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Father in heaven Come before you this morning.
Just thankful for All that you are and all that you do and all that you have done for us.
Father we are amazed that your consistent care for us for your church
and in particular for Us as individuals even as you provide for every need
and our main need that is for Forgiveness of sins in the person and work
of your son the Lord Jesus Christ.
Father as we looked here word this morning.
I pray that you would encourage us to be faithful To that which you have called us
Lord to be mindful of.
The truth that we are.
But slaves we are to be obedient to the Lord Jesus Christ, but we are to do so with joy.
Knowing what you have done for us all that you have promised us and father.
Let us keep the cross in our vision.
We pray in Jesus name.
Amen.
Well, we've been talking about the ordinary Christian life and last
week when we left off We were talking about maturity immaturity and we're gonna finish up talking
about that.
I do think.
Well, there's some good stuff here.
And I just thought We could finish talking about that with regard to maturity.
Want to ask a couple questions to start with
and this this is one that really grates on me and I don't know maybe maybe it's because of
personal experience, but what is the problem with.
Sort of letting our children children our young people our teens
be raised.
With less of an influence from The local church and less of an
influence from the parents and more from their peers at high school.
Can you think of a problem with that?
But it isn't I well in effect is now a lot of what we see young people raising
young people.
Who's the biggest influence on?
Teenagers today, what's that?
The Kardashians, I mean, I think they are a big influence right television.
But I think the number one influence in their life is each other
through social media, I Mean they're walking
around like this all the time.
I There's a massive increase in the number of videos that you can go to online and watch people, you know
walking into ponds and pools and Chasms,
I mean, that'd be great right set up some 200 -foot pits and you just set up a camera to watch people, you know.
And I think some of those are staged but I mean the truth is people are tied to those things.
They can't imagine life without it.
And what are some of the problems with that?
Well some of the problems.
Let's put it this way.
If you have a teenager in your home, who would you rather have them?
Come to with significant issues.
Significant questions.
Want to know what's right or wrong to do in a given situation.
Dear Facebook, you know, I I need some moral guidance.
Twitter.
Twitter verse.
Help me throw me a line, you know.
Some of their social media forum.
I don't know that it's like there's a new social platform.
Every couple weeks so I can't even keep track of all of them.
Which is probably good.
You know Mike says follow the Tuesday guy on Twitter and I'm like why I'm only on there once a week.
What is the what what's the outcome of something like that?
What happens to young people when they are left to their peers?
They're left to the Internet and other things like that.
What did you put in your coffee this morning?
Anything at all need more sugar.
What do you think the outcome is?
Worldly wisdom.
I Think that's right.
Okay.
Everything becomes relative moral relativism.
Here's the one thing you do know.
If the goal of parenting and I think this is right is to imprint as much
good on them as you possibly can.
Given your own fallibility and to try to steer them away from the mistakes that you made when you were younger.
If that's the goal of parenting and I think in many ways it is right you want them to be saved.
But you also along the way you want to teach them.
The things that you've learned why that you know, that's what I used to tell my kids and It's what I tell young people.
Why do you have parents and don't give me the biological reason
why you have parents?
Why do you have parents?
And I'll look back at him and I'll say because in a nicer way because you're stupid.
You'll do stupid things you need somebody who's been there and survived to tell you what to do and
Instead you're gonna go to somebody else who's stupid and say hello.
Hey help me.
That's a bad idea.
And I you know, I use stupid in the advised way.
They're just What what immature?
Immature, you know, it's a nicer way of saying stupid
immaturity Doesn't help immature people you don't want immature people coming
alongside immature people and telling them what to do.
But that's exactly what we've done, you know in many ways I mean when you go to a lot of churches, what do they
do right away?
I mean, I watch this one.
You know commercial for this church here recently.
What it what's the number one thing they do right away.
They Isolate the youth they take them away, you know, they say your youth are really gonna love our program they're gonna love the
music and we take them away and we don't waste their time with you know, the boring messages that they're gonna hear on the
regular service we treat them like.
They have to be entertained because that's what they're used to.
I Had this thought while I was reading over some of these things last night and this morning and I just thought
When was the last time and I did it for a while last night, you know.
What was the last time your house was absolutely quiet?
And if you have younger people in your home the odds are if it's quiet, why is that
because they're sleeping or They're in trouble
or they're gone or they've got their you know Ears covered
and they can't hear anything.
Anyway, so It I think it's I think it's just
important to reestablish the kind of The whole
family thing and that's one of the things that we will talk about this morning as we get get to that.
But first we have to finish this about churches.
Let me kind of shift gears and I'll just put it this way.
Can you imagine?
What are some of the names of churches you hear new churches
next level.
Where are some other names.
Was that?
Victory.
Okay, but that's kind of a that's that's almost like from the 60s, right?
I mean that doesn't you know, like from the Jesus movement.
Cory the journey.
I Was joking one day with Mike and I said, you know what I think every week they just exegete
some old journey song, you know.
Week number one don't stop believing, you know number two lights, you know number three and they just keep
going.
Yeah.
You say you want a revolution what if what does that mean revolution good
liberty.
The woo.
I Don't you understand that one, you know, I'm just like I thought that was a
yogurt place, right?
I Don't know.
Oh a worship center.
All right, Peter Wagner nice.
Gonna cast out some demons.
Yes connect.
Now now does connect.
I I sort of I think that's a great example because what does that sound like?
Social media.
So what what's the message there?
I mean just from the name the message is.
It's horizontal.
It's all about the people and that's kind of the
ordinary church experience.
How many of you been to like a really kind of modern church service in the last and I'm sorry
I I mean other than our hip and modern services here at Bethlehem Bible Church.
How many of you have been to you know, okay a few hands.
Because I have to and I was struck and I you know your experiences may vary but I was
struck by the fact that it just basically felt like watching TV and
Why would I say that anybody had Go ahead.
What do you mean by they had commercials halfway through?
What do you mean?
So wait a minute like the pastor would sit down or something and then they really oh.
So it was only 15 minutes in and then they had halftime.
Yeah, I mean I I thought you know what I and I've talked about this before but I would I thought it was interesting because You know the
the I don't know what to call him.
He was a pastor.
He was the youth pastor was Preaching that Sunday and he would sit down after like eight or ten minutes and they would show
a movie clip which you know.
Anything else anybody else have any other experiences commercials?
I like that.
You know, I thought you were saying like Nestle scrunch bar.
Product placement, you know, yeah Haley.
They broke beer bottles and we're making mosaics.
Hmm that's unique.
I'm not really sure what the Spiritual purpose of that is.
Okay We're done with this demon beer.
Other Experiences,
why do they do that?
Why are things you know, why do they change things like that?
Because the Bible is not enough let's look at I
I Just wrote in my notes.
I'm like worship, you know, they'll talk about the worship music and how great it is.
What does that mean again smoke machines guitars, you know?
They've got the best rappers in town.
Somebody have a hand up.
Okay, what's that?
Not now just imagine that you know, the sermons on hell and all of a sudden, you know, there's smoke coming over.
You want to escape the fire of hell, you know?
Yeah, the final countdown, right.
Oh, sorry.
I Mean they do everything except for you know, preach the Bible.
Let's look at Acts 242
and would somebody read that please?
Acts 242 going once.
Yes, go ahead.
Now.
There's just.
This is kind of a description of what you know an average service might look like
ordinary church service apostles teaching fellowship breaking of bread
meaning either a meal or communion and Praying.
I think that's pretty you know what we wouldn't see.
Well, you know, this is 2 ,000 years ago.
Of course, they didn't have.
You know video breaks, of course, they weren't Doing commercials.
I don't know why that would be of course.
But why what are some of the reasons they give for the things that they do now
in church?
Why would why would they have a commercial?
Why would they have movie clips?
Why would they have?
Smoke flames relevant to our culture.
Other thoughts.
Yeah, Lucille.
They want to entertain.
Okay, excellent other thoughts Tim.
People have shorter attention spans.
Do we hear that fairly often?
We hear that a lot, right?
I mean, I remember the first time I was at Paddleback.
Saddleback.
Sorry I always say they're paddling back from the gospel and and you
know.
It was like 10 minutes and then music.
10 minutes and then music 10 minutes and then music and the idea was to set it up like a
Television show so that you didn't have a chance to get bored or anything like that.
I'm like, well, what about the chance to just engage and be convicted by the Holy Spirit?
But the idea is you don't have that kind of attention span.
But you know like pastor Mike says, you know the same child that you say well can't pay attention.
Put them in front of Xbox and see how long they can pay attention to that.
You ever see one of those stories, you know, some kid in Korea played video games for and I don't know why it's always South Korea but.
Some kid plays video games for the three or four days without even going to the bathroom and dies.
You just go.
Somebody need to grab that kid and say hey, maybe you should go get something to eat.
Maybe you should go get some sleep.
Maybe you should go to the restroom.
I don't know crazy crazy.
Okay, let's skip down to here.
And this is kind of where I was heading here this morning.
How would our youth?
Young people Be treated differently if they were thought of as lambs to be fed guarded
guarded and nurtured.
Rather than markets to be exploited or People who had to be entertained.
How would we treat them in the church if we really thought you know, here's my here's my main question.
If you go to one of these church services where they're really worried about entertainment everything else.
Here's the question.
What about their souls.
Someday Hebrews 13 17 says the leaders of the church are going to have to give an account for the souls of the people
they Entertained.
I don't want to be there on that day.
Yeah, Scott bring in the numbers, you know in a business sense we could call that what market share.
You know, we want to seize market share by having the best show in town.
Yeah, I think that's a great numbers people.
Money.
Yep.
I think that's great.
And I mean the care the thought Always needs to be about Souls, you know, I
mean why why preach the gospel so often because believers need to hear it and
unbelievers need to hear it.
Then he asked how can we cultivate a culture in our homes and Churches in which God's children of
all ages not only know what they believe but why they believe it.
How can we cultivate a culture in our homes and churches in which God's children of all
ages Know not only what they believe but why they believe it.
How do we do that?
Making sure that they're properly entertained that they don't get bored.
That they're fixated on what's going on that they can repeat all the key.
I Don't know commercials that they saw the video clips that they saw.
That they can remember the funny things the pastor said, how do
we do that?
How do we make sure that people not only know what they believe but why they believe it?
There's a one -word answer
lean.
How about teaching.
If you teach people, I mean it's it's like the old fishing example, right you give a man a fish and he's
Fed for a day if you give him or if you teach him how to fish then he can feed himself
and so if you teach people what the truth is where it is why they should believe it then they
can Defend it themselves.
I mean Lord willing the idea would be that someday when Mike gets hauled off to jail and Steve gets hauled off to jail and Harry Gets hauled
off to jail and Scott gets hauled off to jail and pretty gets hauled off to jail that Then somebody else will stand up and
declare the truth and one by one, you know as we all get taken to jail and hopefully eventually Michael make bail, but
Now Horton in his book. He says that Christianity is inherently intergenerational.
What does he mean by inherently generational?
What does that mean?
Why is Christianity inherently generational?
That's exactly right.
It has to get passed from one generation to another.
It's passing the baton.
It's a Version of 2nd Timothy 2 to write these things that you've heard
you need to pass them to faithful men.
We need to inculcate our children with truth and Our
children then will inculcate that truth to grandchildren.
But each generation has to do that and that's one of the
problems with today's churches.
If you go to a church that's into entertaining.
Then maybe some of the young people will learn the truth on their own away from church.
Maybe they won't.
What happens to the next generation after that.
It comes down to this something else that Mike says a lot.
You know if you bring people in with the Bible and you tell them this is all you're gonna get you're you know.
You either like it or you don't or you bring them in with entertainment in which case.
What does the next generation want.
More entertainment better special effects.
I mean imagine this if you went into a You know if the new Star Wars movie comes out here in a week or so.
And if you went in there and you saw like cheesy Star Trek 1960
special effects, you know like little Carpet covered, you
know men moving around and that was supposed to be a monster or something like that or the famous one.
I don't know how many people have even watched Star Trek.
And you're probably more sanctified than me.
But where Captain Kirk is fighting this this guy in this Gorn suit and they're like, it's a horrific fight
the worst fight ever recorded on film and If something like that was in the yeah.
If something like that was in the new Star Wars movie people would be going I want my money back.
Right because we expect bigger better.
You know more immersive more believable and if that's how you pack people into a church.
Then you have to keep giving them that and it has to get better all the time.
You can't just do the same thing and expect people to come back.
It's got to get better.
But if we're passing on truth and people are coming to hear the truth.
Then generation after generation you can survive with that.
It's good enough.
The Bible is sufficient.
Let's look at 1st Corinthians chapter 3 and
if somebody would read the first 9 verses, please
1st Corinthians chapter 3 1 to 9.
Yeah, go ahead Luke.
Okay, now we we talked about Jill Joel Osteen from time to time
anybody know what his backstory is how he came to be who he is today.
His father.
His father was a TV teacher and Fairly
popular at that and nothing like Joel is and then his father died and
Joel stepped forward started teaching and now they went from being a pretty good -sized church to being this monster
church.
I mean they bought the The Astrodome in Houston.
I mean got this huge Facility and you know, he's this mega guy.
And when when we were reading that Luke was reading that I couldn't help but think This is like I
follow Joel Osteen, you know, I'm sorry.
It's people follow people.
They're they're into Listening to you know different individuals or whatever.
And you just have to wonder what what's the next generation gonna do who's gonna follow that and the answer is probably
something worse.
But the author here asks about you know, this really is about
Immaturity this passage about immaturity about a certain self -centeredness if you will.
What about Self -centered spirituality.
What about this idea that you know.
It's it's just about me.
I don't need to worry about anybody else I even that even those phrases
there.
I follow Paul.
I follow Paulus.
I Follow Joel Osteen.
I don't but I don't even follow him on Twitter.
The individuals are irrelevant, right?
But what about even the idea of I mean we talk about People who say you know what?
I can worship God just as well in the forest or on the beach or you know in the mountains as I can
at church.
Is that really what it's about sometimes?
I think that is what people think Christianity is.
It's kind of Lone -Ranger rugged American individualistic
Worship, but what about that
idea that you know, I could just follow an individual.
I mean we know that's wrong how about the idea
of I
Came to think well, what what is a mark of maturity?
Let's put it that way.
Let's reverse it.
What's the mark of maturity in a Christian in terms
of?
Okay, let's make it easy.
Let's say you're in a place a town.
You've just moved there and you find out that the churches there aren't so great.
And so you go to the best one you can find and you go there on Sunday after Sunday.
And what do you do?
Do you just kind of walk in there walk out week after week or?
Do you find a way to Serve to improve the church.
Do you look at the weaknesses and say, you know what?
Maybe I can help in this way and that would be the right thing to do.
Let's look again at 1st Corinthians chapter 15.
Just over a few chapters.
Maybe this will help a little bit more.
Paul writes what do I gain in verse 32.
1st Corinthians 15 verse 32?
What do I gain if?
Humanly speaking I fought with beasts at Ephesus if the dead are not
raised.
Let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die.
What's he saying there if the dead are not raised let us eat and drink for tomorrow.
We die.
What's his point?
Okay, and if this life is all there is then
YOLO.
You only live once so Carpe diem seize the day.
Make the most of it.
You can have the most pleasure that you can.
I mean, there's a.
You know, it's hedonism it's also narcissistic right because it's all about me and what if everybody just kind of
adopted that sort of attitude.
See, I'd say we'd be living in the United States of America.
What's the problem with that idea that philosophy?
Okay, there's no teaching involved because it's all about me and it's all about what I can have right now, right?
No concern for the next generation.
And may I say and I'm not pointing the finger at anybody.
May I say that I think that's one of the main problems we have in the United States of America right now.
There isn't that much concern for the next generation, you know as a country.
I think that is a national problem, I have a friend
who's a lunatic but He teaches in public school.
And I remember I was talking to him a couple years ago and he had his Phone threat or stolen a
couple times.
He had his life threatened by a sixth grader and he called the parent.
And the parents said what?
Thank you for bringing that to my attention.
I'll talk to Johnny and make sure he receives the appropriate discipline.
What do you suppose the parents said?
Very close.
What do you want me to do?
What'd you do to provoke him?
It wasn't that bad.
Well, I don't know.
I'll tell you exactly what the parents said.
The parents said why are you calling me?
Why are you calling me?
I'm like I heard that and I was like you have to be kidding me.
It's not my problem.
Sixth grade.
They're cute and they're cuddly.
I mean, it's like people give puppies for Christmas and then they you know, take them back six months later.
Didn't know it was gonna be this much work.
This kid, I mean cute nice, but now I'm done with them.
Let's look at Ephesians 4.
We'll see what the and verses 11 to 16.
We'll see what the goal of the church is.
What the goal of the church is?
Versus 11 to 16 who would read that in chapter 4 of Ephesians
go ahead mark.
Okay, now if the goal of the church is maturity and
We're to we're to get to where we're no longer children tossed by every wind of doctrine.
How do we do that in the passage tells us?
The passage tells us that Christ has given us what to accomplish this.
What do you give us
all those things so that they would teach us so that we would grow.
So that we wouldn't mature and so if the approach a church takes is Kind of a
marketing thing, you know, they're more concerned about numbers.
They're more concerned about entertaining people.
Then that maturing that teaching that really discipleship I guess is a good way to phrase it.
None of those things are happening.
Michael Horton writes this he says remember that the past and present are basically the same and at least one
important respect now.
This is incredible and true 2 ,000 years ago.
This is no less true and no more true than it is today.
Both occupy the period identified in Scripture as this present age.
And he says that present age is passing away.
It is the powers of the age to come that are breaking in on us now as they did on our forebears.
If this is true, then neither the past nor the present is normative.
In other words, neither one is the ideal.
It is the canon of Scripture that renders both relative and open to correction.
Instead of allowing youthful passion for the new and revolutionary to dominate our families and our
churches.
Let's begin to recover our role as adults.
Who discover and then hand over hidden treasures that we've been stumbling over each day in
our own flight from the ordinary?
So here's what he's saying.
We receive truths from men in the past.
We Discover new truths not new truths, but things for the first time for us.
We hand all these things on to our children.
We want the church to grow in maturity.
We want them to.
To grow up into that mature man, we may not see it in our lifetime, but the goal is beyond us.
That's why it's intergenerational.
Our focus shouldn't be so much on us right now.
It should be future generations
now.
Horton moves on to what he calls the next big thing how church or
culture rebranded Jesus every couple of decades
and I think this idea of.
He starts talking about cultural rebellion.
If you think about cultural rebellion from the 60s, I mean to me that was a very rebellious phase because I
was a child I saw it.
What what do you think of when you think of the 1960s.
Mean well, let's back up for a second.
What do you think about the 1950s?
What do you think about?
What's that?
Elementary school.
Okay, but I mean what's the what's the image of the 1950s?
American dream baby boomers.
Do up.
Yes, Charlie conservative repressed.
Okay, Ozzie and Harriet, I mean for me my image of the 50s is you know, happy days
the 1970s version of the 1950s.
1950s kind of you know, it's mom dad house job.
Kids at home.
Everybody's happy right cold war.
But there's there's a just a genuine kind of lack of I Would say it seems like a
rebellion less decade and then we go to the 60s and The
pendulum swings back, right?
I think you could say that if I was to think of a Term to
talk about the 1960s.
Well, what do you how would you describe the 1960s?
Tumultuous.
I think that's a good one.
Women's lib, I mean it was a decade of
Rebellion of breaking norms of breaking away from those things, you know, if the 1950s were
normal.
Then the 1960s were that the rebellion, you know, it was women's lib.
It was drugs.
It was vast changes in music a Lot of things
changed in our culture during that time.
Now I had to say that compared to the 1960s though I Was trying to think of the most
outrageous thing that could happen.
I mean does it shock you when you see anything these days?
If you see some guy with you know, ceramic plates coming out of his face, you know.
Does that shock you or you just go.
I mean I do I just kind of go nothing surprises me.
Because people just keep coming up with new things.
And so I don't really know if you could surprise me
I think in fact I would say Rebellion has gone so far if you
know if The most rebellious thing you could do is conform
right, I mean if you're just a nice kid and you you know, you don't have a Smartphone and you're
not constantly on it and you engage people and you talk to people and everything.
They're gonna go.
There's something different about that kid.
I'm not really sure.
Yeah, he's weird.
Yeah, but on the other hand I wouldn't be surprised if we had a president in the very near future, you know.
Who had a pierced face and you know, just kind of like look bizarre and we just go no, it's just our
culture.
That's just what you know, it's I mean like, you know some kind of really I don't know I don't know
what people are gonna do next.
I sometimes hate to even think of some of those things just look painful.
You know that people do talks about
CS Lewis's book the screw tape letters and the demons note that the same old thing
is a Valuable tool people getting bored of the same old thing is a valuable tool.
Why.
Because When people look for change, they rebel against the old and they want to
bring in something new.
And that's exactly what's happened in a lot of our churches.
The old is dead.
We need something new.
He talks about perpetual novelty.
Perpetual novelty.
Protestantism is being shaped by the cult of perpetual novelty.
What does the author mean or what is it?
What does perpetual novelty mean means?
Well, it's easy.
We always need something new some change some tweak.
Fact Horton says that the next big thing is a tradition.
In other words, it's normal.
It's become normal to just kind of wait on the next big thing.
That's what we do.
We're a culture of anticipation.
I mean right now the next big thing that's going on.
I mean, there are people who are already waiting in line to see Star Wars, even though they have their tickets.
They're still waiting in line.
It won't be out for you know, I don't know four or five days.
Well, let's talk about you know in religious terms.
What's the next big thing?
The next big thing would be a Revival, you know, you might hear Mike talk
about we want revival in New England.
We would love to see churches coming back to life.
We'd love to hear the gospel proclaimed all over the place.
Well, this is the home of a spiritual awakening or two New England is.
But what typically when we when we see a revival, what are we thinking about like the Great Awakening?
I think about Jonathan Edwards and those people.
How did that happen?
How did this next big thing the the Great Awakening, how did that happen?
Supernaturally.
And Through the preaching of the word, which is exactly right.
So here's how here's how you could frame it while I almost trip on my shoes there.
It's a supernatural work by Ordinary means there's preaching of the
word and God just blesses it in a supernatural way and people come to faith.
So Horton says that there are two ways of understanding revival says the first way is to see it as
a Surprising work of God.
God's extraordinary blessing on his ordinary means of grace meaning the preaching.
The second way to see revival is as something within our control something that can be started and
managed with predictable results.
Now what do you suppose is the the the difference between those two
if I read them again.
Well, I will read them again a surprising work of God.
God's extraordinary blessing on Ordinary preaching.
The second way something within our control something that can be stated.
Or I guess started should be the word started and managed with predictable results.
Started and managed with predictable results.
How would you approach one versus the other.
Yes, Joni.
Good.
The first one is you just go about doing your ordinary work, right?
The preaching and teaching of the Bible and you trust the Lord with the results.
And sometimes you get amazed the second one is God is
important.
Yes.
But what we're doing is a little bit more important and certainly if the Lord wants to add to it, that'd be fine.
But which one is more In keeping with the Bible and I would say it is.
You know the first one I mean, can you imagine on the day of Pentecost Peter saying get you know before the before
the big sermon.
Gathering everybody together and go.
Okay guys.
Here's what I'm gonna do.
And you guys be ready because people are gonna come forward when I give that altar call and you guys need to be ready to give
them you know the for spiritual laws or whatever.
That's not what happened at all.
But in fact, what do we see now people calling for revival people trying to start it themselves and it really is
pretty remarkable why.
Because they want to see the next big thing, but they want to do it their own way because.
Well, I think the main reason they want to do it is because it would be hard work to do it the other way.
They want it easy now let's talk about
Tradition let's talk about How God builds us how he matures us.
Is there anything wrong with Tradition
per se.
Is there anything wrong with tradition within a church?
I mean we do certain things in certain ways.
Well, why is that we you know?
We open with the announcements and then we do a song and then we do another song and then we have
scripture.
Is there any reason to have an order of service like we do?
Any biblical reason to have an order of service like we do?
Not really.
I mean you could you could have the sermon first.
In fact, I've suggested that Have the sermon first.
Why would I want to have the sermon first?
No, because I mean is the reason I want to have the sermon first because that way the people show up 20 minutes late all the time would miss
out the sermon.
See you're mean too I
Mean that's just an example.
That's a small example of a tradition.
You know, why why do I wear a tie when I preach because It's a tradition.
It's just kind of what's expected.
Is there any biblical command I dare say You know the the church back
then did not wear ties.
You won't see a single painting of Peter with a tie on
but I mean this idea of You know revival kind of goes across or goes it goes
against all the traditions and all all the things that we're used to.
Now, this is a completely it's not a completely different topic, but it's gonna sound like a completely different topic.
It has to do with ordinary church.
And I thought about this question.
I don't remember why it came to me, but I just wrote it down.
I want to ask it anyway.
When someone asks you when you say that you were at church this morning For whatever reason and you get home and they
say well, you know, how was church?
I Have this happen somebody from the other coast calls me and says how was church today?
How was your meeting this morning?
What do you say?
How do you answer that do you say oh it was ordinary oh it was just regular oh it
was.
It was fine.
You ever think about that though, what is it really because I need to close here.
But what is that when somebody says how was church today?
You're walking around your neighbor says what did you do this morning?
Oh went to church.
Oh, how was church?
What is that?
It's a window of opportunity, right?
You probably are not gonna get a better chance to preach the gospel to somebody than that.
You can say it was great I had the opportunity to go here that I'm a
Sinner and that God can forgive all my sins through the finished work of his son the Lord Jesus Christ.
Because I thought you just went to go to church, you know to hear some message sing a few songs.
You know eat communion or whatever and go home.
I mean you have a lot of people that just aren't used to that kind of idea.
Why why do you go to church?
What is church all about?
What was church like for you this morning?
It was great.
It was life -changing.
There's an answer that you could give.
Yeah, what a great point right you go to church and they say how was it you go?
Well, you know, I really had my eyes open to what a bad person I am this morning.
You're not a bad person.
There are all kinds of things that you could say, but you have to be sort of ready for that.
But what what do you get out of church?
How do you think about it?
You know if you go home and on the way home all you can think about is what you need to do
during the week.
The bills you need to pay the things that have to get done around the house, etc, etc, etc.
When your neighbor says, you know, how are things going or whatever?
What's your response?
Well, just same old same old.
How was church this morning same old same old.
If you go home and you're talking about the sermon.
And you get home and you take that walk around the neighborhood.
Isn't it nice to be able to walk around the neighborhood by the way right now?
As opposed to trudging around.
Took the dog for a walk yesterday.
I was like, this is crazy.
What what's the difference the difference is it's in your attitude in your approach in your readiness to hear.
Your neighbor tea that thing up for you so you can give them the gospel.
You need to be ready to do that.
We need to close but I mean some things.
Let me just close with this idea if you think about Hebrews 412 and this is appropriate because we're about to hear the
word priest here in a few minutes.
What does it do?
Hebrews 412 says it's living and active and sharper than a two -edged sword.
It means it shows us our sin.
You know, how was church today?
Great.
I got to a Little more insight into how sinful I am.
How was church today?
Well, it also corrects error.
So, you know what I Was convicted of some things I need to change my life
how was church today?
Well, it builds up and matures us, you know, I There there are some wrong
ideas I've had and I've had to change those.
We need to be thinking about how we can be impacted week by week and then how that impact
can be handed on to others.
When we need a closing prayer father.
Thank you for your word, thank you for the gifts that you've given the church.
Thank you for that.
Just just the the truth That transforms us that shapes our mind and our
our thinking would you?
Make us people who are not only Ready and able to give an answer for the hope
that is within us, but Also to be purposeful about handing these truths on
to our children equipping them with the knowledge that.
Because they're gonna have children one day Lord willing father we want to equip them that they might
be able to teach their children the truth and So pass the baton from
generation to generation.
Father just encourage us in this way convict us in this way.
Give us a greater desire to obey you in this way.