How God Transforms Us // Forged Pt. 2 // Luke Humbrecht

Welcome to the Lookout Weekly Podcast.

Church of the Lookout is an old of Colorado, and our vision is Jesus, abiding in his presence, growing in his family, and living on his mission to transform the world with awe-inspiring love.

Visit us online at thelookout.church.

Good to see you guys.

Got a couple birthdays in the house.

Noah Humbrack to my 17-year-old son.

Happy birthday, friend.

Happy birthday, Tara.

I don't think she's over here.

She's not here.

She's oh she she left on purpose.

She left on purpose.

Um hey, good to see you guys.

Happy Labor Day weekend.

I I know that there's we have a lot of friends who are out and about getting their squeezing the lass out of summer, summer travel.

Um, but so good to be here with you guys, share this space with you.

If we haven't met yet, my name is Luke.

Um, and I get to um share the message here in just a moment.

One really fun story I wanted to share with you is this uh we have a group uh at the church called Be the Bridge, and um it really started as a group to explore the biblical theme of racial reconciliation and God's heart for all ethnicness all ethnicities, tribes, tongues, races to to be able to see each other in the image of God.

Um two two of the members of this group, uh Mildred and Cynthia Gutierrez, they're actually from Puerto Rico.

Um they're not here this morning, I don't believe.

Oh, they're right here.

Awesome.

Um, and what one one really cool story that emerged, Cynthia, um she sent an email out to the group because there is a major crisis happening in Puerto Rico right now with the water crisis.

Um thousands of people do not have access to um uh to clean water.

And certainly that was uh weighing heavy on their hearts because they have friends and family in Puerto Rico.

But she sent an email out to their group, and and together they they just started raising money.

She started finding how we can get water to these people, what can we do?

And she was researching all these options, all these ways to ship water, and then she'd have one way and then it gets shut down, another way and it gets shut down.

She finally figured it out and was able to raise around, I mean, over a thousand dollars at this point to send uh water, and I want to show a couple photos.

Yeah, photos right here of the Twirland Center.

Um, the Tortland Center cares for adults living with mental uh health conditions.

Most of them don't have family or anyone else looking out for them.

And so their administrator uh administration got boxes of water dropped off, and they wrote back to say thank you.

They said um this was uh a major act to care for their people, and they were just beaming with the light that they were thought of and that we were able to rally to get water straight to their doorstep.

So come on, let's give it up to this group.

That's how this works.

Um it it's it's a beautiful picture how in community we catch God's heart for his world, for something we can do.

And we and we knock down doors, we pray, we do what it takes to share the love of Jesus, even in practical ways like that.

So that's awesome.

Um so uh today I'm gonna continue uh part two of a series we started last week.

I know some of you weren't here last week.

I'll just do a quick recap, but we started a new series called Forms.

And uh and I'm gonna start with a passage today, and then I'll I'll tell you a little bit more about it.

But I want to read from 2 Corinthians chapter 3, verse 16.

2 Corinthians 3:16

And if you don't have a Bible, you can always grab one of the blue Bibles in the back or in the foyer.

But this is 2 Corinthians chapter 3.

2 Corinthians 3 · chapter mention

This is Paul writing.

He's writing about what's happened in Christ, about something new that's happened in Christ.

And here's what he says He says, but when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Somebody say amen.

And we all, everybody say, we all with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another, for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

Let's say this together.

This is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

Come on.

So here at the Lookout, if you haven't heard this before, one of the driving heartbeat of what motivates us as a community, that here's how we say it.

The churches say this all kinds of different ways.

Here's how we say it.

We say our vision is Jesus, abiding in his presence and growing in his family.

It's this, and living on his mission, it's that, to transform the world with awe-inspiring love.

Not all, not our awe-inspiring love, with his awe-inspiring love.

So our vision is Jesus.

This is what this passage is talking about.

He's saying, Paul is saying, listen, we all with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of God, as we look to him, we become more like him because why?

Because we become what we behold.

This is true in life.

This is true for all of us.

What has the most of our attention forms us from the inside out.

And this is one of the things we explored last week is that all of us here, we are all being formed by something.

We are all being formed by something.

The question is not if, but by what and into whom.

And all of us are on this journey.

Donald Trump is being formed by something.

He's been formed into the kind of person he is.

Pope Leo has been formed into the kind of person he is.

Dolly Parton, God bless her soul.

She was formed into the kind of person she was and still is in the presence of God.

Bo Nix, God, oh geez, Lord, help him.

Bo Nicks.

He has been formed into the kind of person he is.

You just pick anybody throughout history.

Um, the principle is here is staying the same is not on the menu.

We are all becoming, and Robert Mulholland, he said it like this, we're all either becoming agents of God's healing and liberating grace, or we're becoming carriers of the sickness of the world.

There's not a neutral thing.

And this is why this matters for the time we live in, because if if you are a Christian and you're living and kind of going with the flow, I guarantee you you will end up somewhere you do not want to be.

And you'll become the kind of person you do want you don't want to be.

You want to be in the flow and in the formation of what God is doing.

And it starts with beholding him as he is, right?

So being a disciple of Jesus, and you'll want to go back and listen to last week, but being a disciple of Jesus is a lifelong journey of being formed into a person that actually looks like Jesus for the sake of the world.

Okay.

Isaiah 64, 8 is the beautiful picture we get of God's intention.

It says, But now, O Lord, you are our Father, we are the clay, and you are our potter.

We are the work of your hand.

How beautiful is that to know that God is a master potter.

He is an artisan and you are the clay.

This is a theme all the way through scripture, the very beginning.

God reached into the clay of the earth and fashioned man and breathed life into him.

And he continues to breathe life into us.

And even Paul, just after the passage we read, would he would he would comment on this.

He said, But we are but jars of clay, that we may know the surpassing uh power of the God who is in us.

He has hidden his treasure in us, his treasure is inside of us, but we're just jars of clay.

But he put his power inside of us.

So God is shaping us, he's forming us from the inside out.

But how does this happen?

That's the question I want to get at today.

How does he transform us?

There's a lot of books written about this for forever.

Everyone's writing about how transformation works.

This is not the end-all be-all, this is just a few thoughts for this morning, so please take this with a grain of salt.

But I want to answer this question: how do we transform?

Because there's all kinds of equations that we were handed and you've learned over the course of your life.

Okay.

So, for most of us, transformation, it's it's completely unconscious and it's incomplete.

Our theory of change, you might not even have ever thought about it, how a person changes, how you've changed.

Okay?

Here's a few things that maybe uh, you know, coming into church, we think about.

We think if I just go to church enough, I'll be changed.

If I can just get another prophetic word, I'll be changed.

If I just pray more, I'll be changed.

Now, in the world, here's a formula that the world uses information plus inspiration plus willpower equals transformation, right?

So I just, so the working idea here is like I'm always just, I just gotta learn a little bit more.

If I just learn a little bit more and psych myself up, that's what's gonna do it.

That's how I change, right?

That's how I become the person I want to be.

Now, if you go into like the experience of a lot of Christians, it would look something more like this.

Tell me this sounds familiar.

Go to church plus read the Bible and pray equals transformation.

Go to church plus read the Bible plus pray.

Now, listen, all three of those things.

Yes, yes, and amen.

I do all those things.

They're part of my rule of life.

I mean, there this is this is this is how I live.

But how many of you guys know you can do those three things and remain the same person for a long time?

And even potentially deform over time.

So there's there's a reason for that, okay?

But so some of us are like, man, if I just if I just do kind of the basics, that's that's what's gonna do it.

Well, I think Jesus invites us into a more complete holistic picture.

We'll get into that in a second.

But here's another one.

Here's another one.

When I was a kid growing up in youth groups, so my words and story is I I grew up in church world.

My parents loved Jesus, and uh and they grew me up to to know Jesus, but I had an encounter with God at uh youth group when I was 13 years old, and it really marked my life.

But the culture of the youth group that I grew up in really the only the only play in the book was have an encounter with God.

And we're not gonna tell you anything else after that, just keep having encounters with God, and then once that one runs out, come back.

So it looks something more like this encounter God plus stay passionate plus really mean it this time equals transformation.

And so the the I didn't have I didn't know what else to do.

So it's just get back to you to be able to get your hands in the air.

You better ramp this thing up, amp it up.

And uh we're not gonna talk about how to live into that afterwards, just get back next week and just be as excited, just figure out how to keep it going, keep it going, keep the engine going.

And I think depending on your personality or you know, your life experience that worked for some people, I had a lot of friends that over time they realized they were never given a vision for how to live.

They were only given a vision for how to get amped up at church.

Do you guys are you guys with me?

Now, here hear me out.

I am first in line when it comes to we must have an encounter with God.

That's why we started with where we are.

Beholding the glory of God.

You will not transform unless you encounter the man Jesus Christ, the living God, and his presence in your life.

So, me saying this is not a diminishment of that.

What I'm saying, though, is that when Jesus, when people encounter Jesus, he invited them into a life where formation could take place.

And uh, but I just want to ask you the question.

If you had to answer the question, how does transformation work?

What would be on your ingredient list?

Right?

How does it work?

You're like, well, I again I don't know, just don't think about it, just go with the flow.

I'm just saying, we're living in a time where there's things that are forming us.

There's people that have a plan for your life.

God has a plan for your life.

There's a lot of other people that have a plan for your life.

There's in our culture, there's there's forces at work that lead us to be certain kinds of people.

I don't believe it's an option to think that we're going to grow in the image of Christ just by happenstance.

It happens with a level of cooperating and participating in his life.

It happens through the stories we believe, the habits and practices and behaviors we embody, right?

And then the community that we're embedded in.

Um there is a part that's God's work alone.

Listen to me.

I'm not saying we transform ourselves.

There's a part that's God's work alone, but then there's a part that we play to participate and surrender and avail ourselves to his work, to avail every part of our life to his white hot love so that we can be transformed.

Now, this happens transformation, it can happen in small ways, it can happen in big ways.

All right.

I'll share with you a story, one transformation in my life that happened after I married Megan.

Actually, I transformed in a lot of ways after I met and married Megan.

Um, I'm grateful for all the ways I've transformed since um being married to Megan.

One of the ways, though, when I moved out to Colorado and I met Megan and we married, uh, I had few to no skills.

Skills of any kind.

But particularly like fixing skills, building skills.

All right.

I could barely change a light bulb, right?

I moved in, like, she already had a house.

I moved in, we got married, and I had a crate of old junk from high school.

I moved in, and then I'm like, I had to figure out how to be a husband and actually fix things around the house.

I didn't know what I was doing, I didn't learn those things growing up, and um my and that's not my dad's fault.

My dad didn't learn those things either from his dad, right?

So it's not it's funny, it's just we didn't have so the operating system growing up is uh we don't know, like we don't know who somebody else does these kinds of things, right?

We hire these things out, we play music, you fix cars, you build things, you change light bulbs, the whole thing.

All right, and so that was kind of that's kind of the thing growing up.

So but I got married, and uh I found out, you know, well, I didn't find out, but my my father-in-law is a contractor.

And so that was actually, I mean, certainly it's like that's a that's a bonus, okay?

So if you don't know how to fix things, it's good to marry somebody whose father is a contractor.

And her brother had skills too.

So the first time that we had to fix something or build something, I was like, oh, this is great.

So I went and asked my father-in-law, hell, can you can you do this for us?

And and I I quickly very uh learned very quickly his response was uh I will help you do this thing.

And I was like, Well, that wasn't what I had in mind, but sure, okay.

Uh I was compliant enough to learn.

So I uh uh very quickly, as things would come up around the house or we decided we wanted to finish our basement, my father-in-law, my brother-in-law, they would say to me, I'd say, I don't know how to do these things, and they would say to me, Um, well, you can learn how to do these things, and yes, yes, you can.

You have you have what it takes to do this.

And they gave me the belief, right?

They gave me uh they gave me a vision of what it could be like to actually learn how to do this.

And said, not only do you can we teach you how to do these things, we're gonna give you the tools and the skills and show you actually how to do it.

And then uh, and then as I always start doing the things and start realizing I was making mistakes, they would help correct me if I was making mistakes, but they'd encourage me, like, hey, you did that, you did that all on your own.

So what happened was slowly but surely, I was able to change my mindset from somebody who is saying, I don't do things like this, to I can and I will learn how to fix this.

And I started to actually realize that I like this.

I had this as part of my identity at one point, but now my identity is shifting into somebody who's not afraid of doing that.

Now I can do that, and they gave me a new mindset, a new story to enter into.

They gave me the tools and the actual skills.

He said, All right, here's how we're gonna do it.

You watch me do it, and then you're gonna do it, and we're gonna show you exactly how to become the kind of person that can do these kinds of things.

And then as that would start to happen, as we started, you know, finishing basements and fixing stuff around the house, they would encourage me, like, that was awesome, you've got this, we're with you.

So it's just the communal part of we're gonna learn from you, you're gonna learn from us, and we're gonna do this together, right?

So, did you guys catch that?

I went from I don't believe I could do it, to a paradigm shift, a new story to enter into where now I am my story's changing.

I am now the kind of person who can do this, right?

To I didn't I take that down just for a second.

I didn't know how to do it, so I needed the skills and tools which would become practices.

How do you actually live into that?

And number three, I don't know what have anyone to show me how, and I don't know if I'm doing it right.

So that's where community and the people come in.

Now, this what you see on the screen, because I'm a preacher, I have to find three letters that all have start with the same thing or four letters, and so I don't particularly like the word paradigms, but it works for today, so go with it.

Okay.

So when you talk about like what's needed for a life of holistic change, number one, we need paradigms or story, we need to look at the stories that we believe.

When Jesus invited people in the transformation, he fundamentally changed the story that they were living into.

Okay.

But number two, he didn't just give them something to think about, he gave them practices, ways to inhabit a new kind of life.

Okay, not just good ideas, but he's like, here's what to do.

And number three, he didn't just invite them into isolation, he invited to become a people, a community that was transformative, right?

And not just that, but he would eventually give us the power of the Holy Spirit at the end at the center of it all, that would be the engine that fuels all of these things.

Because you can have all these things, but without the power of the Holy Spirit, we're toasts.

Come on.

And so I want to look at three of these things, and I want you to see and just kind of get a picture for today of three things that God uses to transform us.

This is true for you, it's true for me.

And as we move forward together, the reason why we're doing this series is to just share some language and a way of thinking about how we're building into this kind of life together as a community, okay?

Are you guys with me?

Okay.

So, yes.

So, my story of transformation uh of uh becoming somebody who wasn't handy to somebody who's is is handy.

Uh obviously it's not a spiritual story, though I could argue it's a Christ-like story, uh, because you know, Christ was a carpenter and you know that whole thing.

Sorry, I'll leave, we'll cut that one out of the podcast.

Um uh but spiritual transformation happens in a lot of the same ways.

And it happens in a lot of other ways too.

It happens through suffering and over time.

There's things that we're not gonna be able to talk about today, but one of the things that happens when we come into Christ is he gives us a new story to live into.

AW Tozer said this what comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.

So when it's following Jesus, ultimately, one of the first places it starts was God starts rewiring our thinking about Him, about ourselves, and about the world that we're living in.

None of us here are blank slates.

We've all inherited a lifetime of assumptions, beliefs, ideas, lies, expectations, both from your family of origin uh origin, your own sin nature, and the culture around us.

When you encounter Jesus, though, he starts to renew our minds and starts teaching us how to live in God's reality.

So this is the verse we explored last week in Romans 12 do not conform to the patterns of this world, but uh be transformed by the renewal of your mind.

So a lot of transformation starts with the renewal of mind.

And so that might not sound um revolutionary to you, but I just want to remind you that Jesus, one of one of the labels or the names of God, the how his disciples referred to him was rabbi or teacher.

And all throughout the gospels, um, it wasn't just son of God and Messiah and Savior and Lord, it was teacher, teacher.

Jesus came in pri he this one of his primary identities as he's walking with people was a teacher.

He's your teacher, he's gonna teach you actually a new way to live.

Um and he did this all the time.

He would say things like, You have heard it said, but I say to you, you've heard it said like this, you've learned things in one way, but I say to you something different.

He'd say, You have heard it said, an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, but I say to you, do not resist the one who is evil, but if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.

Okay.

He would say, You have heard it said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, persecute you.

And so he would help start transforming the way we think, he would help start rooting out deception and lies and old paradigms that weren't actually going to be helpful.

Um and you know, across this room is if we were to take an inventory of the types of stories that we're living into, both great and small, it happens in all kinds of ways.

Maybe for you it sounds like this if I stop, it all falls apart.

If I stop.

If I stop what I'm doing, everything will fall apart.

And so you're never able to rest or delight, right?

Or maybe you think love is you've learned this in your life.

Love is something I earn.

Nobody just gives me love.

It's something I have to earn my way.

That's a lot of us here too.

Maybe you think, maybe you when you think about God, the operating system is God is mostly disappointed.

Occasionally He'll smile at me.

But mostly He's disappointed, hoping that I'll figure it out.

Or maybe it's I am what I produce.

That's the my significance and my significance.

It's all about what I produce.

So there's all these stories that we live into, but what happens is when we come into him, he starts to rewire our paradigms, how we think.

That when I come into Christ, he teaches me.

He actually teaches this to me through the Holy Spirit.

That when I stop, God still cares for my needs.

Or God is always present and at work, even when other people abandon me.

Or I am loved by God and love never fails.

Even though other love fails, love never fails.

Or maybe this: I am not an orphan, I am a beloved son or daughter of God.

See, the story you live in is the story you live out.

And if you're trying to follow God without allowing him to teach you his ways and teach you about the kingdom, then we'll never be able to have the breakthrough and be able to submit to his loving hands.

All right.

Maybe here's another one.

If you believe the popular Western story that more money equals happiness, that the good life is about accomplishment and accumulation, it'll form you into a certain kind of person who looks like what?

Who looks driven, greedy, envious, discontent, distracted, never satisfied, maybe even dishonest and cruel.

On the other hand, if you believe Jesus' view of money, if you enter in, if you receive his teaching and obey it, but if you just receive his teaching, that all good things in our life are God's gifts, that wealth makes it harder, not easier, for most of us to enter the kingdom of God.

That's a whole other sermon.

But that's what Jesus taught.

That freedom from our dis uh from our desire is more found through giving and not getting.

That freedom and joy is actually more from giving and not getting.

That following his way of simplicity and generosity and hospitality will help us live freely and lightly.

So if we if we believe those things, it forms us into somebody who looks a little more like Jesus, right?

It's a it's we're being formed into a different kind of person.

So a paradigm, we have to, here's what we have to remember about paradigms.

They're formed through repetition and through experience.

So if you think that you can come to church on a Sunday morning and in like a 30-minute message, give or take, um, that's going to be enough to you know to form your, to live into God's reality.

And say it what we all will be malnourished and malformed over time.

Here's the invitation here.

As a people, to continue to change, to let God change our paradigm so we can become like him, we have to submit to the scriptures.

We have to open the word of God, not as an event, but as a lifestyle.

Not because we forgot what it says, but because we need to keep reminding ourselves of what is true.

Some of you are like, well, I know what it says, but you need to hear it again, and you need to hear it again.

Do you know how often you need to hear that God loves you and that you're not alone, and that there is hope, and that God has a plan and a future for you.

Do you know how often you need to hear that?

A lot more than you think.

A lot more than you think.

Because we forget, and the messages we're hearing on the outside are not those things.

So God comes to us, and when when people came to Jesus, He would He He He would invite them to Himself, and He would start to form like a Potter.

Let's change the way we think here.

But then it wasn't just paradigms, it was practices.

And the way I like to see is say this is counterformational habits.

We're formed into, you know, we're conformed, we're tempted to be conformed into the pattern of this world, but he transforms us into his image, and the way we participate that with that is by actually embracing what I would call, it's a beautiful word, counterformational images.

So when counterformational habits, so when the world is zigging, the followers of Christ are zagging.

When culture is doing this, we're doing this.

And we're going to get into a little bit more of that over the next couple weeks.

But James K.A.

Smith, theologian James K.

Smith, said this: You cannot think your way into Christ's likeness.

You can't think your way there.

You're not one more sermon away from Christ's likeness.

Even Jesus said, listen, um, listen and what's the word?

Obey, right?

Listen and obey.

Whoever hears the word and does the word, that's how he gets to us, and that's how we're formed.

And he would do this with his disciples.

Remember when he was feeding the 5,000, and there's a crowd of 5,000 all around him, and there's only um five fish and two loaves, and and they were they didn't have enough food.

And they came to him like, we have a problem, you go fix this problem.

He said, No, you go give them something to eat.

You go do this.

They're like, We don't know what you uh we literally don't know what you're saying right now.

Um, we have this food.

And he said, You go feed them.

And he first of all was challenging their paradigm, but he said, Listen, you need to learn to give even when what appears in your hand doesn't look like it's enough.

Because that's how you're gonna grow into the type of person that knows that God is the God of multiplication.

So he was teaching them generosity in a very specific way.

You go give them something, don't give out of lack, watch God multiply as you're faithful to distribute.

And so he blessed it and he broke it, and then as they were, as they were giving, the food multiplied.

It's a it's a really beautiful story.

But he would always invite them into new ways to respond.

Even all the people he healed, almost every time he gave them something to do.

He healed you.

Now go leave.

No, go wash yourself, go clean yourself, go show yourself to the priest.

He would do that all the time.

And that's the one thing I think we have to know, especially in a charismatic church, that God can powerfully transform us in a moment.

He can rewire our thinking, he can deliver us and set us free.

I do believe a moment in his presence can mark us for a lifetime.

But what's really interesting that even the people in the Gospels, um uh God would often powerfully heal somebody's body in a moment, but he never healed somebody's character in a moment.

You notice that?

If an angry person came to him, he never just said, boom, you're no longer angry.

He he did that with bodies, he did that with demonic oppression, he would set them free right away.

But he didn't fundamentally change an impatient person into a patient person, like, all right, you're now patient, go give it a shot.

Tell me how it goes.

No.

He'd invite them into a way of life where they could grow and and learn and be rewired from the inside out.

For angry people that would come to him, he wouldn't just zap them out of anger.

He would say, I'm gonna teach you how to forgive others as Christ has forgiven you.

And as you forgive, you're gonna you're gonna realize you're becoming a different kind of person from the inside out.

Are you guys with me?

This is the whole Sermon on the Mount.

Is he teaching people to see the kingdom of God and then to actually live into it.

Um and he did this with the rich young ruler as well.

This rich young ruler is dealing with greed.

He wants more of the kingdom of God.

And Jesus didn't zap it, he didn't just give it to him.

He said, Listen, if you want to experience more of the kingdom of God, then sell everything you have and give it to the poor.

And the rich young ruler is like, I can't do that.

He walked away sad.

And Jesus didn't fix that for him, but he did invite him into a life of, listen, if you are willing to set aside all of your attachments to your things, the life that God has for you is waiting on the other side of obedience.

So it's not just changing the way we think, it's changing what we do.

And this is why the desert fathers and mothers, like we talked about last week, and if that phrase means nothing to you, you can go listen to the sermon from last week.

But basically, in the third and fourth century, there's a whole group of um Christians, of, of, of believers who left Egypt and fled, fled the city and fled the church, and they they they they formed these communities out in the desert because they wanted to preserve their lives before God, and they started living into what would be later called a rule of life, or basically a way of life where we're going to practice availing ourselves to God so we can cooperate with his transformational work in our life.

And so it's a lot like a trellis.

And we looked at this trellis from last week.

This is kind of what we're talking about.

It's decisions about the way that we're going to live that keep the love of God at the center of everything we do.

They, every generation has to figure this out.

We have to figure this out in our generation.

How are we going to organize our lives and our habits, not just out of willpower, but in surrender to the love of God to remind and live in such a way, remind ourselves that the love of God, the Holy Spirit, that God Himself is at the center of everything that we do.

And so that means that when we give ourselves to practices like generosity, it's actually freeing us from the demonic power of greed and scarcity.

It's actually spiritual warfare when generosity is in your way of life and not just a one-time thing you do every now and then.

Or like prayer, calling you to a week of prayer.

Listen, this is about communion with God.

Jesus would leave the crowds and his people and go up on the mountains in silence and solitude.

Why?

Because he's attuning his heart to God.

And even for Jesus had to free himself of the voices and the noise all around us.

We have to give ourselves not just to a week of prayer, but a lifestyle of prayer in order to retrain ourselves to hear him in a world perpetually and chronically distracted.

Practices like Sabbath, which maybe you practice this, maybe not, but you've heard about it in the scriptures, and we we believe that practices like Sabbath, it interrupts our life.

It stops us and forces us to take one day out of seven to actually delight in God and trust him outside of what we produce.

It's spiritual warfare, guys.

It's going against the grain.

Counterformational habits like hospitality, where we have a rule, we have open doors in our house, we we we invite people to our tables to remind us that God is at work in the lives of others or practices like serving.

This is why we're always inviting you to serve, even at the church.

Why?

Because not just because we're filling needs, but because for you, serving regularly breaks the power of self-centeredness.

How many of you need to be broken of self-centeredness?

I think we should all be raising our hands right now.

I need this for myself, we do too.

So we give ourselves to a way where we practice the paradigms in our life built around Him.

The practice, practicing these things and the works, it's not what saves us.

We don't we're not saved by what we do.

But we participate in the life of God.

We obey and we respond until He transforms us from the inside of out.

And the fun part is the next three weeks, we're gonna be talking three specific weeks on the presence of God and the family of God and the mission of God, and how, as a community, here's the way we're gonna live into these things together as a way of life that keeps Jesus and the love of God at the center of everything we do.

I hope you're ready for that.

Come on.

But lastly, paradigms practice is the people, this is the community that shapes us.

And here's what I just want to remind you guys some of us try to change on our own.

And I get that there's a very private thing, there's a personal thing to change.

Maybe some of you think about the change needed in your life, and it's it's you.

But when it comes to spiritual transformation into the image of Christ, transformation, we have to remember, is not a self-improvement project.

It's it's it's about becoming like Christ so that we can love others as he loves them.

You guys with me?

So all the things I'm talking about, I'm not just talking about how how can I just be.

No, we're we're we're seeking to be what Jesus called us to be, which is a force of love in the world, to be sent by God in his power.

And uh, you know, here's the problem with with community.

The biggest problem with community is people.

Here's what I found, guys.

People are frustrating and annoying and flaky, and they drive too slow, and they drive too fast.

They're commitment averse.

They never can see me rightly or know me or know my thought.

People, I mean, here's what I've concluded.

Here's what I conclude this week.

I would be so much better at loving if it weren't for people.

If you could just deal with that, dude, I'd be a great person of love, man.

I'd be so full of love.

But this is the whole, this is the paradox here.

You cannot become a person of love by yourself.

And we have to just keep hearing this and hearing this and hearing this and hearing this.

And I know I've just harp on this all the time, but listen, you cannot become a people of love by yourself.

Part of the role of a community like this is to become the test lab for the quality of our love.

It's the lab in which love is grown and tested.

You cannot grow in love unless you are tested.

You cannot become a person of patience unless your patience is tested.

Who tests your patience?

People.

Now, I'm not, I don't want to be so hard on you.

I'm talking about myself.

No, this is a we're a fantastic family and community.

I'm I'm being facetious, you guys know that.

Uh, but what I want to emphasize is that the way that we practice following Jesus, the way he transforms us, is never outside of the context of who are the people we're living with and working this stuff out with.

And and here at the Lookout as we're coming into the fall, there's all kinds of ways to integrate, both on Sunday mornings, but in our men's nights and women's Bible studies and classes and courses, and there will continue to be ways to do this.

But it actually starts with desire, because you can have all of the opportunities you want, but if you actually don't desire to be with people, then that's part of the problem.

And I want to encourage you, if you've tried, if you're if you're kind of do it on your own and you sprinkle people in, I'm just saying you will cut yourself off on the loving hands of the Father and how he wants to continue to shape you into his image, into his likeness.

I love hearing stories of what our friends did in Puerto Rico.

I love hearing stories from friends who are learning to follow Jesus and the testimonies of breakthrough.

We need to hear each other's stories.

We need the encouragement.

This is what I needed when I was learning to become handy.

I needed people who not only told me what to do, but were with me to actually show me how to keep moving, how to keep walking, how to keep at it.

We need the same thing.

But we cannot transform ourselves.

We need that all of this, the context of all of this is in the power of the Holy Spirit.

The Holy Spirit's at the center.

Ruth Haley Barton said it like this I cannot transform myself, but what I can do is create the conditions in which spiritual transformation can take place.

Okay?

So the reason I walk through all of that is because over the next three weeks, we're going to be talking about paradigms and practices and how, as a people, we're going to take these things seriously for the day in which we live, right?

So in a rushed and distracted world, how is God forming us at the lookout into a people who are present with Him and with each other?

In an isolated, self-serving world, how is God forming us into a family that loves each other and knows each other and actually lays down our life for each other?

In an age of timidity and fear, how is God forming us into a people who live with purpose and passion to love the world like he loves the world?

How many of you guys want these things?

I want these things.

I want these for us, I want these for myself.

And the intentionality as a community to set, to index our hearts in our ways towards him.

Together, if we prioritize, if we can behold him in our thoughts, in our behaviors, and even in our community, we will continue to become like him.

Amen.

So here's what I want to do.

I just want to ask a few questions this morning.

And I want to peel back, just reel it back a little bit.

There was a little teaching kind of foundation laying, but just for a moment here today, can we just invite the Holy Spirit to speak to our hearts?

And I want to invite you to close your eyes with me.

Let's just take a moment and quiet before Jesus today.

Holy Spirit, we invite you.

You're the center of it all.

I do want to speak to anybody in the room here this morning who, as I'm talking about transformation, you're you may be thinking of one part of your life where you really need transformation.

And you feel it.

It could be in your marriage.

Or an important relationship.

It could be there's things welling up.

It could be anger or addiction.

And there's things that you've just tried to get at.

And it's been hard to know how it works.

But I just wanna wanna I believe that God this morning, for any areas where we need to be transformed, but we've just lost hope.

I just believe that God wants to resurrect faith in hearts this morning.

Faith that change is possible.

So I speak faith and hope across this room.

That in your presence, God, anything can change.

And as we submit to your ways, anything can change.

For some of us serious, I'm talking about the ways that God actually loves to transform us.

Maybe maybe you've been on a solo mission.

Maybe you've been trying to do stuff your own way and you haven't really thought about how what is what is how does God want to form me in this season?

And are you taking that seriously?

And i i I think there's an opportunity, maybe, if if you feel like, man, I I'm you know, I'm trying to do the right things and believe the right things, but maybe you're just you're doing it alone.

Or maybe you've you've you're doing the paradigms and the practices, but not the people.

Or maybe you've got the people and you got the beliefs, but you're not you're not diligently trying to live out what Jesus called us to live out and what the scriptures call us to live out.

Maybe you're trying to do one thing but not another.

I'm just telling you, today is a is a chance to just say, God, I I'm done with doing this my own way, and I want to choose your way.

And that would be a great prayer to pray.

God, teach me how to submit to you.

And even right now, I surrender myself to you, God.

And then I just imagine, like, what if we're the kind of community when people come in and say, I my marriage is broken, and I don't have any hope that we're the kind of people, he's saying, No, no, no.

God has given you everything you need and the power that you need.

And guess what?

We're gonna walk with you and give you the tools and the skills.

We're gonna help get you the ministry, we're gonna expose the lies, we're gonna set you free, and we're gonna journey into transformation together.

What if people came in and said, This is one part of my life?

I'm I'm I find myself always judgmental and overly critical, and I can't stop.

And we say, No, you can stop because God has given you a different mindset, He's given you humility and grace, and we can change the way you think.

And then you're gonna start learning how to live into that and how to extend grace and peace to others, and we're gonna do that together.

What if we became a transformational kind of community?

And together we're agreeing with God about reality.

Together, we're sharpening each other in how we're living, and together we're offering unceasing encouragement because God never gives up on us and we don't give up on each other.

What if that were the case?

It starts with a yes in our hearts.

So today, God, across this room, I pray that you would look at what we need and you would help us to orient ourselves towards you.

We say yes.

If you have a yes in your heart towards the transformational work of God, just say yes.

Yes, God.

We surrender to you.

We surrender to you, God.

We say yes to you.

Now teach us how to live.

And what I want to do, I want to invite our ministry team, our prayer team, and the first place that we started this morning, or in just a few minutes ago, was just anybody who needs faith for transformation.

And listen, if you're here today and you just need faith, you need hope today for transformation in your life or any part of your life, we're gonna ask some of our ministry team to be on the sides of the room.

And this is a chance you can come and just receive prayer and just say, I cannot figure this out on my own, but I want to talk with somebody, I want to pray with somebody.

And you just need a bolster of energy and Holy Spirit power in your life.

This is what this team is for.

We believe that God loves to meet us as we reach out to him, he is eager to meet us where we are.

And listen, all of us need the transformational work of God.

We all need God to get to us.

And so let's stand together today.

Let's stand together.

And if that's you, if you would like to pray with somebody, if you'd like to meet with somebody and for them to bless what God is doing in your life, or just help help you just get some hope and experience hope in your life.

I want to invite you, you can leave where you're at and go to the sides as we close our service here.

But for the rest of us, say, listen, we're we're leaving here, not empty-handed, but with an invitation of God to join him on the potter's wheel as he continues to shape us and to form us.

So may the Lord bless you and keep you.

May he make his shape face to shine upon you, may he lift up his countenance upon you and give you rest.

And I just want to say to you go in the peace and the strength of the kingdom of God.

Love you guys.

Have a great Labor Day weekend.

And if you like prayer, go to the side and we'll pray with you.

Love you guys.

Let's go.