The Blood Water Offering
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet this week.
Transcript
So good morning my name is spencer i'm one of the pastors here we are in week two of our gift series we're going to be in 2nd Samuel chapter 23 verses 13 through 17 today a brief story in the old testament you can turn there we'll thought you could fall on the screen behind us we'll be there in a moment when i was in high school i was very excited about uh the xbox 360 which is a gaming system that was going to come out and and i was like i want this.
But it was in the holiday season when it came out and they just said if you want this you're probably going to have to enter into the holiday craze in order to get it and i hate shopping it's just it's not my thing especially around the holidays i just in christmas time i i don't like it but i was like i want this so i'm going to go for it i had really three options at hand to be able to get an xbox 360 the.
First was in the the day that it came out the night before to go out and camp uh which i was never going to do because i don't camp a whole lot anyways i'm certainly not going to do it for a gaming system so that one didn't make sense the second one was to show up the morning that it came out and and get in line very early and hope that you could you know be one of the people that got in line and got one uh the.
Third option uh was to rob somebody to to show up early to find an easy week mark go get a biscuit from mcdonald's come back and then take it from them but i talked it over my mom she said that was not a good idea i might miss christmas in jail so we went with option two so i showed up at five o'clock at target in irmo and i got in line and i was one of the last four people in line to get one of the vouchers that would get you an xbox 360.
So i was excited and then as a few minutes went by more people got in line and there were parents behind me that were excited about getting one for their child who were very disappointed to get a different voucher that voucher was if we get a shipment before christmas you've got one so they still had to stay in line very upset that they were going to get one for their kids and there were a group of younger guys at the very front they had been there since the night before and they were they were talking about their intentions uh what they were going to do with their xbox 360.
Loudly about selling it on ebay for double the price so as these parents who are behind me that you know possibly not going to get one of these for their kid for christmas are hearing these young guys up front talking about selling these online for double the price you can imagine about how that went they were very upset they were starting to argue they were starting to verbally attack the guys i thought we were going to have an arnold schwarzenegger situation from jingle all the way or terminator or predator it was going to get violent.
But that listen we tell stories like that every time around this series because that highlights the insanity of this season every year we talk about pausing for gifts series because we've lost the thread on what christmas is supposed to be and we get all caught up in the holiday craziness the christmas craziness of getting presents and materialism and everything else so we we hit that every year that's why we pause for this series however in having kids now i can at least.
See that when parents go crazy over getting toys for their kids that it's actually a good desire that's just gotten corrupted right i mean the good desire is that you would get your child a gift and on christmas morning they'd be really excited and you'd see their face light up that's that's a good desire that their desire becomes our delight and we get to be excited about it it just goes a little crazy right and people get violent and all the youtube videos that we've seen of how people go a little crazy.
But at its core it's a good desire that's become corrupted and today we get to sit in a story where these uh we're going to look at three soldiers uh these are David's uh soldiers who uh want to get something for David they want to cheer him up and we're going to sit in this for a moment and glean from it and hopefully as we step back from it at the end we're going to see that this actually helps us grow in generosity and growing a normal of.
Jesus so let me pray for us and then we will jump into the story father i thank you that we get to pause every time this year and remember the Gospel and remember that it calls us to walk in generosity God i pray that you would bless this time grow us and shape us and mold us into your image we ask this in Jesus name amen all right so some context because we're jumping into a very obscure passage from the old testament all right.
So first and second Samuel really highlight the rise of David all right the one of the greatest kings in the history of Israel so we're at the end of second Samuel uh and and what this story is doing is in a series of stories that are highlighting some flashbacks and they're flashing back to uh David's 30 mightiest warriors all right so this is a series of stories that are talking about the the baddest of the bad they're called the chief men the 30 mighty men these are the baddest of the baddest warriors that fought.
For David think the expendables but less botox all right so for those of you that have never seen the expendables there you go that these are the baddest soldiers that he's got i'll just give let me give you three different highlights from three different guys that show this one uh soldier his name is jay shabiam which for those of you that are having boys it's a strong name all right jay show all right jay shabiam killed 300 men at one time with one spear all right went toe-to-toe with 300 men with one spear killed them all the.
Second uh uh banaya banaya was one of David one of David's bodyguards so banaya uh went toe-to-toe with a with a lion and a snowy pit all right and he killed the lion one-on-one he also killed an egyptian giant a seven foot five soldier so he killed shaq and he killed a lion all right and that's just to be David's bodyguard all right uh we'll give you one more eleazar eleazar was uh there's a story where he um with the Israelites or they have a barley field they're defending.
But they flee from the barley field when the philistines come eleazar posts up in the middle of the field and defeats all of them by himself all right these are the baddest of the battle these are David's mighty men and specifically in this brief story that we're going to be in today this is three unnamed men we don't know which ones they were i like to think that joe was in this bunch but we don't know all right three of his men and we're gonna pick up in.
Verse 13 and what they did 13 and three of the 30 chief men went down and came about harvest time to David at the cave of adulum when a band of philistines was encamped in the valley of refugee David was then in the stronghold and the garrison of the philistines was then at bethlehem all right so this gives some context for the situation so David uh and his men they are encamped their stronghold is at the cave of abdullah that is about as a few miles southwest of Jerusalem the philistines are encamped throughout uh they are spread out through the valley of refugee and their stronghold is in the town of bethlehem and that is.
Very sad news for David because that is David's hometown that is where he's from and the philistines are his greatest enemy the philistines i mean he has a history with him right remember David and Goliath Goliath was a philistine that's how he made his entrance into being a great military warrior he defeats Goliath there's another story where he goes he wants to marry king Saul's daughter and king Saul really wants to get rid of David because he's a threat so he says go and kill me 100 philistines and and David goes and kills 200 philistines and brings back some some goodie bags which.
For small ears we're not going to go into but you can go back and read the story the philistines hate him all right it is and that is his greatest enemy and they have taken his hometown his land where his home is and and he is deeply dismayed at this it's in caves like the cave of abdullah that we get psalms like psalm 57 there are a few psalms that were written uh in the cave and it's you can connect the dots and think this is probably one of those psalms was written during a time like this in psalm 57 1 he says be merciful to me o.
God be merciful to me for in you my soul takes refuge in the shadow of your wings i will take refuge till the storms of destruction pass by he's lamenting he's he's in the midst of storms of destruction uh there's another psalm psalm 142 same thing written in the cave when he says when in 142 3 says when the my spirit faints within me you know my way his spirit is weak he's dismayed you could even say he's probably depressed this is the state of David all right that's the context.
For verse 15 when we hear what David says in 15 and David said longingly oh that someone would give me water to drink from the well of bethlehem that is by the gate so some context for this all right the the structure of this sentence i looked at this alongside some commentators this this is not a command okay he's not saying somebody go out and get me some water he is simply expressing a deep longing probably talking to himself oh if someone would get me water from the.
Well specifically the one by the gate in bethlehem all right this could be nostalgia for missing home right i got like if you're traveling abroad and you're like oh i miss my wife's cooking oh i missed my mama's cooking i longed for this all right it could be that the water is better there i remember when my wife and i we moved back from we lived in louisville kentucky when i was in seminary for five years when we moved back we realized something that the water in louisville is actually really really good people rank city waters.
Because they have time on their hands and it makes the top 10 across the country every year i don't know how because the ohio river is gross but they've got some type of filtration system and the water tastes very good and when we moved back here you know the lexington and now we live in lakes west columbia area every summer i don't know if you know this if you live on this side of the river but every summer uh the water tastes they say earthy that ain't earthy it's it's gross it's dirty it's.
Because there's an algae bloom in the lake which by the way that's where we get our water from on this side of the river and every it just it tastes not that great and when i taste the water sometimes i'm like man i really miss the water that i had in louisville that didn't taste like dirty algae i it listen it could be for nostalgia reasons it could be the water in bethlehem takes better than the cave for whatever reason he longs.
For the water that he used to drink at home and his longing does not go unheard verse 16 then the three mighty men broke through the camp of the philistines and drew water out of the well of bethlehem that was by the gate and carried and brought it to David all right so three of his mighty men they hear this and they spring into action they are going to get this water if it is the last thing they literally do they're going to risk their lives.
For this it says they break into the camp now i want to make sure i understood this correctly that they weren't just kind of sneaking in at night what so i looked at the hebrew for the word break and it's a violent breaking which means they fought their way into the camp all right risking their blood probably shedding some of their own blood and shedding the blood of others they got to the well drew the water out presumably defending themselves and they had to get out of the camp which means they probably fought their way out of the camp and ran all the way back to the cave of adul think about that what kind.
Of devotion is that what what kind of what what compels people uh men to do this to risk their lives for a drink of water it's because they loved David they loved him they loved him fiercely they're in the midst of David's depression and his sadness he expresses a a whim a desire oh that i'd have a drink of water and and his very win all right his very longing that he expresses becomes their complete and total devotion that they're willing to risk their lives that's love that is love.
For David that you would risk they'd risk their comfort their safety all for a drink of water you might be thinking well i mean these are his men right don't i mean they have to be obedient that's that's part of it right well here's the deal first off it's not a command as we just said but also obedience is not enough to compel this type of action it's just not in high school i uh i played two sports play baseball and football and my two coaches.
For baseball and football could not be any different my baseball coach was very successful in building a program won lots of state titles partially because he recruited players to come in and then my junior year i guess he stopped recruiting because we weren't very good uh and and he just gave up on us for two years he just he just gave up on us and he he didn't love us we were in we're a means to an end in winning titles and and we just we kind of went through the motions of the baseball season i.
Remember going into my senior year we had not taken the field for actual practice and we had a game five days later we still hadn't taken he was running us to death every day and conditioning i remember specifically one day he had an excuse that they'd been raining a lot but it was very it was dry enough for us to go and practice and and he said all right put your tennis shoes on which meant we were going to run some more and i just i just stared him down i was furious and our team was just we were.
So upset he was was was furious with us he pointed to the state championship banners and said you're never going to win any of these walked on us walked out on us and then we went out and practiced without them all right it was just completely different though the relationship we have with him than with our football coach our football coach loved us and we loved him we would run through a brick wall for him my my sophomore junior season we were not good at all we didn't win a lot of games and we loved him we fought to the finish in every game two very different relationships we do anything.
For our football coach because it was based on love and our baseball coach he was half hearted obedience and that's the difference love versus obedience love produces true devotion obedience just produces the mere semblance of devotion it's not the same love is an all-out response while obedience is just walking through the motions love is the foundation for devote for this type of devotion for these men they love David and it shows up in how they respond to him so they bring this water back to him.
Verse 16 but he would not drink of it he poured it out to the lord and sometimes we read the bob you're like wait what a second if you're just reading through second Samuel you're like wait what he pours out the water seriously oh i mean they went to all these lengths to do this and he pours out the water uh chet and jordan jordan's one of our members chet's one of our pastors they uh they sometimes talk about this restaurant that they met in in lynchburg virginia at liberty and they talk about this restaurant called osaka it's supposed to be like tokyo grill.
But way better and they swear by they they say it is the best and finally jordan he brought me one a plate that was like a day and a half old i heated it up and it lives up the hype it is it is it is great now imagine i walk into the office one day and i see jordan and chet and they're just sad and they're downcast and they just oh if we could just have some osaka we'd feel better and i hear that and i spring into action and i get in my car and i drive five hours up to lynchburg and i get it and i fight traffic and i come all.
The way back and i bring it to them like guys and i put it in place with some covers to make it here it is boom and they take it they smell it and they just dump it on the ground all of it they take the white sauce and just pour it out it's shocking when all that effort for what they got all the effort they fight they risk their lives they shed their blood for what pours out the water say.
But he would not drink of it he poured it out to the lord and said far be it from me o lord that i should do this shall i drink the blood of the men who went at the risk of their lives therefore he would not drink it these things the three mighty men did David realizes that he isn't worthy of this type of devotion he's not worthy of this type of sacrifice these men gave up blood to secure this offering and he's not worthy of it he realizes that the only one who is worthy of this type of offering offering is the.
Lord he takes their devotion he pours it out to the lord this is this is a drink offering all right in the old testament they had they had drink offerings numbers 15 says you shall offer a a third of the hen of one the picture is it's a pleasing aroma to the lord that a drink offering is poured out that's what he takes he takes the devotion and he pours it out this is hear this this is the most honorable thing he could have done in this moment is to take that devotion and turn it up to the.
Lord far be it from me to drink the blood of my men this belongs to the lord this type of love and devotion belongs to God and that's the story real small obscure story from the old testament and it's it's an incredible story to look at how they honored their king like this is incredible so you might be wondering that's neat why are we talking about this in our gift series what does this have to do with christmas here's the deal we won't understand this series we will understand generosity and we won't understand christmas until we understand that we serve a much better king than David we serve a much better king these men got.
To serve David who was a great king and we see the kind of sacrifice and the kind of devotion that kind of love they poured out to him how much more so should we serve the king of all creation how much more should we be devoted to how much more should we love the king who left heaven to come for us to wage war against the enemy who stepped into darkness David in the midst of his despair doesn't have it in him to go out and get this offering he doesn't have it in him his soldiers go out.
For him our savior our king came he's the one that broke through enemy lines for us when he left heaven and he came to earth we sing this season joy to the world the lord has come let earth receive her king and we look at that song we think that's it's cute it's nice because 30 different pop stars have covered it in terrible fashion it's not cute it is a declaration of war joy to why is there joy because the king came.
For us because he stepped into the darkness he stepped into this domain to wage war against the enemy and we've been in the Gospel of Matthew for over a year now and we've gotten to see how good our king is that he came for us they didn't leave us in our darkness they didn't leave us in our sin that he came we got to see as he steps on the scene in in Matthew 4 right when he's being tempted in the wilderness and he goes toe-to-toe with Satan after 40 days and 40 nights of fasting and drinking no food or water and he's a showdown with Satan and he does what adam and eve couldn't.
Do he remains sinless and we got to see how good our king is and that he teaches us the sermon on the mount is beautiful it is the embodiment of wisdom we get to see over and over again over the last year as our king as he healed the paralytic and said rise take up your mat and walk away as he put his hands on the eyes of the blind and gave sight to them we get to see over and over how good our king is and he does all of this on our behalf and it doesn't cost our blood to obtain this gift we're not being sent out to earn this on our own.
As soldiers no now the king lays down his life sheds his own blood and his blood is poured out like a drink offering how much better is our king than David he's so much better and once we understand that once we understand how good it is the king who came for us how sweet how amazing he is then we can begin to understand how we should respond in worship then we can look at the example of these three mighty men and say i i want to respond like that.
And then some because our king is much much better with the hope that one day we'll stand before our king and he'll say well done my good and faithful servant well done my good and faithful soldier that is how our approach changes to opportunities that we have right in front of us you know oftentimes we get every year we do this and we we have these these opportunities to give to something like this and i feel this there's a part of us that looks at this and says all right.
Well what what do i have to give what is it i mean all right my regular generosity okay it's a 10 is that what i have to give all right do i need a budget for forgive project is that is that what i have to give listen i feel that i do but understand this that respond misses it misses on it misses out on total devotion in love it's a different response than us uh instead of just showing a mere semblance of obedience by going through the motions with how we do generosity instead of doing that how about let's chase after the heart of.
God let's let his his desire become our delight and let's run after that i mean what if like what if we caught a mere whisper of the Holy Spirit like these men did they just caught David talking to himself what if we caught the voice of the Holy Spirit saying to go big to to go maybe he starts pointing out stuff right maybe it's the christmas bonus that you get every year maybe it's it's christmas money that you get every year i don't know what that is.
For you but what if the Holy Spirit just started touching on something a mere whisper and that caught our full attention and we said all right what do you want lord what do you want i'm all in i want to be i want to be completely devoted is it this is it more that's a different response when we go after the heart of God that's the type of devotion that God calls us to my hope is is that we catch a we catch wind of that and we'd respond.
Listen when we sent the rockies out i honestly i thought it was a little hasty i did i talked through i sat with chris and was like are you sure right now you don't have all your support raised are you sure like we're right in the middle of the pandemic i wouldn't hurt to wait a few more months and he said no no we've prayed the lord has spoken and we're going chris and danielle like good soldiers heard the Holy Spirit and they said we're all in we're going we're selling everything we're packing up we're moving our kids and we're going and isn't the.
Lord wiser than we the fact that chris a builder shows up right before hurricane decimates the very village that every town that they were going to reach they were obedient because they are devoted and they love God and they're gonna follow his heart anywhere and the desire that we have right in front of us is this project it is fully funding them at a thousand bucks a month it is building some houses down there my hope is that we can join them with the love and devotion that sent them down there that we might.
See Jesus use them to build some houses to make some disciples to raise up some Church plants and to bring light into darkness as our king came and did for us the band's gonna come up and i just want us to sit in that for a moment before we respond and worship i want us not to feel like we have to but to listen to the Holy Spirit and to chase after the heart of God that his desire would become our complete delight and we respond with however.
God calls us to i don't know what that looks like for you my hope is you'd listen my hope is we listen as a Church and that we respond with the type of love and devotion that these three soldiers did for David and then some let me pray father i pray that you would first help us see what you did in your coming what you did on the cross what you did in the empty tomb and that we be so overwhelmed by you that in worship we'd respond and we'd pray and we'd.
Listen and we trust you i don't know what that looks like for us but God i pray that you would speak to us that we take a step of faith in growing in generosity that flows out of a heart that is totally devoted to you we ask in Jesus name amen.
Dont Waste Your Pandemic
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet virtually this week.
The Invitation to Abide
Transcript
My dad likes to fish and hunt, and he went, on a regular basis, would go fishing with my uncle. It was his brother-in-law, my Uncle John, and they would go fishing. And they went fishing one time, and they were out, and it was cold, and it was raining, but they were catching fish. And so they had spent the time to get out there, and they were fishing, and it was getting colder and colder. And my dad eventually looked at my Uncle John and said, aren't you cold? Can we just, can we call it, can we go in?
Because, I mean, I don't know if you've ever spent much time out in the rain. It doesn't have to be raining very hard for you to eventually get completely and utterly soaked. And he was completely and utterly soaked, and it was cold. And fishing can only be so fun if you are cold and wet. And so my dad looked at my uncle and said, can we call it? And my uncle was like, no, we're going to catch a fish.
And, like, I'm fine, so you should be fine. And so my dad was like, all right. Because I don't know if you've been here and heard some stories about my dad. He's not tender or delicate. He does happen to be here this morning, if you would like to confirm some of the stories I've told and see if they are true. The quickest way to do that would be to try to slap him on his way out and see what happens.
I'm just kidding. Don't do that. But I did. This past Christmas, he asked to help him get set up so that he could listen to the podcast or the sermons. And I helped him set that up for Christmas. But I said, I just want you to know I've talked about you with complete immunity for, like, four years now.
And it is mostly true what I've said about you. But so he just, you know, he's like, all right, I'm going to buck up. I can handle it. I can handle it. You know, so they just keep fishing. And my dad's sitting there, you know, he's shaking at some point.
He looks at him and says, I think probably about time to go now. My uncle's like, no, no. I'm like, you know, and he's giving a hard time. He's like, come on, kid. You can't handle it? You know, so my dad's like, all right.
So eventually they just keep going. But finally it just soaks, I mean, to the bone. My dad looks at him and says, you know, I don't care. Like, I just, I've been as much of a man as I'm going to be today. Like, let's go. Like, I don't hear it.
Let's pack it up. Let's go. So they went back to where they were staying. They get in. My dad's shaking. He's taking his clothes off.
My uncle unfazed the whole time. Just, just take, you know, unbutton his clothes. And I say, my dad's peeling off wet layer after wet layer. And my uncle takes off his first jacket and has on a raincoat underneath it. Undoes his raincoat and was perfectly warm and dry the entire time. My dad's peeling wet t-shirts off.
And he's like, you, you, you gotta be kidding me. My uncle's like, how was I to know you didn't have a raincoat? We knew the forecast. Like how? I just assumed everyone dressed the way I dress. And in reality, what we want in life, what everybody in here wants in life is to be able to walk through life like my uncle was able to be out in the rain where it doesn't matter what's going on around us.
We're still warm and okay. That it doesn't matter what's happening around us. It doesn't matter what life is throwing at us. It doesn't matter the circumstances. It doesn't matter our finances. It doesn't matter our relationships that we're okay.
But in reality, many of us feel like my dad did on that day. Like what is going on around me has soaked to the bone. And I don't know if I can keep going. I don't know if I can move forward. I don't know if I can keep walking in this. It has gotten to me and I don't know how to move.
We just spent three weeks talking through idolatry where we said that we were designed to love something, to cherish something, to have affection for something and to have it set for us life, our meaning and our purpose and our hope and our satisfaction. We took the time to say that we consistently, that was meant to be God, but we consistently move him from that position and put something else there and it cannot handle the weight of our worship. And every time we spend time talking about idolatry, I'm convinced. I'm reconvinced that I am an idolater and that I need to love and worship Jesus above everything else.
But maybe that's where you are, but maybe you're like one of the guys in our, in my community group this past week who said, yes, yes, I love this thing more than Jesus. And yes, I'm supposed to love Jesus more. And I know I'm going to, but how, how, how do, how do I force myself there? How do I get my heart there? And so that is our hope in this series that we would be able to learn how to abide in Christ so that we were consistently filled up, made fresh, kept warm, even in the middle of everything else that's going on, that we would be pumped full of life. And that's what we're going to read in John chapter 15.
So let's pray together and then let's begin studying this together. God, we thank you for the invitation that you make to your disciples today. We thank you for the command that you give your disciples today. And we pray that we would learn how to rest and abide in you. We ask for your help in Jesus name. Amen.
John chapter 15. This is Jesus with his disciples. The, the night he is betrayed, the night before he will go on trial and then be crucified the next day. And he knows what is coming and he is in some ways finally finalizing all the information he's given him. He's praying with them. He's coaching them up and he's doing this all in the context of the crucifixion, the gospel that he's about to die, be buried and rise again.
And so he's talking to his disciples and I just want to make this clear as we read this, he is talking to the, to the men that were around him and he had been training and equipping. And as he prays for them later, he prays not, he says, Lord, this isn't just for them. It's for all those who will believe through them. So this is for us as well. So what he's saying to them is for them, but then for the church, for all those who would choose to follow Jesus.
He says, I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. And every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit. So the idea here is like a grapevine. And he's saying that he's the vine, he's, he's the, the health, the life, the vitality. He's the one that has roots that, that reaches up and that the father is the vine dresser who comes along and prunes.
And he says, you are the branches. Already you are clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Abide in me. And I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I'm the vine.
You are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit for apart from me, you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers and the branches are gathered and thrown into the fire and burn. If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. By this, my father is glorified that you bear much fruit. And so prove to be my disciples.
We're going to keep going in just a minute, all the way down to verse 11 in this section. He says, abide 11 times, abide, abide, abide, abide, abide. Now this is not a word that we use very often. But it means to live in, to dwell. This is where the, an abode is where you live. I remember my young brother, my younger brother came up to visit us after Anna and I had gotten married and he walked in and he said, thank you so much for welcoming me into your humble abode.
And I was like, dude, if I call it a humble abode, it's humility. If you call it a humble abode, it's rude. So I wouldn't just rock up to people's houses and say that like, I don't mind. But like in a minute, she's going to fix this food. Don't sit down and thank her for the meager sustenance. Okay.
Like, but an abode is where you abide. And what he's saying is live, dwell with, wait here, stay here. Terry, live in me. Abide in me. Make your home here. Now that is a beautiful invitation made more beautiful to you if you're an introvert.
Extroverts maybe don't really understand how beautiful that invitation is, but introverts are like, oh yes, a home. Yes. You close the door. People don't bother you. It's wonderful. That's what my wife every once in a while I'll be like, hey, look, I'll watch the boys.
You can go somewhere. And she's like, oh, and I'm like, all right, I will take the boys somewhere and you can lock the door and pretend no one exists and just be in your house. Because that means so much more. And that's what Jesus is saying is he's saying, dwell here, live here, have life here in me. Abide in me. I am the vine.
You are the branches. And without me, you can do nothing. You will wither and die. Some of you have heard the phrase about having a friend who is ride or die. Well, with Jesus, it's abide or die. You have to dwell in, live in him, be filled up by him, or you will die.
I brought something with me this morning I want to show y'all. So this is a branch that used to abide in my backyard. It lived on a tree. The tree is still there. This branch is not. This branch got to come here.
These used to be green. Oh, that was embarrassing, buddy. There used to be more of them. The other branches are looking a little better than this one. This is Jesus' point. That as soon as this was removed from the tree, this branch has no more hope.
It will wither and die. It took a little while to get this way. But it has been doing what he said. It's been sitting in my backyard waiting to be burned. So I just went and grabbed it out of a pile this morning so that he could come on a trip and y'all could get to meet it.
So here's the thing. When you go to abide in Jesus, he says, I am the true vine. Not, I'm a good vine. I'm the true vine. I'm the only one that can actually pour life into you. I'm the only one that can give you vitality.
And what he's saying is that you need something outside of yourself to give you life. That seems pretty straightforward, but in American culture, we don't believe that. We are told constantly, you, look inside of you. Find what's inside of you. Learn how to express it. Learn how to bring it out.
If you can find the real you and the inner you, then you'll have peace and you'll have life and you'll be full and you'll be free. This branch is free. It got to come on a trip and see the inside of Glen Forest. Live its dreams. And many of us feel like this. We've been told you're all you need.
Fill yourself up with you. Find you. Whatever. And the truth is we're not fruitful and lush. We're dry and brittle and exhausted because we were meant to abide in Jesus. But if you're going to abide in Jesus, if we're going to stick with Jesus, the truth is he says the result will be fruitfulness.
And in reality, what we so often want is the fruitfulness. We want this to be green. We want it to have fruit. We want it to have life on it. But if you're going to have fruit in life here, you've got to pay attention to this end of the branch.
Not this end. This end. Where it attaches to what pours life into it. So many of us are exhausted because we're over here trying to accomplish everything over here. We're trying to make it look fruitful, trying to be fruitful. And we don't know how to attach rest in Christ.
We don't know how to abide in him. You see, when he says that we will bear fruit, what he means is that there will be, as we abide in him, as we're connected to him, that life will be poured into us. And it will be both internal and external fruit. He says that you would bear much fruit and by this way prove that you are my disciples. That he desires that. But that's the end result.
And it's internal and external fruit. I might pick this up again later, but I've got to put it down now. It's internal and external fruit. Internal being character. So the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control.
Wouldn't it be nice if that actually described us? If we were so connected to Jesus that love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and self-control were the markers of our life? Don't you actually want to, in a deep way, love people? And don't you find that extremely difficult? Don't we want to be patient and kind and at peace? But see, as we connect to Jesus and stick to Jesus, he pours that in us.
And it's not just internal fruit, but it's external fruit, that we would see people come to know Jesus. The point of fruit is not for the vine, it's for others. So that as we bear fruit, it's that it would be a blessing. We'd be a blessing to those around us, that people would come to know Christ, that people would be served. Martin Luther, I believe, is the one who said that God does not need your good works, but your neighbor does. And that's the reality, that Jesus has accomplished everything on our behalf, but he pours in us and we bear fruit.
This is actually what happens with Jesus when he's hanging out with Martha and Mary. He's hanging out with two sisters. Mary comes and sits at his feet while he's teaching, and Martha runs around working. She's preparing everything, she's fixing everything, she's getting a meal together for him. And she comes over to Jesus and she says, Hey, Jesus, will you tell Mary to come help me? Because, what the heck?
Like, I'm busting my tail here, and Mary's just hanging out in front of you. And Jesus looks at Martha, and I'm going to be honest with you. I'm like, thank you, Martha. Tell Mary to get up, what is she doing? Like, look at you, busting your tail, and your lazy sister, just plopped on the ground. You have guests.
Like, there's part of me that's like, yes, thank you. And then Jesus is like, no, no, no. Martha, Martha, you're busy and worried with many things, but Mary's chosen what's better and it won't be taken away from her. You see, Jesus, Martha was preparing a meal. Jesus can make bread out of anything. He can prepare a meal, he can do whatever.
And he just says, she's chosen something better. We'll be okay if we eat later or if we eat something different. She's chosen what's better. She's actually learning how to sit and rest and not have all this activity. And so there are people in this room who we're saying, I'm working so hard, I'm trying so hard, I've got so much ministry going on, I've got so much going on in life, I'm so busy, I don't have time. I don't have time for this, learning how to sit with Jesus stuff.
And the reality is you don't have time not to. Because you are going to dry up and die. And your ministry, if that's what you're shooting for, will not be fruitful. And if it's just life stuff, just raising children, just having a job, if it's just that and we don't learn how to daily stay connected to Jesus, we will not make it. So we have to, have to learn that it really matters.
My son and I have started watching this Bear Grylls show on Netflix where you can like choose what he does, which is great because he's always like, all right, I can either eat some tree bark or some fish eggs. My son's like, fish eggs? We have made him throw up so often and like we lose our adventure because he's later like throwing up and he's like, you ate the wrong thing. And it's like, well, we're going to go back and make you do it again. But one of the things he does on a consistent basis is he repels down from like a cliff down a thing.
So he takes his rope, watched him do this multiple times and he gives you this option, he can repel down something and you pick for him to repel down. And one of the things I've noticed is he's got a rope. He actually, he hooks it up here and then he walks over here and he just kind of looks and he'll just throw his rope and then he turns and he repels down. He spends way more time on the side of the rope that's going to hold his weight than he does on where he's trying to go. I've never once seen him walk over with his rope and toss it here and then turn and just toss it back this way and then try to repel.
Well, it would not go well for him. Jesus says, this is the side that keeps you alive. Not all your activity, not everything we're running out and doing, not all of our ministry, not all of our fruitfulness. That's a result. This is the side that keeps us alive. Do we know how to abide in, live in Christ?
When he says, live in me, was anybody like, oh, I know exactly how to do that. That it matters immensely that we learn how to stay stuck to, tethered to Christ. That's the whole point of this series is that we might learn ancient practices, things they've done forever that help us stay tethered to, stuck in Christ and abiding in him. In verse 9, he says, as the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. There might be a temptation for us, specifically for those of us who are busy and active and trying to work hard, to go, okay, I'm going to do it.
I'm going to suddenly put in all this effort. Jesus said to do it. I'm supposed to do it. Let's figure this out. And it's not a, he's not chiding us. It is a command.
He's telling them to abide in him, but he's not, it's not aggressive. He says, abide in my love. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Do y'all have any idea how much God the Father loves God the Son? No, you do not. The best picture we can come up with, it does not reach the depths of the love that the Father has for the Son.
The amount that he prefers him, desires him, chooses him, cares for him, knows him. And Jesus looks at his disciples and has the audacity to say, the way the Father loves me is the way I love you. And that's true. And he goes to the cross to prove it. He tells them, nobody has a greater love than this, that someone would give up his life for his friends. He's about to prove this, put this on display.
And that's the reality for us, that if you were in Christ, he loves you with an unending, unyielding love that is beyond compare. That he is not frustrated with you or upset with you or sick of you. That he prefers you and desires you and wants you to abide in his love. He wants you to rest in, stay connected to him because he cares about you so much so that he would die for our sins to redeem us out of our brokenness. That he did this for us, not while we were clean and perfect, but while we were sinners. He's saying this to the people who are betraying him and about to deny him.
Who are about to fail him and run away. He's inviting them to abide in him and to rest in his love. And that's the invitation for us. Verse 10, if you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love just as I've kept my father's commandments and abide in his love. If you keep my commandments, verse 10, I'm reading again, you will abide in my love just as I've kept my father's commandments and abide in his love. Now this is written in context.
So I want to show you two things he says in John 14 because at first it sounds like he is saying the opposite of what I just said, which is just, hey, work real hard, earn it, and then I'll love you. Verse, John 14, 15, it's on the screen, says this, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. So he just flipped it in 15. He says, keep my commandments, you'll abide in my love. And then he says, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments. And in 14, 21, he says, whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.
You see, the reality is that obedience to Christ goes hand in hand with a love for Christ and brings us into, helps us rest in, the love of Christ. This is what we've been talking about in our idol series is that we love something else more than Jesus, so we serve it, we obey it. And what he's saying is, if you love me above everything else, then you will serve and obey me and you will rest in my love. And if you love me, you'll keep my commandments and if you keep my commandments, you'll abide in my love. That our hearts will be oriented to him so much so that he is chief above everything else and so that we will be able to rest in him.
You see, many of us are anxious. we live in a country that is extremely wealthy, that gives us access to health care, entertainment. Our needs are met so much so that we come up with new needs. We need four pairs of shoes. We need, we need, like we have, but we're anxious. We're not, we're not at peace. We're stressed out.
Not only that, we're busy, overly busy. Do you realize that because of our cell phones, we live very distinctly different than people did 20, 30 years ago? You remember, you remember, if you ever had, you haven't had to like wait at a, at like a doctor's office or like wait in line at a thing or sit in a chair? You know, you used to, your brain would just like do stuff on its own. You would think, like thoughts. But now we have a phone in our face?
That if you look at the little report, it says you stare at it three hours a day? Some of you don't. That's what you use Netflix for or whatever. You stare at that. We just, we've learned how to push all the margin out of our lives so that we don't have the ability to just rest and to just sit and that is distinct to us because this is, this is a new way of living in the past 20 to 30 years. We're anxious and we're busy.
We don't know how to sit and be quiet. We don't know how to rest. Not only that, we're bored. It's weird to say that we're busy and we're bored but those are symptoms of the same problem. This is why a lot of men will spend a lot of time and money on adventure hobbies. This is why we, yeah, men will get caught up in video games and we're not in the past.
We're not cheering for a sports team vigorously because it's, it's something in us that wants to be a part of something bigger that matters, wants to accomplish something, wants to achieve something and in reality when we've bought the lie that we're supposed to go out on our own and be free, we have so much freedom but now we have to define our own value, we have to get our own purpose, we have to make our own meaning and it is too much. It's too much. My wife and I had the opportunity to take our four-year-old, he was three at that point, we got to go to Disney World for two days, saved up, we went. One of the things we did was we walked around with him, we let him make a lot of choices, we asked him what he wanted, we asked him if he was having fun, a lot.
Did you like that? Did you like that? Did you like that? About two hours into that, he had almost lost his mind. It was the first time in life we had ever just walked around with him going, are you happy? Are you happy?
Are you complete? Do you want this? What do you like? And I looked at my wife and I said, he doesn't get to choose anything else. We're done asking him if he's happy? I don't care.
The reality is he wasn't designed to be able to handle that. He's four, he's not supposed to make all of his decisions. If right now, he got to choose when he went to bed and what he ate and what the purpose of life was, he would mess himself up. We understand that because he's four, but the reality is we're creatures designed by a creator. we were not meant to define our own value, give ourselves meaning and purpose and know exactly what the role of the world is. We were meant to find that in God and only when we are tethered to him are we actually free. You need less freedom so that you might actually have love and meaning.
And not just that. See, he says that if you follow my commandments, if you obey, you'll dwell in my love and if you love me, you'll obey. And then he says this, verse 11, these things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full. Full. When was the last time you said, you know, if I had more joy, I think it would kill me. Full.
Filled up to the brim. So, I just, joyous. I need to buy, like, bigger clothes to handle all the joy I got. That we're to have full joy in Christ as we learn how to rest in his love and as we learn to be tethered to him. This is the freedom that you are offered. And you're not able to do it.
The limbs, the branches that stayed in my backyard are not free to roam around. But they're doing better than this guy. There's actually more joy in being stuck to Jesus, tethered to him so that there are certain decisions in your life you don't get to make, you don't get to decide your value. Christ says that you are absolutely valuable, that he loves and cherishes you above all else. You don't get to decide your worth. You don't get to decide your purpose and your meaning that God gives us this and then we get to rest and have joy and life as the vine pours life into us.
But we have to learn how to sit with him. We have to learn how to rest with him. We have to learn how to daily stay connected to him. It's not like rechargeable batteries where we get to go spend away time with him and then you get to go back out into the world. Some of you have children. You get like 12 minutes a day by yourself and during that time their hands are under the bathroom door.
We have to learn how to stay connected to Jesus in the mundane and the normal so that life might be poured into us at all times. There is a pastor named Alistair Begg who I really appreciate the way he thinks about things and I listen to him on a regular basis. He said that he found that young pastors overestimate what they can accomplish in a short time. So if you talk to a young pastor in six months we are going to be doing this in a year we are going to be doing this and then I don't know well just like ascend into glory. And he says they underestimate what they are able to do over the course of a long time.
So they overestimate what they can do in a year but underestimate what can happen what the Lord can do in 20 years in 25 years. And I don't think that is true just for pastors I think that is true for us. That we so undervalue what happens if we will learn how to stay tethered to Christ for the next 25, 35, 45 years the amount of people that will be blessed the amount of fruit that will be born. That's even the thing is that a healthy tree bears fruit in season. There are times where the limbs on that tree look just like this. Guess what?
They are coming back next year. This one is not. The rest of them will. But there are times where we do not look fruitful but if we are stuck to Christ we will be eventually because this end of it is the result of the vine working not the branch working. The branch's Job stay stuck to the vine. The vine's Job do all the other stuff.
That we actually get to stay connected to Jesus and Jesus works through us and in us for his glory. It's by the fact that we bear much fruit that the Father is glorified and this is for our joy and our freedom. There's a story in the Old Testament of a Syrian general. He's powerful. He's rich. He's feared.
But he has leprosy. So his body is rotting away. He's in a position that we would most look at and say he would be to be envied in the amount of power he has and the amount of wealth he has and the amount of stature he has. His name's Naaman. He actually they capture an Israelite have her as their servant and she tells him there's a prophet in Israel who can take away leprosy. The Lord works through him.
You can be healed. So they load up the head to the castle to where the king is. They say where's the prophet? The prophet says oh the king's not in charge of the prophet. He does his own thing. He's not here.
Because the only thing he'd think was like where can I go get more power? Where can I you know where would be the strongest person? Let's go to the castle. They send him over to the prophet. God tells Elijah that Naaman's coming. Elijah tells his servant go outside and talk to Naaman.
So he goes out you know it's possible the servant talks to him first and goes in and talks to Elijah. Y'all can read it later. I'm getting a few of these details messed up. I'm going to get most of it right. I also periodically get Elijah and Elisha confused. And so I just this is going to be real close.
And I'm now realizing I should have read this whole thing before I got up here. Tried to paraphrase it. Alright. So the servant goes out to Naaman. Naaman tells him why he's there. He's brought all this gold.
He's brought all these changes of clothes. He brought all this stuff and he says I'm here to get healed. And the servant says yes. Go to the Jordan River. Dunk yourself in it seven times. Your leprosy will be gone.
Naaman gets angry. The prophet won't even come talk to him. He just talks to his servant. The servant tells him to go to a small dirty river and wash himself. He just turns around and he says we're leaving. They start riding off.
Tells him to go to a small dirty river and wash himself. He just turns around and he says we're leaving. They start riding off. He said the Tigris and Euphrates we have nicer rivers in Syria. I've got better stuff I can go wash in than y'all's dirty little podent garbage river. Again, let's paraphrase. One of his servants stops him and says Naaman if he had
Told you to do something great wouldn't you have done it? Like you're a military leader if he had said to you climb to the top of a mountain battle a wizard get the golden crystal bring it down like if he'd have told you like take the ring to Mordor whatever wouldn't you have done it? He picked it's like a super close river
It's not even deep like I don't even think you could drown in that if you wanted to like just head on over dunk yourself seven times it's simple see humble yourself so Naaman does he goes and he dips himself in the river seven times and he comes out and it says his skin was like a baby's skin which I'm sure was weird the next time he got in
You know was having to do general stuff and fight and stuff because of his tender little new skin that he had had to regain some calluses and what not perfectly clean his leprosy is gone there's part of us that wants fruitfulness to be based off of how good we are Jesus Jesus
Just says rest in me abide in me rest in my love stay connected to me it will take some effort some you will actually have to open your bible we will actually have to pray we will actually have to make it a practice of these disciplines that we're going to try to coach us through and practically how to do but it's the
Amount of effort it takes for a war hero to go dip himself in a river seven times you just gotta do it it's not that difficult it's like if someone prepares a meal for you and when you're done taking pictures of it with your phone they have the audacity to not walk over and cut it up for you
And stick it in your mouth you actually have to use your hands like did you have to work to eat the meal yeah you had to chew it your body had to digest it you had to use your hands but what did you prepare the meal that's what Jesus is saying he's the life he's the one we get to rest
And he's the one we get to connect to it's going to take some effort we are going to have to be disciplined we are going to have to put our phones away we are going to have to set aside some time we are going to have to wake up a little earlier go to bed a little later we are going
To have to do some of those things but all of those things are so that we can get connected to Jesus and he can do everything else Jesus in Matthew chapter 11 it will be on the screen he makes this invitation
He's in a big crowd he says come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest take my yoke upon you a yoke's what ox wear to pull a load take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am
Gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls a lot of us vacation but we don't know how to find a rest for our souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light
You see the reason this is true is that we do not have to earn our own salvation you do not have to gain your own value you don't have to find your own purpose and meaning that you get to
Trust in Jesus and his finished work on the cross and you get to have him pour life into you if we will only stay connected to him then we'll bear fruit in season when we're
Meant to we'll have life and vitality pouring into us at all times the band's going to come back up Eugene Peterson is a pastor who on a consistent basis would translate the Greek
To English for his congregation in just real simple terms and so he eventually just compiled all that and made the message version of the Bible and I think it's helpful the way he phrases this and again he's just
Trying to hit the gist of it in very common wording he says this are you tired worn out burned out on religion so this is him taking what Jesus just said we read in Matthew 11 he says
Come to me get away with me and you'll recover your life and I'll show you how to take a real rest walk with me and work with me watch how I do it learn the unforced rhythms of grace
We are meant to submit to Jesus we are meant to follow his commands we are meant to stay connected to him so that he is the guiding ruler of our lives and we are told we are
Withering and dying by a burden that is too heavy for us we cannot save ourselves we are withering and dying and Jesus says come to me learn the unrushed rhythms of grace learn how
To dwell with me learn how to make me your home learn how to sit and get what is better our hope our goal is that we would walk with Jesus for a lifetime bearing fruit in season not look great for a short time and flame
Out dry up die be gathered and burned but that we might learn how to rest in Jesus and have a sustainable pace of life where there is joy to the full and if you are like me saying I don't know if my
Joy is full I don't know if I feel like the Lord is pouring life into me every day then let's commit to walk down to the Jordan and dip ourselves seven times and trust Christ and his grace
And do a little bit of work that gets us close to him that moves us under the waterfall of his grace where we might have life poured into us where we might be made full come accept the invitation to come and rest accept the
Invitation to abide and let's learn how to practice some ancient practices so that we might dwell in Christ who offers us hope and life and joy through his resurrection and the life that he brings to all those who would trust in him
Let's pray God we thank you for your grace thank you for the hope that we have in you and you alone and I pray that we would that you would train us through your Holy Spirit that we might abide that we
Might learn how to rest in you that for all of us who are right now trying to earn our way trying to prove ourselves that we would lay down those burdens that we would come to you who picked up our burden at
The cross and might we have joy and might we focus on the right end of the branch and let you do the rest for your glory and your name and your praise amen
Transcript
My dad likes to fish and hunt, and he went, on a regular basis, would go fishing with my uncle. It was his brother-in-law, my Uncle John, and they would go fishing. And they went fishing one time, and they were out, and it was cold, and it was raining, but they were catching fish. And so they had spent the time to get out there, and they were fishing, and it was getting colder and colder. And my dad eventually looked at my Uncle John and said, aren't you cold? Can we just, can we call it, can we go in?
Because, I mean, I don't know if you've ever spent much time out in the rain. It doesn't have to be raining very hard for you to eventually get completely and utterly soaked. And he was completely and utterly soaked, and it was cold. And fishing can only be so fun if you are cold and wet. And so my dad looked at my uncle and said, can we call it? And my uncle was like, no, we're going to catch a fish.
And, like, I'm fine, so you should be fine. And so my dad was like, all right. Because I don't know if you've been here and heard some stories about my dad. He's not tender or delicate. He does happen to be here this morning, if you would like to confirm some of the stories I've told and see if they are true. The quickest way to do that would be to try to slap him on his way out and see what happens.
I'm just kidding. Don't do that. But I did. This past Christmas, he asked to help him get set up so that he could listen to the podcast or the sermons. And I helped him set that up for Christmas. But I said, I just want you to know I've talked about you with complete immunity for, like, four years now.
And it is mostly true what I've said about you. But so he just, you know, he's like, all right, I'm going to buck up. I can handle it. I can handle it. You know, so they just keep fishing. And my dad's sitting there, you know, he's shaking at some point.
He looks at him and says, I think probably about time to go now. My uncle's like, no, no. I'm like, you know, and he's giving a hard time. He's like, come on, kid. You can't handle it? You know, so my dad's like, all right.
So eventually they just keep going. But finally it just soaks, I mean, to the bone. My dad looks at him and says, you know, I don't care. Like, I just, I've been as much of a man as I'm going to be today. Like, let's go. Like, I don't hear it.
Let's pack it up. Let's go. So they went back to where they were staying. They get in. My dad's shaking. He's taking his clothes off.
My uncle unfazed the whole time. Just, just take, you know, unbutton his clothes. And I say, my dad's peeling off wet layer after wet layer. And my uncle takes off his first jacket and has on a raincoat underneath it. Undoes his raincoat and was perfectly warm and dry the entire time. My dad's peeling wet t-shirts off.
And he's like, you, you, you gotta be kidding me. My uncle's like, how was I to know you didn't have a raincoat? We knew the forecast. Like how? I just assumed everyone dressed the way I dress. And in reality, what we want in life, what everybody in here wants in life is to be able to walk through life like my uncle was able to be out in the rain where it doesn't matter what's going on around us.
We're still warm and okay. That it doesn't matter what's happening around us. It doesn't matter what life is throwing at us. It doesn't matter the circumstances. It doesn't matter our finances. It doesn't matter our relationships that we're okay.
But in reality, many of us feel like my dad did on that day. Like what is going on around me has soaked to the bone. And I don't know if I can keep going. I don't know if I can move forward. I don't know if I can keep walking in this. It has gotten to me and I don't know how to move.
We just spent three weeks talking through idolatry where we said that we were designed to love something, to cherish something, to have affection for something and to have it set for us life, our meaning and our purpose and our hope and our satisfaction. We took the time to say that we consistently, that was meant to be God, but we consistently move him from that position and put something else there and it cannot handle the weight of our worship. And every time we spend time talking about idolatry, I'm convinced. I'm reconvinced that I am an idolater and that I need to love and worship Jesus above everything else.
But maybe that's where you are, but maybe you're like one of the guys in our, in my community group this past week who said, yes, yes, I love this thing more than Jesus. And yes, I'm supposed to love Jesus more. And I know I'm going to, but how, how, how do, how do I force myself there? How do I get my heart there? And so that is our hope in this series that we would be able to learn how to abide in Christ so that we were consistently filled up, made fresh, kept warm, even in the middle of everything else that's going on, that we would be pumped full of life. And that's what we're going to read in John chapter 15.
So let's pray together and then let's begin studying this together. God, we thank you for the invitation that you make to your disciples today. We thank you for the command that you give your disciples today. And we pray that we would learn how to rest and abide in you. We ask for your help in Jesus name. Amen.
John chapter 15. This is Jesus with his disciples. The, the night he is betrayed, the night before he will go on trial and then be crucified the next day. And he knows what is coming and he is in some ways finally finalizing all the information he's given him. He's praying with them. He's coaching them up and he's doing this all in the context of the crucifixion, the gospel that he's about to die, be buried and rise again.
And so he's talking to his disciples and I just want to make this clear as we read this, he is talking to the, to the men that were around him and he had been training and equipping. And as he prays for them later, he prays not, he says, Lord, this isn't just for them. It's for all those who will believe through them. So this is for us as well. So what he's saying to them is for them, but then for the church, for all those who would choose to follow Jesus.
He says, I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away. And every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit. So the idea here is like a grapevine. And he's saying that he's the vine, he's, he's the, the health, the life, the vitality. He's the one that has roots that, that reaches up and that the father is the vine dresser who comes along and prunes.
And he says, you are the branches. Already you are clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Abide in me. And I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I'm the vine.
You are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit for apart from me, you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers and the branches are gathered and thrown into the fire and burn. If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. By this, my father is glorified that you bear much fruit. And so prove to be my disciples.
We're going to keep going in just a minute, all the way down to verse 11 in this section. He says, abide 11 times, abide, abide, abide, abide, abide. Now this is not a word that we use very often. But it means to live in, to dwell. This is where the, an abode is where you live. I remember my young brother, my younger brother came up to visit us after Anna and I had gotten married and he walked in and he said, thank you so much for welcoming me into your humble abode.
And I was like, dude, if I call it a humble abode, it's humility. If you call it a humble abode, it's rude. So I wouldn't just rock up to people's houses and say that like, I don't mind. But like in a minute, she's going to fix this food. Don't sit down and thank her for the meager sustenance. Okay.
Like, but an abode is where you abide. And what he's saying is live, dwell with, wait here, stay here. Terry, live in me. Abide in me. Make your home here. Now that is a beautiful invitation made more beautiful to you if you're an introvert.
Extroverts maybe don't really understand how beautiful that invitation is, but introverts are like, oh yes, a home. Yes. You close the door. People don't bother you. It's wonderful. That's what my wife every once in a while I'll be like, hey, look, I'll watch the boys.
You can go somewhere. And she's like, oh, and I'm like, all right, I will take the boys somewhere and you can lock the door and pretend no one exists and just be in your house. Because that means so much more. And that's what Jesus is saying is he's saying, dwell here, live here, have life here in me. Abide in me. I am the vine.
You are the branches. And without me, you can do nothing. You will wither and die. Some of you have heard the phrase about having a friend who is ride or die. Well, with Jesus, it's abide or die. You have to dwell in, live in him, be filled up by him, or you will die.
I brought something with me this morning I want to show y'all. So this is a branch that used to abide in my backyard. It lived on a tree. The tree is still there. This branch is not. This branch got to come here.
These used to be green. Oh, that was embarrassing, buddy. There used to be more of them. The other branches are looking a little better than this one. This is Jesus' point. That as soon as this was removed from the tree, this branch has no more hope.
It will wither and die. It took a little while to get this way. But it has been doing what he said. It's been sitting in my backyard waiting to be burned. So I just went and grabbed it out of a pile this morning so that he could come on a trip and y'all could get to meet it.
So here's the thing. When you go to abide in Jesus, he says, I am the true vine. Not, I'm a good vine. I'm the true vine. I'm the only one that can actually pour life into you. I'm the only one that can give you vitality.
And what he's saying is that you need something outside of yourself to give you life. That seems pretty straightforward, but in American culture, we don't believe that. We are told constantly, you, look inside of you. Find what's inside of you. Learn how to express it. Learn how to bring it out.
If you can find the real you and the inner you, then you'll have peace and you'll have life and you'll be full and you'll be free. This branch is free. It got to come on a trip and see the inside of Glen Forest. Live its dreams. And many of us feel like this. We've been told you're all you need.
Fill yourself up with you. Find you. Whatever. And the truth is we're not fruitful and lush. We're dry and brittle and exhausted because we were meant to abide in Jesus. But if you're going to abide in Jesus, if we're going to stick with Jesus, the truth is he says the result will be fruitfulness.
And in reality, what we so often want is the fruitfulness. We want this to be green. We want it to have fruit. We want it to have life on it. But if you're going to have fruit in life here, you've got to pay attention to this end of the branch.
Not this end. This end. Where it attaches to what pours life into it. So many of us are exhausted because we're over here trying to accomplish everything over here. We're trying to make it look fruitful, trying to be fruitful. And we don't know how to attach rest in Christ.
We don't know how to abide in him. You see, when he says that we will bear fruit, what he means is that there will be, as we abide in him, as we're connected to him, that life will be poured into us. And it will be both internal and external fruit. He says that you would bear much fruit and by this way prove that you are my disciples. That he desires that. But that's the end result.
And it's internal and external fruit. I might pick this up again later, but I've got to put it down now. It's internal and external fruit. Internal being character. So the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, self-control.
Wouldn't it be nice if that actually described us? If we were so connected to Jesus that love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, and self-control were the markers of our life? Don't you actually want to, in a deep way, love people? And don't you find that extremely difficult? Don't we want to be patient and kind and at peace? But see, as we connect to Jesus and stick to Jesus, he pours that in us.
And it's not just internal fruit, but it's external fruit, that we would see people come to know Jesus. The point of fruit is not for the vine, it's for others. So that as we bear fruit, it's that it would be a blessing. We'd be a blessing to those around us, that people would come to know Christ, that people would be served. Martin Luther, I believe, is the one who said that God does not need your good works, but your neighbor does. And that's the reality, that Jesus has accomplished everything on our behalf, but he pours in us and we bear fruit.
This is actually what happens with Jesus when he's hanging out with Martha and Mary. He's hanging out with two sisters. Mary comes and sits at his feet while he's teaching, and Martha runs around working. She's preparing everything, she's fixing everything, she's getting a meal together for him. And she comes over to Jesus and she says, Hey, Jesus, will you tell Mary to come help me? Because, what the heck?
Like, I'm busting my tail here, and Mary's just hanging out in front of you. And Jesus looks at Martha, and I'm going to be honest with you. I'm like, thank you, Martha. Tell Mary to get up, what is she doing? Like, look at you, busting your tail, and your lazy sister, just plopped on the ground. You have guests.
Like, there's part of me that's like, yes, thank you. And then Jesus is like, no, no, no. Martha, Martha, you're busy and worried with many things, but Mary's chosen what's better and it won't be taken away from her. You see, Jesus, Martha was preparing a meal. Jesus can make bread out of anything. He can prepare a meal, he can do whatever.
And he just says, she's chosen something better. We'll be okay if we eat later or if we eat something different. She's chosen what's better. She's actually learning how to sit and rest and not have all this activity. And so there are people in this room who we're saying, I'm working so hard, I'm trying so hard, I've got so much ministry going on, I've got so much going on in life, I'm so busy, I don't have time. I don't have time for this, learning how to sit with Jesus stuff.
And the reality is you don't have time not to. Because you are going to dry up and die. And your ministry, if that's what you're shooting for, will not be fruitful. And if it's just life stuff, just raising children, just having a job, if it's just that and we don't learn how to daily stay connected to Jesus, we will not make it. So we have to, have to learn that it really matters.
My son and I have started watching this Bear Grylls show on Netflix where you can like choose what he does, which is great because he's always like, all right, I can either eat some tree bark or some fish eggs. My son's like, fish eggs? We have made him throw up so often and like we lose our adventure because he's later like throwing up and he's like, you ate the wrong thing. And it's like, well, we're going to go back and make you do it again. But one of the things he does on a consistent basis is he repels down from like a cliff down a thing.
So he takes his rope, watched him do this multiple times and he gives you this option, he can repel down something and you pick for him to repel down. And one of the things I've noticed is he's got a rope. He actually, he hooks it up here and then he walks over here and he just kind of looks and he'll just throw his rope and then he turns and he repels down. He spends way more time on the side of the rope that's going to hold his weight than he does on where he's trying to go. I've never once seen him walk over with his rope and toss it here and then turn and just toss it back this way and then try to repel.
Well, it would not go well for him. Jesus says, this is the side that keeps you alive. Not all your activity, not everything we're running out and doing, not all of our ministry, not all of our fruitfulness. That's a result. This is the side that keeps us alive. Do we know how to abide in, live in Christ?
When he says, live in me, was anybody like, oh, I know exactly how to do that. That it matters immensely that we learn how to stay stuck to, tethered to Christ. That's the whole point of this series is that we might learn ancient practices, things they've done forever that help us stay tethered to, stuck in Christ and abiding in him. In verse 9, he says, as the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Abide in my love. There might be a temptation for us, specifically for those of us who are busy and active and trying to work hard, to go, okay, I'm going to do it.
I'm going to suddenly put in all this effort. Jesus said to do it. I'm supposed to do it. Let's figure this out. And it's not a, he's not chiding us. It is a command.
He's telling them to abide in him, but he's not, it's not aggressive. He says, abide in my love. As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Do y'all have any idea how much God the Father loves God the Son? No, you do not. The best picture we can come up with, it does not reach the depths of the love that the Father has for the Son.
The amount that he prefers him, desires him, chooses him, cares for him, knows him. And Jesus looks at his disciples and has the audacity to say, the way the Father loves me is the way I love you. And that's true. And he goes to the cross to prove it. He tells them, nobody has a greater love than this, that someone would give up his life for his friends. He's about to prove this, put this on display.
And that's the reality for us, that if you were in Christ, he loves you with an unending, unyielding love that is beyond compare. That he is not frustrated with you or upset with you or sick of you. That he prefers you and desires you and wants you to abide in his love. He wants you to rest in, stay connected to him because he cares about you so much so that he would die for our sins to redeem us out of our brokenness. That he did this for us, not while we were clean and perfect, but while we were sinners. He's saying this to the people who are betraying him and about to deny him.
Who are about to fail him and run away. He's inviting them to abide in him and to rest in his love. And that's the invitation for us. Verse 10, if you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love just as I've kept my father's commandments and abide in his love. If you keep my commandments, verse 10, I'm reading again, you will abide in my love just as I've kept my father's commandments and abide in his love. Now this is written in context.
So I want to show you two things he says in John 14 because at first it sounds like he is saying the opposite of what I just said, which is just, hey, work real hard, earn it, and then I'll love you. Verse, John 14, 15, it's on the screen, says this, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. So he just flipped it in 15. He says, keep my commandments, you'll abide in my love. And then he says, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments. And in 14, 21, he says, whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.
You see, the reality is that obedience to Christ goes hand in hand with a love for Christ and brings us into, helps us rest in, the love of Christ. This is what we've been talking about in our idol series is that we love something else more than Jesus, so we serve it, we obey it. And what he's saying is, if you love me above everything else, then you will serve and obey me and you will rest in my love. And if you love me, you'll keep my commandments and if you keep my commandments, you'll abide in my love. That our hearts will be oriented to him so much so that he is chief above everything else and so that we will be able to rest in him.
You see, many of us are anxious. we live in a country that is extremely wealthy, that gives us access to health care, entertainment. Our needs are met so much so that we come up with new needs. We need four pairs of shoes. We need, we need, like we have, but we're anxious. We're not, we're not at peace. We're stressed out.
Not only that, we're busy, overly busy. Do you realize that because of our cell phones, we live very distinctly different than people did 20, 30 years ago? You remember, you remember, if you ever had, you haven't had to like wait at a, at like a doctor's office or like wait in line at a thing or sit in a chair? You know, you used to, your brain would just like do stuff on its own. You would think, like thoughts. But now we have a phone in our face?
That if you look at the little report, it says you stare at it three hours a day? Some of you don't. That's what you use Netflix for or whatever. You stare at that. We just, we've learned how to push all the margin out of our lives so that we don't have the ability to just rest and to just sit and that is distinct to us because this is, this is a new way of living in the past 20 to 30 years. We're anxious and we're busy.
We don't know how to sit and be quiet. We don't know how to rest. Not only that, we're bored. It's weird to say that we're busy and we're bored but those are symptoms of the same problem. This is why a lot of men will spend a lot of time and money on adventure hobbies. This is why we, yeah, men will get caught up in video games and we're not in the past.
We're not cheering for a sports team vigorously because it's, it's something in us that wants to be a part of something bigger that matters, wants to accomplish something, wants to achieve something and in reality when we've bought the lie that we're supposed to go out on our own and be free, we have so much freedom but now we have to define our own value, we have to get our own purpose, we have to make our own meaning and it is too much. It's too much. My wife and I had the opportunity to take our four-year-old, he was three at that point, we got to go to Disney World for two days, saved up, we went. One of the things we did was we walked around with him, we let him make a lot of choices, we asked him what he wanted, we asked him if he was having fun, a lot.
Did you like that? Did you like that? Did you like that? About two hours into that, he had almost lost his mind. It was the first time in life we had ever just walked around with him going, are you happy? Are you happy?
Are you complete? Do you want this? What do you like? And I looked at my wife and I said, he doesn't get to choose anything else. We're done asking him if he's happy? I don't care.
The reality is he wasn't designed to be able to handle that. He's four, he's not supposed to make all of his decisions. If right now, he got to choose when he went to bed and what he ate and what the purpose of life was, he would mess himself up. We understand that because he's four, but the reality is we're creatures designed by a creator. we were not meant to define our own value, give ourselves meaning and purpose and know exactly what the role of the world is. We were meant to find that in God and only when we are tethered to him are we actually free. You need less freedom so that you might actually have love and meaning.
And not just that. See, he says that if you follow my commandments, if you obey, you'll dwell in my love and if you love me, you'll obey. And then he says this, verse 11, these things I have spoken to you that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full. Full. When was the last time you said, you know, if I had more joy, I think it would kill me. Full.
Filled up to the brim. So, I just, joyous. I need to buy, like, bigger clothes to handle all the joy I got. That we're to have full joy in Christ as we learn how to rest in his love and as we learn to be tethered to him. This is the freedom that you are offered. And you're not able to do it.
The limbs, the branches that stayed in my backyard are not free to roam around. But they're doing better than this guy. There's actually more joy in being stuck to Jesus, tethered to him so that there are certain decisions in your life you don't get to make, you don't get to decide your value. Christ says that you are absolutely valuable, that he loves and cherishes you above all else. You don't get to decide your worth. You don't get to decide your purpose and your meaning that God gives us this and then we get to rest and have joy and life as the vine pours life into us.
But we have to learn how to sit with him. We have to learn how to rest with him. We have to learn how to daily stay connected to him. It's not like rechargeable batteries where we get to go spend away time with him and then you get to go back out into the world. Some of you have children. You get like 12 minutes a day by yourself and during that time their hands are under the bathroom door.
We have to learn how to stay connected to Jesus in the mundane and the normal so that life might be poured into us at all times. There is a pastor named Alistair Begg who I really appreciate the way he thinks about things and I listen to him on a regular basis. He said that he found that young pastors overestimate what they can accomplish in a short time. So if you talk to a young pastor in six months we are going to be doing this in a year we are going to be doing this and then I don't know well just like ascend into glory. And he says they underestimate what they are able to do over the course of a long time.
So they overestimate what they can do in a year but underestimate what can happen what the Lord can do in 20 years in 25 years. And I don't think that is true just for pastors I think that is true for us. That we so undervalue what happens if we will learn how to stay tethered to Christ for the next 25, 35, 45 years the amount of people that will be blessed the amount of fruit that will be born. That's even the thing is that a healthy tree bears fruit in season. There are times where the limbs on that tree look just like this. Guess what?
They are coming back next year. This one is not. The rest of them will. But there are times where we do not look fruitful but if we are stuck to Christ we will be eventually because this end of it is the result of the vine working not the branch working. The branch's Job stay stuck to the vine. The vine's Job do all the other stuff.
That we actually get to stay connected to Jesus and Jesus works through us and in us for his glory. It's by the fact that we bear much fruit that the Father is glorified and this is for our joy and our freedom. There's a story in the Old Testament of a Syrian general. He's powerful. He's rich. He's feared.
But he has leprosy. So his body is rotting away. He's in a position that we would most look at and say he would be to be envied in the amount of power he has and the amount of wealth he has and the amount of stature he has. His name's Naaman. He actually they capture an Israelite have her as their servant and she tells him there's a prophet in Israel who can take away leprosy. The Lord works through him.
You can be healed. So they load up the head to the castle to where the king is. They say where's the prophet? The prophet says oh the king's not in charge of the prophet. He does his own thing. He's not here.
Because the only thing he'd think was like where can I go get more power? Where can I you know where would be the strongest person? Let's go to the castle. They send him over to the prophet. God tells Elijah that Naaman's coming. Elijah tells his servant go outside and talk to Naaman.
So he goes out you know it's possible the servant talks to him first and goes in and talks to Elijah. Y'all can read it later. I'm getting a few of these details messed up. I'm going to get most of it right. I also periodically get Elijah and Elisha confused. And so I just this is going to be real close.
And I'm now realizing I should have read this whole thing before I got up here. Tried to paraphrase it. Alright. So the servant goes out to Naaman. Naaman tells him why he's there. He's brought all this gold.
He's brought all these changes of clothes. He brought all this stuff and he says I'm here to get healed. And the servant says yes. Go to the Jordan River. Dunk yourself in it seven times. Your leprosy will be gone.
Naaman gets angry. The prophet won't even come talk to him. He just talks to his servant. The servant tells him to go to a small dirty river and wash himself. He just turns around and he says we're leaving. They start riding off.
Tells him to go to a small dirty river and wash himself. He just turns around and he says we're leaving. They start riding off. He said the Tigris and Euphrates we have nicer rivers in Syria. I've got better stuff I can go wash in than y'all's dirty little podent garbage river. Again, let's paraphrase. One of his servants stops him and says Naaman if he had
Told you to do something great wouldn't you have done it? Like you're a military leader if he had said to you climb to the top of a mountain battle a wizard get the golden crystal bring it down like if he'd have told you like take the ring to Mordor whatever wouldn't you have done it? He picked it's like a super close river
It's not even deep like I don't even think you could drown in that if you wanted to like just head on over dunk yourself seven times it's simple see humble yourself so Naaman does he goes and he dips himself in the river seven times and he comes out and it says his skin was like a baby's skin which I'm sure was weird the next time he got in
You know was having to do general stuff and fight and stuff because of his tender little new skin that he had had to regain some calluses and what not perfectly clean his leprosy is gone there's part of us that wants fruitfulness to be based off of how good we are Jesus Jesus
Just says rest in me abide in me rest in my love stay connected to me it will take some effort some you will actually have to open your bible we will actually have to pray we will actually have to make it a practice of these disciplines that we're going to try to coach us through and practically how to do but it's the
Amount of effort it takes for a war hero to go dip himself in a river seven times you just gotta do it it's not that difficult it's like if someone prepares a meal for you and when you're done taking pictures of it with your phone they have the audacity to not walk over and cut it up for you
And stick it in your mouth you actually have to use your hands like did you have to work to eat the meal yeah you had to chew it your body had to digest it you had to use your hands but what did you prepare the meal that's what Jesus is saying he's the life he's the one we get to rest
And he's the one we get to connect to it's going to take some effort we are going to have to be disciplined we are going to have to put our phones away we are going to have to set aside some time we are going to have to wake up a little earlier go to bed a little later we are going
To have to do some of those things but all of those things are so that we can get connected to Jesus and he can do everything else Jesus in Matthew chapter 11 it will be on the screen he makes this invitation
He's in a big crowd he says come to me all who labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest take my yoke upon you a yoke's what ox wear to pull a load take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am
Gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls a lot of us vacation but we don't know how to find a rest for our souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light
You see the reason this is true is that we do not have to earn our own salvation you do not have to gain your own value you don't have to find your own purpose and meaning that you get to
Trust in Jesus and his finished work on the cross and you get to have him pour life into you if we will only stay connected to him then we'll bear fruit in season when we're
Meant to we'll have life and vitality pouring into us at all times the band's going to come back up Eugene Peterson is a pastor who on a consistent basis would translate the Greek
To English for his congregation in just real simple terms and so he eventually just compiled all that and made the message version of the Bible and I think it's helpful the way he phrases this and again he's just
Trying to hit the gist of it in very common wording he says this are you tired worn out burned out on religion so this is him taking what Jesus just said we read in Matthew 11 he says
Come to me get away with me and you'll recover your life and I'll show you how to take a real rest walk with me and work with me watch how I do it learn the unforced rhythms of grace
We are meant to submit to Jesus we are meant to follow his commands we are meant to stay connected to him so that he is the guiding ruler of our lives and we are told we are
Withering and dying by a burden that is too heavy for us we cannot save ourselves we are withering and dying and Jesus says come to me learn the unrushed rhythms of grace learn how
To dwell with me learn how to make me your home learn how to sit and get what is better our hope our goal is that we would walk with Jesus for a lifetime bearing fruit in season not look great for a short time and flame
Out dry up die be gathered and burned but that we might learn how to rest in Jesus and have a sustainable pace of life where there is joy to the full and if you are like me saying I don't know if my
Joy is full I don't know if I feel like the Lord is pouring life into me every day then let's commit to walk down to the Jordan and dip ourselves seven times and trust Christ and his grace
And do a little bit of work that gets us close to him that moves us under the waterfall of his grace where we might have life poured into us where we might be made full come accept the invitation to come and rest accept the
Invitation to abide and let's learn how to practice some ancient practices so that we might dwell in Christ who offers us hope and life and joy through his resurrection and the life that he brings to all those who would trust in him
Let's pray God we thank you for your grace thank you for the hope that we have in you and you alone and I pray that we would that you would train us through your Holy Spirit that we might abide that we
Might learn how to rest in you that for all of us who are right now trying to earn our way trying to prove ourselves that we would lay down those burdens that we would come to you who picked up our burden at
The cross and might we have joy and might we focus on the right end of the branch and let you do the rest for your glory and your name and your praise amen
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Transcript
Good morning. My name's Chet. I'm one of the pastors here. As we get started this morning, I want to give an update on our gift project. Every year, towards the end of the year, we do a gift project where we're able to, we try to raise financial support for some sort of specific need, some sort of specific work. We've raised money for church plants before.
We've given gifts to children in local areas before. We've done some different things. This past December, we were raising support for some missionary work and for some church planting happening in Minya, Egypt. Our goal was $15,000, which, just so y'all know, the most our church has ever raised for a gift project is like $7,400, $7,400. So our goal was twice what we've ever raised.
And we were just like, let's go for it, because that's what they said they needed for a whole year to be able to buy. They took some transportation and to be able to have their budget for the whole year. And so we, during our church family, during the month of December, we were able to raise about $11,500, which was very exciting. At the same time, a local church, New Spring Church over in the Columbia area, said they were praying that they had had a surplus or that they're blessed financially and that they had heard about us and they wanted to just support us and show us that they love us. And so they wrote us a check for $3,500.
And so the pastors got together and just, we started praying, asking the Lord what he wanted us to, first of all, let me say, we got together and started talking about what we wanted to do with the money. And then we were like, maybe we should pray and ask the Lord what he wants us to do with the money. And, you know, it took us a little longer to get there than it should, but we did get there. And so I just want y'all to know, you should be very proud of us. So we prayed about it and we asked the Lord what he wanted us to do with it and felt confirmed and united in that we were supposed to give that to the work in Minya, Egypt.
We had someone in our church family say that that got us close enough that they'd pay the difference. And so we actually were able to raise $15,000 for the gift project. And super excited. The Lord knew we didn't have enough money, so he told another church to give us some so that he can go to Egypt and we're excited in how he does that and just blessed to get to be involved. Grab your Bibles, go to John chapter 1. We are in our Multiply series where we are talking through this call that the church has to make disciples.
And so we're discussing what that looks like and how we ought to respond to that, that we're called to share the gospel, to see people believe in Jesus, be baptized, and then to teach them, to train them in what it looks like to follow Jesus. And so as we've been talking through this today, we're specifically coming to how do we share the gospel? How can we go about pointing people towards Jesus? And we're going to look at several different ways this morning. We're going to look at several different kind of some methods and some different ways that we can go about pointing people towards Jesus.
So in John chapter 1, we're going to start here in verse 43. John 1 verse 43. It says, The next day, Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, Follow me. And that is primarily what being a disciple is. It's someone who follows Jesus, who learns from him, who in this time, and this very practically was, Jesus got up and went somewhere.
You walked behind him. You followed him. You saw what he was teaching, what he was doing, how he acted, how he treated people. There were times where he would stop and just explain something. And this is what has carried on from then on is that as followers of Jesus, we try to learn who he was, what he taught, what he did, how he treated people. And then we collectively walk together.
And that's a disciple, a learner from Jesus, someone who practices following Jesus and who he was and what he did and what he cared about. So he says, Follow me. Now, Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. So Andrew and Peter are already following Jesus. Philip found Nathanael and said to him, We have found him of whom Moses and the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. So Jesus finds Philip.
Philip finds Nathanael. And this is what we're talking about today, that as Christ followers, as people who Jesus has found, who are following Jesus, that we get to be a part of finding other people and bringing them to Jesus. And what does Philip say? He says, We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. He goes to Nathanael and says, You know, That stuff we've been reading in the Old Testament, the stuff we've been memorizing since forever, and that we're Jewish and we celebrate waiting for this prophet to come, this Messiah to come.
Found him. He's from Nazareth. His dad's name is Joseph. His name is Jesus. We found him. And you know how excited Philip is to be doing this?
How much prayer has been answered? How much hope and longing that this... And this is us if you're a Christian. Christian, the point of the universe, the hope of the world, the forgiveness of sins is in Jesus. And he's found us. If you're a Christian, he's redeemed you.
Your hope is in him. And all Philip's doing is going to his friend and saying, Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, have I got some good news for you. You know that stuff we've been longing for. You know that stuff we've been worried about. We found him. That's what he's doing.
And that's what we get to do. And so today we're going to specifically talk about how do we get to be like Philip in this passage and like some other people we're going to see as we jump around a little bit this morning. How do we get to go to other people and just say, Hey, you want this? Because it's so good. And Jesus is so good. And if you're a Christian, he is.
All the questions we have about, why are we here? What happens to us after we die? What's the point of this? What's the meaning behind this? Is my life going to count? Do I have hope?
How will I get through this? All of that is found in Jesus. And so we just get to go to other people and do what Philip said and said we found him. So let's pray. And then we'll talk through several methods, several different ways that we can go about bringing people to Jesus. And then we're going to talk about kind of a way of life, just how we get to live as these people.
So let's pray. God, we pray that you would bless our time this morning as we study your word and that you would send us as disciples who make disciples, as followers of yours who lead other people to follow you, that you would equip us to do that through the power of your spirit. And we love you and we thank you for how good you are. In Jesus' name, amen. So, he says, Philip found Nathanael and said to him, We have found him of whom Moses in the law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph. And Nathanael said to him, Can anything good come out of Nazareth?
So you would think Nathanael would be like, That sounds great. That's not what Nathanael says. He says, No, you didn't. That's kind of his response. It's like, No, nothing good comes out of Nazareth. Now, this is taught often, this is just a shot at the fact that Nazareth was a hick town and it was.
But more than that, he knows his Old Testament and he's saying, No, I don't think so because, you know, I went to school, I've studied this and nobody comes out of Nazareth. Like, there's no prophecy. We don't sing any songs about it. There's no, nobody's excited to be from Nazareth. Nobody comes out of Nazareth. This is actually like an informed Bible question.
He just basically says, Can anything good come out of Nazareth? So Philip goes and invites him and he just says, No, I don't, I don't, like, what do you, I don't think so. That doesn't sound right. Philip said to him, Come and see. Come and see. And this is the first thing we're going to talk about is you can just share an invitation.
That's it. One of the, one of the primary ways that we can try to bring people to Jesus is just share an invitation to something where there's a good chance they'll encounter Jesus. That's all Philip says. It's like, Okay, good Bible point. You know your Old Testament. We're proud of you.
Come see. Come meet him. You'll see. You'll see what I'm talking about. And so we get to do that. Some of us are like, I don't know enough.
I don't know all the answers. And if I come and they're going to say, Well, what about this? What about that? And you just get to say, It's a good point. I don't know. There's like 12 other people in my community group.
Come and ask them. Come and see. Let's see. His hope was that they would encounter Jesus. That Nathanael would come meet Jesus. So he says, Nathanael said to him, Can anything good come out of Nazareth?
And Philip said to him, Come and see. Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward him and said of him, Behold, an Israelite indeed in whom there is no deceit. Nathanael said to him, How do you know me? Jesus answered him, Before Philip called you when you were under the fig tree, I saw you. And Nathanael answered him, Rabbi, you are the son of God. You are the king of Israel.
Jesus answered him, Because I said, I saw you under a fig tree. Do you believe? You will see greater things than these. And he said to him, Truly, truly, I say to you, you will see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending from the son of man. Now, that went really well for Nathanael and it went really well for Philip because he says, We found him. Nathanael says, No, No, I don't think so.
He says, We'll come and see. And then like two seconds into meeting Jesus, Nathanael says, You're the king of Israel. You're God. And Philip's like, Told you. That's what I was talking about. He did the same stuff to me.
I was just standing there. He said, Follow me. And something was like, Yes. And then I knew he was. And it was just, That's why I wanted you here. That doesn't always work that way.
But sometimes it does. I've invited people to things before where I'm like, Just come. Just come. They showed up and it didn't go like this. It was weird or things didn't go like I had planned. But I'm not in charge of how that works.
I'm just in charge of saying, Come see. But then there's been other times where you've invited someone to your community group and they finally show up and your group gets to talking about weird stuff or gets to talking about good stuff or talks about something. Matt Freeman was telling me one time that he invited somebody over and his group just got to confessing sin and talking about some things. And he was thinking, Oh, come on guys. This is a bit heavy for this person's first time. Like, can't we just talk a little bit, like, a little higher up, not getting everybody's basement.
And then the person at the end said, Thank y'all so much. This meant so much to me. And began to confess as well and began to talk as well. And it was like, And Matt said he leaned back and was like, I'm sorry Jesus, I forgot you're in charge of this. And that sometimes it works like this and so that we just get to make an invitation hoping that they'll encounter the Jesus that we know. We don't have all the answers.
This is one of the things I love about when we do our baptisms and we have baptism videos. We want people to have the opportunity to share their story. And so many times we've had people who have met Jesus and would not trade Jesus for anything. And in their story they say, Yeah, this person harassed me. And then I kind of ran out of excuses. So I eventually showed up to a group.
And then I saw what they were talking about. And then I met Jesus. And I'm here to tell you that I'm going to follow him with the rest of my life. And there is something to just being able to say, Hey, come see. Come see what I'm talking about. Come see what my group's like.
Come see. Come hang out on a Sunday. Come. And it doesn't have to be just your community group. It can be, Hey, we're all going to be hanging out and eating a meal. But come see what I'm talking about.
What it looks like when people who love Jesus just get together and just having an invitation. Now, some of you are like, Sweet! That's what I'll do. If that's sharing the gospel, that's what I'll do. And I'll tell you that that's part of it and it does work. And you do see a lot of people meet Jesus this way.
Jordan Surratt, who's led a community group in our church family, who serves a lot. His cousin invited him to a prayer meeting. Now, if you're thinking, What should I invite my friend to? Most people wouldn't go to a prayer meeting. Jordan went to a prayer meeting. Didn't love Jesus.
Didn't know Jesus. He said it was really weird and it wasn't what he was expecting and then he just kept coming back. And surprise, Jordan's a Christian. Loves Jesus. Follows Jesus because his cousin said, Come pray with us. This does work and this is helpful, but what you have to understand is it's specific invitation.
Philip said, Come now. Let's go. Took him to Jesus. There's, sometimes we just do the, Hey, you should come hang out with my church sometime. Hey, you should come hang out with my group sometime. Just the same way that you look at your friend that you hadn't seen in a long time and you say, Yeah, we should hang out sometime.
And how often have y'all been hanging out? None, because sometime is no time. Sometime isn't an actual time and so that when we make these invitations, they need to be specific. They actually did some research on this, Lifeway did, because they do research on all kinds of things. And they found that 80% of people who are invited to a church or to some sort of a church thing will go, will accept the invitation if the person inviting them will walk through the door with them. So we'll set up a specific time to, Hey, let's meet here, let's grab some coffee, then let's go over there.
Hey, let's meet here, I'll meet you outside, we'll meet in the parking lot, I'll meet you at this gas station, I'll meet you there, I'll come pick you up, whatever, let's go. It's a specific invitation for a specific thing with the hope of them meeting Jesus. And that is one of the things that we can do is that we can share an invitation. Move to John chapter 8, we're going to look, John chapter 9, verse 8. We're going to look at another thing that we can do. So we can share an invitation, just hoping that they'll meet Jesus, that he'll work, that they'll see what we've seen.
We don't have all the answers, we just want to get them there. John chapter 9, we can share our story. So that's what, that's what's going to happen here is we're going to see this guy who's sharing his story. He's just telling people what Jesus has done with him, how it's worked with him. So John chapter 9, verse 8, we're going to pick up with a guy who was born blind.
The disciples are actually walking along with Jesus, they see him, and they say, okay, we want to know something, we have a theological question, who was the sinner, him or his parents, that he was born blind? And Jesus says, that's not how it works. And then Jesus heals him. And so he's a grown man who's never seen, and now he has sight. This is a beautiful day. I watched recently a video of a nine or ten month old that had never heard and they got some hearing aids and stuff and they put him in and the mom starts talking and she starts cackling, laughing, just so excited to be able to hear.
This guy's a grown man, has never seen. And Jesus, who's the king of all things, heals him so that he can see. In verse 8, it says, the neighbors and those who had seen him before as a beggar, were saying, is this not the man who used to sit and beg? And some said, it is he. And others said, no, but he is like him. And he kept saying, I am the man.
So some of them were going, I think this is the guy who used to beg. And other people were going, no, but he looks a lot like him. And then he kept going, no, it's me for real, you guys. Except for he said it like this, I'm the man. All right.
So they said to him, then how were your eyes opened? And he answered, the man called Jesus made mud and anointed my eyes and said to me, go to Siloam and wash. So I went and washed and received my sight. And they said to him, where is he? And he said, I do not know. I want y'all to know something is this guy shares his stories.
He tells in Christian circles, this is called a testimony a lot. This is his story of how he met Jesus and what Jesus did for him and how that's changed his life and worked in him. He's willing to say, I do not know. He doesn't have all the answers. He has his story. He has what Jesus has done with him.
And so, so often when we're thinking, I'm going to try to share the gospel with somebody, I'm going to try to tell them about Jesus. I'm going to try to, and this idea that they'll ask a question where we don't know the answer is terrifying to some people. Guess what? You can say, I do not know. So if you're talking with somebody at work and you're trying to point them towards Jesus or you're talking to them about church or how Jesus has worked in your life and they say, oh yeah, you believe all that mess.
What about evolution? What about, how could a good God let these bad things happen? What about this big social issue? You really believe and they'll pull something out that's this huge and you get to say, I do not know. Our group was actually talking about this this week. That's actually one of my favorite things to ever have happen when I'm talking to somebody about Jesus.
I like it most when it works like with Nathaniel and they're just like, wow, Jesus is God. That's the best one. But if they start just asking questions that I don't know the answer to, y'all don't know how excited I get. I'll tell you. Very. Because here's what happens.
If I don't know the answer, I just get to say, oh, I don't know. That's a really good question. That's really smart. Which makes them feel great because that was what they were going for, being really smart and making me look dumb. Usually, sometimes they're genuine questions. A lot of times, it's just, they wanted to just beat you.
And then guess what, you guys? This conversation is not over. I will be back. And the conversation will start right when I walk up because they gave me something to go study and to immediately start the conversation back up with. You see, sometimes the conversation kind of ends and it's really hard to get back into the conversation or it feels weird to get back into the conversation, but not if they stump you. You just go, that's really good.
I'll go look into it. And then you just go walking back in and go, so you were asking about dinosaurs. Well, guess what about Jesus? And you just get to jump right back into the conversation. And they have no choice. They're on lunch break.
You know they can't leave yet and you just get to talk to them. So he gets to say, I do not know, but he keeps going and here's what he leans into. He's just telling his story. It says, they brought, they brought to the Pharisees the man who had formerly been blind. This is verse 13. Now it was a Sabbath day when Jesus made the mud and opened his eyes.
Sabbath was a big deal to the Jewish people that you were not allowed to work. It was a very big deal to the Pharisees. This was their Mark of what made them faithful Jews, faithful to God. And Jesus runs around healing people all the time on the Sabbath. If you read the gospel accounts, it seems like he only healed people on the Sabbath. I'm assuming he did it a lot other times, but these are the ones where they got really annoyed and became a big deal.
So the Pharisees again asked him how he had received his sight and he said to them, he put mud on my eyes and I washed and I see. Some of the Pharisees said, this man is not from God for he does not keep the Sabbath. But others said, how can a man who is a sinner do such signs? And there was division among them. So they said again to the blind man, what do you say about him since he opened your eyes?
And he said, he is a prophet. Verse 18 says, they don't believe him. They keep, they eventually call his parents. They make his mom and dad come down and they're like, is this your son? They're like, yes, that's him. Was he born blind?
Yes, he was. And then they say, who healed his eyes? And his parents are afraid to say Jesus because they're afraid of the Pharisees. So they don't answer. They just, they say, well, he's old enough. Ask him, but that definitely is our son and he did used to be blind.
Verse 24. So for the second time, they called the man who had been blind and said to him, give glory to God. We know that this man is a sinner. And he answered, whether he is a sinner, I do not know. One thing I do know that though I was blind, now I see. And all he's doing is saying, I know what he did for me.
I know what he's doing. I know, I know what he did. I know I was blind. I know, now I see. And this is one of the ways that we get to share the gospel is just share our story. I don't know the answers to all that, but I know what he's doing to me.
I know that he's changed my heart. I know how I respond in anger now. I know how he's fixed my anxiety. I know how he's gone to work in me and my selfishness. I know what he's done in me. I don't know all of those answers and I'm willing to look them up and I'm willing to walk with you in it.
But I do know one thing. I was blind and now I see. And that's a beautiful way to point to Jesus. You can share an invitation. You can share your story. One of the things that happens that I want to just address here is that sometimes people think, well, I became a Christian now, but I used to be terrible.
I used to hang out with all these people and do all these things that I shouldn't have done and that I'm ashamed of now. And then they think, and I can't go back and tell them about Jesus because I look like such a hypocrite. I've heard this before. I thought this before. I just want to help you out. That's incorrect.
Does this man look like a hypocrite for seeing, even though, because he used to be blind? No. He's just saying, Jesus is great. I used to be blind and now Jesus has made me be able to see. And so if you go back and talk to all your friends about Jesus and they say, you, you, you coming to tell me about Jesus? I know how terrible you are.
And you'd be like, no, you don't. You don't know the half of it. I was way worse than what you think. I just, you only know about stuff I did with you. I did other stuff with other people that was way worse. I'm here to tell you that I'm terrible and that Jesus is great.
That I was blind, but now I see because Jesus did work. And I'm here to tell you that you can have hope in Jesus. I'm not saying come be a good person like me. I'm saying, come to Jesus. I actually know a guy who planted the church in his hometown for that very reason. It's a little podunk town.
Nobody cared much about it. It wasn't that big a deal. And people ask him, why are you planting there? And he's like, oh, because I was the worst. I'm very well known in that town for being a terrible person. So I just want to go back to that town and tell people about Jesus because no one will believe that I am a pastor and that I follow Jesus.
And if I don't do this in my own town, they just won't believe it. So I'm going back there and starting a church. And you get to do that. You get to share your story. Some of you are like, yeah, okay, well, I became a Christian when I was five, so I don't really have that kind of story. Yeah, you do.
Because even though you became a Christian when you're five, Jesus has continually been a good savior to you who is a sinner. And he's continually opened your eyes and helped you grow. And so you get to talk about how the gospel is good news right now for your soul that would run from him so fast if he didn't have a death grip on you. For you who's continually needing to grow and continually needing his hope and continually needing his light in your darkness. And you absolutely can share the gospel even if you've walked with Jesus most of your life. You can say, let me tell you what he's doing in me.
I can't answer all the questions, but I can tell you how he changes my heart. So you can share an invitation. You can share your story. And this third one is that you can share the gospel. And ultimately, the goal is that you would share the gospel in all of these, that the gospel would be clearly, explicitly said. But what we're really talking about here is that you can open your mouth and just tell them the facts about the gospel.
It doesn't have to involve you. It doesn't have to. It's just here's what Jesus has done. Go to Acts chapter 10. There's a lot of examples of this. Acts 10 is one of them.
There are plenty throughout the book of Acts, throughout the gospels. But this is where Peter was praying and God told him, hey, some people are going to come and I want you to go with them. At the same time, there was a man named Cornelius who was a Roman centurion. He had been praying and God said, hey, I'm sending some people to you. I want you to listen to them. And it's a really cool picture about how in prayer God prepares people to hear the gospel.
And so one of the things I would tell you is that in any of these, in all of these, you might be praying. I'll tell you specifically three things to be praying for. You want to pray that God would send you to receptive people. That God would prepare them beforehand. That he would work in their lives. That he would work for this moment to be the right moment for you to share the gospel.
That he would send you to receptive people. That he would make you sensitive to the spirit. Sometimes we're around receptive people but we're not sensitive to the spirit. They're sitting next to us at work and they're going, man, nothing ever works out for me in life. God's prepared them to hear the gospel and we say, yeah, tell me about it. I'm going to go to the drink machine and you want to go to the mountain too.
And we need to be leaning in and listening to the spirit that we might be prepared. And thirdly, that he would give us boldness. That he would lead us to receptive people. That he would make us sensitive to the leadership of the spirit and that he would give us boldness to speak when it's time to speak. But that's what happens here is that Peter's praying.
He's sensitive to the spirit. When the spirit tells him to go do something, he goes and does it. We're going to pick up in verse 30. Cornelius said, four days ago, about this hour, I was praying in my house at the ninth hour. And behold, a man stood before me in bright clothing and said, Cornelius, your prayer has been heard and your alms have been remembered before God. Send therefore to Joppa and ask for Simon who is called Peter.
He is lodging in the house of Simon a tanner by the sea. So I sent for you at once and you have been kind enough to come. Now therefore, we are all here in your presence, in the presence of God to hear all that you have been commanded by the Lord. He is very prepared. An angel actually told him, I'm going to send somebody to you so you can hear this. And this is miraculous, but the truth is it's no less miraculous how he does this all the time now.
That somebody has not walked with Jesus, doesn't know Jesus, but has God's been preparing their heart to be able to hear, to be ready for this, to be able to acknowledge him through life circumstances and they're in the right spot at the right time with the right person and God opens the window and tells somebody to speak and here's what it says. So Peter opened his mouth and said, that's the third method is that we would actually just share the gospel, that we'd open our mouth and say, which means that we would know the gospel, we would know the foundational core parts of the gospel. And so let's read what he says. It says, truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.
As for the word that he sent to Israel preaching good news of peace through Jesus Christ, he is Lord of all. You yourselves know what happened throughout all Judea, beginning from Galilee, after the baptism that John proclaimed, how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power. He went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil for God was with him. And we are witnesses of all that he did, both in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people, but to those who had been chosen by God as witnesses who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.
And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. To him all the prophets bear witness and everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name. That is all true, but God has to work on somebody's heart for them to believe it. But there are times when we are led by the Spirit and ought to just tell somebody, open our mouth and say, here's what's true. Jesus Christ was good and holy and he was murdered on a cross and he died in that to save us from our sins and he rose from the grave so that we might have hope and there is forgiveness in his name and salvation in his name.
And that's good news and God prepares people to hear it. And the circumstances around it are interesting. My uncle and his friends when they were in college were riding around sharing the gospel with people and they had practiced a certain method where you have kind of certain little lead-in lines that you kind of open up with or whatever. So three of them are in a car and they're riding and they see a guy who's hitchhiking and they just go to pick him up. He hops in the backseat of the car and they're riding around sharing the gospel and so this is like, hey, God just sent like a hitchhiker here, somebody ready to hear.
So the guy sitting in the backseat with him uses the opening line they'd learned and he leans over to him in the backseat and he says, if you died tonight, do you know where your soul would go? And the guy just looked at him and he says, deep in thought. And they pull up to a stop sign and that guy opens the door and takes off running as fast as he possibly can. And they were like, oh, you know, now that I think about it, that probably wasn't the best opening line given the circumstances. Sometimes people aren't ready. I mean, I think you probably could have done that a little better, but sometimes it's not the right moment.
God hasn't prepared. It's not, we're still supposed to open our mouths. We're still supposed to share. I was in college coming out of a study hall and one of my friends I played football with said something about death. And I just asked him, I was like, man, do you think about death? And we just got to talking about what happens after you die.
And I asked him, do you know what would happen to you after you die? And he's like, no, how can you? And I was like, well, the Bible says you can. And we just started talking. I shared the gospel with him and he said, I said, do you want to follow Jesus? He said, yes.
He committed his life to Jesus, standing out under a street lamp on our way back to our dorms. I didn't follow up well with him, didn't do discipleship stuff well with him. If you're in my community group, that makes sense to you because that's how I usually do stuff. I'm very excited about people who don't know Jesus and once they believe in Jesus, I'm like, cool, figure it out, see you at the end. That's why we're working on some of these things. But I talked to him recently and he said, hey, you know, it's about two weeks away from anniversary of me committing to follow Jesus.
And I was like, dude, first of all, I didn't know when that happened and second of all, I'm so glad to know that you do. And so, sometimes God prepares people. Patrick Harden, who's a part of our church family, is a part of CEO's Campus Outreach and they go to Myrtle Beach every year and they send all these college students up and down Myrtle Beach to while people are vacationing on the beach to share the gospel with them, to go tell people about Jesus. They have different methods they try. They do start a conversation and just lead them to Jesus just to get there. They do four spiritual laws, I think, is one of them where there's like a set way that you kind of start talking about this and you move to this and you move to this.
That's kind of the thing where if you die tonight, like it's this startup conversation. They have a couple of different ways. They share their story. They have a couple of different ways. And if you were to pick the people that you think who's most likely to want to follow Jesus, I would say people vacationing at Myrtle Beach. They want you to come talk to them about Jesus.
Like if I'm sitting out on the beach enjoying the beach, I want four college students to come over and be like, hi, do you know you're a sinner? It's like, yes, I do. I'm a pastor. Keep going. Guess what? Every week, every day, regardless of the method, people commit to following Jesus.
People are ready and want to hear the gospel. And guess what? Every week, every day, regardless of the message, some people say, I don't want to hear this. But some people are prepared and there just needs to be some people who go and open their mouths. That we have good news to share and that God is at work in the lives of people to prepare them for these moments. And I think sometimes we're in the habit of making fun of someone who would just go around and tell people about Jesus and that's really cute of us to make fun of people who would go around telling people about Jesus when we haven't sat down and told anybody about Jesus in who knows how many years.
And the truth is, God is at work. The message is good. And I don't care if we share an invitation. I don't care if we share our story. I don't care if we just walk up to people and share the gospel. We've got to be active in doing what Philip did, which is trying to grab somebody and saying, come see Jesus because he's so good and all the hopes and all the prayers and everything's been answered in him.
And all your fear and all your doubt, it's in him. Some of you are here this morning because someone invited you. And I want to just tell you something. They just want you to meet Jesus. They want you to have what they have. They want you to check out what they're checking out.
They want you to see if you're seeing what they see in Christ. They care about you. They're really nervous because they're like, please don't say anything weird or let's not do anything weird today because it's just like, and we don't usually do anything weird, but they're just thinking maybe today would be the day we do something super weird. People get nervous when they bring people around churches. And I just want y'all to know that it's your first time here. We're so glad you're here and we don't want you to feel uncomfortable.
And I know churches do some things maybe you're not familiar with. And in a minute, when we pass by the bucket full of snakes, people think because it's their first time they have to take a snake. You don't have to take a snake. Just pass the bucket. Just kidding. We're not going to do that.
You guys, we don't ever do that. We just want you to know Jesus. And here's the thing. This is ultimately, like I said, we're going to have a couple of different methods and really just share your life is the last one. That you would so know and love Jesus that you would just share your life, that you would be a person so impacted by the gospel that you would just be around people and you would be a gospel person. So this is Mark 12, 30 says this.
This is Jesus talking and he says, this is the greatest commandment. He says that you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. That God and ultimately revealed to us in Christ would be so primary to us that every part of our life would be saturated by this gospel. And so then we just get to know people at work. We just get to know our neighbors and we're gospel people. One of the ways we talk about this is that the concept of gospel fluency, that if you're a Christian, that how you receive the world, how you understand the world is through the gospel.
Fluency is the idea that you would speak a language fluently, that you could dream in it, that when you think, you speak English fluently, most of you speak English fluently so that you're not having to translate what I'm saying right now, pink elephant. You're able to just kind of take in whatever is said. Your brain processes it without you being able to control that flying giraffe. Like you just, whatever is said, just you can't help it. You understand that you're fluent. Now, that's not the case for us if we go to another place.
I got to go on a trip one time to a mission trip to Romania and I learned some phrases in Romanesti. And honestly, I know what the phrase means, but they're just noises I memorized. I know that means, may God bless you. I don't know which part means what and what order it's in because I just memorized the sounds. So that's the way I am with, I know a little bit of Spanish, but all I'm really doing is taking the Spanish word and go into the little Spanish dictionary in my brain and trying to say, I think that word means this word in English.
I'm just really trying to get it to English. I'm not fluent. But the goal for us as Christians is that this would be true, that we would love God so much with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength, that it's how we see and understand the world, that the gospel is how we think about everything so that you can't talk to us about marriage, you can't talk to us about money, you can't talk to us about relationships, you can't talk to us about savings, you can't talk to us about death or life or hope or the future or sadness or anything without us, the gospel just coming out. Here's the thing, some of us have this down when it comes to our groups.
One of the things we've talked about over and over again is that we would be, we'd give the good news before we give good advice. We have it down. We're gospel fluent. We have a gospel accent. It pours out of us when we're in church family. And as soon as we get around our neighbors and as soon as we get around our coworkers, we go TV newscaster on it.
My wife and I got to go, my parents won a trip to Jamaica through his job, my dad's Job. They weren't able to go and we got to go for free and I would absolutely recommend that to you. If you ever get to go on a free trip to Jamaica, you should go. It was very enjoyable. While we were there though, we were watching some TV and I don't know how they worked out this deal, but they just had channels from all over the place. And so we were watching.
Well, the funny thing was, if you watched any local news, you couldn't tell where they were from because they all had newscaster voice. They had this same little dialect that they all speak. The severed limbs were found in the elevator shaft. Good news for egg lovers, like whatever, like they just have this same tone, same voice, whatever. So we ended up realizing we were watching one that was from Miami, one that was from Canada.
They sounded the same as the people in Columbia, South Carolina, because they've all trained to just, if you're going to do the news, you just got to cut that out. And that's what we've been taught by our culture. If you're going to be a Christian, that's fine, but when you go to work, you just got to cut that out. You just can't sound Christian at work. You just got to, or you can be Christian light. You can say some things about God or whatever, but let's not talk about Jesus and let's not talk about, we just cut it out as soon as we get outside.
We put on our little newscaster voice. I'll give you an example of this. If your group, one of the questions in your community group was, what would you do if you won the Mega Millions jackpot? Most of us, if we really had to think about that in our Christian world, I got to know my answer, I'd be terrified because I think me having a billion dollars is probably not good for my soul. I really probably should keep going to work. It's nice right now that I can't own everything I would like to own.
There's something good about when God says you can't serve God and money. It's really nice that I don't have a billion dollars saying serve me. It's nice that I don't have much money and I go, you're right God, that sounds brilliant, but as soon as you gave me a billion dollars, I'd be like, well, I don't know, maybe some jet skis. The lake starts looking real good on Sundays. Like, you know, whatever. And so I'd be like, well, I think I'd probably have to give a lot of it away.
I'd probably have to get a whole bunch of people involved, maybe set up a trust, maybe spend the rest of my life just handing out money, maybe just give it to the IMB and go back to work the next day and be like, that was cool. IMB is the International Mission Board. All right. That's probably how I'd answer in our group. I'd really try to think about it. I'd talk about what was real to me and what really mattered and I'd try to fit it in the concept of eternity.
And if someone asked me at another Job or another place, hey man, what would you do if you win the Mega Millions? I'd just go newscaster on it. They don't want to hear all that stuff about how I think I'm a sinner and if I got a lot of money it would ruin my soul because that's a weird thing to say to somebody. So I'd just say, I'm going to probably own a mountain with like a castle and some sort of gun turrets because that would be amazing. We just cut it out so that when somebody's dealing with real things, you see the gospel applies to every aspect of life. This is one of the things that happens in the Old Testament.
There used to be a God of the forest and a God of the rivers and a God of the rain and a God of, in the Old Testament comes along and God says, no, I'm the God of everything. I'm the God of the rain and I'm the God of the wind and I'm the God of the mold in your kitchen. I own everything. And then Jesus comes along and he says, the gospel applies to everything, every aspect and every square inch of your life. So that if someone's talking about sadness or brokenness or depression or the Mega Millions jackpot or what they're going to do with their life or what they're hoping for their future or what they're struggling with with their kids, guess what?
The gospel applies now. It's good news now and there's hope now. That's what Peter says in, nope, sorry. It's not Peter next. It's 1 Thessalonians. Here's what it says.
It says, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves because you had become very dear to us that we would be such gospel people that when we begin to build friendships with people who don't know Jesus, not only do we share the gospel with them, we share ourselves with them and ourselves as a representation of what it looks like as the gospel goes to work on somebody. Not that you're perfect but that you're repentant. Not that you have it all together but that you trust someone who does. Not that you have all the answers but you have a lot of hope in the one who does.
1 Peter 3.15 says this, But in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect. This means that as Christians the gospel will be so real to us that it didn't matter what the objection was, what the comment was, what the... This is usually taught that you're going to be at work and someone's going to come to you and say, You are so joyous and happy. What's special about you? And for some of you maybe that happens and you ought to respond that the gospel gives you hope and that Jesus works on your soul.
That's not the context this is written in it. Most of what Peter was talking about was someone's going to come to you and say, Really? You're a Christian now so you had to break up with your boyfriend? Oh, you're a Christian now so y'all can't live together? Oh, you got this going on? Oh, and they're going to have this aggression and you're going to go, Oh, gentleness and respect.
I'm so glad you brought that up. Jesus is way better than sex. I'm so glad you brought that up. Jesus is way better than money and you have a real reason that the gospel is a hope in you and you have a real answer. That's what he's talking about. The hope would be that we would be gospel people so that whether we were sharing an invitation, sharing our story, sharing the gospel, that ultimately we'd just be sharing our lives and that's who we'd be.
That we'd be those type of people who so know and love Jesus and his word so dwells in us richly that it didn't matter what we were talking about. It didn't matter what we were doing that it just comes out of us, pours out of us and some of us need to learn how to lose our newscaster voice and go back to having our gospel accent when we're out in the world so that some people might find hope and might hear the goodness of the gospel and this sharing your life thing helps us a lot when people say, well, I can't share the gospel at work. What they mean when they tell you that at work is that you can't go around trying to proselytize everybody. You can't start handing out tracts.
You can't, but you can share your life and you can be a Christian and you can, when somebody's struggling with something and you're their friend, you can say, hey, can I tell you the hope I have? Can I tell you what I lean to in these moments? Can I tell you that there's a Bible story that talks about this? And it also means that, okay, maybe you can't share the gospel at work. Maybe you got fussed out for that. Guess what?
You can share the gospel in your backyard when you have a cookout. Get to know your coworkers. That way when you say, hey, you want to eat burgers at my house? They say, that sounds like a good idea. And then guess what? Who gets to talk about Jesus at their own house all day long?
I'm going to close with this story. I have a friend named Josh Davis. I met him across the street playing at the park with his children and our kids are about the same age and we started hanging out. We had a, pretty early on, had a conversation about the gospel, which is helpful. Just so y'all know, some of you are like, I'm developing a friendship and seven years from now, when the moment's right, I'll jump out of the bushes and say, turns out I've been a Christian the whole time. It's not super helpful.
Just own it right when you start. And then if people are like, I don't want to be friends with a Christian. Okay, that person's probably not going to be Jesus right now. They're not ready. But some people go, okay, and you get that already open.
The conversation's already there. And so I had the chance to talk with him pretty early on. And one of the things Spencer's been challenging us on is just looking at people and telling them, I want you to know Jesus. I want you to believe this. So much we make it this big conflict, but the truth is, it's us trying to love somebody and trying to help somebody find something that is so good.
And so we continued this friendship and we hung out some and I just realized the next time I saw him, I needed to just say to him again, hey, I want you to know Jesus. So we were over at the park playing and we were heading back to my house and I just stopped and said, hey, our kids were playing at the park. He and I weren't playing at the park. We're on the seesaw. It was awesome. We hold hands and run to the field.
We're walking back over to my house and they were going to be there for a minute and I just stopped and said, hey man, I just want you to know I care about you. We like your family and I want you to know Jesus. So as much as we can talk about that and as much as you have questions about that, I just, I think he's amazing and I want you to know him. And he just stopped and then he said, I think I really needed to hear that. And I was just like, yes, Jesus, that's awesome. And then we talked about Jesus for the next hour or so.
He didn't become a Christian. I'm still praying for him. I'm going to keep saying that to him. I'm going to keep building a relationship with him. I'm going to keep using all these methods. I'm going to invite him to stuff.
He's coming to hang out with our group some. He's not going to do that all the time. I'm going to keep inviting him. I'm going to keep sharing my story and how Jesus is at work in me. I'm going to keep sharing the gospel with him whenever I get the chance and hopefully at some point it'll be the right moment and he'll say, what do I need to do? How do I follow Jesus?
See, our prayer for our church family this year is that every single one of our community groups would get to see somebody baptized. See, last week we said that we'd be all preachers, that we'd be all sharing, that there'd be a hundred people out proclaiming the gospel. And this week, as we talk about ways that we can go about doing that, our hope, our prayer, and we don't know if it'll work because it doesn't always work. God doesn't always lead us to the people. We don't know how his timing on all that, but our prayer this year is that every single one of our community groups would be on mission, would be active in sharing the gospel and we get to gather around the baptismal pool and see some people who on their videos say, I got tired, I ran out of excuses, and Jesus is so good.
I was blind, now I see, and I'm so thankful that somebody grabbed me and said, you need to meet this Jesus. Band's gonna come back up. As we sing this next song, we as a church family are gonna take communion. This is where we, through the bread and the cup, that we remember that Jesus' body was broken for us, that his blood was shed for us, and that we need the gospel and that in Jesus we get the gospel. That he died for our sins, that our hope is in him, that our joy is in him, that our life is in him, and so we take a moment to pray, to repent. The repentance isn't that we have to be good before we come up there, but that if we are walking in unrepentance, we are not believing the gospel, which is that Jesus saves sinners and that there's hope and freedom in the gospel.
And so we pray, we repent, we confess sins, and then we joyously, celebratorily take communion. And I pray that as we pray this morning that you would also pray for those who need to know Jesus, who need to have what you have in Christ, that we might be led to receptive people, that we might be sensitive to the Spirit, that we might be bold in sharing our faith so that more people might have the Jesus, so that we know who loves and saves sinners. Let's pray. God, we thank you that the gospel is good news and that it is hope in our darkness and that it is a bandage for our souls and that our life and our joy are in you and nowhere else.
And we ask, Lord, that you would make us effective in sharing the gospel. And we pray right now, collectively, that every single one of our community groups this year would get to see somebody baptized, we get to know the joy of sharing the gospel and of having someone begin to follow Jesus, that we'd get to be like Philip and that you'd lead us to the right Nathaniels who are ready to hear and know the goodness of your word and hope in Christ. In Jesus' name, amen. When you're ready, take communion.
Multiply
Transcript
This is an exciting time for me. I know that some of you don't get as excited about New Year's. I know that some of you, I've seen the jokes. Some of you don't stay up to watch the ball drop at New Year's Eve. Some of you aren't the biggest fan of New Year's resolutions. I get it.
It's okay. I am. I love New Year's. It is one of my favorite holidays. It's a big deal for our household. Every year we do a New Year's Eve party at our house.
This year our group, which is the Grove group and the Kitty Wake group, got to come together. And we got to watch the ball drop together. It was exciting. The next day I got to go hunting and I got to spend some time in thinking through New Year's resolutions. Because I like them. I value them.
I have personal resolutions. How I want to grow in my faith. How I want to grow as a father. How I want to grow as a husband. I have pastoral resolutions. And how I want to grow in caring for our church.
How to serve here better. How to grow in preaching. I have professional resolutions. Because I also do real estate. So how I want to grow in that.
And I hold on to those. I'm one of the few. I just like it. It's measurable stuff for me that I can look at throughout the year. I get really excited. Which is good.
Because over the last three months, all four of us pastors have been sitting together, praying, have been studying the scriptures, have been reading books, have been thinking through one of the ways that we can grow in 2019. And one of the things that we want to grow in is in multiplying and making disciples. So we spent the last three months preparing for this. And that's why we have a series that we are doing called Multiply. We're going to take the next five weeks to walk through this as a church family. We'll get back to Genesis when we get done with this series.
But we want to grow in this. And today we're going to be in Matthew 28, verses 16 through 20 on page 487. And the blue Bibles around you. If you don't have a Bible at home, please take that. That's our gift to you. We want you to be able to have a Bible that you can read.
This is called the Great Commission. For centuries, that's what this has been called. This is Jesus commissioning out the church and the start of the church. So we're going to be in this today. And what today is going to look like is just a big picture of what it looks like to make disciples. We want to see the big kind of picture of what Jesus is calling us to.
I want us to see it, get excited about it as we lean into 2019. And then Chet, over the next four weeks, is going to give some more practical handles how we walk this out, how we make disciples. But today we're just going to go big picture. So go ahead and flip there. We'll get to it in a moment. One of the most successful philanthropic movements that I've ever seen was the Ice Bucket Challenge.
Y'all remember that? Remember how big of a deal that was in 2014? For like a month, that's all you saw. It was a big deal and it was so simple. I would have loved to have been in the pitch room when they kicked this idea off. This was designed to raise money for ALS and awareness for ALS research.
I would have loved to have seen it when someone said, Hey, I got an idea. How about we get people to take buckets of ice water and they'll dump it on their friends. And then their friends will challenge other people. It'll be great. Someone at some point said, Okay, sure. Yeah, let's run with it.
What are we going to call it? The Ice Bucket Challenge. Let's hashtag that. It's going to be trendy. And it grew. Something as simple as that.
A few people challenged another. A few people challenged another. All of a sudden it swept across the globe. And it raised over $115 million in a little over a month. There's been no other movement that's happened like that. I mean, it had real effects.
And the year after that, they saw real impact in research and how this impacted ALS research. It was a big deal. And people have looked at this and they've studied this and they've wondered, How did they do it? How did they get something to go so viral? How did they get something to be so widespread? And when you look at it, it was very simple.
If you get people excited about something, that they're going to own it, so much so that they take a bucket of ice water and pour it on their heads, and then you get them to challenge others, what happens is you're not adding people to your cause, you're multiplying. You can go from one and they challenge three other people, and then those three people do it and they challenge three other people, and you've gone from one to three to nine, and then you get those nine to challenge three other people, you've gone from one to three to nine to 27, and then you keep going exponential growth to 81. I don't math much farther than that. But it grew so widespread, and that is because multiplication, exponential growth, is greater than addition, and that is not a new idea.
And we go back to how the early church, this is how it began. It was a multiplication movement that changed the world. A few disciples who owned this and were commissioned out, and it changed the world. So we're going to take the next five weeks looking at through this, and as we walk through the Great Commission today, what we're going to see is that Jesus, he chose a few ordinary people to invest in them that they might impact many and might change the world. So we're going to see it as we walk in.
I want to pray, and then we will dive in. And God, I'm so thankful that we get to start this year by looking at the Great Commission. I'm so thankful that you call us to join you in mission. God, I pray that you would help us see this, the beauty of it, the glory of it, and the simplicity of it, and that we would leave here today encouraged by it. In Jesus' name, amen. All right, so let's walk through these first two verses.
It says, Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain which Jesus had directed them, and when they saw him, they worshipped him, but some doubted. Now this is after a bunch of events have happened. So this is after Judas betrays Jesus. That's what's being mentioned here when it says the eleven. That's what's being brought to mind. There was twelve, but Judas betrays Jesus.
Now there's eleven. This is after Jesus goes to the cross, taking on our sins, our punishment. This is after he goes to the tomb, where he conquers death at the resurrection. He appears to the women at the tomb. Then he appears to the disciples in the upper room.
And then he directs them to go. Go to this mountain. We don't know which specific mountain it was in Galilee. There's some scholars that they think it may have been where the Sermon on the Mount was. We don't really know, but it's significant for them for this moment. So they show up, and when they get there, the text tells us that some doubted.
Now we don't really know who was doubting. We don't really know what went into their doubts. But Jesus sees their doubting. And he intentionally addresses this great commission with that in mind. So he sees their doubting, and he says in verse 18, he says, All right, so there's a lot going on in this passage.
Let's walk through it bit by bit. He starts off this great commission addressing some of their doubts. Because when he says, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. I want you to picture this. They're on a mountain. And Jesus is saying, Do you see the heavens?
Do you see the earth? I am king over all of it. God the Father has given me authority from the heavens where you see the sun, the moon, and the stars, and the galaxies, all the way down to all of creation, as far as you can see, from galaxies to atoms. I am king. I am the sovereign ruler over the universe. He makes it clear that he is in control.
And before he delivers this commission, he delivers this special mission that they're going to take part in, he makes that abundantly clear. And that is a great encouragement. That the king of the universe is behind this mission. It's like the game is rigged in our favor. It's kind of like, it's a little bit like, Bama football. I know.
Some of y'all tomorrow, like, no, it's not going to be. Maybe. You might be right. But it's kind of like Bama football. They've got the best coach. They've got the best players.
They just keep winning. It's obnoxious. We're all tired of it. But the game is rigged. It's so much more so than that, man. We have a rigged game.
The king of the universe stands behind us. And that's the beauty of this, is that as he delivers this commission to the disciples, it also affects everyone who believes in Jesus. All of us have this authority that stands behind us, the sovereign ruler of the universe. And this is huge. Because here's the deal, man. When we start talking about making disciples, when we start talking about sharing the gospel, we start talking about multiplication and reaching people, man, I get it.
This brings up doubts for some of us. This brings up doubts for many of us. Doubting our abilities to do this. What am I going to say when it comes to a situation where I'm going to share the gospel? What's going to come out? There's some anxiety that goes into that.
And I love when Jesus teaches in the gospels, he says, specifically when he's talking about persecution, he says, when the time comes, the Holy Spirit will give you the words. This is the king who stands behind us. He is sovereign. He is the ruler. Which means he's also sovereign over salvation. And that frees us up.
Because hear this, we don't change hearts. We don't bring repentance. That's the work of the Holy Spirit. And we're just called to be faithful in this. So all this is brought into this.
That we, our main goal here, the only main way we can mess this up is not being faithful. That we are just called to be faithful in declaring the good news in this commission. So all that authority gets brought into here when he says, go therefore and make disciples of all nations. So let me walk through this piece word by word. The word therefore there is important. Because it links all the authority that he just established.
Which is a great comfort for us. He brings all of that in to this command. So it is a comfort, absolutely. But it's also a responsibility. And the same way that a general gives orders. And the same way that a coach calls the play.
There's some responsibility and some weightiness that's brought to it. So it is a comfort, but it's also weighty. So therefore, go. Go. Now, in college, I did a thesis, which is a capstone. I spent a whole semester researching a topic.
And I was going to present this paper and have to defend it before my professors and before my peers. And I chose this passage. And I specifically chose the word go. Go. I wanted to focus in on this. And I felt pretty good about myself.
I was like, you know what? It doesn't mean go. It means as you go. So I did this whole big thesis on it. This whole big explaining how the Greek actually says as you go. And I had professors that were like, yeah, that's really good.
I had peers that were like, good Job. I had pats on the back. I made an A. And I felt like I had some swagger. Because I looked at all the English translations out there. Every one of them that said go and said, no, I've discovered it.
It is different. And I get to seminary. And in one of my first Greek syntax classes, my professor goes, hey, you know, sometimes knowing a little bit of Greek is dangerous. Let me give you an example. Could have chosen any example he wanted. He said, you know how some people translate the Great Commission as as you go?
I got excited. I said, yeah, come on. I know all about this. He said, yeah, well, for the next 15 minutes, he just absolutely dismantled my whole semester's work of thesis. But all the work I had done.
I was like, yep. I guess knowing a little bit. It's not really good for you. If all the English translations say go, it means go. That's the force. It's meant you go.
So if you've ever heard that, no. Trust me, you don't have to go through the pain that I did. It means go. And that doesn't necessarily mean you always have to go across the world. For some of you, if you lean in to the Holy Spirit and he reveals to you that it's not going across the world, it definitely means going across the street. It definitely means going across the office.
It means going and reaching people. But for some of you, obedience to the Lord is going across the world and planting churches amongst unreached people groups. The forces go, but that's not the main point, the main thrust of this passage. When it says make disciples, that's it. That's the meat. That's the main verb of this passage that everything else kind of surrounds it by.
It is the focal point. It is make disciples. Disciple. And what Jesus just did was he took a word, disciple. All right?
And he made it a verb. Because in that language, there's not really a way to do that. He just said, discipleize. And the same way that we take Google, which is a noun, which is just a name, and we made it into a verb by Googling stuff. That's exactly what he just did. He verbalized and said, do this.
Make disciples. Disciple's. So in order for us to understand this, we need to clearly state what a disciple is. A disciple is a learner. It's a student. It's an apprentice.
That's what's being implied here. And it's not just a learner or a student or apprentice in general. It means an apprentice under somebody else. You see, this was common in first century Judaism. When a great rabbi would be raised up and they would come and people would hear them preaching, they would have crowds that would come and hear them. That's what happened with John the Baptist.
And John the Baptist chose disciples. He chose apprentices. And the picture of what it would look like is they would have a rabbi that they would learn from, that they would literally sit at the feet of their teaching, collecting the dust from their sandals, learning, growing in wisdom, and becoming just like them. That's why Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11, he says, imitate me as I imitate Christ. Christ, the picture there is that you're so much learning and growing, you're imitating him as you're imitating all the way back to Jesus. So that's what a disciple is.
It's someone who's learning everything they can, soaking it up. And he says, make those. Make disciples. And he says, of all nations. Now, I don't have a lot of time to spend on this today. We did do a lot of this in our gift series.
But all nations means all people groups. Everywhere. Every tribe. Every tongue. Every nation. That we get to participate.
And we got to do this in our gift project. We got to raise thousands of dollars to help a church plant all the way across the world in Menya, Egypt. Because we want to see disciples be made of all people groups everywhere. Go, therefore, make disciples of all nations. And then we get two big phrases. So, make disciples, that's the meat.
These two big phrases that come out of this. This is the seasoning. This is the juices. This is helping us understand what make disciples means. He says, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. And he says, teaching them to observe all that I've commanded them.
So let's sit in this first part. Baptize in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Baptism happens because someone placed their faith in Jesus. And they were changed by him. And that only happens when people go and share the gospel. That's what Romans 10 teaches.
That faith comes by hearing the word of God. So what's being implied in this passage, what's being implied in baptism, is that we would go and we would share the good news. That we go to our neighbors, to our friends, to our co-workers, to people that we know, to family, and we would declare that Jesus is Lord. We would tell them that he is better than everything else. And that God willing, they would believe and trust in him. And they would stand in a baptism pool.
And we would say, who is your Lord and Savior? And they would say, Jesus. And we'd say, we baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And that we'd celebrate knowing that Jesus changed lives. That that is a big part of making disciples. That we get to go and we get to declare who Jesus is to those who don't know him.
The second big part is teaching them to observe all that I have commanded. Now the word observe there isn't always the most helpful. Because we observe Christopher Columbus Day. I mean, some people do. Like bankers. I don't.
I know most of y'all are working. I guess that doesn't help us complete the picture. What's being lost in the word observe is also keep. It's to keep. It's to obey. That we would keep, obey all that Jesus has commanded.
And when it says, all that I have commanded you. Man, that is where this really gets interesting. Because that encompasses everything. All of the ministry from the last three years that he has done with the disciples. This is the part of the story. We're at the end of it.
It's kind of like Pulp Fiction or Titanic. It starts with the end of the story. And you've got to go back to the beginning. And see the rest of the story. Or, if you watch Bird Box. Start at the end.
And then rudely move between the beginning, the middle, and the end. With no grace at all. That was for three of you that watched that movie. I thought it was like 45 million. But y'all didn't get on Netflix.
That's fair. It's good. But this is the part of the story where we've got to go back to the beginning. We've got to run through the middle. We've got to understand what's happening here. We've got to understand the ministry that Jesus does with his disciples.
Because that is going to complete the picture for us. As we understand what make disciples means. So you go back through how Jesus starts his ministry. He starts with preaching in Matthew 4. He starts preaching that the kingdom of God has come. And when he starts preaching that the kingdom has come.
People get excited. He starts having crowds that surround him. And they start wondering more about this. That a great rabbi is being raised up. He's preaching the kingdom. And then they're anticipating at this point he's probably going to choose disciples.
Because this is what rabbis do. So they're waiting for it. And then he chooses his first disciples. He chooses fishermen from Galilee. Now, I know that that gets lost on us a little bit. There's a cultural difference here in understanding this.
But the equivalent of that is choosing chicken farmers from Saluda. That's it. That it's, I mean, blue collar work. My best friend from high school and college, he grew up in a chicken farm. I thought it smelled, he said it smells like money. It's blue collar work.
And Saluda, just like Galilee, is the sticks. It's the middle of nowhere. And I can say that because I went to school in Saluda. Those are my people. But it's, people are anticipating who are you going to choose.
And he chooses fishermen from Galilee. It's like conventional wisdom says you would have chosen the biggest and the brightest and the best. Like, why did he choose? You would have expected this montage of all these different people. Similar like in Ocean's Eleven when Danny Ocean starts choosing all of his, all of the criminals that are going to rob the Bellagio's vault together. He chooses like a guy who can do all kinds of jumping and all around.
Another guy that can disarm stuff. Another guy, all these really gifted criminals. And then Matt Damon. Do you guys really know what his point in the movie is? But I guess he did something.
But he chooses all these gifted people. And that's what this is supposed to look like. That's what culture is expecting here. They're thinking he's going to choose the evangelists and the preachers and the movers and the shakers and all the important people in society. And he chooses fishermen. They're not super educated.
They're not super elite. They are blue collar. And the rest of the society doesn't uphold them. And then he goes on and chooses more fishermen. And then he chooses a tax collector who, I mean, they're like the bottom social rung of society. Like everyone hates them.
They're traitors. They're the worst. Then he chooses to sell it. Think conspiracy theorists who's trying to overthrow the government. It's kind of weird. And then we don't even know who the rest of the disciples were.
I don't know what Bartholomew did. He could have been a fisherman. He could have been doing anything. We don't really know. And that's the point. They were of no notoriety.
The rest of the world didn't uphold them and say, man, they are awesome. And that is good news for us because God chooses ordinary people of no social, no worldly importance to do extraordinary things. That's good news for you. And that's good news for me. That's good news for our church. Because y'all, we're ordinary people.
I know that someone back in the day said, you're extraordinary. Yeah, you're made in God's image. That is extraordinary. Outside of that, we're fairly ordinary. We just are. My whole life, listen, own it.
My whole life is taking an ounce of talent and maximizing that through hard work and a few good breaks. Like I have the most average white guy look possible. Like there's nothing remarkable about me. I'm like, you find the emoticom for a bearded white guy and that is me. Which is cool because if I ever get in a bind, the FBI comes for me. I'll just show up to a Dave Matthews concert, blend in.
You will never find me again. And what I love is that I'm not the only one. And that's why I love our church is that you guys are ordinary too. You guys, we are a bunch of ordinary people that God has chosen to do extraordinary things here in Columbia. That we might see disciples be made here. God chooses the ordinary to do the extraordinary.
And he intentionally chooses these ordinary disciples and he pours into them. For three years, he invests in them. He walks them through the scriptures and teaches them from the scriptures. Showing them the beauty and the wonder and the mystery and the glory of God's word and its importance in their lives. He models what prayer is for them. Teaching them to pray.
He says, don't pray like the Pharisees who pray so that everyone else can see them. Don't pray like the pagans who just say all kinds of words. Pray like this. Our Father who art in heaven, who lives in heaven. Hallowed be thy name. Holy is your name.
He makes it so simple. There are moments when Jesus has big ministry moments where he heals lots of people. Where he feeds lots of people. And then the next moment you see he gets away with his disciples. And then he even steps away from them. And he gets to be before the Father in prayer and solitude.
He models the importance of prayer. He models the importance of servitude. Focus on serving the least of these. He focuses on how the last will be first. He washes their feet. Their stinky first century sandal wearing, collecting dung and dirt feet.
He models the perfect embodiment of service and love. Over the next three years he invests in them. Showing them how to be a follower of him in everyday life. The focus of Jesus' ministry. Hear this. Is the disciples.
They're the main focus of his ministry. People might push back on that. And they say, wait, wait, wait, wait. He did real public things. He preached. He had big followings.
He healed lots of people. It was all public. And I'd say, yes, absolutely it was. But who is front and center for all of that? If you think that his main part of his ministry was public ministry, you need to go back and you need to read the Gospels. You need to go back to Matthew 4 after he calls the disciples.
In Matthew 5 through 7 is the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount doesn't say he had big crowds and they all came around. And then he started teaching them. It starts with he taught the disciples. They're the main part of his teaching. The main focus of his teaching.
When in Matthew 8 through 9 he starts doing these big miracles, guess who's there? The disciples. In Matthew 10 when he commissions out the first missionaries to go and declare that the kingdom of God is coming, guess who the first ones are? It's the disciples. And the rest of the book of Matthew, the rest of the Gospels is Jesus doing big public things and serving and teaching. But his disciples are there for all of it.
Because they are the main focus of his ministry. That he would pour into this few. And even more so than the 12, he poured into select three. He poured into Peter, James, and John intentionally investing in a few that they may impact many. So why did Jesus invest the majority of his time in these disciples?
It is because they were the ones that were going to start this multiplication movement. They were the ones that were going to start and lead the church. They were the ones that were going to make disciples. This is all what is implied when he says, observe all that I have commanded. It is the pattern of ministry that he did with them for three years. That they might go and do this.
That is discipleship. That's the plan. That is what is implied here. And it shows up all throughout the rest of the New Testament. You see shades of it. You see it in the book of Acts as the church starts to grow.
One of my favorite stories in the book of Acts is in Antioch. When the city of Antioch explodes with the Gospel. It is significant because this is the city that Paul and Barnabas are sent from to take the Gospel all over Europe. But in the city of Antioch it says, in 1421 it says, They preached the Gospel in that city and won a large number of disciples. And the word for won a large number of disciples is the same word that we get in the Great Commission for make disciples. We see this keep showing up.
We see this in a really cool way when Paul in 1 Corinthians 4 starts talking about spiritual family. Paul never had kids. He never had a wife. But he discipled people. And he considered them to be spiritual children. And that he was their spiritual father.
And we see a uniqueness in that in biblical family and the discipleship relationships that he had. We see this in 2 Timothy 2.2 when it says, And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. That you would take what you have learned and you would entrust it to others. We see this in the discipleship relationship that Paul had with Timothy, with Titus, with Luke. We see it in the discipleship relationship that Peter had with John Mark. John Mark being the one who wrote the Gospel of Mark.
Y'all, we are called to this kind of discipleship. This intentional process of investing in a few that they may impact many. And y'all, it is a beautiful thing when you get to see this happen. Let me walk through really quickly what this has looked like in my story. Years ago, I became a Christian when I was 17. I was excited about Jesus.
And then I went to college, still excited, but didn't really know a whole lot. Early on in my first semester, I was in an intramural softball game. And we lost. And I was walking off the field and there's another guy there. And he was from the other team. And he started talking to me.
And I was like, oh, cool, this guy's a Christian. So we started talking. His name was Andrew Hawkins. We called him A-Hawk. We'll put this up on the screen. So A-Hawk, we go to dinner.
And his plan was to share the Gospel with me. And then I was like, oh, no, no, I believe this, man. It seems like you know a lot. It'd be great if you would teach me because I don't. I'm excited. But I don't really know some of the things that you're talking about.
And for the next two years, he discipled me. He spent time with me. We'd go out in the woods on some hunting property and he'd show me how to study the Bible. Show me how to read it. Show me the importance and the beauty of God's Word. That he would show me what it looked like to pray.
Because I didn't really have handles for that. He would show me what an intentional prayer life looks like. He would show me how to share the Gospel. Because I didn't know how to share my faith. And we'd go out and I'd see him share the Gospel with other people. And I'd learn.
He showed me how to love others. He spent two years investing in me. And then he graduated. And he said, you need to do the same thing with others. This is what making disciples looks like. So then the next two years of college, there's three specific people that I've got to spend some time with.
The first one was a guy named Brent Thompson. Brent was a guy who came to college and he was lost looking for significance and meaning and everything else. So we spent time with him. We shared the Gospel with him. And then finally Brent believed. And it changed his world.
We started walking with him. I started doing the same thing that I learned from Ahog. Reading the Bible. Showing the importance of prayer. Started walking with him. Ended up transferring.
The next semester he went off to Texas. He still lives there today. Still following Jesus. I got to spend time with another guy named Will Lewis. Will, same kind of story. Came to college.
Didn't believe in Jesus. A few of us shared the Gospel with him. He finally placed his faith in Jesus. And I still catch up with Will from time to time. He lives in Tennessee. He's still following Jesus.
And then there was one other person. His name's Brian Trail. Brian was all over the map. We couldn't peg him. He was in my community group. We shared with him.
I was like, I don't know if he's getting this or not. And then I graduated. And like a year later, I see him. I'm like, dude, what's up, man? He's like, dude, I believe in God now. I'm going to believe in Jesus.
I was like, that's awesome. I didn't know. Because it was hard to tell. He's like, no, man, I believe this. And I'm actually going to be a part of a college ministry now where I'm going to do this. Where I'm going to make disciples.
And he still does today. He's investing in students with the hope that he would invest in a few and impact many. And that's not even the real, that's not even close to the complete story. Because if you work backwards, Ahok had someone who poured into him. And his name was Devin. Devin did the same stuff that Ahok did with me that I got to do with Brian.
He read the Bible with him. He taught him how to study the Word. He taught him how to pray. And Devin is still doing this. He does this in North Carolina. And there was someone else that poured into Devin.
And his name was Ben. And Ben has done this for over a decade. Investing in a few that he might impact many. There's a long line of people that believe in Jesus. Because he invested his life into this. And Ben's not even the full story.
There's a guy named G. Joe that poured into him. And Anna and I, as we've been praying the last few months. As we've been thinking through. Who are some of the best disciple makers we've ever met? Man, G.
Joe Joseph is one of them. He has poured into. I would be willing to bet that at this point, after 20 years of ministry, he has poured into tens. He has poured into hundreds. Who have poured into thousands. He has had an impact.
And G. Joe is a 5'2 Indian guy. I mean, he's not the most relatable person in the world. But he relates to basketball players. He relates to everyone in between. He has invested in so many people.
He has leveraged his life to see a multiplication movement come out of it. One, that he will never see the end of it. Until one day he stands before the presence of Jesus. And there will be thousands of people who are there worshipping the king. Because he was faithful to go and make disciples. This is the vision of what making disciples looks like.
And this is just a small piece of the story. That generations of believers can be impacted by the gospel. When we multiply disciples. I want us to dream. What can this look like in our groups? What can this look like?
Some of the people that you have been building relationships with. Some of the people that you've been getting to know in your work. In your neighborhood. What if this year in 2019. You get to share the gospel with them. And they believe.
And they trust in Jesus. And they start coming to group. And they start learning. And you take some intentional time to walk them through the Bible. Teaching them what the Bible. How to study the Bible.
How to love the Bible. That you get to spend some intentional time with them. Teaching them what it looks like to pray. Teaching them what it looks like to serve. They get plugged in here. And they're serving.
And they're growing. Teaching what it looks like to steward their finances. All of this. And while this is going on. Over the next few years. They do the same thing.
They share the gospel with somebody else. Who believes and trusts in Jesus. And as you're pouring into them. They're pouring in to others. And then we start doing this. And there's a few people.
Let's just say there's three people over the next few years. That we start pouring into. And groups start multiplying all across this city. And then one becomes three. Becomes nine. Becomes 27.
Becomes 81. And we impact thousands. And what if in our church we do this? What if we invest in a few. And we see that many. That we don't even get to see the full effect of it.
That down the line there are people in the presence of God. That we get to worship with for the next thousand years. What could we resolve to do in 2019? This better than this. What has more eternal significance than this? This is exciting.
This is something that stirs our souls. That we get to participate in God on mission. To see him change this city. But I get it. It's also intimidating. It can be a little bit anxious.
It can be a little bit nervous. And that is why I love how Jesus completes this commission. He ends it by saying. And behold. I am with you always. To the end of the age.
I am so encouraged. By how he closes this out. That Jesus never forsakes us. That he's with us to the end. That when we get a little bit anxious about this. A little bit anxious about sharing the gospel.
He is with us. That when we start doing this. And people trust in Jesus. What is inevitably going to happen. What we have seen happen in our church. Is that people get spiritually attacked for it.
That the enemy comes for it. And what he reminds us is. Is that when we are kicking down hell's door. And seeing people be robbed out of the kingdom of darkness. And trust in Jesus. In the midst of those attacks.
He is not going to leave us. He is not going to forsake us. He is forever going to be with us. That when we have our own doubts. And our own frustrations. And our own difficult seasons.
That we are walking through. And we are still trying to do this. Y'all. He is never going to leave us. He is never going to forsake us. He is with us all the way to the end.
That is the beauty of what happened. When the Holy Spirit came upon the church. He sealed us in faith. And he promised. He is never going to let us go. He is with us to the end.
So y'all. Let's do this. In 2019. Let's do this. Let's see Jesus go to work.
In a multiplication movement. That thousands of years from now. We will be worshipping in the presence of Jesus. Meeting people that we have never even met before. That came to Christ. Because we share the gospel of the co-worker this year.
And pour it into them. That we invest in a few. That we might impact many. Matt is going to come up. And as we take communion today.
The Explicit Gospel
Transcript
It's kind of mean, isn't it? That bumper video gets you all hungry, and now it's going to feel like two and a half hours before I get done preaching. Happy Mother's Day. We're excited this morning. We are just glad to be continuing our extraordinary series. Maybe some year we'll get it together and preach official Mother's Day sermons, but we haven't done that yet, and we're not starting this year.
So if you are all amped up to talk about moms, moms are great. All right, grab your Bibles, go to Psalm 103. We're in the third week of our extraordinary series, and we're going to keep walking through. What we've been talking about is that we are called and designed by God, that God has designed the world to work in such a way that the normal, ordinary parts of our lives are to be used for His eternal, glorious purposes, so that our normal going to work, our normal tending to our families, our normal parenting, our normal being a co-worker or tending to our yards, like just all the normal weight of life that is on us, God has intended to use for His extraordinary, eternal purposes to see people come to know Him.
And one of the things that we're talking about, what we'll be talking about today is the fact that as Christians, we said in our first week that we have one Job as the church, that we're to be disciples who make disciples, and that encompasses a lot, but what we're talking about today is the fact that as Christians, we're supposed to tell other people about Christ. That as Christians, we're supposed to, called to, commissioned to, sent to, tell other people about Jesus. There's a comedian named Jim Gaffigan, who in one of his stand-up specials, goes, you know, everybody having a good time tonight? You know, I really, it's really important to me that everybody's comfortable and having a good time, and that's why I'd like to talk with you about Jesus Christ.
And like, everyone starts laughing, because that's a good joke. Because as soon as he says that, no one in the room is comfortable anymore. Like, it immediately makes everyone uncomfortable, and that's one of the things he goes on to say, is that in some ways it makes religious people even more uncomfortable. Christians become even more uncomfortable. I'm that way. If I'm listening to a stand-up special, or I'm watching a TV show, and they start talking about Jesus, I immediately knot up inside.
And he said, there's nothing worse than having a stranger come up to you and say, I want to talk to you about Jesus. He's just like, no, how about we don't? It's kind of the point of his jokes here, and it's true. And for us who are Christians who are called to talk to other people about Jesus, there's this tension of like, I don't want to be weird. This is awkward. I don't know how to, how do I start this conversation?
This is difficult. There's, look, I'm a pastor. It's weird for me. It's weird for me to tell people I'm a pastor. I just try to dodge that in conversations. I met some of my neighbors.
We were having a great conversation. We were talking. And then he told me what he did for a living. He said, what do you do? And I was like, well, I'm a pastor. I really want to just say I run a firework store because I do do that twice a year.
But I said, I'm a pastor. And they went, oh. And they just froze. It was, I really felt like a lobster had just fallen out of my mouth. It would have been the same reaction. They just sat there, and it was almost like you can see every once in a while, I feel like people are thinking, did I say a cuss word?
Did I talk about beer too much? Like, I don't know. Like, it just feels like it makes, and to bring up Jesus, it's the same kind of thing. It's like, I don't know how to do that. It feels really difficult. And what we're talking about is that God has designed our ordinary lives to be used to see people come to know him, come to love him, worship him, follow him, to see others around us submit their life to Christ.
And to have their eternities impact through the normal things we do. So what we're looking at today is how do we share the gospel in a normal, helpful way? How do we share the gospel? How do we point people to Jesus? How do we tell people about the cross? How do we tell people about the resurrection?
How do we tell people about their sin and need for a savior in a way that fits into a normal, ordinary life where you're friends with people, you're intentionally being around your neighbors and your coworkers? How do we do that? Because we're supposed to. Recall just what we looked at last week that in Deuteronomy it says that God, I'm going to be your God. And it says to put this on your wrists and your forehead. And that's what we said as Christians.
We're supposed to not just wear Christianity on our sleeves, but on our face. Like it's supposed to be a normal part of who we are. And so what we're going to do is we're going to look at the starting place for us as Christians to point people to Christ. We're going to look at the starting place. Then we're going to go to Colossians after we look in Psalm.
And we'll spend a little bit of time looking at actually how. Like practically, how do we do this? So let me pray for us this morning before we begin to read the text. And then we'll dive in. God, we thank you this morning that the gospel is news worth sharing. That we are called to tell people about Christ.
But that it's good news that we get to tell them. I pray, Lord, that in this time we have this morning that you would help us to remember how good that news is. And then you would equip us to begin to share it with others. We love you. We praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.
Psalm 103. It's on page 288 if you have one of the white Bibles that's in the row with you. This is by David. And David is praising God in this Psalm. And I think it's a helpful just kind of a look at where's the starting place for us to want to tell people about Jesus. Where do we begin?
And so he starts this way. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. So he says, bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. Now we use the word bless differently than he's using it here most of the time.
Most of the time when we say bless, we mean to do something nice for. Or to endow. To give. To give a gift. Someone's blessed with. Like, that was such a blessing that you gave me ten dollars.
Oh, this pizza when I was hungry is such a blessing. We use it like God's really blessed that person. And we mean they have a boat. Or we'll say God's really blessed that person like with physical attributes. Like Shaquille O'Neal, basketball player. He was not blessed with acting ability, but he was blessed with athletic ability.
And Shaquille O'Neal can stand flat-footed and dunk a basketball. He does not have to jump. He can stand and dunk. So every time you watched him dunk a basketball and then dance around and flex on people, it wasn't that impressive. It was like me lowering the goal to six feet and then dunking on some neighborhood kids and being like, what? How do you like them apples?
That's what he was doing. And really it was just that he's blessed with the height that he had. He's blessed with the wingspan that he had. He's blessed by God. But that's how we usually use that word.
But that's not how David's using the word here. When he uses it here, what he means is praise. Worship. So when he says bless the Lord, O my soul, what he means is praise, honor, glorify, place value on, lift up. And what's beautiful about that word and all the times we're told to praise God is that you cannot truly praise something without enjoying it. Praise without enjoyment is not praise.
It's flattery. To praise something but actually not mean it is flattery. When you eat a meal and it does not taste good and you can see the person who made it staring at you and you're like, mmm, this, this is fine meal. You cook this. Of all the things I've eaten, this is most recent. Like what?
You're trying to dodge the, but if you just went out of the way, this is so wonderful. This tastes so good. Oh my goodness. Like it's like you're, it's, you don't mean it. It's not genuine praise. It's not real to you.
But, but actual enjoyment leads to genuine praise. Actual enjoyment leads to genuine praise. This is why people will talk about the things that they love. This is why people will talk about the people that they've fallen in love in a certain way. Like they, it just, it gets all gushy and it just floats. Like that's what he's saying.
He's saying soul, so enjoy God that it rolls over in praise, in song, in worship, lifting him up. So enjoy, so be satisfied, so be filled up by God that it's overwhelming and we have to say something. You ever just looked at a sunset and you just, you, it's natural for you to just hit the person next to you and go, look at that. And you just say things that you didn't need to say. It's so orange. But that's natural.
That's the overflow of enjoying something, being captivated by it. And that's what he's saying. Oh, my soul. And, and the Bible here, the soul is the most real part of you. The deepest, most true who you are soul. The part of you that was designed to exist for an eternity.
That's your soul. So he's saying at the deepest, darkest, most real part of me, bless the Lord. Bless the Lord. Oh, my soul and all that is within me. Bless his holy name. And then he says, bless the Lord.
Oh, my soul. And forget not all his benefits. This is the starting place for a Christian to share the gospel with others. Is that you would so enjoy God that it would overwhelm you and roll up in normal life for you to worship him and glorify him and that you would not forget all of his benefits. That's where it begins for us to share the gospel with someone else. That's where it begins for us to point someone else to Jesus.
That we remember the benefits of Christ. That we remember the benefits of God. He keeps going to list some of the benefits. Forget not all his benefits. Who forgives all your iniquity. It means that you're sinful.
You're busted. You're broken. You're dark. You're twisted. You've been actively participating in the rebellion of the world against God. And he forgives that through Christ.
Who heals all your diseases. Everything in you that's twisted and wrong. He fixes. He mends. Who redeems your life from the pit. That you were going to spend an eternity in hell separated from God.
And he redeems it. He buys you back. Who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy. Meaning that he wraps love around you. He makes love the first thing people see about you. Because he's crowned you with it.
And mercy meaning that we don't get from God what we deserve. Who satisfies you with good. So that your youth is renewed like the eagles. That he makes us new. And that in him we're satisfied. He says don't forget his benefits.
That's the gospel. For us as Christians. We believe that the soul was designed to exist for an eternity. That we were made to exist for an eternity with God. And that humanity rebelled against God. And that now every person will physically die.
But our souls will exist for eternity. Either with the joys of heaven. And a relationship with Christ. Or in the despair pain and punishment of hell. There are no other options. Our souls will exist for eternity.
That was the way God originally designed them. But we believe that Jesus Christ came. That he loved us so much. That he died for us. To pay the penalty for our sin. To offer us forgiveness.
And that what he says here. Our benefits are genuine actual benefits of the gospel. That our sins are no longer held against us. That as a Christian because of Christ. You stand before God freely forgiven. That he heals what's broken in you.
That he satisfies you. That everything else that we would chase after in this life. And in this world will not fill us up. But he will. That he satisfies us with good. And that we are now wrapped in and covered by his love.
And his mercy for an eternity. That's the gospel. And that's the news we're called to share with people. That's why the gospel just is a word that we've brought over from another language. That just means good news. It's about an event that happened.
That Jesus Christ came. That he died on a cross. That he was placed in a grave. That he rose again. And that through his death. We can be free.
Forgiven. And offered grace. It's news. It's an event that happened. That we get to share with other people. That Christ forgives.
That he redeems. That he makes us new. And that he satisfies us. Some of you in the room. Some of us as Christians at times. Go through seasons where we don't tell anyone about Jesus.
And I think quite often it's because we've forgotten the benefits. We've forgotten how good the news is. We've ceased to enjoy him on such a soul level that it rolls up in praise naturally and fully in our lives. For those of you in the room who are not Christians. Let me say very clearly to you. We want Jesus for you.
And make no qualms about that. Because I believe fully that Christ is the best thing you will ever get. That he does fully satisfy your soul. That he does forgive of sin. That he does fix what's broken in us. That he does mend us and redeem us.
And that we are headed for an eternal hell without him. But he loved us so much that he didn't leave us there. And he didn't give us what we deserved. But he took what we deserved on himself on a cross to set us free. We want Christ for you. You're welcome to be around.
To keep checking that out. You're welcome to be around and say, I don't know if I buy that yet. I don't know if I see that yet. I don't know if I believe that yet. You're welcome here. To be a part of a community group.
To ask questions. To argue with people. You're not going to offend us. We'll forgive you if you do. We're Christians. We're supposed to.
You're welcome to be here. But I want to be clear. We want the gospel for you. Christians in the room. You kind of have two options. Either you don't actually believe this.
You don't actually enjoy, partake in, understand, have the benefits of the gospel overwhelming your soul. So that you have no real desire to share it with other people. You either don't believe it or you've forgotten it. Or you do believe it. But when we do not have any desire to intentionally see other people come to know Christ, we cannot claim to love them.
We cannot believe that the soul exists for an eternity in either heaven or hell. That we deserve wrath from God. But that Jesus took wrath on our behalf. That's what we read a second ago. That he was the propitiation. It just means that he took wrath on our behalf.
And if we believe this but have no desire to reach people with the gospel, we actually cannot claim to love them. Or to care about them. Penn and Teller, they do magic. One of them is kind of a staunch atheist. And one of the things he says from time to time is that he appreciates it when Christians tell him about Jesus. He doesn't believe it.
But he appreciates it. Because he knows that's hard for them. And he knows that if they don't, how much would they have to hate him to actually believe that and have no desire to tell him. But the starting place for us is that we would so enjoy Jesus and so remember his benefits that we couldn't keep it in. There's no way we could so see that he forgave us of our sins. That none of us are worthy.
Some of you are in here and you have no desire to share the gospel with people. It's because you believe the gospel was, hey, come be good. That's not good news. I've got good news for you. Behave for the rest of your life or God will crush you. Let's pray.
That's not the gospel. That's not good news. The good news is that you could not behave. You were not good enough. You are not smart enough. You have made a shipwreck and a train wreck of your life.
And Jesus comes and takes the full force of the shipwreck that you deserve, the train wreck that you deserve. He was crushed for our iniquities. He was broken for our sins so that we could not receive what we deserve. That's mercy. And we're crowned with it. This is a...
I love our community groups because they're just small collections of a bunch of train wrecks that get together and talk about how good Jesus is. Flip over to Colossians chapter 4. See, it begins with us being so overwhelmed by Christ, so overwhelmed with the goodness of the gospel that we can't help but share with others. That we want this for everyone. That it's so true to us, so real to us. We said last week that if that's not the case, you just need to spend more time with Jesus.
You need to go to work on your soul. You need to remember how good he is. It's a starting place. Now we're going to look at a process. So if I'm there, if I love Jesus, if I'm overwhelmed by the gospel, I'm just seeing this.
I'm remembering and knowing that he's so good. Now the question is how do I do this because it feels really difficult. We're going to look at Colossians. I love this section. Paul's just gotten done in Colossians chapter 3. He's writing a letter to the church.
He's just gotten done talking to parents and wives and husbands and basically what would be bosses and workers in our time. And he's just kind of saying live your life in a normal way that Christ is at work. And then he says, okay, as you're doing that, okay, here's how to kind of walk that out in a way to see more people come to know him. And so pick up in verse 2. Colossians chapter 4, verse 2. It's on page 573 if you have one of the white Bibles.
Paul's in prison at the time because he's been sharing the gospel with people. People may look at you weird. You're not going to get arrested right now. And he says that I may make it clear which is how I ought to speak. Okay. First step, pray.
He says continue steadfastly in prayer and pray for us that God would open a door for the word. So the first step to trying to see people come to know Jesus is to pray, which is just cheating. And it's wonderful. God loves your neighbors so much that he sent his son to die for them. Ask for his help. God loves your coworkers so much, your classmates so much, your best friend from high school so much that he sent his son to die for them.
That he might redeem them and bring them back to himself. That he might re-welcome them into the family. Begin to ask God. Make them yours. Open up a door. But that's what he says.
He says pray that a door might be opened for the word to declare the mystery of Christ on account of which I'm in prison. So what he says is pray, but don't just pray that they meet Jesus. One of the things people sometimes, it's like they're praying for their neighbors. God, you do something to save them. And it's like, I want, it feels like God at some point would just look at you and go, yeah, I made you their neighbor. Go talk to them.
Go be their friend. Like, I want to see this person who's my cousin come to know Jesus. Yeah, they're your cousin. Go start talking to them. So what you start praying for is not just that they would come to know Christ or they would, you know, you begin to pray.
Sure, pray that they have a vision and just show up to you. Pray that they watch a YouTube video and come and know Christ. That's great. But you also are going to be praying that God will open a door for you to share the gospel with them. So what he says is pray for a door for the word.
That's the Bible. That I might declare. That's with your mouth. Out loud. To their face. Specifically their ears.
That I might declare the mystery of Christ. So that you would use the Bible to point them to Jesus. That through scripture you would help them see the gospel. The mystery of Christ. Which is that God would use Christ to redeem us. That's what he's talking about.
So, second thing. You pray. And the second thing is you need to know some Bible. You don't have to have it memorized. Although having some sections memorized is very helpful. But at least know where to go.
Know where to take somebody. Know where to show them some stuff. And just depending on the situation, some of that makes more or less sense. And is easier or more difficult. One of the nice things is you can carry a Bible around in your phone or in your purse. In your phone.
You have a Bible in your phone that you can easily pull up. Look stuff up. Try to show somebody something. Rather than always having to carry a physical Bible with you. Although you'd look awesome. And I support that.
Romans Road. This is something people use periodically. And have taught periodically. As a way to help people see the gospel clearly. From the book of Romans. I'm just going to put these up on screen.
For someone who's saying, okay. I just want. I need to know a little more Bible. Before I can talk to people about Jesus. There you go. Write those down.
That's actually the order that they tell you to do Romans Road in. But it just basically says you're a sinner. Jesus is good. Here's how to be saved. Isn't that awesome? It's really awesome.
That's kind of how that works. That's kind of how that walks through in Romans. And it's very good. It's a helpful way. It's short verses to kind of show them. This is the gospel.
So this would be. You had a little more time. Someone says, all right. I want to hear this thing. You know, you talk about Jesus all the time. You said you want to.
Like, show me what you're talking about. And then you can go to Romans. It's one book. You can flip around. So for people who write down stuff.
You got about ten more seconds. To write those down. Okay. There's more like five. All right.
Ephesians 2. These are other ones. Ephesians 2. Eight through ten. It's a shorter section. These would be easier to memorize.
You can memorize. All of these are helpful. Colossians 1. 19 through 23. John 3. 16 through 19.
These are just ways to show somebody. Here's what the Bible says about this. So it's not just you. But you're actually trusting God to work through his word. So that you can declare the mystery.
You're going to show him the word. And you're going to say. Let me explain what that's saying about Jesus. So he says. Pray. That God would open a door for the word.
That there would be an opportunity for you to do this. That God would open a door. That you'd be looking for that door to be open. That means that you're building a relationship. You're around somebody. And then there's an opportunity.
There's a door open for it. That you'd be ready. That you'd have some of this prepared. You'd know. And this is kind of what I would show him in the word. This is what I would tell him about Christ.
I used to have a family friend. My mom told me one time. She said. Show me the young lady's name. And she said. That they had asked that.
I would be praying. That our family would be praying. That she would meet a good man. And I remember telling my mom. Not going to pray that. Because if she meets a good man right now.
That's not going to work out. She's a hot mess. And a good man's not going to mess with that. So I'll pray. She'll get some of her acting. She'll get together.
And that's rude. And that was mean to say. I know. I've repented some. Of things. But.
There's a little bit of that. That we would want to know a little scripture. We'd want to know. We'd want to be prepared. As we're praying that God would open a door. That we'd be prepared.
Now. That does not mean. Some of you say. Well I'm not ready. I'm not ready to share the gospel. You know who some of the best people.
At sharing the gospel. And bringing their friends around. And telling people about Jesus are. And our church family. It's the people who just became Christians. You know why?
They hadn't forgotten the benefits. And they hadn't taught themselves out of it. And you know what? People who just became Christians do. All the dadgum time. Oh I don't know.
They say that all the time. Someone says. What about this? Oh I don't know. We have people who are Christians show up. And go.
Hey. I was talking to my friend. And they brought up this whole point. About this thing. That I've never heard of. And it's just train wrecked me.
For about a week. And I'm like. What's up? And we talk. We study the scriptures together. They get to go back.
They get to bring stuff. They learn and grow through it. Some of the people who are the most. And least likely to share the gospel. Somebody's been a Christian for 45 years. And they keep saying.
Well I'm not really prepared. I'm not really ready. And it's like. That's nonsense. Go share the gospel. Go point people to Jesus.
Just don't forget the benefits. Of how good he is. It's good news. And it really is. Okay. Know the Bible.
Declare the mystery of Christ. That you would be able from scripture. To say. Here's how the gospel works. It's not just know the Bible. So that you can say.
Here's a rule from the Bible. But it's know the Bible. In a way that you can say. Here's how Jesus saves us. Here's how he redeems. Here's how he forgives.
So that's what he says. To declare the mystery of Christ. This is verse 3. On account of which. I am in prison. That I may make it clear.
Which is how I ought to speak. And he says. Walk in wisdom towards outsiders. Those are people who are not. In the church. Making the best use of the time.
Let your speech always be gracious. Seasoned with salt. So that you may know. How you ought to answer each person. Walking in wisdom towards outsiders. Is pretty much what we're talking about in this series.
Making the best use of the time. That we would. You're only here for a limited amount of time. You're only around people who don't know Jesus. For a limited amount of time. We're just saying.
Make the best use of it. Be intentional with it. If you have a 9 to 5 Job. If you work retail. If you go to class. Realize you're going to be in that class for so long.
You're only going to be at work so long. If it's retail. You're only going to have those co-workers for so long. Because they're only going to work for 3 months. Make the best use of the time. Get to know them.
Become friends with them. Ask them questions. Invite them to do stuff. It's only been summer so long. Invite people for cookouts. And to come swim.
And make a friend who has a pool. And then invite other people to their house. To go swim. Make the best use of it. Be intentional with your time. Make invitations.
Try to ask people to come hang out. To eat a watermelon. To do whatever. Be intentional with the time you're given. That's what he's saying. Walk in wisdom.
Means make wise decisions. One of the things we've been doing in our group. We've been hanging out. Inviting people to go do stuff. We were going to have a board game night. One of the guys in our group is a forester.
And he's trying to invite some of his people. To come hang out with our group some. And they're foresters. They walk around in the woods with trees all the time. And we just basically told him. Look.
Probably don't invite them to board game night. Because that might be weird for them. They might not like board games. Invite them when we do chili cook off night. Or you know. Like be wise.
Make good decisions with the people you're around. You're building with. You know. Like some people. The best thing to invite them to. Is a Sunday morning.
They grew up in the south. They're churchy. They think this is great. Some parts of it. Some people. Let's invite them to a community group.
Some people. Let's invite them to a cookout. Just hang out at your house. Play video games. Be wise. Make the best use of the time though.
I will tell you this. That a lot of people. Will say. Well. Everybody in the south. Is already a Christian.
Everybody's already a Christian. No. Because of statistics. And math. And the fact that that isn't true. It's just not.
Now there are a lot of people. Who tell you they're Christians. And that's just because. Christmas Vacation. Is their favorite movie. And they grew up in the south.
And they think. I'm a Christian. Because. Yeah. The south. And.
Sure. I had a friend in high school one time. I was talking with him. He played football with me. And I asked. One time.
I was like. Are you a Christian? He said. Yeah. I'm black. I was like.
I didn't know. That's how that worked. You have a different version of the Bible. Than I do. But people do that.
We just have this kind of. I'm a Christian because. My uncle was a deacon. I'm a Christian because. I used to be a part of a Lutheran church. Like I.
Just. There's a lot of people. Who just would say that. But actually aren't. Just keep. Being friends with them.
Keep inviting them. The other thing that people will say. Because we're in the south. Is look. If they wanted to meet Jesus. They'd be here.
They'd show up. There's a thousand churches. If they actually wanted to become Christians. They would show up. And here's what I want you to know. A lot of them.
Don't want to become Christians. Because you're right. They want to become Christians. They know where to go. They don't want to become Christians. They just need to.
And it's good news. So why do you care what they want? If it's ultimately good. I could. We could take a Sunday. And line up all the people.
Who've become Christians in our church. We've only been around for a little while. We have a lot of people. Who were far from Jesus. Not in a church. Had no desire to become Christians.
I got to talk to one a couple weeks ago. We mentioned him the other day. Where I asked him. What his thoughts were on. God or spirituality. Before he became a Christian.
And he said. Oh I just thought it was stupid. Didn't think God exists. Thought all that sounded dumb. But he'll walk up here.
And say I'm so glad. That people came and harassed me. And got and became friends with me. And told me about Jesus. And wouldn't let me get off with lame excuses. And kept inviting me to stuff.
And I had. I'm so glad I had to sit and think. I'm not sure I want to be this person's friend anymore. Or. Because they're annoying. And then eventually I met Jesus.
And it's actually good news. We can line up Christian after Christian. Who's new believer in our family. And we can line up people who've been Christians for years. Who could say the same thing. But.
Says. Walk in wisdom towards outsiders. Making the best use of the time. And let your speech. Always be gracious. Grace.
You know what grace means? Grace means that you don't get what you deserve. That God blesses us. Above and beyond. What we earned. But also to be gracious.
Just to be kind. Be friendly. Be forgiving. Be gospel in your speech. We could. We say we're a gospel centered community on mission.
We could just as easily say we're a grace. Centered community on mission. It's the same thing. That Jesus forgives. So it just says let your speech be gracious.
Be a forgiving person. Be kind. Seasoned with salt. So that you may know how you ought to answer each person. Okay. Seasoned with salt means that the gospel is a part of how you normally talk.
You're gracious in your speech. And your speech is seasoned with salt. Now. Your speech isn't just salt. You ever seen a street corner preacher? Maybe just in a movie.
Street corner preaching. If you don't know Jesus you're going to hell. If you know Jesus you don't have to. Repent and know Jesus. Basic good street corner preaching. All of that is true.
It's just all salt. So it's not very tasty. It's just all. It's just aggressive. It's just. Now sometimes that works because it's true.
Sometimes it's what people needed to hear. But primarily you just season yourself with salt. You just include the gospel and things. It's salt in everything. That's why he says season it with it. Salt in all of your food.
All the food that tastes good. Salt in it. It's in your butter. It's in your cake. Somebody when we were talking about this said it's not in LaCroix. Well LaCroix tastes terrible.
If you don't know what LaCroix is you have done well in life to dodge it. But how do we do that? How do we season our speech with salt? How do we include Jesus in normal conversations? Because that still feels really hard. Because that's what we're going to talk about now.
How do we do that? Because the truth is you're going okay. Have Jesus be a part of normal way. I talk to people as I'm walking in wisdom with outsiders. As I'm building relationships. I'm going to talk about Jesus some.
But how? Because it's not like you can be like. Yeah that's a really interesting point you made about the NBA final. You know who else is a slam dunk? Jesus. Yeah that's a really interesting piece of news about Comey.
But have you ever thought about getting fired up for Jesus? Like it just. It's like how do I do this in a normal conversation? Because it just feels like I'd be a weirdo. How do I do that? I'm glad you asked.
First thing. Be a real friend. Be real friends with people who don't know Jesus. Like an actual friend. Like these are the people you want to hang out with. You will call them.
You will do stuff with them. They will call you. If they have problems they'll pick up the phone and call you. You're an actual friend. Because then this becomes way easier to take. And you talk a lot more.
But step one is get to know people who don't know Jesus. And be a real friend. So we're talking about all the ordinary stuff of life. Hobby with people who don't know Jesus. Get to know your neighbors. Invite them for things.
Become real friends. The second one is have Christ actually impact your life. So that it's normal for you to talk about it. So that when you're talking with your friends about normal friend stuff. Like you might be mentioning your budget. Well if Christ doesn't affect your money.
Then it's going to be really hard for you to talk about it. But if he does. If you're actually submitting your money to Christ. Then it makes sense for you to bring it up. If Christ doesn't affect your marriage. Or your work.
Or how you pick a major. Then it's going to be harder to try to infiltrate. And put him in normal things. But if he does. If he's already at work in you. In all the normal ways of life.
It's easier to talk about him. I had a friend named Amir. I worked with at. This is just kind of a way to do this. But I had a friend named Amir.
Who I worked with at Sears in Lynchburg Virginia. And Amir was a Muslim. And we would talk a good bit. And one of the things I realized Amir did a lot in our conversations. We'd just be talking about normal stuff. And then he'd say.
Well I'm a Muslim. So. And then he would explain how Muslims think about that. Well I'm a Muslim. So. Here's how I would do that.
Well I'm a Muslim. So. Here's why I wouldn't be a part of that. I'm a Muslim. So. And just over and over.
And I got to learn so much about Islam. Just from him talking to me about. How he thinks about the world. And then I realized. I can do that. I can just say.
Well I'm a Christian. So. And you know what that does. It's just a small phrase. But it helps you.
In your normal talking with people. Bring up Christ in a way that's not. Aggressive or weird. Because here's what it is. What you're saying is. Can I share something about myself?
And I'm just talking about me. Someone's talking about marriage. Or they're talking about something with their kids. Or they're talking about. Something with school. Or how they're going to approach something.
And you just go. Well. I'm a Christian. Sometimes I would even just go. Well I'm a Christian. So I don't.
I think about that differently. And then just wait. Sometimes they go. Okay. They have no desire to talk about it. That's cool.
Sometimes they go. What do you mean? It's like. Well I'm glad you asked. But you have to have actual ways.
That Christ is at work in your life. For that stuff to make sense. But what it does. So here. Let me just. Let's.
We talk about how our culture works a lot. Let's just use culture against itself here. As we as Christians. Trying to point people back to Jesus. Our culture. U.S. culture.
Has pounded into your brain. That whatever you want to do. Whatever you want to be. Is right for you. That whoever you are. No one can step in and tell you.
You can't be you. That's been pounded into everyone. So as soon as you say. Well I'm a Christian. So. You've walked into a magical judgment free zone.
Sometimes. Doesn't always work with Christianity. But go for it. You've walked into a place. So now they're willing to listen to you.
Because you're just talking about yourself. Now. I say our culture has pounded that into our brains. The Bible doesn't. The Bible says. Some of the things you think are stupid.
And there are a lot of things you're wrong about. And you need Jesus. But. I'm a Christian. So I believe that.
But you may not. That's. You get to just talk about things that have. That are true to you. Real to you. In a way that isn't.
So if. If my friend Amir had constantly said. Well the Quran says this. So you need to change your behavior. Well the Quran says this. So you.
You're wrong about that. It'd have been harder to talk to him. But he would just say. I'm a Muslim so. The Quran says this. And then he would just apply it to himself.
In a way that I was willing to listen. And that's. Be real friends. Have Christ actually affect your life. So that it makes sense to bring him up.
And then the third one is just. Listen. And I'm going to give us a practical method for this. To try to help us out. But the third one is.
Listen. That we would actually just listen. I'm going to put this over here. It may mess me up. But. Everyone.
Has a story. A primary story. That. They use to define their life. And the world. Everybody does.
Everybody lives by a story. And here's what we're told about the. As Christians about the Bible. Is that there is a story. For the world. And that story falls along four plot lines.
Creation. Fall. Redemption. Restoration. That's the story of the world. That God created the world good.
In a relationship with himself. And that humanity rebelled from him. That we fell. In theology it's called the fall. That we rebelled and wallowed in sin. That's where racism.
And hatred. And murder. And murder. And greed. And lust. And infidelity.
And like everything comes out of. Us sinning. And rebelling against God. And in this place. God created the world good. And we broke it.
And that all of us as humans. Have joined in breaking the world. That it was harmonious. And beautiful. And every single one of us has partaken. In the fall.
That we've all joined the rebellion. Through lying. Through bitterness. Through talking about people behind their backs. Through stealing. Through pride.
You name it. Pick your poison. You're on this team. We deserve hell. We deserve to be punished for our rebellion. But it doesn't end with the fall.
The story of the Bible is the story of redemption. That God loved the world so much. That he came. And joined humanity. In the brokenness of the world. And took the brokenness of the world.
On himself. The most heinous thing. That has ever happened. In the history of humanity. Is not. When we rebelled against God.
It's when we killed him. But God was using that. To redeem. That he took the worst thing that's ever happened. And he turned it on its head. Because he's a God who's like that.
And he offers mercy and grace. To those who will place faith in Christ. And then there's restoration. That heaven is a return. To the garden. Heaven isn't a place where we float around.
In magical spirit bodies. That there's going to be a new earth. That he's recreating. What was broken. Creation. Fall.
Redemption. Restoration. And this story has been imprinted. On your soul. That there's something about this story. That you know is undeniably true.
That's why the best stories we tell. Follow this. The best stories we share with each other. Follow this. That's why when you watch a movie. And it's nice and happy.
And then it falls apart. And it stays fallen apart. Titted. Stays broken. And then it ends. And it goes black.
And it says fin. Because that's like a Parisian way to say. How you like that. Critics can tell you. Oh that's more like real life. But it hurts.
And there's something inside of you. That says no that's terrible. No no no no no. It doesn't just end terrible. Good. Good.
Good wins. There's something inside of us. That screams that. So let me give you some examples. There's a little boy. Who's born into a beautiful loving family.
But a mean wizard kills his parents. He has to learn magic. To defeat this wizard. Ultimately he has to die. In order to break the wizard's power. That sound like anything?
Then he rises from the grave. Death defeats the wizard in that act. And the sun shines again. And everything's magical. And then we go to the train station. And hug our children.
Like that's. Let's do another one. There's a guy. He loves his daughter. She gets taken. He has a particular set of skills.
He kills everyone. They hug and everything's great. Until she gets taken again. There's a ten year old boy. And he's a prince. And everything's wonderful.
And some old lady comes to his house. And says. Can I live with you? He answers the door. Even though he's a prince. And he's ten.
Can I stay with you for. In exchange for a rose. He's a capitalist. He says no. She turns into a wizard. Enchantress lady.
And then turns him into a monster. And says. You've got to learn how to fall in love. With someone. Otherwise you'll stay this forever. He does.
Boom. Sparkles. Tears. Magic. Hugs. Kisses.
And a remake. Creation. Fall. Redemption. Restoration. In West Philadelphia.
Born and raised. On a playground. Where I spent most of my days. Chilling out. Maxing. Relaxing.
Or cooling. Or shooting some people. Outside of the school. When a couple of guys. Who were up to no good. Started making trouble.
In my neighborhood. Got in one little fight. My mom got scared. She said. You're moving with your auntie. And your uncle.
To Bel Air. All the good stories. All the good stories. Follow this. And we begin to listen. Because the thing is.
For those around you. Their story follows this as well. Because it's imprinted. On our souls. That we all. Have this playing out.
In our lives. Because sin. Is the problem. That has wrecked. Everything. You were designed.
Good. And right. And sin. Wrecked it. That's everybody's story. And everyone is looking.
For a redeemer. Who will fix. The problem. Let me give you an example. I had a friend. I used to work with him.
Hadn't seen him in a while. His story played out like this. And I got to know this. As I listened to him. And talked to him. Over time.
He was married. When he was about 19. Divorced when he was 22. He was in his 40's. At this point. And what was broken.
With him. As he could define it. And as he would experience it. As he could explain it. Is that he was meant. For love.
And marriage. And relationship. And family. And that had been. Lost. He was on online dating sites.
This isn't a critique of those. But I'm just telling you a story. Every. Wink. Nudge. Click.
Smile. Swipe. Was a chance at a redeemer. That someone was going to come fix. What was broken. And when he had a lady in his life.
He was up here. And when she was gone. He was down here. Because what he needed. Was someone to ride in. And fix this problem.
So that he could be full. And loved. And complete. And that was his story. Now as I began to listen to this.
And as we begin to listen to those around us. We now have a way. To naturally begin to see. Where the gospel intersects. With this story. Was he designed for love.
Can we agree or disagree with that. One of the things we're going to do. As you listen to your friends. And your neighbors. Is where can I agree. And where do I have to disagree.
Absolutely agree. You were designed to be loved. In a way that you cannot even imagine. And that has been robbed from you. We believe that God existed in Trinity. He was God the Father.
God the Son. God the Holy Spirit. That when he created the world. He didn't create it. Because he needed beings to love. But he created it.
Because he is loving. And he's invited us into that love. We believe that. That lines up with the creation story. That we know and believe. And hold true and dear.
The story that's the story of our lives. Of those who have become Christians. That this is now the true gospel story for us. So we could agree with that. It's torn up by sin. That that love has been shattered because of sin.
Absolutely can agree. I have to disagree here. And this is the place where you will disagree with most everyone that you are walking with. A woman's not going to fix that. The biggest issue he had was that he needed to be heaven. An overwhelming love.
He needed to be crowned with it. He needed to be wrapped in it. He needed to have an eternity of comfort and joy and love. That comes only through Christ. That's the restoration he needed. And without that.
He was going to place so much pressure on any female that came in his life. She was going to buckle and crumble. And it was going to be another train wreck. Because she was never going to be Jesus. Take one of your friends. Maybe you don't know the whole story.
You just know they move from Job to Job and city to city. They're looking for that dream Job. And maybe you start to learn, okay, it's actually because they believed that they were meant to do something that fulfilled them. And gave them a purpose. Made them whole. And so they keep moving from Job to Job.
They keep looking for career to career. They keep trying to find the thing that will finally make them want to wake up in the morning. And once they find it. The magical Job. Where the boss is amazing. Then they'll be in heaven.
They'll be full. They'll be complete. They'll be whole. This will fix it. See, what you're listening for is who do I think I'm supposed to be? Who was I designed to be?
Who was I made to be? What broke it? What destroyed it? What's hell to me? Who's the savior? What's heaven?
And as we begin to listen to our friends. As we begin to see this play out. We begin to know how to share the gospel with them. I believe you were created for a purpose. And I know why you never found it. Because the job was never going to do it.
You needed Christ to come in to show you. You need the creator to tell you what you were created for. And only in Christ will you ever fully be. This plays out in anything. You can take a staunch militaristic atheist. We're rational, intelligent beings.
Who've created science and art and all these wonderful things. But if they're militant, maybe religion's the problem. It hymns people in. It promotes ignorance. It harms society. But through science and reason, we can reach utopia.
And everything will be wonderful. And we can intersect with that. We can say, yeah, we were. I agree with you. We have reason and logic. And people who are ignorant, we should teach them and train them and help them.
But I actually think that it's only through God's created purpose for us. Who invented reason and math and science and logic and all the things that are beautiful in the world. And the order that you so appreciate. It's only through Him that we'll actually reach fulfillment. And it just depends. It depends on what.
So a lot of times, just for example, you're listening with your friends. You may not get all four of them. You may just begin to pick up along the way. Here's what they think heaven is. It involves a boat. Expensive things.
Okay. So I've learned what heaven is. You begin to learn what messed it up. Or what's causing the problem. What's keeping them from that. But you can start realizing, okay, I can probably agree here some.
I can agree here some usually with what's messed up the world. Sometimes you might meet a Christian who they've put Jesus here. Husband. Well-behaved children. Peace and prosperity. And we have to say, yes, actually, maybe fringe benefits.
That's not the ultimate benefit of Christ. This may be some of your neighbors who you say are Christians. Jesus is a means to end that doesn't ultimately get them to the restoration they need for their soul. To save them from their sin. This is what we begin to listen. As you become real, genuine friends with people, you start listening to them.
What do they, creation, what do they assume the world should be like? What kind of person would they like to be? Who are their heroes? Fall. How do they describe their struggles and battles? What do they feel like is the biggest issue?
Where do they lack? What's hell to them? Redemption. Who's their savior? Who will deliver them from what's broken? Restoration.
What are their hopes? Long-term project they're working on? When will they finally be satisfied? And here's what drives me crazy and breaks my heart. Is when I hear Christians say things like, yeah, but they're happy. They already have something that they believe.
Christians say this to each other and to other people. Just do whatever makes you happy. You've got to do whatever you find in your heart, whatever fulfills you. That's not true. Because every one of us is plotting this out and picking a savior that only can short-term safe. At best.
Short-term safe. And then eventually, it's a train wreck. But we have a savior who redeems this story. You can play mine out on this. I'll do some confession here. Creation.
Born into a middle-class family. I did not hit a double. I was born on second base. Relatively intelligent. Relatively athletic. Highly attractive.
Just kidding. That was just for fun. All right. Stay focused. My whole life, I've just felt like I had potential. Like, if anything went wrong, I had no excuses.
So every ounce of any type of failure is on me. Anything that goes wrong in any situation I'm in, I have no excuse. I wasn't smart enough. I didn't try hard enough. I didn't think well enough. I didn't plan well enough.
So what saves me is hard work. Get up early. Go to bed late. White-knuckle it. Don't complain. Keep your head down.
Hard work. And ultimately, success. In any avenue I'm in. You can play that out over grades. You can play that out over sports. You can play that out over relationships.
You can play that out over my relationship with my wife. Or my children. Or my friends. Or this church. It's that story. Without Jesus.
And that's a terrible story. See, I believe. That when Jesus said it's finished, it was. That I don't have to be good enough. That I don't have something I have to prove. That I don't have to make right with all the stuff that I've been given.
That I can fail and that I have. And gee, this goes two ways really wrong for me. I fail and I end up feeling miserable and broken and depressed and worn out. But I don't let anybody know that. I just grind on. Because to quit is the ultimate failure.
Or I succeed. And I am arrogant and prideful. And a miserable human to be around. Without Jesus. But see, I believe.
That he interrupted my story. And it's a better story for it. And so I can with complete integrity. Try to force him into everybody's story I talk to. Because I think it will be a better story for it. With complete integrity.
I can argue with you. I can reason with you. I can say, hey, I'm a Christian. So can I tell you actually what I see going on here? And one of the beautiful things for us as Christians. Is that this is the story.
And this is everybody's story. And you begin to speak to something in someone's heart. That they didn't even realize was there. Can I tell you actually why you need a boyfriend so badly? What the Bible says about that? Can I tell you why you're so addicted to following your heart?
And what the Bible says about that? Can I just tell you as a Christian how I see this. And how I view this. And how we talk about this in my community group. And actually what I believe. If you actually got that job.
It might be the worst thing that ever happened to you. Because you'd watch your Savior die before your eyes. And then you'd have nothing to keep leaning into. And because I love you. I'm going to pray that that happens. And I get to be around.
So that I can point you to a better Savior. There's a quote from Tim Keller. He's a pastor in New York. He says, Jesus is the only Lord. Who if you receive him. Will fulfill you completely.
And if you fail him. Will forgive you eternally. And that's not true about anything else you put in that spot. And I don't know why on earth. We wouldn't begin praying. And walking with wisdom towards outsiders.
Making the best use of the time. And trying to as best we can. With all that we have. And every ounce of time and effort we have. To try to tell them. Your Savior is going to fail you.
But there's one that won't. Or you're going to fail your Savior. But there's one that will forgive you. Let's pray. God I want to thank you. I want to thank you that you fulfill us completely.
And that when we fail. You forgive eternally. And I thank you Lord. That for so many of us in this room. You interrupted our story. You dethroned our Savior.
Savior for a better one. A Savior that doesn't just sit on a throne. And command obedience. But a Savior that left the throne. And went to a cross. In obedience to his Father.
For the glory of God. And the salvation of souls. And God I pray. For all the false saviors in this room. That they would die. Never to rise again.
So that a Savior who comes from the grave. Can take their place. In Jesus name. Amen.
Everyday Life
Transcript
All right, we are in the second week of our Extraordinary Series talking about a pretty simple concept. We're basically looking at the fact that God has designed and has purposed that our ordinary lives, all of the normal stuff we have to do, all the meals we have to eat, the work we have to do, the chores, the relationships, everything we have in our normal life, that he's designed to use that, to use our ordinary daily work, our ordinary daily tasks, the ordinary weight of existence for his extraordinary eternal purposes. That's what we're looking at. And I grew up in the church. I remember growing up in the church, and one of the things I began to kind of see was the church I grew up in, we had a Sunday morning.
We had an early service, which was for people who wanted to wake up early. So it was a handful of people, you know, 60 and above, I think, was pretty much who was there. I don't really know because I never was. Then we had Sunday school, and Sunday school happened after that. And then after that, we had the late service. The early service and the late service were the exact same thing.
And so we had early service, Sunday school, late service. Then we would go home. We would eat, maybe eat out, maybe go home and eat. We used to ride, my family would ride to Hardee's and get chicken a lot. That doesn't have much to do with this, just Hardee's used to have good chicken back in the day. And chocolate chip cookies is about that big.
And we used to get that, and then we would go home. We would eat. You would take a nap. Or, you know, sometimes we'd get like a pickup football game going. And then you had to be back at 6 if you were in choir, 7 if you were just going to be at the normal kind of gathering in the evening. And then we would do that.
And then we had Wednesday night stuff. There was some Tuesday night stuff. But overall, the gist I got growing up in church was that the goal was to be there. The overall goal of being a Christian was to be in that building. And that if you came on Sunday, the general thing was, cool, come back next Sunday. And if you came back the next Sunday and the next Sunday, eventually they might say, hey, you should get into the Sunday school class.
And you'd get into a Sunday school class, and that would kind of double the time you were there. And then it was, you should be at the Sunday night service. And then there should be, you should be at Wednesday night, prayer meeting or Bible study. And there's the ladies' meetings and the men's meetings. And overall, the goal was be here. And maybe they wouldn't have said that.
That was just the picture I picked up on was the people who were the most faithful, the most good, the most Christian-y were there the most times. And that was the goal. I know my dad growing up, his parents, his dad was a pastor. And he had to be there every time the doors were open for anything. And if he was sick, they would let him stay home. But he wasn't allowed to do anything.
And they would actually come home and check. The first thing they would do in walking the door after he had been home sick from a church meeting was they'd walk in and they would stick their hand behind the television to see if it was hot. And if it was hot, he got a whooping. That was how that worked. So he said when they would leave, as soon as he saw the car pull out, he would turn the television on and watch about 15 minutes and then turn it off and hope it had enough time to cool down.
He got it down to a silence. He could watch just the beginning of a show and then just kind of figure out later what happened in Lost in Space and ask his friends at school the next day or whatever. But the goal was to be there. You had to be there. We don't do a whole lot that involves you being here. We do this.
We gather on Sundays. That's it. That when we begin to read the Bible and begin to study it and we realize that the primary call for us is to not always be together, but to be Christians everywhere we are. To be sent out into the world, to be Christians everywhere we are. Now, we value gathering very highly. And we should gather.
It's normal and good and helpful and it builds into us holiness and it reminds us of God's goodness for us to gather every Sunday. We have people who show up here at 7 in the morning and begin to set all this up. We've got people that are going to stay to help us pack all of this up. We intentionally go out of our way to do things to be welcoming because we know we live in the South and people will show up to a church on Sundays and that we should. Some of us, our friendships, we should intentionally invite them to this first. That's the thing that makes the most sense for someone to come be around.
And hear the gospel proclaimed and study the Bible. But we also realize this is primarily for Christians. It's one of the reasons why we do it early in the morning. Wake up and then go spend the rest of your day getting to know your neighbors and getting to be around people. This matters, but it's not our primary main thing. It's not the overall goal for us.
We love this building. It's kind of a steal financially for us. It's not the prettiest building you've ever been in. But this isn't our main thing. If it were, I might be a little depressed sometimes. Like we talk about like we need to work on the lighting in this room to make it brighter.
And then usually in that conversation someone says, yes, but if we make it brighter, you'll be able to see the carpet better. And we're like, usually that just kind of ends it. We're like, good point. We'll just keep it the way it is. But we just, we want to gather.
But we want to gather to study the Bible, to be equipped and to be sent back out. We gather to go. We don't gather to gather. We gather to go. We don't gather just to gather. The point of this is not just let's get in a room and pat ourselves on the back and we're done.
No, we gather to remind ourselves about what matters and what's important and what's real and then to be sent out. It's that song we just sang. Who are we that Christ would save us? So we gather to celebrate that. And then it's who are we that Christ would send us? See, we gather to go.
This does matter. However, it is important that we're here and that we're here on a regular basis and that we remind ourselves consistently that we're not alone and that we are a family and that we are sent together. But it's important that we then go and live a life of ordinary things, intentionally seeing God work in extraordinary ways. And that's our goal. We started this last week. Grab your Bibles.
Go to Deuteronomy 6. You have one of these white Bibles. It'll be page 87. It's going to be pretty early on in everybody's Bible. It'll be Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus to Deuteronomy. And we're going to spend time studying this morning.
We're going to look at this. And here's what we said last week, that God intends to use our ordinary, normal lives for his eternal, extraordinary purposes. And one of the stories we told last week was about Dawn, who happens to be in my community group. She has short hair. She gets her hair cut every five weeks. So she had to go to her hairstylist every five weeks.
And Kelly Weed is her hairstylist as part of our church. And she just consistently kept saying, you've just moved here. You need to come be around. Our church family is great. They're so loving. They're so gracious.
You should be here. You should come. You should come. And Dawn kept saying, no, no, no, thank you. Dawn's polite. So, no, thank you.
Sounds good. Maybe she lied some. I'll see if I can fit that in. And then didn't show up. Eventually, though, she came because she ran out of excuses and she didn't want to get a new hairstylist, I guess, is my assumption. And so she showed up.
And God used that very ordinary hair cutting to bring her around. Eventually, she met Christ. We have story after story like that in our church family. Some of you, that's your story. It's just normal. Some of you have felt like I don't have a good testimony because your story was my neighbor became my friend.
He was a Christian. She was a Christian. This person I went to school with was a Christian. My parents were Christians. The lamest version ever. I grew up in a Christian house.
My parents told me about Jesus. And eventually, I believe this extraordinary gospel that the God of the universe saves sinners and wants to have a relationship with him. I know that's so boring. No. All of that is normal, ordinary things that God uses for extraordinary, eternal purposes. And that's what we're looking at today.
And today, we're actually, over the rest of the series, we're just talking about how do we do this? How do we join in using our normal, using our ordinary, using our mundane for God's spectacular purposes? So, Deuteronomy 6. Where we're about to pick up is Moses. They've led the Israelites out of Egypt. And he's saying, here's where we're about to go.
We're going to go into the promised land that God has provided. So, they've come out of Egypt, headed into the promised land. He's saying, here's what we're going to do. Here's what God's going to accomplish for us. And the overall picture here was, they were enslaved. They were rescued by miraculous means from slavery to be a people that belong to God.
To be a family and a nation that belong to God. And that God's going to give them a place to be a beacon for him. That they're going to go drive some people out, take over some land. And then God is going to use that land to say, here's what it's like to follow me. Here's my people. And begin to show the rest of the nations what it's like to belong to him.
And the truth is, that's the church. This is a picture of what Christ does with the church. That we were enslaved to sin. That by miraculous means, Christ dying on a cross vicariously for us. Being our Passover lamb. That they would practice sacrifices.
Where they would place their sin on an animal. And the animal would be sacrificed to pay the debt of their sin. That Christ becomes that for us. That he sacrificed to pay the debt of our sin. And that he rises from the grave. To offer free forgiveness and hope and grace to everyone.
And then he makes us into a people. And a family. And a nation. To show the rest of the world, here's what God is like. And to begin to welcome others in. So we're picking up in Deuteronomy.
Where we're seeing a picture of what ultimately God's going to do with the church. So he's talking to the nation of Israel. The people of Israel. But it also helps us as Christians to know how do we live this out? How do we walk in this? How do we understand this?
Because we're in a very similar place. Verse 4. Hear, O Israel. The Lord our God. The Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart.
With all your soul. With all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children. And shall talk of them when you sit in your house. And when you walk by the way.
And when you lie down. And when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand. And they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house. And on your gates.
That first verse there. Hear, O Israel. The Lord our God. The Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart. With all your soul.
With all your might. That's the Shema. The Jewish people would repeat this over and over again. At one point a rabbi asked. A Pharisee asked Jesus. What's the most important law in the Bible.
In the Old Testament. And Jesus says this one. To love the Lord your God with all your heart. With all your soul. With all your mind. With all your strength.
With everything you have. To love God. So as we talk about how do we do this. How do we join him in the ordinary mission of life. The first thing that has to happen. Is we have to love him.
As Christians. You have to love Christ. In order to join him in his mission. I've. I have met people before. That were a part of the church.
But they loved the church. Maybe they loved the music. Maybe they loved the preaching. Maybe they loved the friendships they had there. Maybe they loved that. That it made them an upstanding citizen.
In the area. But I don't think they loved Christ. I don't think they enjoyed him. Rested in him. Saw the greatness of him. That's the first command.
And I want to give you some freedom here. It's a command to action. Here. The Lord your God. The Lord is one. Now you will love him with everything you have.
With all your strength. With all of your soul. With all of your might. With everything you have. With all of your heart. This is a command.
It's the same as when the Bible says. That husbands should love their wives. It does not mean. Husbands should have a passive. Receptive feeling. Towards their wife.
Sometimes we think about love. As just an emotion. So you either love. Or you don't. You either feel it. Or you don't.
Like watching a movie. You either enjoy it. Or you don't. So that it's based on the movie. Whether it's good or not. And like how you respond to it.
Now this is a command to action. The first thing we ought to do. Is work. To love him. To know him. To see him.
And the place that that begins. Is the gospel. We cannot effectively join him in mission. Unless we actually love. The outcome. Of the mission.
You see. The reason I want people to meet Jesus. Is because I've already met him. And he's worth meeting. That's how that works. The reason you should want your friends and neighbors.
To come to Christ. Is because you've already come to Christ. And you know what that's like. You know what that accomplishes. Some of you don't want to share the gospel. Don't want to tell people about Jesus.
And the reason is. You don't really like it. You're not captivated by it. You're not overwhelmed by it. It's been a long time. Since you laid on your face.
Thinking about the gravity. Of your sin. And the holiness of our God. And the fact that he loved you so much. That he would redeem you. It's been a long time since that happened.
So you. You're not stirred up by it. You're not overcome by it. So why would you tell other people about it. Some of you believe that the gospel. That what we're supposed to do as Christians.
Is work really hard. And be really moral. Some of you maybe grew up in a church like that. The goal was don't drink. Don't smoke. Don't watch R-rated movies.
And God will love you. Why would you tell your friends about that? You're looking at them thinking. Smoking. Drinking. And R-rated movies seem so great.
Maybe you weren't. You were. There's something about like. If the. I have good news for you. Get to work.
That doesn't sound like good news. But that's not the gospel. The gospel is I have good news for you. Jesus did all the work. You're free. You're loved.
You're redeemed. He offers you grace. Your sin. Had built up. A debt. Before God.
That you deserve to be destroyed for. But Christ. Died for you. Because he cares about you. And he cares for you. And he wants you.
That's good news. That's freedom. That's purpose. That's enjoyment. That's rest. And some of us don't.
Don't share this with our friends. Because we haven't really gotten there yet. We haven't really believed it yet. If you have no desire to tell other people about Jesus. I don't think you've met the Jesus I have. I don't think you've really met and interacted with the Christ that we find in scripture.
Because he is lovely and lovable and good and gracious and welcoming and merciful and compassionate. And he fixes us. Mends us. We believe. If you read the Bible. We believe that sin has wrecked the world.
That there's isolation and loneliness. That the people around us are held down by guilt and shame and depression. That they're doing everything they can to just build some comforts around their life. Thinking that the best thing they could possibly do is just have a nice couch and a good show on Netflix. The most troubling thing to them is when that season ends. And they can't find something else good.
So they watch The Office again. Like that's the biggest issue in their life right now. They have no purpose. They have no meaning. They feel adrift. They feel lost.
There's some people that you know put on a really brave face. But they are wracked by anxiety and fear as if a shadow was following them. They don't know what. They don't know how. But they know one day it's going to catch them.
And we believe that Christ is the cure for all of that. That he gives us a family. That he redeems us. That he died for our guilt and our shame. That he sets us free from fear and anxiety. That he is our hope.
We want everyone to know that. There's a song by the teddy bears. That came out in 1958. And one of the set of lyrics is to know, know, know him is to love, love, love him. And I do and I do. Do you know what song I'm talking about?
It's kind of catchy. That's true about Christ. To know Christ is to love Christ. And the place that this begins is a command to love him with everything you have. Now, before we can move on, you have to be there. It has to be real.
It has to be genuine love. It has to be heartfelt. He says this will be on your heart. But before we can move on, some of you may be saying, okay, I don't feel that. What do I do? How do I respond?
I don't know if I'm there. It's like when there are times in marriage when you just don't feel gushy about your spouse. You just don't. They're there. You like them. They're okay.
But you're not like overwhelmed by it. It's just not happening. And the response is not to wait until that just shows back up magically. The response is, what do I do? How do I begin to foster this? How do I get back around them?
I know that when I get kind of like that with my wife, Anna, I just got to hang out with her. She's a delight to be around. I just got to make time for it. Sometimes it's really hard to like her when there's a two-year-old in between us that we both have to work with. So it's like the best thing we can do is be business partners to keep this thing alive and help it not hit us with sticks, which he does.
But, you know, I made the sticks for him in the shape of a sword, so that's kind of on me. But you have to figure out a way to make it work. And so here he gives us some clues in the text that I want to show us here. There are ways to stir up our affections for Christ. So I want us to just look at the words here.
First, he starts with here. Oh, Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. So he starts off by saying, listen to what he is like. One of the ways to stir up your affections is to be here and listen to sermons. Some of you, look, there are a lot of really good Bible teachers that exist in the world and put their words and their Bible studies on the Internet. Some of you are most have your affections stirred for Christ through listening to someone explain and teach his word.
And you need to be listening to podcasts of sermons to and from work. Some of you work in a job where you can have that in your head. I one of the most enjoyable, soul stirring, Jesus loving thing for me is when I cut the grass at my house and listen to sermons while I do it. One of the cool things about that is periodically I will be in a spot in my yard. And because that's where I was when I heard that point, I will be reminded of something about Christ just because that's where I happened to be when I heard it while I was cutting my grass. But here, what he's like is one of the things we get to do to stir our affections.
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might. That means to get to work to do this, to pour everything you have into it, to put energy towards it. It's all your might. He says these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. So that means memorize them, roll them around in there, think about them, have them affect you.
You shall teach them diligently to your children. One of the ways that some of you are most stirred in your affections for Christ is getting to explain something to someone else. You need to be around Christians who don't know as much as you. You need to be around people that you can say, hey, let's walk, let's study the Bible together. Let me show you some stuff. There's times where you're explaining something to someone and it's like it clicks in your own heart and you suddenly are like, hold on.
I got to repent, too. Like I love doing premarital counseling for that exact reason. I'm telling people how to communicate to their wives. There's not hasn't been a time I've gotten to do premarital counseling where I did not go home during one or two or five of the sessions and say, hey, and I need to repent for some stuff because I had forgotten how to do this. But I remind remember that Christ is good and this is how I'm supposed to act.
But you're to teach. You shall teach them diligently to children. You should talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise. Somebody's just to talk about God and his goodness and what he's done. You need to say it out loud. It says you shall bind them.
There's a sign on your hand. They should be frontlets between your eyes. We'll talk more about that in a minute. But you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates. Whatever it is. Some of you, it's journaling.
Here's what I have found as a rule for me. Whatever I find that is the most soul-stirring way for me to love Jesus then becomes really difficult for me to do. And it has to take might. It takes energy and effort for me to do it. Some of you, it's journaling and you know that. You know that sitting when you read and pray and writing out all of your prayers and writing about how God is good and how he's answered you.
That's the most you get out of. Some of you, it's memorizing scripture. Some of you, it's singing. There are certain things the Bible tells us we have to do. We've got to read the Bible. We have to be intaking his word because that's how he works on us.
For some of you, that's like going to the gym. It's not enjoyable. It's work. But you don't see the benefits of that until you've, it's been a month or two months. And you usually don't see the benefits of the gym in the gym. You see the benefits of the gym outside of the gym.
Like when you walk upstairs and can still breathe. Like, do you know what I'm talking about? You do something for a day and you're not sore the next day. The gym isn't great. Nobody wakes. I mean, some people do wake up in the morning like the gym.
Let's do this. Most of us don't. Most of us are like, all right, let me do this so that I'll not die doing normal tasks. Some of you, that's the Bible reading. It just takes effort. But ultimately, it builds into you something good.
But we're told some things we're supposed to do. Read the Bible. Be around church family. Be in community. Pray. Fast.
But then we've got to find things together. You've got to find things for yourself. What stirs up your affections? What helps you love Him? For me, that's woodworking. Walking in the woods.
Now, if I told you, I don't need to read the Bible. I walk in the woods. You should hit me. But if I say one of the best ways that I can meditate on the goodness of God is to walk in the woods and that's infused with my knowledge of Him from Scripture, that's great. Some of you, it's singing. Some of you, it's listening to music.
Find whatever it is. Some of you, it's making music or writing poems or drawing pictures. All of that's been gifted by God. And whatever it is that stirs your affections for Christ, you should be doing, even if it takes work and effort and planning. Because we've got to love Him to truly be able to share Him and to point people to Him. It's got to be real to us.
And then it's genuine and it's much easier to take from other people. I love Egg Roll Station, which is a Chinese restaurant in town. I usually have cash in my pocket just for Egg Roll Station. And I have to have $7.07 and then I can eat at Egg Roll Station. I eat there once a week. If I don't, my whole system is messed up.
Like a finely tuned machine. I have to eat an Egg Roll and like two and a half pounds of fried rice in order to just keep going. I tell everybody about Egg Roll. If somebody asks about Chinese food, I will tell you about Egg Roll. If you say that you've been there and it's not good, I will argue with you. And it's genuine.
It's real. I believe it. And it makes it easier to take. It makes it more real to other people. It comes out naturally. It's something I'm going to talk about.
I've gotten tons of people to go eat there. I take people with me on a regular basis to eat at Egg Roll Station because I believe in it. And it has to come from that place. Some of you, you're that way with music or you're that way with art. You're like, I've learned if someone wants to talk to me about music. Like if you're the type of person who wants to talk about music, you are going to be disappointed if you talk to me.
If you're like, hey, have you ever heard of them? I'm just like, stop. Just don't. You're going to be mad. I haven't heard of them. I don't know their songs.
I don't know who that guy is. Just please quit. Like, but when we naturally love something, we talk about it. It's real to us. It means something. And that's the place we have to start with Christ.
You have to know him. You have to love him. You have to rest in him. And then the rest begins to come out in a normal way. I will also say this. We've got to move on, but I'll say this.
Some of you feel like I don't, I don't know. I'm a Christian or I believe this stuff, but I just feel no desire to put forth this energy. I feel no desire for this. I think some of that works like this. Have you ever been really hungry so that everything you heard, thought about, sounded like it would be delicious? There was this moment when you could have eaten a taco or a pizza or sushi or a ham sandwich.
Everything sounded amazing. If you smelled any kind of food, it was the most amazing food ever. You just had to eat something. And then you miss that window, and all of a sudden, you're not hungry at all anymore. And people are like, well, you want to go eat at a Mexican restaurant? And you're like, well, you just want to go get some pizza?
And you know cognitively I really should be hungry because two hours ago I was. I just had to keep working. And now nothing sounds good. You just have to know I still need to eat something. And once I start, I'll be reminded why I was hungry in the first place, and it'll be fine. Maybe I'm the only person to experience this.
I think most of us had. I took a short poll with a handful of people to try to see if anybody understood what I was talking about. Walking with Christ is like that sometimes. Sometimes you get to the place where you're like, I just don't feel the hunger anymore. It's like, right, because you've gone so long without it, you've kind of forgotten how to do it. Just pick up your Bible.
Start listening to music. Start praying. Start asking for the hunger again. And then just start eating. Start intaking. And it'll build it back up in you.
But this is why we have to come from here to see people come to know Christ. It's got to be genuine. It's got to be real to us. We've got to actually know him. We've got to understand his benefits, the goodness of him for our soul and the joy that's found in him. This is why we've talked about this past week.
We said if we would intentionally invite one person into our lives, we would get to potentially see our church family double. That we'd get to see more people here. And that's useless. That's absolutely useless if the point is our church is good. That's useless. That's useless.
That's useless. If the point is Jesus is good, that's valuable. If that's the point, if we talk about our church growing and the best you have. This is why I think a lot of times churches, especially in the south, grow by people coming from other churches to this church. Because the sales pitch is come listen to the music. The music is really good.
Come hear the preaching. The preaching is really good. Come hang out with our groups. Our groups are really good. But we've lost the ability to say, come meet Jesus.
Jesus is really good. And so the only person we know how to pitch to are people who already kind of believe that. But we don't know how to actually tell somebody, here's how Christ has wrecked my soul. And you need to know him. It's got to start there. It's got to start knowing the goodness of Christ and seeing his gospel and seeing our sin and seeing his holiness and his love for us.
It's got to start there. So let's keep going. First step, love Jesus. Then it says, verse 7, you shall teach. Oh, no. I jumped ahead of myself here.
I've got to read 6. And these words that I command you today should be on your heart. For us, the primary command is to know Jesus, to love Jesus, to know his gospel, to be changed by that as we obey. That we are changed by the gospel and then we obey. So that's where we come from here, that we would put that in our heart.
That it would be real to us. Then he says, you shall teach them diligently to your children. I shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise. Don't miss this, parents. Primary first mission for you is your kids. First and primary mission for you is your kids.
I, I, I, it hurts my brain every time I hear a mom say, and this doesn't happen a lot in our church, but I've heard this before. Mom says, I want to be on mission, but I just got to stay home and watch my kids. And it's like, your kids need Jesus. We have to keep them in kid city. We can have people co-sign that. Your kids need Jesus.
They bite people. Do y'all know kids do that? Naturally. You don't have to teach them. They will bite another child. They need Jesus.
And we have to like, so parents don't miss that. The first mission you have, the first mission field you have is your children. And then he says this, teach them diligently the gospel. This should infuse. You should explain it to them. You should talk about Jesus.
You should sing and pray. And then he says, how? Talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, when you rise. That a love for Christ should saturate your day. Fill your day. That when you wake up, when you go to sleep, when you're walking, when you're eating, it's normal and natural for you to talk about Jesus.
What he does, who he is, what he's accomplished, how good he is, how he blesses, how he fixes, how he forgives. But you can't do that if you don't love him and know him. It'll feel forced. It'll feel weird. But if you love Christ and know Christ and it's already overwhelmed you how he forgives and how he loves and how he redeems, then it naturally will flow out.
It's natural for you to talk about it. It's natural for you to explain it. So this isn't just have a Bible study with your kids. It is that. Do that. But you know, your children are picking up everything, not just the stuff you want them to pick up.
I have a two-year-old. He's learning how to talk. And I feel like he is making fun of me with about half the things he says. He'll take some of his food, want me to eat it. I'll eat some. And he'll go, good, isn't it?
That's good, isn't it? Or he'll see something and go, that's pretty, isn't it? Because I say, isn't it? I didn't know I said, isn't it? Until I heard him start saying it. And I was like, what kind of word is that?
And then I realized I would give him a piece of food and go, it's good, isn't it? And he's mocking me. That's what it feels like. He got hurt this past week and he looked down at his own leg and went, oh, honey, hurt yourself. Because that's what his mom says to him every time he hurts himself. Oh, honey, you hurt yourself.
And so I was carrying him around in Lowe's. He was looking at his knee the entire time going, oh, honey, hurt yourself. He said it like 35 times. We had to keep my brother's dog. My brother and his wife bought a dog and then decided to travel so often that we get to share it. So we really appreciate it.
And so it was at our house. It was the first day it was dropped off. It was in our garage and it started barking. And my two-year-old was watching TV. The dog's name is Possum, by the way. That will make this story make more sense.
My two-year-old was watching TV and he goes, shut up, Possum. And we were like, we may have said that too much. And we don't say that to each other. We don't say that to him. We are willing to tell dogs to shut up. And now our son, my wife, one of the primary ways I fight with, fight, I play with my son is to fight him.
This makes more sense a little bit. Like we wrestle. Like it's one of the things we've been doing since he was little. We fight. I teach him how to throw punches. He hits me with sticks.
This is one of the primary ways that we play with each other. And that was fine at our house. But now he has to go up into Kid City. And I don't know if y'all know this. They can't come get me on Sundays. But we're pretty sure there are times where he's going to push someone and be like, shut up, Emmy.
And then like hit somebody. And it's going to be because we trained him poorly. Because he didn't just pick up the stuff we said to him. He picked up all the stuff we do. He picked up who we are. Some of you grew up in families where your parents made you go to church.
But you watched them the rest of the week. And it had no influence over their life. They told you you needed to love Jesus. But you never actually saw them love Jesus. And that messed with you. That's why he says this should so be real to you.
That the way you wake up when you go to sleep. The way you eat. The way you walk. That means walking the way. Means all the stuff you do. Looks like you know and belong to him.
And you love him. And he's changed you. Because I've heard this quote attributed to a bunch of people. Most recently to John Maxwell. But it says you can teach what you know.
But you'll reproduce who you are. You can teach what you know. But you'll reproduce who you are. And that's why he says love him. And then make sure that that plays out in every bit of your life. Parents don't miss the opportunity to disciple your children.
But I want you to see that he says. You shall teach them diligently to your children. And. So he says teach your children. Explain this to your children. Make this part of life.
And he explains kind of how you get to do that. But when he says and. You shall talk of them when you sit in your house. When you walk by the way. When you lie down. When you rise.
That not only affects your children. That means that it affects everyone you're around. He follows that up with this. Verse 8. You shall bind them. As a sign on your hand.
And they shall be as frontlets. Between your eyes. A frontlet. Is a decorative. Head. Dress.
Piece. Thing. And I know that. Because I've studied extensively. And have a computer. And I googled the word.
It's a decorative headpiece. They took this literally. Says that you'll bind them as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on your doorposts. And on your house. And on your gates.
The Jewish people took this literally. They took the little Torah scrolls. The law that he was giving. And the commandments that he gave. And they wore them on their wrists in a little box. And they wore them on their head in a little box.
Or at least the Shema. Which is here. Oh Israel. The Lord our God is one. And they put them on their doorposts. And on their gates.
I don't think that we have to take this literally. I think what he means is. For us as Christians. I think the call is. The way you work. Everything you do.
The way you see the world. That you can't look into the world. Without having to see past. The gospel. One of the things we talk about. Is so knowing the gospel.
That it's the lens by which we view the world. So that the way we handle money. And the way we interact with people. And the way we. And he says put it on your doorposts. Meaning that when you go in.
And when you go out. It's intentional. It's in obedience. On the gates. Which means this is how you interact with the world. This is the first thing they see about you.
You ever heard somebody say. Oh he really wears his faith on his sleeve. And what they mean is. It's just out there for everybody to see. It's just kind of out in the world there. For everybody to notice.
And they kind of say it negatively. And maybe you have thought like. God. Christianity is supposed to be private. And I'm supposed to enjoy it. And I'm supposed to love Christ.
But I don't want to bother people with it. And I don't want to be annoying. And we're not really supposed to talk about religion. It's kind of rude. I don't want to wear my Christianity on my sleeve. Moses says wear it on your face.
Put it on your forehead. That you are a Christian. That you know Christ. Love Christ. That you belong to him. Should be how you interact with the world.
Should be something people pick up from you quickly. And know that it is true and real about you. That's it. That's how to be a part of Jesus' mission in ordinary life. That's it. To so love Christ.
That it pours out. In every interaction. When you wake up. When you go to sleep. When you eat a meal. When you walk.
When you work. To have it be the way you interact with the world. So that if it's bound to your hand. It means that when you're interacting with the world. When you're doing stuff. There are things that you do intentionally.
Because you belong to him. Because you love him. So it affects how you work. It affects how you interact with others. To have it put on your face. Means it's how you see the world.
So that you can't just set a normal budget. Based off of what Dave Ramsey says. But the gospel affects your budget. That you can't just pick a major in school. Because of what your parents said. Or because of what field you want to go in.
But the gospel affects it. And your understanding of who he is. And what he's done. Your love for him. Empowers you to do what you're called to do. In the world.
That doesn't mean that everybody has to go be a missionary. It means that everybody already is a missionary. Wherever God sends them. Because it's how they interact with the world. That Christians wear the gospel on their face. And on their hands.
And it's in their heart. And it pours out everywhere. And it's on their doorposts. And their house is used for the gospel. It's on their gate. It's how they interact with the world.
That's the call. That's it. And that has to start with a love for Christ. And then. All we got to do. Is be around people who don't know Jesus.
Be a genuine Jesus loving. Real person. And intentionally. Go out of your way. To be around people who don't know Christ. And then.
When you. It's normal for you to talk about him. It's normal for you to. To point people to him. It's normal for you. And it makes sense.
Because you so love it. You so enjoy it. So. First. All we're going to do. For the rest of our time.
Is look at. Some practical ways. To be around people. Who don't know Christ. So. For you in the room.
If you're saying. Yeah. I love Jesus. I want to see people come to know him. This is the practical part. Where we just talk about.
How do we do that. For some of you in the room. You're going. I'm not sure. I actually love Jesus. The way you're talking about.
I'm not sure. I actually. Have him. In me. The way you're talking about. I want to tell you.
That you can. That we're called to faith. Which means that we. Say. Lord. I believe that the gospel is true.
That you died for my sin. And I want this. I want you to change me. I want you to infuse me. Some of you. You actually know.
No. I believe in him. I just don't feel it right now. I'm not empowered by him right now. And that's where it's. Yeah.
It's called for strength. For you to start. Putting some energy forth. To read. To study. To repent.
Some of you. Need to start. By taking a blank sheet of paper. And a pen. And saying. Lord.
Where do I need to repent? That's a dangerous question. But it is so good. Jesus loves to answer that one. And here's why. You repenting.
You turning from sin. You confessing. Is not punishment. It's a call into joy. You get more of Jesus. Obedience is not punishment.
It's a call to be free. From all the sin. That he's already set us free from. To walk in it. Okay. So here's what we got to do.
You need to take your schedule. You need to look at it. You actually lay out. How do I spend my time? What time do I get up? What do I do?
Where do I work? Who am I around? Where do I go to school? Who's there? When am I there? What time is that?
When does that happen? You just need to make your schedule. And then you get to ask a couple of questions about your schedule. There's really three primary questions. And then there's one follow-up that I want to show us. But the first one is where's a community opportunity?
It just means in my normal schedule, how can I invite church family to be around? Where can I invite someone from my community group? Where can another Christian come join me in this? This is one of the ways that we get to remind ourselves of what matters. So where can I bring somebody in?
This is one of the ways that we get to talk about God and teach each other and walk in that. And help other people know how to raise children and handle finances. So it's like what am I already doing? Where can someone else join me? The second one is where is there a mission opportunity? Which just means where am I around people who don't know Jesus yet?
Or where could I invite someone? What am I already doing that I could just invite someone in who doesn't know Jesus yet? So you've laid out your schedule. You ask where is there a community opportunity? Where is there a mission opportunity? The third question is where is there a gospel opportunity?
Where can I actually begin to show Christ? Where can I actually begin to share Christ? That's one of the things we're going to talk about in this coming week. Is how to explain the gospel. How to say it. Talk to people about it.
The fourth question. One. Which is kind of an underlying question. It's not one of the main ones. Is what needs to be cut? For some of you.
You say like in my evenings I watch some TV. And maybe there's a good community opportunity. You could invite some people to come watch The Walking Dead with you. Or Frasier reruns. Some of you it's. I could invite my neighbors.
I know that I found out that one of my neighbors is really into this show. So we're going to watch House of Cards together. I'm just saying popular shows. But something makes me think that one might have bad stuff in it. And I should have mentioned it. So I don't know.
That was not an endorsement. But maybe your neighbor really likes it. And you should watch it with him. I don't know. Some of you. It's.
I watch three hours of television every night. And therefore have no time to be around anyone else. And that needs to be cut. Some of you play video games like it's a part time Job. And with more intentionality than your part time Job. I have nothing against video games.
In and of themselves. Some of them aren't great. Some of that needs to be cut out. You need to invite a friend over. Play for a couple hours. And then go into the world and talk to humans.
Like you've got to look at your schedule and say. What do I need to cut? What doesn't work? Some of you treat your home like it's the escape from the world. So as soon as.
Introverts pay attention. As soon as you. Get off work. You run into your house. And the goal is to just have enough. Cushions around you.
That no one gets to talk to you. And that's fine. God designed you to be introverted. That's okay. One of the problems with the church. Is that extroverts stand up here.
And tell all the introverts. That they're wrong and sinful. And that's not true. But. You need to make friends. Like an introvert makes friends.
And you need to find ways to be around people. Because you can't just say. Oh I don't like that. Or it's hard. And never do it. And extroverted people.
Need to not say. I hung out with 30 people. That was mission. Did you have a real conversation with anybody? Do you remember their names? Did you just walk around and call everyone guy?
Maybe you need to build some real friendships. With people who don't know Jesus. And get around them. I've got a list of. Eight things I want to talk through quickly. Somebody.
This is just a list that was in the book. Everyday Church. It was written by pastors. Steve Timmis and Tim Chester. That Tim Chester guy sounds really smart. But.
Eight. A list of eight things. I want to. I want to just kind of share with us. As ways to intentionally be around people. Who don't know Jesus.
This is a list they give. That I think is helpful. First one is. Eat with non-Christians. Or eat with people who don't know Christ. You eat.
21 Meals a week. That's an average. Some of you. You're above average. I'm proud of you. You eat 28 meals a week.
That's well done. Some of you skip breakfast. You're at 14. You eat. You have to. God designed us to have to stop.
To eat food. To refuel. Eat with people who don't know Jesus. Invite them to lunch. Talk to your co-workers. Invite them to come eat with you.
Invite people in your neighborhood. To come over and eat. It's about to be summer. Go to your neighbors and say. Hey. After dinner this next week.
We're going to have a watermelon. But there's no way. The two of us. Are going to eat an entire watermelon. If we do. We will not feel good.
So we need you to come over. And help us eat this watermelon. We're going to be in our front yard. We just want to invite people to come. Find ways to get around people. Who don't know Jesus.
The second one they give is to walk. If you live in a walkable area. Of our city. Walk. For the majority of us. Because we live in Columbia.
And that doesn't really matter. We exist. Can't walk. In our city. Can't walk to the grocery store. Can't walk to.
So just walk around your neighborhood. Walk at the same time. Get to know the people. Who live in your neighborhood. One of the things. That we do intentionally.
Is we walk in our neighborhood. And we've gotten to meet. Our neighbors. Just walk around. Get to. Get to know people.
If you. Work at a place. Where you can walk. To get some food. Rather than ride in your car. Walk.
Be. Begin to care about the city. We live in. Begin to see people. Begin to. Start conversations that way.
To meet people. The third one they give. Is to be a regular. Go to the same place every week. Get coffee in the same place. Get breakfast in the same place.
Be around the same people. Go at the same time. This is for people who are saying. Look. I want to be a part of Jesus's mission. I just don't know anybody.
Who doesn't know Christ. And for Christians. That happens some. We become Christians. We start hanging out with the church. Eventually.
All of our friends are Christians. We have a lot in common with them. It's easy. We believe the same stuff. We're fighting for the same stuff. But he's called us.
To be out in the world. Using our ordinary lives. For extraordinary purposes. So be a regular. Get to know all of the wait staff. To have your community group.
Go eat at the same place. Every week. At the same time. And tip well. Even when the service is bad. Have the gospel affect your tipping.
You were terrible. Here's grace. Here's abundant grace. Above and beyond. Your. Worth.
At this. Today. Um. Hobby with people who don't know Christ. Is number four. Join a hunting club.
Join a gym. Join a local book club. Or start one in your neighborhood. Play tennis. Paint. Sew.
Join a local softball league. Little league. Parents. Little league. People will say. I can't.
I can't be part of the stuff. Our group's doing right now. Because our kids. Is playing t-ball. Some of you need to say. Parents.
We're not. We're not rotating off. I'm going to take this one. And I'm going to be there. At practice. And I'm going to get to know.
All the other parents. And I'm going to be a help coach. And we're going to hold a party. For the. For the kids. At the end of the season.
We're going to be the person. Who brings Gatorade. We're going to intentionally. Use t-ball. As an opportunity. To get to know people.
Love people. Serve people. And join Jesus. In his mission. Um. Number five.
They give us. To talk to your coworkers. I used to love it. When I worked. Uh. I used to work at Sears.
One of the things I loved. About working at Sears. Was my coworkers. Were stuck with me. My coworkers. Could not fire me.
Their only option. Was to quit. And I got to talk to them. I got to hang out with them. I got to share with them. I got to be their friend.
Go out of your way. To talk to your coworkers. Get to know the people. In the cubicles near you. Or that work on the same shift. Care about them.
Pray for them. Begin to pray for them. Before you go to work. When you leave. Get to know them. Be their friend.
A genuine. Actual friend. Number six. They give us. Volunteer with non-profits. Find a non-profit.
Serve once a month. Bring your family. Bring your group. Number seven. Participate in city events. Go to a fundraiser.
Or a clean up. Summer shows. Concerts. Talk to people. Get to know the city. Care about people.
Number eight. Serve your neighbors. Or get to know your neighbors. Some of you have lived in the same place for a while. You don't know your neighbors. Let me give you a couple of quick ways to do this.
We're going to talk more about how to use your house. And to be a good neighbor. But a couple of quick ways. If you move into a place. Go knock on everybody's door. And say.
Hey I just moved here. Here's one of the things that happens. Most people feel the obligation to be nice to the people they live around. They don't want to be rude. They will not naturally be rude to you. Go knock on their door.
And say. Hey I just moved here. I'm trying to meet people. And they will feel. Some sort of social pressure. To get to know you.
And talk to you. It's a great way to meet all your neighbors. To talk to them. To pray for them. If you see someone moving in. Go knock on their door.
Say. Hey Saul you just moved in. Wanted to get to know you. We live right down here. Talk to them. If you have a person.
If you have lived in the same place forever. And don't know any of your neighbors. You have a couple of options. You can. Make up. A neighborhood thing.
So that you have a reason to knock on their door. Hi. I'm a part of the neighborhood planning committee. Want to talk to you about the thing out front. Where we need to plant some plants. Hi.
Just talk to them. I'm a part of the neighborhood gathering group. It's a group you made. So you're part of it. You're not lying. Chairman.
Chairman. We're trying to do two cookouts a year. Would you be up for that? Maybe all of your neighbors say no. Maybe you find five that say yes. Have a cookout with them.
Some of you just need to knock on people's doors. And say. Hey. I've lived here for three years. And I've been a terrible neighbor. And I just wanted to get to know you.
Most of your neighbors will say. Yeah. Me too. Sorry. And you can talk to them. One of the things we do.
In our neighborhood. Is we walk. In the neighborhood. And. And. I will.
If I intentionally see my neighbors outside. Sometimes pretend to go get something from my mailbox. Or out of my toolbox. On my truck. So that I can say hey to them.
We walk. One of the things I do. When we're walking. And this. I break social norms. Just for the reason.
To be able to meet my neighbors. If I see a neighbor. And we make eye contact. But I can tell. That was it. They don't want to talk to me.
I will. While we're making eye contact. Do this. Hey. Way too early. But now they have to choose.
To not shake my hand. They have to be willing to break that. And most people aren't. So they. They'll go. And wait.
While I walk like 30 feet. So we can shake hands and talk. And I get to know my neighbors. And then the next time I see them. I can say hey. I already know them.
How's that thing? What's going on? Like. Just find ways to get to know your neighbors. Here's the thing. This isn't a trick.
We're called to be genuine Christians. Who really love Jesus. And then our goal. Is to be genuine friends. With people who don't. Let me explain something to you.
And if you're a Christian. This is true. And you believe this. We only have a certain amount of time here. This is temporary. There is an eternity to come.
And I believe 100%. That every person. Needs to meet Christ. Needs to hear the goodness of the gospel. Most of the people you live around. Think they know the gospel.
Think they know about Christianity. Think they know about Christ. And it's just that they've never really seen. Anybody truly living that out. In life. Christians.
True. True. Genuine gospel. Bible following believing Christians. Are the best people to be around. They should be gracious.
Generous. Forgiving. Loving. Serving. Sacrificial. Not condemning.
But joyous. And welcoming. And merciful. If your neighbors. Never come to know Christ. The best thing they'll ever get.
Is to live a life on earth. Around some Christians. Because it only gets worse from there. The goal is not. Just. See people meet Jesus.
That is the ultimate goal. Because if we truly believe what we say we believe. We want that for everybody. We just want to be friends with the people that are around us. Love them. Serve them.
Care for them. Pray for them. Fight for them. Be the person most likely to take them in. To give them some money. And to swap shifts with them.
Just to ease life a little bit. And show them somebody cares about them. Okay. Homework for this week. Look at your schedule. Pick a thing.
To do with intentionality. Some of you that means you need to cut something. You need to go for a walk. Some of that means you have. Coworkers that you've never really prayed for. Cared about.
Gotten to know. Some of that means you've got to go knock on the neighbor's door. But everybody. Who says they are Christian. Needs to do one thing this week. Everybody's in one of our community groups.
That's it. Just do one thing this week. To try to meet somebody. Get to know somebody. Begin to build a friendship with someone who does not yet know Christ. That's the goal.
Genuine friendship. With a genuine Christian. Let's pray. God my one prayer out of this. Is that we would all love you. With all our heart.
With all our soul. With all our mind. With all our strength. Because naturally. Out of that. We begin to love those around us.
I pray that we would be. Captivated by. The goodness of the gospel. And enamored. With your grace. So that we might begin to see the world as you see it.
And love those who are around us. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.