Boast In Our Invisible Race (1 Thessalonians 2:14-20, Jeff Kliewer)

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Sermon Notes: http://notes.cornerstonesj.org Boast In Our Invisible Race

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His blood was the payment, His life was the cost
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We stood near the dead, we could never afford
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Our sins they are many, His mercy is all
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Praise the Lord, His mercy is more
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Stronger than darkness and new and more
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Our sins they are many, His mercy is more
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Our sins they are many, His mercy is more
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Our sins they are many, His mercy is more
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Lost are safe, find their way
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At the sound of Your great name
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All can dare, feel no shame
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At the sound of Your great name
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Every fear has no place
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At the sound of Your great name
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The enemy, he has to leave
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At the sound of Your great name
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Jesus, worthy is the
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Lamb that was slain for us Son of God and man,
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You are high and lifted up And all the world will praise
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Your great name All the weak find their strength
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At the sound of Your great name
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Hungry souls receive grace
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At the sound of Your great name
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The fatherless, they find their rest
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At the sound of Your great name
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Sick are healed and the dead are raised
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At the sound of Your great name
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Jesus, worthy is the
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Lamb that was slain for us Son of God and man,
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You are high and lifted up And all the world will praise
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Your great name Worthy is the
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Lamb that was slain for us Son of God and man,
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You are high and lifted up And all the world will praise
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Your great name Jesus, worthy is the
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Lamb that was slain for us Son of God and man,
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You are high and lifted up And all the world will praise
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Your great name Your great name
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Lord Jesus we give You all the praise and all the glory
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We praise the Lord even the rocks would cry out God, You are so good to us, Lord God And we just pray that You would just And we give
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You all the praise and all the glory In Jesus' name, Amen Alright, as we go to open
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God's word Let us pray and seek His blessing On our time in His word
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So Father, this morning as we go to open Your word We pray that we would get a glimpse of things to come
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Lord, I picture from the book of Revelation The Lion and the Lamb Who opens the scroll
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And every tribe and tongue and language and people Fall down and worship and sing
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Worthy is the Lamb who was slain We're looking forward to that day
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When all the peoples, that the world would be full Of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea
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Lord, we look to that day And this morning we pray that we would get a glimpse of this Seen here in Your church
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In the local gathered assembly As people gather in the name of Jesus Would You come and dwell with us
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Fill us with Your Holy Spirit And I pray for myself As I teach from 1
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Thessalonians 2 14 to 20 Some controversial matters
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Lord, I pray for myself that I would handle the word rightly Rightly dividing the word entrusted
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And I pray for us, Lord That we would receive well
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And Lord, let Your gospel call go forth to those who are not yet Belonging to Christ We pray that they would come and belong to the church
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The assembly of the firstborn In Jesus' name we pray, Amen The gospel is not ethnic
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The gospel is colorblind The promise of John 1 12
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But to all who did receive him Who believed in his name He gave the right to become children of God To become a child of God Is not at all dependent on the color of one's skin
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It is an offer made to all On every continent
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And regardless and without reference To anything outward Man looks on the outward but God looks on the heart
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We understand these things hopefully from the scriptures That God is offering the gospel to all
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Without looking at the color of skin But sadly, this clear biblical teaching was not always clearly taught
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In fact, there was a cult that formed An offshoot of Christianity which was no longer
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Christian Called Mormonism Have you heard of it? The Book of Mormon was produced in the 1830s
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Early 1830s And it taught to the people of Utah And the surrounding indigenous population
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That were they to come to Christ Their skin would become more and more white
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And delightsome That's a horrific doctrine
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Horrific But sadly, it didn't exist only on the frontier in Utah This kind of teaching permeated the
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American church For the first hundred years of this country Not all churches In fact, there were many who withstood such a horrible teaching
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But some taught what was called the curse of Ham Now we know that Ham was cursed in Genesis 9
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And it was said of Ham A servant of servants shall he be to his brothers
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But those who mishandled God's word Began to look on outward appearance And they began to apply that to people with darker skin
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So the curse of Ham Was applied to people from Africa And therefore many people justified
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Man -stealing in the enslaving of people Which is clearly condemned by the scripture
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So these things were prominent in the church But thanks be to God A bloody war was fought to set the slaves free
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And from that point in time The struggle based on the color of skin Continued in this country
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In 1892 A man named Homer Not Homer Simpson Homer Plessy was his name
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Tried to get on a train in Louisiana And he had one great -grandparent
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Who was of African descent Seven great -grandparents Who were of European descent
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So he was one -eighth dark -skinned And seven -eighths light -skinned
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The coach in which he tried to sit Was reserved for whites only
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In Louisiana law So he was told he couldn't sit there Because the doctrine was
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That if you have just one drop Of African blood Then that makes you
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African Well Plessy challenged this And he sat there And willingly let himself be arrested
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To challenge this doctrine in the courts And the case that we now know
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As Plessy versus Ferguson In 1896 Came from this travesty
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And the court ruled Separate but equal Was in fact legal
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Can you believe it? Plessy was told Because he had just one drop
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Of African blood He could not sit in the whites only coach That was the ruling of the
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Supreme Court In this country On a side note If the Supreme Court rules wrong
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In 1973 in Roe versus Wade That should be overturned Just like Plessy versus Ferguson was
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In due time And I think this year in 2022 Roe versus Wade will be overturned
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Glory to God Let's pray that that happens Plessy versus Ferguson was a travesty
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And here's what it did It separated people Based on the color of their skin And it was such an arbitrary thing
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Because people even at that time Were mixed in race So do you remember when
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Elizabeth Warren Tried to claim that she was an indigenous person? Because she had just one drop
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Of Indian blood Well I have the same thing I have Cherokee in me From the
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Wagner side So I guess I'm indigenous By that kind of logic Which of course is nonsense
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Because to judge people Based on the color of their skin And these kind of doctrines Is completely foreign to the scripture
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Now in Plessy versus Ferguson There was one righteous judge His name was
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Judge Harlan And he looked at the situation And he said The Constitution is colorblind
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Repeat after me Colorblind And he was right The Constitution And the biblical approach to people
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Is colorblind Martin Luther King Jr. would come later And say that he dreamt of a day
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When people would be judged Not by the color of their skin But by the content of their character
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And he was right Brown versus the Board of Education In 1954
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Overthrew Plessy versus Ferguson The Civil Rights Act in 1964
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Established equal rights And got rid of the so -called Separate but equal Because that doctrine
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Is what gave us Jim Crow All of that came crashing down In the 1960s
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And good riddance But in 1965 Lyndon Johnson President of these
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United States Began what was called The Great Society And in that He began to push
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Separate but equal In different terms It's what we call Affirmative action
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Now people are to be separated Based on the color of their skin And favored or disfavored
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Based on melanin in the skin And this continued to grow
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This movement In 1973 The Supreme Court upheld Affirmative action
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And in 2003 The court saw it again Because it wasn't working And so what did they decide?
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On one side Was Sandra Day O 'Connor Taking the Plessy side of the debate On the other side
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Was Clarence Thomas Of all the Supreme Court justices That we have right now
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Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito Are the only trustworthy ones And here's what
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Clarence Thomas said Judge Harlan was right The Constitution is colorblind
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And he argued That we also must be colorblind Not looking at the color of people's skin
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But judging people individually By the content of their character Sadly His view failed
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And Sandra Day O 'Connor And the court once again Upheld this unjust law
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In Bollinger The University of Michigan case In 2003 Fast forward to 2022
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And according to the Sandra Day O 'Connor side 25 years later We should be able to move past this
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Rather what we have seen Is a virtual or uncivil race war in America Things have not gotten better They've gotten worse
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The University of Michigan case Sandra Day O 'Connor Has been proven wrong
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A new doctrine emerged
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Beginning in the 1960s in Harvard And then developing in the 1990s
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Also at Harvard And then popularized in the media With the writing of many books
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And that is called critical race theory The concept of critical race theory
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Is that you are and you must Look at the color of people's skin To redress grievances from the past You must be obsessed with the color of skin
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And take a critical approach To the world in which we live Critically assuming racism
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Often where none exists The point of this
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Is to say that the world Is fascinated with the color of skin
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Church We have something better Man looks on the outward
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But God looks at the heart And I want to introduce you to A passage of scripture you might not be familiar with But it deals with the subject of race
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Guys I didn't want to talk about race today Paul made me do it Here's what I do as a preacher
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When the text goes to a place That's where I go The last time we looked in 1
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Thessalonians 2 It talked about economics So we spoke against Marxism Because Paul in 1
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Thessalonians 2 verse 9 Says remember brothers Our labor and our toil We worked night and day
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That we might not be a burden to any of you While we proclaimed to you The gospel of God The text brought us there
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Today turn with me to 1 Thessalonians 2 14 to 20 And Paul will address
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The issue of race But unlike the critical race theorist
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And Sandra Day O 'Connor And the Ferguson side Of Plessy versus Ferguson Paul does not cling
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To his ethnic identity And form his identity there Rather Paul places
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His identity in Christ And with The people of God That is to say the church
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He sees that the dividing wall Between Jew and Gentile Has been torn down in Christ And he identifies
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Not with his own Ethnic people The Jewish people But he forms his identity
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With Christ And the church This is a very important teaching for the day in which we live
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Because just as it was In the 1800s Churches today are being swept up In an unbiblical movement
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Seeking to favor people Based on the color of skin And the Bible knows nothing of it
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So let's read it 1 Thessalonians 2 14 -20 For you brothers
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Became imitators of the churches of God In Christ Jesus That are in Judea For you suffered
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The same things from your own Countrymen As they did
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From the Jews Who killed both the Lord Jesus And the prophets
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And drove us out And displeased God and opposed all mankind
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By hindering us From speaking to the Gentiles That they might be saved So as always to fill up The measure of their sins
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But wrath Has come upon them At last But since we were torn away from you brothers
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For a short time In person not in heart We endeavored the more eagerly
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And with great desire To see you face to face Because we wanted to come to you
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I Paul again and again But Satan hindered us For what is our
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Hope or joy or crown Of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming
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Is it not you For you are Our glory and joy
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So the Big idea this morning Is that we live in a world That is obsessed
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With man -made Constructs of race Constructs that don't actually exist
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They're man -made Whereas the world runs after these
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Identity groups We are in Christ And standing in Christ We form our identity
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In the church In Galatians 6 .14 Paul will say
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Far be it for me to boast Except In the cross of Christ Through which the world
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Is crucified to me and I To the world. He's made a break With the world and his boast
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Is in Christ In Christ. Remember that phrase We'll come back to it
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In Ephesians 2 .19 -20 He identifies that He is part and a member
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Of the household of God He forms his identity In the church
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Not in his ethnicity In Hebrews 11 .25 We learn that Moses chose not
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To be identified With the Egyptians who Raised him but rather To be identified with the people
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Of God And in Acts 11 .26 We learn for the first time
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We were called Christians At Antioch The big point being
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You'll see it in two parts We must make a break From loyalties
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That are only skin deep And create
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A bond and join This bond that is the church The church is
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Something more than a Sunday Morning gathering It is an identity
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You are part of a household When you are in the church A family will see this language
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So let's look at the first part The break that Paul makes From the Jews because when you read these words
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I didn't write them They sound harsh What is
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Paul doing here Let's look at verses 14 -16 First For a
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Christian identity Is not to be found In ethnicity or race
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You'll notice in this section Paul speaks of himself And them
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There's an us them but it's the church The brothers and the them In this case are the
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Jews Now what ethnicity is Paul? Jewish And yet For you brothers
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Became imitators of the churches of God In Christ Jesus that are in Judea For you suffered the same things
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From your own countrymen These are Greeks In Thessalonica When the
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Thessalonians came to Christ The Greeks rejected them And this is in keeping
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With what happened in Jerusalem The churches were established In Judea And the
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Jews rejected them They're rejected By their own By their own world
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Their own culture Now notice How Paul speaks
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Of the Jews In verses 15 and 16 He describes them as having
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Killed both the Lord Jesus And the prophets And drove us out
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And displeased God And opposed all mankind By hindering us from speaking to the
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Gentiles Is this anti -Semitism Remember Paul is
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Jewish He is not Speaking to them According to their melanin
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According to their descent According to ethnic markers He is speaking based on the content
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Of their character He's speaking to their behavior
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This generation of Jews In particular There are times when the
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Jewish people In history are the victims Of a holocaust But this generation
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Of Jews to whom Paul is referring Is opposing All that is right and good
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Look at verse 15 The first thing they do Is the worst thing that was ever done
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In the history of the world They killed Jesus And that was in keeping
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With what they had been doing When prophets came foretelling the coming Christ They killed the prophets
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They sought Isaiah in two They threw Jeremiah in a dungeon Daniel in a lion's den
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And drove us out Paul himself went To preach the gospel in Jerusalem And they tied him up And they arrested him and sought to kill him
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It was only the Romans that rescued him He appealed to Caesar and was sent to Rome But time and time again
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We read in Paul's letters That he was rejected By his own people
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Five times I received from the Jews The forty lashes minus one The forty lashes
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Was the harsh punishment Of being whipped with a cat of nine tails The punishment of forty lashes
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Would be reduced by one Because if you actually Killed the person And were charged with giving more
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Than the forty You could be held liable And so they would back that off one Just to play it safe In case you counted wrong
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Thirty -nine lashes on the back Paul received that punishment From his own people
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Five times He was driven out of Jerusalem Then he goes on to say
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They displeased God and opposed all mankind Now why do they oppose Mankind Verse sixteen
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Or how should How do they do it They hinder the gospel being taken
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To the Gentiles Here the Jew Has a descent from Abraham And takes pride
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He boasts in his ethnicity Over against the Gentile dogs You can read about it in Philippians three
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The Jewish person Has been specially chosen by God For a purpose
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Which are described In the book of Romans in chapter nine Supremely That the
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Christ would come through them But they begin to Boast in themselves
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In their ethnicity over against Gentile people and the rest of mankind Is to them
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A pack of dogs And they stop Paul Even from taking the gospel to them
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In verse sixteen by hindering us from speaking To the Gentiles that they might Be saved Now Paul says so as always
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To fill up the measure of their sin See Paul is judging them Based on their
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Own behavior and he says But wrath has come upon them At last notice the word
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Them Paul disassociates from them He sees
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A different kind of us Who is the Us in this section
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Look at verse fourteen For you brothers He's referring to the church
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Paul Identifies himself With his brothers the churches of God in Christ Jesus whether they be
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In Judea or in Thessalonica Nowadays we live in a culture
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Where people are obsessed With the color of skin And people seek to Form identity
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In ethnic background I even Saw a meme come across Of anybody see the new spider man
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The new spider man Some of you like that There's a new Character in it who plays
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MJ The girlfriend of spider man And she has Darker skin
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And some Christians produced a meme That shows The former MJ And another one who are both
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White and this MJ Has darker skin And they place over it
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Embrace tradition reject Modernity what does that mean
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It is a sad Pathetic Attachment to ethnic
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Heritage In which this current MJ Is rejected
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Because of the color of her skin That is alive And well in churches
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Across the land not many It's in a Certain small circle of the
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Evangelical church That embrace a doctrine called kinism Have you heard of kinism A kinist believes that People should only marry people
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Of their same ethnic background They will Say that you know it doesn't make one
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Superior to another But that those from European descent Should only marry those from European Descent and those of African And Asian etc etc
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It is a pernicious Doctrine But that's not the only
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Appearance of this In our culture it's everywhere You find it in Churches of various stripes
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I once worked for A couple of years at a church That was
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Seeking to establish A new church That speaks
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English the church That was launching this church was all Vietnamese People they didn't even speak
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English Many of them so they preached in Vietnamese Nothing wrong with that But they wanted to establish
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An English speaking church of the younger Generation And so as we began to preach the gospel
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In the neighborhood many people Started to come There were the Vietnamese young people
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But there were also people of Lighter skin And darker skin
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And the church grew to More than a hundred people many were getting baptized And the church began to Become very multi -ethnic
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Do you want to know what the mother church did They pulled the plug
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On the entire church plant Took the building back Fired the pastor I was working with Because The church was no longer
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Vietnamese you see Their identity Was in their ethnicity Rather than in Christ And in his church
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You will find manifestations of this All throughout society And it is pernicious
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Paul Refutes this do you see it in verses 14 to 16 Here is a
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Jew Judging his own ethnic people Not by Their ethnicity but by their behavior
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It's a righteous judgment Not a loyalty based on Ethnicity and he says the same
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Of the countrymen in Thessalonica You're rejected by your own Don't look
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At the skin color I'm giving you a new Identity now do you want to see the good news Verses 17
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To 20 Provides us with something far more Valuable Something that's true and real
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And lasting eternal Look at it It is the church Look at the language
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Paul employs In speaking of The new identity that we have In Christ this is a beautiful thing we don't
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Appreciate it as We should For the Christian identity
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Is found in Jesus and in the Many who belong to him He says but since we were
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Torn away That word torn away Comes from the
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Greek Orphanos Orphanos what does that sound like An orphan
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To be torn away Is to be orphaned from some Now remember earlier in chapter 2
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Paul has employed paternal Language he was a father To them and Maternal language
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I was a Mother to you caring for you like A nursing mother Now he uses a similar
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Language torn away Orphanos I was Ripped from you and he
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Says we were torn away from you Brothers for a short time In person not in heart
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Notice Paul had been In Thessalonica for three weeks Preaching in the synagogue maybe a couple weeks
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Beyond that but he had already Established a bond with these people Like a father to his child
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A depth Of love that the world knows Nothing of a real bond Where does this come from how does this form
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So quickly in a matter Of weeks it comes
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In Christ Because these people The Thessalonian believers
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Are blood bought even as he is And so he'll go on to say We endeavored the more
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Eagerly and with great desire To see you face to face Because we wanted to come to you
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I Paul again and again But Satan hindered us So you see he has this
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Strong desire for them a fatherly Love a motherly love But he's been torn from them
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This is his people The church He loves them he's willing to do Anything he can however
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There's a spiritual war going on Satan hindered them Now does Satan get the last word here
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Of course not we're reading 1st Thessalonians It was God's plan That we would have this book
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Because He was separated from them he then Writes two letters 1st and 2nd Thessalonians So we would have this as part of the
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Bible So Satan Is only an instrument that God is using He's a secondary cause but it's a real
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War Satan is resisting at that point But then he goes on in verses 19 and 20 and here is
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The joy The good news this is what we should Take away this morning This is what's offered to you in the church
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So much better than I ever realized The joy
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The joy is the church We have a visible expression Of an invisible race
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That was known from before The foundation of the world For what is our hope Or joy
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Or crown of boasting Before our Lord Jesus at his coming Is it not you
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For you are our glory And joy We belong
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To Christ And therefore We belong to each other
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Christ is coming And when he does he's going to rapture From the earth every
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Genuine believer on the planet At his coming at his
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Appearing and we will delight in One another for all eternity This is lasting this is real
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This is the church Now look at the world around us They have nothing
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To belong to Nothing lasting I mean If we're just stardust
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Evolved from apes And we're all dying There is no purpose
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There's nothing transcendent There's nothing to belong to And so what do you do
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If you're just a descendant From apes Originally stardust and Returning to stardust
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What do you do You search And you clamor for meaning
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You look to establish Some identity Some identity somewhere that will make you belong
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To something better Do you feel Unnatural attractions Will form a community with the
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LGBTQIA Plus whatever Wants to be thrown into that You see it's a person
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That's clamoring to belong to Something and call it a community But there's no community
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In that And very many people Try to find
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Identity In Ethnicity It's why
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Adolf Hitler Rallied the German people To conquer
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Poland And try to Conquer the world Survival of the fittest
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The logic of Darwinism His identity And the people of Germany At that time bought this lie
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That their identity was in being German So why not establish that as chief among The people.
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Survival of the fittest Perfect logic in a godless World. It's why
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Putin Wants to take over the Ukraine As we speak Because there's Russian people
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In the Ukraine You see Collectivism Identity politics
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Is the root of all kinds of evil In our world People seeking to establish
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Meaning but they form collectives Around What is not transcendent
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What is not real and eternal and lasting And then those competing Groups of people
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Fight for privilege Resources To establish themselves
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In power And influence And that's what you see happening in our world
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Where God Is removed People will create collectives Around all manner of identity
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But listen church Paul forms his identity here In the church
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Look what he says This is my crown Of boasting Did you think boasting was bad?
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Don't you hate it When somebody's boasting? Well the reason it's obnoxious When people brag and they're boasting
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About how great they are Is because they're elevating something That's not worthy Boasting itself
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Is not bad if it's in The ultimate and supreme value in the universe We ought to boast
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In Christ Listen to Paul's words Regarding boasting
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He says Just as it is written Let him who boasts, boast in the Lord Elsewhere he says
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He who boasts is to boast in the Lord Therefore in Christ Jesus I have found reason for boasting
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In things pertaining to God And then Galatians 6 .14
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May it never be that I would boast Except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ Through which the world
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Has been crucified to me And I to the world Paul boasts
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In Christ And in the church David boasts In Psalm 34 .2
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My soul will make its boast In the Lord The humble will hear it and rejoice
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In God we have boasted all day long And we will give thanks to your name forever
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Selah Psalm 20 .7 Some boast in chariots
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Some in horses But we will boast In the name of the Lord our
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God We will boast In the ultimate value which is
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Christ To belong to him And the church
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So Paul's point here Is to make you boast In Christ When I was a young man
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As opposed to now Getting some gray in the beard But 1999
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My boast Was in basketball Even if I wouldn't have
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Admitted it, that's where my heart Boasted. 1999
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I flew up to North Carolina For a week And this is when
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I was Called into ministry, this week In 1999, June Summer break
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I went up there for a week to be a fellowship Of Christian athletes counselor To the young people
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The year before my Last year in college Between my junior and senior year
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The first night Of that fellowship of Christian athletes Camp I heard the preacher
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Adrian Dupree Calling Christians To surrender all
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And to make Christ Everything, to make Christ Our boast, and I realized
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At that time that my life Was devoted more To secondary things than to Christ And instead of The teens alone going forward
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At that altar call, we used to have altar calls Remember that? You go to the altar Of course the cross is the only altar
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There's nothing sacred about Space up here Which is why we don't do that, but In that context it was good for me
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I myself went forward and I Laid down on that stage And I confessed my
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Sin And I surrendered My life to Christ Fully A few days later
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He worked powerfully in me In that I began to Witness and share the gospel with the kids
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That I was working with One of them named Ryan He didn't get saved on the last day of camp
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And so we were leaving And as I was walking out I was alone in this field
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And I began to pray and ask God, why didn't you save him? And before long
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I started to cry, and then I Was just overcome by This deep, guttural weeping
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For his salvation My heart was broken that this young man Had not come to faith at camp
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If he couldn't come to faith at Fellowship of Christian Athletes camp for a week And he's going back to the inner city
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How is he ever Going to come? And my heart was Breaking and I was weeping, but I never
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Felt so close to God in all my life He gave me a heart for the lost
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At that camp And he called me into ministry And so on the flight back
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From North Carolina to Tampa There was going to be a layover in Atlanta I got on the plane
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And as I was Walking up the aisle, I was determined To share the gospel With whoever
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I sat next to I mean, this guy was going to be held Captive from Charlotte To Atlanta.
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I was ready To go. And the guy sitting in the
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Middle seat, I'm on the aisle He was bigger than me Much darker skin
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Gold teeth And I reached into my bag To grab a
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Bible And as I did He pulled his Bible out He was a member of the
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Invisible Church. Couldn't see it But I would discover soon enough He opened that Bible And I'm telling you, every
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Page from Genesis to Revelation was underlined And starred and highlighted with notes
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This guy had spent time In the word And he said, young man, let's look at the
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Book of Ephesians. And so For that flight, he opened the Book of Ephesians with me
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And he told me, listen You need to underline everywhere You see in Christ In Christ It was 27
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Places in the Book of Ephesians And 165 Places in the New Testament In Christ And Quentin Williams taught
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Me on that flight what it Means that I am in The Beloved That he has saved me
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Who am I and what has He called me to do? I have identity In union with The Lord And there are people all over this earth
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Who likewise believe in him Who are united with him and we are united In one body
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We are in Christ That's my new identity So going back to Tampa Even before Getting on the second flight
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Quentin Williams and I were walking to our Next layover flight. He was going To Dallas I think and I was going to Tampa.
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Right there in the airport He laid hands on me and prayed Over me for 10 minutes Just praying
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God's blessing on me in ministry The power of God That I would know who
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I am in Christ. So I shared the
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Gospel on that flight and The next week I went to Real estate class. I became a realtor
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That was what I did over the summer. My parents Were in real estate. So I got my Real estate license but at lunch
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I shared the gospel and for the first time In my life I led someone to Christ My good friend
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Keith Who still believes to this day The Lord had called me to ministry
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He showed Me what it was to be in Christ Brother Sister Do you know your identity
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What are you living for Who are you living for Do you realize the value
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Of what we have here For that last year of college I didn't have A good church family. There were a few
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Believers at Eckerd College And I found them and we would pray together But it wasn't
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Until the next year when I graduated I became A youth pastor at a Presbyterian Church And that's when
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I saw what a local Church of believers ought to be like And I realized
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I want to give Every breath that I have To building up this thing called
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The church It's worthy. This is a crown Of boasting. This is a joy, a hope, a glory
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Something that lasts Church, do you realize
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What we have here? We are a visible Expression of an invisible Church Worldwide.
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God sees the number Of the elect. He knows who they are And here we are a visible
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Expression of it. A local body This is something Worthy of your time
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And of your life So as we go to prayer In closing
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I want to invite you. Maybe I'm just aware There's somebody here maybe That's not yet a part of the church
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You don't know that you belong here Guess what He welcomes you
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The gospel call is to All who would come It is a free offer of grace
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He's inviting you To come and be a part of Him and his church and it's so much
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Better than anything that the world Is offering. Leave all the identity Politics behind Every pet cause, every other
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Identity which is Only skin deep Come to Christ Come and be a part of a church
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That glorifies the risen King. If you want to do that Pray with me. Let's just all bow our heads
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For those who have Not yet come to saving faith Right now you can call on The name of Christ to save you
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Repent of your sin Believe in him. You will find him to be A perfect savior. Pray this
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Way. In your own heart You don't have to say it out loud but say God I am a sinner
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I've sought meaning in so Many other things And they are empty
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I'm sorry for my sin But today
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I recognize That Christ is all And I pray
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Lord that you would Save me, the sinner Please forgive me of my sins
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I believe That Jesus died That Jesus rose
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And I ask you Lord Jesus to save Me from my sins Make me a part of your church
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In Jesus name I pray Amen. Anybody Just raise your hand if you just did that You just prayed that prayer.
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Anybody pray that prayer? Confess before Men. God will not be ashamed Of you in heaven.
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Just raise your hand if you just Prayed that prayer Okay Alright well let's pray again
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This time for us as a church For the church of the firstborn The assembly of the firstborn
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That we would not look on the outward As man does but look on the heart Father in your word
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It says here there is not Jew or gentile Barbarian, Scythian, slave, free
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But Christ is all and in all We pray Lord that this church Would always be colorblind
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That we would not look On the outward But look
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To you alone As you look on the heart Lord I pray That our church would be unified
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Around What matters for all Eternity. Around Christ That Christ Would be all here.
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Help us Lord To love the church and give ourselves Entirely to building up the church
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We're looking forward To your coming and we pray that your blessing Would remain on this congregation in Jesus name
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Amen. Let's stand and sing There is
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A truth Older than the age There is
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A promise Of things yet to come As one
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Our salvation Jesus There is
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A light That overwhelms The darkness There is
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A kingdom That forever reigns
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There is Freedom From the chains
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That bind us Jesus Jesus Who walks
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On the water Who speaks to The sea
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Who stands in the fire Beside me
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He roars Like a lion He bled
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As the lamb He carries My healing
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Jesus There is a name
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I call In times of trouble There is
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A song That comforts In the night There is
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A voice That calms The storm and rages Jesus Who walks
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On the water Who speaks to The sea
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Who stands in the fire Beside me
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He roars Like a lion He bled
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As the lamb He carries My healing Jesus Beside me
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My Savior There is power
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Deeper There is power
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You walk On the waters You speak to The sea
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You stand in the fire Beside me
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You roar Like a lion You bled as the lamb
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You carry My healing In your You walk
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On the waters You speak to The sea You stand
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In the fire Beside me You roar
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Like a lion You bled As the lamb
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There is no one Like you There is no one like you
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And he put all things Under his feet And gave him as head
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Over all things to the church Which is his body The fullness of him
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Who fills all in all Built on the foundation of the
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Apostles and Prophets Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone In whom the whole
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Structure being joined together Grows into a holy Temple in the
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Lord In him you also Are being built together Into a dwelling place for God by the
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Spirit Now to him who is Able to do far more abundantly
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Than all that we ask or think According to the power At work within us
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To him be glory in the church And in Christ Jesus Throughout all generations