The Power and Purpose of the Church

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For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.

Let's pray together.

Lord, we've come to acknowledge, we've used some language this morning to acknowledge a lot that's right about you.

There's nothing that's not right about you, so we've got a lot to acknowledge.

We've said, What a savior, and then we ended by saying, My king forever.

We lift our hands up and we lay our lives down.

Our whole life now is for you.

This is why the Bible says, whatever you do, whether you eat or drink or play basketball or you're the CEO of a wildly successful company, whatever you do, your stay-at-home mom, your school teacher who's adding up the numbers to see if you got to your magic number so you can quit.

Whatever you do, whatever you do, there's nothing that we do that is outside the realm of your glory that was intended not to glorify you.

So, whatever you do, because you're the high king forever, and because you're our savior, you're gonna gather all your ransomed ones.

He who began a good work in you is gonna continue it to the day of Christ Jesus.

We don't get a day off.

And so, whatever we do, whether we eat or drink or watch football today or take a nap or go to Target or go to Marshall's because our husband's a selfish jerk and wants to watch football all day.

Whatever we do, do it all for the glory of God.

Holy Spirit, we need you today to increase our capacity to glorify you.

We need you to magnify the scripture, illuminate what's on the page, let it get into our head and into our heart, find expression in our hands this week.

That's the way you get glorified.

Make that happen, God.

We pray in Christ's name.

When everyone said, Amen.

Amen.

You could have a C.

If you got a Bible, I invite you to take it over up to Acts chapter 8.

Acts 8 · chapter mention

If you're our guests, we're preaching through the book of Acts.

Uh uh, and we're up to Acts chapter 8, verse 26.

Acts 8:26

And I'll talk to you this morning about how to have spiritual conversations that change people, how to have spiritual conversations that change people.

It's not enough just to have spiritual conversations or to have conversations at the end, you could you you you you throw in a little splash of Jesus just to kind of asquase your comfort, your, your, your uh conscience.

Uh, but but I want us to be people who understand how to have spiritual conversations that change the people we're talking to.

Now, by the way, it is not your job to change them.

You have to come to a point where you trust the efficacy of the Holy Spirit and the power of God to do that.

But also you have to see yourself as a medium through which the voice of God and and the will of God finds expression, okay?

While you're finding Acts chapter 8 and getting a pen, I just want to say this there's two kinds of people in the world.

Acts 8 · chapter mention

Uh, those who are like chicken little, they always feel as if the sky is falling.

I mean, you get a flat tire, oh my gosh, it's the end of the world.

Oh, the humanity, how could a good God let this happen?

The sky's always falling, it just always is falling.

And here's the thing about that if you're one of those chicken little people, the sky's always falling.

After a while, people just stop believing you when you say the sky is falling.

But there's two kinds of people.

Those are people who believe that the sky is falling, and then there's people over here that believe that the kingdom is coming.

The sky is falling and the kingdom is coming.

Now, when Jesus dies on the cross, maybe Khan did, it felt to his disciples like the sky is falling.

It's like, won't, won't.

Well, that was fun while it lasted.

However, what really was happening is that the kingdom was coming.

And so uh at Pentecost, they realized that hey, the kingdom is coming and this changes everything.

And the gospel begins to spread.

He's not just the God of the Jews, he doesn't live in Jerusalem like it's a Christian city and everything.

The gospel begins to spread.

As he said in Acts 1.8, you'll be my witnesses.

Uh, you'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.

If you don't have the Holy Spirit inside of you, you do not have the power to live what the Bible talks about.

It's just religious determination and it will not work.

He said, You'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you.

You'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria.

So far, the gospel has gotten from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria, and now it gets to the ends of the earth.

That's what he says.

Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

We're now at the ends of the earth because in this section, Philip meets a man from Ethiopia.

That's I told you a couple weeks ago when you're talking to people in Sugarland and and they get convicted and they pull something out of nowhere.

What about the God in Africa?

No one ever says, What about the guy in Cati?

We picked the furthest place from us.

That's just what God said.

God said the uttermost ends of the earth.

And here we are now in Acts chapter 8, verse 26.

Acts 8:26

We're at the ends of the earth because God is a God who keeps his word.

What he says in Acts 1.8, the people of God begin to experience in Acts 8.1.

Let's read Acts chapter 8, starting verse 26.

Acts 8 · chapter mention

It says, Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, Rise and go toward the south to a road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.

This is a desert place.

And he rose and went.

And there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure.

He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning, seated in his chariot, and he was reading the prophet Isaiah.

And the Spirit said to Philip, Go over and join this chariot.

So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, Do you understand what you're reading?

And he said, How can I unless someone guides me?

And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.

Now the passage of Scripture that he was reading was this: like a sheep, he was led to the slaughter, and like a lamb before its shear is silent, so he opened not his mouth.

In his humiliation, justice was denied him.

Who can describe his generation?

For his life is taken away from the earth.

And the eunuch said to Philip, About whom, I ask you, does the prophet say this?

About himself or about someone else?

And then Philip opened his mouth, and beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus.

And as they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, See, here is water.

What prevents me from being baptized?

And he commanded the chariot to stop, and they both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch, and he baptized him.

And when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch saw him no more, and he went on his way rejoicing.

But Philip found himself at his oddest, and as he passed through, he preached the gospel to all the towns until he came to Caesarea.

How to have spiritual conversations that change people.

It's one thing that people over and over and over talk to me and say, Man, I want to get better at this.

Uh, here's five things from the text that help you get better and become a more consequential person who has more weight on your words.

You don't want to go into this culture and speak, speak fluent helium, or your words just come out of your mouth and float up in the room.

They're like, okay, thank you.

You can be done now.

You want there to be weight and authority on your words.

Where when you speak, people are like, Whew! I'd like to hear more of that.

Five things from the text.

Number one, you live in the spirit.

If you want to have spiritual conversations that change people, before you say anything, it comes down to what you do, how you live.

You live in the spirit.

Verse 26 says, Now, angel of the Lord, which is a biblical phrase for the Holy Spirit, the messenger, he talks about later in the text, he talks about the Holy Spirit said.

He's what he's talking about here.

But you when you live in the spirit, you are keenly tuned in, you're sensitive to the movement of the spirit.

To live in the spirit, this means that we experience what I call the different postures of the spirit.

Don't turn there.

But in Luke chapter 4, verses 1 to 14, he's talking about Jesus.

Luke 4:1–14

Now, if Jesus, you wonder how Jesus did as much as he did, it's easy to cop out and go, well, he was Jesus.

I don't know if it's a news flash to you.

Well, if you read in Luke chapter 4, verses 1 to 14, you'll see three phrases in there, what I call the postures of the Spirit.

Luke 4:1–14

It says, And Jesus was full of the Spirit.

Number one, he was full of the Spirit.

And then secondly, he was led by the Spirit.

You are at the mercy of that which you're full of.

Let me say that again.

You are at the mercy of that which you are most full of.

Now, this is a maybe a crude analogy, but if you've ever been drunk, you understand that more than anybody.

You are at the mercy of what you're full of.

And so the Bible says that Jesus was full of the Spirit and He was led by the Spirit.

And what happens in Luke chapter 4 is that what's called the temptations.

Luke 4 · chapter mention

He is tempted in the wilderness.

And then at the end of the passage about verse 14, he comes, it says that he came out of the wilderness in the power of the spirit.

So there's three postures of the spirit.

If you live in the spirit, you should experience these things.

You should have a sense of what it means to be full of the spirit, to be led by the spirit, and in the power of the spirit.

You should feel like I bring to some conversations of power that I by nature do not have.

This is what it means to be in the power of the spirit.

Now, a lot of people are like, how do you know you're full of the spirit?

Well, it's evidence you speak in tongues and blah, blah, blah.

Here's one of the ways you know you're full of the spirit is that obedience is reflex and not labor.

It's just reflex.

You say, look right here, the spirit speaks to him, verse 26.

Now the angel of the Lord said to Philip, Rise and go towards the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.

This is a desert place, verse 27.

And he rose and went.

The Spirit says, Rise and go, present tense.

So what did he do?

He rose and went, past tense.

Evidence that you're full of the spirit, it's not as mystical as some people want to make it out to be.

And oh, I've had this experience, nobody else has.

No, evidence that you're full of the spirit is that obedience is reflex and not labor.

And my concern is that too much of the preaching in America has eroded into psychological attempts to help people not feel as bad as they should feel for disobeying God.

Ask yourself this question: if Philip doesn't obey, just look at what he misses out on.

Ask yourself, here's a practical question.

Who was the last really interesting person that you met that you find hard to forget?

Because most of us don't have meaningful dialogues in the warp and woof of daily life.

We're around the same people, we see the same people, we have the same conversations about the same things.

But when you live in the spirit, you remind people that there's a whole other dimension to life.

So if you're gonna have spiritual conversations that change people, first of all, you have to live in the spirit because that puts you in touch with what the spirit is doing.

Here's the second thing from the text.

I would say, be curious about people.

Be curious about people.

Now, in verse 27 and 28, it says, as he he rose and went, and then it says this, and there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candace, the queen of the Ethiopians, who was in charge of all her treasure.

He had come to Jerusalem to worship and was returning seated in his chariot, and he was reading the prophet Isaiah.

Now, there is a lot there, but when I say be curious about people, let me just say this.

If you live in assumption, if you're one that's quick to judge, not that any of you would be, but if you read the book by its cover, that's assumption.

Assumption robs you of authority in interpersonal uh interactions with people.

But when you're curious, it gives you authority in people's lives.

Like, let me let me ask you this question.

When you listen to people, can you pick up on the appetites that drive them?

Because if you're curious about people, one of the things that you'll realize is that what's happened up here on the surface is really not what's happening.

It's what's down here.

This is what drives, this is the motive up here is behavior.

This is the appetite, this is the outcome.

And when you listen to people through a lens of curiosity, you begin to pick up on the appetites that drive them.

And then you should ask yourself, should do you ever wonder if people's appetites is really a drive, their behavior is a drive to satisfy these appetites?

Because we get hung up on behavior instead of saying, hey, what need is this person trying to meet?

Now, here's how a curious person breaks down the information of verse 27 and 28, and it informs how he approaches this person.

There's eight pieces of information, and they're all in little fragments set off by commas.

I brought them for you this morning.

This is how a curious person reads the Bible.

This is how a curious person engages people.

Here's eight pieces of information about this cat.

Starts off general, gets real specific.

Number one, he's an Ethiopian.

An Ethiopian.

Now, when it says he's an Ethiopian, what does that mean?

He's from there.

You go, Ethiopia.

Some of you are like, uh, okay, that's all you got.

Second piece of information, he's a eunuch.

He's a eunuch.

What is a eunuch?

You want me to say that out loud in church?

A eunuch is someone who has undergone a certain procedure, because I know your kids are sitting around you.

A eunuch is someone who has undergone a certain procedure uh that makes them not have to worry about interests in the opposite sex.

Now, by the way, this is free, okay?

It's easy to go last way back there.

Governments have always preferred genderless, neutered servants, which is why our culture celebrates gender dysphoria so much today.

Don't worry about a family and kids, focus on us.

Your job is your life.

That's not new.

This is what this cat is.

He's an Ethiopian, he's a eunuch.

Thirdly, he's a court official of Candace.

You may be like, okay, who's Candace?

Next piece of information, Queen of the Ethiopians.

With every layer of information, you should move closer to this guy and closer to this guy.

He's you know, he's the court official of Candace.

Who's Candace?

Queen of the Ethiopians.

Here's what makes you want to sit next to this guy who was in charge of all her treasure.

So if you pulled out a dollar bill in Ethiopia, this cat's name was on it.

He was the secretary of the treasury, he was the Janice Yellen of his day.

And so all of a sudden, oh now I'm getting more, it gets more curious.

He had come to Jerusalem to worship.

Now, this is the one I put a star by when I read this passage.

He had come to Jerusalem to worship.

Now, Philip doesn't know this, but but we know this because we're living after the fact.

Why does a guy who does not know God, doesn't understand his Bible, why does he come to worship?

Some of you in this room know the answer to that question because you fit in that category.

And you're not a bad person.

I'm so glad you're here.

You're you, if somebody pressed you, you'd you'd make a joke and say, Well, my wife makes me, or I come for my kids.

But deep inside, there's this appetite that drives you that you don't have language for.

You're like, I don't know why.

There's something bigger and better and beyond me.

That's it.

Yeah, it's the same reason this guy comes.

He's a in charge of all our treasure.

He'd come to Jerusalem to worship.

And then it says this here's the seventh piece of information.

He was returning, seated in his chariot.

Now, a long time ago, before TV, people had a more active imagination.

You had to visualize what was happening.

You can't just read the word, you gotta see the word, but you also gotta, oh, excuse me, you can't just read it, you gotta hear it and then see it, visualize what's happening.

He is seated in a chariot, he's reading from the scroll of Isaiah, which means he's not driving, he's got a personal driver.

Now, okay, somebody's driving Miss Daisy here.

And so he's reading, and by the way, back then they read out loud.

This is not uncommon.

This is how Philip hears him, he doesn't read lips.

And so the guy's just rolling down the road, reading from the from the book of Isaiah out loud, and that's the last thing it says he was reading the prophet Isaiah.

Now, why do I tell you all that?

Without discerning, remember a few minutes ago when you listen to people, you want to pick up on the appetites that drive their behavior?

Because if you don't if you don't learn to discern people's appetites, you will never know how to properly apply the gospel.

Let me say that again.

Without discernment, there can really be no effective gospel application.

Because you're just saying the same thing you say to everybody.

Like when I was a kid and people would talk to me about church, they used to talk about church.

Did your family go to church?

No, we don't go to church.

Uh, they were like, why not?

Well, I went once and it looked terrible, okay?

Y'all looked miserable and you were all overdressed, and I just thought, men on the self, never do this again.

Never spend the night with any of your friends who have to go to church on Sunday.

That was my big resolution, walking away from that experience.

Uh, but without discerning the appetites, there can be no proper gospel application.

What do you mean?

I get asked this question a lot from spouses, from men about women, and from women about men.

Why does my spouse blank?

Why does my husband blank?

Why does my wife blank?

I've heard everything.

Why does my wife shop so much?

Why does my husband drink so much?

Why does my husband eat so much?

Why is my wife so addicted to her foam?

Why is my wife addicted to candy crush?

I've heard everything, okay?

And here's the thing: it's easy.

For example, a woman asked me recently, why does my husband drink so much?

And I said, it's real simple.

By drinking, your husband, I'm not excusing the behavior, I'm trying to get to the appetite behind the behavior.

By drinking to excess, uh, your husband creates a world in which he knows how to function.

Uh, here, here's how, but you got to get to the appetite behind the behavior.

Because again, appetites drive the behavior.

People ask me nowadays, you know, the new alcohol is marijuana.

Why is my grown husband?

Well, we got why we got kids, we got this, we got that.

Well, why does my wife smoke weed?

I get asked that.

I got asked that about a month ago.

My wife's in her 40s and she acts like a 16-year-old.

I'm like, yes, yes, yes.

There's the behavior.

And then down here under the water line, there is the appetite, the need that drives that behavior.

Unless you understand the need, the behavior will never change.

Here's how you get to the appetite.

You ask a question something like this What is this person experiencing or not experiencing in this world that makes them want to create a world of their own through excessive addictive behavior?

I gladly say, Well, mostly drink so much.

I hate him, I can't stand you.

Okay, I'm not, I said just ask, ask yourself and then ask him.

Hey, what do you experience or not experience in our world that makes you want to go to your game room and just get hammered and play online video games with strangers all over the world?

And it's oh, you're saying it's my fault.

I didn't say that at all.

We're not trying to discern fault, we're trying to just understand the appetite that drives the behavior.

Well, that's a stupid question.

Then your husband will continue to drink.

He might be drinking to escape you.

That conversation ended shortly after that, by the way.

It wrapped up quickly.

Because you see, here's the thing.

And again, I'm not excusing the behavior.

I'm not excusing the person that smokes weed or the person that drinks too much or the person that eats too much, the man that said, Hey, I just slowly lost interest in my wife because she has an affair with food and I don't want to be with her.

Yes, this is what I hear on a rainy Thursday in my office, which tells you that was a long time ago because it hadn't rained in a while.

But again, we're so we as a culture are wrapped up around behavior.

Stop doing that.

Hey, look at me.

You think if people could stop, they wouldn't, they just choose not to.

Like I can, but I don't.

No, they don't even know the appetite that drives this behavior.

They couldn't tell you if you put a gun to their head.

Again, without discerning appetites, there can be no proper gospel application.

But Philip comes along and he's running alongside the chariot, and he just asks a simple question Do you understand what you're reading?

Because Philip put it together.

He's like, Why would a guy who's reading out loud, he's got some, he's got some swag, he's got some authority, he's got a personal driver, he's riding in a chariot, reading out loud, he just came from worship.

Well, Ethiopia is a long way from Jerusalem.

By the way, if you drove 12 hours a day, it would take you like 21 days to get there.

Much less in a chariot, which is three times slower than a car.

So big appetites are producing big behaviors.

Here's the third thing from the text.

If you want to have a more interesting spiritual uh conversation, you don't have spiritual conversations to change people.

The third thing is you have to do is maintain a posture of listening.

It's verse 29.

Maintain a posture of listening.

Verse 29 says, And the spirit said to Philip, stop right there.

And the spirit said to Philip, How do you know it's God talking and not just your ideas?

That's another question I get asked a lot.

And the spirit said to Philip, You realize that God is always speaking.

Hello.

God is always speaking.

He doesn't just speak in the Bible.

Now listen very carefully because some of you get kind of kooky and you get out here and you try to make God say what you want him to say to excuse your preferences.

God is always speaking, but he never speaks in violation of his word.

You can feel a sense of, people ask me, how do you know you talk about the Lord?

You can feel a sense of peace, of direction, of urgency, or exceptional clarity.

Uh, but here's the thing: anything the Spirit says never violates the word of God.

The Spirit of God never tells the people of God to do anything that violates the word of God.

And I've heard a lot of attempts at it, like, oh, well, you know, the Lord told me that He wanted me to be happy, so I'm gonna divorce my husband.

What page is that on?

I just want to know.

I just that is thin ice there.

And so here's the thing uh uh uh here's a practical tip.

It helps if you know your Bible and you know yourself.

Because if you know your Bible and you're like, you know what, I that doesn't square with scripture.

It just doesn't.

And you say, what do you mean, know yourself?

Because sometimes your flesh just wants to make something happen to justify your efforts.

So if you know your Bible and you know yourself, it kind of keeps you in check.

So, but let me say this: the Holy Spirit doesn't live inside of us just to forgive us, he lives inside of you to involve you, which is why the Holy Spirit speaks.

The Holy Spirit involves Philip in this moment, verse 29.

And the Spirit said to Philip, Go over and join this chariot.

And again, look at this immediate response.

So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet.

Philip did not say when the spirit said, Go over and join this chariot.

Philip did not say, You want me to make a fool out of myself?

Are you kidding me?

Run alongside a chariot?

What are my friends gonna think?

Somebody's probably filming this with a cell phone, going, look at that moron.

No, there's just there's no time delay.

Rise and go, got up and went, run beside the chariot.

Here I go, I'm running beside the chariot.

If you're always so self aware and not spirit aware, you will be left out on what God's currently doing to change the world.

If you're just paralyzingly, you got the fear of man in you.

I like the way Andrew Wilson says it.

He says, We serve a speaking God who talks to his people throughout the Bible.

We are sons and daughters of a loving Father.

Who wants a relationship with his children?

We are the bride of Christ, and husbands and wives talk to each other.

We aren't employed as slaves or servants, but welcomed as friends, and friends talk to each other.

We are the sheep of our great shepherd, and sheep know their master's voice.

We are a body in which people prophesy, speak words of wisdom and knowledge, and use other spiritual gifts to edify each other.

We may get ourselves into muddle and silliness sometimes, but as Christians, we are those who hear the voice of God.

When a person becomes a Christian, God puts his spirit in them.

And so the Christian, being a Christian is not a matter of going through life trying to discern what God is saying.

You got to do that.

But listen, it's not just trying to figure out a puzzle.

I'm trying to discern what God is saying.

Being a Christian means you have the capacity to demonstrate what God is saying and doing.

Do you hear the difference in those two?

I'm not saying don't be discerning.

I'm not saying set discernment aside.

Yes, discern and then actually do.

Does that make sense?

Say amen.

Like back in July, well, my wife and I were in Pensacola hanging out with our father.

Now, people on staff here are like, oh man, you took four days.

What do you do at Pensacola?

You go to the beach, didn't see the beach.

Beautiful beach in Pensacola.

And if you go further east, it gets more beautiful.

You got Rosemary Beach, you got 30A, you got all this stuff.

Incredible.

Didn't see a grain of sand while I was there.

I said, I just played to one of the guys on staff.

I said, hey, took my father-in-law, my father-in-law out to eat.

He likes he eats like breakfast, like a bite of something.

And then about 2:30, he's ready for lunch.

And that's the only meal he eats all day.

And so we lived in that world.

We redid his flower beds, trimmed trees, hauled stuff off, did this, got the air conditioner fixed.

We're there about four days.

Thursday, we're leaving Friday morning at like four in the morning because I like to get up and go.

So Thursday afternoon, about 4:30, 5 o'clock, my wife texts me and said, Oh, my dad needs Picani sauce.

We forgot to get that.

I'm like, ooh.

Okay, I'll go.

And so I'm driving to Target, and all of a sudden on my left, I look and I see a Wind Dixie, a Wind Dixie grocery store.

Like, oh, that's closer to Target.

Whip in things built in like 1976.

So I'm like, ooh, this is not good.

And so I find the Picani sauce.

I go get in line.

This is my confession of the day.

When I'm in a hurry, I want the whole world to speed up.

Okay, and so I get up there and I pick.

There's like six people in that line, four in that one, seventeen in that one.

There's one in this one.

I'm like, suckers! I get up there and there's a person reaching in.

There's an older woman in front of the car.

There's a person reaching in and grabbing things one by one.

I didn't pay attention to the guy behind her.

And she picks it up and she looks at it.

And I'm just like, for the love, lady, you're not gonna eat it here.

Put it on the conveyor belt before I put you on the conveyor belt.

I got one item.

Why don't you look back and see me and wave me through?

Like faster golfers play through, okay?

And I'm just kind of sitting there, and this goes on for about three minutes, which is an eternity.

I'm like, I gotta get up at four in the morning, okay?

I'm done serving people.

I'm ready to get back to what I want to do.

And all of a sudden, I mean, maybe five minutes.

She reaches over and gets the last thing and puts it on there.

And then she turns around and looks at me, and in that nanosecond, I realize this is a mentally challenged adult.

Yeah.

And I'm like, I'm going to hell on a slipping slide.

I'm going to hell on a slipping slide covered with razor blades, soaked in isopropyl alcohol.

And I'm just like, and I even I just kind of put my head down.

I was like, Lord, I am so sorry.

Um, and I just hear the Lord just giggling.

And then this desire swells up in me that says, pay for her groceries.

And it wasn't penance for all you former Catholics.

It wasn't like, I had a bad thought, I gotta pay you back.

It's like, I was like, Lord, what do you involve me in?

And so I just took a second.

I'm discerning, I'm discerning over.

I'm like, I'm that that is you, and now I'm doing.

So the girl had walked up past her mom and standing at the in.

There's like a 17-year-old checkout girl and the sacker who smoked weed every day of his life.

He's like, hey, bro.

I'm like, dude, you are headed to schizophrenia.

Stop smoking weed, okay?

Uh but I just walk up, the lady's reaching in her purse, and I walk up to her and I say, Excuse me, man, wouldn't it bless you if I paid for your groceries?

And she put her bill phone right back in her purse and said, Why, yes, it would.

And I said, and the the seven-hero checkout girl is like, and I said, Yeah, just just bag all that up.

Hey, hey, hey, hey, Bill and Ted's excellent adventure.

Bag it up.

And I got my pecanic sauce in my hand, and I just said, and this is my beconic sauce.

And I scanned it myself.

I said, ring it up.

And the girl's like, Oh my gosh.

Well, and Bill and Ted over here, it's freaking awesome, bro.

I'm not your bro, okay?

I stopped what you're doing back in 1982, but I digress.

And so the girl's standing there, and the lady's like, and so I'm I'm like, Lord, thank you.

Yes, I I'm reminded I am a Christian.

And the lady getting all her stuff, the older you get, the more junk you got in your purse.

Because she's trying to get it down in there and zip it up, and finally she gets it zipped up.

And then she, I've kind of recovered from that boom, that first punch.

And then she just turns to me, hadn't said a word, and she says, My mom's in hospice.

Oh, I said, I am so sorry to hear that.

I said, What's your name?

And she tells me, she's a matter of fact, these groceries are for her.

I'm gonna tell her a total stranger paid for them.

Now, unless you think I'm all big and generous and noble, I'm not.

It was like$42.

Okay?

It wasn't like an astronomical amount.

Uh, and I said, Man, I am so sorry.

I'm gonna be praying for your mom.

And I said, It's worse than just a total stranger.

I don't even live here.

I'm from Texas, and I believe that God sent me in here to meet you and to get this Pican sauce.

Check out, girl, it's like, do I hit total now or is there more to come?

Bill and Ted's got it yoked up.

The adult daughter of the woman is putting the bags in slow motion in the cart, and the dude's like, Man, this is awesome.

This is awesome.

And I'm like, stop talking.

And I went up my credit card, and the girl's like, Are you really gonna do this?

Can't, yeah.

And I grabbed my pecani sauce and I said, Look at me.

And I said, How old do you?

I don't have anything.

Evil doesn't win.

It's easy to live in this world and turn on the nose and just think the world's going to hell in the handbasket.

It's every man for himself.

Oh my gosh, let's just get out there.

And I said, Evil doesn't win.

And every once in a while, the God just kind of interrupts my life and says, Hey, hey, Potse, okay, don't miss this.

Evil doesn't win.

I don't know what you're like.

I don't know if you go to church, I don't know if you believe in God, but evil doesn't win.

And I realize I've got the pecan sauce above my head like a trophy.

And the dude's like, Bagging boy's like, hey, bro, calm down, calm down.

I will club you like a pup seal, son.

Shut up.

And I walk to the door of the wind dicks, it opens up, and I just turned around.

Evil doesn't win, everybody.

Walk to my car.

And I'm halfway through the parking lot, and that little voice in me says, That's all I wanted to announce.

Thank you for listening.

I said, I'm not saying discern, but don't get stuck in discerning.

You discern so God can involve you in doing.

The reason a lot of people have wrong thoughts about God is because Christians don't listen to the Holy Spirit and walk in the Spirit and do not live interesting lives at all.

I don't mean to the people in this room, I mean to the people out there.

I'm walking out in the parking lot, people coming out.

I got one thing about the part way out there.

One lady walks by their daughter and she says, That was that was incredible.

And I was like, oh, because my big takeaway, who pastors the 17-year-old?

Who pastors that kid?

Who look, look in her eye, like I don't stand a chance, dude.

My life is so screwed up.

If you're gonna have spiritual conversations that change people, here's the fourth thing from the text: you have to understand what evangelism is.

You have to understand what evangelism is.

Verse 30.

He says, So the spirit said to Philip, Go over and join this chariot.

Verse 30.

So Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, Do you understand what you're reading?

And he said, How can I unless someone guides me?

And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.

Now, the passage of scripture that he was reading was this.

It's from Isaiah, talking about Jesus, like a sheep.

By the way, this has just happened.

This is fresh in Philip's mind.

This was a prophecy from the book of Isaiah that has been fulfilled.

Like a sheep, he was led to the slaughter like a lamb before its shear is silent.

So he opened not his mouth.

In his humiliation, justice was denied him.

Who can describe his generation?

For his life is taken away from the earth.

And the eunuch said to Philip, He reads the Bible and he's got questions.

About whom I ask you, does the prophet say this?

About himself or about someone else?

By the way, if you're a student and you read the Bible and you've got questions, we have a great ministry here at our church called Alpha.

It is for people that have questions.

It meets at 5 30 in the warehouse right back here.

You're welcome.

Your questions are welcome.

The people you go to school with and their questions are welcome as well.

No one's going to try to convert you.

We do want to engage with you in a conversation.

So if you've got any questions about that, see any of our staff, we'd love to give you information because here's a guy in the Bible that is reading the Bible and he's like, dude, I don't understand.

This guy talking about himself or about someone else.

This is you got to understand what evangelism is.

Evangelism is basically three things.

Number one, it's you listening for the invitation.

It's you listening for the invitation.

The invitation for Philip was when the guy said, Hey, come up here and sit beside me.

How can I understand this unless someone explains it to him?

The problem with most Christians in America is when someone invites us up alongside them, we become more like them.

They don't become more like us.

So evangelism is you listening for the invitation.

Secondly, it's you joining the conversation that's already been going on.

It's already been ongoing for a long time.

You're joining a conversation.

You're not the first person to bring this up.

You say, What do you mean?

Many people come in from a bad Saturday night, and their last thought for they drift off to sleep was, God, I'm sorry.

Could you please forgive me?

The conversation's been going in their head for a while.

Therefore, you don't need to reinvent the wheel.

You just need to calibrate your words to the pace of the wheel that's been turning in them for a while.

Here's the third thing evangelism is it's you being the second person to talk.

It's verse 35.

Then Philip opened his mouth.

This is the hardest thing when having a spiritual conversation, yet it's the most necessary because you responding to their questions, it's you responding.

If you're the second person to talk, then you're responding to their questions.

You're not trying to convince them of what they what they believe to be your opinion.

You're responding to their question.

And when you when you listen, you tend to ask better questions.

I was meeting with someone in counseling uh not too long ago.

And the more this person talked, the more I was like, I'm not listening to the behavior.

I hear the behavior, it doesn't bother me at all.

I'm listening for the appetite that's driving this behavior.

And clear as the veil of the Holy Spirit said, Ask this question.

And I just said, What do you believe about God that keeps you from trusting Him?

And this person said, Excuse me.

And I said, What do you believe about God that keeps you from trusting God?

Because I'm not here to try to say some cute little phrase and make you obligated to trust God.

There's something you believe that makes God a bad option for you.

And I want to understand it.

Maybe I shouldn't trust him either.

And this person said, No, you should trust him.

And I said, Then why don't you?

And then here it came out on the table.

And I said, Wow, that would be hard to trust God.

I'm not saying impossible, but it would make it difficult to trust God.

I said, You remind me of the story in the Bible.

Oh, really?

Where am I in the Bible?

Mark chapter 2, these guys brought a paralyzed man, tried to get him to Jesus, and the Bible says they couldn't get him to Jesus because of the crowd.

Mark 2 · chapter mention

So they had to go around and dig a hole in the roof.

The crowd of people that you experienced at church when you were younger has caused you to doubt God.

Yeah, that's an understatement.

Okay, easy, easy.

Calm down.

Would you like some coffee?

Yeah.

I would flip the question on you and ask you what do you believe about God that keeps you from trusting Him?

See, if you're gonna evangelism, if you once you understand what evangelism really is, it's not you closing the deal.

Coffee's for closers, buddy.

Always be closing.

Sometimes it's you plant, sometimes it's you water.

But here's what always is you've got to believe that God causes the increase.

So you're not obligated to make something happen.

You just gotta be faithful to what you know God's leading you to do in that moment.

Here's the last thing I see from the text.

If you're gonna have uh spiritually spiritual conversations that change people, you gotta be gospel fluid.

Look at verse 35.

You still with me?

Verse 35.

Then Philip opened his mouth.

Finally, when the guy's done, here's my big question, bro.

Then Philip opened his mouth and hear this next phrase.

In beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus.

In beginning with this scripture, I used to have a professor that would walk around and he would just flip the pages of your Bible that was on your desk in class, and he'd just put his finger down and go, preach me the gospel from right there.

Read that out loud.

And he'd read out loud, he goes, get to Jesus from there.

Go.

And I was always like, please don't let it be in the Old Testament when he comes by my desk.

And he would never go to the New Testament, by the way, Greg Alexander.

It was always the Old Testament.

He's like, Oh, you New Testament junkies, Jesus is easy.

You got to be able to get to Jesus.

And he'd turn to Exodus and just put his finger down.

And you're like, and you'd read it and he would say, Can you get to Jesus from there?

Uh well, you are not gospel fluent, son.

You do not speak fluent gospel.

They said of Spurgeon, the great English preacher, his blood was bibline.

You prick him anywhere, and he bleeds the Bible.

You boys do not believe.

He called us boys, too.

We want to be offended.

One guy asked him about halfway through the semester, why do you call us boys?

Because you are.

You're boys.

You don't even know what you're doing.

Your grandma's paying for your education.

And some church is going to have to raise you.

Yeah, that's the way they used to talk to you in seminary.

Now it's like, hey guys, a quiz is not going to hurt you and dysregulate your mental health, is it?

Because we don't have to have a quiz.

Are you okay?

Tell me about your weekend, and I'll tell you if I'm going to give you a quiz.

Now I had the old guys that said, you are going to stand up in front of God and you are going to represent God to your people.

Some of you should quit.

Do the church a favor and quit today.

That's a quote from one of my seminary professors.

And I look to my buddy on my right and go, he's talking to you, bro.

Yes.

So I get it.

Being gospel fluid is not knowing everything.

Look at me.

We're almost done.

You for being done, say amen.

I hate you people.

I hope your team loses today.

Yeah.

Being gospel fluid, look at me.

It's not, I know everything, but you can pick up wherever people are, and you can look at what he says.

He says, and then Philip opened his mouth and beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus.

Now, the dude, you got to read the Bible like it's like it's written.

It says in verse 36, and as they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, See, here's water.

What prevents me from being baptized?

Most of you, especially if you come to faith later in life, you're like, Well, you know, I was baptized when I was 11.

I was Christian, blah, blah, blah.

You're not like the eunuch.

Here's how you know you've genuinely been converted.

You got no object.

What baptized?

There's water right there.

Stop the chariot.

I'm getting off.

And you're coming with me.

Well, you know, I don't want to hurt my mom's feelings.

I think your faith is in your mom, not in Jesus.

And I always point to this.

When's the last time you saw someone get this excited about water?

Look there.

Read it like it's written.

Look at the punctuation.

See?

Here is water exclamation point.

What prevents me from getting baptized?

Nothing.

That's a good idea.

Why wait?

We're gonna have a baptismal Sunday and baptize a bunch of people, make our church look more successful than it really is.

Now, see, let's do it right now.

Here's gospel fluent.

Jeff Vandersfeldt wrote a book called Gospel Fluency.

Uh and in the book he says this a person is gospel fluent when the gospel becomes their mother tongue.

They see the world through that filter, they hear the world through that filter, and they know how to speak the truths of the gospel, the truths of Jesus into the everyday stuff of life.

Marcy and I would take our girls there a little to movies.

And at the end of it, we'd walk it out and say, Where'd you see the gospel?

Because I want my kids to train their eye to see the gospel.

My oldest Madison went to see True Grit, the remake by the Cohen brothers.

Oh, so good.

I said, Where'd you see the gospel?

And she goes, Well, you know, uh-huh.

I said, Did you realize that the soundtrack has different arrangements of the old hymn, Leaning on the Everlasting Arms?

And sometimes it's just a piano.

And at the end, when the credits are rolling, it's a lady named Iris Dement who sings like someone's choking a chicken.

Why not fellowship, my joy divine.

And she's like, I don't get it, Dad.

And I said, when she got snake bit, we've all been snake bit with sin, Madison.

And we ain't gonna make it.

Rooster Cogburn gets up on that horse, that beast of burden, and ha! He's stabbing the horse with a knife.

She's like, Don't hurt the horse.

Gotta get her there to that cabin or she's gonna die.

That's Jesus.

We got to get there.

And the whole time, the Cohen brothers, Jewish men who make great movies, better than Christian movies, about your football team.

And the soft soundtrack played underneath it is a cello playing, leaning on their everlasting arms.

I said, babe, they're leaning on their everlasting arms for their salvation without telling us what they're doing.

That's where I see the gospel.

And she's like, Yeah, Dad, I didn't see that, but now you say it.

Yes! Yes.

Train your eye to see and hear the gospel.

Here's the last thing I want to point out.

Look down at the very end.

Verse 39.

When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch saw him no more and went on his way rejoicing.

Look at me.

How do people walk away from conversations with you?

If you want to know how effective you are at having spiritual conversations, ask yourself a really practical question.

How do people walk away from the conversation with you?

Because this Ethiopian eunuch who's the secretary of the treasury, he's over the over the treasury, all the money of Candace, the queen of Ethiopia.

He walks away, he's like, I'm so glad I met that cat.

What was his name again?

Yeah.

Yeah, Philip didn't pass out cards.

Hey, I've got a minister.

Run alongside chariots.

If you've got any friends coming through, let me know.

The entrepreneurial spirit is taking the church.

We gotta monetize everything.

Instead of just being the free people, they're just walking in the spirit.

Listen, we live in the spirit.

Why?

To remind everybody around us that that's another way of doing life.

And when people see that in you, guess what?

They want to have more conversations with you.

So just ask yourself this simple question: how do people leave the conversation with you?

Later in Acts, we'll get to Acts chapter 17.

Acts 17 · chapter mention

It's very, very conflictual.

Paul's talking to this place called the Auropagus, those smart people.

It's kind of like Harvard married Cambridge and had a bunch of smart babies.

And Paul is just smoking these fools.

It's like the end of the movie, the rap battles from the movie Eight Mile.

One pock, two pock, three pock, four.

Four pock, three pock, two pock, none.

He's just killing them.

Ward, I think you're a little hard on the beaver.

And they're just like, ah, and these people are so offended.

And guess what they say?

They say, You're bringing some strange ideas to our ears.

Next sentence.

We want to hear you more on this.

They walked away rejoicing.

How do people walk away from a spiritual conversation with you?

Let's pray together.

You're our guests, relax.

We like to teach the Bible and give you some space to think about it.

That's what this time is.

Some questions come up on the screen.

Those are for your consideration.

Don't try to write them down.

There's a lot of them this week.

Because I want you to think.

Take a picture with your phone, whatever.

Let me voice a prayer.

Father, thank you that we can have conversations that are transformative.

Not because we're we're we're whipping people with the guilt stick, but because we're the freest cat in the room and we're gospel fluent.

Whatever they bring up, we can bring the guy, we can get to Jesus from there.

It's not a leap or a stretch or some kind of contortionist little thing.

No, it is straight up gospel fluency.

I know myself and I know the word, and I trust the Holy Spirit.

Let's go.

This is my kind of party.

Holy Spirit, be on us and brood over us.

Some people in here they got cut to the quick talking about baptism.

Some people, it's about living in the spirit.

Like, what does that mean?

Oh, Holy Spirit, would you press that in on us?

Brood over us now.

Love on us.

You didn't come to whip us today, you came to love on us to remind us, or as Jesus said, to lead us into the truth.

So, Holy Spirit, come and do right now what Jesus said you would do.

Lead us into the truth.

It's never not appropriate because it's the good news.

And the text said that Philip starting that verse tells him the good news about Jesus.

The good news is about Jesus, the good news is not about our church, it's not about About our preacher, it's not about our kids' ministry, it's not about our thriving student ministry.

The good news is about Jesus.

That's what people need to know.

It's not about religion, it's about Jesus that came to make available a relationship to everybody, regardless of what you've done.

The voice of God is just arcing out.

His barbaric yawp drones across the rooftops of the world.

And he's saying the same thing he's always said.

Ollie, Ali and free.

Come out, come out wherever you are.

I'm here to change you.

Lord, give us ears to hear.

Give us moments this week where we get to bring the gospel to bear on conversations.

We're not here to tie people up, we're here to set people free.

That's what you came to do.

So use us to be a part of that.

Remind us that our job is just what we have to pay the bills.

That is not our purpose.

Our purpose is to be these kinds of people.

Thank you for that.

We say thank you in Jesus' name.

And everyone said, Amen, amen.

If you're a guest, I'm gonna say thanks for being here.

You're always welcome, all right?

If you're a guest and you like you're cynical, you got questions, you're skeptical, you're always welcome.

I want to buy you a cup of coffee, breakfast, lunch.

I want to take you to dinner.

I want to get to know your story, all right?

I don't think you're a project, I think you're a person.

Uh, and so I'd do anything I can to help you understand this great God that we're talking about today, okay?

Uh and so we've always got stuff going on in the life of our church for our guests and for our members.

And so here's some opportunities we want you to be aware of by way of our video announcements.

Here's what's happening at Grand Parkway Baptist Church.

If you're new, text welcome to 281-626-5707.

This way we can know you're here and get you connected with the church.

Hey, my name is Marcy McClendon.

I'm the women's and local outreach pastor here at Grand Parkway, and I want to tell you about something really great coming up.

Our church has been placed at a crossroads that geographically reflects the very truth God has given us to take to our neighbors.

In some of his last words on earth, Jesus said to make sure all nations know that salvation is possible because a good God came looking for us in our darkness and made a way out.

He said to start in Jerusalem and move out from there.

October Outreach is a chance for us to do the same thing with our Jerusalem and to live our lives with such kindness, such generosity and intentionality with our neighbors that it will require explanation.

October Outreach offers four ways for us all to love our neighbors.

We want you and your family to pick one and jump in on the movement to reach our neighbors with the best news ever.

October 3rd is National Night Out.

We want as many of us as possible to be the house on our street where the party is.

October 17th, we'll be at Neary's Promise for Bible study and a warm meal for a big bunch of precious children who live in the midst of generational poverty.

October 27th, we'll be working the Carnival Booths at Orster Creek Elementary Blue Jay Festival, which is a half mile from our church.

Every child who attends this school is from a family who lives within earshot of our church, many without Christ.

October 31st is the ESL Fall Party and an opportunity to sit and visit with these courageous students, letting them practice their English in casual conversation.

For all the details on October Outreach and to register, head to our website or the Mission Center in the lobby.

Just pick one, Let's Love Our Neighbors this October.

Ovidio, our international missions partner from Romania, and his family will be here next week, September 17th, to give us an update on their ministry and upcoming ways we can get involved.

September 17th is also the beginning of community groups.

They're great ways for getting plugged in and making meaningful connections.

You can find them under our Connect page on grandparkway.org.

If you have any questions or want someone to pray for you, find one of our pastors at the front of the stage at the conclusion of our service.

By the way, uh I sent you an email, but just by way of reminder, a video will be he'll be sharing our service uh next week.

But Chris Brooks, our friend from Nashville, or y'all call him the bearded crazy guy, will be here preaching next Sunday.

Uh somebody said, Are you gonna be here?

Yes, I'm gonna be in the lobby pestering your kids and drinking coffee.

Uh uh, but also uh you may be wondering, you saw those four squares for the missions uh center.

If you go out in these doors and go right, it's right there on that wall, right there's a big flat screen TV, right to the left of that is each each one of those opportunities for October outreach.

Just open up the camera and your phone, hover over those things, and you can sign up, okay?

It takes about a minute.

So on your way out, I want to encourage you to get your phone, just click and just come and help us be who the Bible says we are, and help us remind people that hey, this same God came for you as well, okay?

Through practical acts of service and love.

Got it?

We'd like to conclude our service with a smoking blessing.

So stand on your feet.

Hold your hands out.