Review / Introduction:
Four Reasons We Are Committed to Expository Preaching:
- It determines the Sermons.
- It lets the Word Speak for itself.
- It gives us Confidence to read the Bible ourselves.
- It supernaturally Confidence to read the Bible ourselves.
Isaiah 55:10-11 - For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty; but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.
Romans 10:17 | 2 Corinthians 3:18 | Nehemiah 8:1-8
For God's Word to Be Effective:
- You have to Want it! (Neh 8:1-2)
- You have to be Attentive to it! (Neh 8:3)
- You have to Revere it! (Neh 8:4-6)
- You have to Understand it! (Neh 8:7-8)
John 15:11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
Ephesians 3:10 so that through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places.
Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!
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00:42-00:50
We're starting a series today, four weeks, called Harvest DNA, and this was at the request of our elders.
00:51-00:57
I'm seeing so many wonderful newer faces in our church and people getting involved in ministry.
00:58-01:03
The elders had asked that I do a message series on what kind of a church are we.
01:03-01:14
So we're going to be exploring our DNA as a church and sort of pulling the curtain back on why we do what we do at Harvest Bible Chapel.
01:14-01:21
So if you're a first-time visitor, this is a great time to jump on board, get a full view of who we are and what we're doing.
01:22-01:41
But many, many, many, many years ago, I was driving from Ohio back home, and it was the middle of the night, it was about three in the morning, and I was on 528 somewhere between Evans City and 19, and there was a car on my bumper.
01:42-01:51
Like again, three in the morning, I'm exhausted, I've been driving all night, there was a car in my bumper, and I'm thinking, you know what, I'm just gonna slow down and let 'em pass.
01:52-01:54
So I slowed down, they weren't passing.
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I slowed down almost to a crawl and they weren't passing.
01:59-02:00
I'm like, well, maybe I'll speed up a little bit.
02:01-02:07
And no, on my tail, high beams could not get rid of this person.
02:07-02:35
all I could think of was somebody's looking for trouble and I'll be honest with you I've been driving all night it's 3 in the morning I'm not in the mood to get engaged in any trouble. Kids I don't encourage this. How's that for a disclaimer? Never mind I don't want to tell this story. Okay um I'm like I'm not looking for trouble, pedal to the metal.
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And I went as fast as a Chevy Cavalier could go.
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I hit almost 40 miles per hour.
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I'm like, nobody's gonna be bothering me.
02:52-02:52
Well, you know what?
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That car did catch up with me.
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And this time it had blue and red lights flashing on the roof of the car.
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So I thought that person is not going to get me.
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That person got me.
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I'll tell you the rest of the story later.
03:10-03:13
But what made the difference?
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What made the difference between this car that was following me and the car with the blue and the red lights that were behind me?
03:21-03:22
What made the difference?
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The difference is something called authority.
03:27-03:29
We're gonna talk about authority today.
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Authority is the power or right to give orders, to make decisions, and to enforce obedience.
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That's what authority is.
03:43-03:51
I had zero intention of engaging with the person behind me until I saw that this was a person of authority.
03:54-04:01
And our source of authority at Harvest Bible Chapel, this is where this whole series starts And this is where it ends.
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Our source of authority at Harvest Bible Chapel is the Bible.
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That's why it is our middle name, Harvest Bible Chapel.
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This is our source of authority.
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This is the book that God wrote and everything we do comes from our view of Scripture.
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So the question we're going to look at today, how do we go after that at Harvest Bible Chapel?
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Now here's another disclaimer.
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In talking about what we do at Harvest, I am not condemning or criticizing how other pastors and other churches do it.
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Okay?
04:38-04:39
Everybody's got their thing.
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And I'm not really concerned with what other churches are doing, I'm concerned with what this church is doing.
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Because at Harvest Bible Chapel we have an unyielding conviction to know God through His Word by expository preaching.
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Teaching and preaching the Word of God, verse by verse, drawing the truth from the text.
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So I want you to jot some things down in your outline.
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These are four reasons that we are committed to expository preaching.
05:19-05:28
You know, for the person that might be sitting here saying, "It doesn't really matter, preaching style or how you preach, aren't all sermons the same?" No, they are not.
05:31-05:36
We are committed to verse by verse, expository, text gives us the meaning.
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That's what we're committed to.
05:39-05:47
I want to explain why. I could give you probably fifty reasons but I just want to give you four today.
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Four reasons we're committed to Expository Preaching. Number one is this, it determines the sermons.
05:54-05:56
It determines the sermons.
05:58-06:07
Every year I go away for a week and just work on the preaching calendar. My sermons are planned out a year ahead of time.
06:08-06:11
And then I bring that preaching calendar to our elders for approval.
06:12-06:16
And it sort of shows, as a church, what direction we are heading.
06:18-06:24
The sermons are already determined, not by what I feel like preaching, but what is in the text.
06:25-06:28
And if you've been with us, we've been going through the Book of Acts.
06:28-06:37
Our elders went a three-year through the Book of Acts for the purpose of understanding what it means to receive God's power by the Holy Spirit to be witnesses.
06:38-06:43
So I broke the book of Acts down for a three-year plan.
06:44-06:45
Determines the sermons.
06:46-06:47
A couple other things under that.
06:49-06:51
Letting the Word determine the sermons.
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Preaching verse by verse keeps me from just preaching on my favorite things.
06:57-07:00
We talked about this last week, didn't we, Mike, with Q&A day.
07:02-07:08
If I just picked what I wanted to preach on, you'd probably only get like maybe four different sermons, right?
07:09-07:15
Like, I'll have a sermon on grace, I'll have a sermon on mercy, I'll have a sermon on love, I'll have a sermon on loving your wife or whatever.
07:18-07:22
And those are all important things, but they're not everything that the Bible has to say.
07:24-07:28
The other side of that coin is preaching verse by verse makes me preach on things I would otherwise avoid.
07:31-07:38
You see, when we walk through the Bible, we take the subjects as they come up, and we address them.
07:40-07:46
I don't really enjoy talking about hell, or judgment, or sin.
07:47-07:53
And I wouldn't go after those themes if I just preached on my weekly preferences.
07:55-07:57
But verse by verse preaching forces us to deal with them.
07:58-08:02
And God has them in His Word because He wants them dealt with.
08:03-08:07
So number one, reasons we're committed to expository preaching, it determines the sermons.
08:07-08:10
Number two, it lets the Word speak for itself.
08:13-08:20
You see, preaching verse by verse, going through the Bible, it makes me avoid taking things out of context.
08:20-08:26
It makes me avoid misrepresenting God by misunderstanding what the Word actually says.
08:28-08:33
It's ripping a passage out of its context and preaching on it.
08:35-08:50
A lot of us in this room could probably give stories of disastrous sermons that you've heard where the preacher has taken a verse out of its context and just like run with it, but when you see that verse in the context of the book, it says nothing about what they're talking about.
08:53-09:03
Or the major crime, this is the major crime, using the Bible to support my thoughts.
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This is what a lot of quote unquote sermons are.
09:09-09:34
The preacher gets up and says, "Okay, I'm going to talk to you about," you know, pick a subject, you know, "being a friendly co-worker," or whatever, "I'm going to talk to you about being a friendly coworker and we have a few quotes from Maya Angelou or whatever, and then we tell a little anecdote about back when I was in college and I worked at so-and-so and I learned how to be a nice coworker.
09:34-09:40
And then we sprinkle a couple of Bible verses on that and then we call it a sermon.
09:41-09:47
Let's draw a proverb here or maybe a do unto others thing that Jesus said there.
09:47-09:51
And people think, "Well, that's a sermon because he used the Bible." You didn't use the Bible.
09:51-09:52
You weren't preaching the Bible.
09:54-10:02
You were just sort of allowing the Bible to somewhat authenticate this message you had.
10:02-10:03
That's not a sermon.
10:04-10:05
That is not a sermon.
10:07-10:10
We need to let the Word of God speak for itself.
10:11-10:17
As a friend of mine has said many times, he said, "The Bible is like a lion." He said, "You don't defend a lion.
10:19-10:25
You let a lion out of his cage and he's going to defend himself." And that's how we at Harvest Bible Chapel view the Word of God.
10:26-10:31
We'll just open the Word, proclaim the Word, and we'll let the Word of God defend itself.
10:33-10:37
So number three, it gives us confidence to read the Bible ourselves.
10:39-10:43
Preaching verse by verse helps people become better Bible students for themselves.
10:45-10:52
You see, if the sermon is from Acts, you see, here's how a lot of sermons go.
10:52-11:00
Like, okay, we're going to preach from the book of Acts, and I'll read like a couple of verses, but then I'll spend 30 minutes cross-referencing.
11:01-11:20
You know, like we're reading this passage in Acts, and it's just like what Moses said in Exodus chapter 23, and it's like what the prophet said in Jeremiah chapter 14, and oh "Oh yeah, the psalmist said this in Psalm 15, and we are all over the Bible." And that's not actually preaching the book of Acts.
11:24-11:25
And there's a reason I don't do that.
11:26-11:28
I cross-reference very rarely.
11:29-11:34
Only when in my mind it's absolutely necessary to support a point.
11:34-11:56
But at Harvest, when we open the Bible, we're not likely to tell you to jump around in your Bible. Okay, we're going to start here, but now I want you to turn here, now I want you to turn here, now I want you to turn here. Do you know why we don't do that? Do you know why? Do you know why? Because people don't read the Bible like that. Is that how you read the Bible when you sit down at home? Like we're going to have a flipping marathon.
11:58-12:09
Nobody reads a Bible like that. But you see the other problem with that, okay, so the guy comes to church, maybe he's a new believer, just cracked the spine on the Bible for the the first time we have people like that here.
12:10-12:13
And God bless you, seeking the Lord, and I wanna help you with that.
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But we have people that crack the spine on the Bible for the first time.
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They're like, "Okay, I wanna learn about the Bible." And I open up the book of Acts, and all of a sudden I'm talking about Exodus, and Psalms, and Jeremiah, and back in Matthew, chapter whatever.
12:28-12:31
And that guy's gonna be sitting there going, "Well, I can't read the Bible.
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"How in the world does Jeff know "about all these magical little cross-references places?
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"I can't read the Bible.
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Well, I couldn't find those verses.
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I better just let Jeff explain the Bible to me because I don't know how to do that.
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You don't need to know how to do that.
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The message, let's take the book of Acts, for example.
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The message of the book of Acts is in what book?
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Acts, right?
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The message of Ephesians is where?
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In Ephesians, right?
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You guys are getting good at this.
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The message of the gospel of John is where?
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The gospel of John, right?
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You're like, okay, we get the point.
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We stay in one chunk of text, verse by verse, and that's what gives people confidence to read the Bible for themselves.
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You see, I want you to go home and open up your Bible and look at the passage that we just covered in church.
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I want you to look at that and go, do you realize all Jeff did was talk about what's in this passage?
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You realize that's all he did?
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I could do that.
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I don't know what we're paying him for.
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Look, I got kids to feed, but why would, I could totally do what he does.
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All he did was go through this and explain what it says.
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I could totally do that.
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I could, I could certainly read this for myself.
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Yeah, that's what I want you to do.
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I want you to go home and get excited about reading this for yourself.
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That's why we preach the way that we do.
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At Harvest Bible Chapel.
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Number four.
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Why do I believe in expository preaching?
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This is probably the biggest reason.
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It supernaturally transforms people.
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You see, this is what we're going after.
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As a church.
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God transforming me.
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God transforming us.
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And God's Word claims to do just that.
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For example, Isaiah 55 verses 10 and 11 says, "For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater," look at this, "so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth.
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It shall not return to be empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall "I shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it." God's Word always accomplishes God's purposes every single time, according to God, 100%.
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It always accomplishes the purposes for which He sends it out.
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Tell me something else that exists anywhere on the earth that works perfectly 100% of the time.
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There's nothing but the Word of God.
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Romans 10.17 says, "So faith comes from hearing, through the Word of Christ.
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Do you want faith? Do you want to grow in your faith?
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Do you want your faith to deepen?
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The Bible says your faith comes from the Word of Christ.
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The Word of God.
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2 Corinthians 3.18 says, "And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit." You look at the context of that passage, he's talking about the transforming power when the Spirit of God is at work with the Word of God.
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That's what changes people.
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And that's why we're committed to expository preaching.
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I can't change anyone.
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I can't come up with a creative or clever enough two minute TED talk that's going to transform your life.
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I can't do it.
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I don't have that in me.
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Nobody does, but this book does.
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God's Holy Spirit has chosen to work with the Word of God.
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That's how He works.
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So the question is, does it work?
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With these verses you just read, Pastor Jeff, is that really what happens when we engage God's Word?
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this past week, Ben Murphy actually sent me these stats.
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And I said, "I'm totally using them in my sermon." The Bible's Center for Bible Engagement.
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I didn't even know such a thing existed.
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But they did a study of people who read the Bible just four days a week.
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And here's what they found.
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If you read a Bible just four days a week, you're 57% less likely to get drunk.
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You're 68% less likely to have sex outside of marriage.
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You're 61% less likely to engage in pornography.
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You're 74% less likely to engage in gambling.
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Look at these last three because the numbers are going to jump.
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You're 228% more likely to share your faith with others.
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You're 231% more likely to disciple others.
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You're 407% more likely to memorize Scripture.
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What does all that mean?
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What that means is the Word of God works.
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The Word of God works.
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The statistics back that up.
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But I'll tell you what, I was sold on the Word of God even before Murph sent me these statistics because that's been my experience.
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The Word of God works.
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The Word of God transforms people's lives.
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And that's why we are committed to expository preaching.
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Alright, that's all I was going to talk about today.
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But then I thought, there are going to be people that are like, "But Pastor Jeff, you just taught me that that wasn't a sermon." You're right.
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Turn to Nehemiah 8.
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That was the introduction, right?
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Nehemiah chapter 8.
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That was the introduction, here's the sermon.
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Trying to find it. The book of Psalms is like right in the middle of your Bible and it's a couple books before Psalms.
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Nehemiah chapter 8.
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While you're turning there, I'll give you a little background what's happening in Israel's history at this point.
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The book of Nehemiah, Israel, was returning to Jerusalem after the exile.
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Remember we talked about this way back in Bible 101.
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But Israel, because of her persistent sin, God sent judgment in the form of the Assyrians, in the form of the Babylonians, but God allowed Israel to return back to her land under the Persians, the Medo-Persians.
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And Nehemiah, under his leadership, They went back for the purpose of rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem.
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Remember that story, Nehemiah was like, "We're going to build a wall, and the Persians are going to pay for it." That might not be in your translation.
20:00-20:03
that they were going to rebuild the wall around Jerusalem.
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And more important than building the wall, was building the people.
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And church, before we look at this, boy, what a message we can learn from Nehemiah.
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More important than building the wall was building the people.
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More important than this address, you know, the Lord has so blessed us.
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Mark and I, we were just talking about this before service, weren't we?
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how the Lord has blessed us, taking us from running the school and all of the set up and tear down, and the Lord's provided this place, and now the new space up there that has been renovated and work is being done, and the Lord has been so good to us.
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And I am so thankful to God for what He has provided so that our ministry can grow and expand and we can do a better job making disciples.
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But you know, so much more important than this space, these rooms.
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So much more important than building this stuff is building you.
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Because I'll be honest with you, none of this stuff matters.
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It doesn't matter how nice the stuff is.
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It doesn't matter if you're not growing as a disciple of Jesus Christ.
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None of this matters if people aren't getting saved here.
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None of this matters if marriages aren't being healed here.
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None of this matters if people aren't being equipped to be ministers here.
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So there's a definite message here from Nehemiah.
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Yeah, building of the stuff, important, but by far secondary to the importance of building the people.
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That's what we see in Nehemiah 8.
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I want you to jot some things down in your outline.
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We're going to talk about God's Word being effective in your life.
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There are some things that we can do to maximize that.
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See, God's Word is effective not sitting on the shelf.
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God's Word is effective not left in the pocket of the seat.
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God's Word is not effective just sticking it under your pillow at night.
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I've heard of people doing that.
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Have you ever heard of that?
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People putting the Bible under their pillow at night thinking that it's going to like through some kind of Holy Spirit osmosis, it's going to bless them.
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That's not how the Word of God works.
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For the Word of God to be effective, for God's Word to be effective, we're gonna see four things here from Nehemiah 8.
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First of all, letter A, you have to want it.
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For God's Word to be effective in your life, it has to start here, you have to want it.
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Look at the first two verses.
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It says, "And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the water gate." They estimate there are about 50,000 people here, okay?
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It says, "And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the book of the law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel.
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So Ezra the priest brought the law before the assembly, both men and women and all who can understand what they heard." Stop there, you have to notice The thing that really stands out in this passage is in verse one, it says, "They," the people, "They told Ezra to bring the book out." Did you see that?
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They asked for the Word.
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It wasn't like Ezra showed up, was like, "Listen, people, we're having church." They're like, "All right." And they sort of like, "We'll endure.
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Are we gonna do the religious thing?
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He didn't initiate it, the people did.
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They said, "Please, would you give us the word of God?
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Please, please give us the word." You see, they didn't have access to it like we do.
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All right, you pack your bags, we're going on a guilt trip.
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How many Bibles do you have?
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Like in those days, usually just the men could hear the reading in the temple.
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this was a really unique circumstance because the women and children were also present, but they didn't have copies of these on their shelves.
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They didn't have personal libraries full of books and commentaries on their shelves at home. Like, "Wait, how many Bibles do you have?" Right? I'm the same way.
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I got shelves and drawers full. We have access, like, with the Internet? How many How many translations and different renderings of God's Word do we have available for us?
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See, they didn't have access to God's Word like we do.
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They didn't have family Christian stores.
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Actually, hang on a second, we don't have that anymore either.
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But notice it says in the text, it was on the first day of the seventh month.
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That was significant because according to their civil calendar, that was the new year.
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And I think we can make an obvious application, can't we?
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We're celebrating the new year.
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How many of us feel this sense of it's a new year, the calendar's turned.
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Yeah, had a lot of rough stuff happen in 2017, but something about turning that calendar over to 2018 is like, "You know what? It's a new opportunity, right?
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We can start over. And it's going to be a better year this year.
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God does something better. His mercies are new every day." But you can get the sense in which people were anticipating, "New Year, please give us the Word of God." And I would just ask you, Harvest, can you share the longing that the Israelites had?
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This year God's Word is going to be my priority.
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You know I haven't been going after it as I should, and that's changing now.
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Can you share that?
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Like, well Pastor Jeff, that sounds like a nice sentiment, but I'll be honest with you.
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I don't really have much of an appetite.
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Well, I've got some fantastic news for you.
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Because the more you read God's Word, the more you study God's Word, the more you hear God's word, the more you're going to want God's word.
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It's an amazing thing.
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Can somebody testify to that?
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The more you're in it, the more you want it.
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You know, I was trying to think, is there a way I can illustrate that?
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Is there something from my life that I'm like, "Yeah, I have a perfect illustration of that." Organic roasted seaweed snack.
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See, I bought it because it says winter harvest right here.
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Like harvest.
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No, the reason I bought this was because my doctor recommended me doing some detoxing.
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I'm like, well, how do you do that?
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And he said, one way you can detox is to eat seaweed.
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I'm like, really?
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So, and my wife will tell you, remember how it went the first time I tried this?
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You remember?
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So Erin's like, yummy, yummy.
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So, anybody ever had this?
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A couple of you have?
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Do you like it?
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Okay, yeah, you probably have the same illustration, right?
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The first time I tried it, if you don't know what we're looking at here, it's little green sheets of cellophane.
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[ Laughter ]
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It's called a seaweed snack.
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Like snack?
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I can see through it.
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(laughs)
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But Erin will tell you the first time I tried this, she's like, "Come on, try." I'm just like, I mean, I took like a hummingbird size bite.
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I was just like, oh, oh, oh, I'm rolling around on the ground like I'm on fire covered with snakes.
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I'm like, oh, this is disgusting.
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But then I, like, you know what?
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This is supposed to be good for me.
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So I'm gonna try a little more.
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And then I tried a little more.
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And now what I found, no joke, you're experienced in what I found is, if I open one of these, I finish it.
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I eat these things by the bag, just like handfuls stuffing these little sheets of cellophane.
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I love them now.
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I really do.
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The first time I tried it, not so much, but this is good for me.
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Now, I love these things.
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For some people, you need to have that experience with the Word of God.
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To say, "Look, I haven't had much of an appetite for it." Does anybody want some, by the way?
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It's really not fair.
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Here, pass this around, Alex.
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It's not fair for me to have it and not share.
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My mother taught me better.
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Go ahead and try some.
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There's...
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What do you think?
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It's an acquired taste.
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It's an acquired taste, right.
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There's somebody visiting our church right now that's like, "I am never going back there." They were passing around seaweed, they're about to start handling snakes or something.
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Or there might be somebody that's like, "I'm going to that church every week, they handle seaweed." Anyways, God's Word, you have to want it.
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You have to want it.
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And you'll find that once you try it, you're going to want more.
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So letter B, you have to be attentive to it.
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Look at verse 3.
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It says, "And he read from it." Ezra reading from the law.
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"And he read from it, facing the square before the water gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand, in the ears of If all the people were attentive to the book of the law, I love verse 3 because actually they would have been listening to God's word for about six hours.
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They would have been listening to God's word for about six hours.
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Six hours.
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You're like, "Why do you keep saying that?" Because the next time you're tempted to complain that my sermon was too long, I want you to stand up next to Ezra's.
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Six hours.
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The amazing thing was not that Ezra spoke for six hours.
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The amazing thing was the people were attentive to the Word of God for six hours.
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If you've ever flown anywhere, you know when you get on the airplane, and before you take off, you know, the flight attendant does that little, the speech and the thing with the seatbelt, right?
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You know what I'm talking about?
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You know, in the, you know, put, here's how you buckle your seatbelt and they show you as if there's somebody sitting on the plane that's never seen a seatbelt before.
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Oh, is that how that works?
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I should get those for my car.
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And they explain how the oxygen mask dropped down and, you know, put it over your face before you helped your child, you selfish parent.
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And, but they go through that speech, right?
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And while they're giving this speech, like if the plane crashes into the water, here are some things that you need to do.
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Some things you need to know.
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Your seat becomes a flotation device.
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I'm like, you should have like, your seat becomes a parachute or your seat becomes another plane, but it becomes a flotation device.
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But I'm always amazed that when they're giving this life and death speech, you look around, what are people doing?
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Settling in for their nap, reading SkyMall, doing a crossword puzzle or playing Sudoku on their phone.
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And I'm like, what does it matter with you people?
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She's telling us what to do if we crashed into the water and you're not paying attention.
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But could you imagine, like if you were on the plane and the plane was literally going down into the ocean, and the flight attendant at that point stands up and says, "Okay, I'm going to give this speech again." Do you think people would be flipping through the SkyMall?
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They would be hanging on every word.
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"Tell me how this works.
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Tell me what I need to do." You see, when we stand and preach the Word of God, this is God speaking.
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Words of life, words of salvation.
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We should be hanging on every word that's in this book.
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This is the book that the Almighty Creator Sovereign wrote?
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You have to be attentive to it.
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Let her see you have to revere it.
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You have to revere it.
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All right, verse 4, it says, "And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they for the purpose. And beside him stood... Okay, now here comes a list of names. And I know we have a few pregnant ladies at our church. If you're looking for names, don't get them from this list. And I want you to show me grace. I literally stood here and practiced saying these names out loud, and I'm still going to butcher them. But beside him stood Mattathiah, Shema, Ananiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Masiah on his right hand, and Paddaiah, Mishael, somebody's cat walked across the keyboard here, Malchijah, Hashem, #banana, You're like, "Remember when I said I could totally do Jeff's job?" Yeah, not this part.
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Hashbanana, Zachariah, and Meshulam on his left hand.
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And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it, all the people stood.
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You see the respect for God's word?
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He stood up.
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And Ezra blessed the Lord.
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Look at this.
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The great God and all the people answered, "Amen, Amen!" Lifting up their hands and they bowed their heads and worshipped the Lord with their faces to the ground.
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Did you see the physical response as the Word of God was opened?
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Shouting Amen, raising hands, bowing heads, worshipping.
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That's the purpose of the Word of God by the way, is to make true worshippers.
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You know, the idea that the music is to prepare you for the sermon is completely backwards.
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The sermon is to make you a better worshiper.
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Because when we get to heaven, they're still going to be leading worship, but I'm going to be out of a job.
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The Word of God is to make you a better worshiper.
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Psalm 138 verse 2 says, "You have exalted above all things your name and your word." And that's what we should be striving for as a church, is to take the Word of God as seriously as He does.
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Because when you revere God's Word, you're learning to revere the God who wrote it, and that's what makes you a sincere worshiper.
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And finally, letter D, you have to understand it.
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Okay, you have to want it, you have to be attentive to it, you have to revere it, take it for what it is.
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Number D, you have to understand it.
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Look at verse 7.
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"Also..." Oh, boy.
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"Jeshua, Bani, Shurahbiah, Jamin, Aqab, Shabbatai, Hodiah..." Oh, look, another one.
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Another of the "Messiah." "Khaledah, Azariah, Jezebel, Hanun, Pelaiah." Like, didn't anybody in this day believe in nicknames?
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The Levites!
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Like, why didn't you start with that?
36:56-37:00
Help the people to understand the law while the people remained in their places.
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They read from the book, the law of God, clearly.
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Look at this.
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And they gave the sense so that the people understood the reading." You have to understand it.
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I know we're having some fun with the names and stuff like that, not disrespectful, just having some fun, just being honest with our own trouble to pronounce them sometimes, at least my trouble to pronounce them sometimes.
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But something very important here.
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Did you notice in verse 7 immediately, they had small group.
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Did you see that?
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They had small group, those names, I'm not gonna read them again, but it says they helped the people understand the law.
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So while Ezra was reading, you had all of these Levites like spread out through the people, like, do you understand what this is saying?
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Can you, do you need me to explain it?
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Do you have any questions?
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And like, you know, what exactly does that mean?
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And they were helping them understand and it says they were giving them the sense.
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Well, this is what God said.
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And here's what God meant by that.
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And here's what they were doing was having small group and understand that our church, we use small group for the exact same reason that it happened here in Nehemiah, is to help people understand what is proclaimed.
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Verse eight says, it says, "They read from the book of the law of God," underline this in your Bible, clearly, clearly, what does the text say?
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Do you understand what's being communicated?
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And it says, "They gave the sense." It wasn't just understanding the words, it was taking it deeper.
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How should my life reflect this truth?
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It says, "So the people understood." And they did.
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We're not gonna read.
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We're already a little over time here, but it's not gonna be six hours.
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But they responded.
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They understood.
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We know this because if you look at verse nine, It says that the Word of God caused weeping, caused great conviction at first, but then verse 12, it ultimately led to rejoicing.
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And any biblical sermon should do that.
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Any biblical sermon should do that.
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It should give the sting, offer the healing, and bring rejoicing.
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When the Word of God is proclaimed, you should be able to say, okay, I see where I'm weak, I'm mourning my condition, But I see what God has done for me, and that brings me to praise.
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Every sermon should do that.
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That's why Jesus in John 15, 11 said, "These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full." Just like in Nehemiah's day, same for our day, Understanding the Word of God is what is going to bring you joy.
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So Ephesians 3.10 says, "Through the church, the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places." Through the church, the wisdom of God might be made known.
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The world is decaying around us.
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So who needs to uphold God's truth?
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The church.
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People are hungry for the Word of God.
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Who's going to give it to them?
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The church.
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The world is full of lost and hurting people.
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Who is charged with giving them the healing, life-giving gospel of Jesus Christ?
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The church.
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That's why everything we do has to start here.
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It has to have a sure foundation.
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That's why pillar number one of Harvest Bible Chapter is proclaiming the authority of God's Word without apology.
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Let's pray.
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Father in heaven, I thank You for Your Word.
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We would be so clueless as to who You are, what You've done, how we can make You happy, how we are supposed to live.
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We would have no idea.
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But You've given us a book that we can read and understand and discuss and apply.
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What a beautiful gift that You've given us, Father.
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revealing who you are and who we are, and how you have brought us back to yourself.
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Father, as we examine who we are as a church, I pray that the hearts of our people will always be for the Word of God.
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Our appetites will always be for the Word of God.
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Father, we are not here to entertain, We're not here to sort of fulfill some sort of relational fellowship void that someone might have.
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Oh yeah, we laugh together and we do have relationships here, Father, but we are here to receive Your Word.
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Whether it's me, one of our elders, or whoever stands on this platform, Father, May they always represent You by accurately and clearly proclaiming the authority of Your Word.
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Give us a hunger for it, God. Make it the mission of this church.
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Make it the appetite of Your people as we take it home.
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Thank You, Father, for the joy that You give us when we know and understand and apply Your Word.
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We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.
Small Group Questions (Whole Group):
Read Nehemiah 8:1-8
How has the Word of God changed you? Be specific - and beyond salvation - how has the Bible changed your life?
How would you rate your hunger for God's Word? How can you increase this appetite?
Why do you think people aren’t as attentive to the Word (Nehemiah 8:3)?
How has your Small Group been doing in helping you (and the others) in understanding God's Word (Nehemiah 8:7-8)?
Breakout Questions:
Did you abide through prayer and Bible reading this week? What specifically are you moved to change or apply this week, and how are you going to apply it?