Deeper // Deeper by Making Jesus Known

Hey man, good morning family.

We're going to be in Acts, chapter 16 today Acts chapter 16.

Acts 16 · chapter mention Acts 16 · chapter mention

So today is the day where football fans, everywhere, except for 49ers fans, gather joyfully to watch the nation's most popular sporting event.

I am talking about?

What game am I talking about?

I'm talking about the, which, by the way, can I just give all of y'all a shout out?

Today we had fun.

We called it Super Bowl Sunday as far as gave you guys an opportunity to donate canned goods and different things for needy families in our community, and the bin in the lobby is like overflowing.

So you guys way to support people in our community, needy families.

That's absolutely awesome.

But today is a football game, super Bowl Sunday and I don't know if you're a football fan.

In fact, if you're a football fan, would you raise your hand?

Okay, that's great.

I don't know if maybe you're like are the Warriors playing today in the Super Bowl?

Wherever you are, there's been some playoff games leading up to the Super Bowl and the temperature has been absolutely freezing for some of these games, like fans literally have gotten hypothermia.

It's been snowy conditions, in fact.

The Eagles are playing today and in one of the Eagles games, the Eagles Rams.

That is the weather.

Y'all.

People paid to go and watch that game, crazy people.

People paid to go and watch that game.

And I was thinking about it.

You know, I got to give the fans credit.

They will not let anything stop them from letting their fandom know this is who my favorite team is, and I was thinking this week just about the importance of us, as Jesus followers, letting people know about Jesus and making him known, and sometimes, for us to do that, what it requires is for us to get outside of our comfort zone and take a step and be willing to be uncomfortable to make Jesus known to others, because how many of you can agree with me?

Sharing your faith sometimes can be a little uncomfortable.

We're in the series right now called Deeper, and what we're doing is we're looking at five rhythms, five decisions it takes for us to grow deeper in our faith, and the fourth decision that we're talking about today is the decision to share your faith with others, because when you share your faith, you actually grow in your faith.

And here's why Because when you share your faith, you grow in your faith because you have to have one an eternal mindset.

Because I mean, why else would you share your faith without an eternal mindset, and it also requires you to rely on the Holy Spirit to help you share your faith, because, if you're anything like me, sharing your faith can be a little bit fearful.

When we talk about sharing our faith, this isn't for most of us.

This isn't like new information, like I'm not like hey, guys, we should make Jesus known, and you're not like, really, pastor Nate, I never heard that before I should make Jesus known to others.

This isn't new information to us, and I think, though, we know we should share our faith.

I think, sometimes, we can fall into a couple of ditches when it comes to making Jesus known to us, and I think, though, we know we should share our faith.

I think, sometimes, we can fall into a couple of ditches when it comes to making Jesus known to others.

We can fall into the ditch of maybe guilting ourselves and overemphasizing our role in people coming to know Jesus.

So what we can do is we can think, man, like I've shared my faith with somebody before and they just weren't open to it, like it's my fault, like come on, nate, you should have done it differently, and we like guilt ourselves.

We think it's like our job to change somebody's heart, and how many of you would agree with me.

You can't change anybody's heart.

But I also think there's another ditch we could fall into, and it's the ditch of apathy, of being apathetic and under-emphasizing our role in making Jesus known to others.

And for me, the ditch that I'm more prone to fall into is the ditch of apathy of just being like living my life yes, even as a pastor just kind of like living my life and going through the motions of my life and being apathetic.

But, guys, we don't wanna fall into this ditch over here.

We don't wanna fall into this ditch over here.

We wanna have this healthy understanding.

And this is what this healthy understanding is, and I think this really is the heart in sharing our faith with others.

It's this is knowing that God is working in people's hearts and he wants us to be a part of people coming to know Christ, knowing that God is actually working in people's hearts.

God is actually drawing people to himself and he wants to use us to be a part of that.

I was reading an article this week.

I sent it out to all of you in the Growing Deeper campaign.

Right now, bible sales nationwide are up 22%.

Isn't that cool.

That's where I miss it.

She's like, yeah, 22.

Bible sales are up 22%.

Here's what's happening.

Here's what's happening.

People in the world are realizing that the world doesn't have the answers.

And maybe you're here this morning and you're so welcome here and what brought you here is you see the world, you see everything happening.

You're like this does not have the answers.

I want to find the answers.

Can I just say the answer is in the scripture, the word of God, and the answer is in the person of Jesus Christ.

If you believe that, would you say amen?

Bible sales are up 22%.

People are looking for truth.

God is working in people's hearts and, guys, this isn't going to surprise you, but we're also seeing this happen here at our church.

You guys know Pastor Cody was talking about we have Connect Lunch happens every other month and we just had one last week and it was filled up, and we're having so many new people come to FCC that we can no longer afford and get away with doing it every other month.

Now we're going to start having to do Connect Lunch and we're going to call it Connect.

We're going to start doing this every single month because we have so many new people coming to FCC.

Isn't that awesome?

That's amazing.

That's amazing, and here's the reality.

God is working in people's hearts and here's something I want you to think about.

Could it be that there's somebody in your sphere of influence, somebody you work with, somebody you live around somebody, you know a friend, that God might be working in their hearts and God might want to use you to be a part of them coming to Christ?

Could it be?

Could it be that you have a friend that's in the 22%?

Could it be that you have a friend that's going through something right now, or you know somebody that they're going through something and God has been in their mind more now than maybe ever in their life, and could it be that God wants to use you to be a part of what he's doing?

This takes us to Acts 16, where we're going to see a story of three people that couldn't be any more different.

Any of you in the room have more than one child and you look at your kids and you're like they cannot be any more different than each other.

We see three people that couldn't be any more different.

They're different ethnically, they're different religiously, they're different socioeconomically, it's just different.

But they had one common denominator and it's this is all of them needed Christ.

They all needed Christ, and these people were able to understand who Jesus was and it changed their life forever.

And maybe you're here and maybe you have a religious background or maybe you're identified as spiritual.

Can I just say, when you understand who the real Jesus is and you choose to give your life to him, to trust him to be your Lord and Savior, it will change everything about you.

So I want us to read about to trust him to be your Lord and Savior.

It will change everything about you.

So I want us to read about this in Acts, chapter 16.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

I want us to see how God is working in people's hearts all around us, and sometimes we don't even realize it.

So let's pick it up in verse number 13.

If you're ready for the word, would you say amen, amen.

This is such a beautiful text of scripture.

It says on the Sabbath day.

Does anybody know what day of the week is the Sabbath day?

Saturday?

That's right.

On Saturday, the Sabbath day, we this is Paul, his traveling companions, his homies he would hang out with.

They went outside the city gate, by the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer.

We sat down and spoke to the women gathered there.

So they go to a place to pray and this is what they find like basically a women's Bible study.

There's women gathered there.

There's a God-fearing woman.

Now, god-fearing it doesn't mean that she's a follower of Jesus, it just means that she's not a pagan.

She doesn't believe in all these other gods.

She hasn't necessarily put her faith in Christ, but she's not.

She understands that all these other deities in that area, that those aren't the one true God.

She's a God-fearer.

Her name is Lydia Lydia.

Everybody say Lydia, together, ready, lydia.

Everybody say Lydia, together Ready.

Here's the thing, lydia.

We learned something about her.

She's a dealer in purple cloth.

Ooh, translation for the young folk Lydia's bougie.

Purple cloth, that's y'all.

That's the fancy gear of the day.

That's like the Gucci, louis Vuitton of the day.

This woman's in the fashion industry.

The next verse tells us that she owns a house, so she obviously has some money.

She got herself together, says.

She's from the city of Thyatira, so ethnically she's probably asian.

And she was listening.

So, paul, you studied the greek here.

In these verses, paul is rationally explaining christ to her, like when it says in the verse 13.

We sat down and spoke to the women gathered there.

That that's what he was doing.

So so he's speaking to her and though she has money, and though she's in the fashion industry, and though she's a big deal and she's smart and she's intellectual, she has some type of internal dissatisfaction, which is why she's listening to the truth of who Jesus is.

It's why she's searching, because she knows there's something else out there.

Money's not enough, wealth is not enough, prominence is not enough.

And look what happens.

It says in verse number 14,.

It says the Lord opened her heart.

Can we say that together, ready?

The Lord opened her heart.

Paul didn't open her heart.

Paul didn't change her heart.

The Lord opened her heart to respond to what Paul was saying.

It's only the Lord that can change people's hearts.

And after verse 15, she and her household were baptized.

She urged us if you consider me a believer in the Lord, come and stay at my house.

And she persuaded us.

So she believed in the Lord.

She was baptized, she trusted the Lord to be her Savior, publicly expressed this faith through baptism.

Now I'm really excited.

In a couple weeks from now, we have one of the best Sundays we have here.

It's called Celebration Sunday.

We don't just love Celebration Sunday because we have like a taco truck or a food truck or something.

But free tacos are amazing.

Can somebody say amen to that?

Let's go, yeah, let's try it, man, we got to clap up in the balcony for that one.

Celebration Sunday we're going to have baptisms and we have several baptisms lined up already for Celebration Sunday.

And if you have put your faith and trust in Jesus to be your Lord and Savior but you have not yet expressed that through baptism, can I say, just like Lydia in Acts, chapter 16, in two weeks from now, you can publicly express your faith in Christ, knowing that the baptism waters don't save us.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

There's nothing magical about baptism, but it publicly expresses that you are a follower of Jesus.

Lydia here was baptized.

Lydia here is a wealthy, intellectual, bougie, smart, have-herself-together woman the next person in the story.

Not like Lydia at all.

Next person in the story not like Lydia at all.

In fact, this is what it says.

It says once, as we were on our way to prayer, paul was going to another place to pray and his friend there was a slave girl.

A slave girl met us who had a spirit by which she predicted the future.

Y'all, this was not the Holy Spirit.

She predicted the future, because we're going to read that she's possessed by a demon.

And can I just say watch out for those palm readers and psychics and fortune tellers that are predicting the future, because much of that has demonic influence.

She's making this slave girl made a large profit for her owners by fortune telling.

So this slave girl is enslaved, she's been exploited, she's been taken advantage of.

She's making money for her owners.

In verse 17, as she followed Paul and us, she cried out these men who are proclaiming to you a way of salvation are the servants of the most high God.

I find it interesting that she knew the truth that these guys are servants of the most high God.

Verse 18, it says this.

It says she did this for many days.

Can we just take a timeout and pause for a second?

If you had a demon-possessed girl follow you around for many days and crying out behind you, what would you do?

How would you feel?

The same way Paul felt.

What's it says?

It says Paul was greatly.

What's that next word?

Greatly?

He's annoyed.

Can I just don't you love how real this is.

It'll sugarcoat it.

It doesn't say Paul was filled with compassion and love.

Paul was annoyed.

I'm like I would be annoyed too.

Turn into the spirit.

This is this demonic spirit.

He said.

I command you, in the name of Jesus Christ, to come out of her.

And it came out of her.

And it came out right away.

And now, guys, things are about to get crazy.

Verse 19, her owners realized that their hope of profit was gone.

They seized Paul and Silas, dragged them into the marketplace, to the authorities, bringing them before the chief magistrates leaders in the city.

These are the bigwigs, decision makers.

They said.

These men are seriously disturbing our city.

They're Jews and are promoting customs that are not legal for us, as Romans, to adopt or practice.

Then, verse 22, the crowd joined in the attack against them.

Wow, y'all get the image of this.

The chief magistrates stripped off their clothes and ordered them to be beaten with rods.

This escalated rather quickly.

All they were doing was trying to make jesus known.

After they had severely flogged them, they beat them.

They threw them in jail, ordering the jailer that's the third person, lydia, slave girl jail ordering the jailer to guard them carefully.

Now, jailers were often highly decorated Roman soldiers who, as a parting retirement gift, were given a jail to run.

So these are older guys, typically probably a little hardened, saw quite a bit.

You guys have seen those war movies, everything that happened.

You know what I'm saying.

Those Roman dudes did not mess around Roman soldiers, they were all for blood, seen all that.

He's probably a little hardened, probably a little cynical.

He's probably a pretty tough dude.

Now he is guarding Paul and Silas.

He has this order, verse 24, receiving an order.

What did he do?

He put them in the inner prison.

The inner prison was rough.

They don't have Netflix on the inner prison TV.

Nobody's playing PS4 or whatever the gaming system is out these days on the inner city prison.

All right, the inner prison, this is the lowest part of the prison, absolutely disgusting.

Fecal matter would run rampant.

It was a disgusting place.

They were put in there and they secured their feet in the stocks.

What are the stocks?

You know how?

On the movies, you see like the wooden pieces where they put them there and they secured their feet in the stocks.

What are the stocks?

You know how?

On the movies, you see like the wooden pieces where they put them right there and they can't move, just like the movies.

That's what the stocks are here.

Okay, paul and Silas, they had done literally nothing wrong but make Jesus known.

Now those dudes, innocent, are thrown in the inner prison.

That's a bad day.

They didn't sign up for that.

If it's me, I'm not very happy.

In fact, I'm kind of like God.

Where are you at?

In fact, I'm probably kind of mad at God, but you know what their response was About midnight.

I'm probably kind of mad at God, but you know what their response was About midnight.

Paul and Silas.

What were they doing?

They were praying, singing hymns to God.

Nate's mad, bitter Paul and Silas praying, singing, and the prisoners?

They were listening to them and as they're praying and singing verse 26, suddenly there was an earthquake.

It's a violent earthquake that the foundations of the jail were shaken and immediately all the doors were open and everyone's change came loose.

When the jailer woke up and saw the doors of the doors were open and everyone's change came loose.

When the jailer woke up and saw the doors of the prison standing open, he drew his sword and was going to kill himself, since he thought the prisoners had escaped.

Culturally, if a jailer's prisoners fled, the Roman authorities would execute the jailer because these prisoners were his responsibility.

So this jailer is like, rather than those guys killing me.

I'm just going to kill myself.

But Paul called out in a loud voice don't harm yourself, because we're all here.

Paul, why are you still there?

Why in the world are you still?

If I'm Paul, I'm setting the world record for the 40-yard dash.

You ain't never seen a white boy move that fast.

Let me tell you, guys, I'm gone.

Usain Bolt, I'm breaking your world record.

I'm getting out of that prison.

They said we're still here.

The jailer called for lights, rushed in, fell down trembling before Paul and Silas.

He escorted them out.

He said sirs, what must I do to be saved?

He saw how Paul and Silas responded to everything.

He saw their lives, and their lives were compelling to Paul and Silas.

Paul and Silas' lives were compelling to that jailer.

The jailer says what must I do to have what you have?

And this is what they told him.

They said believe in the Lord Jesus, trust in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved, you and your household.

They don't say become a better person and then you're gonna be saved.

They don't say once you change your life, then you'll be good enough for God's forgiveness.

They don't say that here's what you need to know is God will accept you just as you are, with your junk and your baggage and your sin and everything else.

If you will come to him just as you are, if you will trust, if you will believe in the Lord, you will be saved, you and your household.

Verse 32,.

And they spoke the word of Lord to him along with everybody in his house.

Verse 32,.

And they spoke the word of the Lord to him along with everybody in his house.

He took them the same hour of the night, washed their wounds Right away.

He and all his family were baptized.

He brought them into his house, set a meal before them and rejoiced because they had come to believe in God with his entire household, to believe in God with his entire household.

When you understand salvation, you understand, when you believe that you're saved, it produces joy in your life.

Verse 34,.

They have this joy and then they rejoice.

And in this text we see the jailer, cynical, hardened guy.

We see the exploited slave girl.

We see the intellectual, smart, wealthy, homeowner woman over here.

They're all different, but you know what the common denominator is, guys, is there's power in the gospel.

Number one there's power in the gospel.

The gospel is the death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus.

In Romans 1,.

Paul says this I'm not ashamed of the gospel.

It is the power of God for salvation to everyone.

You know who everyone is.

That's you, that's your friend, that's the atheist.

That's the down and out.

That's everyone who believes the gospel.

And the gospel, the death, the burial, the resurrection of Jesus.

Believing on that means putting your faith, your trust, in that.

You realize that it's not enough to intellectually believe in God.

The demons believe in God and they shudder.

James tells us, now we need to believe there is a God.

The demons believe in God and they shudder.

James tells us Now we need to believe there is a God to understand the gospel and to put our trust in the gospel.

But the power is in the gospel.

When Paul would go city to city traveling, what he wouldn't do is he wouldn't just tell people hey, guys, you need to be a better person.

Hey, here's five ways to be happier, here's three ways to make your relationships work.

That's not what he did.

This is what he did.

It says in 1 Corinthians, chapter 2, when I came to you, brothers and sisters, announcing the mystery of God, the gospel to you, I didn't come with brilliance of speech or wisdom, with brilliance of speech or wisdom.

1 Corinthians 2 · chapter mention

I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

I came to you in weakness, in fear and in much trembling.

My speech and my preaching were not with like persuasive words of wisdom, but with the demonstration of the Spirit's power.

Demonstration of the Spirit's power so that your faith might not be based on human wisdom but on God's power.

When Paul was going place to place, he wasn't trying to be a fancy TED Talk speaker.

He wasn't trying to be some charismatic guy that could woo the crowd.

This was Paul's message Jesus, what Jesus had done and how Jesus can change your life.

And here's why I bring this up, because some of us, when it comes to sharing our faith, we're really scared that we're going to say the wrong thing and we think like man.

And we think like man like uh ah, pastor Nate, he could, he could, he could do better than me.

Like you understand, I can't really share my faith.

Can I just say the power is not in the presenter of the gospel, the power is in the gospel itself.

Here's all you need to do Share the death that bear on the resurrection of Jesus, that Jesus died on the cross for all of us and if we'll turn from our sin and put our faith and trust in Christ, we can be saved.

The power is in the gospel.

You're not going to say something wrong.

Also, there's power in your personal story.

How has God changed your life?

What has God done for you?

What is your God's story?

In Revelation it says that the way they overcame the enemy was from the blood of the Lamb, the blood of Jesus and the word of their testimony.

There is power in your testimony.

And you might say, man, pastor, nate, like you don't understand, like I can't really share my faith, Like I have all these limitations, I say God specializes in working through people's limitations.

God does his greatest work through your limitations and this is why Because when he works through our limitations, it shows that he's the one that did it and it's not us.

It shows that he's the one that has the power and it's not me and it's not you.

And in our limitations, in our difficulties, in our challenges, can I just say, if we will make Jesus known, he will do the work.

So here's what we all need to do and here's what I invite us to do.

Number two is to pray.

To praise and to participate in what God is doing in people's lives.

If God is working in people's lives all around us, then we can be a part of that.

We can't change people's hearts, but we can pray that God will work in people.

We can also live lives where we're praising God, no matter what our circumstances are, no matter how difficult things are.

Can we just say sometimes life is really hard, sometimes life really sucks, and can I say this is a safe place.

When life is difficult and hard, it's okay.

And if your life is never hard, then you're probably not.

A human Life is hard and in those moments of hardships, if we'll choose to praise God, sometimes that can clear the path so other people can see God.

Could it be that you're in a hardship right now and you're in a difficulty and you're in a challenge, and that can be the very thing that God wants to use, so somebody can see God clearly?

Could it be that right now you're in something and you're like God?

I have been praying for this and you've told me no, like I still have this health challenge, I still got this difficulty.

I'm kind of like borderline upset at you, god, and could it be that that's the very thing that God's using so somebody else can come to God.

Think about this Paul and Silas.

They were beaten publicly, they were thrown in jail.

You know what they did?

They made Jesus known to somebody, they shared the gospel and they were thrown in jail.

And in the jail there was a jailer and the jailer had a family and they needed the gospel.

And the way that the jailer heard the gospel, understood the gospel, was because Paul and Silas were beaten and stripped and put in the prison.

Okay, so y'all aren't getting this.

Sometimes we're in the prison and sometimes we're in the storm and sometimes we're in the hardship.

It's not even about us, it's because there's a jailer that's there that God wants to use you in their life.

And sometimes I wonder in my life, am I like?

Oh, why is this happening and what is?

It's not even about me, it's about other people, and sometimes, when we praise God in the storm, it allows people to see him clearly.

I want to end with three quick reminders for some of us when it comes to sharing our faith, to kind of wrap this up.

And then I want to ask you a question.

Here's three of those.

Number one don't underestimate the impact of your faithful prayers to soften somebody's heart.

There are stories after story after story of people who somebody prayed for them for years and even decades before they came to Christ.

That's some of your story here this morning and some of you you're discouraged because you've been praying for a friend, a family member, a prodigal child and you're like it seems like the needle's not moving at all.

The prayers are hitting the ceiling.

Can I just say, guys, don't stop, don't underestimate the impact of your faithful prayers.

Number two ask God to show you opportunities to make Jesus known.

Often what will happen is God will reveal opportunities to us when we're asking God for opportunities, and sometimes we don't see the opportunities when opportunities are around us to make Jesus known and what we have to say is Lord, would you give me an opportunity, because they might be all around us In a couple weeks from now.

As a church, we've tried to create an opportunity for you to invite some people.

We have something called Friends and Family Day.

I think we have some flyers in the lobby and here's all this is.

This is just an opportunity for you to invite somebody.

Chances are, if you invite five people, probably four of them will say no.

There's probably somebody that's open and if we'll see this as an opportunity to say Lord, who can I invite Lord?

What opportunities do I have?

And then, number three don't let yourself fall into apathy and not share your faith.

I said this at the 10 o'clock service.

Maybe this third reminder is for me and not for any of you in here, because this is what I can do.

I share my faith every Sunday on stage.

I don't need to share my faith throughout the week, or I can say this is just me, not you.

I can be like I'm just going to live my life and let people see Jesus through me, and it's almost like I have stitches on my mouth when it comes to sharing my faith, but I have a megaphone when I start talking about sports Guys.

I can't let that happen for me.

We can't be apathetic.

We have to say no, no, like I am not gonna fall into apathy, like I'm gonna fight this apathy with all that I have and I'm not, I'm not, I'm not gonna let myself go months and months without sharing the gospel of Jesus with people, because Jesus has the hope and he's working in people's lives and there's people all around us and we're not in a city with a bunch of churches on every corner.

We're not in a community where there's people all over the place doing this.

God has called us uniquely in this time, in this season, on purpose, for a purpose to be ambassadors for the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and God has put people in our sphere of influence to make Jesus known to them.

And could it be?

Could it be in six months, 12 months, 18 months?

Man, this is happening right in front of us.

Praise be to God that people are going to be baptized and following the Lord because God used you in their lives.

We say here the best is yet to come.

We've been saying that for a while, guys.

Right now we're living in some of the best, but can I just say we ain't done.

Like God's on the move here, and what I have to do and what you have to do is we have to say I'm not going to be apathetic in this, like, lord, help me, help me to see people right where they are and help me to have an opportunity to share my faith with them.

So I end with a question who can I, who can you, share the gospel with?

Like, who's the family member, who's the neighbor?

Who's the co-worker?

Who's the friend?

Who's the gym bro like?

Who is it like?

Who's the classmate?

Who's that person that maybe God wants you to share the gospel with them and get out of your comfort zone a little bit?

Maybe there's somebody that you have already shared the gospel with, you've already talked to them and they're just not open.

Here's what I'm going to invite you to do the name that came into your mind when this question went up, or maybe the person that you have shared the gospel with.

This is what I want to invite you to do.

I want to invite you to take some time right now and just to pray for them.

Take some time and just pray for them.