Turn the World Towards God - Michael Adolphus

Sunday sermon recorded on May 31, 2026   

Part of the "Be a Blessing" series.   

https://linktr.ee/northpointema

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Oh well, good morning everyone. Well, the clicker need the clicker. Good morning, everyone. It's great to be together this morning. As mentioned in the introduction, my name is Michael Odolphus. I get to serve as a campus minister in the Boston Church. Specifically in the downtown region in Back Bay. And this past year I got to serve at Northeastern University, which was amazing. But it's a pleasure to be able to speak to you all today or this morning. But I figured maybe as I start off, maybe I could tell you guys a little bit about myself, a little bit about my story. But I grew up going to church. It wasn't this fellowship of churches, it was more of like a traditional church. And at first, like any child, I did not like going to church. I'd want to stay at home. I'm gonna play my Game Boy. I don't play Pokemon. I didn't want to go to church. But I remember around the age of 12 was when I first started to have this desire to figure out what I believed and why I believed it. I figured, okay, I believe in God. Certainly that has to be the most important thing in my life. Let me learn a bit more about this. And so around the age of 12, I started to try to read the Bible on my own and pray on my own. But I had no support around me, I had no communion around me to help spur me on in that direction. So from ages 12 to 17, it was a cycle of, oh, I need to figure out my faith. And I'd read my Bible every day and I'll try to pray every day. And that'd go on for about a month, and I'd slowly kind of fall off till eventually I get to a point where I'm completely forgetting about God. He's not on my mind at all. And that would last for like two, three months. And I'd come back to God, be with him for a bit, stray away from him, forget about him. And it was this cycle for about five years. And then when the pandemic happened, and COVID hit, and and we were all in quarantine, I had a lot of time to think. Because the the the this is my senior of high school, and the teachers at that point had none no idea what to do. In their heads, they thought, okay, this is gonna last two weeks and we're gonna be back. They were dead wrong. They had no idea what was gonna hit them. And so I was just in my room looking at the ceiling, and I and it started to hit me all these doubts I had about God. I didn't even realize I had all these doubts, but I had them deep down, and I tried to figure out like, man, does God actually exist? What is the purpose of my life? Why is there even a world? Why is there a universe rather than nothing? And I tried so hard to rationalize it in my head, and I just simply couldn't figure it out. And so for the next year and a half, I just became agnostic. I settled with, I don't know, maybe God exists, maybe he doesn't. But if I'm not sure if he even exists, then why would I live my life for him? So for the next year and a half, I completely stopped trying to live out any ounce of faith in my life. I didn't want to follow Jesus. I wasn't interested in that, my heart grew cold. But then about a year and a half later, when I was entering into my first semester on campus, at I went to UMass Boston. I don't know if there's any UMass Boston grads or anything like that here. I guess not, but I love that school. You would have heard it. Um I would have heard it if something was. We got Berkeley over here. So that's close enough. But when I was 19 years old, as I was entering into college, that question of does God exist entered my mind again. And it was something that I felt like, okay, this is the most important question of my life. Right. If there's one thing I gotta figure out, it's this.

SPEAKER_00 3:40

Yeah, it's true.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

And so I remember there was this one October night, I think it was like October 13th or something like that. I entered into my dorm room, I was all by myself, and I was like, let me figure this out. And so I go on the internet, I'm trying to figure it out. Doesn't help me out too much. But that night, for the first time and who knows how long, I decided to pray. I remember praying to God, and I asked him for guidance and for proof of his existence. And then the very next morning, as I was walking to my first class of the day, I got reached out to by the campus minister. Invited out to a Bible talk.

SPEAKER_00 4:12

Oh my word.

SPEAKER_01 4:14

And at that point, you have to say yes. You can't say no. You know, so I gave him my number, I came out to the Bible talk, I enjoyed it, they asked me to study the Bible, I agreed, and then a little under a month later, I decided to get baptized and devote my life to Christ. And it's the best decision that I could have ever made for sure. And that's not to say that everything has been sunshine and rainbow since then.

SPEAKER_00 4:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

No, so sometimes when you become a disciple, sometimes life can get a little harder, even.

unknown 4:40

Sometimes it does.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

But being a disciple of Jesus, there's so much joy and gratitude that enters into your life that you can hold that you can hold on to even through the hard times. You know, you can always take joy and gratitude in your salvation. Yeah, you can always take joy and gratitude in the relationship you have with the Father.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

Amen.

SPEAKER_01 4:59

Now, about a year after I got baptized, I was an intern, uh a volunteer, part-time intern in our campus ministry. Then about a year after that, I graduated from campus, and that was about three years ago now. And after I graduated, I went straight into the full-time ministry. I've been doing it for three years now. At first, I was at I don't know how familiar you guys are with uh the universities in the Boston area, but at first I was with the Fenway Schools and Boston College. Then I was with uh Boston University and Harvard University, and then this past year I was over at Northeastern University and Suffolk University. And this upcoming year I'm transferring over to the South Coastal region of the Boston Church. I'll be at Bridgewater State. So it's been a lot of moving around, but it's been a lot of fun. I've enjoyed it quite a bit. I hope to continue to do ministry long term. It's been such a joy. To share with you guys a little bit of good news from the downtown region. Since the beginning of this calendar year, since January 1st in our downtown campus ministry, we've seen 36 people get baptized so far. Awesome. Which is so, so amazing. I think it's important to remember that this number, 36, it's not just a number, but these are 36 individual people, real people with real stories. And God pursued and reached out to all these people to help bring them to the point of salvation. I mean, it's so amazing, and God's been moving, He's gonna continue to move. It's also been amazing to be able to serve on a young campus staff. I am 23 right now, I'll be 24 in July. And honestly, being on the team that I'm on, I feel like a veteran. I feel I feel old on the team that I'm on because there are just so many young people that are stepping up. There's so many people that have this desire to serve God in a great way to the best of their abilities. It's been purely amazing seeing the way God has been moving in the hearts of not only the lost and bringing them to Christ, but also in the hearts of the disciples to help them grow in their zeal and their desire to serve God and to seek and save the lost. So that's some good news from the downtown region. I just got back from a three-week trip in Europe, which was really cool. I flew out April 30th. I got back May 22nd, I think it was. Um, but I went to a bunch of different cities, a bunch of different countries. I first went to Budapest, Hungary, then after that, I went to Zagreb, Croatia, then went to Prague, Czech Republic, Berlin, Germany, Warsaw, Poland, then Krakow, Poland. If you're thinking, wow, Michael, that's a lot. You're right. It was a lot. My feet were absolutely killing me. I would travel from one state to another city, sleeping on the bus. But it was it was tiring, but it was so much fun and so refreshing to go to these different cities. And I have family in some of these cities, but also just to see the disciples in these different cities. To see our brothers and sisters was amazing. You know, at the beginning of the trip, I was in Budapest. There was a conference for our disciples out in Eastern Europe. And I remember the the conference came to an end, and at one point I was on my way back home. I have a cousin that lives there, and so I was on my way. I was taking the scenic route. So instead of taking public transportation, I decided to walk. And there was a point where I was walking home, and I'm right by this major river that kind of splits the city into two. And I'm walking, and eventually I see this beautiful building right in front of me. Oh, that that's title lesson. We'll get to that in a second. But boom, I see this beautiful building that's right in front of me. I believe that's a parliament building. Let's go. I I remembered well. But that's a parliament building, and I remember standing right before this building, and I remember being in such awe of this building because it's so intentional. Yeah, it might be a little bit hard to see, but there are like images of human beings in that building. Yeah, all these different various designs, and on a practical level, these designs are completely unnecessary. But these designs and these images of people, it makes the building so so beautiful. And it's amazing to know that there was a builder or an artist, like a like a Michelangelo kind of figure, kind of person, that made every individual person, every crevice, every curve. It's just I was standing before it and I was in such awe of this building. And I remember looking at this building, and then eventually I looked away. I started walking back home, and I couldn't help but think that the world that we have before us is so much more beautiful, it's so much more intentional, it's so much more awesome than this building. I mean, you look at the trees, and you look at the bark, and there's so much more, so many more crevices and designs than on this building. You look at the the sky and the different colors in the sky, you look at the clouds. I don't know about you guys. I love clouds. I'm fascinated by clouds. You look at every individual people, you look at the people in this room, everyone's different and beautiful in their own way. You think about the souls of people, it's not something you can see or touch, but something that you can experience. And God's creation of this world is so much more deserving of awe than this building. But yet, people will walk and stand in awe of the building, but they won't stand in awe of God's creation. You know, the people will pay attention to the building, but not to God's creation. And the unfortunate reality is that the people of this world are spiritually dead. They are spiritually numb, they can't see or understand what is right before them. And now I'm not trying to bash on the people of the world by no means because I was like them. There was a point where my heart was completely cold and hard towards God. So I'm not trying to bash on them, but my eyes were opened. And we want to open the eyes of the world too. Can I get an amen to that? You're in Acts chapter 26. We'll read verses 15 through 18. It'll be on the slides. But it's this point where Paul is speaking before uh King Agrippa, and Paul's giving his defense to the king. And at this point that we're going to read, Paul is retelling his testimony. He's retelling the story of how he met Jesus. And starting in verse 15, it says here, this is Paul speaking. It says, Then I asked, Paul asked, Who are you? Lord? I am Jesus, who you are persecuting, the Lord replied. Now get up and stand on your feet. I have appeared to you to appoint you as a servant, as a witness of what you have seen and will see of me. I will rescue rescue you from your own people and from the Gentiles. I am sending you to them to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive the forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me. You have an incredible passage where Jesus puts this incredible vision before Paul. That Paul's gonna go into the world, he's gonna open the eyes of the world. He's gonna turn them from darkness to light, he's gonna take them from the power of Satan to the power of God. And I believe that this vision that God gave to Paul is still the vision that God has for the church today. That we as a church will go into the world and turn the world toward God. And so the title of the sermon today is turn the world towards God. Turn the world towards God. You know, the thing is that turning the world towards God is not an easy task. You know, it can be fun and inspiring and exciting to talk about this idea of we're gonna turn the world towards God. But have you ever tried doing it? You know, I had this really great friend of mine, his name is Anthony. We've been best friends for about nine years. We became best friends. It was like my freshman sophomore year of high school when I was like 14, 15 years old, so about nine years ago. And I remember there was a point last year where I invited him out to church and I convinced him to come, and he came out, and I was really excited about it. And then as we were driving home, we were kind of talking a bit, and he mentioned that he's not really interested in coming out to church every week, but he could see himself maybe every now and then coming out to church, and I kind of felt like, amen, yeah, I'll take that. That that's better than nothing. But then there was this point where I was like, okay, I need to I need to invite him out again. I need to get this guy out to church, I need to help my best friend out. And I remember that morning, I was like praying for it. I was like, God, like let his heart be open. And I texted him. And I still remember exactly where I was. I was driving in Boston. I I just got off the Tobin Bridge, I was on the Zacum, I was going towards Sur Drive when I saw the text that he sent me. And he said, Hey, like, I don't think this is for me. Like, I'm not, I'm not really interested in coming out to church. And I remember feeling crushed. I mean, I was brokenhearted. There's only been a couple times in my life that I've cried for the lost. And this particular friend of mine was one of those people. And so I was so brokenhearted when I got that text back that he wasn't interested. Now I still have hope for him. But you know, turning the world towards God is not an easy task. And so the question becomes well, how do we do it? How do we turn the world toward God? And the truth is that there's a lot of different things I can talk about in terms of turning the world towards God. I mean, I can talk about the importance of us having faith in God and relying on him and believing that he will move in the hearts of people. I could talk about the importance of us loving the lost and how that will spur us on to help people. I can talk about the strength and the great you need to overcome the hardships of trying to bring people to Christ, the disappointment that you'll face, the persecution that you'll face by trying to spread the gospel. But the one thing that I want to talk to you guys about, and this is my one and only point this morning, is this is your life's goal. This is your life's goal. You know, there's a there's a lot of different goals that people can have in the world, including myself. I mean, I I think about retirement. For a lot of people, including myself, uh, I think it'd be cool to have a nice retirement. You know, you amen, right? You retire, you have your house paid off, you can go to the beach or something like that. Oh yeah. You know, you you invest in different accounts, you you have a not as glorious as it sounds. I'll find out one day, I guess. But you invest in like a 401k or 403B or all these different things. You know, you can have a goal of health and fitness, right? You you try to eat healthy, you you try to work out. I'm I'm trying to do better in that. I ran for the first time in a couple months this past week. So I'm I'm trying to get back into it. Check. Uh I think about career success.

unknown 16:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:43

You know, we we get in desire to climb up the the corporate ladder.

unknown 16:48

Right.

SPEAKER_01 16:49

I think about different hobbies that we might want to have, be it dance or music or fishing, or it could be a number of different things, or travel. You want to travel the world and go to I don't know, Egypt or Fiji or Hawaii or all these different places. But check out this passage here in Philippians 1. Philippians 1, we'll start verse 21. And Paul says here, for to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. If I'm to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know. I am torn between the two. I desire to depart and be with and be with Christ, which is better by far, but it's more necessary for you that I remain in the body. Convinced of this, I know I will remain and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in the faith. And now I'm not here to say that having non-spiritual goals is sinful. I mean, even as I mentioned, one of my goals is I'm trying to get back into running. That's something I'm gonna get into. A friend of mine is gonna run a 10K later this month. I want to join him, and I hope I'll be able to complete the race. I'm also trying to get into reading. During my vacation time, I realize when I have free time, I enjoy reading. And I want to get more into reading. But I what I am trying to say here, and what we see in this passage is that ultimately, as disciples of Jesus, your goal is to get into heaven. And the only thing, the only thing that should pull you to stay here in this world, is to help other people get there too. Ultimately, nothing else matters. The only thing that matters is you getting to heaven and you bringing other people to heaven. Because the truth is that we're all gonna die. And you can't bring anything else with you except your soul and your friends. That's it, nothing else. So why would this not be the goal of your life? Why would you getting to heaven and bringing others with you not be the goal of your life? Why would turning the world toward God not be the goal of your life? As I mentioned, I I just went on this Europe trip. And at the end of my Europe trip, the last country I went to was Poland. I got I I create this with uh Chat GPT. I used AI to make this image, to make this map. Now, you guys, I don't know if you guys know any Polish people in your lives, but I'm actually Polish. I I don't look Polish though. It's because I'm half Dominican. But I am Polish, I speak the language culturally, I'm very much with it. Maybe oh, you're Dominican?

unknown 20:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:04

But I'm very in tune with the culture. I've if I had to guess, I probably spent around like three years total of my life in Poland. Um, in total, I probably spent let's say three to six months in the DR. I'll say my dad's from Santo Domingo. That's all it is. Amen. Amen. But the the first city that I went to was Warsaw, Poland. Um, that's the capital city. There's about two million people there. And we well, I I spent my two days there with the church over there, and it was so amazing to be there. I think one of the things that really encouraged my heart was the fact that the young people there, their hearts are on fire for God. They they really want to serve Him, they really want to do something great in their generation. And it was even a point where I went on campus uh with some of the guys, and we were out sharing our faith, and it was such a great time. And the the guys who I went sharing my faith with, the story behind it is they were never told to do that. It was just one guy and another guy, and they were like, let's share our faith. And every week they just continuously share their faith on campus, not having been asked by the minister or anything like that. They were just going because they felt like, oh, this is what we gotta do. And I was so encouraged by that. There were also a great group of fun guys. There was this card game that we'd play, it was called Heap. And I won't fully explain all the rules, but it was a very like boyish card game. Essentially, you have uh three cards in your hands, and you're trying to get these three cards to all have the same suit. And then once you do that, you put your hand down and you say heap. If you are the last person and you haven't put your cards down, then you are the loser. And there is a punishment. Evolves with being the loser. It very much is. And the punishment is dependent on what their cards were. And depending on what their cards were, if you're lucky, nothing happens. But you might get a flick on the forehead. You might get a flick on the nose. Or you put your hands like this and they punch your head. And I lost my time. So although I gave some, I also got some too. My bad. But it was such a great game, and it was a great time of spending time with our brothers and sisters in Warsaw, Poland. And then Friday night, I took the train after a youth devotional. My family lives in right by the Krakout area. And I arrived there like a little bit past midnight. All of Saturday, I was just relaxing. My feet were killing me from this entire three-week trip. And I get there, I relax all Saturday. And then Sunday morning, I actually did not go to our church in Krakout for Sunday service. And it's not because I didn't want to. You know, in so many of Paul's letters, he begins it by saying, Man, I'm so grateful to God for your faith. I thank God for your faith. Now I remember two years ago, I led a mission team to Berlin, Germany for a month. And I remember going to Sunday service there and feeling that. Like, wow. Like in this other part of the world, I have brothers and sisters here. Man, thank God for the faith of the people here. So it wasn't that I didn't want to go to church with our church in Krakow. The thing is, is that the Krakow church doesn't exist. We actually don't have a church there. You know, I think in the scripture in Romans 9. You know, in Romans 8, it's this beautiful chapter. In Romans 8, in verse 1, it talks about how there's no condemnation for us as disciples. In Romans 8, it talks about how the present sufferings that we're facing in this world is nothing compared to the glory that we will receive. In Romans 8, it talks about how God works good through all things for those who love him, even the bad things. In Romans 8, it talks about how we're more than conquerors. It talks about how nothing can separate us from the love of God. It talks about all the blessings we have as disciples. And then right into Romans 9, starting in verse 1, then Paul says, after talking about how amazing being a disciple is, he says, I speak the truth in Christ. I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit. I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. He has this unending pain and suffering in his heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race. In this passage, we see that Paul is utterly heartbroken and crushed because his people are not saved. He even says that if he could, he would give up his own salvation for his people. I mean, that's such a strong statement to make. That's how much he cares for his people, how much he loves them. And honestly, I relate to this passage because I too feel broken over the fact that where my family lives, we do not have a church there. And my goal in life is to hopefully one day be able to help plant a church in that part of the world. And so if you guys want to join me, I didn't talk to Petty about this. Let me know. But what is your goal in life? What is your life's goal? You know, the truth is, we all have goals in our lives. You know, I mentioned some of the things that we might have goals with. It could be retirement, it could be health and fitness, it could be hobbies, it could be travel. Maybe you're sitting here this morning and you're thinking to yourself, actually, Michael, I don't really have goals in life. I'm I'm just I'm just living. Well, the truth is that although you say you don't have a goal, probably your goal is to live a comfortable and peaceful life. But the thing is that if you are a disciple of Jesus, your goal has to be, it needs to be to get to heaven and to bring other people with you. If you're a disciple of Jesus, your goal has to be to turn the world towards God. And what greater purpose is there than this? Now, how do you know if turning the world towards God is your goal? Well, I think you know if it's your life goal, if your actions reflect it. I love this proverb. It's probably one of my favorite proverbs. It's Proverbs 27, verse 19. It says, as water reflects the face, someone's life reflects the heart. And so in your life, if you share your faith, if you're studying the Bible with people, then that's a sign that this could be the goal of your life. But I actually think that a better metric would be that you that you share your faith and you study the Bible people at the expense of something else. Because what that means is that you don't just do it when it's convenient, you do it even when it's inconvenient. Right? That shows that this isn't just a goal in your life, it's not just one of your goals in life, but this is your life's goal. That turning the world towards God is more important to you than the other goals you have in your life. And like I mentioned before, having other goals in your life is not wrong, it's not simple. You can have other goals, but what's number one? What's most important? You know, I'll quickly share this story about a friend of mine. He was at Northeastern University, he just graduated, his name is Matt. He's an awesome brother. I hope you guys get the chance to meet him one day. But Matt, in the fall of 2024, so about a year and a half ago, two years ago, is when he first started trying to seek after God. And throughout that semester, he'd go out to the church that he was a part of. And then at the very end of that semester, at the very end of the fall semester of 2024, the church that he was going to wasn't open, I guess, on Sunday morning. And he was friends with one of the sisters in our ministry. Her name was Maddie. And so Maddie talks to him and is like, hey, like, why not come to church with me? And he figured, yeah, why not? And so he ends up coming out to church with us December 2024. And he he comes out, he has a great time, he loves it. He connects with the brothers at Northeastern University, and they end up getting together, they end up studying the Bible together, and then only a couple months later, he gets baptized in April 2025. So only a little bit over a year ago. And then what was amazing about Matt was only like five months into him being a disciple, only five months into being a Christian, he raised his hand and he said, I want to be an intern in the campus ministry because I want to serve God to the best of my ability and learn how to help people become Christians. Which that is super rare. I don't know if you guys know that. What were you doing after five months into being a disciple? I mean, I know for me, I was a knucklehead five months into me being a disciple. So he he was definitely far far beyond me. And the thing about Matt is Matt is a man who has a lot of different interests. He loves a bunch of different things. I mean, he he loves soccer, he is probably the biggest Arsenal fan I know in my life. He loves cooking, and he also loves martial arts, and he really wanted to get into Mua Thai. It was around the same time that he was becoming an intern that he also wanted to do Muay Thai. And he signed up for a class, but then probably pretty soon into it, he realized oh, I actually can't do everything I want. I can't be a student and also work part-time to support myself and do Muay Thai and be an intern in the campus ministry. And so, long story short, he said, I love Muay Thai, I love martial arts, but I'm giving that up. Because serving God is more important to me.

SPEAKER_00 30:59

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 30:59

Me learning how to help people become Christians, that's more important to me. My relationship with God, that's more important to me. He had these other desires in his life, but this was what was more important. Mass goal in life was to turn the world towards God. And let me ask you this morning, church, is that your goal too? Is that your life's goal? That's the one thing that I want to communicate with you guys this morning. But as we close out and as we conclude the lesson, I just want to remind us. I'll turn this slide again. But I just want to remind us of the spiritual reality of this world. You know, as we saw in Acts chapter 26, everyone is in one of two categories. Their eyes are either open or they're closed. They're either living in darkness or they're living in the light. They're either under the power of Satan or they're under the power of God. And I think sometimes we can forget this because we can't see it or feel it, but there's a spiritual war happening right now. It's happening all around us, and it's beyond what we can even understand or comprehend. And the thing is, is that every single one of you guys in this room plays a part in it. And your job is to help turn people's souls from darkness to light, from the hands of Satan to the hands of God. But the only way that we're gonna change the world, the only way that it will not only be the Fitzburg Church of Christ, but there's also gonna be the Leo Minster Church of Christ and churches of Christ all around this town. The only way my family is gonna have a church to go to, and maybe the only way that some of your family members are gonna have a church to go to is if this is the goal of your life. That this is your main focus. There's no other way that we're gonna climb this mountain of a calling that God has given us unless we make it the goal of our lives. And just imagine if every single one of us in this room made turning the world toward God the goal of our lives. I mean, imagine what God could do through us. Imagine what God would do to this town, imagine what God would do to this world. It's been great to be together this morning. I hope this sermon's been helpful. So God be the glory. Amen.