Review:
Be the Church!
Be Authentic! (1 Thes 1:1-3)
Be an Example! (1 Thes 1:4-10)
Be Done with People Pleasing! (1 Thes 2:1-8)
Be an Imitator! (1 Thes 2:9-16)
Be an Overcomer! (1 Thes 2:17-3:5)
Be the Church!
Encouragement:
The Church's Report Card: With What Subjects Do We Evaluate the Health of the Church?
- FAITH (1 Thes 3: 6-7, 10)
- LOVE (1 Thes 3:6, 12)
- FELLOWSHIP (1 Thes 3:6)
- PERSEVERANCE (1 Thes 3:8)
- TEACHABILITY (1 Thes 3:10)
- HOPE (1 Thes 3:13)
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above with your cursor for answers!
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00:00-00:02
1 Thessalonians chapter 3.
00:02-00:06
Before we get to the text, it's important to remind you of the context.
00:07-00:19
We've been going through this book, so many of you are up to speed on this, but just as a reminder, in Acts chapter 17, the Apostle Paul planted this church in Thessalonica.
00:19-00:24
And we saw last week in the text that Paul was talking about being torn away from them.
00:24-00:26
What is he talking about?
00:26-00:39
Well, when they planted the church, many people came to Jesus in Thessalonica, but you can read this in Acts 17, this big riot breaks out and Paul and Silas were accused of starting an insurrection.
00:39-01:28
Like yeah, these guys don't, they don't worship our king, they worship a different king and they're gonna cause problems and there's all these accusations railed against them and this riot breaks out and Paul and Silas had to be snuck out of the city by night. 1 Thessalonians is a very personal book because we've seen over and over in our text that Paul was very concerned about this church. Is this baby church still living in Christ? So we saw last week Paul said that he sent Timothy to establish and exhort them in their faith and to report back to Paul on how they were doing.
01:29-01:31
And we stopped last week in verse 5 in chapter 3.
01:32-01:47
He said, "I sent to learn about your faith for fear that somehow the tempter" - that's Satan - "the tempter had tempted you and our labor would be in vain." That was Paul's concern that his labor would be in vain.
01:48-01:58
Like, we worked so hard, we worked so hard, and we preached the Gospel so hard, and we invested in you, and Satan gets you off track.
02:01-02:02
That your faith withered.
02:03-02:10
And you can imagine - I'd like to remind you because it's so hard - in our day and age, it's so hard for us to imagine this.
02:12-02:14
Imagine Paul here in the interim.
02:14-02:17
He sends Timothy to find out how they're doing.
02:17-02:19
Remember I told you Paul couldn't get on Facebook.
02:20-02:21
Like Thessalonica has a Facebook page.
02:21-02:22
Let's see how they're doing.
02:23-02:25
Or let's check their Twitter account.
02:25-02:32
Or I'm going to get on their website and look at their latest news and see how they-- those are all things that we have.
02:32-02:42
You can find out how any of us are doing, whether it's through websites, social media, email, FaceTime, Google Hangouts, Skype, you name it.
02:43-02:46
You can keep track of just about anybody in our day and age.
02:46-02:52
But in Paul's day, so he sends Timothy, and it wasn't like Timothy could call and check in.
02:52-02:54
Could you imagine Paul's concern here?
02:55-02:56
How are they doing?
02:56-02:57
How are they doing?
02:57-02:58
How are they doing?
02:58-03:00
When's Timothy coming back?
03:00-03:07
We saw it over-- he was so concerned about this church because he loved them so much.
03:08-03:16
And Paul knew that this report was either going to encourage him or discourage him.
03:16-03:20
It was either going to inspire him or it was going to dishearten him.
03:20-03:30
The title of your message today is "Be an Encourager." And when we talk about encouragement, I want you to understand that encouragement is not just a high five.
03:31-03:35
Like, "Bob, you were fantastic today! High five!" Is that encouraging? Yeah.
03:36-03:42
But that's not really the depth of what it means in the Bible when we talk about encouragement.
03:44-03:54
Encouragement isn't just, you know, "Cheer up!" Like, "Mark, I know you had a rough week, but hey, cheer up, buddy, things are going to get better." Is that encouraging? Yes.
03:55-03:58
But that's not really the depth of biblical encouragement.
04:01-04:04
Okay, so I thought a lot about this this week.
04:04-04:07
While you're doing what you do at work, this is what I'm doing.
04:08-04:22
And I really wrestled with how can I possibly define encouragement to do justice to the biblical depth that the Word has?
04:23-04:27
And I had several definitions that I wrote out and scratched out.
04:27-04:35
And I think the best way to describe it to you is by using an illustration.
04:35-04:38
And I'm going to use a non-personal illustration.
04:40-04:42
How many people in here plant a garden?
04:43-04:45
How many people are gardeners in here?
04:45-04:45
Raise them up high.
04:46-04:47
OK.
04:47-04:48
Many of you are.
04:48-04:49
You plant gardens.
04:49-04:50
How do you do with that?
04:50-04:51
Gardeners.
04:52-04:52
How do you do?
04:52-04:53
Angie, I see you laughing.
04:53-04:54
Your garden's good.
04:55-04:57
Anybody have a garden not so good?
05:00-05:02
I saw those hands go up much slower.
05:03-05:09
It's so funny, because we literally have like a 16th of an acre or something.
05:09-05:14
We live on this little-- as many of you have been to our house-- we live in this little tiny piece of land.
05:14-05:17
But that doesn't stop my wife from being a gardener.
05:17-05:20
And she gets all these buckets that she hangs on the fence.
05:20-05:24
And she's like, yeah, these are tomatoes, and here's corn.
05:25-05:26
I'm like, you got corn in that little bucket?
05:27-05:34
And she plants just all these things and does a fantastic job.
05:36-05:49
But when you plant a garden and it grows and it's healthy, it sort of inspires you to keep at it and do it again, right?
05:50-05:54
If you're planting a garden and you're like, hey, I'm pretty good at this, it's working.
05:54-06:23
Angela Wagner, like it's working and I'm gonna make my garden a little bit bigger and it's it's working. It inspires you to do it more and better. But if you take a swing at planting a garden and everything withers and dies, it discourages you or you could say it inspires you to quit. Say I planted this thing and it looks like a graveyard. I'm not exactly cut out for gardening.
06:26-07:01
Now you can understand that basic simple illustration. Now I want you to think of the emotion behind that that increases a billion fold when you're dealing with people, okay? Because we're not is talking about planting a garden, we're talking about planting a church. And the care and nurturing and affection and personal stake that goes into people is so much more than goes into a silly little plant.
07:04-07:24
So you can understand Paul, he plants this church and he knows with this report either they're growing and healthy which is going to encourage him in ministry or they're withering and dying and it's discouraging. It's discouraging. How are they? How are they?
07:24-07:50
Are they strong in the faith? Are they weak? Is the church growing? Did the Thessalonians have to close the doors of their church? Again, Paul had no way of knowing in his day. Well, in the passage last week he said he sent Timothy and in the passage we're going to look at now. He's talking about Timothy coming back and giving the report. Okay, everybody with me? 1 Thessalonians 3.6.
07:52-08:09
He says, "But now that Timothy has come to us from you and has brought us the good news of your faith and love and reported that you always remember us kindly and long to Come and see us as we long to see you.
08:12-08:24
For this reason, brothers, in all our distress and affliction, we have been comforted about you, or encouraged, through your faith.
08:26-08:33
For now we live, if you are standing fast in the Lord.
08:35-08:36
I'm going to pause here for a second.
08:36-08:46
"For now we live if you are standing fast in the Lord." What does that mean? "For now we live." Like our lives are on the line, are we going to die if we get a bad report?
08:48-09:09
It's just a figure of speech. When you think about it, we say things like that all the time, right? "Moms, I was scared to death." Right? Don't we say something like that? "I was scared to death." Some dads say that. "I was scared." You weren't literally scared to death, were you?" That's an expression. I was so scared, like...
09:09-09:13
I think that's sort of the terminology that Paul's using here.
09:14-09:35
"I was worried sick over you." He's like, "But after hearing this report, man, I feel alive, like I am so excited, you guys are doing great, and that's revived me, and we were so worried, and we're wringing our hands and pacing, how are they?" And then we get the news, And we're like, "Aha!" It's refreshing.
09:36-09:37
It's revitalizing.
09:38-09:41
For now we live if you are standing fast in the Lord.
09:43-09:46
For what Thanksgiving can we return to God for you?
09:47-09:51
For all the joy that we feel for your sake before our God.
09:52-10:00
As we pray most earnestly night and day that we may see you face to face and supply what is lacking in your faith.
10:02-10:06
This next little section here is actually-- Paul breaks into a prayer.
10:06-10:09
Just right in the middle of his letter, he just breaks into a prayer.
10:10-10:12
You see, this prayer is sort of in the third person.
10:12-10:12
It's not in the second.
10:13-10:15
He's not saying, OK, dear God, would you please?
10:16-10:18
He's praying, but it's sort of in the third person.
10:18-10:19
You'll see that here.
10:19-10:44
He goes, now, may our God and Father himself and our Lord Jesus Christ direct our way to you, And may the Lord make you increase and abound in love for one another and for all, as we do for you, so that he may establish your hearts blameless in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.
10:47-10:54
Timothy brought the report, the question is, what was it that he and Paul were evaluating?
10:56-10:57
That's what we're going to look at today.
10:58-11:14
If these spiritual assessments either encourage us because of their growth or discourage us because there's not spiritual growth, the question that we need to ask ourselves is, how do we evaluate a church?
11:15-11:21
What was Timothy, when he rolled up into Thessalonica, what kinds of things was he looking for?
11:21-11:30
Paul's like, "Timothy, I want you to go do a little preaching, and I want you to come back and tell me how they're doing." So what kinds of things was Timothy looking for when he was there?
11:31-11:33
How do you evaluate a church?
11:36-11:40
About three years ago, we had a couple come to our church.
11:40-11:40
You remember this?
11:40-11:43
This couple came and visited, and I follow up with visitors.
11:44-11:54
I called them and I said, "You know, it's great to meet you and tell me a little bit about your experience." And they said, "Well, this is our ministry.
11:54-11:55
We don't belong to any church.
11:55-11:59
Our ministry is we go around and evaluate churches and then we do a write-up on the internet.
12:01-12:02
That's our ministry.
12:03-12:10
And we're going to be doing a write-up about you." And I remember getting off the phone and I was like, "That's not a ministry!
12:11-12:12
I've read the Bible.
12:12-12:41
I know the spiritual gifts. There's no spiritual gift of evaluating churches, and who do they think they are evaluating our ministry?" And I'm just like, "I'd better get online and see what they say." So I log in, and we got rave reviews from this couple. So I was like, "I guess that's a valid ministry. I mean, you know, the Lord cuts us all different ways and that's obviously what he's prepared them for and you know.
12:43-12:53
How do we evaluate ministry? Well it's not about numbers, okay, we say this at Harvest, it's not about a quantity of disciples, it's about a quality of discipleship.
12:55-13:02
My primary concern isn't for the people who aren't here, my concern is for the people who are. I want to see you grow in Christ.
13:03-13:23
Okay, my concern is for the quality. I believe that God will take care of the quantity. Our concern is for the quality. How do we evaluate? Well, did the musicians hit every note? And how much is spent on that church's communion trays? And how creative are they in putting their services together?
13:26-14:42
And what's the record of the church's softball team? That's how we evaluate the church? What's the record of their softball team? Or, you know, how good are their potlucks? None of those are criteria for evaluating a church. What encourages, what inspires a pastor and inspires ministry leaders and authentic believers in a church Church is really one thing. And it's seeing fruit of God at work. The question is, are we seeing God genuinely at work? You have to know as a pastor, that's what I'm evaluating constantly. Am I seeing God at work in this church? Because if God is at work, if God is saving people and we see people being changed and we see relationships being healed and we see people growing in Christlikeness. God's at work. That's encouraging. Look, we're gonna keep at it. We're seeing, you know, people getting baptized and we're seeing exciting things happening. We're gonna keep at it.
14:43-15:07
If we're not seeing those things as a church, it's discouraging, right? Did you imagine if we've been, you know, doing this in almost four years and every week It's turning a school into a church and all the work that goes into everything from music to bulletins to You know putting signs up and all the work that goes into this if we're not seeing God at work Then we're just gonna sit back and be like, what are we doing?
15:08-15:14
What are we doing if God's not at work here? Look people just go home Why are we here?
15:15-15:28
We're paying a lot of money to rent a facility and we're paying a lot of money to maintain a website and advertise through the radio and we're doing all these things and if God's not at work, what are we doing?
15:30-15:34
So we're going to do something a little different today because of the tone of the text here.
15:35-15:36
We're going to school.
15:38-15:42
But don't worry, you, today you're going to be the evaluator.
15:43-15:47
You're going to be the grade decider.
15:49-15:53
Remember when you were in school, how well are you doing academically?
15:53-15:55
Well, you had a list of subjects.
15:57-16:00
And every six weeks, you'd get the report card, right?
16:01-16:03
What were some of the subjects on the report card?
16:03-16:04
Like, what were the important ones?
16:05-16:06
Go ahead, Jim.
16:07-16:08
Yeah, absolutely.
16:08-16:10
Physical education, right?
16:10-16:14
Our accountant, our treasurer is like math.
16:15-16:16
I am not a math person.
16:17-16:18
History, right?
16:18-16:18
History.
16:20-16:20
Science.
16:21-16:22
OK, I got into science.
16:22-16:23
I love science.
16:23-16:24
What else was on there?
16:25-16:26
English, right?
16:27-16:31
English and reading and-- what else was there?
16:31-16:33
Let's go to some obscure ones now.
16:34-16:34
Art.
16:35-16:36
Woodchop.
16:37-16:37
Home Ec.
16:39-16:39
Health class.
16:39-16:40
Yeah, health class.
16:41-16:42
OK, so you guys get the point.
16:42-16:45
On your report card, you have a list of subjects.
16:45-16:46
And they're like, how are you doing academically?
16:47-16:52
here are the things, and we're kind of grading you on how you're doing.
16:52-16:59
So your bulletin insert today, I want you to see this as a report card.
17:00-17:01
So you're not just taking notes.
17:02-17:03
Here's what I want you to do today.
17:04-17:10
So you're going to, over in this column here, just write a C.
17:11-17:16
Just write the letter C, and then you can draw a line down and write an M.
17:16-18:02
Okay, just write like a C and an M. Here's what this means. You're going to give a grade. And as we go through each of these, we're going to go through them quickly, but as we go through these, for C, you're going to grade this church. Isn't that what Timothy did? He was evaluating the church, he was giving a report, and these were the things that Paul said that he was reporting on, and these were the things that Paul was very concerned about. These were the things that Paul was reflecting on in this passage, okay? These aren't just like, these aren't like random things I like made up, okay? They're all from the text. What we're going to do today is we're going to evaluate our church on the criteria that Paul was going after and that Timothy was going after this passage. And some of you are like, "Man, this is like my second or like first time here." That's okay.
18:04-18:09
You can just put A's for everything. Just use like the A through F scale, okay?
18:14-18:18
We Because what does the scripture say? The scripture says examine yourself to see if you're in the faith, right?
18:20-18:22
Examine yourself to see if you're in the faith.
18:23-18:42
Here's the thing, as we evaluate the church, it's easy to step back and say, "Well, here's some things I don't like about Harvest Bible Chapel, and da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da." But you know, the church is made up, the components of the church are the individuals, right?
18:43-18:52
As we talk about this criteria, this church is only going to be as good as each of us are doing in these areas.
18:52-18:53
Does that make sense?
18:53-18:55
For example, we're going to talk about love here in a second.
18:56-18:59
You may not seem very loving at church. Well, how loving are you?
19:00-19:03
You don't seem very warm at that church. How warm and welcoming are you?
19:05-19:20
You know, are you going to sit back and criticize on how the church can improve, Or are you going to say, you know what, this is an area that I can see our church is missing, and if I'm honest, I'm not doing so hot in that area either.
19:22-19:26
And I'm going to cheerlead moving forward with that.
19:26-19:28
Okay, so that's what we're doing today.
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We're going to go through the list here in the text as we understand and explain and apply it, and you're going to give a grade.
19:37-19:39
All right, so this is the church's report card.
19:40-19:43
with what subjects do we evaluate the health of the church?
19:44-19:52
Number one, faith. Faith. Over and over in the passage, right?
19:52-19:56
He says, "Timothy, verse six, has brought us the good news of your faith.
19:57-20:01
Verse seven, comforted about you through your faith.
20:01-20:08
Verse ten, supply what is lacking in your faith." And Paul's just like, "Faith, faith, faith." Faith is number one.
20:08-20:09
It's at the top of your list.
20:10-20:12
In other words, it is the most important subject in school.
20:14-20:22
And we could get into debates over what was the most important subject in elementary school and high school.
20:22-20:23
We could debate that.
20:24-20:26
There's definitely no debate here.
20:27-20:36
Because the number one thing to evaluate, considering the health of the church, is the faith of its people.
20:37-20:38
This is where it has to start.
20:39-20:45
The question is not, are people happy at the church or are people leaving entertained?
20:46-20:50
The issue is, do people understand life in Jesus Christ?
20:50-20:53
Do people in this church understand the gospel?
20:54-21:01
If you've been coming here for a while, you notice that I, in some way, shape or form, talk about the gospel of Jesus Christ in every sermon.
21:01-21:02
Why?
21:02-22:53
get a visitor that's never heard it before, or we might get the guy that's heard it 50 times, but for some reason the 51st time the Lord's going to really let it sink in. We need to evaluate, do people in this church understand the gospel of Jesus Christ? Like what is the gospel of Jesus Christ? The God Almighty, the creator of everything whom we rebelled against as a people. About 2,000 years ago, He became a man. He took on flesh and blood. He became a man and dwelt among us. And we rejected Him. We hated Him as a people and we crucified Him. But that was God's plan. God came to lay down His life as a sacrifice for my sins. All the wrong things that I've done, God took it out on Jesus. God punished Jesus Christ for all of the things that I've done and all the things that you've done. When Jesus Christ was on the cross, that was the agony. The agony was God was pouring out his wrath on his Son because of all the stupid, wicked, rebellious things that I've done and that you've done. The Bible says three days later Jesus rose from the dead. He rose from the dead to give us eternal life. You see, when Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, God said, "If you eat off this tree," interesting Hebrew phrase, your English Bible says, "You will die. If you eat off this tree, you will die." But the Hebrew phrase is literally, "Dying, you will die." What God was saying to Adam and Eve was, "It's going to start a process that's going to culminate. What does that look like?
22:54-22:57
It looks like getting old and wearing out.
22:59-23:13
Took my son yesterday to the comic book convention and they have these celebrities and these actors and they had the stars. Remember that 1966 Batman TV show? Remember that? Did you ever see that show?
23:13-23:19
Pow, bam, zap, you know that show? And it was very campy and very funny and they had the actors there.
23:19-23:21
And I'm going to tell you something.
23:21-23:24
They look a lot different today than they did 49 years ago.
23:26-23:28
And I'm not criticizing, because guess what?
23:28-23:28
I saw a picture.
23:28-23:40
My niece texted me a picture of me holding her sister, my younger niece, texted me a picture of me holding her when she was a baby.
23:40-23:41
And I had her wedding last week.
23:42-23:43
I'll tell you what.
23:43-23:45
I've changed in the last 20 years.
23:47-23:56
I'm looking at this picture of me that she sent, I'm like, "Look at me." I was so like, full of life and hope and, what happened?
23:58-24:02
That's why we're getting old and wearing out and dying, because of sin.
24:03-24:13
But you see Jesus Christ, he rose from the dead to give us eternal life, that Jesus said, I am the resurrection and the life, John chapter 11.
24:14-24:44
Jesus said, "Whoever believes in him will live even if he dies. So I know that someday this physical body is going to wear out, I am going to die, but because of faith in Jesus Christ, he has given me eternal life that will continue on through heaven. The gospel says you need to turn from your sin and by faith you need to receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. And there's no plan B.
24:45-24:49
You're like, well, "You know what, I want to go to heaven when I die.
24:49-24:57
I want this eternal life you're talking about, but I'm not really crazy about following Jesus." There's no plan B, there's not.
24:58-25:04
You won't find any page in the Bible where God's like, "Well, if you're not interested in Jesus, you can try this." There's not.
25:05-25:13
There's only one person who paid the penalty for your sin, and there's only one person that can give you his eternal life.
25:13-25:16
And that is the perfect Son of God.
25:17-25:22
God's perfect man and man's perfect God, that's Jesus Christ.
25:23-25:23
He's the only one.
25:25-25:26
That's the gospel.
25:27-25:31
So when we evaluate the church, the question is, how are we doing in faith?
25:32-25:38
How would you evaluate this church in our understanding of the gospel and our living out of the gospel?
25:39-25:48
Romans 10, 17 says, "Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of Christ. Is this a church where our faith is growing?
25:49-26:14
We're seeing greater trust and dependency on the Lord, greater understanding of God's Word, greater growth in Jesus Christ. Like, well, how do you even evaluate that? Well, at Harvest Bible Chapel, we talk about worship, walk, and work. That's what a disciple does. We believe a disciple of Jesus Christ does three things. Every disciple of Jesus Christ, first of all, worships Christ.
26:16-26:28
That's why we place such a premium on getting together here and lifting our voices. You know, Jesus told this Samaritan woman at the well in John chapter 4 that God was seeking worshippers, okay?
26:28-26:40
If that's what God's seeking, let him find some here, right? Worshippers who worship him in spirit and truth. So we as disciples worship Christ. Secondly, we walk with Christ.
26:41-26:52
That's our personal prayer and time in God's Word and time meditating on God's Word. And part of that is also small groups that were involved in a community of believers in small groups.
26:53-26:58
We meet in each other's homes and we talk about God's Word and we pray for and with each other.
27:00-27:05
And we believe that a disciple not only worships, not only walks, we believe that a disciple works for Christ.
27:06-27:21
Meaning shouldering the weekly kingdom responsibility and whether that's helping set up signs, turning a school into a church, greeting people with our hospitality team, so many options of working.
27:22-27:32
That's how we evaluate our people living out an act of faith. Are they worshipping Christ? Are they walking with Christ and are they working for Christ?
27:33-27:34
How would you grade the church on that?
27:35-27:37
And how would you grade yourself on that?
27:38-27:40
How are you doing in your faith right now?
27:41-27:44
There's someone here right now that says, you know, Pastor Jim, my faith is strong.
27:44-27:46
I've seen God do some big things right now.
27:46-27:50
I'm like a solid A because I'm seeing God at work in my life.
27:50-27:51
Again, that's not bragging.
27:52-27:53
It's not, we're not bragging about you.
27:54-27:56
We're boasting in the Lord, which is biblical.
27:57-27:59
But are you seeing God do some big things in your life?
27:59-28:01
And faith comes from God, by the way.
28:02-28:04
So how do you see that in your life?
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How do you see it in the church?
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Number two is love.
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Love is the evidence of growing faith.
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Not feeling and not speaking, but love in action.
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What grade would you give this church on love?
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Is this church a loving place?
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And I gotta tell you from a pastoral perspective, as I said earlier, anytime somebody visits, I call them that week and I just say, "Hey, how can I pray for you?
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"Do you wanna ask me any questions about the church?
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"What was your experience like with this?" By far, the number one comment that I hear about this church, I felt very loved and welcomed at that church.
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That's the number one thing that I hear.
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I just really felt like people made me at home while I was there.
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I'd give you an A. I'm asking you, how would you grade the church?
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Are you seeing something that I'm not?
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I remember a few weeks ago, Luke Aarons from Harvest Columbus was here.
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You know what the number one thing he said was about our church?
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He goes, your church is so warm.
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And he didn't mean like last year when the air conditioner didn't work, and Mike Gates is like throwing water on water on people.
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He didn't mean warm like that.
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He meant we embrace people.
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I just felt so welcomed at your church.
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I'd give you an A.
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What about personally?
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How are you growing in love?
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How would you evaluate your own love?
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Well, you're like, well, can you help me with the evaluation?
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Sure I can.
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How do I know I'm growing in love?
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Here's some things to think about.
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How do I know I'm growing in love?
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I'm just going to give you four things.
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Number one, I have more concern for other people and less concern with myself.
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That's how you know you're growing in love.
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I have more concern for other people and less concern about myself.
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The opposite of love really is selfishness.
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My way, my preferences, things at the church have to be done my way.
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And I like everything to be to my preferences.
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Oh, you mean like everybody else on the planet?
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You're so unique.
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Everything has to be comfortable for me.
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That's not love.
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Love is, I care more about the other person.
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You know, what about their preferences?
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How can I minister to that person?
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How can I lay down my rights?
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You see, as you're growing in that, you're growing in love.
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Secondly, I have done, we talked all about trials last week.
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Here's another way that you know that you're growing in love is that you have less preoccupation with your trials and more preoccupation with people.
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You know what I'm talking about.
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There are some people that are so preoccupied with their trials that they can't get out of their box.
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And look, I'm not trying to diminish trials are hard.
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We've all been through them, right?
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We've all been through them.
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I'm not, don't take this away, I don't mean it.
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But some people, decades locked in their box and it's my trial, it's my trial.
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My life is so hard, my life is so difficult and I just can't seem to get out of it and nothing's ever gonna be good for me.
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Life stinks and you know, life is just so horrible.
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people, we all go through trials and we are to minister to one another, but when we are constantly locked into a "poor me" mentality, that is not love. That is too much preoccupation with yourself. I am trying to say that as lovingly as I can. As a church, we need to – we talked about this last week – we come alongside each other and we love each other through each other's trials.
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As you grow in love you realize, I need to be investing in other people.
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You know what, my life is hard, but I have opportunity to love people and disciple people and maybe I can allow God to use the trials that I'm going through to minister to others.
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I pray to God that you took that the way that I meant it because by no means was that intended to be a being dismissive of your trials.
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We all go through them.
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We should be going through them together and we should be looking to helping other people go through theirs, allowing other people to help us go through ours.
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That's where love relationships happen.
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How do we know we're growing in love?
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Thirdly, it's shown in giving. We talked about this in January.
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It reflects in giving. It just does. It's an objective test.
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Jesus said where your treasure is, that's where your heart is. Bam.
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Well, I love God. Does your money reflect that?
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Oh, no, no, no, we're not talking about money. Well, Jesus was.
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Jesus said where your treasure is, that's where your heart is.
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Like I love missions. Do you give the missions? And see I'm preaching to the choir here.
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We told you a couple weeks ago, you know between raising money to send to the training center and Raising raising money to send seven people to go build this training center. Nearly $40,000 has come in from this church Just for Romania That's not counting the generosity that it comes in for special needs that come up and I can tell you stories of furnaces being replaced and transmissions and cars being replaced and all these little things that are happening that you don't even know about. And if there was a grade higher than A+ that I could give you for demonstrating your love through generosity, I certainly would. Because you have shown it over and over. Here's a pastor in Moldova whose house is crumbling and I guarantee you there probably wasn't two people in this church that could point to Moldova on a map. But you're like, "This His house is crumbling, this pastor I've never met that lives in a place that I've never heard of, here's what, $6,000.
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Like what?
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Your generosity is astounding.
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I believe that the reason you're so generous is because you love.
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You love.
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Your love moves you to give.
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That's biblical, we get that, right?
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I'll be honest with you, this is going to sound blasphemous, you don't even need the Bible for that.
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know that just from when you love somebody you give them stuff, right?
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That's just, that's like in us. Love and giving are just tied together.
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You love your wife, you give stuff to her. You love your husband, you give stuff to him. You love your kids, you get stuff for them. We express love and giving and you have excelled in that so much. How do we know we're growing in love? Last one is, um, last one for today. There's so many more things I could say, but it comes straight from the text, compassion for the lost.
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Verse 12, he says, "May the Lord make you increasingly bound in love for one another," look at this next phrase, "and for all." Who's the for all?
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Well, the one another is the church, and for all is the people that are outside the church.
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That's an evangelistic phrase, and that's really the highest rung of the love ladder is when you have compassion for the lost.
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You know those people that think you're stupid because you go to church and read your Bible and worship Jesus and you're so stupid.
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Those people that would ridicule you and mock you and take advantage of you and you love them?
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That's the highest rung of the love ladder.
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When you're sharing the gospel with people, you're sharing the love of Christ with people, you're inviting people to come to church with you, you're praying for lost people, you're involved in our small group outreach that happens.
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It's love.
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How would you grade the church on that?
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How would you grade yourself on that?
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Thirdly, fellowship.
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Fellowship.
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We've seen this over and over, haven't we?
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6, we see it again.
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You long to see us as we long to see you.
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Fellowship is more than the dreaded potluck.
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Like what's your deal with the potluck?
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You know what my deal is with the potluck.
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Many of you know.
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I have no problem eating something if I know where it came from.
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Okay, I've been to your house.
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If I go to your house and you put something in front of me, I'm gonna eat it because I've been to your house.
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I know where it came from.
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If I don't know where something came from, I don't wanna eat it, okay?
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It's nothing personal.
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That's my thing with the potlucks, okay?
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Like, what are you talking about?
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Fellowship is more than that.
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Fellowship, biblically, is all things in common.
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You see this in the book of Acts.
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Your need is my need.
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When we heard that this person in our church had transmission problems in their car, we all had transmission problems with our car.
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When we heard this person in our church was having problems with their furnace, as I mentioned before, Suddenly we all had a problem with our furnace.
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Your need is my need, that's fellowship.
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How would you grade this church on that?
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How would you grade yourself on that?
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How much do you long to be with people?
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Our small group, we're having a hard time in our small group, we're trying to shorten the night because people don't wanna leave.
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That's a good problem to have versus we can't get anybody to come.
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Our problem is nobody wants to leave when they get there, so how can we shorten the night a little bit. That's a good problem to have. Number four, perseverance.
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Perseverance, verse 8. He says, "For now we live if you are standing fast." Standing fast. Standing fast in the Greek is a steko. English spelling it out is s -t-e-k-o.
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It's actually a military term. It's a military term for when an enemy's attacking and you ain't retreating. That's what steko is. Like enemies coming and you're like, "I'm not backing down.
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I'm going to stand here and fight no matter what.
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I will fight to my dying breath." That's the word that Paul used here.
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He says, "Oh, we're refreshed because you're not willing to retreat.
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You're standing strong in the Lord no matter what comes." I'm standing.
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That's perseverance.
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Saving faith is always persevering faith.
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And you don't know if you have faith until a trial comes.
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You don't know if you have faith until a trial comes. That's just all there is to it.
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You don't know what you really believe until it's put to the test.
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For example with us, when Aaron was pregnant with Cade, you know, we've always been like anti-abortion, right? We believe that a baby in utero has as much right to live as I do.
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And we've always been anti-abortion.
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But when Aaron was pregnant with Cade, the doctor said, you have two choices.
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You can either go blind, or you can abort the baby.
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And we had these doctors counseling Aaron to abort Cade.
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Because they said, if you take this pregnancy to term, you're going to completely lose your eyesight.
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Anybody want to take a guess how long it took Aaron to mull over this decision?
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Like, no time at all? Aaron's like, "We're not killing the baby." It's one thing to say, "Oh, I'd never get an abortion." "Oh, what if it's gonna cost you your eyesight? What if you're gonna be blind for the rest of your life?" So you don't really know what you believe until it's put to the test, right? That's why trials are a good thing.
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Find out what you're made of.
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Evaluation for myself and I would also say small group leaders, Dan and Jay and Ben, future small group leaders, you are doing and I am doing a terrible job discipling people if the first trial that comes along just knocks them out.
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We're doing a terrible job discipling people.
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We need to disciple people to stand firm.
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It's going to get rough.
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That was last week's whole sermon.
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It's going to get rough out there.
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What are you going to do about it?
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Are you going to run?
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Are you going to stand strong in the Lord?
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Perseverance.
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Number five, teachability.
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Teachability.
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Verse 10, Paul says they were praying night and day that they can get together face to face.
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Phraser, he says, "Supply what is lacking in your faith." Like, what in the world does that mean? It doesn't mean that Paul was like, "Well, you don't really have full faith. You have like 50% faith, and we need to give you the other 50% or you don't really have faith." That's not what that means. You either have faith or you don't. You either trust Jesus Christ or you don't. You're either born again or you're dead in your sins. You either have faith or you don't. So what's talking about? He's talking about teaching them more doctrine. He's talking about teaching them more about the faith. Why? You remember this, they were whisked out of there in a hurry. They plant this church in like three or four weeks, like gone, you know, out of the city by night, on the run, riot breaks out. Paul's like, "We didn't get to tell you everything that we wanted to tell you." What more doctrine do you think it is? I'm a hundred percent convinced the thing that's lacking, the more doctrine he wants to teach is end times stuff, end of the world teaching what in a theological term is eschatology. I believe that that was the thing that he wanted to teach them about. Why do you think that? Because we get to 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, guess what he writes about? It's eschatology, the coming of the Lord. You get to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, guess what he talks about? More end times stuff. I believe that because Paul's time was so short he didn't get to talk about what the second coming of Jesus Christ is going to look like. "Oh man, we got out of town before we could teach you about that!" Because you don't always lead with that, right?
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You don't always lead with that. You know, so you're like sitting in the, you know, desk and, you know, your co-worker comes up to you and, you know, "Well, can I understand you go to church? Can you tell me about that?" Like, "Yeah, let me tell you about the gospel.
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You know, Jesus Christ is going to establish a thousand year kingdom on the earth when he's going to restore all things to the way they were meant to be a creation.
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You know that during a thousand years, Satan's gonna be bound and Jesus is going to reign.
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It's called the millennial kingdom.
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You don't start with that, right?
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What do you start with?
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You're a sinner, God loves you, God died for you.
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You're Jesus Christ and Jesus rose from the dead so you might have eternal life.
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That's the gospel.
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usually start with the millennial kingdom of Jesus and the second coming of Jesus and I think that that's what Paul was talking about here like there's some more stuff we needed to tell you. I can't wait to get face-to-face with you tell you more. But they obviously had a teachable spirit and some people go to church to learn what the Bible says and others go to church to see if the preacher teaches what they want to hear. How would you grade this church?
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on teachability.
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How would you grade this church on teachability?
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How would you grade yourself on teachability?
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I hope you've been grading the church on yourself.
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I don't think I have.
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I thought that had to do with perseverance.
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How are we doing?
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How's your report card look?
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Report card, what card that you're going to be happy to give to your mom?
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card that you're hoping mom doesn't want to ask about. Finally today number six is hope. Number six is hope. End of his prayer in verses 11 through 13 he says said he may establish your hearts blameless and holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all his saints.
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A little eschatology preview there. But it's hope. We've already talked about this quite a bit.
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What is hope?
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It's living now with an eye on then.
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So as we evaluate the church, the question is how much does this church believe that Jesus is coming back?
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How much does this church believe that Jesus is coming back and how much does it affect how we live?
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How would you grade us?
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How would you grade yourself?
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How often in the past week have you thought about heaven?
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you longed for heaven? How much in the past week have you thought about the return of Jesus Christ?
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And honestly, I believe that's why so many people are depressed. There's so many people that are depressed. I think one of the biggest factors is people have bought into the mindset of this is how it's always going to be forever, nothing's ever going to change, and that's a lie from hell. Things are gonna get way better. Everything's gonna change.
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You know, so many times people say, "Oh, Pastor Jeff, I feel bad for you.
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Your son Owen doesn't talk, and I'm sure you'd love to talk to him, and I appreciate so much the compassion, but I have a standard answer for that." Like, you know what?
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It is hard.
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It is hard.
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I'm not going to discount that.
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I'm going to have all of eternity to talk to him.
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Okay, so I'm on the earth for just like a few years, and then for the few years that I'm on the earth, I can't talk to my son.
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But we're gonna be in eternity and it's gonna get to the point sometime in eternity like 20,000 years into eternity. I was gonna be like, okay, can we like stop talking for a while?
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I know Because reality is in about 15 minutes Jesus is going to come back And he's going to set everything straight How much does that Give you hope to press on. Integrating the church is easy, but you are a component of the church. And if you want the church to receive high marks in these areas, then you need to be growing in these areas as well.
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What kind of church would we be?
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What kind of impact would we have in our homes and in our workplaces and in our communities. If we went down this list on our report card and we as individuals and we as a church are scoring straight A's, what kind of impact would that have?
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As I close I just want to pray for us, but I want to pray for us the prayer that Paul had for the Thessalonians.
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Will you bow with me?
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Father in heaven, we thank you for your Word, and we want to, just now as we close this time in your Word, we want to pray it back to you.
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Certainly, Paul was in a different circumstance than we find ourselves in.
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The first part of his prayer was that he would be able to physically be with the Thessalonians.
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And God, we thank you we are able to physically be with each other.
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We do have many people that were part of this church that unfortunately had to move and we still keep in contact with and we still have much love for.
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But Father, we thank You that we have the ability to get together here and in our small groups.
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Father, may You make us increase and abound in love.
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First of all, for one another.
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Let us build each other up.
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Let us speak well of each other.
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Father, let us be a people that love the lost.
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It's hard to love people that don't really love you back.
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That's exactly what Jesus did and does.
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Father, give us a heart for the lost.
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Father, establish our hearts blameless and holy.
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Father, Your Word tells us that when we have the long view that things are not going to be like this forever and Jesus is coming back, that affects how we live right now, today.
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Father, we want to be holy as You are holy, and we can't do it ourselves.
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You have pronounced us holy through Your Son, and You have given us Your holiness.
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We just want to live out the reality of what you've already said that we are.
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You said that we're holy.
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You've empowered us to be holy.
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May we act in accordance to that.
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Father, I pray that we would continue to evaluate the church for the things that matter in evaluation.
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We certainly like to have fun.
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We certainly like to do things together and enjoy life together, but big picture, Father, we want to evaluate ourselves in the criteria that really matters.
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Father, help us to stand firm.
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Help us to love.
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Help us to look.
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long view to eternity.
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We praise You in the glorious name of Your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.
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Amen.
Breakout Questions:
My Report Card: Evaluate your health in these subjects. What is your strongest? Weakest? How can you "bring your grade up" in your weakest subject?
Faith (1 Thes 3:6,7,10)
Love (1 Thes 3:6,12)
Fellowship (1 Thes 3:6)
Perseverance (1 Thes 3:8)
Teachability (1 Thes 3:10)
Hope (1 Thes 3:13)