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Welcome to the Hope Community Church! Hope is a multi-site church community with locations around the Triangle in Raleigh, Apex, Northwest Cary, Garner, and Fuquay-Varina. We are here to love you where you are and encourage you to grow in your relationship with Jesus Christ! We strive to speak the truth of the Bible in a way that is easy to understand, helpful in your current life circumstances, and encouraging. No matter who you are or where you come from, you are welcome here!
Hey, hope so.
Good to see you. Would you to your, you joining
ing your name in the dark and everything,
We Sing
that inside
Fall you.
This
Is what living looks like.
This is what freedom feels like.
This is what heaven sounds like. We praise you.
We praise you. This is what living looks like.
This is what freedom feels like.
This is what heaven sounds like.
We, you
What?
This, What? Freedom.
Like this. What?
We praise you, we praise.
This is what looks like. This is what? Freedom.
Like this. What? Like
let's give him a shot of praise this morning.
Hallelujah. Y'all look good today.
It is good to see you in the house.
Hey, why don't you turn to two or three people?
I know you might have to go out of your seat
or find somebody, but find somebody
and welcome them to Hope Community Church.
Some of you're doing too good of a job. All right?
All right. Bring it back. Bring it back. Find your seat.
Psalm chapter 96, starting in verse one.
It says this, oh, sing to the Lord a new psalm.
Sing to the Lord all the earth.
Sing to the Lord, bless his name, tell
of his salvation from day to day.
Declare his glory among the nations.
His marvelous works among all the peoples.
For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised.
He's to be feared above all gods for all the gods
of the peoples are worthless idols.
But the Lord made the heavens, splendor
and majesty are before him.
Strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.
Ascribe to the Lord o families of the peoples.
Ascribe to the Lord. Glory and strength.
Ascribe to the Lord the glory.
Do his name bring an offering and come into his courts.
Worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness, tremble
before Him all the earth.
Come on. Can we, can we give the Lord some praise
for his word today?
We have come to bless the mighty matchless name of the Lord.
Every voice in this place lock in. Come on.
Momster those who onto him, who place their hope
and confidence in Jesus,
he won't forsake
those, those who see his face, who bend their knee.
And Jesus, they,
he
those who walk him whose hearts
die
Jesus.
And,
And
Bless God in the fields of blessed God,
in the darkest, I bless
your name, bless God, when my empty,
bless God, that me bless
God's every chance I
bless God, bless let
are falling because he goes
before me every chance I get.
I bless your name, God, the victory
he's always with, he always worthy
every chance I get.
Bless your name,
every bless
Name.
Come on. And
If You love,
And
If you've known His,
He
And you deserve
it all, come on church,
Join together.
Mom Declared in this place.
You
all.
Yes, you,
We lift our praises to you.
We lift our voices and our hearts
To you. Jesus.
Come
On day and night, Day, night
and Inc.
Day, Inc.
Come
On church. You,
You all
things you deserve.
I wanna sing that chorus one more time together,
all the voices,
You
and to
you deserve
it. Come
On, give him praise in this place.
Lord, you are worthy of all the praise of all the honor
that we could ever give you.
There's no amount of praise that we could give that would
be due to you, but we give you our best.
Now we are ready for your word. Your word is spirit.
Your word is life. We are ready for it.
So speak to us, Lord, we commit the rest of this time
that we have together to you be glorified.
And in Jesus' name we pray. Let the church of God say amen.
Amen and amen. Hallelujah. You may be seated.
Amen. Amen.
What amazing time of worship together. This has been so far.
Hallelujah. My name is Jean
and I'm the campus pastor at Northwest Kerry.
And I just wanna say welcome to all of you
and it's great to see you.
Uh, welcome to those of you who are online as well.
We're thankful that you're here joining us.
Um, I wanna extend a special welcome to those of you
who are new or here for the first time.
Uh, and just say thank you so much for taking the time out
to join with us, uh, in this moment.
Uh, we're so thankful, uh, to have you here with us
and we actually would love to meet you.
Uh, we have an area outside these doors called Next steps,
uh, where you can go and meet someone after service.
But it's also a place where, um, you know,
if you have questions about, uh,
some ministries here at Hope
or you want to get connected, uh, it's a great place to do
that as well.
Uh, you know, and fall is quickly approaching
and, uh, as as that happens,
we're gonna get back into our routines and settle in.
And, uh, it's time to maybe ask the question,
uh, what are we doing?
Or what is something that we could do
to grow in our faith personally?
And I say that because, uh, as the fall comes,
we actually start our fall classes, uh,
and we have a lot of different classes to choose from.
First one that comes to mind is reengage.
It's actually our marriage class.
Uh, it's, it's for, uh, all stages of marriage, you know,
uh, my wife came to me and said, Hey, I wanna do reengage.
And I was like, well, our marriage is is great.
And she's like, well, it could be better. And she won.
And, and we went to reengage.
No, it was really, really great.
It was a great place to connect.
Uh, it was a really great, great place to just grow together
with a new group of people
and we made some great friends there.
So I would encourage you, if you're married, uh, to go to
that class that you would get a lot out of it.
We also have a class called Hope for Parents.
Um, yeah, that's a place
where maybe you could get some new strategies as, uh,
you know, you go into the school year and meet some people.
Uh, we have, um, we have a divorce care class.
We also have grieving, uh, with Hope.
Uh, maybe you have been through some really hard things
and you just want to be with some folks that have, uh, been
through some hard things as well.
I would encourage you, uh, to go to that class.
Um, and as we, uh, get into, uh, get ready
to go into the message, uh,
we actually have a powerful story, um,
that we want to share with you.
And, and it's a powerful story of, of what it looks like
to take a next step and what can happen.
And, you know, for you, maybe your next
step is taking a class.
Uh, maybe your next step is getting into a small group,
or maybe it's serving or giving.
Um, and I, I just, I wanna share this
story, uh, with you view.
I grew up Catholic and I felt like it was a checklist,
religion where every time I checked a box,
I was welcomed more and more into the church.
I didn't feel welcomed at all on a Sunday morning.
Nobody really talked to each other.
I grew up in a very abusive household
with a very abusive mother.
And I was told to always obey my mother
and father no matter what.
But since I was abused very often, daily,
I started to disobey my mother.
So then I moved down here to North Carolina, hop on a plane
with one suitcase, and I surround myself
by people that don't believe in God.
So there was no push to become a Christian
or go back to church.
You have a daughter, she gets sick
and I become even angrier.
And during that time, my husband kept praying.
He kept worshiping, he kept playing music on the radio
or music on the phones.
And it was just, I'd roll my eyes.
One day my daughter looked at me
and she said, mommy, can you help me?
I don't feel good. Can you help me?
And in that moment I realized that I wasn't able
to help her, but I knew somebody that could.
And I started to pray.
In that moment, I surrendered myself
and I said, God, it's in your hands.
My daughter needed another surgery.
She had to get another tube put in her stomach.
So she has two tubes in her stomach.
Now, she was not able to attend kindergarten last year.
We had to unfortunately remove her from school.
But now she gets to go back to kindergarten,
redo kindergarten, and she's in competitive cheer
with two tubes in her stomach.
So I feel like he did heal her.
It just might have not have been the way that I wanted him
to heal her, but he healed her enough to be a kid again.
I start to slowly grow my faith again.
And then we had another daughter who went into the nicu.
And at the time I had more faith than I
did the first time around.
And her being in the nicu, my emotions were everywhere.
I didn't know where to turn, who to talk to, what to do.
There was a lot of prayers.
My husband wasn't able to be up there a lot with me.
So it was me on my own with God.
And I feel like that was really the time where I was able
to say, okay, it's you and I, I'm gonna trust you.
There was a sense of peace over me
where I felt like I didn't have to be Mama Bear.
24 7, we found hope.
I started volunteering with several different ministries.
I was able to form connections
with people on a deeper level than I was outside of church.
And then one day at three o'clock in the morning,
I decided I needed to get baptized,
but I needed to do it when I was pregnant.
My pregnancy has caused a lot of fear this time around
and I felt like I was spiraling back down
and I had lost my way.
And I wanted to surrender and say, it's you
and I we're going into this operating room in a couple weeks
together and that I'm not doing this alone.
I got baptized, pregnant, I got baptized.
And um, but I'm not gonna lie,
I'm in the thick of it right now.
It's very, very difficult.
But I feel like now that I have made the choice
to be baptized and I've made the choice
to grow my relationship closer to God,
I'm opening a Bible more.
I'm reading the Bible,
I'm looking up verses I'm becoming closer to God,
way more than I would've before,
but the enemy is still coming after me more and more now.
But I'm making a choice every day to wake up and trust God.
A great story. What's going on? Whole family.
Uh, if you don't know, we are in a series right now
that we are calling image bearers.
Uh, which Aaron Nelson has done such a phenomenal
job of kicking us off.
Can yeah. Let Aaron know.
I'm sure he is watching at one
of our campuses, uh, right now.
But you are not gonna hear from me in week three.
I'm just up here really to
let you know who you're gonna hear from.
We thought this week, since we're talking about our image
bearer, the image that we are to bear as worshipers of God,
why not have one
of our worship pastors come out and share with you?
And so this week you're gonna hear from Rob Jones.
You have a minute the clap for him in a moment.
Just hold on a second. Uh, but man, you know, every now
and then you meet somebody and you're like,
I think I like this guy.
Uh, he's a man's man. Alright? He's got a big beard, okay?
So kind of partial to that. Uh, he drives a truck.
This guy lives on a farm.
He farms the land, he hunts, he fishes.
He doesn't fish as good as I do, but he does fish.
And recently he's actually got into Juujitsu.
So we have a lot of fun talking about that.
But more than that, this is a guy when, when you talk
to his family, when you hear him talk about his wife,
this is a guy that loves his family.
In fact, I was just talking to his daughter Jackson before,
and I said, man, you're here tonight to,
to be here to hear your dad.
And she said, man, I wouldn't miss it.
And so you just know this guy has a connection
with his family, but above all
that he has an affection for God's word.
This guy is a pastor
and he has an anointing on his life, uh, to point people
to the word of God, to point people
to the truths of who God is.
And so before he comes out, I'm just gonna pray for him
and I'm gonna invite you into praying with me.
Father, I wanna pray right now in this moment, uh,
there is something that happens when your people
that you created to be image bearers of you, um,
rightly recognize who you are
and who we are In light of that.
And right now we're in this series going to your word
to unpack who we are in light of who you are
and who you created us to be.
And I pray right now for Rob as he comes out here
and as he opens your word.
Lord, I wanna pray for any man or woman
or student who maybe is at one of our campuses right now
who might be in the room right now who thought, you know
what, I'm gonna give this Jesus thing.
One more try. Father, I pray
that they would know in this moment
that your spirit is here to bring comfort.
Lord, I pray that truth would be elevated
and that all of our lives would be changed as a result.
Lord, we love you and we pray
and ask these things in Jesus' name.
And everyone said, amen.
So if you would please put your hands together, big a hope,
welcome to my friend Pastor Bob Jones.
Man, oh man, I'm excited to hear myself
after an intro like that.
Goodness. Uh, I want to start us with kind
of a serious question if that's okay.
So I want everyone kinda lean in as I ask you this question.
Um, how many hours this week
did you doom scroll on social media?
You can be honest. I'm not gonna tell you
my answer, but you can be honest.
But this is like your confession time, not mine.
If I'm honest. I spend more time kind of on YouTube.
Any DIYers in the house, any DIYs at other campuses?
I mean, I would rather,
I know I could pay a guy like 50 bucks to come fix the thing
that I wanna know, but I'd rather spend 12 hours,
have someone teach me on YouTube how to do it,
spend 400 bucks in materials and tools and still mess it up.
That's kinda like my thing. That's the thing I enjoy to do.
Uh, you know, there's other easier, you know,
like, what'd you do this week?
How many hours did you spend working?
You can probably answer that one. How
many hours did you spend working?
How many hours did you get of rest, sleep?
Uh, you know, around my house, one of the things that's,
you know, kind of a high number
that shocks most people is we spend, uh,
the Saturdays at, at the farm.
We watch the UFC and that's six hours.
Then we spend watching the UFC
and then we'll watch like post-fight commentaries.
And then my wife is like sending me like, Hey,
did you see this fighter hurt his his wrist?
We spent a lot of hours doing that.
Um, so you might all have your things,
but the, the real question, my serious question if you will,
uh, today is how many hours this week did
you worship?
How many hours this week did you worship?
Now if you attend church at all,
you probably at least are like, well, I had at least an hour
last Sunday, right?
I had at, I had at least an hour
that I can guarantee you that I worship.
If you have kids and you're trying to get them ready
for church, that's like a holy opportunity in of itself.
So we're gonna give you an hour plus a mulligan.
So maybe two hours a week you can say that you worship.
But I want to challenge us today in the, in
that very principle of thinking of worship as Sunday,
the scholar, GK Beal says it like this.
It's a fundamental truth about human nature.
Whatever captures our devotion will shape our character,
our priorities and our very identity.
If we worship God, we become more like him.
If we worship anything else,
we become distorted versions of ourselves.
He goes on later to say that we resemble what we revere,
we resemble what we revere.
So let me ask you today, what do you revere?
The word worship comes from the old English word worth
declaring worth of something or someone.
But biblical worship goes far deeper than simply
declaring the worth of God.
It's about surrendering our entire lives to
that very worthiness, knowing that in doing so we become
who we were created to be.
And so if we understand at the outset of our time together
that worship is fundamental to the human experience,
we all do it all the time.
Have you ever heard the expression you are
what you love, you are what you love.
It could easily be said that you are what you worship
because what you worship is what you love.
GK Beal goes on to say some other things,
but what I thought was pretty interesting about his idea
of we resemble about what we revere, what we re reveal
shows in us a true reality of our identity.
Think about the power of this statement.
When we revere that is when we give ultimate affection
to the God of the Bible, we become restored in our identity.
We become more like him, more loving, just
merciful faithful.
We are restored to our original design as image bearers
who reflect his character.
But when we revere false gods money,
success, comfort, power, even good things, maybe it's our,
our children, when we revere something other than God,
what he calls false gods, we ourselves are ruined.
We do not become more human. We become less human.
We become distorted reflections of whatever idols
that have captured our heart.
If you worship money, you become greedy and cold.
If you worship success, you become prideful and ruthless.
If you worship even comfort, you become selfish and lazy.
And this is where each of us find ourselves today.
We are all in need of a right understanding of true worship.
And let's be real. It's not just the songs we sing
or the gatherings we attend,
but it is what God desires of his people.
And it's pretty interesting that we kind
of do live in a time where at least inside of the church,
the the idea of worship has become a source
of division instead of unity.
And let's be real. We, we all have our own preferences.
We're all individuals. We all have.
Like, if you could think about it, think about it right now.
If you could put together a worship service
with your preferences, think about what that is.
Everyone has an answer to that. Some people desire
traditional hymns or contemporary worship songs.
Some like liturgy, others prefer spontaneous expressions,
some value quiet reverence while others embrace
joyful celebration.
But what if we're asking the wrong question?
What if instead of asking how should we worship,
we ask the question, what kind
of worship does God seek?
And the good news for you
and for me is we can go straight to Jesus.
'cause he gives us the answer.
We can go to John chapter four.
We find Jesus sitting at a well with a Samaritan woman.
They're having a conversation about a lot of things,
but at one point the woman says, Hey, listen,
my forefather say we should
worship on the mountain over here.
But you know, your folks say we should worship in Jerusalem.
And Jesus says this to her in John chapter four,
verse 23, I wanna do a quick shout out.
My wife got me a big letter Bible so I can actually read it.
So this is great. Uh, John chapter four, verse 23.
But the hour is coming
and is now here when true worshipers will worship the Father
in spirit and in truth,
for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.
God is spirit and those
who worship him must worship in spirit
and in truth, Jesus did not mention musical style,
liturgy or format.
He identified the two essential elements that makes worship
real and that is spirit
and truth, truth and spirit.
Now I wanna be clear at the outset,
we need a fundamental basis
before we can engage with this topic.
And this is it. We worship God on his
terms and not our terms.
We don't get to define worship.
God does we worship God on his terms
and what he desires and how he wants it to look.
So let's explore spirit and truth and truth and worship.
And so the first thing I wanna talk about today is
that worship must be grounded in truth.
The Father is seeking worshipers who worship in truth.
In fact, just a few chapters later in chapter 14,
we find out that truth has a name.
His name is Jesus. In chapter 14, Jesus says, I'm the way,
the truth and the life.
And I wanna ask you, are you grounded in the truth?
If you don't know this, Jesus we're talking about today is a
good day to get to know him.
But what this means to be grounded in truth
for our worship means it must be based in an accurate
knowledge of who God is and what he has done
and not just feelings, preferences, or assumptions.
As I was reflecting on this, I thought
of the prophet Isaiah in chapter six.
He has an encounter with the God
of the universe inside the temple.
And immediately he responds.
The first thing he notices is God's otherness,
God's holiness.
Isaiah erupts into praise saying, holy, holy,
holy is the Lord God Almighty.
The whole earth is full of his glory.
This revelation of God's character produces immediate
revelation of worship
and in Isaiah, an immediate awareness of his own sinfulness.
We'll get to that in a second. So true worship begins
with a true knowledge of God.
We cannot properly honor someone we don't truly know.
Lemme tell you this, if your understanding
of God is shallow, I promise you, I'm sorry to let you know,
but your worship is shallow.
If your idea of God is distorted, here's a reality check.
Your worship is distorted.
This is why scripture is so critical to the life
of a true worshiper.
You'll hear us say around here all the time,
we wanna be a wildly biblical church.
The reason is because the Bible reveals the character
of God, his holiness, his love, his justice, his mercy,
his sovereignty, his faithfulness.
And every attribute we learn about God should,
and I promise you will deepen your worship.
But here's the problem, image bearer, what we tend to do
is we make God in our image
rather than understanding ourselves in his,
we emphasize the parts of God
that make us comfortable while ignoring altogether, those
that seem to challenge us.
We worship a God who's all loving but never holy.
We worship a God who's all powerful but never personal.
We worship a God that is made in our image
and not the God who made us in his worship.
In truth, it means embracing the full revelation of God.
We find in scripture it means worshiping God as he truly is
and not as we wish or imagine him to be.
We worship God on his terms and not our own.
A good way to think of it is it's worship surrendered,
not worship, preferred we worship God on his term.
And so yes, this does mean
that worship should reflect theological accuracy.
The songs we sing, the prayers we pray,
the words we speak should align with biblical truths.
We're not just merely expressing our feelings,
but we are proclaiming
and celebrating objective truths about the
God of the universe.
And this is why doctrine matters.
That's why we spent so much time trying to teach us together
that good doctrine leads to Godly living.
Because how you think about God really matters
and consider how this transforms our corporate worship.
When we sing the song, uh, one
of my favorite songs is How Great the Art
Y'all know the song, how Great the Art.
What I love about Thou song is
that the melody in the chorus then sings
My soul, my savior God,
to the how great thou,
how great thou
I love that melody,
but more so than just a beautiful melody,
we are declaring the truth of God's greatness
as revealed in creation and redemption.
When we recite the Lord's Prayer, we align our hearts
to the biblical truths of not only God's character
but our relationship to him as God the Father.
But true worship, it goes much deeper than just
correct theology.
It means worship flows from a genuine understanding
and not just a mere familiarity.
It means you have wrestled with God
and you have been changed by what you have discovered.
So yes, this requires intentional study of God's word.
And here's why. You cannot worship deeply
what you know superficially.
You cannot worship deeply, truly
what you know superficially.
The more you understand of God's character
through scripture, the richer your worship becomes.
Because a God who seems distant becomes personal.
A God who seems harsh, becomes compassionate,
and a God who seems weak becomes all powerful.
And this is where the identity piece connects back in.
When we go back to Isaiah chapter six,
he sees God in the temple.
He sees God's holiness. He responds, holy, holy, holy.
But he's dramatically
and immediately thrust into the reality
of his own sinfulness.
He immediately understood his identity
as a sinful being in need of grace.
That scholar, GK Beal, he puts it like this,
we don't just worship God
and then go about our lives unchanged.
The act of worship fundamentally transforms us.
When we worship the true God revealed in scripture,
we gradually become more like Him reflecting his character,
his priorities, and his heart.
But when our worship is directed towards false guides,
we become distorted reflections of our idols.
True worship also means being honest
about ourselves.
Uh, there's a hymn I like, it's called, uh, come Thou Fout.
And when anybody know that one come Thou Fuqua,
I know y'all know the song come that F out.
We sing that one a lot. Come that F There's a verse in
that song that says, oh, to grace,
how great a debtor daily I'm constrained to be
let thy goodness like a Fedor bind my wondering
heart to thee.
And there's no cowboys in the room.
A Fedor literally means a rope tied around a post.
What an honest lyric to sing in church.
God, I'm prone to wonder, I note it.
So in your goodness, would you bind me
to you like a rope wrapped around a post?
We serve a God who will meet you in that place
because my fear for some of us is
that we can just enter into church
and do the religious thing we need to put on a performance.
But we serve a God, this God that we can learn in truth
through God's Word.
We can come before that very God true about where we are,
and he will meet us in that place.
So worship must be grounded in truth.
Secondly, worship must be empowered by the spirit.
Truth alone isn't enough, y'all.
Now here's the, here's the deal. Let's be real.
If truth was tripping up, half of us
spirit is gonna trip up the other half.
And here's why. Spiritual realities cannot,
I shouldn't say cannot, but they should not be
manufactured or manipulated.
They can only be received.
I'm gonna let that sit for one second.
Spiritual encounters cannot be manufactured or manipulated.
They can only be received.
And what that looks like practically is worship is not meant
to be performed for others.
We're not trying to create
experiences through our own efforts.
We are depending completely on the Holy Spirit
to make our worship genuine and acceptable to God.
The Holy Spirit is the one
who takes our feeble attempts at worship
and makes them acceptable to God.
It's without the spirit that our
even theologically correct.
Worship just becomes religious ritual without
the work of the spirit.
Even theologically correct worship is just
religious ritual.
Paul who is writing to the Philippians, he,
he says, it is us.
We who serve God by his spirit,
who boast in Christ Jesus
and put no confidence in the flesh.
True worship is service by
his spirit and not human ability.
So what does this look like? It means recognizing
that genuine spiritual encounters cannot be programmed
and cannot be produced.
We can create atmospheres, we can use technology.
We're using technology today.
Right now I'm talking to all
of our campuses because of technology.
We can use technology, we can craft moving experiences.
But the thing we cannot do is create the presence of God.
Only the Holy Spirit can do that.
Now, this doesn't mean we just sit passively by
and wait for something to happen.
The Spirit is still at work.
He's at work through our preparation,
our hearts, our participation.
But it does mean that we acknowledge our complete dependence
on him to make our worship spiritually authentic.
Spirit empowered worship. It can be quiet and contemplative.
It can be exuberant and joyful.
It might follow a familiar pattern.
It might even break new ground.
The key, listen to this, the key is not external form,
but internal reality.
The key is not external form,
but internal reality is the Holy Spirit
leading and empowering.
What has happened, Paul does give instruction
for spirit led worship in one Corinthians 14.
He doesn't forbid any of the supernatural things
that could happen through the power of the Holy Spirit,
but he does insist that they must be exercised in ways
that build up the church
and reflect God's character in order and not chaos.
The truth is the Holy Spirit never contradicts scripture,
never promotes disorder,
and never draws attention to himself rather than Christ.
When the spirit is truly at work,
people leave more aware of God's greatness
and they're not impressed by a service.
So someone at another campus better give me an amen.
When the spirit of God is at work
and worship, you're talking about
how great God is when you leave and not how awesome
and talented people are at church.
And that's the thing that's kind of rubbed me.
So this is the pride of Christ.
And sometimes we leave church
and we're, we're talking like we just went
and saw a Quentin Tarantino movie, man.
It's kind of, you know, it was all right, kind
of dragged on, you know, didn't really know the punchline.
And if you've been around this part since Easter,
it's been apparent that we are
making a declarative statement.
That Jesus Christ is the hero. He's the star.
He's why we're here. And so our worship is
to him and led by Him.
And when the spirit is at work,
you won't leave talking about us.
You're gonna be leaving talking about him.
Now, this will require cultivating a sensitivity
to the spirit's leading.
How do we do that? We do it through prayer,
through prayer, through prayer.
We pray 'cause it matters. Y'all get on your knees and pray.
Study scripture become spiritually mature.
And this is what a spiritually mature person looks like
when they come to worship.
They've, they've prepared their hearts to worship.
They don't come to get stirred up so they can worship.
Um, spiritually mature person will show up prepared
with a prepared heart having dealt with sin.
And then they are open to however God may wanna move.
That is worship that is led by spirit.
Worship requires biblical balance.
We got spirit, we got truth.
But we need to see them in balance.
And what that looks like is we need to avoid extremes
where we elevate one aspect
of worship while neglecting others altogether.
I'm gonna give very quick and general examples.
I'm not speaking about anyone directly,
but these are my general exam examples of unbalance.
Some churches will choose to emphasize emotional expression,
but lack biblical substance.
They have a lot of feel,
but little truth, others will stress
theological accuracy.
Accuracy, it's a fancy word for me, theological accuracy.
But quench the spiritual vitality they have, right?
The doctrine, but they don't have a spiritual life.
Some focus on tradition
and order while others embrace chaos in the name of freedom.
But scripture calls all of us to approach worship
with balance, Paul again in Corinthians 14.
But everything should be done in a fitting and orderly way.
Now, does this mean that we, we need to be rigid,
legalistic, formulaic?
No. But it does mean we should be thoughtful,
purposeful in our worship, we have worship
that reflects God's character both creatively
and with consistency.
Biblical balance means we can appreciate different styles
and expression as long as they honor biblical principles,
ancient hymns and contemporary songs, which
by the way is 95%
of the conversations I have on a Sunday morning in a
lobby somewhere in the triangle.
Ancient hymns and contemporary songs both can glorify God.
Liturgical traditions
and spontaneous expressions can both be spirit led
quiet meditation and joyful celebration can both be worship
in truth and in spirit.
The key is that everything must be done to God's glory.
And for the edification of the church, not
for personal preference and not for cultural accommodation,
we must ask, does this honor God?
Does this build up the body of Christ?
And does this align with scripture?
CS Lewis, the great author of the Chronicles of Narnia,
which we watch a lot in my house,
has a great observation about worship.
Worship serves two purposes, glorification and edification.
Glorification meaning we magnify God's
greatness and worthiness.
In other words, we make much, we make a big deal about God.
It's a big deal to, to worship him.
So that's glorification
and edification, which means we build
up one another in the faith.
Our worship strengthens and encourages the body of Christ.
True worship achieves both of these aims simultaneously.
We're not choosing between honoring God
and edifying each other.
If we truly worship a balanced approach,
we will do both at the same time.
So yes, a balanced approach
to this sometimes means you need to step outta your comfort zone.
Traditional worship might need
to embrace a fresh expression.
Maybe it connects with someone who's different than you,
or even the younger generation, contemporary worship cats.
You might need to rediscover the rich
historical tri Christian traditions
and the value they bring even today.
But most importantly, biblical balance keeps the focus on
God rather than ourselves.
The trick here is worship ain't about
you if you didn't know it isn't.
It's about God.
Biblical balance keeps the focus on
God rather than ourselves.
Worship's not about what we get out of it,
it's about what we bring to it.
And it's not about how we feel
and the reason it's really important
because it's not about how we feel.
It's because life isn't always easy. Is that fair? Do we?
Unless all y'all got a different life than
I got, life isn't always easy.
So sometimes I don't feel like worshiping.
So that's why we don't base what we choose to do
off how we feel.
Worship is not about how I feel,
but it's about honoring the one who is worthy of all honor.
I got one more for you.
Worship is a way of life, not just an event.
This can be challenging for us
because we view worship as a time
that we go to and that we leave.
It's the Sunday morning gathering.
But Paul again in Romans gives us a challenge.
Therefore brothers, I challenge you, urge you, encourage you
In view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies
as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God.
This is your true and proper worship.
Our true and proper worship is not the songs,
it's not the gatherings, it's the offering
of our entire lives.
Your work, your work becomes worship when you do
with excellence and integrity as unto the Lord.
Your finances, yes, your finances
become worship when you manage them
and are generous with them as stewards of God's resources.
Your relationships become worship when you love, forgive
and serve others as Christ has loved you.
When you pull a trailer on a Sunday morning at five 30
to one campus, even though you attend another campus so
that a gym can be turned into a place to share hope
for young people, that is worship.
And what I love about it is that the most mundane things,
or should I say, the seemingly mundane things
can become moments of worship them.
Pile of dishes that are in the house that no one wants
to touch them, pile of dishes, cleaning those dishes,
become service to the Lord.
I don't know if any husbands have ever come home from a long
day of work and you, you get in the house
and your wife has that look on her face that says,
if one more person talks to me
or touches me, it's on you ever.
You ever have that moment. And
what you do is you give a mommy minute.
Well, I dunno what y'all call, that's what we
call it, my house.
It's called a mommy minute. And
what a mommy minute means is like no one talk to mommy.
Mommy's gonna have the rest of the night to herself
and daddy's here and we'll see her in the morning.
That is an opportunity of worship in service to God.
When you're raising and loving, I got an amen from my wife.
Ooh boy, let me add a couple minutes to the clock.
Um, when you're raising those children
that sometimes frustrate you, sometimes hurt your feelings,
you're tending to the precious gifts of God when you study,
you're stewarding the mind that God gave you.
When you exercise, you're caring for the body.
That is his temple.
What this is is a whole life approach to worship,
a whole life approach to worship.
This transforms everything.
It means we can't compartmentalize our faith.
You can't sing. I surrender all on Sunday
and then live selfishly Monday through Saturday.
Our corporate worship and our daily life must align.
And what I love about this understanding is it
elevates the ordinary life.
Hear this, the ordinary life gets raised
to sacred significance.
And you don't have to be in full-time
ministry to live a life of worship.
And I'm not gonna speak for all
of the other pastors, I'll just speak for myself.
I'll take prayer because the hangup for me can be
because I make my livelihood putting on worship.
And the shortcoming for me could be, I think I've done it
because I worked my nine to five.
I mean, y'all call me at like seven
o'clock at night, so my nine to whatever.
But so I'll take prayer
because that's, that's just me doing a job.
That's not a whole life worship, whole life worship.
It's not just a full-time vocational ministry.
What this means for every believer in every occupation
and every season of life can offer their daily
activities as worship.
This means our worship should flow from
and to daily worship.
So when we get together, when we gather, when the family
of family's hanging out, being ruckus,
the worship should flow to that.
And from that back to our individual lives, we bring
that individual worship into
what we call the corporate gathering, the family families.
We bring that individual worship in
and we continue to worship back out as we go
and live out our daily lives.
You can think of it as daily devotion lived out
or daily devotion lived out loud.
It's not just the quiet times in the morning, it's devotion.
All the live long day.
Consider how this perspective can transform
your Monday morning meetings.
You're not leaving the sacred to head to the secular.
You're simply taking worship into the world.
Your workplace becomes a mission field.
Your family becomes your first ministry.
Your community becomes the places of service.
This requires intentionality. I'm I'm sure of it.
You must consciously choose to see every aspect of your life
through the lens of worship.
You must regularly ask yourself,
is this situation, is this trial?
Is this moment an opportunity to glorify
and bring glory to God?
And I'll give you one caution.
If your private life doesn't match your corporate worship,
you are living a divided existence that neither honors God
or yourself, don't compartmentalize your faith.
Worship is a whole life experience.
I wanna read where we started and then I got four
encouragement for you back in John
chapter four, verse 23.
But the hour is coming
and is now here when true worshipers will worship the Father
in spirit and in truth,
for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.
God is spirit and those who worship must worship in spirit
and in truth, the Father is seeking worshipers
who will worship in spirit
and in truth, truth, spirit, and in truth.
Truth meaning we know the God of the Bible
and that we depend on the spirit.
Lemme give you four encouragement as we end our time today.
My first encouragement to you is commit to knowing
God through his word.
That's probably gonna be a little bit of a sacrifice.
Worship equals sacrifice.
Make studying scripture a priority so
that your worship is grounded in the true God of the Bible.
Let's worship him as he truly is.
Second, let all of us begin to cultivate a sensitivity,
a dependence on the Holy Spirit
and what that can look like through your life of prayer,
through bible study.
Y'all church, where's the camera? This one right here.
Hey, show up to church, prepare to worship.
Call on the Holy Spirit every single day
and show up with worship to offer, not
to get yourself stirred up in,
cultivate a dependence on the Holy Spirit.
That way you can know when an authentic
spiritual encounter is happening.
Third, let's embrace biblical balance.
We want to glorify God and edify each other.
We can be open to different expressions
of worship while maintaining a focus on God's glory
and building up of his people.
And fourth, most importantly, I believe, integrate worship
into daily life.
You must begin to see every activity, every relationship,
every responsibility as an opportunity to honor God
who so loved the world that he gave his only son,
that whoever would believe in him would not perish,
but have eternal life.
The kind of worshipers the God
of heaven is seeking is not about your
style or your preferences.
He wants worshipers who will worship in spirit
and in truth, it's not about perfection,
it's about authenticity.
It's not about performance.
It's about the heart
of an image bearer responding to their creator.
You were made for this.
You were created to be a worshiper.
Who are you worshiping?
This is your true identity to be a worshiper.
And when you worship God in spirit
and in truth, you're not doing something religious.
You are being who you are always meant to be.
So let's end how we begin.
I asked you as we started our time together,
how many hours did you worship this week?
Now let me ask you, how many hours will
you worship this week?
Let's pray. Father of mercy
and grace, we thank you that we can come before you
because of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.
Lord, we want to be a people of family
who worships you in truth, who's wildly biblical
And who is spirit led.
Lord, I pray that you would convict
and call all of us to live this way.
In Jesus' name, amen. Hope, community church, I love you.
Can we lift up a shadow? Praise to God. Yeah.
What a powerful word. Thank you, Rob.
You know, we've seen God moving in, um, some amazing ways,
uh, through our church and in our church.
Um, and we want to, we wanna have a night where we,
we praise him, uh, together, uh, all as one campus.
And, uh, during this time, we're actually gonna, uh, have,
uh, a vision night where all of our campuses come,
come together here at the Raleigh campus.
It's going to be August 10th at, uh, 5:00 PM And we want all
of our campuses to join in on this.
We're gonna hear from Jason Gore,
our lead pastor and some of our elders.
Um, you know how we
as a church are gonna live out the mission
and vision that God has put before us.
And so we would love to have you there, uh, for that.
And we want you to RSVP as well.
You can actually text vision to 7 2 9 8 9, uh,
and RSVP there.
Uh, we'd love to see you.
We can't wait for it this coming Sunday.
Um, and then also a reminder, next,
or actually Thursday the 21st,
not next Thursday, Thursday the 21st.
We're not going to have service here on Thursday night.
We're actually going to, uh, be inviting in NC State Crew
and they're gonna come in and have a worship night here.
So you can attend on Sunday morning or you can watch online.
Uh, we're super thankful that, uh, we got to worship, uh,
with you today and we look forward to seeing you next week.
Have a great night.