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_02: Father, we proclaim that this morning of there is power when we call upon your name.
SPEAKER_02: It's a name that dispels all fear.
SPEAKER_02: It's a name that delivers hope and purpose and peace.
SPEAKER_02: And with that being said, as you just stand there just for a moment, pray in the name of God.
SPEAKER_02: I love spending time with some of my Nigerian friends because when they pray, they pray in the name of Jesus before they even start praying.
SPEAKER_02: Here in the Western culture, we we finish our prayer, but they begin and end their prayer.
SPEAKER_02: So pray in the name of God.
SPEAKER_02: And just say, God, what do I need to hear today?
SPEAKER_02: What do I need to leave outside the doors of this church and what do I need to hear today?
SPEAKER_02: And let me be selfish and ask you to pray for me.
SPEAKER_02: And pray that I would be at peace with what God has to say and that I don't try to add to it or take away from it.
SPEAKER_02: Father, we, your people, say that we trust you.
SPEAKER_02: And in your name, we're listening, and in your name, we want to be people of response.
SPEAKER_02: And we praise things in your name.
SPEAKER_02: Amen.
SPEAKER_02: You can have a seat.
SPEAKER_02: Well, it is uh it is good to be back here.
SPEAKER_02: A little weird, if I'm gonna be honest, but um, but as Don said, I am Sally's husband and Jack and Sophie's dad.
SPEAKER_02: I guess that's all you need to know.
SPEAKER_02: Um and about a year and a half ago, I preached a sermon from this pulpit from the book of Exodus entitled The Posture Before Your Father.
SPEAKER_02: Um I by no means expect any of you to remember it, um, but but one of the things that I preached about that morning that I want to just kind of point back to was in Exodus 2, and we find Moses and he's fleeing from Pharaoh, and he's running and he's running and he's running, and he's at the end of himself, and he just collapses uh from exhaustion by a well in the land of Midian.
SPEAKER_02: Um and Moses was at the end of himself when he collapsed.
SPEAKER_02: He wasn't intentionally looking for rest.
SPEAKER_02: Um, he wasn't trying to sabbath, he was just plain old ghast and exhausted.
SPEAKER_02: Um was out of options.
SPEAKER_02: And what followed is when he began to lean to that rest.
SPEAKER_02: We see this season as we read about Moses and the things that God had for Moses is it becomes a season of instruction, a season of rebuke and direction, a season of commandment.
SPEAKER_02: Um as I thought about that over the last couple weeks in retrospect, I don't know if it was a particularly good sermon, but here's what I know and the takeaway is that God used the few weeks um leading up to that sermon of studying for me, uh, the Sunday morning where I preached it three times, to begin to lay the groundwork for what um the next season of my life following that was gonna look like and has looked like over the last about 18 months.
SPEAKER_02: And I share that with you because when Neil asked me what I believe God would have me preach in in the midst of this better series, as I prayed and I listened, I prayed and I listened, I just kept coming back and believing that the word that God had given me was rest.
SPEAKER_02: Was rest so that we could become better at rest.
SPEAKER_02: Much like we we just got done singing in this in this amazing time of worshiping and singing these truths about God together, there's a rhythm to that.
SPEAKER_02: There's a rhythm to that music.
SPEAKER_02: And God has built us for a rhythm.
SPEAKER_02: Our life is a rhythm.
SPEAKER_02: Um and the rhythm that you and I were called to, the rhythm that you and I are designed to live within, is a rhythm that God has ordained for our lives.
SPEAKER_02: There's a pastor, um his name's Wade Coleman, and I really like what he has to say.
SPEAKER_02: He says this you were made to work.
SPEAKER_02: You were made to rest.
SPEAKER_02: Too much or too little of either is not a good thing.
SPEAKER_02: We need to work hard and we need to rest well.
SPEAKER_02: It is in your creational DNA.
SPEAKER_02: So this morning we're going to talk about rest.
SPEAKER_02: And so if you have your Bible, if you'll turn with me to John chapter 15.
SPEAKER_02: John chapter 15, let's read together about what God's Word has for us as we explore what it looks like to be better, better at rest.
SPEAKER_02: If you don't have a Bible, um you can look around under maybe underneath your seed or around you, there's some black hardcover Bibles, and I'll be on page 901.
SPEAKER_02: Page 901 in those.
SPEAKER_02: John chapter 15, beginning in verse one.
SPEAKER_02: I am the true vine, and my father is the vine dresser.
SPEAKER_02: Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Already you are clean because of the word that I have spoken to you.
SPEAKER_02: Abide in me, and I in you.
SPEAKER_02: As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.
SPEAKER_02: I am the vine, and you are the branches.
SPEAKER_02: Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_02: If any one does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withered and withers, and the branches are gathered, thrown into a fire and burned.
SPEAKER_02: If you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.
SPEAKER_02: By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples.
SPEAKER_02: As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you.
SPEAKER_02: Abide in my love.
SPEAKER_02: If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my father's commandments and abide in his love.
SPEAKER_02: These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be made full.
SPEAKER_02: This is the word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: As we read this and we study this this morning, here's what I believe, and here's how I would like for us to approach it.
SPEAKER_02: I think there's three words within this text, one or a couple that we see multiple times, um, but there's three words in this passage that I believe are gonna shape our time this morning.
SPEAKER_02: And I believe these words not only will shape our time, I think as we approach this topic of rest, as we try to understand what does, maybe we've heard rest in God or God's rest or Sabbath rest, as we hear those, I believe these three words are gonna serve as a filter for us this morning to separate the junk in our lives from the truth.
SPEAKER_02: And here's what I mean by the junk in our lives is there are things, church, that we will convince ourselves are rest.
SPEAKER_02: There are things that we implement into our lives that we we convince ourselves is rest.
SPEAKER_02: And I think that through today we might discover that some of those things are really just distraction, if not idolatry, that we label as rest.
SPEAKER_02: Um and here's what I mean by kind of filtering out the nonsense.
SPEAKER_02: For whatever reason, uh, over the last couple weeks I found myself interacting with a lot of former students back from when I was a youth pastor from this church and from other churches, and uh just subsequently to that started uh thinking about events, both good and bad, of being a youth pastor.
SPEAKER_02: Um and one that I was reminded of, or one scenario that I lived out over and over and over again as a youth pastor, was dealing with students who lost their retainers.
SPEAKER_02: Um then, you know, trying to jump into action and help out and try to help cut off at the end before they had to come home and face the inevitable wrath of their parents for losing the$8,000 piece of plastic, right?
SPEAKER_02: And I remember one situation in particular we had a retreat and had a young girl come to me and she's just crying her eyes out.
SPEAKER_02: And my first thought was, where is my wife to handle this unstable ball of hormones over here?
SPEAKER_02: Um but she was nowhere to be found, and so um I jumped into the phone booth and threw my Superman uniform on and went to work.
SPEAKER_02: And in this scenario, she had lost her retainer because she was participating in some ridiculous game I'd put together and um had taken her retainer out.
SPEAKER_02: Um and then it got thrown away with the garbage.
SPEAKER_02: And so if you're a thinking person, you're like, hey, what's the game?
SPEAKER_02: Let's all say it together.
SPEAKER_02: Hey, what's the thank you for the three people who want to participate?
SPEAKER_02: Um so the game was we got uh happy meals from McDonald's and we threw everything in a blender, uh, fries, drink, burger, and then you got the chug it in the first one.
SPEAKER_02: So this is pure gospel work, people.
SPEAKER_02: All right.
SPEAKER_02: Um and so she did that, and the game was over, and everything got thrown away, and so she came to me, and so I said, Well, you know, we gotta do what we gotta do.
SPEAKER_02: And so I go sneak into the retreat kitchen or the campground kitchen and get a colander and just start pouring bags of McDonald's Happy Meal Slurry, and then finally, through one of the bags, voila, we found the retainer, right?
SPEAKER_02: Now, this is a stretch and a gross one, I get.
SPEAKER_02: Um, but but as as as we read through this, um, what we're gonna do is use the words of Christ found here in John 15 to filter through misconceptions and misunderstandings of rest so we can grow towards resting better.
SPEAKER_02: So I told you just three words.
SPEAKER_02: The first word I want to highlight from this section of scripture is fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Is fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Look back at verse one and two with me again.
SPEAKER_02: It says this I am the true vine, and my father is the vine dresser.
SPEAKER_02: Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away.
SPEAKER_02: And every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes, so that it may bear more fruit.
SPEAKER_02: How many of you have been here at some point in your life, being at church or Sunday school or talking with someone, have heard something about the responsibility and obligation as a Christian to bear fruit?
SPEAKER_02: All right, so we're covering the majority of the room here.
SPEAKER_02: Um I remember being in a theology class, I'm not sure, I don't remember which one, but I remember studying Lewis Schaefer and theology.
SPEAKER_02: And if you're not familiar with Lewis Schaefer, just great writings, and he's got this list, um, pretty, pretty famous list of 33 works that when God saves you, when God, as Neil was talking about earlier, reveals himself to you and he saves you, it's a list of 33 things that happen within you that are part of the salvation process.
SPEAKER_02: And all those things are inside, but when when Jesus begins to talk about fruit, he begins to talk about the things that happen on the outside.
SPEAKER_02: And so your question might be what Wade, what is what does that have to do with rest?
SPEAKER_02: The fruit that Jesus is describing to his disciples as he's teaching them here in John 15, and to us as we sit here this morning, this fruit is the visible evidence of an inner working power.
SPEAKER_02: It's the visible evidence of an inner working power, Christ within us, compelling us to submit and respond to the prompting of his Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: If you have a relationship with Christ, you are called, we are called and compelled to be continually growing, continually producing fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Continually producing fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Notice that I didn't say continually performing fruit, but continually producing fruit.
SPEAKER_02: Because fruit is the visible evidence of an inner working power.
SPEAKER_02: It is not which performing is, is the result of your best effort.
SPEAKER_02: The fruit that Jesus describes is not the result of our best effort.
SPEAKER_02: And here's why I know this is it says here in verse 4 that a branch cannot bear fruit by itself.
SPEAKER_02: Then it says in verse 6 that apart from Christ, we can do nothing.
SPEAKER_02: Our best efforts, church, will not produce fruit.
SPEAKER_02: And the reason they won't produce fruit is because they are fertilized by unrest and they bear fruits of fear.
SPEAKER_02: And here's what I mean by that.
SPEAKER_02: Our best efforts bear fear because they are rooted in fear.
SPEAKER_02: And you might be thinking, I don't I don't struggle with fear, and I bless Samantha for standing up here and talking about it.
SPEAKER_02: Let's talk about the fears that our best efforts are rooted in.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of being conceived as incompetent.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of not having enough money in the bank.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of not measuring up.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of not being the best at your job.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of screwing up as a parent.
SPEAKER_02: Fear of not being loved.
SPEAKER_02: And so when we embrace that, we begin to see that rest isn't simply adhering to the fourth commandment, which is to not work on the Sabbath, which we'll talk about here in a little bit, but it's resting when God is at work in our lives.
SPEAKER_02: Which sounds awkward, right?
SPEAKER_02: That we would rest while God is working.
SPEAKER_02: But look back at verse 2.
SPEAKER_02: It says, Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, he takes away.
SPEAKER_02: And every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes, so that it may bear more fruit.
SPEAKER_02: And so when a branch isn't bearing fruit, when a believer isn't bearing fruit, Christ says, This is when the pruning needs to happen.
SPEAKER_02: So then the branch could bear more fruit.
SPEAKER_02: And here's where it gets crazy, church.
SPEAKER_02: Can you hang with me?
SPEAKER_02: Here's where it gets crazy.
SPEAKER_02: We need to let it happen, and we need to be excited about it happening.
SPEAKER_02: We need to let the pruning happen.
SPEAKER_02: We need to be exciting about the pruning happen, and we're called to rest while it happens.
SPEAKER_02: How do you do that?
SPEAKER_02: How do you rest when God begins to remove things from your life?
SPEAKER_02: When he's pruning back your default posture of fear and unrest, your inclination to fill your life with busyness, your inclination to fill your life with distraction.
SPEAKER_02: When God begins to remove that, so then you can begin to bear fruit of peace.
SPEAKER_02: Here's where you start is you remember who he is and who you're not.
SPEAKER_02: You remember who he is and who you're not.
SPEAKER_02: You did not create you.
SPEAKER_02: You didn't breathe air into your own lungs.
SPEAKER_02: You didn't know yourself from the very foundations of the earth.
SPEAKER_02: You didn't provide the sacrifice that makes salvation possible.
SPEAKER_02: But he did.
SPEAKER_02: He did.
SPEAKER_02: And so those fears that I mentioned earlier that our best efforts are rooted in, that just bear fruits of fear, right?
SPEAKER_02: This idea of resting in the midst of God's pruning, here's what happens is all of our security, it just goes against everything that we have convinced ourselves, or we've been taught by our parents, or we've embraced from the culture around us, is natural.
SPEAKER_02: And what God does is he begins to open the doors and turn on the lights of every room and every closet in our house and expose the things that we're not comfortable with.
SPEAKER_02: Things that we have no idea to begin how to deal with.
SPEAKER_02: And then God just invites himself in and he tells us to sit down while he gets to work, and he moves us from a posture of unrest to rest.
SPEAKER_02: But here's our issue, and here's our obstacle is we're like some of you that pay someone to come and clean your house on occasion.
SPEAKER_02: You are literally paying someone to come in and clean your house.
SPEAKER_02: But here's what you do.
SPEAKER_02: I know some of you.
SPEAKER_02: You clean before they come clean your house.
SPEAKER_02: You are literally paying people money to come clean your house that you started cleaning beforehand.
SPEAKER_02: And you lie to yourself, clones.
SPEAKER_02: You say things like, Well, if I start cleaning now, it'll be easier for a deep clean for them.
SPEAKER_02: Liars.
SPEAKER_02: You're afraid that the person that you're handing money to to come clean your house is going to think that you need someone to come clean your house.
SPEAKER_02: But this is what we do with God.
SPEAKER_02: And we say, Well, God, you can begin to do that business in me, and you can begin to move me from unrest to rest once I get these things sorted.
SPEAKER_02: It's crazy talk.
SPEAKER_02: Because Jesus says, God tells us, Scripture says that God is the vine dresser.
SPEAKER_02: He's cultivating.
SPEAKER_02: And it requires pruning.
SPEAKER_02: But we don't want to trust him because we're like little kids.
SPEAKER_02: How many parents are in here?
SPEAKER_02: How many of you remember?
SPEAKER_02: Keep your hands up if you remember this.
SPEAKER_02: How many of us remember if you have kids that are old enough that uh that when they decide to wean themselves off naps?
SPEAKER_02: Right?
SPEAKER_02: And you know they still needed a nap.
SPEAKER_02: And you know that you needed for them to still have a nap.
SPEAKER_02: But they were convinced they didn't need a nap anymore.
SPEAKER_02: We have pictures of my youngest just passed out cold on the kitchen floor after wearing themselves out from fighting a nap.
SPEAKER_02: But here's what I believe, church, is that God has memories of us passed out cold on the kitchen floor after fighting against just needing to rest.
SPEAKER_02: And to rest in him and to trust in him and to trust in his pruning.
SPEAKER_02: Can I give you some insight into the extent of my insufficiency?
SPEAKER_02: I know it'll just be between us.
SPEAKER_02: It's not like this is being live streamed on the internet or anything.
SPEAKER_02: The rooms and the closets inside of my house, uh, they're full of dusty boxes, full of fear and full of anxiety.
SPEAKER_02: My flesh, my flesh is married to competency.
SPEAKER_02: I am so afraid of not being competent that I am I am more times than I would like to admit crippled by fear.
SPEAKER_02: Uh so much so, here's how twisted it gets, is so much so, as I am, as I'm standing here disclosing my shortcomings to you, I have this fear in me that you might perceive me as unfit to be preaching the gospel.
SPEAKER_02: Because fear and anxiety and depression are such a tangible sh struggle for me.
SPEAKER_02: And I struggle with the fear that for the men in this room that I will lose respect from them for admitting the fear that I struggle with, for admitting that just a few weeks ago, when I was on a business trip out of state and I couldn't get a hold of my wife for a few hours in the morning, I started checking our bank statements and started calling hospitals because I was convinced that something horrible had happened to her and my family.
SPEAKER_02: That for over 20 years I couldn't sit in a public place with my back to the door because I had convinced myself, and my fear had convinced myself, that the sins of my past were finally going to track me down.
SPEAKER_02: And so then, I know I'm alone in this, the only one who overcompensates.
SPEAKER_02: So then, what I want to do after I've made myself vulnerable and I've talked about this fear and this anxiety and this depression that knocks at my door, is then my instinct is to find a way to work into my sermon to earn back your respect, that I can field dress a deer in record time, right?
SPEAKER_02: I can change my own oil, that all the multitude of guns I have, I can disassemble and reassemble them.
SPEAKER_02: And I can all shoot, I can shoot them all with like Chris Kyle like perception and accuracy.
SPEAKER_02: To experience these fruits, church, this fruit of rest, we have to let the pruning happen.
SPEAKER_02: J.R.
SPEAKER_02: Vassar, great pastor, great writer, he says this resting in God is an opportunity to resist achieving in order to enjoy being.
SPEAKER_02: That's so good, and it's not even mine, so I'll say it again.
SPEAKER_02: Resisting in God, I'm sorry, resting in God is an opportunity to resist achieving in order to enjoy being.
SPEAKER_02: Here's a question for your community groups tonight.
SPEAKER_02: And it's this what are some productive ways to move from unrest to rest?
SPEAKER_02: Said another way is how do we get from achieving to being?
SPEAKER_02: The second word from the text this morning that we see is abide.
SPEAKER_02: Abide.
SPEAKER_02: What does abide with Christ mean?
SPEAKER_02: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_02: You know, there's uh several, if you go, different commentaries and Bible scholars that are way smarter than I could ever hope to be.
SPEAKER_02: They have all these different definitions for abide, but I have to admit, my favorite one is faithful persistence.
SPEAKER_02: Faithful persistence.
SPEAKER_02: So if you would humor me, and I want to read back through verses four through ten.
SPEAKER_02: And every time that Jesus says abide, I replace it with faithful persistence.
SPEAKER_02: Have faithful persistence with me, and I in you.
SPEAKER_02: As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it has faithful persistence with the vine, neither can you, unless you have faithful persistence with me.
SPEAKER_02: I am the vine, and you are the branches.
SPEAKER_02: Whoever has faithful persistence with me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.
SPEAKER_02: If any one does not have faithful persistence with me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers, and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.
SPEAKER_02: If you have faithful persistence with me, and my words have faithful persistence with you, ask whatever you wish, and it will Be done for you.
SPEAKER_02: By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples.
SPEAKER_02: As for the Father has loved me, so I have loved you.
SPEAKER_02: Have faithful persistence with my love.
SPEAKER_02: If you keep my commandments, you have faithful persistence with my love, just as I have kept my father's commandments and have faithful persistence in his love.
SPEAKER_02: You see what happens when we understand what it truly means to abide?
SPEAKER_02: If abiding is the key to rest, and abiding is faithful persistence, what we're being told is abiding is an active posture.
SPEAKER_02: It's an active posture.
SPEAKER_02: It's the reason, you don't have to turn here, I'll just read them to you.
SPEAKER_02: It's the reason that we find multitudes of scriptures like Matthew 7, 7 through 8, that says this: Ask and you will be given to you.
SPEAKER_02: Seek and you will find.
SPEAKER_02: Knock and it will be open for you.
SPEAKER_02: For everyone who asks, and the one who seeks finds.
SPEAKER_02: And to the one who knocks, it will be opened.
SPEAKER_02: This active posture, or Jeremiah 29, 12 to 13, that says this, then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you, and you will seek, and you will find me, and when you seek me with all your heart.
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse 7 again.
SPEAKER_02: He says, If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you.
SPEAKER_02: If you have faithful persistence with me, and my words have faithful persistence with you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you.
SPEAKER_02: So what does this mean?
SPEAKER_02: What does this mean, church?
SPEAKER_02: It means that we have to grow up.
SPEAKER_02: And we have to grow up and grow in the discipline of spending time with God and his word.
SPEAKER_02: We have to ask God to give us the discipline to faithfully and persistently commit ourselves to abide in his presence.
SPEAKER_02: Spending time in his word, spending time with him.
SPEAKER_02: And you might be thinking, Wade, you just got done telling us and going this whole diatribe that isn't based on our effort.
SPEAKER_02: But think about I was reminded of what my friend Neil says all the time.
SPEAKER_02: He says it's music, it's not math.
SPEAKER_02: When you're faithfully persistent to seek God in his word, you're not cramming for a calculus midterm.
SPEAKER_02: You've cut out of work early, you dropped the kids off at your mom's house, you found a back road, windows are down, and Merle Haggard is singing Mama Tride on the radio.
SPEAKER_02: If you have no frame of reference for this, if you have no frame of reference for the fact that spending time and being persistently faithful and chasing after God, that that is music and not math, and let me love you enough this morning, whether I know you or not, to say, if you don't have a frame of reference for this and you're like, I can't see it as music, then it is time to ask God to prune some things from your life.
SPEAKER_02: It is time to ask God and to be honest with God and say, I've got some distractions, I've got some fears, I've got this, and I've got this, and God, and none of it looks like you, and I'm ready for my life to look more like you.
SPEAKER_02: And so I need you to begin to prune these things from my life.
SPEAKER_02: And the biggest obstacle, the biggest obstacle that keeps us from faithfully persisting and resting in God's sufficiency is the distractions.
SPEAKER_02: The distractions that we've systematically implemented into our lives, and we've labeled them as downtime or our rest.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm a true blue generation Xer, and so I'll tell you from experience that the internet and Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and yes shocker news sites, both left and right, and true news and fake news, they will kill, kill your ability to rest.
SPEAKER_02: Because you get so wrapped up in trying to impress people that you don't even like in real life.
SPEAKER_02: It's time to kill the account.
SPEAKER_02: Or you get so wrapped up in trying to convince people that your way of thinking is right, that you spend all this time and energy posting either passive aggressive or for some of you, aggressive-aggressive comments trying to win them over.
SPEAKER_02: Or you are so restlessly committed to being this World Wide Web crusader that you are so far from abiding with Christ that if you were going to be honest this morning, you're overwhelmed sometimes with feelings of paranoia and unrest because you have gotten so wrapped up and so angry and so invested in things of zero consequence.
SPEAKER_02: And real world distractions, they are just the same vice for others of us.
SPEAKER_02: And don't hear what I'm not saying that there's something wrong with hobbies and and these things.
SPEAKER_02: There's nothing wrong with going to the gym, there's nothing wrong with hanging out with your friends, there's nothing wrong with shuttling your kids back and forth to their 14 extracurricular activities.
SPEAKER_02: But but ask yourselves this.
SPEAKER_02: If I had time for one thing today, if I had free time for one downtime, would I faithfully persist in pursuing the Lord?
SPEAKER_02: Or would I hit the gym?
SPEAKER_02: Would I swing by the pub?
SPEAKER_02: Would I pick up my phone?
SPEAKER_02: Or would I faithfully persist in grounding myself and abiding with God?
SPEAKER_02: Christ is telling us this posture of faithful persistence is where we'll find rest.
SPEAKER_02: So it brings us to the last word in the text.
SPEAKER_02: Are you with me for one more?
SPEAKER_02: And that's commandment.
SPEAKER_02: Look back at verse 10.
SPEAKER_02: He says, If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my father's commandments and abide in his love.
SPEAKER_02: Jesus is telling us this key to abiding, this key to faithful persistence, to bearing fruit, to finding rest, is obeying and keeping his commandments.
SPEAKER_02: And this is where I really believe that we are losing our foothold as Christians in living out the gospel to a world who is in dire need of seeing truth lived out by followers of Christ.
SPEAKER_02: And here's why I believe that is because our culture is in this mad dash to the middle.
SPEAKER_02: It's in this mad dash to embrace the subjective and reject the objective.
SPEAKER_02: Because objective truth is offensive.
SPEAKER_02: Objective truth is offensive.
SPEAKER_02: And I don't have time nor the materials to build a soapbox up here to stand on, but here's the deal: God is offensive.
SPEAKER_02: God's incredibly offensive, and that bothers some of you, but let me explain to you how much I don't care.
SPEAKER_02: I'm showing I don't work here anymore.
SPEAKER_02: Here's the reason that God is offensive is He's unyielding.
SPEAKER_02: God is unyielding.
SPEAKER_02: He uses words like commandment.
SPEAKER_02: Commandment, by definition, is a rule that must be obeyed.
SPEAKER_02: Commandment isn't a suggestion, it's not a reminder.
SPEAKER_02: It's not the IKEA instructions that you throw out because they have no words and you can figure it out on your own.
SPEAKER_02: It is a rule that must be followed.
SPEAKER_02: Thou shalt not kill is a commandment.
SPEAKER_02: Honor your father and mother is a commandment.
SPEAKER_02: You should have one God is a commandment.
SPEAKER_02: You know what else is a commandment?
SPEAKER_02: Sabbath.
SPEAKER_02: God commands us, and by definition, remember, a command is a rule that must be obeyed.
SPEAKER_02: God commands us to Sabbath.
SPEAKER_02: He commands us to rest.
SPEAKER_02: God commands you to rest.
SPEAKER_02: God takes rest so seriously, He makes it a command.
SPEAKER_02: And then Jesus, God with flesh on, says right here, keep my commandments, just as I, Jesus, God incarnate, have kept them.
SPEAKER_02: So how do we do this?
SPEAKER_02: What's the takeaway?
SPEAKER_02: What's the application?
SPEAKER_02: I've been all over the place and all fired up and excited to be back here with you guys.
SPEAKER_02: But what what's an application for implementing rest?
SPEAKER_02: Instead of trying to cook up my own, there's been a book that I found myself going back to time and time again over the last 18 months.
SPEAKER_02: And it's a book called Keeping the Sabbath Holy.
SPEAKER_02: And it's W-H-O-L-L-Y, Fully Keeping the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_02: And Marva Dawn has just done an incredible job with this book.
SPEAKER_02: And she has four things that are going to come up on the screen that we're going to give you time to write down.
SPEAKER_02: But these are four things as we create this posture of rest and Sabbath rest in our lives, whether it be today, on the Sabbath day, or whether it's Wednesday, or whether it's Thursday, when you're ready to choke everybody you know until they pass out, and you are in need of Sabbath rest in your lives.
SPEAKER_02: What does that look like?
SPEAKER_02: The first thing is ceasing.
SPEAKER_02: Ceasing.
SPEAKER_02: Not only from work, but from productivity.
SPEAKER_02: Ceasing in productivity and just resting.
SPEAKER_02: Ceasing from anxiety.
SPEAKER_02: And hey, look at me.
SPEAKER_02: I get that that is not as easy as it sounds.
SPEAKER_02: But ceasing from anxiety.
SPEAKER_02: Ceasing from worry, from possessiveness, and so on.
SPEAKER_02: The next one is resting.
SPEAKER_02: Resting of the body as well as the mind.
SPEAKER_02: And you know what that looks like for you.
SPEAKER_02: You know what keeps you from resting.
SPEAKER_02: And maybe you run to that because you're afraid of what happens when you really rest.
SPEAKER_02: And I believe that that's true for many of us in here.
SPEAKER_02: Resting of your spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And when it's your mind and your emotions and your spirit and your body, what happens is it's holistic, full, full rest.
SPEAKER_02: So laying in bed, still getting the dopamine rush from the bright screen on your phone probably is not holistic rest.
SPEAKER_02: And maybe that isn't it for you.
SPEAKER_02: And maybe it's eating up books like crazy.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's just resting for a minute and not living in that world, but living in this world as God is speaking rest into you.
SPEAKER_02: Embracing.
SPEAKER_02: Deliberately taking hold of Christian values, of our calling in life, of the wholeness God offers us.
SPEAKER_02: And lastly is feasting.
SPEAKER_02: And this is where we'll close, and this is where we're gonna we're gonna end a little bit early intentionally, so you have the opportunity to see what this feasting looks like.
SPEAKER_02: It's not heinous gluttony at Chili's, but it's celebrating God and his goodness.
SPEAKER_02: Celebrating God and his goodness in individual and corporate worship as we've done this morning.
SPEAKER_02: And here's where I think we miss it, or maybe this is just my own issue, is feasting with beauty, music, food, affection, and social interaction.
SPEAKER_02: The reason that a lot of us and a lot of you cannot find rest is we have not embraced what God designed.
SPEAKER_02: He says, do not forsake the gathering together of saints.
SPEAKER_02: This is not news to my community group that I co-lead.
SPEAKER_02: I don't like community group.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not on staff.
SPEAKER_02: Community group is painful for me.
SPEAKER_02: It's painful.
SPEAKER_02: Because I have to open up and I have to talk.
SPEAKER_02: I don't like talking.
SPEAKER_02: This is I'm used up all the words for the week now.
SPEAKER_02: My wife is, she's not gonna know what to do.
SPEAKER_02: I don't have any more words for the rest of the week.
SPEAKER_02: But when we lean in and we begin to do that, what happens is we begin to see what rest looks like when there's other people to shoulder the burden.
SPEAKER_02: And it's scary because once you're open once, if it's if it's a good community, then they're gonna ask you about it because they've been praying for you.
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna be like my friend Blake, who texts me throughout the week, and I'm like, dude, I talked to you about that once.
SPEAKER_02: Let's wait two more weeks till the next community group.
SPEAKER_02: But that is that that's what God intends, and it's a great avenue for rest.
SPEAKER_02: So I'm gonna invite um Clyde to come up here, and Clyde's gonna play, and I think he's gonna sing.
SPEAKER_02: Um and so if you're a visitor with us here this morning, um, this is what invitation looks like.
SPEAKER_02: Is like I said, Clyde's gonna play and he's gonna sing.
SPEAKER_02: And we just have some time just to think.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe if you had grabbed one of those worship folders on the way in, jot this stuff down.
SPEAKER_02: Um maybe God had something for you in worship.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it wasn't even uh in this part of the service, but we're gonna provide some room for you to sit, to pray, and to respond.
SPEAKER_02: Hey, uh, in just a minute, I'm gonna give you a few instructions.
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna speak a blessing over you, and we'll be done.
SPEAKER_02: Um, but let me tell you what I'm guilty of.
SPEAKER_02: Um, so much so that I went and spent some time with uh some some friends um down at Galveston after they lost a family member, and a couple of folks said, You still go to church here?
SPEAKER_02: I was like, Yeah, I do.
SPEAKER_02: But I sit over here and I sneak in that door and I sneak out that door.
SPEAKER_02: Um and I teach every other week, five-year-olds, and I go to community group and I just check off the boxes and I miss out on the feasting.
SPEAKER_02: So I'm not asking you to go and confess your sins one to another here in the sanctuary.
SPEAKER_02: I'm asking you to go and embrace and hugs with folks, but I would think it'd be interesting if we took this little few minutes of extra time that we don't normally have during this service and meet some folks this morning, or maybe make some plans for lunch and maybe find out what it looks like to walk together, to separate ourselves from unrest and embrace what rest really looks like.
SPEAKER_02: Sound fair?
SPEAKER_02: Do me a favor and stand to your feet.
SPEAKER_02: If you're a guest with us this morning, hopefully you've had a chance to fill out that tear-off portion in your uh worship folder.
SPEAKER_02: As you exit today, if you could drop that off in any of these tall brown boxes by the door, we'd love, I know the church would love to follow up with you about that.
SPEAKER_02: Um, for all the rest of the family here, if today is your day to worship through giving, that's where you would do those.
SPEAKER_02: That's where you would do that, rather, is in those boxes.
SPEAKER_02: And um, if you need someone to pray with you, um, if you're ready to out yourself, if someone's been coming to the church for a few weeks, I know there's some pastors and elders that would be up front.
SPEAKER_02: Love to shake your hand.
SPEAKER_02: Not in the awkward Donald Trump shake where they pull you in.
SPEAKER_02: Um, but just hey, just get to know you a little bit too much, too soon.
SPEAKER_02: Um, hey, do me a favor and put your hands out like this.
SPEAKER_02: Let me speak a blessing over you.
SPEAKER_02: God has built you for a rhythm.
SPEAKER_02: A rhythm of work hard and to rest well.
SPEAKER_02: Leave this place and rest well so you can enjoy and embrace the blessings of working hard.
SPEAKER_02: In the name of the Father and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: Amen, you're dismissed.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening to our sermon podcast at Grand Parkway Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_01: Here are a few things happening in the life of our church.
SPEAKER_01: Our women's retreat registration has begun.
SPEAKER_01: It's gonna be a great time to be with other women and to worship together at Honeywoods and Camp from March 31st to April 1st.
SPEAKER_01: There is an option to go up and take early if you would like.
SPEAKER_01: Head to our church website to register.
SPEAKER_01: While you're on the website, ladies, sign up for the free pancakes and pajamas event next Sunday as well.
SPEAKER_01: Our new Bible studies have just begun.
SPEAKER_01: So the next time you're with us, we would love to have you check one of those out at 10 a.m.
SPEAKER_01: on Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: Finally, our 2017 mission trips have been scheduled, and our first one leaves this week to Costa Rica.
SPEAKER_01: Please take some time to pray for the men on this trip and to consider going on a trip yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks again for listening, and we look forward to next week.