Chosen to Serve

All right.

Well, good morning.

Um, church at the Grove.

Everyone's back from summer vacation.

Um, it's finally full um in here again.

Thank you all for joining us this morning, especially if you're a first-time guest.

Um, we hope that you felt welcomed and loved when you walk through those doors this morning.

Um, my name is Jonah Faulkner.

I'm the student pastor here for our Walnut Grove campus.

Um, our lead pastor Russ finally had his shoulder surgery on Monday, and he is, yeah, that's been a long time coming.

Um, and he's recovering, he's doing well.

He told me this morning that he was finally kind of sleeping through the night, which is obviously a good sign after something like that.

So he hopes to be back.

Um we have Joseph Velarde coming in next week, um, and Russ hopes to be back in the next few weeks or so after his shoulder surgery.

But this morning, we are starting a new series called Everyday Heroes with this idea that the kingdom of God is built on everyday, ordinary followers of Jesus who just walk in obedience.

Um but before we get too deep into that, I want to ask a question.

Um, show of hands.

Don't don't say anything if you know who this is.

But show of hands, if you know who the person Ted Scott is, raise your hand.

Ted Scott.

No one?

There's one, there's one.

So um Ted Scott, I as you know, if you know me well, I do love the game of golf.

Um, Ted Scott is someone who has been very successful um in kind of the the world of golf, especially on the PGA tour.

He's he's kind of had 22 um PGA tour wins, and four of those wins were wins at the Masters, which obviously is a huge tournament, especially for those of us who live in Georgia, even if you don't really know the game of golf, you know the Masters, you know how serious and prestigious that is.

And he has four wins at the Masters, which is only one less than Tiger Woods, which I would say maybe raise a hands, who knows Tiger Woods?

Okay.

Yeah, so so why is it that Ted Scott, even though he has been very successful, has all these wins on the PGA tour, why is it that not a lot of y'all know he is who he is?

You would think he would be a little bit more well known, even by people who aren't super big golf fans.

However, Ted Scott he tends to fall out of the spotlight despite his incredible success.

And the reason for this is because Ted Scott isn't a player, he's a caddy on the PGA tour, and namely um he caddies currently for the number one golfer in the world, Scotty Scheffler.

Maybe raise a hand, Scotty Scheffler.

Okay, yeah, even if you don't know golf very well, you have probably heard the name Scotty Scheffler, you may have seen his mugshot online.

Um that was a crazy little, crazy little scenario.

Um so as much as golf kind of seems like a one-man team, a one-man show, um, it's it's just it's not.

It's not.

Um, there is a lot that kind of goes into the game of golf, and there's no way that Scotty Scheffler would be as successful as he has been if he didn't have his caddy, if he didn't have a swing coach, if he didn't have all these sponsorships and club manufacturer, a dietitian, um, a strength and conditioning coach, all these different things.

Um, but we don't know any of those people.

All we know is Scotty Scheffler.

We don't really know his caddy's name or his story or anything like that because he tends to fall out of the spotlight that is typically on Scotty instead.

And what I'm trying to get at is that even though Scotty Scheffler usually kind of gets all the spotlight as the golfer, there is an army of people behind him that are contributing to his success and absolutely vital to his success that he's had on the PGA tour.

However, um, typically, again, these people go without ever being seen or known by the public.

And I really think this is because our culture, it kind of promotes select people with select talents or select gifts or maybe even select personalities, these charismatic leadership personalities.

Our culture tends to put, loves to put the spotlight on one person or maybe a group of people, even though there is an army of people behind every single spotlight that we see.

Our culture loves to promote people who find the spotlight and as a result naturally neglects the people that work behind the scenes of every single spotlight.

And what I'm trying to get at is that while this happens in kind of the world we live in and the culture we live in, this also tends to happen within the church as well.

Even kind of within the church, we have these kind of famous, maybe even famous musicians or famous bands that will do these sell-out concerts.

My wife, she surprised me this past Thursday.

Anybody know who Forrest Frank is?

Okay, all the young people.

Um Forrest Frank is he's kind of this Christian hip-hop artist, um, more kind of on the pop side, maybe a little bit of rap.

He's really good.

The concert was really good, but literally we're in the Roxy in the battery.

Um, a sell-out crowd right across the street.

You know, you got the Braves game, but in this little theater, just people jumping up and down, worshiping the Lord, um, just coming to see this one artist.

So you have kind of things like that within the church, even with pastors, you see pastors that are streamed on every single platform or posted all over social media.

People will travel hundreds of miles to go and see these pastors.

I have a few different pastors that I love to listen to that are typically probably a little bit more well known.

So even within the church, we have these people that we tend to promote that might be in a bit of the spotlight.

And I do think these people and personalities are important and are absolutely used to advance the kingdom of God.

Um, I think the fact that these people do draw in hundreds and thousands of people, um, a lot of times it is for the glory of Christ, sometimes it is for the glory of that person.

But when it is for the glory of Christ, then praise be to God that hundreds and thousands of people are being exposed to the gospel through these maybe select few charismatic leaders or super talented people.

But what I'm trying to get all of us to see is that these people are important, they are used by God.

However, the kingdom of God is not built on these individuals alone.

All the work that God does in this world and through his people is not built on the select few, maybe charismatic leaders or the people that have these huge followings.

It's not built on them alone, but rather God uses his entire church.

He uses the entire body of Christ to do his work.

He uses, again, the everyday, ordinary followers of Jesus who go about their business walking in obedience to their Messiah, their Savior, and tell people about him along the way.

That is what the kingdom of God is built on.

However, so many people in the church today, they don't feel like they have anything to contribute because they can't lead the multitudes or they can't draw these crowds of thousands of people.

So they feel like they can't do anything really effective for the kingdom of God.

They feel like they don't have a place or don't have a purpose.

However, again, the beauty of God's church and his kingdom is that everybody has a place.

Everybody has a purpose, everybody has a gift to be used for the glory of God.

So again, that's exactly kind of what this series, Everyday Heroes, is all about.

It's going to kind of focus on, we're going through the book of Acts, and all we're doing is just kind of focusing on these obscure people or maybe even people groups that we might not have ever heard of or read about.

Um, typically, when we think about the book of Acts, we think about the Paul's and the Peters and the Johns, these big, again, charismatic leaders that did great things for the kingdom of God.

However, behind the scenes within the church, there was everyday ordinary followers of Jesus, just walking in obedience, doing what God had called them to do.

So again, the whole point of this series is that even if you aren't called to lead the multitudes or serve the church from a platform, you are called to be an everyday hero, an everyday contributor, everyday servant to the kingdom of God.

So as we kind of get into the text, the big idea for this morning is that the words of Christ cannot be heard without the body of Christ.

The words of Christ can't be preached, they can't be taught, they can't go out to the nations without the body of Christ working together.

So I want to pray for us and then we'll get into our passage in Acts.

Um, Father, we thank you for this morning.

We thank you for just the opportunity to gather as your church and as your bride, as your people, um, and just pray that we truly would just kind of cherish this morning and and cherish this opportunity.

God, as we open your word, um, would we just listen?

As we open your word, would we come with the expectation that you're going to speak, you're going to open your mouth, you're going to speak to us directly into our lives and speak to us in a way that each one of us individually may need, but also speak to us as a church and continue to show us where you're leading us.

So, God, I just pray that you would fill us with your spirit, give us wisdom and understanding and just truthful interpretation of your word.

We love you.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

So, like I said, throughout this series, we're looking at stories, kind of obscure people in the book of Acts.

And again, the goal as we look at these lesser-known characters in the book of Acts is to show that we as God's people can have an equally powerful impact for the kingdom of God through simple acts of obedience.

We can have an impact for the kingdom of God just through simple acts of obedience to Him.

So, with that being said, we're going to start out this series looking at a story in Acts 6.

If you have a Bible, it'll be Acts 6, 1 through 7, if you want to turn there.

But kind of up to this point in the book of Acts, if you don't know, it's kind of the book in the New Testament right after all the gospel.

It's kind of the continuation of the works of Christ after he ascended back to heaven.

But up until this point where we're going to read, the early church is really just kind of exploding.

Pentecost happens, thousands of people are saved.

The Holy Spirit just comes down in flames of fire and just shows his power and his might.

And the church is exploding.

People are being added to the kingdom of God day by day up until this point.

And they have kind of faced some persecution, especially some of the apostles have been thrown in prison because of their just kind of boldness about Christ, and they were charged not to speak of Christ anymore, and they pretty much said, sorry, we can't do that.

So the church has experienced some persecution.

However, up until this point, they have not experienced any kind of any sort of division within the church, within themselves.

Everything has been from outside trying to attack them.

But here in this text, they experienced their first inward division as the church.

So that's kind of where we pick up in Acts 6.1, where it says this.

However, this was kind of the first internal division or internal conflict that the church had experienced.

And it was a complaint from the Hellenistic Jews against the Hebraic Jews.

In simple terms, the Hellenistic Jews were what we would probably call a little bit more contemporary.

They were a little bit more closer, maybe, with the Greek culture at the time.

And then the Hebraic Jews were what we would call probably a little bit more traditionalist.

So there was a little bit of conflict between these two.

Luckily, that conflict doesn't exist anymore today, right?

It does, it does exist, sadly.

But so there was already kind of this natural tension between these two groups just based on the way that they acted, the way they worshipped, probably the clothes they wore, different things like that, again, that we don't have to deal with today.

But Satan was now trying to, I do think Satan was trying to take advantage of this tension and turn it into a problem that would ultimately cancel out what the disciples and early apostles were trying to do.

So again, the Hellenistic Jews didn't think that their widows and probably kind of their demographic as a whole were being cared for proper properly and just kind of being overlooked in the daily distribution.

And this was kind of the problem at hand.

And I think it's safe to say that this probably wasn't intentional, meaning the apostles and the church probably weren't like, hey, like let's leave these guys out.

We got to take care of our own first.

Like, let's let's take care of our own and then we'll get to them.

I don't think that was their intention.

I think this was just the fact that this church was exploding and thousands of people were being added to them, and there was probably a little bit of lack of organization in the early days of the church.

So I do want to kind of make a little side note that Satan does love to use unintentional, small problems that can be solved to disband and just bring divide and division within the church.

Satan loves to turn small things into big things for absolutely no reason at all.

And I think that happens still within the church.

These small little divisions, these small little conflicts come up, and rather than just kind of addressing them like we see here in this text, we we love, and Satan loves, to make these conflicts bigger than they should be.

Um and kind of the side note there is even here at Church of the Grove, we we are going to mess up.

We're gonna do things that are not intentional, but are probably not not the best because me and Russ and everyone else here on staff is sinners in need of grace, just like you are.

So there are going to be problems and and maybe even some divisions that come up within the church, just like it does with every church.

And the and the charge is not to make the division bigger than it than it needs to be.

And it's to bring these things to light and talk it out and work it out as the body of Christ, like we see here.

So again, this was kind of the problem at hand, but the focus this morning is really on how the prop the apostles respond to this, the solution that they bring to this problem, and ultimately how servants of the church solved this problem.

So it goes on to say, Acts 6, um, 2 through 6, the twelve summoned the whole company of the disciples and said, It would not be right for us to give up preaching the word of God to wait on tables.

If this was a sitcom, that's when it'd be like, oh, you know, you know what I'm saying?

Um so they say it wouldn't be right for us to give up preaching the word of God and just advancing his kingdom to wait on tables.

Brothers and sisters, elect from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the spirit and wisdom, whom we can appoint to this duty, but we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.

This proposal pleased the whole company.

So they chose Stephen, a man full of faith in the Holy Spirit, and Philip and Procorus and Nikonor and Timon and Parmenus and Nicholas, a convert from Antioch.

They had them stand before the apostles who prayed and laid their hands on them.

So again, after the complaint is brought to the apostles, they get the church together and explain essentially, listen, it would not be right for us to give up preaching the word of God, to give up what we think God has called us and created us to do, to wait on tables.

And there was probably some context of this wasn't probably literally just serving tables like food-wise, but also a little bit of kind of the money side of things, administrative side of things.

Like they were just saying that's that's not really what our calling is.

That's not our purpose.

And it wouldn't be good for us to give up our calling to go and do this.

And again, at first glance, it kind of seems like the apostles had this superior attitude of, oh, like that that's beneath me, but that is not their attitude at all.

However, I do think um I think this actually kind of shows the wisdom and discernment of the apostles.

They were simply explaining that it would not be good for them to neglect their central calling from God for administrative needs within the church.

Rather than showing pride and arrogance, they were really displaying this incredible wisdom.

The apostles understood that God did not call them to be everything for the church or to do everything for the church.

The apostles understood that God had called them to preach the gospel and pray for the people, and also had called other people and raise up other people to serve in various ways.

And in a similar way, I think oftentimes people have the misunderstanding that the pastor or the church staff are the ones that are supposed to be doing everything for the church, that we are supposed to be doing everything for church at the grove or everything for this church in the community.

And I'm kind of glad that I'm preaching this Sunday instead of Russ, so I can more boldly say that Russ is not supposed to be doing everything around here.

If Russ is doing everything for church at the grove, then one, that that shows a sign of unhealthiness in Russ, but it more importantly, it kind of shows a sign of unhealthiness within our church.

If our church, if our pastor is the one that's doing everything for us, then that means that we're not walking in obedience as followers of Christ and being the hands and feet of Jesus like he calls us to be.

So I do think there's a fine line that a pastor should not have his time consumed in tasks that takes him away from preaching the word, for praying for the people, for shepherding the people.

But there's also the other side of that of there is something wrong with a pastor who thinks anything else is beneath him and he has higher priorities or better things to do.

And I and I hope y'all would never think that Russ has that kind of attitude because he he doesn't.

There's four words that we're never allowed to say here on staff, and it's that's not my job.

We can never say those words, or um, we won't have a job the next week.

So that's not that's never our attitude.

Um, but I do think there is truth in here that the apostles understood they were not supposed to be or do everything for the church.

So again, as a body of Christ, it's important that our leaders and staff are not consumed with so many things that they cannot fulfill the central calling that God has placed on their life to preach the word of God.

And I do think the point I'm trying to get at is that God did not design the church to be a one-man show.

God did not design the church to be a one-staff show or a 12 apostles show.

God, that's not how God designed the church.

God designed the church to be a body, one that lives and works in unity and harmony with one another.

And not even just, again, a one-man show, but not a one-team show.

The apostles knew that between the 12 of them, they could not do everything if they wanted to see the kingdom of God continue to advance.

They knew that they couldn't do it all.

So the apostles began to realize that they needed to equip other people to begin doing the work of the ministry, to equip other people to be the hands and feet of Jesus, to equip other people to serve and wait on tables and take care of widows who need care from the church.

The apostles knew that the same way God had gifted and called them to be devoted to prayer in the ministry of the word, God had also gifted and called people within the church to serve in various ways.

And we'll kind of come back to this a little later.

So again, this was kind of the proposal that the apostles brought.

Hey, church, you also like seven men that are full of the spirit and wisdom and are faithful, and you also like them to be kind of the servants, to take care of the widows, to take care of those in need.

And we see that this pleased the entire early church.

I love that it says that it pleased the entire early church.

It shows that a healthy church is willing to serve.

They're happy about serving.

It's not something that they dread or neglect, but they're willing to serve.

They're willing to do anything to see the kingdom of God advance.

So again, since this pleased the early church, they selected from among them seven men to become servants, kind of within the church.

And here we learn the names of seven men that we might not have ever heard before, maybe apart from Stephen and Philip, but we haven't heard much about these seven men.

However, they are extremely important and responsible for the early church not splitting in two off the off the get-go.

They are extremely important in the story because they they prevented an incredible divide within the church, thanks to Stephen and Philip and Procoros and Nikonor and Timon and Parmonas and Nicholas, the church avoided a great division that could have derailed the mission of God before it even really got started.

So we see the problem in verse one, we see the solution in verses two through six, but then in verse seven, we see the result of the church working together in unity as the body of Christ.

This is what verse seven says.

So the word of God spread, the disciples in Jerusalem increased greatly in number, and a large group of priests became obedient to the faith.

So again, rather than the church splitting because of a division that arose that was small but could have been made great, we see the church act as the body of Christ, and as a result, the word of God just keeps on going.

The word of God spreads, it continues to reach lost souls.

It even continues to open the eyes of the priests in the day that had it kind of all wrong, but their eyes are open to the beauty of the gospel and the person of Jesus.

So we see the church continue to increase, the disciples continue to increase, and this brings us back to our big idea that the words of Christ cannot be heard without the Bible.

If these apostles were were not able to continue to preach, the word of Christ would not have continued to win.

And the same is true for our church.

If the body of Christ is not actively working as the body of Christ, then the words of Christ will never be able to be taught.

The church had grown to the point where the apostles could no longer do everything and desperately needed the gifts and service of people in the church.

Again, without the body of Christ being willing to serve and help meet the needs of those in the church, the disciples would not have been able to continue teaching and praying for the people and advancing the good news of the gospel.

This was true for the early church, but it continues to ring true for the church today.

Even a small church like Church of the Grove in Little Wanaggrove, Georgia, that no one knows where it's at.

That's true.

God wants to use this church.

He wants his word to go out from this place into this community, but that is not possible without the body of Christ working in unity together and being willing to serve and help meet the needs of those around us.

Church of the Grove is not a one-man show.

It's not a staff-only show.

If the 12 apostles needed people to help them, our church staff needs people to help us because we ain't even got 12 of us, and we're not apostles.

So we are we're already we're already behind.

And if these 12 apostles needed the body of Christ to come together in unity so that God's mission could continue, the Church of the Grove needs the same thing.

We need the same help.

We cannot do it at all.

And I do want to say before I go any farther, this is a really big charge to serve.

But I do want to say we have an incredibly serving church.

There are so many of you that faithfully serve.

I'll kind of get to that in a little bit.

So I don't I want to start off from the get-go that we are extremely grateful for the way that y'all serve.

You give your time, you give your resources, you give your talents.

None of the people singing this morning, leading worship that got here at 7 a.m., none of them are paid staff.

They're people that are simply using their talents for the kingdom of God.

So I do want to say thank you for going any further, but again, it's we still need the body of Christ to be the body of Christ.

We need everyday heroes in order to reach new people in our community with the good news of Jesus.

We need members of our church to be intentional about using their gifts to advance the kingdom of God.

If we want the words of Christ to be taught, if we want the words of Christ to be preached in this auditorium, but also go out of these doors into the community, we need the body of Christ to work in unity together.

Ephesians 4, I think, ties up kind of the application of the passage we read in Acts 6 very well because it tells us that when the body of Christ is working together in unity, growth is the natural outcome and product of that.

So I do want to kind of end with Ephesians 4.

Um we're gonna start in 7 through 8.

Paul says this now grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift.

For it says, when he ascended on high, he took the captives captive and he gave gifts to people.

In other words, those of you that have placed your faith in Jesus, um, you have been given a gift.

Jesus himself has given you a gift through the power of the Holy Spirit.

He has given you some sort of gift that he wants you to use to do the work of his kingdom here on earth as it is in heaven.

You have been given a gift.

Grace was given to each one of us.

And you have been gifted with something in order to serve the kingdom of heaven and be a gift to other people.

Paul goes on to say in verse 11, he says, He himself, um, talking about just God, God himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, to build up the body of Christ, until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God's Son, growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ's fullness.

Then we will no longer be children tossed by the waves and blown around by every wind of teaching, and by human cunning with cleverness and techniques of deceit, but speaking the truth in love, let us grow in every way into him who is the head, which is Christ.

From him the whole body fitted and knit together by every supporting ligament promotes the growth of the body for building itself up in love by the proper working of each individual part.

That's when growth occurs.

Once again, the church, it's not a one-man show.

The job of the pastor is not to do all the ministry, the job of the pastor is really to equip the people to do the work of the ministry, to be the hands and feet of Jesus.

That's what we see in Ephesians 4 12.

God has given each of you a gift to be used to build up the body of Christ.

God has given each of you a gift so that together as the body of Christ, we may grow into the maturity, which is the full stature of Christ Himself.

Not maturity like the world will say, but but our maturity as a church will look more like the fullness of Jesus.

That is what God has gifted us for, so that we together could build one another up, that we may grow into the fullness of Christ.

However, growth only happens, as it says at the end, by the proper working of each individual part.

That's when growth in this church will take place.

That's when growth in this church will begin to spread into the rest of the community.

When each individual part of this church is working together in unity.

Not when me and Russ or Nathan come up with some cool sermon illustration or sermon series, none of that.

But the church will will begin to grow and fulfill the mission that God has called us to.

When the word of God is being taught, people are being prayed for, but each individual part of the church is working together in unity.

If we want to be the church that God has called us to be, then all of us, each individual member, must be working together to build one another up.

Russ can't do all the work, our worship team can't do all the work, our staff can't do all the work.

We need each individual part of the body of Christ to be working together to build itself up into the fullness of Christ.

We need everyday ordinary followers of Jesus to be the hands and feet of Him.

We need ordinary, everyday followers of Jesus to be obedient when you go to work tomorrow, to be obedient when you're leading your wife or your kids, to be obedient when God calls you to do something, but you feel a little bit out of your comfort zone with it.

Don't ever think what God has called you to do and gifted you to do and what you are doing to serve Him is invaluable or less valuable than someone up here teaching the Word of God or leading people in worship.

If you are walking in obedience to God and you are doing the work of the ministry, then what you are doing is valuable.

It matters.

It has an impact not only within this church, but within this community, within souls for all of eternity.

Here is the principle you must lay hold of.

God does not assess the different parts of the body of Christ the way men do.

Everyone looks to the pastor, everyone looks to whoever's up on the stage, but that is not how God views his people or his kingdom or those who are laboring for his kingdom.

That's not how he views it.

He doesn't assess the different parts of the body the way that men do.

What he is interested in is that we are faithful in using the gifting his spirit has given each of us.

Every believer has at least one spiritual gift, and to fail to use it for the benefit of the body of Christ and the glory of Christ, listen to this, is to be reckoned by God in the future as a poor steward.

So the question is, do you want to be reckoned by God in the future as a poor steward?

Is that how you want God to view you and look and look at the life that you have lived here on earth?

Each of you have been gifted for the benefit of the body of Christ and the glory of the Father.

The question is, what is your gift and how are you using it?

What is your gift?

What is the one thing that God has created and designed and just articulated in your life that that you're good at, that you enjoy?

What is the way that you just enjoy serving the Lord or serving other people?

What is the gift God has given you?

And then how are you using it?

We're going to talk a lot about how you can use those gifts within the church, but even just in general.

How are you using your gift?

How are you using your gift that God has given you in your workforce or your family or maybe your close friends?

How are you using the gift God has given you?

The best place I do think to start is within within the church.

I think my life dramatically changed.

My relationship with Christ dramatically got more intimate and deeper when I began to just serve, serve the church and and ask about different opportunities and get told no, get told yes, get told to do things that I figured out I wasn't really good at.

Um that's that it played a huge role in my life, just getting involved and serving the church.

And one thing led to another, and God made his calling and his plan for my life clear.

But I think when we're called to serve the church or just the kingdom of God in general, there's two hesitations that I think come to our mind.

At least this was kind of some of the things that I wrestled with before.

The first one is that we want to just be consumer Christians.

We don't want to give up our time or effort for the kingdom of God, so we leave it up to the professionals.

In other words, we we just don't we just don't want to do the work.

We don't want to step out in faith.

We don't want to be a little uncomfortable.

We don't want to give complete access to the Holy Spirit to take over everything that we have, everything we have been given to be used for his glory.

So we just leave it up to the professionals.

We're passive.

We're passive about our faith and our obedience to the Lord.

And I and I would love to just lovingly, if that is your attitude, to rebuke and reprove that.

That that is not what the Bible teaches.

The Bible, in no way whatsoever, ever teaches this consumer Christianity where it's just about coming somewhere, getting your daily or weekly feel of the word, and then going to do whatever you want to do.

That's not what the Bible teaches.

Jesus says, if you want to follow me, you pick up your cross.

You pick up your cross, you die to yourself and you follow me.

Part of that is dying to our what we all have is laziness and slaughterness and just this consumer mindset of what can I get out of this?

It's dying to that, and it's what can I give back?

What can I give back to the Lord?

How can I serve him and his kingdom?

So that's the first hesitation.

The second one is is kind of the opposite side of that.

We we just don't think we're good enough.

We hear this charge to serve the kingdom of God, and we're like, what am I what am I supposed to do?

What can I do?

We we don't feel good enough.

So then we also just begin to leave it up to the professionals.

But this is again, I just want to encourage you that that's not what the Bible teaches.

The Bible never says you're not good enough.

Actually, the Bible does say you're not good enough, but the spirit that dwells within you is good enough.

The power of God that now lives within you because of your faith in Christ is good enough, it is powerful enough.

You can have an eternal impact through your service to the kingdom of God.

So I do want to encourage y'all with some of that.

If you don't feel good enough or you don't feel like what you're doing is important, it is.

That is what the kingdom of God is built on.

People who just faithfully serve and follow Christ in everyday life.

So again, as we respond in worship, continue to consider what is your gift, how are you using it?

Maybe your next step is to make a commitment to serve the the church and and really just start living out, being this everyday hero, this everyday worker for the kingdom of God.

We have multiple different Sunday morning serve teams.

We got the first impression team out there that is just faithful and welcoming.

There's so many of y'all that that have been so faithful to that.

David and Donna and Caroline, I feel like y'all are out there every single week just welcoming people as they walk in.

Um, the people that usher and just help people find their seats.

I think a lot of times, again, that before anyone ever hears what is is saying or preached from this platform, I do think they have an immediate impression of our church and what we're like within the first three seconds that they walk through those doors.

And I think our first impression team does a great job of welcoming them and preparing them to meet with and encounter God.

We have a kids grow team that, again, we believe here at Church of the Grove is if we're not investing in the next generation, then this church is going to be gone and died out within the next few years.

So we do invest in the next generation.

We don't do child care or babysitting.

If you take your child to kids grow, they are being ministered to and poured into by incredible volunteers that love your children and love the Lord.

We have um even care ministry that again is a little bit more behind the scenes, a little bit more out of the spotlight, just again, caring for the people within this church.

We need a team for that.

We need people who are willing to help minister to and serve those who are in need behind the scenes.

We have worship and tech.

Ruth is going to talk a little bit, but um, man, if you have a gift or some sort of talent musically, we would love to, Brandon and Hannah would love to meet you.

I don't know what's good and what's bad, but Brandon and Hannah would love to meet you and just see how they can help you fulfill your calling, your gift.

If you're just good with tech or or sound, we would love to have you as well.

We got Robin and Everett back there again, who I feel like are here every single week.

I think they're here literally all day, all three services this morning.

Um man, thank y'all.

Thank y'all for your willingness to do that.

Um, but if if that's where your gifting is, um, if that's what God has called you to do, then then do it with all of your might.

All I'm trying to say is there's plenty of ways to use your gift to build up the body of Christ so that we as a church would be able to grow into the fullness of the character of Jesus and be a light to this community that we live in.

So again, as we respond, just continue to consider that.

What is your gift?

How are you using it?

Whatever your next step may be, God wants to use you.

The kingdom of God is built on the everyday ordinary believers who follow Jesus on a daily basis and just faithfully serve and walk out walk in obedience to the Lord with what they have been given.

So, I'm gonna pray for us and then our team is gonna lead us.

Father, again, we thank you for this morning, we thank you for the gift of your word and the the good news of the gospel.

Um, God, we thank you for this kingdom that you have adopted us into.

But God, even more than that, we just thank you that we get to be a part of it.

We thank you that you're a God that loves to include his own people in his plan.

We're we're thankful that by your grace and your mercy, you have given each one of us a gift so that we can be a part of what you're doing here on this earth.

And I pray that as we respond in worship, you would just, by the power of your Holy Spirit, would you just speak to people?

And would you give clarity on their calling, their purpose in life?

Maybe even people in this room that have yet to place their faith in you and they're searching for a purpose.

They're searching for a calling.

They're going to every exhaustive resource that they can think of, and they're still not understanding what the purpose of this life is all about.

God, I pray that they would meet Jesus this morning.

They would see the way that he gave himself up for them so that they could be become a son or a daughter of you, and they could have a purpose that is bigger than themselves, bigger than this world.

God, I pray that you would leave lost people to yourself.

God, you would show them your love, your grace, your mercy.

Again, for those of us who have placed our faith in you, just show us, show us the gift you've given us and how we can use it to bring the most glory to you, and how we can use it to build up your church so that we may grow into the fullness of Christ.

God, we want to be used by you.

We want to be a light in this community.

We want to be a part of what you're doing here on this earth.

We want to reach wasp people with the good news of Jesus.

We want to be just the hands and feet of those who are in need, God.

We want to be used.

So we just ask that you would fill us with your spirit.

Show us and tell us how to do it, and then give us the power to carry it out.

God, we're so thankful.

We give you all the glory, all the praise.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

Amen.