Fulfilled: The Chosen King: Ready to Respond with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at MetaCurch.

And my hope is that today's podcast finds you at the perfect time in your life that God uses it to inspire and enlighten you.

I hope that you enjoy today's message.

We are walking verse by verse, passage by passage, through the gospel of Luke.

Luke wrote this so that his friend, Theophilus, could come to know the real Jesus.

And we are the church, which is the movement of Jesus.

And so if we're gonna follow Jesus, we should know who he is.

And so we're taking our time in Luke's gospel, we're allowing it to speak to us.

We're becoming Bible scholars here at MetaCurch.

I'm so proud.

So many of you are showing up with physical copies of the Word of God.

You may not know this.

In 2025, they still print physical copies of books.

It's the craziest thing.

There are things other than podcasts.

And if you don't have your own Bible, or if you don't have a gospel of Luke, go to Connect after service at either of our venues.

We will get you your own copy.

It's very cool.

Uh there's a page to take notes, there's a page of text, so you can learn alongside us.

Now, this really is part two to last week.

We started by learning about the shepherds.

Some of you went home devastated because I completely just like broke to pieces this picture you had in your mind of an ancient shepherd that they were very tranquil and they were very peaceful and everyone loved them and respected them.

And that's actually not true at all.

In Jesus' time, shepherds were seen as uneducated, they were seen as unclean, both socially unclean and religiously unclean, and they were viewed as untrustworthy lowlifs.

As a matter of fact, according to the Jewish law, a shepherd could not give testimony in court.

You could not call a shepherd to be your witness, because by the mere fact that they were shepherds, they were seen as not trustworthy.

This was their view.

And we talked about last week just how astonishing it is that God comes into the world in the person of Jesus.

And the announcement goes out.

God could have picked anyone, anywhere to make this announcement to, and he chooses a hillside full of uneducated, unclean, untrustworthy shepherds.

We learned a lot about what that means for our own lives and our own seasons of darkness, and how God wants to redeem us and use us, not in spite of the things that we have been through, but he actually wants to use what we have been through to move us closer into our purpose.

Amen?

Amen.

So when I say amen, I see you, you can say amen.

If you don't agree, that's fine.

But then I say, Amen?

Okay.

That was fun.

That was fun.

At some point, we're gonna start serving coffee again, just because of what happened right now, okay?

Um, I'm very excited because today we get kind of the fuller picture of this, and we get to kind of walk into how we could be used to play significant roles in the story that God is telling.

Uh, we know a lot of the story that God has told all the way up to Jesus and the start of the early church, but it's very clear the story of God is still continuing, and there are promises that are out ahead of us, which means we have a part in this story.

It's just whether or not we're going to play it.

And uh here's what I think has happened.

Um, we have this view as modern Western Christians, where we allow the culture to really influence often how we view scripture and how we view God.

And so we think we know the types of people that God is looking to call and God is looking to use in really significant ways.

I've put together kind of a list.

We think that these people will be exceptional.

Maybe they're exceptionally smart or exceptionally kind or they have exceptional skill sets.

We think they will be impressive people.

Like they just walk in a room and you know they kind of got it going on.

Of course, God would want to use someone like that.

Look how impressive they are, look how much status they have, look at their gravitas, look at the aura, right?

Like they're just impressive people.

We think that God will choose us how Fortune 500 companies choose their C-suite, which would be like you have stellar reputation.

You can just kind of look back, or that God will choose us kind of how NFL teams draft their newest players, that they'll have proven past performance.

There's something they can look at in their high school and college games to decide that they're gonna put them on their NFL team.

This is how we think God chooses.

He's looking for the exceptional, he's looking for the impressive, he's looking for a stellar, squeaky, clean reputation, no skeletons in the closet, no past mistakes that have damaged relationships, no sins that are hiding under the carpet to be discovered, no bad habits or addictions.

We think we'll have proven past performance.

So we've already showed up, we know all the words for the worship songs, we can quote all of the memory verses, we already know all of it.

That's the kind of person that God is looking for, and those are the kind of people that God calls.

Now, that is a cultural idea, and the modern Western church has bought that idea, but it is not a biblical idea.

And we don't receive our truth from culture, we receive our truth from the inspired word of God that was preserved and protected for us.

And what's really damaging is that is not just an idea that is wrong, it's an idea that is in exact opposition to what the Word of God teaches us.

And see, one of the reasons that we fall for these lies that keep us sidelined and away from the powerful, purposeful life that God has for us is because although we are the most literate generation that's ever lived, there has never been at any point in human history a generation as literate as us.

It's hard to know where you're at in history, but if you're intentional and you study human history, what you'll learn is for most of human history, most of the people were illiterate.

They could not read, they could not write.

We are the most literate people, but we are likely the most biblically illiterate generation.

And that should sting a little bit.

Because what it means is for 2,000 years of church history, when virtually everyone could not read or write, the people who could not read the scripture knew more scripture than we did when everyone in our culture is taught to read and write.

So why is that?

Well, part of the reason we're so literate is because we have advanced, and a lot of those advancements have come through technological and industrial advancements.

And so we have more convenience than ever, we have more technology than ever, so we're the most literate generation, we are also the most distracted generation.

And we would be able to speak truth to the lies that culture has infused into modern Christianity if we would just take uh a few percentages of the time that we invest into TikTok and Instagram and YouTube and CNN and Sports Center and just invested it in the words of God that are protected and bound for us.

And what's so striking if we just step back and try to kind of pull back the veil between the natural and supernatural, and we just think about Satan, who's already a defeated enemy, and how much glee he must take in the fact that virtually every Christian in the world today has all of the answers that would allow them to live the life God created them to live in their hands and on their phones, and that we are too busy doom scrolling TikTok to get in and find it.

Satan is winning victories in our own goals.

We are handing it over to him.

And so, what I want to do is we may not even get back to Luke today, honestly.

I preached way too long, last message, and I barely got back to Luke.

Because what I want to do is I want to build out what the actual template of calling is in Scripture.

And it is not just different than the cultural Christianity view of God calling the exceptional, impressive, stellar performance, past proven performance.

It is it is diametrically opposite of it.

And so I don't have time to go into every single passage, but I want to talk about some of the heroes of our faith.

Uh back in March, I preached uh a sermon kind of last second.

I wasn't supposed to be on, I was going on vacation, and I found out the person preaching for me got sick on Saturday, so it's like, I don't have a sermon, you know, what am I gonna preach?

And uh I've been studying Moses with the family, and so it's like I'll I'll preach about Moses, and uh I I kind of exposed a faulty way of thinking about Moses, because for most of us, Moses is synonymous with leadership, he's like a generational, transformational leader.

But what we pointed out by just simply going through the text and reading the story of Moses is that from birth to 80 years old, Moses did almost nothing but fail.

At 80 years old, he was a failure by every worldly metric.

And God calls him.

And when God calls him, if you remember, Moses makes like every excuse he can possibly think of, and God just shoots down all of his excuses, and so Moses submits and is like, Amen.

Moses leads the Israelites through the wilderness, and it's finally time to go into the promised land.

Between them and the promised land is the fortified city of Jericho, it's an impenetrable fortress.

God tells Moses to send some spies in.

The spies are going to get caught.

If the spies get caught, the jig is up.

Israel likely will be defeated.

You know who saves the spies and ultimately saves Israel and leads to the defeat of Jericho?

It's a woman named Rahab.

Rahab did not have a stellar reputation.

Rahab was the town prostitute.

That's who God uses.

Not only that, if you read the genealogy of Jesus, guess who's in there?

Rahab.

We know that once the kingdom of Israel is established, the greatest king is King David.

We know that King David was a shepherd boy.

Samuel was told by God that the next king would come out of Jesse's family.

Samuel goes to Jesse's family, and they think so little of David, they don't even invite him in.

Jesse's got all these other sons, a bunch of other sons.

He lines all of them up, doesn't even invite David.

You know this because you have kids.

If you have kids, at least three of those other sons, Jesse already knew, like, this fool can't clean his room.

He is not gonna be king, you know?

They lined those fools up anyway, and still didn't invite David.

David goes on to be a man after God's own heart and the greatest king in Israel's history.

We have so many other examples.

We have Gideon, who's known as this incredible, brilliant strategist.

He led the Israelites to defeat the Moabites in this battle they never should have won.

He only had 300 people against an entire army of people.

But we forget where Gideon was when God found him.

Israel was under siege, and Gideon was hiding in a wine press as a coward, not impressive, not exceptional, bad reputation, no proven past performance.

These are the people that God consistently calls and that get these starring roles in the story that God is telling as history unfolds before us.

And so I want to go to maybe the most obvious example of what happens when we encounter the one true God and he calls us into action.

We're gonna look back at the prophet Isaiah.

And Isaiah is given a vision of the throne room of God.

In Isaiah chapter six, he writes, I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne, and the hem of his robe filled the temple.

Seraphim, which are the heavenly host, were standing above him.

They each had six wings, with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew.

And one called to another, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of armies.

His glory fills the whole earth.

The foundations of the doorways shook at the sound of their voices, and the temple was filled with smoke.

Isaiah is getting this glimpse into the throne room of heaven.

He sees the Lord, he sees the hosts of heaven, and he is overwhelmed.

We're talking about the shepherds in Luke's gospel.

This is similar to what they would have experienced last week when the host of heaven showed up and gave glory to the new chosen king who was upon the earth.

And they reacted in shock and terror and awe, and the angel had to comfort them because it was so overwhelming.

And so, what happens?

What happens when we encounter the one true God?

What happened on the earth when people would realize that Jesus, who they were encountering, was in fact the Lord, the one true God?

It's very interesting.

Here's Isaiah's reaction in verse 5.

Then I said, Woe is me, for I am ruined.

Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips.

And because my eyes have seen the king, my eyes have seen the Lord of armies.

What is his reaction to seeing the Lord, the one true God?

He cries out, Whoa, it is me.

I'm ruined.

When you see a list like what the modern Western church thinks of, as far as the qualifications for calling, exceptional, impressive, stellar reputation, proven performance.

You kind of fall into one of two extremes, both of which are very damaging.

You can fall into one extreme, which is to have the spirit of the Pharisee.

These are the people that maybe you grew up with in church who were meaner than anyone else, and more judgmental than anyone else, and more divisive than anyone else.

But in their own eyes, they were the godliest person in the church.

They had it all figured out, they had their nice Christian masks on, they could play the game.

That's the spirit of the Pharisee.

Now, here's my guess.

At Metachurch, where we don't really allow that, and we don't allow you to come in and fake it, and you gotta come in and get brutally honest.

At metachurch, my guess is we often fall into this other extreme.

And this other extreme sees a list where we believe culturally that God is calling the exceptional, the impressive, stellar reputation, proven performance.

We look at that list and go, well, that has nothing to do with me.

Like I don't see myself in that list at all.

As a matter of fact, what ends up happening to a lot of people is we experience God.

Now we don't get the fullness of God that Isaiah sees in the throne room, but maybe the Spirit of God has gotten a hold of you over the years.

Maybe it happened in a time of worship through music where the Holy Spirit just grabbed your heart and exposed some sin.

Maybe it has happened as you've sat under the proclamation, the preaching of the word.

Maybe it's happened in your own quiet time.

Maybe you have experienced this through friends who have had a word from God for you, whether they knew it or not.

Maybe you've experienced this through your own children, who have exposed things in you.

Maybe as you get older, all of the things that you knew were so unhealthy about your parents, you start seeing in your own parenting.

You see, one of the things that happens, happened to Isaiah, is when we experience the one true God.

His glory and perfection and completeness draws a devastating contrast to our own sin and brokenness.

But a few chapters later in Luke, and I'm not really worried because a few chapters later in Luke means something like six months from now or something like that.

But a few chapters later in Luke, Jesus meets Peter.

And what you have to understand is encountering Jesus is also encountering the one true God, but Jesus was 200%.

He was 100% God, but he was clothed in 100% humanity.

And so when Peter meets Jesus, uh the veil has not lifted.

He doesn't understand he is speaking to the Lord.

And so he's actually kind of annoyed with Jesus because Jesus wants him to go fish, but Peter's been fishing all night and he hasn't caught anything.

And Jesus is a carpenter, and fishermen don't really like carpenters to tell them how to fish.

It's like you worry about, you know, wood, and I'll worry about the seas.

And so he's kind of frustrated with Jesus.

And then this miracle happens.

And if you remember this story, um the veil is lifted, and Peter recognizes that Jesus is the Lord.

And what happens next is what happened to Isaiah.

He falls on his knees and he cries out, Depart from me.

Leave me, get away from me.

For I am a sinful man.

Woe is me, for I am ruined.

Here's the danger is when you encounter the one true God, it will expose your sin.

You will see your depravity.

And it's painful because you're like, I'm a pretty good person, you know, like, man, I've been working on some things, I've been getting a little better, I'm a little better husband, a little better dad, you know, I've been working on this habit over here.

When you are exposed to the one true God, when you're exposed to perfection, it just ruins you.

And we live in this culture that doesn't grab its truth from the word, it grabs its truth from our cultural understanding.

It grabs its truth in the church from religious ideas, not biblical ideas, religious ideas.

And so we stop there.

We stop at verse five and we go, I am ruined, I am a sinful man, I am a man of unclean lips, living in a perverse generation.

I am stained by sin.

My culture is stained by sin.

My righteousness before the Lord is like filthy rags.

And so we put ourselves in a corner and assume that we are no good for the kingdom.

We have bought a lie that I am ruined.

And so I guess God will wait for the exceptional, impressive, stellar reputation, proven performance people, and then those will be the select few people who God will call and he'll use them for significant things.

See, what actually happens when you encounter the one true God is a bit of a paradox.

Two things that don't seem like they belong together, but somehow do.

And you'll know that if you read the rest of the story.

Here's what happens to Isaiah, starting in the next verse.

It says, Then one of the seraphim flew to me, and in his hand was a glowing coal that he had taken from the altar with tongs, and he touched my mouth with it and said, Now that this has touched your lips, your iniquity is removed.

Your sin is atoned for.

He confessed his sin, and his sin was forgiven.

Watch verse 8.

Then I heard the voice of the Lord asking, Who will I send and who will go for us?

For us.

Please remember the context.

This is the throne room of heaven.

God is on his throne, he is surrounded by the hosts of heaven.

They are worshiping him.

Six wings, two to cover their face.

You might know why.

It is because if anyone tried to behold the full glory and majesty of God, they would not be able to survive.

Two cover their feet out of reverence.

With two, they are flying, they are singing his praises.

God looks across his throne room of heaven and he says, Who will I send?

Who will I call?

Who will I appoint?

Who will be my prophetic voice?

Who will play a key role in history?

Who will go for us?

Who will represent the throne room of heaven?

And Isaiah, who just experienced this and cried out, Whoa, it's me, I am ruined, devastated by my sin.

Isaiah says, Here I am.

Listen to me.

Here's the paradox that you have to understand.

If you are going to live out the life God created you to live a life on purpose and with purpose.

When you encounter the one true God, a paradoxical event takes place.

Two things that shouldn't make sense, but somehow do.

First, the greatness, the perfection, and majesty of God will draw a devastating contrast to your own sin and depravity.

And it will ruin you.

And if you think like religion, you would say, I am ruined, I am no good, I am not useful.

Here's the paradox.

At the same time that you encounter the true presence of God, it will instill a confidence in you to finally walk in the power of your purpose.

Both things happen simultaneously.

Which means if you have the spirit of the Pharisee and you are all about finding out what your purpose is, but you're never willing to acknowledge your depravity and sin, then you have not encountered the fullness of God.

Which means that if God has gotten a hold of you and you are devastated by your sin, but you now assume that your sin disqualifies you from your calling, you have not experienced the fullness of God.

Because the fullness of the presence of God does both.

It exposes your sin, it exposes your weakness, it exposes your depravity, and then calls you into your purpose and power and calling.

And I'm gonna go a step further because maybe the actual lesson.

The lesson we learned from the shepherds last week is like you have a lot of darkness in your past.

You have a lot of sin and a lot of depravity.

And when God redeems it, it's not that he will just use you in spite of it, he'll use you through it.

But I want to go a step further in the story.

Maybe the actual lesson is until you are willing to acknowledge your sin and depravity, you may not be equipped to walk out your purpose.

If you fall into this side that is like, I've become pretty aware of my sin, I know how jacked up I am, I know how many people I've hurt, and so I'm gonna leave the whole kingdom of God thing to the spiritual professionals.

I just need you to know that that is the temptation I wrestle with as well.

I see in myself Isaiah crying out, Woe is me, I am ruined.

When Jesus really got a hold of me, I was at a very, very, very low point.

And what ruined me was the fact that at that low point of rebellion, when Jesus found me, he embraced me.

I actually would have been far more comfortable with him casting me out into the darkness because I knew I deserved that.

But his goodness and his mercy and grace, it drew this devastating contrast.

And I finally knew who I was.

Sinful, depraved.

You know, we understand this even at the relational level, just here on earth.

Uh, when I was dating Katie, I was very insecure.

And I I don't say this to try to win bratty points.

I already married her.

I locked that up, right?

I don't.

She was just out of my league.

She was a lot more mature than me, she was further ahead in life than me.

Um, she just had it together in ways that I did not, and I was very insecure about that.

And so what I would do is I would mitigate my weaknesses, I would distract from my weaknesses any way I had to.

And then I would oversell my strengths.

So I wanted her to know that I was strong and I was successful and I was accomplished, you know, that I was wealthy enough.

That was a stretch.

I don't know if you can make less than zero dollars a year, but I was trying at that point.

And I wanted to just, all of this over here, this sin and depravity and weakness and shortcomings, it's like anything to distract from that.

And it was so obvious, because here's what you need to know.

You know who can see all of that?

Anyone who knows you.

I was so overselling, and I at any time those weaknesses would be exposed, I would just, I'd be crazy.

And I almost lost the love of my life.

And in that season, I finally had to look in the mirror and see who I really was.

I went through a process very similar to what we want all of you to go through in the movement academy, which is about to start back up.

Everyone needs to go through the academy.

We take you through the same process where you confront the darkest parts of yourself.

And until you're willing to do that, I don't think you're equipped to live out this significant calling as a part of God's movement.

Here's the truth: uh, when you get married, spiritually, two become one.

And so you're not actually ready to get married until you actually know each other.

Even the hardest parts, even the darkest parts.

Uh, this is why I really encourage people to date for at least two years before they get married, because anybody can behave for six months, and most people can behave for one year, and a sociopath can behave for 18 months if they need to.

But two full years, the mask will slip.

You will see some of their crazy, you will see some of their darkness, and you need to see it because you're about to become one with it.

See, that's true on the micro.

If we're not willing to be who we really are, we aren't ready for a real relationship here on the natural plane.

It's also true in the supernatural.

To be used by God, we have to be aware of our sin, our depravity, and our shortcomings.

You see, you are meant to play a heroic role in the building of God's kingdom.

I love a good action movie.

I love a good action movie.

And part of what happens, this is the narrative.

I'm gonna ruin action movies for you.

Every action movie, early on, there's a scene where you learn their skill set, highly skilled.

You learn that up front so you know what you're working with.

And then the narrative happens, which is conflict loss, conflict loss, hardship, suffering, loss.

And in a great action movie, the hero who has the skill set finally gets to a point.

And that is the point where you have nothing to lose.

And with their skill set, when they have nothing to lose, when you shoot John Wick's dog, okay, when they have nothing to lose, they become very dangerous.

Few things more dangerous than a man with nothing to lose.

When you are trying to hide and mitigate and protect and obfuscate away from your darkness, you have something to lose.

When I showed back up and I was finally ready for a relationship with Katie, I was a man who had nothing to hide.

I had looked in that mirror, I had seen myself.

Here's how it works.

I want you to really remember this.

When you encounter the one true God, it will ruin you.

You will finally see who you are.

And it isn't until you finally see who you are that you are ready to finally see who you are.

The new creation that God has created you to be, the purpose that He's placed inside of you, the calling that He has on your life.

Some of you have all the skill sets you need, you're studying the word, you're in community.

I hope you're on a life team, you need to be, you've been to the academy, you've done all these things.

And what is anchoring you are all of the things that you have been trying so hard to hide from, to ignore, to suppress.

I want to show you one more example, and then we'll finally get back to the shepherds.

You've probably heard of the Apostle Paul, and you might know that before he was Paul the Apostle, he was Saul the Pharisee.

And to make the story short, what you need to know about Saul the Pharisee is he hated Jesus, and he made it his number one mission in life to stamp out the movement of Jesus, the church.

Saul had grown his influence among the Pharisees, he was given more resources, he was given more power, and he leveraged all of that to go city to city, rounding up the believers in Jesus, imprisoning and persecuting them.

I know you may feel disqualified because you're not exceptional, you don't feel impressive, you don't have cellular reputation, you don't have proven performance, but you're not Saul.

And God looked out across the whole earth, and he was like, you know, the guy who's going to spread my church to the ends of the earth, I want Saul.

Now, this isn't in the Bible, this is just how I think about things.

Like the angels aren't omniscient, they don't know everything, they don't have pure knowledge like that.

I imagine at least one of the angels was like, Saul, you said Saul?

Is there a last name?

Because there's a few Sauls that we could.

God's like, that's my man.

I'm gonna meet him on the road to Damascus, and I'm going to ruin him.

And when he meets the one true God, he will be ruined, and he will finally see who he is, so he can finally start to see who he was created to be.

And so Paul becomes, in my opinion, and you can argue with this, but in my opinion, the second most impactful human in history, second only to Jesus.

Paul took the gospels to the ends of the earth.

He was the premier church planting in all of church history.

He raised up the next generation of leaders.

He wrote 13, maybe 14, of the books of our New Testament.

And if you're wondering whether or not the Apostle Paul understood what I'm preaching today, I will show you.

He wrote a letter to a young pastor named Timothy.

This is towards the beginning of his letter.

He says in verse 12, I give thanks to Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me because he considered me faithful, he appointed me, purposed me, called me to the ministry.

Even though I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an arrogant man, but I received mercy because I acted out of ignorance and unbelief.

Now you could read that verse and go, okay, he acknowledges he did some bad things.

He kind of made an excuse.

He's like, you know, I was ignorant, I didn't know who Jesus was.

Does he really understand the depths of his depravity?

Was he really ruined by the presence of God?

Let me show you.

And the grace of our Lord overflowed, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.

This saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance.

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.

And the Apostle Paul, who changed the world, who planted churches, who wrote the New Testament, the Apostle Paul says that of all of the sinners, I am the worst of them.

Woe is me, I am ruined.

Depart from me, Lord.

I'm a sinful man.

And yet, God called him.

Verse 16, but I received mercy for this reason, so that in me, the worst of them, Christ Jesus might demonstrate his extraordinary patience as an example to those who would believe in him for eternal life.

As an example to you, as an example to me.

I often feel like Isaiah.

When I spend time in the presence of the Lord, I'm so aware of how broken, how sinful, how flawed I am.

I got my sleeve, a tattoo uh years ago.

People ask, like, what it is.

Um, it's a motif.

Don't mean to get too archy on you here.

It's a motif.

It's a light versus darkness, uh, good versus evil.

There's a lot of evil, there's a lot of darkness, but goodness and righteousness and light always win.

And I'm telling you, I often feel like Isaiah in verse five.

Okay.

And so at the very top of my sleeve, I wrote, here I am, send me.

You never get to see this because Katie has a rule, I can't preach in tank tops.

I don't know what that is.

Talk to her about that.

I need that.

I need the fullness of God's presence, not just to convict me of my sin, but through the conviction of my sin to equip me for my calling.

Here's what we learn.

We have these cultural ideas, not biblical ideas.

We gotta get in the word so we can speak truth to the culture.

We have these cultural ideas that God is looking for this super Christian.

Here's what we actually see in scripture.

God doesn't call the impressive, he calls the responsive.

You want to know what every single biblical character had in common that we talked about?

They had different worst ways, different backgrounds, they lived at different times, they had different assignments.

Every one of them just said yes.

The disciples became the disciples because Jesus called them and they dropped their nets and they left their tax booths and they just said yes.

The shepherds play a starring role in the birth of our Savior because they just said yes.

What if your starring role in God's story is hidden behind your unwillingness to just answer when Jesus calls?

To just pay attention, listen to the Holy Spirit, and say yes.

Luke chapter 2, verse 15 when the angels had left them and returned to heaven, the shepherds said to one another, let's go straight to Bethlehem and see what has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.

Luke 2:15

And they hurried off and found both Mary and Joseph and the baby who was lying in the manger.

I agree with the consensus of scholars who believe that Luke interviewed Mary, the mother of Jesus.

Joseph died when Jesus was young.

Mary lived on after Jesus' ascension.

We believe that Luke sat down and got Mary's side of the story, which means we know about these shepherds because Mary told us about them.

And there is an alternate scenario where the angels come to the hillside and they proclaim the good news, and the shepherds stand in awe, and then the angels leave and they go.

That was crazy.

Okay, who's got the next shift?

I've got a lot of sheep to look after.

They could have just stayed.

And we would have never known this story.

You have no idea what is waiting for you behind your yes when God calls you.

Two things that happen quickly.

Verse 17, after seeing them, they reported the message they were told about this child, and all who heard it were amazed at what the shepherds said to them.

The shepherds who were marginalized and not even trusted in a court of law, all of a sudden were given the influence to be the first evangelist about the coming of the chosen king.

Let me show you one more thing that happened.

In verse 19, Mary was treasuring up all these things in her heart and meditating on them.

And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had seen and heard, which were just as they had been told.

It says Mary was treasuring them in her heart and meditating in her mind.

We don't talk about this enough, but one of the key roles that you play as a Jesus follower is God will use you to bring affirmation and confirmation to other Jesus followers.

One of the primary ways that God speaks to his people is through his people.

And when we are not paying attention and following the promptings of the Holy Spirit, we miss opportunities to bring affirmation and confirmation.

And here's what's crazy: a lot of the time you won't even know you have done that.

You will have already left their house, left the life team, left the restaurant, left the park, and they will be treasuring it in their heart and piecing it together in their mind that God just spoke to them through you.

The shepherds play an incredible and critical role in the story of Jesus.

It's not because they're impressive.

Uneducated, unclean, untrustworthy.

God doesn't call the impressive, he calls the responsive.

And so the question today is will you respond?

As we close across our venues, let's pray.

Just bow your head and close your eyes.

Create a little bit of space for reflection.

If you are already a believer in Jesus, my question for you is very simple.

Are you hearing from God?

Are you pushing past the distraction?

The division?

If you are a follower of Jesus, the Holy Spirit is speaking to you.

I don't think that.

I know that.

You have assignments on your life.

Are you paying attention?

If you are hearing, are you responding?

Have you put yourself in a corner because you know your sin?

If so, it is time to come back to the presence of God.

Yes, he will convict you of sin, but at the same time, he will fill you with the courage to say, Here I am.

Send me.

As we do every service, I want to speak directly to anyone who does not have a relationship with Jesus.

You've never taken that first step of faith.

The bad news is, Scripture says it is our sin.

All of the ways we have gone against God's desire and design for our life that separates us from him.

God is perfect.

He can't be in the presence of sin.

But he loves you so much that he came down to you, lived a perfect life.

His death on the cross was substituting his life for ours.

And when he rose from the grave, he was proving he can give you life after death.

And all he asks is for your faith that you are convinced and convicted that Jesus is who he claimed to be, and he has done what he claimed to have done.

So with everyone's eyes closed, across our venues, if you are ready today for the first time to put your faith in Jesus, I want to ask you right now to just simply raise your hand.

This is a symbolic gesture that says, Today I choose to put my faith in Jesus.

Amen.

For those who raised a hand, I want you to know that God sees and accepts your faith.

Scripture says all of your sins are forgiven, and that you have been given eternal life with God.

What I want to do is very simply help you acknowledge this moment through a prayer.

If you raised your hand, I'm going to ask you to pray this prayer with me.

I'm going to ask all the believers across our venues to pray this out loud as well.

Let's pray like this.

Jesus, today I choose to put my faith in you.

I believe you are God that you died for my sins and rose from the grave.

I thank you for loving me and forgiving my sins.

Thanks so much for listening to the message today.

If this was helpful to you and you want to help us get the word out, you can subscribe to this podcast.

You can rate and review or share it with your friends.

If you want to get connected further with what MetaCurch is doing, you can go online to metachurch.tv.

There you can learn how to take next steps.

You can learn where our different venues are at if you ever wanted to visit.

And you can also give financially to help push this movement forward.

Man, I love you guys, and I hope you have a great rest of your day.