Obedience and Faithfulness

[00:00:02] Well, let's open our bibles together this morning. We're going to be in the book of first Thessalonians, first Thessalonians, chapter five. [00:00:18] And while you're turning over there, I just want to say, it is good to be back with you this morning. And every time I try to say the name of your church, I mess it up in a different way. And I apologize. I'm not even gonna try this morning. But I love being here with you guys at this church, and the name's not that hard. It's just. It's not ingrained in my brain. I hadn't said it over and over again. So it's so good to be here with you this morning. And as he said, my name is Nathan, and I am the pastor of Hope Church, Asheville. And I had one very perceptive member of this church walk up to me last week, and she said, how are you preaching for us this morning if you're the pastor of Hope church, Asheville? What are they doing? And I said, that's very perceptive. She was paying attention, and I told her that we have our services on Sunday evening at 06:00 p.m. which is a little bit different, but we chose to do that intentionally. We cooperate with a lot of other churches in our area, and we're just a new church plant. We've been there less than two years, and we started off on Sunday mornings and were really having trouble getting some traction. And we were praying, and we felt like the Lord led us to doing a Sunday evening service instead of a Sunday morning service. And as soon as we did that, the Lord just sent quite a few young families to come help us, and it's just been a huge blessing. We do have plans to go back to a Sunday morning, but I've kind of gotten used to being able to go on Sunday mornings and visit with other churches and speak at other places, and my family's enjoyed that, too. I don't know if you realize, but church planning families sometimes really struggle to get to know people in the community because they're so focused on building a church from nothing that it's really hard to get out in the community, especially when you move from another area. And so it's been a privilege for me and my family to be able to visit other churches and get to know some other pastors and families in our area. So it's a privilege to be here. We do have service tonight at 05:00 p.m. so please be praying for Hope church, Asheville. We're studying through the book of First Corinthians, so the Lord's been blessing us in that we're on our third week of starting the book of First Corinthians tonight, so we're also, as I mentioned last week, in the process of planning a church on Seoff Mountain. At this point, it is a, it's a Bible study, and we meet every Thursday night at seven, and I just want to invite anybody that wants to come by and see what's going on up on the mountain. I had a few people ask me last week about that as well. God's opened the door, giving us a property up there. It used to be Dunn's Creek Baptist church, then it was the church at sea off and they closed down and they were looking for a church to adopt them and hope church adopted them. And we're in the process of planning a church up there. So please keep us in your prayers and if you want something fun to do, come by and go to a Bible study with us on Thursday evening. I believe at this point we have four different churches that are cooperating and helping get this Bible study started. And that's such an incredible thing. That's something that I think this county, this Baptist association, should be proud of, because it's hard to get four different churches to do anything together. And God's been blessing us, and I'm really excited about that. [00:03:31] We do have a vision to reach that community for Jesus, and I do covet your prayers for that. And if you want to come by and support us, come by Thursday nights at 07:00 p.m. so I was on the way home from Chattanooga, Tennessee, which is where I grew up. I spent about 40 years there and was on the way home this weekend from an event that my daughter was graduating from. And I was thinking about all the trips that I've been on in my life. Does anybody else in here love to travel? I absolutely love to travel. Whether it's a couple hours down the road or to the other side of the planet, I've been privileged in my lifetime to make many, many trips, and I was trying to count it up this week. I believe I've seen close to 30 states and I don't have an exact count, but I know some of you probably seen more than that. But I've seen close to 30 states, but I have been privileged through doing missions trips around the world to see over 24 countries. 24 is the closest that I can count that I've been able to be at. And I'm probably forgetting a few. Some of those I was just passing through briefly, and some I've been able to stay for a while and help share the gospel and preach, and I've been able to share the gospel on three different continents. And God has been good to me. And when I was a kid, I was terrified of being a missionary. I thought that if I surrendered my life to Jesus, if I got saved, he was going to send me over to the middle of Africa to live in a mud hut and I wouldn't have any more fun for the rest of my life and I'd have to be a missionary. Well, it's obvious I did not know what being a missionary was. It's one of the most exciting things I've ever had the privilege of doing in my life. And now at this stage of my life, I'm begging God, are you sure you don't want me to be a missionary? Because I would love to go travel around the world and share the gospel. But he's given me the privilege of doing that as well as being a pastor here in the United States. And I'm just thankful for what God has done. But as I was thinking about all the trips I've been on, I remembered something with a lot of fondness and it was a great memory. I remember traveling around the country as a young boy with my family, and I started remembering those trips and thinking about what those trips were like. Does anybody remember traveling on maybe a vacation as just a young child with your family, with your brothers and sisters, with your. With your parents? We really didn't know how much of a blessing that was and how much fun we were having in the moment. We had good times in my family on road trips, and we had some not so good times. There were good times and there were bad times. My sister and I would fight nonstop if my parents would let us, which they didn't. But we would try to fight nonstop. We would play games, we would sleep, we would eat a. We would spill drinks and candy and food all over the place. And now that I'm an adult, now that I'm a father, I understand how frustrating that can be, especially when it's because the kids were fighting. And I don't know if anybody else in here had a dad like I did, but my dad threatened multiple times to come over the seat and to straighten us out, and I had no doubts that he would do it. I'm sure my mom could reach over and grab the steering wheel if she needed to, but my dad threatened us multiple times to come over the seats. And in my family, when we went on a trip or really at any time, obedience was mandatory. [00:07:02] Obedience was not optional in my family, obedience was mandatory. It was expected. And when we went on road trips, my dad would give very clear instructions for the trip and for how we were to behave. And there were consequences for disobedience. Sometimes there would be a reward for obedience, but sometimes the reward for obedience was just the simple fact that my dad wouldn't come over the seat to straighten us out or pull over the side of the road and make us pick out a switch, which I had to do many times. [00:07:38] And by the way, it worked. It worked. This world nowadays seems to think they have everything figured out on the how to not discipline kids. And I just, all we have to do is look around at society and realize they don't have anything figured out. I think my parents had a lot figured out, and their parents had a lot more figured out than we have figured out nowadays. But I'm thankful that my dad disciplined me and I'm thankful that my dad taught me what obedience was like because it was almost like it was a matter of life and death in our family. Because if you don't teach a child to obey, you're really hindering that child and handicapping that child for living the kind of life that God called them to live. And many of the lessons I learned as a young boy have served me throughout my life. And honestly, I think some of those road trips were preparation for my future life and for life in ministry. Because if you don't know this, I want to remind you, church is family. [00:08:40] Church isn't just like a family. Church is family. We are a part of the family of God. [00:08:48] And families are dysfunctional. Does anybody else know that? Families are dysfunctional. We don't have it all together, even in the church, man. If you want to see a real good fight, you need to go to a family reunion, because that's, we can fight better than anybody else, it seems like in this world because families are dysfunctional. When Satan attacked this world, the very first thing he attacked was the family. [00:09:16] And he hasn't stopped attacking the family. And we've got to fight for unity. We've got to fight to love one another the way that God has called us to. We have to learn to live together and not kill one another. Amen. And sometimes as a church, that's not real easy. Sometimes in our homes, it's not real easy to not kill one another because we have disagreements and everything is fighting against the unity of our families and the unity of believers. And sometimes we just need to celebrate the fact that as families and churches, we haven't killed each other today. I mean, that's not a whole lot to expect, but sometimes that's just about the best we can do, right? But God calls us to love one another. He calls us to live together, and he also calls us to learn to walk in obedience as a family together. Not only did my parents teach me to obey them, to obey mom and obey dad, and obey my teachers and Sunday school teachers and pastors, they also taught me to obey God. And they also taught me to obey the authority that God had set up in my life. [00:10:29] As believers, we have to learn obedience. And obedience, extended over a long period of time is called faithfulness. [00:10:40] We are called to be faithfulness. Our God is faithful to us, and he calls us to a life of faithfulness. And I want to remind you this morning that the christian life is the best life that anyone could ever live. It's not the easiest life. There's nothing easy about the christian life. I didn't know what struggle was until I became a Christian. [00:11:03] Before that point in my life, I was doing whatever this mind and this flesh wanted to do. But as soon as I gave my heart and life to Jesus, he forgave me of my sins. I knew that there was a new way that I had to walk. [00:11:17] And as soon as I began to try to walk in the way of righteousness, as soon as I began to try to walk in obedience to God's word and in obedience to what the Holy Spirit was teaching me in my life, I began to learn what true struggle was all about. Because living the christian life is not easy. Nothing that lasts ever is easy. [00:11:40] Marriage isn't easy, but it is worth it. Families are not easy. Church isn't easy, but it is worth it. Obedience and faithfulness are always worth it. [00:11:54] They are always rewarded, even if there's a delay between the obedience and the reward. Many times we want immediate rewards in our life. And that's not how the christian life works. Many times it's years of planting seeds, toiling and tilling the soil, and working hard to see something grow. That's true in a garden. That's true on a farm, and it's even more true in a family. It takes years of getting rid of weeds, planting good seeds, tending the garden, tending our marriages, tending our families, training our kids. [00:12:37] It's not an easy life, but there is always reward when it comes to living for Jesus, living for Jesus is its own reward. [00:12:46] The Bible says that no one who puts their faith or trust in Jesus will be put to shame. No one who puts their faith and trust in Jesus will be put to shame. The way of Christ always, always pays off. In this life and in the next, in the here and now and in eternity. It always pays to serve Jesus. I want to bring your attention to one Thessalonians, chapter five. I'm going to start reading in verse twelve this morning. And Paul has a message for the church in Thessalonica. And I believe he has a message through the power of the Holy Spirit for the church here this morning, the word of God says, starting in verse twelve, we ask you, brothers, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work. Be at peace among yourselves. And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak. Be patient with them all. See that no one repays anyone evil for evil. But always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. Rejoice. Always pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus. For you. Do not quench the spirit. Do not despise prophecies, but test everything. Hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form evil. [00:14:29] Now may the God of peace himself sanctify you completely. And may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. This is the word of God for his church this morning. I ask you to join me as we go to the Lord in a word of prayer. Father, we thank you this morning for your word. We ask that the Holy Spirit would take these words and apply them to our lives, to our hearts, help our minds to hear and understand and believe and obey the truth that you're teaching us this morning from your word. Lord, I pray a special blessing on this church as they are searching for a pastor. God, I pray that you would lead them. Lord, I pray that you would give them a unified heart, a unified spirit. God, I pray that you would protect them from the schemes of the enemy. [00:15:28] And I pray that you would protect them from the attacks that the enemy wants to bring against this place. Lord, I pray that you would lead them forward into a very fruitful season. I pray that the gospel would be spread through this community, through this church, for many years to come. God, I pray that you have blessed them, give them wisdom, encourage them. And, Lord, I pray that you would speak to us this morning through your word and I ask all these things in Jesus name. Amen. [00:15:55] This morning I wanna talk to you about obedience and faithfulness. [00:16:01] Obedience and faithfulness. God has called us. If you're a believer this morning, God has called you and saved you and made you a part of the family of God. If you're not a believer this morning, he is calling you to believe the gospel and become a part of the greatest family ever, the family of God. He's called us, and he's called us to be obedient and to be faithful. [00:16:27] As I said, faithfulness is obedience over a long period of time. It's a lifestyle. In the weather, they talk about the climate. A climate is where you measure temperatures over a long period of time. And you come up with averages and you look at that and you say, this is the climate for western North Carolina. [00:16:53] And it's the same way in the christian life. The climate of our christian life isn't one day. It's not one year or one season of time. It is a long period of obedience following after God. We all have good days and we all have bad days. We all have failures. We all have flaws. We all struggle with sin and disobedience in our lives. Some of us struggle with pride, which seems to be one of the higher, more acceptable sins. And some of us struggle with the sins of the flesh addictions. Some of us struggle with anger. Some of us struggle with selfishness. I think we all struggle with that at some form or another. But we all struggle with sin. But God has called us to a life of obedience, and not just obedience today, but a long pattern of obedience in our life. Our God is a faithful God, and we're called to live as he lived. Jesus lived a perfect, sinless life of obedience to the Father and the Holy Spirit. [00:18:03] And we're called to live as if to live as Jesus lived. We're called to walk in obedience as he walked in obedience. And we're called to be faithful throughout our entire lives as he was faithful. We all fall short of that, but he is our goal. He is the model for the christian life. We are to be conformed into the image of Christ. [00:18:30] Our God is faithful, and because of his faithfulness, we can be obedient and faithful. And I wanna remind you this morning that everything in our life and everything in these verses that we just read circle back to him. [00:18:49] In these verses we see, first of all, that God's faithfulness is the basis of our salvation. He begins out this verse, these verses, by talking about the family. He talks to brothers and he says, I want to call you brothers. [00:19:06] We urge you brothers. We ask you brothers. He refers to it repeatedly, that we are brothers and sisters in Christ. We are family. How did we become a part of the family of God? By grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, our Lord and savior. None of us did anything to earn our salvation. Every single one of us in this room was a sinner who was separated from God because of our sin. The only thing we had to look forward to in the future was judgment, was the wrath of God being poured out on us because of our sin. [00:19:47] But God, in his grace and in his mercy, allowed the word of God to be preached to our hearts, letting us know that we were sinners, that we fall short of the glory of God, that our sin separates us from God. And one day every one of us will have to stand before God and give an account for our lives. We were created in his image to glorify him. And we've all chosen to sin and disobey and live for ourselves. [00:20:19] And we all sin differently, but we all sin, and we've all dishonored God, and our sin separates us from God. And the Bible says, Jesus told Nicodemus, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. This is the gospel that Jesus died for. This is the gospel that he came to this earth. He said, I came to seek and to save the lost. He knows we're sinners. He knows that we self destruct. He knows that our sin only leads us into misery and destruction. So he came to this earth to live the sinless life that we couldn't live. He died a sacrificial death for our sins. And he rose from the grave offering salvation, justification, to whoever will believe in him. [00:21:12] That is the good news. That is the gospel. And we all became a part of God's family, not on the basis of our goodness or our faithfulness, not on the basis of our obedience, but on the basis of God's grace. He tells us in ephesians two, by grace are you saved through faith. It's not of yourselves. [00:21:33] It's a gift of God. [00:21:35] It's not of works. So that no one can boast. He says, we are his workmanship. You know whose work? God has saved Jesus work. We're saved by his righteousness. We're saved by his sacrifice. We're saved by his holy spirit that calls us to repentance. We are part of the family of God. And it's God's faithfulness that is the basis of our salvation. No one comes to God and says, I want you to save me based on all the things I've done. [00:22:08] We come to God and say, I am a sinner. [00:22:12] I need your grace, I need your forgiveness, I need your mercy. [00:22:17] That's the only thing that we can appeal to for salvation is the grace of God. We're saved by grace through faith. We were orphans, we were lost, we were alone. We were enemies of God. We were in darkness, our minds were darkened. This is all language that the apostle Paul uses to describe the person that is lost in their sins. Our eyes have been blinded, our hearts are darkened. We're enemies of God. [00:22:48] And the Bible tells us the wages of sin is death and separation from God. [00:22:55] But that's not the end of the verse. [00:22:57] It goes on to say, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. There is salvation in the gospel of Jesus Christ, and God's faithfulness is the only hope that we can be saved. We failed in every way possible, yet he made a way for us to be saved, for us to be born again, saved from our sins. The Bible says that if we're not forgiven of our sins, all the weight of our sin is a burden that is weighing down on us. And one day it will crush us. Because when we stand before God, the only possible way of salvation is by grace, through faith in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. So we're christians, we're believers, we're family. Based on God's faithfulness. His faithfulness is the basis of our salvation. The next thing we notice in these verses is God's faithfulness is the anchor of our hope. [00:24:01] It's the basis of our salvation, but it's also the anchor of our hope. Where is your hope at today? If your hope's in politics, you're going to be miserable all the time. If your hope is in the economy, oh, my goodness, stay away from cliffs, because we don't want you jumping off any of them. Because this economy is up and it's down and it's. It's real scary. [00:24:28] If we place our hope in the wrong things as believers, it will affect our joy, it will affect our perspective, our outlook. But our hope is anchored in God's faithfulness. He's writing to the church at Thessalonica, and this church was experiencing difficult times. In this book, you know, he deals with the resurrection, he deals with the return of Christ, he deals with the fact that when we die, it's not all over. Because they were having people die in their congregation, because of persecution, because the devil was fighting against the spread of the gospel throughout the known world through these missions, trips that Paul was going on, planting churches. And he went to the city of Thessalonica, he planted a church, and a healthy church sprung up there. But the enemy attacked that church. And Paul is writing this letter to encourage the church. And he reminds them, as he reminds us this morning, that God's faithfulness, not our circumstances, is what anchors our soul in the storms of life. Amen. [00:25:40] The winds and the waves surround us. [00:25:44] When Jesus and the disciples went out on the boat, all seemed hopeless when they looked at their circumstances, but they had to be reminded that God was in the boat with them. The winds and the waves are the circumstances of our life, but we're tethered to the rock of ages, and he cannot fail. [00:26:08] He's the one that speaks peace, be still to all the storms in our life. He's the one that has power over nature. He's the one that has power over demons. He's the one that has power over sickness, and he's the one that has power over death and over hell. Jesus is in the boat with us. Jesus is faithful, and he's the anchor of our hope. [00:26:36] The author of Hebrews deals with this in Hebrews, chapter six. I'm going to read quite a few verses to you, but I want you just to listen to what he's trying to say to us. He's talking about the faithfulness of God, Hebrews 613. He says, for when God made a promise to Abraham, since he had no one greater by whom to swear, God swore by himself, saying, surely I will bless you and multiply you. And thus Abraham, having patiently waited, he obtained the promise. [00:27:10] He says, for people swear by something greater than themselves, and all their disputes and oath is final for confirmation. So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise, the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have a strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us. And we have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, we have this sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that is anchored in Jesus Christ, that he will never leave us. He will never forsake us. That greater is he that's in us than he that is in the world. And it's in the middle of this great persecution at the church in Thessalonica that Paul writes to him. And do you remember the words that I read to you that he commanded them? In the middle of this great persecution, he says, rejoice always. [00:28:41] That sounds a little bit surprising. [00:28:46] If you walked into a hospital where someone had just lost a loved one or met someone at a funeral, are these the words that you would choose to say to them? Rejoice always. [00:28:59] That's not a very good bedside manner, is it? A. As a pastor, we have to learn. [00:29:05] Earl and I talk about this a lot. I've got a lot to learn about being a pastor, being a shepherd, being beside people's bedside when they go through difficult times. But this isn't the verse that you pull out usually when difficult times are happening. But Paul's writing to people going through death, sickness, persecution, imprisonment. And he says, rejoice always. [00:29:27] Then he says, pray without ceasing. Then he says, give thanks in all circumstances. [00:29:34] You know, I want to remind you that the apostle Paul was inspired by the Holy Spirit when he wrote these words. So we know that he wasn't speaking out of line. We know that he just didn't have a bad bedside manner. He's giving this church difficult words to hear, but the exact words that they needed to hear in the circumstances, because these words remind us that our hope is not anchored in our circumstances. Our hope is anchored in God's faithfulness. So we can rejoice always. We can pray without ceasing. We can give thanks in all circumstances, because God's faithfulness is the anchor of our hope. [00:30:22] But we also see a final thing that I want you to notice, and that is that God's faithfulness is the source of our obedience. And this is something that I really want us to notice this morning, because I believe there are people in this room that are struggling, people that are discouraged, people that find it difficult to walk and live a life of obedience to Jesus Christ. This world is fighting against us. Our own flesh is fighting against us from the inside, the world's fighting from the outside. And the devil is out to stop us. He wants us to disobey God. He wants us to fail. He wants us to be unfaithful. He wants us to be disobedient. Yet God's called us to a life of obedience and faithfulness. And he's reminding us in this verse, in these passages, to obey some things in our lives, to obey the commands of the Holy Spirit, to obey God's word. Just some examples. He tells us to respect one another. That's not always easy in a family. It's not always easy in a church. We have disagreements, we have different viewpoints, perspectives, but we're called to respect one another. [00:31:41] He calls us to be at peace among ourselves. [00:31:46] He says, correct. The lazy I grew up on a farm. I grew up with pigs and cows and goats and horses and motorcycles. [00:32:02] Those two didn't mix together very well. [00:32:05] But I grew up on a farm. I grew up on a boys home at a ranch, and my dad was the director of the boys home. And I grew up bell and hay. I grew up driving tractors. I grew up learning what it meant to work hard, to be a hard worker, to sweat. And at twelve years old, I got my very first job, official job, that paid money and that was bailing hay in south Georgia or North Georgia in the middle of July. [00:32:41] And I want to tell you something. It was hot in the beginning. They let me drive the truck. I was just twelve years old. But they're like, look, don't push the gas, it'll idle. The field was flat, so you just keep the steering wheel, keep it in between the rows, don't run over any bells of Hayden, and you just drive. Well, that was easy. I could turn on the radio, there was an air conditioner, but I could have the fan going and the windows down. So that wasn't too bad. I was sitting in the shade. Well, it wasn't bad. It wasn't hard work, but it got real boring and I didn't want to do it. So before long, I switched out and I'm back there right in the middle of every, I could barely even pick up a bell of hay by the time I was, when I was twelve, when I started that out, by the time I was 14, I could throw them better than some 1819 year old boys that were out there doing it with me. But I grew up working hard. And hard work is something that God honors not just in life, but in the church. We were admonished this morning to work hard, to take tasks seriously, to serve together, and to do it as unto the Lord. This church had people that were lazy, people that would come to meals, but they would never bring anything. [00:33:52] You know those people, every church has them. [00:33:56] People that would enjoy a nice clean church, but they would never come help clean it. People that would appreciate the fact that the grass was mowed and all these different things were happening, that lessons were prepared, but they never wanted to take part in it. In our christian life, we're called to work hard, not for our salvation, but because we've been gifted to work hard for from our salvation. [00:34:21] And there are lazy people in the church that need to be corrected. He goes on, he says, encourage the weary, help the weak, be patient, return good for evil, hold to what is good. Abstain from every form of evil. [00:34:38] That's a lot to obey, isn't it? As a Christian, that's not an easy list to be like, okay, yeah, I can do that. [00:34:47] That's a difficult command. A lot of difficult commands by the apostle Paul through the power of the Holy Spirit. [00:34:58] As christians, if you read the rest of the books of Paul, the epistles, the letters, you'll find that he warns us against all kinds of sin that can creep into our lives, all kind of division and strife, anger, hatred, all sorts of things. We're commanded to live lives of holiness. As believers, we're called to press on even through the storms of life in obedience. [00:35:28] But here's what he's telling us in this verse, these verses. [00:35:32] We're not called to press on in our own strengthen. We're called to press on in the strength of God himself. In the strength of the Holy Spirit, we are fueled by our father. Amen. We are empowered by the Holy Spirit, the fruit of the Holy Spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, meekness, temperance, all these different things, self control, those are the fruits of what the spirit that lives inside of us. [00:36:08] We're empowered by the Holy Spirit, and we're motivated by the example of Jesus. [00:36:16] Our disobedience comes from doubt. [00:36:21] Our failure always comes from a lack of faith. When we doubt God's goodness, we choose to disobeye. [00:36:32] When we doubt the value of our relationship with him, we choose other priorities. [00:36:38] When we doubt the reward that he promised will eventually come. There is a reward for living a holy life. There's peace of mind. [00:36:48] There's so many benefits to walking in obedience to God. [00:36:54] There's confidence in our faith. [00:36:58] But many times we grow weary and well doing, and it seems like the promised reward is never going to come. [00:37:08] Faith in Jesus is the only thing that can sustain us. He is the object of our faith, and he is the secret of our success, his strength, his wisdom, his love, his compassion, his endurance. I've been a Christian for over 20 years. I've been in ministry almost that long. As soon as I got my heart right with God, Jesus called me into ministry. I knew that this was what he created me to do. [00:37:43] And I can look back over the past 20 something years, and I can tell you that I have not perfectly followed Jesus. [00:37:51] None of us has. [00:37:53] But I can also tell you that I've been following a perfect Jesus from day one. I'm not the one that's perfect. Christians aren't perfect. We are messed up. We're broken. We struggle, we fail. We embarrass God, we embarrass ourselves. We embarrass our churches. We've all fallen flat on our faces. [00:38:14] But we're not called to perfectly follow Jesus. We're called to follow a perfect Jesus. He's the savior, he's the Lord. He's the one that lived a perfect, sinless life. And as we follow him and love him, we become more and more like him. That's right. [00:38:33] It's his strength, his wisdom, his love, his compassion, his endurance. [00:38:40] As christians and as a church, we are on a journey. [00:38:45] We've come a long way, but church, we're just getting started. [00:38:49] We don't know where the finish line is at. And when we pass away, the church is going to continue marching on. His truth is marching on, but we're just getting started. God is moving his church forward in this community. [00:39:07] He's expanding the influence of the church. He's growing our borders, extending our reach. But he is doing all of this. [00:39:17] I want you to go back with me to what I was speaking about at the beginning of the sermon, that when I was a young boy and going on road trips with my family, obedience was required. [00:39:29] Me and my sister had to stop talking. When our parents said, stop talking, we had to stop fighting. When they said, stop fighting, sometimes they'd say, don't touch each other. So what would we do? We wouldn't touch each other, but we put our finger right in front of the other person's face. And if they knocked it out of our hands, mom, she touched me. [00:39:49] That's what it was like going on a road trip with me when I was a kid. [00:39:54] But when I was a young boy, obedience was required. However, listen to this. Don't miss this truth. [00:40:02] My obedience was not what got us to our destination. [00:40:10] I was required to obey. It was an important part of my experience. [00:40:15] But my obedience did not get us to our destination. My father's faithfulness was what got us to our destination. [00:40:29] My dad was the one who put gas in the car. [00:40:34] He was the one that paid for the vehicle. He was the one that bought our food. He was the one that drove the vehicle, planned the route. He's the one that made all of the major decisions that got us from where we were at to where we were going. [00:40:52] And if my dad had fallen asleep on one of those many nights that we were driving across the country, we would have never made it to our destination, no matter how obedient I was. [00:41:12] Do you see the point I'm making this morning? [00:41:15] My salvation, my sanctification, is not dependent upon me. Yes, I'm called to live a life of obedience. Yes, I'm called to be faithful. But even when I'm disobedient, my father is still faithful to love and to lead and to correct his family. [00:41:37] And that's exactly how our God is. Our God is faithful, and his faithfulness is the only thing that can get us to our destination. His faithfulness saves us from our sin. [00:41:53] His faithfulness sanctifies us. It takes us from being slaves to sin, to being slaves of Jesus, to being submitted to his will, to walking in obedience. [00:42:09] His faithfulness saves us, sanctifies us, and his faithfulness will ultimately get us home one day. [00:42:17] All of our hope is in him. [00:42:21] If you want to be saved this morning, you've got to come to Jesus. Place all of your hope in him as your lord, as your savior. He will forgive your sins. He will wash you as white as snow. He will cast your sins as far as the east is from the west, in the depths of the ocean. He will remove them from you, never to be remembered against you again. Salvation is available today through Jesus Christ. Because of his death, his burial, and his resurrection, he offers salvation to all who believe in him. Amen. [00:42:58] And if you know Jesus today, he's calling you to a life of obedience. Many times, as christians, we explain away our disobedience. Well, you know, I'm just human well, you know, you're just a human that Jesus died to save. And his holy spirit lives in you so that you can walk in obedience and so that I can walk in obedience. We can't explain away our disobedience. It always hurts us. It always affects us. It always affects other people. You can choose your sin, but you can't choose the consequences of your sin. [00:43:33] The devil never puts a price tag on the sin that he tries to sell to us. When we buy it, we buy it not knowing what it's going to cost us. How many of you would go down to Walmart today and fill your buggy up with stuff. And when you got to the register, they topped it all in and they said, we're not going to tell you how much it costs. We're just going to get together and have a meeting and decide to send you a bill, and you'll find out in a couple weeks how much all this costs. [00:43:59] I would leave the buggy sitting right there and I would go home. [00:44:03] But when we choose to sin, when we choose to live lives of disobedience, we don't get to look at the price tag. You don't get to flip that price tag around and see what this is going to cost you. [00:44:15] We have no idea what our sin is going to cost us or our families or our children or future generations. [00:44:24] That's right. But we do have hope that there is a God who forgives us of our sins. And yes, we still struggle with consequences. I have consequences in my life from sin I committed 2030 years ago. Is there anybody else in this room that can relate to that? I have consequences in my life, but praise God, I'm forgiven of that sin. The penalty of that sin has been paid. The price has been paid. The blood of Jesus Christ was shed so that I could be forgiven. [00:44:56] Had a friend who crashed on a motorcycle due to his sin, and he lost a leg. [00:45:03] Well, he asked God to forgive him. God forgave him. He got his heart right with God. [00:45:10] But guess what happened? His leg was still gone. [00:45:14] He still had daily reminders of the consequences of his sin. [00:45:20] Many of us are the same way. We bear scars. We have scars in our life from our past disobedience. But God has a way. [00:45:29] After he forgives us of that sin, after he cleanses us of that sin, after he makes us a child of God, he has a way of using even the very sin that we committed against him for our good and his glory. All things work together for good, for those who love God. Some of the greatest lessons I've learned in my life came through my sin and my disobedience and the consequences of that sin. [00:45:56] God uses those things to make us more into the image of Christ. [00:46:02] And if I'm talking to anyone this morning who's been away from Jesus for a while in your christian life, he's calling you to come home. He's calling you to return. [00:46:14] He's calling you to a life of obedience and faithfulness. And I promise you, it's the greatest life you can ever live. It's not easy, but the rewards are out of this world. Amen. He always always, always rewards those who walk in obedience and faithfulness. [00:46:40] I think of the old hymn, great is thy faithfulness. [00:46:46] O God my father, there is no shadow of turning with thee. Thou changest not thy compassions, they fail not as thou hast been, thou forever will be. What does the course say? Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning, new mercies I see all I've needed, thy hands have provided. Great is thy faithfulness. Lord, unto me. It goes on to say, we have strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine, with ten thousands beside. Great is his faithfulness. [00:47:33] Let's go to the Lord in prayer. [00:47:36] Father, I thank you so much for your word. I thank you for this family of believers that's gathering here today. Lord, I pray that you would bless them. I pray that you would lead them. I pray that you would encourage their hearts today through the word of God. [00:47:51] Father, I pray that you would continue to do a great work in this place and change many lives. God, I pray that if there's anyone here this morning that does not know you as their lord and savior, that they would surrender their life to you, that they would call on you to forgive their sins, that they would follow you. And Lord, you promise that whoever comes to you, that you will in no way reject you, will in no way cast out whoever comes to you in faith for salvation. You will forgive them and save them and change their lives and make them a part of the family of God. God, I pray that you would do that this morning. I pray that you encourage the hearts of believers. We ask all this in Jesus name. Amen. Let's all stand together. I'm going to ask the piano player and the song leader to come forward. We're going to close in a song. [00:48:43] Page 307. [00:48:57] I am without one feet, but that thy blood was shed for me and that thou bidst hash become today hash. O lamb of God, I come. [00:49:24] I come. [00:49:27] Before we sing that next verse, I just want to ask you if there's anybody in this room that God has spoken to you, whether he's calling you back to a life of obedience, whether he's calling you to turn from some stronghold or sin in your life, say yes to him. You can do that in your seat. You can come forward. You can pray here. Someone will be happy to meet you and pray with you. If anyone in this room is struggling. You don't know if you're a Christian. You don't know that you're born again. You don't know that you're saved. This is a perfect time to give your heart to Jesus. The Bible says that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. There's nobody that's too far gone that God can't save you. He can save any sinner, and there's nobody so good that they don't need to be saved. We all need forgiveness of our sins. So if God's dealing with you this morning, just right where you're at, you can say, yes, Jesus, I know I'm a sinner. Please come into my heart, forgive my sin. [00:50:29] I want to follow you. [00:50:31] Let's continue and sing another verse. [00:50:34] Your son I am lean on to rain my soul of one dark blood to thee whose blood can cleanse each bottle. Lambda of God, I come, I come. [00:51:08] Dear Lord Jesus, I thank you for your word. I thank you for the promise of your holy spirit. Lord, thank you that you've never failed us and you never will. Your faithfulness is the anchor of our hope. It's the basis of our salvation and God. It is ultimately what will one day bring us home to our final reward. To be with you, to see you face to face. Father, I pray that you would do a deep heart, life changing work in the hearts of your people today. Continue to draw us closer to you. [00:51:40] And may this not just be a short service that we gather together and go home and forget about, but may something happen through the power of the Holy Spirit in this service that will echo and reverberate throughout generations. And I ask all this in Jesus name. Amen. I want to thank everyone for being here. You don't have to leave. Please hang around and fellowship, but for this morning, you are dismissed.