Called, Set Apart, Assigned

Get me started.

Y'all won't be home till dinner time.

Y'all put an organ on the pulpit.

We're gonna be here for three hours.

Mm-mm-mm.

Hallelujah.

Alright, so if you will, we're gonna read seven scriptures.

If you'll stand for the reading of God's word, seven short little scriptures.

If you got the text from the church, which when we said text the number 9400, every week I give you the sermon notes of where we're coming from, so you have something to chew on and study before we get to it, and then you have it after.

And then we also provide notepads out there with pens, free pens.

Yes, you are allowed to take them.

It's not stealing them.

We buy them so that you will have them.

Some of you have a surplus at the house, but that's okay.

We'll pray for conviction in the house today.

So we want to just say we are glad that you are here.

Whether you've been here for five minutes or you've been here for five years, we're glad that you're here.

Hallelujah.

So we just finished a into the deep series, and we're talking, we were talking about for nine weeks, ten weeks, maybe even 11.

Lost track.

But this series right here is from strictly the book of Romans.

And I mapped out yesterday before I sent out the text to everybody.

And be prepared because this sermon is a lot of notes, and we're only from verse 1 to 7 for today.

I have mapped out so far 20 sermons from the book of Romans.

If you've been around long enough, you know that I don't tell you to read scripture, I tell you to crawl through scripture.

So that's what we're gonna do.

We're gonna crawl through it.

We're gonna pause, we're gonna intake, we're gonna see what the Lord actually meant when he wrote this.

We're gonna look into scripture.

We need to be good stewards of the word.

If you know our our flags, they we had a man down out there, the flags they they ripped through the thing, but we got strong winds out here.

But we have a five, five, and five.

Five minutes of prayer, five minutes of reading your word, and five minutes of praising God every day.

And watch that five minutes will not be enough, and that you go closer to God.

Just because you said for me and my temple has to start here.

Your spouse can't get you more saved, your spouse can't get you filled, your spouse can't break out in revival and make you do it.

My spouse does a lot of things, and she can't make me do anything if I don't want to.

Hello?

Am I the only one that's ever been in a healthy relationship where she can do what she can do, and I can do what I can do, and we just work it together.

Come on, somebody.

So let's read these scriptures so that you can sit down finally.

I know we've been standing for a while.

Romans chapter 1, verse 1 through 7.

Romans 1:1–7

This letter is from Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, chosen by God to be an apostle, sent out to preach his good news.

God promised this good news long ago through his prophets and the holy scriptures.

The good news is about his son.

In his earthly life, he was born into King David's family line.

He was shown to be the Son of God when he was raised from the dead.

This is important.

He wasn't just another prophet, as some Muhammad screamers try to say, he was the Christ, he was the one true Son of God that was raised from the dead.

This right here squashes any argument.

And then there were witnesses.

Anyone in the house, a witness of his power today?

He is Jesus Christ our Lord.

Okay, very important.

Verse 5 it says, Through Christ, God has given us the privilege and the authority as apostles to tell Gentiles everywhere, if you remember the Great Commission, that God, what God has done for them so that they will believe and obey him, bringing glory to his name.

Very important, right there as well.

The last two verses from chapter one is this and you are included.

Say, I'm included, I'm included.

We're included.

Paul is writing, you are included among those Gentiles.

We are not of Jewish descent.

Most I'm pretty sure nobody in here is, unless I just don't know, but you are not of Jewish descent.

You don't hold to the old law, you don't wear the little thing on your head, you don't pray like they pray, you don't eat like they eat.

Some of you may.

Sometimes kosher can be the healthiest form of what you can get for your body.

I don't do it, but go ahead.

And you are included among those Gentiles who have been called to belong to Jesus Christ.

I am writing to all of you in Rome who are loved by God and are called by his own holy to be his own holy people.

May God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ give you grace and peace.

Let's pray.

Father, we thank you for your mercy.

Lord, we praise you for your grace.

I pray, God, if anybody under the sound of my voice today has not fully committed their lives to you, begin to shine a light in the dark places.

Begin to open up and make uh make us aware of the hidden places we've tried to keep a hold of because we are not willing to completely let go of who we were and follow you.

Father, I pray that every person here in this sanctuary or watching online, Lord, I pray if they hear it today or 10 years down the road that it still reigned true, that you are who you say you are, and we are called to be a holy people.

In your name we pray, amen.

Amen.

So as I started off saying, we're gonna begin this journey going through the book of Romans.

We are going to go slowly, we are going to walk carefully, and I hope, and this is my prayer for you, and I hope it's your prayer for you.

As you heard me say our five, five, and five.

Well, prayer is a part of that five.

Why do I say five?

We call it the challenge of fifteen.

Some of us, I said in the beginning, the challenge of 17.

Do one small act of faith every single day and invite one person to church.

Some of you have been doing that, some of you need to pick up your cross so that others have a reason to follow you.

Y'all missed it.

That's all right.

I promised, I promise today we're gonna come back to it.

We must pray prayerfully, come into God's house.

Now, here's something to ask yourself.

I I was raised, uh, I think I would call it full-blown Pentecostal.

But they they they lost some sight of some things, they got legalistic, thinking that a tie and a suit was gonna get them into heaven.

But the same ties and suits that they wear and say that that's how God wants them to do, it's the same one the sharks wear in the lawyer system.

Come on.

Dunk on them.

Felt good, huh?

Get that off.

But all these all these things that we come into service and we don't actually come into service prayerfully, and we wonder why that our services are the same week in, week out, our lives are the same week in, week out.

There's no there's no maturity that happens in us, there's no maturity that happens in our family, there's no maturity or or sanctification that happens in our lives, in our hearts, and our minds.

It's because we don't come prayerfully into the place we go.

We must prayerfully bring everything of us before God when you pray and petition and you linger in his presence, the glory that this these verses say that this is the whole reason of sharing the gospel to bring glory to God, not to a man that stands on a stage, not to a person who's preaching in the streets, even though those are good things, not to a church building who's leaving a mark in Longview, Texas.

We're not about making what we're doing the center of everything.

We talked in the men's Bible study was the night about being self-centered and being God-centered.

When people of God act like they know who God is, and we prayerfully step in our lives, we prayerfully make decisions in our lives.

My son's right now, he just got a job.

It's his second week.

He just finished his second week.

Thanks to Josh over here that said, Hey man, we need some help.

So he's clean, he's pushing a broom.

He's he knows what hard work is, but it sure feels a lot better when you're getting paid for it.

So he's doing that.

Well, we're talking to him about college.

He's a junior in high school.

We're saying, you know, what do you feel like you want to do?

What do you feel God leading you to?

And the go-to answer or wisdom from those who have lived a little bit of life is go towards money.

Are y'all living in a different world than I am?

I might get you a fat check, son.

I almost said something.

I'm gonna I'm gonna leave it at home.

I'm gonna leave it at home.

Ask me later what I was gonna say.

It could be a t-shirt.

But you make more money, you get to buy cooler things.

That's that makes sense, right?

You make more money, you get to do more, you get to get your seven brew coffee.

Come on, somebody.

Huh?

You get to eat out more, you get to do things like everybody else is doing.

Well, you know what I found and I've learned is that your life long term is better and more quality when you do things other people won't do.

Like save.

Oh, we're getting some Dave Ramsey in the house.

Save that money, don't spend it.

That was all free.

You just got some life advice, and your check is gonna your check balance is gonna be great.

But we need to prayerfully, how many purchases do we not prayerfully ask God about?

We wonder why we don't have enough check when the month is still 10 days out.

We don't ever ask God for a blessing on our money.

Yeah, I don't want to talk about money today.

That's okay.

That will come.

But this is he said, get out of my pocket now.

But this is not just a study, but this that we're gonna walk through is foundational for every believer, those who have been believing for a while, and those who have not yet made the decision.

It is the gospel's truth that builds believers and it awakens the lost.

I want you to, while we walk through this series in the book of Romans, I want you to just read over and over and over again in Romans so that when I mention verses, when I mention context, when I mention studies and all these things that go along with the text, you'll already be aware of where we're walking.

Okay?

I want you to lean into it.

I want you to open your Bibles, I want you to soften your hearts, and I want you to engage your mind.

Okay?

Christianity is not for dumb people.

Christianity is not for lazy people.

We have to be studiers and doers of the word so that when someone who does not know who God is does not know why we act the way we act in a good way.

Come on, somebody.

If you're saved, act like it.

Huh?

They're asking, well, you should have got mad, you should be angry, you should take revenge.

Why don't you do those things that are normal?

Because I serve a God that calls me to be abnormal.

We have to be comfortable in being abnormal and going against what sinful nature and culture tells us is truth because they are not the bearers of truth.

There is no truth in them.

It may sound good.

They may even some of them try to pair up.

I'm not gonna get political, but I'm just gonna say it.

We had last, was it last week or the week before?

There was a No Kings protest over in the mall.

Now, you may have been there.

I tried looking, I didn't find you, but that's okay.

If you don't know what it is, it's about Trump and all this other stuff, but I didn't care about all that.

I'm like, whatever.

You vote how you vote, I'm gonna vote how I vote.

I am a conservative because I believe murdering babies is killing.

I'm just saying.

And I still believe, as the word says, that marriage is between a man and the woman.

I think we get too caught up on the donkey and the giraffe.

What's the elephant?

The elephant.

And some of y'all are solely rhinos.

Come on, somebody.

A hybrid of the two.

But here's what I know we should stop trying to play this party versus that party and look at it as good and evil.

When we have the truth of the word of God and understand it in full context, whatever the culture, which is sinful nature, they try to make things that are wrong seem right, and then you're the bigot, you're the homophobe, you're the transphobe, you're all these other words with the phobia inside.

And I tell you right now, I ain't scared of none of them.

But what I am saying is this we know truth, and truth will draw in untruth.

What do I mean by that?

When we live our life according to Scripture, those who do not have life inside of them, this is turning to a whole other message.

Those that do not have life inside of them will be drawn to the light out of their darkness.

This is what I believe.

That if we as Christians live in such a way that there is things different about us that we don't just let culture push us around.

You want to know why the world is all messed up like it is?

Because the church has remained silent and won't speak out because we don't want to offend anybody.

We don't speak out to offend, but the truth does offend.

I don't speak out against homosexuality and all these other perversions of what God set into motion.

I don't go, I don't speak that out to hurt somebody.

Matter of fact, I have some people that I know right now that are living that lifestyle, and I don't tell them I'm a pastor, but I love them.

Because when I tell them, they clam up, they just clam up.

I don't have to tell them that I love Jesus because I love them, they will understand the love of a father that they probably never knew.

It's when we realize that us hating them is sin.

You know how patient God is?

Take a hard look at you.

Now I'm not saying that we affirm them, but you can be here and not belong here.

You can come into the sanctuary, you're in the right place.

This place is a place of conviction, and so when the church people embrace conviction, we do it different than the other street down the church, is just worried about your tithe money because we are the actual church, we're the ones that love people, but we hate to sin.

And this is not something I'm telling you to do towards them.

If we display that we're doing it to ourselves first and submit to the Lord and make Christ the Lord over our lives, then they will see that something is different.

They will see that the way we speak to them, because most of people living in an alternative lifestyle and that are out there, you'd be surprised how many have never been to a church or a true church, I would say.

They maybe were raised in it and they rebelled.

Now they're living in their rebellion.

Understand this, their mind gets so twisted up, you're the enemy because other people who said they were Christians treated them like they were dogs.

And so they immediately think that you're the enemy.

And you know, I'm here to tell you today.

Sometimes us in the church, we immediately act like they are.

That was sermon number one.

So the book of Romans is Paul's most extensive spirit-breathed explanation of the gospel.

Why did I bring any of this up?

Because the church needs to understand that the gospel is for the believer, but it's also for the unbeliever.

How can they come to Christ if they don't know the story of Christ?

How can they know the good news if no person is on point and looking for opportunities to share that good news?

Your pastor is not the only one that should be preaching to people.

And I'm telling you, you don't need to say words, but you need to live a life that preaches the gospel, and the questions will come.

Because what we have, what we should have, it looks the opposite and nothing like what they have out there.

It's freedom.

And right now they're living in prison and they don't even know it because the devil has made them so comfortable.

I tell you what, the same trick is being played on the modern church.

None of us move in any direction towards God.

We're pacified by a lazy presence that we call church, and we never move in any direction.

We are good where we have sat.

So let's go on with this.

The title of today is Cold, Set Apart, and Assigned.

Called, Set Apart, and Assigned.

I told you we're only getting to seven verses, and I've got notes.

Lots and lots of notes.

I hope you're taking some.

I have I sent my points out.

There's only two of them, but I've got A, B, C, D on underneath each one of those.

So be ready, because here we go.

So the two points we're coming from is called identity before activity.

We have to understand there's a proper process of how you need to find Christ so you find your identity, and then you will live out Christ-likeness and activity from your life.

Do you understand?

You cannot have a tree that pops up.

There first must be groundbroke.

There first must be nourishment, water, sunlight that helps that sprout up, and all of a sudden you have the fruit tree.

A lot of us want to come and find the tree first, but that's not how we grow.

You first there has to be a seed planted, nurtured, and then there is growth.

This is what we call discipleship.

Okay, preaching the gospel, living out the gospel is seeds planted.

But we have to be patient enough with new people, patient enough with each other.

How many of you know you come to church long enough, and there's some people you don't like anymore?

Keep your hands forward, don't look across the aisle.

Because all of a sudden, that new that that uh that honeymoon season is over, and now you know who they really are.

And the fact of the matter is, usually people really find out about who you are.

Ah, come on, somebody.

Woo! And the second point is set apart and assigned holiness unto mission, holiness unto mission.

So we said it already.

Turn to your neighbor and say, I'm called.

Come on, y'all are so weak.

Turn to your neighbor and say, I'm called.

There you go.

Feel it in your guts, feel it in your chest.

Put your chest down.

Say, I'm called, I'm anointed, I'm set apart.

We are meant to be called.

We are called, even the Holy Spirit.

The Bible says that we are drawn by the Holy Spirit.

We are being called even when we are in sin.

And then once we are established in Christ, we are grafted in the true vine.

We are now his blood is flowing through our veins, our heart of stone has become a heart of flesh.

Now we are called to go out and duplicate.

If you're a Christian that comes to the church and you've been doing the same thing for your entire life, you are a bump on a log and you're making no difference in the kingdom.

Matter of fact, you're probably doing more damage than you are good.

Well, this church ain't for a lazy Christian.

I will call you out.

But I never, you you know, if we in the Bible study was it not, I put myself on the chopping block before anybody else because I have.

Been the complacent.

Let's put the word in there, I like better.

Lazy Christian.

That I don't do nothing but come and get something so I can go home and live my life how I want to live it.

That ain't being set apart.

We're gonna talk about set apart.

I'm gonna get ahead of myself.

Let's go on to point number one called identity before activity.

This is verses one through four, skip five, six through seven.

So Paul's identity is, he names this first, rooted in Jesus.

Let's read it again.

This letter is from Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, chosen by God to be an apostle and sent out to preach the good news.

Before Paul mentions Rome, he mentions Jesus.

Before he says apostle, he says slave, a willing, devoted servant of Christ.

Identity first, assignment second.

Some of us want to get on assignment before we ever figure out our junk.

And what that does is it makes us feel good in the moment, but we can't be truly discipled because we don't know who we are.

When nothing is revealed of who we are, when there's no discipleship, there's no establishment of what the word says about me, what the word calls me to do.

What the this is why I believe with all my heart, when the rapture happens and we stand before God, I believe with all my heart there's going to be a lot less people than we think in heaven from the church.

Because the church people won't humble themselves and pick up their cross.

If we get it right in our house, the house will grow.

Naturally.

Naturally.

Identity first, assignment second.

Many are exhausted because they reversed the order.

If you try to get ahead of the system and how it's actually mapped out and laid out of how we should do this in the right order, it's like, and I don't care if you've done it in here, what's in the past, in the past, I hope you ask the Lord for forgiveness, but if you have kids before marriage, it's in the wrong order.

Oh, four of y'all believe what the word says.

That's that's fine.

We'll get the rest of you in a minute.

If you have kids before marriage, it's in the wrong order.

That's the facts, okay?

If you're living together before you get married, it's in the wrong order.

I have a very dear close friend of mine.

He he said uh he he got uh a girl pregnant, she's living with him, and now he's questioning everything.

And he calls me, he's like, Oh man, we're under spiritual attack.

You know how people that aren't doing right, they're super spiritual about everything.

I love this dude to death.

He is one of my best friends, has been for most of my life.

And he said, Man, I need you to pray.

We're under spiritual attack.

I said, Are y'all married?

No, y'all living together?

Yeah, I ain't praying for that.

I'm not gonna pray God's blessing over sin.

I'll pray over that baby because that baby's innocent.

Y'all just couldn't keep your pants up.

Y'all don't like the truth in the house of the Lord today, huh?

Now, not nothing that we could ever do can be unforgiven.

God will forgive us, but we have to remember that there is a proper order established by the word, established by the Lord, and established by what God calls the body of believers.

There is a proper order to the system.

So we have to keep things in order.

So when you try to get an assignment before you figure out your identity, you will the rest of your life chase your identity and forget who you are in Christ.

You will serve your own mission and forget to bow to the master.

Telling you.

I'm telling you, I have done it.

I wasn't living right, and I got put in positions in church when I was younger that I had no reason being in those positions.

And what did I do?

I used sinful nature to get what I wanted, and sinful nature flourished in my life, even though I had the covering of a church.

It don't matter what church you go to, sin is sin.

And we have to get things in the proper order, we have to be a slave to Christ, totally belonging to him, chosen by God.

Every believer is chosen by God to do his work, divine initiative.

We are apostles, his functionality flows from his belonging.

Did you hear what I said?

He doesn't function and then look for a place to belong, he belongs, he becomes established, and from that belonging, he finds his place and calling.

Sent out to preach the good news.

Mission proceeds from identity.

The gospel is not new, it's promised.

So look in verse 2.

God promised this good news long ago.

So he's referring to the Old Testament about how the prophecy was said that there was a Messiah that was going to come.

So he's validating who Jesus said that he was to the Roman people long ago through his prophets in the Holy Scripture.

For seasoned saints, okay, Romans is not a detour, it is the culmination of the story God has always been telling.

For new believers, this means you can trust the Bible.

God's plan is consistent.

It is consistent.

You try to you try to look up, I can't remember what it's called.

I wish I had it in my notes.

But it's where Old Testament and New Testament, they all coexist with each other in harmony.

And it's like back and forth, this little strand, and all of a sudden it looks like a mass color spectrum going from old to new, back and forth.

That's consistency of people that never knew each other.

You know how impossible that is?

So impossible that it was only from God, that it was only preserved and spoken through the Holy Spirit.

So, God's plan is consistent from Genesis to Revelation.

The gospel is not man's idea, it's God's promise.

The gospel is Christ centered, like I mentioned earlier from the men's Bible study.

The good news is about his son, in his verse 3 and 4, in his earthly life, he was born into King David's family line.

And he was shown to be the Son of God, who he raised from the dead by the power of the Holy Spirit.

He is Jesus Christ our Lord.

Incarnation and lineage.

He was born into from these verses, he was born into King David's family line.

Jesus is, he was truly human and the promised king.

Now the reason this caused such controversy in the day that Jesus was born into is because the people, just like always, expected something different than what it actually was.

There's a reason King Saul ended up being King Saul.

They begged and begged and begged and begged for a king, and when they finally got it, it was not what they thought.

Anybody ever pray for something you think you need until you get it and realize it ain't what you want?

Be careful what you pray for.

Sometimes, like a good father, he will allow you to get exactly what you asked for, and then you have to live with the results.

Resurrection and sonship, shown to be the Son of God by resurrection power.

Jesus is truly God.

Lordship.

So we have incarnation and lineage in these verses, resurrection and sonship, and then we have Lordship.

He is Jesus Christ our Lord, not just Savior, which is a great place to start.

Then once he saves you, now you become underneath his reign.

Now you could become underneath his lordship.

And so you put aside what you desire, what you want, what you seek out, and you say, Lord, what do you have for me to do?

Remember, we talked about in the beginning being prayerful in all things.

Even Paul writes, the same author of this says, Pray without ceasing.

It's not a joke, it's not a game.

It's not a you call on the Lord when you want the slot machine to spin around and give you lucky sevens.

That ain't what praying is, it's a relationship, it is a back and forth.

Some of y'all won't stop praying long enough and talking to let him speak.

Don't let your toes hurt.

But that is that has been my problem as well.

Sometimes driving in the car, most of y'all know I get a lot of road time for work.

And sometimes I play worship music, sometimes I play a podcast or have the Bible read to me or whatever.

I don't read it while I'm driving.

You're welcome.

But I will sometimes turn everything off and just let the road noise be road noise.

And I will just let God speak.

Or not freak out when he doesn't.

If God's talking, I got faith.

But when he's silent, hey, now where are you at?

It's like you're in the dark in a place you don't know, and all the lights just got turned off.

You start trying to back up and find everybody.

Like, Lord, I know you're in here somewhere.

Just trying to, because if you just you want to have your hand on him so you know where he is and what he's doing.

We treat God that way all the time.

When we feel like we're by ourselves, but as a Lordship, he's not just our Savior, but he is our Lord.

The empty tomb is God's public declaration that Jesus reigns.

Christianity is Christ.

Christianity is not a set of tips of how to live your life, it's not a list of do's and don'ts.

But they're there.

Some things are obvious.

The Bible even talks about work out your salvation with fear and trembling.

We should be fearful of our next move when it comes to the Lord.

The Bible says that he has not given us a spirit of fear.

Why?

Fear does not belong to the believer unless it comes to the Lordship of God because fear belongs to Him.

We should fear Him and Him alone.

Some of us get so scared going through life that the devil's gonna get me, or he's just around the corner.

The Lord, the devil's been working on me.

Sometimes God's letting you learn some things, and you blame the devil.

Everything we do must remain Christ-centered.

Worship, preaching, teaching, serving, parenting, our businesses, a life centered around Christ, not the other way around.

God isn't coming up to you every day and saying, Now, what do you have on your agenda today?

How can I help you?

But this is the way we do our Christianity.

We want God to come alongside us and help us with our agendas, our wants, our desires, our prayers.

We want things to be answered in the way we see fit, and we forget that the one who is the maker and designer that could have flicked you off the face of the earth if he really wanted to is the one you're just passively, aggressively praying to.

We don't give God his actual proper place in our lives, and so what do we do?

We end up living a boring, mundane, complacent Christian life that has no fruit.

The call includes you.

Verse 6 through 7, it says, and you say you to your neighbor, say it to them like you know they're in trouble.

You did this to me.

Oh, sorry.

Flashbacks to pregnancy with my wife, and you are included among those Gentiles who have been called to belong to Christ.

Every person in this room or watching online, you are called to be subject to Christ.

On to the next one.

I am writing to all of you of Rome who are loved by God and are called to be his own holy people.

May God our Father and the Lord Jesus give you grace and peace.

This is the Holy Spirit's word to connect.

You are called to belong to Jesus Christ.

That means everything about you now must be about Him.

There should be a switch and deletion of the old you so that you can because if not, it'll be dead weight to you, and the cross that you're trying to pick up to bear that you're supposed to will be heavier, and you won't be able to last.

Because the the believer will persevere until the end.

Word says it.

To persevere until the end means you run the race and you finish the race bearing the name of Christ.

You are called to belong to Christ and you are loved by God.

This is why He sent His Son.

You are called, every believer is called to be a holy people.

Notice the order: loved, then called, belonging, then becoming.

I'll say it again.

Loved, called, belonging, and then becoming.

God's love secures your identity.

God's call shapes your destiny.

Grace and peace flow when you rest in who He says you are.

Some of the craziest, most depressing times in my life is when I forgot who God said I was.

Or I tried to be a church person, but I wouldn't live my life according to what scriptures say I should.

It's hard living two distinct lives.

There is a schism in the believer.

And there doesn't have to be.

I can't tell you the weight lifted off of me when I finally decided that who I was in the church house was who I was going to be in my house.

And who I was in my house is the same guy that I am when I'm with church people and when I'm not.

When I'm in Walmart, or I'm in, let's let's just talk a minute for traffic.

When I'm on 31, go in a Tyler and people pull out like a bunch of idiots.

If that's you, just please stop.

Just help the rest of us stay saved.

Come on.

But are we the same in our vehicle when we're by ourselves as we try to be when we're sitting in these seats in the church?

We are called to be set apart.

That means we are not even a remnant of who we used to be.

Now, you can ask anybody who's up in age in this house today.

We got a few white heads in here.

You got a lot of work to do.

And even living a long time on this earth, you're gonna realize you still got a lot of work to do.

So don't be discouraged, don't be dismayed.

We all are a work in progress.

And when we realize that we also begin to love each other different, see each other different.

When we realize that the person that I'm angry at, maybe they had a bad day.

Did you know people have bad days in church?

Or we got one of them EGR people, extra grace required.

Some of y'all need to be more self-aware and realize if that's you and stop living in sin because you're making other people mad.

If you're the problem and you don't care to work it out, that's your fault.

Oh, we ain't gonna talk about that.

That's okay.

Belonging to Jesus is where you need to start.

This is not trying out religion.

We don't want religion here, we want relationship.

When you say yes to Jesus, you are entering into a relationship, you are entering into a covenant with a living Lord and Savior.

Ministry.

If you've been around for a while, maybe you've been serving God for a while.

Let me ease your mind and take this weight off of you.

Ministry should not be your source of your validity of who you are in Christ.

Ministry, what you do for God, should flow from who you are in God, not I feel validated because I am working and therefore now I am saved.

That is not salvation, that is performance.

And if we're not careful, that performance can grow an ugly monster of pride inside of us that we can't even see anymore.

Let your soul drink again from the identity that God loves you, He has called you, and you are His very own.

Let that definition be the source of how you perform, what you do, how you act, how you respond.

Don't let everything on the outside make you feel like you're validated on the inside because you'll end up serving the master of a gift.

Did you know good gifts from God can become masters?

Good blessings of jobs and family and churches and pastors can become idols in our life if we let them.

Let no man that ever stands on this stage and holds a microphone become the man you look to for salvation, the man you look to to define yourself.

I'm only preaching God's word, but it's very easy, someone you look up to or you respect, to put them on a pedestal.

Do not ever put me on a pedestal and say he's got it together because I'll be the first to tell you that I am the worst, I am the least.

I'm still trying to work on myself.

I am nobody that's just trying to tell everybody about somebody.

I have no reason to uplift myself except for giving glory to God because we are set apart, and when we become set apart, we become assigned.

Say it with me.

I'm set apart, I'm set apart.

There should be something different about us.

Holiness, living holy, it will breed out and pull out of you the mission that God has for your life.

It will pull out the mission, set apart to the gospel.

Verse number one chosen by God to be an apostle and sent out to preach his good news.

Paul is set apart, marked for God's purpose.

He was designed.

You can tell Paul loved writing and loved encouraging, but he also loved correcting.

Bible says he didn't love it so much.

He wished he didn't have to, but he had a gift.

Some of you, if you turned your negativity and you you dialed it back a little bit, God can use you to really speak into people's lives.

You want to be in your mission and in your purpose?

Take your pride out of the equation and humble yourselves and serve others, and God will elevate you.

Paul was set apart.

To be set apart is not isolation.

There wasn't one amen on that.

That's okay.

That means we got to rest here for a second.

Set apart does not mean now you have a written notice from the doctor that you can check out and not have to deal with people.

Set apart from the world to be in the world, not of the world.

Set apart is not permission for isolation, it is separation from sin and dedication to God.

Holiness is not cold, it's consecration that burns within us.

If the God Has claimed you your calendar, your habits, your speech, your ambitions.

You are now marked with the good news of Jesus Christ.

Set apart in affections.

Jesus is and should be our first love.

My wife is second in my life.

Some of you need to understand what that means and what that looks like.

Doesn't mean abandon your wife.

It doesn't mean not see her needs and realize who she is as a person and justify it by using the word of God.

That's not what I'm saying.

She knows that we together look up to the Lord for direction and correction and where we go next.

It's not a me lordship over her, it's he is the Lord over us, and I am the leader of the house that he has established in our home.

Some people can't get order in their house because they don't have the right leader.

Let's go on.

Y'all write that down.

Set apart in conduct.

We must have integrity in the church again.

We must have integrity in the house again.

We must have integrity in our marriages again, in our jobs again.

When no one is watching us, we must remain the same.

Set apart in priorities.

God's mission redirects our plans.

How many of you have been praying for something or you're going through a season, you get on the other side and you look back and you're like, I can see the hand of God, but none of it is recognizable to me.

It didn't turn out how I thought it was going to look.

And it sure didn't happen in the time I thought it was going to happen.

It usually never does, but he's always on time.

Amen.

Somebody.

We are assigned with authority and purpose.

Look at verse number five.

Through Christ, God has given us the privilege.

How many of you know serving Christ, preaching the good news, living out the gospel is a privilege?

I think sometimes, especially as leaders in the church, we forget that it is a privilege to serve you.

It is a privilege to go out into the community.

It is a privilege to lead.

It is a privilege to serve.

God has given us the privilege and authority as apostles to tell Gentiles everywhere what God has done for them so that they will believe and that they will obey, bringing glory to his name.

There is an anointing on your assignment.

So if you believe that that is true, but you don't know what your assignment is, go back to the definition of who you should be.

Once we establish definition, now we can get to our destiny.

Do you understand what I'm saying to you?

Don't be defined by who you were, don't be defined by what you've done.

But who does Christ say from this moment on?

When I say yes to Jesus, now what should I look like?

Now how should I act?

How should I speak?

There should not be a football game that can make me act unsaved again.

Woo! Jesus.

Come on now.

Come on now.

Can we talk real in the house of the Lord today?

If we love Jesus, even when we get mad at the TV, we can still act like Jesus.

Y'all know Jesus flew some tables in his day.

It's all right.

If you got to, set a little table up outside and go flip it and come back in and watch the game again.

Whatever it takes to keep your mind holy and focused on God, do it.

It may feel dumb, but you'll probably start laughing and not be so upset anymore.

Woo! Yeah, I know I was coming for you.

But there was an anointing on the assignment.

Paul says privilege and authority and grace to do it and the authority to accomplish it.

What God put in our hearts as young people.

And now we've grown old into middle people.

Some of us have went past to a little past middle.

And some of you, we'll just leave you alone.

You've earned it.

But God's purpose from beginning of life to the end of life is clear in his scripture that we are to go into all the world and preach the good news.

That doesn't mean you will have a microphone in your hand, but you do have a voice.

God will present opportunities for you to speak into people's lives.

Be aware of his um leading you into seasons, into situations.

Lord, I'm uncomfortable right now, but what would you have me do?

Not what do I always do.

What would you have me do?

How would you have me respond?

The purpose is clear when you start from your definition of who you are in Christ.

Some of you may be called only to pray.

Some of you may be called to worship, some of you may be called to run a camera, some of you may be called to do some sound.

We need some sound people.

Hello, somebody.

May be called to do some live stream stuff or some computer stuff.

We really, really need you.

Come to me after service.

If the Lord is moving you in that direction.

We need people to serve.

You never know.

Have you ever been in the season in your life and you didn't realize you were that person until you were there in the situation?

I'm telling you, before we came here, I preached a lot in my day.

Before we came here, our pastor had heart issues and then it was COVID.

So my first time of filling in for him was me preaching to an iPad and a sanctuary that had three people in it.

You talk about weird.

We didn't have camera people.

Our Wi-Fi was spotty, and we were only on Facebook.

It's all we knew how to do.

But what's crazy is years before that, I started a YouTube channel teaching photography and doing real estate stuff.

I had experience that was being developed.

This is crazy.

Now think about this.

I was not uncomfortable talking to someone who wasn't there.

Now, some of you are like, yeah, no duh, you could talk to anything.

Calm down.

We'll pray for you after service.

But I had an I had a skill set that I had no clue was going to have to be used in a later time.

That I was completely comfortable.

I preached as if I was preaching a thousand.

I didn't care.

And then the more that that was cultivating, now watch what God does.

If you ever think God is just randomly doing something, just look back a little bit in your most recent times and you'll see how the dots were connected.

And as these dots became connected, we came to connect church.

Come on, somebody.

But as I was filling in over there, he had some heart issues, and then he he wasn't able to come back as quickly.

And it was just like this this weird time, and then shortly after we got the phone call for over here, and it was like over there preaching to an iPad and three people, my family and the pastor's wife, and maybe one other person.

There was this fire stirring inside of me that I didn't fully understand.

There was something in my deep down in my belly, you know what I'm saying?

I was like, I don't know what this is, but I like it.

And I don't know how to use it yet.

I've got this weird feeling that I never, never, never, never had before.

And sorry, that that song popped in my head.

And then we got the call to come over here, and I began to to preach more and more and more as Pastor Phil faded out, and we faded in.

And it was like that fire that was being kindled in my spirit, it now had a channel to be released.

And that's the only way I could think of it in my mind is it like, and I look back and I until today I never even thought of teaching YouTube on YouTube and talking into a camera with nobody else in the room, and then and then having to do it during COVID, and then and then get that getting set up to where that began to kindle a fire that I forgot that even existed.

Because I preached it in my dad's pulpit all the time.

I was his youth pastor, and so there was step after step after step that was slowly pointing me in the direction, and it reminded me that whatever phase, whether you're teaching on YouTube, or maybe today's TikTok, who knows, or you're teaching a class at your church, or maybe you pick up people that come to church, or maybe you serve on the worship team, or maybe you're in the sound booth.

Every person is called to do something in the kingdom of God.

Every person has a place, every person has a reason why you are here.

I serve a God who is bigger than just happenstance.

I serve a God who orchestrates beyond just reason of, oh, it just happened that way.

I serve a God who orchestrates things that we can't even imagine or understand until we look back and see his handiwork.

And so here's what I know.

Every person that is here, you are here because it was designed for you to be here.

And here's what I know.

Just as you sit here today, and some of you may, before you came in here today, may never heard of this church.

This may have been your third choice.

That's all right, you're our first.

But God, even if you don't come back, God brought you here so that you can hear his word.

And to remind you that you don't start with your assignment so that you can find your definition, you start with your definition so that you can prosper in your assignment.

That the seed that is planted first must be planted in ground that is broken.

Y'all know I say this all the time.

We have to be broken before the Lord, we have to remain broken.

I I get my in my mind this this uh this vision of a vessel and it being broken so that when it is poured into, everything around it also gets poured onto.

That's how I want to be.

I want to be broken before the Lord so that when He pours into me other people, other people reap the benefits.

So the message is what God has done for them.

We proclaim divine accomplishment, not human advice.

The aim is so that we will believe, so that they will believe and obey faith that produces obedience.

We in the church house we must remain obedient.

It's not an option.

You can't just come to the church, check it off your week, and not follow scripture throughout the week and claim Jesus.

You can't.

Faith that produces obedience, real conversion produces real transformation.

Real conversion produces real transformation.

So we have to examine ourselves, Lord, what in me is not pleasing to you?

I don't care if anybody else thinks it's a sin or not.

What do I need to let go of so that I can step into where you are calling me to?

Some of us will circle for years outside of the promised land because we won't let go of the things of our past.

Your assignment will always carry gospel content.

What God has done.

Your assignment will always carry the gospel call to believe and then to obey.

Your assignment will always carry the gospel consequence, which is God's glory manifested in your life.

The assignment includes the nations and your neighbor.

It says in verse 5 and 6 to tell Gentiles everywhere, and you are included.

The gospel is global and the gospel is local.

It is for the ends of the earth and it is for the end of your street.

Your assignment might be a pulpit, it might be a classroom, it might be a lens, it might be a register, it might be a kitchen table, it might be a hospital bedside where God has planted you, He has assigned you.

Loved, you are called, and you are holy.

Then in verse 7, it says, You are sent, you are loved by God and you are called to be his own people.

He is selfish with us.

He desires you, he longs for you.

I love every single person in this room, but I don't know if I would send my son to die in your place.

Think about that.

When you put it on earthly perspective, it changes the way God you see, you understand how God sees us, is that He was willing to sacrifice His Son.

Not just a sacrifice, but a bleeding out.

It wasn't just a walk to the cross, there was a process.

For the believer, battling compromise, your calling is too costly to trade for moments of comfort.

Did you hear me?

Every believer is called to do something.

Every person has an assignment.

It may be that person at your job that gets on your nerves.

Have you thought of that?

No, I don't like them.

I ain't talking to them.

Your assignment may be raising children.

Your assignment may be raising somebody else's children.

Take mine any day.

But your calling is too costly to trade for moments of compromise and moments of comfort.

For the weary servant, authority flows from Christ.

Start with Christ and let it flow from there.

You can't operate on empty.

This is one of the things that I preach to myself over and over again.

My wife preaches to me over and over again because I will go until I run my face into the ground.

I don't stop.

And then I've been having issues lately where I get so tired.

And I just want to pass out and I get angry at everybody.

Now she's making me go to the doctor.

And she tells me all the time, you need rest, you need rest, you need rest.

And I said, Tell me when.

You know, then you go down your list and stuff.

Well, this house ain't free.

There's gotta be food on the table, and this has got to be done, and this can't happen if I'm not there, and blah blah blah.

All the excuses.

I got a bag full of them.

And then after I do my little windy thing where I throw a little fit and I circle and I spiral and I hit the ground, and then I finally get back up and I say, You're right.

As always.

But it's easy to get weary, and then what happens?

We get burnt out.

A lot of times when I start feeling that way, I start feeling weary, I start feeling what we call burnout.

It's like you just like you can't go on, it's like you've been spinning your wheels, and it's nothing but rubber spinning in the air.

I remind myself of who God says I am and why I'm here.

When I realign myself with the why that was given from the Lord, you would be surprised.

Once you find out who you are, because here's the here's the truth: you can find out who you are and then venture off and forget.

You can find your purpose and then you live life a little bit, and things happen, it just like you end up getting off the path a little bit.

So I have to remind myself who has God called me to be?

Once I do that, then I re-establish my foundation in Christ, and I reestablish, and it's it's like all of a sudden a surge of energy and motivation and declaration and purpose comes back alive in me again.

But we have to take the time to remember who we are so that then we can begin to live out properly in our assignment.

We're the seeker or the skeptic.

God has done something for you in Christ, He has opened the door to belong, to be forgiven, and to be made new.

Some of us have to remind ourselves that have been saved for a while, we have to remember that.

Now we've heard from the word.

Now we're gonna go to a call of response as we close.

These seven simple verses.

Does that feel like seven verses?

Something like it felt like the whole book.

Remember our title, and these seven simple, seven short seven verses that we read at the very beginning of the service.

It announced that we are called, that we are set apart, and every believer is assigned.

We are called.

I am set apart, I am assigned.

Now keep your eyes open for that assignment.

Because you never know who's gonna put in front of your path when you're just living your regular life.

So we talked about five, five, and five if you'll stand.

Here's a challenge to you as you go through this week and we go into the the next verses of this book.

We have the five, five, and five, five minutes of prayer, five minutes of reading your word with Jim's wearing the shirt, five minutes a day.

If you can't give God five, ten, or fifteen minutes, then you need to start back at ground zero of salvation.

Because when I remember what he saved me from, it makes me want to get close as I can to him.

Makes me want to read his word to what he has to say to me today.

We need to look for opportunity as we walk in our assignments.

Intentionally share what God has done with you so that others that know or don't know can be encouraged.

And I promise you, if you share what God has done in your life to those who do not believe, they will start to ask questions.

Curiosity will bring somebody to Jesus.

How can we be holy?

As we mentioned.

Every person in here, you have a path.

You do the same things, all of you are sitting in the same seat, you sit in every Sunday.

I'm a jack with Yahweh Sunday and move all the chairs like six inches in one direction.

Yahweh know what to do, you'll try to sit in the middle of here.

We all have the ability through the power of the Holy Spirit by the Lordship of Christ to live a life that is holy.

We all have patterns.

But does the pattern, does the mindset, does the heart posture that you have who you are right now, is that being set apart in a set apart life?

Or are there things that you are still holding on to?

That maybe you just haven't been quite ready to give up yet.