MetaVision: Captive Audience with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at Medichurch.

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.

Yeah.

Well, I want to welcome you in.

I want to thank you for being here today.

If you're new with us, my name's Clayton.

I'm the lead pastor here at MetaCurch.

We're in a very exciting series.

Last August, we started a series called Metavision with the tagline See What the Future Holds, and we laid out this big vision that God has given us for the next 5, 10, and 15 years.

Now we're back in MetaVision with a new tagline, Step Into the Future.

If you were here last week, you know that we talked about this week and next Sunday that we're gonna be taking practical steps of obedience in order to allow God to use our movement in the most powerful way possible.

Now, if you missed last Sunday, or if you missed any of the past Sundays and you want to get caught up, you can go to youtube.com slash metachurch.

All of our sermons, all of our past series are there.

Now, we are rooting this series and our vision out of the last instructions that Jesus gave to us before he ascended back to heaven.

We find this in Acts chapter one, verse eight.

Jesus said, You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

Now, last week we took our time and really looked at that word witnesses.

This is the new identity that Jesus is calling us into.

And we found that that is the same Greek word that eventually we got our word martyr from.

In other words, a witness is someone who shares about Jesus, who spreads the gospel, even at great cost to themselves.

This is what will have to happen for us to take our first step in this vision.

Here's what we believe in the next five years, we will have a meta church venue within 20 minutes of every person in San Antonio.

This is a big, audacious, God-sized dream that we believe if God's people, that's you, you are the church, you are the movement, if God's people will mobilize and move like he has called us to move, then we will actually see this come to fruition.

God is doing amazing things here at our Richland Hills venue.

He has been moving here for years, and uh we want to see that replicated again and again all across the city.

And today I want to hone in on the reason that it is so important for us to go to the ends of the earth.

My message today is captive audience.

Captive audience.

Would you pray with me?

Jesus, we love you.

We thank you for your great love for us.

Thank you for every person in this room, every person who's watching with us online.

God, we thank you for the vision that you've inspired us with to not sit still.

Jesus, you made it very clear that your movement, what we call the church, was meant to move.

And we just want to be obedient to that.

And so help us to that end.

I pray that you would bring clarity, Holy Spirit, that you would speak to us, and that we would be humble enough to listen.

We love you, and we pray these things in Jesus' name.

And everyone who's ready say amen.

Amen.

Um, we're gonna talk a little bit about mountains today, all throughout scripture, and really in the ancient world in general, mountains are seen as a place of divine revelation.

In fact, ancient people thought that mountains were the domain of the divine.

They didn't really have any concept in the ancient world of astronomy or how the solar system worked, or that there was a solar system, or that like the world wasn't flat.

They really didn't know a whole lot.

They thought that the tops of mountains were kind of where all of the deities uh were at.

And so the followers of the one true God had a little bit of a better understanding, and yet the very tops of mountains, the places where they never went, still held this kind of awe in their environment.

The psalmist gives us a little clue into this.

In Psalm 121, it says, I lift my eyes toward the mountains.

Where will my help come from?

And then the psalmist answers in verse 2 My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.

He lifts his eyes to the mountain because his help comes from the Lord.

This is how ancient people thought mountaintops, the dwelling place of the divine.

Now the plains were where the people lived, the flat ground, even sometimes down in the valley.

They are divine and we are not.

Our lives happen down low, where they're shaped by pain and trauma and hardship and sin.

And we see this idea all throughout the Old Testament as Israel is forced into one season of the proverbial valley after another.

The Old Testament tells the story of the Israelite people, and they had a very, very hard life.

At almost every turn, it seemed they were being captured or conquered or enslaved.

In Isaiah 52, it lays this out in just a few verses.

This is God speaking through Isaiah.

This is what the Lord says you were sold for nothing, and you will be redeemed without silver.

For this is what the Lord God says.

At first, my people went down to Egypt to reside there.

Then Assyria oppressed them without cause.

So now, what have I here?

This is the Lord's declaration that my people are taken away for nothing.

Its rulers well.

This is the Lord's declaration, that my name is continually blasphemed all day long.

Here's a little bit of the history of Israel laid out in short order.

Uh at first, they go down to Egypt, they end up slaves in Egypt for about ten generations.

Finally, they are freed.

After that, they're conquered by Assyria.

Finally, they're freed from Assyrian control.

Isaiah is writing to them in chapter 52, and now, after escaping Egypt, after escaping Assyria, they're now held captive in Babylon.

As a matter of fact, all of the valuable young men were removed from Israel and actually taken to Babylon, and Isaiah is writing a letter to them.

Life was very, very difficult.

It was normal for them to be conquered and captured and enslaved.

Once again trapped in Babylon, once again in bondage, once again feeling forgotten by God.

However, you need to know this, especially when life gets hard, God never forgets his people.

Eventually, a leader named Cyrus the Great came to power in Babylon and actually allowed the Israelites to be set free.

Isaiah in chapter 52 is prophesying that this is coming, but his prophecy holds even more weight than that.

Isaiah 52, 7 is going to be an important verse for us today.

And look at what he says.

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of the herald who proclaims peace, who brings news of good things, who proclaims salvation, and says to Zion, Your God reigns.

These ancient heralds were almost mythological in nature.

They had to be because they were on the tops of mountains.

The heralds could sprint impossible distances, they could climb impossible mountains, and then they would come and they would preach to a captive audience.

Literally, an audience who had been taken captive.

The herald was there to say, freedom is coming, because it always came.

Eventually they were freed from Egyptian slavery, flee for uh freed from Assyrian control, even freed from Babylon.

And every time they were set free, they thought the valley season was over.

And every time, they were wrong.

Even after they were freed from Babylon, captivity came again.

By the time Jesus came to earth, Israel once again was occupied.

This time they were occupied by the Roman Empire.

Just a devastating history all throughout the ancient time in Israel.

The little hope that the people could muster is that maybe their Messiah would one day come.

And in their mind, because they were so sick and tired of being conquered again and again and again, they had developed a picture of the Messiah that he would be a conqueror, that he would come as a king who would defeat Rome and give them back political freedom.

However, in the back of their mind, the pattern had to seem intractable.

I mean, even if we get freed from Rome, who's next?

We got freed from Egypt, Assyria came, we got freed from Assyria, and then Babylon came, we got free from Babylon, and now here's Rome.

Over and over it goes.

Now we look at the Old Testament and it tells the story of Israel, and the New Testament, most of it tells the story of the church.

But we as individuals in the church can learn from Israel.

It almost acts as a type, this thing that has patterns that we can look at and learn from.

We as individuals are often just like Israel as a nation.

We deeply desire freedom, but we find ourselves falling captive to all kinds of things on a personal level.

Captive to anxiety, to greed, to lust, enslaved by our own inner monologues that convince us that we aren't good enough or smart enough or worth anything.

We're held hostage by toxic relationships, we're drowning in debt, chained by our desperate need to please people or to be accepted.

And maybe you have been held captive enough in your life, not able to find freedom, freedom of spirit, freedom of purpose, freedom of your mind, freedom of your finances.

Maybe you've been held captive long enough that even when you finally get over one hurdle, you just assume another one is on the way because that's how life seems to work.

Here's what Jesus said while he was on earth.

Jesus responded, Truly I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.

Without the freedom that can be found only in Christ, we are the captive audience.

We spend our lives waiting for someone to come and rescue us, but the rescue is only ever temporary.

And then we're back at it.

We're back in the addiction, back in the toxic relationship, back seeking significance through sexual encounters.

What if freedom is actually possible in our lives?

If it was, we could join with Isaiah and proclaim how beautiful are the feet of those who proclaim freedom for the oppressed.

And this is why Jesus came.

Jesus stepped into the picture and he spoke with authority, like no one had ever heard, and he demonstrated power that no one had ever seen.

And everywhere he went, more and more people accepted his message.

The revolution seemed like it was starting, hope was building, however.

Every time it felt like people were ready to actually hand their lives over to Jesus, he would teach these hard, hard messages, and ultimately it would turn people away.

Let's back up a few verses from John 8:34 and see about what it means to be slaves to sin.

John 8:34

In verse 31, Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, If you continue in my word, you really are my disciples.

They were fine with that.

Then he said, You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

I mean, this is the offer of what they've been longing for their entire lives.

True, actualized freedom.

A life that is fully and finally liberated.

And he's saying, I can give it to you.

If you know the truth, the truth is going to set you free.

But that's not the kind of freedom they were looking for.

They're not looking for spiritual freedom, they're not looking for emotional freedom, they're not looking for financial freedom, they're not looking for relational freedom, they're looking for political freedom.

And so instead of taking this well-meant offer that Jesus could change and transform their lives and give them hope and peace and power like they've never experienced before, instead, they're offended.

In verse 33, they say, We are descendants of Abraham.

And we have never been enslaved to anyone.

Now, is that true?

It's the exact opposite of true.

They've almost never not been enslaved to anyone.

Y'all like that grammar?

The English teachers in the room are dying right now.

They've almost never not been enslaved to anyone.

It's like as soon as Egypt got rid of you, then Assyria came, then Babylon came, and finally you had a few years, and now Rome, right now, as they're saying, we're the children of Abraham.

We've never been enslaved to anyone.

They're literally enslaved to someone right then and there.

They're offended.

We've never been enslaved to anyone.

How can you say you will set us free?

You see, this is what pride does.

And what's so brutal is that when you are most enslaved to your sin, you are least likely to admit it.

This is what pride does.

Someone comes to you in love and tries to assess an issue you have in your life, and you're like, I don't have a problem.

I'm not a slave to anyone.

What are you talking about?

It's not that bad.

They're not that bad of an It's just a habit.

It's not an addiction.

I can quit anytime I want.

I'll start saving after this purchase.

It's fine.

My wife understands.

This is what pride does.

Literally, the most enslaved nation ever throughout human history.

We've never been enslaved to anyone.

This is when Jesus responds.

Truly, I tell you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.

Isn't that interesting?

That Jesus could have gone on the tirade I just went on, which is why I'm not Jesus, you know?

Like what are y'all talking about?

Someone bring me a history book.

You've never been enslaved to anyone?

That's me if they say that to me, right?

Which is why I'm not Jesus.

I'm trying to live more like him, but I'm not Jesus.

Jesus doesn't care.

He doesn't care about Rome.

Jesus, before he came to earth, was residing in heaven.

He's the agent of all creation.

He sees the end from the beginning, in the beginning from the end.

Rome, the most powerful empire in the world, is not a problem for Jesus.

So he doesn't even address the absolute insanity of what they just say.

He just stays on task.

He stays on mission.

Anyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.

You're a slave to Rome, also, but I'm not worried about that.

I'm worried about the fact that even if you get freedom from Rome, you still won't be free.

We live in the freest country that the world has ever seen.

Literally, that's, you know, there's a lot of like political tension and everything right now.

That is still true.

Nobody has the guaranteed freedoms that we have in America, and no one literally ever has.

And yet we may be one of the most enslaved societies that has ever existed.

Not to a political power, not to some outside oppressive force, but to our own sin.

Jesus offers freedom and they take offense.

We don't need you, Jesus, to set us free in some metaphorical way.

If we sin, we'll go offer some sacrifices at the temple.

We need you to drive out Rome.

Are you the Messiah?

If you are, then do the Messiah thing.

And Jesus just keeps teaching, telling people to love their enemies, to pray for their persecutors, to love their oppressors.

And the more obvious it becomes that Jesus is not going to fight for a military victory, the more people begin to desert his cause.

And it's why some of the same people who laid down palm branches and said, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, a few days later cried out, crucify him.

It turns that fast when God doesn't turn out to be who you wanted him to be.

And they just simply missed it.

Jesus didn't come to bring temporary relief from a political enemy.

And I'm going to say that again, because we're in an election year.

Jesus did not come offering you temporary relief from a political enemy.

Whatever happens in November, Jesus did not come, and his primary target is not for you to have temporary relief because of who you might see as your political enemy.

Freedom, rebellion, captivity, exodus.

Freedom, rebellion, captivity, exodus.

Again, and again, and again.

And you maintain freedom by giving proper worship to God.

And when you rebel against God, you become a slave to sin.

Not because God has changed.

God never changes.

But because you move yourself out from under his blessing.

Freedom, rebellion, which leads to captivity, and then God intervenes and brings exodus, relief.

Jesus came to break the cycle and to deal with our captivity on an eternal level.

You need to know that.

That what Jesus is offering is spiritual and eternal first and foremost.

And you need to know that because there are plenty of false teachers who will tell you that you'll know whether or not God's blessings on your life, and you'll know whether or not you are exercising enough faith based on whether or not you wake up in Gucci slippers and drive your Lambo to your newest mansion.

Like only then is the blessing of God on your life.

And that teaching is anathema to scripture.

It is cursed by scripture.

That is a different gospel and not the gospel that Jesus brought.

God may bring material possessions into your life.

You may have talents that lead you to great resources, but those resources are fuel for your mission that God has placed on your life, and your mission is spiritual in nature.

It's not physical, it's not material, it's not political.

When we take a political cause and we say we are Christian Republicans, Christian Democrats, Christian socialists, you don't get to put adjectives on what Jesus started.

We are just Christians.

We're foreigners in this world.

We are pilgrims passing through.

If you cannot rise above your political swaying to love the people who are on the opposite side of the aisle than you, you don't understand your assignment.

If someone votes different than you and you cannot be in a friendship with them, you don't understand your assignment.

You are captive.

You're enslaved.

I'm not saying don't have political opinions.

Have them.

Have conviction.

But know your priorities.

We are called to a spiritual mission.

We are called to something that transcends this world.

We've never been captive to anyone or anything.

You're captive to everyone and everything.

Until Christ reigns supreme in your life, you are captive.

We live in a world broken by sin.

And when the world around us determines the quality of our life, the peace that we live with, the fluctuation of our hope, as long as that's the case, you're captive.

And Jesus came to preach to a captive audience that there is freedom, and freedom is found not by political might, not by victory in this world, not by riches.

Victory is won by you putting your faith in Jesus and living a life in the Lord.

This is what Jesus said.

You will have suffering in this world.

But be courageous because I have conquered this world.

Our hope is not in eternal circumstance.

Rich or poor, resident or foreign, male or female.

Scripture says we all have hope in Christ.

Our freedom from captivity positions us to be in any state or situation during our time on earth and still be the freest person in the room.

Still have the most joy.

Still have the peace that passes understanding.

Still have perfect hope for our future.

Jesus conquered the world by dying on the cross for sins and rose again.

And here's the thing if you're here or you're streaming with us right now on this rainy day, you need to know that if you have never had a moment where you have put your faith in Jesus, then you are held captive by your sin.

You are chained to your sin.

And what it's holding you back from, first and foremost, is a relationship with your Heavenly Father.

Our sin separates us from our God.

And unless someone comes and breaks the chains of that captivity, we will be held separate from our God in this life and in the life to come.

And Jesus came and died on the cross.

Cross and paid the price to bail you out, to set you free, and get you back to the life with your Heavenly Father that you were created to live.

Until you are connected to Jesus, you will be captive.

Death is coming.

Ooh, I'm about to encourage you.

Death is coming.

And it comes for everybody.

Death and taxes, right?

This year I'll take death, honestly, taxes.

Boy.

You can count on it.

It's coming.

We don't like to think about it.

If you don't have an answer for death, then you're captive to it.

If you don't have an answer for death, then at some level, you're probably fearful of it.

And if you don't have an answer for death and you're not fearful of it, that's even worse.

You're a nihilist.

Which means you don't value your life.

Which means you're a captive.

An inner monologue that's convinced you you don't have worth.

You can be set free by the one person who can answer the question.

By the one person who can guarantee your value by showing you that your life was worth the life of the Son of God.

So Jesus played his role and is playing his role.

But he handed his mission on earth over to us.

Which is why after he died and after he rose and before he ascended, he gave us our marching orders.

You will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.

The movement that Jesus started was expected to move.

His followers were expected to do whatever it takes to get the message of Jesus to as many people as possible, which means followers of Jesus are expected to be witnesses.

Witnesses, spreading the message of Jesus even at great cost to ourselves.

I think I have time for this.

It's not scripted.

If I don't have time, I won't do it in the other two services.

So yeah, I got a little bonus.

I was teaching a class in our academy here yesterday morning for about three hours.

And uh I was walking people through the entire story of scripture, and we got to the Tower of Babel, and I explained how I was always taught that story, and they always left off the most important part coming up, like in Sunday school, right?

And what they would say is, uh, you know, let's build a tower, this is what the text says, uh, as high as the sky, and make a great name for ourselves.

And that's what I would be taught, that it was pride.

They were prideful.

And God punished them and confused their language because they're pride, because they wanted to, you know, build a skyscraper, because they were prideful.

And that was like basically the message that I was taught.

Maybe you were taught that as well.

But that's not the end of the verse.

They say, so we will make a great name for ourselves and not be scattered throughout the earth.

That's the actual sin of the Tower of Babel, Genesis 11.

Why is that a sin?

Well, you see, the mandate in the Old Testament was to be fruitful, multiply.

You know what the third one is?

To fill the earth.

It's a mandate from God.

Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the earth.

But their technology increased.

They didn't have to build structures out of stone.

They learned how to make oven-fired bricks.

They learned how to create a mortar, which meant they could build much bigger structures.

And so, like technology often does, instead of being a great tool for our purpose, it becomes a distraction and leads us into sin.

And so this new technology allowed them to build something big enough for everyone to live in.

And they decided if we did that, we could stay comfortable.

And how convenient would it be if instead of doing what God told us to do and fill the earth, we could all just build a high rise and stay right here.

Why does the Tower of Babel matter?

It matters because God told them to fill the earth.

And their sin was that they tried to stand still.

That's the Old Testament.

And now we're in the New Testament.

And Jesus said, You will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, in Samaria, and you will fill the earth with my message.

And somewhere along the way, we've gotten convinced that church means building one building.

Sitting still, being comfortable, prioritizing convenience.

It's the same sin of Babel.

To the ends of the earth.

Matthew's gospel, Jesus says, and you will go into all of the world and preach this gospel.

That's what we're called to do.

We are called to move even at great inconvenience to ourselves, even as martyrs, which many people were in the first three centuries of the church.

They actually gave their lives to get this movement around the world, which is why we're here today on the other side of the world.

This is what happened.

The early church took this seriously.

The apostles, which just means the sent ones, they took this very seriously.

Let's look at the apostle Paul.

Here's how he understood it.

He says in Romans 10, this is the message of faith that we proclaim.

If you confess with your mouth Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Someone say, Amen.

One believes with the heart, resulting in righteousness, and one confesses with the mouth, resulting in salvation.

For the scripture says, everyone who believes on him will not be put to shame.

To summarize, in verse 13, Paul says, everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

Everyone, everyone, anyone, anywhere can put their faith in Jesus and receive eternal life.

And this matters because everyone, everywhere, is living captive.

Everywhere the gospel proclamation goes, it goes out to a captive audience, captive to their sin, captive to their fear, captive to their shame, captive to their addictions.

And Jesus came to set people free.

What Paul's doing in Romans 10 is he's explaining why we must take this message to the ends of the earth.

Here's how he explains it.

How then can they call on him if they have not believed him?

And how can they believe without hearing about him?

And how can they hear without a preacher?

And how can they preach unless they are sent?

Paul is using a series of rhetorical questions to emphasize an obvious point.

The life-changing message of Jesus is open to everyone, but how can anyone believe in Jesus if they've never heard of him?

And how can they hear if no one preaches the message?

And how can they hear a preacher if no preacher is sent?

Now, we know we've all been sent.

Jesus told us, you will be my witnesses to the ends of the earth.

What Paul does next, I'm going to show you the rest of verse 15, is he links his argument all the way back to Isaiah.

Here's the end of 15.

How can they preach unless they are sent as it is written?

How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news.

Paul quotes Isaiah, an Old Testament prophet.

Let me remind you what Isaiah says.

We saw this earlier.

How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of the herald who proclaims peace, who brings news of good things, who proclaims salvation, who says to Zion, your God reigns.

This is what we do here every week.

Every week we proclaim peace to people who are living in turbulence.

Every week we come into a world of darkness and we shine light.

And every week we offer a gospel, the only thing that can say, This is what we do here.

And this is what we will do in Helotus.

As we open our next venue this year, we must go because we are called.

And there are people who are a captive audience.

They need Jesus.

They think they need more money.

They don't.

They'll get the money eventually and be even more miserable.

They think they need a few more sexual partners to finally feel like they're worth something.

They don't.

They will only feel emptier.

They think that they just need a promotion.

They don't.

They need Jesus.

And how will they find Jesus if there is not a group of people who are willing to break the paradigm that church is a building that you go and sit in once a week and instead start living as the church, becoming witnesses, sharing the gospel, spreading the gospel, creating new environments and new communities, even at great cost to ourselves.

This is so motivating to me personally.

You are sent.

I am sent.

Scripture could not be more clear about this.

And what Paul does by quoting Isaiah is he brings us back to this moment where Israel is actually captive.

He's saying, the way that we were in bondage, occupied in a foreign land in Babylon, the world is captive by sin.

No longer are the mountaintops and the heralds reserved for angelic beings.

We are now called to be the heralds, proclaiming peace, proclaiming salvation, proclaiming the good news.

You realize what Paul has done is he has linked you and your life to the ancient program of God to rescue his world.

That is what your life was created for.

The skills you have, the career you're in, the family you're in, the neighborhood you exist in, all of it.

God wants to use every single piece of it for people who will start living on purpose and with purpose to make a difference in the world.

I want to remind you, our mission at MetaCurch, we do whatever it takes to get people to Jesus.

And our vision to open more locations around this town, our vision is we do whatever it takes to get Jesus to people.

If we can't get them to come to us all the way on the east side, all the way on the north side, all the way on the south side, we will go to them.

We will create more and more opportunities to get Jesus to people, to create new spaces, new communities for people to discover their purpose and live the life they were created to live.

Now, some of you have started attending MetaCurch in the last couple of years, and you may or may not know that all the way back in January of 2020, when MetaCurch was only one year old, we started a venue in Helotus.

In the same building we're about to open up our venue in.

Now, it was January 2020, and so it's probably not lost on you that just a few weeks later it got shut down by COVID-19.

When we were finally able to open, Helotus did reopen for a short period, and then God gave us this building out on Richland Hills.

And it was obvious to us at that time we needed to bring all the troops together to be able to manage this new space that God had given us.

But when we stepped out of Helotus, I was very clear.

We are not closing this venue.

We are pausing this venue.

And we put our money where my mouth was.

We kept our lease these entire four years.

It's not a great business decision.

We were paying for an empty building most of that time.

We believed so strongly, though, and we had seen evidence already of God's move out there.

We believed that God had called us to be his witnesses to the ends of the earth, and that his movement was meant to move.

So in faith, we kept our lease alive.

We prayed for the right time.

And the time has come.

And all it takes is for some of us to get off the sidelines and get in the game to become witnesses.

It will cost you comfort and convenience, some security, time, energy, and effort.

But if you're willing to do it, we will see amazing things all around us.

I want to show you real quick just one story of how God is our Holotus venue the first time.

Prior to Meta, and even prior to COVID, we attended a church that was great for a season of our life, but we got to this point where we knew God had different plans for us, but we didn't know what that meant.

And so COVID hit, and then we really fell into this comfort trap.

Um the struggles that we had were is this all that God has for us, or does he have more for us in attending church?

We were invited by a friend of ours, a really good friend of ours, who doesn't go to Meta, so it was very much a God encounter.

And when we got here, we realized it was a very small congregation in Pilotus.

And again, we were expecting our comfort, we were expecting to stay where we were at, but God moved immediately.

As soon as we we got there, we were moved by the praise and worship, we were moved by the word, we were moved by the message, and we were moved by the people.

And the more we got there, and the more we kept coming, the more we then got involved.

It was just incredible the movement that God had in my family's life, and then it became obvious that this was where we're supposed to be.

So MetaCurch has helped me as a family because my whole family volunteers together on these Sunday mornings when the four of us are back there.

It's crazy seeing all these children, and it's just it's something so powerful that if we can help them even a little bit be excited about coming to church, there's something so powerful about that that my family gets to be a part of that movement.

We have a heart for our community in the Lotus, and so when that announcement was made that the Lotus venues are opening back up, uh my wife and I were excited, and and I'm surprised the neighbors didn't hear us how loud we cheered.

And we immediately knew that God put it on our hearts that that's where we wanted to be, um, because that's where we always wanted to be.

The truth is, we want to invite the people in our community.

Proximity becomes a challenge, and this fulfills the whole vision we talked about to the ends of the earth is you want people within 15 minutes of everybody in San Antonio, and we just feel that, right?

That's exactly what we feel.

We can help that in Helotus and help invite the people that are part of our lives, part of our community.

If the Lotus venue would not have opened, I would not be a part of Meta today.

God created this window, this small little window where the Helotas venue was open, and we were there, we fell in love with the church, and we like to think that proximity shouldn't disqualify where we go to church, but it does.

Like you're looking for a local community.

And if it wasn't for that time of me being at Helotus, for our family being at Helotus, we would have definitely probably tried to find something local, or we'd still be at YouTube on doing YouTube church.

The things that Meta's done here at Richland Hills and see that expand out to Helotus and then beyond from there.

It's something super exciting, something my my family is just honored to be a part of.

They have become some of the key volunteers for our Medikids program.

Um if you've been to a daddy-daughter dance and seen the extraordinary designs of the room, uh Crystal leads all that.

I mean, it's huge, the impact they've had here.

And it's because we came to where they were.

This matters.

And so on October 20th, this year, we're going to reopen our Holotus venue.

This is going to be our first step of many steps.

We will keep pushing for as long as MetaCurch exists to get the gospel to the ends of the earth.

It's not about Meta, it's about the church.

It's about the movement that Jesus started 2,000 years ago.

And I don't really care what anyone else does, but we in this community, we will organize ourselves.

And I will continue to urge us that eternity is coming and how we live matters.

And we're called to be witnesses, to spread the gospel, even at great cost to ourselves.

And so let me tell you what we need.

Last week we said over the next two weeks, which is this Sunday and next, we will do our first launch.

And we're making two calls because we're not just opening a location like we have this main thing and then we have another thing.

We're going into a multi-location model, which means we're gonna try to have the same experience at Richland Hills that we have at Helotus.

We are one vision all together, all the metachurch locations, one vision that meets in multiple venues.

That's how we're gonna move forward.

When you go to Helotus, everything will be live, live music, a venue pastor who's helping connect you.

There'll be a kids' program, a welcome team.

But to keep us all on the same page, everyone will hear the same sermon.

Whoever preaches on any given Sunday will be broadcast into all of our locations, so we're all on the same page.

And we just need help.

We're calling for two things today.

Number one, we're calling for a Helotus launch team.

And number two, we are calling right here at Richland Hills to help bolster our current volunteer teams.

So let me explain a little bit about both of those.

Uh, the Holotus launch team, these are people, at least 40 people we need over the next two weeks.

We need at least 40 people who are willing to raise a hand and commit the next 18 to 24 months of their life to standing up this new venue and making it successful.

We're not asking you to attend Helotus.

We're asking you to be a witness.

We're asking you to serve.

And honestly, we're asking you to serve in the place that you're most needed to serve, even if it's not where you're most wanting to serve.

This is like a sacrificial team.

Beyond that, we're gonna be having interest meetings with the community, vision night, marketing events.

We want you at as many of those things as you can be.

We genuinely want you to join with our staff, to join with Pastor Tony, and to be on the team.

And so, as service dismisses, if you want to be a part of the Holotus Launch team or find out more information, they're gonna be meeting right out on the patio.

Swing that patio door open because it's really dark over there, and I want people to see, get ready to be blinded over here.

Yeah, there it is.

That's the patio, if you don't know.

That's where Holotus Launch Team will be meeting now.

The 40 plus people who are gonna go to Helotus, my guess is the majority of them will be current Richland Hills volunteers, which means we need to backfill those positions and Richland Hills is growing.

We had 1,400 at Easter, we had a thousand at Baptism Weekend, we will need to be in four services probably by 2025, which means we need people to step up and help us run our Sunday services.

So if you're here at Richland Hills, this is where God has you.

This is your mission field, this is where we live as witnesses.

And so if that's you, it's time to get off the sideline and in the game.

And so we will have a volunteer fair under the driveway after service.

If God's called you to Richland Hills and you're ready to get involved, we have a huge need in Medikids, but we also have a production team, a music team, a welcome team, a connect team, a prayer team.

Takes a lot to run our Sunday services.

There is somewhere that you can fit and have a meaningful role.

And so you go under the driveway, check all of that out.

When we dismiss you, we have ended service early, right?

We believe in miracles here.

I preached a short sermon today.

We got out early so that you can go check out Holotus, go check out our volunteer teams.

We need probably 50 to 100 people to volunteer with us at Richland Hills.

You can do that before you check your kids out of Medikids.

So we've given you about 10 minutes to go do what you need to do, but don't forget your kids after that, right?

You still gotta check them out and bring them home.

Um, let me pray over us that God will continue to use us to set the captives free and find freedom in our own life.

Jesus, we love you.

I pray you would begin stirring the hearts of the people right now, of where you are calling them to be a witness.

For some, that could be getting things started.

Brand new in Helotus.

For some, that could be supporting the ongoing work here at Richland Hills.

God, we are praying for at least 40 in Helotus.

We are praying for at least 50 here at Richland Hills.

God, that we would not be in the church to be served by the church, we would be in your movement to serve your movement.

Help us make that paradigm shift.

With everyone's eyes closed, and before we leave, I wonder if there's anyone here today or are streaming with us online who has never put their faith in Jesus.

And as we were going through the gospel today, you realized you are still captive.

You've never had a moment of belief and allowed Jesus to set you free, to give you eternal life, the promise of hope.

If that's you, you've never had a moment where you've put your faith in Jesus.

I want to ask you right now, in this moment, to just lift your hand where only I can see it.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Jesus is getting ready to set people free.

So we're gonna close.

If you lifted your hand, Jesus sees your faith and accepts it.

And all I want to do is help you acknowledge that faith.

And so if you raised your hand, I want you to pray this with me.

All who call upon the name of the Lord will be saved.

And I want to ask every believer in the room to pray this as well.

Let's pray together.

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

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

I thank you for loving me and forgiving my sins.

Now let me pray over you, Jesus.

We celebrate you setting the captives free.

And we are unbelievably humbled that you have called us to be the heralds of that good news, to be the beautiful feet on the mountaintops proclaiming salvation to a world held captive.

Help us to stop at nothing as a movement to get your gospel to the ends of the earth.

Let it be so in our lifetime.

We pray it all in Jesus' name.

And everyone said, Amen.

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.