Speaker 1: for them.
Speaker 1: Now, this past week we had something.
Speaker 1: We had a holiday.
Speaker 1: You guys know what it is.
Speaker 1: We had Thanksgiving, all right, you guys got your turkey and your stuffing and you're all full.
Speaker 1: How many of you people celebrate Christmas after Thanksgiving?
Speaker 1: You can only celebrate Christmas once Thanksgiving is over.
Speaker 1: That's you guys.
Speaker 1: All right, a few of you, all right, hands down.
Speaker 1: I don't understand you people at all.
Speaker 1: All right, I just don't get it.
Speaker 1: This is what you do.
Speaker 1: You decorate the house, you put up all the ornaments and you set everything up just to take it down in three weeks.
Speaker 1: I'm going to go through all that work to only leave it up for three weeks.
Speaker 1: There's no way, kelsey and I, we love Christmas.
Speaker 1: It's our favorite holiday.
Speaker 1: We holiday.
Speaker 1: We start celebrating Christmas in the Burr month.
Speaker 1: No, no, that is.
Speaker 1: That means September, october, november, december.
Speaker 1: That is Christmas time.
Speaker 1: Some of you guys are looking at me like I am absolutely crazy.
Speaker 1: We just love Jesus and we love to celebrate his birthday and if you're not that spiritual, I'm really sorry.
Speaker 1: Okay, we love Christmas around here, but with the Christmas season there's often this air of romance, right, this love in the air that comes around Christmas time.
Speaker 1: It's cold and it's foggy.
Speaker 1: Here in California it doesn't snow but it rains, so you just want to stay home and snuggle up in your Christmas blankie and then a very particular type of movie starts to roll out around the holidays, you guys know the ones with, like, the horrible acting takes place in some small town in Wisconsin, somewhere, right?
Speaker 1: All these little Hallmark movies and these Netflix movies that come out.
Speaker 1: Now, how many of you, if you're being honest, you're into those?
Speaker 1: Like you like those?
Speaker 1: A few of us.
Speaker 1: Okay, guys, y'all are lying there, we go, let's go.
Speaker 1: He got his hand up, all right, you guys like those movies.
Speaker 1: We saw one, kelsey and I.
Speaker 1: We were like flipping through Netflix and there's this one movie that was about this girl she builds a snowman and then the snowman comes to life and she falls in love with the snowman, okay, and everyone's just like, yeah, it's just a Christmas miracle, this is totally fine.
Speaker 1: During Christmas, there is this romantic time and, by the way, in our house those movies do get watched, but my wife is not the one who watches them, right?
Speaker 1: That is the closest to a confession you will get from me.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 1: You're here today and you guys are like Christmas in September, hallmark movies.
Speaker 1: What kind of sermon is this right now?
Speaker 1: Okay, we're going to be talking today about this idea of love, this idea of romance and passion, and how you and I can have a passion for God and be passionate about him, but without realizing it, we can often lose that passion.
Speaker 1: We can lose that love that we once had for him.
Speaker 1: We're going to be in Revelations, chapter 2.
Speaker 1: If you are ready to hear the word, would you say amen, let's go.
Speaker 1: All five of us, all right.
Speaker 1: Revelations, chapter two, verses one through five says this write to the angel of the church in Ephesus.
Speaker 1: Thus says the one who holds the seven stars in his right hand and who walks among the seven golden lampstands.
Speaker 1: So this verse here, this verse is referring to Jesus.
Speaker 1: Right, it's saying Jesus is the one who is giving this message to this people.
Speaker 1: The book of Revelation was penned by a guy named John, the apostle John, and he's delivering this message to the churches in Ephesus, coming directly from Jesus.
Speaker 1: And this is what he says.
Speaker 1: He says I know your good works, your labor and your endurance, and that you cannot tolerate evil people.
Speaker 1: You've tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and you found them to be liars.
Speaker 1: I know that you've preserved and endured hardship for the sake of my name and you have not grown weary.
Speaker 1: So Jesus starts off by commending them.
Speaker 1: He's saying you guys have done such a great job of keeping your doctrine pure, of keeping your teachings right.
Speaker 1: You have not allowed false doctrine to creep into the church.
Speaker 1: He's saying you guys are doing all the right things.
Speaker 1: This is actually a huge deal when you understand and realize the context of where Ephesus was.
Speaker 1: In the city of Ephesus there is this huge temple to the Greek goddess Artemis.
Speaker 1: Do I have a photo of that up there Temple?
Speaker 1: Is that working?
Speaker 1: All right?
Speaker 1: It's working Cool, all right.
Speaker 1: This is the temple that would have been.
Speaker 1: Now it's since been destroyed.
Speaker 1: So there was this temple to the Greek goddess Artemis in this city of Ephesus and this wasn't no ordinary temple.
Speaker 1: This temple was one of the seven ancient wonders of the world.
Speaker 1: It was four times the size of the Greek Parthenon.
Speaker 1: This was a huge city of of worship to this Greek goddess Artemis.
Speaker 1: This is where people would come from all around, from neighboring cities, to come and worship her.
Speaker 1: So when Jesus is saying you guys have done a good job keeping pure doctrine, this was a huge celebration for them and I can just picture them right.
Speaker 1: The pastor comes up to the church.
Speaker 1: He's like all right, guys, we're going to gather together.
Speaker 1: We've got this message from Jesus that he has for us.
Speaker 1: And he reads in verse three.
Speaker 1: He says I know that you've preserved and endured hardship for the sake of my name and you have not grown weary.
Speaker 1: And the people are gathered together.
Speaker 1: It's like, bro, look at us.
Speaker 1: We're doing so good man, we're doing such a good job.
Speaker 1: But it continues.
Speaker 1: You guys know, usually if someone like says a bunch of good stuff about you and they go, but you're probably not going to like what comes next, right, he says this but I have this against you.
Speaker 1: But I have this against you.
Speaker 1: You have abandoned the love you had at first.
Speaker 1: Remember, then, how far you have fallen.
Speaker 1: Repent and do the works you did at first, otherwise I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent, as a stern warning for the church in Ephesus, saying you guys are doing all of the right things, but your heart is wrong.
Speaker 1: If we were to give them a job description of everything a Christian is supposed to do, they were fulfilling that job description, that checklist to a T.
Speaker 1: They had correct doctrine.
Speaker 1: They had correct doctrine, but they had an incorrect heart doctrine.
Speaker 1: They had correct doctrine, but they had an incorrect heart.
Speaker 1: They were doing all of the right things, but they were doing it for the wrong reasons.
Speaker 1: They were living out the Christian job description, but out of tradition and duty, instead of a genuine love for God.
Speaker 1: He says this in verse four.
Speaker 1: But I have this against you You've abandoned the love you had at first and the key word in this verse here is first, that phrase, first love.
Speaker 1: It's the idea of this, like romantic love, when you're first crushing on somebody and you start liking them.
Speaker 1: Maybe if you guys can remember back to, like high school and you did the thing on the phone where you're like, no, you hang up first, no, no, no, no, you hang up first.
Speaker 1: You guys ever have a weird relationship like that.
Speaker 1: If you were super weird, if you're one of those couples like you just listened to each other breathe and you didn't hang up the phone, right, it's talking about this passion that you just want to be with them, you want to be around them.
Speaker 1: You'll do whatever it takes to get their attention.
Speaker 1: You want to spend time with them.
Speaker 1: I can remember this time where I met this beautiful lady, this girl that I was crushing on.
Speaker 1: Her name is Kelsey.
Speaker 1: We actually met in Hawaii.
Speaker 1: We were working at the same church.
Speaker 1: She was a school teacher at the Christian school that the church had, and then I was going to college and I was working at the church part-time.
Speaker 1: I was helping out with a youth group and I did like maintenance and landscaping stuff and we met there and we weren't dating yet.
Speaker 1: But I remember one day saw her walking from her classroom across the parking lot and they had teacher housing on the property there.
Speaker 1: So she's walking from her classroom to the teacher housing.
Speaker 1: I just think to myself I'm like man.
Speaker 1: I really wish she would like look this way.
Speaker 1: How can I get her attention?
Speaker 1: I'm there sweeping the parking lot and I see some rocks on the ground.
Speaker 1: I have an idea.
Speaker 1: I've got some.
Speaker 1: The kids call it riz.
Speaker 1: Right, I've got some riz.
Speaker 1: This is how I flirt with her.
Speaker 1: So I look on the ground, I pick up these rocks.
Speaker 1: Turns out I have pretty good aim, okay.
Speaker 1: So I grab these rocks, I throw them at her.
Speaker 1: I'm successful, I don't hurt her, okay, but I hit her.
Speaker 1: They're small rocks, they like scatter around her feet.
Speaker 1: I am successful.
Speaker 1: And then she looks at me and she goes did you just throw a rock at me?
Speaker 1: And I look around, there's nobody else around.
Speaker 1: I look around, I'm like, no, not me.
Speaker 1: And then she just like walked into her house.
Speaker 1: She still asks me now.
Speaker 1: She's like what were you thinking?
Speaker 1: Like what was going through your mind?
Speaker 1: Guys, you know, when you like a girl, like you know, sometimes we don't always think through things properly, right, but I mean it worked.
Speaker 1: So, hey, things progressed and it went on and we dated for a while.
Speaker 1: We went on a bunch of romantic dates and eventually I was like, okay, I got some counsel from some people, I talked to some people.
Speaker 1: I was like this is the girl I want to marry.
Speaker 1: We started having these conversations about getting married.
Speaker 1: So you guys know, when you're going to propose, you got to make the big thing right.
Speaker 1: You've got to decide what you're going to do and plan out this whole big event.
Speaker 1: So I went out and I bought the ring and I spent a bunch of money on the ring and I got this romantic plan together.
Speaker 1: You guys, ready for the best proposal story ever?
Speaker 1: All right, this is what happens.
Speaker 1: We live in Hawaii.
Speaker 1: So I got a group of my friends together and we're going to kayak to the Mokulele Islands they're called.
Speaker 1: We have a photo of them up here.
Speaker 1: What you can do in Oahu is you can actually kayak from the shore out to these islands where nobody else lives or these isolated islands.
Speaker 1: So we get up early in the morning, I get my friends together, we're going to go kayak out there at sunrise and we get there.
Speaker 1: It's super romantic.
Speaker 1: Nobody else is on the island, it's just us and my friends.
Speaker 1: Obviously they know what's on, so they like go one way and then when you get there, there's like this beautiful beach with nobody else there.
Speaker 1: So we go for a little walk, take this romantic stroll along the beach.
Speaker 1: And I have a plan.
Speaker 1: So I brought with me in my pocket I had a seashell, and then I had a ring.
Speaker 1: Okay, I don't know what I was thinking, kayaking out there with the ring in my pocket, but so I did.
Speaker 1: So I had a seashell and then I had a ring.
Speaker 1: Okay, I don't know what I was thinking, kayaking out there with a ring in my pocket, but so I did.
Speaker 1: So I had a shell and so I did.
Speaker 1: I pulled out the shell and I pretended to pick it up off the ground.
Speaker 1: And I tell her I'm like, hey, look at this shell that I found on the ground Now.
Speaker 1: At first this is us on that beach right there.
Speaker 1: At first she thought it was like some weird animal that I had in my hand, so she didn't want to touch it, okay.
Speaker 1: But eventually she picked it up and then under the shell was the ring.
Speaker 1: Pretty good, right, pretty good.
Speaker 1: This is where you guys go.
Speaker 1: Aww, why am I telling this story?
Speaker 1: Eventually she said yes, and things went well and we've been married for seven years now.
Speaker 1: This is the kind of love that Jesus is talking about, that he wants the church to have for him, this passionate love that will do whatever it takes, that will plan out all these big, extravagant things because they love him so much.
Speaker 1: And he said you guys used to love me.
Speaker 1: Like that.
Speaker 1: In a marriage relationship it often starts off that way You're infatuated with each other, you love each other, you're passionate about one another.
Speaker 1: But then life gets busy.
Speaker 1: Maybe you have some kids and your routine is like you go to work and you brush your teeth and then you come home and you got to make dinner and then you get dinner ready, then you wash the dishes and then you just go to bed and date nights kind of slip away.
Speaker 1: You don't do those big romantic things anymore.
Speaker 1: It becomes easy to drift in those relationships.
Speaker 1: The same thing can happen in our spiritual lives and in our spiritual relationship with God.
Speaker 1: If we live out the Christian job description, we do the things we're supposed to do as a spouse and as a wife and a husband.
Speaker 1: You do all the stuff that husbands and wives are supposed to do, but we lose that passion In our Christian lives.
Speaker 1: We live out the Christian job description but we lose our passion for it.
Speaker 1: And here's why that is so dangerous to do all the right things but with the wrong heart.
Speaker 1: It's what Jesus tells them in verse 5.
Speaker 1: It says remember then how far you have fallen.
Speaker 1: Repent and do the works you did at first, otherwise I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent.
Speaker 1: A lampstand would have represented God's presence within a church.
Speaker 1: That lampstand would have represented that God was with those people.
Speaker 1: He was with that church.
Speaker 1: He was walking with them.
Speaker 1: He's saying if you do all of the right stuff, but you do it for the wrong reasons.
Speaker 1: He says I'm not in that.
Speaker 1: If you come to church every Sunday and you sing these worship songs but you're not meditating on the words and that worship's not coming from your heart, it doesn't mean anything to him.
Speaker 1: If you're on a serve team on Sunday and you're just doing it because this is what a Christian is supposed to do and you're living out the job description, it doesn't honor God, it doesn't glorify him and he removes his presence from that work.
Speaker 1: See, ministry without love is meaningless to God.
Speaker 1: Ministry without love is meaningless to God.
Speaker 1: We get into this mindset where we feel like God needs our help.
Speaker 1: It's like I have to do this stuff to be a good Christian.
Speaker 1: That way, god will look down on me and I will gain his approval, because if I don't do it, nobody else will will.
Speaker 1: God doesn't need your help.
Speaker 1: God doesn't need you to do anything.
Speaker 1: He's God.
Speaker 1: He can do whatever he wants to.
Speaker 1: He wants us to experience the joy that comes from him working through us and in our lives.
Speaker 1: He wants us to experience what it's like when God uses you to lead people to him.
Speaker 1: This is why it is so important that we don't lose our passion for Jesus, because when we're simply doing it out of duty and instead of our love for God, we might as well not be doing it at all.
Speaker 1: And the church of Ephesus didn't even realize this was happening.
Speaker 1: They thought they were doing all the right stuff, keeping pure doctrine in this place where there was this goddess worship happening.
Speaker 1: And in our lives we can think we're doing all the right steps because we're checking off the list of what Christians are supposed to do, but if there's no love and passion in it, we might as well have never done those things.
Speaker 1: So how can we tell?
Speaker 1: How can we tell if we're losing our passion from God?
Speaker 1: How can we know that those are happening?
Speaker 1: Here are three things that I do in my personal life.
Speaker 1: They might be different for you, but three ways that I know that I can tell that I'm losing my passion for him.
Speaker 1: Number one you see, serving as a chore, not a gift.
Speaker 1: Ephesians 3, 7,.
Speaker 1: I was made a servant of this gospel by the gift of God's grace that was given to me.
Speaker 1: By the working of his power, I can tell that something is off in my life when the planning center invitation pops up, you're like, ah, scheduled again.
Speaker 1: When you're in the midst of serving and you're like I really don't want to be doing this, I really don't want to be here right now.
Speaker 1: And what we can do if we're not careful is we can just push that to the side and be like, well, this is what Christians are supposed to do, so I'm just going to push through and I'm going to keep doing it.
Speaker 1: Pastor Nate talked about there being some check engine lights in our life.
Speaker 1: This is a check engine light.
Speaker 1: That's saying why do I feel this way?
Speaker 1: Why have I lost my passion for him?
Speaker 1: Why don't I want to be serving right now?
Speaker 1: This is an indicator that we're losing our love for God.
Speaker 1: Second way we can identify if we're losing our passion for love for God is this you see, giving as losing, not investing.
Speaker 1: Matthew 6, 21.
Speaker 1: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be.
Speaker 1: Also, no one can serve two masters, since he will either hate the one or love the other, or he will love the one and hate the other.
Speaker 1: We cannot serve God and money when we see our tithe go out, when we hear about things like Project 33 and all the exciting things that God can do through our giving and we're like man, I don't want to lose my money.
Speaker 1: I'm going to give my money to that.
Speaker 1: Then my money is going to be gone.
Speaker 1: It means our view of our finances and our passion for God is off, because when we tithe and follow Christ in obedience to that, he uses what little we give to accomplish amazing things for his mission.
Speaker 1: He uses what we give to make him known throughout the nation and throughout the world.
Speaker 1: So I know in my heart when I give and I feel like I'm losing something, I've lost my passion for the work that God is doing.
Speaker 1: What we spend money on is a direct indicator of what we prioritize.
Speaker 1: If you were to go through your bank statement and look at all of the stuff you spend money on, that will tell you everything you value.
Speaker 1: What we spend money on is a direct indicator of what we prioritize in our lives.
Speaker 1: The third way you might know that you're losing your passion for God is you see prayer and Bible study as time-consuming, not a necessity.
Speaker 1: Verse 5 says I am the vine, you are the branches.
Speaker 1: Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for, apart from me, you can do nothing when we get so busy in our lives and we just view reading our Bible.
Speaker 1: We just view praying as a checklist item that we have to do, or maybe you don't view it as a necessity at all and you skip it altogether.
Speaker 1: God says, if we are not abiding in three indicators, that you might be losing your passion for God.
Speaker 1: You see serving as a chore instead of a gift.
Speaker 1: You see giving as losing, not investing, and you see prayer and Bible study as time-consuming instead of a necessity.
Speaker 1: Maybe for you there are different checklists that you have to put in your life to make sure your passion is where it needs to be.
Speaker 1: Maybe some of these things rang true for you and you resonate with some of them.
Speaker 1: Then what can we do?
Speaker 1: You realize your passion isn't where it should be.
Speaker 1: You realize your priorities have differed and your love for God is wavering.
Speaker 1: How do we get that passion back?
Speaker 1: Three things, and then we'll be done.
Speaker 1: Number one how do we get that passion back?
Speaker 1: Three things, and then we'll be done.
Speaker 1: Number one how do we get that passion back?
Speaker 1: We admit and repent.
Speaker 1: Revelation 2.5 says Remember then how far you have fallen, repent and do the works you did at first, otherwise I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent.
Speaker 1: They didn't realize they were doing anything wrong.
Speaker 1: They didn't realize they weren't serving God.
Speaker 1: They thought they were doing all the right things.
Speaker 1: To realize we've lost our passion for Him takes some humility To go beneath the surface of your heart.
Speaker 1: Say where am I really at with God?
Speaker 1: Where's my passion level really at?
Speaker 1: Am I just creating this checklist so that I can feel good about myself and feel like I'm serving him, or do I need to take a hard look at myself and admit yeah, I'm not where I'm supposed to be?
Speaker 1: We want to gain our passion back for God.
Speaker 1: It starts by admitting it's not where it should be and repenting and turning back to him.
Speaker 1: Number two, the second way how do we get our passion back?
Speaker 1: You get around passionate people Galatians 6.1, brothers and sisters.
Speaker 1: If someone is overtaken in any wrongdoing, you, who are spiritual, restore such a person with a gentle spirit.
Speaker 1: This is why God designed the church.
Speaker 1: This is why he created the church body, because all of us in our lives will have seasons where we're on fire for God and we're in love with him.
Speaker 1: And we want to do everything for him, and we'll all have seasons where we kind of drift away and we get tired.
Speaker 1: It's so important for us to be around passionate people that will help lift us up in those times.
Speaker 1: We get around them.
Speaker 1: We get around a Christ follower who has been following Jesus for 20, 30 years and they're constantly learning something new.
Speaker 1: You ask them what's your secret?
Speaker 1: Years, and they're constantly learning something new.
Speaker 1: You ask them what's your secret?
Speaker 1: What have you done to stay this passionate for God all these years?
Speaker 1: How do you do it?
Speaker 1: Get around passionate people and ask them what is it that keeps them going?
Speaker 1: Lastly, and then we'll be done, how do we get our passion back?
Speaker 1: We practice active rest.
Speaker 1: Practice active rest If you've done sports or work out at all.
Speaker 1: This is a term that's used in there active rest days.
Speaker 1: So if you work out right, when you work out, you like tear your muscles down, you get beat up and you have to take time to rest.
Speaker 1: But an active rest day isn't just sitting in a chair chilling like watching Netflix.
Speaker 1: An active rest day is actively doing things that are going to help you heal and recover.
Speaker 1: So you'll stretch, you'll do yoga, you'll go for a light jog, you'll get a massage.
Speaker 1: You do these things to actively replenish yourself physically so that you can go and work out again.
Speaker 1: The same is true in our spiritual lives.
Speaker 1: When all we do is go, go, go, serve, serve, serve.
Speaker 1: It's no wonder why you're burnt out when you can neglect your time with God.
Speaker 1: No wonder why our passion is running thin, because God created us to have rest in our lives.
Speaker 1: Mark 6, 30 through 31 says this.
Speaker 1: This is after Jesus had sent out his 12 disciples.
Speaker 1: They preach, they perform miracles, they healed people.
Speaker 1: They did all this stuff.
Speaker 1: And then verse 30, it says the apostles gathered around Jesus and reported to him all they had done and taught.
Speaker 1: So they're excited.
Speaker 1: They're like Jesus.
Speaker 1: Here's all the stuff we did for you.
Speaker 1: This is how he responds to them.
Speaker 1: He said to them come away by yourselves to a remote place and rest for a while, for many people were coming and going.
Speaker 1: They did not even have time to eat.
Speaker 1: People were coming and going.
Speaker 1: They did not even have time to eat.
Speaker 1: One of the reasons we lose our passion for Jesus is because we get so caught up in doing stuff for him that we don't take time to just sit at his feet and fall in love with him.
Speaker 1: We don't take time to get into the word and hear about his love for us, and hear about the sacrifice he's made for us, and fall in love with him again and again and again, when all we do is do, do, do we burn ourselves out and we forget why we've done it in the first place.
Speaker 1: And we can trick ourselves, because we can have a ton of movement.
Speaker 1: We can have a ton of movement in our lives and make absolutely zero progress.
Speaker 1: We can have a ton of movement in our spiritual lives and make zero progress.
Speaker 1: Spiritually to grow, we cover up the hidden parts of our heart by serving, serving, serving.
Speaker 1: So people think we're doing what's right.
Speaker 1: So people think we're right with God.
Speaker 1: So we try to convince ourselves that I'm right with God and I'm just going to stay so busy so that I don't have to think about it.
Speaker 1: But in your heart you know that passion isn't there.
Speaker 1: In your heart, you know there's something wrong and there's something off and you've got to take that time to sit at his feet and rest in him.
Speaker 1: For you, that might be listening to worship music, going on a hike, waking up 30 minutes before the craziness of the day starts and just spending time in prayer with him and reading your Bible.
Speaker 1: You have to do something to practice active rest, to refuel yourself spiritually.
Speaker 1: How do we get our passion back?
Speaker 1: We admit and repent.
Speaker 1: We get around passionate people.
Speaker 1: We practice active rest.
Speaker 1: Maybe you're here today and we've gone through some of these things.
Speaker 1: Say, man, if I'm being honest, my passion level for Jesus isn't where it should be.
Speaker 1: My desire to serve him, my desire to give, my desire to be around him and his people isn't where it should be.
Speaker 1: Here's the good news you may have lost your passion for Jesus.
Speaker 1: You may have lost your passion for Jesus, but he'll never lose his passion for you.
Speaker 1: He's right there, right next to you, just waiting for you to turn back to him, waiting for you to admit and repent and begin to restore that relationship with him.
Speaker 1: So what I want us to do right now just take a few moments in your seat, search your heart and ask God to truly reveal have you lost your passion for him and make some commitments of what you're going to do to get that back.
Speaker 1: We want people to talk to and pray with.
Speaker 1: We have people at our prayer.
Speaker 1: Next steps banners up here.
Speaker 1: Go ahead and just take a couple of moments and then we'll pray together.