Pastor Bryan Grant | Consistent Faith, Extraordinary Impact | July 6th, 2025

How are we doing this morning, church?

Is it officially summer?

It's been summer for a while, but not really summer.

I get a text morning a text message this morning just about uh the weather, and then I got another one after that said worship was insanely good.

And I I just had a thing I wanted to just share about worship just before we just move on into the message today, is that worship is warfare.

When you're coming into church on a Sunday morning and you're feeling pressure, you're feeling under, you're feeling under attack, you're feeling sick, you're feeling whatever you're feeling, anxious, anxiety, all of the things that we feel, worship is a time that we can come in and we put that aside and we say, God, I leave this for you.

And so when we're coming to church on a Sunday morning, boy, we get the opportunity to worship.

And this morning was exceptional.

It was so great to see where God was leading us, hey?

Yesterday I went to Cultus Lake Water Slides.

Why do y'all laugh?

Wow.

Like no injuries this time because I had to adult and not do the slides that actually hurt me every time I've been to Cultist.

Last time I went, I hurt my neck so bad.

I was in chiropractor three times a week, massages for like six or seven weeks afterwards.

But we get out there this this yesterday, and as we're pulling in, it's like quarter to 10.

It's only 16 degrees.

It was not great weather.

And so we're 16 degrees.

I got up at one point to maybe 19 when the sun poked its head out from behind the clouds.

But my son, Ezra, is with us, and he looks and he's like, Man, it's cold, better to be in the water than to be out of the water because it was just cold all the way through.

And they say they heat the pool, but I'm not sure that they do.

I actually think they're lying when they say that because it didn't seem particularly great.

But it was a great day.

Summer started.

Uh, I love coming to church on uh Sundays and just hearing I the hearing the stories already of well, and we can see people are just heading to go camping and just do amazing things this summer.

And so we're starting this next few months into our summer series called Everyday Saints.

It's gonna be a really great series for us this summer, and I'm really excited about it because when we talk about this type of thing, and we talk about people that are exceptional or heroes, um, I want to just lay the definition for what we want when we want to, I'm gonna lay the foundation for us today.

It's everyday saints, ordinary people living holy and surrendered lives, doing extraordinary things through simple, faithful obedience.

All of our songs this morning pointed us towards being obedient, pointed us towards Jesus this morning.

So I want to start with this scripture.

It's in Acts chapter 4, verses 13 and 14.

Acts 4:13

Now, when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished, and they recognized that they had been with Jesus, but seeing the man who was healed standing beside them, they had nothing to say in opposition.

I just want to pray for us this morning.

Lord, as we open up our hearts for your word this morning, and we hear what you have to say, and we, Lord, that your Holy Spirit is moving in our hearts, and we just want to be open to what you want to do in us, what you want to say to us, how you need us to shift, Lord, to be more like you, to be the one that you've called to move forward your kingdom, Lord.

So this bless our time this morning in Jesus' name.

Amen.

You're gonna hear through the next few weeks that like Hebrews chapter 11.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

How many of you know it's the like the hall of faith, the hall of heroes?

Whenever you read, it just goes through lists.

And the one thing I love about this is that whenever you think of hero, you hear like movie stars or things like that, movie stars, music, and and things like that.

And and we're gonna be going through these things to actually break down that real biblical heroes, the way God's called us to be and to live our life and what God's called us to in faithfulness is different than what the world is saying to us.

It's so much different.

And so we live in a culture who's absolutely obsessed with spotlight moments.

We follow influencers that probably can't even spell the word influence.

Or we see someone who rescues a cat because they another hero and it went viral, and that's the hero.

I mean, okay, if you're a cat person, I'm sorry.

I now own a cat.

It's a thing that's happened in my house.

Yeah, exactly.

Right?

I'm not a cat person, but we have a cat.

But real heroism isn't flashy, it's not trendy, it's not the next thing that you see on Instagram or on Twitter or anything like that.

And when we think of biblical heroes, what do we think?

We think of like Moses, who split the sea, or David who conquered, who knocked down giants, or we see Paul who was starting revivals in jail cells, singing, and the whole place was shaking.

And oftentimes, I know that when I read these things, I'm like, Lord, I can't do that.

I got bills to pay.

You know, I got I got a car that I have to pay, I got tuition, or I got dental bills.

How can I do all these things that God's called us to?

But I one thing I love about this is this is like the plot twist for the whole thing is God doesn't call us to be superstars, he calls us to be servants.

Right?

This is what I love about God is he's not scanning this whole place looking for the one of us that has the most impressive resume.

Because if that's the case, I would never be here.

Right?

And I want to get this straight right from the beginning that when people and we are trying to move in our impressive resume and things like that, the resume isn't your the point at all.

Your relationship with God is God is looking for people who are willing to say, God, here I am, I am available.

Let's go.

That's a thing that kids say, Let's go for everything.

Let's go.

And I want to get this straight right from the beginning is God hasn't called all of us to massive globe-shaking, world-shaking assignments.

He's called us to accept the call that he has for us.

So let's take the pressure off.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it.

I was wondering if people are gonna get that one.

Should you choose to accept it, is to accept the call that God has for you.

Some of us are called to raise children who love Jesus.

Some of us are called to leave our workplace with integrity and honor and honesty.

Some of us are called to be that person that walks into the room and just brings peace with them.

Not all of us are called to be Paul's or Esther's or David's, to be Timothy's.

We're not called to that.

But every one of us in this space is called to be faithful.

So I want to frame today what it means to be a hero.

Not according to what the world says, not the kind that's on magazine covers or you see Thor holding his hammer, anything like that.

But I want to show what the Bible says and what it means to be a faithful, obedient hero according to what he's called us to.

And we don't want to define it by the world's standards, right?

Because God calls us to different values.

Culture values fame and flash and and all of those things, money and power and influence, all those things above what God calls us.

So let's look at what God considers important.

And it's extremely simple.

Colossians 3 17 says, and whatever you do, and word and deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

That's it.

Simple, but not easy.

And we gotta realize that sometimes heroism, or heroism, heroism, heroism isn't tied to something that's massively spectacular.

It's showing up in your family when it's hard.

It's forgiving when you don't feel like it.

It's not taking an offense when you have every reason to be offended.

It's staying faithful when no one is watching.

It's daily sacrifice saying yes when the flesh is screaming, screaming no.

I don't want to get up in the morning and read my Bible.

I don't want to go to church this morning and have to serve.

I don't want to have to make my wife coffee in the morning again.

That one sounded a little personal, I apologize.

That was my inside voice, it came out.

I thank you, I appreciate that.

But God's called us to serve when no one is seeing, when we have the faithful moms and grandmas that are praying, even though they don't get a stage or a platform.

That quiet strength, that person that brings joy when you're just in feeling sorrowful.

And I love this passage that we see at the beginning of our scripture in Acts is that Peter and John, they weren't impressive by the world standards.

There was no seminary degrees, there was no university, they weren't trending in Jerusalem.

People were amazed by them.

Why?

Because they had been with Jesus.

You want to be heroic, well thought of, we need to know Jesus.

We need to have a deep relationship with Jesus.

We need to let our life be the thing that shows what the most important thing is life, our values.

It's not money, it's not fame, it's not power, it's not uh status or influence.

It's Jesus that brings real satisfaction.

It's Jesus that brings real contentment, it's Jesus that brings real purpose.

And when we look through the scriptures, we see that it's not a highlighted Instagram reel of all the most polished, well-spoken, richest people.

It's an Instagram reel of the unlikely heroes.

People who had baggage, who were broken, who had the worst of all the track records.

So we look at Noah.

I always like the this one was called the obedient weird.

He tells him to build a boat in the middle of a dry land with people that have never seen rain.

And for decades, people laughed at him.

But they mocked, but Jesus or Noah just kept on building.

He wasn't famous, he was just being faithful.

We see Moses, he was insecure, he had a stutter, he had a temper, and he had a murder charge on him.

And he begged God to send someone else, but God used him anyway.

He didn't want polished from Moses from Moses, he wanted willing.

We see Rahab, she was a prostitute in Jericho, not the type that we'd expect to live up to God's plan, but when the Israelite spies showed up, they risked ever she risked everything to protect them.

Her one act of courage saved her whole family, and she was in the lineage of Jesus.

Your past doesn't disqualify you, it prepares you.

Amen.

We see Peter.

He's the hot mess of hot mess of with a heart.

He made more mistakes than a toddler with a sharpie.

Think of it this way: he denied Jesus to a teenage girl.

This is a scary teenage girl.

Wow.

For those of you that need some prayer after the service, from your scary teenage daughters, Jesus restored him, handed him to the keys to the church, and then he ends up building the church.

He was one of the main voices at the Pentecost.

God heals and brings his kingdom forward with broken people.

Paul, the church's worst enemy.

He was a former Christian killer that turned gospel preacher.

There's not many things that are a better redemption arc than while reading Paul.

If you had a yearbook and there was a least likely to become a Christian at the very back, it would be everyone pointing to Paul.

He hunted believers.

He approved of the stoning of Stephen.

This man tried to kill the church, but then became its most passionate builder.

Redemption is God's favorite thing.

But sometimes the heroes that we see in our culture aren't those with that are pastors, often.

Or people with platforms or influence.

They're everyday people that are walking around doing God's extraordinary things.

A single mom raises four kids, shows up to church every Sunday, ties when she can, goes to school so she can raise them.

That's a big deal.

The high school janitor literally walks through each locker praying for each person, picking up the garbage, faithful because you know God's called them to be in that place.

That's a hero.

A retired, we I actually know a few of you in house, retired women and men that actually help our seniors in this church, that feed them, that pray with them, that go to their house when there's struggles, when there's health problems.

Those are people that are heroes, a factory worker that lived in a factory or worked in a factory for 30 years, that shared the gospel and went to church, faithfully sharing the gospel with people.

A young man or a woman who just leads a Bible study every Tuesday night or Wednesday night or whatever it is, knowing that discipleship matters.

Do you know what these people aren't doing?

They're not chasing the applause.

They're not chasing the accolades, they're not chasing the things that they need, the all of those things.

You know what they're chasing?

They're chasing Jesus.

They're going where Jesus has called them to.

They're doing what Jesus has said, I need you to do this, and that's where they're going.

Do you want to want to know what the most two of the most powerful words in the Christian vocabulary are?

I need you to say yes, I want to hear it.

It's I will.

It's a phrase that moves your faith from just a theory into action.

That's the power of I will.

When you say, I will, as a Christian in this place, you are aligning your heart with God's will.

You're saying, God, your way is better than my way.

I will align me with you.

I'm not going to do what I want to do, God, I want to do what you want to do.

And we do that even when it's uncomfortable, even when it's inconvenient, even when it's hard, even when it's confusing, even when it's unclear.

We do that anyway.

The I will is the most powerful phrase you can say as a believer.

I will is powerful.

It means you're no longer waiting.

Hear this.

You're no longer waiting to feel ready.

Here's the thing.

I remember when we, Nat and I were young married, and probably lots of dads and moms in here, a fair amount.

I remember I don't know how many times we've heard this from couples.

Oh, we're just gonna wait to have kids until we're financially ready for it.

I'm telling you, my oldest is 20.

I'm not financially ready for this.

But my response to having children is like, all right, Lord, I will.

I'm gonna be faithful.

I'm gonna do the best I can and the best that I know how, I will.

I will be the best dad that I know how to be, I'll be the best husband that I know how to be.

I'll work the hardest.

Lord, I will do what you called me to do.

This is the thing, is that when you say I will, you're choosing, you're choosing to be faithful.

Not saying, like, how many of you ever have um had a wife or a husband say this to you, hey, can you take out the garbage?

Yeah, I can.

I'm glad you all clued into that.

Like, yeah, I can.

What about your thing?

But you're you're you but what you're doing is you're you're you didn't say, well, you didn't ask me to do it.

You just said, well, yes, I'm very capable of taking out said trash to the garbage can.

I can do it.

But that says yes, I will is completely different.

The I say I will say, yeah, I'm gonna do it.

And now you've said, okay, Lord, or to your wife or your husband, I will take out the trash.

Amen.

You don't need a cape, you don't need a hammer, don't need a shield.

Other than if you want those, you can have them.

Because I will isn't just a phrase, church.

It's not just a thing that we do.

We say this to God, it's a turning point.

It's a spiritual declaration that says, I am in.

That takes us from consumers to contributors, from spectators to participants.

That we're not coming to church on a Sunday just to consume.

That we're coming here to participate.

That when that first worship song comes up, we're ready as a church to give all we got to God.

When you need prayer, you don't shy and hide in the back.

You come right to this place, right here, and you ask for prayer.

That you're not running, that you're coming in here and saying, God, I will be a contributor.

When you hear the Lord, there's people in this room that just sometimes ignore it.

I'm not going to point you out.

Because I don't really know who it is, but I know it's here.

But the Lord's saying, Hey, I want you to go over and encourage that person, and you just don't do it.

Small things.

It's a turning point.

I will turn your calling into action.

It's the moment that your potential can potentially and very actively turn into a purpose.

And it's that moment that when you step out, you have nerves, things are hard, it's a struggle, that God moves.

Amen.

So here's this.

There's a few things that I saw when I was studying this that every one of these characters show in one way, shape, or form.

They all have courage.

Now, the moment I say courage, everyone is gonna be like, oh, courage, yeah.

Someone who runs face first into, you know, like gunfire, or they run up a burning building, or they're in the the struggle, they go to war.

Something that is obviously extremely heroic.

Like not rescuing a cat.

Like, it's not about the cat.

But I want it's not about the explosions or the way Hollywood builds everything up to be heroes.

This is what I believe heroes actually are, and this is what it says in Psalms.

I want to read this first.

The Lord is my light and my salvation.

Whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the stronghold of my life, whom of whom shall I be afraid?

You've heard this before.

Courage isn't the absence of fear.

You've heard that?

You see it in all the Hollywood movies when they're trying to really build the hero, someone's asking, How are you so brave?

Are you not scared?

Yes, I'm scared.

I have courage.

That's just the the lines that they do in Hollywood.

But this this is what I believe the biblical definition is.

Courage isn't the absence of fear, it's obedience to what God is asking in the face of it.

I will, says, I don't know what tomorrow holds, but I know who holds it.

I'm assured of tomorrow because of the king, because of who he is, the trust I have in him, and the obedience that God's called me to.

The second thing we see after courage is we see a willingness.

Philippians 2 13.

For it is God who works in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

God can't steer a parked car.

You and I have to be willing to move when God asks us to move.

You have to get out of your comfort zone.

You have to be uncomfortable, you have to do it when it's inconvenient.

Willingness is a position that our heart takes to move to where God's called us to.

And it says, Whatever I am, whatever you ask, Lord, I am, I will, I am available.

You know what James 1 says?

It says, Don't just be hearers of the word.

What does it say to be doers of the word?

We need to be doers of the word.

There's a story in Acts chapter 16 that I just love.

Acts 16 · chapter mention

Paul was meeting Timothy and Lystra him.

And Silas and Paul were all going on their second missions trip together.

Paul has a vision while on the boat.

And he sees in this vision the Macedonian man is asking him urgently for help.

So the group of them, Paul, Silas, and Timothy, all get together, they pray, and they decide in that moment, because they felt that this was a divine call from God to go into Europe.

They'd never been there before, they didn't know it was facing them.

Christians have been under per prosecution or persecution.

Prosecution is the wrong word.

Persecution.

God has caught, and so they just decided in that moment that God's going to take them and they're going to go into this place.

He had a strategy.

He had his own personal plans.

He probably had it written down because he's Paul.

He knew exactly where he felt he needed to go.

And the moment that God asked him to do something out else, he was willing to pivot and go where the Holy Spirit led him.

He did it, even though he would have been uncomfortable, it would have been an inconvenience.

He probably had people that knew he was coming because he likes to write letters.

He didn't argue, he just moved.

I'm an arguer.

I love my wife.

Wow.

Sometimes, in order for God to get through to Brian, when I'm arguing, is he has to hit me with a hammer.

I don't mean a real hammer, I just mean like some and he has to shake me sometimes.

I'm I'm better now.

I'm older, I'm more mature, I'm wiser.

Nothing from you, please.

But God has to really get through to me.

But there's something that I've had to learn in my older person age, is that I have to be teachable.

So I have to have courage, I have to be willing, and I have to be teachable.

If you ask Pastor Brody what I was like when I was a teenager, I'm not sure that that's the word that will come to his first about me.

If you ever ask him, he always is like, boy, was he intense.

And I've asked him many times, what does that definition?

I need to know it.

And he just laughs and walks away.

I'm like, not saying anything to me.

I need to know what it is.

But this teachability is one of the most important things.

I say a lot of this is everything we do as believers when we're trying to hear God is important.

Teaching, being teachable is so important.

That's something that we have to practice.

This is what it says in Proverbs 1:5.

Proverbs 1:5

A wise man will hear and increase learning.

And a man of understanding will attain wise counsel.

Everyday people, ordinary saints, everyday saints, that when we're following God, we are always learning more about what God has for us.

We, as teachable people, need to be humble enough to say, I don't know everything.

But I want to grow.

I don't know how to do that, but I want to grow.

I don't know what that Bible verse means yet, but I want to know.

Lord, Holy Spirit, what are you saying to me in this moment?

I don't know yet, but I'm gonna pray my way through it.

I'm gonna do, Lord, I want to be teachable.

I can almost look back in my life to see where stubborn Brian is stubborn.

Well, okay, that's the we can't say that.

Stubborn Brian is still stubborn.

I'm just stubborn differently now.

Perseverance.

I've persevered in my stubbornness.

But there was a time where I can actually, I can, I can like almost go back to the year with me and my wife where I went from being stubborn and doing things my way to where God I did.

And it wasn't like it was perfect and it was like I was doing things God's way every time, but where I went from stubborn and I switched over to Lord, I just want to be teachable.

Do you know what that changed in my life?

Everything.

My relationship with my wife changed, my relationship with my kids changed, my relationship with my friends changed, how I approached work, how I approached God of all things.

I saw Him with an open, soft heart way more than I did before.

I can mark it because I knew what I was like before and how hard it was as a believer being stubborn and not doing and not being teachable, like God's correcting.

I'm like, haha, I can do things my way.

That doesn't always work.

We don't stop learning.

We are honest, we're open with God and saying, God, I need you to speak into my life.

And do you know who God puts in your life to be able to speak into you?

Spiritual authority?

Other people that you trust?

Men and women that when you go to them, they're not gonna give you the pat yes on your shoulder, yeah, doing everything right answer.

They're gonna be like, no.

Actually, that's unbiblical.

Actually, you actually did the wrong thing there.

You said the wrong thing.

They're gonna be the ones that challenge you and push you in the right direction.

Do you know what we need as believers?

Do you know what I need as a pastor in this church?

I need Pastor Brody.

I need Jamin.

I need my team.

I need Pastor Malachi.

I need my wife.

Thank you forever said that.

You guys are on fire today.

I appreciate it.

But I need all of those things because if I want to be who God's called me to be, I can't do it on my own.

It's actually worse when I do it on my own.

I make worse decisions with than when I seek out wise counsel, like the Bible says.

I do worse.

The posture of the everyday hero is to do what God's called him to do and to position ourselves for the I will.

Now, teachability prepares us to receive what God's gonna do for us and what he wants to deposit in us.

If you're teachable and you're reading the word and the Lord shares something, that means your heart is open to receive what he wants to teach you.

But purpose, when we know God, purpose is what we do to act on it.

God just doesn't want us to fill our head with knowledge.

You know those Christians that have lots and lots of knowledge but have no experience with the Holy Spirit.

Sometimes we say that there's the mean ones.

I wouldn't say that.

But the ones that only have the knowledge about how they behave but never the experience.

Only have the knowledge about what the word says, but never actually experience the Holy Spirit.

We He wants us to know His Word, He wants us to know Him, He wants us to fill ourselves up with it.

But when your heart is soft because you're teachable the weight of your calling, even if that calling, do you know what someone said to me?

This is why I'm I I kind of share it like this, is someone said to me, said every time in a church, not just here or here, but anywhere else, when they preach about calling and destiny, everyone just sometimes feels like, well, I'm not gonna be the next Billy Graham, or I'm not gonna be the next big influencer, I'm not gonna be, I'm not gonna be, and it's always this massive thing.

What if your calling is to be the best dad for your family that actually raises the next generation of pastors?

What if your calling is to make a difference in a school as a janitor?

Do you think that the calling is any different on someone who's a janitor versus a uh a big pastor or a pastor somewhere else just because if one is one and the other?

No, God called that person, that means there's value, there's intrinsic value, and anyone that acts on what God's called them to do.

Your standing in God's kingdom wasn't because one was a janitor, one was a pastor, not at all.

God calls all of us to be servants.

That means my responsibility to Pastor Brody is that I serve from underneath and I go up.

I don't lord over.

Pastor Brody serves his team from coming up from under.

Our teams serve.

We come this way.

We don't lord this over.

Because if we do that, we just cause destruction.

We're doing things our way, not God's way.

You don't want to know what the secret to all of this is?

That's a dumb way to say that.

Grace is what's needed.

Here's what I mean.

So I want to just take a minute right here and just say it like this.

And acknowledge that some of us may be thinking, oh, it sounds really good when the pastor says, Yeah, just say I will.

It preaches really well.

There's good traction with this I will thing.

Y'all are on fire.

He said I will.

I'm gonna do it too.

Right?

There's a lot of traction with this.

A whole thing, there's a whole other thing when life hits and the I will looks different.

What do you do when you said I will, but the door was slammed in your face?

What do you do when you want to be faithful, but nothing seems to change?

What do you do when you keep showing up but your strength is just wavering?

What do you do when you've been serving faithful?

But Lord, I just can't see what the end result is.

What do you do when you're tired?

When you're unseen, when you feel unqualified, when you feel anxious, when you feel undervalued, what do you do?

And I want you to hear me with this church.

This is exactly where God and his grace comes to life.

And his grace comes in, not to like pat you on the back and say, good boy.

You're doing a great job.

It comes, but it's the fuel that keeps you going.

Because this is what it says in Corinthians.

2 Corinthians 12, 9, but he said to me, My grace is sufficient.

Interesting.

It doesn't say could be, it doesn't say maybe, it says is.

That means when you're feeling all of these things, discouraged, struggling with something, don't know what to do, it doesn't mean can't see what God's doing.

It's unclear to me.

I don't know where you want me to go, God.

Let me tell you.

That's when grace, God's grace begins to activate in a new way.

But you have a requirement.

Show up.

You have a requirement to be willing.

You have a requirement to say to God, I will, and mean it.

I don't mean, you know, you may say, you may say it on a Sunday.

You may, and we may have, I'm gonna pray with you after church.

But what I want you to hear is that this prayer, amazing.

I'm glad if you want prayer, we're gonna pray for you.

But the I will, the moment you leave here and you go out those doors, you go to your job, you're gonna have an opportunity to exercise I will.

Then you you are gonna move in what God's called you to, and you're gonna you're gonna say, God, I will, on Monday morning when you're faced with a struggle.

God, I will do what you call me to.

When you have a chance just to like wreck someone because they did something so dumb.

God, I will, because that's not what you've called me to.

The kind of life that it takes to live the I will life isn't easy, but it's impossible without God's grace.

Thank goodness for God's grace, I'd be messed up a long time ago.

And you're not always gonna feel like you're doing the right thing.

You may not feel like you're the hero in the moment.

You're gonna mess up, you're gonna make mistakes, you're gonna wrestle truthfully with doubt.

You're gonna wrestle with insecurity, you're gonna wrestle with guilt, you're gonna wrestle with shame.

But where you go in those things is incredibly important.

If you go to Instagram, if you go to Facebook, you go out into the world, you go into, you try and find that in your job, you try and find none of that brings life.

All of those things just are are things that would just pass away.

Where you're gonna find any of this is when you seek after God and say to him, I will.

God thinks that you're great.

I have that there's a saying that I've heard many times is that God loves you the way you are, but he loves you too much to leave you that way.

Right?

It's because you see where you are right now, God sees who he's called you to be.

And as we go through this series and we see the character development of all these people that God put into positions to do amazing things, you'll realize that every one of them started off as just an everyday person that did amazing things because they had courage, they were willing to move where God called them to go.

So I want to close with a story from I'm gonna read Luke chapter 1, verses to 11.

Luke 1 · chapter mention

One day Jesus was standing by the lake of Genneseret.

The people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God.

He saw at the edge, water's edge, two boats left there by the fishermen who were washing their nets.

He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and he asked him to put out a little from shore.

Then he sat down and he taught the people from the boat.

When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, Put out into the deep water, let down the nets for a catch.

Simon answered, Master, we've worked hard all day, and nothing's come of it.

Nothing's changed, haven't caught anything.

But because you say so, here's the word I will let down the nets.

When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.

God's blessing, because of obedience.

So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them.

And they came and they filled both boats so full that they began to sink.

When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, Go away from me, Lord, I am a sinful man.

For he and all of his companions were astonished at the fish that they had taken.

And so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon's partners.

They said to Jesus, Don't be afraid, from now on you will fish for people.

So they pulled up the boats on the shore, they left everything, and they followed him.

Peter wasn't at a church service, wasn't praying at the temple, he was out at work with a long night, not accomplishing anything.

He was done, he was frustrated, he was just trying to catch fish, and then he was done, and he just wanted to clock out from his job.

Then Jesus, love this, steps into the boat.

And Jesus says, Go out deeper, throw your nets again.

Now Peter had an option here.

Peter's a master fisherman.

Jesus was a carpenter.

One knew how to fish, one was the Son of God.

I love that.

Jesus got in the boat with them and said, Go do this, and he said, Because you say so, I will.

There was no big speech, there was no pleaing, there was no theology degree attached to it.

It's just a simple I will because you said so.

I love it because it's just simple, it's ordinary, faithful obedience to what Jesus had said.

How much of my life would be so much better if I just had ordinary, simple, obedient, faithful response whenever he spoke to me.

And what happened?

A miracle happened because he was obedient and he was faithful.

He said, You're not a fisherman anymore.

You're a fisher of people.

This is what I want to say.

Peter didn't have a platform, he had a boat.

He was an ordinary guy like us.

He didn't preach a sermon, he obeyed a simple instruction.

But that I will, that I will became the launch pad for his whole life.

So here's a question.

What is God asking of you right now?

What net, as we can use that, is he asking you to throw off the side of the boat again?

What step of faith is he calling you for?

And you may not feel ready, you may not feel seen, you may not feel qualified, but I'm telling you, God's grace qualifies you.

Because if you're willing to say, I will, even when it's inconvenient, even when it's hard, even when things don't look the way they're supposed to, God will use you.

And so here's here's the other the shift that I just kind of want to lean into for a second.

Is that we can, as believers, believe that we're going where God's called us to be.

But sometimes we get in our own head.

And we think we're going where God wants us to go.

And then the moment that we feel God's saying, no, no, I actually want you to go this way, you kind of just do one of these.

And you just kind of push the Holy Spirit to the side.

And there's there's us in the room that, man, you're doing what God's called you to, but he's actually, and you're and things are going really well.

But he's actually asking you for more.

And he's saying, I want you to give more of you to me.

I want you to sacrifice more.

I want you to lean into and understand that when God's saying this to you, he's not saying he's not going to give you provision, he's not going to give you help, he's not going to be there with you.

He's just saying, I want more of your heart.

And he's saying, I just I just want you to be obedient in this moment.

Because that is that place where you say, God, I will, will shift your whole life.

Because I, you know what?

Before this, studying this, kind of going into this, I realized I said yes.

Every time the Holy Spirit said, I said yes, yes, gives me way too much latitude to sit still and do nothing.

Yes, I can, but I'm not gonna.

I want to be in a place.

We want, we want you as a leadership team, we want you to be in that place where you have such a deep, thriving relationship with God that every time He says I will, you're just blessed fully.

You're moving into what God's called you to do.

Do you know why?

Because Pastor Brody and I, Pastor Malachi, our team, we can't reach the people you can reach.

And our one of our purposes as believers is to share the gospel with those that are around us so they know the same love and the crucifixion, they understand the resurrection, they know all of that.

But we can't do that unless you're saying, I will, to when God speaks to you.

Because you can make a difference in spaces that we can't even touch.

You will go to places and see things and have opportunity that we won't have.

Because you said I will.

Someone said to me this morning, they don't want the Lord to come back yet because they have people in their family that don't know Jesus.

Say I will to him.

When you feel that push to engage with your family members that don't know Jesus, just say I will.

Can you stand with me, church?

Have the prayer team prepared to come up as well.

So here's how I want us to end this.

There's two things.

One, if this is your first time ever hearing something like this about Jesus and the gospel, I want to pray.

If you want to close your eyes, church, I want to pray with those.

And if you want to know Jesus today and this is your first time, I'm just gonna put it out there.

I want, if you don't know Jesus and you want to today, I want you to just put up your hand so I can see it.

We don't ever want to walk away from a moment like this where it says, I didn't know Jesus.

I want to experience his grace.

If that's you, just raise your hand.

Church, can you just follow along with me in this?

Jesus, I may not have all the answers, but today I say I will.

I believe you died, rose again, and are calling me to follow you.

I surrender my past, my pride in my plans.

I give you my heart.

Make me new, make me yours, use my life for your purpose.

Amen.

Now I do want to pray, just keep in that spirit of worship just for a minute.

If you feel this morning like you want to take the step to I will, not from a yes, but into I will, Lord, wherever you want me to go.

I will do this.

I just want you to, I'm gonna pray with you, then close the service, but I want you to come up so we can have an opportunity to pray with you.

But if you feel the Holy Spirit this morning is asking for your I will, I'm saying to you that if you submit to the I will, God will shift your life drastically.

You'll go from a place of just maybe a little bit of holding back.

You don't know what God wants to do, but when you say I will, he's gonna push you into a direction that is gonna shift your life.

I can tell you from my own life that when I said that, finally said those words, God, I will do what you want me to do.

That my it didn't, it wasn't like two days later everything was perfect.

But what it was was I had a heart that wanted to serve him and do what he's called me to do, and my heart shifted towards my wife, my heart shifted me towards work, my heart shifted me towards my friends, to other people.

Because I want God's heart for me, not Brian's heart for me.

God, what do you want?

I want to be aligned with you.

So I'm just gonna pray this over you, and I'm gonna release, and the team is just gonna play behind us.

But if you feel this morning you want an I will, and you feel that's what God's asking you, I want you to come up and we're gonna happily pray with you.

So I just want to pray, Lord, in this place, we may not feel qualified.

We may not feel like we have it all together, we may feel like we're unseen, Lord, that we're struggling with some things, but Lord, I want to be available.

We want you to use us in the everyday with our families, with our friends, with our jobs.

We want to be available to make a difference as you have called us to make a difference.

That my calling is my calling, and I'm not looking at someone else and saying that's what I want.

I'm not comparing myself to anyone else, Lord.

I want what you have for me.

Lord, I want to be a hero in your kingdom, not so I get applause, but for your glory and what you've called me to.

So just as these people are just responding to your presence this morning and they want to shift to the I will, Lord, that you would just shift.

Shift their heart.

Thank you, Jesus.

Let's sustain this attitude of worship just for a minute.

Thank you, Jesus.

Lord, we say I will to you this morning, to be who you've called us to be, to walk in what you've called us to walk in, to bear the the things that you need us to bear, so we can move your kingdom forward, Lord, so you can show us what you need us to do, Lord.

So we ask for your purpose and your Holy Spirit as it's going over people this morning to respond to the I will.

So if that's you and you need prayer, just make your way forward.

We're just gonna have an opportunity to play or to pray with people.

And if you just want to take some time, just move to the back of the room, just chat quietly.

But we want this opportunity for the Holy Spirit just to move in our church and move in our people.

Love you.

Love you.

We love seeing what God's doing in you and your chair in our church and seeing where God's taking you.

But be blessed.

And if that's you, please make your own for it.

Have a great Sunday.