Why We Don't Prioritize the Church | Kingsmen

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Welcome to the

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Kingsmen Podcast. I'm Jon Moffitt. I'm the host and pastor of Grace Reformed Church in Spring Hill, Tennessee, and also one of the hosts of Theocast.

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Kingsmen is about helping people understand the purpose and the point of the kingdom. When Christ says, Seek first the kingdom of God, what does that mean?

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How is it that we are to navigate a living in the kingdom of darkness while having the hope of a kingdom of light?

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That's the point of it. So this one's a little bit different today. As a pastor and as I think about shepherding people and I think about the purpose of the kingdom,

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I just have a challenging thought for us, some things to think about as it relates to the king and the gathered people.

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When we think about church, church has been so ravished and attacked by Satan in ways many people hate the experience of church.

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They've been stabbed in the back, they've been misled, they've had possibly false teachers who have been pastors in the past.

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It's an amazing tactic of Satan to come in and utterly just destroy the church.

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This is why in multiple passages James and Ephesians, Philippians and Corinthians, he deals with the unity of the church, like protecting a place where it's supposed to be the hope center, the center of our hope where we can come and not have to worry about being influenced by the world, being attacked by the world, being accused, but where you have a bunch of sinners who are desperately in need of God's grace who come not to judge one another but to come and to encourage each other to look to Christ.

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That's what church should be. Unfortunately, a lot of times it's not. Now you can sit there and continue to be a problem and make the criticisms.

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People are like, oh, they're just full of hypocrites. That's one hypocrite talking to another hypocrite.

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Because if the standard is God's law and the standard is God's command, which is to love

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God perfectly with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and you're telling me you've done that. No, you haven't. Therefore, you're a hypocrite too, and you're just wrongfully judging someone else.

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It's easy when we get away from the wonderful grace of God, how quickly we can become judgmental and our accusations against each other.

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If we truly believe that God's word is living and active and powerful, and it changes our hearts and it draws us closer to him, and it gives us hope and strength, and the more of it we know, the more we believe, the better we can enjoy his benefits.

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A lot of that being understanding mercy and grace and kindness and forgiveness while we await and being a sweet aroma to the loss and those around us, right?

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Being able to live sacrificially and to give. What ends up happening, though, is when we think about Sundays, Sundays become optional for us.

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You know, Sundays is kind of one of those things that we look at and go, yeah, well, as long as nothing gets in the way, I'll be there, or on the days that I serve,

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I'll make sure I'll be there. But every other time is kind of optional. When you think about the early church, boy, that would destroy them.

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And what would make it different from the early church to the church to today? Some people say, well, everybody has their own

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Bibles. And you know, God in his perfect wisdom and knowledge and being able to prophesy about the future, don't you think he would say, until everyone has their own copy of the word, you need to be diligent to meet together.

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You need to be diligent to allow the elders to teach you and to preach to you and to equip you for the work of ministry.

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And then once you all have the word, then you can do that on your own. Don't you think he would prophesy that? I mean, he's perfectly prophesied the beginning to the end.

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He knows all things. Don't you think somewhere in Scripture that he would encourage independence over time?

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And he doesn't. He never encourages independence over time. Multiple times in Scripture, both in Peter and in Hebrews, he says that you are to submit to your elders because they watch over your souls.

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He says in Hebrews, do not forsake, do not abandon, do not leave behind the gathered saints on the

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Lord's day. Why? Because that is how God has used his means, his mission, his purpose to care for and equip the saints.

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I mean, just go read Ephesians four and tell me where you would walk away with the option of living the

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Christian life individualistically and where the gathered church would be an option. It's just not. It's not an option.

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He says that it's within the body of Christ that when the body functions properly, Ephesians four, 16, it builds itself up.

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When the body, not an individual body, but the body of the collective believers, when they function as they should, and he gives all of the work in there when the elders and the teachers are preaching and they're equipping the saints for the work of ministry, it prevents bad doctrine.

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It prevents people from sneaking into the church and leading people astray. It takes somebody from weak to strength.

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It takes them from immature to mature so they're not tossed about. And then they can do the work of ministry, which is then caring for each other's burdens, praying for each other, administering to one another, and then sharing the gospel with those around us in the world.

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But that doesn't happen individualistically. He says that happens within the body. Now that's not to say that we can't use

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God's word and shouldn't use God's word on our own, but I think we should always understand that when we're engaging in the word,

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God did it expecting you to be dependent upon each other. Galatians 6, when one is caught in sin, go to such a one and restore them, pull them out.

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You know, it's interesting, he doesn't give you a solution for when you're caught in sin for yourself. This is why church discipline exists, because it's not that Christians can't fall into sin.

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It's that they will fall into sin. And how do we handle that when they fall into sin? What measures?

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We are to confront one another. We're to exhort one another. We're to rebuke one another. Literally, that's what it says in Timothy, right?

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Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all patience and long -suffering. So the church is a mighty powerful tool of dependence that God has put in our place and has not only suggested it, but commanded us to be involved in it and to be submitted to it.

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Literally, Paul says in a couple of passages in Philippians, specifically, and Ephesians, we are to be submitting ourselves to one another.

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That means that my life is dedicated to the service and love and care for you for the work of the kingdom and for the glory of Christ, and you are doing the same in return.

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I just want to challenge you and challenge all of us in thinking about how it is that we structure our life.

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You know, in the American culture, we work really hard all week long, and then we look forward to the weekend, and that's our time.

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That's our time to relax. It's our time to kind of take off and do whatever it is that we want. And if church feels good that day, then we'll do that.

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And I'm not trying to be legalistic here. I don't want to make people feel guilty and shamed. I'm trying to say if you're thinking about your discouragement, you're struggling, you're probably maybe not being effective in loving one another, you feel selfish all the time, you feel ashamed and guilty, you know, church is a place where we receive mercy and kindness as it should be.

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I know a lot of people who go to churches that all you hear is law and you don't hear any gospel. And so my encouragement to you is how long can you go without eating and drinking?

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You're not going to survive very long physically, and that's exactly how God describes it. Well, the Holy Spirit lives within me,

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John. And that same Holy Spirit that lives within you also told you to be a part of a body that is submitting to elders, that is hearing the word preached and read, and that you are praying.

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Consider daily how to build one another up, right? Singing psalms and hymns. I think it's interesting that, sorry, the fan is drying out my eyes here.

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I think it's interesting that he says, let the word of God dwell in you richly, Colossians chapter three, by singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to one another, right?

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Not to each other, not to me, not to individuals, but with one another. And so the gathered church is

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God's mission for the world for first, the encouragement, strengthen, development, and maturity of the believer, but also the advancement of the gospel.

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Immature, weak, sin -trapped Christians don't share the light of Christ. They actually are ineffective and unfruitful, 1

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Peter 1 .9. And that's because they have forgotten they'd been cleansed from their former sins because they have abandoned the place that is supposed to be reminding them.

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Well, John, I can just read my Bible every single day. You can, and you should, and it can encourage you. But at times we can become so weak or we've become so burdened that that is not effective.

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And there's nowhere in scripture that says you can sustain yourself for long periods of time by individually pulling yourself away from the collective body.

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So my challenge to you is we need to take this serious. We did structure our life around the kingdom of God.

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And that kingdom is functioning in its outposts called churches, embassies, right? We don't structure our life around that.

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We structure the church around our life. And if the church doesn't meet my entertainment and my work and my lifestyle, then it's too bad that, you know, they'll either

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I'll find another church or I'll just won't deal with church altogether. And then we're sitting here and we're wondering why it's hard to pray.

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We're wondering why we're frustrated. We're wondering why we're being trapped in sin. We're wondering why there's this functionality in our home.

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We're wondering why we can't feel satisfaction. We're wondering why we're angry. We're anxious. It's because we have left the strength.

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Go back to last week. We're not standing in the strength of the Lord. We're trying to be independent of His means.

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The moment you say, I don't need church, you're saying God is unwise. He doesn't know what He's doing. And I know better than God.

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If you do not prioritize God's means and God's church, you are saying, I know better than God.

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And I know this sounds punchy, and I know this sounds harsh, but I'm just trying to communicate exactly what

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Hebrews meant. You cannot abandon this, right? There's so many passages in scriptures, but if you can just think about the book of James, Ephesians chapter, the end of chapter four and beginning of chapter five, first Corinthians, even chapter 13, like if you don't have love and unity, the rest of your existence of all these gifts that you think you have, if you don't have love and unity, you have nothing, which is the greatest gift that we give one another.

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And I'm not saying this because I want better attendance in churches. I'm saying this because our God who loves us and understands our frailty and understands how weak we are and understand that we must have a constant renewal of the mind and washing of the word and knows that we need each other because the gifts and the strengths and the power that the

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Holy Spirit brings through each other, that we must prioritize his word. Therefore, we prioritize his people and we gather together and we don't want to let anything in its way.

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So my last encouragement to you is this as well. Sunday mornings, I find it interesting how people show up tired, distracted, exhausted.

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They show up late, they leave early. And then there's like, I don't ever get anything out of the service. I mean, just stop and think about that for a moment.

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You didn't get anything out of it because you didn't prioritize it while I was there. But were you really?

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But were you really there? Did you really come and say, Father, I'm going to give you my full attention, my heart, my mind.

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I'm going to show up early. I'm going to make sure that I'm not frazzled. I'm going to make sure that I'm awake. I'm not going to stay up late. I'm not going to be on my phone.

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I want to receive. I'm going to be there to serve and love my brothers and sisters. I want to make sure that I get the most benefit out of this because I need this for the rest of the week.

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I need this for the rest of the year. I need this for life. This is why he literally describes the preaching of the word.

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The word itself is the living active power of him. When the gospel is proclaimed, it is

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God's power being proclaimed to you. And it is what you need. And when you have the power of prayer being prayed over you, and you receive the gifts of the table,

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God's supernatural is the power of his spirit encouraged and strengthens you. There's something supernatural about the gathering of the people.

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Of God and the word being its center core and the gospel being its message that sustains, strengthens, and grows and matures a believer.

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And so my encouragement to you is take that serious. Go to bed early.

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Now, I'm not trying to be legalistic as if you're gaining God's favor. I'm saying you have a weak body. You have a weak mind. Do everything you need to be fresh and ready so that you get all the benefits of it.

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You receive all the joy and benefits and you could be a benefits to others. But at times, instead of working the whole week and realizing at the end of this week,

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I am so ready to be refreshed and renewed. And I'm going to make sure I protect myself so that I am ready to do that.

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As a pastor, I always ask people, if I showed up and just kind of gave really bad sermons and was exhausted, and at times didn't even come,

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I'm like, you know what? You guys can figure out Sunday on your own. I don't want to preach today. Would you be upset at me?

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Would you say I was ineffective? And would you be judgmental of me? Absolutely. We expect a lot from the pastors.

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But you understand that God doesn't put high expectations on the pastors and expect them to show up every

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Sunday and not the same expectation. There's not like two expectations. He does say that there's an accountability.

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I'm going to be held accountable for what I say. Absolutely. But it's not that I'm to be more dedicated and faithful than you are, or any of the pastors to be more dedicated and faithful than any other person.

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You'll never read that in scripture. And I'm encouraging them. And I'm trying to throw a little bit of cold water on here and just say, re -evaluate your priority.

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Going back to last week, God uses trials, uses struggles in our life to show us our weakness and then says, here's where I provide strength to you.

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Here's where I provide accountability and hope and uplifting and joy, and where you'll be matured when the body functions properly.

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There's a growth that happens. And it's a supernatural growth He promises. And trials and each other were used to spur and push each other on.

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And so I hope you hear this and say, I want you to learn to depend upon your Father and receive the joys of putting your faith and trust in Him and obedience to Him.

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So my encouragement to you is He has, for 2000 plus years, has used the gathered church for that means.

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Nothing in prophecy or in scripture would tell us otherwise. It's been working for 2000 years.