WEBVTT

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Well good morning Valley View.

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It never ceases to amaze me. Andrew and I, I promise we talk, but we rarely talk- hardly ever- about what songs we're going to sing. I- I don't know what they are till I come in here usually. I don't check with him.

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Sometimes I'll have a request.

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But the way week after week, God uses the songs to set up the message just always surprises me.

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I mean, the fact that we’re singing about dwelling in him, resting in him, it's not about what I do to save myself.

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I can... Listen, I did plenty to mess myself up trying on my own.

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I mean, I can't save myself.

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What's our response? Worship.

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Praise.

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Sit still.

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Rest. Christ alone.

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That perfectly sets up what I'm going to talk about today because we've been in the midst of the book of John.

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We went into John chapter 13 and last week we set up the whole final words of Jesus.

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So Chapter 13.

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Chapter 14. Chapter 15. Chapter 16.

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Chapter 17 are this huge chunk of teaching from Jesus that He's given His disciples right before He goes.

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And we all know your last words are going to be important.

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You want to make sure people are paying attention.

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In fact, you can learn a lot about someone by their last words.

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In fact, I found a number of examples of well-known people and what some of their last words were, and I'm 100% confident these are true because I found them on the Internet.

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You can be too.

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All these people are dead.

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So it doesn't matter.

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They're not going to argue with me about it.

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But here's a couple of examples.

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First from French grammarian Dominique Bulgars.

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“I am about to -or I am going to die.

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Either expression is used.” Thank you.

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The English teachers here. I heard both of you laugh.

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Thank you.

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A couple of us got it.

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All right.

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Next from banker Richard B Mellon.

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He said to his brother, “Last tag.” They had had a game of tag going for 70 years and he got him right before he took off.

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Next, we get Oscar Wilde.

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He was known for being, let's say, maybe outlandish.

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And he said as he's passing away,“Either that wallpaper goes or I do.” Yeah, well, it was you, Oscar.

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Now we get into some that move towards a little more meaning.

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A little more significance.

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So here's Thomas Edison.

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“It is very beautiful over there.” Who knows exactly what he was looking at.

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Probably getting a glimpse of the afterlife.

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Second, how about this one, Bob Marley?

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“ Money can't buy life.” Maybe that's a little late to realize that, but it's true.

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And then lastly from playwright Wilson Mizner.

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Never heard of him.

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He said this “Why should I talk to you?

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I've just been talking to your boss.” He said that to the priest who came to see him right at the end.

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Look, final words have something to say about who you are, about what's important to you.

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And we've been looking at Jesus.

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His final words.

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Here's the things I'm going to pass on to my disciples right before I go.

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Here's the wisdom they're going to need to get through a very troubling time.

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But what's interesting is in the book of John, we don't get Jesus's final, final words, and these are his words before his death.

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But what were his final words to the disciples before he left the earth?

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What are his final, final words?

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What I want to do today is jump out of the book of John.

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We're going to take a break.

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Jump ahead to his final, final words.

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We're going to look at that in three phases or in three pieces.

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First, we're going to look at his commission.

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What was the great commission and commandment?

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He leaves them with.

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Then we'll talk about the propulsion or the power.

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What are the means for carrying out that mission that he lives his this leaves his disciples with. But then lastly, their convictions.

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How's this going to play out day to day in their lives?

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How does this shape who they are and what they do?

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And by the way, those songs were really important to set this up, because everything we do, we're going to talk about what we do.

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It all comes from who we are.

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It all comes from who we are in Christ.

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We don't do great things to gain favor with him and hopefully he saves us eventually because of how good we are and it outweighs the bad.

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I don't know.

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We know we are united with him in him, buried with him in baptism, raised to walk in newness of life.

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And because of that, we serve, we act, we go, we teach, we baptize in response to how great he is.

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And it's really important to understand that going into what we're going to look at today, Jesus's final, final words and we're doing that now because that's going to shape everything else we read in the coming weeks in John Chapter 13, 14, 15, 16, 17.

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So grab your Bibles.

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We're going to be in the book of Matthew at the very end of Matthew.

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Matthew is the first book in the New Testament, first of the four Gospels.

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It is the second longest gospel. Luke.

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Luke is the longest in word count.

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Matthew has more chapters, and if you don't have a Bible, we have Bibles out in the connection corner.

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The page numbers you see on the screen are tied into those Bibles.

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Slip out any time and grab one.

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Keep that Bible that's free for you.

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We want to make it easy for you to find the references for pointing to as we go.

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We want you turning in God's Word, reading it for yourself, see?

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And we're just not making it up as we go.

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Hopefully we're being fair with God's Word, pointing you back to it as we go.

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But Matthew 28, in the last few verses in Matthew 28, this is a very well-known passage.

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If you've been in church, it's often called the Great Commission, and these are Jesus's final words, and they set up his final, final words that he says to his disciples at the very end right before he goes.

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So let's look at Matthew 28.

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Look at verse 18.

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Jesus came to them and said to them, He's meeting with his 11 remaining disciples.

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All authority in heaven and on Earth has been given to me.

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Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.

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And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

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What I love about these final words of Jesus to his disciples is how action oriented they are.

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Our faith is inherently an action centered faith, an outward focused faith.

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He didn't, in his very parting words, say, Now, go get alone in your prayer closet, study the Bible and only pray and just wait.

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And you're good.

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Now he wants them to pray and study the Bible and to spend time alone so that they can go therefore make disciples, baptize, teach.

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We have an act of faith.

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You'll hear people at some time say, Well, you know, my faith is a very private thing.

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It's a very personal matter.

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And there's definitely a very personal side to our faith.

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Christ deals with us personally, not only corporately, but personally.

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But it's not only that.

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If your faith is only a private faith, it's not a Christian faith, because we're called to be active.

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If Christ has radically changed your life, you can't not tell anyone about that.

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You have to be telling others.

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Listen to what he did for me.

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And that looks different for everyone.

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We have different talents.

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We have different gifts.

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We have different abilities that can look a lot of different ways.

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But there's this overwhelming urge to be telling other people, Here's what Christ has done in my life.

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We have an active faith, an outward turned faith.

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And part of the problem is, though, sometimes we forget that.

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A lot of churches forget that over time.

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It becomes more about just only looking inward and look, we need to look inward.

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I mean, a good example would be the army military forces.

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Their mission is protecting the nation.

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Ultimately, that means at times war, battle.

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But if they ever forget that and just turn inward, well, it's all about the training.

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It's all about our physical condition.

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It's all about our equipment.

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It's all about us caring for our wounded soldiers.

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All that's important, all that's critical so that we carry out the mission.

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We can't ever get that upside down.

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We can't get that backwards if we turn inward.

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That's where the infighting starts.

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That's where we lose focus on priorities.

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That's where I've become self-centered.

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It becomes all about me.

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Rather than No, God has put us here to turn us outward, to focus on serving others, to pour out to others.

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He modeled that last week with washing the disciples feet.

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So that's the first- the Commission- here’s the charge he gives them.

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I'm pointing you outward, guys.

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Now he needs to remind them of that and also tell them how that will happen.

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And he hints at it here in the very last verse.

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Behold, I'm with you always, even to the end of the age.

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What a beautiful way to end the book of Matthew.

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You're not doing this alone.

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I'm giving you some challenging instruction, and I'll be right there with you.

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I'll be right beside you all along the way.

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But he's going to have to remind them of this.

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In fact, this takes us to the second layer.

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The second part of this outward focus. Turn to Acts chapter one.

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And here we're going to look at the propulsion, the commission, the propulsion or the power.

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What are the means?

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What gives us the ability to carry out the mission?

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Look at Acts chapter one and we're just going to look at verses six through nine because this is right before Jesus leaves the Earth, but he's reinforcing what he just said to them.

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We can't know the exact time gap here.

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Could it be a few days?

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Could be many days, but it's right here at the end reinforcing the same message Acts chapter one, verse six.

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So when they had come together, they asked him, Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?

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You know, they're still stuck in this old thinking about the kingdom.

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Will you reestablish the nation of Israel, establish a Davidic king so that we can rule politically over this area?

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They're still stuck there.

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Once again, he reminds them, it's not for you to know the times or the seasons that the father has fixed by his own authority.

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Don't worry about that.

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Don't worry about that.

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You got your focus on the wrong thing.

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The father will take care of that.

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But here's what I said before, and I'm going to remind you now, But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you.

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You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria to the end of the earth.

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And when he had said these things as they were looking on, he was lifted up in a cloud, took him out of their sight.

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Guys, don't forget our faith is outward.

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I told you already. Go.

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You will be my witnesses.

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Not just here, not just at home, but everywhere.

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Don't forget.

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And I haven't left you alone.

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I've given you the power to do that.

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You don't understand it all yet because the Holy Spirit hasn't come.

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But he's about to.

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And he will give you the power to do that.

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And this is so important.

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I can't stress how important this is because all of our activity, everything we try to do to honor him, to tell others about him, it's not about our abilities.

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It's not about how charismatic you might be or your amazing evangelistic gifts or maybe some of the apologetic tools you've studied and learned about, or your really good ability at arguing or reasoning, or even your relational gifts.

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I can get into someone's life, man, and I can make them.

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I can convince them of anything you might say.

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Now, those things can be helpful.

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But apart from the spirit, not only are they not helpful, they could do the opposite.

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It's not about how great we are at anything, but it is about the spirit moving through us, about us getting out of the way and letting the spirit move, which is intimidating.

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That's it. How do you do that?

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I was on the phone with somebody this week.

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How do I have the spirit?

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Fill me, take control of my life, lead me.

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It's intimidating.

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It's difficult.

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If it were easy to get out of the way, we would all be walking fully by the spirit, watching him move in amazing ways in every realm of our life.

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And I would say we probably all have some challenges here and there with that.

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That's part of the Christian life.

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But the hope is over time, day by day, as we commit to reading his word, as we join in Christian fellowship, as we build up one another over time, over time, over time, we grow more and more aware of the presence of his spirit, and we listen more and more to his spirit directing and guiding us.

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But it's a lifelong process.

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And you can't do it alone.

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But this is the source of power, the propulsion.

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This is the means of carrying out the Great Commission.

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Now, third, the conviction.

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What does this look like?

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In our day to day life, Jesus says to the disciples, go, I'll be with you.

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The Holy Spirit will be with you.

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How did they respond to this?

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What did this look like in their life? Jump ahead.

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Just a couple of chapters.

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Acts Chapter four.

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And here we have the disciples meeting.

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Talk about this very thing, Acts Chapter four.

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They're praying.

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They've already seen God move in a number of ways.

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And in chapter four, verse 31 through 35 we’ll read through this and start to see what this looked like for them early on in the early church, verse 31.

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And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken.

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They were all filled with the Holy Spirit and they continued to speak the Word of God with boldness.

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And that's the first result.

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The first result of the filling of the Holy Spirit is to speak the word of God with boldness.

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And the word we've been using is fearless.

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We want to be fearless to proclaim God's Word.

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We speak with boldness, confident that the Spirit is working through this.

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Now, that doesn't mean that we're rude to people.

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I'm not talking.

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Sometimes we take boldness as rudeness.

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Well, I'll just tell it like it is.

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And they got deal with it.

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Now there's also gentleness, kindness, self-control, wisdom, patience, love that can take on a lot of different forms.

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But we don't walk in fear of man.

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The Holy Spirit emboldens us to share.

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But something else happens here in that room.

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Now, the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one said that any of the things that belonged to him was his own.

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But they had everything in common.  Unity, complete, utter perfect unity, everything in common.

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And with great power the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.

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There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of lands or houses, sold them, brought the proceeds of what was sold, laid it at the Apostles feet, and it was distributed to each as any had need.

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Can you imagine what that would have been like where each person was so committed to the proclamation of the Gospel, to the spreading of the Gospel that no one viewed anything as their own, no matter what it was?

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These are not mine.

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They're here to be used for God's purposes.

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It's so hard to separate ourselves from our stuff.

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It just is.

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It's hard for me.

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I've had tastes of this along the way.

00:17:54.498 --> 00:17:59.231
I remember one time I went to teach at a Bible college in Rwanda.

00:17:59.298 --> 00:18:07.065
It's probably ten or 15 years ago and I knew that in Rwanda they really care about their appearances.

00:18:07.065 --> 00:18:11.298
They make sure to dress their best for occasions.

00:18:11.365 --> 00:18:15.998
They take good care of their clothing, even though they're walking around in dirt everywhere.

00:18:15.998 --> 00:18:18.565
They're all their shoes were nicer than mine.

00:18:18.565 --> 00:18:25.798
Every time they stop somewhere, they're flicking off some dirt, they're polishing shoes ... just a meticulous attention to their appearance.

00:18:25.798 --> 00:18:29.065
So I thought, Well, I'm going to bring my best shirt, my favorite shirt.

00:18:29.065 --> 00:18:32.664
I had this shirt I really loved to wear it fit just right.

00:18:32.765 --> 00:18:33.964
It was well made.

00:18:33.964 --> 00:18:34.698
It's one of those shirts.

00:18:34.698 --> 00:18:40.964
You feel a little smarter when you wear it, feel a little stronger, a little more attractive when you wear it.

00:18:41.031 --> 00:18:44.632
And so I go to Rwanda, I have the shirt with me.

00:18:44.698 --> 00:18:47.164
And of course, I brought other shirts, too, don't worry.

00:18:47.164 --> 00:18:49.231
But there was a guy in my class.

00:18:49.231 --> 00:18:52.964
He wore the same shirt every day.

00:18:53.031 --> 00:18:56.332
And I thought, that dude has a favorite shirt, too, right?

00:18:56.464 --> 00:18:58.031
Yeah, I'm with you.

00:18:58.031 --> 00:18:59.565
I would have worn mine every day.

00:18:59.565 --> 00:19:05.065
But I remember in high school camp, Gary Jones told me not to, that I did have to change my clothes occasionally.

00:19:05.065 --> 00:19:08.365
I learned that early on.

00:19:08.464 --> 00:19:23.798
One day, though, I was staying after and I saw him walking around without a shirt and I thought, Hey man, catching some sunrays, enjoying the cool weather. He’s like, No, I'm washing my shirt.

00:19:23.865 --> 00:19:27.498
That's my only shirt.

00:19:27.565 --> 00:19:35.132
And it's drying right now and I'll put it on when it's dry.

00:19:35.231 --> 00:19:37.664
The next day I gave him my favorite shirt.

00:19:37.664 --> 00:19:39.498
Here, take it.

00:19:39.498 --> 00:19:46.265
I had forgotten that I had that favorite shirt until the stream of photos came up from that event a few weeks ago.

00:19:46.265 --> 00:19:47.865
Oh yeah, I remember that now.

00:19:47.865 --> 00:19:50.397
I don't remember what it looked like.

00:19:50.397 --> 00:19:54.698
There was so much more joy out of letting that go.

00:19:54.765 --> 00:20:14.964
In fact, I came home and I thought, If I had to go shirtless, how many shirts do I have that I would go through before I had to go shirtless?  Something that, you know, I'm not talking about your favorite shirt, even this could be my 1989 Valley View softball t shirt still in tatters.

00:20:15.164 --> 00:20:15.464
All right.

00:20:15.464 --> 00:20:22.164
Nothing I would wear in public, hopefully, but how many shirts do I have that I could survive on?

00:20:22.265 --> 00:20:25.198
I thought probably 20,30 at least.

00:20:25.198 --> 00:20:29.031
You know, I'm going on the high end here, but I counted every one of them.

00:20:29.097 --> 00:20:33.832
Something that would cover me, 60 something shirts.

00:20:33.832 --> 00:20:35.198
Right.

00:20:35.198 --> 00:20:38.198
And this guy had done one.

00:20:38.397 --> 00:20:40.597
Now, two.

00:20:40.597 --> 00:20:41.832
It was so much joy.

00:20:41.832 --> 00:20:42.832
And go on this.

00:20:42.832 --> 00:20:53.698
Look, I've been blessed with so much I could give away all the rest of the shirts I brought with me and still not even be near being in trouble.

00:20:53.698 --> 00:20:55.464
I remember hearing Bill Bright.

00:20:55.464 --> 00:21:02.065
Bill Bright was the founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, which I repeat his definition of successful evangelism.

00:21:02.065 --> 00:21:11.664
You're going to hear it so many times, you are going to be tired of hearing it,“Taking the initiative and the power of the Holy Spirit and leaving the results to God.” I love that definition.

00:21:11.664 --> 00:21:12.664
We don't save people.

00:21:12.664 --> 00:21:17.565
The Holy Spirit does, but we take the initiative in the power of the Holy Spirit, leave the results to God.

00:21:17.565 --> 00:21:19.964
He's in control.

00:21:19.964 --> 00:21:21.932
But I remember hearing the story of Him.

00:21:21.932 --> 00:21:29.132
He won the Templeton Prize, and this prize was established to advance, promote religion and human welfare.

00:21:29.132 --> 00:21:32.132
It really was established in response to the Nobel Prize.

00:21:32.231 --> 00:21:41.464
This guy who established it said, I want it to be a bigger prize than the Nobel Prize because we should put more emphasis on religion, human advancement.

00:21:41.565 --> 00:21:58.597
And Bill Bright won that million dollar prize in 1996, and the very first thing he did was he took the check and turned around and handed it to the person who was going to oversee the new prayer and fasting initiative that all that money was going toward.

00:21:58.664 --> 00:22:00.798
He may not have even touched it, Right.

00:22:00.798 --> 00:22:03.464
He didn't even want it dragging through his hands.

00:22:03.464 --> 00:22:06.964
There's too much temptation to just hang on to it.

00:22:07.065 --> 00:22:08.832
They don't put any stipulations on that gift.

00:22:08.832 --> 00:22:12.132
He could do whatever you want with it.

00:22:12.198 --> 00:22:17.897
And he took so much joy in that, launching more ministry, giving it away.

00:22:17.964 --> 00:22:20.265
It's not my own.

00:22:20.265 --> 00:22:27.397
I got to tell you a little bit about Bill Bright, because he headed up the largest missions organization in the world.

00:22:27.431 --> 00:22:33.365
The large-- really probably as a result, the largest nonprofit in the world.

00:22:33.464 --> 00:22:39.931
And right now, the president of the Red Cross makes something like$650,000 a year.

00:22:39.964 --> 00:22:44.198
You know, another big, large, successful nonprofit.

00:22:44.265 --> 00:22:47.897
I don't think he ever made more than about $50,000 a year.

00:22:47.964 --> 00:22:52.597
His wife made about the same. Together, $100,000 a year.

00:22:52.664 --> 00:22:55.330
It's not like he just had money out his ears.

00:22:55.330 --> 00:22:58.765
And this is a guy that traveled all over the world nonstop.

00:22:58.830 --> 00:23:05.798
I could give story after story after story of the way he didn't hold on to anything.

00:23:05.865 --> 00:23:07.365
That's been such an inspiration to me.

00:23:07.365 --> 00:23:11.464
In fact, I've often prayed since then, Lord, let there be a day.

00:23:11.565 --> 00:23:16.230
I mean, what bigger dream than to give away a lump sum of $1,000,000?

00:23:16.330 --> 00:23:17.765
How amazing would that be?

00:23:17.765 --> 00:23:22.298
I have zero idea how that will happen, but I'm praying for it.

00:23:22.365 --> 00:23:25.065
Do you imagine that day?

00:23:25.065 --> 00:23:26.998
How exciting that would be.

00:23:27.097 --> 00:23:35.131
And here in this moment the disciples recognize this is what Jesus was talking about.

00:23:35.265 --> 00:23:44.131
The power is in us to not just think about ourselves, but to recognize the mission he gave us is greater than anything.

00:23:44.230 --> 00:23:51.265
And I think Valley View is starting to move into a season where we're going to be more outward focused.

00:23:51.498 --> 00:23:53.830
I'm not saying we're too inward focused.

00:23:51.498 --> 00:23:53.830
Okay?

00:23:53.830 --> 00:24:03.498
That's no comment on anyone here, but I believe we're moving into a season where we're going to be more outward focused than we has been.

00:24:03.565 --> 00:24:06.131
Have been.

00:24:06.131 --> 00:24:07.998
Let me tell you why.

00:24:07.998 --> 00:24:15.730
You know, we recently renovated the fellowship hall, which is the room down below us, and a couple of weeks ago we celebrated that.

00:24:15.730 --> 00:24:21.298
We saw that room and we renamed it the Larry and Sharlett Peercy Hall.

00:24:21.397 --> 00:24:29.698
After Larry and Sharlett, who had had so much influence on my life and this church and a lot of it through that room, but many other areas as well.

00:24:29.798 --> 00:24:36.631
Well, I met with Larry, Larry and Sharlett, before naming to ask them, we want to name it after you, but I want to make sure you're okay with it.

00:24:36.631 --> 00:24:39.964
I don't want you standing up and complaining about it when I do it in church.

00:24:39.964 --> 00:24:41.431
Right.

00:24:41.431 --> 00:24:47.964
So I thought, you know, he may push back some because Larry, Sharlett, they're both humble servants of the church.

00:24:48.030 --> 00:24:51.530
They don't want lots of recognition.

00:24:51.597 --> 00:24:55.230
So I brought his son Phil with me for some backup, some muscle.

00:24:55.330 --> 00:24:56.798
Make sure to get an answer from him.

00:24:56.798 --> 00:24:59.030
And I ask him, Look, we want to name Fellowship Hall after you.

00:24:59.030 --> 00:25:02.365
Here's why I spent some time setting it up.

00:25:02.464 --> 00:25:04.730
What do you think?

00:25:04.730 --> 00:25:10.998
And Larry launches into a sermon about how we need to give more on missions.

00:25:11.065 --> 00:25:12.798
And I was like, Larry, I didn't come here for a sermon.

00:25:12.798 --> 00:25:13.664
That's my job.

00:25:13.664 --> 00:25:18.498
Okay, Larry, I want I came with a simple yes, no question, Larry.

00:25:18.565 --> 00:25:21.198
How do we get off topic, reel it back in.

00:25:21.198 --> 00:25:23.998
What's it going to be?

00:25:23.998 --> 00:25:29.830
And about 30 minutes later, he had shared a lot.

00:25:29.830 --> 00:25:32.830
They did, of course, finally say yes, but he had shared a lot.

00:25:33.030 --> 00:25:37.730
And it was all centered on I've been involved in this church.

00:25:37.730 --> 00:25:39.431
I've been involved in that church.

00:25:39.431 --> 00:25:41.565
I've been involved in this church.

00:25:39.431 --> 00:25:41.565
They've been here a long time.

00:25:41.565 --> 00:25:45.565
But God had moved them around to other areas before they settled here.

00:25:45.664 --> 00:25:55.865
And I saw this pattern of churches that took the initiative to give to missions that at least at a tithe level, at at least 10%.

00:25:55.865 --> 00:25:58.931
I watched God bless them, I watched God grow that church.

00:25:59.164 --> 00:26:00.565
I watched God multiply them.

00:26:00.565 --> 00:26:05.198
I watched him bring them more than they ever could have imagined over and over and over again.

00:26:05.198 --> 00:26:08.830
And I saw churches that didn't do that.

00:26:08.897 --> 00:26:11.365
Who cut that part?

00:26:11.365 --> 00:26:12.897
Who steered away from that?

00:26:12.897 --> 00:26:18.097
Who said they didn't have the space for that or the budget for that?

00:26:18.097 --> 00:26:37.030
And I watched them slowly decline, decay, turn inward. Of course, there are exceptions, of course, but that hit me hard because our church hasn't been giving a ton to missions.

00:26:37.097 --> 00:26:39.464
We haven't been at that 10% level.

00:26:39.464 --> 00:26:42.597
And you can argue whether that's a biblical number anymore or not.

00:26:42.597 --> 00:26:46.931
In fact, actually, we just saw the biblical numbers, everything, right.

00:26:46.998 --> 00:26:49.265
I was expecting some nervous laughter, at least with that.

00:26:49.265 --> 00:26:51.631
That's all we're asking for. Everything, right?

00:26:51.631 --> 00:26:58.431
Well, no, but look, 10% is a good starting point for churches to target, to look at.

00:26:58.664 --> 00:27:03.565
I got a friend's church across town, gives 40% to missions a year.

00:27:03.631 --> 00:27:05.230
I'm not saying that's the right number.

00:27:05.230 --> 00:27:08.230
I'm not saying that's what our church needs to do.

00:27:08.397 --> 00:27:17.865
But I do feel like it's a burden for our church to be moving, to be more involved in missions, to be turned more outward as a church.

00:27:17.865 --> 00:27:22.897
The hard part of that is we don't have every bit of that figured out yet.

00:27:22.964 --> 00:27:24.030
But you know how this goes.

00:27:24.030 --> 00:27:26.865
If you wait till you have everything figured out.

00:27:26.865 --> 00:27:33.664
Sometimes you’ll never get started.

00:27:33.765 --> 00:27:37.397
So what we're going to do today is I'm going to present the budget to you today.

00:27:37.431 --> 00:27:38.897
I'm not going to put anything on screen.

00:27:38.897 --> 00:27:41.164
There's going to be copies for you when you go out.

00:27:41.164 --> 00:27:46.530
This is the time of year when we present the budget to the whole church because we want to be transparent.

00:27:46.530 --> 00:27:48.431
We're not trying to hide anything.

00:27:48.431 --> 00:27:52.663
You'll get an overview of the budget front and back page when you leave.

00:27:52.763 --> 00:27:53.864
Then we'll vote on it.

00:27:53.864 --> 00:27:58.597
Not this Wednesday night, but the following Wednesday night, September 27th.

00:27:58.663 --> 00:28:05.530
But I want to just highlight a couple of things about this, because I've got good news and I've got faith news.

00:28:05.597 --> 00:28:07.330
I say it that way.

00:28:07.330 --> 00:28:10.298
Good news and faith news.

00:28:10.298 --> 00:28:18.298
The good news is we have built in significant more amount in the missions in our budget this year, which is exciting.

00:28:18.397 --> 00:28:29.298
In fact, when you look at the numbers, you'll see it's at exactly 10% to the penny roughly that's going to be in the budget for this year.

00:28:29.463 --> 00:28:36.263
The challenge, the faith news is that bumps our budget up over where it was last year.

00:28:36.263 --> 00:28:42.698
And we took a step of faith last year because not only is our missions giving going up, our utilities went up a bunch.

00:28:42.763 --> 00:28:45.263
Our insurance went up a bunch.

00:28:45.263 --> 00:28:50.463
So you're going to see about $100,000 jump in our overall budget for the year.

00:28:50.564 --> 00:28:55.730
And you may remember that we took a step of faith with our budget last year.

00:28:55.798 --> 00:28:59.597
The elders have said we need to have a faith element built into our budget.

00:28:59.597 --> 00:29:00.463
It's not just all.

00:29:00.463 --> 00:29:03.463
Here's exactly what we can figure out.

00:29:03.631 --> 00:29:08.431
Here's exactly how we, in our own strength and ability, can plan out everything perfectly.

00:29:08.431 --> 00:29:09.597
God gives us those abilities.

00:29:09.597 --> 00:29:13.730
We need to weigh that out as well.

00:29:13.798 --> 00:29:23.298
So here's a couple of things that happened over this last year. One, we renovated the fellowship hall in about seven months.

00:29:23.298 --> 00:29:35.864
We saw God use you to raise from you new cash gifts $311,000 in seven months.

00:29:35.931 --> 00:29:41.864
Yeah, You know, the total project was more than that.

00:29:41.864 --> 00:29:44.097
But we already had some money.

00:29:44.097 --> 00:29:45.698
That's all done now.

00:29:45.698 --> 00:29:48.498
That room's ready to use That room.

00:29:48.498 --> 00:29:50.330
We're going to start Wednesday night suppers up again.

00:29:50.330 --> 00:29:55.397
October 11th is our first day for new Wednesday Night suppers again.

00:29:55.463 --> 00:30:01.330
And in fact, we had a generous donor come and say, I want to sponsor that first night.

00:30:01.330 --> 00:30:05.498
I want everyone to come for free that first night, and I want everyone to be there.

00:30:05.498 --> 00:30:07.198
I don't want anyone to not show up.

00:30:07.198 --> 00:30:11.364
I want us to come and join and celebrate in excitement on that first night.

00:30:11.364 --> 00:30:13.998
So the sign up link was in the midweek update.

00:30:13.998 --> 00:30:21.330
Make sure we need you to sign up for that so we know how many are coming, but that room's ready to be used.

00:30:21.330 --> 00:30:23.431
God, used your generosity.

00:30:23.431 --> 00:30:36.163
Now, the other part of the faith news is everyone told me if you asked for money for the fellowship hall, it's going to affect the general budget giving because everyone would much rather give to a building than the photocopiers and toilet paper. Right?

00:30:36.163 --> 00:30:40.564
Everyone would.  Me too, mostly.

00:30:40.663 --> 00:30:41.431
And that happened.

00:30:41.431 --> 00:30:43.163
I knew that would happen.

00:30:43.163 --> 00:30:48.364
So we ended up coming up short on the budget for the year.

00:30:48.498 --> 00:30:59.498
But let me go back to that statement about faith news, about taking a step of faith, about building faith in the budget, about trusting God to see what He might do.

00:30:59.564 --> 00:31:08.230
I got a call from our finance administrator, Jim Stewart, a few months ago, and he said, This is kind of weird. By the way.

00:31:08.230 --> 00:31:10.463
I love it when he starts a sentence that way.

00:31:10.463 --> 00:31:16.131
Finance people, if it's bad, they start with, This is bad, but this is weird.

00:31:16.131 --> 00:31:19.131
There's a little hope, there's a sliver of hope in that.

00:31:19.298 --> 00:31:20.763
It's kind of weird.

00:31:20.763 --> 00:31:25.763
It looks like we qualify for some kind of payroll tax rebate.

00:31:25.830 --> 00:31:27.198
I'm going to look into it.

00:31:27.198 --> 00:31:30.730
It's probably not much money in the grand scheme of things for the church.

00:31:30.730 --> 00:31:34.230
Maybe ten or $20,000. That's helpful.

00:31:34.330 --> 00:31:34.663
Great.

00:31:34.663 --> 00:31:36.763
Look into it. Please.

00:31:36.763 --> 00:31:39.030
I'll get back with you in a few weeks.

00:31:39.030 --> 00:31:48.030
A few weeks later, Jim calls. This is kind of weird. Yes, I'm thinking weird good, weird bad?

00:31:48.030 --> 00:31:50.730
It's probably not ten or 20.

00:31:48.030 --> 00:31:50.730
Probably less.

00:31:50.730 --> 00:31:53.330
Yeah, it wasn't ten or 20.

00:31:53.330 --> 00:31:58.163
It's more like $160,000.

00:31:58.230 --> 00:32:01.798
Yeah.

00:32:01.897 --> 00:32:04.463
Keep calling me Jim, please.

00:32:04.463 --> 00:32:05.897
Please.

00:32:05.897 --> 00:32:12.364
That combined with you remember, we had a bunch of cars parked in that parking lot over there, Ford was parking their cars, we were renting that lot to them.

00:32:12.364 --> 00:32:15.798
That brought in another $32,000 or so.

00:32:15.864 --> 00:32:19.064
And those two combined just about...it's close...

00:32:19.064 --> 00:32:33.597
you know, the whole year's not shook out yet, kind of breaks it even.

00:32:33.698 --> 00:32:41.064
If you've taken steps to give by faith in your life, you've seen this, you've experienced this in your own life, with your own family.

00:32:41.163 --> 00:32:45.198
I keep a whole notebook full of instances of this.

00:32:45.330 --> 00:32:55.763
I read back through this page after page after page of the way God's provided in our lives in ways when we needed it we couldn't have even imagined.

00:32:55.763 --> 00:32:57.830
I remember one of the stories I ran across.

00:32:57.830 --> 00:33:00.131
We were pursuing an adoption at the time.

00:33:00.131 --> 00:33:01.698
We had struggled with infertility for years.

00:33:01.698 --> 00:33:04.198
We came up $1,000 short on this adoption.

00:33:04.198 --> 00:33:08.963
We're going have to pay it tomorrow or the adoption is over.

00:33:09.030 --> 00:33:17.230
And a family calls us that day and says, God put it on our heart to send you a check for $1,000.

00:33:12.131 --> 00:33:17.230
That very day.

00:33:17.298 --> 00:33:22.564
Another time I had to pay for those flights to Rwanda, $3300.

00:33:22.663 --> 00:33:29.730
The very day I put that money out by faith, a gift comes in, no joke, for $3300. Unsolicited.

00:33:29.730 --> 00:33:34.431
The other person didn't even know we were in need.

00:33:34.497 --> 00:33:36.263
I could read page after page of this.

00:33:36.263 --> 00:33:38.963
Phil Peercy, Larry's son, told me.

00:33:38.963 --> 00:33:41.931
There was a year I lost my job.

00:33:41.931 --> 00:33:47.263
For three months I had no work and then I took a job making half of what I made before.

00:33:47.530 --> 00:33:50.463
And at the end of the year I made more money than the previous year.

00:33:50.463 --> 00:33:53.463
I have no idea how that happened.

00:33:53.696 --> 00:34:02.064
How many of you can say you've seen God do that at times?

00:33:55.730 --> 00:34:02.064
The math didn't make sense on paper.

00:34:02.163 --> 00:34:06.763
And so as a church, we're going to take a step of faith in this direction.

00:34:06.830 --> 00:34:10.563
It's a big step of faith.

00:34:10.630 --> 00:34:15.896
But I believe it's time for us to watch God move in ways that we can't even imagine.

00:34:15.996 --> 00:34:18.130
So you'll get a copy of that budget when you leave.

00:34:18.130 --> 00:34:19.097
You'll be able to look it over.

00:34:19.097 --> 00:34:23.130
The other thing we're doing today is putting before you new elders.

00:34:23.231 --> 00:34:24.697
So our church is elder led.

00:34:24.697 --> 00:34:27.597
There's a team of men who lead the church.

00:34:27.597 --> 00:34:30.431
They oversee the spiritual direction of the church.

00:34:30.431 --> 00:34:33.164
They oversee the theological direction of the church.

00:34:33.164 --> 00:34:40.396
They oversee the strategic direction of the church, and they serve on three year terms and they roll off.

00:34:40.496 --> 00:34:43.331
What happened, though, is Pastor Brian left.

00:34:43.331 --> 00:34:45.364
So there's a season without a pastor.

00:34:45.364 --> 00:34:48.130
The elders stay on for continuity.

00:34:45.364 --> 00:34:48.130
There's a pastor search team.

00:34:48.130 --> 00:34:49.530
Those elders stay on for continuity.

00:34:49.530 --> 00:34:52.431
I show up, I’m like, guys, stay around for continuity.

00:34:52.431 --> 00:34:53.996
For a year and a half, almost two years now.

00:34:53.996 --> 00:34:55.431
And so their terms got extended.

00:34:55.431 --> 00:34:58.063
And we're at a point now where a number need to roll off.

00:34:58.063 --> 00:35:05.963
You bring on a couple of new ones and we're going to reappoint one who was kind of an emergency replacement when one elder moved, moved off to another town.

00:35:06.063 --> 00:35:07.530
So let me introduce a couple of these to you.

00:35:07.530 --> 00:35:12.731
The way we do it is the elders recommend new elders and the church affirms.

00:35:12.797 --> 00:35:17.264
So Wednesday night, the 27th, when you vote on the budget, you’ll also be voting to affirm the elders.

00:35:17.331 --> 00:35:24.496
And by the way, on both of these, the budget and the elders, if you have any questions about anything, come, come to me or come to one of the current elders.

00:35:24.496 --> 00:35:28.030
In fact, if you're a current elder, go ahead and stand where you are so people can see.

00:35:28.030 --> 00:35:29.797
Go to one of them.

00:35:29.797 --> 00:35:32.297
We want to answer any questions you have.

00:35:32.297 --> 00:35:32.530
Okay.

00:35:32.530 --> 00:35:35.396
I could see five or six of them down here.

00:35:35.396 --> 00:35:38.697
One guy upstairs, Jon Holland's upstairs.

00:35:38.797 --> 00:35:40.197
We want to be as transparent as possible.

00:35:40.197 --> 00:35:44.264
In fact, there'll be a meeting next Sunday after the service for Q&A about the budget.

00:35:44.264 --> 00:35:46.264
You guys can go ahead and sit.

00:35:46.264 --> 00:35:48.164
But here's the first elder.

00:35:48.164 --> 00:35:50.097
First one being reappointed is Troy Kolb.

00:35:50.097 --> 00:35:51.831
Oh, that's from when he was little.

00:35:51.831 --> 00:35:55.963
Sorry, back in the day.

00:35:55.963 --> 00:35:58.130
Troy was doing our Christmas play with John Krive.

00:35:58.130 --> 00:36:01.063
Here he is. Here's a current picture,  Troy Kolb.

00:36:01.063 --> 00:36:03.431
And then Troy with his family.

00:36:03.431 --> 00:36:09.097
Troy is a reappointment; he rolled on when Chris Phillips had to roll off and his family moved to Indiana.

00:36:09.164 --> 00:36:13.130
Best for their family to start serving in that area, investing there.

00:36:13.197 --> 00:36:16.197
Now one of the two new elders is Josh Sutherland.

00:36:16.231 --> 00:36:19.164
Here's picture of Josh himself now Josh's family.

00:36:19.164 --> 00:36:21.364
Josh, would you go and stand wherever you are?

00:36:21.364 --> 00:36:24.231
Josh is up in the balcony.

00:36:24.231 --> 00:36:29.197
And then lastly, Nick Rice.

00:36:29.264 --> 00:36:31.731
Nick and his family is on the next screen.

00:36:31.731 --> 00:36:34.664
He's one of our new elders as well.

00:36:34.664 --> 00:36:40.396
And Nick, if you're in here and you stand up, he might be there's Nick right here in the middle.

00:36:40.630 --> 00:36:53.197
The reason the reason why we put them before you publicly is if there's any concerns and I'm not talking about what team they cheer for, okay.

00:36:53.396 --> 00:36:59.630
Or what political party I'm talking about spiritual concerns, leadership concerns, again, come to me.

00:36:59.764 --> 00:37:01.231
Come to one of the elders.

00:37:01.231 --> 00:37:04.231
We we don't want to be surprised by anything.

00:37:04.463 --> 00:37:08.364
We don't want you to be surprised by anything.

00:37:08.431 --> 00:37:15.931
We want to be an open book and you'll get when you leave also a biography one page that has a little bit about each of them.

00:37:16.030 --> 00:37:25.530
And then on the back of that, there's a letter explaining our elder transfer process, because, because of the timing of all that, we need to have a temporary vacancy very short term.

00:37:25.697 --> 00:37:27.797
So I can continue to get to know.

00:37:27.797 --> 00:37:36.264
It takes a while to get to know all the men in the church and and to develop our potential elders, and that'll give us a little space to do that coming into the next year.

00:37:36.264 --> 00:37:42.630
Hopefully roll on a couple more, but those will be for you when you leave.

00:37:42.731 --> 00:37:46.364
All that to say, this all points back to how we started.

00:37:46.364 --> 00:37:48.130
Christ has given us a mission.

00:37:48.130 --> 00:38:03.364
We have an outward, active faith that is rooted in who we are in him, rooted in the power of His Holy Spirit, so that our daily convictions, it shapes every part of what we do, every part of how we live.

00:38:03.463 --> 00:38:06.764
And I think we have an exciting new season before us.

00:38:06.764 --> 00:38:16.063
We don't have everything figured out about how we're going to do missions yet, but we feel like God is pushing us that way and we feel like now's the time.

00:38:16.130 --> 00:38:16.664
Let's pray