Thrive | To Be In Awe (January 17th, 2021) - Mike Armstrong

All right, well, let's grab our Bibles now and uh turn them to the book of Acts.

Acts chapter 2 is where we are for this next series, this new series that we are in.

Acts 2 · chapter mention

And I mean, we've been talking about, just starting last Sunday, what it means to truly thrive as a church community.

As we all know, much has been said.

We're living in these super weird and in many ways unprecedented times, in our lifetime at least, uh, where thriving these days might seem to you uh simply too much to ask.

Like, man, are you serious?

Like, like you look out into the world right now and the economic situation is kind of sketchy, and you look at the political uh scenarios in our country and certainly uh elsewhere, schools online, working from home, out of a job, can't spend time with my friends and even my family, according to the government, and all of this.

I mean, this is just this is difficult.

And are you serious, man?

We can actually thrive as individuals, as Christ followers, as the church.

I'm more just trying to kind of make it out, make it through this, uh, not too badly damaged.

And maybe that's how you kind of feel.

You're just trying to survive more than anything, and perhaps that has been your mindset.

Well, of course, if you are familiar with the scriptures uh at all, the Lord shows us in his word that that Christ's followers uh or his church can most definitely thrive when life is difficult.

In fact, it's so interesting how we, you know, when we go through difficulties, we go through trials, we go through hardship, that is actually when we find ourselves thriving most in the Lord because we recognize our need for him, we're crying out to him, we're drawing close to him, and so that is exactly uh what we want to do in this season as a church.

Now, our verse today uh talks about how a thriving church is one that is gripped by a strong sense of awe.

Okay, now what is awe?

Well, awe is what you have perhaps experienced uh when you stood mesmerized by the sheer magnitude of something like Niagara Falls or maybe the Grand Canyon.

I've never been to the Grand Canyon before, but but everyone who's been there uh will will speak about how you just get there.

It kind of takes your breath away.

It's this this amazingly vast area that you're trying to just kind of absorb through your eyes and through your senses, the amazing thing that kind of again takes your breath away.

Perhaps for you, you've been to Niagara Falls and maybe you remember your very first time and you go there and it's just it's thundering, it's loud, it's just so much water.

It's hard to comprehend all of that, and again, that fills you with awe.

Perhaps you have been filled with a strong sense of awe.

You think back to high school and and the moment where that beautiful girl just captured your attention from across the cafeteria and you were just stunned, sitting there.

You know, your friends are trying to close your gaping mouth as you were just, again, struck by this girl's beauty.

Perhaps awe is what you experienced when you witnessed the birth of your child.

Uh, my son uh Wyatt is actually here in the room with me right now this morning, and it is his uh 12th birthday today, and so I've been thinking uh quite a bit about this already this morning, and just remembering what it was like to be in the delivery room, and you know, Ang just trying to get some rest, and I'm holding him all bundled up in you know, in blankets, and he's so warm and filled with this sense of like, wow, look what has well look what the Lord has done, and probably a sense of, oh boy, here we go, right?

And uh, I mean, what an amazing thing to consider that.

I mean, we we experience awe in so many ways.

These are the kinds of moments that that fill us with with awe and wonder.

Okay, and it's the type of response that we have when we are struck by the greatness and the glory of God.

Hey, just take a look at me here with this uh at this verse here.

Actually, let's just start with what we read last week, verse uh 42.

It says, and they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers.

Remember, we read that last week.

This this church jumped all over the opportunity to be devoted to the essential things that a church is about.

But then this, verse 43, our verse, it says, And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.

All right, so what this verse shows us here, just one point, is that a thriving church seizes the opportunity, okay, to be in awe of the Lord.

Now, I think it's really important to kind of think of it and and and even frame it that way, because if if we're aware of this, if we understand, the Lord is always doing something awesome.

The Lord is always displaying his greatness in creation, and in what he is doing in the world.

Now, now sometimes we see that as kind of a scary thing.

We're like, what is happening with this global pandemic and and economies, you know, wherever it might be, and and like, you know, what is the Lord doing?

And we're kind of struck by that, and and other times it's in this, you know, maybe a more joyful and and exciting way for us, but oftentimes we we just miss it because we're not looking for it, or or we're we're so you know focused on other things, and so our awe seems to kind of go by the wayside.

But again, a church, a strong church, a thriving church, is looking for opportunities and seizing the opportunity to be in awe and to practice that and go after that.

Now, uh to give us uh a definition of the word awe.

I know we've been talking about it, but here's actually what the def uh dictionary says.

It describes it as a feeling of reverential respect mixed with fear or wonder.

I like that.

I think that's what the idea of the word awe is there.

I mean, you even see a little note in your Bible at the bottom that kind of describes it as this this fear, this holy fear and reverence for the Lord.

That's exactly what was happening to these believers.

Awe is is what happens when you're captivated by such a strong sense of God's significance.

Awe is kind of saying, whoa, like wow, like how amazing are you, Lord.

Again, you're you're sensing his significance, but I think at the same time, another thing that kind of happens is that we also sense our own insignificance in certain ways.

Okay, and it says that this awe came upon every soul in the early church in Acts here.

It says, many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles.

Okay, so what was happening here is that you know the Spirit was doing these powerful acts, these wonders and signs through the leaders of the church, uh, like we were talking about.

We, you know, we know about the speaking in tongues.

The Holy Spirit came at Pentecost.

That had just happened, and and they had gone out into the to the street and and and and talked about God's powerful works.

We know that Peter was filled with the gospel and and proclaimed Christ's death and his resurrection and salvation through him to the Jews in that moment.

We of course know of the salvation of 3,000 people in one fell swoop.

And of course, the the rest of the book of Acts and even the rest of the New Testament speaks of healings and you know, these dramatic prison escapes, and and even some people being raised from the dead.

Right?

All of these were evidence of God's power and and and these stories and these happenings.

What they really did was they painted this grand picture of God's epicness, his greatness, his worth, his supremacy, which caused that that strong sense of awe that came upon uh every soul.

So, hey, do you find that awe is your experience when you encounter the Lord?

Hey, where are you at with that these days?

Do you sense that when you open the Bible, you're like, man, wow, how amazing is the Lord as as you pray to him and as you seek his face and you see him working and answering those prayers and moving in your life and the life of your family, in the life of your church, are are you filled with this sense of wonder and and and and reverence and this this fear of who God is?

Or or or maybe for you that's that's not really been the case lately.

Maybe you feel like, man, I I haven't been in awe of the Lord in in quite some time, and and I feel you know pretty empty in terms of that tank.

Well, in Paul Tripp's book, uh titled Awe, I know many of you read it, he speaks to the fact that every single human being has been created by God with the capacity for awe.

It's not that you and I don't have the ability to be in awe.

Uh the question, really, for us as a church, is just where is that awe being directed?

You know, what are we channeling our awe towards?

What's captured your awe?

Is it something like money?

Right?

Money is a big one.

Money captures our hearts so quickly, so easily, so subtly, and then it comes to this point where it's so not so subtle at all.

You know, and it's this you know drive for money and this desire for the things that money can bring us, and the comfort and the power that that we seem to get and or long for when we have money.

Are you in awe of money?

Are you in awe of something like pleasure?

For you, it's this desire for entertainment and or or comfort or or or that that feeling that you get from that.

And so you just throw yourself into uh your your hobbies or or or you you drown yourself in in Netflix or scrolling on your phone or or or you know longing for food and filling yourself because you think that this pleasure that you were in awe of that you were looking for is going to satisfy you.

Perhaps for you, you're in awe of people.

People are are what capture your awe, and you're you would be considered a people pleaser, or you have a fear of man, and there are certain individuals that you just you so long for their respect, you so long for their adoration.

And and when you when you get that, if you get that, it makes you feel kind of happy inside, and when you don't have that, you feel lost and you feel depressed and you feel so empty.

Listen, if our awe is is wrapped up in these kinds of things, and we're going after that, and that is what we're pursuing, then we really shouldn't be too surprised when we experience uh a cooling off of our passion and our and our awe of the Lord.

You know, so I've been as I've been really you know thinking about this for uh myself and and for us as a church here, you know, if if thriving involves a profound sense of awe of the Lord, then then how can you and I get to that place?

Right?

For you, maybe it's been way too long since you've been just blown away by the goodness of God.

You know, maybe for you, you've just been struggling in all of this, and and and there's part of you deep down that just wants to get there, but you're not really sure.

Like, how how do I get to the point where where these other things that have captured my attention fall by the wayside and I can be focused back on the Lord and full of passion, full of joy, no matter what's going on in our world, no matter what's going on in our lives.

How do we get there?

Well, I believe it really comes down to seizing the opportunity to do a couple of things here.

I've got three things uh for us that we can, I think, give some attention to here so that the awe of the Lord grows in our lives.

First of all, I think we need to really seize the opportunity to repent genuinely.

Repentance is something that we can very easily just skip over and and and not really give the proper attention to.

You know, we slip up and we sin and we kind of have this mindset of, well, maybe I'll just try and do better next time.

I'm not gonna let that happen to me, and and and and so we try to do better or we just move on, but we don't actually deal with the sin that that we've that we've done that that exists between us and God.

And so it's about repenting genuinely.

Now, maybe for you, you've been you know in that that cycle and and sense yourself kind of stuck in that, well, you know, I'm trying to repent, I'm I think I'm saying the right things, I'm praying the right things, but it seems to be more this, yeah, I I I confess these things to the Lord, or maybe even I'm talking about it with other people, but but I just seem to go right back to what I was doing.

And so how do I repent in a sense that's that's genuine and real?

Well, here are a couple of passages that you can write down that have encouraged me over the years and and even recently, and some of them, probably all of them, you've heard me talk about with you before, but if you have a pen, just jot these down and maybe spend a bit of time today or this week, you know, getting back into a place of genuine repentance.

First one is Psalm 32.

Psalm 32 has been a blessing to me.

Psalm 51 is another one that you can jot down.

I've mentioned this one, Romans 2, verse 4.

Romans 2:4

And again, I think about this often because sometimes I'm tempted to think that repentance is just on me.

I've just got to say the magic words, I've just got to do the right things, I've got to get myself into a proper place of grieving and beat myself up enough and feel terrible about myself, and then, you know, then the Lord will forgive me, then it will be good enough.

But I love that it's not just repentance is not just an act that we do, but repentance actually involves God.

It involves the Spirit of God.

He does a work in the process of repentance as well.

Romans 2 verse 4, if you want to write that down, it says God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance.

Romans 2:4

You see how God has a role in this?

He actually leads us to that place.

2 Timothy 2, verse 25.

2 Timothy 2:25

It says God may perhaps grant them repentance.

Notice how he doesn't just grant forgiveness, but he actually is gracious to us to allow us the ability to be able to repent.

He works in our hearts to do that.

I've been encouraged by Acts 5.31 as well.

It says that God gives repentance.

And so if for you, as you're stuck in that that rut of, man, I want to repent, but it just feels like empty words at this point, and I don't really know how to get myself there.

Just lay your heart again before the Lord and just invite him and say, Lord, I want to get there, but I need you to stir and move and work in my heart by your spirit.

Would you lead me to repentance?

Would you grant me repentance?

Would you give me repentance, Lord, so that as that is happening, the awe of you can begin to flow again.

All right, so we seize the opportunity to repent genuinely.

That's the first one.

Here's the second one.

We seize the opportunity to discipline ourselves.

I've been thinking about this a bit this week as well, as I've been realizing some of my discipline, my discipline to follow the Lord and commit to holiness and live for him has just been kind of waning.

And I've gotten lazy in a few different places.

And one of the areas that I was reading this week was was from Proverbs chapter 5, and in there, in verse 23, it says there that he dies for a lack of discipline.

Proverbs 5 · chapter mention

Because we don't discipline ourselves, we get caught up in all kinds of things that don't please the Lord.

And so disciplining ourselves is a really important thing.

1 Timothy 4, verse 7, it says, train yourself for godliness.

1 Timothy 4:7

We want to be godly, we want to grow in this.

Well, it involves some effort to train ourselves by doing things like getting in the scriptures, by having that time carved out every single day where we just we get into it, we start to read it, we maybe start small, but allow the Lord to work and move.

And it's disciplining ourselves in prayer and in confession and disciplining ourselves to be in community, in relationship with other people.

Sometimes that doesn't come very easy for us.

And in our world today, it seems like a lot is going against that, doesn't it?

But listen, we've got to train ourselves for these things.

I love 1 Peter 5, verse 6 to 11 in there.

1 Peter 5:6–11

Someone was encouraging me with this today or this week.

It says this be sober-minded and be watchful.

We gotta watch ourselves here.

That's that's all part of disciplining ourselves.

Why?

Well, because your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.

It says, resist him firm in your faith.

That's all disciplining ourselves.

Have you let your disciplines, your personal disciplines, your spiritual disciplines just fall by the wayside?

I read one pastor's words again earlier this week.

He said this if we're a stranger to watchfulness, he's talking about discipline, if we're a stranger to watchfulness, we must expect to fall often and dangerously.

How important is disciplining ourselves?

As we discipline ourselves, our awe for the Lord will grow.

You get into God's word, I trust me, he's going to speak to you, he's going to work.

It's not going to be heaven's opening every single time you do that, but trust him and allow him to work, allow his spirit to move as you discipline yourself.

Lastly, here a church that wants to grow in this profound awe of the Lord must seize the opportunity to worship with joy.

You notice that every time we sing and we we we we focus on the words and lift up our voices and you focus on the lyrics, you just sense like, wow, like how awesome is the Lord.

It's amazing how worship does that for us.

But again, it's not just singing, right?

Worship can happen at any moment, at any time of any day.

It's where we we focus our thoughts and our affections and our gratitude on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Be thinking about him, be thinking about who he is, his his goodness, his holiness, his strength, his power.

Be thinking about the gospel as you focus on what Christ has done for you.

He's rescued you from sin and hell and God's wrath.

He's reconciled you with your Maker as you think about these things and pray through these things and ask the Lord to bind these things to your heart.

Listen, your awe is going to grow.

Your passion for the Lord will only increase.

And so listen, church, let's really, let's really embrace these things today.

This week, this month, this year as a church, as we look to be a community whose awe truly thrives, where we could be, we could look at Acts chapter two like this and be like, man, I'm seeing this very thing happen in my life, and I'm seeing it happen in our church.

Now to help us kind of get the gears turning here and the ball rolling with some of these things right now, we're gonna have a time of prayer.

We're gonna have a time of getting our hearts right uh before the Lord.

So a couple of things here.

John is going to come up and he is going to lead us in a song.

He's gonna play a song, and this is uh a song uh called Returning, and it's been uh a major blessing uh in both John's and my life over the last month or so, as it just focuses on repentance, it focuses on getting our hearts right before the Lord.

And I think it is appropriate that as we think about awe, we spend a little bit of time here in the repentance piece.

And so one of the things I want to encourage you to do now as an option in the next few moments is to really listen to the song as John plays it over us and the words are gonna be available to you.

You can focus on those lyrics and use that as a time of prayer and getting your own heart right before the Lord.

If you're meeting uh over at our at our office, uh, we would encourage you to instead of gathering and praying with the people that are with you, just spending the next few moments silently on your own, praying and and getting your heart right.

There's gonna be prayer requests that are gonna come up on the screen.

And so whether you're at the office or you are at home, you can pray through some of these things again as we get our hearts on the Lord and seek to uh see that awe grow in us as we thrive.

And before I let you go, I want to say that I'm going to be making my way over to our Zoom call.

And so if you are someone who needs prayer and you need to share what's on your heart, I encourage you to go to our website and click on that Zoom link.

We're going to be starting that up in about five minutes' time.

And that is, of course, for people watching the nine o'clock live stream.

And so, church, I want to pray for us now that the Lord would draw our hearts to Him and bring back that sense of awe as we thrive.

Lord, we thank you for this time and we thank you for your word.

And we pray, Lord, that as we meet with you right now and do some business in our hearts, God, that you would bring, where needed, Lord, you would bring conviction.

Lord, I pray that you would stop your church in their tracks if any one of us are wandering off into things that will only cause great damage in us, cause great damage in our families or in other areas of our life.

Lord, the different areas, the idols that we tend to be in awe of, Lord, would you make those very clear to us, Lord, and show us, show us that they do not satisfy.

They are not worthy of being the thing that has captured our awe, Lord.

Only you are, Lord.

Would you encourage us, Lord, as as we want to be captured by you, we want to be in awe of you, we want you to be our focus, Lord, but but we are weak and we stumble and and we're we're we've been trying to get there, but but maybe we we just seem to not be able to and we're discouraged in that.

Lord, would you encourage your church?

Would you fill us with your spirit?

Would you motivate us?

Would you drive us?

Would you would you push and pull us, Lord, to the place where our heart and our focus is on you?

Lord, as we consider this season as a church, Lord, I pray that our hearts would be to truly thrive.

So Lord, to make the most of the opportunities that are in front of us.

So Lord, as we pray these things, I pray that you would unite your church.

I pray that you would light a fire in us.

I pray that you would be glorified.

And we pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.