Groups that Multiply
Transcript
We're wrapping up our anchor series, and so what we've been doing for the past six weeks is just kind of walking through and looking at who we are as a church family, what we feel called to do and to be in this area. And so really what we've been doing is taking – we're a gospel-centered community on mission. That's what we say about ourselves. That's what we strive to be. And so we've just been taking that and saying, okay, if we're a gospel-centered community on mission, what does that mean? What do we mean when we say that?
What does that look like? How do we do that? Where did we get that from? Did we just make that up? We didn't. We got it mostly out of the Bible, liked the phrasing of some other churches and how they talk about things.
And so we stole some things from other Christians who are smart. But we really just wanted to help define who we are. And so that's what we say. We're a gospel-centered community on mission. And so in the anchor series, we've just been looking and saying, okay, what are we talking about? What's that look like?
So today is our last day in the anchor series. And the next week, we're going to start walking verse by verse through the book of Jonah. So I'm really excited that we get to do that because we like books of the Bible and we like going through books of the Bible. But today is our last day in the anchor series. And so what we're going to do is we're going to try to sum it all up, try to wrap it all together, put a nice bow on it. And so we've got our work cut out for us.
So what I'm going to do before we hop in, before we get to talking about what we're going to look at today, is I just want to take a minute to recap where we've been, what we've been talking about for the past six weeks, what we've been trying to articulate. And so what we did was the first three weeks, we just talked about the gospel. We talked about what does it mean for us to be gospel centered. So if we're gospel centered, if that's primary for us, everything else comes out of that. What is the gospel? And so we walked through the first six chapters of Romans because we're ambitious.
And so we took one Sunday and walked through the first six chapters of Romans and just kind of skipped around, but tried to get a really clear picture of what the gospel is. And basically what we saw is that God created everything and designed everything to exist in relationship with him as creator and creation. Just like a husband and wife would exist in relationship with one another. So if you were married and you acted like you did not have a spouse, that would make you a bad spouse just because of the relationship. So if I was hanging out with you and I was like, man, don't you need to like head home, check on your wife, like whatever.
And you're like, nah, man, I don't even act like that holds me down. I'd be like, you're a terrible husband. Like you aren't doing this right. And so the biggest problem that we have as creation is that we haven't existed with God in that relationship. We have removed God from the position that he ought to hold as our creator. And we've worshipped other things.
We've pursued other things. We've loved other things. And this is sin. And this is what leads us into all sin. It's when we begin to value something more than God. We begin to look at anything and say, you're going to complete me.
You're going to make me whole. You're going to fix me. If I can just have this, then I'll be okay. When we were designed to be fulfilled and complete by God, when we remove him from the equation and put anything else there, that becomes a fundamental issue. And it's treason of the highest type. And so it puts us in a bad spot.
So as we went to Romans, we saw that we've sinned, we've fallen short, and there's no way we can fix this. We can't moral our way back into it. We can't behave our way back into fixing this problem. That even in a lot of our morality and behavior-based stuff, we're just using that to put God in our debt. And so he's still not in the place of creator. And so what we saw was that Jesus came and lived perfectly on our behalf, did exactly what we ought to have done, loved the way we ought to have loved, worshipped the way we ought to have worshipped, related with other people the way we ought to relate with other people.
And then he was perfect. And in his perfection, he was killed. He was nailed to a cross. And he died in our place for our sin as our substitute. So that he took our execution that we deserved.
And when he did that, he took our death that we deserved, and he gave us his life that we did not earn. And so that through Jesus, we can be saved. We can be made right with God. So we're saved by Jesus's work, not ours. That's the gospel. And that's really good news.
We don't gather together as a church to celebrate that we can all behave well. That would be a terrible group of people to have to try to be a part of. I would be the worst at it. So we gather together to celebrate the fact that Jesus behaved, Jesus loved, Jesus worshipped in our place, Jesus did everything, and he took our punishment to set us free. So that's what we're centered on.
That's our story. That's the way we view the world. And so what we did was we took the next two weeks and just talked about, if that's true for us, then that affects how we talk to people. It affects how we respond to each other in our sin. So if I'm walking with somebody, and they're walking with me through life, and I'm struggling with being a jerk, they don't just say, hey, here's your problem.
You're a jerk. Which that wouldn't be a good, like they didn't need it. I would be like, cite your sources. Tell me how I'm a jerk. And then 30 minutes later, I'd be like, I get the picture. That's enough.
Like, I didn't realize you had, like, footnotes and stuff and, like, dates. Like, you ever get in an argument with your wife, and they're like, well. Because they've got, like, way more memory than you do. And they're like, well, four months ago, you said this at 7.15 p.m. on a Thursday. And I'm like, maybe. Sounds like something I might would have said.
I don't remember. But they wouldn't just say, she wouldn't just say, my wife wouldn't just say, or the friend just wouldn't just say, or we wouldn't just say as Christians, hey, here's your behavioral problem. Fix your behavior. Here's the behavioral change that needs to take place. Because that actually Acts as if we don't know that the gospel is true. Which is, not that our behavior fixed the problem, but that Jesus did.
And that our major problem isn't a behavioral one, but a worship one. And so actually, the way we respond to each other is with the gospel. Which is, you have a behavioral issue, but what it means is, and what it betrays is, that's just a symptom, but you have cancer. And what we're seeing is that you're actually not worshiping and loving God the way you ought to. You don't actually believe the gospel the way you ought to. And here's what Jesus did on your behalf, and that in that, our hearts can actually change, and then our behavior can change.
But the behavior is the smaller problem. And so that we actually respond to each other and point each other to Jesus, and that's how we change, and that's how we grow, and that's how we get life. And that's the story anyway. Not that we behave, but that he did. Not that we're good, but he was. And so we don't just try to behavior modification one another.
And then we understand in that, that our main problem is idolatry. That's our major sin issue, is that we're worshiping something other than God as God. And so we address that, that there's always sin beneath our sin. So that if I'm not generous, the major problem isn't that I'm not generous. The major problem is that I believe something about money that is fundamentally not true. Which means I believe something about God that's fundamentally not true.
And so we address that. So we spent three weeks talking about that, talking about the gospel, what it means for us to be gospel-centered. And then we talked about community. All right, so we exist in the context of relationships. We exist as a family because God, when Jesus died for us, he actually reconciled us to God, and we've been adopted. So the Bible is repeatedly going to say that we've been adopted into God's family so that we are in relationships with one another as an eternal family.
So that if your spouse at one point, if you're both believers, someday you will no longer be spouse and husband and wife, but you will be brother and sister forever because of Jesus. And so that we treat our church family as family. So that when a phone call comes in at midnight, we answer. When somebody's moving, we help. If you could ask your dad to come help you with something, if you could ask your cousin to come help you with something, or your brother or your sister, then you can ask church family to help with the same thing. That's how we relate to one another.
And then we said that in that, in that relating to one another, it's very difficult and painful, and that's part of how we get to grow in relationships and how we get to grow in the gospel. So that I actually get to understand how costly Jesus' forgiveness was when I have to forgive someone. I actually get to understand how great his sacrifice was when I have to sacrifice my time, my energy for someone else. And so that we actually grow and are designed to serve in those relationships. And then last week, Raz talked about that we, because of that, so because of the gospel is true and because we exist in relationships with each other, then we just normally in everyday life move on mission, that we invite other people into that, that we tell the good news, and that in normal everyday life, we make disciples by building relationships with people.
That's people in our church family and people who don't know Jesus yet. And so Raz specifically talked about what does it look like to make disciples, what are we doing in life as we do that, and that we're called to make disciples of all nations, which is just all ethnic groups, that everybody is invited in. And that's normal for Christians. That in normal life, we build relationships, we see who we're around, we pray for people, and we seek to share good news. And so what we're going to do today is we're going to kind of tie all that together. We're going to look at how that plays out in the context of us as our church family specifically and as Christians in general and why it's important, why it actually matters that we're a gospel-centered community on mission, why it actually matters that we pay attention to this, that we think about this, that we would take the time at the beginning of the year to remind ourselves of this.
And so what I'd like for us to do is, I know everybody's had to get here this morning. You've had to go through maybe a decent amount to get ready, to time everything right, to drive in the rain, to decide whether or not it was going to be freezing rain and whether or not you should even risk it. So you are all risk-takers. You love to live dangerously. That's what I know about the people that are here this morning. And you also understand that it wasn't going to be freezing rain because it's out in Carolina.
So what I'd like for us to do is to take just a second. If you've been here for that entire time, all the stuff we just recapped, or if you've been here for a couple of those or maybe this is your first Sunday, what I'd like for us to do is just take a second. And for Christians in the room, I want us to just, we're going to be quiet for about 60 seconds. I want us to just invite the Holy Spirit to remind us of all of that, to help us feel it and know that it's true. And then to help us as we look today to really show us what this looks like for us personally and in the context of our groups. If you're not a Christian and you're hanging out with us this morning, you really have two options for what we're about to do.
Option one is sit quietly for 60 seconds. Maybe daydream, pick where you want to eat lunch, something like that. Option two would be to actually pray, to just inside your head, ask God to speak to you, to reveal himself today. If you're here hanging out and checking us all out and you weren't dragged here, maybe you're checking out the whole Jesus thing. So you can pray and say, God, if you are real, help me see that today.
We would invite you to do that. At worst, that's a waste of time. At best, you talk to the creator of the universe and he might respond. And so we would invite you to do that. So Christians, we're going to pray that the Holy Spirit would remind us of this, of what we've talked about, help us to see it, to have it actually be real to us.
So let's do that now. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We're going to spend a little bit of time in Acts chapter 1 and Acts chapter 2. I got to speak at my home church, the church I grew up in this past Sunday, last Sunday night.
And we looked at Acts chapter 1 and Acts chapter 2. And I told them, I was like, our church family looks at this passage all the time. Like if you grab a pew Bible or a row Bible, I guess we don't really have pews, but if you grab a row Bible at our church family and you go to Acts chapter 2, the words are all smudged because we've read them too much. And so, but this is one of the foundational things that helped us get started as a church family that we look at a good bit, that we remind ourselves of. And so we're going to be in Acts chapter 1 to start and then we're going to jump over to Acts chapter 2 and just get to see a really beautiful picture of what the church gets to look like as the gospel takes hold in the lives of believers.
All right, so Acts chapter 1 starting in verse 6. So when they had come together, they asked him. Okay, so they being Jesus and his disciples, and they asked him, so they being the disciples, asked Jesus. Now, that seems like a very normal sentence and it's one of the weirdest ones you probably have ever read in your entire life. Because the they that got together includes a bunch of random kind of hodgepodge group of guys that were brought together by Jesus in and around Galilee and Jerusalem in the first century. It includes them, but more than that, it includes a guy who had been dead 40 days earlier.
Not like on the table, heart stopped, clear, and he came back and he's like, I was dead. No, three days in a tomb, dead. Had been wrapped up. They were going to put some smell good stuff on him when it turns out he wasn't dead anymore and had come back to life. So that's a really weird sentence.
It says they got together and they asked him. They're there with a guy who had been dead, who had said all along that he was God and that he was going to be killed and then rose from the grave. So you don't get to say that sentence. You're not like, yeah, my uncle passed away, but in two weeks we're going to be going to vacation together. Or, yeah, I was just hanging out with my grandmother who died last year. Do what now?
Like, you should probably get some help. That's weird. I hope that she wasn't actually there because if she was actually there, that's even worse. Like, you should have buried her. Like, this is bad. So Jesus was dead and is alive, bodily, physically resurrected, alive.
And so they're with Jesus. He said he was God and then when he came back from the dead, they were like, oh, oh, for real though? Okay. No, no, yeah, we get it now. That makes more sense. All the stuff you had said about dying and coming back.
We thought it was like metaphorical and then when you died, we were all bummed and then now you're not dead and that makes way more sense. Okay. Verse 6. So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said to them, it is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. Basically, you're asking the wrong question.
That's not what we're going to talk about. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and to the end of the earth. And when he had said these things, as they were looking on, he was lifted up and a cloud took him out of their sight. Okay. So that got weirder.
He had died. Said he was God. Said he was going to die. Said that he was going to atone for sins through that. He died. Three days later, he rose again.
He tells them, here's what you're going to do. And then he flies. He ascends back into heaven and a cloud took him out of the way. He didn't like vaporize. Like he just, his whole body just took off. And I used to, when I would imagine that, I used to imagine it was like slow.
Like if you had like little wires or something, he just started to float. Do you know how long that would have taken? Like if it was slow? Like after a while, he'd have just been like, I mean, you'd have been enthralled because the guy was flying. But after a while, he'd be like, man, it's going to take forever until he hits that cloud.
Like he'd be waving or whatever. I think he just took off. He just said what he had to say. He said, here's what's going to happen. The Holy Spirit's going to come. You're going to be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the ends of the earth.
And then he was just like, boom, dust. They looked up and then they just, it says they stared up there for a while like, oh, goodness. And then angels show up or some men show up. It doesn't tell us they're angels, but men wearing right robes go say, hey, are y'all going to go do what he said? But here's what he said.
And here's what I want us to see. He says, you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria, the ends of the earth, that the Holy Spirit's going to come upon you so that Jesus is going to leave and the Holy Spirit's going to come and empower his church to do this, to be witnesses. What are they witnesses of? What is he talking about? What is the church, us as believers? What are we witnesses of?
The gospel. We're witnesses to the fact that Jesus died and rose again. That's what they were going to go tell people. And here's the way witnessing works. Here's what a witness does. They just tell you what's happened.
That's all they do. They're just telling a story. They're telling about an event that happened. If a cop gets called up on the witness stand, he doesn't sit down and start explaining how to be a cop. His primary role as a witness is just to tell everybody what he's seen, what happened. If you're watching a news program and they have a cooking segment, the cooking segment and the eyewitness segment are completely different.
The cooking segment is here's what you do to receive these results. The eyewitness section is just someone holding a mic and telling us not a whole lot other than what they've seen. So, yeah, we're out on the scene and there's an ambulance. Uh-huh. Some tape. People were running.
It's like, okay, that's what we get to do as Christians. We just get to be witnesses to who Jesus is, to what he's done. Yes, there was a man who came from God. Turns out he was God. He lived perfectly and he died. And three days later he came back.
That was the story that they got to tell. And here's the thing. Jesus did that to save the world, to reconcile it back to himself. And then he hands that mission over to his disciples. That mission is handed over to the church. God's plan to save the world is the local church.
God's plan to save the world is the local church. We have been given this message to declare. We have been called to be witnesses. And it says where? Well, for them it was Jerusalem, where they were. Judea.
Samaria, which was a place they didn't like. A bunch of people they didn't get along with. They racially weren't happy with. And to the ends of the earth. That it goes to everyone. Everyone is invited in.
That's the church. Have been given the message to declare. To declare the gospel. That's why we're gospel centered. Because we're witnesses. We've been called to make much of Jesus.
In normal everyday life. We've been sent out by God to declare. So here's what happens. That's what they do. They begin to pray. The Holy Spirit comes.
Empowers them. And then they go declare this message. They go be witnesses. And so let's jump to Acts chapter 2. We're going to pick up in verse 36. And we're going to see what happens as they declare this message.
What happens as a group of people who believes this message begins to be witnesses to it. 36. So this is Peter. He stood up. The Holy Spirit comes. Peter stands up.
Begins to proclaim the gospel. Begins to tell this good news. And people are listening. And this is the very end of it. Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ. This Jesus whom you crucified.
So Peter ends with it's your fault. The reason Jesus was crucified is on you. That Jesus was fundamentally in the gospel is a little bit of we have to respond because it's our fault. He had to die for our sin personally. So he says you whom you crucified.
So let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ. This Jesus whom you crucified. Now when they heard this. If you're thinking. Okay but hold on a second. He's talking to the guys that actually crucified him.
Maybe. The Romans actually crucified him. The Jewish people were culpable. But this is the feast of Pentecost. So there was people from miles around.
So it's the same message to us. That we're culpable. We're guilty. When it comes to the death of Jesus. 37. Now when they heard this.
They were cut to the heart. And said to Peter and the rest of the apostles. Brothers what shall we do? And Peter said to them repent. Which means turn away from your sin. Turn away from your brokenness.
Turn away from your need. Repent and be baptized every one of you. In the name of Jesus Christ. For the forgiveness of your sins. You will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you.
And for your children. And for all who are far off. Everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. And with many other words he bore witness. And continued to exhort them saying. Save yourselves from this crooked generation.
So those who received his word were baptized. And there were added that day about 3,000 souls. Baptism is just an outward showing of what's inwardly happened. So they trusted Jesus. Were saved. And then they were baptized.
Which means that they dumped them in water. The word baptized just means to dip. Or to submerge in water. And so that's what they were. They were baptized. Who responded?
Who trusted Jesus? Who became Christians? The first people to say. I'm broken. I'm needy. It was the people who saw that they were guilty.
And said I have nothing to offer. Nothing to bring to the table. What must we do? And he says trust Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins. That Jesus is both Lord and Christ. Which means king and savior.
He's in charge. And he's the one who saves us. The only people who aren't invited in. Are those who don't think they have need. The only people who did not respond. And who walked away that day.
Were the people who did not believe this message. And didn't think they were broken. And that breaks down into people who don't think that Jesus is Lord. Don't think he's king. And to people who don't think he's savior. You see if I'm really moral.
I'm really good. I behave really well. I'm upright. I'm a good citizen. Listen. I'm a red state American.
Then it's very likely that I'll believe I don't need a savior. Because I'm good enough. That the way I'm saved is through my behavior. So in our culture they might be called closed minded. Might be called bigoted. But they'll walk away from Jesus.
Because they're believing that they can save themselves. That they can fix themselves. You know how else walks away from that? Everybody who's broken. Everybody who's needy. Everybody who realizes they have nothing to offer.
Gets invited in. It's only the people that exclude themselves. You know how else walks away from that? The people who think that they're on Lord. That Jesus isn't king. I'm open minded.
I'm free. Whose rules would I have to follow? Whose regulations? I can make my own decisions. All of that religious stuff. That's for closed minded people.
That's for ignorant people. I'm a true blue stated American. And I can rely on myself. You see both sides of that? Self reliance. Self salvation.
Self lordship. But everyone who realizes they have nothing to offer. Nothing to bring to the table. Nothing. They're invited in. That's why the church can't hold a position of moral superiority in culture.
Because we were the first people to say we're busted and we need a savior. That's why everyone's invited into the church. Oh you're prideful? Oh you think you have it all together and you're just realizing now that you don't? You're welcome. Come on in.
We got a lot of prideful jerks here. Who need Jesus? Jesus. Oh you're rebellious? Oh you've run after every type of flagrant sin you could possibly chase after? And you've just now realized you have nothing to offer and you need Jesus?
Welcome. We've got a lot of people who struggle with that here. We've got a lot of people who can't remember many nights because they were too drunk. We've got a lot of people who've realized their need for Jesus and have been invited in. The only people who aren't invited are the people who think they're already in through their behavior, through their moral superiority, through their intelligence. Everyone who realizes that they're far off, everyone who realizes that they're out gets invited in.
That's the church. So what happens in that group of people? What happens in us as we begin to believe the gospel and exist in relationships? What happens in this group of people who were the first to say, I need a savior. I need someone else to do this on my behalf. I'm not good enough.
I'm not smart enough. I'm not strong enough. What happens? 42. 42. And they, that's the 3,000 people.
That's all the believers. All the people who said, I realize I'm needy. I'm broken. And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching. What were the apostles' teaching? The gospel.
They were taking the Old Testament and they were saying, here's the gospel. And then as we get their teaching in the New Testament because it's the stuff that apostles actually penned. But that's what they were devoting themselves to was understanding the gospel, what it looked like to live in light of the gospel. If Jesus was actually God, how do we rightly relate to him? That's what they were doing. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to the fellowship.
That just means, that's a fancy word for they were hanging out with each other. They were being church family. So, you know, like you hang out with friends and then you become a Christian. And so instead of saying like, oh, yeah, we had a really good time hanging out, you say, oh, we had a wonderful time of fellowship. That's where that comes from. That's why people say that.
Oh, bless this fellowship because it's just a fancy Christian word for us being together and being in a relationship. Okay? So if you want to like out-Christian somebody, throw fellowship around. It's real helpful. Anyway, sorry. And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and to fellowship.
They were church family. They existed in relationships with one another. And to the breaking of bread. That shows up in two ways. That's communion. That's celebrating that Jesus died for us.
Reminding ourselves of the gospel tangibly. It also seems like it just means they ate meals together. Breaking of bread. Breaking of bread. And the prayers. And all came upon every soul.
And many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. They got together, realized the gospel is true, realized they were family. And suddenly they got to hold everything with an open hand. You need this.
You need to borrow that. You need to, like, we're family. And everything's already been given to me in Jesus. 46. And day by day, attending the temple together. So they got together in big groups.
And breaking bread in their homes. They got together in smaller groups and homes. They received their food with glad and generous hearts. Praising God and having favor with all the people. The city was glad that they were there. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.
Okay. That last line's a little weird. You can just read over and not pay attention. But the last line's a little weird. Because how? How did the Lord add to their number day by day those who were being saved?
Those who were believing the gospel? Because it doesn't tell us. It just tells us what they were doing. And most of the way we respond in the church is like, well, what did they do? Did they go knock on doors? Did they have a program where they got people together and they sent them out?
Did they have some kind of thing where they were inviting people? Like, we don't. We're like, how? How did people become Christians every day? Love to see that happen in our church. How'd they do that?
Well, they just told us. They were devoted to the gospel and to each other. They spent time in relationships with one another, celebrating the gospel by breaking bread. And they prayed. And people become Christians. It becomes normal for people to become Christians.
Because they actually believed the gospel, which is good news. If you're here and you're a Christian and the gospel doesn't feel like good news to you, if it doesn't feel like it sets you free and gives you hope, I don't think you've believed the right gospel. I don't think you understand what's true about it. Because it's actually good news that Jesus saves us through his own work, not ours. And here's the thing about good news. We want to share it.
When that becomes real, when I understand exactly what Jesus has done for me, in those moments, I want to tell people. You ever had really good news? Like, we've had a couple of couples in our church family recently become pregnant. They're going to have children. They go around and they share that good news. They want to share that joy.
They want to have different groups of people to get together to share that with. We've had people, when they get a promotion, they want to throw a party. They want to share that news. The biggest way I do this on a regular basis is with restaurants. That's my favorite thing to talk to somebody about. Like, if I eat somewhere good, I want everyone to know it.
And that's how good news gets spread. So, like, if you're giving me directions and you're like, do you know where Tillman Street is? I'll be like, do restaurants. You'll be like, do you know where the Taco Bell is in West Columbia? Yep. I know where that is.
That's how I get around. That's how I get to know a city is I eat places. And if I ever eat somewhere good, I'm going to tell you about it. Egg Roll Station, it's on where Sunset meets State Street. It looks like a barn. And you have to have cash only, and it is amazing.
But anyway, that's what we want to share good news with people. And they had good news that Jesus saves, that he rescues, that he redeems, and that everyone's invited in. Everyone. Everyone. And people on a normal, regular, everyday basis start believing the good news and being invited in because they see the church being the church because the gospel was true. Have you had that?
Do you have those moments when the gospel is so true? When Jesus's generosity towards you is so real and somebody needs something, you have that moment where money's just money? You just have the opportunity to bless? Like you didn't even hesitate to grab your wallet and help somebody? Have you had that moment? Have you had that moment when Jesus's sacrifice was so real to you that when someone called and asked for help, you didn't even think about it because you got to just hop in?
That's few and far between for us, and that's why we spent a whole week saying we get to grow as we work in that. But even as we've walked through this series, if you had those moments where the gospel seems so real, so tangible, that you understand why we exist in relationships with each other as family. That's what was going on for them. It was so real, so rich, they could taste it, what had been accomplished for them on the cross, that they just lived it out in normal everyday life. You see, the plan to save the world, God's plan to rescue the world is the church. And there is no plan B.
And the way he does that is through normal everyday life. Certainly, some of them ended up moving far off. Certainly, some of them ended up saying, I feel specifically led to go to this area. But most of it happened in normal everyday life. And you know what happens when the gospel is real? The weight's lifted up.
We don't have to earn it. We don't have to achieve it. We're not burdened by being good. We want to be good. We have a desire for it because of Jesus' work in us, because the gospel is true, but we're not burdened by it. And everything suddenly has meaning.
There is no wasted day anymore if the gospel is true. So that was what messed me up in college. I started reading the Bible in the morning. I'd always read the Bible growing up. I didn't know. I grew up in a Christian home.
I didn't know people didn't read the Bible. So I just always read the Bible, start to finish all the way through. So I mean, I was like in middle school reading the book of Numbers. I don't know if I understood any of it, but I read it. I got to college and I started reading the Bible in the morning and drinking coffee. That messed up my whole life.
That's why I'm standing here this morning. Because it totally altered things for me. Because I started reading the Bible. I read sections like this. I remember distinctly reading this section in college and thinking, if the gospel is actually true, if what we're here saying we believe this morning is actually true, well, that changes everything. And it would actually change how I live.
It actually changed how I treat people, how I view the world, what I do with my time, my money, my energy, if it's actually true. If what we just read about Jesus coming back to life and then in bodily form ascending into heaven is true, that he is Lord and Christ, that one day he will return and he will rule and reign forever. And that the two options for his creation are you pay for your sin or Jesus pays for your sin. You exclude yourself or you get invited in. If that's actually true, I couldn't keep living my life the way I was. And that's what we see here.
That's why you read this in Acts and you go, why did they suddenly change? Why did this group of people in this, why did they, because it was true. Because they believed it and it affects everything. That's what we get to see and that's what we get to be as a church family. We get to be Christians in normal everyday life. We get to have normal jobs, but we get to have them with intentionality.
We get to go to school. We get to study physical health. We get to study to be an athletic trainer. We get to study to go be a nurse practitioner. And we get to do that absolutely wrecked by the grace of the gospel and absolutely invited in to be a part of God's mission. And so here's how that plays out.
What we see is that God added to them day by day, those who were being saved. I want us to read that again. 46. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. So again, the city was happy they were there.
And the Lord added to their number day by day, those who were being saved. That's why we organize the way we do as a church family. That's why we get together in groups. That's why on Sundays, I remember we were meeting at First Baptist and Hope Bridge. I would stand up. Not Hope Bridge.
First Baptist. I lied. Hope Bridge, we didn't say this. First Baptist, I would stand up on Sundays. We would get together Sunday nights. I would look at everyone, all 15 of you, and I knew everyone was in a group.
And I would say, hey, if you want to get in a group, I remember doing that and people going, who's this fool talking to? Bro, we in your group. I'm going to see you Thursday. The reason we did it was because that's who we are. That's how we exist in relationships in life. And I want everybody to remember that, not get confused by what we're doing on Sunday.
And I wanted everybody to know if you get somebody to come hang out with you, somebody wants to come hang out with us on Sunday, we're going to tell them about how we exist as a church family. We're going to talk about it because that's who we are. We walk through everyday life together because we're trying to do this. Because we believe this is how we grow and this is how we have life and this is how we remind ourselves constantly of the gospel. We believe that's what we're called to. And here's what we're going to do as a church.
We're going to try to grow and multiply at all levels. It says day by day they were added to their number, those who were being saved. What we want to see is that people who follow Jesus help other people follow Jesus. That disciples make disciples. So I'm a Jesus follower so automatically I'm going to help other people follow Jesus because it's actually good news.
It's actually real. It actually gives me hope. It actually gives me peace. He's actually rescued me. That for our group leaders, we have community groups and we have group leaders, that they would train other people to be group leaders, which is just someone who's intentionally going to give some extra time to help pastor our church family, to help gather people together, to help be organized, go out of their way to do that so that group leaders would train other group leaders, that groups would make other groups. My group has grown to the point now at some point we're going to have to multiply.
We have this debate all the time. They're like, but isn't it dividing? It feels like dividing. They'll use the word split. I'm like, we're not using split. Like that's not, that's a bad word.
We're multiplying because we're gaining. We're growing through it. We're seeing more people get to hop in. Here's what's beautiful. None of us, you didn't know anybody here two years ago. And now you can't imagine life without them.
And there are people who are not here today that that's true for. It'll be true for them in a year. There's two real people. You don't know them yet. We'll call them Eric and Sarah. They're real.
You don't know them because you haven't met them yet. But in a year, you won't be able to imagine what it was like, what life was like without Eric in it because of how much joy he brings because that time he just sat next to you on your couch after your relative died and was just there. You'll be able to look back a year from now and remember the time that you screamed your head off when he was baptized. And you won't be able to imagine what it was like to be in a community group to exist as church family without Eric around. Sarah, you'll look forward to hearing her laugh because she has an infectious laugh.
She laughs at dumb jokes that aren't funny and makes everyone else laugh with her because the way she laughs is great. currently, the place that she sits regularly when she gathers with your group throughout the week, just a throw pillow sitting there. But a year from now, you won't be able to imagine what it was like without Sarah around, without Sarah in your life to call. That's why we get to be who we get to be because there are real people in this city who don't have hope, who don't know Jesus, who haven't been set free, who are lonely and have no one to call and haven't been invited into family. The reason why we get to be, the reason why we're a gospel-centered community on mission is because of us.
Because we didn't have that at one point. Because there's people who exist in our city who were like us two, three, five years ago. without hope, without church family, without Jesus. If you take a circle and just draw it around West Columbia, just West Columbia, not Columbia, not Irma, not Lexington, just the West Columbia area. It's like a four-mile radius. 60,000 people in that circle aren't a part of a church family and most likely don't know Jesus. A lot of them probably think they do.
But they think it's about behavior. It's about work. And that's why we do what we do. And that's why we're going to continue to multiply groups and continue to train group leaders. And that's why it's worth it. Because we get to be God's church.
And His plan to save the world is the local church. It's groups of people that actually believe the gospel. It's communities centered around the gospel on mission. That's us. That's what we're shooting for. That's who we get to be.
And here's why it matters. Flip over to the book of Revelation. So in the book of Revelation if you're not really familiar with it you've probably heard weird stuff about it. We'll be on page 666. So go ahead and get that out of the way.
It's fitting that that page would be in the book of Revelation. But we're in the book of Revelation. Here's what happens in the book of Revelation. There was a disciple named John. He wrote the book of John. He wrote 1st, 2nd, 3rd John.
I think there's a 3rd John. It's real short. Yeah, he wrote 1st, 2nd, 3rd John because I know about the Bible, guys. And he wrote the book of Revelation. The book of Revelation is really old. He was exiled to an island.
He had already been boiled alive in oil but he didn't die. But he probably looked weird after that. But he was exiled to an island. The Holy Spirit takes him and shows him some future stuff and shows him some weird things and he just kind of writes down what he sees. At this point though he's getting a glimpse into heaven. He's getting a glimpse into eternity.
And so I just want us to take a second to look at that and see why this matters. We're going to be verse 9, chapter 7. After this I looked, that's John, he looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages standing before the throne and before the Lamb. So God, the Father, is on the throne. The Lamb is Jesus who died for our sins as our sacrifice. Do you see what he just said?
Jesus in Matthew, chapter 28, what Razvalad read last week was, go and make disciples of all people groups. Jesus, so what we see right before he ascends in Acts, chapter 1, says, you're going to be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth. God, God, everyone, everyone's invited in and everyone makes it. Not everyone on earth is going to make it, but God will not have a people group, a nation, a tribe not represented before his throne. And you know what's beautiful about that? When he looks out and sees them, he still sees people groups, nations, and tribes and languages.
Everyone's invited in and there is not one set culture for Christianity because God made everyone and every people group, every type of person shows and reflects some of his glory. Everybody gets invited in. That is going to be the best singing and worship that exists. I remember going up to visit Liberty University before I was going to go to seminary there and I walked in and there was two white dudes, skinny jeans and like flock of seagulls haircuts. Like, I mean, they just looked ridiculous. Um, like the, a super long version of like the Macklemore haircut or whatever.
Um, and I remember thinking, okay. And they both had, uh, acoustic guitars and they started just leading us in singing, uh, through worship. And I mean, I'm white and I was like, this is great. Like I totally got into it. Like we, I was able to worship because a white people can worship to two electric, uh, two acoustic guitars. Most white people can, can sing and praise Jesus.
That's some of our music. I remember last year we got together for Easter or one of the weeks before Easter. And we had like, uh, we had a violin and a, um, mandolin. And I mean, I was, we were, they were warming up and practicing. I was like, this is great. This is amazing music.
And it may be too white. Like if I'm liking it this much, it may be we've, we've overshot our goal of what we're doing. I remember gathering with a, um, a church in Lynchburg that was, uh, mostly African-American and a guy led worship from a drum set. And it was awesome. That was it. It was just a drum set and them singing.
It was great. And I had no clue what to do with that. Like, I'm like, do I cut? Okay. I don't like I, that's all I had. It was beautiful.
I just had to sit and listen, but I couldn't do anything with it. I remember in, in, uh, college being a part of a gospel choir. Um, and so it was Matt helped lead it, but it was, we were the only two white boys involved in this. And, uh, I remember I can, I can sing. Okay. If I'm standing next to somebody who can sing in the last day before our gospel choir, big showcase thing, we're, we're going over to the place to practice and aunt Frederick, uh, not aunt Frederick, uh, Antoine Thomas looks at us and says, all right, we walk in.
Here's what we're going to do. We're going to stomp, stomp, clap, stomp. And I was like, do what? You going to tell me this the last day? This is what I should have been practicing the whole time. They were like, what?
We go sing the same songs. I was like, what? We go sing the same songs. I got to stomp and clap while I sing. I'm not kidding you. And you can ask Anna for verification.
I could either sing the songs or I could clap and sway. I could not do both. And it was me and another friend of mine, he was on the end. And so I messed him up the entire time. We would run into each other because we were supposed to be swaying this way. And I was swaying this way and I'd be hitting him and he'd be looking at me like, dude, get together.
So eventually I just did this, kept up with the clapping and swaying. Didn't say a word because I didn't have it. I ain't got it. It just ain't going to happen. In eternity, we're all there. We're all welcomed in.
Everybody's invited and everything gets to be a part of it. And it doesn't get erased and it doesn't get washed over and it doesn't become, oh, only this culture, only this type of people, only this nationality, only this background, only this language, all of them, because God's God of all of them. And everyone's invited in. And we get to be his church in this city. Who gets to be a part of that? Who gets to be a part of looking like the kingdom of God already, going out of our way to invite everyone in because we want that throne room packed.
Let's read the rest of this because it gets good. We'll start back up at nine. After this, I looked and behold, a great multitude that no one could number from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the lamb, clothed in white robes with palm branches in their hands and crying out with a loud voice, salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the lamb. So what we're screaming out is the gospel. We didn't earn this. We didn't accomplish this.
We didn't make this happen, but you did. Salvation belongs to you. And all the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. And they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God saying, amen, blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever. Amen. And one of the elders addressed me saying, who are these clothed in white robes and from where have they come?
And I said, sir, you know, and he said to me, these are the ones coming out of the great tribulation. They have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the lamb. There's going to be an eternity where we get to praise and worship Jesus that he cleaned us up through his own blood, that he made us right through his sacrifice, that we were all welcomed in because he was cast out, that we all get to have a real father, a true father, father because his for forsaken him, that we get to have a life because he died, that we're washed clean because he shed his blood for us. That's true. Eternity is real.
So are we going to go out of our way to multiply groups? Are we going to go out of our way to invite people in? Are we going to go out of our way to sacrifice? Absolutely. Because the gospel is real. Is that going to affect everyday life?
Absolutely. Why wouldn't it? Is that going to affect what we do with our money and our time? Absolutely. Why wouldn't it? Is that going to affect how we relate to our neighbors?
How we relate to our coworkers? Absolutely. Why wouldn't it? And we're Christians. We wouldn't have it any other way than to be family, to center our entire lives around the gospel and to see that throne room packed out with everybody. All those who knew they had need and ran to the king.
Everyday Mission
Transcript
G'day everyone, my name is Raz. This morning we're turning to our last chapter of Anchor Series. If you've been with us for the last little while, you'll know that we're talking about what it is that anchors us as a church. What it is that we turn to, what it is that makes us foundationally a church, and what we believe and how we believe the church functions as we're out in the world. And if you've ever seen anything that we've ever printed, t-shirts, cards, giant banners, you'll see that we use the phrase, a gospel-centered community on mission all the time. For the first five weeks of this series, we've talked about what it means to be gospel-centered.
The first three weeks, we've talked about gospel-centered. The next two weeks, we've talked about what it means to be community. And today we're kind of turning to what it means to be on mission. But immediately we've run into this problem when it comes to the word mission. And that's that lots of different people use a different definition of the word mission, particularly when it comes to the church. This is kind of common in English language in general, and particularly for me, miscommunication based on wording.
I'm from Australia, and I live in America, and so I say things different, and I get in trouble all the time. For example, if I learn something for the first time, or something makes sense for the first time, I might accidentally, this would be wrong, but I might accidentally say, ah, I just joined the dots in my head. Everyone knows you don't join dots in America. You connect dots in America. And for someone to suggest that joining is the same as connecting in this country is craziness. Similar confusions can also get you in trouble sometimes.
In America, you have a kind of footwear that is commonly referred to as the flip-flop. In Australia and other areas of the country, other areas of this country and other areas of the world, it's not called a flip-flop, it's called a thong. This can get you in trouble at times if you're not careful. Hypothetically speaking, and I'm not saying that this happened to me, but it might have, you might be away on a youth camp with a bunch of teenagers, explain a card game to them in which one of the rules is that when something happens, you remove your thong and slap the person next to you with it, and suggest that you are going to do that repeatedly to a 15-year-old.
It could happen to anyone. I'm not saying it happened to me. It was obviously a friend of mine. But the main problem that we have with this word mission is that different people use the same word to mean a bunch of different things. There's some people who think that mission means overseas. You've got to be out of here.
You can't be in America because that's not mission. You've got to go to China. You've got to go to Russia. You've got to go to Belarus, wherever that is. You can't do it here. You've got to be somewhere else.
And some people say that's trash. That's not the truth. What you've got to do is cross a cultural barrier. That would be talking to Chinese people who are here in America or talking to people who don't speak English. If you speak Spanish and you speak in Hispanic neighborhoods about the gospel, that would be mission. But other people say, no, that's trash as well.
Every time you leave your house and talk about Jesus, you're on mission. Some people say there's like this umbrella category of mission and evangelism is under that. But some people say, no, that's trash. There's an umbrella category of evangelism and mission is under that. And some people say missions and some people say mission and they get confused between the two of them because they're two separate things. And so you could be on a mission trip, but refer to it as a missions trip and people think you're weird.
And you're just like, I don't know if it's missions or mission. The problem is there's too many different people in the world who use the word to mean different things. There's too many definitions. So this morning, we're going to be looking pretty specifically at what Jesus said about it, what Jesus said about mission. And we're going to look at the great commission that he sent his church to accomplish. Ultimately, though, God himself has his own mission.
And that is to bless all of humanity, all of creation, to bless all nations and bring them back, reconcile them, bring them back to himself. And he does that through his son, Jesus Christ, who he sent to pay the penalty for our sins, to reconcile us to him. And then Jesus himself invites us into that work and sends us out into the world to continue it. And we're going to look at Jesus' words today on that topic and how that applies to us here in Columbia, South Carolina. Let's pray.
Father God, we praise you and we thank you for the work that you've done in Jesus Christ on our behalf. And we thank you that you've given us a mission. We thank you that you've trusted us with that mission. And we pray that we can do it to your glory for the rest of our lives. In Jesus' name, amen. Now, if you've got a Bible, go ahead and open to Matthew 28.
If you've got one of these blue ones, it is on page 542. It's right at the end of the book of Matthew. If you get to Mark, you've gone too far. This is the very last little paragraph in the Gospel of Matthew. At this point in time, Jesus has come to the earth. He's been born as a baby in Bethlehem.
He's lived the first 30 years of his life. Then he was sent out and he preached the word for three years. He gathered disciples to him, preached. Then he died and he resurrected three days later, proving that he was God. And then we're going to step into the story in that period of time between when he was risen from the dead and before he ascended back into heaven. This is right in that period of time.
This is from chapter 28, verse 16. Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. And when they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted. And Jesus came and said to them, this is the Great Commission, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.
Jesus, he comes out swinging. He makes his point hard and fast. He says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. I'm the boss man. And so when you're at work and the boss man comes out and says, I'm your boss. I have the authority here.
You know he's about to say something that you have to do. And he's allowed to do that because he's got authority and you don't. Jesus comes out swinging. All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. It means that whatever comes next is pretty important and he expects us to do it. But it's also really encouraging because he says, I'm Jesus.
All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. You are my disciples. Go out and make disciples. Let's read. The Great Commission. It says, all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.
Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. It doesn't really leave a whole lot of room. His command is, make disciples. Make disciples of everyone. It says, make disciples of all nations. It's a translation from a Greek word, ethne, which really means ethnicities, all people groups.
It's not just saying all nations that we've given names to and have territories. It's not saying China, Russia, England, France. It's saying all people, all people groups. Everyone. Make disciples of everyone. And that's really it.
When it comes down to it, that's the basis for what we're talking about when we use the word mission. The mission is to make disciples. Make disciples of everyone. And the cool thing for the guys that Jesus is talking to is that they were his disciples. He's gathered his disciples together and said, go and make disciples. He's perfectly modeled to them for the last three years what it looks like to make disciples.
And then he sends them out and says, go and do for other people what I've been doing for you. Now, when we make disciples, what we're really doing is making followers of Jesus. That's what a disciple is. It's a follower of Jesus. It's taking someone who doesn't know Jesus and introducing them. But it's also taking people who do know Jesus and giving them next steps towards Jesus as well.
So they might already know him, but not be very good at knowing him. And we just need to teach them some more things about him and how that's involved in life as well. And we push people baby steps towards Jesus. And that's what it means to make disciples. Now, it might not seem super logical to us in the English translation. It is logical.
It's really logical once you understand the basis of how this works. In Greek, and if you want to geek out with me, I love this kind of junk later. So we can talk about this. In Greek, there is main verbs and supporting verbs. It doesn't work the same in English. We usually rely on sentence structure and word order.
But in Greek, there's main verbs and supporting verbs. And so in this sentence, the main verb is make disciples. And then all the supporting verbs tell you how to do that. So we're commanded, make disciples, and then told what it is you could do in order to make disciples. And we're told the other three verbs, the supporting verbs, are go, baptize, and teach. That's how you make disciples.
As you go, you baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. And you teach to obey all that Jesus has commanded. Let's look at go. What does it mean to go? Here's what it looks like. As we make disciples, we go.
It's not saying pick up your bags and leave. Go. Get out of here. It's saying as you go, as you go about life, as you go about daily life, as you go about your rhythms, as you go to work, as you go to school, make disciples of everyone. It's inherently movement-oriented. It doesn't imply that you can stay and do nothing.
You are supposed to go. But some people have twisted this word go. It's what causes most of the confusion with the Great Commission and what it means to be in missions in general. Some people say when it says go and make disciples of all nations, that's why you've got to get out of here. That's why, because he says go all nations. It's like, it makes a lot of sense to leave and go to another country.
But actually he's saying as you go about your daily business, be making disciples wherever you are. This is when definitions become important. And this is where I want to help us out a little bit by clarifying all the different types of missions. And I think all it usually needs is a helping word. Because people say the word mission and think of a bunch of different things, when if they had have just clarified, it would have made a whole lot more sense from the beginning. So let's clarify.
Let's talk when it means to go and make disciples of all nations, and you're thinking of get out of this country, go to another country, be a missionary, which is a perfectly legitimate life, a perfectly legitimate way to be in obedience to Jesus, to get out of this country, to go to China and make disciples over there. That's perfectly legitimate. Let's call that overseas mission. Let's call that overseas mission. And it immediately cuts the confusion. Overseas mission is when you leave your country to go to another country and make disciples there.
It's perfectly legitimate. But the thing is, the Great Commission is bigger than overseas mission. The Great Commission is bigger than that. Then there's another group of people that say, when it says go and make disciples of all nations, that's quite easy in the U.S. because all the nations have come here. Australia has come here. Chinese students have come here.
Indians have come here. Lots of Hispanic-speaking, Spanish-speaking, Hispanic countries, people have come here. It's easy to make disciples of all nations right here. And what they're talking about is what we're going to clarify as cross-cultural ministry. Taking the word to people from another area so that you can empower them to reach people from their area and the gospel spreads cross-culturally. Let's call that cross-cultural mission.
But the Great Commission is bigger than that as well. It's perfectly legitimate. Take the gospel. Go, all nations. Perfectly legitimate. But it's not the end.
It's not the end. Let's call what the majority of us aim for. What is also perfectly legitimate within the Great Commission. Let's call what we do everyday mission. That's what we're aiming to do. Everyday mission.
And the thing is, not everyone is called to overseas mission. Not everyone is called to cross-cultural mission. But everyone, if you call yourself a believer, is called to everyday mission. It's without exclusion. If you're a Christian, if you're a disciple, if you call yourself a Christ follower, you're constantly hanging on the word of God for truth, for life, for sustenance, for direction in life. Your job now is to make disciples of all nations.
And you can do that just here. It's to make disciples of everyone in daily life, in the normal goings about of what you do in your daily life. Make disciples. So this includes everything. The only thing that it really excludes, and exclusions are annoying, but the only thing it really excludes is laziness and apathy. So that would be 14 hours of binge Netflix by yourself, home alone, secluded from the world.
Video games until 4 a.m. by yourself. Maybe talking to people on a headset, but that's not the same. Beating people is not fun like that. The only thing that's excluded in going to all people is not going to anybody. So what does this really mean?
What are we supposed to do? What's the structure? How do we do the next thing? Well, the next instruction is baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Interesting you should mention that. Shameless plug.
We are having a baptism party in a couple of weeks. A baptism is what happens, what we do when a person who doesn't believe in Jesus becomes a believer in Jesus and publicly declares to friends and family and anyone who's there, I am now a person who completely trusts in Jesus Christ as my Savior and my Lord. And then we grab them by the face and power dunk them in water and lift them up again and we cheer because Christians are fun. And grabbing people by the face and almost drowning them is fun. Don't almost drown them. You get to hold your breath.
It symbolizes the death to the old life, the cleansing by Jesus, and then the raising to new life. And we do that as a representation of the work that Jesus has done, but also a public declaration of faith so that everyone in our family and our friends and in our lives know that we believe in Jesus. And we're commanded to do that. That's the second step in what it means to make disciples. It's beautiful. The last instruction says, teach them to observe everything that I've commanded.
This one, this one's a process. This is not like on the checklist of how do I make a disciple. Tick, done, tick, done, baptized, good, taught everything about Jesus. Tick, done. It's not like that. It can't be done so simply.
This is pretty much what we've been talking about for the last five weeks. It is teaching each other all that Jesus commanded is gospel fluency. It's speaking Jesus into every life situation whenever it comes up. It's repenting from our idolatry. It's understanding that we need to live in the context of relationships with other people. It's beating the gospel into our head repeatedly.
It's grabbing other people's heads and beating the gospel into their heads repeatedly. It's repenting and growing in community and teaching each other all that Jesus has commanded us to obey. It's a lifelong process that we do in the context of a gospel-centered community. And that's exactly what we've been talking about for the last five weeks. And so that's it. That's the mission.
That's what we're called to do. Make disciples. Make followers of Jesus out of everybody. As you go, we make disciples of everyone. We baptize them. And we walk with them in the context of community to teach them everything that Jesus has commanded.
That's the Great Commission. That's our mission. That's what it means to be a gospel-centered community on mission. And it seems like a heavy burden. Like a giant task. Make disciples of all nations.
It seems out of reach. It seems so intangible. Like you can't just touch it and feel it and do it. It's out of our reach. But notice how Jesus bookends the Great Commission.
If you look down, he says, He begins with, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Jesus has unlimited power to do as he pleases. Then he gives us the Great Commission. He says, Make disciples of all people. And then he says, And I am with you until the end of the age. We're not alone in this.
Especially if we do things in the context of community. We have teammates around us. You're sitting next to your teammates now. But also, Jesus is in us, in our teammates, in our communities, working his miracle magic to allow us to transform lives. You're not alone in this. And so, the burden is not so big.
What does this mean for us? What does it mean for us in Columbia, South Carolina? How do we make disciples? Well, you probably don't feel like a massive world changer. The normal structure of a day is wake up, make breakfast, shower, go to work, eight hours there, boring, go home, maybe stop at the grocery store to pick up some groceries, maybe work out if you're anyone but me. You might make dinner, eat dinner, watch some TV for a little bit, and go back to bed.
There's next day, same thing again. There's not a whole lot of time within that structure for world changing, for disciple making, for all the nations and all that jazz. So, what is it that we can do in the context of that? Well, it seems like making disciples is the job of someone else. Full-time pastors, full-time missionaries, people who get paid to do that kind of thing. Not necessarily true, or at least not as far as Jesus is concerned in the Great Commission.
Here's what's different about you, and here's what's different about your life. If you're a part of the church, if you're part of this church, if you're part of any church, then you're part of Jesus' plan. And if you're part of Jesus' plan, then he has empowered you with his mission to go and make disciples of all nations. And if you're sitting here today, you're surrounded by teammates on all sides. If you're sitting here today, you're surrounded by teammates. If you're in a community group, you're surrounded by teammates who all want the same things as you do, which is to make disciples of all nations.
And you have Jesus' promise that he will be with you till the end of the age. And he's there with you, and there with your community group, and that he has entrusted you with the message of the gospel, and there is nothing insignificant about that or your life. There's nothing insignificant about that. When you drive around Columbia, and I assume if you're here, most of you have driven around Columbia a good bit. If you drive around Columbia, do you see a city that is completely and utterly wrecked and transformed by the saving power of Jesus and his grace? I know when I drive around, that's not exactly what I think about.
When I moved here about two and a half years ago, I was coming here to go to CIU, a school just here in Columbia, and there was some vague statistics about the city on the website. They say that there's between 600,000 and 700,000 people, which I assume now that I'm here kind of includes the surrounding areas, and that there's 800 churches within that area. And my mind was blown. I'm from Sydney. There's like 800 churches in Sydney and 15 times that population. And so I was like, man, that's awesome.
This city is going to be amazing. It's going to be like the evangelical Vatican. There's going to be amazing angels singing on every corner. And then I got here, and I didn't have a car for a while, but when I got a car, I started driving around. And I was like, man, what are all these 800 churches doing? What's going on in this place?
And I stayed here for a bit, and not too long after I was here, the city tried to make homelessness illegal. What? This is a city with 800 churches, and they're trying to make poverty a crime? What? What? And then you learn a little bit more about the culture.
I didn't go out a whole lot, but you know that there's areas that you're not supposed to go at night. Everyone knows this. You don't go over there at night because, you know, guns. And I'm like, what? This is a city with 800 churches. That's like a church for every 900 people.
What's going on? And then I learned the most shocking statistic of all, and that's that there's seven Moes in this city and only three Chipotles. How on earth is anyone supposed to live in hope when Moes more than double a Chipotle in any given city? Crippling statistics. But seriously, what would it look like?
What would it look like in Colombia if every street, if every street had a gospel-centered community on it? It doesn't have to be a Mill City-sponsored community group. It can be any church. It can be any group of believers. What would it look like if this city had a gospel-centered community on every street or in every office building or a factory or school, if they had a gospel-centered community on every sports team? The city would be rocked and it would change everything.
What would it look like if people everywhere you turned, when you went to Walmart, when you went to get groceries, when you go to the downtown Soda City markets, what would it look like if everywhere you looked was people empowered by the Spirit to love, forgive, repent, and show mercy like Jesus did? We would be living in a very different-looking city. Here's our plan. If you're a note-taker, this is a good time to start taking notes. Here's our plan. Step number one.
Start by being you with all your interests, with all your desires, with all the things that you like. Start by being you, as a Christian, in love with Jesus. Start by being you, as a Christian, in love with Jesus. That's what we call being gospel-centered. Step number two is get in a community group. A community group is a group of people who are doing step number one.
A community group is a group of people who are being themselves, as a Christian, in love with Jesus. And they do it together. That's called being a gospel-centered community. Step number three. Go out into your life and invite people who don't know Jesus to do things with your community group. That's called being a gospel-centered community on mission.
Step number four, and this is the easiest one, it should go without saying, let Jesus do his thing. Jesus in the Great Commission says, and surely I will be with you until the end of the age. He's going to be there. He's going to be helping. Let Jesus fulfill his promise. You do what you've been called to do and let Jesus do what he said he's going to do.
And that's, he's going to change people. He's going to transform people. If you think it's your job to do that, you're wrong. Your job is to show them the gospel. As we go about our daily lives, we invite those we encounter to hang out with our community group and take next steps towards Jesus. That's what it means to make disciples of everyone.
But what does that look like for the church in general? What does it look like for churches out in the world? There's two main kind of categories, two main strategies that exist for churches and how they operate. The first one is what we're going to call a come and see mentality. Come and see the church. This is any church that typically has like, their main mode of operation is the Sunday service, the Sunday gathering.
Come and see what we have to show you. You've got to come to our event, our thing, our building. Come to us and we'll show you how to live, whatever that looks like. American culture has taken this to the extreme. They've kind of exploded it. You can watch it on TV.
You can watch it on the internet. You could go to an actual church building and still watch it on TV. You could hang out with laser beams and fog machines and like professional musicians and it's this big thing of come and see. Come and see what we've got to show you. That's one mode of operation. The second mode of operation is what we're going to call go and be the church.
So it's no longer come and see the church, it's go and be the church. Now if you haven't guessed, our primary mode is not come and see the church. And if you're here today and that's what you were thinking, then this is it. It's not the best thing in the world. It's okay. But we believe that we're primarily called to go and be the church.
And if you haven't experienced that before, it's actually, for us at least, a lot better than this. If you're here today and you're just coming to see the church, then you're actually missing out. And we're called to go and be the church. And to go and be the church, it means leaving here today and not thinking the church is over. Because church isn't just Sunday morning, church is Monday night. It's Tuesday at lunchtime.
It's Thursday when you hang out with your group. It's Friday when you walk the dog with friends from your community group. It's Saturday when you go and play with your Frisbee disc golf club or whatever you do on Saturday morning, Saturday night. Family doesn't cease to be family when they leave your house after dinner. And for some reason, we think that church does when we leave here. That's not true.
Church family exists all the time. We're called to go and be the church. Well, what do we do with this then? Who is the target audience, for lack of a better word? Who's this mission for? Who do I take it to?
Well, my question is, who are you already around? Who are you already around? Let's think specifically and practically about this. I think, I think there's two main categories, two main categories of people in our lives that this would include. There's friends without hope and there's strangers without hope. Let's talk first about friends without hope.
This is people you already know. This is not necessarily friends, but colleagues, workmates, family members, people who you're on a first name basis with have had conversations with before. This is friends without hope. It's not strangers without hope. What do we do with our friends that we already know who don't have hope? Well, it's actually pretty simple.
After all, you're a pretty normal person. Your friends are pretty normal. Hanging out with you wouldn't be torture, I don't think. It could be. You don't have to be weird and creepy about your faith. You don't have to slam Bible verses down people's throats all the time.
You get to be you in love with Jesus. Granted, you're in love with Jesus. You get to be you and do normal things anyway. And in the context of friendship, you can show other people what it means to be a Christian. Here's an example. You might work Monday to Friday.
You've got a nine-to-five Job. You work Monday to Friday. You don't know everyone there, but you know most of the people there. Actually, there's this one lady there who annoys you quite a bit. She's pretty annoying. And the annoying thing about annoying people is how annoying they are, which can be frustrating.
And frustration springs from annoyingness. And I'm a master of being annoying, but I hate being annoyed. And she's an annoying person, which is annoying. Annoying. Annoying. Annoying.
Am I being annoying? That's the goal. Never mind. There's this annoying person at work. You don't know a lot about her. You don't want to know a whole lot about her.
You kind of just wish she would leave you alone, but you're stuck with her for eight hours a day. You do know one thing about her. She loves her dog. She doesn't have photos of kids and family up and around her desk. She's got photos of her dog. You know this lady is crazy about that dog.
And so you think, huh, how am I going to reach this lady? You go to your community group. You hate dogs, obviously, because you're an intelligent person. But you know there's some unintelligent people in your community group who like dogs as well. So you go to your community group and you say, community group, does anyone like dogs?
Does anyone want to start like a Saturday morning dog walking thing? And they say, yeah, sure, why not? And boom, perfect. You've got this avenue to invite this annoying lady from work to hang out with Christians. And the best thing about it is that once she gets involved, assuming she does, once she probably does, she likes her dog, once she gets involved, you get to put her in a group with your friends who get to do all the heavy lifting for you. You no longer have to deal with her.
Your friends do because they can bond over the dog thing. She'll probably rock up with her dog in like one of those tote bags for the walk. It might be weird, but you can get over that. People are weird. The heavy lifting is done by others. All you've really done is orchestrated a situation where someone that you know, a friend without hope, is hanging around with Christians doing things that they like doing.
Here's another example. You have a friend, he's a guy, he's been not around Jesus for a while. He's grown up in church, thinks he knows some stuff, but at some point in time, you don't really know what happened. He got burned by the church, doesn't really trust Christians, doesn't really trust the church anymore, doesn't hang around with anyone. You've invited him a few times, you've said, hey, come hang out with us on Sundays, and he's just not biting on that. He doesn't like that idea.
The thought of being around Christians, being judged, he's got some things that he's ashamed of, he doesn't really want to buy into anything like that, and you think, dang, hitting a wall. And then, one of the guys in your community group says, hey, let's all get together and shoot guns at a range, and you think, bing, perfect, he's a guy, guys like shooting guns, at least around here they do. And you think, this is perfect. I'm going to invite him to come and shoot guns. And he bites. You say, hey, do you want to come and hang out with some of my friends and shoot guns all morning?
And he says, yes, obviously. And all you've done is orchestrated a situation where a friend without hope gets to hang out with friends who know Jesus, and he gets to see that they're not that weird after all. He gets to see that they're just normal people who love Jesus and go about their lives in light of the fact that they love Jesus. It's not, you don't have to be a weird guy who dresses up in a suit and puts his bow tie on and carries a clipboard and a huge Bible and knocks on people's doors and says, would you like to know Jesus today? I mean, you could. There's no way to make friends.
Instead, orchestrate situations with your current friends your community group mainly where you can invite other friends easily to that and they're going to say yes because who doesn't want to shoot guns and walk dogs? One of the biggest hurdles for people becoming Christians is that they don't know what Christians look like. They think that you're weird Bible-thumping, praying, sitting in a circle, holding hands, singing Kumbaya. You could do that. That's weird. You're just you being in love with Jesus, doing it in the context of your community group.
And you get to do that and do fun things and invite people in. That's called being a gospel-centered community on mission. Dog walking, fishing, crafts, coffee, breakfast, football, soccer, which is actually football, frisbee, Pinterest parties, painting each other's nails, jams. Yeah. I know you ladies know what jams are and if you're a married man you probably know what jams are as well. I know you ladies love that stuff.
Invite your friends to that. It's fun. Jams, everyone. When you and your community group have this great commission outlook, every day is full of disciple-making moments. When you and your community group have this great commission outlook, every day is full of disciple-making moments. We meet people where they're at and we allow them to see Jesus through us and our community groups.
Now let's turn to that second group, the group called Strangers Without Hope. This is the category of people that you don't know. This is someone who when you saw them on the street you would not know their name or anything about them. Strangers Without Hope. I think, and I think I'm right in this because I think it, I think that the most underutilized, most overlooked, most underthought, most duh kind of people group that would fit this category in our lives is our neighbors. And it's interesting to me because I remember this guy called Jesus who said, the greatest command is to love God and love your neighbors.
But I know you guys, I know you're Bible scholars and academics and when he says that, he's not saying you're actual neighbors, he's saying love everyone, which is great because for some reason that means we get to ignore our actual neighbors. Despite the fact that he said the words love your neighbors. It cannot not mean neighbors when he says love your neighbors, even if he means love everyone. I've been reading this book recently, it's called The Art of Neighboring. My wife and I are planning to move into apartment community soon and we're just reading a bunch of things that's involved in that and how to make friends with your neighbors.
I've been reading this book called The Art of Neighboring and they have this diagnosis test in the book. It looks like this, it's a three by three grid, the middle square represents your house and so you put your name in your house. There's eight other squares around that and they represent the houses of the eight geographically closest houses to your house. So it's not Bob who lives down the street and three houses down around the corner, it's the eight closest people to your current house. The diagnosis test is this, step one, write the names of your eight closest neighbors. Write all their names in the boxes, each one represents another house.
Step number two, in the middle of the box, write some basic thing about those people. It can't be an observation that you could see from the street, it can't be that he drives a red car or that he gets up at seven in the morning to go to work, it has to be he's a carpenter, he likes fishing, something that you would only really know from a conversation, a basic level conversation, hey how are you going, picking up your mail, what do you like, that kind of thing. The third diagnosis, which you would write at the bottom, is some deeper level issue that's happening with that person at the time. Can't find a job, family member in hospital, that kind of thing, some deeper level something that's not just a basic conversation starter.
Now according to the book, and I think that these statistics are inflated, 10% of people can fill out the names of their closest eight neighbors. So in a room this size, it's probably seven or eight of us. And I think that's inflated. Maybe, I don't know. The second step, only 3% of people can fill out a basic something about those eight people. So in a room this size, that's maybe one or two.
Less than 1% can fill out an important something underlying life issue of all eight of their closest neighbors. Less than 1%. So in this room, it's probably zero. It might be, might not be, but it's probably zero. Now I'm not saying this to make you feel like a bad neighbor because I'm a bad neighbor as well.
I filled out three boxes and then guessed the name of the fourth box because I wasn't really sure. My point in this isn't that I'm good and that I know how to do this and you don't. My point is that none of us are really good at this anymore. And when it comes to this category of strangers without hope, our neighbors are an incredibly obvious one that we just don't put a whole lot of effort into. But what would it look like if Christians made a habit of getting to know their neighbors and caring for them, looking after their kids, helping them in times of need or even knowing when times of need exist.
Here's a crazy thought. Get your community group together. Throw a block party. They don't really exist anymore, but you can do it. Throw a block party. Invite ten of your closest neighbors.
How hard could it be? Set up a grill. Get some hamburgers grilling. Smoke up the area so that everyone can smell it down the street. Set up cornhole, can jam, frisbee, whatever you've got. Set it all out on the street.
Invite ten of your closest neighbors to come and hang out. And even if only three of them turn up, get to know them. Have the people in your community group. Get to know them and invite them to some stuff. Have a plan for what you're going to do the week after. Hey, we're all going fishing next week.
You want to come? Great. You know that field at the end of your street? Why not start a weekly soccer game there? Or t-ball game there? Or kickball game there?
Get all the kids from your neighborhood. If you don't have kids, don't do this. But if you've got kids, start up a regular game and you get to hang out with all these people from your neighborhood and it gets to be this regular rhythm that everyone gets to enjoy in the neighborhood. Why not start at work and get coffee with one person from work every Monday? Get to know them a little bit. Find out what they like doing.
Do something like that with them. Help the old lady next door taking her groceries. Take a buddy from work out to get wings. Get your group together and go to the markets. Either the nice ones downtown or the sketchy ones out on Augusta Road. Everyday mission is not as scary as it seems.
Making disciples of all nations doesn't have to be this heavy burden that we feel all of the time. It's not only for paid missionaries. It's not only for paid pastors. It's for us in the context of our community groups, our gospel centered communities who are out on mission. We can fulfill the great commission when we're intentional with the time that we already spend. It's not about freeing up time to make time to do this in excess.
We're already spending time anyway. Let's be intentional with the time that we already spend. We do it in the context of our gospel centered community. community, we have teammates who are there, surrounded by Jesus, who are able to help us out. So here's what we're going to do. Let me just explain everything and we're going to do it after I'm done explaining. Everyone should have a Mill City blue card.
If you don't have a blank one near you, you can get a blank one because there's some empty chairs. There's also some more at the back. Take out a blank card and take out a pen. We're going to write down the names of anyone who's come to mind throughout this entire time. Anyone who we know exists, who's a friend without hope. Write down anyone you work with who you want to reach with the gospel, who you want to invite to something.
Write down your neighbors. If you've got that annoying person at work, write that annoying person down. If there's a person that you don't like being around at work, write their name down. Then you're going to write down something that you know about that person next to it. It doesn't have to be important. It can be they like dogs.
It doesn't have to be super important. Write down whatever you can think of when it comes to that person. If the only thing you can think of is that they really annoy me, write that. Then we're going to spend some time praying for those people. We're going to play some house music and spend some time praying for those people. You can move around.
You can get people from your community group together. You don't have to stay where you are. And we're going to pray for those people. See if we can think up some kind of way to present to our community group that we can reach those people. Then on Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday, whenever you meet with your group, bring this list along.
This list is gold to your group. And in your group times, you get to talk about those people that you want to reach. You get to talk about things that you can do together, that you can make rhythms, fields that you can play soccer at, places you can walk your dog. Rangers where you can go shoot guns. You get to bring that list to your community group and brainstorm different ways that you as a group together can be a gospel-centered community on mission. So I'm going to pray.
We're going to play some music. Take some time to write some names down. Feel free to move around. And then after a few minutes have gone by, a chat's going to come up. This is it for us. We're going to spend time praying.
There's no more songs. Ted's going to come up later and close up with announcements and stuff, but this is what we're doing today. We're thinking about people that can be reached, people that we already know, things that they like doing, and we're going to pray for them. So I'm going to pray for us and then that's what we're going to do. Father God, we praise you and we thank you. We know that you can do immeasurably more than we expect, and we pray that you do that as a result of today.
And we know that you have the power to transform this city, and we pray that you use us to help do that. God, be showing us people in our lives that we can reach. Be showing us people in our lives who need hope. Teach us how to reach them and empower us with your mission. Pray that we can reach Columbia, that we can reach our friends, that we can reach our neighbors, and pray that you be with us until the end of the age as we do it. It's in your name we pray.
Amen.
Repentance and Growth
Transcript
My name is Chet. I'm excited to be here with you all this morning and for us to continue our Anchor Series. What we've been doing in our Anchor Series is looking at what is foundational for us as a church family, what we kind of anchor ourselves in so that what guides us and what leads us. And so that's going to be scripture, but it's going to be specifically how we understand that and how that plays out. And so what we've done so far is we've talked about kind of the gospel-centered portion of who we are. So we're all about Jesus.
We understand that it's about him changing us. It's not about our behavior. And so when we have sin struggles, we know that those are a symptom but not necessarily the root of the problem. And so we consistently apply the gospel to each other, point each other towards Jesus as it's him who changes us through his Holy Spirit. And then what we've moved into over the past two weeks is kind of the community section. So what we mean when we say we're a gospel-centered community on mission, what we mean by community.
And so last week Matt talked to us about church being a family, that we relate to one another that way. And so he went Galatians 4 where it talks about that we've been adopted. So Galatians is going to say that. Ephesians is going to say that. Romans is going to say that. Romans says that Jesus is the firstborn among many brothers.
And so we've actually been brought into God's family. John chapter 1 is going to say that we've been, through Jesus, given the opportunity to be children of God. And so then Matt was just talking about what that looks like and how that plays out and how we exist in relationship with each other. We looked at Acts chapter 2, which just talked about the early church and how they existed in relationship with one another. And so that's us. That's what we're shooting for.
That's why we do community groups, because we believe that the Christian faith has to happen in the context of relationships, that growth has to happen in the context of relationships. And so one of the things we say is that the content is always the gospel and the context is always community. So even when you're reading through the New Testament, most of the use in there are actually would be y'alls to us or use guys for like a handful of people that are part of our church family. But but it's y'all. It's written to a group of people. And so what we do as Americans is we immediately turn everything into rugged individualism.
And so we'll read even in the New Testament and we take it as this personal. This is what I have to do. And we do that to the exclusion. So we ought to respond personally, but we do that to the exclusion of relationships. We do that to the exclusion of this have having to happen in the context of real relationships with people. So we even see Jesus came to earth and spent most of his time with 12 guys.
Most of his time was spent with the 12 disciples and even more than that, a handful of three guys that he that he spent significant time pouring into and walking in life with. And so we often think that the spirituality and growth in spirituality is like a solo operation. Like it's like me on top of a mountain. Looking at a flower and weeping like we kind of feel like there's this we got to get away from everybody. And that's where that's where we'll grow the closest to God. So like when you're reading in Scripture, Jesus did that.
He went off by himself to pray. He went away by himself at times. But most of the time he was in relationship so that even when he goes and the transfiguration happens, which is where it's like this absolute mountaintop experience where Elijah and Moses show up and talk to God, which just just so you know, I don't know how legit your your quiet times are by yourself. But Moses and Elijah have never shown up and they don't show up and then talk to you. You may have read about them, but they don't show up. So Jesus does this has this absolute mountaintop experience.
And when he does, he's got three other guys with him. Because things happen and growth happens and life happens and discipleship happens in the context of community. So the next time you're talking to someone and they're like, man, I just need to spend some time, just me and Jesus, just some alone time. Just invite yourself. Be like, that sounds great. I'll come.
I'm just going to go to my cabin in the woods and just spend some time praying. Sweet. I love cabins. That'll be great. When are we going? Just invite yourself.
It's OK. It is OK to have some alone time, to spend some time absolutely fasting, praying, spending time alone. But I think too often we treat Christianity like it is a slow, solo operation and the Bible does not. And so what we're going to be reading here in Ephesians chapter three, as we get into this today, is Paul's going to be talking and he's just going to assume that the church is a family. He's just going to assume that we exist in relationships with each other. So every time it says you, it is it is the plural form of you.
It's it's written to y'all. He's writing to a church and he just assumes they have real relationships. And we'll see that as we go through. I'm going to pray and then we'll be in Ephesians chapter three. God, we just thank you for this opportunity. Thank you for who you are and what you've accomplished on our behalf.
And we ask, Lord, that your Holy Spirit would continually guide us to be church family. Help us walk through all the difficulties that come along with that. And that through that we would grow in a very real understanding of the gospel. In Jesus name. Amen. Before we get into this, I just want to highlight a few of the things I'd like for us to see as we spend time walking through Ephesians chapter four.
I want us to see that that it is understood that we would exist in relationships. I may have said Ephesians chapter three a couple of times, but I mean, I meant Ephesians chapter four. So. There you go. Ephesians three is good, but we're not going to be looking at it today. Ephesians chapter four.
As we walk through, I want us to see that for us as Christians, growth and discipleship happens in the context of community. That it has to we have to be around people and that in that we actually get to understand the gospel to a greater, greater depth. And so that's kind of what I want us to be able to see as we walk through this, as Paul walks through this entire section where he's writing to him. And so we'll see a few different things that he explains and points out to him. And we're going to be kind of moving kind of fast because we're looking at a whole chapter because we're ambitious this morning.
All right. Chapter four, verse one. I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord. So this is Paul writing and he's in jail. So he's like an actual prisoner.
He's not speaking metaphorically. He's in jail. I, prisoner. I, therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called. And so what he's talking about there when he says walk, he just means your life. I urge you to have your life be worthy of the calling to which you have been called.
The calling that they've been called and the calling we've been called is to be Christians. It's a calling into Christ, into salvation. And so he's saying live as if the gospel is true. Walk in a way that makes sense in light of the gospel. Verse two. With all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace.
Do you see what he automatically assumed as he told us to walk in life as Christians? He automatically assumes that we're in relationships with other people. And he automatically assumes we're in the type of relationships with other Christians that we're familiar with. Which is that we're a big, hot mess of sinners who love Jesus. Because what does he say we need? Humility.
Gentleness. Patience. You only need patience if you're around people for an extended period of time. And if they're annoying qualities, don't stop. Do you all understand that, right? That's what patience is.
So when you pray for more patience, what you are praying for is God, help this problem not stop. I don't pray for patience. I don't want it. I want the problem to stop. But that's what patience is.
It means that the problem continues. The frustration part continues. Here's what he says. With all humility, gentleness, and with patience. And Paul adds this in the list a good bit when he's writing these, and it's my favorite. Bear with one another.
He says put up with each other. That is so beautiful and freeing. Because what Paul doesn't write is, Dear church, as you become Christians, everything will be laughy and happy and rainbows and sunshine. And I don't know why he'd be like a weird English lady, but that's just how I assume if that's what he was saying. But that's not what he says.
What he says is be church family, and here's what you're going to need. Patience. And put up with each other, because it's going to be frustrating. And I can get on board with that. I'm like, oh man, he's been a part of my group. He's hung out with people like me.
I see Paul knows what he's talking about here. That's beautiful. He says humility, which is just if we all pull ourselves down a notch, if we all just assume other people are more important than us, that'll work out well. Gentleness just means graciousness to one another. And then patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Which means that we understand that we've all been called into the same church family, and we fight for unity.
So we don't put up with drama. We don't put up with awkwardness. We don't let situations just be like, ah, yeah, we kind of had a falling out. No, we don't accept that because we're eager to maintain unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Verse 4. There is one body, and as he talks about this, body means church family.
There's one body. We've been made a body in Christ. And so Corinthians is going to say that. Romans is going to say that. Ephesians is going to say that. That means that we exist with one another, the same relationship that your hand has with your foot.
You're on the same team. Something bad happens to your foot. That affects your hand. Something bad happens to your hand. You now have to pick things up with your foot. And it's a problem.
Like we exist in a body with one another. There's one body, church family, one spirit. That's the Holy Spirit that's come into our hearts as we've trusted in Jesus and been saved. Just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call, that one hope is an inheritance that we have in Christ. It's an inheritance we have that we know that we've been saved by Jesus to spend eternity with him. That's our hope.
Our hope is an inheritance, in a calling to heaven through Jesus and through Jesus' work, not our own. Just as you were called to the one hope which belongs to your call, one Lord, that's Jesus, one faith, that's faith in Jesus, one baptism. That's baptism. That's pretty straightforward. One God and Father of all. So he's God and he's Father.
We are a church family who is over all and through all and in all. So we exist unified in the faith. Verse 7. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift. Therefore it says, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives and he gave gifts to men. In saying he ascended, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth?
He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens that he might fill all things. Okay, so he quotes an Old Testament passage and then he explains it and his explanation is kind of confusing. But all he's saying is this passage is talking about Jesus. Because it assumes that he ascended. It's talking about him who came to earth for us. And so what it says is that when Jesus left, he led a host of captives.
And as we read in other places in Scripture, those captives are twofold. It's the people he set free and the enemies he's taken captive. And that's the way kings would work. When they went and conquered, when they would return, they would lead a triumphal procession of those that they had freed and those that they had enslaved. And so it's both his enemies and those who've been freed. And he gave gifts to men.
So he gifts his church, says by grace that he gifts his church to serve. And we're going to understand why here in a second. 11. And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds, and the teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry for building up the body of Christ. Okay, so we're not going to spend much time, any time, in apostle, prophet, evangelist, shepherd, teacher talking about what that is and how that plays out. That's going to be another sermon for another time.
But what we want to see as we look at this is two things. One is Paul says he's gifted us, which means that the church has been gifted. If you are a Christian, you have been gifted by God through the Holy Spirit to serve and that leadership and our giftings. So leadership in the church and our giftings have one purpose. 12. To equip the saints for the work of ministry.
And saints just means believers, those who are made right by God through Jesus. To equip the saints for work of ministry for building up the body of Christ. Leadership in the church and giftings in the church exist for one purpose. That the saints that the church might serve might do the works of ministry and in that the church would be built up. So that's affected how we exist as a church family.
So if you're a part of a church, if there's a church and only the leaders, only the pastors, only the people, the deacons or whoever they set it up, they're the only ones who can make decisions. They're the only ones who can come up with good ideas. They're the only ones who can lead any kind of ministry or service. They're the only ones. They've missed it. Because the role of leadership in the church is to equip saints to do ministry.
So when people talk about the person's a minister and they mean that they're the one who does all the ministry, I actually kind of missed the point. Because the role of leadership in the church is to equip church family to do ministry. And the role of giftings in the church is to serve church family so that everybody grows up. So just so you all know, if here is a part of our church family, if anytime somebody gets sick or has a problem or needs some counseling, and Matt has to be the one that comes and talks, has to be the one that comes and visits, which let's just be honest. If you're sick and having problems, you probably don't want me.
We want Matt. Like we want Matt to come hug us. We want Matt to come be nice to us. Like if I'm sick, I want Matt. I want Matt to come hug me and tell me it's going to be okay. But if that happens, we've actually missed the point.
Now, leadership in the church should do ministry because they are Christians. But the role of leadership in the church is actually to equip others and equip church family to do ministry. To all the things that the church is supposed to do. Serve and give and love and impact the city and pursue people with the gospel and help everybody grow. And actually when that happens, then the body grows. So one of the ways that we respond to this and one of the ways that we seek to apply this is in our community groups.
That that's where primary relationships happen. That's where pastoral care takes place. That's where people grow together and use their gifts to serve one another. It's in our community groups. That's why if somebody says, hey, I want to do this thing or the Lord's really been pressing on my heart that we need to go do a backpack ministry for BC Grammar. Awesome.
How can we help you? Like a lot of times we've we've outsourced ministry to the church and we try to run everything through church leadership so that someone feels called to do something. And they're going to go to church leadership and say, how can we do this? When the church leadership needs to respond with how can we help you do that? So just so you know, if you if you love the children at BC Grammar and you want to do a backpack ministry and you come tell me the Lord's been waking you up at night and calling saying we need to do that.
My response is going to be sweet. How can we help you do that? You say, well, our whole church needs to do that. No, our whole church is going to do a few things, which is community groups. We're going to gather on Sundays. And then our whole church has the freedom to do everything else as we serve and work together.
And if the Lord's been pressing something on your heart, it's because he specifically gifted you and calling you into that. And that's what gets to be beautiful as we all get to serve and work together. Does that make sense? You see how that's good? We'll get to see how that continues to play out. So to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ.
So as as the saints are equipped, the church grows, the bodies built up until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the son of God. As we all serve, as we all use our gifts, as we've all been specifically gifted to serve in the church, as that happens, we all grow. We all grow in unity and we all grow in our knowledge of the son of God. It's through serving that we better understand who Jesus is and what he's done. And it's through serving one another. You have been gifted by God to serve others.
See, I even think a lot of times in our talk of gifting in the in the American church, we think about it as a personal thing. So like, what are you gifted in? Where do you find your role? And it becomes about you. You're gifted by God for the for the benefit of everyone else. To build up the church.
Until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the son of God to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of fullness of Christ. Mature manhood in the Greek just means full grown man, which I love that because every once in a while you meet somebody and you're like, that's a full grown man. Like there are men and they're like adult men and then there are full grown men. And so as Christians, we all want to serve and we all want to work so that we can be Christians with like big man hand, like man paws and beards and back hair. You know, spiritually. Like we want to grow to be full grown men in the church is what it what he says to the measure of the fullness of the stature of Christ that as we all serve, as we all work, as we all toil together, we all grow to be more like Jesus.
And that's beautiful. See, what happens is the more people serve, the more people use their gifts, the less it is about people and the more it gets to be about Jesus. The more it gets to be about all the ways that he blesses and works and gives his grace and his giftings to his church family so that the church builds itself up. And the more that that happens, the more it gets to be about Jesus. So that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
You know, it's beautiful about all of the church pulling together and striving together. It's not easily led astray. One person who can say things in a very articulate way can't stand up and lead a large group of the church off into nonsense because the whole church has been serving and working and growing together. It doesn't happen. So it's beautiful about our groups.
I get to show up to my group and say, I was reading this and I was thinking I was thinking it was saying this. And my group gets to say, there's no way it was saying that because Roman says this. And I get to say, you're right. What I thought was stupid. It's very helpful. Thank you.
We don't get easily led astray as we all grow together. 15. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into Christ. We use that speaking the truth in love. A lot of times I think people use it as like, I'm going to say something mean to you. I'm going to speak the truth in love to you, brother.
You ought not sing in front of people. It's like, well, OK, we should say true things to one another and we should say it in a gracious, loving way. But really, the truth is the gospel. And so we speak in love. We speak the gospel to each other. We point each other back to Jesus.
And as that happens, as we all serve and we all work and we all use our gifting, as that happens, we grow up into Jesus. And it gets to be about him, not about us. Verse 16. from whom, from Jesus, from Christ, from whom the whole body joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow. That's Jesus makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. When all of us pull together, when all of us use our giftings, the whole church grows. We grow into Jesus and Jesus helps us grow and we build each other up.
That's why community groups are important for us because we look at scripture and we don't see how we're going to do some of the things that it calls us to do unless we're in real relationships with each other. And in our community groups, we're designed to serve one another. So you've got somebody in your group that just relationally has way more friends than anybody should ever have. Like there's probably someone in your group that just, they can keep up with everybody. They know everybody. They're constantly introducing you to people they genuinely have friendships with.
Like it annoys you how many friends they have. Like you don't think they should have that many friends. Like no one person should have that many friends, but they're gifted that way. And so we get to grow together. Some of you hadn't made a friend since middle school. Not very gifted there.
God hasn't gifted you in the ability to just make a friend. Like you start a conversation, it gets awkward and you bail. Like you consistently are like, hey, this is a nice conversation. You run it into the ground and then you go, all right, this is good, good talking. You're not designed to do it, but in your group, you have something you're gifted to do. Maybe you are amazing in a kitchen.
Maybe you are amazing when it comes to service. You love not having to talk and having to be at the front of things, but you're going to make sure everything's clean. You're going to make sure everybody has what they need because God's gifted you to serve and to help. And the person who relationally connects to everybody maybe can't have a real deep conversation with anyone. It goes beyond ha ha ha ha and they're over their head. And there's just one person in your group that immediately can turn conversations and handle spiritual things and go towards the gospel.
Some of you, when someone's hurting, the best you've got is like, there, there, there, there, there, there, there, there. Like that's what you got. But you can, you can show up and help them work. You can show up and help serve. You're going to take care of logistic things for them while they're dealing with problems. You're going to make sure that people bring food to their house, but someone else is going to be the person sitting on the couch crying with them.
You've been gifted by the Holy Spirit for your church family. And if we are not consistently figuring out how we've been designed to, to, to serve each other, we actually hurt the body because we're designed to use our gifts so that the body builds itself up. So we actually get to begin to pray about and ask God, how am I supposed to serve my community group? How am I supposed to serve my church family? What have you gifted me to do? And we're going to get to see how this helps us grow.
We already see how it helps the rest of our church family grow, but we'll get to see as we look through the rest of this, how it helps us grow. So, um, Paul in this next section, we're going to kind of read through it pretty quickly. What he's going to say basically is this, you used to not be a Christian. Now you are, you have a new identity in Christ, not you did these things and it made you a Christian. He's going to say, no, Jesus made you a Christian through what he's done. Now live like it.
So we, we can't get that backwards. You can't get it as you do stuff and get to become a Christian. And then you get to live that way to keep it together. No, it's Jesus did stuff. He saved us through his work, not ours. That's the gospel.
We became Christians and then we get to live like it as we have a new identity. Okay. And then he's going to explain kind of how that looks as we read through the rest of this chapter. So now this, I say and testify in the Lord that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles. And in this particular situation, it just means those who don't know Jesus in the futility of their minds. And they are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to their hardness of heart.
They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But this is not the way you learned Christ, assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him as the truth is in Jesus to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds and to put on the new self created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. And so Jesus makes us new. He creates us in righteousness and holiness. And then we get to walk in that.
And so here's how he explains how we get to do that. And again, we'll see that it's all relational. It has to do with being in real relationships. Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger and give no opportunity to the devil.
Let the thief work with his own hands so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. Let no corrupting talk come from out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. Okay.
So here's what Paul says. Walk in the new life you've been given. And then he tells us what that looks like. And it's all relational. Don't lie to each other. Don't be fake.
That's an invitation. That's not a command. It is kind of a command, but it's an invitation. Just so you know, if you're in a community group, you have a couple of options. You can be a fake version of yourself, a pretend version of yourself, and people can like the pretend version of you, but that is tiring and very difficult to keep up. And it's not real.
What he says is be honest, be open, be real. And then you actually get to find that you get to be a messed up sinner that a bunch of people love anyway. You get to be the real, uh, non-fake, non-cleaned up version of yourself and get to see how freeing that is as a group of people rally around. I always, I always think it's funny when something happens in our groups and somebody like something comes out and it turns out that they're worse than everybody thought. Um, and they're usually like, I just don't want people to think, um, you know, and it's like, what a sinner? Braswell brought us together.
We knew you were a sinner. You've been having it together for too long. We all assumed you were faking. We're glad this came out. Now we get to actually begin to grow.
We get to actually walk this out like it's good and healthy. Our goodness didn't bring us together. Our sin did. So when we find out that we're broken, all it does is point to how good Jesus is. So he says, be honest, be real with each other.
Then he says this, be angry, but don't sin. Don't let the sun go down on your anger. You know what he assumes as you exist in relationships with each other? You're going to get mad. Isn't that nice? And he says, be angry, just work it out.
Like don't, don't linger on that. Don't let that hang out. Don't, don't go, don't let the sun go down on that. So he says, work out problems, relational problems quickly. Don't hold onto them. He says, uh, change the former man of your life.
So if you used to steal, don't steal anymore. Like he goes through this whole list and then he ends it with this, forgive each other. So he says, do this, do this, do this, do this, live like this. And then he gets to the end and he goes, okay, guys. All right, team, you're going to mess that up.
So forgive each other. Let me tell you something that is true about our church family. If you hang out long enough, one of two things will happen. And if you keep hanging out, both will. If you hang out long enough, one of two things will happen. If you keep hanging out, both will either someone in our church family will hurt you, will offend you, will fail you, will sin against you, or you will hurt somebody, offend them, fail them, or sin against them.
Either you will be sinned against or you will sin against someone if you hang out long enough in real relationships. And here's what's beautiful. We get to forgive each other. Through the cross, we've been forgiven. So we actually get to forgive as we live in real relationships.
And here's the thing. If you don't live in real relationships, you won't have to have patience. You won't have to bear with anyone. You won't have to forgive anyone. And you'll actually have a shallow understanding of God's grace towards you. Because it's only when I have to forgive someone that I realize how costly forgiveness is.
And I appreciate all the more the cross. And it's only the people that we exist in real relationships with that we have to have patience for. My wife, Anna, has to have the most patience for me than anyone else in the world. Because she's around me all the time. She has to bear with me than more than anyone else in the world. And the truth is, is we walk in real relationships in our community groups.
We get to have patience with each other. We get to bear with one another. And we get to repent. And we get to forgive. Hang out long enough and you'll be on both ends of that. You'll have to go to someone and say, I failed.
I sinned against you. I've been angry with you. And I hadn't talked to you about it. I allowed this awkward situation to get in between us. And we never worked it out. And I was wrong.
And I'm sinful. And I need you to forgive me. And then they actually get to apply the gospel, which is that Jesus forgave them. So they get to forgive you. And it's a process. And if you hang out long enough, you'll be on both ends of it.
And the truth is, in both sides of that, we get to remember the gospel and we get to grow in it. I want us to see one thing as we look in, as how he moves into this next section. Of course, the chapters and verses were added later. So I feel like this is the same kind of thought process. But therefore, this is chapter five.
Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children. So remember, we're a family. And walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and a sacrifice to God. So here's what he says. Be imitators of God as children of God. Love one another.
Walk in love and realize that that Jesus gave himself up as an offering and a sacrifice for us as he loved us that much. Tim Keller, who's really smart. He's a pastor in New York, and he writes really smart things. He's kind of like C.S. Lewis, but he's alive. He says this when it talks about loving people.
And I just thought this was helpful. It's this whole section on how loving people is difficult, but he starts it off this way. He says, think about it. If you love a person whose life is all put together and has no major needs, it costs you nothing. It's delightful. There are probably four or five people like that where you live.
You ought to love. You ought to find them and become their friend. That's nice. He says, think about it. If you love someone who's got their life all put together, it costs you nothing. And it's nice.
It's delightful. Find those people and be their friend. And then he says, but the rest of love doesn't look like that. And he goes to this whole section and explains that all of love is sacrifice. And that's what we see in this chapter, this verse where it says, walk in love, just as Jesus loved us and was a sacrifice for us. Here's how this works.
My wife and I are about to have a baby in a couple of weeks. It's supposed to be like 30 days from now, but Anna's hoping that he comes early because she's getting really tired of him kicking her. I'm hoping he doesn't come super early because I'm enjoying like being able to sleep at night and stuff because he doesn't kick me. He doesn't keep me up. But here's what I understand.
We don't have any kids, but here's what I understand about children. Uh, cause I've been doing some research online and talking to people. Um, here's what I understand about children. Uh, they don't really pull their own weight for like some years. Like they're pretty useless when it comes to like chores and accomplishing things and like making money. I think it's like upwards of like seven years before you can like get them in the workforce and they start really, really pulling their weight around the house.
Uh, here's what we understand when it comes to love. It takes sacrifice to love somebody. It just does. Real love is going to involve sacrifice. It's going to involve sacrificing time. It's going to involve.
So as we raise our son, we're going to have to sacrifice. He's going to take up our time. He's going to, he's going to monopolize our time in a lot of ways. He's going to, I'm going to be involved in less than interesting conversations. Like he's going to be, I'm going to be like, bro, you're babbling nonsense. I don't even understand half of what you're saying.
And that show is dumb. I don't want to talk about it. Like, wait till you get something interesting to say, we'll talk. No, I can't do that. I have to be like, really? Wow.
You did what? Even if I can't understand what he's saying, like, I've got to do that. So he'll grow. I have to sacrifice so that he'll grow. I have to sacrifice time and energy and money and effort. And that's what love looks like.
And if I didn't do that, I wouldn't love him. Like if you saw parents that weren't willing to sacrifice for their children, you'd be like, there's something wrong in this situation because all love involves sacrifice. And we know that. Let's say you're in high school and there's a girl that's considered a geeky. And some people don't really hang out with her, but you notice this. And so you, you want to be your friend.
Like you want to go out of your way to be nice to her because life seems rough. So you do, you start hanging out with her, you start talking to her and I don't know, maybe a week into this, your friends come over and say, why are you talking to her? Why are you hanging out with her? What's happened? Her geekiness has rubbed off on you. You, you can't love her without taking on some of her qualities, without taking on some of what makes her unlovable by other people.
You have to pour out some of your coolness and take on some of her geekiness. But that's how love works. If you're in a community group and there's someone in your group that's just needy, they're hurting, life hasn't been good for them right now, they're just emotionally down, they're depressed. If you spend time with them, the only way for them to be undepressed, for them to be, come out of being down is for you to pour out your joy, for you to actually let them drain you. It's the only way to love them. It's through sacrifice.
It's through taking your time and your energy and your joy and pouring it out on their behalf to be a substitutionary sacrifice for them, which is what Jesus was for us. All love is sacrifice. We can't bear each other's burdens unless we carry some of the weight. The problem with the Christian church in America so often is that I'm going to bear your burden unless some of the burden gets on me, which doesn't make any sense. Like that's my favorite way to move things. Like in my community group, we have to move people all the time because they never stop moving for some reason.
The best is when they're moving far away because then you don't have to do it once. You just pack them up and you're like, peace. Just kidding, guys. These crosstown moves are killing me though. So I was talking to Logan the other day.
He's moving and he was explaining who was helping him. He goes, yeah, and we've got your truck. And I was like, bro, I haven't even told you how to help you yet. Like, I don't know why you're just assuming my truck. I'm like, are you going to drive it? I didn't say that.
I thought it. That's why he was laughing hard back there because I didn't. This is just things I think, guys. Here's the thing. If somebody's moving something and I'm going to help, I actually have to shoulder some of the weight. I can't just stick my hands under.
That's my favorite. It's like, just follow somebody and be like, I'm spotting you. You pull your back. I'll catch you. Like, no, you actually have to carry some of the weight. And as we walk in life together, we actually have to give up some of our energy, some of our joy, some of our, we have to bear some of our burdens.
We have to actually, to be generous, have to open our wallets to help someone else out. That's how that works. And if we don't do that, we miss out on the opportunity to grow because we miss out on an opportunity to align ourselves with Jesus and understand the depth of his generosity, the depth of his love and the depth of his sacrifice and how difficult it is to forgive. If we never walk in relationships, we miss all of that. Not only does our church family not get served as we pour ourselves out for them, but we actually miss out on understanding the reality and the weight of the gospel. See, too often we approach our groups and we approach churches by, what am I getting out of this?
And we miss the point. If you show up to your group and think, oh, you know, people talk to you and say, yeah, I just wasn't getting fed there. I just wasn't getting anything out of that. Or it just wasn't, it wasn't meeting my needs. They've missed the point because they were gifted specifically to pour themselves out. And real love is going to involve sacrifice.
And so when everybody in your community group starts showing up and saying, how can I serve? I exist for these other people. My gifts are here for these other people. I'm going to pour out for these other people. That actually gets to be a beautiful group. Everybody gets to grow and it gets to be about Jesus.
And it's beautiful. When we were about to plant a church, I was up in Lynchburg. I was going to school and I was talking to a pastor who's solid guy, has done a lot of stuff, was a pastor of a big church and his dad's like a brain genius. And, um, he was talking to me and he said, his dad had been a professor forever, actually like started a school. And he said to me, he said, um, he said, okay, you're going to do groups and that's cool to help people grow as disciples and stuff. Cause I was, you know, I had my plan for what we were going to do.
And, uh, he said, uh, but my dad's 80. He's been in the church forever. He knows the Bible backward and forward. He doesn't need to be in one of your groups. What does he need to do? Like, what would you have for him?
And so I, that was a legitimate, like I was thinking about it. I was like, okay. Um, and I was like, I don't know. So I spent more time praying about it. And then I realized that the whole understanding, the approach to that was just off. First of all, he's gifted for the benefit of others.
So actually he might think he doesn't need a group, but the group needs him to share wisdom, to point them out to where they're off in the gospel, where they're not understanding the Bible clearly. It needs him to teach and to lead and shepherd. And here's the other thing. He doesn't get to grow. If he's not in relationships, he won't get to forgive unless I get to take him off. He won't get to bear with someone unless he consistently is around me so that I can annoy him.
Like that's how that works. He actually gets to grow, even though we would look at him in our, in our culture and say, Oh, he knows everything. Yeah. But he doesn't get to apply it unless he's having to forgive, unless he's having to bear with people, unless he's having to have patience, unless he consistently has me sit down across from him and completely misunderstand what he taught me the week before. Then he needs patience.
Then he needs to bear with somebody. You see, we all get to grow as we have real relationships. And when Paul's walking through this and saying, we're gifted to serve one another, he's saying that you were designed to be in relationships with each other. This is just how it works. So don't miss that.
If you're not in a community group and you say, I'm a Christian, get in a group because it's how we grow. It's how we get to be around each other in normal life so that we can see how we ought to apply the gospel to one another, how we ought to walk through life together. If you're in a group, pour yourself out. Realize that all love is sacrifice and that we're empowered by the sacrifice that Jesus made on the cross to actually love one another, to actually forgive. And that as we have to do that, we'll grow. We'll all grow as we pour ourselves out, as we go beyond how far we thought we could bear, as we deal with people that are frustrating, as we have to repent and as we have to forgive.
We'll come to love the gospel in a way that we never thought we could. And we'll become a part of a real family. And there's a lot of joy there. So we'll be messy. Yes, we'll be difficult. We'll be hard.
We'll be frustrating. Will you be absolutely worn out at times? Yes. But will it be beautiful and good? And will it make much of Jesus? Yes.
And as we do it, we'll all get to grow. So don't miss out. Josh and Bianca and Raz are going to come back up and we're going to sing as a church family together. And that's all I would say is to realize that you've been gifted by God to serve others, that you exist for the benefit of your group, not the other way around, that we're designed to pull together, to serve together, to grow together in all the ways that God's gifted us to do that. And if you're not, you're missing out. You're missing out on the beauty that comes from being in real relationships with real sinners who have a real savior.
So don't miss out. Let's pray. God, we thank you that through your sacrifice and through your forgiveness and through your love that we can have real relationships, that you have made us into a family and that it's our brokenness and our messiness that brings us together because it's your righteousness and holiness that saves us. So God, I pray that we wouldn't settle for surface level, that we wouldn't settle for fake, but that we'd be real because none of us through our good behavior saved ourselves. And as we're real, God, and as we're open and as we're broken and as we're frustrating to one another, I pray that you would empower us through the gospel to forgive and to sacrifice and to love in a real way.
We ask God that your Holy Spirit would move, begin to show us how we ought to serve, where you have gifted us, for those of us who don't know. That you'd help us to point out in each other where there's growth and where there's gifting. God, we just ask that as we all serve and as we all pull together and as we all do ministry, that you would build your church and that it would get to be all about you and that you would get all the glory from it as your entire family serves and works and uses the gifts that you gave them. We ask you to work in and among us and we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.
Y'all stand, let's sing.
Church as Family
Transcript
It's good to see you guys this morning. My name is Matt. I'm one of the pastors here with Mill City Church. And it is an honor and a privilege to continue on with you guys in our Anchor Series. So we're in about the middle of it.
And the question that we've been seeking to answer is, what does the Bible say about the church? And then from that, how do we live that out as Mill City Church, as a local church body, as a gospel-centered community on mission? And so we've kind of taken it in those chunks. For three weeks, we looked at what is this idea, what does it mean to be centered around the gospel, the good news that Jesus saves? So we took one Sunday and just looked at the gospel message as we see it from the book of Romans.
We looked at Romans 1 through 6. And we see that we were created to worship God, but we choose to worship other things instead. We saw that we all fall short, and there's no amount of work that can fix this. But Jesus died to pay our debt and to make us right with God, so we're saved by His work and not ours. That's the gospel message that we're saved by Jesus' work and not ours. And coming out of that, it's the message, but it's also more than that.
It's how does that impact our lives on a day-in and day-out basis. So two weeks ago, we looked at the idea of gospel fluency. Since the gospel is the story that changes everything for us, it impacts everything. It impacts the way we think. It impacts the way we speak. It impacts the way we view the world and live in a relationship with other people.
And then last week, we just took that a step forward. Since the gospel applies to all of life, it actually applies to my individual life. And we talked about what it looks like to apply the gospel to our hearts, because our hearts are prone to wander and to drift. And when we speak that gospel truth back into it, it brings us back into right understanding of living in relationship with God. So today, we're switching gears just a little bit.
We're moving from this idea of gospel-centered to talking about what it means to be a community. And what we're going to see throughout the entire New Testament is that the way that believers grew in their understanding of the gospel, grew in their understanding of how to follow Jesus, was in the context of community, of living in real relationship with other people. And I think part of the reason that is, is that the society in that day, the culture in that day, was very communal. Like people had to live in a relationship with each other, which is actually very different than the culture that we live in.
We live in a very individualistic society, where most people are just kind of looking out for number one. So the money that they make from their job, or how they spend their time, or with their hobbies, is we live in an individual society where most people will say, you take care of you, you take care of your family, and then whatever else you have left, whether that be time, or money, or resources, whatever, you can use that to, to be in relationship with other people, or to bless other people. And so we see that. That's one way to think about it. I heard someone say that it seems like in America, the goal is for you to work a good nine to five Job, to get a good paycheck, to be able to go home, and not have to talk to anybody, watch TV for four hours, and then go to bed.
Like that's the individualistic American dream. And I don't think, I don't think it's because we don't want to be in relationship with other people. I really don't think that's it. I think we just don't feel like we need to be in relationship with other people. That people aren't a necessity. That relationships aren't important.
Don't enhance life. Don't make it better. And the culture of Jesus' day didn't see it that way. They needed each other. And as we look at places in scripture today, what we're going to see is that this idea of community, or relationships, it's expressly taught, some, but it's way more just implied in the relationships that people shared as believers, as they lived out this community together. That's what the culture was like at the time.
And Jesus shows up on the scene, and begins to preach a gospel to everyone, that salvation is for everyone. He's preaching to the Jews. So the Jews were God's chosen people that lived in relationship with him, that he said that he was going to love, and to bless, and to multiply. And Jesus comes preaching a salvation for everybody. And through his death and resurrection, he opens up access to God for everyone. And the entire New Testament is this beautiful story of all these different kinds of people coming together and figuring out what it looks like to follow Jesus in relationship with each other.
And the Bible is going to describe those relationships as a family. That's the word that's going to be used. So today, that's absolutely what we're talking about, is the idea of church as a family. And I just want to say this, before we dive into the scripture, I realize that family is not the easiest thing for everyone to talk about. So we all come into this room from different backgrounds, different experiences.
And in fact, when I said the word family, some of you went ahead and checked out, because you don't want to talk about it. The pain, the emotions, the feelings that you have, whether it be from a divorce, or some type of abuse, or just a bad home life that you grew up in, or are a part of now, you don't want to talk about family. And so what I want to ask you this morning is regardless of your background, regardless of how you walked into this room, I just want you to open up your mind and open up your heart to this idea of family that the Bible is going to talk about. Because I believe if you do, it will change everything.
Just like it did for Josh and Nadine, it will change everything for you. And I'm going to pray that God would help us to do that. So you guys pray with me. God, we ask that you would help us grasp this idea that you have made us into a family. God, it wouldn't just be something that we know or something that we recognize, but it would change us. God, it would change the way we live, the way we speak, it would change the way we lived in relationship with other people.
God, I pray for everyone in the room, regardless of the family background that we've walked into this room with, I pray that you would redeem that idea and you would give us a beautiful picture of what your word says you have invited us into. I pray that you would do that through your Holy Spirit. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so if you got a Bible, go ahead and grab that. And if you didn't bring one with you, look to your right or to your left, because this scripture isn't going to be on the screen. So just grab one of those Bibles that we have sitting on the seats.
We're going to be in Galatians chapter four. Galatians is in the New Testament. If you got the blue and white Bible, it's going to be page 623. And if you don't have a Bible, we want you to take that one with you when you leave. We have lots of these and we want everyone to have a Bible. So please take one of these with you when you go.
Okay, the book of Galatians is a letter that Paul is writing to a church that's in the Southern province in the Roman Empire. Okay, and what we know from the book of Acts about Paul is that Paul becomes a Christian. He becomes a believer and he starts going on these different missionary journeys. Yes. Well, and you know what? I'm a little dyslexic, guys.
I told them it was. So if you go to 623, I don't know where you're going to be, but if you'd like to join us in 632, sorry about that. But anyway, so this is a letter that Paul's writing to the church in Galatia. So when Paul became a Christian, he began to go out on these missionary journeys and one of the areas he ends up is in Galatia. Paul shares the gospel. People become Christians.
They begin to follow Jesus. He begins to teach them what it means to be a disciple and they start a church there. And then Paul moves on from that place. And we know that by this time, there are many churches in this area. And what Paul, the purpose of Paul writing this letter is to continue instructing them in how to follow Jesus in normal, everyday life as a church family. And that's important for us.
That's important for us to remember that Paul is speaking to a church family because I want us to listen to this as a church family. I want to hear this as a collective. So chapter 4, verse 4 on page 632, if your Bible looks like this, let's read it together. Verse 4, But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law. Okay, let's stop there. All right, this is what we've been talking about for the last couple of weeks.
This is the gospel message. What it said here is that God sent Jesus, born of a woman, conceived of by the Holy Spirit, which meant that Jesus was fully God and fully man. So Jesus was God in human form. And it says that he sent Jesus to be under the law. The law, God gave the law to his people to tell them how to live in relationship with him and with each other. So it says that he sent him to be under the law.
But here's the catch. Nobody could live up to the law. That's what we talked about in our first week, is that no amount of work could fix this. Nobody could live up to it. And so it says that he sent him to be under the law to redeem those who were under the law, which is this beautiful picture that Jesus comes and he lives a perfect, sinless life. He perfectly obeys God's law, perfectly lives in relationship with God, and then he dies to pay for the fact that we never could have lived perfectly in relationship with God.
And in doing so, he paid for our sin. That's the gospel message, and that's important because Paul, before he goes into how this plays out, he just sets the stage again. He said, here's the gospel that Jesus came to redeem us, and then it begins to give us the practical outworking of what that means. It continues on. We'll read verse 5 again and keep going. to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. To redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons.
And that's beautiful. That the reason that Jesus came wasn't just to save us, but it was to adopt us as sons. That Jesus, in doing this, was creating a new family that was made possible for those who placed faith in him. And I want you to think about this idea of adoption for a second. I want you to think about adopted parents versus biological parents. And this idea of adoption.
How many of you know someone who's gone through the adoption process? Okay, so kind of all across the room. It's insane what you have to go through to adopt a child. So you have to fill out a ton of paperwork. You have to have all these different background checks. You have to go through interviews.
They come to your house and look through how your house is set up. They not only interview you, but they interview your family. They interview your friends. And then when you add into that the cost, oh man, it costs a ton of money. Thousands upon thousands of dollars. And especially if you're adopting somebody from overseas, you have to pay for the adoption and pay for the plane ticket to go over there.
And a lot of times ending up in another country, you're just paying to fly out there for another interview. And then you've got to fly back and then they let you know and then you get to fly back over and you get to pay for another ticket as you bring your adopted child home. Adoption is very costly. And it's absolutely the same thing for God. It costs Jesus his life to adopt us into his family. And in an adopted family, and think about an earthly family for a second.
Biological children and adopted children have the same rights and same status within a family. But how much more grateful is the adopted child because they were chosen? The parents could have could have left them, not provided for them, not protected them, not cared them, just left them out on their own. But how much more grateful is the adopted child because they were chosen? And it costs a lot. And that's absolutely what's true for us.
That God was willing to allow his son to be murdered to bring us in to adopt us into his family. It gets better. It gets better. Keep reading with me. Go back to verse 6. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts crying, Abba, Father.
So you are no longer a slave, but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God. I'm going to read that one more time. And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son into our hearts crying, Abba, Father. So you are no longer a slave, but a son.
And if a son, then an heir. So for those that have placed faith in Jesus to redeem them, it says that God sends his spirit into them to cry, Abba, Father. Just this beautiful picture of family. And we can kind of gloss over that and not catch it because Abba is actually the Aramaic word that means Father. but it's way more relational than Father is for us. It's much more akin to the word Daddy. How awesome is that?
I want you to think about that. The creator of the universe is allowing us to be brought into a family where the relational tie is where he's our Daddy. That's absolutely beautiful that we've been, as verse 7 says, that we're no longer slaves. We're not slaves to sin. We've been made sons. And God is our Daddy and not only sons but an heir.
The inheritance that we have as sons is salvation, is God himself. It's his presence. And the reason that it says sons and not sons and daughters, it's not trying to be exclusive. So it isn't just saying only the males. No, no, no. What God is showing us is actually the nature and the value of the adoption that Jesus' redemption brings us.
You see, in this culture, the way that inheritance was passed down was from male descendant to male descendant. It was passed from father to sons. And the way that females were blessed in this culture or taken care of was through the finances that were provided by the males. And what Paul is saying here is that men, women, and children alike are given the new standing as sons in this new family. Which means that all of us are heirs. And here's another thing.
Don't miss this. Not only are we given Jesus' right standing with God, we're also given his relational standing. not only does Jesus take care of our sin, but we're seen as sons. We're given his relational standing as well and it changes everything. What we're looking at is the theology behind this idea that we've been made into a family, that we've been changed forever, that our identity is no longer in ourselves, but it's in Jesus and in this family that he's invited us into. That's what we mean when we say that Mill City Church is a gospel-centered community on mission. That's what we mean.
It's a family and we're not just talking about it in means of the relationships that we're aiming to grow. No, no, no. This is a declaration of what God has made us into. We've been made into a new family for those that have placed faith in Jesus to redeem them. That's why the New Testament letters are written to brothers. It's a shout-out to this family of people that come from all different walks of life, all different backgrounds.
I want you to look around the room for a second. Not for real. Y'all still looking at me. Look around the room for a second. Okay. For those that have placed faith in Jesus, you have been made into a new family.
Just as much family as your flesh and blood family. real family. That's what Jesus has made us into. All right. So we're tracking. We're getting this idea. We're understanding.
Like we can see it very clearly from Scripture. This isn't just something that we talk about. It's absolutely true. It's what Jesus has done. He's made us into a family. So the question then becomes, okay, I'm on your team.
That's true. How does that play out in life? What does that actually mean? How does that affect me on a day in and day out basis? And what we're going to do is we're going to take a zoomed overview. We're going to zoom kind of through the New Testament here.
We're going to look at a little bit of Jesus' interactions with people. We're going to look at how the early church lived in relationship with each other as we see it in Acts. And we're going to kind of talk about the New Testament so that we can begin to see this idea of church as family. What does it look like? Because here's the deal. This wasn't so much commanded as it was assumed because of their culture.
You're not going to see Jesus sit down. You're not going to see two chapters in the gospel where it says Jesus sat down and told them how to be family. It doesn't say that. It just shows how they followed him in relationship with each other. It's way more fish than water. Y'all get that illustration, right?
No. That's why I'm going to explain it. Okay. If I was going to, so if I was going fishing and I was telling you about the bass that I was trying to catch, all right, you tracking with me? I'm going to tell you about that bass. At no point do I have to tell you that that bass is in water.
No point do I have to do that unless I'm talking to the part where I hooked him, battered him, fried him, and then we ate him together, which is the intended purpose of the fish's life. But if I'm telling you about the fish, if I'm telling you about what the fish ate, how it moves, how it breathes, at no point do I have to remind you that the fish is in water. And that's very much the way the Bible treats this idea of living in family. It's not, it's expressly taught some, but it's way more understood in the relationships that we're going to see. So again, if you're a note taker, you may just want to jot down some of the references rather than try to flip back and forth in your Bible because we're going to kind of go all over the place.
The first place I want to go is Matthew 12, 46 through 50. Matthew 12, 46 through 50. We're going to have it up here on the screen. It says this, while he, and this is talking about Jesus, while he was still speaking to the people, behold, his mother and his brother stood outside asking to speak to him. But he replied to the man who told him, who is my mother and who are my brothers?
And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, here are my mother and my brothers for whoever does the will of my father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother. Okay. So Jesus is hanging out with people and it says that his mom and his brother show up and someone says, hey, your mom and your brother are outside. And he said, who are my mom and brothers? It's not like Jesus forgot. He didn't just have a moment there because he then points to his disciples and he says, here are my mom and brothers.
Whoever obeys my father's will is my mother or, I'm sorry, I said father or mother, mother or brothers. Okay. Here's another one. This is another interaction of Jesus with people and this is going to come from John 19. Okay. This is at the end of Jesus' life.
He's giving his life. He's on the cross. It says this, but standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother and his mother's sister, Mary the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene. When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to his mother, woman, behold your son. Then he said to the disciple, behold your mother.
And from that hour the disciple took her to his own house. Okay. So Jesus is on the cross and it says the disciple whom he loved, which is John, which is my favorite. Like John calls himself that. This is John writing the gospel. You know, it's a little cocky, John.
Take it easy. But it's true. He did. He did love John. And as he's dying, he gives the care of his mother to his disciple. And it's not that Jesus didn't have other brothers.
We just saw that in the passage before and we know that from other passages in scripture. But there's some amount of, but they didn't believe in him yet. We know that from, we know later that they become Christians and they follow him. But he hands care over of his mother to his disciple. So Jesus begins, is beginning to change this dynamic.
He's beginning to shift our understanding of earthly family and this new faith family that he's creating. And then Jesus rises from the dead and then he ascends into heaven. And so these believers, these disciples and others that he had spent time with, they just go into action. They begin living like the words, the things that Jesus had taught them, the things that Jesus had showed them. And we get a very clear picture of that in Acts chapter 2. We get to see this, this new family playing out.
Acts chapter 2, starting in verse 42. You might be familiar with this. And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And all came upon every soul. And many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common.
And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple, I'm sorry, and day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. It says that they shared all of their possessions, that they spent time together, that they prayed together. What you see there is a picture of a new family, that their understanding of family had been radically changed.
They realized that the only way that they could follow Jesus was in the context of these family relationships with other believers. And that makes perfect sense when you tie together with what we've already seen that Paul says to the church in Galatian, the Galatian church, they've been made into a new family and so they're absolutely going to live that way in their relationships with other people. But here's the problem with that. That messes with our Western minds, right? When I say that you should be living in relationship with other people and sharing your faith with them and that's actually how you grow, don't, don't, some of us just kind of go, really, I think I can handle it on my own.
In fact, the thought of Jesus ignoring his mom and his brothers when they came to visit makes most of us cringe. Right? Just a little bit. What about honoring our mothers and fathers? Isn't that one of the commandments is Jesus saying that I shouldn't obey that commandment? No, he's not saying that.
I mean, we see very much that Jesus has a deep love and compassion for his mother. He entrusts her to one of his dearest friends and his disciples. But what all of these passages are emphasizing is this idea that the new family is going to play as significant a role in our lives just as much as our earthly family. So is Jesus saying that we shouldn't spend time with our spouses or with our kids? No. But is Jesus saying that this new faith family is to be viewed the same way?
Same amount of love? Same amount of care? Same amount of compassion? Energy? Absolutely. Now, before mothers start to take off their shoes and hurl them at the stage at the thought of not being able to spend time with their children, it's not to the exclusion of our families.
It's an extension of it. Think about the entire New Testament for a second. Again, this is the zoomed out version. Jesus spent the three years of his ministry with twelve dudes. Some of them were fishermen. Some of them were tax collectors.
One of them was a zealot. And here's why that's funny. A tax collector basically worked for the Roman Empire getting money for them. A zealot was someone who absolutely wanted to overthrow the Roman Empire. So next time you're in a conversation in your community group, realize that the tax collector and the zealot probably wouldn't have had a whole lot in common too.
But, they learned to follow Jesus in relationship with each other. It was in relationships that Jesus poured into them and they learned to follow Jesus in relationship with each other. And then Jesus ascends and we see the early church doing the same thing. And now the barrier has been broken down. Salvation isn't just for the Jews, it's now for the Jews and the Gentiles which means it's for everyone. And this early church is learning how to live in relationship with each other because they've been separated for so long the door has been thrown wide open.
As you read the letter to the church at Rome, at Colossae, at Philippi, at Thessalonica, you're going to read through it. And what those letters are going to be is it's going to put the gospel on display and then it's going to talk about how do you live that in relationship with other people. In fact, more often than not when you're reading those letters, when you see the pronoun you, it's usually not singular. More often than not it's going to be plural. The idea that the letter is being written to y'all. It's not written in there like that but it is to y'all and it's to be understood and lived out in the context of community.
In fact, if you just read through the New Testament you're going to see a whole bunch of these things called one another's. Okay? Fill in the blank, one another. The greatest example of that is love one another. It doesn't say love yourself. It implies the fact that to grow in our understanding of love means that it needs to be between two people or a group of people.
Love one another. That's how we grow in our understanding of how Jesus loved us is with other people. And that's just one of them. And I just tried to brainstorm all the ones that I could think about and just kind of create a list. Listen to this. Love one another.
Pray for one another. Serve one another. Bear with one another. Encourage one another. Teach. Be at peace.
Be devoted to. Give preference to. Same mind toward. Edify. Admonish. Accept.
Greet one another. Have patience with. Speak the truth in love to one another. Be kind. Be subject to. And on and on and on.
This idea of relationship. And they got that. That the way they grew in their understanding of the gospel and how to follow Jesus was in the context of relationships. You see what the New Testament is pointing us to? Family. Real family.
And it's not to the exclusion of your earthly or your biological family. Instead of thinking of them as distinct and different, the goal is to begin viewing them as the same. Same amount of love. Same amount of compassion. Not that your children aren't going to get your time, but you're actually throwing open the doors of your family so that your children receive more love, more care. Now let me be clear.
I understand that not everybody grew up as a part of this idealistic, earthly family that I've been describing. Maybe you grew up in a home where your parents split up, in a home where there was abuse. I get that. And in fact, you're kind of cynical towards this whole idea of church family like I'm talking about right now. But all of us know what a good family should look like.
Every single one of us. Whether you have that, have that or not, we all know what it should look like. And all of us have this intrinsic desire within us to belong, to be accepted, to be a part of that. All of us want a father that instead of raising his fists, open his arms in love. All of us want a father that will speak words of love and care and not tear us down with abuse. And what I'm telling you is, what the New Testament is screaming to us is that you've been invited into that family.
Regardless of our backgrounds, regardless of whatever baggage we come in with, the New Testament is going to say is that Jesus redeems people into this family, which is really good news. You know why? It means that no person in that family is going to be perfect. That the entrance exam to that family is not, you've got your mess together. No, no, no. The entrance exam is, I don't.
That the reason we get to come and be a part of that family is because Jesus redeems us and brings us into relationship. And so, yeah, it's a messed up, jacked up family, just maybe like the one that you grew up in, maybe the one that you know, but here's the difference. The gospel changes us. Jesus works and he changes us and he brings us into real relationship with each other. And as we open up our homes and open up time with each other, it over time, as the Holy Spirit works in that, helps us grow closer to him. And there's a lot of love and there's a lot of joy.
And so that's what we mean. When we say that we're a gospel-centered community on mission, that we're a people redeemed by Jesus to look like and to live like family, and so we just act like it. That's how we express ourselves. That's how we grow in our faith is with other people. And so the question then becomes, okay, I'm with you, Matt. I'm tracking.
I understand that this is what the Bible says is what Jesus has done. That I see that this is how that plays out. How does that impact my life now? How do I begin living like that is true with the people that are in this room, the people that are in my community group? And so we're going to talk. I'm going to give you just a few practical, tangible handles for how this plays out.
But our community groups are going to talk about that this week too. And so I want you to be thinking about what would it look like for us to live in a relationship with each other. And the first way is this. The first way to begin thinking about how do I exist in family with other people is to ask the question, how do I exist as family with my earthly family? Seems pretty simple, right? Try to answer that question.
Okay, how do I relate to my family, my earthly family already? And so for me, the way that I'm going to answer that question is I'm going to think about Katie. I'm going to think about the way I relate to Katie. So Katie and I spend time together. We share meals together. We go to the grocery store together.
We read the Bible together. On Friday nights, we go to the grocery store and we buy cookies and we go home and we bake them and then we shamelessly eat all 24 within 24 hours. We go on walks together and it's the same way that you relate with your family. You fight and you forgive and you reconcile. You defend each other. You help each other.
You laugh together. You do Pinterest projects together. Yeah, I said Pinterest projects. You do it. You know, it's true. You pay for things for each other.
You give gifts to each other. You see how beautiful that is? It's not to the exclusion of the family you already have. You're just opening that up for other people. You begin to ask that question. It sets the stage for how we live in relationship with each other.
And I'm going to be really honest with you guys. This is absolutely from my heart. Katie and I moved to Columbia two years ago to be a part of helping start Mill City Church. And the only people we knew in the city were Chet and Anna and they had moved here three months before. We spent time praying and planning and asking God, what do you want this church to look like? What is this going to look like?
And then we started with our first community group meeting in a home and right off the bat I knew that something was different. It was real. There were real relationships. We spent time together. We shared meals together. We played spike ball together.
I began to love and care for the people that I was in a group with and they shared that same love and care for me. And then it went from one group to two groups, two groups to five groups and as we continue to grow as a church, that's our understanding. That's how we view ourselves in living in relationship together is in this idea of family. And Katie and I have this conversation every now and then. It's like, how did we ever exist without this? I never want to go back.
I never want to miss out. Life is so much better, has much more, I don't know, it's just better. I just love being in relationship with other people and it has changed my life. It has changed my walk with Jesus. It's improved. Like Katie and I have grown closer in our marriage.
It's changed everything. And so when you start to ask that question, how do I view my earthly family? It begins to answer the question, how do we relate to each other as church family? Let me give you a couple of scenarios. Think through this. Okay, if we really are family together, think through these scenarios with me.
You get a call in the middle of the night from somebody in your community group. It's not look at the phone and move it to the side. No, they're family, right? So it means I'm going to answer the phone and I'm going to run to help, whether it's something that's happened or their car's broken down or if they just need to talk, they're family. I'm going to answer the phone. Short on bills?
Can't pay their mortgage? Don't have enough money to buy groceries? Absolutely. I'm reaching for my wallet. Because they're family. I'm going to help.
There's relational drama in your group because of a fight. You're family. You're not running away from each other. You're going to stay and you're going to talk about it. You're going to be open. You're going to be honest.
You're going to forgive. You're going to reconcile. We've got college students who live with us, who live in this city with us but have family that live other places. What if you had a college student that didn't have money to travel home to see their family? What then? You're going to put them in the minivan and you're going to grandma's house and they're going to have to choke down the same terrible stuffing that you do.
Just part of it. When you start answering those questions, it begins to show us how we should relate to each other as church family. And I've got some examples of this. Tati and I have been putting hardwood laminate in our house. We're expecting our first child in May and wanting to do some house improvements. And so I told someone in my community group that I was going to be doing that and they said, I want to help.
Okay, we were going to be working on it on Friday. Well, that Thursday that person got sick. That Thursday night their child had to go to the hospital and it had to get stitches. And the next day he couldn't even go to work because he was so sick. But you know who showed up at my house that afternoon?
Drove an hour to my house to help me even though he didn't feel good. Stayed till nine o'clock on a Friday night and whose wife and children completely understood because we were family. We get that. He was willing to sacrifice. That's a beautiful picture of family. I have heard countless stories of people having trouble with their car.
I've heard stories of people riding with each other to go check out a new car that was an hour away. Of people stopping work in the middle of the day and going and taking care of somebody's vehicle. Of coming together to help people get a vehicle. Not only vehicles but like AC units. Like if there was something going on like an HVACalypse. People running to your rescue.
Absolutely. I almost died that week guys. I'm for real. But because I'm in church family came to my rescue. Helped me in my need. I've heard of stories of people trying to organize birthday parties and kids going I want church family there.
The people they're rattling off aren't their classmates. They're rattling off church family. Adults that they want to be there. People sharing in life experience together. Stories of people who have had to go to the hospital or had a family member that had to go to the hospital dropping everything in the middle of the day and just taking off. Because it's family.
It's real church family. Just as much family as our earthly family. See how beautiful that is? And that is absolutely the picture of the gospel. That Jesus opened up the door so that all of us could be welcomed in through his redemption. That we were offered forgiveness and grace and we've been made sons and heirs.
And so that's the way we live that out is as a church family. And I want to point out just a couple of groups of people where this is especially beautiful. The church has family for new Christians. For some of you when you placed faith in Jesus your old friends your family wanted nothing more to do with you. You might have had to leave old habits and old patterns behind. And what's beautiful about this is that the church steps in and helps and loves and serves.
That it's real family. It's real relationships. And so what you left pales in comparison to what you now have. The church is family for people who are single. Our culture says that the goal is to get married and have 2.5 kids and have a house with a white picket fence. Yeah, is the Bible going to say that marriage is a blessing?
Absolutely. Is the Bible going to say that singleness is a blessing too? Yes. But unless the church opens her arms unless we're opening our homes unless we're opening our tables to people what we're asking single people is to be alone. That's not the case when you have real church family that you're throwing open the doors and inviting and welcoming people in. And it's especially beautiful for people who come from broken homes.
If you come from a home where you didn't have a dad who was there or you had a parent who was abusive or you didn't have real loving relationships with people the church's family redeems that for you. Jesus invites you into a family where the entrance exam is Him. It's Him. He welcomes you in. He's the one who redeems you in. And the most beautiful and captivating part of this idea of church's family is this.
Is this last scripture that we're going to look at from Revelation. And I want us to read it together. And they sang a new song saying, Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals for you are slain and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God and they shall reign on earth. The striving that we put forth now together as a family is just practice for what we've been invited into. That one day all those that have placed faith in Jesus from every tribe nation language and tongue are going to sit at the table with Jesus our Savior and Lord and we're going to share a meal together and we're going to be together as a family for eternity.
You see, Katie won't always be my wife but she'll always be my sister so that when Katie and I open up our homes to people when we go out of our way to make time for people in our church family we're just getting a little bit of practice in for what eternity is going to look like as we share in relationship with Jesus forever because we know that our citizenship is in heaven just like Philippians says and so that when we open up our homes open up our time it helps us grow in our understanding of who Jesus is and it's just practice for the eternity that's waiting for us. Bianca's going to come back up and we're going to continue to sing this is going to be hard this is it's going to be messy we're going to have to fight everything inside of us our natural tendencies and the things that we think we're going to have to we're going to have to learn how to grow and how to sacrifice time and as we do so Jesus works in that and he brings us closer to him and he brings us closer to each other and he gives us real family and I say this all the time and it's absolutely true here it's messy it's beautiful and it's worth it and so we're going to stand and sing in a second and there are three ways that you can respond to this the first one is this you can become a Christian and you can be a part of this family so if you've been you've been listening the whole time like I want that I want that to be true for me but I know it's not it says that to be a part of this family is for those who place faith in Jesus that Jesus redeems them and saves us and brings us into this family so right where you are as we sing this next song just cry out to him place your faith in him for the forgiveness of your sin ask him to change you from the inside out and then tell somebody don't leave here without telling somebody that news the second thing is this join a group if you've been hanging out with us on a Sunday and you've been hearing us talk about this idea of community groups join a group that is absolutely where we grow and what this looks like on a day in and day out basis you can't become family with people in an hour and a half on a Sunday you just can't do it it's not possible and you don't want to miss out on that and the third thing is this if you're already a part of a group don't settle for anything less than the beauty of what we've talked about this morning let me pray for us God I pray that you would teach us what it looks like and what it means to be family that you've opened up the way for us to live in a relationship with you and in doing so you have invited us into a family God I pray that you would teach us what that looks like that we would grow in our understanding of you as you work through the relationships in our church in Jesus name Amen
Jesus > Idols
Transcript
How y'all doing? I'm doing well, Vicki. Y'all, let's turn to Romans chapter 1. That's where we'll be this morning. It's on page 610 if you have a Bible that looks like this. If you don't have a Bible that looks like this, it's going to be in the New Testament, kind of near the back, after the book of Acts, before all the other letters like 1 Corinthians and stuff.
So best of luck. At the front of your Bible, there's a thing that has all the names of the books, and you can look, and it'll tell you what page number it's on. I'm going to pray for us, and then we'll kind of hop in this morning. God, we just ask you to teach us and to lead us this morning, that your Holy Spirit would work in our hearts to help us see your beauty and your glory, and to help us to love Jesus more. We thank you and we praise you for all of the love and grace that you've poured out on us. In Jesus' name, amen.
So what we've been doing in the Anchor Series, and kind of the reason we called it that, is when I was in seminary and was learning, trying to grow in church planning, what that would look like, felt called to it. One of the things that we talk about is your church needed some sort of a mission, vision statement, and we in class had to write them out. And so you'll see churches a lot that'll have things like, I know one that was like, love God, love people, love life, which gets more epic at the end. It's just like, everything is great. So you love God, you love people, and then just, life is wonderful, and you're just hugging everybody.
But you would have these different things, and so there's like, seek, serve, send, and it's like, your church is saying, this is what we're going for. And there's like, no, grow, so, go, whoa, hey, ho. Like, it's just these things that people, mantras or whatever for churches. And so as we got into it, we were just like, ah, it's helpful for us to have something that's taken from Scripture. That's not just made up, but that's an idea of what we're shooting for as a church family, what we're going for. But we didn't want anything that was super out there or convoluted or complex.
And so all we said was that we're a gospel-centered community on mission. So we're just trying to define who we are, not what we do, but who we are. And so we're a gospel-centered community on mission. And so in our Anchor Series, all we're saying is that's kind of what we're tied off to. That's what holds us. And so there are some things that, man, wouldn't this be a good idea or wouldn't this be fun?
But they're outside of kind of where our anchor will let us go. It's like, yeah, that actually would work or would be a good idea, but Scripture says this, so we can't really, we can't go there. We can't do that. Or it kind of goes against how we understand we're supposed to look and be as a church family. So that's all we're doing in our Anchor Series.
So we've been kind of in the gospel-centered portion for the first three weeks. And so we're staying there today. And what we're talking about today lines up with the first two weeks and really lines up with last week where we talked about gospel fluency, which is just that since the gospel is our story, it's how we understand life. It's how we understand the world. And it's how we see the world and speak to each other. So we're not just giving each other good advice to adjust our behavior, but that we know that our fundamental issue is that we don't worship God, that we put other things in place of him and that we need the gospel to change us and to point us in the right direction.
And so that's kind of what we're adding on to that today to help us understand what we're going for and what it looks like for us to just operate as Christians. And so we're in Romans 1. We'll start reading verse 21 and kind of recap a little bit and then talk about kind of where we're going today. So verse 21 says, And so the big issue for us as humans is not that we that God has rules and that we've broken his rules, but it's that God is our creator and that we don't exist in a relationship with him appropriately. We don't treat him as the creator. And so we actually begin to look to other things to fulfill us, to bring us life, to bring us joy and hope.
And so we we move God from his rightful place and we put created things there. Now, created things is and the Bible is going to call that idolatry. But that's idolatry whenever we're we're putting something else in the place of God. And when it talks about created, they worship the creature rather than the creator. That includes everything. There's only one creator and everything else is created.
Everything else comes out of him. And so when we think of idolatry, I think most of the time we think of like a carving or we think of like a statue or we think of like a totem pole. And we'll even we'll get kind of smug about it. We'll be like, yeah, how ridiculous is that? People would cut down a tree, carve an image on it and worship it. We would not do that unless you flattened that tree out, made it green and the image was an old dead president.
Then maybe we think about it. We'd give it some thought. But it's it's anything. It's anything. And it can just be an idea. It could be love.
It could be acceptance. It could be relationships. But anything that we begin to look at and say, you'll fill me up. You'll make me happy. Life will be good if. Everything will work out if.
Anything that we begin to put in that spot is when we begin to have idolatry and we begin to worship created things instead of the creator. And so this this is a problem. And we all have something that we're looking to and saying, if that would just work out. If I could just reach this spot, if I could just have this, then life would be OK. I wouldn't be worried anymore. I wouldn't be bothered anymore.
I wouldn't be stressed out anymore. If I could just have this and we're all pointing to something and saying, this will save me. This will fill me up. This will make me complete. And that's that's that's how the Bible understands idolatry, that it's not primarily about and sin is not primarily about us breaking rules. But it's actually that we've swapped God out for something else.
So that's what happens in the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve, our first parents. That's what that's what they did. It wasn't that he just had a rule. It was that in that moment they wanted to be like God. They believe that God was withholding something from them and that they could, through their own effort, through their own actions, through some other type of savior, reach God level, that they could be happier, that they could have fulfillment and strength. And that's what that's what happened.
That's what the Ten Commandments, when Moses goes to Pharaoh and sings that song about letting his people go. And then and then they do. And the Ten Commandments, we think of that as those are God's rules. That's the rules God began to give the law that we follow. But it starts off with you will have no other God but me.
And the second one is you won't build any idols. You won't make any idols. You won't take anything. And when he says it, he says anything in the heavens, anything on the earth, anything under the earth, which could be anything other than God. You won't turn into something supreme. And so even the Ten Commandments begin with not here are my rules, follow my rules, but with object of worship, with I'm God and nothing else is.
And so the primary issue for us when we sin is not that we've done something bad or broken a rule or that our behavior is off. But first and foremost, we've broken the first two commandments, which is something else has become more important to us. Something else has become primary, that we've taken God out of his rightful place. And that's why we're willing to steal. That's why we'll commit adultery. That's why we'll lie.
Because something else has become more important to us than God. And so at its core, sin and rebellion and the fall is based off of not having God in his rightful place and not worshiping him as the creator. It's based off of us putting something else there, which leads us astray all the rest of the time. And that's what the Romans 1 is going to say is that's the issue, that they worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator. So we even see this as we move into the New Testament.
So when they're talking to Jesus and asking, what's the what's the primary commandment? He says to love God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind and all your strength. That's the commandment. It has nothing to do with behavior, has everything to do with our hearts and our love for God. And so as we talked about gospel fluency last week, what we were talking about is pointing each other not to here's some advice to change your behavior, but pointing each other to here's what Jesus has done and here's how that works in our hearts to bring about change. Because we're not trying to change our behavior.
We're trying to change our hearts. That's even what Jesus says. It's about our love for God. And then he says to love others. And somewhere I'm sure it says love life. Okay, so what we see first, though, as we begin to look at something and say, you'll fix me, you'll fill me up, you'll make me complete.
We're going to talk about surface idolatry. Bible doesn't use that phrase. It does use idolatry, but we're just using that to help explain this. So we're going to talk about the two major areas that idolatry shows up in us and in our hearts. So surface idolatry is when we begin to look at anything and say, you'll fix me, you'll fill me up, if I could just have this, if this would just work out.
It's what we daydream about. It's what we plot on. It's our biggest fear that we would lose this because we believe that it's going to fix us, that it's going to fill us up, that it's going to give us life. It's going to make us whole. And for most of us, that is something good. We've picked something good.
Most of us don't have really dumb idols. We've picked something good. We've picked something kind of intelligent. Just like you might put a lot of energy and effort into fixing your car up, get a new paint Job, maybe some sweet flames running down the side. But you're not going to do that to your trash can.
You're not going to put spinners on your garbage can that you roll out to the road once a week, get a sweet paint Job on it, some fire going up. Like you're not going to do that because it's a trash can. And so most of us, when we pick an idol, we pick something pretty smart, something that actually has value, that actually has worth, that actually has some beauty. And then because it has value, worth, and beauty, because it brings joy, we begin to believe that it actually can replace God. We're not usually tricked by something small and trivial. We're tricked by something good.
So even take an alcoholic. There's something in alcohol that brings some level of joy, some level of forgetfulness, some level of pleasure. At first, at least, and then it leads into worse things. But that's what begins to make someone believe this is actually what will fill me up, what will make me whole. Someone with sexual addiction, there's actually something beautiful there created by God for enjoyment, for pleasure, for life. And that's what begins to make us believe the lie that it will fix us, fill us up, make us whole.
Athletic achievement. It's good. It's designed by God for joy, for us to compete, for there to be some. And that's what begins to make someone believe, if I just get this, then I'll be fine. If I can just reach this moment. Parents, your children.
They're designed by God, given to you by God as a blessing. And that's actually because of the joy and the life that they bring. That's what actually can make you begin to say, if they just turn out okay. If they're just safe. If they just get the best of everything. If life just works well for them.
If they just end up the way the Bible says someone should end up. Then I'll know. Then I'll know I have value. Then I'll know I have worth. Then I'll know I'm okay.
And it's when we do that. When we begin to look to anything to accomplish that for us. We've swapped the creator out. And we've put the creature there. We've taken something creative. And placed it there.
And we've begun to put more pressure on it than it'll ever be able to hold. And we've begun to believe something about it that it's never going to be able to fulfill. Because it won't fill us up. And it won't make us whole. And it won't complete us. And it won't get rid of that nagging emptiness in us.
And so as far as surface level idolatry goes. We'll take anything. You name it. We can put it there. Money. Love.
Relationships. A particular person. This is what keeps us in bad relationships for longer. This is what makes us make a lot of the mistakes that we make. Is because we've begun to believe that something is fundamentally going to fix us. Fill us up.
Make us whole. And it won't. But I have bad news for us this morning. We're trickier than this. So some surface level idols you can see pretty clearly.
Like you've sat down with your friend and said. He is a terrible boyfriend. Like he is the worst. Get rid of him. And then they say something like. You just don't know him like I do.
No. You're right. He's never laid his hands on me. I don't know him like you do. But he's terrible.
And we can see that. Or you can see somebody chasing after money. And you can go. That's. That's. You.
I can obviously see this. But here's the problem. We're trickier than this. So Jeremiah 17 9 says this. One of my favorite verses in the Bible. Because it's just very true.
It's going to be up here. It says the heart is deceitful above all things. And desperately sick. Who can understand it? The heart is deceitful above all things. Desperately sick.
Who can understand it? Your heart lies to you. You have actually lied to you more than anyone else ever. And some of us just thought. No I haven't. But that's exactly what you would say.
Don't trust yourself. Your heart is desperately sick. It lies to you. If you're ever watching a Disney movie. And I always give this. This warning.
If you're watching a Disney movie. And. And a little bird comes out. And sings about following your heart. Or a. A grasshopper shows up.
Or a little cricket with an eye patch. Or no. Monocle. He didn't have an eye patch. That would have been creepy. A monocle.
Dragging a peg leg. I'm Jiminy Cricket. No. With a monocle. And begins to sing a song about following your heart. Don't do it.
It's a trap. It's a trick. Your heart is going to lie to you. It's going to lead you into bad places. And it's going to trick you. And so what happens is.
We can actually have deeper level idolatry. And so. Again. This is just a way to think about it. And to understand it. Deeper level idolatry.
Which actually begins to be the. The operator. Of our other idolatry. And so. I'm going to give us four. They're made up.
Just to be helpful. So if you think there should be more. If you think there should be less. Or you wanted them all to start with the same letter. Or something. Sorry.
There's four that we're going to talk about. And it's just to be helpful. So don't. Don't argue with the categories too much. Get the concept. Comfort.
Control. Approval. And power. These are just big categories. And it's to help us see. That we can have something else we're chasing.
Which changes. How we operate. Which changes how we manipulate our surroundings. Comfort. Control. Approval.
Power. Comfort is. I'll arrive. If I can just rest. If I can just. Have all the stuff I need.
If I can just be able to go on vacations. If I can just have what they have. If I can just have it to where I'm bored in the evenings. Control is. I don't have to worry about my surroundings. I don't have to worry about.
I'm in control of what happens. I'm in control of my destiny. I'm able to exercise authority over what's around me. I don't have to worry. I have security. Approval is just.
I know I'm okay if I'm loved. If people think highly of me. If people want me around. That if I can just be approved of. Then I'll be good.
I'll be okay. And then power is just the ability to exert. Authority over those around you. Over your situation. To just be the boss. To be in charge.
To have your decisions win out. So here. Here's. Here's why it's helpful for us to see this. Money. Some people say.
Oh that person just loves money. Or you might even be thinking. I think my. My surface level idolatry. I think what I chase after. What.
What I say will fill me up is money. Because here's the thing. Nobody just loves money. You don't. You love what money can give you. You love what money provides you.
But you don't just love money. Because. The reason I know that is. None of us. Have a bank account. That has monopoly money in it.
And none of us have a purse or a wallet. With monopoly money in it right now. Because it doesn't give us anything. Now when we're playing monopoly. We care a lot about those little yellow dollars. So much so.
We'll yell at our grandmother. And for the three or seven hours. That we play that game. Until our grandmother beats us. With a really smug attitude. We care about monopoly money.
But then we don't anymore. And the reason we care about money. Is because of what it gives us. And so I'm just going to walk through. Those four. Comfort, control, approval, and power.
And show you how money begins to be manipulated. By those. But you're not really seeking money. You're just seeking what money gives you. Comfort. Money is a great way to get comfort.
You can go on vacations. You can buy a jet ski. You can pay people to do work. So you can take a nap. Like. Money serves comfort very well.
Some of you. That's what your money goes to. Eating out. It's one of my favorites. Being able to rest. Being able to.
Like it just. Why would I own. Why would I have money. If my couch is uncomfortable. That makes zero sense. Why would I have money.
If my TV is not big. This is dumb. That's what money is for. Control. Oh. Money is a great way to have control.
You don't have to worry about the future. If you've got a lot of money. Something bad happens. We'll pay for it. Tire gives out. We'll pay for it.
You can just. People open their bank account. And just look at all this money. In their bank account. And just know. I'm okay.
It's like a big green security blanket. Approval. Oh. Money is a great way to get approval. Like if you want me to be your friend. Buy me lunch.
I will approve of you. I will be like. We are friends. This pizza is delicious. Like that's. I mean.
But money is a great way to give approval. You think. Oh my grandmother is so generous. Maybe. Maybe she just really wants to get the approval of her grandchildren. Because that helps fill her up.
And make her feel like she's okay. Power. Oh. Power is great. You can exert your authority over people. If you have enough money.
You can. You can. Sway the outcome of an election. But I know that. I know our crowd. We live in West Columbia.
In Columbia area. None of us can sway the outcome of an election. But. You can sway the outcome of where you're going to eat lunch. Hey man. If you go.
If we go here. I'll pay for it. That generous. Maybe. Maybe it's just that you wanted to be in control of where you ate. You just wanted to exert your power over it.
And money was a good way to do it. Here's why this is important. Our behavior can change. But at a core heart level. We're still chasing after the same thing. And the problem is.
That we've swapped out the creature. In place of the creator. We've taken created things. And we've put them in place of the creator. And when we do that. It leads us into sin.
It leads us into bad behavior. But the big issue is that our hearts are off. And God's after our hearts. Love the Lord your God with all your heart. With all your mind. With all your strength.
He's after our hearts. Our worship. Way more than our behavior. So. Our behavior can change. All of those idols.
Can actually have really good behavior. So if you're. If comfort is. You have a comfort idolatry. That. Yeah.
That can be laziness. Which the Bible clearly says is bad. You can be really lazy. You know what else? You can be a really good friend. You can be the most agreeable person.
Because you just don't want your friendships to be. The boat to be rocked. Makes you uncomfortable. So you agree really quickly. You're really nice. You let your friends have whatever they want.
Seems really nice. But your heart's off the whole time. Approval. We said it. Approval can show up in really. Drastic neediness and relationships.
But it can also show up in a whole lot of generosity. Which is nice. Which is good. The Bible says to do that. But the whole time we're chasing after something other than God.
And we're not doing it because we love God. And we love people. But we're doing it because we. We have to have this in order to feel complete and whole. Do you see that? So you can have a couple arguing over money.
The husband believes that why would we own money if we don't go on vacations? Like what's the point of me working hard if I can't have a bass boat? Like that's what money exists for. And the wife's saying no we need to save. And we need to plan ahead. And we got kids that are going to go to college.
And he's like our kids aren't going to college. And so like. And they have these struggles and they butt heads over money. But the truth is they're both just working to serve. What they ultimately believe will fill them up. So she seems more reasonable.
But she really is just seeking security. That's what makes her feel comfortable at night. It's what lets her sleep at night. Do you see that? So even though her behavior could be good or wise.
And the Bible would actually commend the behavior. The Bible worries way more about our hearts. So yeah we should have good behavior. And yeah those things are commendable. But the heart is the issue.
And so as long as we're chasing after other things. Other than God. Other than resting in God. We can get ourselves in trouble. So let's take a guy.
Power is his thing. So he just. First way he can feed that. Is through sports. So he gets real strong.
Works really hard. Seems really determined. And just is very powerful. Exerts his power on the field. On the court. But then as he gets a little older.
He begins to realize that chasing women. Is a good way to feel powerful. And that he proves his power. And his dominance. With every conquest. But as he begins to grow.
And he gets older. He begins to realize that one of the best ways to have power. Is through civil service. To be a politician. To serve the community. Because you get to actually affect change.
At a much larger level. So he completely quits chasing women. Comes very chaste. Very pure. But what he loves.
And what he's pursuing. Hasn't changed. And then he finds out. You know what? The ultimate power is found in. Jesus.
And the best way to have power. Is to be a Christian. Because Christians are the only ones that have truth. So he devours scripture. He's in your community group. And he just crushes people with Bible verses.
He has more knowledge than anybody. Because it's a way to have power. And at no point has his heart changed. Although his behavior has changed all along the way. It's a big deal for us to begin to look at. What is it that our heart believes.
Will fill us up. Will make us whole. Will complete us. So here's how this works. Our deep idolatry. A lot of times is going to be answered.
It's going to be how we answer the question. What does heaven look like? What would heaven be? What is it you daydream about? Oh if I could just have this. I'd be good.
I'd be set. Wouldn't be worried anymore. Wouldn't have problems anymore. What is it that you're looking at and saying. This will fill me up. This will make me complete.
This is when I'll be at rest. And then our surface level idolatry. Is whatever we think will get us there best at the time. It's our functional savior. It's what will take us from where we are. To where heaven is.
It's what will step in and bridge that gap. What will allow us to get from where we are. To where heaven is. That's a problem. Because we can change our constantly. Change our motivation.
Change what we're chasing after. What we think was going to get us to heaven. But our deep idolatry stays the same. What we're chasing after fundamentally stays the same. So take lying for example.
We all know we're not supposed to lie. It's one of the ten commandments. It's bad. Hurts relationships. So when you lie.
What do you do? You say. Ah. Don't lie. Shouldn't lie. Bad Christian.
Bad mother. Shouldn't lie to your children. Bad. Fix that. But here's the thing.
Why do we lie? That's the question. What is it you're trying to protect? What is it you're trying to defend? Through lying. So some of you would lie about how popular you were in high school.
You'd be in a conversation. And you'd kind of ham up how good you were at sports in high school. How popular you were. Because this person's never going to find out. Unless you're still in high school. Which is going to be a hard sell.
But go for it. No. I'm super popular here. Or you go back to your high school reunion. Or you bump into someone. And you're going to make it sound like your job's better.
Your life's better. Things are going better. And all you're seeking is you need them to approve of you. Even in this conversation with someone you're not going to see. Some of you. You would never lie about that.
You think that's a ridiculous thing to lie about. You straight up tell somebody. No. My life's pretty crummy right now. But you look like you're doing good.
Like you just wouldn't care. But you lie about something else. You'll tell somebody something starts earlier. So they'll show up on time. Oh. Did I say 845?
My bad. It's good to see you though. At 855. Got you here at 9. Tricked you. But you're lying about it.
Me. You call me on the phone. If I am asleep. I'm going to want to tell you I was awake. Doesn't matter. I think that's true for most people.
Like if I answer the phone and people go. Oh I'm sorry did I wake you up. I am going to want to say. No. I was awake. Doesn't matter what time you call me.
It could be 3 o'clock in the morning. No. I was up. I was up. Why were you up at 3? I was working out reading the Bible.
I had to do that one time in the middle of a conversation. We've been talking for about 10 minutes. I said hey man I need to tell you something. He said what? I said I was asleep when you called me. I lied to you when I answered the phone.
He's like it sounded like you were asleep. I thought you were lying. I was like yeah I was. We can continue with the conversation now. I just had to get that out there. Had to confess.
But the question is why are we lying? What are we seeking to gain from that? You see because we've all answered the question. This is what heaven will be for me. And this is what will get me there. Here's the problem.
The Bible says that where God is is where heaven is. That it's in his presence. That we're engulfed in his glory. Which glory just means that it has. It brings to mind the idea that you would look at something. And it would bring you joy.
Just by seeing it. Just by being in his presence. It's like when you're watching a sunset. And you just you get that moment where you're just like. I'm so glad I got to see this. I'm so glad I was driving on this road at this time.
Because it's bringing me joy. Just by seeing it. That's what heaven is. It's the presence of God. That heaven isn't all the nice things that you like and chase after. No heaven is God's presence.
Where we're completely satisfied. Completely fulfilled. Completely made right. Completely known and loved. And Jesus is the savior that gets us there. That it's his work not ours.
That rescues us. And redeems us. And takes us from where we are to where God is. So when we answer the question. This is what heaven is. And this is what will get me there.
We have replaced God. And we've replaced Jesus with something else. Something smaller. Something weaker. And something that will never provide. Never fill us up.
Never make us okay. So our idols and our hearts lie to us. And I want to show that to you. We look at 24. These are the two major issues when it comes to idolatry. What they do to us.
What our idols do. Therefore God gave them up in the lust of their hearts to impurity. Let me just tell you this real quick. Some of us are chasing after things. Just so you know. Part of God's wrath is to give you exactly what you want.
What it just said was that God gave them up to their lust. To what they were loving. What they were chasing after. He actually handed them over to what they wanted. That's actually one of the worst things that can happen. Because then we've got our idol.
And we realize it never fills us up. It won't make us complete. It's actually a form of God's wrath. God is actually being very kind to some of us. But not letting us have the thing that we think will make us whole.
To the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves. Verse 25. Because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie. And worshipped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. Amen. The two things that happen when we chase idols is they lie to us.
And they enslave us. It says they worshipped and served. That they exchanged the truth about God for a lie. And they worshipped and served the creature rather than creator. Your idol is telling you. I will bring you joy.
If you could just have me. Life would be okay. You wouldn't have doubt. You wouldn't have fear. You wouldn't have restlessness. And it is a lie.
And they ultimately. Our idols enslave us. They cause us to worship and serve them. I had a friend of mine who was part of our church family for a while. He's moved. And he was an older guy.
Had been married at one point. Wasn't married now. And was doing some online dating. And just believed in his soul. That what would fix him. Was a perfect marriage relationship.
That that's what would fix him. To the point that even when I was having conversations with him. He like idolized mine and Anna's relationship. And I'd say something about. You know. How we were working on stuff.
Or we were having problems. Or I'd be like. Yeah man. It's not. And he would laugh. Like.
Like. There's no way that was possible. Because I was married. I had to be perfectly happy. Perfectly complete. And it's like.
No. We got. Anna married a sinner. And I married a sinner. And we got stuff. We got to work on.
And grow in. Like. That's normal. That's how. But he didn't see it.
It was. Sometimes it was like talking to. Like. Like he was a middle school girl. Or something. Like he.
He idolized it so much. And so. In his mind. Any girl he met. Any female he met. Any lady he met.
And began to talk to. That was his savior. That was who was going to take him to heaven. Perfect. Married land. So he would meet a female online.
Through talking conversations. And I talked to him. He'd be. I mean. Soaring. I met somebody.
She's special. That's good man. I'm excited. I just. I think. I think we got something here.
And he would begin to. Pursue way too quickly. Up the ante. Way too quickly. Because she wasn't just a female he'd met. And got to have conversations with.
But she was actually who was going to save him. And so. Inevitably. A couple weeks later. That relationship wasn't going well. They weren't talking anymore.
And he would just be. Crushed. I mean shattered. Because what he had lost. Was not. Reality.
Wasn't just a conversation. And a possible relationship with a female. What he had lost. Was what was going to save him. And what was going to take him to heaven. What was going to fix him.
And it was way worse. Some of us. Should he want relationships? Yeah. That's fine. Is getting married a good thing?
Yeah. Does everybody have to get married? No. Is that good? Yeah. But he had put so much else on it.
That it couldn't fail him. Some of us have those. We have something in our life. That this can't fail. Because if it does. I don't just lose this.
I don't just lose this relationship. I don't just lose this job. I don't just lose this amount of money. I don't just lose this position. I actually lose what is going to save me. What is promising me fulfillment.
What is going to fill me up. And take me to heaven. I lose God and Savior. And it's. There's way more tied to it. Some of us are.
Some of you in here. Are chasing after success. You've put in your mind. That if I can just reach this stage. If I can just be successful. If everything I put my hand to.
Can just work out. If I can just have accomplishment. If I can just. And you're. You're believing that. And you're chasing that.
But here's the thing. You become enslaved to it. Because you can't not be successful. It crushes you. When you fail. It eats away at your insides.
Because your God. Demands sacrifice. So you begin to spend more time at work. More time putting your energy and effort into this. When something's not going well. It's the only thing you can think about.
Because your God demands sacrifice. And will not forgive you if you fail. Some of you. You just have this in your moment. There's going to be this day when I arrive. When I no longer have to.
I'm not living paycheck to paycheck. All my debts paid off. I'm just. I'm there. I can rest. I can have peace.
I can just. Bring in an X amount of dollars. Then I'll be okay. But until then. You're a slave. And if you'll look back over your life.
You've bumped up. How far you have to go. Before you'll arrive. How much money you need to bring in. And you're a slave. And your God doesn't forgive you when you fail.
And it demands that you sacrifice. Advice. Some people in here. It's approval. You have to. Have people like you.
So that Facebook and Instagram. Become your temple of worship. It's not just a place to keep up with friends. It's where you. You go to seek approval. It's where you go to post things.
That people will like. It's where you go to get those. Little thumbs up. And little comments. About how your dress looked. Or how good that meal looked.
That you cooked. Or that you were about to eat. It becomes this. This is what I need. This is what's going to satisfy me. This is what's going to fill me up.
Now. Facebook. Until. Until you begin to realize. That you're forever going to be enslaved to that. That's why when a relationship is going poorly.
And you're at odds with a friend. It tears you up inside. You can't have someone not like you. Not because you want those relationships to work out. But because you have to have approval to be okay.
As long as we're worshiping something created. We're never free. We're enslaved. We have to make sacrifices to please our God. And our gods are not forgiving when we fail. What's the solution to this?
How do we get past this? How do we fix this? I want to read a quote from Thomas Chalmers. He was a. He lived in 1780 in Scotland. And he was a missionary pastor.
He says this. The heart's desire for an ultimate object. May be conquered. But it's desire to have some. Object is unconquerable. The only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection is through the expulsive power of a new one.
So I'm going to read that again. The heart's desire for an ultimate object. May be conquered. Which means that you can swap it out for something else. Like you can. You can chase after power for a while.
Or you can chase after money for a while. And then you can begin to chase after a political position. But it's desire to have some object is unconquerable. We're always going to have to have something in that place. The only way to dispossess the heart of an old affection. Is through the expulsive power of a new one.
And this is why it becomes huge for us. That we always point ourselves and each other back to the gospel. Because as we kept reading in Romans two weeks ago. We saw that it's Jesus that steps in and saves us. My friend is not going to be free. From the need to have a successful relationship.
Until he realizes that Jesus has already provided all the approval. All the love that he'll ever need. Until he realizes that Jesus has stepped in and in his place. Given him the relationship. The perfect relationship with the father. Which is where heaven is.
That Jesus is his savior. Then he'll be free. And then relationships can just be relationships. You're chasing after success. Until you realize that Jesus steps in. And provided success for you.
Made you holy. Made you righteous. Made you blameless. Made you successful. In him because of his work. And that ultimate success is in him.
Found only in him. And that he forgives when we fail. And that he sacrificed himself for us. See our other gods don't love us. Demand sacrifice. And don't forgive us.
And Jesus loves us so much. That he sacrificed himself. And that he always forgives us when we fail. But until we see that. Until we're engulfed in that. We'll be a slave to success.
We'll be a slave to achievement. Until we realize that a rival doesn't come. Through financial security. But that ultimate security has been provided to us. And Jesus will forever be a slave. Until you know that approval has been given to you forever.
Through God who knew you perfectly. And loved you anyway. And through the cross. Gave you worth and value. Facebook will not be a way to connect with friends. It will always be a way to posture yourself.
Make yourself look good. And feel good inside. Your relationships will always be on the needy side. Of having to have someone else fill you up. And make you whole. Until you realize that Jesus has already done that.
Until Jesus becomes the ruling affection of our hearts. We will forever be enslaved. But Jesus didn't come to be served. But to serve. And to give his life as a ransom for many. Ransom means the cost it takes to buy back a slave.
Jesus doesn't enslave us. He makes us free. He is the truth that replaces all the lies. And in Jesus we have freedom. We have a God who sacrificed himself for us. Doesn't demand that we sacrifice to him.
To earn his love. To behave our way into his good graces. But came and lived perfectly on our behalf. And died in our place. To sacrifice himself for us. So that he could forgive us of everything.
Even forgive us of worshiping and loving other things. And thinking they'll fill us up. That's what we have in Jesus. That's why it's crucial for us as a church family. To always point back to Jesus. Because our hearts lie to us.
They deceive us. They run in all kinds of directions. And we need to remember forever. That it's Jesus who saves. It's Jesus who fills us up. It's Jesus who's holy.
It's Jesus who is our king and God. And the ruling affection of our hearts. And only then will we begin to change and be free. Band's going to come back up here. And we're going to make much of Jesus. It's like a man who got sicker.
And sicker. And sicker. Symptom after symptom kept cropping up. And he went to the doctor. And he found out he had cancer. And at that moment.
Symptoms no longer matter. The only thing that has to be gotten rid of. Is the cancer. Even if it causes more symptoms in the process. Our hearts. Are wicked.
Deceitful. And desperately sick. And changing our behavior. Only takes care of symptoms. But when we see that we've begun to love.
And worship something else. Other than our creator. That's when we begin to allow Jesus to work on the cancer. To begin to wreck our hearts. And to make them his. Through his grace.
And through his work. Not ours. We get to trust him. It's not in our ability to work hard. Or to make this happen. We get to trust Jesus.
And his ability to do this for us. To change us. And to begin to take over our hearts. That we're saved through faith. And God's grace. So as we see our idols.
The response isn't. Let me work really hard to get rid of that. No. It's let me begin to love Jesus. See Jesus more. And trust him.
And ask him to become the ruling affection of my heart. To begin to take over. To help me get rid of the lies. And begin to be free. From my slavery. And be free to follow him.
Father. We thank you. For your grace. We thank you for your love. And we pray that you would help us to see. Where it is that we're chasing after things.
That we've begun to believe the lie. That they'll fill us up. That they'll make us whole. That they'll complete us. Where it is that we've begun to. In relationships.
And in our jobs. And in our life. Put more weight on something. That was never meant to carry that. God. Where are we leaning into a good gift.
That you gave us for your glory. And asking it to be God. We ask that your Holy Spirit. Would begin to show that to us. And more than that. God.
We ask that as we see that. That you would show us yourself. That we would see the cross. Where you came not to be served. But to serve.
And to give your life as a ransom. To buy back slaves. And God. As we see our sin. That we would see the cross. Which so greatly outweighs our sin.
That we would so be engulfed. By Jesus. That your beauty. And your glory. Would so fill us up. That we wouldn't look to lesser things.
To make us whole. God. We ask that your Holy Spirit. Would press in. That you would expel idols. And that you would become the ruling.
And reigning affection of our hearts. And we ask God. That you would lead us as a church family. To continuously. Be anchored in the gospel. And pointing one another.
To Jesus' work. At all times. So that we might rest. In the grace that's been provided. That though we fall short. You save.
You always save. You always forgive. That you were our sacrifice. And God. We just ask that your Holy Spirit. Would lead us now.
The spirit of Jesus. In our souls. Would begin to work. You'd begin to cut out cancer. And help us to quit chasing symptoms. We ask this in your powerful name.
In Jesus name. Amen. Amen.
Gospel Fluency
Transcript
How we doing? We are in our second week of our Anchor Series, and so what we're doing, we are a church plant, and I think you kind of stay a church plant for like the first five years. I think that's kind of the rule. At least some organizations will say that, and after that you've kind of existed long enough to think you probably won't die. And so that's kind of how that works. And so we're a church plant, and what that means is as we continue to grow and as we continue to see more people hop in and be church family with us, we have to consistently re-remind ourselves, re-launch into who we are, what we're shooting for, what it means for us to be church family, and so that's kind of what this is.
That's what the Anchor Series is. And so what we're going to do is for the next six weeks, we're going to just be walking through what we mean when we say we're a gospel-centered community on mission, what we're talking about. So we put it on banners. We put it on t-shirts. And we're just going to kind of take some time to say this is what we mean. This is what we're talking about.
This is what we're shooting for as we follow Jesus. And so what we did last week was we just talked about the gospel. And so we just said, here's what the gospel is. We went from Romans 1, 2, 3, skipped 4, and went to 5 and 6. And so we just skipped 4 in case you had OCD just to make it where you can no longer pay attention. And we just kind of went through the first six chapters of Romans and said, here's what the gospel is.
Here's what the gospel story is. And so what we said was we were created to exist in a relationship with God, designed by Him to exist as creation in a relationship with Him as our Creator, and that we fell. And that fundamentally sin is not us breaking rules, but it is us swapping out what it is that is primary for us, that we swap our Creator for something else. And we begin to say, this is the goal. This is the hope. This is the dream.
This is what will fill me up. This is what will satisfy me. And that in doing that, we dishonor God. We run from Him. And so we were created. We fell.
But that Jesus redeems us. That He steps in and becomes for us our salvation. That He lived perfectly for us, died in our place for our sin. So that in Him, we do have that. He remakes that relationship back right with God. And then after that, we get to live in light of that, that we're restored.
We have a restored relationship with God. And then ultimately when we die, we'll spend eternity with God back in the perfect relationship we should have had had we not fallen. And that's the storyline we find ourselves on. Whether you're a Christian or not a Christian, that is the storyline of the Bible. And that is the storyline of the world. And so what we've said as Christians is that that is our story.
That is fundamentally where we are in the world, how we exist. And so since that is the gospel, since it's the gospel is that Jesus died on our behalf and we're saved by His work, not ours, and then everything else comes out of that. Everything else plays out of that. And so what we're going to do today is just talk a little bit about what do we mean when we say we're gospel-centered? Like that sounds cute or nice or it's some good Bible word goal thing that you put on that banner. That's nice.
What are we talking about? What does that look like? How do I do that on a daily basis? And so we're just going to try to be real practical for the rest of this series and just say if that's the gospel, then this is what we mean by gospel-centered. This is what we mean by community. This is what we're talking about when we say mission and try to help us all grow in, oh, okay, some tangible.
That's how we'll do that. And that's what that'll look like. So let's pray and then we're going to talk about some stuff this morning. God, I thank you that we are saved by Jesus's work, not ours. That we've been made right with you, not through our efforts, not through our work, but through Jesus's work on our behalf. Praise you that the Bible is not fundamentally about our behavior and it's not about our ability to fix the situation.
I pray that you would, through your Holy Spirit, lead us today, speak to us and teach us today and help us all to grow in what we mean of being gospel-centered. We love you. Praise you in Jesus's name. Amen. So we fundamentally all fall short and we all need Jesus to step in and save us.
And it's about his work, not ours, not our behavior, but his. And so Paul, the whole New Testament is about the gospel. And Paul even says that the, we read last week in Romans that the law and the prophets testify to this. And so what he said is the Old Testament, which is kind of the law and the prophets, that means that all of the Old Testament is pointing to Jesus and what he was going to do, that that is the story. And so Paul in 2 Corinthians, I'm just going to read this to you. He says, for I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.
He said, that's it. That is all we talked about is Jesus Christ and him crucified. I decided to know nothing among you. And every time I read that verse, it reminds me of a scene in the office where one of the guys is getting fussed at and his boss looks at him and goes, do you understand me? And he stares him back in the face and goes, I understand nothing. Like real defiantly, but makes himself seem like a complete.
And that's us. That's us as church family. Do we understand anything other than gospel? We understand nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified. That's us. That's, that is what the New Testament is about.
That is center for us. And so everything comes out of that. And so one of the ways that we talk about this, one of the ways that we describe this is the term gospel fluency. And so gospel is the story. It is that Jesus died for us, that he saved us. And fluency just means that we speak that language naturally, normally.
So I took Spanish in high school and in college and am nowhere near fluent. I passed and that's about it. That's all I got. And so like if I'm speaking Spanish with someone, I've got to translate the whole time. So if I'm talking to, I actually was over, we were in the North Brown area of West Columbia about a week ago.
And I was talking to, I heard somebody, we were talking with a guy who spoke Spanish. He was speaking English with us, but then he answered the phone. And so he was talking to his son in Spanish. And I'm just like, listen, and I'm trying to hear things. And I'm like, I think that means mama. I don't know what that is.
I think he said dog. This is a weird conversation. And like, I'm just trying to pick up on what he was talking about because I have to take the word he says to put it in my brain and I have to translate it. I have to say, okay, what's the English equivalent of that? So if I was in Mexico, I could walk over to someone and I'd say, all right, I need to know how to find the library.
Because this is one of the only sentences I know how to say in Spanish. So bear with me. Donde esta means like where is. So, okay, donde esta es la biblioteca. Yeah, because if I ever visit a Spanish speaking country, I really want to know how their libraries are. So I've memorized this phrase.
I will be able to get permission to go to the bathroom. I will not know where it is, but I will know that I'm allowed to go there if I ever find one, stumble upon it. But what I've got to do is I'm not fluent. So what I have to do is I've got to take the English word and I've got to pair it up with the Spanish word and I've got to figure out. So you say something to me in Spanish.
I've got to figure out what that means in English. I've got to take my English words, what I want to say, pair it up with Spanish words and speak back. But once you become fluent, so a native Mexican Spanish speaker is going to hear Spanish words, think Spanish words, speak Spanish words. That's fluency. So if you moved to Spain after a while, you wouldn't have to translate.
You would just know what was being said. You'd respond. You'd dream in Spanish, think in Spanish. You'd become fluent. And that's what we do with the gospel. It actually becomes our language because it is our story.
So I'm a Southern American. So I speak American, which is a form of English. I speak Southern American. And so I know what a crawdad is. I know what the term all y'all means. It is the most inclusive form of y'all, often followed by something derogatory, like all y'all can kiss my foot.
Like I just wanted to make sure everyone knew they were included. But that's my heart language. And that's what happens with the gospel is that it becomes our language and it actually begins to affect how we think, how we see the world. So our language shapes our worldview. I heard this and I don't know if it's true, but it was told to me like it was true that somebody was an English speaker was in a country in Africa and was going to be teaching them this group about self-sufficiency. And he was talking with his translator, but he wanted to talk about self-sufficiency or self-reliance.
And he was trying to get the translator. He was like, what's the, he explained the concept of the translator. And the translator said, okay, the closest word that we have for that concept is a mental disorder. That means that you don't believe you need your tribe, that you, you believe you exist outside of community because our language shapes around what we believe and our language shapes what we believe. And so for us as Christians, we become fluent in the gospel because that is our story, which what that means is when we sit with somebody and they begin to tell us, we begin to plot their story out, their life out.
When we're talking to them about creation, fall, redemption, restoration, we begin to look for where they're saying they fit in that story. We begin to hear through the lens of the gospel. And when we, when we talk back to them, we point them to the gospel. We speak as if the gospel is true. So I no longer hear as a happiness seeking American.
I listen in here as a gospel filled Christian, a gospel changed Christian. And when I talk back to someone, I speak back to them. I'm not just going to give them. Here's the advice. Here's what the world says. Here's what I've been taught as an American.
No, we're going to speak back in light of what the gospel is. And so that's what we're shooting for today is we're just going to talk about that concept and we're going to try to grow because the gospel is our story. And because it is the story, we're going to try to grow and what it means to be gospel centered. So if you'll flip to Colossians one, um, this is, this is a passage that kind of points this out to us, that shows this to us. And then we're going to just talk through some, uh, uh, how we see this in the Bible, because the new Testament is gospel centered. It is about Jesus and what he has done.
And so it's not going to be so much when you look through it, you're not going to see, oh, this is where they explained this concept. It's like, no, this is where they do this. This is where this shows up. So we're in Colossians one, uh, go to verse 27. So Paul's been talking about Jesus in the beginning of Colossians, how big he is, how massive he is, what he's done for us, that he, through his sacrifice has made us right with God and made us holy, blameless and above reproach.
And he's explaining all this. And we get into this text, he's going to say the mystery. Uh, and what he means by the mystery is this, this massive God, what he said in Colossians one is this massive God became a human. Lived perfectly on our behalf and swapped places with us that, that he gives us his goodness, his righteousness, his holiness, and he takes our sin on himself. And so that's the mystery he's talking about, that that is absolutely baffling. If you've been in the church for a while, you've been around Christianity for a while, you've heard that a lot.
And sometimes we can forget how absolutely mysterious and baffling that is. And the mystery of it is also that how is God going to handle sin? How is he going to make people pay for their rebellion against him? And, and the mystery that is revealed is that he's actually going to pay for it for them. And so that's what we're looking at. And that's what he's talking about when he says the mystery, he's really just talking about the gospel to 27 to them.
God chose to make known how great among the Gentiles, Gentiles are people who are non-Jewish are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. And so it's the gospel and the fact that Jesus melds his life with ours, mixes his life with ours so that he's in us. And he is our hope of glory because of his work, not ours. And then 28, him, we proclaim Jesus, him, we proclaim warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this, I toil struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me. Okay.
So what he says is it's Jesus that we proclaim. It's Jesus that we're talking about. It's Jesus that we're pointing to. It's Jesus that we're going to push towards, that we're going to point people towards, that we're going to focus on. And his reason is so that we can present everyone mature in Christ. If you are a Christian, maturity is not really an option for you.
It is your trajectory. It's where you're headed. Romans says that we're predestined, which means that he sealed it beforehand to be conformed to the image of Christ, to the image of his son, which means that all of us over time are going to slowly look more and more and more like Jesus who've placed our faith in Jesus. So if you feel like, oh, I'm not really growing, I'm not really, it's happening. It's going to continue to happen. It's slow and messy and painful, but growth is going to continue.
And maturity is the goal for us as Christians, that we want to grow in maturity. We want to repent of sin faster. We want to sin less. We want to see our sin more. That's one of the marks of maturity is not so much that you sin less, that happens, but it's actually that you just begin to see your sin more. Things you didn't know were sin start showing up and you're like, I've been doing that forever.
I didn't even realize I was off there. My whole thought process was broken here, but we grow in maturity. And the way to do that most of the time has been answered by the church as learn the rules. It's been, we want to grow in maturity, read the Bible and learn what it looks like to be a Christian. And it comes across as learn the rules. So you get told Jesus died for your sin and his work replaces yours and you're saved by his work, not yours, that he took your sin.
He died for it and he gives you his righteousness. And that's the gospel. And then somebody said, do you want to be a Christian? Raise your hand. And you said, that sounds like a sweet deal. You raised your hand.
Y'all talked or you had a conversation with somebody. You said, I've placed my faith in Jesus. And then they said, cool, now here are the rules. And you were like, what? I thought this wasn't about my behavior. I thought this wasn't.
And it feels a little bit like, I feel like we've changed the story here because we feel like most of us feel like the way to grow as a Christian is to figure out how to behave better, figure out what the rules are and follow them. But Paul says it's Jesus we proclaim. That we're going to consistently point back towards the gospel. So it's not that we grow out of the gospel. We grow into the gospel. Does our behavior change?
Yes. Is that what it's about? No. Is Jesus going to consistently make us more mature and grow us? Absolutely. Are we consistently going to see our sin, repent of it, change, grow?
Yes. But it's the way to grow, learning all the rules and trying to white knuckle them and trying to follow them. No, we grow in Jesus. It's him that is proclaimed. Growth comes through Jesus. And so just to help you with this, and I'm going to give you the references.
So if you disagree with me right now, I feel like this isn't true. I want you to just write these down. If you just like taking notes and writing things down, you want to look this up later. I'm going to give you the references. And I'm just going to explain quickly what Paul says. So we're going to see where Paul does this, where Paul sees the world through the gospel.
So 1 Corinthians 6, 9 through 11. 1 Corinthians 6, 9 through 11. Paul's talking about behavior and living correctly, what it looks like to behave, what it looks like to have a right life. And he goes through and lists this sin, this sin, this sin, this sin, this sin, this sin. Step away from it. Don't have it in your life.
And then he lands with, because Jesus has saved you, because you've been called out of this, because you used to be a part of this, but you've been rescued by the cross, because you've been rescued by Jesus. And so the reason that we behave is because Jesus has already saved us, already rescued us. In 1 Corinthians 6, 18 through 20. So later in that chapter, he specifically talks about sexual sin. He says that sexual sin is a big deal, that you should flee from sexual sin, because it's not, it's one of the only sins that's not outside of the body, but it actually is a part of your body. And the reason he gives is that you've been bought with a price, that Jesus shed his blood for you.
Your body doesn't belong to you anymore. It belongs to Jesus. He owns it. He paid for it. You've already been made right. So act like it.
Live that way. But the reason is the gospel. The motivation is the gospel. Not you're falling short. Not God's mad at you. Not live up to the rules.
Not you're a bad person. No, it's that Jesus already made you right. Live that way. When he's talking about giving and generosity to Corinthians again, but it's 2 Corinthians 8, 9, 8, 8, and 9. What he says is that they should be generous because Jesus, who was rich, became poor on their behalf. And so the reason for generosity, the reason we open our wallets, the reason we give to the church, the reason we help people pay light bills is not because it's good, not because it makes us right with God.
It's because Jesus has already given up everything and given us everything. We already have all the wealth that we could ever want. When he's talking to husbands and wives in Ephesians 5, 22 through 25, he says, here's how to be a wife. Here's what that looks like. Here are the rules for being a good wife. Here's how to be a husband.
Here's what that looks like. And the whole time, the reasoning behind it is because marriage is a picture of Christ's love for the church. And what Jesus has already done on behalf impacts how we live as a married couple. But it's always the gospel is the reasoning. The gospel is the motivation. And it's the gospel that empowers us to actually live that way.
That's what we're talking about when we say we're gospel centered. It's not, hey, come, let's all work to behave together. It's no, our behavior is going to change as we focus on Jesus, as we grow in Jesus. So this is how we talk to ourselves. This is how we think. Husbands, wives.
We'll pick on husbands. I'm a husband. We'll pick on them. Wives, this applies to you, but I'm going to fuss at your husband. So you're welcome.
Why do you serve your spouse? Why are you gracious to your spouse? Why do you go out of your way for your spouse? Now, if we're honest, a lot of husbands will say things like, well, if you just had this conversation with somebody, because it's good. Okay. Because you're supposed to.
Right. Because life's better when you do. Yeah. She fusses less. Mm-hmm. Bible says we should.
That's okay. That's a good reason. But we could rattle this stuff off. But eventually, there's a reason. That all runs out. The motivation for that runs out.
It makes me a good husband. Okay. But there's some days I could care less about being a good husband, if I'm honest with you. I just, I just, yeah, what would a good husband do? Probably get up and help. What do I want to do?
Sit on the couch. I'll just take a loss today. Perhaps a track record's probably good enough to be at least above 500. Like, I'm above 50% right now, probably. I'll justify. I did something last week that really probably counted double.
Covers this day. That your wife is happier. People will say, like, happy wife, happy life. If mom ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. Okay. Eventually, that runs out, too, though.
The only reason I'm doing good stuff is because it makes my wife not fuss at me. At some point, I just don't care anymore. This ain't worth the effort. Because I get fussed at all the time. Like, eventually, husbands, you're just like, ah, ah, ah, ah. Truth is, though, the reason that you serve your spouse is that Jesus served us.
That Jesus gave himself up for us. That we have been so absolutely served. So absolutely taken care of. So absolutely had someone sacrifice on our behalf. That it fundamentally changes how we behave. And then the reason I behave is no longer about me.
Because all of those were about me. All of those were about you. Makes me feel good. Makes me look good. Makes me happier. Makes life better.
She fusses less. All of that eventually turns in on itself and is just about you. That's why it breaks down. Because at some point, you've decided something else is more important. But all of those get to be about Jesus.
And they get to be about Jesus and not about your spouse. Not about making her happy. Not about she responding appropriately. It's only always about Jesus. And that never runs out. That motivation doesn't quit.
Yes, I've been served. Yes, I've sacrificed. She doesn't notice. So Jesus does that for me. And I take it for granted. And I don't notice.
And I don't appreciate it. And I get to grow. When I serve and do something I don't want to do. When you're doing something you fundamentally hate, you get to remind yourself, I bet the cross was terrible. Thank you, Jesus, that you sacrificed on my behalf. And that doesn't run out.
And it continues to change us. And it actually brings joy in that situation. Why do you work hard at your job? You can rattle off the list. Makes me feel good. People see me doing it.
Boss will notice. I'll get a promotion. Eventually, all that just runs out. But if it's that I worked fundamentally for God, that he sees me, that Jesus has already come and worked hard on our behalf, that he's already come and sacrificed on my behalf, that doesn't run out. Motivating yourself with the gospel and remembering that this is my story, this is who I am, that doesn't run dry. Why are you generous?
Jesus was generous. Why do you avoid temptation and sin? Because Jesus died for it. Because I've been made new. Because I'm holy and blameless and above reproach because of him. And then what happens is we get to turn this out towards other people.
There's not even just behavior. It's circumstances. You get fired from your job. Is that bad? Yeah. Do you wish that hadn't happened?
Probably. Although my dad had a friend one time who got fired during hunting season and they were going to be, he got to be on like unemployment for a little while and he was so happy. And his twin brother didn't from the same place. And so he went hunting every day while his brother was getting ready to go to work. And that was like the best thing. He's like putting on his camo and laughing or whatever.
But most of the time though, getting fired is bad. And you have to remind yourself that, yeah, this is bad. But God's trustworthy. He's proven that in the cross. And my worth doesn't come from my ability to work, my ability to provide, my ability to earn. That all of my worth and approval has already been sealed in Jesus.
Jesus. So it changes how we see the world. It changes how we react. And it changes how we talk to people. So this becomes our primary story.
It becomes our language that we're fluent in. And it becomes how we respond for the most part. Christians. If you're in here and you're not a Christian, you're off the hook on this one because you probably don't do this. Although you probably do give advice. But Christians.
A lot of times we memorize Bible verses. And then we use them like bullets to shoot people. All we do is we remove the verse, wipe the gospel off of it, which was the context in which it came. And then we just give the verse to someone and we think we're being helpful and we are not. Is that verse true? Yes.
Is the context the gospel? Yes. And a lot of times the way we apply it is not the gospel. So you're having a conversation with someone and they're like, I just feel like a bad wife. I feel like a bad mother. And you're like, well, Proverbs 31.
Boom! Feel good? Feel like a better mom now? Better wife? Let's read those verses together.
I just wanted to help you see how woefully you fall short. Happy Mother's Day. The gospel doesn't show up. It's out of context. You're not telling the whole story. I've really been struggling with lust.
I've really been struggling with, well, Job 31.1, Ephesians 5.3. Boom! You're welcome. I'm enjoying our confession time. Like, we just lay weight on people and we haven't told them the whole story. And so we actually get to respond out of the gospel.
Instead of just saying, yeah, you are a terrible husband. Yeah, you are. Yeah, you do fall short. We only give that half of it. The Bible's very clear. Yeah, you are a selfish roommate.
You are a jerk. Good point. I've been meaning to tell you you were a jerk. Here's how the Bible says you're a jerk. Like, we just end up shooting people repeatedly with Bible verses that don't help people love Jesus, don't help people grow, and don't help people see the gospel. And so what we do as a church family is we give good news before we give good advice.
And I'm going to explain what that means. Good news is the gospel, that Jesus died for us, that he rescued us. And it's an event that happened on our behalf. So, king goes to battle. I heard this story before. It helps me see this picture so clearly.
A king goes to battle, leaves his castle behind. He gets his archers together. He gets his chariots together. He gets all of his horsemen, all his foot soldiers. And they go to battle and they leave. And everybody, he leaves a couple of people in the castle.
And all the civilians in the castle. And they're waiting to find out what's going to happen. One of two things happens. The king goes to battle. And he wins. And what he sends back is good newsers.
All they're doing is riding back on a horse, laughing to themselves, feeling real happy and light inside, to go tell everybody, we won. King won. Victory's been won on your behalf. Throw open the gates. Get the band out. Bring out your finest meats and cheeses.
The celebration will begin. The battle has been won. And all you can do with that, because it is news, is live in light of it. So you feel better. You celebrate. You dance.
There's like freedom in that. Or he loses. And he grabs somebody on the horse and he says, ride back as fast as you can and tell them they're coming. They've broken our ranks. His army is scattered. He says, tell them to put the archers on the walls.
Tell them to seal up the gate. Tell them to bring in as much as they can. Close everything up. Seal everything up. Put all the women and children in the inner chamber. And here's the game plan.
Best way to probably defend yourself and good luck. That's advice. He sends good advisors who just show back up and say, here's what we have to do to hopefully survive. And that is not the gospel. The gospel is, here's what Jesus has done to give us life and to give us victory. And we live in light of that.
It changes our behavior. But it's not about our behavior. Our behavior isn't to fix the problem. It isn't to beat off the enemy. It isn't to win. It isn't to defeat those who are charging against us.
It isn't to have the victory. The victory has already been won. The king has already won. The good news is already proclaimed. And so as a church family, we give good news before we give good advice. And we like good advice.
Good advice is good. But we give good news first. We're going to talk about Jesus before we talk about you. Before we talk about your situation. We're going to talk about Jesus first because we have good news. So we give good news before we give good advice.
And we talk about Jesus before we talk about you. And it changes how we interact with each other. It changes how we speak to each other. And here's why it matters. If you sit down with someone for coffee and they say, I feel like I'm a terrible mother. I feel like I'm a terrible wife.
I just feel like I'm falling short. And all you say is, yeah. Here are the things I did to be less of a terrible mother. Super encouraging. Let me tell you my three tricks to being awesome. Here's what I did to be a better wife.
Here's what I read that Beth Moore says about being a good wife. Here's what all you're fundamentally saying. You're giving good advice. But all you're fundamentally saying is, This is about your behavior. And that is the opposite of the gospel. When I just give you good advice, When you sit down with coffee for someone, And you say things that you're hoping to be encouraging, Hoping to be helpful, And you leave Jesus out of it.
What you're saying is, This is about your behavior. The problem is your behavior. And the way to fix it is your behavior. That's what we're telling people. And here's why that matters. Parents.
You got kids. You got kids in, You grew up. So younger people, Maybe you came up through a youth group. Parents, Maybe you've got kids in a youth group. Well, not if you're here. We don't have one of those.
But maybe you've had one. Your kids were in a youth group. And here's the thing. With your children, You want them to behave. You want them to grow. You want them to have morals.
You want them to have standards. But here's the thing. If your child, Doesn't say any swear words. Doesn't drink. Doesn't smoke. Doesn't chew.
Doesn't date people that do. Only listens to family friendly radio. Like they're tearing up WMHK, Which is now K-Love. Like they're rocking on the way to school, To a Sandy Patty thing. If y'all know who that is. They iron their blue jean shorts, And tuck their shirt in.
They only wear, Or they only watch VeggieTales movies. If they do that successfully, Do they not need Jesus? If you successfully beat, These behaviors into them. Do they not need Jesus? No. They do.
They're just a goofy lost person. They're just an awkward sinner. That's all it is. Should their behavior change? Yes. Should you teach morality as a parent?
Yes. Should you pay attention to the messages, That your children are learning through music and movies? Yes. Should we all? Yes. Everything is preaching to us.
Everything is declaring a false gospel. Does that save us? No. In your community group, If you could just get everybody to behave. If confession time was, I only prayed for seven hours this week. I really wanted to hit 14.
And then y'all just hugged each other. Would you not need Jesus? No, you'd need Jesus. You'd need him to save you, To redeem you, To change you. You need his work, Not yours. And so when we look at someone, And you just say, Here's how to change your behavior.
What I have just declared to you is, It's about your behavior. And if you fix that, You'd be okay. And that is the farthest thing from the truth. So it makes a difference. It's a big deal. So we're going to, Give good news before we give good advice.
And we're going to talk about Jesus, Before we talk about you. That's how we as a church family respond. That's what it looks like, To be gospel centered for us. So when we talk to somebody, We're going to talk about good news, Before we give good advice. And we're going to talk about Jesus, Before we talk about you. Martin Luther says this, And this was, He said it in German, Way back in the day.
He's one of the guys that like, Had a fit and started the reformation. He's a pretty angry person. It's kind of cool. He also helped clarify some things, About the gospel and some of the stuff in scripture. But he said this in German, So it was translated into like, Old English.
So some of the words will be weird, And I'll try to skip. Where it says teacheth, I'll just say teaches. Martin Luther said this, Here I must take counsel of the gospel. I must hearken to the gospel, Which teaches me, Not what I ought to do, For that is the proper office of the law, But what Jesus Christ, The son of God, Has done for me. To wit that he suffered and died, To deliver me from sin and death. The gospel wills me to receive this, And to believe it.
And this is the truth of the gospel. It is also the principal article of all Christian doctrine, Wherein the knowledge of all godliness consists. Most necessary is it, therefore, That we should know this article well, Teach it to others, And beat it into their heads continually. And that's what we're shooting for as a church family. To beat the gospel into each other's heads continually. And a lot of times we think, I know the gospel.
I don't need to know the gospel right now. I need to know how to change my behavior. The problem is, Your behavior won't change, Unless the gospel becomes more real to you, More clear to you, More, You feel it more. That's what changes our behavior. And the truth is, You don't know the gospel. We function outside of the gospel all the time.
There are times Matt and I, We're getting this up, I'll need to repent, Or I'll be upset about something, And Matt will go, Let me tell you, Your approval doesn't come from that, That you completely whiffed on, And it was terrible. Your approval comes from Jesus, And his work for you. And the whole time he's doing that, I'm like, I know that Matt. Thanks. And when he gets done, I'm like, I feel better, That was really helpful. Because we need to be reminded, Of the gospel.
Flip over to Hebrews 3, So if you're in one of these bibles, It's going to be like, 11 pages to the right, On 649. And the author of Hebrews, Is kind of laying this out for us, What this looks like. And so I just, We're going to walk through this, And then we're going to talk a little bit about, Just practically, How do we share the gospel with each other, On a regular basis. Hebrews 3 verse 12, Take care brothers, So brothers and sisters, Church family, Take care brothers, Lest there be in any of you, An evil, Unbelieving heart, Leading you to fall away, From the living God, But exhort, And I'll explain what that means in a second, Exhort one another every day, Every day, As long as it is called, Today, See what he did there?
That none of you may be hardened, By the deceitfulness of sin, Sin lies to us, For we have come to share in Christ, If indeed we hold our original confidence, Firm to the end, Okay, Exhort one another today, As long as it's called today, Every day, As long as it's called today, Exhort just means special Bible encouragement, It really just means special gospel encouragement, That's what it is, That's what exhortation is, It's reminding each other of the gospel, Because that's our original hope, What was your original hope? That you were awesome? If that was your original hope, I have news for you, You are not a Christian, And you are not awesome, Your original hope is that Jesus, Was awesome for you, That he was good for you, That his work saves you, That's the original hope, And that's what we exhort one another in, That's what we remind each other of, Jesus is great, You aren't, You are going to fall short, That's the gospel, That's why a feel good, Ism, Feels so empty, You ever mess something up terribly, And someone trying to be nice is like, Oh it's okay, You'll be okay, It'll be alright, It'll all work out, That'll, Oh you'll be fine, It's great, You're great, You didn't mean that, You're a good person, Some of you, Maybe, You believe that, If you say that to me, I'm like, I'm not a good person, Like that's not, This isn't helping me at all, I don't think it'll all work out, I don't think, Like, It just feels so empty, Some of you who aren't Christians, You've been told that repeatedly, And you've really, Really tried to believe it, But you just can't, Something in you just won't let you, Fall in love with the idea, That it'll all be okay, And everything will work out, You know what warms my soul, Is when someone stares me in the face, And says, Yeah you messed that up, And that was terrible, And you failed, And Jesus steps in, And rescues, And redeems, And works, And it's because of your failure, And because of your sin, And because you fall short, That he gets to be your savior, It's your sin, That made his salvation possible, Then it's like, Yes, Thank you, So we can't do, Just you fall short, And we can't do, Just you'll be okay, We've got to connect them, With the understanding of the gospel, Which is, Yeah you fall short, But you'll be okay, Because of Jesus, Because he works on your behalf, Because he's saved you, Okay, Here's what we're going to do, Take just a second, To talk about, How we actually do this, What this actually looks like, As church family, When we talk to each other, So we've already said, We're going to give good news, Before we give good advice, And we're going to talk about Jesus, Before we talk about you, So, You're sitting down with somebody, And they confess, That they've been, Really struggling with lust, Really struggling with, They've been looking at pornography, It's just tearing them up, They don't want to, It's a Christian friend, I don't want to, I just, And every time, I feel so terrible, I just feel worthless, And I know that God's mad at me, And at some point, I just can't keep repenting, Of the same thing, At some point, He just doesn't listen anymore, I'm sure, At some point, It just doesn't mean anything anymore, When I confess this again, Normal response, Would usually follow, And fall in the advice category, Yeah man, That's a big deal, And it hurts you, And you think it doesn't hurt anybody else, But it does, It hurts all the people, That are involved in that industry, It's very similar to sex slavery, It can hurt your future relationships, It can damage those, The Bible says it's sin, Job 31.1, Ephesians 5.3, Maybe you should memorize those, And quote them out loud, When you feel tempted, Let's get a blocker thing, On your computer, Let's set it up, To where it will email people, If you fall, Let's meet once a week, And I'll ask you how this is going, Boom, Is that good advice? Yeah, Memorizing verses, Putting a blocker thing on your computer, Will it help change the behavior?
Maybe, Does it make him love Jesus more? Probably not, Because it's trusting himself, So let's rewind, Let's give good news, Before we give good advice, Let's talk about Jesus, Before we talk about him, Hey man, Yeah, That's sin, And Jesus died, For sin, And when he died for you, You were his enemy, You were weak, And he saved you, And he saved all your sin, Past, Present, And future, And if you fall again, It's already been paid for, You are covered forever, By grace, Let me tell you something, When you feel miserable for a few days, And you feel guilt, And you feel shame, And you're beating yourself up, You're not allowed to, Because once you've become a Christian, You don't get to atone for your sin, Jesus does, You don't get to beat yourself up, Your beating has already been poured out on Jesus, You don't get to be punished, Your punishment has already been met in Jesus, You don't get to feel bad, Your guilt and shame have already been taken by Jesus, You're free, And you get to praise him for his grace, That saves you when you're off, And when you're wrong, And when you're terrible, The gospel is more beautiful to you, Not on your days that you're good and you behave, But on the days that you fall so woefully short, And feel so much like you don't deserve it, That's actually what grace is, Undeserved favor, So when you feel like I don't deserve this, You've tapped into it, That's the gospel, You don't, And he gave it to you anyway, So maybe you should memorize some verses, And you and I can meet, And I'll ask about this, And we can talk about this, I know a guy who put a blocker thing on his computer, Which just helped him, Know that it was going to send out emails, And that can be helpful, But Jesus saves you, And you get to praise him for his forgiveness, And his grace, Now is that better? Does that feel better? Does that feel more real?
So maybe you should memorize some verses, And you and I can meet, And I'll ask about this, And we can talk about this, I know a guy who put a blocker thing on his computer, Which just helped him, Know that it was going to send out emails, And that can be helpful, But Jesus saves you, And you get to praise him for his forgiveness, And his grace, Now is that better? Does that feel better? Does that feel more real? More right? As a Christian, You start going, Yes, That's true, You're hanging out with one of your Christian friends, And they do this, They do the, I just, I just haven't been praying,
I haven't been reading the Bible, And I know I should be sharing the gospel with people, But, I just haven't been, I haven't been telling anybody, I haven't been intentional, I'm playing, You know, I'm spending more time, You know, Just doing other things, As opposed to sharing the gospel, As opposed to reading, What do we say? Ah, Man, Or lady, Friend, Sorry, Every once in a while, I call Anna man, And it turns into manna, I'm like, Hey man,
And Anna, So this could be a lady, I just may have called her man, Um, Hey, Set your alarm earlier, Get up 15 minutes earlier, And read the Bible then, Just do it first thing in the morning, That works for me, Um, Have someone else read through a book with you, So that you'll have someone ask, Hey, How's it going? Or, Did you read your chapter, And you'd say, No, I didn't know, Whatever, And yeah, We should share the gospel, Like,
We've been given the ministry of reconciliation, So we should do, If you don't tell them, Who will, So yeah, Normal responses, Heard that before, Said that before, I've said that before, It's one of my favorites, Set your alarm earlier, That's one of my go-tos, Just wake up earlier, Because I'm a morning person, So it just seems easy, Um, Now here's how we get to respond, Because we're going to give good news, Before we give good advice, We're going to point to Jesus, Before we point to you, Talk about Jesus, Before we talk about you, Hey yeah,
Let me tell you something, Your relationship with God, Is not based off of how much you pray, And read the Bible, Because you don't get to take that aspect, Of the gospel back from Jesus, Your relationship with God, Is that you've been adopted, Into the family, Because Jesus has given you, His position at the table, Because he reconciled us, And his relationship with God, The father has been given to us, Through the cross, So just read, You get to read, You get to study, Because it helps you grow, And helps you love God more, And helps you see the gospel more clearly, But it doesn't change, How God feels towards you, And we actually do have good news,
To share with people, Because it's not about, Our work or our effort, And guess what, Ultimately at the end of the day, You will save no one, So the pressure is off, Just tell people about Jesus, And if you mess it up, Talk to Jesus about it, Ask him to fix it, Go repent, Go tell him you're sorry, You said that wrong, Say I told you this the other day, And then I was reading in John, And man was I wrong, Here's what John says, And he said it better, So you get to share the gospel, But it's not, The pressure is not on you, To save or to rescue, Or to do any of this,
You're talking to a non-Christian friend, Works with you, Coworker, Friend of yours, Friend like you actually hang out with, Type friend, Who doesn't know Jesus, She comes in and says, Yeah I just found out my dad has cancer, We see the world through the gospel, That's terrible, I'm sorry to hear that, Pray with her, You hug her, She says, What am I going to do, How's this going to happen, And you get to say, I don't know what you're going to do, And I don't know how this is going to play out, But I'm a Christian, And I know this, I know that God is in control, I know that he's sovereign over everything,
And in these circumstances, One of the things that Christians know, Without a shadow of a doubt, Is that Jesus became a human, Suffered and died with us, And so when we face these kind of situations, We don't know how they're going to work out, But what Christians do know, Is that it's not that God doesn't love us, And it's not that he's not good, He's forever answered that half of things in the cross, He's good, He's for our good, And he loves us so much, That he would suffer and die alongside of us, How is this going to play out, I don't know, But we know he's good, And we know that he loves, And we know that he loves you more, Than you could ever understand, I'm going to pray with you, And I'm going to help any way I can, So we get to just respond,
Out of the gospel, And it's so much more life-giving, And it's so much more filling, And it's so much more true, That's why when we hear this, When we begin to talk like this as Christians, You begin to go, That's it, That's what we get to do, And then we give good advice, Here's how I quit being a jerk, It's helpful, But not until I know that me being a jerk, Isn't going to snatch me out of the hand of God, Because Jesus has already been not a jerk on my behalf, Which is beautiful, And here's what's cool about this church family, We're going to be terrible at this, And we're going to work to grow in it, So just so you know, You're sitting there going, That seems really hard to do, Yeah, And especially for those of us,
Who've been Christians for a while, That have been gotten used to, Just saying other things, Here's what's cool about this, And one of our group leaders pointed this out, He said it's like when you have a little kid, And it got me thinking about it, And it is like that, My brother has a little daughter, And she's like one now, And so I'm going to kind of make some jokes now, Because we're about to have a kid, And when we have a kid, My kid's going to be really special and smart, But, You ever been around parents, They're obnoxious about their children, They just are, Because their kid is the best, And he's the sweetest, And everything he does is the cutest, And so I'm hanging out with my brother, And they just, They love her,
And it's fun to hang out with little kids, And I like little kids, But every once in a while they'll do something, And the parents will get so excited, And it doesn't really make any sense, So they'll look at their little kid, And be like, She walked, Did you see her walk? She's walking, And it's like, She fell forward, Because her head is too big for her body, I don't know if that's walking, Or you ever see a parent, Like hold their kid's hand, And walk with them, And like, Look at them walking, It's like you're cheating bro, You're holding their hands the whole time, Or kids are learning how to talk, And they babble nonsense, All the time,
And then they say something, That sounds remotely close to airplane, And their parents lose their minds, She said airplane, Did she though? Is that real? Like, Get her to say it again, Get her to point one out in the picture, Like, That's what parents do, That's what we get to do as church family, That's what we get to do in our community groups, We're going to say stuff that doesn't make a lot of sense, We're going to mess up, We're going to just fall forward sometimes, And we're going to get to celebrate, Hey, That was kind of the gospel, Did you hear that? We talked about Jesus first, That wasn't just advice, Time out, Time out everyone,
I know you have a problem, But he just said the gospel, So we're high-fiving, And then we'll get back to your problem, Because we talked about Jesus first, Like that's what we get to do as church family, We get to celebrate the fact, That we're going to work, To beat this into each other's heads continually, Because we all need the gospel, We need Jesus, Over and over and over and over again, We need Jesus to fill us up, To remind us, To call us forward, To change us, So what we're going to do, Is Raz and we're all going to come back up, And we're going to sing, And we're going to praise Jesus, And as a church family, We are going to work and commit to, Giving good news before we give good advice, And talking about Jesus,
Before we talk about anything, Before we talk about your behavior, Before we point to, How you should change your situation, We're going to talk about, How Jesus has already stepped in, And fundamentally rescued us, Because that's the story we're a part of, Bow your heads, Let's pray, God I thank you, That we have the good news, And I pray, Through your holy spirit, That you would not let us, Let that get lost, And all the other stuff, That you would not allow us, To let that get, Just covered up, By all the other things, When we try to fix our behavior, And we want so badly, To change and to grow,
I pray that you would help us to remember, That we're going to change and grow, And we get to change and grow, But that that's, That we grow in the gospel, Not away from it, Not beyond it, Not above it, We grow deeper into it, Understanding grace, And understanding salvation, And being rescued by you, Help us to be gospel centered, Help us to be, Pointing each other to the gospel, In all things, Change our hearts to love you more, In Jesus, In Jesus, Daniel surgery Valentine's Day St. Seth
She's walking, And it's like, She fell forward, Because her head is too big for her body, I don't know if that's walking, Or you ever see a parent, Like hold their kid's hand, And walk with them, And like, Look at them walking, It's like you're cheating bro, You're holding their hands the whole time, Or kids are learning how to talk, And they babble nonsense, All the time, And then they say something, That sounds remotely close to airplane, And their parents lose their minds, She said airplane, Did she though? Is that real? Like, Get her to say it again, Get her to point one out in the picture, Like, That's what parents do, That's what we get to do as church family, That's what we get to do in our community groups, We're going to say stuff that doesn't make a lot of sense, We're going to mess up, We're going to just fall forward sometimes, And we're going to get to celebrate, Hey, That was kind of the gospel, Did you hear that? We talked about Jesus first, That wasn't just advice, Time out, Time out everyone, I know you have a problem, But he just said the gospel, So we're high-fiving, And then we'll get back to your problem, Because we talked about Jesus first, Like that's what we get to do as church family, We get to celebrate the fact, That we're going to work, To beat this into each other's heads continually, Because we all need the gospel, We need Jesus, Over and over and over and over again, We need Jesus to fill us up, To remind us, To call us forward, To change us, So what we're going to do, Is Raz and we're all going to come back up, And we're going to sing, And we're going to praise Jesus, And as a church family, We are going to work and commit to, Giving good news before we give good advice, And talking about Jesus, Before we talk about anything, Before we talk about your behavior, Before we point to, How you should change your situation, We're going to talk about, How Jesus has already stepped in, And fundamentally rescued us, Because that's the story we're a part of, Bow your heads, Let's pray, God I thank you, That we have the good news, And I pray, Through your holy spirit, That you would not let us, Let that get lost, And all the other stuff, That you would not allow us, To let that get, Just covered up, By all the other things, When we try to fix our behavior, And we want so badly, To change and to grow, I pray that you would help us to remember, That we're going to change and grow, And we get to change and grow, But that that's, That we grow in the gospel, Not away from it, Not beyond it, Not above it, We grow deeper into it, Understanding grace, And understanding salvation, And being rescued by you, Help us to be gospel centered, Help us to be, Pointing each other to the gospel, In all things, Change our hearts to love you more, In Jesus, In Jesus, Daniel surgery Valentine's Day St.
Seth
The Gospel
Transcript
What we're doing today specifically is we're just looking at the gospel. So as we get into the next several weeks, we'll be unpacking very practically what it means for that to affect us, for the gospel to change us and to affect how we live our lives. But today we're just looking at the gospel. And to do that, we're going to look in Romans chapter 1 through 6. Chapters 1 through 6. So everybody, put your big boy britches on.
We've got a lot of work to do. The reason we're doing that and the reason we're going to try to cover so much text is this. The gospel is the primary story of the Bible. It is the story of the Bible. And what happens sometimes when we talk about the gospel is we'll say, hey, everybody flip to 2 Corinthians. Everybody now jump over to 1 Timothy.
Everybody go to this passage in Luke. And it seems as if sometimes, if we haven't spent much time reading scripture, that the gospel is somehow hidden obscurely all around like it's like a little treasure hunt to find it. And it is not. And so what we're trying to do today is actually just go through Romans 1 is going to say this. Romans 2 is going to say this. Romans 3 is going to say this.
And move so that we all have a good handle on a linear walkthrough of a big understanding of the gospel. Now, when we say the word gospel, it sometimes gets confusing. We use the word gospel a lot, sometimes wrongly. Sometimes we're talking about the Holy Spirit. And we'll say, you know, the gospel changes you. And really it's the Holy Spirit changing you through the gospel.
So sometimes we'll use the gospel too much and use it in the wrong sentence. A lot of times we just say it's become buzzwordy for us, especially us as a church, where we'll say things like we'll press into the gospel, point each other to the gospel, walk in the gospel. Your community needs to be about the gospel. And after a while it's like I don't even know what you're talking about anymore. You just keep using that word. And it's not helpful.
And for some of us that maybe don't have a church background, when you hear gospel, you might even just think of a type of music. And depending on where you grew up, that may be southern gospel, which is like four overweight white guys telling a story in harmony with one another. And it may be the other type of gospel, which is going to be any number of 1 to 30 African Americans not telling a story, but saying the same thing over and over and over again. And we can argue all day as to which one's better. There is one that's better, and it's not the four white guys. But I'm just throwing that out there.
So we may even just be confused about what that word means. And so what we're going to do first is we're just going to really clearly try to explain where the word gospel comes from and what the Bible means when it says it, because it is a very loaded word. It means way more. It's a huge concept, and it is the story of the Bible. So the word gospel comes from the Greek word euangelion, or sometimes they'll English eyes at some and call it evangelion.
That's where we get the word evangelist from. And what it means is angelia just meant message. And so you would have news. That's what it means. So the gospel basically, ooh means good, and angelia means news.
And so the gospel very fundamentally just means good news. But it's not good news the way we use the term good news. So like I might see you and be like, I've got good news. Little Caesar's having a buy one, get one free sale. Wow. And you're like, that's great news.
But the way they would have used it is everything was news and only life-shattering, epic, this will change you news was good news. Was euangelion. And so everything was news. So you would have heralds and people that would proclaim news. And then there are certain things that were called gospel, good news. Like this is actual life-changing news.
And so there were certain things like there's the gospel of Caesar, which is saying this is the guy who got like our nation started, set it up the way it is. This is life-changing news for everybody who exists in the Roman Empire. It's the gospel of Caesar, much the way we have like the gospel of Jesus. Mark will start off with this is the gospel of Jesus Christ. There was the gospel of like Marathon. So there are certain battles that your army won.
So when the Greeks held off the Persians and defeated them at Marathon and people ran to the cities to proclaim that, what they were proclaiming was the gospel of the battle of Marathon, which is this is epic, life-changing news. We're not going to be slaves. This isn't advice. This isn't, hey, get ready. This isn't everybody run for your life. This is gospel.
It's epic, life-changing news. Everybody throw a party, pop the keg, start celebrating. We won the battle. That's what it was. That's what gospel was. And so when the Bible says gospel, what it means is the epic, life-changing news.
And that's why the Bible is going to call it the gospel. So they took that word that meant good news and epic news, and they just put this is the life-shattering, world-changing news. And what that news is this. And I'm going to try to just walk through this very simply, and then we're going to walk through it in a more complex way as Paul unpacks it, who's a guy writing the book of Romans. As Paul unpacks it in Romans. So God created the world.
So there is a creator God, and he made everything, and he designed it to exist in a relationship with himself. Much the way that a father wants to have a relationship with his children and fights for that and wants that because the father loves his children and because it's good for the children. Like if we see a four-year-old just living on the street, we're like, no, this kid needs a family. And that's the way God created creation to exist in that relationship with himself because he loves creation, and it's good for creation. Humans, your first parents, Adam and Eve, you may know of them. You've probably seen a picture of them somewhat naked, which I hope isn't true for all your ancestors but is true for Adam and Eve.
They existed in relationship with God in a garden, and they rebelled against him. So because they existed, they chose to love themselves more, to honor themselves more, to go after their own way and not to exist in that relationship with God. And when they did that, it was a train wreck of cosmic proportions. It absolutely shattered the very fabric of our world because now creation no longer exists in the relationship with the creator as it's supposed to. Then what happens is God begins to pursue humans again and begins to try to teach them what it looks like to live in a relationship with him.
He didn't have to teach them at first. They just did. Now he's having to try to rebuild this. So he chases after the nation of Israel. He gives them the law, which is just here's how you honor me. Here's how you live in a relationship with me, and continues on, and it goes from bad to worse, and it becomes to where no human is ever going to live up to and fix the relationship with God.
So God becomes a man, and that's the person Jesus Christ. And he lives a perfect life, does not rebel, exists in the relationship with the creator as he's supposed to. The Bible tells us that when we rebel, when we fall short, when we sin and dishonor God, we deserve death. So Jesus lives perfectly and does not deserve death. If he had sinned, if he had fallen short, if he had rebelled, if he had chosen to dishonor God, he would have deserved death, but he didn't. So then he trades places with us.
And Jesus, on a cross, dies the death that we all deserve. And then he rises from the grave three days later. Not spiritually, not an apparition, rises back to life, still has scars, eats food, touches people, scares people, rises from the dead. And when he did that, he gave us his life. And so that for anyone who places faith in Jesus, his life applies to your account. So that your terrible life, your failure of a life, that where you fall short, where you mess up, where you have sin, where you have problems, he applies his life to your account.
And where you have fallen short and messed up and had problems and disobeyed God and run from him, he takes that onto himself and dies for it. So he dies for our sin and rises to give us life. And that is the gospel. And that's what the Bible means when it says the gospel. It's that Jesus saves us through his work and effort, not ours. And that's what Paul is going to mean.
And that's what we're going to walk through today. And that's what everything is about. For us as a church, that's all we talk about. If you've been hanging around for a while, you're like, man, they only talk about Jesus. Yes. That's all we have to say.
We're a band with one song. We're like Brian Adams. We start with summer of 69. We close with summer of 69. We got nothing else in the middle. That's it.
That's all we do is we're going to talk about Jesus. We're going to talk about the gospel. And so we're going to walk through Romans 1 through 6 so that we can all have a very clear picture. And that's what we're walking through, this epic, life-changing good news as Paul unpacks it. So I'm going to pray.
And we're going to walk through Romans 1 through 6 at a hefty clip because we don't want to be here until 3 o'clock in the afternoon, I'm assuming. I'm cool with it if y'all are. All right, let's pray. God, we thank you that the gospel is not obscure, but that you've made it evident and clear. And we ask that you would reveal it to us as we study your word today. Give us wisdom and clarity as we walk through.
May your Holy Spirit speak to us in a very real way. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. So I just want to give a disclaimer. If this is your first time hanging out with us, maybe you're not a Christian. Maybe you got invited by your Christian friend to come hang out with their church.
They've been bugging you. You ran out of excuses. First of all, well done, Christian friend. Second of all, if you're here hanging out, I just want to tell you this is it. This is what we're about. This is what the church is about.
This is what Christianity is about. This is what the Bible is about. So they can't tell you, oh, he didn't really talk about it. You're going to have to come back. No, this is it. You came on the right Sunday to hang out with us.
This is what we're talking about. And as clearly as we can, we're going to walk through it. So we're in Romans 1. Now, Romans 1 starts off, it's a letter. So he starts off with like, hey, I'm Paul.
How y'all doing? How's your mom and them? And then immediately in 16, he jumps right into what he's talking about. He jumps right into the main point. So Romans 1, 16.
This is kind of Paul's lead. So if you write for a newspaper, the lead is the main part of the story. So it's going to be at the first sentence you have. Actually, the headline is going to be just the news piece. And then the first sentence will be the main point. And then everything else from that is just explaining the main point if someone writes a news story well.
So you should be able to stop reading a newspaper article at any point and all you would have done. You're not waiting for like, like news headlines aren't like, someone won the Super Bowl. Read page 4b to find out. Like it doesn't tell you the story and then you find out at the end. The headline will be Colts Win. I'm not making a prediction.
I'm just saying that's how headlines work. So like if you're angry about that, we'll see. It may just be Packers, whatever. Seahawks. Not making a prediction. But that's how it works.
And so that's what Paul's doing here in 116 is he's saying this is what the rest of this entire letter is about. The rest of it will be explaining it, but this is the point. 116. For I am not ashamed of the gospel, the epic life-changing news of Jesus, that he lived in our place, died in our place, and that we can be saved through him. That's the gospel. For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.
Salvation from sin, salvation from death, salvation from the wrath of God that we deserve as we've rebelled. It's the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. To the Jew first and also to the Greek. The reason he breaks that out, and we'll see more later, is the Jews were the people that God gave the law to, gave his rules to, gave his this is how you honor me to. And so he's going to talk about them in two separate groups. So those who don't know how to relate to God and those who did or do.
For in it, the righteousness, which means goodness, rightness, right standing, of God is revealed from faith for faith as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith. So what Paul starts off with is, I'm not ashamed of the gospel, which is that Jesus saves us, he rescues us, and it's the power. The gospel is the power of salvation. That's where rescue comes from, for everyone who believes. Everyone who believes. Now he's going to walk us through this story that we just talked about.
He's going to walk us through the gospel. And so he jumps right in. 18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. Look, if God is good and holy, he has wrath. He has anger towards unrighteousness and brokenness.
My wife loves this show called Forensic Files, which is where they do like real crime stories, and then they say how they caught people based off of forensic evidence. And a lot of times it's like, 12 years later, we figured out how to use DNA. Because it used to just be like, this person bled everywhere. Gross. Clean it up. Now they keep it, and they can use DNA testing.
And so they'll find out way later. And I watch that show with her sometimes, and it creeps me out. So I have to like load a gun and sleep with one eye open after I watch a good bit of those shows. But I get so angry watching that show sometimes. So angry at the way humans treat each other and at the sick things that happen.
The terrible way that people interact with one another. The evil in the world. And I'm not that good. And I'm not that nice. And I'm not that holy. And to act like we have a good, holy, loving God who sits in heaven and doesn't care.
Doesn't have wrath for people. We very much misunderstand how much he loves. If we don't think he has wrath. And so it says that, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. Verse 19. For what can be known about God is plain to them.
Because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and his divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him. But they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened.
But claiming to be wise, they became fools. And exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Okay, here's the first bit of our problem. We were created to worship God and we replace him with other things. Now as we walk through this, we're going to have some sentences come up on the screen.
If you take notes, I try to just make clear statements about the sections we're walking through. If that's helpful, cool, write them down. If it's not helpful, pay no attention to the screen behind me. I'm not a note taker person. It takes me a lot of effort to come up with sentences that are helpful. So there you go.
We were created to worship God. We replace him with other things. What it just said was that we know God exists through creation. And that's true. You make all the arguments you want to, but that's true. Because creation is way too complex for it to just have come out of nothing.
I'm sorry, it just is. It's like the human eye, the leaf. You know, all the work all our scientists are doing to come up with solar panels. They're trying to recreate the leaf. Because that thing is like this big and very, very efficient at turning sunlight into energy. That's why that car is called the leaf.
They're trying to make the leaf. And they can't because that is crazy efficient. And we're trying to figure out how to do it. But the way God designed the world is complex. Very complex. And it's got order in the midst of what seems like chaos.
And what it's saying is that we stumble upon creation and we should automatically know something intelligent was here and had something to do with this. Your brain is a chunk of meat that knows that it exists. Your brain named itself. It's the only organ to name itself. It named itself brain. And I've made this joke before, but I like it.
So I'm going to make it again. The brain really should have done better. It named itself like superpower lightning thought muscle or something like that. Like once you think about it, you're like, if I'm going to name myself, it needs to be something really sweet because the brain can do whatever it wants. That's complex. Like if you're walking through the woods, I don't know why you're in the woods, but you're walking through the woods and you come up on a little cottage.
And it's got a little thatched roof and it's made out of wood, you know, logs. And there's a little fireplace, like smoke coming out of it. You don't think, huh, I bet wind did this. I bet there's a whole lot of nature going on, made this little house. No, you immediately are like, oh, there's a human here and he's home because there's a fireplace. And I don't know why he lives in the woods, but he's probably weird.
Like that's immediately what happens. Like you're walking through the woods and you find a bird's nest. Immediately something intelligent had something to do with this. And this isn't even really complex. It's like sticks in a circle with a little hole in the middle. But you see it and you know this didn't just happen.
And so what Paul just said was with creation, God has made himself evident. He's made himself clear. You can't look at creation and be like, I bet wind did this. Like it's not how it works. Like a tornado never rips through a part of the country and builds a better city. This is not how chaos works.
So what he's saying is that it's clear that God exists and that we replace him. So it says that they replaced him with creatures, with creeping things. What we did was we took God as creator and we moved him out of that spot and we put other things there. We worship and care about and love other things. Something is going to be primary for us. Something is going to be what you spend your time on.
Something is going to be what you spend your energy, your sweat, your money towards. Something is going to be where you put your effort. Whatever that is, it's supposed to be God. It's supposed to be what you orient your life around. But you'll shift it.
It'll become something created. So it'll be money. It'll be sex. It'll be enjoyment. It'll be pleasure. It'll be your family.
Most of the time it's something good. It'll be your children. That's what you're going to spend your time on. That's what you're going to put your effort towards. But we've taken something creeping, something small, and we've replaced God with other things.
Now here's how this works. When the Bible talks about law, what it's really saying is that God exists so he actually has things that he likes and doesn't like. Things that honor him and don't honor him. So when he's primary, we'll orient our life around the things that he likes and doesn't like. Let me give you a very small example. It's kind of, sorry.
I made my, anyway, sorry. My wife, Anna. The reason I thought it was funny is because she's very small. So it's a very small example. My wife, Anna. She used to be smaller.
She's been putting on weight lately because she's really pregnant. She's going to have a baby here soon. But, man, I apologize, guys. My wife, Anna. So I care about her.
I love her. And so my life gets bent around her some. Like I begin to know what she likes and doesn't like. And I honor her through that. So like one of the ways that I would honor her well is like she comes home.
And I got home a little early. I started preparing. You know, I'm going to kind of, I'm going to show her some love. You know, so I wrote her a little note. And it's like, ooh, girl. Because that's a good way to start a note.
And it's like, I made you a cheeseburger with some blue cheese and a whole lot of ketchup for you. Because I've just been sitting at the house thinking about your curly brown hair, your olive skin, and your bright blue eyes. And I went to Redbox. And I rented you a DVD, the scariest one I could find, the best horror picture I could find that stars Vin Diesel. Now here's the problem.
That sounds nice. She doesn't have olive skin. She doesn't have blue eyes. She doesn't have curly brown hair. So I'm in trouble.
She doesn't like ketchup. And she's allergic to blue cheese. She doesn't like horror movies. And especially not anything with Vin Diesel in it. So when we talk about following and honoring and loving God, when the Bible talks about his law, what it's basically saying is a concept that we all understand very simply.
Is that because he actually exists, he has things that he likes and doesn't like. He has things that honor him and don't honor him. Because he's real. So when you're having a conversation with someone and they say, Well, my God would never. Time out. You don't get to choose.
Like I don't get to say, well, my wife would never be allergic to blue cheese. It's like she is, dude. Like she's real. So when somebody starts defining God in a way that he doesn't define himself, because he's real, he actually has things that honor him. So we have to ask questions like, how does he feel about children?
What's it mean to be a good father in relationship to my creator? Can I beat them? Can I get rid of them if they get on my nerves? Am I supposed to take care of them? What's he feel about the elderly? How does he feel about the way men treat women?
Are they property as they are in other parts of the world? Or are they have value in life and worth and are designed, made to be, designed, made to be cultivated and flourish and have giftings that they're supposed to use? Like how does he feel? Because he's real, he actually has ways that we follow him. So when the Bible talks about honoring God and loving him and following his law, that's what it's referring to in a very simple way.
Is that if he's primary, we'll exist as if he's primary. Now here's the problem. God is creator. We've replaced him with other things. If I have a wife, if you have a spouse, husband or wife, and you don't treat them as your spouse, that makes you a bad spouse. Very simply.
You don't treat your spouse like they're your spouse. You don't acknowledge them. Don't care for them. Act like you don't have a spouse. You're a bad spouse. You're a dad.
You've got kids and you don't treat your kids like they're your kids. You just, you ignore them like you don't have kids. That makes you a bad dad. If we are creation and we don't treat creator like he's the creator, that makes us bad creation. It's just a very simple concept. And so that's what Paul's saying.
Is that the wrath of God is shown against us because we've all replaced God with something else. All of us. Okay, jump to chapter 2, verse 11. We're going to read two things here, two verses, just to kind of clarify some of this. For God shows no partiality. That sounds nice.
12. For all who have sinned without the law. Okay, time out. We're about to find something out. If you did not know what honored God. So Paul just said that God made himself evident through creation.
But let's say you've never grown up in the church. You never spent any time reading the Bible. You never knew what honored God. You never got to know him to know what it was like. What he liked and didn't like. What would make him happy.
What would please him. It's about to tell us what happens to you. So if that's you. I never really read the Bible. I never really spent any time in church. I don't really know what God likes or doesn't like.
We're about to find out what it says. He doesn't show partiality. For all who have sinned. So that means disobeyed God. Run from God. Dishonored God.
Without the law. Will also perish without the law. Okay, that didn't go well for y'all. What it says is if you didn't know how to honor God. And you dishonored God. No excuse.
You'll perish without the law. You had no rules. You had no way to relate to him. You perish without it. And all who have sinned under the law. Okay.
Other half of people. Grew up in church. Read the scriptures. Understand a little bit about what it means to honor God. You know a little bit about the ten commandments. Like you can remember six out of the ten of them.
Know a little bit about what we're supposed to do to honor God. Let's find out what happens to us. I'm in that camp. I grew up in church. For all who have sinned under the law. Will be judged by the law.
Well that's not good. What it says is. Oh you knew it? You generous? You gracious? You loving?
Do you lie? You steal? Do you put other things over above me? It's just gonna. They just line up against us. And you're judged by it.
So. He shows no partiality. God's very fair. If you don't know the law. You perish without it. And if you do know the law.
You'll be judged by it. And God's wrath is coming forth for everyone. And all the unrighteousness in the world. Okay. Jump over to 3 verse 9. So what we've seen so far is that we have a problem.
We were created to worship God. And we replace him with other things. Chapter 3 verse 9. What then? Are we Jews any better off? And when he says Jews.
He means those who know how to honor God. Are we Jews any better off? No. Not at all. Sorry church people. People who knew the rules.
He says you're not any better off. He's specifically talking about the Jewish people. Who were given the law. But. Understanding how to honor God. Not any better off.
For we have already charged. That all. Both Jews and Greeks. Are under sin. As it is written. None is righteous.
No not one. No one understands. No one seeks for God. All have turned aside. Together they have become worthless. No one does good.
Not even one. Their throat is an open grave. They use their tongues to deceive. The venom of asps is under their lips. Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood.
In their paths are ruin and misery. How many of you that sounds like your path? In their paths are ruin and misery. And the way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. So that just means that they haven't placed God.
In his rightful position as creator. They haven't honored him. Loved him. Served him. There is no fear of God before their eyes. 19.
Now we have known that whatever the law says. It speaks to those who are under the law. So that every mouth may be stopped. And the whole world may be held accountable. To God. He will judge everybody.
Is what that's saying. For by works of the law. No human being. Will be justified. That means made right. It's actually a word that.
It's a. It's a. Judiciary term. It means that you won't stand before God in his courtroom. And be declared innocent. So justified means.
For by the works of the law. No human being will be justified in his sight. Since through the law comes knowledge of sin. All right. Real quick. What that means.
Is that through the law comes knowledge of sin. Just means that if you didn't know what God liked. You could. You could dishonor him without knowing about it. But once you know about it.
It doesn't fix your ability to. To follow. It just means you dishonor him. And know about it. No one. Will be made right with God.
No human being. Raise your hand if that applies to you. Okay. Hands down. No human being. Will be made right.
With God. By works of the law. What that means is. If we all came in here. And studied what made God happy. What he liked and didn't like.
And we worked to live under that. None of us. Would do it. None of us could live up to it. None of us could be good enough. None of us would be able to stand before God.
And be declared innocent. If you thought. That the Bible. Was about a bunch of do's and don'ts. Do this. Don't do that.
And God will love you. Do this. Don't do that. And you'll be a good person. It is not. What it just said was.
No one. Will be justified. By the law. So if you're talking to a friend. You don't know much about the Bible. And they're like.
Oh the Bible is just about a bunch of rules. You don't know much about the Bible. But you can now say. No it ain't. What's it about. I don't really know yet.
But it's not about being a good person. Because the Bible very clearly says. No one's going to do it. No one's going to be good enough. We all fall short. No amount of work will fix this.
In chapter 2. Paul says that we will all be judged by our works. And then he goes into. And all of us will fall short. So our problem is that we were meant to worship God.
But we were replacing with other things. And the second half of that problem. Is that we all fall short. And no amount of work will fix it. Been pretty uplifting so far. Paul really starts this letter off.
With a nice little hug. Chapter 1. Get in here. Verse 21. But now the righteousness.
Okay look. That sentence starts with but. Which sounds really nice. Because the first two chapters have been. Like a beating. And so it starts with but.
Which means something different is about to happen. But now the righteousness. It means the rightness. The goodness. The holiness of God. God.
Has been manifested. Just means it showed up. Apart from the law. Although the law and the prophets bear witness to it. That's just saying the Old Testament. It's called the law and the prophets.
It's saying it points to this. The righteousness of God. Through faith. In Jesus Christ. For all who believe. For there is no distinction.
For all have sinned. And fall short of the glory of God. And are justified. And are justified. Made right. Declared innocent.
By his grace. As a gift. Through the redemption. That is in Christ Jesus. Whom God put forward. As a propitiation.
That is a big word. And you need to fall in love with it. The word propitiation. Means that he diverted wrath. That wrath that we read about in chapter one. Where God's wrath is coming forth from heaven.
It was poured out on Jesus on the cross. In his excruciating. Painful. Bloody. Humiliating death. God's wrath was poured out on him.
And it diverted its course. From us. To him. That's what propitiation means. God put forward as a propitiation. By his blood.
To be received. By faith. By trust. This was to show God's righteousness. His goodness. His holiness.
Because in his divine forbearance. He had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness. At the present time. So that he might be just.
And the justifier. Of the one who has faith in Jesus. It means he's still a good judge. Because the guilty aren't acquitted. But he paid the penalty for us.
That's good news. That's the gospel. That's the epic. Life shattering. Time changing news. That changes everything for us.
We were created to live in an existence. With God. We removed him. And worship other things. No amount of work can fix this. And Jesus stepped in on our behalf.
And fixed it for us. That's good news. There's some movies I watch sometimes. I get pretty into movies. So I'll get amped up.
So like. It depends on what kind of movie I'll watch. But if I watch some movies. Like they make me want to work out. Some movies will make me like. Want to go fight someone.
Or whatever. Just depending on how good the movie is. But there's some movies that just get me really pumped. Really excited about stuff. Rudy's one of those. Like every time I watch Rudy.
I just want to go achieve something. Like I just want to spend four years. Chasing after one thing. And then just accomplish it at the end. And then like. Everybody picks me up.
And like I just. It makes me want to go try harder. That movie Unbroken. I hadn't even seen it. The previews get me amped. That guy's in that prisoner of war camp.
And he's like holding that stick. And that Japanese guy looks at him. And says don't look at me. And then punches him in the face. And then he looks down. And he looks right back at him.
I'm like. I best not see a Japanese person. I'll straight up look right at him. I don't even care. Like. There are certain movies.
And certain stories. And certain things. That just get you excited. They motivate you. All other religions. Are fundamentally doing that.
They're working to motivate. They're going to give you a good example. They're going to show you a way to live. They're going to say. This is what it looks like. To be a good this.
This is what it looks like. To reach nirvana. This is what it looks like. To be in a right relationship with God. And anytime you watch that. Anytime I watch Rudy.
Anytime I get motivated by something. It is certainly motivating. But it does not take weight off of me. It actually puts weight on me. Anytime someone gives you a rousing example. Of what it looks like to be a good.
Wife. Good mother. Anytime you read that. That mommy blog. It motivates. But it doesn't take weight off.
Anytime you. You find out. You look. And look at one of those. Before and after pictures. Of somebody who lost a bunch of weight.
It might motivate. But it doesn't take the pressure off. It doesn't lift that off of you. This. Good news of Jesus. Doesn't motivate.
It takes the pressure off. He came and took the weight for us. The pressure we feel. To be good. To be holy. To live rightly.
To prove ourselves. To earn it. None of us will. No. And Jesus showed up. To take the weight off.
To carry it for us. To die in our place. For our sins. And to give us. Righteousness. And holiness.
And to make us right with God. Jesus died. To pay our debt. And to make us right with God. We are saved by his work. Not ours.
Fundamentally. That's. That's. What we believe. When we say we believe the gospel. Is that we're saved by Jesus's work.
Not ours. That the church is not a group of people. Who got together. And try to be good together. It's a group of people. Who got together.
Because they knew they weren't. And they needed Jesus. To be good on our behalf. Romans 5. Paul's going to kind of unpack this. A little bit more for us.
Clarify a little bit more for us. As we dig further away. From. From kind of his lead. Romans 5 verse 6. For while we were still weak.
At the right time. Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die. For a righteous person. Though for. Perhaps for a good person.
One would dare to die. So what Paul's saying is. None of us want to take a bullet. For somebody on. On death row. None of us are going over there.
And saying. Hey you know what. That guy. Who. Who's in that triple homicide. Killed those little kids.
Let me take his lethal injection. Nobody wants to do that. But. For a good person. You might take a bullet. There's certain people.
That in your life. That you might would care enough for. To take a bullet for. That you might would. Lay your life down for. But God shows his love.
This is verse 8. But God shows his love. For us. In that while we were still. Sinners. Christ died for us.
Since therefore. We have now been justified. By his blood. Much more. Shall we be saved. By him.
From the wrath of God. For while we were enemies. We were reconciled to God. By the death of his son. Much more now. That we are reconciled.
Shall we be saved. By his life. More than that. We also rejoice in God. Through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through whom we have now.
Received reconciliation. Which means he fixed that relationship. What it just said was. We were all on death row. We were weak. We were sinful.
We were enemies. And Jesus showed up. And died for us. Do you know what's beautiful. About that. You can't out sin God.
Because he never saved you. Because you were good. And after you've been rescued. And saved. How much more. Will he continue to save you.
How much more. Will his life be your life. How much more joy. Will he give. How much more. Will he fulfill.
His promises. How much more. Will he fill us up. He's not mad at you. You were weak. And sinful.
And his enemy. When he died for you. Some of you Christians. In the room. Need to hear that. He's not disappointed in you.
Does he want good things for you. Yes. And we're going to get into that. In chapter 6. That's where Paul goes next. Does he want us to change.
Yes. Is he mad at you. No. Is he disappointed in you. No. Is he ashamed of you.
No. Does your standing with him change. No. Does he change from. Declaring you innocent. Because of Jesus.
To guilty. No. That's some of the most. Encouraging passage of scripture. For me. Because I know that I was weak.
And sinful. And an enemy. When I was saved. That means I don't mess it up. I can't take it back from him. Chapter 6.
Verse 1. Write down the page. If you're on. If you're in one of these. What shall we say then? Okay.
So if that's true. What shall we say then? Are we to continue to sin. That grace may abound. If we can't out sin God. So that anytime I sin.
It just means more grace. Has been applied to my account. Should I just keep sinning. To get more grace? Like as a Christian. When you sin.
He's already paid for that sin. So should we just keep sinning. And get more grace? Paul says. By no means. How can we.
Who have died to sin. Still live in it? Do you not know. That all of us. Who have been baptized. Into Christ Jesus.
Were baptized into his death. We were buried. Therefore with him. By baptism into death. In order that. Just as Christ.
Was raised from the dead. By the glory of the father. We too might walk. In newness. Of life. Because of Jesus.
We're given a new life. Which means we change. Which means we grow. Absolutely all of our sin. Is covered by grace. He saves like a God.
And you sin like a human. All of our sins. Covered by grace. But we do grow. We do change. We do get a new life.
To walk in. So the sentences. Kind of. That will help. Clarify. Maybe some of that.
Is we can't be too bad. For God. But we will begin to change. Can't be too bad. But you will begin to change.
Okay. If that's. True. If that's the gospel. If the story. The epic.
Life changing story. Is that we were created. To worship God. But we replaced him. With other things. That we all fall short.
And no amount of work. Will fix it. If it's that. Jesus died. To pay for our debt. And to make us right.
With God. And that we're saved. By his work. Not ours. And if we can't be too bad. For God.
But we will begin to change. If that's the gospel. If that's the epic. Story of the Bible. Then it has very clear.
Impact on the church. It has a very clear. Impact on who we are. As a people. If that's the foundation. For us.
Because we can only build. Off of the foundation. That's been laid. So let me just clearly. Show a few places. For the church.
That that shows up. And we'll spend the rest. Of the. Of the series. Kind of unpacking. Some of these.
And drawing some of the lines. So we'll basically be saying. If this is the gospel. Then this is where it goes. And if this is true. This is where it goes.
So a few things. That are true. We worry more about our hearts. Than our behavior. Because the problem is. That we don't have God.
In his right place. And that's a heart level issue. We love. And worship. Something else. And that.
Affects our behavior. What that means. Is if you change your heart. Your behavior. Behavior will change. Just like.
We've all had a friend. That maybe started dating somebody. And as they. Started loving that person more. You saw them less and less. Their heart changed.
Their behavior changed. This is how it works. So we worry more about our hearts. Than our behavior. Because we can change our behavior. But no amount of work.
Will fix our problem. It won't change our hearts. It means that as the church. We aren't surprised. By sin. If everybody.
Falls short. If that's the entrance exam. For the church. Then the church. Isn't surprised by sin. Let me tell you something.
This is the best place. To be broken. The safest place. To fall short. The most wonderful. And dearest place.
To have baggage. And problems. And pain. And brokenness. And hurt. And to be messy.
The church is. Absolutely. The church is. And if we don't live like that. We don't believe our own message. Let me tell you something.
That is true. About every other group. Every other group. Every other people. In the world. Every other place.
That you will hang out. And be a part of. Every other social circle. You'll run with. They have a limited amount. Of things.
That can be wrong with you. There's a limited amount. Of deficiencies. That you can have. They'll put up with these. But not these.
You can be really immoral. But you better not be intolerant. You better not be self-righteous. Other groups. It'll be. No.
You can be really. Really intolerant. And self-righteous. But you better not be immoral. You better not say anything. About the.
The nuclear family. You better not. Begin to. To. Be. Socially.
Progressive. They'll have. A limited amount. Of things. That you can be. Absolutely deficient here.
You can be a terrible dad here. Absolutely. But you better not be a coward. You can be a terrible husband. But you better not be soft.
All other groups in the world. Are going to have a limited amount of things. That you can be best. Messed up with. And broken by. Except for the church.
We accept every type of messed up person here. Because we all need Jesus. You can be deficient in anything. All that does is qualify us for Jesus. Which means that we can't be judgmental. And self-righteous as Christians.
You can't look down on somebody. Because their deficiency is different than yours. That makes us the best place. To be broken. And to be open. And to be honest.
And to own your sin. And to confess. And to be real. Because that's what makes Jesus. Jesus. That's how he saves us.
That's how he rescues us. That's how we get his grace. Is by being messed up. And we know that we all are. If you're in a community group. And y'all consistently confess.
And someone never has anything to confess. Let me tell you something that's very true. It's not that they don't have anything to confess. It's just that they're not confessing. Because we're all messed up. We all have problems.
We all need Jesus. We all need to grow. We all need to change. That means fundamentally for the church. We're not surprised by sin. It also means on the other hand.
We're not okay with sin. And we have to hold those together. Which means that we do grow. We do change. We don't like sin. We're not okay with it.
It killed Jesus. It's what he died for. That's like loving the knife. That killed our brother. That's weird. So we all hate sin.
And aren't surprised by it. Aren't judgmental about it. Realize that everybody's going to have it. But work to change and grow. Which means that it's absolutely. The safest place to have baggage.
And brokenness. And pain. And hurt. And messiness. It's just not safe for your baggage. Your brokenness.
Your pain. Your hurt. And your messiness. Absolutely safe for you. But we're going to go to town.
And your baggage. Your hurt. Your pain. Your brokenness. And your messiness. Because we work to grow and change.
It means that we want. It means that everything is a gospel problem. If that's the foundation for us. Then it means laziness. It means that anger. It means that weakness.
It means that sin. It means that immorality. All of it's a gospel problem. We're going to point to the gospel and everything. It means that we have been made into a new family. We've been all saved and brought together.
And Romans 8 is going to say that we've been adopted. So we're a new family together. And it means that we want everybody to know this. Because it's actually good news. It's the only thing that is freeing. It is the only thing that is life-giving.
And it's the only thing that fixes our problem. So we will absolutely do everything we can to go out of our way to help everybody know this. For every person in here today, you're somewhere on that spectrum. You fit somewhere neatly in that line. You were created by God. You're not worshiping him as creator.
Some of us are there. And that was news to you today. Some of you have moved to step two, which is you realize that and you're working to fix it, but you'll never fix it. You figured out, oh, I messed up. And you're working really hard to somehow make up for that, somehow make your life count, somehow make everything mean something, and you're not going to fix it. Some of us, though, and for everybody in the room, we want you to move to step three, which is Jesus' work saves you, not your all.
That it is the power of salvation for all who believe. All who place trust in Jesus. It's not about earning it. It's not about working it. It's not even about the strength of your faith. It's just about Jesus.
That we trust him and know that he can take care of it. That he's good. If you're in here and that's you, just talk to Jesus about it. Tell him you want to have faith. Tell him you want to quit trying to fix the problem. Tell him you understand that you've removed him and that you know that he died for that.
Talk to him about it. And then don't leave this room without talking to somebody else about it. Grab the person you came with. Grab a stranger that seems nice. Say, I just met Jesus. I just want to talk to somebody about it.
I just placed faith and trust in him to rescue me from this pain and hurt and brokenness. And we'll say, good. So have we. The band's going to come back up. We're going to sing and make much of Jesus. We're going to praise Jesus because the gospel is true.
That we have life and hope and joy and peace based off of Jesus, not us. That the weight has actually been lifted. That our debt has actually been paid. That God actually loves us and adopts us and makes us right with him through Jesus' work, not our own. That's the gospel. That's it for all of us.
That's the story. And we're going to spend the next six weeks talking about how that looks for the rest of our church family and the rest of church life for us. And what that looks like as we walk that out as in a relationship with Jesus. And we'll pray. God, we thank you that the gospel is true. We thank you that every person in this room, whether they believe it or not, trust it or not, has had the chance to hear the good news.
And God, we pray that every person in this room would believe it and trust it and follow you. Quit carrying the weight themselves and let you take it off their shoulders. We ask that in Jesus' name. Amen.