What You Started: Managing Your Miracles 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.

So excited to announce that on December 8th of this year, we will be opening a meta church venue in Helotus, Texas, at the 4H Activity Center, right across the street from O'Connor High School.

We need to consolidate to be healthy as individuals so we can be healthy as an organization.

To do this, we are going to pause our Sunday services at our Holodas venue.

When the time is right, we will reopen Helotus.

We ran for about nine weeks and COVID shut everything down.

We still hold that lease.

In faith we never broke it.

Our goal in the next five years is to have enough metachurch locations that everyone in town is within 20 minutes of a meta church that they can visit.

And our plan is to start next year by reopening our Helotus location.

So we are planning this year to open our second location.

We already have our physical building.

It's the Helotus 4-H.

Our targeted date to open is October 20th of this year.

What comes against us?

You will defeat.

Last Sunday was the grand opening of MetaCurch Holotus.

God is already moving so powerfully there.

And opening a second location means we are now one movement with one mission, but meeting in multiple locations.

And we see this as the first step to taking the mission, movement, and gospel of Jesus to the ends of the earth.

That's what God called his church to do.

We are gonna put our energy towards that for as long as MetaCurch exists.

Now, to get to this point of being multi-site, we planned like crazy, we prepared, and most of all, we prayed for this, and God saw it through.

He gave us this, and we see it as another of many miracles in our history as MetaCurch.

Today, my message is instructive in how to live in light of this blessing that God has brought us.

My message is managing your miracles.

Would you pray with me?

Jesus, we love you.

We thank you for your great love for us.

I thank you for MetaCurch, a place for all people at all different parts of their faith journey.

I pray, Holy Spirit, that we would have open minds and open hearts and allow you to do work in our lives today.

We give all this to you and we pray it in Jesus' name.

And if you're ready to manage your miracles, say amen.

Amen.

As you've seen throughout this series in the video that opens up service, it was a long and winding road to get Helotus back up and running.

And this is really emblematic for how life often works.

There are all kinds of twists and turns between where we are and the dreams and destiny that are out in front of us.

It's very rare that we just pray for some kind of miracle and go from A directly to B and it just falls in our lap.

We have all kinds of things that we're hoping for and praying for.

Somewhere in our early 20s, we start imagining marrying the perfect spouse and having the perfect kids and living in the perfect house with the perfect white fence.

And then you have to go out and date, you know?

And if you've tried to date like in the 21st century, it can be tough.

And every once in a while, someone like falls in love at 18 years old and they just have their person forever.

But most people don't go just from A to B.

It's like from A to J to terrible to crazy, a short, regretful detour through Tinder, you know, to a liar and a cheater.

And then maybe finally you found someone.

If you're single and dating right now, this is when you should say amen, because you know that it is tough out there right now.

This is true in our careers, you know.

A lot of us when we're young, we're like, this is what I'm gonna do, and this is who I'm gonna be, and this is the company that I'm gonna start.

I'm gonna be an entrepreneur.

And then you like get out there and you realize that the industry you're in, you're not really cut out for, and you did four years of study and a hundred thousand dollars in student loans, and you don't wanna do this job anymore, or maybe you have some terrible supervisors uh along the way, or you start a business and it fails.

I mean, there is often a long, tumultuous season of suffering between what we are hoping for and praying for, maybe even begging God for, and then Him delivering that miracle to us.

And that's because life is a journey.

We we saw this with getting Holotus back open.

God had us open it in 2019, and it just seemed like everything was moving forward, and COVID hits us out of nowhere, and we get a building here on Petrenko out of nowhere, and all of this comes along, but it brings us to today, and then you finally get your miracle and often realize that once the miracle is received, there's real work to now manage it.

We're gonna be in a very unique place in scripture today.

We're gonna be in the Jewish scriptures, what we often call the Old Testament.

We're gonna be looking at God's chosen people, the Israelites, and they have been waiting on their miracle for 440 years.

Okay?

I know you've been single for seven months.

440 years, 400 years in Egyptian captivity.

Now they've been wandering in the desert for 40 years, and finally their leader, Moses, doesn't make it, he passes away.

Joshua, a new leader, has taken them to the edge of their promised land.

And it's bordered by the Jordan River.

God allows them to miraculously cross the Jordan River and they are in the miracle.

They are in the promised land.

And as they move into the promised land, three very unique things happen to prepare them to manage their miracle.

And I think that by slowing down and really paying attention, we can learn how to manage this miracle called Metachurch and some of the miracles that God has brought to your life as an individual.

We're gonna be in Joshua chapter five, we're gonna start in verse two.

It says, At that time the Lord said to Joshua, make flint knives and circumcise the Israelite men again.

Now, without a lot of context, circumcision is one of those things in the Old Testament that can be quite confusing.

This goes all the way back to Abraham, who is the patriarch of the Israelites.

He was a single person that God called out and said, If you will follow me, I will make you into a great nation and I will bless the entire world through that nation, which is exactly what happened when Jesus came to earth hundreds and hundreds of years later.

As a sign of the covenant between the Israelites and God, they would be circumcised.

Now, this was in the ancient world.

It literally says, take flint and sharpen it.

Those are rocks, okay?

They're just getting sharp rocks.

There's no scalpels, there's no anesthesia, there's no numbing anything.

This is really, really brutal.

And because they've been wandering in the desert for 40 years, this entire generation of men, none of them have been circumcised.

This is going to affect everyone.

And there's deep meaning and symbolism to why circumcision is the sign of the covenant.

And we don't have the time to go into all of it, but it is something that was painful, that cost them.

And what it did is it created an obvious difference between Israel and the rest of the people.

They were getting ready to go to take back the promised land.

The nations who now inhabited the promised land were idolaters, they were wicked, they were pagan, and they were incredibly evil.

These were barbaric nations, everyone was subjugated, the poor were subjugated, all women were subjugated, children were subjugated, and many children were sacrificed to their false gods while they were still alive.

These were very wicked people, and the Israelites were meant, as God's people, to stand apart.

The first thing this teaches us is to manage your miracle, you must be set apart.

You must be set apart.

The sign of the covenant was one of the things that set Israel apart.

The question then is what does that mean for us?

And this is where it becomes really important as you're growing in your faith to really learn how to handle scripture well.

This is one of the things that we teach in the Movement Academy here at MetaCurch.

We run two semesters a year.

Got a bunch of people in there right now.

We teach you how to handle the word properly.

And what you'll learn is in the Old Testament, God has a covenant between one nation and himself.

And we call this now the old covenant because it's been replaced by a new covenant.

And the new covenant comes from Christ.

God loved you so much that He came down to this world for us and he died in our place.

And he said, you no longer have to take a physical sign of the covenant, like circumcision.

You no longer are bound to the 613 Hebrew laws.

Now you come into covenant by faith and by faith alone.

That is the miracle of salvation.

And what's interesting is the New Testament goes on and it continues talking about circumcision, but it's a metaphor.

It talks about circumcision of the heart.

So men can breathe a sigh of relief.

We will not have circumcision inspection stations in front of our venues next week, right?

We're not going there.

That is Old Testament.

We're new covenant.

Instead, it talks about circumcision of the heart.

And so everyone can just go, whew.

The problem though is circumcision in the ancient world cost you.

And if we get it right, setting ourselves apart at the deepest level, what the New Testament calls the church to is setting ourselves apart in our hearts, in our souls, in our spirits, in our minds, in our relationships, in our finances, in our careers, and every aspect of our life, and I want to suggest that will cost you as well.

That will be some of the most painful work that you do in your life.

Cutting away at the things that are keeping you from God.

And we all have that because we all have a lot of pain in our life, and we've all developed coping mechanisms to deal with that pain.

And many of those coping mechanisms lead us into sin.

And we all have false narratives that keep us on the sidelines, convincing us that we aren't really built out for the kingdom of God.

And so we'll attend a church service every once in a while, but we're not gonna get crazy and actually really get involved because we're not really built for that anyway.

You have to start cutting away at those ideas, cutting away at those falsehoods, cutting away at the sin that keeps you at arm's length from your Savior who loves you so much.

You see, if we are not set apart, what do we have to offer the world around us that is desperate for hope?

If we are living hopeless lives, what do we have to offer a hopeless world?

If we are just living for instant gratification and temporary hedonistic pleasure, then we don't have a bigger vision of eternity to offer a world that knows they are meant for more but don't know where to find it.

So let's get really practical.

We are days away from election 2024.

Who's excited?

Nobody, right?

That's where we're at in the world.

Nobody's excited.

Everyone's just hoping civil war doesn't break out at this point, right?

Can we get this over with and whoever wins wins, and then please just let the world go back to normal.

It is so tense right now.

And we live in this world that is so incredibly divided.

And here's the narrative, and you know this, you hear it constantly.

If he wins, if she wins, oh, it's all over.

The world's over, civil war, impending doom, all hope is lost if the wrong person wins.

And what's so heartbreaking is to see Christians not just going along with this, but many pockets of Christianity actually pushing forward those same ideas.

And if you think that your hope, your joy, your peace, your future, your destiny, your miracles are contingent on who sits in the Oval Office, you must have forgotten who sits on the throne of heaven.

That's the only conclusion we can come to.

If people during election season, when everything is heightened, look, I want you to vote.

I want you to be informed.

Really, get informed.

You have a voice, we're in the culture, not of the culture, but in the culture.

We're living as pilgrims passing through, waiting for a greater day when we live in our eternal life.

But we're in it and we have a voice.

So use your voice and use it well.

But if we look exactly like the rest of the world during this election season, we are missing one of the greatest opportunities of our lifetime when everyone's hope is centered on something happening in the political sphere of our world.

We can show them there's a better way to live, and we are called to, and God expects us to.

We are called to be set apart.

If you want to manage your miracles, you must be set apart.

The greatest miracle, the first miracle, is the miracle of salvation.

That God loved you enough that he gave his life for you, and he offers you eternal life with God, the forgiveness of all of your sins.

And it's free, it costs you nothing.

And then you live out your salvation.

And to do that, you must be set apart.

The Israelites were circumcised, and as you can probably imagine, they took a few days of rest and relaxation.

They healed up, and then the next thing that they did in Joshua 5.10, it says, While the Israelites camped at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, they observed the Passover.

It was on the evening of the 14th day of the month.

They were camped at Gilgal, they were on the plains of Jericho.

They're in the miracle, but there are huge, huge battles ahead.

And they know this because at Gilgal they can see Jericho, and Jericho is a massive, fortified city, impenetrable walls, highly trained military.

The Israelites are just like a ragtag group of people.

They were slaves for 400 years, now they've just been wandering around in the desert for 40 years.

They're not a highly skilled, highly trained army, and yet they're going to have to take the promised land by force.

They're sitting at Gilgal, they can see Jericho, which means they can see their anxiety, they can see their worry, they can see their problem, and what they do is they stop and they take the Passover meal.

And if you don't know, the Passover meal at that point looked back 40 years to when God miraculously rescued his people out of Egyptian slavery.

And every element of the meal had meaning about Moses and Pharaoh and God and the plagues and their rescue.

What's interesting about this meal is that just through the process of receiving it and walking through the meal, it takes their attention off of themselves, off of Jericho, off the battles ahead, and puts their attention on God.

Hundreds of years later, Jesus came to earth, and the night before Jesus died, we call it the Last Supper, but if you read it in the Gospels, it was the Passover meal.

It was this same meal that Joshua and the Israelites were taking as they moved into the promised land.

And yet Jesus did something revolutionary, highly controversial, even blasphemous at the time.

The meal was prepared, and Jesus stood up and he took the bread and he said, I know this bread's been about Moses and Pharaoh and Egypt, but this bread is now about me.

This bread now represents my body that will be broken for you.

And likewise, the cup, this wine, this represents my blood, which will be spilled for you.

Jesus took the Passover and he said, From this day forward, you won't just think about Moses in Egypt and a rescue from Egyptian slavery.

You will think about the God of the universe stepping into your world to rescue you from slavery to sin.

And as we take communion together today across our venues, it shifts our focus up.

To manage your miracle, you must be set apart and you must be focused.

And we live in a world where we're constantly fighting battles and we pray and pray and pray for our miracle, and we get our miracle and realize, uh-oh, now I have to manage that miracle.

So many people are like, if I can just get married, if I can just find Mr.

Wright, if I can just find Mrs.

Wright, if I can just find my partner, if I can just find my soulmate, all my problems will be solved, I will be finally fulfilled, nothing will ever go wrong again, and all the married people are like, okay, okay.

And it's really not our fault, you know.

We grew up watching these Disney movies, and it convinces you if you just find the right foot to fit in the right slipper, you will live, you know it, happily ever after.

Like all you have to do is find your person and be like, I do.

I do.

And then it's just happiness and pillow fights and bliss, you know.

And what happens is you get married, and it's like, this is really tough.

It's big things, big ideological things.

You don't agree about things.

Your life rhythms are completely different.

One's an extreme extrovert, one's an extreme introvert, who's gonna win?

Hygiene things, you're all in love, and then like one month in you walk in the bathroom and she's brushing her teeth with your toothbrush, you're like, I didn't sign up for this.

This is crazy.

You think differently about disciplining the kids, about how often you're gonna attend Sunday services, fight and fight and fights.

And we know the statistics, a lot of marriages don't work out in our culture.

We think this way about kids, like, oh, I just, you know, it can be hard to have kids these days.

And if I could just have a kid, you know, everything would be great.

And I know they would be the perfect baby and the perfect toddler and the perfect kid.

And by the time they're a teenager, they'll be my very best friend.

And then you have these kids, and like you literally give them life and you keep them alive, and you feed them, and you give them everything they want, and then just there's like a countdown to puberty where like for four years they just look at you like you're the dumbest person on earth.

Every miracle that God gives us requires management.

We said since week one, God has all of the power, all of it, and in his power, he allows our participation.

And the question is, are you living set apart and are you focused?

Specifically, are you focused on God's power or are you focused on your own?

And the Israelites, who are an untrained ragtag group, focused on their own power, they would have never made it past Jericho.

But through the power of God, they had victory after victory after victory.

And you have a lot of strengths, you have a lot of talents, you're a very gifted group of people here at MetaCurch.

God has blessed you in so many ways.

But if you want to maximize your life, if you want to manage your miracles well, if you want to see victory after victory, then you will submit all of your strengths to the God who gave them to you, and in his hands, he can do exponentially more than you could ever imagine.

And what's crazy is that God, if you're willing, will do more with your weaknesses than you alone could do with your strengths.

God was calling for their faith, he was calling for their submission, and they were willing.

We must be set apart, we must be focused.

These first two steps to managing your miracles, the Israelites were first movers on.

They went and got the flint stones, they sharpened them up, they did the circumcision, they laid out the Passover meal, they went through it, they focused on God.

The third step was started by God.

It's very interesting.

In Joshua 5 11, it says, The day after Passover, they ate unleavened bread and roasted grain from the produce of the land.

They're in the promised land for 440 years, they dreamed of the land that was flowing with milk and honey.

That's a metaphor to say a land with boundless resources, and they're there.

So it's not odd that they're now eating from the produce of the land, but it is new.

You see, in the desert, they got out there and food was very hard to come by.

And the desert, the 40 years of wandering, that represents that time period between where you start praying for the miracle and where you're just trying to keep hope alive until you can get there.

And that can be long and it can be filled with pain and filled with doubt and filled with suffering.

That's that season between me having to get on stage and saying, We're not closing Helotus, but we are pausing Helotus.

And this is what we have to do for a season.

And in my mind, like six months later, we were going to reopen, and six months went by, and then a year went by, and then two years went by, and we're just kind of in the wilderness, just trusting God for this, you know.

And you can't really always see it in the moment, but God is providing for you.

That's what God did in the wilderness with the Israelites.

He said, If you will wait and hold on to faith, I will provide for you.

And he gave them what's called manna.

Mana from heaven.

Literally, food that God was dropping in front of their tents day after day after day.

In other words, in the wilderness, they did not have to work for their food.

Watch what happens though in verse 12.

The day after they ate from the produce of the promise, the manna ceased.

An entire generation, 40 years of never having to harvest, never having to hunt, never having to gather, and now all of a sudden, no more Doordash, no more Uber Eats, Amazon fresh.

It's not just gonna show up at their doorstep.

As soon as they ate from the produce of the promise, the manna sees.

Manna was very interesting.

We read about it in Exodus 16, 4.

The Lord said to Moses, I'm gonna rain bread from heaven for you.

The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day.

That was manna.

You got it for that day, you ate it that day, it was gone.

If you tried to say that it would spoil.

There's an old saying, if you teach a man to fish, he will eat that day.

But if you if you give a man a fish, he will eat for that.

I don't know how to fish, so I don't even have the metaphor.

I go, if you give a man a fish, he will eat for a day.

If you teach a man to fish, he will eat forever.

It's a similar.

If you give a man a manna, no, I'm not even gonna try that, right?

He just gets it for the day.

But they're growing.

And they're growing into this miracle, and the miracle must be managed.

And that happens in life.

You know, if if your children, if you give them three square meals a day and a roof over their head and a bed to lay in every night, you buy all of their clothes, you provide everything they need, and they're nine years old, that's exactly what you should be doing.

If you feed your kids three meals a day out of your kitchen, you keep a roof over their head, they sleep in a bed in your house, you buy all of their clothes and provisions, and they're 39 years old, now you are doing harm to them by not allowing them to mature into the miracle of adulthood.

God kept them in the wilderness and he provided for them so they could keep hope alive.

But they're not in the wilderness anymore.

They're not just trying to survive day to day.

They're now in the promise.

They are called to thrive and take ground.

That's where we are, meta church.

We are taking ground.

We just took ground in Helotus.

We have a presence there, a beacon of light and a world of darkness that will call people in, just like God has done here.

God has been moving for five and a half years.

139 people baptized this year, 569 people baptized since 2019.

God is moving and providing, and miracles are happening.

It will happen in Helotus.

It will happen in the next location, God gives us.

But this is not passive.

Jesus didn't come to start a church service.

I'm glad we have them.

It's an opportunity for you, the movement, to come together across our locations to get filled up and get ready to go out of those doors and be the church and make a difference.

God didn't come to, Jesus didn't come to start a religion.

It's not passive.

It's not something where you just sit in a seat and sing some songs and you've done your job.

See, the movement that Jesus started is a miracle.

And God always provides for you in the miracle.

Let me show you what happened in verse 12 again.

The day after they ate from the produce of the land, the manna ceased.

And since there was no more manna for the Israelites, they ate from the crops of the land of Canaan that year.

There's no more manna, but they are not going to starve.

They're building new skill sets.

They're becoming active in this pursuit.

And it teaches us a key lesson that there is always provision in the promise.

There is always the means inside the miracle.

And we miss it because we start looking to ourselves, we start looking to the world, we start looking to our addictions, we start looking to our relationships instead of setting ourselves apart and looking and focusing on the God who can provide all that you need and more than you can imagine.

There is always provision in the promise, and we've seen that.

We've been around five and a half, going on six years.

We've been through COVID, we've been through rough times.

We've walked through it and watched.

We started this movement in a bar, in the 151 saloon.

And guess what?

There was bounty in the bar.

God gave us a location at Petrenko.

There was provision at Petrenko.

There will be a harvest in Holodas.

God always shows up and provides in the promise if we walk into it with full confidence of the miracle that he has placed in front of us.

I want to go to Jesus because he lived this out.

Every moment of every day on earth, he lived this out.

And we need this.

It took a massive effort to get Metachurch multi-site.

This first step of many steps to see God's vision come to fruition.

It took a ton of work, it took a ton of time, strategy, it took a ton of money.

But God will provide.

We've seen it again and again.

We can count on him.

And Jesus knew this.

In John's gospel, Jesus and his disciples were going on a long trip.

They'd been walking all day long.

They were very tired.

The disciples went and looked for food, but they were in a very unique location.

They were in an area called Samaria.

These people did not know God.

They were marginalized from the rest of Israel.

They were looked down upon.

The disciples came back with some food and they offered it to Jesus.

Jesus responded in John 4 and said, My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.

Jesus said, My manna is my mission.

That's all I need.

To build the kingdom of God, to expand his territory, to reach new people.

As they sat there on the hillside overlooking the Samaritan people, Jesus continued, He said, Don't you say there are still four more months and then comes harvest.

Listen to what I'm telling you.

Open your eyes.

Look at the fields, because they are ready for harvest.

Jesus sat his disciples down who were still new, they were fresh, they were learning a lot.

The disciples who hated the Samaritans, they were deeply racist against them, they saw them as inferior, they didn't believe that God loved them.

Jesus looked across Samaria with his disciples and said, Do you not see that the fields are ripe with harvest?

That's where our provision is.

That's where our resources are.

That's where we find what we need to take us to the next level.

To manage your miracle, you must be set apart and you must be focused and you must be active.

The movement of Jesus is a movement that moves.

We say it all the time: what you're doing right now in our venues, this is not church.

This building is not the church.

You are the church.

You are the movement.

This is Sunday service, and it's important, but church really begins when you leave these buildings.

Church really begins when the people of God get on the move in our communities and in our neighborhoods and in your places of work and in the gyms where you work out, in the grocery stores where you shop, in your neighborhoods, among your family members who don't know Christ.

When we go out and begin to shine the light of Jesus as people who are set apart and focused and active, the movement of Jesus that we call church is a miracle.

Let me tell you how it worked.

The only reason there is a church is because a dead Jewish carpenter claimed that he was God and then walked out of his own grave.

That's it.

It was a miracle, and 40 days later, Jesus left and went back to his home in heaven, and he looked at ordinary, jacked-up people just like me and you.

He said, I've started a miracle, you manage it.

It's not passive.

In the movement of Jesus, we don't rely on manna.

This isn't something you show up to and go, Oh, someone else will fund it.

Someone else will use their gifts, someone else will volunteer, someone else will take care of it.

It's your movement.

And for us to reach our potential, everyone must be active in the movement.

You matter to this.

The apostle Paul was writing to the Corinthians, and he said, You are the body of Christ, and everyone plays a different function.

And you can't say, just because I am the big toe of the body, I'm out.

You know what you can't do if you don't have big toes?

Anything, right?

Like you matter to this movement, and the role that God is calling you into matters.

We must be set apart and focused, and we must be active.

I want us to look at Jesus once again in Matthew 9.

It says in verse 35, Jesus continued going around to all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness.

And when he saw the crowds, this is the same response he had looking over Samaria.

When he saw the crowds, he felt compassion for them because they were distressed and dejected, like sheep without a shepherd.

If there is a better line to describe the state of our culture, I don't know what it is.

Our culture is distressed and dejected, living without direction, living without hope, living like sheep without a shepherd.

We live in a culture that has rejected God, and yet the very person they rejected is the source of the hope they are so desperate for.

And the way that they learn that is when everyday people like me and you work to be set apart, focused, and active as a part of Jesus' movement.

Here's what he says: Jesus said to his disciples, the harvest is abundant, but the workers are few.

It's heartbreaking.

You know, Jesus lived with like the perfect spiritual vision.

He could just see it.

And I think if we're paying attention at all, it's obvious that the harvest is abundant.

The world is desperate for hope.

Crying out, the world is lost, deeply confused, putting their faith in a million things that will all let them down.

And we know the answer, and we know what hope is.

Hope has a name, hope is found in Jesus Christ.

We are the movement pushing that forward and proclaiming it, and yet Jesus saw the harvest is there.

The workers are few, busying themselves with religion and tradition, distracted by the things of this world that are causing all the division that only Jesus can solve.

My prayer for MetaCurch is that we push aside all of the things in our way, all of the religion, all of the history that has gotten in our way, all of the distractions, all of the politicization.

That God would look down on this movement.

One movement with one mission, meeting now in multiple locations, he would look down and say, the harvest is abundant.

And at Metachurch, the workers are ready.

The workers are plentiful.

They're very imperfect.

I know you, you know me.

We're not perfect, but we're working at it to set ourselves apart.

We're working at it daily to focus on Jesus.

We're working at it to get active into what God has called us to do.

From the beginning of MetaCurch, we have said growing the kingdom of God is expressed quite simply.

There are two things that all of us can do that will make a massive difference in our city, in our community.

We've always called you to invite and invest.

As you begin to follow Jesus, set apart, focused, and active, people will get curious about what is different about you.

Why you are not spiraling into depression during election season, why you treat your spouse differently than most people they observe, why you handle yourself differently.

And what just might connect the pieces is a simple invitation.

The people that you work with, the people you go to the gym with, the person who always ends up scanning your groceries at HEB.

It's like, how do I always get this person?

That's divine.

And all it takes is going, hey, uh, I go to Sunday services at Metachurch.

I'd love for you to come sit with me.

And what they'll think is, oh, that's why they're weird.

They're one of the Jesus people, you know.

But they just might come, and honestly, they might come out of curiosity.

And I can't tell you how many people who got curious about Christians ended up meeting Christ.

Their lives were changed forever.

We invite and we invest.

And there's a very simple truth that people invest in what they believe in.

And we are called to invest our time, our talents, our energy, and our resources into Jesus' movement.

To do it with joy, not under obligation, but by seeing it as the opportunity of a lifetime to join with the God of the universe in bringing hope to the world.

There are things inside of you that God is calling out.

You were created on purpose, and you were created with purpose.

And that purpose meets its potential by helping to build the kingdom of God.

And that is the opportunity that we have as the Church of Jesus Christ.

Would you pray with me?

As we close right where you're at, across our venues, if you bow your head and close your eyes, nothing magic about that.

Just create some space for yourself and for the people around you.

As we move into application, I wonder what are the miracles that God has brought to your life?

Your relationships, your resources, your career, your friends, the things that you sought God for and he delivered.

And my next question would be: how are you managing your miracles?

Are you living like the rest of the world, a world that does not know God, that lives without hope, that often lives without peace?

Or are you living with a clear sense of purpose and direction, your hope in eternity, your peace from God Himself?

What does it look like for you to be set apart?

What does it look like to get really truly focused?

Not on yourself, not on the world, but on God.

What does it look like to get active?

The movement of Jesus is a miracle, and we are part of that movement.

What does it look like to get active?

And I wonder if there are people at our venues today who have never taken claim of the most important miracle, the miracle of eternal life.

God loved you so much, he stepped out of heaven and into our world.

He did all the work for you, he lived a perfect life, he died in our place, and all that he asks is for our faith.

And by simply believing Jesus is who he says he is and has done what he says that he's done, all of your sins will be forgiven.

You'll be adopted into the family of God and you will be given eternal life, a gift that no one and nothing can ever take away from you.

The rest of the miracles God has waiting on you are on the other side of coming into relationship with him through faith in Jesus.

And so if you're here at one of our venues today and you've never had a moment in time where you have decided to put your faith in Jesus for this life and your eternal life, I want to give you the opportunity to do that.

With everyone's eyes closed, I want to ask you if today, for the first time, you're ready to put your faith in Jesus, to simply raise your hand.

It's a symbolic gesture that today I choose to put my faith in him.

Amen.

By raising a hand, what you're saying today is I choose to believe in Jesus.

And for those who have raised a hand, your sins are forgiven.

You've been adopted into the family of God, and you have received eternal life.

And what I want to do is I just want to very simply help you acknowledge this decision through a prayer.

And so I'm gonna ask at our venues for you to repeat this prayer with me.

And I'm gonna ask all the believers in the rooms to pray with us 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.