CORE VALUES: Gospel

This podcast is the Ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church.

For more information on our church, please visit Grandparkway.org.

If you've got a Bible, I invite you to take it and open it up to 1 Corinthians chapter 15.

1 Corinthians 15 · chapter mention

We'll uh we'll kind of start there as kind of a jumping off spot.

If you've uh been at our church very long, you realize we preach expositorily, which means we go through books of the Bible.

And right right now we're in the book of Romans, and we're gonna pick back that up in February, first Sunday in February, but we want to take the month of January.

We've kind of re-expressed our core values, and we want to just take a month, take a Sunday.

All the four Sundays in January, we're gonna talk about our core values, which are simply four.

And by core values, we mean these are the four things that shape the decisions we make as a church.

And so I met some folks who are new to our church and just checking out a church.

This is a great Sunday to be here because this is what we're about, this is what we're passionate about, this is what keeps us kind of on track.

We believe, doing what God's called us to do.

Our four core values are simply this gospel, community, mission, and blessing.

In other words, we're people of the gospel, and I'll talk about that today about the gospel.

And then next Sunday, the gospel produces a community of people that have a shared belief, and those community people are on a shared mission, not missions.

So two Sundays from now, we'll talk about mission, not missions, like going all over the place.

Bart and Heather Cardi, uh, some of our missionaries that came out of this church will be in our service.

I don't know if they're here.

I think they'll be in our next service.

Uh, and so mission, being missional is about being intentional.

Uh and then finally, we'll talk about blessing.

We believe that God's blessed us and we'll be a blessing.

That doesn't mean we're all going to be rich.

The Bible never says that.

Never does.

Uh it just doesn't.

But it says that you'll be a blessing.

I'll bless you, and you'll be a blessing.

It means on Christmas Day that we had so much food left over, we could take something to our neighbors who didn't have any, who's too sick to cook, and we could just ring the doorbell and say, we just want to bless you in Jesus' name.

They think I am awesome.

They're so deceived.

Uh but they just think I'm great.

And I just tell them, hey, really, it's just God's blessing.

And they said, Man, you you are the most generous person I know.

I'm like, you need to get out of your house and meet some people.

Uh but that's what we're talking about when we say blessing.

So anybody can be a blessing.

I don't want to preach that sermon today, but I just want to tell you, this is what we value as a church.

But the main, and by the way, they're sequential.

The gospel produces a community of people.

These community of people are on a shared mission.

We kind of live with this sense of intentionality.

And the easiest way that expresses itself is that we get to be a blessing.

That means that sometimes when you invite people to play, you invite somebody to play golf and you pay for it.

Unless you're like my friends.

And I got some friends that we'll go play golf, and I get there and I go, hey, have y'all checked in?

No, we're waiting for you to get here.

Translation, we ain't paying because we thought you may pay, because we think you're generous.

Okay, Wade and Lance, I got it.

Come on, let's go.

But today it starts with the gospel.

The gospel.

Now, what do you mean by the gospel?

Without a doubt, the clearest expression of the gospel.

Gospel, by the way, means good news.

Good news.

One of the clearest expressions of the good news of Christianity is found in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verse 1.

1 Corinthians 15:1

Paul says, Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preach to you, unless you believed in vain.

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received.

That Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures.

Pause.

Aren't you glad?

Don't ever get over that.

Don't ever move past the simplicity of the gospel, that Jesus died for a screwed-up wretch like me.

That Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures.

And he was buried.

He was raised on the third day, in accordance with the scriptures, and then he appeared to Cephas, and then to the twelve, and then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep.

And then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.

Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.

See, the Bible tells us the gospel is not just it's the life, the death, the burial, and the resurrection of Jesus.

It's this verifiable, objective, historical reality.

That is the gospel.

And that's why it's a core value for this church.

It's the reason we turn the lights on, it's the reason we run the air.

It's the reason we do anything we do, it's because we believe the gospel.

And I want to give you three things today that I want to ask you to do.

Number one, I'm gonna talk to you this morning about knowing the gospel.

I want you to know the gospel.

I don't want you to ever outgrow the gospel.

Don't think you're so smart, like I got that.

The gospel is not a prayer you pray that kind of gets you into Christianity.

No, no, no.

It is the air you breathe.

It's the waitress that waved on me the other day, and we got to talking, and she said, Well, we're all God's children, aren't we, Neil?

And there I am at the fork in the road.

You know, the fork in the road where you're kind of like, I don't want to make this awkward, but we're not all God's children by nature.

We by nature are children of our objects of wrath.

We by nature are sinful, fallen people in need of redemption.

If we're all, quote unquote, God's children, then why does Jesus have to die?

In accordance with the scriptures.

And if Jesus doesn't have to die, then this is all a myth, and the Bible's not reliable.

See how necessary to everyday living the gospel is.

And by the way, I didn't say, oh, that's not the truth.

The Bible says.

I just said, hey, uh, let me let me encourage you to think about something.

If we're all God's children, then why does Jesus have to die?

Oh, I didn't think about that.

Well, maybe maybe that'd be a thing you think about.

And so I got to the end of the meal, and very clearly that little voice in my head said, tip her this much so she never forgets this.

Are you sure?

Because I think$10 would be plenty if she never forget this.

This meal is barely that much.

Uh but I said, Hey, I want you to think about this, and this is just a little token reminder that by the way, think about this.

Jesus came and died for a reason.

He didn't just live and die and bury and rose again.

He appeared to people.

This verify, objective reality.

But I don't talk to you, I want you to know the gospel.

Secondly, I want you to live the gospel.

And then thirdly, I want you to share the gospel.

And we'll finish by looking at the book of Acts at different passages about how they shared the gospel.

Because if we're not careful, I think the church in America has gotten so creative and so slick and corporate that we don't preach the gospel they preach anymore.

Like I got back from well, I won't go into that.

Never mind.

You ever have more thoughts than you have words?

That's the way I am about the gospel.

Okay, let me just say this.

I wasn't gonna say it, but I'm gonna say I went to I went to see my in-laws and I got back for a week in Florida.

It was great, and I got back, and somebody had stuck under my door.

Uh, what I was gonna say is the gospel that the church in America preaches is really not a gospel, it's a creative expression of how awesome we are.

And and somebody stuck under my door a newspaper article about a church in our state somewhere, and the pastor was on the stage, and he was preaching from inside a life-size snow globe.

And I just wanted to smoke.

I was just like, that's what I'm talking about.

I made my New Year's resolution to be happier and shinier, and already I've blown it.

And I was just like, really?

Is this what Jesus died for?

Ah!

Anyway.

See, I my my my concern is you'll see just a little bit later on, that when we come to sharing the gospel, the gospel is not what our church is doing.

When you reduce the gospel down to the size of your church's activities, you have a cult, not the gospel.

The gospel's bigger and expansive than that.

Here's a mental image of the gospel, then we'll get into the outline.

When I was about seven years old, my stepmother told me, hey, we had a dishwasher that wasn't under the counter.

We had one of those dishwashers you roll out of the pantry and it had a little handle and you hooked it up to the faucet.

Have you ever seen one of those dishwashers?

Hooked that bad.

We thought we were rich.

We're like white trash out in the country.

And she said, you know, start the dishwasher.

And so I went and got the palm olive green dish soap and put it and put it in the Oh yeah, you know where this is going, right?

You did that too.

And so I put it in there, closed it up, hit start, and about 30 minutes later, my dad came out of the kitchen.

I mean, turning the air blue.

Oh, blah, blah, blah.

It was knee deep in suds.

It was just flowing out of that.

And you couldn't get it shut off.

And my dad looked at us and said, Hey, hey, what's wrong with you?

Why are you so stupid?

Who's stupid?

I didn't know what to put in there.

You know what to put in there, but you didn't tell me who's the stupid one.

Now I didn't say that.

But I thought it.

And so my dad said, Well, there's nothing you can do.

You gotta let it run its cycle.

And my dad let us play in the suds in the kitchen.

They just kept foaming out that thing.

It was awesome.

The gospel's like that.

It just keeps coming.

It just gets more expansive and more expansive.

I remember we were scooping it up and trying to put it down the sink.

You ever try to put suds down the sink?

You might as well just learn to enjoy it.

And what I'm saying to you today is look at me, beloved.

You once you know the gospel, it enhances your capacity to enjoy the gospel.

No, why know the gospel?

What do you mean?

Paul says, hey, I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel that I preached to you.

Why does he have to remind these people?

Because we forget.

We get too smart for the gospel.

We think, oh man, oh, well, you know, I got this.

You know, I became a Christian when I was eight.

The gospel is not just how you become a Christian, it's how you live as a Christian.

Paul's reminding these people because they forget.

They want to move on to something deeper and more mature.

And I want to say to you, you never move beyond the gospel.

And here's why.

Here's why you should know the gospel.

Number one, the gospel is the defining characteristic of the church.

The gospel is the defining characteristic of the church.

We are the church in as much as we demonstrate a fidelity to the gospel and all its ramifications.

When we cease being faithful to the gospel, we stop being the church.

We're just a bunch of people that get together and we say, hey, how creative can we be, or how whatever can we be?

We are the church.

In as much as we are faithful to the gospel.

So the gospel is a defining characteristic of the church.

If you're looking for a church, find ones that preaches the gospel.

Not just how you become a Christian.

Because I had deep thoughts.

I did not become a Christian until I was 18, but I went to church some as a teenager, and I had deep thoughts.

And one of my deep thoughts was why is every Sunday wired up around getting these people to make a decision?

None of them live like it.

Maybe they shouldn't even make a decision.

But every Sunday, it was starting at 11, it ended at noon, and it always ended with this long, drawn-out invitation thing where the guy would say, if no one else comes, we're going to sing one more verse.

If no one else comes, and I'm the only person in the back thinking, no one's came.

You sang six verses.

Let us go.

Because it felt like, and probably none of you grew up in a church like this.

But they felt like they had to like make something happen to justify our being there.

Because the invitation was where we kind of evaluated the service if anybody went forward or not.

And I just want to say the evaluation of the gospel doesn't happen down here, down front on Sunday.

It happens at your workplace on Monday.

When one of your friends says, hey, let me see you, let me show you this picture I found on the internet.

Great opportunity for the gospel.

Hey, did you hear that joke about President Obama?

Great opportunity for the gospel.

You see, that's what defines us as the church.

Secondly, I would say, well, I know the gospel.

The gospel is the story of Christ.

Paul tells us that God has made provision for man's deepest need and greatest problem in Christ.

He said, He said, What do you mean?

He says he died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures.

If we were not sinners by nature and by choice, why does Christ have to die?

The gospel is the story of Christ.

It's not my story and your story.

And we talk about, you'll hear people talk about it in the past where people get up and say, Hi, my name's John, and my story is, and you're gonna hear more of that in the new year.

People tell their story.

We want people to tell their story, but we have a story because the story of Jesus is true.

Does that make sense?

My story finds expression in the context of God's story.

I am a part of what God is doing.

God is not a part of what I'm doing.

Make sure you get the order right.

The gospel doesn't begin like I became a Christian on July 5th, 1982, about 9.30 at night.

The gospel didn't start with, well, I as a teenager, I was heavily involved in drugs and alcohol, and I came to the point of frustration and desperation in my life, and just just aloneness, realizing that my life wasn't.

That's not when the gospel starts.

The gospel starts with in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

And the earth was void and formless, and darkness was hovering over the waters, and the Spirit of God was hovering over that.

That's when the gospel begins.

From the very first page, very first word of the Bible, the good news that God has for humanity is kind of just hovering, the Spirit of God is just hovering over the waters.

Third thing about why you should know the gospel, and I should know the gospel, and I should think about the gospel.

Third reason is this a right understanding of the gospel is the ultimate motivation for worship.

A right understanding of the gospel is the ultimate motivation for worship.

Now, if you're visiting today, you may be thinking, man, this is kind of heady.

I don't know if I get this.

This is not a heady church.

This is not a church for like engineers and scientists or whatever.

Uh what I mean is that when you rightly understand the gospel, that God reveals himself to you and you respond and your mind is blown because we believe in a big God.

We believe that God is who the Bible said he is, that he's infinitely wise, and he's always available.

But when you believe, when you understand that this God in mercy reveals himself to you, your knees are kind of buckled by the reality that a God like this would reveal himself to somebody like you.

I don't know.

Does anybody remember what you were like before you became a Christian?

Hello?

Yeah, yeah.

Don't forget that.

I know church people say, oh, you know, that's in your past, you should forget that.

In some ways, yes.

But to understand and have proper motivation for worship, you should never forget that.

So you can just kind of go, man, that's who I used to be.

And despite all my New Year's resolutions, I couldn't change myself.

Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.

All the king's horses and all the king's men and all the Prozac and all the red wine and all the money in the world couldn't fix me.

But God, who's rich in mercy, made me alive in Christ Jesus.

See, when you understand the gospel rightly, is that a gospel that's not rooted in preference but in mercy?

Because, see, if your gospel is rooted in preference, like there's people that come up and say, Well, you make it sound like God did everything in salvation and we did nothing, that's exactly right.

That's exactly right.

You're a good listener.

Oh, no, Pastor, that's not true.

I believe that God made it available, and then I had to choose Christ, not the gospel.

Not the gospel.

You and I, Ephesians chapter 2, don't turn there.

Ephesians 2 · chapter mention

Ephesians chapter 2, verse 1 says that we were dead in our trespasses and sins in which we used to live when we followed the ways of this world.

Ephesians 2:1

Spiritually dead people cannot all of a sudden get up and choose Jesus.

That's impossible.

Does not happen.

God, in his mercy, because see, here's what we want to do.

We want to be able to point at something and say, I did this.

Therefore, I can kind of take credit for that.

And not only that, but going forward, since I kind of did this, then I've also got a list of things that needs to happen for me to feel motivated to worship God and to thank God.

Because if you did something, then you're always gonna kind of be lacking sufficient motivation.

You come to church and it's like, well, I hope we sing my favorite song, or I hope we sing this, or since Christmas Eve, I hope we start having a choir.

Oh, yeah.

And I'm all for a choir.

Don't tell anybody.

It was my idea.

I said to the cloud, hey, why don't we have a Christmas Eve choir?

It's gonna be packed in here.

That'll be great.

And I think it'll sound great.

Well, if you were here, wasn't that great?

Didn't you love that?

That was incredible.

No, don't clap, it'll just get the rumor going.

And so somebody came up to me.

I mean, I know more said uh the the Christmas Eve blessing, and you're dismissed, and kids begin to run up here and grab poinsettas and kick people over.

And somebody came to me and said, We should have a choir every Sunday.

I said, That's a great idea.

Go tell Clyde.

He's the worship pastor.

I'm not.

And that person's like, Oh, you'd be for that?

And I, sure, it's not my deal.

I don't care what you do.

Go tell Clyde.

That person, like a snow plow, begin to plow through people and get to Clyde.

Clyde looked at me like, Thanks, appreciate you.

Got it.

Awesome.

Here's what I'm saying: a right understanding of the gospel, you could sing the phok.

And that person doesn't need any external simulation.

We don't need certain songs, we don't need choir, ensemble, glee club, whatever you got going on.

This needs the opportunity to open my mouth and say, Hallelujah.

All I have is Christ.

But what makes that okay is hallelujah, Jesus is my life.

Jesus is my life.

So this is great.

Awesome.

Make it happen.

You see, and you say, well, I don't, we mean know the gospel and you never outgrow the gospel.

As you grow as a Christian and you mature as a Christian, listen carefully.

Don't you misunderstand me?

There are discoveries that you will make about the gospel, about the good news, about the truth of God is contained in the Bible.

But there are discoveries that you will make that will be so overwhelming, you'll be thinking, how did I mean, oh my gosh, there's no.

And with it, matter of fact, Keith Green, the Christian singer, you ever heard of him, the old guy from like the 70s?

At one point he walked into his wife and said, I think I just got saved.

And she's like, You're Keith Green.

You can't do that.

And what had happened was he had discovered something in the Bible and he was so overwhelmed by it, it was just like took his breath away.

What am I saying?

I'm saying that there are moments in your life when you just you don't just assume the gospel, you you you you you know the gospel.

And so you discover things and you'll read things and you'll just be like, oh, it's like Paul in Romans chapter 11.

Romans 11 · chapter mention

He's explaining how how God works salvation, how God changes people, how God reveals himself to people, and and and and they come.

Now don't get hung up on what I'm saying.

Yeah, I believe that we respond, but I believe our will has been so overwhelmed by the Spirit of God that the most natural thing we can do is respond.

Give our life to Christ, say yes to God, whatever language you use, I don't care.

I'm not hung up on that.

Uh but Paul is writing about this, and this is one of those discoveries, he just kind of burst forth in Romans 11 towards the end of the chapter about verse 33.

He just is writing, and he just says, Oh, the depths of the wisdom and the knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and his past beyond tracing.

Now, I mean, who has known the mind of the Lord or who has been his counselor?

Who's ever given to God that God should repay him for from him and through him and to him are all things, for to him be the glory forever.

And then he just turns into chapter 12 and says, Therefore, in light of this, I urge you, brothers, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living sacrifice because this is your spiritual act of worship.

You see, the right understanding of the gospel is the ultimate motivation for worship.

And there's so many things.

You never arrive.

You never go, okay, I got it, got it.

I memorize four spiritual laws, memorize the Roman road.

That's not what I'm talking about.

I'm talking about never get over the wonder of the gospel.

See, there's this, there's this sense of uh Jared Wilson wrote a great book called Gospel Wakefulness.

Because he he says we basically we can fall asleep to the gospel.

And he talks about the the gospel awakefulness of conversion versus the gospel awakefulness of what I would call understanding.

I think he uses a different word.

There's that, hey, this is I was kind of awakened to the gospel in July of 1982, and I was converted.

I was a different person.

Oh, it's awesome.

But since then, there have been discoveries, things that I've realized, things that God's revealed to me that I'm just like, oh my gosh.

And what happened back in July of 82 has so much more worth simply because I kind of realized, oh, this is the total greatness of the loss that I could have suffered.

Oh man.

But oh, you say, what do you mean?

Imagine you're driving down the road, you're driving on Highway 6 up here, and right before you get to Highway 90, there's a railroad track.

Did you know that?

And at that railroad track, a lot of people don't pull on the railroad, and the people on the other side pull way off the railroad track.

And there's enough room if you're prone to, if you're sitting back here in traffic, you can just pull.

Pull out and pass all those people and just pull right over the railroad track and get right in behind the car, right over there, because it leaves so much room.

Not that I would do that or anything.

But can you imagine you're there and you pull out and it's not as open as you think when you get up there and you just kind of park on the track, you think, well, I mean, no train's coming.

And the light just goes on forever, and all of a sudden you hear and the arms start coming down, bing, ding, bing, ding, bing, ding, bing, ding.

And you look back and you can't go back and you can't go forward and you're stuck.

And pretty soon you're like, oh man, that I've been looking back and forth, but I haven't been looking to the left and to the right.

And that train is coming.

That thing is barreling down on me.

And you reach over to open your door and you just can't get it open.

You panic and you're like, oh, and all of a sudden the guy behind you backs up, and you think, okay, I can back up.

And all of a sudden he rams it forward, boom, hits you in the bumper and propels you off the railroad track.

And you look up in the rearview mirror, and the last thing you're seeing is a train just wiping out his pickup.

And you get out, and everyone's getting out.

Are you okay?

And you're like, oh my gosh, that man just gave his life to keep.

Oh, and you're like, I gotta call my husband.

You set your purse down in the trunk of your car and you're rifling through it, and you get your cell phone out, and about that time you hear the voice of your child, you're like, wait a minute, is this and you realize it's coming from the trunk?

And you rip the trunk open, and your youngest son crawls into your arms and says, Mom, what just happened?

You're like, What are you doing?

Well, we were playing hide and go seek at the house, and I just hid in your trunk, and they say, I knew the car started moving, and I just thought I'd be quiet because I didn't know I didn't want to get in trouble.

And the magnitude of what you were saved from lands on you in a new and fresh way.

That's what the gospel is like.

It has the capacity to remind you on a consistent basis what you've been delivered from.

What you've been saved from.

That's the gospel wakefulness of maturity.

It's not just, oh yeah, okay, I prayed a prayer and, you know, back to the real world.

No.

The greatest need of the real world is the gospel.

It's men and women who've not stopped discovering the vastness and the wondrous nature of the gospel.

Second thing I want to say too, it's our core value.

That's the big deal.

If we don't know the gospel, it doesn't matter.

Secondly, live the gospel.

I don't want to talk a lot about this.

And somebody asked me, why don't you talk a lot about living the gospel?

Because last January we talked about being gospel-centered people.

Remember that?

We said that being gospel-centered, and I said, you know, I'm crazy.

I expect our people to kind of take to heart and live what we talk about here.

Otherwise, why are we talking about it?

Go do something else.

Get a job that has dental insurance.

No?

Live the gospel.

What does that mean?

Does that mean you take your Bible to work tomorrow and put it on your desk?

I just want everyone to know.

No, it means this.

It means you subject everything in your life to the gospel.

It means you subject everything in your life to the gospel.

You ask yourself, gospel, remember, means good news?

It means you ask yourself in all circumstances and situations, what is the good news for my circumstance right now?

And by the way, don't just think about the gospel when things are bad.

Like yesterday I took a nap.

I do on every Saturday, I took a nap.

It's in the Bible somewhere.

So took a nap, and as I was laying there, I started thinking about this Wednesday is my 20th wedding anniversary.

I would have been married 20 years.

And I thought about all the things I could do.

Like when my wife and I were engaged, one of her good friends, deep, I mean, deeply spiritual person, told her, You're going to make the biggest mistake of your life if you marry him.

True story.

She said, I don't know him.

I never spent time with this person, but I don't know him, but I'm just telling you, I just got a feeling.

So yesterday, when I was just thinking about, okay, how do I apply the gospel to my 20 year?

And you said, Why are you thinking about that?

You have a great marriage.

I do.

We work hard at having a great marriage.

But here's what the gospel says to me about my marriage: don't take your wife for granted.

Because it's so easy for me to take my wife for granted because she's so easy to be with.

She asks me every Sunday, what do you want this week for supper?

And she makes it.

It's like being married to a skinnier version of Paula Dean.

And that little voice, as I was laying there, just kind of said, Don't take your wife for granted over the next 20 years.

In other words, don't coast.

Why?

Because the gospel says this.

The gospel says, husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.

The first 13 years of our marriage, I traveled and preached all over the country.

I was on the road 185 days a year.

My wife's like a single parent.

And so I'm just thinking about the gospel.

How does the gospel apply to my marriage?

Does that kind of come up on 20 years?

What's the next 20 years look like?

And you got to give yourself to your wife.

She's just always giving herself to you.

You need to give yourself to your wife.

What does that look like?

Ask her.

I bet she's got some ideas.

Someone asked my wife.

We go to dinner.

Hey, what does it look like for me to give myself to you?

Because I got some ideas.

What it looks like I mean to give myself to you.

It may not be what you're thinking.

See there?

That's what some of you men are thinking.

Yeah, I got some ideas, baby.

See, the gospel says we believe that Christ died.

And he died that all those who live should no longer live for themselves.

If you're selfish in your marriage, you're living in violation of the gospel.

See, the gospel is not just, uh-oh, it's not like a first aid kit that's on the wall that says, in case of emercy, break glass.

If the only time you think about the gospel is when things are bad, you won't live the gospel.

When things are great, when you got so much stuff that you're thinking about tearing down that barn and building a bigger barn, think about the gospel.

What is the good news for this circumstance?

What do I do with this?

Because God says to that guy, hey, you fool, this very night your soul will be required of you.

See, thinking about the gospel when things are good or bad or whatever is what allows you to live the gospel and it keeps your soul ready for Christ's coming.

Thirdly and finally, share the gospel.

Know the gospel, live the gospel, share the gospel.

What do you mean?

Now, let me say what I don't mean, okay?

Look at me.

I don't mean memorize some canned spiel and go regurgitate it on people in your neighborhood.

You know what I'm talking about?

Have you come to the point in your life you know for sure if you died tonight, you go to heaven?

And if you did, and God asks you, why should I let you into heaven?

What would you say, Bill?

I would say no one talks like you, and why do you talk that way?

Instead, like one of my neighbors said to me, Hey, I see you every Sunday leaving early.

Where are you going?

I'm going to the casinos in Louisiana, making a day run.

No.

I don't say, hey, I pastor a church up the road up here.

I'm going to church.

Why don't you get out of bed?

You sorry, sucker, and go to church.

I said, I'm going to worship at my church.

Christianity, I'm a Christian, and so a big part of my life is gathering with other believers and being nourished by them and the word and just kind of beginning my week.

Sunday's first Sunday week, I like to begin my week worshiping.

Oh, that's cool.

Translation?

That's more of an answer than I wanted.

We're getting our trash cans out of the street.

Hey man, you worship anything?

Anything ultimate in your life?

Just partying, man.

Great candidate for the gospel.

I did not say, hey, speaking of partying, have you come to the point in your life you know for sure if you died right now, you'd go to heaven.

If you were partying one night and you were riding down the road smoking Mirajawanna, listening to deaf leopard music.

Bow your head with me right now.

What do you worship?

This is the neighborhood I live in.

What the hell kind of question is that?

Everybody worships something, dude.

Everybody, your car, their lifestyle, their freedom, their money.

Man, I just want to, I just I just want to be free.

Awesome.

Awesome.

You know, I I don't have spiritual conversations out in the street with trash cans very often, but I would just say that's one of the first things God said to humanity.

If I was a rapper, I'd just spike the mic and walked off.

Instead he would have, what?

Yeah, God said to Adam and Eve, you're free.

And they screwed it up.

And we inherited from them the capacity to screw it up.

And then we've got religious literature.

Can I show you a little diagram right here?

That's sharing the gospel.

It's just it comes out of you.

Doesn't it come out of you like anybody else?

It comes through your priesthood, your personality, your gifts, your understanding.

The early church was really simple.

I want to close this morning by just reading a couple passages in Acts.

I'll start in Acts chapter 2.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

You don't have to turn, it'll come up on the screen if you if you'd like.

But just to hear, just how simple they kind of explained it to people.

Acts chapter 2, verse 36.

Acts 2:36

The Bible says this, let all the house of Israel, therefore, know.

This is the first Christian sermon ever preached.

Peter is at Pentecost, probably Peter.

Remember Peter?

The coward that denied Jesus three times.

Let all the house of Israel know, therefore, for certain that God has made him both Lord in Christ, this Jesus whom you've crucified.

Now, when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, brothers, what shall we do?

And Peter said to them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit, for the promises for you and for your children and for all who are far off.

Everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.

And with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, Save yourselves from this crooked generation.

And so those who received his word were baptized, and there were added that day about 3,000 souls.

And it all just begins when I say, Know the gospel, why?

Look again at verse 36.

He says, Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ.

Nobody is helped by your uncertainty.

If you don't know the gospel, then get in a Bible study here or in a small group and get a better understanding of it because your uncertainty isn't helping anybody.

No one says, What must I do to be saved when you open your mouth and just, well, you know, all roads lead to God, and we can't really be sure.

And who am I to judge you?

You're a lazy churchgoer who doesn't know what you believe, what you I mean, at least our forefathers had the gumption to say, we hold these truths to be self-evident.

And they lived and died for them.

Doesn't stop there if you go on.

Acts chapter 3, verse 17.

Acts 3:17

You hear the same thing, different words.

And now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance as did also your rulers, but what God foretold from the mouth of all the prophets that his Christ would suffer, he thus fulfilled.

Repent, therefore, and turn again, and your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, whom heaven must receive until the time for restoring all the things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago.

Translation, we didn't just make this up on the spot.

God has kind of talked about this.

And he says he spoke through the mouths of the holy prophets long ago.

Think Old Testament.

All these promises God made are fulfilled in Christ.

Third passage, Acts chapter 10.

Acts 10 · chapter mention

Just hear this, church.

Acts chapter 10, verse 39.

Acts 10:39

It's all through the book of Acts.

The distinguishing characteristic of the church was the gospel that they preached and the life that this gospel produced in them.

That was attractional, gravitational, intoxicating to people.

They wanted to be around it.

Acts 10, verse 39.

Acts 10:39

It says, and we're witnesses, excuse me, of all that he did in the country of the Jews and in Jerusalem.

They put him to death by hanging him on a tree.

But God raised him on the third day and made him to appear, not to all the people, but to us who have been chosen by God as witnesses, who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead.

And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead.

To him, hear this, to him all the prophets bear witness that everyone believes in him, everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.

Everyone who believes in him.

Now, if you believe that, beloved, if you don't, I know the gospel, live the gospel, share the gospel, oh that's great.

Everyone who believes in him, if everyone who believes in him can receive forgiveness of sins, then anyone is a candidate for the gospel.

Anybody.

Last verse I'll read.

You still with me?

Acts chapter 13, verse 38 and 39.

Acts 13:38

Just again, same gospel.

They use different words.

Acts chapter 13, verse 38.

Acts 13:38

Let it be known to you, therefore, brothers, that through this man, Jesus, forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you.

And by him, everyone who believes is freed from everything.

Just think about that.

Just think about those words.

And by him, everyone who believes is freed from everything that happened to them as children is freed from everything their ex-husband or ex-wife did or said about them.

They're freed from everything from which you could not be freed by the law of Moses.

In other words, rules and regulations and resolutions aren't going to get you there.

Beware, therefore, lest what is said in the prophet should come about.

Look, you scoffers, be astonished and perish, for I'm doing a work in your days, a work that you will not believe, even if one tells it to you.

God says, this is so good, you wouldn't believe it if someone told you.

What's the good news?

What's the gospel?

That everyone who believes is freed from anything.

Freed from anything.

See, the gospel speaks to these four realities.

Let me just give them to you as I close.

Number one, we're accountable to God who created us.

We're accountable to God who created us.

Secondly, we've sinned against this God and we'll be judged.

That's what Paul tells him at the Europicus, these smart men in Athens, they're hanging out.

He just tells them, God has appointed a time, a day when he'll judge the world in righteousness.

Because of that, he commands all men everywhere to repent.

God's not judgmental.

If he was judgmental, why would he warn you about it?

God is merciful.

God says, hey, this is coming.

That's why he says to repent.

If that's not coming, there's no need to repent.

Just keep on doing what you're doing.

We've sinned against this God and we'll be judged.

Third reality of the gospel is God has acted in Jesus Christ to save us.

Everyone, everywhere.

There's no one that's beyond the pale.

You may be sitting in this church today because your wife said, Hey, my New Year's resolution and yours is going to be, we're going to go to church.

You may have looked around and said, Well, that's a church close to our house.

Let's go there.

However, you got here, I'm glad you came.

Hear this.

Everyone, everywhere, you, none of you are beyond the pale.

None of you have outside the grace of God.

You may say, Well, I don't feel like I'm being drawn to a relationship with God just yet.

That's fine.

The reason we don't have pressure and manipulation, we don't sing 16 verses of an invitation hymn is because when God draws you, you know it.

And so every Sunday we stand down front and we say, if we can help you, we're available.

Fourthly and finally, we must repent from sin and put our faith in Jesus.

All through the book of Acts.

Every time they tell people, repent, repent, repent.

Don't make a resolution, repent.

You say, Well, how do you know you've repented from your sin and put your faith in Jesus?

One word, and I'm done.

Rest.

What?

I wouldn't use the word rest to describe a bunch of religious people.

We're not religious.

We have a relationship that allows you to just sit down on the inside.

You say, What do you mean?

Let me just read to you from Hebrews chapter 4 as I close.

Hebrews 4 · chapter mention

Therefore, while the promise of entering God's rest still stands, let us fear lest any of you should seem to have failed to reach it.

For good news, gospel.

For good news came to us, just as to them.

But the message they heard did not benefit them because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

They didn't say, I believe that.

I got faith in that.

I got more faith in that, what Jesus did, than I do in myself, trying to be moral and good.

Because they were not united by faith with those who listened.

For we who have believed, enter that rest.

So how do you know if you've repented from your sin and you put our faith in Jesus?

Are you at rest?

Are you at peace in here?

That's the way that's the way God created it and designed it to be.

Stand to your feet.

Hold your hands out.

Drowning in your broken resolutions.

God's desire, though, is that not you and I be good, but we be gospel men and women.

Depart now and be gospel men and women to the glory of God.

In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Amen.

Bless you.

You're dismissed.