Apocalypse Now: Part 9- The Gift


Welcome to the River City Church podcast and a message by our

lead pastor Jason Powers. Our prayer is that this message

would inspire and encourage you, build your faith and point you

to the life changing love of Jesus.

May you enjoy the goodness of God as you follow him today.

I. Don't want to begin with our

confession? I'm going to take just a second

in your heart. Just acknowledge.

Where's your heart? Are you racing?

Are you running? Are you going fast?

Are you sad? Are you grieving?

Are you? Where is your heart?

Wherever you are, that's OK. We come to a Father who sees us

and knows us and loves us and our confession to him is we are

badly broken. Yes, you are.

Grace and peace to you. I've really been enjoying this

Ephesians study. It's deep and it's and it's,

yeah, kind of twisty and windy and it doesn't always go in line

with what we what what, what we think and right and what we've

experienced, what we've seen. But I heard an illustration as I

was studying for this that resonated with me.

I've told before, I've talked about how aside from like my

family and my dog and you all like, my favorite living thing

alive is Aspen trees. I love, I love the Aspen the way

that the leaves are, the, the, the way they attach the

branches. When the wind blows, they

whisper. It's just a very peaceful.

I can feel myself driving into the mountains loving and I see

them. You can see just a picture.

Yeah. Right.

So one of the things about Aspen trees as you as you look and see

how they're shaped by wind, they're shaped by, as you know,

the animals come and, you know, rub their horns or their antlers

on and they scratch them and they scar.

So they all grow up looking different.

But what's interesting about Aspen trees is when you come

across an Aspen Grove like this, or you come down and you see

they're all one Organism. So sometimes an Aspen tree

spread over square miles, really their roots are so intertwined

and so interlocked. They come from one root ball.

And as I was watching this, I thought, this is a great

illustration. This is a great analogy that

Paul's been talking about for the church.

As he's illustrated, it's like we're one, like there's no, you

look at these Aspen trees, you look at these, you know, the

trunks and the leaves. And you're going to go, oh,

that's one and that's the one. And oh, that one's been rubbed

on and that's been scratched by a bear.

And this one, you know, needs water.

And this one's got the lesion. They're all stem from and come

from the same 1. And that's kind of really, if

you could summarize visually, chapters one through 3, that's

what we see. We are because of the work of

Jesus, the redemptive and restorative work of Jesus.

We are one humanity with one spirit in Christ.

We have one spirit that unites us, that brings us together.

And the thing that Paul was and saying over and over and over

again, it's important for us is it's real even if we don't

believe it. And the idea is that Jesus came

and in him all these boundaries and all these barriers were

brought down. And the reality is, we can

actually live like that reality, or we can spend our entire lives

and all of our moments rebuilding what Jesus has torn

down. If we believe what Jesus has

told us, if we believe what Paul tells us has happened on the

cross, it affects the way that we work, the way that we walk,

the way that we live, the way that we.

Move, and that is what chapters 4 through 6 begin to.

Spell out now 4 through 6 chapters 4 through 6.

Don't tell us every single thing that every single spirit,

empowered person and picture will do.

It just tells us an overview like this is what a people, a

person and a people who are animated by the Spirit of God.

Will look like. This is how they'll behave.

This is what their work will look like.

This is what their marriages will look like.

This is what their relationships with their children will look

like. This is what warfare looks like.

This is what troubles and difficulties look like.

But it all begins with this idea, this Aspen Grove reality

that is, we all sit in here and you look around and you look at

the people next to you and they came from somewhere and you came

from somewhere. And I'm looking at some of you,

right? Like some of you came from the

Northwest, right? I'm looking at you, y'all,

Mariners fans, and we're praying for your souls right now.

Some of you have come from the East Coast.

You're Dodgers fans. We're not even praying for

y'all. We're just.

Hoping right, like the Lord will come, but praying for me that I

will have compassion for that right.

But we all come from different places, different family

backgrounds, different socioeconomic realities.

But the truth is in Christ, we all have the same root system.

It's the same life that's flowing.

Through each of us and we want that we want to live like what I

want to say is when those moments in your life that feel

the most deeply, satisfyingly, right when you go, hey, this is

it. These those are those moments in

Christ that you experience. What I'm going to say is we know

that we want that. And I want to affirm and

acknowledge today, it's hard. It's really, really hard to

continue to live and to walk out this reality, this truth, even

though it's what our hearts want, even though it's this ache

that is deep inside of us. We all have these deep ache to

belong to something, don't we? This is why we, This is why

tribalism is such a danger, right?

Because there are groups at our job, in our neighborhoods, on

the TV, wherever we go, there are groups that will say you can

be like us. You can be this, oh sure, you

can belong to us. You just have to look a certain

way or think a certain thing or give a certain amount of money

or do a certain. If you just do those things and

check those boxes, then you can be like us.

And everyone who's not like us, who's like them, well, then

they'll be bad. We seek to belong, and what the

analogy tells us is that you do belong in Christ.

You're a part of something that's bigger than you.

But we split. Over differences.

Surface differences, physical differences, differences in

houses and cars and neighborhoods.

And we're lonely as a culture and as a community.

We're. Lonely social media sort of

scratches that itch, but not really.

It can make it worse. It can make it deeper because we

see people, but we know we're not really known.

Any time that I can just turn off when I want to or they can

turn off when they want to, we know that that's not the true

connection. We want purpose.

This is why people are drawn to their jobs.

This is why people become workaholics, because we know in

their job, their job will tell them who they are, tell them

what their contribution is and what their value is.

And identity gets wrapped up in there.

We want to know our identity. Who are we?

What is it that makes me special?

What is it that makes me unique in this world?

We want to be stable, why do we go too?

Far at work. Why do we worry when the economy

turns? Why do we worry about power

shifts and power structures? Because we want to know that

we're going to be stable. We want to know that the things

that are coming down the road, the things that we're saving and

preparing and working for now, that they'll be there.

That's one of the greatest things with some of the younger

generations right now is they're feeling like, man, we did what

we were supposed to do and now everything seems like it's hard

and hurtful and worrying and what do we do?

Where's the stability in this? And it becomes a generational.

Curse and a fear. We all want to be loved not for

what we produce, but for who we are.

See, the problem is if you just love me because of the way that

I preach, well, someday I'm not going to be able to do this

anymore. If you just love me for what

happens here, well, someday I I'm not going to be able to be

here. And this is going to move on.

If you just love their kids when they're toddlers, well, the

teenage is going to suck for you because, right?

We all want to be loved for what God has put in us, for the truth

that's in us, not just for what we can contribute to the whole,

to the thing. That's why Paul has spent so

much time over the last several chapters on the theology of

this. Because what Paul is telling us

over and over again is the things that we most desperately

want and search for and seek out for have already been provided

for us. The things that will satisfy and

nourish the deepest areas of our soul.

Not that it'll be easy. Not that everything will be sun

shines and rainbows now here in this life and eternity is going

to wipe away every tear. He's going to make every sad

thing coming true. But in this world, we want to

know that we have hope, right? And what Paul tells us is that

we do have hope. Everything has been provided for

us. It's available to you here.

And now the question is, what do we do with it so that we can?

Experience it and that is how Paul starts.

So if you have your scripture, turn to Ephesians chapter 4 and

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

let me just tell you like. Who?

Like we could do 48 weeks on Ephesians chapter 4.

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

I mean, we're not going to. I feel like I need to clarify

that because you weren't kind of sure, right?

I want to try to spend a lot of time in the text today because

it it really is kind of a beautiful flowing and what Paul

says and again with his long and smart, you know, sentences,

right? But it really, I guess we kind

of stay into it and and lean into it.

It begins to give us hope, but also direction.

And that's why we start with our confession, right?

We admit that we're badly broken so that when we start to get

instruction from the Scripture, we have less resistance to it

where we can just know like, Hey, my way is the brokenness,

right? Like of course I have sin, of

course I have a preference. Of course I know how I want this

to go, but what I want to look at and go, what does it look

like in here? What does this tell me and what

should it look like? So we started in this in

Ephesians chapter. 4. First word is therefore we've

already seen that such an important word right It means

that everything that's come before is this is that hinge.

This is where it was so because of the fact this.

Apocalypse of Aspen tree. Reality where we are, one where

the dividing line between all of us has been torn down in Christ,

where His church is, is 1. It's the tree, it's the temple.

It's all that. Because of all of that, because

of the theology that we've just been heaped in, I, Paul the

prisoner of the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of

the calling that you have been called to.

Paul doesn't just say believe, he says I want you to walk in

this reality. It begins with belief.

We have to decide whether we believe that what Paul tells us

about Jesus is actually true or not.

As you look at your friend from a different tribe, from a

different country, from a different socio economic

background. As you look at the person across

the street from you that keeps their yard different than you,

that votes different you, that raises their children different

you. The question is, do we believe

what it tells us here? Because what we believe believe

is important. It's where it starts.

But what Paul says is based on what you believe, you need to

walk in that direction. And what I would say to you

lovingly, gently, is you already do.

You walk according to what your deep beliefs are.

That's the problem and my deep beliefs.

I believe that people. Who are different from me are

scary, and that's what Paul says.

Jesus wants to undo and uncover me, so he says walk in a manner

worthy of the calling that you've been deceived.

Now he tells us how that's going to look.

Walk with all humility. Humility is one of those great

words, right? It's all over the the church,

it's all over, you know, the things that we talk about, the

way we go. But it can become one of those

things that we talk about so much that we don't really worry

about whether we know what it means.

We can talk about humility as talking.

Terribly. I say, oh, I'm old.

Nothing. Oh, you don't need nothing.

That's not humility, friend. It's not humility to call what

God has made beautiful, to call it ugly.

That's not humility. That's disassociated from

reality. That's ignoring the truth.

We're going to find what He says about you.

We're going to find what He's done in your life and what He's

doing for you. Humility isn't thinking less of

yourself. Some of you need to make peace

with that. Some of you have been walking

around with some label that your dad gave you 100 years ago that

Jesus has been trying to deliver you from, trying to have you

walk out from, and it's time to still walk out from that.

He says walk according to who you are, according to what Jesus

says. Walk humbly, not thinking less

of yourself, just thinking of yourself.

Yes, Instead of walking through your day going, What does

everybody think of me? Walk through your day thinking,

Who cares? Instead of walking through your

day going, Does everybody notice me?

Is everybody mad at me walking through and go?

I am in the eye of my father. Walk through this world.

But listen, if we're going to do that, if we're going to focus

less on ourselves, we got to start focusing less on the other

people. And that's the problem.

Because when I look at myself, I can get real enraptured with

this, right? But when I look at someone else,

what I see too many times is annoying, frustrating,

discouraging, out of touch, lost.

So he says, walk humbly with your neighbors, walk through and

just go. That person is badly broken.

They. Don't even know it, man.

They think they're right. I don't get to.

Contribute the brokenness. I just get to decide what Jesus

said is they're loves you and I get to decide whether we're

going to believe that or not and walk according to that.

Walk humbly, he says, with gentleness.

I love gentleness. This picture, it's one of the

fruits of the spirit, right? The spirit is in you.

It's gentleness. And the thing I like about

gentleness is the best place to practice gentleness is in the

face of wrongdoing. When I am gentle with my

children, it's generally because they've been terrible and

deserve the wrath, right? And when I instead just say,

hey, but hey, let's figure this out.

We'll be OK, Let's slow down. We'll back up.

We'll do it. This is gentleness.

It it assumes that people in the world are going to cut you off

in traffic, that they're going to stand right in the middle of

the aisle at HEB, that they're going to say that dumb thing on

Facebook that you just. Have to have to sit.

Right. And they just, we just know.

And gentleness says when we walk gently, we look and we just go.

I don't have to tell every somebody every time that they're

stupid because I like it when people don't tell me every time

I'm dumb, right? Like you, You're so gracious to

me. Walk with gentleness.

Walk with patience doesn't say feel patient.

It says walk with patience with people, bearing with one another

and love. This idea of bearing is like

caring each other. And what it means is like, don't

quit on the relationship. Oh, you mean they're a terrible

person. They're probably just in a

really bad season. They're probably just in a place

where the world is scarier than they know what to do with.

What they probably need is exactly what you need.

Not to be abandoned, not to be left alone, be prayed for, to be

encouraged. See, that's what the church is.

We don't quit on each other because we're different.

We don't stop loving each other because it gets hard.

This is to be. This is what it means to be

rooted in this apocalypse. This is what it means to be

rooted in this truth of Jesus's love for us.

It means that we walk in our unity.

That means people should look at the church and see us walking

with people that other people don't.

They should just go, hey, why are you with that person?

Do you know who that person is? And you go, yes, they are one of

my Father's favorite children, and he wanted me to remind them

that they are deeply loved with an eternal kind of love.

What about their? Sin, I can trust that he'll talk

about their sin to them. Thank God He hasn't shared all

of my sinfulness with you, but he talks to me about it.

And we're going to walk in that to be rooted in Christ, right?

And what does it and what does it say, right?

He goes on. So it says we have this unity,

right? He goes on to describe it to

keep the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace.

And now it says, look, there is one body.

There's not a Methodist body and a Catholic body and a Protestant

body says there's one body, body of Christ, there is one spirit,

just as you also were called to 1.

Hope of your calling 1. Lord 1.

Faith 1. Baptism 1 God and.

Father of all. Who is over all and through all

and then all. Did you see what he did with the

ones he says you got one guy and he said how many of there were

there? Seven of those.

You know what 7 is right? Completion.

It was perfection. Why did God created the world in

seven days, right? And what Paul is telling us is,

is in Christ you have this perfect oneness, whatever it is

you think, that keeps you away from the body.

Of Christ that separates you from others you can find in

Christ. It's been a.

Been dealt with one body, one baptism, one strength 1 Spirit 1

Lord and we get to walk in that kind of unity.

See when Paul grew up, he grew up in in part of his Jewish

heritage would have been every day they would have prayed.

It's called the Shema right here.

O Israel, the Lord, our God, the Lord.

Is 1 God and what Tim Mackie's this brilliant guy, and he's

great. He's kind of gentle kind of guy,

right? And what he says, he

reformulates this as a messianic.

Shema, we do have one God. We have Jesus who is 1 king, and

this is what he looks like. 1 spirit, 1 body, us.

And listen church, this is what we walk in.

You want to know what righteousness is?

Righteousness isn't just being good.

Righteousness isn't just cussing less.

Righteousness is the body, it is unity.

We would go to the temple and the Jewish people would go to

the temple to have their sins forgiven so that they could be

unified together, walking with each other and walking with God.

This is it is our righteousness. It doesn't do us to be any good

by ourselves and hateful are separated and detached from each

other, from the body. So to walk in unity is to live

like the roots are real, even if there's hit, even if they're

hidden. To walk like this connection

among us is greater than whatever would separate us and

divide us out there. That's the kind of thing, that's

the kind of fruit that is the visible evidence of new.

Creation. And that's what Paul's been

getting at. We're a new creation.

What he's done in US isn't just a.

A shade of meaning to something else.

It's something entirely new, something that the world has

been desperately longing. For but yet to see so how does

God empower us to do that verse 7 to each one of us.

Grace. Was given according to the

measure of Christ's gift. This is the thing, right?

This is the mechanism. How does God fill the world with

grace? And we've already been seen it.

We've already been looking at, you know, how he gets grace into

the world. It gives it to you.

What's interesting is maybe it's not interesting.

I just say that a word that's like a verbal tick that I have,

right? What The thing is, the Greek

word for grace here is the word caris.

The Greek word for the word gift here is also Paris, right?

And so it's this idea that gifts are grace.

It's something free that he gives us that is for us, that is

to us. The big thing is that it is

something that is undeserved. And what's interesting now is I

want to notice a very important shift.

So what have we been saying every time it says you, right?

What does that mean? All y'all are so good.

You're Bible scholars and you didn't even notice it, right?

So what he's saying is all this has happened to all y'all.

All y'all have the same roots. All y'all are growing in the

same forest. All y'all are part.

Of God's plan, all y'all have this and now verse 7, but to

each one of you specifically, individually, uniquely to you,

sure we all have one plan, but to you has been given grace.

You have a unique expression of God's gift.

You have a unique expression of grace that differentiates us.

So when we say walk in unity, when I say you walk in me with

me and I walk with you and we walk with Jesus, it means we are

together. It does not mean that we are the

same. It says that He has given

something special and unique to each one of you.

That means that what you have is different from what I have.

The grace that you have for the world is different than the

grace that I. Have for the world.

And I think too many times the problem is that we're all

running out with hoping for one kind of grace.

And the really busy kind of people are out there running and

doing their specific brand of grace all over the place.

And the world looks and goes, that's not really enough.

And it's not that it's not enough.

It's just not differentiated the right way.

And what makes the? Differentiation right you.

When you walk in what God has called you to walk in, when you

don't just absorb grace but you give grace, when you don't just

experience the goodness of God, but you express the goodness of

God in the world, that's how he gets grace out into the world.

It's not uniformity. Jesus hasn't called us to be

robots. He hasn't called us.

To look the. Same and dress the same and walk

the same and talk the same and spend the same he's given.

Each of us a unique gift. He goes on and describes it

Verse 8. Therefore it says talks about

now this is a quote from Psalm 68 and notice what it says.

When he ascended on high, he led captive the captives and he gave

he gave gifts to all the people. I'm not going to go in and

unpack. If you're really interested, you

can go to the what's it called Bible project, Tim Mackie's

Bible Project, and he has this great probably 20 minute

exegesis of Psalm chapter 68 and it is beautiful.

Psalms 68 · chapter mention

It is worth your time to go look for that and to do that, but I'm

just not going to do it here. The picture that he says here is

he gives shows the picture of a king after victorious, walking

through his town and showering the gifts of plunder with all

the people in the community. So as we look at this now, who

are the The Who has he plundered?

Powers, the powers of darkness that would separate us, that

would divide us, that would keep us from each other.

But what we have here is instead of the people giving gifts to

the king, O King, you have seen this.

This shows us our king and his generosity.

He's plundered the powers. He's conquered all of that, but

he's not a. King who takes.

From you He's a king who gives, He gives gifts to his people.

Now this expression, he ascended, what does it mean

except that he had also descended into the lower parts

of earth? This is Jesus who did, what did

he do? He came, He lived with us, He

died. And he who descended as himself

also he who ascended far above all the heavens, so that he

might fill all things. So he's talking about Jesus.

The work and the ministry of Jesus is the fulfillment of

Psalm 68. He is this king who doesn't come

to take from us. He comes to give from us.

He doesn't measure what you have.

He doesn't walk through and go, well, this is Jacob.

Jacob, the tall, strapping, handsome young man.

I'm going to give more gifts to him.

But right like, like somebody over there.

That's Jason. He's.

Like he's a little. Funny looking.

He's kind of like Swanny. We're going to give less gift to

him. Here's the thing.

Are you listening? In the Kingdom of God there is

no such thing as meritocracy. You.

Know what meritocracy is, right? You get what you deserve.

You get what you earn. It doesn't exist.

You know what? There's also in the Kingdom.

There is no competition. There's no stretch where me and

Jacob are fighting for the same goods.

There's no stretch where I have to wonder, is Jacob going to get

more because he's better, or because he's stronger, or

because he's faster, or because he's starter?

Meritocracy and competition for glory are entirely out.

Of step with the New Testament, I want to pause and just let

that settle. Meritocracy and competition for

glory and honor are entirely out of step with the New Testament.

So the greater we try to make ourselves look in the world, the

more we find ourselves working against a system that elevates

Jesus. And what it says is he gave

everybody gifts. But since this isn't a

meritocracy and since you haven't earned this, what it

means is the gifts aren't yours. It's not like if you come and

work at your job, the payment that they give you is earned.

These aren't earned. The gifts that you have, the

strengths that you have, the parts of your personality that

really just make people light up, those specific unique things

that God puts in you that that cause change and and growth and

other people who didn't come from you.

It's not for you. It's something that we steward

and now watch what happens. Verse 11.

He gave some as apostles. Notice what it doesn't say?

It doesn't say he gave some the gift of apostleship.

He said he called some to be apostles.

Here's the problem with much of spiritual gift teaching as it

exists kind of in the churches where I've grown up, and

honestly, as I've taught them before.

Spiritual gifts as they've. Come and been taught by me exist

in you need to go find out what just makes you just the most

neat and you just need to like go figure out how all of your

neatness kind of fits in the world.

And that's not what Ephesians chapter 4 says.

Ephesians 4 · chapter mention

It says he gave some people to be apostles.

Apostles are starters, they're expanders, they're beginners.

What that looks like like in context of River City at our

staff, I want to know Pastor Brian Schneider, I think has

this plays this role of apostleship in the sense where

he says, hey, where are we going?

How can we make sure that we get there?

By setting, by establishing processes and systems and

structures to help make sure that the ministry that needs to

happen. We have this great, blowing up,

wonderful ministry on Wednesday night.

That's because Brian has this in this position, in this role of.

Starting things of making sure that there's always a class,

that there's always a teacher, that there's always a room.

He gave some as apostles. He gave others as prophets.

Prophets are not fortune tellers.

Prophets are not the ones who tell you that God's going to

strike you. What prophets?

Do is just say, hey, our God is a God of justice.

Our God is a job as a God who who heals and restores and who

calls the church back to that that.

That's my thing. Right, like when I talk about

things and I push buttons and you walk out and you're like

politically a little uncomfortable.

Good. You should be.

That's my job. That's what I do Now, my

spiritual gift, my primary spiritual gift is to be an

encourager. I love to talk to you and I want

to tell you what God can do in your life.

But mostly what I want you to know is what God can do in your

life is make peace for those who don't have peace.

Lift up those who are held down. Use what you have in this role,

prophet, that's my deal. He gave some as apostles.

He gave some as prophets, some as evangelists.

When I think evangelists are word spreaders, they are the

tellers of the truth. When I think of evangelists and

I think in terms kind of our of our staff right those rounds, I

think of Alyssa, our our worship leader.

When Alyssa leads worship, the things that she says are can you

taste that the Lord is good? You know what that does?

That's an invitation for you to follow to experience something

from from God. My prophetic urge is.

God is great. And you should get in line with

him. Because it'll make your life

better, right? Alyssa's like, yeah, but it's

sweet. Don't you want to taste it on

your tongue? Love it.

We need that. Interesting.

Kind of construct and all of these in the Greek right.

He gave some as the apostle, the prophet, the evangelist, these

next ones, the pastor and the teacher kind of sometimes can

some theologians think that it goes as one as the the pastor

and and my friend Johnny who's code kind of teaching this.

He sent me a a reminder I should probably clarify when they talk

about pastor, they're not talking about me.

Pastor is not a organizational role in in this the a better

word is shepherd. It communicates it's a guy.

If you're in a small group with someone who has called you when

you were lonely, you have experienced shepherd.

Now I teach, right? I teach as part of my as my

prophetic thing. But when we go to our small

groups, that's what we're doing. We're experiencing a shepherd.

And some people are, are like, and I and River City doesn't get

this, but some of the churches are just like when you get sick,

like I need Jason, if I can get to your bed, I, I, I will.

But listen, if you want me at your bedside instead of Miss

Jamie or Miss Sharon, you don't know me and you don't know Miss

Jamie and Miss Sharon well enough because when I'm sick in

my bed, I want Miss Jamie and Sharon on my bed, right?

I don't like I don't want right. But the idea is these are these

are the roles, these are the way that the church.

So how does God give his get his grace out into into the world?

He gives it to people. He gives it to the apostles and

he says apostles take these gifts, this grace that I give

you and built a build a structure in a system that

allows for the for the. Grace to go and go to new places

where Grace doesn't exist. Is that you?

Are you a starter? Do you come to me and just go

like, hey, and some of you do, you'll come up to me on a Sunday

morning. Just be like, hey, we're looking

for a small group. I don't really want to go to any

of those other ones. Can I start one and you go to

Brian? You know what Brian says.

Yeah, yeah. Let's go to training.

Let's make sure like that we're on kind of on the same page, but

yeah. Some of you will come up to me

and you'll talk to me like, why don't you talk about?

Oh, that's the prophetic thing. It's that thing.

The idea is God. Has given you something that

gets the grace and gets his spirit out into the world.

Let me see. Make sure that I didn't forget

anything. Right.

Oh, what are those 4? Right.

This is this is great. What's my job here?

To make sure that you get everything that you need.

No, He gave those these positions for the equipping of

the Saints, for the work of ministry, for the building of

the body. He gave some for the equipping

of the Saints. You know what my job is To make

sure that you have what you need to do what God has called you to

do. That's why we have a teaching

team here. I don't.

My goal is to take 12 Sundays off.

You're just like, I wish I got them.

It's not vacation, it's giftedness.

It's so that you know that my gifts aren't different or better

than your gifts. It's so that you know that when

Johnny stands up in here and speaks, he's got a gift.

When Jason Casey speaks, when Rebecca Grieman speaks, we

acknowledge God has put something in them that we need.

And So what we do, when I tell you to go check the Bible

project, it's to equip you to do the ministry that God has called

you to do. And two.

And so listen, the question becomes then, well then, Jason,

what do you do? If I'm doing the children's

ministry and if I'm doing the wars and ministry, Jason, what

do you do? And I just go as little.

As possible. If I can't, no.

Just kidding. Here's the picture look 2001 I'd

had a radical experience with Christ and I woke up and I knew

at that moment my life will never be the same.

And I'm not sure that I have anything to do with the church

because the church had always been terrible and gross to me.

So I was ready for the Lord. I was ready to experience God's

goodness and his grace. I just didn't think it had

anything to do with the church. But my mom, she's wonderful, but

she was also kind of a nag at the time.

So she like nagged me to go to church with her and she's like,

you found Jesus need to go to the church.

And so I had long hair and my hip rope and.

All this stuff, right? And I was going to go once to

make sure just so I could write the whole experience off.

And what happened when I got there is they just loved me.

And they just said, and I just said, hey, can I like, hang out

in the youth ministry because they were younger than me and I

knew that. And they told me they're like,

yeah, you can go lead that small group of middle school girls,

whatever. Do you know what I said?

Let's go, let's go, let's go. You know why?

Because Jesus had done something in my heart and I wanted to tell

Him. And they were.

Like oh, didn't last long I. Eventually got right, But

listen, over the span of the next couple of years, they gave

me encouragement, they gave me training, they gave me support,

they gave me responsibility. And then ten years later, they

sent me here. See, the reason that we're here

is because 20 years ago, a group of 150 believers on the north

side of San Antonio took a shot with some kid in a hemp rope

necklace and they didn't hoard ministry for themselves.

They didn't say, well, if we let him do it, what will we do?

And I can assure you, there's a thriving, growing church in

Selma, TX right now that we came from.

And anything that we took with us, God has more than replaced.

But what we got from that place was love and training and

responsibility. And let me tell you.

About our men's ministry right now, and I'm just going to go on

and on and on. Our men's ministry right now is.

Blowing up. If you show up on a Wednesday

night, you're going to hear about Jesus and you're going to

have guys that are going to talk to you about to sin in your

life, not to judge you or condemn you, but to walk you out

of it. And do you know how that

started? That started with Jaime Martinez

coming up to me about 8 years ago and going, I've got a vision

to see men discipled in Christ Jesus.

And So what I had to say is we didn't have a men's ministry

group at the time. Do you know why?

Because that's not what I do. And I'm not going to fill a hole

that's going to take from someone else.

Let me just tell you, we got the right guy.

The right guy's. Doing the right thing in men's

ministry. He's.

Got a gift you've got to give too.

And what I'm saying is, there's enough grace in the Godhead for

the entire world. He's waiting on us to get it out

and the way that he does it is gives it to you.

We just got to choose. Are we going to fight on

Facebook or are we going to multiply some stuff?

Are we going to fight on Facebook about stuff that's

going to be dead in 100 years and dead to us anyway in 100

years? Are we going to get busy doing

things that are going to last forever?

He's giving you a responsibility.

He's giving you a place. Those kids up there in

children's ministry, Those people that you mean.

You don't know how many people have walked.

I know some of them. You don't know how many people

have walked through those doors stoned out of their mind, ready

on their last leg. Husband, wife threw them out.

Can't them? They walk in here.

His last hope. 3 weeks later, we're baptized in the whole

family. You don't know how much that

happens, and I should probably tell you, but it happens not

because of me, not because because of the stage, but

because out there, Because when they walk in, you're number one,

they feel like I belong here. Badly broken, deeply loved.

Not just out of his mouth, out of your face.

Yeah, Amen is right, Church. This is what we offer the world.

Not everybody trying to be me. You.

Being you and walking in that. You know why we don't believe

that God gives us grace? Because we don't practice the

grace that He gives us, the grace to lead, the grace to

humble ourselves, the grace to be a fixer.

That's what grace is. Stewarding.

Grace looks like multiplying ministry.

I'm not talking about a program. I'm not saying you got to go

start on Awana. If you're an Awana starter, come

on, like we'll start that. I'm talking about respond with

love in the place where God has placed you.

I'm looking at some of you who work in schools.

I'll never get to go talk to the kids that you get to talk to,

but I know that Jesus died for every student in that classroom

and you get to love them. Oh, but the principal.

Oh, but the school board? Up.

They're all gross. It's terrible and awful.

You've got grace from the Lord to give those kids.

I don't care what the school board says.

Let me love a kid. I don't care what let let me

show love to somebody who needs it.

It's not just about teaching, it's about multiplying teachers.

It's not just about a big gift, my personality.

It's about what the Holy Spirit doing what God is doing.

It's showing up in this room and instead of showing up on Sunday,

going. Who can who needs to serve me?

Who need who's got like you walk up and just going.

I've got something to give today.

I've got grace to give somebody. I've got a person that I need to

I need to encourage. We don't walk around looking.

Who can I talk to that will raise my status?

Who can I talk to that will make me look good?

When you walk into Target, you're looking for the person

that you can pray for, that you can love, that you can serve,

that you can humble. And maybe you walked out

sometime and you didn't know and you don't know, but your mindset

and your perspective is I have something to offer and to walk

in in this. World and So what that means is

like this is one of the things I look now at our broader culture.

This is kind of where I think Christian celebrity is sketchy

at best at best because John chapter 3 verse 30 write like

John 3:30

John the Baptist says that he's got to increase and I must

decrease right like that's the call for all of it.

Jesus is our hero. Jesus is the one who saves us.

Jesus is the one who leads us and guides us and gives us his

spirit. That's who we walk in.

That's our story. So.

And grace is multiplied instead of hoarded.

The church doesn't stay busy. That's the problem.

I think too many times in the church we're just like, busy,

right? So the church doesn't just stay

busy, it grows up. Look, in verse 13, we're going

to do that, build up the body of Christ until we all attain to

the unity of the faith, right? And we talked about that one,

one spirit, one God, right? Unity of the Faith.

And of the knowledge of the Son of God.

It doesn't mean that we all have.

It means that we all are experiencing God, that we just

know this is a place where we come and we encounter, where we

know God's presence is with us. When you go to HEB and you see

that person and you stop and you pray in HEB, you know God's

presence is there with you. You know He's doing that to a

mature man, to the measure of the stature which belongs to the

fullness of Christ. This is where we go.

This is like Paul's not dialing. He's not pulling back from his

assertion. He's doubling down.

When you show up as the church, when the Spirit of God brings us

together at a birthday party, in a classroom, at your job in HEB,

in the parking lot, wherever you go, it is the literal physical

presence of the person of Jesus capable of doing the things that

Jesus did when he was here. That's.

That's the spirit that's in you. You don't have a light spirit,

you don't have the diet spirit. You have the spirit that

resurrected Jesus from the dead, that brought life to dead

places, that empowers his church.

As a result, we are no longer children tossed here and there

by waves. The analogy, this is an analogy.

The analogy he's going to talk about, first of all, children,

immature, right? He's talking about spiritual

immaturity. What does he say?

Spiritual immaturity is like, it's like a baby on the front of

the boat in a storm. Wild analogy, right?

Like. That a baby can't sit itself up.

It can't hold its head straight. It certainly can't hold on to

anything. And if you're in a storm, it

just bounced all over. It's unstable.

We see this in our culture, right?

Like we see this every time we get freaked out when the news

starts to loves to tell the church what like the latest

problem with our faith is and we all.

Freak out. Oh, what if they're right?

They're not right. Stop.

For me, the analogy is The Da Vinci Code, right?

Like it came out and church just went bonkers, right?

Who's the Antichrist? Every time it's like that's,

that's not it. That's being tossed around by

every, what does it say? Wind of teaching, wind of

doctrine, the trickery of people by craftiness and deceitful

scheming. That's what immaturity looks

like. Immaturity is being manipulated

by fads. It's being manipulated by

outrage. I love you so much man.

If you turn on the TV night after night and every time you

turn it on, your heart gets angry and you get madder or you

get more afraid and if you come back and turn it on, you're

being manipulated. I would love for you to not have

to deal with that anymore. And I would love you to know

it's because Jesus hasn't invited you into that.

He doesn't need you to obsess over what's happening around the

world. I'm not even very good at

dealing what's happening upstairs in my kids bedroom and

released from having to solve and to fix the world, he said.

But instead speaking the truth and love, we are to grow up in

all aspects into Him who is the head, that is Christ, from whom

the whole body being fitted and held together by what every

joint supplies according to the proper working of each

individual part, causes the growth of the body for the

building up of itself in love. I want to talk real quick about

a word that's going to show up in a couple of chapters and that

is the word head. OK, so the word head is the

Greek word kefali, right? So it's going to show up in our

conversation about marriage and we'll unpack that at that point,

but let's just see what it looks like.

I want to tell you some literary background, right?

So what 1 of this was written in ancient Greek, 1st century

Greek. So Paul would have written words

according to the custom and the language that they were used at

the time. And so as you read and you read

some literary criticism, what people have read, lots of

ancient Greek works says in the Greek language there is no usage

of the word kefley to express authority.

It is always in the Greek used to express to mean source.

Like if you go to land a park right before you go to Panther

Canyon, down there on the left it's the headwaters of the Komal

River. It's the source of where and as

we look in here, what Paul has in this passage, it doesn't.

I'm not, you can't always apply everything to every single

passage. But in this passage, clearly

where it talks about Jesus as the head, it's talking about the

source. And so we are to grow up into

him who is the head, who the whole body is being fitted and

held together. We have this picture of the head

and everything else coming and flowing out of that.

In the Hebrew, Paul is a Jewish guy, Paul in the Hebrew, it

sometimes can mean that. It can mean authority.

So when we get to that passage, we're going to unpack that.

But for right now, the idea is everything that we are and

everything that we have flows out from him.

And that's why this matters, because this maturity which

comes from speaking the truth and love, which comes from being

in our place, which comes from walking in grace, right, that

brings us that kind of maturity, brings us the stability that we

need. We don't anymore need our

addictions. They don't leave.

And once we get free from the addictions, we're free from all

the condemnation, from all the grace, from from all the the

shame. And what happens is we get to

steadily progress and. Grow in grace because we know

that we are loved and that this is a place to get healthy.

We find our purpose in him, in this body where grace comes.

We know that every pain and every pride is able to help

others experience grace as we express it, as we walk in that.

Now, I do want to say, if you're someone who's winning at life

down here, this may not be good news for you.

If you're winning and you're at the top of the food chain and

the top of the ladder and you've got more and you don't ever have

to order, this isn't good. This is like Nicodemus, right?

And Jesus told Nicodemus, you got to be born again.

Nicodemus didn't want to be born again.

He's like, thanks, I'm doing just fine.

Unfortunately, this is the thing.

If we want to live by grace, by what is given to us freely, we

may have to let go of what we can force and what we can do

ourselves. And maturity is about emotional

and spiritual growth and health. Because you're in an environment

of truth and love, you get to both receive it but also give

it. So at the end of this first part

of the second-half of the book of Ephesians, Paul gives us a

summary of our mission as the church and your mission as a

follower. Are you ready?

Walk in unity by stewarding grace or the maturity in Jesus?

Will you pray with me, Jesus? Help us to walk in unity.

Help us to consider one another more highly than ourselves.

Help us to think less of ourselves and more of you and

more of others. I pray that you would help us in

our groups to understand and find out these roles and these

purposes and these missions. And I pray that we would be

equipped to grow up into you and Jesus.

I pray that we as your church, as we think about moving, as we

think about building buildings and new people coming in, Lord,

they don't just need a place to go, they need a place to belong.

They need your body. So I pray, Father, that you

would prepare us for those that aren't here yet, that we

wouldn't just build a physical structure a mile down the road,

but that You would be building your temple in us here.

Jesus, we ask these things in your name and for your glory.

Amen. Thank you for joining us today.

River City Church is all about experiencing and expressing

God's love in our lives and community, and we hope that

you've been able to experience that today.

As grateful as I am that you've spent this time listening in

this morning, this podcast is no substitute for full

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May the Lord bless and keep you in all grace and peace.