Exhortation to Faithfulness 2026

Open your Bibles today to the Book of Ephesians. We're gonna take a break from our journey through the Book of Acts. Today being our congregational meeting, our annual congregational meeting, I wanted to exhort you today, encourage you today, challenge you today. And as we look at our year 2020, I want to thank the Lord for the 25 that the Lord blessed us with. I want us to consider the year we're in. I want us to continue to look to the Lord, to trust in the Lord, to know that it is the Lord who has provided all that he has provided. It is his grace that will carry us. It was an interesting year. I don't know why this little congregation continues to get attention from those who live and work and exist far away from us. But we do. And I'm thankful for the opportunities to be able to give witness to Christ in the gospel, and what God is doing here in this community, on a national and international stage, but it means nothing in terms of how we are to continue faithfully. In fact, it can become a distraction if we're not careful. And that certainly is what the enemy would want. But God did not give us those opportunities to be distracted by them. He gave us those opportunities, I believe, because we have been a faithful congregation, and we've not been fearful of remaining faithful. We've not been fearful to continue proclaiming the gospel even in the face of opposition. And so, I'm all very thankful for that. I'm thankful for you. And so, I want to challenge you today. I want to talk to you today about why faithfulness matters. So, I want to start with the prayer before I read our text today. Let's pray. Father, we come before you in the mighty name of Jesus. And Lord, we ask, please give us ears to hear your word. Please, Lord, give us eyes to see your truth. Make our hearts attentive and ready to obey your word and your will. And so, fulfill your plans and your purposes. Lord, we pray your kingdom come, your will be done in and through us, your people. Do this individually and corporately that we, your church and this body called Christ Fellowship, will fulfill all that you have ordained for us during our time of visitation on this earth. Do this, we pray, Lord, now, into a thousand generations. Do this, we pray, Lord, for the glory of your name and for your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. As I read the scriptures I have selected for us today, please listen for mention of you, the church. Pay attention to what God, the Holy Spirit, has inspired to be written concerning the church and how those words specifically impact us as the local body called Christ Fellowship Church. I'm going to begin in Ephesians chapter 1 and I'm going to read to you verses 15 through 23. Ephesians chapter 1 verses 15 through 23. Hear the word of the Lord. Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him. The eyes of your understanding being enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the working of His name, His mighty power, which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places. Far above all principality and power and might and dominion in every name that is named not only in this age, but also in that which is to come. And He put all things under His feet and gave Him to behead over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him, who fills all in all. And then turn over to Ephesians chapter three, and I will continue reading Ephesians three verses 11, verses 8 through 11, and then verse 21. To me who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given that I should preach among the Gentiles, the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus Christ, to the intent that now the manifold wisdom of God might be made known by the church to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places, according to the eternal purpose which He accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord. Verse 21, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever amen. This is the Word of the Lord. I want to talk to you about your faithfulness. Faithfulness to God, faithfulness to the cause of Christ, faithfulness to the kingdom of God, faithfulness to the church, and to the body of Christ, faithfulness to God, and to one another, particularly in this body we call Christ Fellowship. And I'm not talking to you today about faithfulness because you've not been faithful. I'm talking to you today about faithfulness because you must continue to be faithful. And for those who have struggled with faithfulness, you must rise to the occasion and become faithful. In the scriptures that we just read from Paul's letter to the church at Ephesus, we see there that Paul writes that the authority of Christ has been given to the church. The authority of Christ has been given to the church. That means it has been given to you. Paul's prayer for the church in his day is the prayer the church still needs today. His prayer addressed to the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of Glory, is a petition, a prayer, that the Father of Glory may give to the saints. That's us. We are saints. We are holy ones made holy by the blood of Jesus. And Paul prays that the Father of Glory may give to the saints the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, that He would cause the eyes of your understanding to be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope of His calling in the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. You are that inheritance as well as all nations. The nations are the inheritance of Christ. That's why we are commanded to go and to disciple the nations until every nation has been discipled. You have been placed by divine providence in this nation. This is where you live. So your top priority must be this nation being discipled for Christ. God placed you here in Williamson County or Lee County or Milam County or some county close here. He placed you at Christ Fellowship Church. So your work of discipling the nations begins right where you are, with your family, with your friends, with those that God has placed around you. Paul prays that the saints would know the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe the same mighty power which He worked in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly places. He prayed that you would know that Christ is seated and so we are also seated with Him far above all principality and power and might and dominion and every name that is named not only in this age but also in that which is to come. That was Paul's prayer for the church. It's a prayer recorded for us in scripture right at the beginning of Paul's letter. A letter not written to you but a letter absolutely written for you. This prayer not prayed specifically about you but a prayer that absolutely is applicable and we should claim this prayer and its promises and all that Paul prayed for the church in Ephesus. We should pray for the church in Taylor and in Christ's fellowship and for yourself and your family and the greater church that we are a part of. The Father put all things under the feet of Christ and gave Him to be head over all things to the church. The church is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all. This language of filling all in all is reminiscent of the creation mandate. Genesis 128 when God commands man to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. Man who was created in the image of God was to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and what was man filling the earth with but countless seeds who are all bearing the image of God. Thus man was commissioned in the very beginning to be fruitful and multiply and to fill the earth with the image of God. We are still commissioned to do this. We call this commission the great commission given to us by Jesus. The command to go and to make disciples of all the nations is a command to take dominion, to be fruitful and to multiply and to fill the earth with the very image of God. There seems to have been a season of disregard for the great commission. There are various contributing factors for this disobedience. Besides a long season of declining church membership, there have been many lives that have infiltrated all aspects of our lives. Mankind has been deceived in condition to believe that overpopulation or climate change or any number of doomsday scenarios are justification to disobey God and to ignore his command to take dominion of this earth and fill it with his glorious image. For many today, man taking dominion of the earth is considered sinful. No wonder we have fallen into chronic disobedience. We have called good, evil and evil good for so long that men actually believe it and live their lives accordingly. Another one of the lies that man has been conditioned to believe is that man himself is his own best hope. The world believes we must teach our children that the answer to all of humanity or humankind's problem is ultimately man himself. The false belief is that we need to produce better humans. This assumes man is inherently good and needs only proper guidance, the right environment and the right resources. This is humanism at its finest and at its most deadly. Jesus did not come to this earth so that man or the state could be head over all to the church. Jesus conquered death so that he could rule as king of kings and lord of lords. He alone conquered sin and death and he alone now rules as head over all to the church. That means the church, not the state, nor any other earthly entity or institution of man has been given the authority of Christ's name. You bear that name, thus you bear that authority. The church, his body, rules with Christ as its head. The father has put all things under his feet and gave him to be head over all things to the church. Such authority is given only to the church. Such authority has been given to you in Christ and you must exercise that authority with intention and purpose. This is what it means to faithfully build the kingdom of God. The authority of Christ has been given to the church. The wisdom of God is made known by the church. You have been given a great privilege and awesome responsibility to make known the manifold wisdom of God to the principalities and powers in the heavenly places. You have been given this great responsibility and supreme honor according to the eternal purpose which he accomplished in Christ, Jesus, our lord. God has chosen you to make known the mystery which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God, now revealed in his church. Paul recognized the magnitude of what God had entrusted to him. He also recognized that there was nothing inherent in him that merited this great honor of having the gospel entrusted to him. Paul realized it was only the grace of God that made him worthy of this high calling. Thus he writes these words, to me who, in less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given that I should preach among the Gentile, the unsearchable riches of Christ, and to make all see what is the fellowship of the mystery which from the beginning of the ages has been hidden in God who created all things through Jesus. This is the same grace of God that has given you this same honor of making known the manifold wisdom of God through your life lived as worship before God. The God who created you and saved you and called you by his own name to you has been given the transcendent honor of making known the wisdom of God not only to principalities and powers in the heavens but to your family, to your friends and your neighbors as they witness your spirit. It's your steadfast faithfulness to Christ and to his church. If your neighbors ever wonder, where do you go every Sunday morning, you should tell them, I go to church. You want to come with me? I don't know who's watching you. You don't know what people are observing about you, but they are watching. To you has been given this transcendent honor to make known the wisdom of God. This is your life. You are to live it intentionally making known the wisdom of God as you faithfully walk in obedience before your God. The Proverbs teach us the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, Proverbs 1-7. It also teaches us that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, Proverbs 9-10. Your faithfulness to God makes known His wisdom in your salvation in Christ. Our faith in God, our membership in the church, our assembling together has much greater impact than we may realize. Our worship of God is certainly much more powerful than we realize. I know that is true for me. I know our corporate worship is important. I know it is supremely powerful, yet I feel my lack in fully understanding just how important, just how powerful what we are doing in this place today, in every Sunday, just how powerful that is. It has the power not only to transform you, but it has the power to transform the world. Our faithfulness in assembling together for worship, our faithfulness in serving and giving of ourselves with our time, our talents and our treasure is not only sending a powerful message to the heavenly realms, it is transforming the world around us. That is true because our worship is warfare. Our worship in spirit and truth in Christ is worship that is waging real spiritual warfare. That is worship we weekly engage in. That is warfare we weekly engage in. I tell people often if you don't believe the world is getting better, go back and do a cursory study of history. You don't have to look real deep. Just start back at creation and look at the progress of this world. Ask yourself in February of 2026. Are we better off today than we would have been in year, go ahead and pick and choose. How about the Middle Ages? How about the early Middle Ages, also called the Dark Ages? Or any other period of time that you might want to choose? If you look at it honestly, you have to come to the conclusion that the world we're living in is a far better place today than it was. Not too many years ago. It doesn't mean there's not sin and death and destruction, there always has been. We're just much more conscious of it because we have instant social media and we can watch it live virtually. But the moment sin entered the garden, death entered the world, destruction entered the world. The moment Jesus was born and entered this world, and even before, but since that time, just since that time, look at this world and look at what the gospel has done. And know that it is the faithfulness of God's people, day in, day out, weekend, week out, the faithfulness of God's people who worshiped maybe in catacombs hidden from their persecutors. Maybe in the hills and the mountains and the forest using boulders as their altar hiding out from their persecutors, or maybe in grand cathedrals built to the glory of God over centuries. Because that's how long it took. And generation after generation after generation would continue that building of these grand and glorious cathedrals built to the glory of God. And daily and weekly, God's people would worship their God. And the worship of their God was transforming the world and they didn't even realize how the world was being transformed through their worship. But we now with hindsight can look back over the centuries and see how the faithfulness of God's worshiping people has brought about the transformation of this world. And that transformation will continue. God's promised it will to a thousand generations. We're not there yet. We're not to a thousand generations yet. We're not close to it. But the promise is to a thousand generations. And what that should inform us is that the gospel, the power of the gospel, the power of the transforming power of the gospel and a worshipping church will continue to bring about the transformation of the world. We're not worshipping and waging war in order to win the victory. We are worshipping and waging war because Christ has already won the victory. You must hold that truth in its proper place as you fight the good fight, as you stand strong in the Lord and in the power of His might, even as the battle may wax and wane all around you. When you read history, read it like you read the stock market. What is the trend? Yes, there are dips and dives and rises and falls. But what is the trend? Well, if we look at it over its history, how is the stock market trending? I heard last week it hit a new all-time high. And if you were to look at a graph whenever that began, I don't know when the stock market began, but if you were to look at a graph over its history, you would see the trend is up. If you look at the history of the world and the history of humankind, you see the very same thing. Are we trending up or trending down? The world wants you to believe we're trending down. Certain theologians want you to believe we're trending down. But if you look at it honestly, are you really trending down? If we're trending down, how did we get from Jerusalem, 33 A.D., to Taylor Texas in the year of our Lord, 2026? Counting from the birth of Christ. How do we get here? Well, we got here because the gospel works. We got here because your worship is warfare and the worship of the church over the centuries has brought the gospel literally to the ends of the earth. And you and I am a product of that glorious truth. You must hold that truth that Christ has already won the victory in its proper place as you fight the good fight, as you stand strong in the Lord and in the power of His might, even as the battle waxes and wanes all around you. For we know that we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the whole armor of God that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, like today. Today is an evil day. We're living in evil days, but that does not mean Christ has not won the victory. That does not mean you do not have power and authority in Jesus Christ. And the weapons of your warfare are powerful to pull down stronghold, to cast them down, to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. And when your obedience is fulfilled, you punish all disobedience. In your faithfulness to Christ and His body, God will cause you to stand. When you consider Paul's language in the way he is addressing the church, you get the idea he's commanding his troops, yet they are his flock, his sheep, that he is commanding to live and wage spiritual warfare with the intention and the purpose of God in mind. He's commanding them to be faithful in all they do and in mindful how they walk circumspecably, not his fools, but his wise, redeeming and discerning the times of Ephesians 5-15. This is how we are to walk. This is how we are to approach our worship and our warfare, how we are to approach our life together as the body of Christ. You are here on purpose. You are not an accident. And you are not here by accident. You and I are not simply here waiting to go to heaven. Bad theology has caused too many Christians to live their lives exactly like that. It is good to know you are going to heaven, but God did not put you here on earth to simply live with the assurance that you are going to go to heaven when you die. You have been placed on this earth to do His will, to see His kingdom come, to see His will be done on earth as it is in heaven. That also means in your own life and the life of those that God has entrusted to you. That includes the members of the body of Christ that you are connected to function with. That means we must live our lives intentionally on purpose. In Christ, we are purposefully connected in life to His body. You are connected to this local body called Christ Fellowship Church. You have been placed here for a reason. You are not only created on purpose, but for His purpose. You are here for such a time as this. You are here at this time for God's preordained plan and purpose. You are not a product of chance. You are not a product of circumstance. You are God's specific creation. For His specific plan and purpose, it does not matter whether you understand what that purpose may be in full or in part. What matters is your obedience to Christ. Obedience to Christ is not conditioned upon our understanding or our knowledge of all that God is doing in and through and around our lives. Obedience may be difficult, but it is never complicated. You do know the difference, right? We live in the Black Land. I had someone a few years ago moved here from another part of the country. They were like, man, how do you dig a hole in this dirt? Where I come from, you know, you just like dig a hole. It is no problem. This is like trying to dig and cement. I said, yeah, but if you can get a hole dug and plant something in it, it will grow anything. Obedience is kind of like digging a hole in the Black Land. It is not complicated. It is just hard sometimes. We obey Christ or we don't. We follow His Word or we don't. We come up with reasons and excuses why we do not obey, meaning we complicate obedience when it should really be very simple. Faithfulness is our willingness to push through the difficulty to obey. Faithfulness is choosing to obey even when obedience may be inconvenient or sacrifice. Faithfulness is not perfection or anything close to it. Faithfulness may see more fails than wins. Faithfulness is striving to be like Christ to submit to His Word, to obey His commands and so to love Him and to love one another, even as He is loved us. Faithfulness obediently presses on into breakthrough. We are here by God's grace, but we are just a very small part of God's greater purpose. This is not your story. It is not my story. It is certainly not an accidental story. This is His story. This is God's story. This is what I teach our children as their history teacher in Coenania. I teach them that history is His story and it is. He is writing it. It is His. It is about Him. It is for Him. It is for His glory, not ours. We are just grace to be a part of it. Just as Paul writes in Colossians 116, all things were created through Him and for Him. That means you and all things concerning you were created through Him and for Him. You and I have been gracefully made a part of His story. We are corporately and individually each person and each family part of His plan, part of His purpose and all for His glory. We are called to live and worship accordingly. Our small yet no less important part of His story is being fulfilled in and through our lives during this time and in this very place, even today. You are here because God has ordained you to be here. In every sense of the word, you are here today, here in this season, for however long it may be, you are here literally and figuratively for such a time as this. Christ Fellowship Church was not accidentally founded by Clifford State and in his wife and child soon to be 50 years ago. It was not founded accidentally. Jimmy Bennett and Jeff Ripple, along with their families, did not come here by accident and served this local body as local pastors by chance. No one that has seen or ever will be, no one that has ever been or ever will be a part of this local body has become a part by chance. It was an accidental that I moved across the field from my neighbor. I didn't know at that time who is my fellow elder and has served this church since almost its inception. You are not here today by accident. You are here by the providential grace of God. You are here by God's design. You are a member of this local body called Christ Fellowship by God's ordained purpose. You are not attending or visiting this church by chance. And if you found us by accident, and that's hard to do, it's hard to find us on purpose much less by accident. But if you did, it's only an expression of speech that does not accurately communicate how you really came to be here. No one is here by accident. We're all here by divine providence by God's sovereign will and purpose. I want you to be clear about this because that truth should inform how we live our lives. It should inform us how we serve the kingdom and our worship is to the kingdom of God and to the transformation of our lives, of those around us and of this world. Consider how you view your involvement at Christ Fellowship Church. Consider how you enter into this space. Consider why you have chosen to enter in and assemble with this body here. Consider how you view your worship, how you sing the songs, how you voice the prayers and the responses. Consider whether you have faith that God is hearing your prayers. As a corporate member of the body, consider how you view the power of the songs you sing. Consider the power of the prayers you pray. Consider the power of the confessions you make personally and corporately. Consider how powerful you believe your worship and your warfare is. Ask God to expand your faith in this area. Ask God to help you faithfully push through to the breakthrough you need. That may start with sharing up your attendance and pushing through the excuses or the distractions that may be keeping you from assembling together on a regular basis. The command to not forsake the assembling of yourselves together is there for a reason in Hebrews 10.25. It is of vital importance. It is of world changing importance. There is a reason the Bible uses the language and metaphors it does concerning the people of God. Paul writes to Timothy encouraging him to endure hardship like a good soldier, 2 Timothy 2.3. We are told in Ephesians 6 to put on the whole armor of God and stand and fight against the enemy. The biblical language of warfare is not accidental. The Old Testament is full of warfare that God's people waged against their enemies just like we see God's people in the Old Testament and the New Testament church of the early centuries. We also are in spiritual warfare. Your participation in the warfare is needed. It is important that you understand the state's thus Paul's prayer to the church at Ephesus is still fitting for us today. We are called to be faithful because our God is faithful. As members of Christ's fellowship I want to stress faithfulness. That faithfulness can begin with regular attendance which means regular worship and regular spiritual warfare and prayer in the heavenly and earthly realms. That also means regular encouragement from one another as the body of Christ. Regular confession, regular singing of songs and hymns and spiritual songs, regular prayer, regular consecration, regular reading of scripture, regular giving of the tithe and offerings, regular preaching of the Word, regular communion and covenant renewal. Regular commissioning and sending out. All of these things are so much more than the rhythms of our weekly service. Each and every part of this is vital and powerful in God honoring. Most importantly, each and every part contributes to the real transformation that's taking place in the hearts and the minds of those who have assembled in this place and the real transformation that's taking place in the world around us. That transformation didn't begin in the four walls of a building. It began as families and individuals made themselves ready spiritually, mentally and physically to assemble together to worship. It was taking place in the days leading up to the appointed Lord's Day. That transformation did not stop once the service ended. It was carried out with the saints into the world as they let their light so shine and truth be told both in the world and in the world. And in word and indeed, it's not a single event. It's not even many events. It's a tapestry that God has been weaving since creation. It spans time and space and geography and cultures and all humanity. It involves countless people, each with their own lives, each with their own stories that are part of God's grand story. This tapestry is so intricate, so wonderful, so beyond our ability to comprehend it yet God in His grace has made you a part of it. He's woven you into it. And it doesn't matter how small our part may be. It is a part and even the smallness of our part makes the beauty and the glory of the tapestry what it is. It is your faithfulness that will in large part determine how your part of the story will be told. God has graced you by making you a part of His story. You have a choice to be fully engaged or to keep trying to live and write your own story. Engage in His or try to write your own. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Peter and Judas were both part of God's story. Judas decided to write his own story. When it was all said and done, it was God's story, even as Judas tried to write his own. Peter was not mistake-free. In fact, the Lord looked at Peter and said, get behind me Satan. The difference between Peter and Judas is that the Lord Jesus prayed for Peter. He let Judas be who Judas was. You are hearing my words today. I believe by the mere fact that you are hearing my words today and you are hearing the word of the Lord today is not accidental. You came here today because you chose to come here and it was God's grace that gave you the ability to make that choice. It was God's grace somehow directed you here, not because this is a special place but because we serve the God of all creation here. For whatever reason, God has directed your steps here and that's not accidental. That was on purpose. So be purposeful because our God is purposeful. Be intentional because our God is very intentional and so be faithful because we serve a faithful God who honors faithfulness. Join the fight, join the feast and let us wage our warfare together for his glory that you would experience his transformation, that the world you live in through you, even through you, would also experience transformation. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Here is your church. Your elders love you, care about you. We have been tasked with watching over your souls and as your elders we want to stress faithfulness in our members. Our faithfulness to God does not exist apart from our faithfulness to one another. So faithfulness to God is not just to God. It is to one another because we are all part of one body. Just as our love for God does not exist apart from our love for one another. To love God is to love one another. To be faithful to God is to be faithful to Christ and it is to be faithful to one another for we truly are the body of Christ. Whenever I talk about a topic such as faithfulness I am aware that people sometimes hear what I am not saying. The topic of faithfulness for some is code for legalism. If you associate legalism with faithfulness you miss the point. True faithfulness cannot be motivated from legalism. Faith and faithfulness are gifts of grace that come from God. Therefore it is not something we can do or sustain out of legalistic fervor or fear. Faithfulness by its very nature is motivated from love. The love of God and our love for one another. If we strive to have faithfulness in our worship, faithfulness in our warfare and faithfulness in our witness we would go far and seeing the command of Christ for his church fulfilled. But at the very least we would be preparing well the generations coming after us as God honors faithfulness. We can rest assured that he would honor and he does honor our efforts to be faithful to him be glory. Amen. Blessing our thanks to God. Praise the God, the good, all blessings flow. Praise him, all creatures, hear below. Praise him, all body, having be called. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all we ask or think according to the power it worked with within us, to him be glory in the church and you Christ Jesus throughout all generations forever and ever am in. Amen. The Lord be with you.

Ephesians 1 · chapter mention Ephesians 1:15–23