SPEAKER_00: This podcast is a ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we've come to remind ourselves what the truth is.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we say we believe.
SPEAKER_01: It's because we've come to orient ourselves and our lives around the truth.
SPEAKER_01: Last week we talked about the wise and the foolish person that you talked about.
SPEAKER_01: One of them digs down deep and builds a life upon the rock.
SPEAKER_01: And the other one just is kind of uh ruled by the convenient choice.
SPEAKER_01: And in the end, it's like a man who built his house on the sand.
SPEAKER_01: So when we say we believe, we're saying we build our life on something bigger than our appetites and our preferences, our kids' uh preferences.
SPEAKER_01: We've dug down deep, we've kind of built our life upon the rock.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Holy Spirit, we've come to testify to what we believe and to proclaim your death in the body and the blood of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Lord, be over this time and shape our thoughts, influence how we move towards the table today.
SPEAKER_01: We pray in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone said, Amen.
SPEAKER_01: You could have a seat.
SPEAKER_01: Uh if you have a Bible, you can open up to Romans chapter 3.
SPEAKER_01: Uh as you can see, you look around the room.
SPEAKER_01: Uh if you're a guest today, we are receiving communion today.
SPEAKER_01: We are the Lord's Supper, whatever your tradition you call it from.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say this.
SPEAKER_01: We practice open communion here at Grand Parkway, which means if you're a believer in the Lord Jesus, you're welcome to celebrate communion with us.
SPEAKER_01: What we like to do is kind of have a brief homily where we kind of say, hey, let's arrest our mind with these truths and think about this as it leads us to the Lord's table today.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm going to begin reading uh in verse 19 of Romans chapter 3, uh, verses 19 to 26.
SPEAKER_01: This is what the Bible invites us to think about this morning as we prepare for communion.
SPEAKER_01: Now we know that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: For by the works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
SPEAKER_01: But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law.
SPEAKER_01: Although the law and the prophets, they bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.
SPEAKER_01: For there's no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.
SPEAKER_01: This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.
SPEAKER_01: It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and a justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible invites us to think about five things this morning I just want to point to to shape our thoughts and influence our thinking around communion.
SPEAKER_01: The first thing the Bible tells us in verse 19 is simply this that everybody, including those who do not believe the gospel, are accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody, even those who do not believe the gospel, are accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul means when he says that whatever the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: And people that say, hey, I'm gonna get right with God by doing good stuff and by keeping the rules, they're accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: People that you and I work with, people that we're we live around that kind of say, hey, I'm glad that works for you, but I'm really not that into that.
SPEAKER_01: This still doesn't excuse them from this accountability to God.
SPEAKER_01: So everyone is accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: That's what the Bible teaches us.
SPEAKER_01: Secondly, we're incapable of doing anything to make ourselves right with God.
SPEAKER_01: Now think about it like this, because it goes from bad news to kind of in worse news.
SPEAKER_01: We're accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: And then secondly, we're incapable of doing anything to make ourselves right with God.
SPEAKER_01: That's what verse 20 says.
SPEAKER_01: For by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight.
SPEAKER_01: Since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, by through works of the law, by trying to do good things or right things to get into heaven, I'm a good person.
SPEAKER_01: I do good things, I help people.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says we're incapable of doing anything to make ourselves right with God.
SPEAKER_01: So the plight of humanity is pretty dire at this point.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible goes on to say this we're invited to have faith in Jesus by believing.
SPEAKER_01: We're invited to have faith in Jesus by believing.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 21.
SPEAKER_01: But now the righteousness of God has been manifest apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it.
SPEAKER_01: The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus for all who believe.
SPEAKER_01: But there's no distinction for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes on.
SPEAKER_01: But I just want to just back up and just point to verses 21 and 22 and say, if you're here today and you've yet to believe the gospel, the gospel invites you to have faith in Jesus by believing.
SPEAKER_01: Uh I I this past Monday I was talking with a friend of mine in my office, and uh he was not a believer, and uh we've been meeting uh on a consistent basis and just trying to explain and unpack the gospel and help him kind of walk through some difficult uh period in his life.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and uh we we were just talking on Monday, and and uh he was talking about how he's gonna, you know, I'm gonna be a better man and this, that, and the other.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, by what power?
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Well, and in the course of the conversation, he said, I don't know if there's a right or wrong way uh to ask the Lord into your life.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Well, the Bible speaks of that.
SPEAKER_01: Would you like to hear it?
SPEAKER_01: Well, sure.
SPEAKER_01: So I turned over to Romans chapter 10 and just read verses 9 and 10.
SPEAKER_01: For if you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart, God's raised him from the dead, you shall be saved.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, just stop right there, just walk that back.
SPEAKER_01: And I says, if you believe in your heart, God's raised him from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: For him to be raised from the dead, I said, You believe Jesus was raised from the dead?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: I said, now for him to be raised from the dead, he has to be dead, right?
SPEAKER_01: You ever say something that's so obvious, people look at you like you're stupid?
SPEAKER_01: He just kind of looked at me like, they let you have keys to the building?
SPEAKER_01: I said, just stay with me.
SPEAKER_01: So for him to be raised from the dead, he has to be dead, right?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: I said, for him to be dead, then back up.
SPEAKER_01: Then it then it begs the question, why did Jesus die?
SPEAKER_01: And my friend looked at me and he said, Jesus Christ died on the cross as payment for my sins.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01: Now walk back from that and ask the question, why did Jesus Christ die on the cross as payment for your sins?
SPEAKER_01: And he looked at me and he said, I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Would you like to know?
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, The Bible says that Jesus Christ died on the cross as payment for your sins because he loved you.
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever been around anybody like this, been moved by that simple truth?
SPEAKER_01: He just was kind of like, I said, that's right.
SPEAKER_01: Knowing full well everything you would do, he loved you and he went to the cross for you.
SPEAKER_01: So when I say we're invited to have faith in Jesus by believing, really, what the question that the gospel is asking us is, do I believe the gospel?
SPEAKER_01: Do I believe the gospel?
SPEAKER_01: If you watch college football yesterday, it'll help you believe the gospel better.
SPEAKER_01: You know, like you just said that because you're a man.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: If you watched college football yesterday, it'll help you believe the gospel better.
SPEAKER_01: You say, How do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: How many of y'all watch the OU Houston game?
SPEAKER_01: Can I see your hand?
SPEAKER_01: Yes, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_01: Now, some of you from Oklahoma are kind of like, Really?
SPEAKER_01: You're going there?
SPEAKER_01: Uh, just to make a spiritual point.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing, I don't have a dog in the fight.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't go to either school, but it in this, it was close game, first half, second half, uh, Houston came out and they began to kind of pull away, they begin to score.
SPEAKER_01: And every time they would score a touchdown or a field goal, they would shoot the camera would go to the crowd, and all the University of Houston people were just looking around like, oh my gosh, can you believe it?
SPEAKER_01: We don't stink anymore.
SPEAKER_01: This is unbelievable.
SPEAKER_01: That's the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: The gospel says you don't stink anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Because a lot of times you come to church and you're like, Yeah, I just stink.
SPEAKER_01: My God, I just stink.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just a worm, and I'm just a sinner saved by grace.
SPEAKER_01: Not anymore.
SPEAKER_01: And so I was watching those people in the crowd, and they just kept panning to the crowd.
SPEAKER_01: This one lady, I don't know if it's someone's girlfriend that kept showing her, she was so excited, she would turn around and look for somebody to affirm her a wonderment to, like, I can't believe it.
SPEAKER_01: You should come to one of these communion stations this morning with the same sense of, I can't believe it.
SPEAKER_01: I don't stink anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Because in the gospel, when Christ dies on the cross, and I say you're invited to have faith in Jesus by believing, that believing the gospel is not just how you become a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: That's how you express your Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: Fourth thing the Bible tells us is that grace is a gift that is experienced through a relationship with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 24.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: He says, hey, for there's no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: We live in a culture that wants the grace of God, but not the person of God.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot separate the grace of God from the person of Christ Jesus on the cross.
SPEAKER_01: And so that's why I say grace is a gift that is experienced through a relationship with Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_01: You can appreciate grace, you can need grace, but until you come into a relationship through grace, by faith, with Jesus, the Son of God, the grace of God will never be realized in your life.
SPEAKER_01: Fifthly and finally, the the gospel tells us that the cross was a demonstration of God's righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: He says we're justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 25, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.
SPEAKER_01: Propitiation is a big word that means that God is angry with sin and sinners, but his anger has been appeased.
SPEAKER_01: The debt has been paid.
SPEAKER_01: He says that God put forward as a debt or paying sacrifice, a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the next sentence.
SPEAKER_01: This was to show God's righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: This, the cross, is a demonstration of God's righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say it like this God has a history of taking what is yours and making it his.
SPEAKER_01: But he also has a history of taking what is his and making it yours.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: God has a history of taking what is yours and making it his.
SPEAKER_01: That's why the Bible says that God placed upon him the sin of all of us.
SPEAKER_01: Says we all like sheep have gone astray.
SPEAKER_01: We've all turned aside and gone our own way.
SPEAKER_01: And God took the sin of all of us and placed it upon Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Because God has a history of taking what is yours and making it his.
SPEAKER_01: But that's not that's just part of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: The other part is that he takes what's his and he makes it yours.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says it like this in 2 Corinthians 5 21.
SPEAKER_01: He made him who knew no sin to become sin for us, so that we may become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: As the Houston cougars would say it, we don't stink anymore.
SPEAKER_01: We're finally somebody.
SPEAKER_01: Now we're gonna go up in the poles.
SPEAKER_01: That's the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Well, for the Christian, it means one thing, and for the non-Christian here today, it means something else.
SPEAKER_01: For the Christian, it's an opportunity to unburden yourself, and for the unbeliever, it's an opportunity to believe.
SPEAKER_01: You say, What do you mean unburden yourself?
SPEAKER_01: 1 Peter chapter 5, verse 7 says this.
SPEAKER_01: It says, Cast all of your anxiety upon him because he cares for you.
SPEAKER_01: And so I want to ask you before we receive communion today, do you believe that God cares for you?
SPEAKER_01: Not that God cares about you, but that he cares for you.
SPEAKER_01: He attends to that which affects you with this familial, this fatherly affection.
SPEAKER_01: Do you believe that?
SPEAKER_01: You say, Well, I don't know.
SPEAKER_01: Some days I do, some days I don't.
SPEAKER_01: Here's how you know if you believe it.
SPEAKER_01: I believe that inasmuch as I give God that which makes me anxious.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say it again.
SPEAKER_01: I I believe God cares for me inasmuch as I give God what makes me anxious, is in as much as I cast all my anxiety upon him because he cares for me.
SPEAKER_01: Some of us don't do that because we think we'll do a better job of worrying about it than God will.
SPEAKER_01: So we hold on to it like it's a precious family heirloom.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna worry about this until Jesus comes through.
SPEAKER_01: When I was in college, I really struggled with the call to ministry.
SPEAKER_01: I did not want to be a preacher because I just thought they were phony people.
SPEAKER_01: I just couldn't do that.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, God, I'll teach Sunday school, I'll give money away.
SPEAKER_01: Please don't make me do that.
SPEAKER_01: You may be thinking, well, how'd he end up here?
SPEAKER_01: Uh because I roomed with a guy in my senior year named Joey Butler.
SPEAKER_01: And he knew that I was running from the call to ministry, and so he would tell me on a consistent basis, I'm praying for you.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, what does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: And he said, Well, every day I just close my eyes and I just I just pick picture myself picking you up and taking you into the presence of God and just laying you in God's presence.
SPEAKER_01: And I just say to God, God, here, I found this, this belongs to you.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm just looking at him like, okay.
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, God and I both agree.
SPEAKER_01: You're you're you're running, you're not doing what you're supposed to be doing.
SPEAKER_01: But every day I just take you and just kind of lay you in in his presence and say, God, here, I found Neil, he belongs to you.
SPEAKER_01: It's hard to live with a man that tells you that on a daily basis.
SPEAKER_01: I would rather him say, I'm praying for you.
SPEAKER_01: Lead God in direct, bless the gift and the giver.
SPEAKER_01: Every once in a while he would just see me.
SPEAKER_01: He's I just laid you before Jesus, and we both agreed you're not doing what you're supposed to be doing.
SPEAKER_01: And I would say, Well, I prayed to Jesus, and we both agreed you need to shut up.
SPEAKER_01: And he would just smile.
SPEAKER_01: Why do I tell you that?
SPEAKER_01: Because this morning some of you need to take that which makes you the most anxious and kind of lay it before God.
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes it's not an it, it's a him or a her.
SPEAKER_01: You need to lay them before God.
SPEAKER_01: Because one of the reasons sometimes if it's a him or a her, they don't really have to deal with their sin is because you fret enough over it.
SPEAKER_01: You're anxious enough over it.
SPEAKER_01: And so they look at you and think, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: If I cared about that more, I'd become like them.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to become like them.
SPEAKER_01: And so sometimes you just have to lay them before God and kind of say, you know what, Lord, I can't worry about this enough to change it.
SPEAKER_01: But I'm just gonna trust you.
SPEAKER_01: This makes me anxious.
SPEAKER_01: Would you do something about this?
SPEAKER_01: Rumor has it that you care for me.
SPEAKER_01: And so as we prepare for communion today, I want you to just have these five truths in your head that everybody's accountable.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody's accountable to God.
SPEAKER_01: We're incapable of doing anything to make ourselves right with God, and we're invited to have faith in Jesus by believing.
SPEAKER_01: It's by believing.
SPEAKER_01: It's not math, it's music.
SPEAKER_01: And ask yourself today, do I hear the music?
SPEAKER_01: The grace is a gift that's expressed, experienced through a relationship with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And finally, the cross was a demonstration of God's righteousness because God has a history of taking what is yours, taking what is ours and making it his, and taking what is his and making it ours.
SPEAKER_01: And that's what we've come to celebrate this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Now the Bible tells us how to celebrate that.
SPEAKER_01: If you notice at the end of the game yesterday, the the OU Houston game, no one told everybody, and now go crazy.
SPEAKER_01: No, there's just something in them that just instinctively took over.
SPEAKER_01: They knew what to do, they knew how to act in light of victory.
SPEAKER_01: And I just wondered this morning if we know how to act in light of victory.
SPEAKER_01: And so let's take some time and just kind of reflect and think.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says, hey, examine yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Don't come to this, don't, don't, don't come to the Lord's table and receive these elements in an unworthy manner.
SPEAKER_01: Without thinking about, hey, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: This is this is why it says, do this in remembrance of me.
SPEAKER_01: This is not a statement about our our worth or our significance.
SPEAKER_01: This is a statement about God's righteousness and the exchange that takes place at the cross.
SPEAKER_01: So let's give ourselves just a little bit of time and space to think about these things.
SPEAKER_01: I'm a voice of prayer, and Clyde may just sing something over us.
SPEAKER_01: And I want you just to kind of prepare your head and your heart to come to the table.
SPEAKER_01: And then we'll give you some directions about how we do communion.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_01: Father, thanks for the opportunity that is ours because of the victory that was yours.
SPEAKER_01: We say again, Lord, thanks for the opportunity that is ours because of of the victory that was yours.
SPEAKER_01: And in that, you provided a lot for us.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Lord, whatever we're anxious about today, we choose to just kind of lay it before you and say, This I found this, this belongs to you.
SPEAKER_01: I've been carrying this around for a while, but I want to lay this before you because this is yours.
SPEAKER_01: And I lay this here not because I don't care, but because you do.
SPEAKER_01: You care for me.
SPEAKER_01: You don't just care about me from a distance, you care for me, up close, intimately acquainted with anything that has everything that has anything to do with me.
SPEAKER_01: And so for some of us today, Lord, the thing we need to embrace is that you care for us.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Lord, we want to just kind of take a moment just to kind of get our head and our heart calibrated towards what we're about to do.
SPEAKER_01: So, Holy Spirit, be over your people.
SPEAKER_01: Lead us into the truth.
SPEAKER_01: Regardless of how good it is, we pray in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: So I told the folks at my station this morning, all the servers came together watching the University of Houston football game yesterday when they started pulling away the second half.
SPEAKER_01: Every time they'd score, they would show the crowd, and the crowd was kind of like, we can't believe it, we don't stink anymore.
SPEAKER_01: And I thought about it this morning.
SPEAKER_01: And so I want you to believe the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: You're not that means that you're not just a bunch of sinners.
SPEAKER_01: You're the sons and daughters of God.
SPEAKER_01: You've been made right with God.
SPEAKER_01: You're saying you have the capacity to do what the Bible says, and you should never get over that.
SPEAKER_01: Hold your hands out.
SPEAKER_01: Take a blessing over you.
SPEAKER_01: On this labor day, you're able to rest.
SPEAKER_01: Because someone has accomplished something that makes you doing nothing possible.
SPEAKER_01: Depart now.
SPEAKER_01: And rest in the finished work of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.