The People in a successful Church are:
- Encouraged in heart (Col 2:2)
- United in Lover (Col 2:2)
- Confident in Christ (Col 2:2-4)
- Established in Faith (Col 2:5-7)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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You have your Bibles?
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You have your Bibles?
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I have brought them.
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Bibles, these are a bit of a name.
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Turn those Bibles to Colossians chapter 2.
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Colossians chapter 2.
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While you're turning there, I heard a story about a guy who was shipwreck on a little island, as often happens in these little stories, by himself on this tiny plot of land.
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And he was there for three weeks before another boat came to rescue him.
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Well, people got off the boat and they saw the man there.
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"Man, how did you survive?" I said, "Well, I've been here for three weeks, and it's been a rough three weeks, but I get by." I saw that the man had three huts built.
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He goes, "Well, what are these huts?" And the man says, "Well, that first one, that's my home. That's where I would go, you know, sleep, and that's where I'd have my meals, and that was sort of my home." And they said, "Well, what's the second one?" He says, "Well, that second mountain is my church." He said, "That's where I would go, I would just pray and I'd cry out to God that he would rescue me." "That was sort of my church. I'd go and sing songs to God there. That's my church." And they said, "Well, what's that third mountain?" He said, "I don't know if I want to talk about the third mountain." They said, "Why not?" "Because it's sort of a sensitive subject." And I'd rather we just not talk about it.
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But they said, "Well, what's that third one we gotta do now? What's that third one?" The guy says, "Okay. That's what I used to do at the church." And, uh...
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Yeah, even if you're the only one there, there's still gonna be problems, right?
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So, let's talk about a recipe for success at the church.
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If you have your outline right down at the top, I'm gonna ask you a question.
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I want you to write an answer down.
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I've done this a couple of times here, I won't do that.
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But write down, what makes a church successful?
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Write that down.
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What makes a church successful?
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Do you have your answer?
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Here's some things that some people say makes a church successful.
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Is it good to have a celebrity pastor?
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You've got to have great attractions for children.
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You've got to have a big bank account.
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Absence of conflict.
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What's the biggest one?
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What's the biggest one that people say, "Is that church successful?" What's the biggest indicator that people usually get?
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How many people go there, right?
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What's the attendance?
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And, listen, a large church doesn't necessarily mean it's successful any more than a small church means it's unsuccessful. Right?
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So, jot this down. Question number two. What determines if a church is good?
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You know, the first question is kind of objective.
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You know, what are some factors that might determine if a church is successful?
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But this is a subjective question.
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Okay, this isn't what I think people would answer.
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This is, if I came to you, you know, we sat down and we talked, and I said, "What do you think makes a church good?" But here's the thing that people would say, this is what the church is good at.
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People say, well, the worship.
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That's a big one.
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You want to divide our group quickly when it comes to talking about churchy things?
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Start talking about music in the church.
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And you will polarize people immediately, won't you?
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You know, they turn that church into a rock concert, or, you know, all they do is sing those old hymns of people you've never heard of.
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Let's sing something new, and you're going to completely polarize people, when you talk about worship, music, and the church.
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What makes the church a good one?
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What about time and location?
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Is it convenient?
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Is the church friendly?
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Did I agree with the message? That's one.
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Did I like the preaching?
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You would say in our vernacular.
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Some people would say it was demographic.
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There were people at that church that were just like me, and I think that's a good thing.
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I think not.
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Often these objective things are purely de-centered.
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The danger we face in our church today is the consumer mentality.
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Let's just be honest.
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I think it happens a lot in this culture.
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I'm talking to some other pastors in this area that we live in a very consumer-oriented little environment.
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And it's easy.
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Because there are a lot of good churches in the area.
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And maybe that's not good for me, so I'm going to grace, or I'm going to harvest, or I'm going to victory, or whatever.
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But it's a consumer mentality.
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Right and wrong are different.
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And if you feel about that, it's the truth.
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The church isn't a place that you go to.
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The church is what you are.
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And what I want to show you today from Colossians is what God says makes for a successful church.
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Okay, so let's look at Colossians chapter 2.
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Starting at verse 1, the Apostle Paul writes, "For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you and for those who play at the sea, and for all who have not seen me face to face." That's an interesting statement. You think Paul will be wrestling over maybe the churches that he's had firsthand hands-on experience, but he doesn't even say that.
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He says, "I'm really burdened with these churches, frankly, I've never had. I've never been to. I don't know the people there, but I have this real burden." And he's going to give us some things. He says, "I'm not there, but I want some things for you so badly." Notice he says, "I'm struggling." We can piggyback that off the previous passage. Remember last time we looked at verse 29?
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He says, "He's toiling, he's struggling with all of Christ's energy that's working within him." We talked all about that last week.
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So what are you struggling with, with all of Christ's energy? Well, he tells us here, "My struggle is, I want your church to be successful." He's like, "I'm really struggling, and as I sit here in prison, all I can think of...
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...are their bullets coming." I hope they didn't use that comic sans form, because that's what men would think.
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Oh, I sure hope that they didn't do anything cheesy like that.
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Paul's like, "As I sit here, I just wrestle with my spirit. Are your greeters wearing name tags?" Because it's so important.
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Do you have a ball pit and an arcade for your children at your church?
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Because this is really stirring me.
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Actually, that's not it at all.
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So, let's see what Paul's willing to say makes a successful church.
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If you're following along on your outline, the people in a successful church are, and the reason I've worded it that way, Because we want to make this personal.
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Again, you've heard me say this before, but sometimes when you listen to a sermon, whether it's from me or from anybody, I can be good at this too.
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Sometimes we depersonalize things.
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We can step back and say, "That's true. Interesting. True. Yeah, I didn't necessarily see anything incorrect about anything you might have said there." and we somehow detach ourselves from...
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You know what? If the church is going to be successful, it's about the people, right? It's about the people.
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And that's what Paul's talking about.
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He says, "Here's some characteristics of a church where Christ is powerful, they work." Just when he said the last message, Christ is at work.
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And what does that look like in the Church?
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I'm going to read through here, and then we can go back and get the four things that we shared with you on this passage.
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Verse 2, he says, "That their hearts may be encouraged, being in together in love, to reach all the riches of full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.
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I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments.
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For though I am absent in body, yet I am with you in spirit, rejoicing to see your good order and the firmness of your faith in Christ.
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Therefore, as you receive Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him, and establish the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving." So what are the people like in a successful church?
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Well, let's look at the passage. First of all, verse 2, "The people of a successful church are encouraged in hearts." Encouraged in hearts. That word for encouraged in the Greek literally means to call to all sides.
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You know what that's like when you're going through a hard time. Maybe a death in the family or a job loss or, you know, child issues.
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and you're wrestling, that person just comes alongside you.
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That's what this word encouragement really means.
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You're called alongside.
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But notice he says, "encourage the heart." Now when we think of heart, we think of, often, we think of Valentine's Day, and, you know, our emotions, and, you know, the gushy stuff.
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But when the Bible speaks of the heart, it speaks of the innermost part of the person.
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So Paul says first of all, the people in a successful church are encouraged in heart.
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Now you know, when the Lord's at work, He has some tools that He likes to use.
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Did you know that?
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There are some things that the Holy Spirit does through us, actually I've listed in relations five the fruit of the spirit you know if they are love joy peace patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness and self-control you can say those are some of God's tools that's what he's using in us but do you know you know Satan has some tools and I read this years ago and I had to find what I was given and I had to do some digging because it almost stuck my tooth.
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Listen to this. There's an old fable that the devil had a sale.
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And he was selling off his tools.
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And he had them spread out on the table.
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And all of the devil's tools had labels on them.
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Hatred, malice, envy, despair, sensuality.
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All the weapons that everyone knows so well.
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Off the one side lay a harmless looking wood-sheathed instrument marked "Discouragement." It was old and worn looking, but it was priced far above the rest.
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When the devil was asked why that one was so expensive, he answered, "Because I can use this one so much more easily than the others.
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No one knows that it belongs to me.
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So with it, I can open doors that are tightly bolted against the others.
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Once I get inside, I can use any tool that I think is best.
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A discouraged person is open for all kinds of temptation.
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And there might be some people here, I'm going to ask you to raise your hand.
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The Holy Spirit is at work.
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He'll let you know if this is you, but some of you sitting here today are discouraged about something.
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Maybe it's something personally in your own life, whether it's a health issue, a job issue.
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Maybe it's something, somebody you love, somebody close to you.
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I want to take this time to encourage you, as a successful church, is encouraged in hearts.
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Well, first of all, the more you. Again, you're open for all kinds of love and temptation.
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When you're discouraged, let's be honest, we just feel like, "What the heck?" It seems like I try and I try and I try and I'm not getting anywhere and nothing's changing.
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And I don't even know if God's hearing my prayers.
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And that's driving that wedge of discouragement in you.
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You're discouraged from praying.
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You're discouraged from being in the Word.
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You're discouraged from being around the church people.
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You don't want anybody to ask you, "What's wrong? What's going on? Talk to me." That's the way Satan likes it.
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Just drive that bench.
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Just a little discouragement here, a little discouragement here, a little discouragement here.
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But listen, God says a successful church is encouraged in heart.
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So I want to encourage you about, first of all, what is sovereign?
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Do you know what sovereign means?
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It means he solely reigns.
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Sometimes we give the devil too much props.
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We give the devil bad props.
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Like, he has some ultimate authority.
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He just thought, he's holding his head up.
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Is that right?
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How am I supposed to know?
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I'm not even going to be a thorium.
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Well, you're kind of a thorium.
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I'll let you know when you're stuck on my lap.
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We'll talk later about that.
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But, where was I?
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God solely reigns.
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He solely reigns.
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Read your scriptures, even the book of Job, the devil had to get God's permission before he could even do anything in Job.
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God is still in control, okay? So it's not as if the devil is sneaking around doing things behind God's back.
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He is sovereign. God is sovereign, that is.
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And I was like, "You're munching, God has made some glorious promises." You know in Jeremiah, in chapter 1, God says, "I am watching over my word to perform it." Do you know what that means?
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God says, "I wrote some things down in my word, and I am standing, looking over my word, making sure that it happens exactly as I said it's going to happen." God says, "I'm watching you. I'm watching over my word. It's going to happen. It's going to happen." The encouraging thing for me...
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We've all already written the end of the story.
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Are you discouraged?
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Do you know this story ended well? Did you know that?
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Did you know that? This ends well.
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Read the book of Revelation.
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Things look like they're going really, really bad.
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But that too is under God's sovereignty.
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But this ends really, really well.
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with Jesus Christ reigning and his people reigning with him, and sin and death, and everything that's corrupted this world is cast into the lake of fire forever.
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That's good news.
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So be encouraged.
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Do you feel like you're being weighed down by sin?
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God's grace is greater than your sin.
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Do you feel like there are people out to get you?
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We've already covered this, but you have somebody residing within you that's craving it all.
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Somebody out to get you?
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Introduce them to your Father.
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Do you have some loved ones making bad decisions?
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Be encouraged.
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Praying for them is the best thing you can do for them.
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As a good friend of mine says, "It's not over until God says it's over." Somebody else, I'm going to quote him on.
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"It's not over until God says it's over." So be encouraged, and I would encourage you to be an encourager.
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Okay? Get alongside others.
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I know there are people in this room that need some encouragement.
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alongside them.
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So the people of the successful church are encouraged in hearts.
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Second, we see in verse 2, just right there in the text, "united in love." My translation says, "knit together in love." The other line I just put down, "united in love." It says we're knit together.
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Sometimes when we have everything set up on a Sunday morning, I see a few ladies sitting in the back, all knitting.
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Where's that crochet?
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It's knitting, okay, it's knitting.
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I don't know who did this.
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I'm going to send everything there.
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And I totally wasn't going to do it or not do it.
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But, um, they sit in the back and they knit.
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And you see as a church we are to be knit together in love. Something should be driving us together What is it? It's love.
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Now understand in the Greek there were different words for love.
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In our language we're kind of limited. We say love a lot.
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I love my wife.
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I love Karen.
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Do you know what else I love?
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It's perfect.
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Do you know what else I love?
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Pepperoni rolls.
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Do you know what else I love?
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I love my dog.
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Now, do I mean love the same way we all love those things?
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Of course not.
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Of course not.
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Aaron, you're at the top of that list, baby.
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Pepperoni rolls, the second, you're at the top.
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We use the word love, but you don't understand it in Greek.
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There are specific words.
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was friendship love. Like when I tell Baal I love him, that's why I kind of dress him up.
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I love him. That's friendship love.
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There's also the word Eros, which is where we get the word erotic, which is kind of the hubba hubba love. That's love that I have for my wife.
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But the word that's used here is agapic, which is your needs ahead of me love. That's kind of love that he's talking about here.
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We're in it together, this is a community where your needs are more important than my needs.
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I'm thinking about you ahead of myself.
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I'm kind of doing a little math on this.
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I think, you know, everybody here just looked after themselves.
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I can break up a little equation here, but like, you know, these barriers are a component of the stuff on the calculus.
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But everybody here is just looking after themselves That means the total number of people that are looking after you equals one, right?
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But when we instead focus our attention on looking after others, everybody in the church is going to have an entire group of people, however many that is, that is more than one, looking after them.
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Do you see the way God designed this?
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It's not just me watching out for myself.
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It's everybody watching out for me.
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That's what it means to be knit together in love.
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We're all putting each other's needs ahead of our own.
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Sometimes love is in saying and doing the hard things.
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Love isn't always the handshake, the smile.
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Sometimes the loving thing is to do the hard thing.
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is to go to a brother and say, "I think you're wrong." "I think you need to repent." "You're doing something sinful. You need to turn from that." Sometimes, I believe you, that's not easy being in the Passionful Ministry as long as I've had.
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I've had to do that a lot.
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Whether it's going after that flirtatious husband, or that wavering teenager, and say, "You know what, you're heading down the wrong path. It's time to turn around." I like having those conversations with people.
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I do not.
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But I understand that's the loving thing to do.
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The unloving thing would be to just let people go.
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Scripture speaks much of that.
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We'll come back to that later.
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But understand this, you don't miss this.
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In united in love, that's one thing you cannot do in isolation.
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It's one thing you cannot do in isolation.
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We're commanded to encourage each other, to love one another, to use our giftedness for the building up of the church.
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That's something that we can't do in isolation.
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That's why when we're doing the small group thing that's starting in January, you signed up.
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There's forms on the table if you came in. If you're not signed up for a small group, we really, really, really, really want you to part of a small group.
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Because it's in that community where you're going to be in a position where you can be united and love.
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See, that's kind of a hard thing to do on a Sunday morning.
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Right now, whether there's 50 people to come or 70 people to come or whatever, it's hard just getting started to build that sense of community.
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Like, after church, I get to sit down with everybody for like 10 minutes, and let's just talk, "How are you doing? What can I bring for you?" We just can't do that.
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But that does happen in small groups.
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And we want to see everybody get excited for that.
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So fill that up.
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I'll do it today all by myself.
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I'll get you pumped in.
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So a successful church, courage and heart united in love, thirdly, a successful church is confident in Christ.
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Confident in Christ.
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Look back again at verse 2.
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He says, "To reach all the riches of full assurance.
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Assurance.
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So I understand church, we are reaching for something.
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As a church, we are reaching for something.
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What are we reaching for?
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What we're reaching for is knowing who we are in Christ.
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That's what we're reaching for.
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You understand what the Gospel really means.
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You understand who Jesus Christ is and what He's done.
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You understand what that means in 2011, the ministry of Jesus Christ.
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That's what we're reaching for, knowing who we are in Christ.
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You see, the reason Paul wrote this, the false teachers that were threatening the church, They taught that salvation was Jesus plus angel worship, and Jesus plus secret knowledge, and Jesus plus mysticism, and ritualism, and ceremonialism, and Jesus plus all these things.
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And it wasn't enough to just be found in Jesus Christ.
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Notice how Paul responds to that.
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He says, "For reaching for the full assurance of understanding and the knowledge of God's mystery, which is Christ, in whom are hidden how much of the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." How much of that does Christ have?
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This treasury of wisdom and knowledge, how much does Jesus have?
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All.
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Circle that word in your Bible. Circle that word all.
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I kind of write that in my Bible. Circle it to the person next to you.
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"And who were hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Well that's interesting. Paul had to deal with that back in his day.
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We've got to be able to deal with stuff like that in our day.
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We... we are like eyeballs deep in our head.
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Honestly, so many churches teaching that being a Christian means, well you believe in Jesus, sure, but you've got to go through these rituals.
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We have these rituals that we do in our church, and these rituals make you holy.
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That's the same thing Paul killed.
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We've got the middle of the Son of the Spirit.
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Same stuff.
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You've got to go through these rituals to make you holy.
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Christ makes you holy.
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How much of this wisdom, all of it, is the answer?
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For a lot of people it's the altar of good works.
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There's nothing wrong with good works.
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As our Judge says, we should never do good works.
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Here's the problem. Good works is kind of like this.
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Part of it is from the worst type of things.
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Some people think if I do enough good works, Jesus will look down on you from heaven to prove it to you.
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But that's not it at all.
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You see, that's what the whole book of James is about.
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When you have true faith, good works comes out of your life in Christ. That's true.
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But some people think that doing good works is how you obtain salvation.
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Incorrect.
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Because the question is how many good works would you have to do to hit God's quota?
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How many would you have to do?
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What would that make of it?
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You cross over a threshold into eternity of God's life and that's sorry.
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I needed X number of hours and you only did Y number of hours.
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Sorry.
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That's not it. Some people think that's how it ends.
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Good work, dude. I helped you.
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Another one is morality.
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Some people think both.
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It's believing in Jesus, but also it's just trying to be a good person. That's how you get saved.
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You know, talk to people. "Are you going to heaven?" "I think so." "Why do you think you're going to heaven?" "Well, I've never tried to hurt anybody. I've always tried to do the right thing. I've never killed anybody." They're getting this back to this, "Well, it's Jesus plus, it's Jesus plus, it's Jesus plus." Or in saying these prayers, I've said enough of certain kind of prayers that that and possibly other belief in Jesus thing.
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If you were with us when we went through Philosophers chapter 1, you may ask me, what else could possibly be added in Jesus Christ?
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He is everything. He is everything.
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What an insult to think that when Jesus Christ said our atonement, our forgiveness, when he said it was at the back, when he said it's done, it is finished.
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How blasphemous it was to think that we're adding something to that.
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Like Jesus, thank me for doing your part. Now I'll do my part.
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What an insult to the atonement work of Christ.
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So there are great mentions of knowing Christ. Paul gives us a few.
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Going back in the text, walking backwards, notice he says "knowledge".
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If you take a nice sharp list on knowledge, you can know the truth.
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You can know the truth, we live in a day of subjective truth.
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The truth is you're truth, you're truth, you're created.
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Yeah, that makes sense.
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There is absolute truth, and Christ is the truth.
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So you can know the truth.
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Secondly, you know, Jesus says, "Understanding." It's not enough to know the truth, you have to make sense of the truth.
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That's one of the other bridges in Christ.
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We can make sense of the truth.
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Out of the truth, we can make sense of the truth.
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I don't know how anybody else outside of people who know Jesus Christ can make sense of this world.
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I just, I don't understand.
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Because God's Word makes a perfect explanation of the reason the world is the way that it is.
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We see, what do we see? We see this glorious creation that is decaying.
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We see inherent evil in people.
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And the Bible explains that.
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And when you understand who Christ is and what he's done in all these...
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Well, okay, our issue was we were dead in a tripwreck and we were made alive in Christ.
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And he's coming again to reverse the thousand year kingdom.
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He's going to make the earth be what it was meant to be.
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And then there's going to come a day that there's going to be a new heaven and a newer.
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I don't know how many can make sense of everything they see around them.
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The way history is going and all those things.
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Apart from Christ. I just don't know how many can make sense of it.
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In Christ we have an understanding.
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Takes us back to the first statement.
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It's assurance.
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So you can know the truth, that's knowledge.
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You can make sense of the truth, that's understanding.
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Assurance is you can rest in the truth.
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You can rest in the truth.
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Thank you.
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Are you sure you're going to heaven?
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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How can you be so sure?
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Because the God of the universe made me promise.
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Okay?
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It's not based on my integrity.
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It's based on His.
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Yeah, I'm sure.
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I'm sure.
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That's not cockiness. That's not pride. That's uptaking God in his Word.
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Let's be honest. Are there times when you lack confidence?
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Are there times when you fall off your ass and you're like, "My faith is not pliable." Let's be honest. Are there times when you lack confidence?
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There's times when I've been sad.
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I don't even think I want to have it. I just mean...
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Just get it through life. Right?
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There are times when you just...
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What if? What if?
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You know, maybe there are some people here this morning that say...
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You might have that heavy thing they'll know, but I've got you. What if? What if?
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You see, being confident in Christ is a mark of a successful church.
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It's no more striving, no more doubt, no more questions as to who He is, as to what He's done.
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A successful church is "All I am is who I am through Jesus Christ." I will be is what Jesus Christ has promised me.
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All that I have has been given to me by God.
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Where I'm going, that is your self-determination.
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It's confidence in Christ.
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I know the truth.
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I see the truth.
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I'm living in the truth because Jesus Christ is the truth.
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And it doesn't matter.
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Why?
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Why, thanks behind your back.
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You're gonna find out what you might need some help on.
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And you're like, "Good thing I have confidence in Christ. Good thing I know the blood that's in charge of all this." That's a good idea for a commercial.
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Notice the next thing he says. Verse 4.
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I say this in order that no one may delude you with plausible arguments.
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What are plausible arguments?
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Persuasive words.
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Every so often this garbage comes down the pipe.
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"Oh, we just proved the Bible. You know what usually happens? What does it usually happen?" "It terrifies the Bible." A lot of time, I hear everybody talk about this, but that was Easter.
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That was Easter time.
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Time Magazine or one of the news people come out with "The Real Jesus." "The Historical Jesus." "We found Jesus' bones in a box in a canyon or something." You see all that stuff? That usually comes out around Easter.
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Why is that?
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People using persuasive words...
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Oh, it's hit time. I think it has to be true.
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People using persuasive words...
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Satan's trying to get us to knock off balance.
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A lot of people don't know how to handle it. Why?
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Because it sounds logical.
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This is a whole other thing we'll be getting into some of this next week.
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And understand that when people bring these plausible arguments, these persuasive arguments, these things that you're an idiot for believing in Jesus because they've disproven the Bible, they've disproven the life of Christ, and here's X, Y, Z.
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When stuff like that comes along, I kind of do it in three categories.
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One category is just flat arguments. Some people come and say that stuff, they're like, "Well, you know, you know, the Bible actually says," and they're about to spew something that, "Why, where'd you go with that?" Trying to disprove the Bible of the Bible.
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Is that a good idea?
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Usually that's just ignorance.
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Here's a way you can think about it.
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When a guy comes to you and says, "Well, you know the Bible says, "ask it where it says the Bible." I guarantee you, 929 times out of a thousand, he has no idea.
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Right?
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It's ignorance. It's ignorance.
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The second way I characterize these things is that people bring these flaws aboard, because sometimes it's ignorance. They don't know what they're talking about.
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Sometimes it's just a moment's slumber.
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That's kind of the anchor's thing, but that's also more of a...
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It's more than "I don't know what's going on." It's more of a...
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"I sound like a pretty sure-of-thing." It's just smoke.
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It's just smoke.
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They come up with all these things that might look like they have substance, but when you really dig down deep, and that kind of takes me to my third level, I call it pop candy.
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You like pop candy?
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Our kids love pop candy.
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It comes in these giant bags, big and fluffy, and then they pull it out of the bag and grab it, and it treats it like this little raisin-sized thing, you know?
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And it looks like it has substance, but it really doesn't.
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Those are just three kind of levels.
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People come with their persuasive words.
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Sometimes we're just like, oh my gosh, somebody's just written a Bible.
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Do a little digging and you'll find it's ignorance and smooth screeners drop candy.
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When we get into the foundation study in our small groups, that's gonna equip you to handle many of these arguments.
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A lot of them center around evolution and cavemen and aging here and things of that nature.
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The foundation steps can help them quickly.
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Those things.
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We're gonna get into more of this in the next passage because Paul continues dealing with these issues.
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The last part of a successful church is established in faith.
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Established in faith.
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Notice he says, on verse seven, established in faith just as you were taught.
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What does it mean to establish something?
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It means to bring it to being on a firm or stable basis.
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You know where I'm getting more established than what I always think of?
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Those t-shirts, Jim Crow's t-shirts.
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Say like, Eric Costello established what, what?
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'87, see I knew somebody who would do that.
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Established in '87.
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All right, how about Everlast?
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Established when?
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Everlast, what do you believe in, the boxes?
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Established 1910.
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And what do those shirts mean?
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Established, what does that mean?
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What it means is since this date, our flag has been in the ground and we're still going strong.
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That's why you don't see many shirts out like, you know, Joe Schmoe-Graham shirts, established 2011.
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It's like, big deal, once you've been in business like three weeks, you can get a shirt.
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What that means is, look, there was a time that we stuck our thigh in the ground, and here it is, many years later, we're still going, we're still going, we're still going.
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You see, that's what it is, we're Christian.
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Established in the faith, if you look back and say, since this date, I was born again, I flagged it with the grass battle formation. That's what he's talking about here.
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Prepared, ready, strong, being confident in grace is what establishes your faith.
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What does it look like? Let's go through the text here. What's it look like verse 6, verse 9, he says, "Therefore, as you receive the grace of Jesus the Lord." First of all, being established at the faith means, at some point you have to receive Jesus Christ.
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So let me ask you, if we're sitting down and I'm talking about your Christian walk, and I say, "We're going to make you a t-shirt about your walk with Christ," and it's going to say "established," what would you put there?
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When were you established at the faith?
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In order for that to start, there has to be a point in your life where you receive Christ.
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And I love the way he works that. You receive Christ.
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It's not as if Jesus is someone that we're trying to climb this mountain in order to work and obtain the salvation.
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He's the one running the house.
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Like the Father, the product, the Son.
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He's calling us to simply receive.
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John 1 12 "Yet to those who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God." It's about receiving Him.
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Not about striving to find Him.
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It's about opening yourself up to say, "I'm at the end of myself. I'm done. I've been wrong." "I want to receive everything that you have." And it's His grace that He wants to pour Himself into you.
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So what did you do?
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What did you flag and ground?
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If you haven't done it, today's the day.
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Okay, today's the day.
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If you're not sure if you've done it, come and talk.
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Come and talk to me.
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Get one of our leaders, grab a day of talks, and grab one of us and say, "I'm not really sure." He says, "As you receive Christ, so walk in Him." What does it mean to walk in Christ?
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He explains it.
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He says, "Rooted and built up." It's planted in Christ.
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in Christ.
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Build up, that's heroic!
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Those are characteristics of Christians.
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That they're in Christ, and are rooted in Christ.
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What about this religious identity over here, "No, I'm rooted in Christ." "This is where I'm at." "This is where I'm staying." "Why?" Because this is where I'm rooted.
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How do you know that thing's working for you?
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I'm being built up.
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Christ is working in me.
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I'm being built up.
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build up he's building me up growing in him and lastly characteristic of Christians see the last word in verse 7, Thanksgiving this is a bounty of Thanksgiving that should be true of every Christian that should be true of every Christian even if every day from here on out is the worst day of your entire life in your life That the God of the universe chose to not put our mercy against you.
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That the God of the universe put his punishment on his Son so that you could be pronounced not guilty and gracious in God's eyes.
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Abound with thanksgiving.
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So that's what a successful church is.
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A successful church is...
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He's charismed in Do you find your confidence based on the person and work of Jesus Christ?
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Last July and August, those were two months of destruction in my life.
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Two months of borderline despair.
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At the plenary I'm launching this church, right?
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And we don't have the funds that we think we need.
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We don't have some of the people that we think we need.
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I never have so many times a day to sit and go, "I don't know how this is going to happen." "God, I believe that you called us to play at this church." And I'm just going to be honest with you, there's nothing like God.
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I'm not doubting you.
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I'm doubting something. Maybe ultimately I was.
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It was rough. I thought, "How in the world is it going to happen?" How in the world is this church going to happen?
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Many of you know, there was a day that sort of changed everything for the church.
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We had a corporate meeting at our house.
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And I was happy, especially down the day, because of some circumstances.
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And as we're talking, as some of the leaders were talking about moving forward, I don't want to get that.
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You know, we don't need microphones and signs and all this stuff to have a church.
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Then he looked around the room and he said, "This is my church." Then somebody else said, "Yeah, I don't care if you're a pastor or a judge, live your life. This is my church." And the elder woke up and he said, "Man, I told you you can plant this church. I'll go wherever you are, man." He's like, "I'm going to go wherever you are, because I'm with you, man." And one by one, everybody in our group was like, "You know, this is my church. This is my church." And I gotta tell you, that day changed everything for me.
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Because I was so just discouraged.
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I'd like to tell you I was this awesome warrior clawing forward.
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But honestly, I'll be honest, there were days I was like Moses.
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I was like, "God, this isn't working, just kill me." Honestly, I don't say that tritely.
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There were days that I said, "God, this isn't working, I just wish you'd kill me." Because I don't see how you're possibly using me or anyone else.
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But to see everyone one by one say, "We're moving forward." "God has promised us this, and God is going to provide." Well later that night, Samuel and Laura led worship in our living room.
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And I don't know, I don't have words to really describe what happened.
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Other than to say, the Holy Spirit manifested His presence on our group somehow in a way that I've never experienced before.
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I just grabbed anybody that was there that night and asked them about it.
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It was just like the Holy Spirit just grabbed us.
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I remember after they were done leading worship and I was supposed to get up and speak, I was completely, do you remember this?
50:27-50:28
I was completely paralyzed.
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Like I know I should get up and say something, but I can't.
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I just wanted to sit there, like I just sit here forever.
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and just feel this presence of the Spirit.
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And I talk to a lot of my group members, I'm like, "Was that just me?" Or was... they're like, "No." "No, the Holy Spirit was really... really speaking to us that way." What the Holy Spirit was speaking to us was, It doesn't matter the stuff that you have, or how many people you have.
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When the Holy Spirit was confirming to us, He would say, "Listen, I'm here. You have the Holy Spirit." So the issue, the question that we kept facing, that I kept facing, is this church going to succeed?
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I sat in a room full of people that were encouraged in heart, that were in it at heart, that the confidence in Christ was established in faith.
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So the question was, is this church going to succeed in the Holy Spirit?
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In His way, a still small voice showed up and said, "No, it can't succeed." You've got to answer for your faith.
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Father, all glory and honor and praise.
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Be unto you.
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Father, we can regard this church as right now a handful of people leading a squad to war.
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and take worldly standards and evaluate are we successful.
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But your work tells us what makes you a successful church.
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The Father is my prayer that as we go forward, we we never lose that sense of wonder that you are the one that's doing the work.
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Jesus said, "I will build my church." And I pray, Father, as we go forward, that we would allow the encouragement and love and confidence, and that just be rooted in our faith and say, "We are following Christ." Just as we made that decision individually, we're making that decision corporately.
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We want to follow Jesus Christ.
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Praise Him who used Bible.
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Live by the Bible.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Colossians 2:1-7
Breakout Questions:
Pray for one another.