How To Truly Love God Back

Oh, crossing family. It is so good to be back with

you this weekend. We are in a series called 50 for

50 where we are spending 50 minutes a day for the next 50

days asking God to move us, change us and use us like never

before. And there are two main

scriptures that are kind of guiding us on this journey.

Mark chapter 12. One of the teachers of the law

Mark 12 · chapter mention

came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given

them a good answer. He asked him that he's asking

Jesus of all the commandments, which is the most important.

This was Jesus's answer, the most important one answer.

Jesus is this. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our

God. The Lord is 1.

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

with all your mind, and with all your strength.

The 2nd is this. Love your neighbor as yourself.

There is no commandment greater than these.

And then the second big chunk of scripture that we're looking at

is Matthew 28. Then Jesus came to them and said

all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them

in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you,

and surely I am with you always to the very end of the age.

We believe a great commitment to the great commandment and the

Great Commission will make for a great Church and will make for a

great life. I believe that there is nothing

greater that you and I can give our lives to accomplish than

this to love God and to love people.

In fact, our mission here as a church is to help people find an

intimate, personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

We desperately want to make this region where we live the hardest

place on planet Earth to get to hell from.

In order to do that, we realized that we need to make some

decisions and more importantly, we needed to make some

commitments. One of the phrases you're going

to hear over and over every single week, if you got one of

the books, you're going to see it.

Inside of the books as you're traveling along is this quote

from Steve Weatherford that had a major impact on me and our

staff. And he said this.

Amateurs make decisions based on their emotions.

Pros make decisions based on their commitments and we believe

that it is time for all of us to GoPro in the things that matter

the most. In loving God, in loving people

and making a difference in this world.

For Jesus, I'm so incredibly thankful.

Last weekend we had over 2655 of you go.

You know what, we're taking this ground.

We're going on this 50 for 50 journey.

I've been getting up early every single week this week, taking

our golden dummy on a walk to get my exercise in reading the

same chunks of scripture that you're reading.

We're almost all the way, depending on where you're at,

you're we're almost all the way through the book of Luke.

We're going to get into the book of Acts.

In fact, by the end of this journey, you'll have read almost

the entire New Testament. This is going to be a great

opportunity for us to grow in our relationship with the Lord.

And let me say this, there's some of you who maybe you didn't

get a book last week or you were thinking about it and you

decided not to. We still have 1300 books left at

our different locations, and I would rather you go on a journey

for 43 days then go on a journey for no days.

Is that a deal? All right.

That being said, I want to welcome all of you join in from

all of our different locations and those of you join in online

and inside. I am so thankful that we get to

be a part of this crossing family and I am thankful for

you. And I want you to know that each

week when I or each morning when I've been going on a walk, I

have been lifting you all up in prayer.

I love being a part of this church.

Give me a second. I'm still recovering and I love

seeing the life change that happens every single week.

Just seeing what God did in Kirkuk this past weekend or

what's happening at the inside and all of our different

locations. God is on the move at this

church, and I want him to be on the move in you.

I love seeing pictures and hearing stories of those of you

coming to the steps and praying and banging on Heaven's door.

And in fact, that's actually what I want to do real quick.

Can I just bang on Heaven's door with you and pray as we got to

start this message? Heavenly Father, you know where

every single person is right now on their spiritual journey.

You know what they're wrestling with.

You know what they're struggling through, and you also know

exactly what they need to get through and God, I pray that you

would use this season of life and ministry in this church to

bring about a significant and lasting change in each and every

single one of us. We want it, God, We want to make

you proud. We want to make you happy.

And you're in my praying. Amen.

In 1992, Gary Chapman released a best seller called The Five Love

Languages and this was the tagline, The Secret to Love that

Lasts. And since everybody when they

get married kind of goes, I would like this thing to go

forever. It became a hit, and in his book

he identifies 5 love languages that all humans have.

Each of us experience love in different ways, but all of us

have a primary and a secondary love language.

The five love languages are words of affirmation, acts of

service, receiving gifts. Valentine's Day, anyone.

Quality time and physical touch. OK for just we'll do this for

just a quick second. For a show of hands, how many of

you would say the primary way that you feel love is when

people give you words of encouragement?

You're so pretty. You're so handsome.

You're so smart. You work so hard.

Raise your hand. OK.

A lot of guys will raise their hand here.

How about this one? You would say acts of service

when you do stuff for. OK, ladies.

We hear you. We hear you.

OK, shush it. All right.

How many of you? It's gift giving.

You're the expensive people among us, OK?

There's way less hands than there should be.

We know you K Black Friday. We we know you.

How many of you would say it's quality time if we could just

sit next? OK.

Yeah. Neither Jennifer and I.

Neither one of us. It's quality time.

It's like, no, that's not us. What am I, physical touch.

Hold my hand. Give me a back rub Other things.

Yeah, you. That's you.

OK, now let me. I kind of went through this and

a lot of you raised your hands. Men.

Did you notice that men or that women kind of have multiple love

languages. They kind of raise their hands

multiple times. And I'll also tell you this,

fellas, if you if you don't like the love language she has,

she'll change it. She'll change it.

In a couple months when she wants something different done

around the house, she'd be like, well, it was, it was words of

affirmation, but now it's home renovation and you'd be like,

well, I looked in the book and home renovation wasn't in there.

Now the reason why this book was so transformative is because you

can love somebody and you're trying to communicate to your

spouse. I love you so much.

I love you so much. And you speak in your primary,

but they only for the most part, receive love in their primary.

So if your primary way of communicating love to your wife

men is words of affirmation, you're saying I love you, I love

you, I love you. You're so beautiful.

You're so great. You're such a good cook.

You're way better than my mom. You're just showering words of

affirmation on her, and her way of receiving love is acts of

service. You know what your wife is

feeling every day? I wish my husband loved me.

And she goes, I just don't feel loved.

And then as the man you're going, I literally just told you

I loved you. I don't know.

I don't feel it. It didn't matter.

I I said it. Yeah, but the house is dirty.

OK? So you go out and you buy your

stuff from Target and you come home.

See. I love you.

But you didn't vacuum. So think about this.

You have two couples that desperately love each other,

that are trying to communicate how much they love each other

and it's not getting through. They don't feel it because they

love us back. And then you have the man going.

I've been trying to spend all my time trying to tell her how much

I love her, and she doesn't feel it.

But you know what? I don't feel like she loves me

either and our spouse is experiencing the exact same

frustration because they are doing work around the house.

They're trying to be helpful and yet we don't see it and we don't

care. You have two people desperately

trying to communicate how much they love each other because of

the love language barrier. They don't feel loved at all.

Some of you guys, you've heard my Que pasta story.

When I was going through high school, I I took three years of

Spanish and I got good grades because I was an athlete and I

really struggled putting together the Spanish language.

And this was at a time when when you talk to people you'd say

what's up my dog, which so kind of tells you late 90s, early

2000s. And I was doing some mission

work down in Tulsa and we would be in a Spanish speaking area of

Tulsa. And I would get out of my car

and gas stations and I would go que pasa MI pero PERO.

And I would get out and I'd see a bunch of Spanish speakers and

I'd be like que Paso, MI pero. And I would, you know, be me.

And then about a year later I was at A at my college and I sat

across the table from Mario and I said que Paso MI pero.

And he goes, what? And I said que Paso MI pero.

What's up my dog? He goes dog is pero.

You'll want to roll the R What you have been saying is what is

up my conjunction word. But so I had been getting out of

the car in downtown Tulsa going what is on my butt?

You a dumbass star. What is on my butt?

I was trying to communicate. I'm really happy to see you.

What I was communicating is I am a scary white man.

OK? That is no bueno.

OK? Not a mucho and no mucho.

OK, there is a big difference. When there is a language issue,

it is really hard to communicate how much you love them.

And Gary Chapman urges his readers to learn to communicate

in the primary love language of their spouse.

So, men, if your wife's love language is acts of service and

you want to show her that you love her, you want your wife to

feel loved. Get a Dyson and get to work

ladies. If your husband's love language

is words of affirmation, get a dictionary and a thesaurus and

get to work. Because if you want to have a

healthy marriage and your kids have a love language and your

boss has a love language and your Co workers have a love

language. And if you want to communicate

that you love people, you need to learn to speak in the

language in the primary and secondary love language of your

spouse, of the people that you care about.

The question for every person who has an intimate, personal

relationship with Jesus Christ should be this.

How do I love God? Back all of us before starting

our relationship with Jesus. Wrestle with How could God love

us? How After we hear the good news

of what Jesus Christ has done on our behalf, we realize that he

loved us when we were messed up and we were broken and something

stirs in our hearts and we desire to love God back.

But the question is how do we love him back?

Does God have a love language? The bottom line is this.

Heaven is not a place for people that God loves.

God loves everybody. God loves all the people in

heaven. God loves all the people in

hell. The difference between those who

are in heaven and those who are in hell is not whether or not

God loves them, it's whether or not they love God.

Because heaven is not a place for people who love God back,

and hell is not a place for those that don't.

Heaven and hell are full of people that God loves.

The difference between those two places is one group of people

chose to love God back and the other didn't.

And did you know God has a love language?

Hear me carefully. God receives love through

obedience. Now before I go too much further

in the sermon, I want to say a couple things.

One, I don't want this to turn into a works based sermon.

And if you're brand new to The Crossing or and you're brand new

to your faith, none of this is going to make sense to you for

like the next, you know, couple minutes.

But for those who've been following Jesus for a long time,

I want to make sure that this doesn't get twisted in your

head. I don't want you to turn this

sermon into a checklist. While James says that faith in

God that is not accompanied by works is dead and a meaningless

faith, we are not saved because of what we have done.

We are saved because of what Jesus Christ has done on the

cross on our behalf and our acceptance and receiving of that

work in our life. Secondly, you can be obedient to

Jesus and you can be obedient to God and still not love God.

Parents, you know this. Can your kids be obedient and

unloving at the exact same time? Go clean your room.

OK? Are they communicating how much

they love you? No, they're communicating how

much They're like their mother, right?

Go. Come on.

OK, just a couple jokes. She's not here.

Your kids can obey you, but their hearts can be far from

you. Jesus, over and over again picks

a theological fight with religious elites because they

were doing the right things with the wrong motives and the wrong

heart. That being said, over and over

and over again in scripture Jesus connects love and

obedience to his message to his followers.

Don't believe me? Let me take you on a little

journey, John 14. If you love me, keep my

commands. Later on in verses 23 and 24 it

says this. Jesus replied, Anyone who loves

me will obey my teaching. My Father will love them and we

will come to them and make our home with them.

Excuse me. Anyone who does not love me will

not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my

own. They belong to the Father who

sent me. So if your life is not being

obedient to God, you are sending a clear message you don't love

Him. Look what it says in First John

1 John 5:3

chapter 5, verse 3. In fact.

This is love for God. This is how he receives love to

keep his commands. Some of you might be going, I

don't believe you. I need one more verse.

OK, second John chapter one, verse five.

I am not writing you a new command, but one we have had

from the beginning. I ask that we love one another

and this is love. He's going to describe what love

is. Guess what?

It is that we walk in obedience to His commands.

In fact, at the very beginning of the message I read to you

from Matthew chapter 28, when he says we're supposed to go out

Matthew 28 · chapter mention

and make disciples and check what shows up inside of there.

Look what it says. Verse 19.

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them

in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Guess what's on the next page And teaching them to obey

everything. I have commended you.

So how do we love God? By being obedient.

Obedient to what? To His commands, His words?

His teachings. Now where do you and I find His

commands, His words, His teachings?

We find it in the Bible. So a person who wants to love

God back will be engaged with the Bible.

The single greatest discipline for spiritual growth is Bible

engagement. Hear me, if you want to grow

spiritually, the number one thing that will help you do it

is regularly engaging in the Bible.

The problem is that study after study shows that people who

identify as Christians are not prioritizing engaging with the

Scriptures. This is what a recent survey

said, that 45% of people who call themselves a Christian

spend time in the Bible once a week.

It gets worse. 12% of people who call themselves Christians

engage in the Bible once or twice a month, 9% of people who

call themselves Christians spend time reading the Bible several

times a year, and 33% of people who call themselves Christians

seldom never engage in the Bible.

If God receives love through obedience, how can a person

possibly be obedient to a thing that they don't know?

This means that a large swath of people who call themselves

Christians are not engaging in scripture and are not loving God

back. And just so you know, by age

demographic, those engaging the most in scripture are those

between the ages of 30 and 49, which makes total sense to me

because they're dealing with teenagers and they're trying to

figure out how to cast out a demon, right.

They're telling we have got to find the demon spells.

OK, now I will tell you this as a word of encouragement. 18 to

29 year olds are at 15% and those who are 65 plus are at

23%. For at least one time a week and

in the category of once or twice a month or several times a year,

the 18 to 29 year olds are beating the 65 plus crowd.

So let me say this. This should give you some hope

for the future, because the younger generation is more

spiritually attuned than the older generation, at least based

on that statistic. So we got to keep prioritizing

those who are younger than us. The crazy thing is, scientific

studies are starting to report that reading the Bible is check

this out. Good for you.

For instance, if you were to list the problems facing the

world today, I wonder what problems you would put on the

list. Would you put loneliness,

bitterness, Anger. Self esteem, Self harm?

There was a massive study done on over 200,000 people between

the ages of eight and 80, and they divided them up and they

started to watch them over a period of time.

After day one and day two, they didn't notice hardly any

difference between the two groups of people.

But on day three something started to change.

They broke people into two separate groups, those who were

Bible engaged and those who were not.

They considered a Bible engaged person, somebody who was

interacting with the Bible, the word of God, at least four times

a week. And here is what they found of

the people who were Bible engaged.

Loneliness dropped 30%, Bitterness dropped 43%, Anger

dropped 32%. Alcoholism dropped 42%.

Porn consumption dropped 60%. Self harm dropped 30%,

Connectedness rose 30%, and self esteem rose 30%.

That when you start to engage in scripture regularly at least

four times a week, it starts to rewire you for the good.

There's an old adage that all of our staff could testify, and

this is it. A Bible that is falling apart

usually belongs to a person whose life isn't.

We could save ourselves a lot of time on the counseling side here

at our church if somebody said, hey, my whole life's falling

apart. If we were to just say, have you

been reading your Bible regularly because the science

will back it up, that the more time you spend in the Bible.

Now I'm not saying listen to me, don't say hey I'm going through

a tough time. I'm not saying pray more, read

more. I'm just saying a lot of us.

It's kind of like man, I'm really hungry.

I just don't feel good. Eat something that a lot of us

were neglecting the very thing that God wanted to use to

empower us and direct us. And when you neglect those two

things, you can expect your life to kind of, you know, fall

apart. If the second greatest

commandment is to love our neighbor, think of how a drop in

bitterness, anger, and an increase in connectedness and

self esteem would help us to accomplish this.

There might be some of you who are reading the Bible, and it's

confusing at times, coming to view.

You've read the Bible and it's confusing.

Just so you know, my hands up. It is even in the stuff we were

reading this week, I was like, man, I got to circle back on

that one. I agree with you completely.

I just want you to know that confusion and difficulty have

never stopped you in the past. And it shouldn't.

It hasn't stopped you before and it shouldn't stop you now.

For instance. Men, just look at me for a

second. Don't look around.

Just look at me. It's safe.

Do you understand everything there is to know about women?

No. Just shake your head like this.

Shake your eyes. Do you understand them?

No. You don't stand a chance.

But are you thankful for them? Are you learning what you can

learn about them so that way you don't do it again.

Yeah. You're married to somebody who's

incredibly confusing and difficult to understand, and you

keep doing it. So just because you bump into

something in the Bible that doesn't make sense to you, just

keep keep your head down and keep moving on.

You want to know why? Because the same thing should be

true when it comes to God. Hear me, the Bible tells us that

God weighs are higher than our ways.

The Bible tells that there's a way that seems right to man, but

in the end it leads to destruction.

It kind of makes sense to me that there are going to be times

when God isn't going to make sense to me.

Does that make sense? Have you ever tried to explain

stuff to your kids and you're just, like, you're just too dumb

to understand what we're talking about?

Like, they ask you questions and you're trying to answer them.

And then you're just like, like my son the other day was like,

so when we come to a stop sign and there's no lights, how does

everybody know when they're supposed to go?

And I go, it's easy. The one on the right goes, He's

like, OK, but what if two cars come and they're facing each

other? I don't know.

He goes, what happens when four cars all get there at the exact

same time? I don't know.

Whoever has the bigger truck, I guess us.

That's who I'm going because I'm impatient, right?

You'll be like, it'll just make sense.

It just doesn't happen. There's someone looking at their

phone, so that's always you just kind of go around them.

Hear me? God is perfect and I'm a Sinner.

He's all knowing. And I forget where I put my

keys. But the other thing I'll tell

you is that time is one of the greatest teachers.

Think about what your first day was like on the new job, and

think about how much you intrinsically understand about

your place of employment. Now think of your hobby.

Do you remember when you first started?

Like, guys? Do you remember their first day

hunting? You're like eating Doritos.

You didn't know what to do, and you're like, trying to figure it

out. And now you have your favorite

brand of deer urine. Like, did you see that coming?

It just took time. Like over time you kind of

developed your rhythm and your routine.

And the same is true with God, that the more time you spend

with him, the more he will begin to make sense to you.

Time is a great teacher. And one of the reasons though,

that we have a hard time with the Bible is because if we were

to be honest with each other and we were to be honest with

ourselves, we haven't put in the time.

I need you to know that God is not purposely difficult.

God is a revealer. He wants to be known by you.

Look what he says in Matthew Chapter 7.

Matthew 7 · chapter mention

Ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find knock and

the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks, receives

and the one who seeks finds. And to the one who knocks.

The door will be opened. If you want to live a

spiritually vibrant life, if you want to live a life that will

help you to make a difference. The Bible is a powerful tool in

the life of a believer. The Bible is one of the most

powerful tools you will have to live and experience the

Christian life. Let me just show you some of the

ways that the Bible is going to be helpful to you.

The Bible is a guide. It's a guide for making

disciples, and it's a guide for training in godly living.

Look what it says in Second Timothy All Scripture Front to

back Genesis to Revelation. Is God breathed?

And is everybody say this word useful?

It's useful for what? For teaching, rebuking,

correcting, and training in righteousness so that the

servant of God may be everybody. Say this word thoroughly

equipped. For every good work.

The Bible makes you ready to do the good work that God has

called you to. Here's another one.

The Bible is a defense against sin.

How many of you have sinned? How many of you would like to

sin less if you didn't raise your hand there?

You sinned. So put your hand back up.

Hear me? The Bible helps you sin less.

Look what it says in Psalm 119. I have hidden your word in my

heart that I might not sin against you.

The Bible helps us to fight back against sin.

The Bible is a light in a Dark World.

Look what it says in Psalm 119 One O 5, Your Word.

This is the Bible is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.

It gets better than that. The Bible is a weapon against

the enemy. Satan is going to come to try to

destroy the things that God is trying to build up in your life.

And when Satan comes, there's something that he can't defeat.

Satan cannot defeat the word of God.

It is our weapon against the evil. 1 Ephesians chapter 6

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

shows us so much. Finally, be strong in the Lord

and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God so

that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against

rulers, against authorities, against the powers of The Dark

World, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly

realms. Therefore, put on the full armor

of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to

stand your ground. And after you've done everything

to stand, stand firm, then, with the belt of truth buckled around

your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and

with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the

gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up

the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the

flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and

the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.

Jesus is actually a perfect example of this.

Before he started his earthly ministry, Jesus goes off into

the desert and he fasts and he prays for 40 days and Satan is

tempting him. At the end of the 40 days, Satan

comes and he tempts him three more times.

And every time Satan tempt, tempted Jesus.

Do you know what Jesus did? He responded with scripture that

when Satan tempts you, if you have an arsenal, you have hidden

God's word in your heart. It will keep you from sin and it

will defend you against Satan. The Bible is a manual for life.

It covers how to navigate sex, handle money, choose friends,

navigate relational hurt, choose a spouse, raise kids, build and

maintain a good reputation and leave a powerful legacy.

How many of you have ever purchased IKEA furniture?

Yeah, if you haven't, don't. Anybody who's ever purchased

IKEA furniture knows that it takes you as much time to drive

all the way down to Saint Louis to pick it out as it does for

you to put it together in your house.

And the biggest idiots among us try to do it without the

instructions. Am I right?

I need you to hear me say this. You are more complicated than

IKEA furniture, and if you are trying to build your life

without a manual, you are going to build something you don't

want. But the Bible is so much more

than that. The Bible helps us deal with

worry, anxiety, identity, and eternity.

It's a mirror into our deepest pain, a window into our darkest

sins, and a healing balm to our heart dish wounds beyond that.

The Bible is a love letter from God.

It tells us that we have been created by him, that we're not

an accident. It shows us how badly we've

messed up, but it shows us that there is a way out and a way

forward. For instance, can I just show

you some of my favorites? John 316 says for God still

loved the world, that he gave his one and only Son, that

whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal

life. If you believe in Jesus, there

is the hope of heaven that is available for every single one

of you. One of my all time favorites.

Romans, chapter 5, verse 8. But God demonstrates his own

Romans 5:8

love for us in this, that while we were still sinners, Christ

died for us. Some of you, you know, somebody

who's thinking to themself, you know what, I got to get my life

together and then I can get my life with God.

You need to know this verse. They need to know this verse

that before you ever started to turn it around, when you were

still as jacked up as you could ever be, God paid the price on

your behalf for your sin. He loved you when you were at

your worst. When you were at your worst, God

was at his best. The verse that I was using to

talk to Jennifer when she was coming to faith in Jesus Christ

is like easily going to be a tattoo.

First one day. Second Corinthians 517.

The hope of the gospel is this. Therefore, if anyone is in

Christ, the new creation has come, the old is gone, the new

is here. When you come to faith in Christ

Jesus, he doesn't just make you different.

He makes you new. He gives you a new heart, a new

spirit, new desires and new priorities.

He gets rid of the old self that was covered in sin, and he

brings about something new. How does he do it, You ask?

If you're looking for a reason to fall in love with Jesus, look

what it says later on in verse 21.

God made him. That's Jesus, who had no sin to

be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness

of God. How did he make you new?

He took all of what was messed up in you, and he placed it on

Jesus, and he took all that was right about Jesus and he placed

it on you. Psalm 23 tells us that even when

I walk through the darkest valley, I'm not alone.

He's with me to guide me and comfort me, and that he's

preparing a place for me. Romans 828 tells me that in all

things, God is working for the good of those who love Him,

who've been called according to his purpose.

What he's saying is if you love me, I never stop working for

your good. No matter how much you messed

up, no matter how dark the valley is, no matter how hard

the challenge is, God takes no smoke breaks and working for

your good, He takes no sick days working for your good, no lunch

breaks working for your good, he says.

If you love me, I can't wait to work to redeem all the things

that Satan's tried to take from you and break inside of you so I

can turn any situation around. We need Christians who are

engaged in the scripture so we can live a life in response to

God's love, so we can love God back and we can clearly

articulate the good News to people who desperately need it.

Let this be the end of a lack of Bible engagement in this church.

Let this be the beginning of people who start loving him

back. We're moving to a time of

decision. If you stick around this church

for a long time, you're going to hear me say this like, over and

over and over and over again. But this is like one of the best

chunks of scripture that Jesus ever put together because it's

so stinking clear. This is what he says.

Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into

practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

The rain came down streams, rose, winds blew beating into

the house, but it didn't fall because it had its foundation on

the rock. But everyone who hears these

words of mine and doesn't put him into practice, it's like a

foolish man. I didn't call you a fool.

Jesus did build his house on the sand.

The rain came down and the streams rose and the winds blew

and beat against the house and it fell with a great crash.

The difference between Christians and non Christians.

The difference between people who love God and don't love God

is not that one group goes through storms and one group

doesn't. If you get baptized today, it's

still going to rain. We own an umbrella and I'm a

pastor. It rains on me just like it

rains on you. The difference as Christians

know that they're going to be fine on the other side of the

storm. And those who aren't Christians,

those who don't love God back, will get destroyed by the storm.

Hear me. Hear me.

Hear me, all of you. Tonight, you have heard the word

of the Lord, and some of you will go, all right.

It's time for me to start reading my Bible and doing what

it says. And when the storms come, I got

good news for you. You won't be washed away.

You'll still be standing, and some of you have heard the exact

same sermon. You'll lift your hands just as

high in worship. You'll pray just as long at the

steps. But if you go home and we don't

put the word of God into practice, then help.

It's like this. It's like going out and buying

all new workout clothes and putting them in the dresser.

How many of you have ever gotten skinny by buying workout

clothes? Judging by the amount of workout

clothes I see women in all over Quincy, everybody shops in

workout clothes, but obviously, Nah, probably working out,

because if you could shop your waist skinny, we'd all be.

We'll get to that in a couple weeks.

OK? Buying workout clothes doesn't

make you skinny. Watching people work out doesn't

make you skinny. Guess what does.

Work it out. Hey, look, I've got 7 Bibles in

my house and I'm still struggling.

Bible ownership is not faithfulness, but I've been

going to church for 30 years. Hearing my words and doing my

words are two different things. You could have heard the word

for 50 years, but until you put it in your life and put it into

practice, it produces no fruit. If you're here today and you've

never started an intimate, personal relationship with

Jesus, I'm standing in front of you living proof that God's word

is good, it's reliable, it's powerful, it's transformative,

and it will teach you that you're a Sinner but that God is

a good savior. And those are if you don't take

my word for it, take the word of people who are in your row,

Taste and see that the Lord is good and you won't regret it.

And if you want to start that relationship, I would tell you,

don't put it off to the rest of you in this room.

To those of you who are Christians, God is not impressed

with your knowledge, but he is moved by your obedience.

And if you want to love him back.

We need to become obedient people if we want to make a

change in the lives of the people we care about.

If we want to be a light in the darkness so that people can see

Christ, the world doesn't need more people who call themselves

Christians and needs people who are committed to loving God.

Back to reading His word and doing what it says.

What I'm going to encourage you to do is would you spend some

time today? Maybe come up here you didn't

fill out a commitment card last week and you're going, you know

what? There's 43 days left in this

journey. I'm going on this journey.

I'm going to see what God's going to do in my life over the

next 43 days as I commit 50 minutes a day for the next 43

days to allow God to bring about a change in my life.

Man, you need it. I need it.

And the people we love need it from us.

Would you stand with me, Heavenly Father, do a work in

this church all across this region, Bring about a change in

us that can only be brought about and sustained and

empowered by you. God, convict us of the areas

where we've been falling short, where we've been running, making

excuses. Stir in us a passion and a

commitment for you and your ways and your name.

I pray. Amen.