BONUS TRAIL | Real Purpose

You are listening to the Gateway Franklin Church podcast.

To learn more about Gateway Franklin Church, including our service times here in Franklin, Tennessee, visit us online at gatewayfranklin.com.

And now, here is this week's message.

Before I get started, I want you to show you this as an introduction.

Welcome to Gateway.

Thank you for your interest in our church.

My name is Charlie Weir.

I'm the founding pastor at Gateway Church, and also it's CWO, its chief welcoming officer.

It's important to us that you've come to visit, so thank you.

Now, whether you're new to Middle Tennessee or you're new to us, um, new can be intimidating.

So I'm here to help with that.

I found that most people are looking for three particular things in their life: a fresh start, great friends, and real purpose.

Now, who hasn't needed a do-over a time or two in their life?

And I haven't met too many people that would say that they have the full complement of friends and all the relationships are great.

I've also found that many people spend too much time spinning their wheels around a temporary cause instead of investing themselves in a real purpose.

We are laser focused at Gateway and creating environments for you to develop and experience all three of those: a fresh start, great friends, and real purpose.

We believe that's the kind of life that God describes in John chapter 10 when Jesus says that he's the gate, he came so that we might have life more and better than we ever dreamed of.

John 10 · chapter mention

We realize that a person's first experience with a church is generally online.

And we have a great website.

You're gonna find out everything you need to know about Gateway Church on our website.

You even can experience either a live stream service or one through the archive or podcast.

But the best part of our church are the people that you get to sit around on a Sunday morning.

That's the part of our church that we want you to experience.

Now, whether you've followed Christ your whole life or you're what we call Christ curious, you're interested in exploring whether Jesus is real, uh, like you've heard that he is.

We would love to meet you in person.

Known and loved.

That's the best thing about Jesus.

No one can know you more than he knows you, and no one can love you harder than he loves you.

We're not going to be able to match that, but that's our target.

We want you to be known and loved here.

So enjoy your virtual visit.

Um, we'd love to see you in person on a weekend here at Gateway Franklin Church.

Some of you have possibly seen that on our on our website.

Um we redid that last year.

Um actually they're the the drummer today, that's his company, and we we did it.

And um, but my wife has been after me to redo that for seven eight years, and I'm saying, I kept saying, honey, I like the old one.

I said, it's it just captures everything that we are.

She said, Yeah, but you look different now.

So she was much more interested, not in the message of the video, but that you didn't feel duped coming in to this guy.

The other day I had this, I had his gray pants on and a grayish kind of shirt, and she had gray sneakers on, and she said, You got gray sneakers, gray pants, gray shirt, gray glasses, gray hair.

So I think gray is the absence of color, I think is what she's telling me.

So, as the chief welcoming officer of whether you're watching today and you're in the student sanctuary, chose to sit in the student sanctuary today, or uh watching online, now, live or later, and in the room today, um, welcome to Gateway Franklin Church.

The last two weeks we've been on this um, we called it a bonus trail to this Psalms of Ascent journey we've been in since the beginning of the summer.

I will pick that back up next week with Psalm 129.

Um, but this this one today kind of ends um the bonus trail on uh real purpose.

Um now, all three of those adjectives, fresh, great, and real, are important.

Um because if we just said starts, friends, purpose, it's not very compelling.

Um, but when you add fresh, great, and real, it kind of gets your attention a little bit.

So fresh um is more than um is more appealing than stale.

Um great is a better target than average, and real has a lasting quality to it instead of imitation.

So over 20 years ago, I I made this observation, and the way I say it is that people settle for a cause, but they long for a purpose.

Settle for a cause but long for a purpose.

So, what's the difference between a cause and a purpose?

To me, causes are temporary.

We lend ourselves out to causes, but purpose, purpose is permanent, it's something we give our lives to.

Um internally, purpose is woven into our DNA by God.

And and I I was I was thinking also about just another metaphor for this, and now it may be surprising, but I don't have any tattoos.

But I know plenty of people that do.

And here's what I know about their tattoos they mean something.

There's a reason why they have something tattooed on them.

It's an outward mark, it's a statement.

So I believe our purpose, God has wired inside of us and even tattooed on our heart as something permanent.

There's written evidence of about 4,000 years ago, actually, the beginning of any kind of kind of formal written um communication, that mankind was grappling with the question um, why am I here?

So if it starts appearing at the beginning of written communication, I think the odds are that that question has bounced around in the heart and minds of people since the beginning of time.

Why am I here?

Now, most people ask that question from the starting point of what was I built for?

Um, what what should I be doing?

Right?

One of the earliest questions we ask kids.

What do you want to do when you grow up?

But what if the answer to why am I here doesn't start with what am I supposed to be doing?

What if it has a different starting point?

I think you're discovering your real purpose begins with who I am before it ever gets to what am I supposed to do?

And I think that makes real purpose um less a mystery to discover than it is to an identity to uncover.

So we're gonna get to why am I here?

But we're gonna start where I believe the best starting place is who am I?

And then we're gonna move to uh how am I supposed to live?

And then at the end, we'll get to why am I here.

So I think Paul, the Apostle Paul, does an amazing job just in one packet of scripture to answer uh this question in all kinds of different facets.

So it's Ephesians 2, 1 through 10.

Um, if you brought your Bible, you can read it from there.

It'd be on the screen, and it's out of the amplified.

So if you've been with me for a little while, this is this is a version I use quite often, actually.

The amplified, that the reason I use the amplified is in the brackets, when you'll see brackets, that is the editor's uh attempt to break out the nuance of a word or phrase, right?

You've heard me say this because English can't bear the weight of Greek and Hebrew.

Greek and Hebrew carry a lot more depth and nuance than English does.

All right.

So that's kind of where this is.

And then there's other brackets because where the editor left off, I decided to add what I wanted to say too.

I don't think we put that on there, but I'll you'll know.

Um, so here it begins.

And you, he who made alive when you were spiritually dead and separated from him because of your transgressions and sins, in once in you once walked.

He's identifying all of us in three different ways dead, separated, and still going in the wrong direction.

All three.

All right, that one was mine.

You were following the ways of this world, influenced by this present age, in accordance with the prince of the power of air, Satan, the spirit who is now at work in the disobedient, the unbelieving who fight against the what?

The purposes of God.

All right, so we're just we're starting with who I am, and already Paul's letting us in on how who I am is going to connect to what do I do?

Why am I here?

Verse 3.

Among these unbelievers, uh among these unbelievers, we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, our behavior governed by the sinful self.

Self's an important player in all of this.

Indulging the desires of the human nature without the Holy Spirit and the impulses of the sinful mind.

We were by nature children under the sentence of God's wrath, just like the rest of mankind, so nobody exempt.

And here comes the two best, two of the best words in scripture, anyway, but God.

But God being so very rich in mercy.

So this one's mine too.

He is so rich in mercy that his mercy is more than enough to cover whatever mess you think you are.

There is no mess that you've created and no mess that you've become that his riches aren't rich enough to cover that.

This is why the emphasis very rich in mercy.

Because of his great and wonderful love with with which he loved us, even when we were spiritually dead and separated from him because of our sins, he made us spiritually alive together with Christ, for by his grace, his undeserved, undeserved favor and mercy, you have been saved from God's judgment.

And he raised us up together with him when we believed.

So when we do baptism, baptism is more than just a physical symbol.

There's there's a lot of spiritual mystery in it.

But it demonstrates the reality of what took place on the cross and in our life.

When Jesus dies on the cross, it is the power of God that raises him up.

He was dead, dead.

Okay?

No breath, no ability.

God raises Christ by himself.

And so when we are put under the water, it is a representation that we've been buried with Christ.

And then when we come up out of the water, it symbolizes that we have been raised with Christ, that the power of God has completely changed who we are.

The water doesn't do that.

Christ does that.

The water symbolizes what's been done.

And it we're not just raised to life.

It says then we are seated with him in the heavenly places because we are in Christ Jesus, and he did this so that in the ages to come he might clearly show the immeasurable and unsurpassed riches of his grace and his kindness towards us in Christ Jesus by providing for our redemption, that we become, we become the poster child of his immeasurable riches.

Verse 8 For it is by grace, God's remarkable compassion and favor drawing you to Christ, that you have been saved, actually delivered from judgment and given eternal life through faith.

And this salvation is not for yourselves, not through your own effort, but it is the undeserved gracious gift of God, not as a result of your works, nor your attempts to keep the law, but so that no one will be able to boast or take credit in any way for his salvation.

For we are his workmanship, his own master work, a work of art, created in Christ Jesus, reborn from above, which God prepared for us beforehand, taking paths which he set so that we would walk in them, living the good life.

Who wants to live the good life?

We didn't invent that phrase.

Living the good life which he prearranged and made ready for us.

So here's how the amplified version helps connect the dots.

And my language and this language, I'm not sure it's gonna it's gonna match, but um, who were we or who am I?

This is how it begins.

Who were we?

Who was I?

I was dead in my sins and separated from God.

This is all of us.

Nobody's exempt for this.

That's who we were.

Who are we?

We're alive in Christ, raised in him.

That's who we are.

We were dead, who we were.

Who am I?

I'm alive.

Okay?

I'm alive.

So what was I saved for?

Good works.

I was saved for good works.

What is the life he's designed for me?

The good life.

I'm gonna unpack a lot of passages here today, but this one Paul really can't, and there's others, but this one Paul really locks in.

All right, so the quest for why I'm in I am here has to begin with who I am.

Because listen, all doing flows from being.

All purpose purposeful doing flows from being.

You you can you can do some things that are kind of outside of your um your wheelhouse, maybe, but you're only gonna be able to do them so long and at a certain level.

But anything that comes out of your being, who you are, one, there's there's a little bit of effortless to that.

It it flows, it's it's it's natural.

I don't have to work it up.

It's it's good it's gonna come.

So that's why who I am is is a is the quintessential question to why am I here?

What should I be doing?

Um reason why it's difficult to live um to live a life new and fresh in Christ is because the old life is the only life we have experience with at the beginning.

Like, well, Pastor, why am I struggling with this, or why do I struggle with this, and why does this keep creeping back up?

It's just because that's that's for the bulk of your life, that's what you knew.

So when he when you when you're given a new life, there's a new life that I discover, I, I, I, I lean into, I get, I get people come alongside me for, I, and and that new life, when you start giving it air to breathe, and you start fanning that flame, then it starts to consume and take over all the other old stuff.

But how am I to live is is a is a really important question after Who Am I, because it becomes this transitional period in our life, this big change.

So in the mid-1600s, the Church of England and the Church of Scotland convened for over about 10 years to try to find a consolidated way in which to state their doctrine and their theology and their faith.

Now, this was a the Protestant Reformation happens at the beginning of the 1500s and goes into this time, right?

Luther doesn't just wake up one day and have this great discovery that the righteous shall live by faith, and the Catholic Church wasn't teaching that.

And so he nails these 95 grievances with the Catholic Church.

He didn't, Martin Luther did not start out to begin of the Protestant Reformation.

He sought out to modify, to change, to reform the Catholic Church.

By the time we get in the 1600s, um, there was a facet of the Church of England that was leaning to back into um kind of the legalism that was the Catholic Church at the time.

How many brothers and sisters in Christ do I have in the room that your background is Catholic?

All right, about the same number in the first.

What I'm gonna say, if it doesn't make sense, find someone that raised their hand, they'll be able to tell you what I'm talking about.

All right.

So liturgy, order, um, all these things are are great, they're important.

I actually like a good bit of that.

But what was happening was a relationship with God was leaning into how good can you keep these rules?

And and then you had to keep them through the priest and the Catholic Church.

And this is where Luther, this is why the Protestant Reformation happens.

Is like, no, we we're saved by faith in Christ.

And so in this movement, young movement, there's a facet of people started leaning back into that.

And I can understand why.

Um, it's always easier to follow a rule than it is to follow a person.

But if God just wanted us to follow rules, Christ doesn't come.

Right?

He just would have given us the whole Bible.

Like, just do this, right?

But he doesn't say just do this.

He says follow him.

The Puritans, the other facet of the Church of England, Church of Scotland, while they understood the the need for reverence and holy and glorifying God, they lean to, but we should be able to enjoy God.

God's someone to be enjoyed.

Have you thought about God being someone to be enjoyed?

I wonder if I took a poll.

I'm going to right now.

When you're first thinking of God the Father, you think of honor and glory, that kind of thing.

That's your first thought, not joy.

Raise your hand.

Come on, be honest.

All right, how many of your first thoughts joy?

Right?

Probably three to one, you know, on the so my grandson just turned, my oldest grandson turned two.

And I'm figuring about 18 months is when he started saying, watch me, Bob.

Watch me, Bob, watch me, Bob, watch me, Bob.

Wanting my attention.

And what I find very interesting is how much joy I get out of watching him.

Like he need, like he's wanting the attention, I get it.

But I enjoy giving him the attention.

Do you think about God enjoying watching you?

He enjoys you wanting his attention.

There's joy there.

That out of the father heart of God, there's joy.

So here is these two important factions of this church trying to, how do we state this in a manner that will stand the course of time?

So out of the ten years they write something called, they wrote other things, but the two main things were the Westminster, because it was hosted at Westminster Abbey.

Anybody been to Westminster Abbey?

Pretty fascinating place there in London.

So the Westminster Longer Catechism and the Westminster shorter catechism.

Now, catechism is catechesis is to teach, and they did so through questioning and answers.

So the longer catechism was it was longer.

And so this is Most people quote the Westminster shorter catechism, right?

So they both started with the same first question, the same first answer.

The longer catechism phrase uh phrases are in parentheses here, and the shorter catechism without them.

But but ready here they are.

Here's the it was the first ten years, ten years of jockeying and trying to get it right.

Here's what they said.

Question number one What is the chief and highest end of man?

Why am I here?

Why am I here?

Answer Man's chief and highest end is to glorify God and fully enjoy him forever.

Who am I?

I am saved by the grace of God.

I'm engrafted into his family.

I'm a son and daughter.

How am I to live?

Um everything that I do should draw attention to who he is and his greatness.

Every action, conversation, deed, private, public, to bring glory to God.

Um Jesus gives us a great picture of what this means in practice in John 17.

So in John 17, this is before he goes to the cross.

He's only going to go across, I don't know, days maybe after he prays this series of prayers in John 17.

Okay.

But here's how he here's how he begins.

Father, the hour has come.

Glorify your son, show them who I am.

Now this is fascinating to me, right?

Because here, because God incarnate comes in the flesh as a man, and people didn't believe he was God.

And so in this act, as he's about to go to the cross, he's asking God, show him who I am.

That I am who I said I was.

Glorify your son.

That your son may glorify you, so that your son can show them who you are.

For you granted him authority over all the people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him.

Now, this is eternal life.

That you that you, that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.

My caveat, which means then eternal life begins at the moment of salvation, not when you die.

Eternal life begins when you're given new life, not just when this one ends.

That's going to be pretty special without a full ability for us to comprehend.

But eternal life begins now.

Verse 4, I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do.

All right?

So if Jesus asks the question, why am I here?

It was to do the work of the Father.

It was to fulfill the purpose that He came.

Fulfilling the purpose why He came, glorified the Father.

So the works that we're being called in to do is how we glorify the Father.

And now, Father, glorify me in your presence.

The glory I had with you before the world began.

Why is that an important chief aim?

Without that being our chief aim, our chief aim ends up being us.

Self, self-sufficiency, self-centeredness, self-fulfillment, self-absorbed.

You do you?

That's what our chief ends up being without having a different target.

Interesting.

I always get you always the tidbits at eleven of what my conversations are between the services at nine.

And this man came to me, he said, Do you recognize the name Antonio?

Um what was the name now?

Um the founder of the of the Church of Satan.

He said their one their main phrase is you do do what you willst.

That is kind of the central rallying cry.

And it just struck me, well, that's that sounds true.

Please, I didn't fact check it.

Levine, Levine.

I think these Antonio Levine.

But it made sense to me that if we are created for a purpose outside of ourselves, it would make sense to me that the antithesis of that was me being the purpose.

Okay?

All right, so the the last part about fully enjoying God forever, that he wanted to be known, which is why Jesus comes.

He didn't just want to be obeyed.

In fact, our obedience comes out of a relationship of love.

That's how we're able to put things down that once were the things we only thought could fulfill us.

We're able to put those things down because the fulfillment is coming from the Father, and we realize that those things, not only did they leave holes, guys, they created more holes.

But they still were the ones screaming that this is where you find life, this is where you find life, this is where you find life.

And it's not do we find life.

Do we realize no, there was no life there?

And so now as I start to fall in love with the Father, everything I do follows that.

It follows us.

Our sin nature says enjoyment comes from satisfying self.

Any restrictions or repressions of your own self-desires makes you less of you.

That's what our sin nature says.

You do you.

Our spirit nature says enjoyment comes in living in unity with our Creator.

The full life we're looking for is found in our surrender and union with Christ.

Our sin nature says surrender is slavery.

Our spirit nature says surrender is to Jesus is freedom and fulfillment.

And this is found in John 10.

In John 10.

Therefore, Jesus said again, very truly, I tell you, I'm the gate for the sheep.

You ever figured out, ever understood where we didn't know where we came up with the name Gateway Church?

All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.

I am the gate.

Whoever enters through me will be saved.

They will come in and go out and find pasture.

God takes us into spacious places.

We learned this in the Psalms of a Son.

The thief comes only to steal, kill, and destroy.

One objective.

I've come that they may have life and have it to the full.

Complete opposite objective.

The enemy has one objective for us that's only counterposed by Christ, who has a complete other objective.

The message translation ends so they may have real and eternal life and more and better life than they've ever dreamed of.

And I connect the dots that the life that's been designed for us is one filled with fresh darts, great friends, and real purpose.

You can't leave any of these out.

Alright.

So let's get into okay, that's who I am.

I'm a child of God, first and foremost.

Out of that flows a completely different way to live.

How am I to live?

Now I can get to why am I here?

Why am I here?

In Ephesians, at that last bit of that Ephesians passage, it said, for we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

All right.

So why am I here?

I'm here for good works.

Now, that seems like a pretty broad category.

So I I don't think I've ever said it like this or wrote it out like this before until this week.

Good works will always be connected to good news.

Good works will all be always be connected to good news.

So we were we were at dinner last Sunday and uh walk in the restaurant, guy um family coming out, so I opened the door for them and they prayed out.

Last guy's about my age, and he had this Auburn shirt on.

And so I paused, I still let him out.

Um, but then as he turned to walk away, I said, Hey, sir, let it be known that a Georgia boy has opened the door for an Auburn boy.

See, I wanted him to be able to connect the good work.

He said, He said, Well, it does it.

He said, What I said, what did that tell you?

He said, It just tells me your mama raised you, right?

That's what he said.

That's what he said.

So what what I want to what I want to try to emphasize to you is that being being a good guy or a good girl, being polite, being nice and all that, um, in order for that work to do something other than draw attention to you, needs to be connected to the the who you are and why you're living that way.

That's the good news.

See, it's one thing about putting a smile on someone's face, it's completely different of changing someone's life.

And my nicety, although nice, isn't going to bring a life change.

But the good news is.

And uh and our call isn't about a conversion.

Our call is about a conversation.

And we can have conversations.

Now, not I mean the guy was, I mean, he entertained the thought that I was a Georgia fan.

He wouldn't have entertained the thought that I was a pastor that just preached two services.

So I'm sure there's context and where it just does not necessarily fit, but I would say there's more context where it fits than it doesn't.

All right, so let me just give you a few scriptures here.

I'm gonna go fast because I've um I'm already out of time.

So we have Matthew 28, we have a real command on purpose.

We're we're where Jesus, one of the last things he would say is that we are to go in all the world, and then Mark says, preach the gospel, and then Matthew says that make disciples.

All right.

And so our quintessential, our quintessential good work is to make disciples.

What's a disciple?

Someone who looks like Jesus.

So as I begin looking more like Jesus, my my call is to help other people look like Jesus.

Well, how do I do that?

Well, and in Acts 1.8, the last thing Jesus says, He says that tells them that remain in Jerusalem because you will receive the Spirit and He will empower you to be my witnesses.

All right, so a witness does, it's a noun and a verb.

It's noun and verb.

And so he not only gives us this mandate, then he tells us he gives us the power for that mandate.

You go deeper in Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 14 says, for we are, for Christ's love compels us, because we're convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died, and he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, self, but for him who died for them and was raised again.

So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view, though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come, the old is gone, the new is here.

Understand this.

When we get a fresh start in Christ, it's not a chance just to screw up all over again.

When we get a fresh start with Christ, it comes up with a fresh new way.

It's not just a chance to just, okay, well, let me hit the reset button on my Atari.

My dad when we got an Atari, and my dad was, Dad, let me show you this game.

And I can't, oh, wait, hold on.

Oh, oh, hold on, oh, hold on.

And he just walked away.

He said, That's not a game.

Just keep he reset.

Reset.

When you come to Christ, it's not a reset.

You might think you resemble yourself, but you do not.

You are an entirely different person.

Hands down.

You are the same.

He doesn't just re-tread you, recycle you.

He does repurpose you.

And he makes you completely different from the inside out.

So then Christ gave us the ministry of reconciliation.

And it goes on, it says, then we've been entrusted with the message of reconciliation.

This is the redemption message.

This is God is our creator.

We're separated from God.

There's no way we get back.

But there is a message and a ministry of reconciliation.

The message is Christ.

The ministry is his.

And we are the messenger.

And we're the minister.

So we have a reconciliation purpose.

And first Peter tells us to do it with gentleness and respect.

Colossian tells us to be why to make every opportunity of this.

So the best answer to why you are here is because you've been created for good works that are attached to the good news.

Now, well, Pastor, but I'm doing this.

Fortunately, God gives us all a bent.

There's a bent that we carry.

Who bent you?

Christ bent you.

And he bent you for a reason.

And he's placed you you are, where you are, for a reason.

So they were spread out all over the world.

I mean, not everybody's a prophet, pastor, teacher, evangelist, right?

These are offices given to the church.

How is it possible that all the whosoevers of the world find Jesus because they run into some pastor?

The math doesn't work, folks.

But when when when we when we will take where we are and take every opportunity to glorify God where you are, every pizza you slint, we are opening up the opportunity for someone to find the good news through us.

This is why we're here.

And he just puts different things on different people and gives you different opportunities here or there.

And listen, I understand where you can, you can be frustrated with where you are right now.

You could be highly disappointed that the job you're in is not your field of study, or it wouldn't have been what you would choose if you had to do it all over again.

Listen, I've gone through my 40s and my 50s.

And I know when some of this stuff starts to surface in me.

And then the beginning of my 60s.

I know where some of this stuff starts to surface.

I know what these voices sound like.

And it's easy to knock you off track.

It's easy to leave you in a place where you're discouraged or disappointed, and you think you just got to play out the string.

Baseball reference.

I gave a couple golf references and football references in the first service, and I think I threw them off because I was sitting down and they're real somber and nobody laughed.

You can turn everything around where you find yourself right now by going back to the 1600s and logging on to.

Because myself is lying.

Your self is lying.

Because he wants to, the enemy wants to dissuade you, discourage you, and separate you from your purpose.

Because it's in your purpose that you find life.

This is the life.

Listen, I've talked to, I've talked to, I've talked to people that are more successful than I could have ever dreamed or imagined.

And they'll tell you the same thing.

You get everything you want, and you realize it's not everything you need.

But you can have Christ be anywhere and live a life fulfilled, knowing my life matters.

That's what we're after.

The whole you feel you just want to matter.

But the very nature of who you are, your His distinguishes that you matter.

You're not going to get anybody better to look at you than the creator of the universe.

You're not just asking anybody, watch me down, watch me down, watch me down, watch me down, watch me down.

It's watch me, creator.

Watch me, creator.

Watch me, creator.

Watch me glorify you in this situation.

Watch me in a place where someone's trying to destroy me.

Watch me live for your glory.

Watch me walk through the heart with hope.

So that others may ask me, why are you living this way?

How are you is it possible you're carrying that hope through that situation?

Well, let me tell you about my father.

Oh Father, oh, I want to hear just just exploding in my spirit.

The father wanted to say, I see you.

I see you.

I love you.

I've got you.

If you don't know who he is, you've heard a very plain spoken, calm, collected expression of who God the Father and Jesus the Son is.

And if you want to receive him and you want that fresh start, and the real purpose, and all the community that comes with it, it's a simple move because he's done all the heavy lifting.

Here's what you have to do.

You have to recognize that your current path is a dead end.

That it has not, nor will it, deliver what you are hoping it will.

And then you acknowledge that He is sovereign, Lord, and Savior.

And you trade this life that was dead.

And you ask him to give you new life in him.

It's not a language to repeat, it's not a prayer to memorize, it is a it's it's it's a full-bodied recognition that I am separated from God and I don't want to be separated from God any longer.

And then when you make that decision, what I said is true, you're no longer the same person.

Scripture says it plainly.

You are a new creation.

He has remade you.

He has remade you.

And then we get to figure out how we live that.

And we get to live that, the best way we get to live that is with one another.

Because none of us carry all the counsel of God.

But together, through a shared life and experience, we're a really good way to gain ground in this new kingdom.

And it doesn't remove heart, it doesn't remove frustrated, it just doesn't.

But it's the fuel to push through.

It only takes one word from God to change your life.

In any situation, only one.

Because for you to have heard a word from God means that you've experienced the presence of God.

It's the presence of God that changes us.

He can take any situation that seems hopeless without you even knowing how it's going to change, and he can put a hope right dab, right smack dab in the middle of it.

It's just what he does.

It's just what I can stand up here the next 24 hours and try to unpack the scripture with you, and it's not any plainer than what I just said right there.

He just does.

So today, you can you can pray and receive Jesus where you are.

If you would like to come and talk to someone here and pray with someone here, um, I would contend that once you stand up and walk this way, God's already saved you.

Um but you someone might want to let somebody know that so someone can walk with you through that.

You might be in a very discouraging place, work otherwise, some join your faith.

Let someone link some faith with you and pray with you today.

Um, I think you're you're at a place where Monday morning you were you were planning on quitting.

Something or someone.

I encourage you to spend some time with him before you leave this place to see if it just needs to be how you glorify him in that situation and watch him change something.

Over here, you have some time.

There's plenty of space you can pray and just spend some time alone with the Lord.

We have communion on my left and on my right.

I want to invite you to stand for uh for the concluding worship.

I'll pray and then I'll invite you to move.

Father, this is your place, these are your people.

No one came in by accident, no one tuned in by accident.

Um, Lord, it's all purposeful.

Your draw.

Your draw.

And I just prayed this morning, Lord, that having been drawn, Lord, people won't stop there.

That they'll trust you enough to take the next step.

So in this last moment of our service, Lord, do what only you can do.

In the name of Jesus, we ask.

Amen.

Amen.

I invite you to move.

We hope you were encouraged and challenged by today's message.

Again, to learn more about Gateway Franklin Church, find us online at gatewayfranklin.com.

Thanks for joining us today.