, you would have be saying this and you'd be lashing out too. So that's where these these these fights and quarrels come from. They come from the the indwelling sin that still remains in our hearts even as believers we want when we don't have so what does the Scripture say we scheme and kill to get it and so you're like back up back up pasture and nobody killed anybody. Like I know that. Like, I sometimes hate her hate him or against him or mom or dad, but I'm not killing anyone. Why do the scriptures go there? Well, keep in mind several times in the book of James, we've gone back to Jesus himself and what he said on the practical sermon on the mount to really eliminate some of these key understandings for us, because we just think we're fighting with our brother or sister or spouse or co worker. But here's what it says in Matthew five, verses 20 through 22. Jesus says on the Sermon on the Mount, but I warn you, unless your righteousness is better than the righteousness of the Pharisees of the religious law, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Now, what's that saying there? Those people would have thought, Man, these Pharisees, these religious teachers, they're the ones who do the best good they know the most. They're the ones if I have to surpass that there is no hope for me. And Jesus is really trying to show them Yes, that's right. Because you need Christ. He goes on. He says, You have heard our ancestors were told, You must not murder. What's That's right. That would have been one of the 10 commandments. If you commit murder, you're subject to judgment. They're all not on Yeah, that's right. We know this. We've heard this before. But Jesus says this, but I say, if you're even angry with someone, you're subject to judgment. If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell. So what we begin to understand is we begin to understand those desires that are welling up in you and me and how we react and lash out and how we think and how we move. It's not harmless, it's not for nothing. It's what ultimately will devour us and take us down. Because why did where did the scriptures go after this? You and I are jealous what others have, we can't get it. So we fight in wage war, to take it away from them. We say War War, I'm not doing this jealousy. I'm not sure I'm really jealous of him or her. Have you seen him lately? That's the way we think. We're just trying to get along to get along. I'm just trying to survive. No, you and I have a goal. rest assure none of us are just neutral moral beings floating around in this universe. You and I have a goal. We're not innocent bystanders. In this conflict that's rising up within us, it goes all the way back to the garden, right? This isn't meant to be discouraging things mainly meant to encourage us. So we think about how we interact with our families this afternoon, this evening and the rest of our lives. But one of the things that we understand is from the garden, we understand because our ancestors made that choice, that we're not born into sin, we born with a sinful nature, and then we'll become old enough to understand right and wrong, we've chosen wrong at times. And so we're doubly condemned. That's why we need Christ. But even after we come to Christ, we're like, wait a second, though, I still had these issues. I still have these wars, in my heart, in my soul, in my spirit, and in my family, in my workplace, in my people. And so what I would just say is why does that happen? It happens, because someone is getting in the way of our pleasures, they got what it says here. That's what it says that last little thing. It says that we want our enjoyment. You and I, we often are thinking the wrong way. We're thinking about ourself, it's gonna be real clear, you're later on, but we're thinking about ourselves. Enjoyment is another name for pleasures. So what do we what do we seek and our goals? Our goal, when we get off work, maybe, okay, I just want to get home. I just want to prop my feet up. I don't want any sort of conflict. Anybody bringing me any sort of problems? And what happens to us what happens when you walk in? Problems? problems, problems, and you got to work? Same way, right? It

just hits you just hit you. As soon as you get there. You're like, no, no, I

wanted something else. And so when that something else doesn't happen, you want it to be successful. You wanted to write this out, you wanted to, you know, have this already cleaned or picked up, you wanted this sort of food, you know, for dinner or whatever you wanted this sort of leisure, you wanted this type of vacation, you wanted this kind of evening to watch this sort of show on Netflix or whatever. But you step in the way of my desires, right? What happens what happens when you cross me when you get in the way of what I want and what I wanted to do. Our tendency is to fight until we get our way. That's why James is saying that we're so powerless in our spiritual life. Because we we even when we do ask, we ask with the wrong motives. We don't we don't come at it the right way. We're not about God in His glory. We're about self and self scoring. So first thing I want us to do first point, consider the possibility you got a problem. Let's just do that. Even on Mother's Day, I get it. Consider the possibility you got a problem. So you're like, Yeah, I got a problem. It's him or her they're sitting right next to me, right? No, no, I'm gonna consider just consider right because I'm not I'm not gonna be being accusatory I don't want to hit you between the eyes or anything like that. But just consider the man there's a problem here and it might be me. Consider the possibility that you have a problem or got a problem. Because right in verse four, the scriptures are gonna hit us right between the eyes. Okay, so what does he do in verse four? How does he shift gears here in the book of James, he goes right in he says, You adulterers, adulterers is a strong that's like cheaters. I understand what that means. This is this is a big deal. And what does he say? Don't you realize that friendship with the world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again. If you want to be a friend of the world, you make yourself an enemy of God. Do you think that the scriptures have no meaning they say that God is passionate that the spirit he has placed within us should be faithful to him. And he gives grace generously as the Scriptures say, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Why does he go after this word, this idea of adulterers well think all the way back to the Old Testament, that God He created us, okay, he created us. And one of the things that happens when you're the creator is you have creator rights, and you understand this, we understand this from, you know, patterns. And we understand this from, you know, building certain things and intellectual properties, all these things, we understand that when you're the creator, you have creator rights. And that's so true with the God of the Bible is just that whole idea that that he's created, we talk a lot to our human rights. And, you know, I've got my my way, and I should have the right to do this, and that, and maybe there's some room for some of that. But first and foremost, we need to think about God having creator rights and one of the things that he has the right to is he's or has the right to create us as creatures. And then jealously longed for the Spirit that He put inside of us were made in His image. So he desires for us to worship worship Him. And so what happens is, is that when we have a choice, every day of our lives every moment to either put God at the center of our world, or to put self at the center of the world, that's what it says, when when the idea of a worldly system is that when we, when we walk with God long enough, we realize we can't want and have the same things everyone else wants and has, because the Kingdom of God is in opposition to the kingdom of this world. That doesn't mean that we don't seek to have good world systems that we don't seek to have jobs, you know, in governmental positions, and all kinds of small businesses throughout the world in the country, I get all that. But it's that whole idea that how we operate is fundamentally different as believers than the way the world operates. This is one principle that you see, in terms of Jesus talking about leadership. He says, The Gentiles love to Lord their authority over someone not so with you, that you're supposed to be gentle among others, you still have to lead, but not in the same way. The world system is the concern. And because God made us you see in the Old Testament, he goes to great lengths to say that he he wants us to know that when we are for lack of a better word in bed with the world, we're adulterers, we understand this in everyday life. Nobody in this room thinks it's okay to have two three spouses in your house. Why? Because you're divided. It's not right. It's divided loyalty can't work. In the same way we can't divide our heart between God in this world. And so you see this over and over again. What is the remedy for all this, though, because we'll find ourselves there often. And what happens is, is that the more we stay there, we ultimately become men and women have pride and pride is so ugly, however, it rears its head in our lives, isn't it? That pride is always spiritual suicide. Go back to those fights and quarrels that are among us. How many of y'all would raise your hand and saying that when I reacted pridefully, it went well, for me, that was good. We had a fight in a quarrel, and I bowed up on them, I beat up on him or her. And it went well, for me. It doesn't, it doesn't go well for you in that moment. It doesn't go well for you afterwards. Pride is always spiritual suicide. Just think about that. It's always that way, and we find it and we'll struggle with it for the rest of our lives. I get that. Humility is always the answer. No, humility is not weakness. It's not letting someone walk all over you. So oftentimes, we think no, if I humble myself, or him and her, him or her, they're just gonna walk all over me. Well, no, I'm not. I'm not saying put yourself under abuse situation, I get all that. But it's that whole idea that we understand that I am not my own. I belong to the Lord. And if the Lord has asked me to do this, I can do this because I belong to another kingdom. That's why when you look at the Sermon on the Mount, there's things like, If someone asked you, If someone slaps you on the cheek, turn on the other, someone asked you to walk on my walk, too, because why? Because you and I serve another kingdom. That's the only way we can do that. Because something has got to happen in our hearts in our lives, to enable us to do that. Because you and I are thinking right now. Oh, when he or she asked me to do that, when they tried to do that. I always want to vote and I would say no, no, no, no, not today, since they're not today for in. And what we're seeing is that God can give you the grace to individually deal with that individual or other individuals and the way he would want us to respond and say the way we would want to respond. Did you see that in that passage? What does it say there in verse six? It's a very small phrase, and he gives grace generously. Oh my gosh, church, how many of us need that grace just just poured over us over and over again to be able to deal with him or her, our child our way? We're child or disobedient toddler whatever, or this person at work this, this person in my literal household in verse six says that he generously gives us the same word that he gives in terms of wisdom through prayer. So here's the way to think about it. I know we don't have a lot of water around here, but you've seen video or pictures of sailboats. And you understand that the only way the sailboat goes, especially if you don't have a little small engine, and cheatin is that with the wind. And so when the wind is against the sale, that sailboat isn't going anywhere, it's just going backwards, or it's just spinning around in circles. In the same way, if that sail catches the wind, what happens? It just flies, it just glides across the water. In the same way you and I need to understand that headwinds are against us when we are prideful. You ever felt that way? You ever tried to get somewhere at work? Or in your home or with your kid or with your parent or with your spouse, and you are being prideful? How'd that go for you? How'd it go? For me? It's it's obviously that I'm either going backwards, I'm staying in same place or I'm spinning around.

But what happens when we just show grace? Remember, grace is getting something you don't deserve? How are you able to show that because you didn't deserve it either. I didn't deserve it either. And so God He freely and generously gives us grace that acts as winds in our sails. And that's what you and I need. We need the wind to blow in our sails so that we can stop fighting and quarreling, because we live for another kingdom, we live for another world, at least to my second point this morning, which is God has enough grace for that. God has enough grace for that. I don't know what all you're going through. Maybe you're thinking of one situation, maybe thinking of several of them. Maybe you're feeling like you're getting it on multiple fronts. A lot of life is that way at times I get that. But God has enough grace for that you and I believe that church? Do we really believe that? If the cross of Jesus Christ, the blood of Jesus Christ had enough grace to cover your sin and my sin, he also has enough grace to sanctify us to make us more like His Son. In the days ahead. That's what verse six says, And he gives grace generously as the scripture say, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. So here's our application verses seven and following. We're ready for it. Here it is. So Humble yourselves before God. That's what we're called to do. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Remember how I said that? That the devil is real? What does he do? He takes us situations we find ourselves and he takes us fights and kills we find ourselves in and he's whispering things in our ear. Go ahead and say that, go ahead. They deserve that. Go ahead and do that. So he's fanning the flames of our inward desires leftover from our old sinful nature for believers. But what happens if we resist the devil, he flees from us? Then what happens where to draw near to God come close to God, he'll come close to you. Then he turns the page and he says some things that could be hard for us to hear this morning, wash your hands, you centers, purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world. We see this over and over again, it can't work that way. Let there be tears for what you and I have done that to be sorrow and debrief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter and gloom instead of joy. Humble yourselves for the Lord. And He will lift you up, in honor. Last point I wants to see this morning is this right here. Repentance is no fun, okay? anybody tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something that that ultimately is unknown is not going to work, which is that we have to understand that we come to the end of our robes when we come to finding ourselves in a mire in a pit in a messed up situation. It's so fun to be in it. It's no fun to finally admit less than I need help. That's why it says in these verses here. What does it say? Understand there'll be tears for what we've done, there'll be sorrow, there'll be deep grief, there'll be sadness instead of laughter. So we can't just laugh everything off, we can just sweep it all under the rug, that repentance is no fun. But you're not gain the sweetness afterwards. He's not such good news. We have to get to the other side of it. And that's why, you know, again, we just find ourselves over and over again. Are you sure God? Like is there another way? Like, like, you seem to say in this passage, God, that humility is the answer. And I gotta lay down my pride. How many of us who raise their hand and say, God, are you sure? Are you sure I think this might work for someone else. But this is not gonna work for me. This isn't working for me. And God is calling us over and over again. Say listen, first and foremost, if you've got anything that you know that you've done, as far as it's up to you, you might need to repent before God and others that's not gonna be fun. So not enjoyable to say you're sorry and then have to go to someone and ask for forgiveness. So he's either granted either by the way, but you and I gain the sweetness afterwards. We get into fellowship with God and Heaven, first of all, and then we get in the fellowship with others as well. Well, that's what I had to tell you this Mother's Day. I think there's there's great opportunity This day and in the days ahead to what this is nothing more than that. The second commandment loving your neighbor as yourself. We're all good at loving ourselves, right? We're all good at that. But what does it look like for us to live radical lives in obedience as Jesus said the world's like, man, what is going on with you, sister? What is going on with you brother may be true of us at Life Church. Let's pray. Father, we thank you so much for Your Word. We thank you for how you love us. How you care for us, how you comfort us. Father, I pray that you would come for the hearts of people right now who feel like I Ain't Got it. Father, I don't even believe in the grace. I don't believe it's enough. Father, help us to realize that you are more than enough. Help us to be men and women who freely and willingly admit I need you. I need you every hour every hour. I need you. Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank you for this church. We thank you for the ability to worship here in a minute. Your great name. In Christ's name, Amen.

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