Rick Warren - The Only Family That Will Last Forever

I haven't told you since last year that I love you.

What can I say? You ought to feel neglected, but

I do. You pull out your message notes. You know,

in life, it's very important at different times in your

life to pause and just stop and ask the question, why?

Why am I doing this? What am I doing and

why am I doing this? Why always determines how and

how long. Now, we're starting a brand new year, a

brand new decade. We're starting our 40th anniversary year as

a church. And I want us to just take a

couple weeks and pause and go, what is church and

why do we do it? I think it's important to

go back and remind ourselves what this is all about. Now,

we're gonna start at the beginning. Watch up here on

the screen. The Bible says in Hebrews 2.10, God is

the one who made everything. That's where we start. We

start with God made everything. And all things are for

his glory. You and every plant and animal and rock

are for his glory. But he wanted to have children

to share his glory. The Bible says God invented the

universe because he wanted a family. God wasn't lonely, God

is love, but he didn't need us, but he wanted

a family to love and to share his glory. And

so he created the universe. Now the Bible says this

in Ephesians chapter one. God's unchanging plan, from the very

beginning of time, has always been to adopt us into

his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ.

So the whole reason everything exists is God wanted a family,

and he wants that family to be with him forever

and ever and ever. He puts us here on earth

as a trial test, but what is that family called? Well,

we've talked about this before. That family is called the church.

Jesus said in Ephesians, excuse me, Jesus said in Matthew 16,

Matthew 16:18

verse 18, I will build my church He didn't say,

I'll build a government. He didn't say, I'll build a nation.

He didn't say, I'll build a business. He said, I

will build my church. Jesus is only interested, God is

only interested in his family. Everything else is gonna burn up.

The only thing on planet Earth that's gonna last is

God's family. He says, I will build my church and

all the powers of hell will not defeat it. The

most successful human movement of all time is the church

of God. 2.3 billion believers, followers of Christ. The church

is the largest organization on the planet. Nothing comes close.

The church at 2.3 billion believers is bigger than China.

The church is bigger than China and the United States

and all of Europe put together. Nothing as big as

the planet, the movement of God. You're not just part

of an organization. You're part of a movement, and that

movement is gonna go on for eternity in heaven. Jesus said,

I will build my church, and no dictator and no

ism can stop it. Now, sometimes you hear people say, well,

I love Jesus, but I don't need the church. No, no,

that's a really big mistake people make, because you can't

love Jesus. without loving his bride, his body, his family,

his flock. You can't love Jesus. In fact, the Bible

says this in Ephesians chapter five, verse 25. Christ loves

his church. Whatever he loves, you better love too. Christ

loves his church and he gave his life for it.

Christ died for the church. So don't ever say it's unimportant.

Don't ever say it's, the only people that are gonna

be in heaven is the church. Nobody else is, that's

his family. It's his family. Now it has different labels

on it. Methodist, Baptist, Episcopalian, Catholic, Nazarene, Calvary Chapel, all

the labels are irrelevant. The fact is the people who

are the followers of Christ, they're part of his family,

that's all that's gonna be in heaven. And he built

the universe because he wanted a family. Now, let's just

start with the basics. What is a church? When I

say the word church, some people think of a building. No,

a church is not a building. A church is not

a location. So when I say church, people think of

something they go to attend. People often say, well, I'm

going to church. Technically, that's a wrong statement. The church

is not something you attend. It's a family that you

belong to. Really, it'd be more accurate to not say

I'm going to church, but saying I'm going to a

worship service. Or I'm going to a Bible study. or

I'm going to a fellowship, or I'm going to an

activity of the church. You can't go to a church.

A church is not an event. It has events, but

the church is the family of God. Church is not

an event you attend. It is a family you belong to.

Does that make sense? Okay, so it's not something you

go to. To actually say, well, I'm going to church,

you really mean to say, I'm going to worship, or

I'm going to service, or I'm going to Bible study, whatever.

So it's not a place, it's not an event, it's

not an institution. I'm going to give you a very

specific biblical definition of the church. I'd like for you

to write these four phrases down, okay? Number one, because

once I explain this, then I'm gonna show you five

benefits of being a part of God's family. Number one,

what is a church? The church is God's family on

earth and in heaven. God's family on earth and in heaven.

The church isn't just on, on earth. Many people are

already in heaven. So some of the church, that's God's family,

is already in heaven. Some of the church is still

here on earth. But the church is both in heaven

and on earth, and it is God's family. First Timothy

chapter three, verses 14 and 15 says this. I'm writing

to you so that you'll know how to live in

the family of God. We need to learn how to

live in God's family. That family is the church of

the living God. The support and foundation of the truth.

So anytime you talk about the church, you're talking about

God's family. Anytime you talk about God's family, you're talking

about the church. There is no family of God outside

of the church. It is the same. So it's God's

family on heaven and earth. Number two, it's composed of

saved and baptized believers. The church is composed of saved

and baptized believers. Now you might have your name on

a roll as a child in some church, but that

doesn't make you a part of the church. It just

means you're on somebody's roll. You have to be saved

and you have to be baptized to be a part

of the church of God. Let me just show you

what Jesus said. Mark chapter 16, verse 16. Whoever believes

Mark 16:16

in me, Jesus said, and is baptized will be saved.

But whoever refuses to believe will be condemned. Now, some

people look at that and go, oh, are you saying

that I have to be baptized in order to be saved,

that it's essential for salvation? No, I'm not. No water

will save you. Only Jesus can save you. No water

will save you. But if you really are saved, you

wanna be baptized. It's a contradiction to say, well, I'm

a follower of Christ, but I don't do what he

tells me to do. That's a contradiction. So maybe you're

not really saved. Baptism is what I call the wedding

ring of the Christian life. This ring doesn't make me married.

It was the commitment in my heart that made me

married when I said I do. This ring is the

outward expression. It reminds me, oh, I made a vow

in my heart. Baptism is the wedding ring of the

Christian life. It doesn't make you a Christian. It shows

that you are. And anybody who refuses to be baptized,

you at every reason of doubt, they've had a commitment

in their heart. Because the first thing Jesus said is,

be baptized as this outward symbol of your inward commitment.

So it doesn't make you a Christian, but notice he says,

anyone who believes and is baptized. Which comes first, believing

or baptism? Believing, right? You believe and then you're baptized. Now,

if you were baptized before you believed, it didn't count.

You don't get any blessing from that. You need to

do it again, because it meant nothing. You just got wet. Okay,

that's all it means. Baptism only matters if you believe first.

Some of you don't even remember your baptism. So how

could you possibly believe? Because maybe you weren't even old

enough to know that. So you believe, Jesus said, and

then you're baptized. Let me show you a couple of

other verses. Acts chapter two, verse 38. This is the

day of Pentecost. This is the day that Jesus began

his church. And Peter preached this sermon. He said this,

repent and be baptized, this is the first day of

the church, in the name of Jesus Christ for the

forgiveness of your sin. Then God will give you his

Holy Spirit. Now in Romans chapter eight it says if

you don't have God's Spirit in you, you're not a Christian.

You're not saved. To not have God's spirit would mean

you don't really know the Lord yet. So he says,

whoever believes in being baptized, he'll be saved. And then

Peter says, repent and be baptized. Now, in that verse,

which one comes first? Repent or be baptized? Repent, right?

So if you were baptized before you repented, it didn't count.

As I said, it was just a nice little ritual,

but it meant nothing. You got no spiritual blessing out

of it, because you didn't even know what the meaning

of baptism was. It comes after you believe, and it

comes after you repent. Now, here's what happens. Same day,

Acts 2 verse 41, it says, then those who believed,

Acts 2:41

they believed first, were then baptized. See, believing comes before baptized.

And then they became part of the church. Baptism is

the entry door to the church. About 3,000 people that day.

So baptism doesn't bless you if you did it out

of order. And if you believed after you were baptized,

you need to be baptized again. Because it didn't mean anything,

it didn't mean what the meaning of baptism is all about,

all right? So it's God's family on earth, it's composed

of saved and baptized believers. Third part is this, it's

people who are committed to Jesus and each other. To

be a part of the church means I'm not just

committed to Jesus, I'm committed to the other people in

my church family. A church means I am committed to

Jesus and to each other. Now let me show you

a few verses about this. 2 Corinthians 8, verse five. First,

it says, they gave themselves to the Lord, and then, second,

by God's will, they gave themselves to us as well.

This is what we call the first base commitment at Saddleback. First,

you give yourself to the Lord, And then you give

yourself to a group of other Christians. The first one

makes you a Christian. The second one makes you a

church member. Let me say it again. First they gave

themselves to the Lord. That's how you get saved. You

give your life to the Lord. And it says, and

then they gave themselves to us as well. That's what

it means to be a church member. You become a

Christian by giving your life to Christ. You become a

church member by giving yourself to a group of other

people and say, that's gonna be my spiritual home. That's

gonna be my family. That's gonna be my spiritual base

for my life. While I'm here in this area, whatever.

It is a commitment, not simply to Christ, it's a

commitment to another group of other people. And we're gonna

look at that today. Let me show you some other verses.

Romans 12, verse 10 says, you are to be devoted,

Romans 12:10

circle this, to each other. Not just to God, you

will be devoted to each other as brothers and sisters

in God's loving family. That's what it means to be

a church member. You're not just committed to Christ, you're

committed to his family. You're committed to your brothers and

sisters in that family. Romans chapter 14, excuse me, Romans

Romans 14 · chapter mention

12 verse four and five. In Christ's body, each member

belongs to who? All the others. You realize this, that

in this church family, I belong to you, you belong

to me, we belong to each other. That's what it

means to be a member of a family. Now notice

it has the word member there. Sometimes you'll hear people say,

I've actually heard preachers on the radio say this. Well,

there's no such thing as church membership in the Bible.

That's just nonsense. The word member came from the Bible.

There was no word member until it was in the Bible.

The word member is used about 100 times in the

New Testament. The whole concept of membership was only about

the church until other people picked it up and all

of a sudden, you know, American Express says membership has

its privileges. No, so now you can be a member

of my book club, you can be a member of

my Facebook following, you can be a member of some

of the Rotary Club, you can be members of a

million other things. But the word member came from the Bible.

And it's talking about being a member of a local

body of Christ. And it's used in a very different way.

It's not talking about secret handshakes and funny hats and

passwords and stuff like that. What is it talking about

in member? Well, look on the screen. 1 Corinthians 12,

12 to 14. Just as your body has many members.

What are we talking about there? Your hand is a

member of your body. Your ear is a member of

your body. Your eye is a member of your body.

Your nose, your spleen, your liver. These are all members

of your body. Just as your body has many members,

and each member of your body is unique. The liver

doesn't do what the heart does. All your members together

Form your single body, physically. So it is with Christ's body.

He says it's the exact same thing, physical parallel to

a spiritual parallel. Christ's body is the church. He said

all the members of the church make up the body

of Christ, all right? So he's saying here that only

as you're connected does it really, really matter. And then

he says the rest of it. He says this, for

in one spirit, We were all baptized into one body,

regardless of our background, whether Jews or Gentiles or slaves

or free, we all received God's Spirit. He said, it

doesn't matter what your background is, religious background, ethnic background,

language background, racial background, none of that really matters. He says,

regardless of your background, we all receive God's spirit. That's

what puts us in the body. We're baptized into one body,

so the body isn't made up of just one member.

It's all the members connected together. And what is that saying?

It's saying this, you are not the church of God

by yourself. You are not the family of God by yourself.

You're not the body of Christ by yourself. Only as

we are connected together, Are we the family of God?

Are we the body of Christ? Are we God's church?

I'm not the church. You're not the church. But together,

we are the church. And he said it's in that connection.

So only in connection to other members are you actually

in God's family. If you're not connected to other members,

how are you in God's family? So what does that

mean then? What does that mean to be a part

of the body of Christ? Look at these verses. First

Corinthians 12, 25. The way God designed our bodies, physical bodies,

is a model for understanding our lives together as a church.

He says, okay, look at your body and then you'll

figure out how the church operates. Every part is to

be dependent on the other parts. I can't say that

I don't need this part or I don't need that part.

We all need each other and we are to be

dependent on the other parts. It was his intention that

we live our lives together. God never meant for you

to go through life on your own. Now, let me

show you another verse. 1 Corinthians 12, 25 to 27.

The members, notice how many times this word member comes

up in the Bible. The members must have the same

care for each other. That means I gotta care about you,

you gotta care about me. We have to care about

each other. If we are in the family of God,

if we are in the body of Christ called Saddleback

or whatever, there are lots of good churches, just choose one.

I'm not saying just this church, I'm just saying just

choose a place that's gonna be my family. The members

must have the same care for each other. If one

member is hurt or suffers, then all suffer together. And

if one member is honored, all the others rejoice. In

other words, you get a raise, you get promoted, the

whole church should celebrate with you. You get the word,

dreaded word cancer, the whole church should support you when

you're going through those protocols. You are the body of

Christ and each one of you is a necessary part

of it. There's no unnecessary part. People say, well, I'm

not very necessary in my church. Oh, how wrong you are.

If I don't use my gifts, you get hurt. If

you don't use your gifts, I get hurt, so does

everybody else. We all have a different role to play.

Now let me pause here and review what I've said

about what is the church. First I said it's God's

family that's in heaven and on earth. Some's in heaven,

some's on earth. I said it's composed of saved and

baptized believers. If you're not saved, you're not baptized, you're

not a part of the church. Number three, they're committed

to Jesus and each other. We commit to him and

we commit to each other. But then there's one other

fourth part. Write this down. These are people who are

preparing for heaven or Christ's return. Preparing for heaven or

Christ's return. That's what the church is doing. So either

Jesus comes back before I die or he doesn't come

back before I die and I go to heaven first.

Either way, I'm preparing for eternity with Jesus. With him.

Hebrews chapter 12 verse 23 is an important verse. It

Hebrews 12:23

says this. you are the church of God's children. Okay,

remember it's the family of God. You are the church

of God's children whose names are registered in heaven. You

ought to be grateful for that because you have come

to God Himself and you have come To Jesus. Now

notice this. Your names are registered in heaven. You know,

I've met a few of these Hollywood types and done

some Bible studies for producers and stuff like that up

in Hollywood. And the big deal in Hollywood is to

get on the A-list. Because if you're on the A-list,

you get invited to all the A-list parties. You don't

want to be on the B-list or the C-list or

like some of us, the Z-list. Okay? Because you really

want to be, because the A-list are the best parties

after the Oscars and stuff like that. Well, let me

tell you something. There's something better than being on the

A list. It's being on God's register of names in heaven. Hello?

That is a big deal, okay? That is a very

exclusive list. Not everybody's gonna be on that list. Only

those who've been saved and baptized and joined a part

of God's family. Only God's family is gonna be in heaven.

But that's a very exclusive list. Most important invitation list

you wanna be a part of. How do I get

on that list? Well, that verse said, get to know,

you've come to know God and you've come to know Jesus.

You come to God and you come to Jesus. Now,

we're gonna, in just a second, look at five different

metaphors of the church and what the benefits of that

means to your life. But this week, I did something fun.

I went and I got the original three members of

Saddleback Church, Don Dale, who was the first member of

the church who joined Kay and me, and Lee and

Cynthia Hensler, who were the first people baptized in this church.

And those three were in the very first class 101

that I taught 40 years ago. And I found, oh,

you can see it on the video, but I videotaped

this interview, and I want you to watch this. I've

got a real treat for you today. My oldest friends

at Saddleback Church are sitting on this couch and they're

really old. We're gonna talk about what membership means. These

are people from the very first membership class. I found

this article in the Saddleback News, a copy that said,

we welcomed 42 new members, this is in 2008, 1980

at the very first 101 class including Don Dale who

was the first member of Saddleback Church and you've heard

the famous story of how we met and he got

home for us and then has been here for all

40 years and the 12 weeks before that and then

Lee and Cynthia Hensler Cynthia Hensler and Lee were the

first two people baptized in Saddleback Church and she was

the first person who called You remember that? Yes. Tell

me about that, because we hand-addressed and hand-stamped 15,000 letters.

Don was involved, obviously, in that.

Well, we wanted to find a church, not for us,

but we had a brand new baby.

A new baby, didn't you?

Yeah.

We thought part of.

The formula for being good parents would take the child

to church.

By the way, Courtney was the first diaper change at

Saddleback Church.

And she also bit your daughter.

She did bit my daughter, who was just a couple

months older. Very first bit, yes.

Blood sisters.

Yes.

But we decided we wanted to find a church so

we could be those good parents.

Yeah.

And the letter arrived.

Yeah.

And didn't give us too much information other than where

it met and what time.

Right.

So I just had a few other questions I needed

to ask.

So you called. And I kept a record. I still

have this record of everybody who called from that letter.

And the first one was Cynthia Hensler.

Cindy.

Cindy at the time, exactly, that's true. That's true. And

I was trying to go by Richard, but it didn't work, so.

I was trying to look older than I really was.

And Don was actually the old man at the time,

so anyway. Don and Lee and Cynthia, I want to

just talk about, well, first, everybody's going to want to know,

what's it like to have been through 40 years of

Saddleback Church? Absolutely amazing. And I did go to the

very first service. You did.

And I listened to you read that first letter of

what your vision was for this church.

Yeah, yeah. That is just really a wild thing. I

just wondered if I could really do it. I did too.

I wasn't even a Christian at the time. I just

had nothing to do on Easter Sunday.

So I went to the church that was meeting in

the school I taught at. Yeah, that's true. You taught

it at Laguna Hills High School. That's right.

And so I did it in there with no expectation.

My real reason was I was going to go and

see what it was like so I could tell her, oh,

let's not bother. when she came back. But I heard

something entirely different that I've never heard before about that

relationship with Jesus Christ.

I've never heard that before.

We had no idea what was in store for us.

Don, talk about all of the prep that we did

getting ready for that first service.

What was it, 15,000 letters?

15,000 letters, yeah.

Rick did not want them computer generated.

Hand addressed them.

I think we licked stamps.

We stamped them, hand stamped them.

And licked the envelope closed and figured out some sort

of method.

We all had this thick mucus on our licks.

It basically just said, we got good news for you.

Visit us. You got it. That's it. That's exactly right.

We've got good news. That's how we started. And I'll

never forget at the first service when 205 people walked

up that walkway to Laguna Hills High School and Kay

looked at me with tears in her eyes and she goes,

this is going to work. That was Easter Sunday.

Remember we did a service a week ahead?

That's true. It's exactly what would happen. Exactly. And we

had 60 people at that.

And my dad's a minister.

I called my dad and I said... 60.

People showed up. On the trial run service.

On the trial run, and my dad goes, 60? We

only got 100 in our church. You got 60 for

the first service?

Yeah, right.

What's going on?

Exactly.

My dad was amazed.

I was amazed. I thought, wow, maybe this.

There is something.

Yeah, five people gave their lives to Christ in the

trial run service. And some of their names, Carl and

Linda Bolt were two of the ones who gave their

lives to Christ. Gary and Pat Streed. I remember they

wrote on a card, they said, Rick, help us. And

I thought they were having just typical problems, marriage problems

or something. I called them up and said, how can

I help you? They said, oh, we just want to

know how to give our lives to Christ. And that

was it.

That's how it started. So we've seen a lot. We

had to set up the nursery. We had to figure

out what we're going to do with the kids. What

are we going to do with the youth? Who's going

to play the music?

If you were a warm body, you could be a

youth worker.

Breeders and all this stuff.

We take it for granted today.

We're only.

10 or 15 of us to do all this.

This is an interesting point that Don's making, that before

the first service, this little Bible study grew to about

15 people. And many of them had not given their

lives to Christ. They were non-believers. I actually had non-believers

helping us plan the service. And I said, you know,

Bob Jacoby, I said, you're going to be the usher.

And Terry, you're going to plan this. And we had

non-Christians helping us plan a church service for non-Christians.

Rick?

Yeah.

Within the first month of the church, we asked Lee

and I to... do one of the Bible studies after

the service.

You're it.

We didn't do that until about the sixth or seventh.

I remember that, exactly, yeah. Oh, you're a teacher, you

could be a Bible study leader. You could be a

Bible study leader, exactly. We later did that in prison

where we pointed to people and said, point around, will

we choose Bubba to be our Bible study leader? Bubba goes,

I'm not a Christian. No, but you're a leader, so

you can ask the questions. So it was the whole

idea that we want to... convince people is it was

all hands on deck. There were literally no spectators. Once

you start coming week number two, you're a participator. You know?

I probably talked on the phone a couple times a day.

A day. Daily at least. Exactly. Exactly.

Let's keep working.

Exactly.

That was how the church functioned.

No, that's exactly right, Don. Okay. Now, there are 67

different metaphors in the Bible. The metaphors are names of

the church. What I want to do in the last

few minutes here is talk to you about five of

them and show you the benefits. What are the benefits

of belonging? So the Bible calls the church many different things,

but let's just look at five. Would you write these down?

The first metaphor is the most well-known one, which is

the church is a family. Okay, it's a family. And

there are many, many implications for that, but The one

thing I want to focus on is that in a

healthy family, you learn who you are. So write this down.

Number one, in God's family, I learn my true identity.

That's the first benefit of actually being a member of

a local church. church. In God's family, I learn my

true identity. Have you ever thought about why people wear brands?

You know, they'll say Ralph Lauren or Ruka or Vans

or Tommy Hilfiger or whatever. Why do people wear brands?

To identify. To feel like they belong to something. They like,

they think that this is a cool brand. If I

wear this brand, then I'm cool. And so we identify

with brands because it helps us identify. But in reality,

your primary identity doesn't come from what you wear. Your

primary identity comes from relationships. I am a son, I

am a brother,

These are all relationships in my life that define

who Rick Warren is. It's not how I look, it's

not how little or much money I've got, it's what

are my relationships. You're defined by relationships. If my connections

are bad, or my connections are broken, then my identity suffers.

If I just got fired, or I just got divorced,

or my spouse dies, if something changes in my relationships,

it causes me to pause and go, who am I?

Who am I? Because your primary identity comes from your relationships. Now,

I know what some of you think. You say, Rick,

that's terrible news for me because my family was dysfunctional,

my family was broken, or maybe my family was nonexistent. Well,

I got good news for you. The next verse on

your outline, Ephesians 2.19. You are a member of, there's

that word member, you are a member of God's very

own family and you belong in God's household with every

other Christian. This is your family. This, you belong here,

you fit here. Now actually, hear me out on this.

Your spiritual family is far more important even than your

physical family. God used your physical family to bring you

into the world so you could become a part of

his spiritual family. You should be grateful that your physical

family got together, whatever the circumstances are, doesn't matter, God

wanted you alive because he wanted you to be a

part of his spiritual family. Why is my spiritual family,

the church, more important than my physical family? Because your

physical family doesn't last. People die, people grow old, people

move away, people divorce, there's all kinds of different things,

it doesn't last. But God's family is gonna last forever

and ever and ever. Our relationship, I have people in

my family I never met, great grandparents and other relatives

that I've never met. My dad was number 18 of

20 kids. Yeah, can you imagine that? I'd have to

rent the Superdome if I had a family reunion. I've

never met most of those relatives. But if they know

the Lord, they're in God's family, we're gonna be in

heaven together. And your spiritual family is gonna be permanent.

It's going on for thousands and thousands and thousands and

thousands of years. God used your physical family to get

you into the world. You ought to be grateful for that.

But his real goal is to get you into his

spiritual family. You're a member of God's very only family.

The world uses superficial identifiers. You have brown hair, you

weigh such and such, your height is this, you're Asian

or you're Caucasian or you're African American or you're educated

or you're rich or you're whatever. Those are all superficial

identifiers for you. People today, when they don't know their

identity in Christ, they look for identity in something else,

like a political party. Well, I'm of this, or I'm

of that. And they find their identity in the team

that they root for, or they find their identity in

the celebrity that they identify with, or they find their

identity in the political person they think's gonna be the

savior of the world. But none of that. It matters,

it's superficial. What matters most is your spiritual identity. Look

on the screen, Hebrews 2.11. Jesus and the people he

makes holy all belong to the same family. That's a connection.

You're in the family of God. That's why he isn't

ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters. Now you

may have had some relatives you were ashamed of, but

God Jesus says, I'm not ashamed of you, I'm your brother,

I'm your elder brother in the family of God. By

belonging to Christ, you discover your true identity. Now you know,

I used to work up in inner city LA as

a youth pastor many, many years ago. And gangs would

get gang tattoos so they could identify who they belonged to, okay?

What's the tattoo of a Christian? Baptism. Baptism says, I'm in,

I'm in. I'm not ashamed to say to the world,

Jesus Christ is my Savior and my Lord. Now that's

the first metaphor, it's family. Let's go quickly to these others.

Second metaphor, the Bible says the church is a temple.

It's a temple. It's like a building erected to hold

the presence of God. And God says his presence wants

to be in you. You're a temple and together we

form the temple of God. Look here on the screen.

First Corinthians 3.16 says this. Don't you realize that all

of you together, together are the temple of God and

his spirit lives in you. I'm not the temple of

God just by myself. You're not the temple of God

just by yourself. Together we are the temple of God.

That's a metaphor. for God's family, for God's church. And

like a strong structure of a building, we each hold

each other up. Okay, this is an important thing. We

each hold each other up. You know, I remember when

we were building all these buildings on the Lake Forest

campus and how fascinating it was that it took thousands

and thousands and thousands of parts to erect the building.

But the most important thing in a building is that

the parts have to fit together. If they don't fit together,

the parts are worthless. A beam that is a quarter

of an inch too short is worthless. A pipe that

is a foot too long is worthless. The parts have

to fit together or they lose their meaning and purpose.

And to be strong and to be stable, everything has

to connect. And that's what the metaphor of the church

as a temple is all about. Also I noticed when

I would walk around in some of these buildings that

were being built before they were erected is that there

was a lot of spare stuff laying around on the ground.

There were parts and wood and tools and all kinds

of things that were not used. And what I noticed

about that is that a piece of pipe could be

laying on the ground. It could be in the building, okay,

it could be in the building, but it was not

a part of the building. You understand what I'm saying?

Just laying on the ground. It's in the building, but

it's not a part of the building. Some of you

are in the church. You come every week to service,

but you're not a part of it, because you're not

connected yet. You haven't made the commitment of membership. You're

in it, you're like, you're in it, but you're not

a part of it, because you're not connected to anybody. Yet,

many times, why did God use this metaphor of a

building to illustrate the church? Because in a building, the

connected parts hold each other together. And there are gonna

be many times in your life when you need other

people to hold you together. You're gonna need other people

in your life to hold you together. As the pastor

of this church, there have been many, many times over

40 years, I needed the members of this church to

hold me together. Because I'm just a person like you.

And I needed people to hold me together when things

are falling apart in my life. If you don't have that,

you're lacking what the church offers. So, write this down.

Number two, in God's temple, I'm supported by others. Like

a strong structure of a building, we hold each other up.

This is what the whole book of Ephesians teaches. Chapter two,

in God's temple, I'm supported by others. Ephesians chapter two

says this, verse 21 and 22. In Christ, the whole

building is joined together and it rises to become a

holy temple to the Lord. He's talking about the church.

And in him you too are being built together to

become a dwelling place in which God lives by his spirit.

By his spirit. Here's the point. In a building, a

disconnected frame has no support and has no stability. And

it's gonna collapse on its own. And if you're not connected,

there will be times in your life when you collapse

because you have no stability and you have no support.

You're just out there on your own. You weren't meant

to go through life all by yourself. You weren't meant

to go through it all on your own. You need

physical and spiritual and emotional and mental support. You need

to belong. Few years back I got, because of my grandkids,

got involved in Legos. It had been a long time

since I'd played with Legos. But we turned my entire

garage into Legoland. And we were building Fantasy World and

Cowboys and Indians and Star Wars and Jurassic Park and

on and on and on. You know what I discovered

about Legos? Legos are created for connection. They have no

purpose if they're not connected. When you connect them, you

can really build some cool stuff. But if they're not

connected to anything else, they're just a pile of plastic.

They get in the way. And you step on them,

it hurts your bare foot. Anybody ever stepped on a Lego?

God bless you, is there another? God bless you, I

see you. Thousands of you have stepped on Legos, thank you.

God bless you. But when you connect them, you can

create something cool. Here's what the Bible says, Romans 1,

Romans 1:12

verse 12. I want us to help each other with

the faith that we have, okay? Your faith will help me,

and my faith will help you. That's why we have church.

Your faith will help me, and my faith will help you. Now,

in class 101, we have actually a membership covenant, and

everybody signs that covenant. And it is a promise, not

simply to God, but to each other, saying, I will help.

Love the other members of this church. And I will

help the other members of the church. You know, the

church is the antidote to the greatest epidemic in the

world right now, loneliness. People are lonely all around the world.

It is epidemic proportion. You know, some of you are students,

you're in school. I just wanna say this to you

because school can be a lonely time This church here

is very far from perfect, but it's filled with people

who will love you if you'll get to know them,

and they will help you navigate the crazy years in

your life. They will help you. Now let's go to

the third metaphor. The third metaphor that we see in

the Bible is the church is a body. The church

is a body. It's called the body of Christ. Up

here on the screen, 1 Corinthians 12 says, together you

are the body of Christ. and each one of you

is a part of it. So the church is a family,

the church is a temple, the church is a body. Now,

what's the benefit of being a part of the body

of Christ? Romans chapter 12, there on your outline, verse

Romans 12 · chapter mention

four and five. Just as there are many parts to

our bodies, so it is with Christ's body. We're all

parts of it and it takes everyone to make it complete.

For we each have different work to do, so we

belong to each other and each of us needs All

the other parts. I could have preached the entire sermon

just on this. It says we're all many parts. We're

all unique. Look around. Nobody's like you in our church family.

Everybody's unique. We're all unique. Everybody's needed to make the

body complete. We each have different work to do. We

belong to each other and we need each other. Church

is far more than simply something you attend. It's a

family you belong to. And you need other people. You

need connections in your life. First Corinthians chapter 12, verse 15.

1 Corinthians 12:15

If the foot says, I'm not part of the body

because I'm not a hand, that doesn't make it any

less part of the body. And if an ear says,

I'm not part of the body because I'm only an

ear and not an eye, would that make it any

less part of the body? Too often, the church is

just a big mouth. And we've amputated the arms and

the feet. And we're known for what we say, we

know for what we're against. I'm tired of that. I

want our church to be known for what we're for,

not what we're against. Okay? I want us to be

known for what we're for, not what we're against. Again,

what good is an eyeball detached from a body? It

can't see anything. I want you to write this on

your outline. I can't fulfill my purpose by myself. That's

one of the fundamental lessons you have to learn in life.

I cannot fulfill my purpose, by myself. You know, I

asked Don, Dale, and Lee and Cynthia Hensler about their

being involved in ministries over the years, because they've all

been involved in dozens of them. And this is what

they had to say. I want you to watch this.

I've got a real treat for you today. My oldest

friends at Saddleback Church are sitting on this couch and

they're really old. We're gonna talk about what membership means.

These are people from the very first membership class. I

found this article in the Saddleback News, a copy that

said we welcomed 42 new members, this is in 1980,

at the very first 101 class, including Don Dale, who

was the first member of Saddleback Church, And you've heard

the famous story of how we met and he got

a home for us and then has been here for

all 40 years and the 12 weeks before that. And

then Lee and Cynthia Hensler, Cynthia Hensler and Lee were

the first two people baptized in Saddleback Church. And she

was the first person who called. You remember that? Tell

me about that because we hand addressed and hand stamped 15,000 letters.

Don was involved obviously in that.

Well, we wanted to find a church, not for us,

but we had a brand new baby.

A new baby, didn't you?

Yeah.

We thought part of the formula for being good parents

would take child to church.

By the way, Courtney was the first diaper changed at

Saddleback Church.

And she also bit your daughter.

She did bit my daughter, who was just a couple

months older.

Blood sisters.

Yes.

But we decided we wanted to find a church so

we could be those good parents.

Yeah.

And, uh, the letter arrived and, um.

Uh, didn't give us too much information other than where

it met and what time. So I just had a

few other questions I needed to ask.

So you called, and I kept a record, I still

have this record of everybody who called from that letter.

And the first one was Cynthia Hensler.

Cindy.

Cindy at the time, exactly, that's true. And I was

trying to go by Richard, but it didn't work. I

was trying to look older than I really was. And

Don was actually the old man at the time, so anyway.

Don and Lee and Cynthia, I want to just talk about, well, first,

everybody's going to want to know, what's it like to

have been through 40 years of Saddleback Church? Absolutely amazing.

And I did go to the very first service. You did.

And I listened to you read that first letter of what.

Your vision was for this church. Yeah.

That is just really a wild thing. I just wondered

if I could really do it. I did too.

I wasn't even a Christian at the time. I just

had nothing to do on Easter Sunday. So I went

to the church that was meeting in the school I

taught at.

Yeah, that's true. You taught it at Laguna Hills High School.

That's right.

And so I did it in there with no expectation.

My real reason was I was going to go and

see what it was like so I could tell her, oh,

let's not bother.

Yeah. when she came back. But I heard something entirely

different than I've ever heard before.

About that relationship with Jesus Christ. I've never heard that before.

We had no idea what was in store for us.

Don, talk about all of the prep that we did

getting ready for that first service.

What was it, 15,000 letters?

15,000 letters, yeah.

Rick did not want them computer generated.

No. Hand addressed them.

I think we licked stamps.

We stamped them, hand stamped them.

And licked the envelope closed.

Yes.

Figured out some sort of method.

We all had this thick mucus on our licks. Licks

were stuck together. Yeah.

It basically just said, we got good news for you.

Visit us. You got it. That's it. That's exactly right.

We've got good news. That's how we started. And I'll

never forget at the first service when 205 people walked

up that. walkway to Laguna Hills High School and Kay

looked at me with tears in her eyes and she goes,

this is gonna work. That was Easter Sunday.

Remember we did a service a week ahead of that.

That's true. We kind of practiced because we didn't know

what would happen. Exactly. And we had 60 people at that.

And my dad's a minister.

I called my dad and I said, 60.

People showed up. On the trial run service.

On the trial run, and my dad goes, 60?

We've only got 100 in our church, and you've got

60 for the first service?

Yeah, right.

What's going on?

Exactly.

My dad was amazed.

I was amazed.

Wow maybe this there is something.

Yeah five people gave their lives christ in the trial

run service and some of their names carl and linda

bolt were two of the ones who gave the life

of gary and pat street i remember they wrote on

a card they said Rick, help us. And I thought

they were having, you know, just typical problems, marriage problems

or something. I called them up and said, how can

I help you? They said, oh, we just want to

know how to give our lives to Christ. And that

was it. That's how it started. So we've seen a lot.

We had to set up the nursery. We had to

figure out what we're going to do with the kids.

What are we going to do with the youth? Who's

going to play the music?

If you were a warm body, you could be a

youth worker.

Breeders and all this stuff.

We take it for granted today.

10 or 15 of us to do all this.

This is an interesting point that Don's making, that before

the first service, this little Bible study grew to about

15 people. And many of them had not given their

lives to Christ. They were non-believers. I actually had non-believers

helping us plan the service. And I said, you know,

Bob Jacoby, I said, you're going to be the usher.

And Terry, you're going to plan this. And we had

non-Christians helping us plan a church service for non-Christians.

Rich.

Yeah.

Within the first month of the church, we asked Lee

and I do one of the Bible studies after the service.

You're it.

We don't do that until about the sixth or seventh.

I remember that, exactly, yeah. Oh, you're a teacher, you

could be a Bible study leader. You could be a

Bible study leader, exactly. We later did that in prison

where we pointed to people and said, point around, will

we choose Bubba to be our Bible study leader? Bubba goes,

I'm not a Christian. No, but you're a leader, so

you can ask the questions. So it was the whole

idea that we wanted to convince people is it was

all hands on deck. There were literally no spectators. Once

you start coming, week number two, you're a participator. You know?

You and I probably talked on the phone a couple

times a day.

A day. Daily at least. Exactly. Exactly.

Let's keep working.

Exactly.

That was how the church functioned.

No, that's exactly right, Don. Okay. Now, there are 67

different metaphors in the Bible, and the metaphors are names

of the church. What I want to do in the

last few minutes here is talk to you about five

of them and show you the benefits. What are the

benefits of belonging? So the Bible calls the church many

different things, but let's just look at five. Would you

write these down? The first metaphor is the most well-known one,

which is the church is a family. Okay, it's a family.

And there are many, many implications for that, but The

one thing I want to focus on is that in

a healthy family, you learn who you are. So write

this down. Number one, in God's family, I learn my

true identity. That's the first benefit of actually being a

member of a local church. In God's family, I learn

my true identity. Have you ever thought about why people

wear brands? You know, they'll say Ralph Lauren or Ruka

or Vans or Tommy Hilfiger or whatever. Why do people

wear brands? To identify. To feel like they belong to something.

They like to think that this is a cool brand,

if I wear this brand then I'm cool. And so

we identify with brands because it helps us identify. But

in reality, your primary identity doesn't come from what you wear.

Your primary identity comes from relationships. I am a son,

I am a brother,

These are all relationships in my life that

define who Rick Warren is. It's not how I look,

it's not how little or much money I've got, it's

what are my relationships. You're defined by relationships. If my

connections are bad, or my connections are broken, then my

identity suffers. If I just got fired, or I just

got divorced, or my spouse dies, if something changes in

my relationships, it causes me to pause and go, who

am I? Who am I? Because your primary identity comes

from your relationships. Now, I know what some of you think.

You say, Rick, that's terrible news for me because my

family was dysfunctional, my family was broken, or maybe my

family was nonexistent. Well, I got good news for you.

The next verse on your outline, Ephesians 2.19. You are

a member of, there's that word member, you are a

member of God's very own family and you belong in

God's household with every other Christian. This is your family. This,

you belong here, you fit here. Now actually, hear me

out on this. Your spiritual family is far more important

even than your physical family. God used your physical family

to bring you into the world so you could become

a part of his spiritual family. You should be grateful

that your physical family got together, whatever the circumstances are,

doesn't matter, God wanted you alive because he wanted you

to be a part of his spiritual family. Why is

my spiritual family, the church, more important than my physical family?

Because your physical family doesn't last. People die, people grow old,

people move away, people divorce, there's all kinds of different things,

it doesn't last. But God's family is gonna last forever

and ever and ever. Our relationship, I have people in

my family I never met, great grandparents and other relatives

that I've never met. My dad was number 18 of

20 kids. Yeah, can you imagine that? I'd have to

rent the Superdome if I had a family reunion. I've

never met most of those relatives. But if they know

the Lord, they're in God's family, we're gonna be in

heaven together. And your spiritual family is gonna be permanent.

It's going on for thousands and thousands and thousands and

thousands of years. God used your physical family to get

you into the world. You ought to be grateful for that.

But his real goal is to get you into his

spiritual family. You're a member of God's very only family.

And the world uses superficial identifiers. You have brown hair,

you weigh such and such, your height is this, you're

Asian or you're Caucasian or you're African American or you're

educated or you're rich or you're whatever. Those are all

superficial identifiers for you. people today, when they don't know

their identity in Christ, they look for identity in something else,

like a political party. Well, I'm a this, or I'm

a that. And they find their identity in the team

that they root for, or they find their identity in

the celebrity that they identify with, or they find their

identity in the political person they think's gonna be the

savior of the world. But none of that. It matters,

it's superficial. What matters most is your spiritual identity. Look

on the screen, Hebrews 2.11. Jesus and the people he

makes holy all belong to the same family. That's a connection.

You're in the family of God. That's why he isn't

ashamed to call them his brothers and sisters. Now you

may have had some relatives you were ashamed of. But

God Jesus says, I'm not ashamed of you, I'm your brother,

I'm your elder brother in the family of God. By

belonging to Christ, you discover your true identity. Now you know,

I used to work up in inner city LA as

a youth pastor many, many years ago. And gangs would

get gang tattoos so they could identify who they belong to, okay?

What's the tattoo of a Christian? Baptism. Baptism says, I'm in,

I'm in. I'm not ashamed to say to the world,

Jesus Christ is my Savior and my Lord. Now that's

the first metaphor, it's family. Let's go quickly to these others.

Second metaphor, the Bible says the church is a temple.

It's a temple. It's like a building erected to hold

the presence of God. And God says his presence wants

to be in you. You're a temple and together we

form the temple of God. Look here on the screen.

First Corinthians 3.16 says this. Don't you realize that all

of you together, together are the temple of God and

his spirit lives in you. I'm not the temple of

God just by myself. You're not the temple of God

just by yourself. Together we are the temple of God.

That's a metaphor. for God's family, for God's church. And

like a strong structure of a building, we each hold

each other up. Okay, this is an important thing. We

each hold each other up. You know, I remember when

we were building all these buildings on the Lake Forest

campus and how fascinating it was that it took thousands

and thousands and thousands of parts to erect the building.

But the most important thing in a building is that

the parts have to fit together. If they don't fit together,

the parts are worthless. A beam that is a quarter

of an inch too short is worthless. A pipe that

is a foot too long is worthless. The parts have

to fit together or they lose their meaning and purpose.

And to be strong and to be stable, everything has

to connect. And that's what the metaphor of the church

as a temple is all about. Also I noticed when

I would walk around in some of these buildings that

were being built before they were erected is that there

was a lot of spare stuff laying around on the ground.

There were parts and wood and tools and all kinds

of things that were not used. And what I noticed

about that is that a piece of pipe could be

laying on the ground. It could be in the building, okay,

it could be in the building, but it was not

a part of the building. You understand what I'm saying?

Just laying on the ground. It's in the building, but

it's not a part of the building. Some of you

are in the church. You come every week to service,

but you're not a part of it, because you're not

connected yet. You haven't made the commitment of membership. You're

in it, you're like, you're in it, but you're not

a part of it, because you're not connected to anybody. Yet,

many times, why did God use this metaphor of a

building to illustrate the church? Because in a building, the

connected parts hold each other together. And there are gonna

be many times in your life when you need other

people to hold you together. You're gonna need other people

in your life to hold you together. As the pastor

of this church, there have been many, many times over

40 years, I needed the members of this church to

hold me together. Because I'm just a person like you.

And I needed people to hold me together when things

are falling apart in my life. If you don't have that,

you're lacking what the church offers. So, write this down,

number two. In God's temple, I'm supported by others. Like

a strong structure of a building, we hold each other up.

This is what the whole book of Ephesians teaches. Chapter two,

in God's temple, I'm supported by others. Ephesians chapter two

says this, verse 21 and 22. In Christ, the whole

building is joined together and it rises to become a

holy temple to the Lord. He's talking about the church.

And in him, you too are being built together. to

become a dwelling place in which God lives by his spirit,

by his spirit. Here's the point. In a building, a

disconnected frame has no support and has no stability, and

it's gonna collapse on its own. And if you're not connected,

there will be times in your life when you collapse

because you have no stability and you have no support.

You're just out there on your own. You weren't meant

to go through life all by yourself. You weren't meant

to go through it all on your own. You need

physical and spiritual and emotional and mental support. You need

to belong. Few years back, I got, because of my grandkids,

got involved in Legos. It had been a long time

since I'd played with Legos. But we turned my entire

garage into Legoland. And we were building, you know, Fantasy

World Cowboys and Indians and Star Wars and Jurassic Park

and on and on and on. You know what I

discovered about Legos? Legos are created for connection. They have

no purpose if they're not connected. When you connect them,

you can really build some cool stuff. But if they're

not connected to anything else, they're just a pile of plastic.

They get in the way, and you step on them,

it hurts your bare foot. Anybody ever stepped on a Lego?

God bless you, is there another? God bless you, I

see you. Thousands of you have stepped on Legos, thank you,

God bless you. But when you connect them, you can

create something cool. Here's what the Bible says, Romans chapter one,

verse 12. I want us to help each other with

the faith that we have, okay? Your faith will help me.

And my faith will help you. That's why we have church.

Your faith will help me and my faith will help you.

Now in class 101, we have actually a membership covenant.

And everybody signs that covenant. And it is a promise,

not simply to God, but to each other saying, I

will love the other members of this church. And I

will help the other members in the church. You know,

the church is the antidote to the greatest epidemic in

the world right now. People are lonely all around the world.

It is epidemic proportion. You know, some of you are students.

You're in school. I just want to say this to

you because school can be a lonely time. This church

here is very far from perfect, but it's filled with

people who will love you if you'll get to know them.

and they will help you navigate the crazy years in

your life. They will help you. Now let's go to

the third metaphor. The third metaphor that we see in

the Bible is the church is a body. The church

is a body. It's called the body of Christ. Up

here on the screen, 1 Corinthians 12 says, together you

are the body of Christ. And each one of you

is a part of it. So the church is a family,

the church is a temple, the church is a body.

What's the benefit of being a part of the body

of Christ? Romans chapter 12, there on your outline, verse

Romans 12 · chapter mention

four and five. Just as there are many parts to

our bodies, so it is with Christ's body. We're all

parts of it and it takes everyone to make it complete.

For we each have different work to do, so we

belong to each other and each of us needs all

the other parts. I could have preached the entire sermon

just on this. It says we're all many parts, we're

all unique. Look around, nobody's like you. In our church family,

everybody's unique. We're all unique. Everybody's needed to make the

body complete. We each have different work to do. We

belong to each other and we need each other. Church

is far more than simply something you attend. It's a

family you belong to. And you need other people. You

need connections in your life. First Corinthians chapter 12, verse 15.

1 Corinthians 12:15

If the foot says, I'm not a part of the

body because I'm not a hand. That doesn't make it

any less part of the body. And if an ear says,

I'm not part of the body, because I'm only an

ear and not an eye, would that make it any

less part of the body? Too often, the church is

just a big mouth. And we've amputated the arms and

the feet. And we're known for what we say, we

know for what we're against. I'm tired of that. I

want our church to be known for what we're for,

not what we're against. Okay? I want us to be

known for what we're for, not what we're against. Again,

what good is an eyeball detached from a body? It

can't see anything. I want you to write this on

your outline. I can't fulfill my purpose by myself. That's

one of the fundamental lessons you have to learn in life.

I cannot fulfill my purpose by myself. You know, I

asked Don Dale and Lee and Cynthia Hensler about They're

being involved in ministries over the years because they've all

been involved in dozens of them. And this is what

they had to say. I want you to watch this.

Now every one of you, all three of you guys,

have started multiple ministries in this church, which we now

have over 500 of these different ministries. These guys started

many of them, grew them up, and then turned them

over to somebody else, and then would go and start another.

Can you guys think, each of you think of a time,

one of the many ministries that was really interesting or

fulfilling to you in service? Something you just go, well,

I didn't know that I could do that, but I did, whatever.

Well, my, in my particular case was the idea of

going someplace and doing something with some of the skills

I had.

Right.

At the time I had, uh, I think I was

still teaching woodshop at the Moon Hills high school and

I wanted to do something with those skills. I knew

your dad had gone and had built mission trips, building stuff. So, uh,

the idea of a mission trip sounded intriguing. So I,

and my, and I guess there were five others, Bob Snook,

Andy Hine, uh, and, uh, Jennifer Stice.

And Bonnie Stice.

Bonnie Stice. And, um, um, he was supposed to go,

but he got sick. We joined with what is now Mariners,

and we went to Costa Rica.

Wow. The very first mission trip that settled. Wow, that

we ever did. And it was a great experience and fun.

So then when he came back, I still wanted to

do more things like that, but knew I couldn't keep

going on trips. So I got the church involved in

Habitat for Humanity. Right.

I remember. A long time ago.

And so we started teams out and doing Habitat for Humanity,

and that is drone and some other people taking it over.

And then because of your dad, again, he taught me

how to go into Africa.

Yeah.

And I've been all over the world, of course. Yeah.

Mission trips. Yeah.

So that's kind of how I got involved and I

lead trips and recruit guys to go with me.

But it was kind of like take that first step. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

Take the first step and then who knows where it's

going to go. Don?

I took over the youth ministry.

We had ministry.

Right.

It had something to do with junior high and high school.

Right.

I ran the youth group for quite a while.

Yeah, you did. I did. Now, I'm back now.

If you have a child in junior high, come see me.

They need to be involved in junior high.

But I now see kids that are in their 40s.

They were at my youth group.

Yeah, that's interesting. All three of you have seen people

that you mentored who, you actually watched them be born.

You watched them be born, you watched them grow up

through all of the crawlers and toddlers and stuff like that.

And now, for instance, we have people on our staff

that were born in this church, including Courtney. Yeah, who

started when the church started and all of that. I'll

never forget when Courtney came back from Stony Brook as

the first character award in that school. Stony Brook School started.

Timothy Award.

The Timothy Award, that's what it was. And all of that.

Well, with me, I started doing the children's ministry, writing

up the weekly curriculum. Yeah.

And preparing the teachers and volunteers.

But then Kay asked me to be on a women's

ministry board. And it was just kind of an advisory board,

getting the pulse of the church. And it was the

first time I had anything to do with a women's organization.

Little did you know.

Then I eventually became minister to women.

Yeah, exactly. Full-time staff. You were pastoral staff to women, yeah.

So that was an exciting time to see that. the

women find a place in the church and grow and serve.

Well, that's that whole thing of you don't know what

you can do until you actually try it. I remember

Kay had never done any kind of Bible study before

Saddleback Church. She'd never, I was a youth pastor. She goes,

I can't do that. I could mentor one-on-one, but I

can't do it. And the first study she taught in

our little home was a Joyce Landorf study. And she

said her knees knocked for the whole 45 minutes. She

was so scared for six people sitting in the room.

But that was the start. You just take a leap

of faith and of course that's the whole history of

our church. Let me give you the fourth metaphor. The

Bible calls the church not just the family of God,

not just the body of Christ, not just the temple

of God, but we are the flock of God. The

flock of God. What I'm talking about here is like

a group of sheep gathered together for safety. Now Psalm

100 verse three says God made us and we are

his and we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

We are in the flock of God. Now that probably

doesn't sound too appealing to you because you have no

idea how well sheep are cared for. Sheep are pretty

dependent upon being cared for and they are cared for well,

and I don't have time to go into this, I'm

gonna cut this out of the message, but if you'll

go and read Psalm 23 and John 10, write that

on your outline, Psalm 23, John 10, you go and

read how well sheep are cared for, and you'll feel

a whole lot better about being in the flock of God,

because Jesus is the good shepherd. Now, in God's flock,

what does that mean, what's the benefit? As a part

of God's flock, when I'm in the family of God,

I'm in the church of God, in God's flock, I'm

defended and cared for. I am defended and cared for.

I'm not on my own. I have other people looking

out for me. I enjoy the safety and the security

and the protection. And what does that do? That makes

me more confident. It makes me less anxious. The better

connected you are in God's church, the less anxious you'll be,

because you realize you're not on your own. And when

you're getting beat up in the business world, you go,

I'm not on my own. And when your family or

marriage is being strained, you go, I'm not on my own,

I'm in the flock. And when you're facing personal crisis

or illness, I'm not on my own. You need people

who walk into your life when everybody else walks out.

That's what you need. And that's what you get in

a church family. Now in the church, God has placed

two kinds of people, two kinds of people to help

you through your difficult times and to help you and

to care for you when you're going through tough times,

to be defensive for you. Write these down. Number one

is my pastors. My pastors look out for me. Do

you know the word pastor is the word shepherd? It's

the same word. A shepherd is a pastor, a pastor

is a shepherd. And in 1 Peter chapter five, God

says this to pastors. This is instructions for me. Take

care of God's flock, his people, that you are responsible for.

Watch over them because you want to, not because you're

forced to do it. You know, nobody pays me to

do this. I've now served Saddleback Church for 40 years,

For free, why? I really do love you. I love

God and because I love God, I love his family,

I love his flock, I love his children, I love you.

Nobody pays me to do this. I do this because

I love Jesus and I love you. He says do

it willingly. But you need to pray for me because

I'm not smart enough to lead a flock this big.

I just, I'm on my knees constantly going, God, I

need to know, what do you want us to do next?

So pastors are given to look out for me in

the flock of God, but there's another, and that is

small group. You need a small group. There are 58

one another's in the Bible. Love one another, care for

one another, help one another, serve one another, share with

one another, pray for one another, encourage one another. There

are 58 one another's. You can't do that in a

crowd this size, a weekend crowd. You can only do

that in a small group. And in the small group,

that's where the flock of God really shows up. Galatians

6 says this, share each other's troubles and problems. And

in this way, obey the law of Christ. I asked

Don and Leah and Cynthia to talk about the small

groups that they've been in for 40 years in this church.

Listen to this. Well, guys, I wanna ask one more thing,

and that is talk to me about a small group experience,

because small groups have been a key to our church

over the years, and you're not really gonna feel like

a part unless you get to know some people. You

don't have to know everybody to feel like it's your church,

but you gotta know somebody. And they gotta know when

you're not there. You gotta have some close friends. The

average person, if you got six or more friends in

a church, you're probably gonna stick. Because you don't have

to know everybody, but you have to know somebody. Don,

talk to me about that.

I definitely don't know everybody at Saddleback.

Even though you've been here from day one.

Yeah, a lot of people I don't know.

Yeah.

You need that friendship.

You need somebody that recognizes you on Sunday, that you

can see during the week. Because I don't have time

to see the Henslers every week. Rick, for some reason,

has a busy schedule.

I don't know why. I don't talk to you two

times a day anymore.

There are times going in my life that I needed.

Support. I needed support.

I went through a divorce.

Horrible thing to go through.

But I needed the support.

I wouldn't have probably made it without the support of

the help of the church people that helped me.

Helped you walk through those dark days.

Yeah.

But then God rewarded you. Oh, yeah. I came out good.

Better than you deserve.

Our small group has been together for many, many years.

And Besides doing Bible studies and campaigns together and growing spiritually,

we have become a very incredible group of prayer warriors.

In our group, at one time, we had 13 people

that were cancer survivors.

Oh, my goodness. Oh, my goodness.

And then we've seen each other through deaths of children.

Yeah, yeah.

And also through bankruptcies.

Yep. 40 years of crises. Absolutely. Just imagine what can happen. Yes.

But also a lot of celebration.

Yeah, absolutely. Good, happy times.

That's the thing that we hear most of all, and

we hear from our leader as well as everybody, is

can you imagine if we didn't have the support group,

how would we get through this?

Right.

I mean, I'll give you an example. Today, one of

our members lost their mother. Oh my goodness, yeah. And

we've been praying and we're there for support. And It

just eases it. I had a little issue a few

months ago. You did. You were in the hospital. Quadruple bypass.

A little issue. Quadruple bypass.

Just knowing I had prayer and support and people supporting

her and being there for me.

I don't know how non-believers and people who are not

in a small group get through stuff. It just doesn't

make sense. Well, thank you, guys. I'm going to say

we'll do this again in 40 more years. 40 more years.

All right. All right. Thank you. Okay. Now, let me

give you quickly the fifth metaphor, and that is the

church is a garden. The metaphor of the church is

a garden or a vineyard. In fact, there are churches

that are actually called Vineyard Church based on this idea.

It's an organic metaphor that we grow and we are

fruitful when we are working together. John chapter 15 verse

John 15 · chapter mention

one and five, here on the screen, Jesus said, I

am the true vine and my Father is the gardener

and you are the branches. So we are God's garden.

In God's garden, write this down, my life becomes productive.

When I'm connected in God's garden, now all of a

sudden I start becoming fruitful. The Bible calls it being fruitful,

being productive. It's called bearing fruit. I'm able to make

a contribution. Everybody I've ever met wants their life to count.

Everybody I've ever met wants to make a difference. They

want to make a contribution with their life. Where can

you best do that? In God's garden where you will

be productive. But here's the key again, you have to

be connected. John 15, four and five on the screen

says this. A branch cannot produce fruit if it's severed

from the vine. And you cannot be fruitful. Read that

as productive. You cannot be productive apart from me. I

am the vine, Jesus says, and you are the branches.

And those who remain in me and I in them

will produce much fruit. You'll be much, you'll be very productive.

Very productive. He says, and, but apart from me, you

can do nothing. The point is this. You'll never be

as productive as God intended for you to be with

your life if you're not connected to a church family.

You're just not going to. It teaches you the questions

to ask, it teaches you the priorities to understand, it

teaches you all kinds of stuff, but you're not gonna

be as productive if you're disconnected from the church. A

cut off branch cannot bear fruit, but when you're connected

to the vine, life giving energy flows through you. I

asked Lee and Cynthia and Don, to talk about the

risks that they had to take over 40 years in

order to be productive. Listen to this, last clip. Talk

to the people here about some of the risks that

you think, well, that's really not gonna happen, but we

really did believe that it happened, and it did. So

remember when we did the walking over to the property,

the 6,000 people, what was that day called? I can't remember.

It was home at last. Home at last.

I still have the sweatshirt.

Oh, you do? Home at last. Yeah, exactly.

We all went behind you and you pushed the pulpit.

Yeah, yeah, I did. We put the pulpit on wheels

and we 6,000 people marched a mile from Tribuco Hills

High School over to the property. And literally, if you

look at the Lake Forest campus now, it's got trees

all over it. There wasn't a single tree. It was

a gravel pit. It looked like a moonscape. And we

set up a tent on a moonscape with no trees,

no green, nothing. And all of the burning up in

the summer and freezing in the winter and stuff like that.

But there was a pioneer spirit. Oh, absolutely. And God's

not through with that. He wants to do it again

with next generations. So talk to me about what you

would say to the next generation of members.

It's really exciting to be involved with that. I look back,

and I was telling Don earlier that when I go

on campus and I walk and look and see, again,

hearing you read that letter way back at the beginning,

now seeing it actually be right there in front of

my eyes, it's just awesome to see what you have

done and the church has done.

And God has done. It's all of us. God used

ordinary people. He did. Absolutely.

And it's exciting.

It's exciting to be involved with something where you're not

sure if it's going to work, but why not give

it a try? attitude.

Let's see where this takes us.

Or were we just dumb and we just went along

with it?

I was trying to make this look better. You weren't dumb.

There's no way we would have gotten here if you

guys had been dumb. God brought an incredibly gifted group

of core leaders at every stage, really. Every single stage

of the church. We now have a new crop of

gifted leaders that have come in that are just going

to take us to the next peak. And all of that.

And it's just so much fun just to take that

risk and see what's going to happen and see God work.

That has just been a great adventure. I think everybody

wants to be a part of a movement.

And if you don't take that step, you're missing out

probably on the biggest adventure of your life.

Here on earth. Yeah, you're right.

I always use the example, God says you just have

to have the faith of a mustard seed.

I don't have an avocado seed.

And it's just amazing what has happened.

Yeah.

Just okay. Yeah. It's not the size of your faith.

It's the size of God. Little faith, big God gets

big results. Well, even when you said we're going to

have satellite churches.

Right.

How is that going to happen? Okay, maybe San Clemente,

but that's probably it. Will anybody actually look at a video,

the screen?

Yeah.

And then now look where we are. Yeah, four continents. Yeah,

four continents. I want you to honor these pioneers of

Saddleback Church, the first three members of the very first

101 class 40 years ago. Welcome Don and Lee and Cynthia.

Come on out, guys. Love you guys. Love you guys. Yeah! Now,

these guys have heard every bad joke I've told 100 times, okay?

In fact, I always know, Lee, After Chris' Easter service,

if I tell an old joke, he'll go, wow, there

were a lot of new people here today. Because there

were still people laughing. You guys, you're out here on stage.

Say a word to your church.

Overwhelmed to be here. And I got to plug junior high.

If you're in junior high, you need to be in

the junior high service, not listening to this boring sermon

over Go to junior high.

All right, good. All right.

Don't miss out on the greatest adventure of your life

and a wonderful opportunity to find what your real purpose

in life is.

Amen.

And I know I speak for everyone who's up here,

and I just want to thank you, Rick, for having

the vision to start the Saddleback Church on just simply

faith and what a huge blessing it has been, not

only to myself, my family, but for everybody standing here.

You've blessed us. Thank you very much. Thank you guys.

Love you guys. This is just an example of the

people who built this church over the last 40 years.

Lee and Cynthia and Don, Dale, they're just normal people.

But they became giants in faith over the last 40

years by being connected to a place that would help

them grow. Can you imagine the reward those people are

gonna have in heaven for founding a church with 15

people that is now one of the great churches of

history and has had global impact? Great will be their reward.

But here's the thing. our best days are ahead of us.

And God has brought you here now for a purpose.

You're not here just to take up space. You're here

because God knows you have gifts, abilities, contacts, connections that

he wants to use in his family for the next

leg of the journey. I have said this many, many times,

hundreds of times in 101 class. Can you imagine getting

to heaven and 100 years from today, somebody walks up

to you in heaven and says, I just wanna thank you.

I'm here because of you. And you say, I don't

even know you. He said, no, no, no, you don't

know me. but you were one of the pioneers of

Saddleback Church. Back there in 2020, when they only had

20 campuses. and you prayed, and you served, and you

got involved, and you were a member, and you got connected,

and you were generous, and you sacrificed, and you gave

it your best shot, you invested your life in something

that would outlast you, and 50 years after you died,

that church reached me for Jesus Christ. I'm in heaven

because of you. Will that be worth it? If you

know anything more important to do with your life, I

challenge you right now, if you know anything more important

to do with your life, than to invest it in

the one thing that's gonna last on the planet Earth

when everything else is gonna burn up, the family of God.

Nothing else is gonna last. It's gonna outlast your business,

it's gonna outlast your hobby, it's gonna outlast your sports,

it's gonna outlast your own family. If you know anything

more important to do than build the family of God

Bring people to Christ, build them up to maturity, teach

them to discover their gifts, send them out in their

ministry in the world to make an impact. If you

know something more important, I invite you to stand up

right now and tell us. Right now. Stand up and

tell us what's more important than that. Because I decided

a long time ago, as a very young man, I

was not gonna waste my life. And I have not.

I have used it for the glory of God. I

want you so badly to know what it feels like

to be used by God. 40 years, great history. It's

nothing compared to where we're going. And you're here now.

Will you join me? Let's charge hell with squirt guns.

Let's go for it. Let's, in a dark, dark, and

getting darker world, shine a light of truth. Shine a

light of hope. Shine a light of joy to be

for the good news, not against all the bad news.

There's plenty of people out there. You wanna go join

a negative movement, it's not here. There's plenty of other

places to go be negative and talk about how bad

the world is, but not here. You have five fundamental

needs in your life. You have a need for identity.

You need to know who you are. You have a

need for stability. You need stability when life gets tough.

You need capacity. You need a place to develop, in

a safe place, your gifts and talents where people aren't

gonna put you down for not having it perfect the

first time you try it. You need security. of relationships,

and you need productivity, you feel like you're making, your

life is gonna make a long-term difference. Where else are

you gonna get that besides the church of God? Nowhere. Nowhere.

So I just end with one question. Given the fact,

why should you remain disconnected when a church family like

this has so much to offer to you? And if

not here, Just go somewhere and find a church, but

get connected. I want to close by talking to two

different groups. To some of you, you've been here, you've

been coming to Saddleback Services for a long time, months,

maybe years, and you've attended, but you've never stepped across

the line to member. You've never gotten connected. You've never

been baptized. You've never joined the church, never taken classes.

You've never gotten involved in a ministry. Many of you

have families that don't live in the area. So you

don't really see your families and relatives much. You don't

have really family around you. Others of you, you're single.

And maybe even you live by yourself. You don't have

much family around you. Others of you, you're in a

marriage or in a family where you don't feel supported.

We will be your family We will be your family.

And maybe all your life you've been trying to belong.

There is a universal longing for belonging in everybody. Everybody

has a longing for belonging. And I've heard many, many

people tell me out on that patio, Rick, I've never

felt I belonged anywhere. Until I got here. Until I

got here. Because you're wanted here. You're not just welcome,

you're wanted. And you belong and you fit and we'll

help you. So what do you do? You take class 101,

the membership class that maybe, I don't know, 50,000 people

have taken. You get baptized. I'm gonna be baptized in

a couple weeks. You get connected to a small group.

Join us for the next leg of the journey. The

other group I wanna talk to, those of you who've

been members here with me for years, thank you. I'm

gonna do a message just for you soon, but thank you.

And my challenge to you as we start not just

a new year, but a new decade is fall in

love with the church again. It is the hope of

the world. It is the hope of the world. There

is no politics that can save the world. There's no

business that can save the world. Only God can save

the world. And it is the only thing that is

gonna last on this planet. Last verse on the screen.

Ephesians 3, 21. All glory belongs to God in the church. See,

in the church, glory belongs to God in the church

and in Christ Jesus for all time and eternity. This

is an investment that will pay dividends for the rest

of eternity. Let's bow our heads. If you don't know

Jesus Christ, you need to get to know him first.

You need to be saved. You need to say, Jesus Christ,

I believe in you. I wanna follow you. I wanna

learn to trust you. I accept your forgiveness. You don't

have to understand it all. Just say, yes, Lord. Yes, Lord,

I want to know you, and I wanna learn to

love you. Thank you for loving me. And if you've

been on the edge, you say, I've been attending Saddleback,

but I've never actually got connected. I've never joined, never

taken the class, never been, baptized, you need to be

in the family of God, if not here, somewhere. And

I challenge you to make that commitment to join us

this month. And for those of you who are already in,

as I said, fall in love with the church all

over again, realizing that there is nothing greater to give

our time our energy, our effort to, it's the only

thing that's going to last on this planet. Father, I

pray for everyone in the sound of my voice. And

as the pastor of this church, I ask you to

bless them. Bless their past, their present, their future. Bless

their bodies. Bless their minds with creativity. Bless their physical health.

Bless their finances, bless their relationships, and whereas there's conflict,

bring peace. We look forward to this new decade together

with great enthusiasm, knowing that you're gonna use ordinary people

in extraordinary ways, just like you have done. You didn't

bring us this far just to stop, but all the

past is prologue in a launch pad for the future.

And we're saying today, we're all in. In Jesus' name, amen.

If you want... Thank you. If you want to take

out a card and write down the day you want

to take class 101, write the day down. If you

want to be baptized by me, get your reservation in.

Have I told you lately that I love you?