SPEAKER_01: This podcast is a ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_01: For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_00: Spring together.
SPEAKER_00: Lord Jesus, because life begins with you, we come to you to have life.
SPEAKER_00: It's the same reason that Jesus, you described yourself and said, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
SPEAKER_00: No one comes to the Father except through me.
SPEAKER_00: And so for people who were born dead in our trespasses and sins, the opportunity and the experience of life, the offer of life, is a delicious invitation today.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're not coming for religion today.
SPEAKER_00: We're coming for relationship.
SPEAKER_00: There was plenty of religion before Jesus crashed into the cosmos.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're not here for that today.
SPEAKER_00: We're here to understand not just relationship, but the kind of intimate belonging that we were created for.
SPEAKER_00: It's the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Breathe life where there's death and bring truth where there's falsehood.
SPEAKER_00: Expose every lie that we've chosen to believe and set us free by the truth.
SPEAKER_00: We ask for this in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_00: And we ask for it as your sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: And all God's people said, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: You can have a seat.
SPEAKER_00: If you've got a Bible, I invite you to take it open up to Ephesians chapter 2.
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians chapter 2.
SPEAKER_00: And if you don't have a Bible, there's one in your row.
SPEAKER_00: I'm on page 976.
SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about our second core value.
SPEAKER_00: We're doing a four-part series on our core values as a church.
SPEAKER_00: Last week, we our four core values are gospel, community, mission, and blessing.
SPEAKER_00: We believe that the gospel, the good news of Christianity, produces this community, this thing called community, which I'm going to talk about today.
SPEAKER_00: And part of this community is that we are on this shared mission.
SPEAKER_00: And central to that mission is to be a blessing.
SPEAKER_00: Let me demonstrate what all four of those.
SPEAKER_00: And one experience I had this week, I was having lunch at Chewie's with some friends, with a couple in our church, and just checking in on them, how you doing?
SPEAKER_00: I know you got a lot going on, blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_00: And our waitress, every time she came to the table, she would kind of look at me, kind of, kind of funny.
SPEAKER_00: And I was not in a weird way, not in an inappropriate way, but kind of, and finally she brought her check and she said, Hey, I know who you are.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Who am I?
SPEAKER_00: She goes, I don't know your name, but every time you come in here, you make us feel better.
SPEAKER_00: And then I was like, uh, because what I'd said, I know she had great fingernails, and I said, Hey, how much does it cost to get your fingernails done?
SPEAKER_00: And she said,$25,$30.
SPEAKER_00: I said, I'm gonna tip you enough to get your nails done, and you tell your man you're looking good.
SPEAKER_00: And she said, You mean my woman?
SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, oh yeah.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Oh, oh, okay, so we're hitting from that side of the plate.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, all right.
SPEAKER_00: Well, you tell your woman, and the couple looked at me and I said, Hey, I'm still gonna bless her.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna go, I'm not gonna withhold the blessing because she lives a lifestyle that I think is sinful.
SPEAKER_00: Uh but here's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_00: We talk about the gospel, the good news.
SPEAKER_00: The gospel shines brightest in that context.
SPEAKER_00: Because when I walked out, and her and some other waiters and waitresses were looking at me kind of like, and I said, What's the deal?
SPEAKER_00: And one of them was like, hey, sit my section next time.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, oh, oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing: it's not about the 25 bucks that I tipped her, okay?
SPEAKER_00: It's about more than that.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's the thing.
SPEAKER_00: I define community like this.
SPEAKER_00: Community is simply two words, intimate belonging.
SPEAKER_00: And if anything, I'll because I walked away and I was like, Holy Spirit, what was that about?
SPEAKER_00: And he goes, You just remind me, it's not about you.
SPEAKER_00: Don't get the big head.
SPEAKER_00: Or don't get a bigger head.
SPEAKER_00: My head is ginormous.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, it's like an orange on a stick.
SPEAKER_00: Heed.
SPEAKER_00: Anybody?
SPEAKER_00: Remember that movie?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody?
SPEAKER_00: It's got its own solar system.
SPEAKER_00: Never mind.
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, uh, here's the thing: you and I should remind people of what they were created for, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And by the way you treat them.
SPEAKER_00: Uh and so when I talk about community today, I want to talk about it.
SPEAKER_00: And this is not a push for community groups.
SPEAKER_00: This is not anything like that.
SPEAKER_00: This is just a, hey, we were created for intimate belonging.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you another picture of intimate belonging.
SPEAKER_00: My father-in-law goes to, he's a part of a church in Pensacola where my wife is from.
SPEAKER_00: First Baptist Church of Pensacola, downtown church.
SPEAKER_00: There, he said this when he was here for Thanksgiving, and I about passed out because we're so transitory.
SPEAKER_00: We're so, hey, you know what, you know, I don't like this, or no one spoke to me, or blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to another church.
SPEAKER_00: In that church, there are 138 people who've been members of that church for 50 years or longer.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Yeah, we got him the year before Martha died, that's my mother-in-law.
SPEAKER_00: Before she died, we got invited in, you know, we got accepted into the 50 club.
SPEAKER_00: I said, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: He goes, There's 138 of us who've been members of this church for 50 years or more.
SPEAKER_00: And I was kind of like, Have you been to the funeral of an old person these days?
SPEAKER_00: Somebody that's like 70, 80 years old.
SPEAKER_00: Because most people outlived their friendships.
SPEAKER_00: At my mother-in-law's funeral, it was stand-in room only.
SPEAKER_00: It was just full of gray hair.
SPEAKER_00: And two couples in our church bought plane tickets and flew to Florida to be there.
SPEAKER_00: And when we got there, we were like, What are y'all doing here?
SPEAKER_00: And they were like, You're our friends.
SPEAKER_00: What do you mean, what are we doing here?
SPEAKER_00: Shut up.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, that's not friendship.
SPEAKER_00: That's community.
SPEAKER_00: That's this intimate belonging.
SPEAKER_00: At the worst moments of your life, these are the people that show up.
SPEAKER_00: And at the best moments of your life, these are the people that show up.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm saying this to everyone of you in this room.
SPEAKER_00: I don't care if this is the first time you walked into this church.
SPEAKER_00: I don't care if you're an atheist, an agnostic, I don't think I don't care if this is the first time you've ever been in church.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to tell you unapologetically, you were created by God to experience this intimate belonging we call community.
SPEAKER_00: The Bible talks about it like this in Ephesians chapter 2, verse 11.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision by what is called uh the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands.
SPEAKER_00: Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
SPEAKER_00: But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.
SPEAKER_00: And he came and he preached peace to you who are far off, and peace to those who were near.
SPEAKER_00: For through him we have both access in one spirit to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and the members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I want to talk about our core value of community, and I want to get at that by first of all giving you some introductory thoughts.
SPEAKER_00: There's three, I want to distinguish between three things.
SPEAKER_00: And the three things I want to distinguish between are similarity, affinity, and then community.
SPEAKER_00: Because they get confused all the time.
SPEAKER_00: So let me give you, it'll come up on the screen.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to write all this down.
SPEAKER_00: You can just get out your phone, keep your phone on, silent, please, and just take pictures.
SPEAKER_00: Snap.
SPEAKER_00: I want to think about that.
SPEAKER_00: Snap, oh no, snap on that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to think about that.
SPEAKER_00: Uh but just kind of take it in because I'm going to say some things today, not to be offensive, but to be truthful, because here's the reality: we are a nation of Cains.
SPEAKER_00: Cain is the guy in the Bible that killed his brother Abel.
SPEAKER_00: And the consequence for killing his brother is that God said, You will be a restless wanderer on the day on the earth the rest of your days.
SPEAKER_00: And in this room right now are some what I call restless wanderers, some people that just can't.
SPEAKER_00: You say, I don't fit in.
SPEAKER_00: It's not that it's that you don't know how to fit in because you've never been fully honest with anybody and just laid your cards down.
SPEAKER_00: You've never been like Wyatt Earp at the end of tombstone when he finds Josie and he walks in and she's in her dressing room and she sees him in the mirror.
SPEAKER_00: She turns around and he's like, I've got nothing.
SPEAKER_00: I'm flat broke, I don't even know what I'm gonna do.
SPEAKER_00: And she turns around and embraces him.
SPEAKER_00: You've never demonstrated that kind of vulnerability.
SPEAKER_00: And so you're like a nation of Cain.
SPEAKER_00: Or Cain's or if you're like, I don't get who Cain is.
SPEAKER_00: Let me give you another visual.
SPEAKER_00: You're like a bumper car.
SPEAKER_00: You just bump off of other people.
SPEAKER_00: You run into them and bump off of them.
SPEAKER_00: When God created you to be like a water balloon.
SPEAKER_00: You ever been hit with a water balloon?
SPEAKER_00: You realize you can't get the water back in the balloon?
SPEAKER_00: You ought to have intimate relationships that are so intimate that you can't get that person off of you.
SPEAKER_00: That they say things to you that, like four days later, you call them up, don't text them like a little seventh-grade girl.
SPEAKER_00: You call them up and say, you know what?
SPEAKER_00: I'm still frustrated at you for saying that because it's really made me think about my life.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
SPEAKER_00: And they say, Well, you don't sound very thankful.
SPEAKER_00: Well, I am thankful.
SPEAKER_00: I'm just mad at you because I got to change now.
SPEAKER_00: It's so much easier to stay out there just kind of frolicking on the outskirts like Cain, this restless wanderer.
SPEAKER_00: So let me distinguish between these three.
SPEAKER_00: Similarity, we are alike.
SPEAKER_00: Affinity, we like each other in the same things.
SPEAKER_00: Community, we like what God does when we are together.
SPEAKER_00: Ask, I'll just give you a couple questions.
SPEAKER_00: They're not on the screen, but you can jot them down if you want.
SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself, who is it that you can say that about?
SPEAKER_00: That you say, hey, I like what happens when we're together.
SPEAKER_00: I really enjoy what happens when we get together.
SPEAKER_00: A few things from the passage, four things.
SPEAKER_00: First of all, Jesus is necessary to gospel community.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus is necessary to gospel community.
SPEAKER_00: Notice how the passage starts off?
SPEAKER_00: Two groups of people, Jews and Gentiles.
SPEAKER_00: When he says that, you know, you Gentiles in the flesh called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, he's talking about now.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes the Bible says things in an irregular way.
SPEAKER_00: And if you're new to all this, you're kind of like, eh, I'm just stupid.
SPEAKER_00: I don't get into that.
SPEAKER_00: No, you're not.
SPEAKER_00: Because what one thing the devil wants to do today is just to kind of whisper into your head, into your heart, see, you don't understand any of this.
SPEAKER_00: This isn't for you.
SPEAKER_00: Let's just go back to being a restless wanderer.
SPEAKER_00: That's not the voice of God, okay?
SPEAKER_00: When he talks about the uncircumcision, he's talking about Gentiles, people that were not close to God.
SPEAKER_00: He talks about the circumcision, he's talking about Jews.
SPEAKER_00: Very religious people, but hey, look at me.
SPEAKER_00: Very religious people that were just, they were near, but they were just as far away from God as the Gentiles.
SPEAKER_00: Look, because you can be near God and not be in Christ.
SPEAKER_00: You realize that, right?
SPEAKER_00: You can be near God.
SPEAKER_00: You can come to church every Sunday, and on the outside, everyone kind of looks and goes, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: But on the inside, you know, hey, this isn't real for me.
SPEAKER_00: And so here's what you have these Jews and these Gentiles, these two groups of people who disagree over circumcision, and here's what they were like.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what they fought about, and they were both sides, uh both sides of their silly argument.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what it came down to.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the five things that they fought about.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what was true of both of them, but they used, and he talks about the hostility in later on in this passage.
SPEAKER_00: The hostility wasn't the law.
SPEAKER_00: The hostility was what the Jews used, what the Old Testament said to beat up on the Gentiles, the unspiritual people, the poor white trash that lived in the trailer.
SPEAKER_00: That was me as a kid, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I was the one that drove by First Baptist Church in my town and felt dirty and would duck down because I wasn't in church.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason I wasn't in church is because I didn't have a church close.
SPEAKER_00: Which somebody stopped me this morning and said, Is that a new shirt?
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: I went to tractor supply yesterday, and this was on sale.
SPEAKER_00: And the guy said to me at Tractor Supply.
SPEAKER_00: He goes, Are you a farmer?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Kinda.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, Uh, what do you do?
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I pastor a church.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I saw this and I thought the Lord said, You fashionista, you need to rock that thing.
SPEAKER_00: And he said, You're gonna wear this while you preach?
SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_00: And look at me, God doesn't care.
SPEAKER_00: God likes men that wear a pearl snap wrangler to work, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'll be going to work tomorrow.
SPEAKER_00: And he's kind of like, I never heard of a church like that.
SPEAKER_00: I said, That's better than that.
SPEAKER_00: You've never heard about a God like that.
SPEAKER_00: Don't settle for making a commercial for your church.
SPEAKER_00: The guy behind me was kind of like, that's different.
SPEAKER_00: So, hey, never say to yourself, I don't look the part.
SPEAKER_00: You show up any however you want.
SPEAKER_00: Just show up dressed.
SPEAKER_00: That's all I care.
SPEAKER_00: You ain't gotta be dressed up.
SPEAKER_00: I know some of you, because somebody sent me an email one time and said, Pastor, why don't you wear socks?
SPEAKER_00: Because I don't like to wear socks.
SPEAKER_00: Because I had a stepmom that used to always tell me, put your socks on.
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Alright, if I got to, I'm a grown man now.
SPEAKER_00: I ain't gonna wear no socks.
SPEAKER_00: God doesn't care.
SPEAKER_00: Now all y'all trying to see if I'm wearing socks.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the JC Penny pose.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, here's why.
SPEAKER_00: Man looks upon the outside, God looks upon your heart.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, dress up if you want.
SPEAKER_00: I got friends that come dress to the nines all the time.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, dude, what were you like?
SPEAKER_00: A pimp in a former life?
SPEAKER_00: Where'd you get these clothes?
SPEAKER_00: Then I got people that show up in shorts and a t-shirt when the weather's above 50 degrees.
SPEAKER_00: Great, wonderful.
SPEAKER_00: These people were kind of looking at each other, and the Jews, the people that were close to God, they were religious, but they didn't know God.
SPEAKER_00: They were beating these other people up with the law, and this is what caused the hostility.
SPEAKER_00: Because these Gentiles, the people that were way off, like me when I grew up, they were like, You religious people, we can't stand you.
SPEAKER_00: All you do is make up rules to make me feel dirty on the inside.
SPEAKER_00: If this is what being Christian's like, and going to heaven is like, I'd rather go to hell.
SPEAKER_00: Which I said to somebody when I was 12.
SPEAKER_00: Our landlord, who showed up every month on the first of the month to get that money.
SPEAKER_00: And I would say, Can you fix this rotten floor?
SPEAKER_00: Oh no, you know, when y'all move out, I'll get it fixed.
SPEAKER_00: You want to come to church?
SPEAKER_00: People like you go to heaven, I'd rather go to hell.
SPEAKER_00: And my mom slapped me when he left.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Well, she goes, You gotta show respect.
SPEAKER_00: That man?
SPEAKER_00: We gotta respect him.
SPEAKER_00: See, because I just didn't, I didn't want.
SPEAKER_00: That's what these people were like.
SPEAKER_00: They couldn't stand each other.
SPEAKER_00: Now, why do I make a big deal out of this?
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus is necessary to gospel community.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what was true about both sides of the argument five things.
SPEAKER_00: They were separated from Christ, they were alienated from the commonwealth of Israel.
SPEAKER_00: For us, that means they were not citizens of the kingdom.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't belong, okay?
SPEAKER_00: They just didn't belong, neither one of them.
SPEAKER_00: The ones that were religious and the ones that were not religious.
SPEAKER_00: Ones had been circumcised, had checked all the boxes, and the ones that were like, oh am I kidding, man?
SPEAKER_00: I'm a broken down whiskey drunk over here.
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't know anything about all this.
SPEAKER_00: Third thing says they were strangers to the covenants of promise.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, some of you need to be listening because they they couldn't claim what the Bible said was true about Christians.
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of people that do not have a relationship with God and they want to like claim what the Bible says, like it belongs to them.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: Having no hope without God in the world.
SPEAKER_00: That phrase, without God, the world, the Greek word for that one phrase is where we get an English word agnostic.
SPEAKER_00: They just, without God in the world, why is this a big deal?
SPEAKER_00: Because these people who had nothing in common except their separation from God and their hostile hatred towards each other are about to experience something that only God can do.
SPEAKER_00: And it's this reconciliation.
SPEAKER_00: They're gonna be reconciled to God and reconciled to each other because in Jesus is where racial hostility goes to die.
SPEAKER_00: I get asked all the time, how did your church get so diverse?
SPEAKER_00: What kind of campaign did you have?
SPEAKER_00: We didn't.
SPEAKER_00: We do not objectify any race, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We just preach the gospel because in the Bible you see a picture of heaven in the book of Revelation, and what you see is around the throne of God, the Bible says there's a multitude of all nations, all kindreds, all tribes, all tongues, all people.
SPEAKER_00: And so because heaven's gonna be like that, the church should look like that.
SPEAKER_00: And the guy's like, oh, so there's not like a book or anything you read?
SPEAKER_00: Get away from me.
SPEAKER_00: Just go see, that's why I don't fit in the preacher club.
SPEAKER_00: I got I gotta wear I gotta write my Wrangler.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, no, golly, would you stop objectifying minorities to make your white self feel better?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I said that.
SPEAKER_00: Happens all the time.
SPEAKER_00: See, when I when I say that that Jesus is necessary uh for gospel community, here's also what I want you to see that we often, too often, settle for an expression of community that's really affinity.
SPEAKER_00: The gospel doesn't produce much of the affinity we have in our lives these days.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not against this.
SPEAKER_00: Here's some expressions of uh of community.
SPEAKER_00: Uh your Bunko group, your kids' swim team, the cheerleader moms, the baseball dads.
SPEAKER_00: None of this in and of itself is bad, but you don't need God or the gospel for any of these things to exist.
SPEAKER_00: What I'm saying is that all these things can be true of you, all these five things that you just separated from the promises, all this stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And yet you can get involved in all these little groups that happen nowadays, little lig mom or whatever, and and you can find some affinity and mistake it for community, and you'll never discover or experience this intimate belonging that characterizes biblical community.
SPEAKER_00: Where when you walk in, it's like, yes, yes, these people know me, they get me, they accept me, they're for me, they speak into my life in consequential ways, and I don't always like it.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the deal: if every time someone tells you the truth, you move away from those people, you're king.
SPEAKER_00: And it starts happening when you're a teenager.
SPEAKER_00: When you get to be about 14 years old, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 years old, and you decide what your favorite sin is, and people who love you say something, you're like, Well, I just tell you what, and it begins to fracture.
SPEAKER_00: That's why you have clicks in a youth group.
SPEAKER_00: That's why you're like, hey, we all agree that we're gonna just kind of sin and act like it's no big deal, and you got people over here that are kind of like, hey, we want to love those people and we don't know how to speak to them.
SPEAKER_00: We said, hey, that's wrong, and they said, take a walk.
SPEAKER_00: It's because you can't handle community, it's because you say, I would rather be Cain than be a part of intimate belonging because I don't like people telling me what I want to do is wrong.
SPEAKER_00: Happens all the time.
SPEAKER_00: He said, How do you know that?
SPEAKER_00: He used to be a youth pastor a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.
SPEAKER_00: Chewbacca was in my youth group.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the second thing now I want you to see in the text is the gospel community is deep and wide.
SPEAKER_00: Gospel community is deep and wide.
SPEAKER_00: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 17.
SPEAKER_00: He says, and he came and he preached peace to you who are far off, and peace to those who were near.
SPEAKER_00: For through him we have we both have access in one spirit to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: Now, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: The width, uh, the the width come, it's wide because you got those who are far off and those who are near.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, my friends at Chewy's, they're far off.
SPEAKER_00: And when I first started going there, there's a guy that worked at the name Darwin.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, You anything like the original Darwin?
SPEAKER_00: And he goes, I'm the original Darwin.
SPEAKER_00: I said, My man, you need to go home and break some mirrors.
SPEAKER_00: You look at yourself too much.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, Darwin was an African-American man with dreadlocks, and he referred to me as his brother from another mother.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, I'm good with that.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and every time he waved on me, I tried to get a little paint on the barn.
SPEAKER_00: I would say something to him.
SPEAKER_00: Like, hey, you know, Charles Darwin, he kind of fudged on the on the facts when it came to those tree moths, and so don't get down that road of naturalism because it cannot be sustained by the truth.
SPEAKER_00: Man, you're tripping.
SPEAKER_00: No, I'm not tripping, I'm telling.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where it all got started.
SPEAKER_00: Now, why why why do I say that?
SPEAKER_00: Because you some of you prefer depth to width, and so you just get with people that have the same theological interest as you do.
SPEAKER_00: And what happens is over time you become not a very interesting person.
SPEAKER_00: No one has a burning desire to discuss how many angels can get can God fit on the on the head of a pen.
SPEAKER_00: No one has a burning desire to to to to to discuss election or Calvinism or Arminianism and all these things you want to get down these roads and talk about.
SPEAKER_00: Because in gospel community, there's there it's deep and it's wide.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews and the Gentiles, these two groups that could not be less alike, they hate each other uh more and they despise each other by nature.
SPEAKER_00: However, because of Jesus, these people that are far apart get brought together.
SPEAKER_00: And so there's breath.
SPEAKER_00: See, one of the things that fuels and informs community is that people that are far off are getting closer and closer and closer.
SPEAKER_00: You should have people in your life.
SPEAKER_00: You should have people, now, by the way, we talk about community.
SPEAKER_00: We have things in our church called community groups.
SPEAKER_00: They meet tonight.
SPEAKER_00: Matter of fact, they meet all you typically on the first and third Sunday night of the month in homes.
SPEAKER_00: There should be people in your community group that show up and say, I don't even believe Christianity, but I'm real curious, so I'm gonna watch you people and see what this is all about.
SPEAKER_00: It shouldn't just be a gathering of the already converted who love queso.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure that's what Jesus died for.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I say the gospel community is deep and wide, let me ask this question.
SPEAKER_00: How many of you have ever walked into a church and felt like a stranger and an alien?
SPEAKER_00: Don't raise your hand.
SPEAKER_00: Just how many of you ever walked into church and when you walked in, you just kind of thought, oh boy, I don't fit in here.
SPEAKER_00: As I had a guy say to me, he goes, I just fit in better at a bar than I do a church.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, please come to my church.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Why?
SPEAKER_00: I said, Because you there's other people that feel the same way.
SPEAKER_00: A bar is the only place where a total stranger will buy you something.
SPEAKER_00: You ever notice that?
SPEAKER_00: Y'all are like, I don't know what you're talking about, Pastor.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: You sat in a bar long enough, somebody goes, Hey, can I buy you a drink?
SPEAKER_00: You're like, uh, uh, oh, are there strings attached?
SPEAKER_00: What's going on here?
SPEAKER_00: No, there's just this that people are longing because they're sick and tired of being a Cain who's on the fringes.
SPEAKER_00: And it kind of comes in to get love and acceptance and then goes back out to just sin.
SPEAKER_00: Gospel community is deep and it's wide.
SPEAKER_00: You say, I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_00: Look at the next verse.
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 18.
SPEAKER_00: For through him we have uh we have access in one spirit to the Father.
SPEAKER_00: Then he says this, so then you are no longer strangers and aliens.
SPEAKER_00: See, the capacity to never feel the way you've always felt exists when you enter into community.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_00: The capacity to no longer feel what you've always felt, like this stranger and this alien.
SPEAKER_00: The capacity to not feel that anymore exists because of biblical community.
SPEAKER_00: And so he says, you're no longer a stranger and alien.
SPEAKER_00: So the question I'll pop up in your mind, if you're a thinking person, okay, if I'm no longer a stranger and an alien, what am I?
SPEAKER_00: Here's what God invites you into today.
SPEAKER_00: He says, You're fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, and whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And so just look how it stacks up there.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Hey, you you used to be uh strangers and aliens, but now you're fellow citizens.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, nobody here's better than you.
SPEAKER_00: You all are welcome.
SPEAKER_00: Come on in.
SPEAKER_00: The only way that the only thing that qualifies us to get in is we accept by faith what Jesus has done, because Jesus is necessary, central, required for us to experience the gospel community.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because it's by his blood and his dying on the cross in our place for our sins that makes any of this possible.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're fellow citizens.
SPEAKER_00: And then he says, secondly, you're saints.
SPEAKER_00: Community is where you go to be reminded, hey, you're not who you used to be.
SPEAKER_00: And so what you used to do no longer has power over you.
SPEAKER_00: It just doesn't.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, he says, you're members of the household of God.
SPEAKER_00: You're members of the household of God.
SPEAKER_00: Your life matters because you're connected to something bigger than yourself.
SPEAKER_00: Then he says this.
SPEAKER_00: He says, uh, this household of God is built on the foundation.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 20 of the apostles and the prophets.
SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't stop there.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together.
SPEAKER_00: And he goes on from there.
SPEAKER_00: And so you were once aliens and strangers, but now you're fellow citizens.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, there's a sense of belonging.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, this is what I was created for.
SPEAKER_00: You're saints, you're members of the household of God.
SPEAKER_00: And this thing is built upon the apostles and the prophets, and the foundation, the chief cornerstone of it all is Jesus Christ Himself.
SPEAKER_00: This is what community introduces you to.
SPEAKER_00: Thirdly, the text tells us that together we become.
SPEAKER_00: Together we become.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 21, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: If you're a student, I want you to understand this about student ministry.
SPEAKER_00: Togetherness determines growth.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the Bible says right here.
SPEAKER_00: And then you say, why do you say that to students?
SPEAKER_00: Because I see a lot of student ministries that they just have a lot of affinity.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, we're in the tenth grade, so we're in a small group together, or we're in the seventh grade, we're in a small group together.
SPEAKER_00: That's affinity.
SPEAKER_00: A community is, hey, we have this sense of togetherness, and because of that, God is blessing what takes place here.
SPEAKER_00: And so I say, together we become, because community is not static.
SPEAKER_00: You're always growing, you're always becoming.
SPEAKER_00: That's the way God created it.
SPEAKER_00: God takes individual sinners, He unites them with other believers in this corporate unity, which is characterized by community, and there's power in community.
SPEAKER_00: That's why being joined together, it grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: You ever wonder how much togetherness affects the growth of the church?
SPEAKER_00: Let me tell you something, beloved.
SPEAKER_00: God does not want churches that are divided and fractured to get bigger because it gives people on the outside the indication that this is the way it ought to be.
SPEAKER_00: God's smarter than that.
SPEAKER_00: So if you wonder why you're hitting a glass ceiling in your area of ministry or the thing you're involved in, you should ask yourself: are we experiencing togetherness?
SPEAKER_00: Are we walking in oneness?
SPEAKER_00: Is there a sense of unity?
SPEAKER_00: Or have we allowed division to kind of take this thing over and it fractures into the well, this is kind of my affiliation, this is my affiliation.
SPEAKER_00: In students, they call it clicks or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: That's a word we could just we could just do away with.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because together, together, being joined together, it grows into a holy temple in the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: The emphasis is not on individual growth, but on corporate growth.
SPEAKER_00: The emphasis in the church is far too much on the individual.
SPEAKER_00: In the Bible, it's not on individual growth, it's on corporate growth.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the last thing I want to tell you about community today.
SPEAKER_00: God builds community so he can inhabit it himself.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say that again because this is the thing I think we miss.
SPEAKER_00: God builds, God creates community so he can inhabit it himself.
SPEAKER_00: The near side you say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: Look at verse 22.
SPEAKER_00: In him, you are also being built together into a dwelling place for God by his spirit.
SPEAKER_00: He builds it so he can inhabit it.
SPEAKER_00: You're being built together.
SPEAKER_00: You're being built together in him, you're being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: God dwells in community.
SPEAKER_00: God, where there's not oneness, there's not this sense of gospel community, God doesn't dwell.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the thing, you gotta ask yourself when you get together with wherever you think you experience community, you just ask yourself, hey, does God dwell here?
SPEAKER_00: Is it just me and eight other people and some finger sandwiches?
SPEAKER_00: Because after a while, you you'll stop sacrificing for that.
SPEAKER_00: You'll just be like, hey man, this ain't happening.
SPEAKER_00: You'll be like, hey, it's Sunday, time for community group.
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I pulled a hamstring, honey.
SPEAKER_00: You better go without me.
SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself, you say, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: The nearsightedness of our generation when it comes to community is mind-blowing because we think it's all about us and our community group, having coffee and dessert, discussing our problems and our affinity circle and our Bible study or our mom's group and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_00: Beloved, if you get anything out of this, get this that the Spirit builds and establishes community in us for God.
SPEAKER_00: Because when God sees that community exists, he dwells there.
SPEAKER_00: He inhabits that place, and people are marked by his presence.
SPEAKER_00: And not only does he inhabit that place, he bestows a blessing upon those people in that place.
SPEAKER_00: He said, I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_00: Let me close by reading the 133rd Psalm.
SPEAKER_00: This is what it says.
SPEAKER_00: Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity.
SPEAKER_00: It is like the precious oil on the head running down on the beard, on the beard of airing, running down on the collar of his robes.
SPEAKER_00: Let me stop right there.
SPEAKER_00: Did anybody pour oil on your head this week?
SPEAKER_00: Because again, this is one of the things where the Bible talks about.
SPEAKER_00: It's easy to kind of go, that's borderline creepy.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta ask yourself, what's he talking about when he says it is like precious oil on the head running down on the beard, on the beard of air.
SPEAKER_00: I don't have a beard, but if I had a beard, I wouldn't want oil running down on it.
SPEAKER_00: I got friends that got beards.
SPEAKER_00: We're at lunch together, and I'm like, hey man, could you do something about that?
SPEAKER_00: You got like a small man hiding that thing.
SPEAKER_00: Wade collier, clean that thing up.
SPEAKER_00: Get a pick or a rake or something and rake that thing out.
SPEAKER_00: It's like John Norman, like a tumbleweed just hanging over your chin.
SPEAKER_00: And then you fathom oil coming on your head and running down into your beard and dripping down on the collar of your robes.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, ah, hot water and salt, please.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: What's he describing?
SPEAKER_00: He's describing someone being anointed.
SPEAKER_00: Look at me, we're almost done.
SPEAKER_00: You still with me?
SPEAKER_00: When a king or somebody was anointed, was that they said, hey, this is gonna be our king, this is gonna be our guy, they would he would come and kneel down and they would pour oil over his head as a sign that God says, I choose this one.
SPEAKER_00: I say yes to this one.
SPEAKER_00: That's why when they were looking for a king, remember that the guy, hey, he had a flask of oil.
SPEAKER_00: He went to Jesse and he said, Hey, line your sons up, line them all up, and he went to each one of them.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: This one's pretty.
SPEAKER_00: This one works out, this one's got a nice body.
SPEAKER_00: He's got a lot of likes on Instagram.
SPEAKER_00: No.
SPEAKER_00: Went to all of them.
SPEAKER_00: And God said, No.
SPEAKER_00: And he looked at Jesse and said, You got any more sons?
SPEAKER_00: He said, Well, LaRunt of the litter, the youngest one,'s out there watching the sheep.
SPEAKER_00: Send for him.
SPEAKER_00: He walks in and God says, Yes, let's pour oil on this one.
SPEAKER_00: And he anointed David as king.
SPEAKER_00: Now, with that backdrop, hear this again.
SPEAKER_00: This is how much God values community.
SPEAKER_00: Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity.
SPEAKER_00: It is like the precious oil on the head running down on the beard of Aaron, running down on the collar of his robes.
SPEAKER_00: It is like the dew of Hermon which falls on the mountains of Zion.
SPEAKER_00: Here's the sentence you need to hear.
SPEAKER_00: For there the Lord has commanded the blessing, life forevermore.
SPEAKER_00: Ask yourself this question, and we'll be done today.
SPEAKER_00: Are you experiencing the blessing of community?
SPEAKER_00: Because the Bible says where there's this kind of oneness, this kind of unity, this kind of community, I'm going to command the blessing.
SPEAKER_00: I went to a church a long time ago.
SPEAKER_00: They used to sing a song that I did not understand until I was preparing for this week.
SPEAKER_00: The song they would sing was this.
SPEAKER_00: It said this, there is a place of commanded blessing where brethren and unity dwell, a place where anointing oil is flowing, and we dwell as one.
SPEAKER_00: And I remember thinking, man, that's kind of different.
SPEAKER_00: And then I read in the Bible and I was like, oh.
SPEAKER_00: And so again, I just closed by asking a simple question.
SPEAKER_00: Are you experiencing the blessing of community?
SPEAKER_00: And here's one of the ways you know it.
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to compensate for not being in community.
SPEAKER_00: He said, Now what do you mean?
SPEAKER_00: You don't have to compensate for not being in community.
SPEAKER_00: Uh every once in a while I have friends that come up to me and say, men especially, they're like, hey, you got anything I can do?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, I never asked that question.
SPEAKER_00: I'm up to my eyeballs and stuff to do.
SPEAKER_00: That's the confession of a man that's never that's not been in community in a while.
SPEAKER_00: Because in community, there's always something to do.
SPEAKER_00: There's always something to do.
SPEAKER_00: Somebody texted me last night and said, Hey, we're moving my mom out.
SPEAKER_00: I got a 12-place setting of dishes.
SPEAKER_00: You know that wants this?
SPEAKER_00: And and and some somebody asked me what time they said, You get tired of that?
SPEAKER_00: Like you gave away some tickets to Shinyun.
SPEAKER_00: You must be generous.
SPEAKER_00: I don't like the ballet.
SPEAKER_00: I ain't generous.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if it's tickets to the rodeo, you ain't getting no email, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna iron up my pearl snap and go to the rodeo and have a turkey leg.
SPEAKER_00: Especially if it's Cardi B.
SPEAKER_00: This is the kind of sinners you go to church with.
SPEAKER_00: Some lady said, I don't want the Xinyun tickets, but if you get rodeo tickets to Cardi B, holla back.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, Okay, Gwen Stefani, I didn't know you were a holla back girl, but I'll holler back.
SPEAKER_00: Again, here's the thing.
SPEAKER_00: Do you, and we're done, do you experience the blessing of community?
SPEAKER_00: Or are you always compensating for the fact that you're not in community?
SPEAKER_00: Because you prefer to be Cain.
SPEAKER_00: You prefer to be the person out there on the fringes, kind of doing your own thing, the Lone Ranger, the Lone Rangerette.
SPEAKER_00: And you show up every once in a while, it's like, hey, yeah, frenetic, and then disappear.
SPEAKER_00: This is where God commands the blessing.
SPEAKER_00: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_00: If you're new to our church, we like to teach the Bible and then give you some space to think about it.
SPEAKER_00: And so I just take this next moment or so.
SPEAKER_00: Lindsay will come.
SPEAKER_00: She may play something, she may sing something.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but just think about what you heard.
SPEAKER_00: No one's gonna jam you up.
SPEAKER_00: We're not gonna dim the lights and humkumbaya and ask you to do anything.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna ask you to think about what God said to you today.
SPEAKER_00: And do you understand that God created you to be in community?
SPEAKER_00: That means to be known, to have a place of intimate belonging where you don't hide, you don't cover up, you just confess, you tell the truth about yourself, and you tell the truth to other people.
SPEAKER_00: And God says, that's the place where I command a blessing.
SPEAKER_00: That's where two plus two equals seven.
SPEAKER_00: So just ask, ask God.
SPEAKER_00: Hey, what had my name on it today?
SPEAKER_00: And Father, we surrender to what we were created for.
SPEAKER_00: We were not created to be this Lone Ranger that just kind of mysteriously shows up on occasion and disappears.
SPEAKER_00: Who hops into church on Christmas and Easter and then no one sees again until next Christmas or next Easter.
SPEAKER_00: We were created to have a place of intimate belonging where I am known and I know, where I give and I receive, where it's mutual.
SPEAKER_00: I don't control things by being in charge.
SPEAKER_00: It's mutual.
SPEAKER_00: I submit to other brothers and sisters because I can trust them, because we have the same experience of being forgiven by Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so they only want what's best for me.
SPEAKER_00: And so anything they say to me, I'll receive.
SPEAKER_00: It may make me angry, it may tick me off sometimes, but I gotta walk away and think about it because these people are for me.
SPEAKER_00: This is intimate belonging.
SPEAKER_00: And this is the place where you, God, tell us in your word that you command a blessing.
SPEAKER_00: I pray for all the Cains in the room.
SPEAKER_00: That they just come in to what they were created for.
SPEAKER_00: This is our prayer.
SPEAKER_00: We prayed in Jesus' name, and everyone said, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for your presence today.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to know, I meant what I said earlier.
SPEAKER_00: If this is your first time ever at a church, this is your first time in this church, and God kind of stirred something up in your guts.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what I want you to do.
SPEAKER_00: You're like, man, I want to know more about that.
SPEAKER_00: I want to say to you, I want to be your pastor, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I I told my friend at Chewy's, I said, I want to be your pastor.
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, Oh, I said, Don't lean away from me.
SPEAKER_00: We got nothing in common, but I still want to be your pastor.
SPEAKER_00: All right?
SPEAKER_00: Uh, and so in just a minute, we're gonna have, we we we video our announcements, and so we'll show a video that has all the announcements for the week things going on because there's opportunities for people to get involved and to experience community.
SPEAKER_00: But if you're visiting today and you're kind of like, man, I am new to this, I don't know what to say, but something kind of got stirred up in me.
SPEAKER_00: What I want you to do is look on the row, uh, uh on your row.
SPEAKER_00: There's a couple of seatback card holders.
SPEAKER_00: Grab one of those guest cards.
SPEAKER_00: If you're just like, I don't know what, but something about this appealed to me.
SPEAKER_00: You're just right on there.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to be my pastor.
SPEAKER_00: Put down your name and phone number, email.
SPEAKER_00: I'll contact you personally this week.
SPEAKER_00: I'll take you to lunch, breakfast, I'll buy you a cup of coffee or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: Here's why.
SPEAKER_00: Because I want you to experience what you were created for.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: I said to somebody, and I say this a lot, and it's not false humidity.
SPEAKER_00: I met somebody this morning that knew, and I said, hey, the best part of this place is the people.
SPEAKER_00: The pastor's kind of iffy.
SPEAKER_00: And what I'm saying in that, don't laugh at that.
SPEAKER_00: Uh what I'm saying in that is that there's power in community that we don't get from an individual.
SPEAKER_00: I believe that.
SPEAKER_00: I believe that wholeheartedly, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So if you're here today and you're kind of like, I'm kind of new to this, just hey, just know that you're welcome and you're wanted, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And let's take a moment to be reminded of some things we've got, opportunities for engagement and for community we've got coming up here at our church.
SPEAKER_02: Here's a look at what's happening at Grand Parkway Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_02: Are you wanting to serve at Grand Parkway, but not sure where?
SPEAKER_02: We invite you to pray about getting involved in kids' ministry and make an impact as we lead kids to Jesus, helping them become fully devoted followers of Christ and teaching them to be gospel to our children.
SPEAKER_02: There are plenty of options for serving beyond being a teacher.
SPEAKER_02: So make plans to attend the informational meeting on Sunday, January 27th at 10 a.m.
SPEAKER_02: If you plan to come to the meeting, email Janet or Krista at Grantparkway.org.
SPEAKER_02: Giving records for 2018 are available in the lobby today.
SPEAKER_02: Our financial administrator, Leanne Corkman, will have yours ready.
SPEAKER_02: DNOW Weekend will take place February 1st through 3rd.
SPEAKER_02: Registration is$65 and ends January 30th.
SPEAKER_02: Students will gather at the warehouse for a meaningful time of word and worship with Leo Almeida.
SPEAKER_02: Today is a community group Sunday where dozens of groups will be meeting in their homes to unpack the sermon and speak to each other's lives.
SPEAKER_02: If you are in a group, see our website for a listing of groups.
SPEAKER_02: If there's anything you've heard today, you have questions, or you would like someone to pray with you, some of our pastors and elders will be available at the front of the stage at the conclusion of our service.
SPEAKER_00: Let me say this.
SPEAKER_00: If uh you're a student or if you're a parent and you're like, hey, uh I'd love my kid to go to disciple now, but things are kind of tight right now.
SPEAKER_00: I can't swing the$65 for that.
SPEAKER_00: If that's you, don't worry about it.
SPEAKER_00: Just come to me.
SPEAKER_00: King Rat's always got some cheese somewhere.
SPEAKER_00: Uh I want your kid to be a part of this.
SPEAKER_00: It's going to be that good, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Seriously.
SPEAKER_00: And I don't, if you're visiting for the first time, you're like, hey, my kid would enjoy that, then don't let money be an object, all right?
SPEAKER_00: Just come to me, shoot me an email, come to me afterwards and say, hey, I'd like to take you up on that, okay?
SPEAKER_00: I'd be glad to, all right?
SPEAKER_00: Fair enough?
SPEAKER_00: If you've got any questions about anything you heard, or if we can pray for you, or if this is your first, second, or third time, we want to put a name with a face, come and introduce yourself before you bolt out of here, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Also, take a moment and look around.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that means stop looking at me.
SPEAKER_00: I know it's hard.
SPEAKER_00: You're jealous of my shirt I got on.
SPEAKER_00: Uh before you leave, one of the ways you experience community is you stay curious about each other.
SPEAKER_00: I want you to just, if you saw somebody you're curious about, you're like, hey, I don't know that person's name, and they sent in my section.
SPEAKER_00: Just go over and introduce yourself before you get out of here, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you, as soon as we say amen, you're headed for the buick.
SPEAKER_00: Relax.
SPEAKER_00: Slow your roll.
SPEAKER_00: Let people catch up to you.
SPEAKER_00: They're not going to ask you for five bucks.
SPEAKER_00: They just want to get to know you, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Stand to your feet, let me speak a blessing over you.
SPEAKER_00: Hold your hands out.
SPEAKER_00: Because your God has given you so much, namely Himself.
SPEAKER_00: You have the capacity now to leave and give to others.
SPEAKER_00: Do as God leads.
SPEAKER_00: Give as you've received.
SPEAKER_00: In the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Bless you.