No Risk no Story | Pastor Brandon Beals | Venture Church

I want to welcome you to Venture Church. If I've

never met you before, I'm Brandon. I am the lead

pastor of the church. I want to welcome those that

are watching our service online. Great that you were there.

Please tell us where you're from. We'd love the opportunity

to engage with you online. We are continuing a series.

By the way, I see a bunch of my NU

students sitting in front of me. Diane and I teach

biblical teaching and preaching at Northwest, and our students get

assigned periodically to go visit churches, so they're here to

critique me as I preach.

So this will be fun in the front row of

all places.

We are continuing a series that we started several weeks

ago through Ezra and Nehemiah. I really encourage you to

go back, listen to whatever message you might have missed.

If you are new, and I know there's many of you,

and you're thinking, oh no, I I came in the

middle of a series. All these messages will stand by themselves,

so you're okay, but I do encourage you to go back,

listen to the other messages. But grab your Bibles, turn

to Ezra, chapter 1, verse 5. If you didn't bring

Ezra 1:5

your Bible, the words will be behind me on these screens.

But let's read one verse together, and then let's pray.

Then the family heads, verse 5, of Judah and Benjamin

and the priests and the Levites, everyone whose heart God

had moved, prepared to go up to build the house

of the Lord in Jerusalem. I want to ask everyone

to bow your heads, close your eyes. I want to

ask everyone to repeat this prayer after me. Everyone say,

Dear Jesus, speak to my heart. Change my life.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Quickly, for those of you that are watching online, we

are going to show a video clip that we do

not have the rights to show you online.

So you will have a blank screen for 30 seconds.

Watch this.

A couple weeks ago, I went on a Grand Canyon

rafting trip with a group of pastors from around America.

And every night, it'd be pitch black around six. They'd

make a campfire. You got a bunch of pastors, so

someone's going to preach around the campfire. And one of

the nights, a guy started sharing, and he started with

a quote.

Here's the quote. No risk, no story.

And I heard that quote, and I was like, dang,

I got to write that down. And so I scrambled

to find my phone and open up my phone and

I start writing it down. And as I'm typing it

into my phone, he's telling us who originated that quote.

And I missed it.

By the time I typed it, I didn't know. But

I figured when I get home, I'll Google it. I'll

figure out who said no risk, no story, because it preaches.

No risk, no story.

So I get home, knew I was preaching this sermon,

thought it fit great.

Googled, who wrote? No risk, no story. And they don't

really know who wrote it. It's been quoted by so

many people for so many years. No one knows.

So I am declaring today, we're claiming it. Venture's claiming it.

I said, no risk, no story. Here's my proof. Years ago,

we have on our website these culture statements. And these

are typically one-liners that I used in a sermon that

people started tweeting. People started posting on Facebook. They became

our themes for a year. If you go in our

culture statement, here's one of them. Playing it safe is risky.

I think it's close enough. Playing it safe... Rarely yields

lasting greatness or unique life experiences. Church, I'm going to

tell you, at some point in your spiritual journey, God

is going to challenge you to take a risk. There's

going to come a point he is going to stir

your heart to be fully uncomfortable, to step out, do

something you've never done before, and take a risk.

And that's where we're at in the story of Ezra.

It was 70 years they had been exiled in the

Babylonian Empire, kidnapped from their home, drugged from Israel, Jerusalem,

all the way to the Babylonian Empire, and they lived

there for 70 years. Then God miraculously provides the opportunity

for the Jewish people to go home. He does one

of the most unexpected things He stirs the heart of

a pagan king. This pagan king is so moved, he

declares that any foreigner living in his empire is free

to go back to their country, reestablish the worship of

their God. And he offered to provide the resources if

they would go.

He even gave them an incentive. He said, I won't

tax you.

You can take everything that you've earned, the life that

you've built in Babylon, all of the livestock, all of

your wealth. You are free to take it with you

to Jerusalem, to Israel, without threat of any punishment. And

then we read in Ezra chapter one, verse five, that everyone...

whose heart God stirred, moved. Ezra chapter 2 is basically

Ezra 2 · chapter mention

a genealogy of all the people. It's a census of

all the people that actually went there. I'm not going

to read the whole thing, primarily because I can't pronounce

90% of these names, and neither can you. But let's

show you the first couple verses. Ezra chapter 2, verse 1.

Ezra 2:1

Now these are the people of the province who came

up from the captivity of the exiles, whom Nebuchadnezzar, king

of Babylon, had taken captive to Babylon. They returned to

Jerusalem and Judah, each to their own town, in the

company with Zerubbabel, Joshua, Nehemiah, Sariah, Reliah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mizpah,

Big V, Rehum, and Banah.

They left everything. I'm not pretty good, huh?

They packed up everything. And they moved 900 miles away

Back to Israel, back to Jerusalem. A quick side point,

just because I get cornered in the lobby by people.

The Nehemiah that is mentioned here is not the Nehemiah

of the book, Nehemiah. He came around 80 years later.

You probably also saw the name Mordecai and thought, oh, Esther, Mordecai. Well,

the story of Esther actually takes place in the 100-year

period of Ezra and Nehemiah, but it is not the Mordecai.

From there.

Mordecai and Esther were normal names. These were names, these

were familiar names, common names.

So these are different people. That's free, just so you know.

Moving on to verse 64, it's telling us everyone that went.

So it lists everybody that goes, and then it gives

us the totals of the people.

So here it is. The whole company numbered.

42,360. Besides their 7,337 male and female slaves, they also

had 200 male and female singers. I think this is

kind of fun, so I'll just add it. They had

736 horses that made the journey, 245 mules, 435 camels, 6,720 donkeys.

All of this went to 900.

Miles in total.

It was 50,000 people that were living out the fulfillment

of God's promise to the Israelites through Jeremiah. That after

70 years of being exiled, they would all be free

to go back to their land, rebuild the temple, reestablish

the worship of God, and reestablish themselves in the land.

And 50,000 people went there. If you know your biblical

history at all, you know that the Assyrians... They conquered

the northern kingdom. Took all the Jewish people from the

northern kingdom into the Assyrian empire. The Assyrians get conquered

by the Babylonians. The Babylonians then conquer the southern kingdom

of Israel. Take all of the remaining Israelites living in

the southern kingdom to what is now the Babylonian empire.

So all of the Israelite people were living in a

foreign land.

The only people that were left in.

Israel We are told by scripture, we're poor people, broken people,

and they were only left behind because the Babylonians found

no worth in them. The only use they had was

to take care of the farms and the crops that

were left behind. So all of the Israelite people are

now exiled in what is now the Persian Empire around

the world.

We are told 50,000 of them.

Left the Babylonian Empire, Persian Empire, and traveled back to Israel,

to Jerusalem.

Okay, this is something I want to point out.

Numbers 26 is the last census of the Jewish people

before this. It was about 1,400 years beforehand. And in

the end of that census, we are told that there

were 600,000 men living in Israel, not counting women or children, 6,000 men.

Most historians will say it is safe to believe that

there were a million Jewish people that were exiled in Babylon,

now Persia.

So my question for you is.

Why did only 50,000 return? It was God's promise to

every single one of them that they could return home.

But why did only 50,000 people return from Babylon to Israel?

One of the things that I will remind you. If

you serve God long enough, he's going to ask you

to take a risk. He's going to challenge you to

risk everything. But he doesn't make you do it. He

stirs your heart. The option's up to you. And because

he loves you, even if you say no, he'll bless

you wherever you are. But there's going to come a

point God is going to challenge you to take a risk.

One of the things that I always train people that

I mentor, I use this quote, and it is, the

good is the enemy of the best.

The good is the enemy of the best.

So often, because God is stirring us to take a

risk and we say no, we settle for the good.

We don't know any better. Life is good.

We're still blessed where we are, but we never know

what could have been. We never know what might have

been had we taken that big risk and stepped into

what could have become God's best for us. The good

is the enemy of the best. Today I want to ask,

I want to answer this question. Why is it so

many people are unwilling to take a risk for God?

Why is it you are going to see Through the

book of Ezra, the reasons many of you and them

are unwilling to take a risk, even though God is

clearly stirring your heart. Number one is totally obvious. This

is the first one you thought of. Why are you

unwilling to take a risk? Because you're afraid. A 900

mile journey to a place you've never been after 70 years,

wasn't an easy choice. You were being asked to go

to a place you'd never been but only heard about

at Christmas, Thanksgiving, and Easter when your grandparents told you

about it.

But it wasn't your world.

That 900 mile journey where you had to pack up

everything you owned and all your family and all your

crops and all of your wealth and your silver and

your gold. And you had to travel 900 miles. What

awaited you on that journey? How difficult was that journey

going to be? 900 miles is dangerous. What if you

don't make it? What if someone you love doesn't survive?

And frankly, what are you returning to? You hadn't been there.

Here's what we know about Israel to this day. People

have been fighting over that small strip of land since

the beginning of time. They still fight over that small

strip of land today. Growing up in Israel, your perspective

is just different. You have all the same modern advances

in technology that we have today. In fact, they have

some technology far more advanced than ours. But this is

what it's like to grow up in Israel today. You

and I, we get annoyed about traffic. We try to

time our drive so we avoid traffic. If you were

in Israel, you're not worried about traffic. You're worried about missiles.

Missiles.

Who's shooting at you today?

You guys stress about, are interest rates low enough? Are

housing prices low enough for me to be able to

afford a house in a nice neighborhood? That's what you,

as an American, are blessed to worry about. Guess what

you get to worry about when you grow up in Israel?

Who's trying to invade us this week? Just a different world.

Since the beginning of time, they've had to fight over

this land. I mean, they had to fight the Hittites.

They had to fight the Philistines. They had to fight

the Amalekites. Then once they conquered the land, they were constantly.

Fighting to keep those people away.

People have been fighting over this strip of land since

the beginning of time until the end of time.

So what were they returning to?

They knew that Nebuchadnezzar had destroyed every important building, the temple,

the walls.

It was rubble.

He burned it to the ground. And they knew that

their enemies constantly wanted that. Who lived there now? Who

were they going to face? What were they going to

deal with? How hard was this rebuilding project going to be?

Could you imagine the dangers that were likely facing them?

Why did only 50,000 go? Because about 950,000 people concluded

it wasn't worth the risk. Church, too often we allow

fear to dictate whether we say yes or no to

something the Holy Spirit is stirring us to do. What

if we fail?

What if it doesn't work out?

22 years of Di and I leading a church that

we started, I will tell you flat out that failure

is a necessary step in the process. If you want

to build a life worth living, if you want to

build a life worth remembering, you are going to have

many moments, seasons of failure along the way. Stop letting

crippling fear dictate your life choices. Although the news that

Cyrus was allowing all of them to return to Israel.

And it brought hope and excitement about the future. Most

of the Israelites living in Babylon. were naturally hesitant to

make this long, dangerous trip and chose to stay behind.

And guess what? No one knows their names. Their names

aren't recorded in Ezra 2, Nehemiah 6.

Why?

No risk, no story.

Second reason that people don't take risks, this one's the

hardest for me. is that we are really quick to

get settled.

We settle. We get comfortable.

70 years is a long time to be settled in

a place. Many of the Israelites living in the Babylonian empire,

they built lives for themselves. They built homes. They'd started businesses.

They had friends. They had community. They had support. The

only thing they knew about Jerusalem was the stories they

heard from their grandparents. It wasn't their home. Babylon was

their home. I had thought about this from my family's perspective.

My Italian dad has his roots traced all the way

back to the Mayflower. In other words, my dad's family

lived in Boston since the Mayflower. My dad is the

first person in his family to leave Boston. He joins

the military. He gets stationed at a missile base in

Great Falls, Montana. He meets my mom, who was born

and raised in Montana and has lived in Montana, her family,

for 400 years prior.

They meet, have my.

Sister and I move to Seattle and settle there. Well,

I meet a woman in Seattle who was born and

raised in Seattle. We raised our kids here. We started

a church here. Our whole family is here. If my

dad all of a sudden said, all right, it's time

for us to head back to Boston. I'd be like,

I think Boston's cool but Seattle's home this is all

I know I'm settled here if my mom announced I

think we should all move back to where we're all

from Montana I'd be like I love Montana.

But Seattle's where I'm settled.

70 years is a long time. In fact, some of

the Jews had even obtained status under Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus

in Babylon, in Persia.

They were wealthy. They were influential. Why leave?

Oftentimes, we're unwilling to take a risk when the Holy

Spirit is stirring us.

Because we're super comfortable.

We're settled.

We're settled. Ezra 3 verse 1. So now they're all there.

Ezra 3:1

They're back to Jerusalem. They're back to Israel. I'm going

to read a verse. When I read this verse, there

was a word that jumped off my Bible. Now I

know it wasn't the author's original intent. I know that

this was written in Hebrew. It's been translated into English.

And I know what I got from this is not

the author's intent with the verse. But it's still a

very biblical principle. So follow along.

Here's what it says.

When the seventh month came, and the Israelites had settled

in their towns, The people assembled together as one in Jerusalem.

Two things I want to point out from that. First one,

they went back to Israel to rebuild the temple. They've

been there for seven months and haven't even moved a brick.

They haven't taken a shovel and turned over some sand yet.

They had done nothing other than go back to their hometown,

their home village, and settle there. They had heard stories

that our family, we are settled in the region of

the Golan Heights. You should go back there and make

a homestead there. We're from the region of Galilee. Go

back there. We're from Bethlehem. We're from a suburb of Jerusalem,

a little town called Bethany.

You should go there.

And so right when they got to Israel, the first

thing they did is mom and dad are always talking

about Bethany. So they went to Bethany. They found a

little piece of land. They built a fence around it.

They built a home. They started a garden and They

settled there.

Isn't that just what we do?

We are so quick to settle. And the reason that

we settle is because we want to feel comfortable. They

hadn't even begin the project that God had called them

to to begin with. So now they meet in Jerusalem

and And now they're gonna talk about starting the project.

Church, I'm gonna be honest.

Every time I get settled, every time I get comfortable,

it's like without a shadow of a doubt, God starts

stirring my heart again.

I'm good. I like it.

I got a great life rhythm. I like everything that

we're doing. And whenever that happens, I think, finally. And

then he starts stirring my heart again.

We build this building.

We get a lot of money in our reserves. We

have an amazing staff. Life is good. I got a

good rhythm. And then the Lord says, you need to

expand the building. And I go through all these phases.

I'm like, Lord, I'm afraid. People will be mad. I

hate raising money. It'll take too long. It'll stop mission.

I'm not doing it. I overcome that.

Then I'm like, but God, I'm good. You know, I

like this. This is 22 years of working super hard.

I like this. I'm comfortable. He keeps stirring.

And now when I walk through that new kids area,

I'm so thankful that we took that risk. When I

look at all the people sitting in the balcony and

all of our four services, I'm so thankful we took

that risk. I'm so thankful we took the risk of

starting a campus in Seattle. Do you know how many

times the Lord has bothered me to start a Saturday

night service?

You ask the staff.

I have been threatening a Saturday night service for two years.

Every time I bring up Saturday night, the staff runs

to their offices and cries because they're.

Wondering, what is this going to mean to me?

And then they all want to meet with me to

make sure they don't have to go on Saturday nights.

But I knew we were supposed to do it two

years ago. You know the reason I didn't do it?

Because I was comfortable.

I was settled.

Frankly, the Huskies play on Saturdays. It's a real inconvenience

to my schedule. But eventually, God keeps stirring. And I

remind myself, the good is the enemy of the best.

No risk, no story. What if, Brandon, what if this works?

What if it takes off? So eventually, God starts stirring.

We expand the facility. We launch a new campus. We

build solar electricity in the Dominican Republic. We start a

Saturday night service, but I always begin with, God, I'm good.

Things are good. I like things the way they are.

I'm settled. Go stir someone else.

Don't allow yourself to be so settled that you are

unwilling to take the risk that God is calling you to. Finally,

number three, Third reason that I don't think they left.

And the third reason that I don't think some of

you are willing to take a risk is that the

future is too foggy. What I mean by that is

we are willing to take a risk if we can

see what the future looks like. Normally, if I'm challenging

my wife to do something crazy, and that is an

often thing that happens in our family, if my wife

is totally against it, she will usually say, Brandon, I

don't see myself living in that house. She has to

see herself cooking in that kitchen, you know, working out

in that garage. She has to see herself in that place.

Whenever we do anything, I will hear Di say, I

just have to see myself in that place.

And that is most of us.

If you are a visionary at all, you are willing

to take big risks because you have a slight picture

of what could be.

But oftentimes... God doesn't give you that picture.

Oftentimes he does, but there are the moments he just

wants you to trust him. He wants you to believe

that his promises are true, and he just wants you

to take a step. And there are times that God

gives me a picture, and I'm willing to take that dive,

that risk. But there are times he stirs and I

just don't see what it's going to be. And so

I'm walking into what is completely the unknown.

It's so uncomfortable. It's so unclear.

I don't even know when I get there what it's

going to look like.

I don't know what to expect. And he just says,

trust me. And I take a step.

It's pretty easy to see that all of the Israelites

that went had a picture of what it was gonna be.

So here's what happens next in chapter three. They meet

in Jerusalem. They haven't done anything yet. And the first

thing they do is they begin to worship God. They

reestablish the worship of Yahweh. Then the priest announces we

are celebrating the festival of tabernacles or the festival of

tents or Sukkot.

It lasts seven days.

What's kind of cool about this story is we are

in that season right now. It is this time of

year when they would celebrate that. So historically, you know,

thousands of years before, but it would be this point

in the year. It's a seven-day festival where they remember

the Israelites wandering in the wilderness and they celebrate God's

harvest and provision for them. Then after all of this festival,

we are now to verse 8. Tell me if this

is not crazy. It says, in the second month of

the second year after their arrival at the house of

God in Jerusalem.

What does that mean?

It means they have now been there for 14 months.

They began the.

Work.

After 14 months of being there.

The reason that God sent them from Babylon to Jerusalem

they are finally beginning the work they were sent there

to start. And here's what they do first. They lay

out the foundation of Of the temple. And all the

people were there. The 50,000. And the Bible says this.

Verse 11.

With praise. Thanksgiving. They sang to the Lord. He is good.

His love towards Israel endures forever. All the people gave

a great shout of praise to the Lord. Because the

foundation of the house of the Lord was laid.

But. Verse 12.

Many of the older priests and Levites and family heads

who had seen the former temple, well, they're over the

age of 70 to have seen it, who had seen

the former temple wept aloud when they saw the foundation

of this temple being laid.

Why is that?

Why did the older people weep? They had a picture

of what it was going to look like. They remembered

what the temple Solomon built was. The temple Solomon built

was magnificent.

It was extravagant. It was huge.

And now they're seeing the foundation of this temple and

they weep because it's not as magnificent as Solomon's temple.

It's not as big as the former temple. And they're

using common, ordinary building materials. not the precious metals that

Solomon built the first temple with, and it didn't meet

their expectations, so they wept. But then the younger generation

that didn't have anything to expect, it says they shouted

for joy.

No one could.

Distinguish the sounds of the shouts of joy from the

sounds of weeping because the people made so much noise.

and the sound was heard far away. In other words,

if you were in another town, you heard something happening

in Jerusalem, but it was absolutely indecipherable. It was loud

and noisy, but you couldn't tell what was going on

because those that were weeping and those that were shouting

from joy were so loud, and it was so garbled

together that it was undecipherable. but it was heard far away.

It's just another reminder. Oftentimes, we will say yes finally

because we get a picture of what it's going to

look like, but sometimes when you get a picture of

what it's going to look like, be ready because it

really won't end up that way. I am the guy

that planted a church because he wrote a master's thesis

on what his church would be like. People ask me

all the time, can I see your master's thesis?

And I say, no.

And that is because it took me two weeks of

starting venture to realize this thing is worthless, and I

threw it out. This was nothing like I thought it

was going to be. No risk, no story. I know

it's fictional characters, but Achilles is preparing to fight the

Thessalonian champion. And if you've seen this movie before, you'll

remember when the Thessalonian champion comes out, he is shoulder

and head taller than everyone else in their army. And

he looks like a professional wrestler. And he steps forward

and none of the other army wanted to fight. So

they turned to Achilles who was back at camp and

they sent the young boy to get him. And the

young boy rallies him. And as he gets on the horse,

there's two statements that are made. He first, the young

boy says, they say you can't be killed. They say

you're a God. And Achilles looks at him and says,

if that was true, I wouldn't be wearing my armor.

And then the young boy looks at him and he says,

that man, I would be afraid to fight that man.

He's too intimidating. He's too scary. He's too impossible. And

Achilles looks at him and he says, that's why no

one will remember your name because you won't fight that guy.

No risk, no story. In about AD 70, the Romans

conquered Israel again. They tore down the temple, but this time,

They destroyed the genealogy. So all the genealogical records that

were in the temple got destroyed and burned. So the

last accurate genealogy we have is from Ezra 2 and

Nehemiah 6. What about the other 950,000 people? Well, no

one's going to remember their name. Because no risk, no story.

I want to ask everybody to bow your heads, close

your eyes. If you're here today, I just want to

pray for you. If you're here and you want to

be real, say, PB, God is stirring me and I've

been stirred. I'm feeling like maybe it's a job change.

Maybe it's something in a relationship. Maybe it's a significant move.

I don't love the significant moves, but I'll accept them.

But maybe it's something going on. The Lord is stirring

you to take a risk and you are wrestling through

all the reasons that people don't take risks. And you

want to say, BB, pray for me that I'll have

the courage to take the next step.

If that is you, raise your hand. Love it. Hands up.

All over the place. In the balcony. You can put

them down.

Lord Jesus, you know every story behind every hand that

was raised. You know what the thing you're stirring them

to do is. And Lord, every single one of us,

you're stirring us to do something. Start a business. Change

a career. Move to a new place. Do something that

they've never done before. Lord, I pray that instead of fear,

they are given courage. That you will deep inside of

them well up courage to take the next step. I

pray that every person that's here is reminded of this

message throughout the week.

That the good is the enemy of the best.

And that you have something in store for them that

they can only imagine.

And no risk, no story. In Jesus' name, amen.

Amen.

How many of you are enjoying this series so far?

Come on, man. I want to, as always, direct you

to our What's Next page on the app because on

there is all sorts of helpful resources. We have Bible plans,

next steps for you to take this message and just

continue to dive into it, continue to learn, continue to grow,

continue to have conversation in your family. as you kind

of ingest this message and then practically live it out

this week. So many of you raised your hands, and

I just want you to know that as a staff,

we're going to be praying for you this week as

you begin to walk that out. But this morning before

we leave, I also want to remind you that we

have a couple things getting going this week. Later tonight,

we have our worship and prayer night, man, 6 o'clock.

If you have not been to one of these, these

are powerful, powerful nights. Maybe our Northwest students will come

out to that too. You can come back, okay? Man,

we would love to have you here for that 6 p.m.

worship and prayer night. And then this week is also

launch of groups week. If you have not signed up

to be a part of a group here at Venture,

this is how we do community. I just want to

challenge you. You can't just walk in on a Sunday

morning and walk out and expect to have community here.

You have to invest in that decision. And so I

want to challenge you to go back to the table

in the lobby, grab some cards, look at the different

groups that we have available, I just want to highlight

one right now for those of you who have kids.

We have a family-friendly group led by Derek and Karen

Illman called the Foundational Faith Study. Man, I would challenge

you to consider being a part of this group. Have

your kids be a part of it too. It's going

to be a great time. And those are two incredible

people right here in our community that would love to

build a relationship with you. But with that, I want

you to go ahead and stand to your feet this morning.

I just want to say thank you again for choosing

to be here with us at Venture Church. We love

you guys. We will see you back here tonight at

6 p.m. for worship and prayer night. God bless you guys.

See you later.