The One Who Holds All Things Together- Colossians 1:15-18

I'm going to go back to the

farm. All right good to see

everybody here this morning

we're going to continue. In our

Colossian series and- I've been

doing a lot of work around the

farm lately if you all driven

by you've probably seen me out

there working on the property

no one has stopped an offer to

help I've been noticing that

but- but I'm putting up a new

dog fence and because we're

trying to give our dogs a bigger

area to run around. And with the

new dog fence I'm having to

build a new house and a new

house. And if you want to build

a new house like ours. You need

a shed. And not offense so- I've

been working on this and- this

is what it looked like we've

got a couple pictures. All right

if you can kind of see that

that's the new shed. That I've

built- and I've put some more

stuff on it since then but

but here's what I want you to

see in this right. And I had

this idea. That we should build

the new dog shed and put it

directly up. To our garage to

our house. And this is what I

did now I want you to look at

this and I know it's kind of

hard to see from that distance

and here's the question I'm

going to ask you. What do you

think is the most important

piece of wood. On that shed.

Take a take a second to look

what do you think is the most

important piece of wood on that

shed Greg Berryhill can answer

for obvious reasons. Now look

you might be looking at this

and you might be tempted to

think it's the rafters that go

along the roof because

ultimately that's what the

sheet metal is going to go on

and that's going to hold up.

The roof so. You might think

it's any one of those things

when in actuality next picture

Emily. It's that very back

piece of wood. Over there and I

know it might be kind of hard

for you to see. And you're

looking at this picture like I

didn't even know there was a

piece of wood back there. But

there is a piece of wood that

you can see. And I'm going to

look at this picture and I'm

going to look at this picture

and I'm going to look at this

picture and I'm going to look

at this picture and I'm going

to look at this picture and I'm

going to look at this picture

and I'm going to look at this

picture and I'm going to look

back there. But there is in

turns out this two by six

along the back is the most

important piece of wood on the

entire project because this

thing. Is screwed into the

studs in the garage so it

anchors down the entire

project. And all of the wrapping

for the project is going to be

attached to that two by six and

all of the rafters that are

going to hold up the roof are

going to be attached to the two

by six. So the whole point is

if you remove that two by six

what do you think is going to

happen to the shed? The whole

thing is going to fall apart.

It looks very non impressive

this very small thing and yet

if you remove that piece of

wood everything else falls

apart. And what's interesting

is as we come to this passage

in Colossians Paul is going to

emphasize to us just how

central Jesus is to everything

that we do. And what Jesus is

to everything that we do. Who

Jesus is and what he's done for

us and let's be honest with

each other. It's pretty

important that we get Jesus and

his identity right is it not.

Because what you believe about

Jesus is going to determine

your entire faith. There are

many people in our world today

who think Jesus is nothing more

than a good moral teacher with

good moral lessons. Like the

intellectual psychologist and

he he goes around talking about

the Bible but he's not actually

a Christian. And so when he

looks at the Bible what he

sees is he sees Jesus as this

archetype for humanity to live

up to. And so he says basically

if you will just try to live

like Jesus and emulate Jesus in

your life then you're going to

be good with God. And so the

problem is since he's not a

Christian he doesn't actually

submit to Jesus and he doesn't

have to be living on his day to

day life. There are other

people in our world today who

would say that Jesus was a

first century Jewish man who

lived a great life. But they

think that Jesus died in the

first century and then stayed

dead. And so Jesus has no

bearing on their lives today.

And then there are other

people. And I think a lot of

church people fall into this

category. There are many

in times of trouble.

They like the idea of Jesus,

and they certainly want Jesus with them

when things start to go south.

When I'm starting to have problems,

when life is getting hard,

then that's when I want Jesus in my life.

But if things are going okay,

and there's not really any trouble,

well, Jesus really has no place in their day-to-day life.

And yet these verses tell us that Jesus is before all things,

and Jesus is central to the continuation of all things.

In fact, Paul's gonna say here

that it is in Jesus that all things hold together.

And so here's what he's saying in these verses, church.

This is what I want you to understand.

Everything falls apart without Jesus.

Everything falls apart without Jesus.

And I know that pretty much every one of you

would agree with that statement this morning.

Amen.

Yeah, we could talk back.

Yeah, amen.

Everything falls apart without Jesus.

So everybody says yes,

but the question is,

I wonder if you're actually living by this.

I wonder if you can honestly say this morning

that Jesus is foremost in your life,

and that Jesus is central to everything in your life.

And so what I wanna do this morning

as we go through these verses,

I wanna show you just how true it is

that everything falls apart without Jesus.

Now, notice what Paul says there in verse 15.

Paul says, he is the image of the invisible God,

the firstborn of all creation.

When Paul says this word here, image, in the Greek,

he's using the Greek word icon.

And I don't know any Greek scholars here this morning.

Maybe you can't tell,

but this is actually where we get our English word.

You wanna guess?

Icon, yeah, there we go.

Good job, guys.

So he uses the Greek word icon,

that was where we get the English word icon.

And it just referred to a picture

that represented someone's likeness, okay?

But here's what we need to understand.

When Paul says that Jesus is the image

or the icon of the invisible God,

he does not mean that Jesus is simply

a physical image of an invisible God.

Rather, what Paul is saying here

is that the very being and nature of God

are perfectly made manifest in the person of Jesus.

The way I like to say it is that all that God is, Jesus is.

And all that can be known about God

is perfectly revealed in the person of Jesus Christ.

And he describes him not only as the icon,

but he describes him as the firstborn of God's creation.

Now, this is where we get problems, all right?

A lot of people have misunderstood

and misinterpreted this verse and verses like it.

Because there are many people today

like the Jehovah's Witnesses,

my favorite group to witness to.

They will believe based on verses like this,

that Jesus is a created being.

I actually, how did Jehovah's Witness say to me

on my porch, I said, hey, let's talk scripture.

I was like, I'd love to.

They said Colossians 1.15.

The Bible says that Jesus is the firstborn

of God's creation.

Therefore, it means that God created Jesus first

and then Jesus created everything else.

And they think it's plain as day.

But the problem is, this is not a description

of the order of creation.

When Paul uses the word firstborn here,

it's referring to a title.

We know that it cannot be a literal description

of something that happened in a sequential order

because think about it like this.

A few verses later, Paul is gonna say

that Jesus is the firstborn of the dead.

Now, if we're gonna interpret those the same way,

and we're saying that firstborn of creation

means this is chronologically how it happened,

Jesus first and everything else,

we have to apply that to firstborn of the dead,

meaning Jesus first and everything else.

But here's the problem.

Was Jesus the first person in the world,

according to scripture, to die and be brought back to life?

No.

In fact, I believe that was the widow's son at Zerapheth.

So this is not trying to describe chronological events

or sequential events or anything like that.

This is a title.

You have to keep in mind the cultural context.

So in the first century, the firstborn was entitled

to two thirds of the inheritance.

Like today, when we have kids,

we tend to divide our inheritance up equally, right?

So when Anna and I die, we will divide our inheritance.

If there is any whatsoever,

I've got a couple of Bibles I can give away.

So Judah and Ezra both get a Bible,

but we'll divide those Bibles up equally among our children.

But it didn't work like that in the ancient world.

In the ancient world, the firstborn son was entitled

to a greater portion of the inheritance, typically two thirds.

And so by saying firstborn of creation,

Paul is saying that Jesus has the claim to creation.

It is his, it is his by inheritance,

which is exactly what the author of Hebrews says

in Hebrews one, two.

He says, but in these last days,

he has spoken to us by his son,

whom he appointed the what church?

Air of all things through whom also he created the world.

So why is Jesus the air of all things?

Because he's the firstborn of creation.

He is the one who is entitled to this inheritance

because he has preeminence in creation.

Firstborn also communicates authority.

In the ancient world,

if parents were unable to take care of themselves,

if they can no longer financially provide for themselves

or take care of their property,

that responsibility fell to the firstborn son.

He became the man of the house

and he assumed authority within that family.

And Paul is saying the same thing about Jesus here.

When he calls Jesus the firstborn of all creation,

he is saying Jesus is the air of all things

and Jesus has authority over all things

because he is the preeminent one,

which is why he continues in verse 16.

Look at it with me.

Verse 16, for by him all things were created

in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible,

whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities,

all things were created through him and for him.

Now, who's ready for a science lesson?

Well, we'll skip that part.

No, are you kidding me?

I'm not skipping that.

I know you didn't come looking for a science lesson,

but it is important for us to have one

because here's what I think, right?

It's easy for us to go outside and marvel

at the wonders of what God's created, amen?

It's very easy with certain things.

When you see a beautiful day and you marvel at the sky

or you go to the mountains and you marvel

at the beauty of the mountains or you go to the Grand Canyon,

there's so many easy places to just go

and look at what God's created and be amazed by it,

but it's another thing entirely

to actually get into the details of God's creation

and marvel at the hand of God at work.

All right, so let's have a little bit of a science lesson.

Here's a picture for you.

Now, this is a picture of Earth's orbit around the sun, okay?

We got it here, yeah?

All right, so everybody pretty much knows this.

This is the orbital path of the Earth around the sun.

Kind of looks like an oval.

Now, here's what you might not know.

As the Earth orbits around the sun,

it veers from a straight line one ninth of an inch

every 18 miles, all right?

We got that one ninth of an inch every 18 miles.

Here's the fun fact for you.

Did you know that if the Earth were to veer

by one tenth of an inch,

Earth's orbital path would become so large

that the temperatures on our planet would drop so drastically

that life on this Earth would not be possible?

Well, here's the other fun fact too.

If the Earth only veered one eighth of an inch

as opposed to one ninth of an inch,

our orbital path would decrease so much

that the temperatures would rise to a degree

that would make life impossible here on Earth.

So here's what that means.

It means that if Earth's orbit was off by one tenth of an inch

in either direction, none of this is possible.

One tenth of an inch, folks.

And all the atheists say, praise evolution.

Aren't we so happy evolution got this right?

By sheer happen chance and by an unguided,

totally random process, we ended up

with this level of precision.

And yet as a Christian, we look at this

and we say praise the sovereign Lord Jesus Christ

who upholds all things by his sovereign hand.

Amen?

You understand, that's how close we are to not exist

in his one tenth of an inch in either direction.

But let's just keep going

because we can dig into this further.

What is it that keeps us in orbit?

It's gravity, right?

Everybody knows this.

You might not know if the gravitational force

were altered by one part in 10 to the 40th power.

That's 10 with 40 zeros after it.

The sun would not exist

and the moon would either crash into the Earth

or drift away into space if it was altered by that much.

Even our place in the cosmos

is according to God's sovereign will.

Our place here on Earth in the cosmos

has sometimes been referred to as the Goldilocks zone.

Why is it called the Goldilocks zone?

Well, you remember the story of the three bears, right?

This bed is too hard, this bed is too soft,

but this bed is what?

Just try.

Yeah, so Goldilocks zone means that we are living

in the just right zone for life to be possible.

If we were any further away from the sun

or any closer to the sun, life would not be possible.

And a lot of our place in the cosmos

is called the Goldilocks zone

because of my favorite planet

and it should be yours too, the planet Jupiter.

Here's what we look like compared to Jupiter, by the way.

That is us in that little spot there.

That's the Earth.

So this is the Earth compared to Jupiter.

And every Christian should wake up every single day

and start your morning by saying,

thank you, God, for allowing me to wake up

and also thank you, God, for Jupiter.

It's the best, okay?

Because here's what happened.

God specifically put Jupiter exactly where it's at

to act as a giant space vacuum.

Basically, if Jupiter was not exactly where it's at,

the Earth would be constantly bombarded

with asteroids and meteors

that are, they are on a direct path to hit us.

But because Jupiter's gravitational force is so large,

it pulls everything that would hit us in

and it gets hit on Jupiter rather than us.

So if Jupiter were to go away and not exist anymore,

we wouldn't exist either.

So get a shirt that says, thank God for Jupiter.

Now, you look at Jupiter,

you might think that Jupiter is pretty big

and you'd be right, but this is what Jupiter looks like

compared to our Sun.

So that little tiny white dot is us

and then there's Jupiter and then there's our Sun.

And if you think our Sun is big,

well, here is our Sun compared to some of the biggest stars

that we know of in the galaxy.

Our Sun is the smallest dot that you can't even see,

by the way.

And see, these are some of the other big ones.

Yes, that red one is named Beetlejuice.

You can do with that information what you will.

But these are some of the biggest stars.

And if you think that is big,

well, here's a picture of our galaxy, the Milky Way galaxy.

There's a red dot there that says you're here.

So this is our whole galaxy and there you are

with all your problems that you think are so big

and bad in this world.

That's us in the grand scheme of everything.

And if you think that is big,

look at this picture,

which isn't a picture of some pretty stars.

This is actually a picture of 15,000 galaxies in one picture.

Not stars, not planets,

15,000 galaxies in one picture.

And so you look at these things in creation

and you ask yourself, why is the Earth tilted just right?

Why is gravity exactly right?

Why is Earth's orbital path so extremely precise

that if we were all by a tenth of an inch

in either direction, none of this happens.

Why is Jupiter so specifically located?

Why are all these things that seem to be balanced

on a razor's edge able to keep that balance?

And Paul's answer here is very simple.

It's because Jesus created all things

and Jesus sovereignly upholds all things.

He is the one who allows them to continue.

The reason that everything continues to function

as God created it to function

is because of the sovereign hand of Jesus

sovereignly holding all things together, amen.

But one common atheist rebuttal

that I've been hearing more and more in recent years

is, well, what's up with all the wasted space?

I don't know if you've encountered this yet.

I had this conversation with a guy I used to work with

at Lowe's because we were talking about the creation question

one day at Lowe's and he said to me,

if God created everything, why did he waste so much space?

And I had never heard this before.

So I was like, what do you mean waste so much space?

And he said to me, well, Earth is the only place

we know of that is livable.

And we know of all these other galaxies

and we know that everything is still expanding.

So if all of this is for humanity,

why is so much of it unusable?

And I said, well, there's your problem right there.

This isn't all for humanity.

It's for God.

Because you see, if the cosmos was created for us,

then yeah, there's a whole lot of wasted space

that we can't do anything with.

But if the cosmos was created by God for God,

then even the vastness of the cosmos is nothing

but a mere drop in the ocean

when compared to an infinite God.

And so this isn't for us.

It is for God.

All things were created for him.

And notice this phrase, all things in the Greek,

it means all things.

And you know what that means church?

It means that you're included in that.

If God created all things for him

and God created you, well, what does that mean about you?

It means you were created for God.

Here's what I would say.

I would say you were specially made by Jesus

and you were especially made for Jesus.

Here's what you have to understand, folks.

It's easy to look at the Grand Canyon

and marvel at the wonders of God.

It's easy to go to various places on this earth

and see the hand of God at work and marvel at it.

And yet when you look in scripture,

the Bible tells us that the cross

is the cross that is the cross.

And you know, the cross is the cross

that is the cross that is the cross.

And you know, the cross is the cross

that is the cross that is the cross.

And if you look in scripture,

the Bible tells us that the crowning jewel

of God's creation is humanity,

not the Grand Canyon,

not Mount Kilimanjaro or anything else.

The Bible tells us that humanity

is the crowning jewel of God's creation

because only mankind was made in the image of God.

Of all the wonderful things God created,

in His image.

And so you were specially made by Jesus

and you were especially made for Jesus.

And what that means, church,

is that you exist for Jesus.

You do not exist for your spouse.

You do not exist for your children.

You do not exist for your job

and you do not exist for yourself.

You were made by Jesus for Jesus.

And the Bible even says in Psalm 19-1,

the heavens declare the glory of God

and the sky above proclaims His handiwork.

Here's my question to you, church.

If that's true of the cosmos,

how much more true should it be of those made

in the image of God?

How much more should our lives resound

the greatness and the majesty of God?

How much more should our lives speak

of His greatness and His preeminence?

And maybe you say, well, pastor,

I don't know how on earth I could do that.

My life is falling apart right now.

So how could I possibly testify

to the greatness of Jesus?

We'll look at verse 17.

Verse 17, the Bible says,

and He is before all things

and in Him all things hold together.

You wanna know why so many relationships fall apart

and why more than half of the marriages

in the United States end in divorce?

It's very simple.

It's because Jesus is not at the center

of the relationship.

I've seen so many couples who are doing everything they can

to keep the relationship going.

I've seen them go through this cycle of they break up,

get back together, break up, get back together,

break up, get back together.

And they just keep doing this in an endless cycle

and every single time they convince themselves

it's gonna work this time.

I can make it work this time.

I can change.

He can change.

She can change.

We're gonna make it work.

But I want you to listen to me say this as your pastor.

The Bible never says you hold all things together.

You may even love your partner, your boyfriend,

your girlfriend, your spouse,

but love will not hold your relationship together.

The Bible tells us here in Jesus all things hold together.

And so if you're taking it upon yourself

to hold your relationship together,

listen to me church,

you were doing a job that was never meant for you.

And you were going to continue to experience

the breakdown of your relationship

until you start putting Jesus at the center

of your relationship.

Because he's the one who holds all things together.

I've seen it happen with people's spiritual lives too.

There might be some people in here this morning

and you feel like your life,

your spiritual life has fallen apart.

Maybe you feel distant from the Lord this morning

and you feel spiritually empty.

I heard someone say recently,

if you take Christ out of Christianity

or if you take Christ out of Christian,

all you're left with is Ian.

And I don't know who Ian is, but he can't save you.

Now they said that kind of tongue in cheek,

but the point that he was making

is that this is what so many Christians are doing.

We're taking Christ out of our faith

and we're turning our entire faith

into a series of activities and things to do

rather than seeing our faith as a relationship

with a living savior.

And so if you ever divorce your faith

from the person of Jesus Christ,

you're gonna start running rampant like this

and your whole life is gonna go downhill

because your spiritual faith is not dependent

upon your ability to keep it going.

It's dependent upon the one who holds all things together.

You cannot take Christ out of Christianity.

The point I want you to understand this morning is

if Jesus is not foremost in your life,

your life will slowly start to fall apart.

And there's a really good way to test this this morning.

Here's what I want you to do.

I want you to think about your life.

I want you to think about the weakest areas

of your life right now.

The ones that you feel are falling apart.

And I'm willing to guess that the weakest areas

of your life right now, the areas where you feel

are falling apart,

is where you're gonna have to move.

And that's not going to be the case.

Now the areas where you feel are falling apart

and out of your control, I'm willing to guess

those are the ones where you have not yet

made Jesus preeminent.

Whether that's your relationship with your spouse,

whether that's your money, your time,

whether that's parenting, you show me the areas

in your life that are falling apart this morning

and I will show you an area

where you need to make Jesus preeminent.

He is before all things and in Him all things hold together.

If He's before all things church,

that means you can't put anything before Jesus.

It means you can't put your activities before Jesus.

It means you can't put your hobbies before Jesus.

You can't put your job before Jesus.

You can't put your passions before Jesus.

Jesus must have preeminence in all things.

Why? Because He alone is preeminent.

You see, it's not enough to just have Jesus

be included in our lives.

It's not enough to just have Jesus be preeminent

in one area of our lives.

We need Him in all aspects of our lives

or they'll start to fall apart.

So Paul has already shown us that,

hey, your spiritual life, like creation itself

will fall apart without Jesus.

Your life will fall apart without Jesus

and then he's gonna say something very interesting.

He's gonna say that the church

will fall apart without Jesus.

Look at verse 18.

The Bible says, and He is the head of the body, the church.

He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,

that in everything He might be preeminent.

Now again, this is one of those verses

that everybody can say yes and amen to, right?

I say, Jesus is the head of the church

and you say, amen, pastor, of course He is.

Everybody agrees with that, but here's where it gets hard.

If Jesus is the head of the church,

you know what that means?

It means that you're not the head of the church

and it means that I'm not the head of the church

and Jordan's not the head of the church

and Christian's not the head of the church

and Mark's not the head of the church.

It means that Jesus is the one who runs His church.

So here's the point, I want you to understand.

If you replace Jesus with anything else,

the church will start to fall apart.

If you replace Jesus with anything else,

the church will start to fall apart.

And I want everybody to put a star by that,

underline it, circle it, do whatever you have to do

because this is the killer of churches.

You can blame it on all sorts of things

that you wanna blame it on,

but when you root it down and get to the root of it,

this is what kills churches.

Replacing anything else, replacing Jesus with anything else

and making that thing the head of the church.

That will kill a church.

I've seen it far too often with far too many churches.

If a church replaces Jesus with their pastor

and they make their pastor preeminent in the church,

here's what happens.

They become known for their pastor, right?

Don't come to our church because we preach Jesus.

You gotta come because of our pastor.

That guy can really preach.

And he's this great guy

and he's got all these letters after his name.

Like that's the guy you wanna come here.

And so the whole church's identity

becomes the identity of the pastor.

And the church is only known for the pastor.

So here's my question.

If that happens to a church

and they make their pastor preeminent,

rather than Jesus, well then,

what happens when the pastor dies?

Or what happens when the pastor retires?

Or what happens when the pastor gets one of those magical calls

to go to some other church?

I've never received one of those magical calls.

I haven't found it in the Bible anywhere yet.

But a lot of pastors get these magical calls

to go to another church.

The weird thing is, it's always a bigger church

with more money.

In the history of Christianity,

God has never called someone

to go to a smaller church for less money.

But that's another sermon for another day.

But my question is, besides Jordan Massie,

we're staying corrected.

But the point is, if the church becomes

the identity of the pastor

and the pastor goes away,

what happens to the church?

It dies, typically.

I mean, that's exactly what happened with Morris Hill Church.

They became one of the largest churches in America.

They had like 13 different campuses.

I mean, they were running into like 50,000s,

almost 100,000 people, I think, at one point.

One of the largest churches in America.

But over time, their identity got lost

and they became all about their pastor, Mark Driscoll.

And Mark Driscoll was preeminent in their church

rather than Jesus.

And so everything about that church

was all about Mark Driscoll and his personality

and the cult of Mark Driscoll.

And then he gets caught in a scandal.

He was dismissed from the church.

He leaves and that church of like 100,000 people,

the one of the largest churches in America,

shut its doors and closed,

never to reopen all within two years.

That's how it happens.

And so there's a clear warning there,

not to put your pastor on a pedestal

that was only ever meant for Jesus.

So listen to me, I love you.

I've told you I plan on being here

until the day I die if the Lord will allow it.

And if he is very good to me,

he'll let me die in the pulpit, okay?

I've said it to you before, but listen to me church,

I will be your under shepherd.

I will walk alongside of you.

I will be there for you, but I am not Jesus.

I do not run this church

and you should never try to make this church's identity

the identity of Alex and make this church known for me.

We exist to make Christ known in love, amen.

But if it's not a pastor,

there are other things that can take the place

of Jesus's preeminence in the church.

For other people it's a denomination.

Like this is what happened with David Platt in his church.

David Platt became the pastor of McLean Bible Church,

which is an unaffiliated church.

And in their constitution and bylaws,

I think article one of their constitution said,

we are an unaffiliated church,

we will never be associated with any denomination, right?

That's their preference, they can do that.

That's something they wanna do.

David Platt becomes the pastor

and he has a desire to be prominent within the SBC,

the Southern Baptist Convention.

And he wants to be one of the biggest churches

in the Southern Baptist Convention.

He wants to be one of the top givers and donators

in the Southern Baptist Convention.

And so what he did is he became so focused on that

and made denominational preference and notoriety

preeminent in his church.

Here's what he started doing.

He started secretly funneling millions

of his church's dollars to the SBC.

And then he hid the finances so that no one in the church

could check the finances.

And he was funneling millions and millions and millions

of dollars and it came out with emails that he was saying,

hey, if we gave this much,

could we be within the top five givers in our state

within the SBC?

That's what it looks like when denomination

takes preference over Jesus.

And now, because this is such a horrible thing to have happened,

his own church is suing him.

He is their pastor and they are suing him

for the mishandling of funds

and there's been an entire documentary come out about this.

And so the point is very clear here.

The warning is here.

If our devotion to our denomination is greater

than our devotion to Jesus, our churches will collapse.

They will die.

All right, now let me just say this, okay?

And this isn't even in my sermon notes.

This one you get for free, all right?

So off the top here, since I just talked about the SBC,

let me say this.

We are an SBC church, convictionally.

I believe that the Southern Baptist Convention

is the greatest denomination because it is most aligned

with what we see in the Bible.

And I think we do more good for the world

than other denominations.

And I think we have more opportunities

the way that we've been set up to do those things, okay?

So I love being part of the Southern Baptist Convention.

Having said that, I will also tell you this,

the Southern Baptist Convention

will never have preeminence in this church.

We do not benefit from the Southern Baptist Convention.

I don't know if y'all know how it works.

They don't send us a check.

They don't send us any money or anything like that.

There is nothing they do to send us anything

to where they can have sway.

They don't tell me what to preach.

I wouldn't listen to them if they did.

They don't tell me what sermon passages to read

or anything like that.

We partner with them for ministry.

But if anything in that denomination gets to the point

where Jesus is not preeminent in that denomination,

I will leave the SBC so quickly.

You'll never remember

George's Creek Baptist Church was part of it, okay?

We all good on that?

Can we say amen?

I would hope you're in agreement with me on that

because here's the thing.

We want to make much of Jesus.

And if our convention is not making much of Jesus,

we can do it better on our own.

And so the denomination will never have preeminence

in our church.

Now, those are the easy things, right?

It's easy to say that these are the killer of churches

when you put the pastor on a pedestal,

when you give the denomination

too much preference in the church.

But let me just ask you as we close very quickly,

do you want to know what the number one

biggest killer of churches is?

It's the self.

And most of the time, the way that comes across

is in our preferences, right?

So the Bible just said here

that Jesus is the head of the church.

He runs the church and we say,

but I want things done my way.

I want things to be done the same way

we've always done them before.

I want the church to look the exact same

that it's always looked.

I want people to dress the same way they've always dressed.

I want the same programs we've always had.

I want to sing the same music we've always sung.

I want the same preaching style we've always had.

Sorry about that.

And I'm gonna do everything I can

to make sure that happens.

I want the pastor to cover his tattoos

at every meal we have and he'll never wear a hat again.

I want things done my way

and I'm gonna make sure I can get them my way.

And that's how so many Christians are.

And what ends up happening is we end up caring more

about preferences than we do about

what the Bible actually says is important.

You understand that?

It's not that your preferences are bad necessarily

and the Bible is not saying you can't have your preferences.

The Bible is saying be very careful

about how far you take this

because if it gets to the point

where you're running the church,

then guess who's not running the church?

Jesus.

And Jesus should be the one running the church.

Every church member would say,

yes, Jesus runs the church,

but here's what I have found in all my years of ministry.

When you get these certain stubborn people

who always have to have their way on everything

and they talk about what Jesus wants,

I've noticed that the Jesus they talk about

looks a lot like them.

One theologian said, God made man in his image

and ever since that time,

we have been trying to remake God in our image.

And so what they do is they'll say,

hey, I was praying and God told me,

he wants things to be done

the exact same way they've always been done.

Hey, you know how I've been fighting for this thing?

Well, I just had God sent me a vision and a dream last night

and turns out he wants the same thing I do.

And all they're doing is they're making something up

to try to get their way in the church.

I'm just gonna say it to you like this,

Jesus knows what's best for his church better than you do.

Amen?

Jesus knows what's best for his church better than I do

and better than Jordan and Christian and Mark

and everyone else in here because we are not God.

Now I'll tell you this church,

the church of Jesus Christ was doing just fine before you

and the church of Jesus Christ will be doing just fine

long after the Lord has called you home.

Why?

Because the church isn't about you.

And the church is not dependent on you.

The church is about one person and one person only

and that is our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

That is why all this exists.

That is why we do everything we do.

We exist to make much of Jesus,

to tell people about what Christ has done for us,

to tell them about the salvation that he has bought for us,

to tell them about eternal life in Christ

and getting to be with God and enjoy him forever.

Nothing else in the church matters except Jesus.

So do you see what Paul is saying here?

If you remove Jesus from anything, it falls apart.

If you remove Jesus from creation, creation falls apart.

If you remove Jesus from your life,

listen to me, your life will start to fall apart

and if you remove Jesus from the church,

the church will fall apart.

The most important thing for you to remember this morning

is that Jesus is before all things

and Jesus holds all things together.

So let's give the Lord Jesus Christ

the preeminence he deserves in the church,

in creation and in our lives.

Amen.