Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Amen. If you got your bibles, make your way to Ephesians.
[00:00:05] Excited to be sharing with you. We're going to be picking up in chapter four, verse seven.
[00:00:10] And it's great passage. Of course, it's the word of God, so it's always great. Right before we get started, let's see Hayden and Colton and Amy. Amy, the girls aren't here, but Hayden, colts and Amy and the girls went to camp ability a couple weeks ago now and man, they were excellent. Basically what we did was we worked with people with special needs and so they basically wanted to offer camp to kids that don't get to go to most normal camps. And so to do that with special needs, you have to have a lot more hands there. And so we took a group of special needs kids swimming. We went to the movie theater one day. We went.
[00:00:51] What else did we do? I went to the zoo one day. That was a lot of fun.
[00:00:55] And so it just. It was a great time. But I really just wanted to shout them out and tell them how good of a job they did. You know, give. Give honor to who honors do Hayden, Colton, and even Lily and Arie. They had a mission to be with a buddy and stay with their buddy and, man, they killed it. Our group was absolutely amazing and I just wanted to give them a little shout out because it was beautiful to watch and it was very awesome.
[00:01:18] So that being said, we're going to jump into Ephesians.
[00:01:20] I'm going to read a little bit of a book called intimacy with the almighty, and it's by Charles Swindoll and it's a great book that I love. It's not very long and not hard, but it's good. It starts off by saying this.
[00:01:32] He says deep things are intriguing. Deep jungles, deep water, deep caves and canyons, deep thoughts and conversations.
[00:01:41] There is nothing like depth to make us dissatisfied with with superficial, shallow things.
[00:01:48] Once we have delved below the surface and had a taste of the marvels and mysteries of the deep, we realize the value of taking the time and going to the trouble of plummeting those depths. This is especially true in the spiritual realm. God invites us to go deeper rather than to be content with surface matters. We read scriptures that the spirit of God searches all things, even the depths of God. The depth of his wisdom and his ways is defined as unsearchable and unfathomable. According to Romans 11:33. Oh, the depth of the riches, both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments. Unfathomable are his ways. So in this book right here, he's talking about basically depth and experiencing depth and not being satisfied with the superficial. And I just love this thought because I think so many times we. We settle in our walk with God. We settle in what we know about God in the depths that we're willing to go. This passage in Ephesians, he gets on to talk about maturity. And I would say those two things are very closely related. And so I wanted us to just open up that word that the depths are better, the deep stuff is better.
[00:02:57] The more you see the fullness of what God is doing, the more beautiful you realize it actually is.
[00:03:03] And it's absolutely fantastic what God has for us.
[00:03:07] And so we're going to jump into that a little bit tonight. We'll pick up in verse number seven and we'll read through to 16.
[00:03:15] And it says this, but grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gifts. Therefore it says when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives, and he gives gifts to men. In saying he ascended, what does it mean? That he also descended into the lower regions, the earth.
[00:03:36] He who descended is the one who ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.
[00:03:44] And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning and craftiness and deceitful schemes. Rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every weight into him who is the head into Christ, from whom the whole body joined and held together by every joint which with which is the it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
[00:04:39] I couldn't get through part of that because I kept wanting to talk about all the things that I was reading through. John, our conversation beforehand on that passage messed me up because I want to just talk more and more about it. This is a great rich passage and I think it's absolutely fantastic.
[00:04:52] But he starts off talking about the different giftings. And so in this conversation he basically calls us that every believer has a gifting. If we go to point number one, every saint has A gifting. And that gift is by God's will, at his pleasure. And gifts are to be used by the glory, to the glory of God and the profit of others. We look at spiritual giftings, and it's talking about it here.
[00:05:17] And basically know that every person has a gift.
[00:05:20] Every person has a gift to share with the body.
[00:05:25] It's not my opinion, but the word of God, right? It's one of those things people like to motivate people and, like, say something nice about them. Kara Bose likes to do that. She was one of those teachers that wanted to give every kid an award. And I'm like, not every kid deserves an award, but she wanted to give every kid an award, right? And it's exact opposite of this right here. It's not just that you want to give them something and encourage them for no reason.
[00:05:50] I'm not trying to find something nice to say and go, you've got something to offer. No. The word of God says every believer has a gift to be used for the body, for the glory of God.
[00:06:00] Also, I made fun of Care for many years about giving every kid an award for no reason, because some kids don't deserve them. And then one day, I was at the warehouse talking to a young man, and he was just struggling. He was in, like, 11th grade at the time. And we're trying to work through some stuff, and he's just down, down, down. And Kara walks across the building like she always is, just smiling. And he said, you see that woman right there? He's pointing to Kara. He said, yeah, that's the only woman who's ever believed in me or the only person who's ever believed in me. And my mind changed really quick about her giving out those awards to everybody.
[00:06:32] But that's beside the point.
[00:06:35] I'm gonna say something mean next about her so we won't get too mushy in here.
[00:06:39] Every person has a gift.
[00:06:41] God has given every person a gift, and it's not to be used on yourself. I would also add this, that a gift isn't necessarily a talent you have.
[00:06:51] Some people have great talents and can sing really, really well. That might not be a gift that they have to use to uplift the body. Or it could also be that they're using that gift as a talent to draw attention to their own selves to give themselves glory, but they're not using it to give God glory.
[00:07:08] And sometimes, just because it's a gift or talent doesn't mean it's something you should be doing for the body. Sometimes it's just you happen to be good at that, but you're gifted in different ways to serve the body.
[00:07:18] That's one of those things that somebody else can't tell you all the time. And there are spiritual gift inventories people do all the time. And sometimes they're okay, and sometimes they're garbage. And I believe that sometimes gifts change in different seasons.
[00:07:32] I was in a big argument about that with some people. Not a really big argument. We were like in a discussion about it, and they were basically saying that giftings don't change, Giftings don't change.
[00:07:41] And as I was talking to Tim about it, he's talking about when he. Before he became a pastor at Clement, he was working the progress, energy, and he was making lots of money and he was giving away left and right. And giving was a gift that he had. Supporting stuff was a gift that he had. And then he took a different job and he was making nothing, and he had nothing to give, no money to give.
[00:08:01] Tell me that hasn't changed his giftings that season. Right. He's no longer able to do that part. And so I think giftings can change different seasons of life. I think in different seasons, we have different callings of what we should be doing.
[00:08:13] My life looks a lot different after I had five kids. The things that I started to do when I had them changed because I couldn't spend all my time in the projects like I did for a season. So I think different giftings can change throughout time.
[00:08:26] To know your giftings, I believe, is to just seek the spirit of God and have him reveal that to you. What's your heart being drawn to? What are you thinking about all the time? What do you see that needs to always be done?
[00:08:37] Those might be some indicators of some things you have giftings in. If you're noticing something over and over again, it might be a hint from God or the urging of the spirit to know that that's a gift.
[00:08:48] I keep thinking about that person over and over again. Go talk to them. You might be having a gift of encouragement to build them up or to call, you know, to meet them right where they are.
[00:08:58] And so man, just seek after God and let him allow you or allow him to just show you what gifting you might have.
[00:09:05] If nothing else, start doing something and you'll figure out what your giftings are. Start serving any way that you see.
[00:09:11] So every person has a gift. Every person is gifted. Now, this in my mind, because of how my mind works. You know, he quotes this little section here where it says in verse eight, when he ascended on high, he led a host of captives and he gives gifts to men. So, like, I mean, the point of that was he gives gifts to men, right? Because that's the part he's talking about. But then he also talked about the first part, talks about he ascended on high. So then you go in here and you get a parentheses in here. And anybody who likes ADA or who has adhd, they like these parentheses things. They have extra thoughts they want to throw in right here. If anybody in here has that, you relate to me, because I'm always trying to throw these in. So when I first read through this, you know, he's got these parentheses, and I'm going, is this a second thought? Does this thought make sense to be put right here? Why does he actually have to go here? You know, so he's talking about gifting. And then he says, I'm going to read it again so we can get to it. And saying he ascended, what does it mean that he also descended into the lower regions. I'm going to go ahead and tell you that my thoughts on that is he's talking about hell right there. Different people want to argue about that or debate that, believe he's talking about hell lower into lower regions. The earth who descended is the one who ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things. So why don't you go into that part right there in this time.
[00:10:33] Is it kind of like out of nowhere that he. Is it kind of strange that he's talking about that? I'd say, no, it's not strange he's talking about that. But before we get to that spot, let's look at the next slide and to kind of explain some of that. I don't know if you can read it right, try to make it big. But I failed.
[00:10:49] But this is part of the Heidelberg Catechism. Casey introduced us to the catechism a few weeks back in his sermon, basically answering his questions and answers to spiritual truths. And it says, why does the Creed add, he descended to hell? And it's talking about this topic right here.
[00:11:06] And the answer is to assure me in times of personal crisis and temptation, that Christ, my Lord, by suffering unspeakable anguish, pain, pain, terror of soul, especially on the cross, but also earlier, has delivered me from the anguish and torment of hell.
[00:11:23] Why is he going to this section right here and talking about that part? He's talking about in the passage before when John preached last week, he's talking about unity. And what is what Brings us together. It's not that we all have the same.
[00:11:36] We like the same things. We like the same teams, the same sports, the same whatever. We're. We're a group of random people here at East Rock especially. We're not all broke. We. We don't look the same, we don't come from the same backgrounds.
[00:11:48] We all are just different in different things.
[00:11:52] But we're called to unity, right? We're called to unity. And what's that unity based on? How is that unity accomplished? It's accomplished through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus. That is what we are unified around.
[00:12:04] And that's why he put this passage in right now. All that he's calling us to, and all that he's calling us to take on is based around this thought right here.
[00:12:14] What Jesus did for us.
[00:12:17] That's what we are unified over.
[00:12:19] And the world likes to talk about unity right now. And I'll be honest, I have no desire to be unified with some of the people of this world based on what they're doing.
[00:12:29] I hate when I see uniforms that say unity. A unity based on what? That we all get along.
[00:12:34] You don't even believe that.
[00:12:36] You don't even practice that. The ones who are talking about unity, you want it in your flavor and you want everybody else to adjust it to you. I'm not interested in being unified with this world. In fact, it's the exact opposite. This world has nothing to offer me as a believer in Christ.
[00:12:52] I want to be unified with the body of Christ.
[00:12:56] I want to have the same mission with believers. Psalm 119 tells us that. He says, those who fear the Lord are those that I have community with.
[00:13:04] I want to be in like minded, in unity with the believers, walking together.
[00:13:08] And what's at the center of that Jesus, his work on the cross.
[00:13:18] So we go on to the next slide.
[00:13:21] We have these verses right here again, 11 through the end. And we're going to break these down a little bit and dive into them.
[00:13:29] It says, he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds, the teachers. Hit that next one right there. Not everybody has these gifts.
[00:13:37] There's a variety of gifts. Not everybody's called to be these things. And if you look at the idea and imagery, Corinthians, Jesus as the body. They're not like one's necessarily more important than others. Just because you have this gift or that gift doesn't mean you're more or less than somebody else. You just have a different gifting.
[00:13:54] And he lists a few right Here that are for the leaders, the pastors, but not everybody's called to that.
[00:14:00] So just because your gift is different, don't fret that part.
[00:14:04] Don't feel like your gift is less important.
[00:14:08] Your gift is there for a reason, to build the body up. If you are not exercising that gift, somewhere in the body that we're hurting, we're compensating.
[00:14:17] My brother has a messed up hip.
[00:14:20] He's in high school. He dislocated it and went behind the socket. It's nasty. It's been that way forever. He needs to get a hip replacement, and at this point, he needs probably to have a knee surgery and maybe a lower back surgery before he gets his hip replaced because he's been compensating for so long because of his hip.
[00:14:36] That's kind of bad. And maybe not the best example, but you get your image right. I'm not trying to draw sympathy for that. But the reality is that when one part of the body isn't working, there's compensation from somewhere else.
[00:14:51] Hit that next one.
[00:14:54] It tells us in verse. I can't even read it from my spot right here. Verse 12, it says, to equip the saints for the work of ministry. For building up the body of Christ.
[00:15:05] To equip the saints for the work of ministry. Who's a saint?
[00:15:12] All believers are saints, right? You're either saint or you're a ain't. Yeah. Y' all still remember that, right? So who's a minister?
[00:15:19] All saints. Every single saint.
[00:15:24] And Tim talks about this all the time. Everybody's on staff. Everybody's on mission. Every believer is called to minister.
[00:15:31] Every believer should be able to articulate the gospel with great clarity.
[00:15:36] Every believer should be able to walk somebody through the gospel. And I love. I love. I love the wordless book. It has the colors. You've seen the bracelets with them sometimes where basically says, you know, black means you're in sin, and the red means it's the Jesus died on the cross for it. And the red washes you white purity. And then you have the green means you walk in growth. And then the gold ones, you have the streets of gold. All right, so that's a very elementary version of the gospel. And I love it. It's great and it's clear and it's easy to repeat.
[00:16:08] But our knowledge of the scripture must go deeper than that. And our knowledge and our ability to articulate the gospel should be more than that. As a believer, I think that every person in this room right now, if you say you are a saint. You should be able to articulate the gospel with great clarity.
[00:16:29] If you don't know how to do that, man, hit me up and we'll talk about it. We've got some trainings coming up on that we're going to do again shortly. And we, last year we did three circle, and we learned it that way. A couple years ago we did three circle. There's several ways of doing it, not just one, like a variety of them, because in different situations you want to share it different ways. But I believe that every believer is a minister.
[00:16:52] Every single one.
[00:16:54] A few years ago, Tim and I were looking for people to basically to mentor. And Tim went to a guy and he was a deacon and well respected at his church. And Tim was like, I need somebody to mentor me. And he goes to this guy and he's like, hey, will you help me do this?
[00:17:09] And the guy basically kind of laughs off, goes, oh, I don't do that kind of thing.
[00:17:13] What you mean you don't do that kind of thing? That is your calling as a believer to do that thing. And we often view it as that's somebody else's job, but it's not.
[00:17:24] Every believer is a minister, every saint is a minister. If you do not walk away memorizing anything else but that idea right there, memorize that one. You were called to minister. Every single one of us pick it up in 13, he says, until we attain the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood to the measure of the stature of fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning and by craftiness and deceitful schemes.
[00:18:06] So we go to the beach. A lot of people who thinks the biggest is relaxing.
[00:18:10] Yeah, I don't understand you people.
[00:18:13] I'm not like Tim either. I'm not taking his side, man. I go to the beach and it's like a game of whack a mole with my kids. It's just like all hands on deck, everybody. We gotta like watch them nonstop. And so a couple years back we went and everybody was there, but I went to the beach one day by myself for a little bit and I'm sitting on the beach with a chair and I'm like, oh, wow, this actually is relaxing. My only view of it though was being there with my kids. And so for years I was like, the beach is not relaxing.
[00:18:38] But some kids are worse than others.
[00:18:40] Kids like will he's terrible at the beach.
[00:18:45] Not that he's bad at all. It's actually something that I love about him. He's fearless.
[00:18:50] He ain't scared of nothing, and that scares me the most.
[00:18:54] He's the most likely one to get swept out somewhere. And also, he ain't as big as nothing, so he ain't scared of nothing. And he'll run to that wave head first. Man, that thing will knock him down, roll him over, spit him out. He'll jump up and do it again.
[00:19:06] The other kids will get knocked down and go, man, it's a little bit too rough to that. Let me stay in shallower. We'll go now. Let's do it again. He'll slam him down, roll him around again. He'll jump up and try to do it again.
[00:19:16] And I'm sitting there nervous the whole time, staying close to him, even with his life jacket on. I don't trust it.
[00:19:23] The imagery we have right here is of somebody being tossed around the same way.
[00:19:30] And scripture's saying it shouldn't be so.
[00:19:33] We shouldn't be tossed around like that. All believers, if you go to the next one, every saint is called to maturity.
[00:19:42] Every saint is called to maturity.
[00:19:47] Every saint is called to depth, as Swindoll was talking about earlier.
[00:19:52] I guess it's not talking about care. It's another example I have of her. It's not a bad one. Care was faithful and brought somebody to church one time. And the guest comes to church and they come. They're hanging out, and somebody that I've known for a long time, too. And it was actually one of the nights where we did. A new member was being introduced. And so we do the covenant with each other.
[00:20:09] This person had grown up in church and been in church, but backed out of it for a while and was trying to get back in. And Kari's like, you should come back and hang out with us. And she said, y' all serious?
[00:20:20] We're like, yes. Yes, we are. Y' all might be too serious. I'm sitting here going, there's no such thing.
[00:20:28] There's no such thing as a believer that's too serious about God and the things of God and the word of God. You can't be too serious about these things.
[00:20:37] And we'll get reputations of being those, I guess, Bible thumpers and whatever else people want to say about it. But I believe that these are the words of God. These are the words of life. And they lead me to what I was designed to be.
[00:20:50] They lead me to the glory of God. I can't be too serious about this.
[00:20:56] For a long time growing up, I looked at my friends and I was doing okay. I was a lot better than they were.
[00:21:02] I was more spiritually mature than them.
[00:21:07] I didn't do all the dumb things they did. I wasn't great by any stretch of imagination. But what's the problem with that?
[00:21:13] They're not the standard.
[00:21:16] The standard says it's Jesus Christ.
[00:21:19] He's going to conform us to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.
[00:21:25] That's our goal right there. And until we are like Jesus, we are not done growing.
[00:21:31] I think it's okay to celebrate growth.
[00:21:34] I think it's okay to become complacent in it.
[00:21:38] So if you're not who you were a year ago, five years ago, 10 years ago, praise God for that. It's worth celebrating. I hope I'm not the man that I was last year.
[00:21:49] I hope I'm constantly maturing and I think that those things are worth celebrating.
[00:21:56] But I'm not like Jesus yet.
[00:22:00] I'm just glad my wife and kids didn't name me right there.
[00:22:05] And so we keep pressing into maturity until we all attain the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. To mature. Manhood call to maturity.
[00:22:21] Paul says that there's a season where we lay down our childish ways and we become men.
[00:22:28] In conversation with Andrew about raising kids, because we're in a lot of the same season, we all talk about how we're not raising kids, we're raising adults.
[00:22:40] Every believer is called to maturity. One thing that I love to do here at East Rock is a class we call bridge. And the bridge class is basically we have like all of our teenagers. Anytime we're meeting here, our teenagers never separated from us. And so when we do our rock solid student ministry, they meet at times the rest of the body is not meeting. And then when we do Wednesday night Bible studies, we have a thing for the kids. But once they hit middle school, we say, come in here with the adults and do it with the adults. Let's learn to walk together.
[00:23:10] I think that somehow in a lot of traditional youth ministries, people miss this. When you take all the young people and separate them from the older people, you take all the stupid and put them in one spot and, and all the wisdom and put them in one side and so let's separate them.
[00:23:24] There's a problem with that, right? It's funny, but it's also true. When Tim and I first started here at East Rock as a church plant. He would talk about this person from Clement, where we both was our home church. He talked about this great man of faith. And I'm sitting there going, you mean the guy in the green hat?
[00:23:41] The problem is, I never missed church. I was always there. But I was always separated with the youth group. When we had times, we would maybe be together. So you get the youth to get together and have all their stupid ideas together. There's nobody sitting around going, maybe this isn't such a bright idea.
[00:23:56] Separating them does damage, I believe.
[00:24:00] So here at East Rock, we're calling every believer to maturity. So when we have the young people coming to the adult class on Wednesdays, what we kind of realized in the beginning was they weren't ready to go from fifth grade to adulthood.
[00:24:14] Not sure why that didn't work out, but, you know, they just didn't make that jump. So we started a class called the Bridge. And the Bridge is we're basically walking with a group of people, fifth graders or now sixth graders, and we're trying to call them to maturity and how to work with and be like the adults so they can come in here and sit with the adults and figure that part out.
[00:24:32] And so we basically do a class where we're just pushing into that.
[00:24:36] And so one of my favorite examples of that was a few years ago when I had Peter Liggett in my class.
[00:24:41] If you know Peter, he's a goofball. He likes to joke. He got it honest from his dad. He always likes to joke, tell stories. He's a little showboater. I'm not knocking him at all, because it's also how I am, right? I'm not like, this isn't bad at all. It's what I love about him the most. And so when you love to joke, you have to also learn when's the right time to joke.
[00:25:00] And so we're in class talking, I'm trying to teach, and he would be interrupting with jokes, jokes, jokes. And one thing that we do is we would spend some time up there. We would also come down here with the adults for a little bit and go back up there and talk about how the adults. We're behaving and whatnot. And so we're talking to Peter about that. And when I said, look, Peter, when's the right time to joke and when's the right time to not joke in this kind of setting?
[00:25:21] And he's like, I don't know. I'm like, yeah, I know. You don't know your actions have shown me that you don't know.
[00:25:27] And he said, what is it when it's going to interrupt from the overall thing of what's happening? It's not the right time for that joke. But if you can make that joke and it's a gig and we get to move on from it really quick, it doesn't disrupt what we've got going on, it's a good time to joke.
[00:25:44] You saw his eyes, like rolling in his head a little bit, like he was processing.
[00:25:48] And he took that message to heart.
[00:25:50] And immediately, even in the bridge class, you would see him catch himself from stop trying to joke.
[00:25:57] From stop trying to joke.
[00:26:01] I was at a church recently and they had a pastor of next generations.
[00:26:07] What do you think that means?
[00:26:11] Say what?
[00:26:13] Youth pastor or youth. And that's my assumption. I don't know because I didn't ask any questions. I hated it.
[00:26:20] I hate that theory. I hate that concept. You also get this idea. I've heard people say in a setting, the youth are our church of tomorrow.
[00:26:30] No, there are churches right now.
[00:26:33] They are a saint, they are a believer. We begin calling them to maturity now. We begin setting the expectations for them now. We're not waiting them to then grow up and then to start getting these things. We minister to every saint right now.
[00:26:49] Every believer is called to maturity. Why do I slow down and talk about the kids in the youth in this setting, if it applies to them? We know it applies to you old people in here, every person is called to maturity. Not just maturity, but spiritual maturity.
[00:27:07] Don't let that be mistaken for right behavior.
[00:27:12] Acting a certain way, talking a certain way, performing a certain way in a business meeting, or knowing certain things. We're talking about the spiritual depths of knowing God, who he is and what it looks like to walk with him.
[00:27:24] The idea that we cannot be thrown to and fro when we're challenged by our faith.
[00:27:32] What's one of the most places that we get challenged the most in our faith?
[00:27:38] I say college is a big one.
[00:27:40] I read something I believe a couple years ago that 97% of college professors are super liberal or lean, very liberal. It was somewhere in the 90s, at least. I can't remember the exact number.
[00:27:52] If that's the one that's instructing our kids, our young people, they're gonna have an impact on them, right?
[00:28:01] We want them to be able to stand in their faith. That's the thing I love about our rock solid idea and what we're planning for is that when you finish high school, you graduate you're part of the real world. You now have a faith that stands on its own.
[00:28:15] It's not just your parents faith, but we're developing our young people's faith.
[00:28:19] Your faith should stand on your own.
[00:28:22] I remember when I first went to pcc, I had a teacher and I can't remember his. I think his first name was Wayne. I can't remember his last name. And he began to challenge people that believe the Bible and biblical things. And he would say, what do you believe? And he'd say, prove it, prove it, prove it. And I've never been challenged that way before.
[00:28:39] I couldn't give a lot of answers to things I said that I believed and that I knew. Like where is that at in scripture? It's in the Bible. Where? Tell me where it's at. I couldn't say anything.
[00:28:49] We need to be ready to defend our faith as individuals with these things.
[00:28:56] We can't be tossed to and fro by everything that comes up.
[00:29:03] Every book that comes up that's heretical, every pastor that pops up, we shouldn't have to come to somebody and go, is this person okay? We should know core doctrines and go. That's a red flag. If he's saying that, it's not okay.
[00:29:17] I shouldn't be thrown around by this. I shouldn't believe this and go that way.
[00:29:25] So verse 15 picks up and he says, rather speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into Christ.
[00:29:37] As believers, we have a duty to each other.
[00:29:41] We're bound to each other. We've taken at Easter rock, we've taken this covenant together to make that clear.
[00:29:49] We have a duty to each other. What's that duty?
[00:29:52] Speaking the truth in love.
[00:29:56] What's the purpose of a public wedding?
[00:30:00] What's the purpose? Somebody shout it out for me. What's the purpose of a public wedding?
[00:30:04] Get married.
[00:30:06] Close, but not quite witnesses.
[00:30:09] You make your vows before not only your other person, but you make that vow in front of the people that you're doing life with and will hold you accountable. Remember when you said you would love your spouse this way? You're not doing it right now. Go do it.
[00:30:25] You do it in front of each other as witnesses. And we hold each other to it as a part of the body.
[00:30:37] We're to speak the truth in love now. Not by the way. The world defines love. Right? Because the way the world defines love is anything goes, allow anything, accept anything. That's just not the reality.
[00:30:51] We need to be able to Speak hard truths to each other and not get mad about it, not be in our feelings about it and receive what that person has to say.
[00:31:01] That requires a great trust with each other.
[00:31:05] But when we are unified as the body and we know that together we're headed the same direction, this becomes much easier.
[00:31:13] If you have somebody speaking to you that you're not on the same page, don't take their advice.
[00:31:20] If their ultimate goal and purpose is not the same as yours, be careful what you share.
[00:31:26] I see way too much of this people posting on Facebook looking for advice. Don't do that.
[00:31:32] It's dumb.
[00:31:34] And the people commenting on there below is dumb. Don't take their advice because they're looking for their own glory. A lot of times they're looking for their own worldly wise outcomes. They're not looking towards the glory of God.
[00:31:49] If the people that you were sharing your biggest struggles with are not believers, you are setting yourself up for failure.
[00:32:06] I want that one sneak in.
[00:32:10] Be careful who you take advice from, whether it's TV, YouTube, social media, wherever the friends at work.
[00:32:24] A lot of times you'd be better suited to keep that stuff all in so you can share it with somebody who desires the same outcome that you desire.
[00:32:36] Because if they're not on the same page with you spiritually, they're in no position to offer you advice.
[00:32:42] And when you share those deep things with them, you're opening yourself up to hear their advice.
[00:32:49] Walk wisely.
[00:32:52] Share that stuff with the body.
[00:32:57] If you have a hard truth, be willing to share it.
[00:33:04] Several years ago, before I was dating Kelly and before we got married, obviously I was dating this different girl and I was lonely. I wanted a girlfriend. I wanted one really bad. I want to get married.
[00:33:14] And God hadn't brought the right person along with me and I began to walk in disobedience. I started dating this girl and it wasn't long, you know, she met Tim, we hung around together and man, deep down I knew that wasn't the girl I should have been dating. I knew I should have broke it off. I really never started that relationship, but I didn't have the strength to do it because I was really living in my emotions, letting them rule me. If I I'm honest.
[00:33:40] And so Tim wanted to tell me that I shouldn't be dating this girl.
[00:33:44] And he knew the situation I was in, that I was desperate, that I was lonely, knew all of that. And so it made it very difficult for him to confront me in this. And so one day he called me into his Office.
[00:33:54] And, man, that fool was blabbering and crying like a baby.
[00:33:58] He was just heartbroken, knowing my situation and where I was at, knowing what I desired and I didn't have it.
[00:34:07] And with tears in his eyes, he's like, brett, this is not the one.
[00:34:14] And I listened to everything he had to say, and I didn't say too much in my heart. I was sitting there going, man, I know. I knew before you knew.
[00:34:24] But I'd given in to my emotions and feelings and was walking in disobedience to the father.
[00:34:33] I didn't want to share that with anybody because it's hard.
[00:34:37] And so he called me to him and in love, spoke truth.
[00:34:46] It's not always the easy thing to do when you know somebody's acting out and acting wrong.
[00:34:54] Speaking truth is sometimes easy.
[00:34:57] Look at him and say, you're being dumb. Stop doing that.
[00:35:01] Speaking truth in love is not always easy, right?
[00:35:11] Mo Pastor Johnny Smith had three things you would say when you're speaking to somebody.
[00:35:15] Is it true?
[00:35:17] If it ain't true, don't say it.
[00:35:19] It's pretty simple, right? If you don't know it to be true for certainty, don't say it. Don't gossip.
[00:35:26] Is it true? Number two, does it need to be said? Some things are true, but it simply doesn't need to be said.
[00:35:34] You can get on with life without saying that thing.
[00:35:37] Is it true? Does it need to be said? And lastly, is it being said out of love?
[00:35:44] Some things are true, need to be said. But you can be a punk saying those things.
[00:35:49] Somebody that flies down, you shout it from across from, hey, John, your flies down. You're trying to embarrass him. You know what you're doing it for is trying to embarrass him, right? It's true. Somebody should tell the man his flies down.
[00:36:00] But you can go up and whisper it, right? I mean, you ain't got to embarrass him like that.
[00:36:05] The other day in the office, Amy had something on her cheek. And I walked by and she was in a conversation with three people. And I walked by and I was like, amy. And she wipes it off and it's on her hand. She goes, ah, and at least you love me. Nobody else in the circle loves me. Everybody else is just letting her walk around with something on her face, not saying anything to her about it. Some things need to be said, right? But how are you saying them?
[00:36:24] Are you saying in a way that will build them up and help them out and encourage them? Are you saying a way that will bring them down. I'm obviously using a very silly example to make you laugh about it, but the point still remains true.
[00:36:36] Speak truth in love.
[00:36:41] We all need it, we all need that.
[00:36:46] We all need people speaking truth in our lives.
[00:36:51] I've got a great set of parents, love them to death.
[00:36:55] I think one of the reasons that I am the man that I am right now is I've had a community of people speaking things to me over and over again.
[00:37:03] Speaking truth to me. Several years ago I was doing ministry and I was very, very busy with it, but also not making a lot of money. So I started a business side business doing photography and I enjoyed it. So I started trying to make some money off of it and everybody said, oh, that's great, that's great, that's great, that's great. And everybody was encouraging me in it. And Judy Batten comes up to me and she says, and we know she was my Sunday school teacher for years and she leans in this public setting, but she leans in when everybody else kind of stops saying all the nice things. She says, are you sure that's a wise thing to do?
[00:37:33] Your schedule is already very busy. Is it really wise to take on something else? How are you going to actually manage that business and do this?
[00:37:41] I said, oh, that's the kind of the point of doing the photography is that when I have time for it, I'll do it. If I don't have time for, I can just leave it alone. So it's not gonna be like an all out business that I'm doing as much as I can. It's just the thing where I, if I got time, I do it. If I don't, I don't do it because. Oh, that sounds very reasonable right there.
[00:37:57] And then Judy became the only one in that group that actually paid me to do that stuff. Stuff. She would hire me to do family pictures every year. Even if it was just I need this one picture for my newsletter and she didn't need a professional photographer to do it. But guess what? She did every year, got me to come do it and paid me for it.
[00:38:15] We often think of love as a thing where we're going, that sounds great, good job, good luck.
[00:38:20] But I would argue that Judy was way more loving and coming up to me and saying, are you sure this is a wise move for you because you've got a lot of responsibilities with the ministry. Are you sure it's wise?
[00:38:32] And when I explained it to her, she encouraged me and then hired me.
[00:38:36] That felt a whole Lot more loving in the end than the people who were going, you should. Good job. This is going to work out great.
[00:38:43] We have a wrong view of what love looks like. A lot of times.
[00:38:46] A lot of times we rub against each other. CS Lewis said his least favorite word was interference.
[00:38:54] He hated the idea of being interfered with. He basically wanted all the believers to leave him alone and not challenge him at all and just let him be where he was.
[00:39:02] He said also, it's the most necessary. It's the thing that I need most.
[00:39:06] I need believers speaking into my life.
[00:39:09] And lastly, we'll wrap up right here.
[00:39:12] This is God's plan for the church.
[00:39:17] The whole body joined, held together by every joint with which it is equipped. When each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
[00:39:28] God is primarily working through the church, not individuals.
[00:39:34] Don't separate yourself from the church.
[00:39:36] If you look at throughout Scripture, how God is moving and working, it's through the body. What he's accomplishing is through the body.
[00:39:44] Don't separate yourself from the body.
[00:39:46] And this is the plan God has for the body, that we build each other up. We bring each other along. When one person can't see the forest or the trees, somebody else comes along and encourages them and speaks truth to them. And we head to the cross together. We head to the Father together. We seek God's glory together.
[00:40:05] This is God's plan for the church.
[00:40:07] It can be uncomfortable, it can hurt, it can seem foreign, but God has a plan for us, and we're going there together.
[00:40:21] Doesn't that sound like a whole lot better than going somewhere by yourself?
[00:40:27] There might be a handful of people who call themselves introverts that want to do something by themselves.
[00:40:31] I think if we press them, even they don't want to go by themselves somewhere.
[00:40:36] Not really.
[00:40:42] So the theme of the night, the title was Walk Captured.
[00:40:46] Captured by the gospel, captured by Jesus.
[00:40:50] And we need to, in response, be eager to serve and grow.
[00:40:54] Our giftings are never used for our own glory. The giftings God has given us are to be used to build each other up, to take each other to the Father.
[00:41:04] Don't settle for mediocrity. Don't become complacent. Don't be okay with the simple things.
[00:41:11] Let's grow to maturity together.
[00:41:13] Let us never be satisfied with what we've achieved in the past, but always desire more and more and more of the Father.
[00:41:22] Let's pray.
[00:41:26] Father, we thank you for your many blessings.
[00:41:28] Thank you for your word that just shows us who you are.
[00:41:31] It shows us who we are as the Church who shows us how we are to operate as the church.
[00:41:43] Father, help us to be concerned for each other. Help us to have a genuine love for each other. Where we're willing to have tough conversations, we're willing to approach each other and speak tough, hard things for their own spiritual journey, for their benefit, so they can be conformed, shaped into the image of Christ.
[00:42:07] Father, we thank you for your many blessings, including this body, the church. Amen.
