Silver Spoons - Week 2

Amen, Amen, and amen, Thank you guys so much forgiving.

And you know, I know it is I know it's

a nasty rainy day outside, but I haven't seen any

rain in here, so I think we're okay. But you know,

any given sunday, it could be reiining here too. You

just never know. Uh, But we're so we're so honored

to be gathered with you today and continue our series

silver Spoons. We're gonna talk about parenting and character development

and the way the Lord sees us and the way

the Lord wants us to respond as children of God.

So if you got a Bible, go to Deuteronomy chapter six,

Deuteronomy chapter six.

You know, in my family, we kind of pass.

Our heritage, those principles, those precepts that that govern our lives.

I'm not just talking about the scriptural principles, but just

you know, the stewardisms, you know, those things that just

kind of are are unique to our family. Through story,

we tell stories. Every time we get together, we tell stories.

And sometimes I tell the same stories.

Over and over and over again.

And I'm aware I'm telling the same story over and

over and over again, but it's that reputation, it's that repetition.

It's that impartation of heritage that makes a huge difference

because those are the lived moments where we learn those lessons, Amen.

And some of those stories they seem insignificant, some of

them seem momentous, but all of them are formational. If

you have a story, if there's something you remember, it's

because there was some kind of moment of formation that's

tied to that story. It's not just a funny thing

or an empty moment, but we learn something deep at

the fabric of our being. And that's why that story stuck.

Because how many things don't stick, Amen, how many days

go by, how many weeks go by in our lives

where we don't have those stories that we remember from

twenty years ago. Those stories are very few and far between.

When we think about the actual lifespan and everything that's

happened in our lives, it's those formational moments that really stick.

And you know, I'll start a story and sometimes, you know,

my wife and my kids they'll roll their eyes because

they've heard it so many times before.

But I feel like I need to say it.

Come on now, I feel like I need to say

it because it is that moment of impartation because it

was a life lived, and that story carries such a

powerful presentation of that principle.

In Deuteronomy chapter six, verse one, Moses is he's speaking

to the people.

This is the very moment where Israel begins to be

more than just a gathering of people, where there's mandate happening,

there's organization happening. They're beginning to see the responsibility of

the destiny that God has given them. And Moses has

gathered to people and he's speaking to them, and he's

talking about those those those laws, those principles of God.

And in Deuteronomy chapter six, verse one, it starts like this, Now,

this is the commandment, and these are the statutes and

judgments which the Lord your God is commanded to teach you,

that you may observe them in the land which you

are crossing over to possess, that you may fear the

Lord your God to keep all his statutes and his commandments,

which I command you, you and your son and your grandson,

all the days of your life, that you that you

may observe it, that it may be well with you,

and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord God

of your father's has promised you a land flowing with

milk and honey.

Here Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord is one.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,

with all your soul, them with all your strength. And

these words which I command to you today shall be

in your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children,

and you shall talk of them when you sit in

your house, when you walk by the way, when you

lie down, when you rise up, you shall bind them

as a sign on your hand, and they shall be

as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on

the doorpost of your house and on your gates. Father,

let's just let's just come to the conclusion that we

are all in need of your touch today. Father, and

I pray that your word speaks deeply to us. That

you transform the way we think about formation. Lord, that

you help us understand the conveying of the spiritual in

a much different, deeper and more powerful way today than

we ever have, and guard our hearts. That we not

be uh filled with shame and guilt because we haven't

done it. But let today be the day that we

begin to do things the Kingdom way.

Lord, I pray that you work and move in our

lives in Jesus' name. Amen.

You know Moses is uh, he's talking, and he's that

there's a lot here. There's a there's a lot of

New Testament in this Old Testament passage. Amen, there's there's

a lot of places that look back to this very passage.

Uh.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your mind,

your soul, your strength is is right here in this passage.

And when we go to the New Testament, Jesus says that, hey,

that's that's like one B.

One A is love the Lord your God with all

your mind. Holders.

One B is love your neighbor as yourself. He's marrying

these powerful precepts and Moses is talking about, hey, these

are the foundational things. If you miss some of the

other stuff, get this stuff right.

If you miss some of the.

Other things, make sure that these things are right. And

this is how you do it. And you know in

that moment, Moses didn't instruct them to build a classroom.

It's not what he instructed them to do. He's telling

them to share life together. He said, when you talk

about spirituality, it shouldn't be around formal instruction. It should

be when you sit down together, when you're walking down

the side of the road, when you wake up, and

when you go to bed. To me, he saying, listen,

when you're with your families, in those most intimate times

of families, that's when I want you to share these things,

because these are the things that bring formation. And formation

happens when we actually share life, not when we teach principles,

but when we live principles in those everyday moments when

we're together.

The reality is that most.

Of us come to our spirituality and it's more about

things written in the book. And the book is important.

The book is vitally important. So don't reduce what I'm

about to say with me saying that the book is

not significant. But the principles in the book should leap

off the.

Page and into our hearts, and.

They should make an indelible imprint that we then live

out and our children model. See, if the book is

only ever a book, then your kids are only ever

going to value the book.

Not the lived out moments.

And he's saying, hey, here's the best way to teach

these things is to do them in the context of

life together, of just living these things out and the

order in which we do that.

It matters.

Those things matter because it has to happen in us. First,

hold on, I want to say, this thing driving me nuts,

all right, it matters because it has to happen in

us before it can happen in somebody else. It has

to happen on the inside of us. And as we

are formed, then we can lead others into formation.

So if it's ever just, if it's ever just.

Information to us, we're ever only going to convey information

to others. But if it's life to us, if we

ever can come to that place.

Like Peter came.

When Jesus made that first declaration, the masses were gathered

around him and people were following him, and he was

at the height of his popularity that everywhere he went,

large crowds drew. And then he stands on the mountain

and he looks at them and says, listen, to have

eternal life, you must eat my flesh and drink my blood. Now,

don't you think about that for just a moment. Jesus says,

the only way that you can have eternal life is

to become a cannibalistic vampire.

That's what they heard, right, because.

He's giving a principle and he's going to live it

out later. It's going to become a principle that transfers

over easily. And it's still a principle that we do

today because he introduced it in life. Just a little

bit later, and it says that the multitudes left him,

that literally everybody left him, and the disciples came to him,

and he looks at him and says, are you gonna

leave me too? And Peter has this moment and he

looks at him and he says, where are we gonna go?

You hold the words of life?

Because when we have those moments and it's more than information, but.

We have a true heart.

In encounter with Jesus, he can say the hard things

to us and it becomes moments of formation, and we

look and we say, even though it's a hard thing,

even though you're calling us up, even though you're calling

us beyond, we know that we're going to do it because.

You hold the words of life.

And if we really truly believe that, then we release

that life into the people that we're responsible for.

In Psalm chapter fifty one, it says.

Creating me a clean heart, O God, and renew a

steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from

your presence, and do not take your holy spirit from me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold

me by your generous spirit. That's formation. That's not information.

That's that's formation. That is a prayer, a prayer driven

and not by words on a page, but my principles

and a heart born in the hard, difficult times of life.

We look back at those moments and we think about

those moments, those moments where things weren't easy, and we

think so many times that I'm so glad, I'm through that,

I'm so glad, I'm past that, I'm so glad I'm

on the other side of that, and we look back

at those things. But really, in those moments, those are

where the true relationships are.

Often born with us in Jesus.

It's when everything else has slipped away and we only

have one direction to look and we just lean into

Him and.

Say, Lord, help me see.

A life driven by formation and not information is always

going to be more powerful because the concepts that happen

on the inside of us.

See, the most powerful.

Teaching is not when we teach information, but when we

allow impartation. Teaching happens from a platform to people, that

happens from a seat to a person, but formation happens.

Impartation happens when we're doing life together. And as we

experience life, we look at those moments and we teach

those moments. We spend so much time. Now listen, I

need you to hear me in the context of my message.

Okay, I need you to hear me. I'm not saying

let your kids go do whatever they want to do.

Okay, That's not what I'm about to say, even though

some of you are going to hear it that way

because it just makes it easier on you as a parent.

Parenting should never be easy.

Let me say that again. Y'all can tweet that if

you want to. Parenting should never be easy. Should be

moments you wrestle with, even the mundane moments you should

wrestle with because you are imparting something one way or

the other to your children every time you come together

and you do life together. But instead of isolating your

children from everything that's hurtful, from everything that's bad, isolating

your children from culture, get involved with your kids and

parent them through those moments where they come into contact

and they have a collision with something that doesn't match

the values that they've had taught, the things that they've

seen at church, the things they've seen in your home.

Parent through those things, rather than just saying ignore those things,

get involved and say, hey, this is why the people

act like that, this is why they say that, this

is why they do that, and this is why we

respond differently because we have Jesus in our hearts and

we know that Jesus has created us different, He's shaped

us different. We're renewing our minds. We see things in

a different way. The reason we give is because it's

obedience to the Lord, because we're p assionately in love

with Jesus. The reason we go to church every Sunday

is because we believe that is formational.

We believe that that's honoring the Lord. We know that

when we go.

It's to give, not to get. And when we have

those moments and we teach our kids through that. You know,

my oldest daughter, she had a friend and really this

little girl, my oldest daughter, was her only friend, and

they were doing life together, several years in school together.

And this young girl, you know, announced that she was

living a homosexual lifestyle. And uh, you know, she made

this declaration. Madison came home, told us about it. She said,

I'm praying for And then a few weeks later, Madison said, hey,

I want to invite her over to the house.

And I had that moment, Come on, somebody, I had

that moment like, well, what that probban?

I wouldn't let her invite her boyfriend over. I wouldn't

let her invite a male friend over.

Now, this is this moment.

And what I could have done and say no, no, no, baby,

that's not gonna happen, bless God, not in my house.

This was a.

Broken young lady who is desperately trying to find identity.

And I looked at her and I said, yeah, that's okay, Maye,

y'all can sleep right.

Here in the living room. That'll be great.

A little girl came over and had a great time

with our family. She started coming actually started attending our

student ministry after that and things with And I want

to tell you that right now, she's married and has

several children. And it's listen, it's not because I made

a difference in her life. It's because somebody chose to

parent through a moment and say that the person on

the other side is more valuable than the current ideology

they hold in their mind.

Because let me tell you something, If you think that every.

Teenager that's gonna think the same thing they think right now,

they're gonna think that when they get older, you've lost

your mind.

They're probably not.

Gonna believe anything they believe right now because that part

don't work all the time. Come on, somebody, so get

involved and teach and lead and minister through those things,

because impartation is the most important thing. Teaching in life

is more important than setting up a classroom in your

home and reading three chapters. Living three chapters as much

more important. Amen that as we go through this, the

important thing is that we're allowing God to speak into

our lives and bring us along the journey.

And maybe you have it. Maybe you didn't.

Live grow up in spiritual formation. Maybe you're doing this

journey as a real first generation Christian who is just

trying to look like Jesus, not go through the motions,

because you know, everybody knows who the Good Lord is

in the South. You know, you ask any good Southern family,

they're Christian that may have never been a church before.

Come on, somebody may have never actually read the Bible

prayed a prayer, but we're all, oh, yeah, the Good

Lord he blesses me every day, and he does. But

I'm talking about beyond that. I'm talking about you may

be a first generation believer who has set your heart

to live Kingdom principles in your home, who has decided

that you're going to sell out for the sake of

the Gospel and be a representation of the King that

you have taken seriously the mantle of being an ambassador

of Christ and speaking on his behalf to hurting broken people.

That's what I'm talking about.

You may be doing that for the very first time,

and you're learning as you go, and that's okay, it's

not too late. You start the process today, and we

have those same thoughts, those same things create in me

a clean heart, help me navigate.

Life's hard times.

And then let my kids, let my family, the people

that I have influence over, let.

Them see you in me.

Because children don't do what we say. They become who

we are.

Children will become.

Who we are, not what we teach, in what we say.

They'll see those moments, you know, Lexi we would pray

every night. There's some phrases that I would use all

the time and all my prayers, and one of those

phrases I always pray, and I still pray. Make us

the leaders of tens of thousands of men, women, boys

and girls. I don't wonder to forget. LEXI was probably

maybe four years old. She said I want to pray,

and I said, yeah, pray, baby, And you know, she

prayed for everybody she could think of by name, like twice,

and I'm just I'm nodding off. I mean, you know,

it's like this prayer's going on, this like a Pastor

Clay prayer. It's been thirty minutes. She's still going, man.

I mean just sometimes I'm thinking, we just want to eat,

Pastor Clay, just pray for the food.

And she's going and going and going, and then she

says it.

She said, make us the leaders are tens of thousands

of men, women, boys and girls, and her little four

year old voice just it was just like broom.

And I realized in that moment.

That there was spiritual formation happening in her life every

time we pray, that she was hearing and she was

grasping that concept.

And it was twisting in.

Her little heart and in her mind, and she wanted

to be a leader and not a follower. And it

was in that moment that that really was burned into

me that parenting is more than just making sure they

don't do bad or that they do do good.

It's parenting through.

Every option and every situation and every moment, so they

live like Kingdom citizens and Second Timothy Chapter one, Second

Timothy Chapter one, starting in verse three, it says, I

thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience, as

my forefathers did, as without ceasing, I remember you in

my prayers night and day, greatly desiring to see you,

being mindful of your tears, that I may be filled

with joy when I call to remembrance the genuine faith

that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother

Lois and your mother Eunice. And I am persuaded as

in you also. Therefore I remind you to stir up

the gift of God which is in you, through the

laying on of my hands. For God has not given

us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love.

And of a sound mind.

The apostle Paul is speaking to this one that he

refers to as my son and the Lord, and he says,

there's some things I notice about you. And the things

I notice about you, they're not unique to you. They

first dwelt at your grandmother and then in your mother,

and now I see them in you also. Because here's

the reality. True formation is multi generational. True formation lasts

from generation to generation to generation. And even if you're

a first generation believer, you're the start.

You're the origin.

You're the genesis of what could be a generational kingdom

landslide that creates the next great whatever. And it all

comes back to you sitting down at the table. Listen

to me of you sitting back at the table and

instead of complaining about how hard your day was and

what a punk your boss is, and how so and

so never picks up a shovel, he just leans on it.

Come on now that if I was in charge.

But rather than that, you sit down and you talk

about the fact that, hey, you know what, I don't

have a perfect job, but the Lord has given it

to me and he's used it to provide this food,

and I will and to do the hard things to

make sure that my family's taking care of you know,

I think about my dad.

He worked hard.

He worked hard for a long long time, and he

could never get away from that. And even in his

later years, he would say things like I'm gonna buy

this to spend your inheritance, and I'm like, Dad, I

don't care. It's your money, you worked for it, you

spend it. But he was always worried about what I

was going to think and how I was going to

see it, and how I was going to how I

was going to respond to it, because it was always

about legacy. It was impartation. It was making sure that

I understood everything and that there was no selfishness. But

it was hard work and ethic and generosity, and that

led the way.

And we must lead the way in the same things.

That we allow God to form us, so we can

form the next generation, so that we respond and in

the right ways, and they see us respond, and that

when they respond in the wrong way, that we correct

and listen. I'm not even gonna get into this in

this series. If you want to whoop their tail, whoop

their tail.

Amen. If you want to.

Put them in the corner, put them in the corner.

If you don't want to say anything, you're ruining them.

But anyway, do it.

They're your kids.

Got you gotta plow through that on your own. You

gotta make those decisions on your own. But the reality

is is you discipline and then you do life. You're

discipline and then you impart. You're discipline and you lead

the way. You celebrate and then you lead the way.

And when we do that, we're living a life of legacy.

We're living a life that creates multile, multigenerational anointing through

your family, not through the preacher, but through your family,

through the principles that God is birthed deep in who

you are, and the world needs what is birthed in you.

The world doesn't just need a message from me, It

needs the life that you live model to the world,

birth from generation to generation to generation. Because God has

called you to be effective in the kingdom. He's called

you to be successful in the kingdom and to sacrifice

for the next generation that he's called you to impart too.

And you may be sitting here thinking, you know what,

I don't have kids anymore.

My kids are grown.

Tell them they're wrong anyway, call them and say, hey,

you know what, I'm proud of you. I'm proud of you.

I'm proud of the young woman you've become. I'm proud

of the man of God you're becoming. I'm proud of

the way you're leading your family. I'm proud of those things.

Pour into them, continue to pour into them. But more

than that, understand that you have an opportunity to shape

a generation at large. And we're moving into a moment,

a strategic moment in the life of this ministry, strategic

moment in the life of Cornerstone, where we get to

make a difference in the next generation, where we get

to make a difference in the lives of those to come.

And I look around here, and you know, a lot

of times when we look around the church, we see

kids that are into stuff. Come on, now, raise your

hand if that's I mean. I don't know how many

times I've heard somebody yell I don't see it, but

I hear somebody else.

Don't run in the church. I was just gonna tell

you them. I wish some of y'all would run.

Every once in a while, I wish the Holy Ghost

would hitch some of you.

Sometimes you just do laughs.

Some of y'all I'd like to say, run, come on now,

we see those things. But let me tell you something, honestly, Clay,

you guys can come on and get ready if you

want to. I mean, that'll be fine. You're gonna be

up here for a few minutes, but it's okay. I

better you ready to come now. You know, uh what

I see when I see your kids.

Because I see the future of a ministry built to

shape a community.

That's what I see. I see some children that were

born in this church. Actually leave those on for just

a second for me. I want to be able to

see everybody. Put my far away glasses on.

You know.

I see an age bracket like Isaac and the potential

that's in his life to be a shaper of culture

and architect of the future. I see that next generation

beyond him, like Oliver and Addie. I see all of

these kids that are running around. A little Hadley with

her just said in her ways, I'm gonna do it

my way, and that's a beautiful thing because that tells

me she's.

A leader and not a follower.

I'm gonna need people like her that are going to

pioneer and walk to the beat of a different drum.

I see some of these babies that they're all they

could do is cry. They can't even hold their heads

up yet, And I see the greatness that's on the

inside of them. And we stand here in this moment

with an opportunity to build legacy and show that it's

more than just words from a stage, but that we

actually believe those things, that we believe that a sacrifice

made today is worth maybe even missing to pay off

with our own eyes tomorrow, but.

To build something that gives them.

An opportunity to continue to shape this community without having

to worry about the things that we have to worry about.

You know, if you got here late last week, you

didn't have a place to park. I know it doesn't

look like it today, but I mean, you know that

persecution of losing an hour at night, it's just overwhelms

people sometimes.

I don't even know how people.

If you set your alarm clock on your phone, it

changes for you. Come on, somebody, they like it. Usually

you have to remember, I don't even know when the

time changes because my clock just does it for my phone,

just does it for me. You had a hard time

finding a seat for the last few weeks. If you

get here during worship, you have a hard time finding

a seat. You can't see where to sit. I see

people standing in the back panics looking around.

I see that.

You know, this person sits over here one week and

then they don't get here on time, so they have

to sit in the middle, and then the next week

they have to sit in the front. Let me tell

you something, Once you have to sit in the front,

everybody starts getting here early. If you ever have to

sit on the first two rows, you start getting here

early because you don't have to want to have to

sit up there.

So Pastor can stare at you. Come on now. And

it's our responsibility.

To make room, not to build something, but to ensure

those who were in search of Jesus have a place

where they can have a grace encounter.

That those families.

That are in pursuit of more, because somehow, some way

they've sensed that they're built for more than the life

they have, that they haven't a place to encounter Jesus

and be impacted by his anointing, which means we got

to create more space. And I know it seemed and listen,

when God spoke the idea into my heart, I knew

it was the Lord because it's backwards.

So we're gonna create more space by eliminating some Come on, now,

that's the way the Kingdom works. It's opposite.

So we're gonna lose the back row in order that

we can open the balcony. So we're gonna lose those

ten chairs in the middle so that we can create

sixty or seven in the balcony for brand new families

that are in search of Jesus can come here and

have a grace collision with them. I don't care about

one two by four or one piece of wiring. All

I care about is the people that are gonna be

touched by it. We're gonna be able to expand our

needs and sound because they are many and they are vast.

We have people that we want to be able to

have on the stage that we can't have on the

stage because we're maxed out to our capacity. And then,

really it sounds crazy, but the biggest, the biggest part

of this is the most fiscally responsible part of it,

which is the fact that these projectors are going out.

It's gonna cost twenty thousand dollars to replace those projectors

that will last for six years. Let me say that again.

We're gonna spend, We're gonna rent. We're gonna rent something

for twenty thousand dollars for six years, or we can

spend about thirty thousand dollars and we can put in

place something that will last decades, something that will allow

our children to step into leadership and ministry and they

don't ever have to worry about a projector going out

because we've already paid the price.

We've already dug deep, and we've already covered it.

You know, to me, renting something for twenty thousand dollars

over six years just doesn't make sense. Why don't we

just go ahead and purchase something that's in there for

the long haul.

And that way, when I don't know who it's gonna

be listening.

I think we've got several potential preachers, and I listen

to them talk.

We got some talkers. Come on now. Maybe it's Lucas,

I don't know.

Maybe it's Miles, Maybe it's Mail, Maybe it's Addie, maybe

it's maybe it's you Believe. Maybe it is Isaac, Maybe

it's a Maybe it's one of the Maybes.

It's not even born yet. But what we can do now.

Will position them for success so that when it's time

for them to preach, they don't have to worry about

things like we worry about.

They don't have to worry about twenty thousand dollars projectors.

They can take twenty thousand dollars and feed more people.

They can hire more staff to do the things that

they're not good at doing.

But it starts with us making that determination in our heart.

And what I want to do right now is I

want to pass out a card to you guys. So

whoever's helping me pass those cards out, if you would

just go ahead and get ready.

So if Pastor Shane talk to you, that's you. I'm

talking to you. Stand up.

If you're passing out cards, stand up and go back

there and see Pastor Shane. He's going to tell you

exactly what to do. They're going to bring you a card.

If you want to give today, you can, but I'm

not asking you to do that.

Just be honest with you.

I need you to give more than you can give today.

Pray, look at me, don't look down, look at me.

I need you to give more.

To make room then you can give today. I'm asking

you to determine what you can give over the next

ninety days, and you know, you come on now. If

that means you need to give it weekly, you can

give it weekly. That means if you need to move

some money around, move some money around and give it

in a month.

If you need to sell some stocks, sell some stocks

and give.

It in ninety days. But I want to commitment to

what you can give over ninety days because this total

project is you know, in excess to seventy thousand dollars.

But do not put a value on a soul.

Do not say that's a lot of money.

For this church.

What if Jesus had said, my life is too much

for fill in your name. That's the question we're really

asking today. I'm not gonna make a commitment to legacy.

I'm not gonna build some others don't have to.

They're gonna come and they're gonna pass down list.

This is what's gonna happen. They're gonna hand you a card.

There's a stack of cards. You take one and pass

the rest of them down. When they get to the end,

take the cards and stick them in that pocket in

front of you. Okay, don't y'all, don't just need one card.

You don't have to pledge eight times. If that's how

many cards come to you don't have to do the

math and break it up. That's not what There's one card.

They're gonna come, they're gonna pass it out. The band's

gonna sing the song, we're gonna worship, and you're just

gonna listen.

Talk to your husband or wife if you need to.

I've been telling y'all this for two weeks, though it

should not surprise you that we're doing this today. Think

about the kingdom a little bit during the week, and

at the end, we're just gonna ask you to fill

it out.

When you fill it out.

Once you fill it out, I'm glass you just bring

it down and put it face down on the stage.

Just walk down here and put it.

Face down on the stage.

Don't turn it face up so everybody's impressed with how

much you're pledging.

Turn it face down.

There are people in this room that over the next

ninety days can get ten thousand dollars. There's something that

can give five thousand dollars, And there are people who

would stretch to give one hundred dollars over the next

ninety days and I'm not asking for equal giving. I'm

asking for equal sacrifice. Before this even became a reality,

we already had ten thousand dollars given to it, So

we've already got ten thousand dollars. We're not asking you

for everything. We've already got ten thousand dollars towards this project.

We're just asking you to help make the difference. Guys,

go ahead and hand those cards out and must worship together.

Pastor Clay