Welcome To Church | Vision | Matthew 28:18-20, Habakkuk 3:2 | Coleton Segars

Growing up in school, um and uh I was pretty good at school.

I made good grades for the most part, and uh also growing up I played baseball and was pretty competitive.

I really enjoyed playing baseball, and uh all of those things were going pretty well until about seventh grade.

And then at like seventh grade, um my grades started to slip a little bit, and um my batting average started to go down, and I was not playing as well.

And my dad, you know, asked the question that any good father asks, he's like, What type of drugs are you on?

I was like, I don't, I don't know drugs.

I and I didn't.

I wasn't doing I wasn't doing the drugs.

Uh I was into like Coca-Cola, like that was the drug.

Um, and so like I but I was like, I'm I'm not it's not a thing, I'm not doing that.

And um, and he was like, Well, what is it?

I was like, I don't know.

And then one day on the baseball field, it all came to a head where I was playing in the outfield and they hit me just this standard pop fly, and it was dark, and I looked up and I could not find the ball, and it fell like right beside my face and like just nicked my face a little bit.

My dad was like, What is wrong with you?

What drugs are you on?

Like, and uh I was like I did not I did not see the ball.

And so at that moment he uh thought, like, hey, maybe we should take you to get your eyes checked.

And so never been to the eye doctor before, and uh my brother who was older than me didn't have eye issues or anything like that, but went to the eye doctor and they're like, my vision was like 2400.

Like the standard is 2020, or the the best is 2020, and then um I think legal blindness is 2200.

I was 2400, and I was like 12 years old, and um all of a sudden I got glasses, and the guy gave me glasses, and I was like, Do you people live like this all the time?

Like, can you see?

Like, look at the detail of like your face.

Um truly, it was it was remarkable, like the difference of like having my vision repaired and being able to see.

All of a sudden, I was able to see the whiteboard at school and able to see the baseball when it was coming up my face, and like just normal stuff that other people could see.

And uh it changed my life.

And so I say all of that because it's if it's not evident to you, like vision is important, being able to see clearly is very important.

And so what I wanted to do in the next eight weeks of our church is really to do this series called Welcome to Church at Christ Community Church.

Welcome to church, and just kind of outline very clearly, hopefully very clearly, our vision for a church.

Um, because I think vision is important not just for an individual, I think vision is important for an organization, especially a church.

Because there's so many different churches around, there's so many different denominations around, and you can go into one, and it's like, what is this church actually about?

And the goal of this series would be that the average person attending our church, being a part of our church, would be able to very clearly state, I know what our church is about, I know the direction that we're headed, I know the vision that they have and where they're aiming, I know where that is, and you're able to communicate that, not only to yourself, but also to other people if they asked you.

And so the goal of this series is to do that.

Outline the vision clearly, and then help explain some of the terms of our vision, what we mean by some of the language that we say.

Again, so that it is more clear, so that there's clarity here.

And so, to begin, our vision as a church, where we're headed, what we want to build and develop, our vision as a church is to develop a community of followers of Jesus who practice the way of Jesus so that the fame and deeds of God are repeated in our time.

We want to develop and build towards a community of people who are following Jesus, practicing the way of Jesus, so that they experience the fame and deeds of God in their time and in our time.

And so, just out of that, I want to answer two questions.

One, what do I mean by practice the way of Jesus?

Because I think sometimes it's like it's it's insider language, it's something that's so clear to me, but sometimes isn't clear to other people.

And then what do I mean by fame and deeds of God?

And then why is this our vision?

And so I want to explain just here's here's what I mean when I say practicing the way of Jesus, here's what I mean when I say fame and deeds of God, and then here's why that's our vision and what it means for our church.

And so practice the way of Jesus.

What do I mean?

To practice the way of Jesus is to take Jesus' way of living life and how he would have us live and to make that your way of life, to take his way of living life and just make that your way of living life.

This is what he says in Matthew 16.

He says, Whoever wants to be my disciple, anybody can, but if you want to be my disciple, my student, my follower, that person must turn away from oneself, turn away from their way, take up one's cross and live a life of following me.

That's what it means to be a Christian, really.

That's what it means to go after Jesus.

That's what it means to practice his way.

You give up your way of doing things, and you take on his way of doing things, regardless of the cost, which is why the cross is taken is a part of that, regardless of what it costs you, and you let him lead you.

He's always in the front of you, never behind you.

He's never to the side of you, and you're going your way, and he's going his way.

He's always in the front leading.

And so it's to give up your way of doing things in every area of your life.

Like I would do things this way, but I don't do it that way because I follow Jesus, so I do it, do it his way.

All of us, every single person, has someone or something that we follow in every area of our life.

We have something or someone guiding and directing, and then we're following behind them, and it dictates every decision that we make.

And so we have a way of living life that we practice.

I practice this way of living life with my money.

I practice this way of living life with my work.

I practice this way of life with how I treat my friends, my enemies.

We practice a way of life in every single area of our lives.

I practice this way in my dating relationships, I practice this way in my marriage.

Something is dictating the flow of our lives towards those areas.

How we speak, how we treat our spouse, how we parent our kids.

There is something or someone that's determining how we operate inside those things.

If you think of an operating system in a computer and a phone or something like that, I have an old phone that doesn't have Siri, so I can speak to it all day, like, hey Siri, hey, I can actually I can't do it right now, my phone will start talking back to me.

Um but if I do that to that phone, it has a way of functioning that it doesn't have that.

It doesn't have that capability.

But if I say that to this, it will respond and interrupt me and talk back to me and be like, what do you want to know?

Like it has a different operation and operates in a different way.

And so for us in all these different areas of our lives, we have something that's guiding the way we make decisions in that particular area of our lives.

It's something or someone that's determining that stuff.

And so for many people, it can just be yourself.

I do what I want to do when I want to do it.

I'm led and I follow my feelings.

If I feel it, I do it.

I am, I practice the way of how I feel.

I want to eat that food, I want to drink that drink, I want to talk that way.

I want to, I feel you made me angry, therefore I'm gonna respond in anger.

I feel angry, therefore you see my anger.

You are following the way of yourself, you're following the way of your feelings.

You can do it, you can have a way of other people.

I act and live the way that other people want me to act and live.

My way of work is not how I want to work, my way of work is how my boss tells me to work.

I don't want to lose my job, and so I work the way that he wants me to work or she wants me to work.

It can be our culture.

I do what the world says is right for me to do.

Whatever the majority says is correct, I live that way.

My morals, my beliefs, everything is dictated and guided by what do the majority say, and I'll just fall in line with the majority.

And so we live by whatever the culture says.

Or it can be how you're raised.

I raise my kids this way because my parents raised me this way.

I raised my kids, or I don't raise my kids that way because my parents raised me that way, and I hated it, so I do it differently.

But the way is still guided by something or someone, and so it can be by how you're raised.

All of us have something.

All of us have something dictating the way that we do things in every single area of our lives.

There's something guiding that.

And so to practice the way of Jesus is to take all of those ways that we would do things and to set them aside and go, I'm not gonna do things this way, how I was raised or the culture or my family of origin or just how I feel, I'm not gonna practice those ways.

I'm actually gonna take Jesus' way and how he would have me live these areas of my life, and I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it his way, setting aside those other things in order to do it his way.

So, for example, I'm gonna give you a couple of examples.

If you are a person who holds grudges or and speaks rudely to other people, if that's who you are.

Don't do that.

But if that's who you are, you hold grudges and speak rudely to others.

You cannot say, I do that because I practice the way of Jesus.

And the reason you can't say I hold grudges and practice and speak rudely to others, the reason you can't say I practice the way of Jesus in that, because he would never tell you to hold grudges or to speak rudely to other people.

And so you're not practicing his way in that.

However, if you seek to forgive the people who wrong you and you speak kindly to others even when they don't deserve it, you could say, I'm doing that because I'm practicing the way of Jesus.

That's how he would have me interact in that particular area of my life.

That's how he would have me deal with people who wronged me.

And so I'm practicing his way.

If you're someone who overspends and isn't generous or sacrificial with your finances or resources, you could not say, Well, the reason I overspend and the reason I'm not generous is because I follow Jesus.

No, that doesn't work because he would actually tell you to live wisely with your finances, to not overspend, and to actually give sacrificially and be generous to other people because that's who he is.

And so you could say, I overspend or I don't give generously.

You could say, I'm practicing that, I'm doing that because I practice the way of my selfishness.

I practice the way that I want to spend my money.

I want, I practice the way of my just gut, what I want to do.

And I feel like I want that thing, so I'm going to go get it.

I practice the way of vanity.

I feel like I need that thing in order to prove something to other people or to be seen a certain way.

And so the way of vanity tells me, buy it even when you can't afford it, to show other people that look, look what I have.

You could practice the way of the culture, and you could say that.

Why do you overspend?

Why do you do that?

Well, because everybody else lives this way.

I practice the way of my culture.

Most people live with tons of debt.

Most people overspend.

Most people do that.

And so I'm just practicing the way of the majority of people that are around me.

But you could not say, I do that because I practice the way of Jesus.

Because he wouldn't have you do that.

In order to practice the way of Jesus with your money, is to handle your money the way that Jesus would have you do it.

And so it's not to live beyond your means.

It is to be generous and sacrificial.

It's not to worship your money.

To practice the way of Jesus in your marriage is to treat your spouse the way that Jesus would teach you and tell you to treat your spouse.

And so you would, if you're practicing his way in your marriage, you would love one another sacrificially.

You would apologize to one another.

You would seek to forgive one another.

You would seek to serve the other person.

You would keep no record of wrongs.

But if you're not doing those things, you're still practicing a way.

You're just not practicing his way.

Because you're doing something opposite to the way in the direction that he would go.

And if we're following him, he would lead you this way.

And if you're not following him, you can go whichever way you want, but you're not actually behind him and doing those things.

If somebody were to ask your you and your spouse, like, why don't you guys yell at each other?

I'm like, well, because I practice the way of Jesus, and Jesus would never tell me to yell at my spouse.

Why don't you, if your friends are like, why don't you talk badly about your spouse the way that we talk badly about our spouses?

All your friends do it.

It's like, I don't practice the way of my friends.

I don't practice their way.

I practice the way of Jesus.

And because I practice the way of Jesus, my friends can talk however they want about their spouse, but I do not have that freedom because I follow behind a person that is I'm allowing to guide me.

I have surrendered the authority of that to him, and so I do it his way, I practice his way.

To practice the way of Jesus is to take his words and then to live by them, to take his way of living life and make that your way of living life.

And it's to do it in every single area of your life.

We do it with our speech, we do it with how we date, we do it with how we raise our children, how we interact on social media.

How do we handle our fears and our worries?

I practice the way of Jesus with those things.

I pray instead of being anxious about everything.

I try not to worry about those things and I give those things to him.

I seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness so that all everything else that I'm worried about will actually be added to me.

That's those are the things that I do.

Practicing the way of Jesus should deal with and inform what we indulge in, how much we eat, how much we drink, how we treat our friends, how we treat our enemies, how we interact in politics.

I don't talk to people or think of people the way that Fox News or CNN tells me to talk about, talk to them or think about them, because I don't follow the way of Fox News or CNN.

I follow the way of Jesus.

And so the way that I interact with people politically in those conversations is to talk to them and to deal with them and to think about them the way that Jesus would have me do it, not the way that opposing sides would have me fight.

We even do this with our sin.

To practice the way of Jesus with your sin is not to hide them.

What I want to do, practice my way, I want to hide my sin.

I don't want to tell anybody about it.

I want to fix it myself and do it.

That's my way.

And Jesus is like, that is not my way.

Jesus' way of dealing with our sin is don't hide them, don't make excuses for them, don't call your bad behavior good and try and convince everybody else and gaslight everybody else that what you're doing is actually right.

Don't do that.

Instead, Jesus is like, if you're gonna follow my way, here's what we do with sin.

You repent, you confess those things, and you seek forgiveness of those things, and then we move forward.

But in every single area of our lives, what it means to practice the way of Jesus is to set aside every other way that we would do things and choose to do it his way.

And I will do it your way.

Now, like me and like everybody else, like you're not gonna be perfect at that.

Like no one's gonna be perfect at following the way of Jesus in every single aspect of their lives.

It's not gonna be perfect.

But that is, bless you, that is what it means.

What it means to practice the way of Jesus is to turn away from those other ways and make that your way of life, to give him that type of leadership in every area of your life.

Does that make sense?

Great.

I've looked at looked at Rani.

Rani and I had this conversation um a couple months ago.

I was talking about practicing the way of Jesus.

This isn't in my notes, so maybe I shouldn't say this.

Um she was like, hey, just so you know, nobody knows what you mean when you say that.

And I was like, I've been saying that for three years pretty strongly, like a lot.

She goes, Yeah, nobody knows what you mean.

I was like, okay, well, noted, and I will try and explain that.

But that's what it means.

All of you and me too, we have a way.

And those other ways try and sneak back in, and they try and grab us and go, like, I know what Jesus says, but we're gonna do it this way.

All of them try and grab hold of the steering wheel and go, we're actually gonna guide your life this way.

But the way of Jesus is to deny that stuff, to deny those ways and go, like, I know that I feel, I know what I want to do, but I follow another king.

That's not king over my life, Jesus is, and so I follow him.

So that's what I mean by practice the way of Jesus.

Second, what do I mean by fame and deeds of God in our time?

Because again, I had a conversation with Rainey, and she's like, hey, you might need to explain that.

So, fame and deeds of God in our time.

The fame and deeds is language taken from a prophet in the Old Testament named Habakkuk.

Uh, he prayed for the fame and deeds of God to be repeated in his time in Habakkuk 3.

This is what he says.

Actually, the whole, really the whole minor prophet of Habakkuk, it's just one long prayer conversation between he and God.

But Habakkuk says this to the Lord.

He says, Lord, I have heard of your fame.

I stand in all of your deeds, Lord.

Repeat them in our day, in our time, make them known, and in wrath, remember mercy.

And so what he's praying for and what he's referencing when he says, I have heard of the famous deeds that you've done.

I stand in all of them.

Like I'm just blown away by the old stories that you just the ways in which you've you've you've done things in history.

And what he's referencing is like, he's asking God to move in power.

You did things incredibly back then.

You're famous in the nations because of some of the power and the strength that you displayed and some of the miraculous things that you did.

You're famous.

They've made you famous, God.

But I'm not seeing that stuff in my time.

And I want to see those things renewed in my day.

I want to see those things renewed in my time.

And so, God, move in power.

Move in power the same way that you did in Egypt when you freed Israel.

Move in power the same way that you split the Red Sea.

There was no way, but you made a way.

How'd you do that?

It made you famous.

Do those famous deeds again.

You sent fire from heaven with Elijah before the false prophets of Baal.

You made the walls of Jericho come crashing down, and no one had to lift a finger.

Like you moved in power.

You broke into the world.

You shook the world.

Shake the world again.

Would you please move in power?

What he's asking for, what he's referencing, are the old stories.

David standing before Goliath, Daniel in the lion's den, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abinega being tossed into the furnace and actually coming out unscorched and unburned.

He's like, I have heard the stories.

Actually, that one he may not have heard yet because it hasn't actually happened yet.

But, anyways, though that stuff.

He's God's powerful stuff.

That's what he's referencing.

And so Spurgeon says this.

I love this, what he says about this prayer.

He says, What Habakkuk chiefly means is, God, make yourself known.

Reveal in our midst your power to save.

That is the petition.

And it seems to me to be one of the wisest requests that ever fell from prophetic lips.

He longed that God would be seen in the midst of his people.

And this, above all things, should be our heart's desire.

We must cry from our hearts, O Lord, revive your work in our midst.

In our time, make them known.

And so when I reference the fame and deeds of God, what Habakkuk was crying out for was what I want to see in my time.

I want to see the fame and deeds.

I want to see that the things that made Jesus famous, the stories that we love to read, the things that happened in the scriptures, that are just like, man, those are stories that we need to tell other people, the things that stand out.

Like I want to see those things happen in my time.

I, like Habakkuk, I have read the stories and I stand in awe of them.

Jesus, when I think of that, when I pray these things, like I have heard and read how Jesus could heal.

I want him to do that again.

I've heard how he delivered people from oppression and darkness and things that they couldn't escape, and I want him to do that again.

I've heard and read how he restored people and families, and I want him to do that again.

I've heard and read how he raised up kids, how God raised up kids and teenagers to change the world.

I'm like, do that in our church.

Raise up kids and teenagers that change the world.

Do that with my son.

Use him as you did Josiah.

Use him as you did David.

Use him as you use so many of these kids that all of a sudden turn into people used by God to do amazing things.

I've read how you provided for people who didn't have enough.

There are families in our church that don't have enough, and I can't give them out of my own means what they need.

But God, you can.

I've read how you've done that stuff.

Would you do that stuff again?

I've heard how you turned people who are adamantly against Jesus into people who follow Jesus and love Jesus.

I need you to do that for my friends, my family, and other people in our lives.

I've read these stories.

I stand in awe of them, and I want them to be done and repeated in our time.

I want to see the mighty acts of God repeated in our midst.

And we live in a time of church history where most people attending church don't even believe that stuff is still possible.

They don't even think it happens anymore.

And the tragedy about all that is they will become a self-fulfilling prophecy to themselves.

They don't believe that it happens, therefore they don't expect it to happen, they don't seek it to happen, and then it doesn't happen, and they go, see, that stuff doesn't happen anymore.

And it's like it doesn't happen anymore in your life because you don't hunger for it.

He waits to be wanted.

The scriptures say that he rewards those who earnestly seek him, that the eyes of the Lord search the earth.

He's looking throughout the earth to find a heart devoted to him, that believes in him enough, that wants him enough, that he can show himself strong on their behalf.

He is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

He hasn't changed.

I don't believe that he's abandoned us to just like, I just spun the wheel and now it's just gonna function.

I don't believe that because there's not testimony in the scripture to show me that that's true.

And anybody who's like, I don't think God does that stuff anymore, they're basing that based on their experience.

And those people, let's say they're not married.

Like, oh my god, okay, you're not married, you've never experienced marriage.

Do you think marriage isn't real either?

Like, I just all the different things that people throw out and they go, I don't think he does it anymore.

It's like it's based on your experience and you're allowing your experience.

You're following the way of your experience, not the way of the scriptures, not the way of Jesus, not the way of the God of the Bible.

And I heard a pastor once say one time, like, we shouldn't pray or believe in the God of the American church.

We need to pray and believe.

We pray to and believe in the God of the Bible.

Because the God of the American church is just small and weak.

And I want to see a church and a community of people that go like, this stuff still happens because God testifies that it still happens.

And he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

And I've seen this stuff in my life.

I've seen the fame and deeds of God repeated in my time.

And I've been chasing it.

And I haven't seen every single thing that I want to see, but I have seen that.

I've seen God restore my relationship with Rainey when I thought it was just I mean, it was dead and done.

I've seen God step into my son's life and give him the ability to speak when he could not speak.

I've I've I had someone share the gospel with me, and it took about a year.

Like all of a sudden, that particular gospel message like transformed my life and changed my desires and all of the things that I who I was as a sophomore in high school, between who I was as a junior in high school, I was such a different person that people didn't recognize who I was.

And they were like, I of all the people who would ever come to faith and believe in Jesus, I never thought it would be you.

But like you're a completely different person.

I've seen those things happen and experienced those things, and I want a church that believes that stuff is still possible as well.

Otherwise, we're just grinding our gears here and just doing this thing, trying to live morally, which isn't the goal of anything, but the presence of God among his people, that's always what he's wanted.

And so I want that.

When I reference the fame and deeds of God, I am talking about this.

God, do those things that I read about, that I've heard about.

Would you do those things?

Would you renew them in our day?

We're not experiencing them the same way that they did 100 years ago or 200 years ago in the midst of revivals.

We're not experiencing them the way that I read about them in the scriptures.

I want to see those things happen.

And so that's what I'm referencing.

More of his power, more of his glory in our time.

And so those are the terms.

Practicing the way of Jesus is to take his way of living life and make that our way of living life.

In the fame and deeds of God, for God to move in power the way that you read about in the scriptures, the way that he talks about doing those things and see those things, for him to do those things in our present.

So those are the definitions.

Two reasons why this is the vision that we have as a church.

Two reasons why we're aiming at that thing.

Okay?

The first, one of the reasons we're aiming at this is because people practicing the way of Jesus is always what Jesus wanted.

He didn't just want people who ascribe to a certain belief about Jesus.

He always wanted this.

He always wanted people following his way, practicing his way.

He always wanted disciples.

He wanted students who fall under his authority and follow him as he goes, which is why, if you read in the Gospels, he's constantly telling people, follow me, follow me.

Belief is a part of it, but the following is a huge bit.

He's saying, yes, believe in me enough to follow me, but follow me is definitely what he wanted.

In Matthew 28, Jesus gives the great commission to his disciples and to the church.

What is the church supposed to be doing?

And he's like, therefore, go and make disciples.

Go make followers of me.

Go make students of mine.

Go make don't just make people who ascribe to a set number of beliefs and go to church every now and then.

Make people who like take my way of life on their way of life.

Make people who set aside their way of life for the other ways of doing things and actually take on my way of life.

Go make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit.

Teach them to obey, to follow everything that I've commanded you.

Disciples, the reason this is our vision is because this is what the church is supposed to be.

We are supposed to be developing practitioners.

We're supposed to be developing followers who practice Jesus' way.

That's what he's always wanted, and that's what it means to be a Christian.

Truly, that's what it means to be a Christian.

I was talking to someone the other day, and it was a great conversation, but he described himself as a, he's like, I think I would describe myself, like, are you a Christian?

He's like, I think I would describe myself as a practicing Christian.

And it was a great conversation, but I was like, that's really the only type of Christian that there is.

There isn't a non-practicing Christian.

There's there's there's actually no non-practicing Christians.

To say that you're a non-practicing Christian is to say that, like, I'm a living person with a non-practicing heart.

Like, no, you're a dead person.

Like if you don't have a if you don't have a practicing heart, you can say you're alive all you want, but you did.

Like, that's not that's not real.

And so if you're a non-practicing Christian, you're a non-Christian.

In some religions, which maybe this is where the confusion comes from, in some religions, like your heritage, like your ancestry and your religion can be tied together.

And so you can be born Jewish, but then you could say, but I'm a non-practicing religious Jewish person.

You're still, your heritage is Jewish, but you're a non-practicing religious Jewish person.

That doesn't exist in Christianity.

No one is uh heritage-wise, no one is actually born into Christianity.

You can be born into a Christian home, but you cannot inherit the Christian ancestry from your ancestors.

Christianity doesn't work like that.

It's not a heritage.

Christianity is not something that you inherit, it's a choice that you make to believe in Jesus and then to follow Jesus.

And so even if you're born into a Christian home, it doesn't make you, I'm a Christian, I'm just a non-practicing.

My parents are Christians who practice.

I'm a born, I'm born a Christian who doesn't practice.

No, you're a person who was born into a Christian home who has chosen to be a non-Christian if you're a non-practicing Christian.

There aren't non-practicing Christians.

There are just Christians and then there's non-Christians.

It doesn't work the same way that it works in other different and other heritages and things like that.

So being a Christian by implication means you are a follower of Jesus.

If you are claiming to be a Christian, that means that you are claiming to be behind a man following his way of life, practicing his way.

And so if you call yourself a Christian but don't actually practice the way of Jesus, then you're not actually a Christian.

You can call yourself whatever you want, but you're not a Christian.

There are only practicing Christians.

Or as the apostle James said this, he goes, faith without practice is dead.

Faith without works is dead.

If your faith in Jesus isn't leading you to put his word into practice, he would say you don't actually have that faith in Jesus.

It's like having a dead heart and a living body.

That body is dead.

And that's what James says.

He's like, if you if your faith isn't being worked out in practice, then your faith actually doesn't exist.

It's not actually there.

And so what we want is a community that practices the way of Jesus.

And we want other people who are in the room who are trying to figure that out and wrestle that out.

Like, do I want to believe in Jesus?

Do I want to follow Jesus?

I want people in the room that are wondering about those things, but I don't want anybody to be confused that you can be a non-practicing Christian and then give them this false hope of, like, yeah, I'm a Christian, I'm just a different one that doesn't follow Jesus.

Like, no, you either do or you don't.

You're either choosing his way or you're choosing someone else's way.

And so as a community, as a church, Jesus has always wanted the church to go and make disciples, to make people who practice his way.

And so it's a part of our vision because that's what we're supposed to be doing.

As a church, we're supposed to shape our ministries and our time trying to make disciples of all nations.

Anybody that's in this room, anybody that's out there that comes in here, we want to shape you and form you into somebody who is being developed into a practitioner of Jesus' way.

Again, we won't do this perfectly, but the idea is that that is our aim, that is our goal, to follow behind this man who gave his life, who bled for us and body was broken for us, to follow behind him.

And so we want a community that practices that way because that's what he wants.

That's the first reason.

The second reason that this is our vision is, and this is long, but I want us, I want you and me to experience the fame and deeds of God in our time.

And the testimony of Scripture is that those who put God's word into practice experience the fame and deeds of God in their life and in their time.

I want this to be a reality that you walk in.

Not every single day are you watching like red seas split and fires from heaven fall.

Not that.

But I do want you to be in awe and stand in awe and wonder of this God that wants to be close to you and near to you, that actually wants to help and break in, that actually is an ever-present help in time of need.

I don't want this to be an ideal that we ascribe to, but I want it to be a live in reality that he is, in fact, a good father.

We are people who he loves, that he cares for us to enough to speak to us, interact in our lives, and do things in our world.

He actually is that way.

And so I want us to experience the fame and deeds of God in our time.

And the testimony of Scripture is those who choose to practice God's word, to do what he says, to do those things, they are the people who primarily experience what God has for them.

They are the people that primarily experience the fame and deeds of God in their time.

I do not have enough time to go through all the different examples to show you how this is true, but I preached on this January 4th and outlined this a lot longer.

And so if you want to go back and listen to that, but I'm going to give you the list anyways and just name a couple of them.

But you see this, the people who practice God's word, put it into practice, they experience the fame and deeds of God.

And so the Old Testament, you see this with Noah, you see this with Abraham, Moses, Joshua, Israel, Elisha, and Naaman the leper.

That last one there, Naaman the leper wants to be healed.

And they're like, there's a prophet in Israel that whose God might help you.

And it's like, okay, how can I be healed?

And Elisha hears from the Lord, like, go dip into the Jordan River just a couple of times, and then you'll come out and your leprosy will be out.

And Naaman gets so mad.

He's like, that's so stupid.

Like, I don't want to, I don't want to dip in the Jordan River.

It's gross in there.

Like, I don't want to do it, like, there are, aren't there rivers that are closer?

Like, this doesn't make any sense.

And his servant, Naaman's uh servant, had eventually said, like, if he would have asked you to like climb a mountain or like steal the moon or something, like, wouldn't you have been like, okay, that's that's that's something I should do?

He's like, he told you to just do something easy.

Just go and do it.

Humble yourself and just practice the word that God had gave you.

Go do it.

And then he goes and he does it, and all of a sudden he comes up and his um skin is cleansed and he's cleansed of his leprosy.

And it's like, why did he experience that?

It's like, well, he heard God's word from Elisha, but that didn't change anything.

He took God's word, believing, even though he was a little bit hesitant to do it, he took God's word and he shoved it into his life, and it led to his feet or his horse's feet or whatever, going to that Jordan River and him dipping in there three times, just as the Lord said, and then all of a sudden he experienced the fame and deeds of God in this time.

That's in the Old Testament.

You can see this through and through and through.

I don't have enough time to go through all of them.

Then you get to Jesus, and you see this as well with people practicing Jesus' words.

The disciples, they feed the 5,000 because Jesus says, Here's how you do it.

They've never seen this before, they don't have any idea how to do that.

The ten lepers that Jesus heals, he doesn't go and touch them or anything.

He's like, Go show yourself to the priest, and it says, as they went, as they put his word into practice, they were cleansed.

Peter, go out into the deep water and cast your net.

And he was like, I don't want to do that.

I've been fishing all night, but because you said it, I'll go do it.

He goes and does it and catches so many fish.

The blind man, uh, John 9, he says, Go wash in the pool of saloon.

You got put some mud on your eyes, just go wash.

Go to the place.

That means this pool of siloam means sent.

I have sent you.

Practice my word and be sent and go to that place and wash your eyes.

And the whole time he's on the way, he's not, his eyes aren't open.

The whole time his blindness remains.

Even though he's met Jesus, sat with Jesus, heard Jesus' word, knows what to do, until he actually does it, until he shoves it into his life.

He doesn't experience the fullness of what is available to him.

But when he does it, he experiences the fame and deeds of God.

The disciples, go and make disciples of all nations.

And when they go and do that, they watched as God worked through them to transform the world.

Consistently, you can break this the passage.

God sometimes just breaks in on his own and he's doing his own thing.

He definitely does that.

But many times when he's interacting with us, he's like, I have given you my word.

And if you will just take my word and live that thing out, you will actually experience what I have for you.

I am not trying to control you by telling you deny your way and do my way.

He's not trying to control us.

He's going, I'm trying to lead you into life that you know nothing about.

I'm trying to get you into a space that you're not fully gonna understand how great it is.

I've said this story about Teddy when he was young.

We were at the beach and we were gonna go to the water park, and he was in the tub because he got disgusting at breakfast because he used to eat like a maniac.

And he was in the tub and he was like going all around doing this stuff, and like, hey man, we're gonna go to the water park.

And he's like, This is the water park.

This is so much better than any water park.

And I was like, you don't fully understand where I'm trying to take you.

There's slides and you know, just water everywhere and buckets that are gonna dump on your head.

Like, you don't, the tub is not the fullness of a water park, son.

Like, get out of the tub.

We're going to the water park.

And it's like, and I think like God telling us, would you please take my word and put it in your life?

Like, why are you trying to control me?

Why are you trying to why you what are you doing?

It's like, I'm trying to do, I'm I'm not telling the blind man to go wash in the pool of saloon because I hate him.

I want him to see.

And so there's all of this stuff that's like he's just going, if you will take my word and shove it into your life and allow it to shape how you talk, how you, what you listen to, what you watch, what you do with your hands, what you do with your feet, what you do with your body, every single thing in every relationship you have, if you will take my word and shove it into your life, what will happen is you will experience my life breaking into every aspect of your life.

I am not trying to control you.

I'm trying to fill your life with a fullness of life that you know nothing about.

And that's what he's trying to do.

And so consistently, the people who would actually do it, who definitely believed, but believed in him enough to actually practice, they experience something far greater and far more different.

And I think he's calling us to do that.

He says this uh somewhere in Matthew, uh he says, maybe it's Matthew 13, but he says, like, uh take, choose the narrow road.

Choose the narrow road.

Wide, wide is the path that leads to destruction.

But narrow is the path that leads to life, and only a few find it.

And the idea is like, can I can I practice my way?

Absolutely.

Is it easier to practice my way?

Absolutely.

Is it easier to be selfish in my marriage or selfless in my marriage the way that Jesus had me to be?

Much easier to be selfish, ask my wife.

So much easier.

But wide, the easy way, is a way that leads to something being destroyed and something not being built to its fullness.

But the narrower way, the denying of myself and choosing to follow Jesus' way and going, I'm gonna do it this way, will bless my marriage with something that it's never going to experience if I just choose the easy path, and that will work in every single aspect of our lives.

The narrow path is more challenging, and Jesus is very honest about that.

But he's like, But I'm telling you, my way, denying yourself might be difficult, my way will lead you to life, and that's what he wants for us.

And so it is our vision to practice the way of Jesus so that we experience the fame and deeds of God because those who practice the way of Jesus experience those things breaking into their lives.

Those who practice God's word experience the fame and deeds of God breaking into their lives.

And I want us to experience those things.

I want our lives to be transformed.

I've shared this before, uh, again, January 4th, uh, but I we don't have numerical goals for our church.

I love it when there's a bunch of people here and I miss you when you're gone, but we don't have numerical goals for our church.

Um I have, but I do have fame and deeds goals, like this deficit of wonder that I want God to do in our time.

And so I want to see marriages in our church that are struggling.

I want to see them restored like mine was.

I want to see that.

I want to see them healed.

I want to see prodigal children who are astray and you're crying for your kids, and you're just like, I don't know what's gonna get them back.

I don't know.

I'm like, I don't know either, but I know that he can.

And if I just capitulate to the the circumstances around me and go like, it seems impossible, then I'll then I'll never actually seek those things.

But if I remember that he does impossible things in the scriptures all the time and he still wants to do those things today, and he got the apostle Paul who was murdering Christians one day and all of a sudden making Christians the next day, like he can do anything.

And I just want that to be an experience like you want your product with me too.

I want to see them not just restored to the faith, but restored to the family.

I want to see people who strongly oppose Jesus to become followers of Jesus, families that are estranged and broken to be reconciled.

I want to see long-term prayer requests that people have been praying and praying and praying.

I want to see those things come about because we do not quit praying.

I want to see the addictions in our church broken and people set free, people healed, outcasts who have no community outside these walls to find community here.

I want to see the fearful become fearless.

I want to see kids and teenagers grow up to change the world in Jesus' name.

I want to see lives transformed, notorious sinners come saints.

I want to see our city change.

The narrative of Memphis, what tell me about Memphis.

There's a lot of crime.

That's normally one of the first things that they say.

I would love for that narrative to eventually shift and go, you know, there used to be a lot of crime, but we don't really talk about that anymore.

That would be a fame and deeds of God breaking into our time.

And I want to see that stuff.

I want to see those things happen.

And to me, it's undeniably clear.

The testimony of the scriptures is those who believe in Jesus enough and believe in God enough to put his word into practice, they experience something greater in their time.

And so I want a community that's defined by that, aimed at that, so that we experience that.

So we're not like anyone else going, like, I don't think he does that stuff anymore.

But it's like, dude, let me tell you, come and see what God has done, is the psalmist tells us, Psalm 66, like the wonders that he has brought about.

I want us to have stories like that.

And so that's why we're aiming at that.

That's why it's our church, our church's vision.

We're meant to make people and develop people who practice the way of Jesus.

And those who practice the way of Jesus experience the fame and deeds of God, and I want us to experience those things.

So, what does that mean for our church?

Basically, what it means is we're gonna aim at this more and more and more.

I've been three years of the lead pastor at this church, and just shaping ministries and forming things towards this vision.

And so every ministry will be shaped and formed by this, and they really already are, but we're even aiming at this even more, especially as we have new staff coming on board and things like that.

But as a church, I want us to practice the way of Jesus.

And so we want to encourage you and move our ministries towards.

We seek to practice the way of Jesus through seven, seven core practices.

We seek to there are tons of practices, go to the next slide.

We seek to practice the way of Jesus, there's tons of practices in the way of Jesus.

But we want to encourage you to begin practicing the way of Jesus through these seven core practices.

And again, our ministries are built around these things.

Our church events are built around these things because we believe you're meant to be someone who practices the way of Jesus.

And we're gonna go through them week by week.

But I want us to be people who know the scriptures.

It's impossible to practice someone's way of life if you do not read about their way of life.

If you do not know what the scriptures say that God actually wants us to do in the way that Jesus wants us to go, it's very difficult to know how to interact with all these different areas of our lives.

Like, how do I practice Jesus this way if I don't read about it and know it?

And so I want us to read the scriptures, devour the scriptures.

I want you to read through the Bible and do those things.

I want us to practice community, committing to one another, continuing to meet together, building relationships, not just here on Sundays, but also at our events and also in small groups, so that you actually are able to practice the one another's.

We're meant to encourage one another, bear one another's burdens, and practice the one another's together in community.

Sacrificial service, using our spiritual gifts, our gifts, our resources, and our time to bless others, seeking God in prayer and fasting and just seeking God in general, pursuing God through those wings, turning from sin, turning from lesser things, and trying to seek after him.

We'll talk more about that one because it's broader.

Um, but we'll we'll dig into that.

But to seek him in prayer and fasting.

Uh confession, confessing sin one to another.

James says, if you confess your sin, notice, if you confess your sin one to another and pray for each other, you will be healed.

That's James 5.16.

But notice the language.

The language is if you will practice these words, practice what I'm what I'm telling you.

If you will practice these things, if you will practice God's word, you will experience something different.

And if you choose not to practice that, then you will miss out on something that's available to you.

And so we want to press into this idea and not hide our sin or be ashamed of our sin or run away from talking about it, but actually finding community enough and safety enough to actually be able to confess those things so that we experience what's true in the scriptures.

I want us to learn how to share the gospel and have this revival of being able to share the gospel and understand what it means to actually witness about Jesus.

Paul says that the message of the gospel is the power of God for salvation.

It will transform someone's life and it's transformed mine.

And we should be people that know how to do that.

And so we want to share the gospel.

And then celebration, because everybody likes a little joy and all of us need it.

Dallas Willard says that we'll never fully understand God until we finally grasp that he's the happiest being in the universe.

And I think celebration has taken a backseat to like somber church services, but celebration was meant to be this thing that God instituted to be reminded he has broken in and done things in history.

Let us celebrate those things.

Jesus even says, we're gonna, you're gonna eat bread and you're gonna drink wine, and you're gonna celebrate this thing that reminds you of my death.

It's this celebration that's supposed to be reminded of what Jesus has done for us.

And so we're gonna talk about celebration and what it looks like to practice celebration in our lives.

But we'll deal with those over the next few weeks and we'll go one by one through those things, but just seven core practices that we do as a church to shape our community into people who practice the way of Jesus.

I love what John Mark Comer says.

If you know who John Mark Comer is, I don't believe everything this dude says and align with it all, but there's a lot of it that I really love.

But he says this, he says, I have come to believe that there is a way of life laid down by Jesus Himself, and that if we give ourselves to it and ultimately to him, it will lead to the life that we most truly crave.

And he's not promising like abundant blessing with no suffering whatsoever, but he is absolutely saying, look, there is a way of life, there's something that we're longing for in our hearts, and we are looking for it in our relationships, we're looking for it online, we're looking for it in our money, in our career, we're looking for it in our success, whatever.

We are looking for something to finally feel satisfied.

And what Comer is saying, I believe what the scriptures testify to is like that life that you're longing for, Jesus, it's found in him, and it's found in him alone.

And he gave his life so that you could be filled with his life and filled with his spirit, and then ultimately experience that life being poured into you and then pouring out of you as well.

And so I want us to experience the life we most truly crave, not the one that we think might fulfill us.

If I get this, then I might be fulfilled, but the one that we actually long for.

And so we're seeking that.

A community of people who practice the way of Jesus so that we experience the fame and deeds of God in our time, and I'd love for you to be a part of that.

Let me pray.