SPEAKER_00: Good morning.
SPEAKER_00: It's so good to see all of you here worshiping with us today.
SPEAKER_00: I'd like to welcome all of you here at this campus, but I want to welcome all of our campuses and all of our venues and those of you that are worshiping with us online.
SPEAKER_00: If I haven't had a chance to meet you personally, I'm Tony Walliser, one of the pastors here at Silverdale, and I have the privilege today to share with you God's word.
SPEAKER_00: So this is what I encourage you to do.
SPEAKER_00: Go and take your Bibles.
SPEAKER_00: Open up in the New Testament to the book of Hebrews, Hebrews chapter 10.
SPEAKER_00: You can turn to Hebrews 10 or got a smartphone, Bible app, you can open that.
SPEAKER_00: We also have a Silverdale app as well.
SPEAKER_00: And you can do this.
SPEAKER_00: Take out these Bible study outlines that we provide for you.
SPEAKER_00: We give these outlines so you can follow along and take notes as we study God's Word together.
SPEAKER_00: We are in a series called the One Another Way.
SPEAKER_00: And what we're doing is we're looking at these one another principles found in the New Testament, and they will transform relationships.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever you apply these one another principles to your marriage or family or coworkers or neighbors, whatever it may be, it will bring about a transformation.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the fact is, if we do this, our marriages will become stronger, our friendships will become deeper, our church will become healthier, and our witness to a watching world will become clearer because we are living out these biblical relationship principles.
SPEAKER_00: Now, today, I want to teach you on how to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: How are we supposed to, as followers of Jesus Christ, supposed to encourage each other?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, think about it.
SPEAKER_00: Do any of you here get too much encouragement?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're like, oh, I just can't take it anymore.
SPEAKER_00: Don't encourage me anymore, right?
SPEAKER_00: Kids, stop praising me.
SPEAKER_00: I just can't take any more of your encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, right?
SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, um, boss, quit patting me on the back.
SPEAKER_00: I can't handle any more encouragement at work.
SPEAKER_00: Look, nobody's ever said that.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because we all need encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Why do we need encouragement so much?
SPEAKER_00: Because we live in such a discouraging age.
SPEAKER_00: We're bombarded with hate and discouraging, bad news all the time.
SPEAKER_00: We live in a broken world surrounded by broken people.
SPEAKER_00: We will come to the place where we come to an end of ourselves and go, oh, I just can't go on like this.
SPEAKER_00: We need encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that happens to be where the people are for the first recipients of the letter that we're going to study today.
SPEAKER_00: It's the book of Hebrews.
SPEAKER_00: What does that mean, Hebrews?
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's written to Jewish Christians.
SPEAKER_00: These are Christians, they are Jewish background that come to followers of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: They believe Jesus is the promised Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: But because of that faith in Jesus, what's happened is they become ostracized.
SPEAKER_00: They are hated by their family and the Jewish community.
SPEAKER_00: They're also hated by the Romans, so they're getting hate on every side and they're discouraged and they're starting to wander away in their faith.
SPEAKER_00: And the writer of Hebrews wrote this book to encourage them in their faith.
SPEAKER_00: And in the three verses that we're going to study today, we're going to learn how we are to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: So let's look at our passage together.
SPEAKER_00: It's Hebrews chapter 10, beginning verse 23.
SPEAKER_00: Notice God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he that's God, who promised is faithful.
SPEAKER_00: And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good works, not neglecting to gather together as some are in the habit of doing.
SPEAKER_00: But, here it is, encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day approaching.
SPEAKER_00: This is the word of the Lord for you today.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks be to God.
SPEAKER_00: Now, those three verses is God's answer for the negative world that you and I live in.
SPEAKER_00: Every one of us, we're bombarded on every side, and we have a tendency that we will drift away unless we get the proper encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Can I just tell you, encouragement is powerful.
SPEAKER_00: Years ago, I read a really powerful story about the power of encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: There was this boy named Tommy.
SPEAKER_00: Tommy was a slow learner.
SPEAKER_00: And so he was in school and the teacher was getting frustrated because he was asked a bunch of questions, but he could never keep up.
SPEAKER_00: And eventually she goes to Tommy's mom and says, Look, um, he is incapable of learning.
SPEAKER_00: You just need to, you know, prepare yourself.
SPEAKER_00: He's not going to amount to much of anything.
SPEAKER_00: And so I can't teach him anymore.
SPEAKER_00: And so Tommy's mother said, Okay, well, I'll teach him at home.
SPEAKER_00: And you know what?
SPEAKER_00: He struggled and he would fail a lot, but she would always encourage him.
SPEAKER_00: She would give him hope.
SPEAKER_00: She would say, keep on going, try again, right?
SPEAKER_00: You go, well, whatever happened to Tommy?
SPEAKER_00: Well, he grew up.
SPEAKER_00: Here's his picture.
SPEAKER_00: We know him today as Thomas Edison.
SPEAKER_00: All right?
SPEAKER_00: One of the greatest inventors in American history.
SPEAKER_00: All because of encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: He is a product of encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Well, the writer of Hebrews is going to teach us how to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: And there's three principles that I want you to jot down on your outlines today.
SPEAKER_00: There are actually three choices that we've got to all make if we're going to give encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: Ready?
SPEAKER_00: Here it is.
SPEAKER_00: Number one is this first, you got to choose to connect with others.
SPEAKER_00: You got to choose to connect with others.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you can't give encouragement and you can't be encouraged if you're not connected with other people, right?
SPEAKER_00: You got to get connected.
SPEAKER_00: God said, it's not good for you to do life alone.
SPEAKER_00: But here's our problem in our culture today.
SPEAKER_00: We are now high tech, but low touch.
SPEAKER_00: Got a lot of friends on Facebook, but not a lot of friends in our face, right?
SPEAKER_00: The reality is that most of us are connecting on screens.
SPEAKER_00: But let me remind you of something.
SPEAKER_00: You can't download intimacy 301 on this.
SPEAKER_00: There's no app for closeness and connection.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to be in community.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's the problem.
SPEAKER_00: All the reports are telling us this.
SPEAKER_00: That we, this generation, is the loneliest generation in the history of mankind.
SPEAKER_00: That's crazy, right?
SPEAKER_00: We're more connected than ever.
SPEAKER_00: And yet we're lonelier than ever.
SPEAKER_00: God says, I don't want you to do life alone.
SPEAKER_00: So what do you got to do?
SPEAKER_00: You got to choose.
SPEAKER_00: You got to choose to connect.
SPEAKER_00: Notice how the writer of Hebrews puts this.
SPEAKER_00: Again, verse 23 says, Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering.
SPEAKER_00: How are we going to do that?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 25.
SPEAKER_00: Not neglecting to gather together, as some are in the habit, I'll call it a bad habit, of doing, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, think about it.
SPEAKER_00: Even in the first century, just a few decades after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, there were some Christians that were choosing, having a bad habit of not connecting and gathering with other believers, right?
SPEAKER_00: Now, you go, how does a habit form?
SPEAKER_00: Well, you know, right?
SPEAKER_00: It starts with our behavior.
SPEAKER_00: Basically, you know, we start making choices, and over time that becomes a habit, and next thing you know, it's so ingrained in us, we don't even have to think about it anymore.
SPEAKER_00: We just do it.
SPEAKER_00: I Googled America's, you know, top 10 bad habits.
SPEAKER_00: This is the top 10.
SPEAKER_00: Ready?
SPEAKER_00: Here it is.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, you got smoking, overspending, gambling, overeating, drinking too much, taking drugs, complaining.
SPEAKER_00: Everything about that as being a bad habit, it is.
SPEAKER_00: Chronically being late, some of you are convicted right now.
SPEAKER_00: Eating drunk food.
SPEAKER_00: I'm convicted right now.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the most recent one added to the list.
SPEAKER_00: Always looking at your phone, right?
SPEAKER_00: Don't doesn't that drive you crazy, right?
SPEAKER_00: Now, the Bible says there's one more bad habit you can add to that list, and what is it?
SPEAKER_00: Not gathering together.
SPEAKER_00: Choosing not to do this, not gathering.
SPEAKER_00: Now, there are some people that they only come to church on three occasions, right?
SPEAKER_00: Baby dedication, weddings, funerals.
SPEAKER_00: They come to church on a baby dedication, and some churches will throw water on the baby, right?
SPEAKER_00: Then they come to church for the wedding, they throw rice on the couple.
SPEAKER_00: Then somebody dies, and then you throw dirt on them, right?
SPEAKER_00: So that's the occasion when you come to church.
SPEAKER_00: Always throwing something on people.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, some people are called CEO Christians.
SPEAKER_00: That means they come to Christmas and Easter only.
SPEAKER_00: I call people submarine Christians.
SPEAKER_00: They only surface a couple of times a year, you know.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the fact is, I've heard it all.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, people give their excuses.
SPEAKER_00: Well, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to go to church to be a Christian.
SPEAKER_00: Very true, you don't.
SPEAKER_00: The church doesn't save you.
SPEAKER_00: But the Bible is teaching us here that if you're not connected, you will drift away from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You'll drift in your faith, you'll fall into sin.
SPEAKER_00: You'll get away from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You need to get connected, right?
SPEAKER_00: In fact, I've put this basic principle on your outline.
SPEAKER_00: 80% of success is showing up.
SPEAKER_00: That's true for anything.
SPEAKER_00: 80% of success is just showing up.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's sad is that some of you as parents have been giving a horrible example for your kids, right?
SPEAKER_00: You know this.
SPEAKER_00: Your values are caught more than they're ever taught.
SPEAKER_00: And whenever you say, you know what, uh, we don't have to go to church this weekend or whatever it may be, right?
SPEAKER_00: You are teaching your kids that Christ doesn't really need to be a priority to you.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm very thankful that my parents brought me to church when I was young.
SPEAKER_00: I didn't become a follower of Christ until I was an adult, but I'm thankful they brought me to church.
SPEAKER_00: I had that foundation in my life.
SPEAKER_00: See, you don't ask your kids on Sunday morning, hey, do you want to go to church?
SPEAKER_00: No, be the parent.
SPEAKER_00: Saturday night, go, hey, tomorrow we're going to church, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So make that a priority.
SPEAKER_00: And so we know we all need community.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, even our culture is informing us of this.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, think about it.
SPEAKER_00: What about the rise of coffee houses?
SPEAKER_00: What's up with that, right?
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you what's up with that.
SPEAKER_00: You go to most coffee houses, including our coffee house, Oaks, and you'll see that many people that are there are by themselves.
SPEAKER_00: And there they are by themselves, and yet they're in a coffee house.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because intuitively they know they want to be around other people.
SPEAKER_00: And that's the same reason why people go to bars, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's been said the bar flourishes not because people are alcoholics, but because people desire to connect.
SPEAKER_00: But you and I, we are created for more than just coffee shop talk or bar stool talk or you know, barber shop talk.
SPEAKER_00: We're created for real talk, real relationships.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're not connected, when the storms of life come, you'll fall away.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, truth is, storms of life are gonna hit every one of us.
SPEAKER_00: We don't, we don't realize it, we don't acknowledge whenever it happens, but suddenly the storms of life hit, and it can be a number of things.
SPEAKER_00: You may lose that job, you may get a bad doctor's report, you know, a wayward child, your marriage is crumbling, your finances are falling apart, whatever it may be.
SPEAKER_00: And in those moments, you need other people around you.
SPEAKER_00: We all need a shoulder to cry on, we all need a person to lean on, we need community.
SPEAKER_00: I read recently about the friendships of Adolf Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: Bottom line, he didn't have any.
SPEAKER_00: There was one guy, his name was Albert Speer, and everybody considered him the closest friend to Adolf Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: He later wrote, he said, look, Hitler was incapable of friendships.
SPEAKER_00: He was a loner.
SPEAKER_00: He did things by himself, he just didn't have relationships in his life.
SPEAKER_00: And so my word for you today is don't be like Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: Don't be like Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are gonna leave church and go, what did you learn in church today?
SPEAKER_00: Uh not to be like Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: Good, that's a good thing, right?
SPEAKER_00: You learn.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, don't be like Hitler.
SPEAKER_00: Have friends in your life.
SPEAKER_00: If you're here and you rarely attend, start attending regularly.
SPEAKER_00: If you're not in a small group, get in a small group and start attending.
SPEAKER_00: If you're married, start going out on dates.
SPEAKER_00: A weekly date is still necessary for every marriage.
SPEAKER_00: When you're in the car with your family, turn off the noise and talk to each other.
SPEAKER_00: When you're having meals, turn off the TV, put away the devices, it's device-free time.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna have conversations in this family.
SPEAKER_00: If you don't do that, it won't happen.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to choose to connect.
SPEAKER_00: That's where it all begins.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: But there's a second choice that you and I have to make, and it's this.
SPEAKER_00: Jot this down.
SPEAKER_00: You must also choose to challenge others.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta choose to challenge others.
SPEAKER_00: That means you gotta be like a coach and push people.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta be like a teacher and inspire people.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta be like a parent and you affirm people.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta be like a personal trainer and get people get the most out of people, right?
SPEAKER_00: You go, what?
SPEAKER_00: We're supposed to do that?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we're supposed to be doing that to one another.
SPEAKER_00: Check it out.
SPEAKER_00: Notice how this is written in verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: It says, Let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good works.
SPEAKER_00: That word stimulate literally means to spur on, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you're from Texas, you know, you got boots, you know, you're riding a horse, you got spurs on your boots, right?
SPEAKER_00: You're riding the horse, and what do you do?
SPEAKER_00: You put the spurs in the side of the horse and go giddy up, right?
SPEAKER_00: And it motivates that horse to move on.
SPEAKER_00: Most of you know, whenever I grew up in Florida in a farm, a hog farm, and so we would move pigs from one barn to another, we would have what we called a hot shot, okay?
SPEAKER_00: It was an electric shocker.
SPEAKER_00: It's also called a cattle prod, right?
SPEAKER_00: And yes, I had, you know, two brothers, so we would use it on each other and go, what are you doing?
SPEAKER_00: Had to make sure it worked, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And so, you know, and but anytime you use the cattle prod, you know, the shocker on the pig, mah! And it suddenly got motivated to go forward.
SPEAKER_00: Well, the Bible says we are to motivate each other to love and good deeds, right?
SPEAKER_00: Did you know you're supposed to be doing good deeds?
SPEAKER_00: We're supposed to be motivating each other to love and good works.
SPEAKER_00: The problem with a lot of people is that they think that church is like a cruise ship, right?
SPEAKER_00: For a lot of Christians, they come to church and they just imagine, you know what a cruise ship is, right?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: You got a lot of passengers and they're just lounging back, taking it easy.
SPEAKER_00: And you got the crew, they're working like crazy to serve the passengers.
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of people think of church that way.
SPEAKER_00: They just come to church and they're just, you know, it's like a cruise ship, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's a consumer mentality.
SPEAKER_00: What's in it for me?
SPEAKER_00: Let me see if I like this church.
SPEAKER_00: This church is gonna, you know, encourage me and serve me, right?
SPEAKER_00: And if they don't like the music, or maybe they don't like the preaching, it's not entertaining enough, they'll go, they'll leave one and they'll go find another cruise ship.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, another church, right?
SPEAKER_00: But the church is not a cruise ship.
SPEAKER_00: Church is a battleship, right?
SPEAKER_00: We're at war, folks.
SPEAKER_00: We got the world, the flesh, and the devil that we fight every day.
SPEAKER_00: And whenever battle stations alarm happen, what happens?
SPEAKER_00: We all know what we're supposed to be doing.
SPEAKER_00: We all jump in.
SPEAKER_00: We we know where we're called to serve.
SPEAKER_00: We're all about serving one another.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we're called to do.
SPEAKER_00: We are called to stimulate one another to love and to good works.
SPEAKER_00: So when you come to church, do not come to church with the mindset, well, who's gonna encourage me today?
SPEAKER_00: No, come with a mindset, who am I going to encourage?
SPEAKER_00: You see a visitor that you don't recognize, go introduce yourself to that person.
SPEAKER_00: Did you know that most guests will choose to attend a church a second time before they ever hear the pastor preach?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: That's the that's you, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you see a mom in the parking lot struggling with two kids and a diaper bag, go help that poor girl, right?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We are called to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: We're to stimulate one another to good deeds.
SPEAKER_00: But the Bible says we're to stimulate each other to love and good deeds.
SPEAKER_00: Last week, the one another principle we studied was to love one another.
SPEAKER_00: Love's a big deal in the Christian faith.
SPEAKER_00: This passage is encouraging you to stimulate one another to do what?
SPEAKER_00: To love one another.
SPEAKER_00: What does it mean to love one another?
SPEAKER_00: That means you're you're you're entering into their world, you're serving them, you're helping them.
SPEAKER_00: Um, there was a research that was done asking children to define love, which is sort of a scary question to ask kids.
SPEAKER_00: But there is one answer that I loved, and this kid said this.
SPEAKER_00: He said, When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore.
SPEAKER_00: So my grandpa painted her toenails even though he had arthritis.
SPEAKER_00: I think that's love.
SPEAKER_00: I completely agree.
SPEAKER_00: That's a great definition of love.
SPEAKER_00: We are to stimulate one another to love and good deeds.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because love creates love.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever there's an atmosphere of love, suddenly we love more.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever there's an atmosphere of kindness, kindness begets kindness.
SPEAKER_00: I read recently a story of this eight-year-old boy, his name was Miles Eckern.
SPEAKER_00: And Miles and his family were coming into a cracker barrel for lunch, and he finds a$20 bill in the parking lot.
SPEAKER_00: And he's all excited because what am I gonna do if we spend this money, you know, going into the cracker barrel store?
SPEAKER_00: He's looking around, I'm gonna spend this$20 on something.
SPEAKER_00: But all his attitude changed whenever they they sat down in the dining area, because as they were going in, he noticed there was a soldier that was by himself.
SPEAKER_00: Well, his dad was a soldier who died in the military.
SPEAKER_00: And so he got that little um that little pencil there on the cracker barrel table, and he wrote a little note to the soldier.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what he wrote.
SPEAKER_00: My dad was a soldier.
SPEAKER_00: He's in heaven now.
SPEAKER_00: I found his$20 in the parking lot when I got here.
SPEAKER_00: We like to pay it forward to you.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for your service.
SPEAKER_00: Miles Eckard, a gold star kid.
SPEAKER_00: So gave it to the soldier.
SPEAKER_00: That soldier happened to be an Air Force lieutenant colonel.
SPEAKER_00: And um he immediately took a picture of the note and took a picture of the$20, sent it to his daughter.
SPEAKER_00: His daughter posted it on social media, it went viral.
SPEAKER_00: CBS saw the story, picked it up, interviewed Miles.
SPEAKER_00: Why would you give away this money?
SPEAKER_00: Let's hear his story.
SPEAKER_00: Suddenly, people from all over the country were sending money to Miles Eckard.
SPEAKER_00: He and his parents gave it away.
SPEAKER_00: Over two million dollars that was brought to him, and he ended up giving it back away.
SPEAKER_00: See, Jesus said it's more blessed to give than to receive.
SPEAKER_00: And so, whenever you come to church, come with a mindset, okay, I'm ready to give.
SPEAKER_00: You go, give what?
SPEAKER_00: Give worship to the Lord, give encouragement to one another, right?
SPEAKER_00: Somebody need a little strength?
SPEAKER_00: Will you be that strength for them?
SPEAKER_00: You you see a need, you do the best you can to meet that need.
SPEAKER_00: That's what we're called to do.
SPEAKER_00: Can I just tell you something?
SPEAKER_00: If you come to church with that mindset, it changes your church, it changes your small group.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, see, see, some people come to church and they're like, well, I didn't get much out of that.
SPEAKER_00: Can I tell you, if you come to church with a mindset of I'm ready to encourage and give to other people around me, you'll never leave church going, didn't get anything out of that.
SPEAKER_00: No, because it is always more blessed to give than to receive.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're in discouraging times.
SPEAKER_00: How do you encourage?
SPEAKER_00: First, you gotta choose to connect with each other.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta choose to spur one another on to loving good deeds, right?
SPEAKER_00: But then there's a third thing, and it's this jot this down.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta choose to cheer others on.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta choose to cheer other people on.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's a simple reality.
SPEAKER_00: In this room and in all of our campuses right now, there are people that are ready to quit.
SPEAKER_00: There are.
SPEAKER_00: Life has been so discouraging to them right now, they're ready to quit.
SPEAKER_00: They're ready to quit that marriage, ready to quit that family, are ready to quit their faith.
SPEAKER_00: Or they're they're ready to quit life through suicide.
SPEAKER_00: And they need encouragement.
SPEAKER_00: And so notice what the writer of Hebrews tells us how to do it.
SPEAKER_00: Look again what it says, verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: And let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good works, not neglecting to gather together as some are in the habit of doing, but here it is, encouraging one another.
SPEAKER_00: That's the one another principle.
SPEAKER_00: And all the more as you see the day approaching.
SPEAKER_00: Now you may go, what does it mean to encourage somebody else?
SPEAKER_00: It literally means to inject courage in someone.
SPEAKER_00: So encouragement means I take some of my courage and I inject it into you.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe there's a day when I'm weak and you inject your courage in me, and I keep on going.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe there's a time when you're weak and I can inject some of my courage into you.
SPEAKER_00: That's what encouragement is.
SPEAKER_00: You're injecting courage into each other.
SPEAKER_00: Now, here's our problem.
SPEAKER_00: Most of us prefer to walk alone.
SPEAKER_00: Why do we prefer to walk alone?
SPEAKER_00: Because you get your own way.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to compromise with anybody, right?
SPEAKER_00: And you know what I'm Discovered walking alone, you can walk faster alone.
SPEAKER_00: You can, but you will walk farther when you're with somebody else, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, years ago, um, my um son John asked me to run a 5K with him, okay?
SPEAKER_00: You see that picture of me and John there.
SPEAKER_00: Now you gotta understand, I'm almost six foot, so you see how tall John is, all right?
SPEAKER_00: And um and so John he says, hey dad, will you run a 5k with me?
SPEAKER_00: And look, I know a 5K is not that far.
SPEAKER_00: Compared to a marathon, 5K is nothing.
SPEAKER_00: But to this old body, it was a lot, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And so about halfway through our 5K, my knees were killing me.
SPEAKER_00: And so, um, but John, what'd he do?
SPEAKER_00: He was running with me.
SPEAKER_00: He didn't run ahead.
SPEAKER_00: He could have finished a lot quicker than me, but he stayed with me.
SPEAKER_00: And he used his military army training, you know, to sing cadences as we were running.
SPEAKER_00: He would sing cadences like, Mama, mama, can't you see what the army's done to me?
SPEAKER_00: I used to drive a Cadillac, now I'm running with a pack, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so, and so he would, we would just be running together, and he'd be doing these cadences.
SPEAKER_00: And I finished because John ran with me.
SPEAKER_00: He gave me the encouragement to keep on going.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's what we do with each other.
SPEAKER_00: We give each other the encouragement to keep pressing on.
SPEAKER_00: You can do it.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what's interesting is this passage ends with a look to the future.
SPEAKER_00: He says, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: We need to really be doing this even more as Christ's return is getting closer.
SPEAKER_00: Check it out, look at how this ends, verse 25.
SPEAKER_00: And all the more as you see the day approaching.
SPEAKER_00: See, it's a big capital D there, day.
SPEAKER_00: It's the ultimate D Day.
SPEAKER_00: It's the day that Jesus Christ is going to return.
SPEAKER_00: Now, there's been a lot of churches and religions through the years that have made predictions about when Jesus was going to return.
SPEAKER_00: Jehovah's Witnesses did it at one point.
SPEAKER_00: Seventh Adventists made a prediction at another point.
SPEAKER_00: Last year, about this time, there was an internet preacher, and he was predicting that Jesus was going to return at the end of September, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then, of course, when Jesus didn't return at the end of September, he made the prediction, oh, miscalculated it's actually October.
SPEAKER_00: You know, anytime anybody predicts a day when Jesus is going to return, I know something for sure.
SPEAKER_00: He's not coming on that day.
SPEAKER_00: He is not coming on that day.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus said, no one knows the hour or the day, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So quit being so full of yourself, right?
SPEAKER_00: So he's not coming on that day.
SPEAKER_00: But this is something I do know.
SPEAKER_00: The return of Jesus Christ is closer now than it's ever been, right?
SPEAKER_00: I mean, the return of Christ back to rule and reign as Lord, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: It's going to happen.
SPEAKER_00: It's closer this week than it was last week.
SPEAKER_00: And the Bible tells us something.
SPEAKER_00: The closer the end of time happens, the harder it is.
SPEAKER_00: That there's gonna be, yeah, wars and rumors of wars, and there's gonna be some persecution, there's an antichrist, there's tribulation, there's stuff going on, and especially followers of Christ, man, you're gonna, you and I, we're gonna be under it.
SPEAKER_00: And so the Bible says we need, as we're seeing that day come closer, and we see the signs, right?
SPEAKER_00: We do, we need to encourage each other even all the more.
SPEAKER_00: So, church, let's be an encouraging church.
SPEAKER_00: I think one of the greatest examples of encouragement is actually found in nature.
SPEAKER_00: I love this.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever seen geese whenever they're flying, migrating, right?
SPEAKER_00: And they're in that V formation.
SPEAKER_00: You've seen that before.
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever wondered why do they fly in that V formation?
SPEAKER_00: Well, there's been a lot of studies done about it, including NASA did a study about it.
SPEAKER_00: And they discovered that with every flap of the wing in the V formation, it creates an updraft for the goose directly behind that one.
SPEAKER_00: And so everyone is getting an updraft, and so literally the guy at the end is almost floating because he hardly has to do it.
SPEAKER_00: It's so much updraft.
SPEAKER_00: They say that they can fly 71% further than if they were just flying alone.
SPEAKER_00: And then a real interesting thing is that they change positions, right?
SPEAKER_00: You got the goose that's at the front, he's flying point, he's taking on the wind head on, he's doing it all, right?
SPEAKER_00: Well, guess what?
SPEAKER_00: He doesn't stay there all the time.
SPEAKER_00: They rotate so that everybody has a chance where they're flying at the front and they're taking the weight of the responsibility.
SPEAKER_00: And then what's interesting is that if you get one goose that gets too tired to go on, it will fall out, but two other geese that are healthy and strong will go down with it and stay with that weak one until it's ready to get back up, and then the three of them in a V formation will fly off together again.
SPEAKER_00: Pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00: But then you've heard them flying and they're honking, right?
SPEAKER_00: Honk, honk, honk, right?
SPEAKER_00: Do you know who's doing the honking?
SPEAKER_00: It's those that are in the back.
SPEAKER_00: They're encouraging those in the front, keep it going.
SPEAKER_00: Good job.
SPEAKER_00: It's great back here, honk, honk, right?
SPEAKER_00: They're encouraging them to keep on going, right?
SPEAKER_00: Well, here's the thing, church.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be a honking church, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We need to be encouraging one another, you know?
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are like, the only honking I get is in the highway.
SPEAKER_00: People honking me all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's because you're such a bad driver, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'm just spurring you on to good works, all right?
SPEAKER_00: Quit driving like that.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, here's the thing.
SPEAKER_00: We need to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: So God's saying, are you out of formation?
SPEAKER_00: Are you flying alone?
SPEAKER_00: You need others with you.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you may be here and you're like, I'm thinking about walking away from the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Honk, honk.
SPEAKER_00: Don't quit.
SPEAKER_00: Don't give up.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you think about it walking away from your family, quitting.
SPEAKER_00: Honk, honk, don't give up.
SPEAKER_00: Some of you are here and you're thinking, you know, I'm just ready to end it all.
SPEAKER_00: I got a troubled life.
SPEAKER_00: Honk, honk, don't give up.
SPEAKER_00: Encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: That doesn't mean you gotta fix their problems.
SPEAKER_00: You can't.
SPEAKER_00: You're not Christ.
SPEAKER_00: But you can be there with them.
SPEAKER_00: You can be a listening ear.
SPEAKER_00: You can try to give them the encouragement you can.
SPEAKER_00: You can pray with them.
SPEAKER_00: God will use all those things to bring about encouragement in somebody else.
SPEAKER_00: Interject courage in someone else.
SPEAKER_00: Now, let me tell you how we're gonna end today's message.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna put all this into practice, okay?
SPEAKER_00: At the very bottom of your outlines today, you have some words of encouragement to say to each other.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is how we're gonna end today's message, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We're going to pair up, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And so this is what I want you to know.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to look around and I want you to find pairs, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Groups of two, but I don't want anybody by themselves.
SPEAKER_00: If there's three, then okay, you're gonna have a group of three, all right?
SPEAKER_00: I don't want anybody at all of our venues, I don't want anybody by themselves, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So look around.
SPEAKER_00: You paired up with somebody, okay?
SPEAKER_00: This may mean you gotta get up and go, okay?
SPEAKER_00: All right?
SPEAKER_00: You ready to do that?
SPEAKER_00: I'm looking at moving.
SPEAKER_00: Everybody ready?
SPEAKER_00: So, this is what we're gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: I am going to give the word of encouragement, and then I want you simultaneously to say that word of encouragement to the person you're paired up with or you're tripled up with, okay?
SPEAKER_00: You ready?
SPEAKER_00: Let's encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: Ready?
SPEAKER_00: Say this.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for being here today.
SPEAKER_00: Say that.
SPEAKER_00: You matter to God, you matter to me.
SPEAKER_00: I may not know everything you're carrying.
SPEAKER_00: But God does.
SPEAKER_00: He sees your every burden, so don't give up.
SPEAKER_00: Don't lose heart.
SPEAKER_00: God's not finished.
SPEAKER_00: He's still writing your story, he's still working.
SPEAKER_00: You are loved, and you're not alone.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Praise God.
SPEAKER_00: All right.
SPEAKER_00: That's a good honkin church.
SPEAKER_00: We are called to encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: We all desperately need it.
SPEAKER_00: You need it, I need it.
SPEAKER_00: Let's be the family of God we're called to be.
SPEAKER_00: Amen?
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
SPEAKER_00: Father, thank you so much for your word.
SPEAKER_00: I'm so thankful, Lord, that your word works and it is relevant to where we live every day.
SPEAKER_00: Lord, you know how desperately we need each other.
SPEAKER_00: Forgive us for isolating ourselves.
SPEAKER_00: Forgive us for thinking we can be the Lone Ranger Christian.
SPEAKER_00: God help us to truly connect and encourage one another.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this in Jesus' name.
unknown: Amen.