From Believers to Followers Part 2 | Ps Graeme Politanski

Hey, welcome to the City Point Church podcast.

Thanks for joining us. Every day is an opportunity to

take hold of. So we hope this message inspires

you and build your faith that it helps you have more of the God

perspective for your day. Enjoy.

Who's ready to declare today? My heart is open.

My ears are alert to grow and change and never be the same.

Amen. And then once you take your

seat, Nicole, you are louder than everyone.

It's awesome. I love it.

So who knows that we exist to spiritually and for spiritual

and social transformation in our city.

This is the purpose of our life. This is the purpose of City

Point North and Bribie Island is we are here to not just see a

spiritual but also a social transformation in our city.

And I love that because spiritual, that's easy for the

church to go. Yeah, we want a spiritual

transformation, but we want more than just a spirit

transformation for you and I. We want to see a spiritual

transformation in society, in the world around us, in the

world that we live in now. Pastor Mel started the message

that we're doing a little like a mini series for three weeks on

discipleship who enjoyed that last week and I hope you've all

listened to the podcast. If you've never done that

before, there is an app out there called podcast.

You can download that or basically on all streaming

platforms, I think Apple and Google and and all of that.

And you go search City Point North and you can listen to

every Sunday's messages there and they're very good.

So I encourage you to do that from last week.

But we titled this mini series Believers to Followers.

From Believers to followers. Let me give you some thoughts

this morning. There is a start point and an

end point to discipleship. The start point is when you're

born and the finish point is when you die.

There is a context change that happens in a person's

discipleship journey. From birth, it's to be the best

you. From salvation, it's to become

more like Jesus. That's now our purpose.

Church, if you're a St. we should endeavour every day to

become more and more like Jesus. There are two purposes to

discipleship #1 personal discipleship.

So growing in one's own relationship with Jesus, but #2

making disciples, helping others grow in their faith with Jesus.

There is one goal of discipleship, to become more

like Jesus in character, in conduct, and in purpose.

There are two reasons for discipleship #1 righteous living

discipleship matures us, discipleship is designed to

mature us, and #2 mission living discipleship is designed to

equip us, discipleship is to mature us, and discipleship is

to equip us. Let me tell you, discipleship is

to mature you and discipleship is to equip you.

Discipleship is not planting flowers, it's not riding bikes,

it's not driving cars together. But I think God missed that one.

I think it should be driving cars together.

There are many, many things in the church and in our lives that

are parts of discipleship but are not discipleship wrapped up.

Let me give you a really good corporate idea of this is life

groups. Life groups does not allow us to

tick a box of discipleship because the life group is just

one small element of discipleship.

You don't really want to know what discipleship is, so I'm not

going to tell you this morning. I'm just going to get to the

word of God. You do Nicole though, don't you?

Nicole's my best friend today. He's not even take my jokes

anymore. So useful discipleship is when

one person completely gives up their whole life and follows

another. And we get discipleship through

the early church now, I mean, before the Jesus Church in the

sense of Old Testament. I'm going all the way back to

the Hebrews. All right, the Jews.

See, when you turn 14 years old, mum and dad kicked you out of

the house and you became a disciple of a disciple or an

apostle or a, a, a, what's the word?

I'm looking for a rabbi. And so you would then live with

the rabbi. And the whole intention of this

discipleship was a lifelong journey.

I told you you didn't want to hear this.

And discipleship is a lifelong journey.

And the objective biblically, which we'll get to in a moment

in discipleship, is that you would speak like your rabbi,

that you would think like your rabbi, that you would have the

same concept. You would even sleep as your

rabbi slept. This is crazy stuff, right?

This is why we don't talk about it much in the church anymore

because this is really out there.

But let me tell you, we need to be talking about this.

It's because I'm learning in my life.

I've been, I've been a Christian for 44 great, amazing years.

But let me tell you the the Christian journey has completely

transformed my life. But where I am today, I should

have been about 15 years ago if I had this understanding of what

real discipleship is. This is why I would be a

different man today. I'm just being honest, OK?

I hope this is OK. It's because the people that God

had brought into my life and I chose to follow, I would have

stopped judging them. I would have stopped criticizing

the things I don't agree with. See, obedience isn't obedience

until you disagree and discipleship.

You want someone's disciple until they can challenge your

core and you are a disciple of this person when your core gets

challenged. But you say yes Sir.

And so This is why choosing correct disciples is so

important. Disciple is this or rabbis is so

important. It's because we need to look at

the person we're about to follow and say they have the fruits of

life. They have the fruits of Jesus

living that I want in my life. So I lay my life down before

you, Sir, and I say, would you take me on the journey?

Yes, and the more my core gets challenged, the more my core

belief system gets refining and the Bible's got this scripture

about iron sharpening iron. But whenever we see real strong,

determined God infused iron, we judge it.

Well, at least I judge it. I'm just going I'll be honest

today. I I judge it.

Does anyone else judge it? Like we look at these people,

Billy Graham and we judge him, but why would we judge him?

Now we're talking about Billy Graham, but you do this too.

You go, well, that's God's man for the hour.

This is awesome. I love it's like a candle in our

midst, the iPad. We, we often say things like

that's God's man for the hour, but Jesus never taught us that.

That's not what he taught. He said.

He said whoever comes after he, he and he exampled it with his

12 disciples. He said go heal the sick, cast

out demons. He didn't say in history's time,

in the future to come, there will be a man.

His name's Billy Graham, and he's going to cast out demons,

heal the sick. No, no, no.

He sent his disciples. And then he said to his church,

all of us, he said, I give you this power and authority just as

I rose from the dead. The same spirit is in you.

And so we have, we have this judgement thing.

But let me tell you, every time we're looking at people like

this and we're not allowing iron sharpen iron, it's us that gets

held back, not them, because they have the revelation.

It's us that are struggling with the revelation.

And so this is the journey of discipleship.

It's that I've had people in my life.

I remember Steve, my old music director, he would see things in

me and he would just speak life into those things.

Man, I wish I didn't judge his every word.

I I just really wish his words just flooded over my life.

And I just said, if you see it, I'm going to see it because if

you speak it, I'm going to speak it.

If you behave that way, I'm going to behave that way.

You know, we did it in one area of our lives with housing.

You know, we allow them to disciple us with housing, Mel

and I've had six houses in our life already.

We've had investment properties at one point in our life, you

know, because iron was sharp and you know, that were teaching us

amazing things for our life. Amen.

And so these are the purposes of discipleship.

Jesus said in the Holy Bible just before leaving planet earth

in the book of Matthew chapter 28, he said go therefore and

Matthew 28 · chapter mention

make disciples of all the nations.

However, a year or so earlier than that, Jesus taught the

reason we need to be disciples, and this is found in the book of

Luke, and we're going to look at this now by understanding the

reason we need to be disciples and we need to make disciples,

we can work out how best to be disciples.

So let's look at the reason that he taught us.

If you've got your Bible, why don't you just turn turn to the

book of Luke and we're going to read from Chapter 9 this

morning. It will be up on the screen, so

you can read from there as well. In the new King James Version,

Luke 91 to 6:00, we're going to read our fair few verses here.

It says this titled Sending out the 12.

Then he called his 12 disciples together and gave them power and

authority over all demons. We already like this.

Hey, we're a Pentecostal church. We like this stuff over all

demons and to curse diseases. He sent them out to preach the

Kingdom of God and to heal the sick man.

I love this already. He and he said to them, take

nothing for the journey, neither staff nor bag or bread nor

money, and do not have two tunics apiece.

Whatever house you went to, stay there and from there depart and

whoever will not receive you when you go out of that city,

shake off the very dust from your feet as the testimony

against them. So they departed and went

through the towns preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.

And then the next title in the New King James Version is Herod

seeks to seek Jesus, followed by feeding the five thousands,

which was a an amazing mirror miracle.

And then we have Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ, which is

all good. And then we're going to pick it

up in verse 21. Jesus predicts his death.

Just hang with me. I'm going somewhere.

Jesus predicts his death and resurrection. 21 And he strictly

warned and commanded them to tell this to no one, saying, the

Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the

elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be

raised on the third day. Jesus has expressed that power,

authority and blessing of living like Him is ours.

Then he expressed the surrender required to live such a life

brings transformation to a corrupt world.

Then what Jesus says next is not only how disciples would be

sustained through Jesus death, but how we all will be sustained

through our life. Verse 23 and 24 says this.

Then he said to them all, If anyone desires to come after me,

say come after me. If anyone desires to come after

me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and

follow me. For whoever desires to save his

life will lose it, but whoever desire loses his life for my

sake will save it. The point is surrender.

The disciples had power and authority over demons, to curse

diseases, to preach the gospel so that you and I to heal the

sick. But we need to understand

church, that this will bring rejection from society when the

church rises up, that we enter a spiritual battle.

It's not all just shouting in church on Sunday.

It's not all just, well, look what the Lord has done.

You know, it's not all just, you know, the joy, the joy of the

Lord. It's all of those things.

But it also brings rejection because there is a real enemy

out there. His name is the devil and he's a

deceiver and he's a liar. But for those who do not know

Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, they come under that

that dark cloud of that society is under.

But as the church rises up in righteousness, the enemy gets

every weapon he has against us. Now, his weapons have no power

over us. This is the weird thing.

Like, you think he would just give up, right?

I would have just given up like a real long time ago.

But you know when, when in the Garden of Eden, when God said

that the serpent will be on under our heel, I would have

just given up then, right? I would just be like, I'm not

going to win this. But the reality is, is we human

beings feel sometimes like we're under a dark clouds.

The pressure, the rejection of society in our schools, in our

universities, there's like this. The world is coming against us.

No, the world's not really coming against us.

The church is rising up and showing what victory looks like.

But the reality is, is we have to fight for the souls of

humanity. We have to get into battle for

the souls of human humanity. Then Jesus said after that come

after me, church, deny yourself, follow me.

And then he said, this will give you life, this will give you

life. I think sometimes we can

struggle with the feelings of life, purpose of life, a new

breath of life, because we haven't yet come to the altar

and surrendered our all. And when you surrender your all,

your all, this will give you life.

Jesus is saying I have life and I have life abundant.

Who knows in this place that when Christ sets you free, you

are free indeed. Who believes that?

I know we all do. Let me tell you this freedom is

the breath, fresh breath, the Holy Spirit breath of life.

But to walk in this breath, this newness, newness of life, to be

a new creation constantly on the forming of new constantly of the

on the journey of I'm a new creation.

I have been born again into a new life as we surrender every

single day like a disciple with a rabbi.

And we we, we surrender ourselves, our will, our

desires, our passions as as God, as Jesus said in in the book of

Galatians, he said those who are in Christ crucify their flesh

with their passions and the desires.

And I, I used to read that and go, really, you want all of that

from me. And I've learnt that the more I

give to him, the more breath of life I have inside of me, The

more that God feels me, the more that he sustains me, the more I

feel the the movings and The Walking in power.

Let me ask a question, what is your prayer life like, Church,

What is your prayer life like? Because there's no shortcuts.

If you want more, you pray more. If you want more, you read more.

If you want more, you surrender more.

In fact, the the the objective is surrender.

All the big idea here is surrender allows discipleship

and equals really living. Surrender allows discipleship.

Discipleship does not mean surrender.

And I think we've got this wrong.

I've had this wrong because I thought I'm being discipled.

That is my surrender. But I get discipled when I

surrender. That's true discipleship here.

I judge here. I've got nothing left to judge

with here. I'm my own restriction here.

I'm at surrender to my rabbi, my apostle, my apostle, my

disciple. Does this make sense?

And then let's take this to gospel here.

I'm under the will of Jesus because I've surrendered all.

Now He can mould me. Does this make sense?

But in the church, if we're too, not too focused, but only

focused on discipleship, we stop allowing Jesus into every room

of our hearts of our lives. But As for me in my house, we

will serve the Lord. Not As for me in my entryway, As

for me in my lounge room where I sit and pray with Jesus.

As for me in my every room, every fibre, every part, all the

furniture, every dream of this house, we will serve the Lord.

Amen. And so surrender allows

discipleship have its place. And when we get there, let me

tell you, church, the word of God inside of us comes alive and

that's where the really living happens.

That's when you walk out and you pray for someone and they get

healed. Remember, He gave you the power

to cast out demons and to to cure diseases and to heal the

sick. He's given to preach the gospel.

Who's preachers in this house? Lift your hands right now.

If you know that you've got a gift of preaching on your life,

lift your get bold, get bold. I know there's people here that

know it, have never done it, never walked in it, never been

seen yet and you've got to. I just speak over you right now.

Would you allow your soul and your spirit man be discipled

because your disciple will get you to the destiny that God has

on your life. Amen.

You know what I love about the idea of a rabbi is a rabbi or,

or the person that I'm being discipled by, They, they are so

invested in me that they will, they will move the world for me.

That makes life, it makes life so easy to walk in and to live

in. Amen, Luke 1427 says.

And whoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot

be my disciple. Matthew 1038 And who?

He who does not take his cross and follow after me, is not

worthy of me. Can you see this Surrender

first, Mark 834 And whoever desires to come after me, let

him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

The denying is before the following because if you follow,

you're just following a person, but when you deny yourself,

you're actually following Jesus, not the person.

Amen. So through the lens of

discipleship, God is calling us to obedience but desires

surrender. I just dropped gold and no one

got it. Oh my gosh, I'm just going to.

I just said it too far. Did I say it too far?

God is calling us to obedience, but He desires surrender.

Let me tell you something, obedience is what I do.

It's not what you call me too or require of me.

The obedience is the followers responsibility.

When the leader requires obedience it's called

dictatorship. This needs to sink.

Is this sinking? Is this good?

I have to come with a heart and a spirit of obedience, not

judgement, but the one that I am following.

Even Jesus didn't do this. If we are got people that we are

disciple in and we expect them to be obedience, that reminds me

of someone else in history. What's his name?

Hitler. It's true Jesus desires

surrender, and when we can get ourselves to the place of

surrender, we want to do nothing more than obey.

Does this make sense? And sometimes we get more

focused on the obedience. But God doesn't just want blind

obedience, He wants everything. This is the New Testament.

The difference between tithes and generosity.

Tithes is 10%. It's law, generosity,

everything, everything. It's everything.

God is calling us to obedience, but really he desires surrender.

Obedience is doing what God commands.

Surrender is yielding your will to God's will.

Obedience is behaviour and actions.

Surrender is heart and posture. Obedience is rooted in faith,

fear, and duty. Surrender is rooted in trust,

love, and humility. Surrender desires

transformation, but obedience doesn't.

Surrender desires transformation, but obedience

doesn't. The biblical objective of

discipleship is to become like Christ and help others to do the

same. Discipleship is not just about

learning information or behaviour, but about

transformation, becoming more like Jesus, and character,

conduct and mission. Surrender is the catalyst to

transformative discipleship. Amen.

You believe that today. And So what I would love to do

right now, very unnormal in a church, but I want to open up

the altar this morning. And so I've asked some spirit

LED musos. I got like that because that's

the that's the spirit thing. The twinkling feels of the

spirit. Is that all right?

Can everyone just do that right now?

And so as these guys lead us in some atmosphere, can we just all

stand to our feet for just a moment?

I'm going to continue in the message, but I've asked just to

sing a great song that I remember as a kid that is

appropriate in this very moment. You've been listening to this

and you're like, Pastor Gray. I'm not sure I've got myself to

that point where I surrender all I believe all I believe the word

of God, but I haven't really surrendered.

Pastor Grey. I can I can see right now that

when I read the word, even I judge it, I go, is this for me?

Can I do this? Do I want to how how does this

happen? God and, and we're looking at

the word and we're filtering the word of God instead of letting

the word of God filter us. And so I know this can be bold

right now, and I'm just going to open the altar.

We call this an altar because at an altar you sacrifice, we

surrender all. And so Tyron's just going to

sing that chorus for us a couple times.

And if you'd like to come down and just say, God, I'm moving

beyond rooms of my house, I'm going to give you the house.

I'm not just giving you hopes. I'm giving you my will.

I'm giving you my everything. Or to me, or bless the say girl.

Or to me and do more. Or to heed my lessons that

surrender. You know, I remember a song,

this song being sung when I was a kid and I remember the posture

of my heart this particular day in Townsville where I did, I did

what these people are all doing and I do it all the time.

It's not a once off thing because the Bible says that we

wrestle against flesh and spirit daily.

There's this wrestle. The flesh wants to do what the

flesh wants to do, but the spirit is craving more of God,

more of righteousness, more of purity.

And so the surrender idea is a daily Christian walk.

It's part of our Christian journey.

And I know that there's people that aren't out here, but you

are out here. I, I, this isn't any form of

grading Christianity because I understand, because I didn't

come out the front. I, I sat right at the back as a

kid, teenager. But you know, sometimes the

action, remember, it's not about obedience as much as it is about

surrender. So if you were wishing you were

out the front, could I just give you another little option?

Why don't you just hop to your knees and surrender?

What a great noble thing to do. And I know that this can be

revealing for some of us. This is what I love about the

Christian journey is when you gave your life to Jesus, you

surrendered all, but it's just the journey of continually

walking that which is just so powerful.

Can I just pray? Holy Spirit, thank you for your

presence. Lord God, in this place right

now, there are people that have never given their lives to you.

There are people that are fresh that gave their lives to you

maybe this year. And then there's some of us,

Lord God, that have grown up in the church.

Father, wherever we're at, you don't see us like this.

We are all your children and so far they're in this place.

I just pray that you do a transformative work inside of

us. Father, we want to go from being

soul LED to being spirit LED. We want to go from being flesh

LED to being spirit LED. Father, we want to move daily

from allowing the thoughts and the burdens of the enemy in our

minds dictating to our lives, but we want to be spirit LED.

And so, Father, I just pray, would you mould us, every one of

us in this place? Let it be done according to our

faith in Jesus mighty name, Amen.

Amen. You know, I've got a little bit

more of my message and I didn't really think this through.

It's so I don't know if we want to do a little bit of a youth

rally concept where you stay at the front and I preach.

That's very exciting. Otherwise, feel free to take

your seats. And we're just such a blessed

church, such a blessed church. Thank you Jesus.

I want to move the message now in just the last few moments

that we got to some practical teaching for you and I.

We now know the reason. But I want to give you 5 keys of

discipleship. Number one, desire and seek God

first before seeking a person to disciple you.

Scripture shows that discipleship begins with the

heart surrendered to God. Proverbs 35 to six.

It's not on the screen. It says trust in the Lord with

all your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all

your ways. Acknowledge him and he will

direct our paths. You know, in giving our lives to

Jesus, I know that you remember that you did that because you,

you need guidance in your life. You knew that your way wasn't

the way. The way is Jesus Christ, and so

you surrendered. If you want to be discipled,

first ask God to lead you to the right person.

That's how discipleship works #2 be teachable and willing to

follow. In the Bible, those who were

discipled had a teachable spirit and a willingness to submit to

guidance. In Second Kings 2, we see Elijah

and Elijah. Elijah refused to leave him

alone. He needs to be discipled.

In the the book of Luke, the disciples left everything and

followed Jesus. In Acts, the Ethiopian eunuch

says, how can I understand unless someone guides me?

Are you ready to learn to serve and to be corrected?

And then #3 we look within the body of Christ.

Biblically, discipleship happens within the local church or the

community of faith. In Titus, the older men and

women are to train the younger in the godly living.

Let me tell you something, discipleship isn't going to

appear peer relationships that you feel safe in.

That's not discipleship. You don't go to those people

just because they accept you the way you are.

You want people that don't accept you the way you are

because they see greater on your life.

People that are going to call things out of you, not just

accept your dysfunction. This is makes sense.

So this is this. If you're older than 44, A 45

man, I just had my birthday this year.

If you're older than 45, I need you.

I need you. I need your wisdom.

You know, I know, I know that I'm very, very young.

I get that, which makes you very young too.

I'm very, very young and you're very young.

But here's the thing, if you're older than someone, they need

you and they need you to continue growing so that you can

take them further than where you are now.

Does this make sense? This is the discipleship model

#4 initiate, initiate relationship and ask humbling.

Jesus called these 12 disciples, but we also see examples where

people pursued mentors like in Ruth.

Your people will be my people. What if she never said that?

And your God will be my God. Elijah left his family to follow

Elijah and asked. Timothy joined Paul because he

was well spoken of. He had a reputation.

Of a as a godly, well spoken man who knew his stuff, man, you've

got to disciple me. Mel and I are so desperate for

this. We paid someone this year to

disciple us. We were like, because they're

they're in a world greater than us.

We're like, how do we get into that world?

We'll just pay for their time now.

They owe us. We've got them.

You know. It's biblical and wise to ask

someone humbling, would you be willing to walk with me in faith

and help me to grow in Christ #5 Watch their life before

following their teaching. Don't desire the fruits of a

dying tree. I just made that up on the spot.

But that was the Holy Spirit. Thank you.

But often we do we we go, oh, don't do this.

Don't go. I love the fruits of your life.

And so please disciple me. Yet that person's not growing

anymore, because what that will actually teach you is how to get

stagnant in your faith. Look for a tree that's got fruit

and fruit and next year more fruit, next season, more fruit.

They're growing. You thought that they were at at

the top of it and then the next year they go, would someone

prune me because I've got my next leg, my next journey, the

next part of my life to go. They want fruit.

Look for that person because they're going to take you places

to someone who models Christ, not just talks about him.

There is no such thing as graduation day.

Everyone at every stage and at every age needs discipleship.

And I want to equip us all in the church today with a great

question. So I'd love you to repeat out

loud after me. Who's discipling you?

Who's discipling you? Church Nicole, you're all over

this. Was that you?

Listen, this is your Cafe question for today after church,

when you go out in the Cafe, because you'll be talking about

the message because that's what we do every Sunday.

Why don't you ask this question of each other and ask it of

yourself as well. Who's disciple in you?

If someone's, if someone's offering to be your disciple,

the question back is, but who's disciple in you?

So we don't want a stagnant tree.

We don't want a tree on its last season and then it gets cut

down. We want a tree that wants

pruning so that it can continue to grow.

So if they're growing, you're growing.

And then let me tell you, Christian, there is a

responsibility on your life to continue to grow.

No graduation days here at City Point.

NO ma'am. So we all ask of ourselves and

the one we want. The band can be with me.

I'm on literally my last sentence.

We also ask of ourselves and the one we want to disciple us.

So the reason we get disciple is because discipleship matures us

and the discipleship equips you for what God has for your life.

Amen. You know, becoming a follower of

Jesus wasn't the end of our new life.

It was the beginning of becoming new creations.

You received that today, Church.