Intro/Outro: You're listening to GARDEN CHURCH Podcast. We're in a series called Church on Fire, a journey through the book of Acts. This is the story of ordinary people filled with the spirit carrying the presence of Jesus into every corner of the world. The same spirit that raised Jesus from the dead is alive and in us today. Join us as we step into the call to be people set on fire for his mission.
Darren Roaunzoin: What's up 9AM? Well, this is the first 9AM where we are broadcasting this to Huntington Beach. So can I Who am I gonna talk to right now? Can I just say over here? I'm gonna say hi to this.
What's your name,
Intro/Outro: bro? Al.
Darren Roaunzoin: Al. Hey, that's great that you're on here. I'm gonna have to get used to this. Hi. Hi Huntington Beach.
You're gonna I'm gonna walk over there so you might need to back up and But Al, we'll figure this out together. Okay? Sorry if that's distracting for you all but we have hundreds of people in our Huntington Beach location that are listening for the first time. Alright. So I don't have to hurry.
So I just I think that's really important because for the last eight months my nervous system is shot. And I I wanna I just wanna take my time today because we're not rushed for any reason and if the 11:00 comes in I don't really care anymore. But I get to lead you through being present which is a thing I've missed. I miss being with the church. I miss being in the in between moments of seeing you and and I miss ministering in the ministry time and all that stuff.
So I wanna say a couple of things pastorally, okay? First of all, if you've been checking us out, know, I I totally great. Make a commitment at some point. Yes? Like we need you because this like this is the 09:00, it's full and maybe nobody comes at eleven but you guys, Vanguard's not back yet, Circuit Riders, their students are not back yet, Biola's not back, we're gonna just keep growing and so if you've called this home, I wanna invite you to serve And for those parents here that didn't get to drop off your kids because there's not enough volunteers, that's on us.
If you don't have kids and you're young, I don't care how you define young, can I just say, would you bless the parents for an hour and a half to two hours once a week where they can drop their kids off in a discipleship environment that you are hosting as a volunteer and serve the families that need in this moment just a little bit of margin to come worship the Lord and come to another service after you serve? Can I invite you to do that? You're like, I want the fast pastor back. I I wanna build the church that honors every stage of life and on Sundays just that you came here with little kids, you've done an amazing job bringing them to a house of God. Church, can we show up for them?
We need you to serve in the kids ministry. And can I just say one thing to the 20 and younger real quick? You don't know what busy means. I'm not being this isn't me talking down. I used to say I'm overwhelmed and busy.
And then I had kids. And and and this isn't a It's just your capacity grows and you have the ability to do a lot more with a lot less time. So can I just say, church, can we be church? Is that okay? Okay.
What else did I wanna say? I'm not gonna rush, so it's so great. So take take serve in kids ministry. I was at the men's retreat and we have about a 150 men having the most amazing weekend. I walk in because I my son's with me and he started school for the first time.
He's been homeschooled but now he's at a Christian academy and so I I had to take him Friday and I show up Friday morning to the first session and Zach comes in. The guy pastors, he's one of our elders and he's like, Darren, so and so gave their life to Jesus at breakfast this morning. And so so and so has been in pursuit for about eight years and has been hostile to Christianity. So I walked into like, yes, let's go. God is moving.
So that's my story, that's my update. Now I'm gonna preach. Can I pray? Yes. Alright.
Jesus, would you minister to us? Wherever we find ourselves in Huntington and Costa Mesa, pray your holy spirit would come and fill the space with your presence. Thank you Lord that you're near. Thank you that your word is alive and active and I pray in the power of the Holy Spirit you'd move in Jesus name, amen. Alright.
It was winter. A winter night in 1610. So go with me. To Padua, Italy. When a middle aged mathematician climbed on top of a roof carrying a tube of lenses that he ground with his hands himself and he pointed this device towards Jupiter.
Pressed his eye in the glass and saw something no human eye had ever seen before. Four little stars lined beside the planet. He wrote them down, came back the next night and they had moved. He came back the next night and they moved again. So he started to chart what he was witnessing on top of the roof.
And he charted them for weeks and he came to the conclusion that was unvoidable. They were not stars, they were moons and they were circling something else other than the earth. His name was Galileo. And he knew exactly what he was holding with his research and it would cost him everything because everyone knew that the earth was the center of the universe. Aristotle, taught it.
The astronomers of the ancient times charted it. And the church preached it. Careers and books were were architected around this. There's the artist. Here's here's what what was called the geocentric world view at the time.
Earth was the center of the universe. And the heavens and the earth knew that everything moved around the earth. That quiet man on that roof realized he was holding something that would unravel the world. And he did the reasonable thing first. He invited the experts to come and look and examine for themselves what he had saw.
And they came. Here's a picture. One by one, he asked the experts, the educated scientists of the world, all they had to do was peer into the telescope and see for themselves what he had witnessed and recorded. Only the men in the room with the telescope right there refused to put their eye next to the glass. Evidence was not weak.
It was one eyepiece away And by sixteen sixteen, years later, the theory was declared contrary to scripture. Galileo would stand trial before the court and before the church And he would spend his last years under house arrest, nearly a heretic. And it took the church three fifty years to admit that Galileo was right. So why would educated men refuse to look? Because the truth was never the problem.
Every man in that room had organized his life around a different story. And the glass threatened their story. You see brothers and sisters, the world did not miss the truth because the truth was hidden. The world missed the truth because it was invested in the wrong story. This is what's gonna happen in Acts 17.
So if you have your bibles, let's go. Let's raise them up. Let me see. Costa Mesa raise it up. Huntington Beach raise them up high.
Look around. Say I brought the scriptures this morning. I put my idol away and I pulled out my scriptures. Today I'm speaking in rhymes all the time. You didn't know I was that clever.
Acts chapter 16. We're gonna Or sorry, Acts chapter 17, we we already did that one. It tells the story of a similar collision of world views. Two separate cities we're gonna read about today, they're forty five minutes apart, sorry 45 miles apart. They have the same sermon and the same preacher in both cities.
One city, the city riots, the other city they form a bible study. Same message, same method, same missionaries. The only variable is the heart to the message. Who hears it? The question I have for you is very simple.
I'll I'll land there in a second at the end of the sermon but this is the question I want you to ask, which story is your life invested in? You could miss the truth because you are invested in the wrong story. So let's read the scriptures today. We're gonna read the story of Thessalonica and Berea, not the tacos. All week long.
Can we pull up that? I know it's later on. We're gonna get to Berea in a couple minutes but I love in our gatherings team meeting, one of my pastors sent me this AI generated. Thank you pastor Luis for the text. Alright.
Here we go. Acts 17 verse one. Paul leaves Philippi. When Paul and his companions had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica where there was a Jewish synagogue. Philippi didn't have one, Thessalonica has one.
As was his custom, Paul went into the synagogue and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the scriptures explaining and proving that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead. This Jesus I am proclaiming to you is the Messiah. He said, some of the Jews were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas as did a large number of God fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women. Alright. Let's pause there.
Paul begins by doing something I just want you to see. As was his custom is written a few times in the book of Acts by Luke. Remember, Paul was just beaten with rods, he was flogged, 39 lashes. Right? That comes from Deuteronomy chapter 25.
There was a Jewish synagogue punishment, whipped them one less than 40 times. And he'll give a testimony that he receives flogging five times according to second Corinthians. Because of his custom. And his custom is not to go to the synagogue because he feels like it, but that was his habit. That was his strategy.
He shows up to the synagogue to preach because the synagogue was more than just a strategic location. There's something going on with his strategy to reach the lost. Now listen, I was trying to process why would he keep going knowing he gets beaten up every single time he gets to the synagogue or get kicked out. Number one, here's the reason I wanna give you some theology. The reason he goes to the synagogue is it's theologically, it's what he decides to do.
He first goes to the Jews because it's God's promises fulfilled to Israel. The Messiah is Israel's Messiah first, then to the Gentiles. We read about this in Romans. He writes about this that that this is the fulfillment of Israel's story. It is the fulfillment of all humanity's story, but it's Israel that holds the narrative, the story.
When he goes to Athens, he doesn't say Jesus is the Messiah. He says Jesus and the resurrection, which sounds like two gods. It sounds like he's advocating to a bunch of pagan worshipers, two separate deities. We'll talk about that next week when we get to Athens. But in this case, says Jesus is the Messiah.
Second, his sermon has a foundation in the synagogue. When Paul goes to the synagogue, it says that he reasons with them. He he dialogues with the Jewish believers for three Sabbath, for three weeks. He shows up on a Saturday and he opens the scriptures to dialogue with them about Jesus the Messiah, which we'll get to in a second. The other reason is sociologically, the the the synagogues had God fearing Greeks.
So they were Greek by birth and they became Jewish in religion and they were kind of on the outskirts of of society and the synagogue and they were probably biblically illiterate, but they had a network of God fearing or pagan families. So it was sociologically strategic for Paul to go to the synagogue, to preach Jesus the Messiah, to collect the outsiders, and then go somewhere else. That's what he does all over the place. It was very strategic, But it was his habit. It was his custom.
He shows up because that's what he decided to do beforehand. A couple weeks ago, I commissioned all of you into your workplaces, into your neighborhoods, into yours in into this places that you have. How many times do you show up to that place on purpose? Are you showing up to your workplace commissioned by God to bring words of life, the word of God, into that space? Paul shows up and does it.
Now here's practically, there's a lot of reasons it provided structure but let me just say, he tells devout Jews that Jesus is the Messiah. And it says, he reasons with them. I think this We we read over this. He he explains that the Messiah had to suffer and rise from the dead. He's having to show the Jewish believers the scriptures, arguing with scriptures about Jesus being the Messiah.
And this would have been so controversial, it would have got him kicked out of every synagogue. And it does. It gets him kicked out. Because Deuteronomy 21 says, cursed is anyone who is hung on a pole or a cross. So the Messiah is cursed according to the scriptures.
This would have been so scandalous in the first century that Paul would be kicked out, and he does. But what he does is he re narrates the scripture through the lens of the resurrected Jesus Christ. And what I want to imagine, I was thinking like, imagine Paul today telling us the story of the Old Testament. See, we have so much great scholarship that we can peer back and look at what Paul probably would have walked through. He would have told the story with the resurrection of Jesus Christ as the climax, the cross and resurrection.
And it would probably be something like this. I'm gonna attempt to give you his story in like five minutes. Is that okay? Costa Mesa 9AM, I need your I need your 10 energy. Or at the very least, the 9AM Huntington Beach energy because they're on fire.
So the story of Israel begins in Egypt. Do you know that? I We always start in Genesis but Egypt is where it picks up and there's four hundred and thirty years of slavery in Egypt and they cry out and God hears their cry, sends Moses and Moses sends the plagues against the pharaohs, against the tyrant king. And they get freed and they cross the Red Sea and there's a poet, there's Miriam cries out and she says this line which is is from Exodus 15, the Lord reigns forever and ever. They cross the Red Sea, The Lord Yahweh reigns, rules forever.
It's kingdom language. And then he pulls them to Mount Sinai where he makes a covenant. This king, Yahweh, makes a covenant with the people of God. The people he just freed. He says, you will be my people.
A holy nation set apart, but a kingdom of priests. You, based on how you live amongst yourselves, will live in such a way that will reflect the reality of my existence to the rest of the nations. That's your vocation. Your identity is my people, my treasure possession. Your vocation, your purpose is to live in a way through the law so that the world knows Yahweh reigns.
If you obey me fully. That's the condition of the promise of the old testament. And the old testament takes off and we see, do they obey? You guys, that was a yes or no question. You want me to go fast?
What are you What's wrong right now? Do you need more coffee? 9AM, I know you're at Huntington, I know you're on fire right now, just let me hear you say hallelujah, I can hear it, just kidding. They're in Sinai, they make a covenant if you obey and we see throughout history they do not obey but then then it moves to Jerusalem. They they go into the promised land and God they they bring up a king in Samuel and and then and then God makes a covenant with with a king, David.
And it's in Jerusalem that they they they they form this this new community. Can you go to the scriptures real quick? Where where in Jerusalem, there there it says, your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me. Your throne will be established forever. They The promise is that the the the lineage of David will be a kingdom that lasts forever.
Right? Right. If they obey. And do they obey? No.
So the story of scriptures is the story of God accommodating to his people. And this is I'm just walking you through in the entire Old Testament right now, okay? And what happens is God warns Israel, if you don't obey, something bad's gonna happen. He warns them. Jeremiah is a prophet who's who stands before the king, warning them to remain faithful to their marriage vows to the king.
And the bad thing happens. The Babylonians come in, destroys Jerusalem, destroys the temple and exiles Israel. Israel lives in slavery for years and it's there that the prophets begin to describe in the old testament, the prophets begin to describe a new exodus. That's what scholars call it. A time when God would free Israel once and for all from captivity.
But in the language, it's not just Israel, it's like anyone everywhere that's been held captive. Anyone everywhere that's been held in bondage. And so the prophets describe what this kingdom will look like, what this movement will look like. It will be a Messiah, a savior. God will pray.
His holy spirit will pour out. And and and so there's this thing that scholars call the age to come, that there will be a time marked when God begins to act decisively in human history like he did in the book of Exodus with Moses. And so the Old Testament is filled with the prophets, the minor major prophets describing this, the age to come. There's a bunch of scriptures I don't have time to go through it, but this is what the story Paul would have said. What would that age to come look like?
Would well, it'd be would you go to the next one real quick? Just keep up with me for a second. Thank you so much, Faith. And afterwards, I will pour out my spirit on all people, sons and daughters will prophesy, you your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Go to the next slide.
Ezekiel says, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you, and I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. Is that not good news? That when God acts in history, that callous heart that's been ruined by a season of trauma and pain and brokenness and sin and unforgiveness, God promises a new heart. He promises the Holy Spirit will dwell within you. There's literally dozens and dozens of scriptures of what this movement will look like and guess what?
Israel comes back into Jerusalem, they rebuild the temple and they they they cheer and they they grieve and wail and cry because it's not as glorious as the previous one and the movement that's described in the old testament doesn't happen. Malachi ends with, hey, the Messiah is gonna come and one like John the Baptist will prepare the way of the Lord. And then it ends and there's four hundred and thirty years of silence. Four hundred and thirty years of slavery and then Moses. Four hundred and thirty years of silence.
Then in Luke's narrative. The Gospel of Luke, the first prophetic word spoken in four hundred years, four hundred and thirty years is Zechariah who writes on a piece of tablet, his name is John. Malachi ends with one like Elijah that will prepare the way. His name is John. And Jesus comes onto the scene and in Mark, you can't miss it.
He says, the time has come. The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news. What time? Everything you've been waiting for in the old testament has come into fulfillment in my being.
God's reign and rule. A life marked by forgiveness and new hearts and the holy spirit, a life marked by justice and peace, the way you were designed to live in the Garden of Eden, that is here in your midst. You can reach out and touch it. And then he walks around acting like he's in charge, Casting out demons, healing the sick. And then he goes to the cross and he dies.
Once and for all, solving the crisis at hand. God's justified wrath has to be propitiated. The sin has to be atoned for. And Satan's rule has to be powered over through self sacrificial love, and death needs to be conquered. And Jesus does one, two, three, four, all on the cross and resurrection.
Brothers and sisters, so when he shows up, Paul shows up to the scene, he proclaims the gospel. This is the good news of Jesus Christ. So he shows them through the lens of Jesus the Messiah, that this Messiah had to suffer and die and raised to life and he became king. So why did they riot? Says this, let's read this.
But other Jews were jealous. Verse five. So they rounded up some bad characters from the marketplace, formed a mob and started a riot in the city. They rushed to Jason's house in search of Paul and Silas in order to bring them out of the crowd But when they did not find them, they dragged Jason and some other believers before the city officials shouting. Listen to what they say.
These men who have caused trouble all over the world have now come here and Jason has welcomed them into his house. They are defying Caesar's decrees saying that there is another king, one called Jesus. When they heard this, the crowd and the city officials were thrown into turmoil, then they put Jason and the others on bail and let them go. They signed an official document banning Paul from the city, Which Paul writes about in first Thessalonians. He says, Satan blocked our way back to you because there was a policy made because of Christianity.
Isn't this great? Why do they write? Because they were invested in the wrong story. See, they were conquered by Rome and Daniel's kingdom, according to Daniel, said that there would there would be someone who wins against the conquering powers. They interpret it as our party is going to conquer.
The way we know how to conquer with swords. But what Paul probably did is he showed them Isaiah 53 is next to Isaiah 52. I know that's clever. But the same prophet who shouts, your God rules, your God reigns, it shows that the servant is pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities. God did not become king in spite of the cross.
No. The cross is where he took the throne and that's offensive. It's not something you wear around your neck. That was a curse word in the first century. It was a derogatory word.
It was the worst thing that could ever happen to a human and when we get to Corinthians and talk about how they receive it, it clearly is offensive as a concept and Paul preaches it so people invested in a story other than self sacrificial love, riot. You could say people that are invested in another story other than self sacrificial love, protest. Picket. Divide. Tear down.
What are you seeing in the church today? I don't see unity. I see more division and anger and people call it courage. But it doesn't look like Jesus or Paul. It looks like the sword.
Are we alright? Can I I can I keep going on this? Yeah. Don't I I have no time. Let's just take my I'm gonna take a breath.
Just chill for a sec. I see a clock, doesn't matter. The green clock, make it red, it doesn't trouble me anymore. It it is healing. I have a lot to say about anyways, I'll I'll I'll talk about that another time.
There's this word in here I just I feel I was really I was really moved by cause I did some word studies in verse two. It says, as was his custom Paul went into the synagogue and and on three Sabbath days, it says he reasoned with them from the scriptures. Oh, when I read Paul, I'm like he's he's a bad a. He's I mean this guy gets flogged and jailed and then there's an earthquake and like he saves the jailer and then he's like the magistrates come in they're like please leave and he's like nah I'm staying for a few more nights. Lydia promised me rib eye.
Let's go. And then it says he reasoned, is tender. He's dialoguing. He's taking questions. He's having conversations in the synagogue about the scripture.
Why is he so patient? Because this was the man who's now teaching the Bible study that used to lead the riot. There's patience in his voice because there's mercy in his story. God loves to take people who are hostile to God and use them to become preachers, proclaimers, apologists, evangelists, and missionaries for his purpose. I was at UCSB convincing Christians to leave their faith.
At 18 years old, I convinced probably 10 people to leave their faith because I was so bitter at God. And then I met Jesus at Jesus Burgers in Isla Vista. And it was mercy that met me. Not an argument around truth, kindness expressed in a person handing me a burger and warning me that I'll get a ticket if I keep drinking in public. I heard the voice of God said, what are you doing?
I gave my life back to Jesus, found myself at Vanguard and became a pastor. God likes to humble those who and he loves I'll just say this, he is in the restoration business. And if you're here and it's your seventieth time returning, welcome to the business of restoration. Because he gives second chances and third chances and 71 chances. That's the God of scriptures and Paul reasons because he knows mercy.
So verses five through nine show you how not to respond to the gospel. Jealousy led by religious men and in the text, I love this, Luke uses language about the mob. The jealousy will always find logistic outcomes. So the logistics come in and the jealous religious folks rent a mob. They go to people who aren't working in the marketplace and he stirs them up and the mob is borrowed by these men's hostile intentions.
Does that sound like society today? Like like, let's just rent a mob to protest. In fact, I was driving back from one of our first gatherings here and there was a protest going on and I got stuck in the carpool lane trying to get back to Huntington Beach because there were five buses with a name of a protest happening, and they were driving to some unknown location. Literally, were shut, they were bussing in protesters, and I was late to church. This is what we do.
We we we we we co op people into our story rather than submit to what's ultimately true. The charge against the men defying Caesar's decrees. In other words, Caesar in eleven a d said that you cannot predict another Caesar, you cannot forecast another Caesar, you cannot say that there's another king. It was outlawed years before this happens. And it's true.
They were declaring Jesus the Messiah. The word Messiah in Hebrew is anointed one and you only anoint a king. He is not a helper. He is the king of the universe according to the Hebrew scriptures. And yes, they are caught.
They are categorically claiming something that is true. He is king and Caesar is not. And so, in a city that's defined by Caesar, they defy Caesar. In a city that uses coins with Caesar's image, they have to pay the penalty and they do. They pay a penalty.
And let me just say before we go into the next one which I'm really excited about Berea, especially after church. It says, I wanted to say that the collision today for some of you is that Jesus will not be a mascot for your political party. He's not asking you to vote for him. You cannot say Jesus 2028. He's not asking for your vote, he's asking for your allegiance.
And I think it's fascinating because Jesus turns the world upside down and these men it says, these men have turned the world upside down. They just show up for twenty one days, three weeks, and the city is saying, you turn the world upside down. These men are agitators. They're changing the world. And I I was wondering, has has this story turned anything in your life upside down?
Like, has it turned the way you handle money upside down? Has coming to Jesus changed the way you view your calendar, the way you view your Sunday, the way you view your time, the way you manage your relationships? Did it arrive and everything else get rearranged or did it arrive and you just added him to Sunday mornings? How not to respond to the gospel is to keep him in a corner, keep him as an accessory to resist the change that he brings. Let me just say this, I meant to say it earlier, Jesus is not running for office because he already reigns.
That's what I wanted to say, I forgot that one. Alright. Now, what Luke does here is he contrasts Thessalonica with Berea and we're gonna see how to receive the gospel when it's presented. Because I said earlier, there's the only thing that changes is the heart of those who hear the message. It's a difference in the reception of the word.
And Luke does this as a literary tool to show you this is one way, here's another way. And look at the story in Berea. As soon as it was night, the believers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea. On arriving there, they went to the Jewish synagogue because it was their custom. Now, the Berean Jews were of more noble character than the Thessalonians for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.
They looked through the telescope. As a result, many of them believed as did also a number of prominent Greek women and many Greek men. But when the Jews in Thessalonica heard that Paul was preaching the word of God at Berea, 45 miles away, some of them went down there too, agitating the crowds and stirring them up. The believers immediately sent Paul to the coast but Silas and Timothy stayed in Berea. Those who were those who escorted Paul brought him to Athens, hundreds of miles away, 222 miles away.
And they left with instructions for Silas and Timothy to join them as soon as possible. So Berea hears the same gospel message from Paul, we don't know how long, but they receive the word with eagerness and it says, Luke says, because of their more noble character. Now that phrase in Greek has to do with bloodline. It has to do with a term for class based on your blood that you're born into a risk Aristocratic bloodline and Luke says, no, no, no. The Bereans, it's not about how their bloodline is.
The kingdom of God nobility is not in your bloodline in the kingdom of God. It's in your posture towards the word of God when it threatens your story. Because this threatened the Berean story, only they received it. And so, how do we move out of living and investing in the wrong story? Where the Bereans show us exactly what to do.
I'll give you two things that show up. Number one, is they receive the word with eagerness. They hunger for the word of God. I I really believe this is so important. They receive the message with eagerness.
In the Greek, they are expectant and they are expecting God to speak to them. I wonder if that's how you walked in today. If that's how you wake up and read the scriptures, are you eager to hear from the Lord? They have this eagerness. The second, the best word I could describe it is it says, they examined which is a court verb.
It's a courtroom verb. It means that they put the scripture on the witness stand and they cross examined it. They were disciplined in their approach to the word of God. I think those two characteristics are what this generation in this moment needs. Hunger and discipline.
Fire and form. Right? We need to become people who wake up and have a hunger for God and we need people that when we wake up without the hunger have a discipline to walk in. The word of God. Does that make sense?
Because when that happens, God multiplies the impact. Right? So in verse 12 it says, they're examining, they're researching and the examination of scripture didn't create doubt, it created faith. Their persistence created faith and Thessalonica it says, listen to this, some believed. In Berea it says, many believed.
Jesus tells this parable. He says, when the kingdom of God is preached in verse chapter chapter eight verse five. He says, it's kind of like this, a farmer went out to sow his seed as he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, it was trampled on and the birds ate it up. Some fell on rocky ground and when it came, the plants withered because they had no moisture. Other seed fell among thorns which grew up with it and choked the plants.
Still other seed fell on good soil, it came up and yielded a crop a 100 times more than was sown. And then he said, he called out whoever has ears to hear, let them hear. He says, whenever the gospel is preached, whenever the kingdom of God is proclaimed, you can be four different soils at any time. Any day of the week, you can be a different soil. And in Matthew's gospel, he explains the meaning of the soil and he talks about what I think the the the the weeds and the thorns, he says, it chokes the plants.
He says, the worries of this life and the deceitfulness of wealth choke out the kingdom of God flourishing in your life. What happens in Berea is that these agitators come in and rather than losing their faith, they stay in it and they escort Paul all the way to Athens because a faith you receive second hand will fold when you have pressure. But a faith you've examined daily will always stand. Well, I just Now let me just land it and give you some context real quick. Gen z alpha generation, my boys here, all of you that are here.
I was talking to a bunch of men yesterday morning at breakfast at the men's retreat from Costa Mesa. They're new to our church and they were they were talking about how how encouraged they are by how many young people are here on fire for God. And it's true, this is what we know historically, every revival in history is always a young generation leading the way. But for this whatever this is to be sustained, we need every generation on board. And I think there's something in the text in the way Berea received the the gospel that gives us a way to live today and I wanna give you some ways to cultivate hunger and cultivate discipline.
Because I think those two things are what's needed in this moment. How do you cultivate hunger? Number one, you ask for it. Hunger for God is itself a gift from God. The Psalmist says in Psalm one nineteen, incline my heart to your statutes.
Turn my heart to your way, your law. And then he says, open my eyes that I may see the wonderful things in your law. Turn my heart to you and your way and let me see the wonderful things that are there. He doesn't say, I feel hungry and now I'm gonna read the scriptures. He asked God, make me hungry.
Brothers and sisters, that is a prayer you can pray today. May it not be that the the days of hunger are in your youth. May may the 60 and 70 and 80 year olds in the room hunger more forgotten now than ever before. Ask. Second, and this is so important.
This is what you can do outside of prayer is starve the counterfeit appetites. Nobody is hungry at dinner time because they snacked all day. It's a real frustration when you're teaching your kids to eat. Nobody's hungry for the word at 7AM when they've been feeding on the feed until 1AM. The Berean's eagerness had room to exist because nothing else was competing for their appetite.
And church right now, you bring your appetite killer everywhere you go. You feed yourself with such meaningless things and it's not evil, it's just filling you up. It's filling your mind, it's filling your time, it's filling your heart, it's filling your relationships. You don't need more desire for scripture, you need to stop snacking. I know it's good, it's prophetic.
Listen, do the work. I can't do that for you. Have a no phone zone when you open scriptures in the morning. Third, and this is the counterintuitive one, feast on the Lord. See, in the spiritual things, the way appetite works is the more you consume God, the more you hunger for him.
It says taste and see that the Lord is good. The Psalmist puts taste before seeing. Most people wait until they feel hungry before they open scriptures and the feeling will never come because kingdom hunger is usually rewarded after you feast. This is what I see. The person who reads five minutes every day for a month, you know what happens to them?
They want more. And God wants more. And that the reward is more intimacy with God. The more you consume, the more you hunger for him. That's what happens when you eat at someone's house and they cook a really good meal.
Like I I went to Ramin's house one day and he he cooked me a rib eye. I crave more rib eyes from him. You know you know what I'm talking about? It's like, you just had it, celebrate. No, I want more.
Yeah. It's the spiritual way. Second, how do you cultivate discipline? And brothers and sisters, we need discipline in our church. How do you cultivate discipline in your life?
Paul himself is the model. Right in front of us is verse two, as was his custom. Custom was the strategy. Paul did not consult his feelings in Thessalonica. Do I take a day off?
I've been beaten with rods. Was you know, I already got the flogging going on. Do I take a Do I skip a synagogue? No. Discipline means the decision is already made before the morning asks the question.
Make time with God. An appointment more than an intention. Don't judge yourself by your intentions for the love. I meant to do it. I meant to sign up for kids ministry on Sunday, but you forgot and you're feeling prompted by the Holy Spirit or at least a pastor's call, if you have some time, serve in the kids ministry for the love.
Do the discipline of filling out the application, getting a live scan and bless the church and watch God reward you. Maybe not in this life but in the age to come. Is that too long to wait? Eternity is too long for you? Don't tell me I'll read more when I feel like it.
Wake up. Make some coffee if you need it. Nothing bad about that. Grab the scriptures, get into prayer, make it a custom. Third, read like a Second, read like a Berean.
Here's what I wanna invite you to do. Read with questions on the table. Cross examine it. Go to the passage I taught on Sunday and read that passage and then look at three points that I made and challenge those points. Say, I don't agree with you pastor, and I did the work, prove it to me.
I'm not afraid of that. I'm I'm I'm doing the work. You go and do the work. Watch what God does as you dive in to the word of God with discipline and intention. Don't read utmost from my highest for thirty seconds and call it a devotion.
You want a devotion to compare your life to? The woman who pours the alabaster jar of perfume. That's the comparison. The the Levite who's named Barnabas who takes his Is it Barnabas? Yes.
He takes his he takes his property which he shouldn't have an inheritance and gives it to the apostles feet. That's devotion. You getting five minutes on your commute, you call it devotion, what is that? It's multitasking Jesus. I bet he would have loved to multitask on the cross.
I don't know, maybe that's too harsh. I'm in the red and it doesn't matter. Huntington, how you doing? Are you right here? I love you, Huntington.
See you next week. I love the third thing is the Bereans could not examine the scripture by themselves, so they do it in community. They didn't own a scroll, it was in the synagogue. Talk about inconvenient, you have an app. You have the ability to get an email with scripture every day, and you make excuses.
They have to go to the synagogue, pull out the scrolls, each one together, and do the work to examine daily. There are brothers and sisters around the world that would love to have access to the kind of content that you have access to. They don't even have the Bible in their language. If they heard, if they could sing songs out loud in a corporate gathering, they would be like the young man with the mustache doing color guard up here with his white scarf. But instead they hung quietly alone because they're persecuted.
But somehow we've made this, this machine of consumerism and I'm gonna convince you that reading scriptures is a worthy endeavor, forget that. I'm not competing against other churches. I love oceans, I love rock harbor, I love Mariners and Saddleback Canopy, Mesa City, I love all these churches. We're competing against Satan. And you have an enemy that wants to keep you idle and distracted and on your phone.
Brothers and sisters, get after it. Don't tell me you don't have time. Go to bed earlier, wake up earlier. Crack open your heart to Jesus. I don't know where I'm supposed to end.
What is your life invested in? Show me your screen time and I'll tell you what it's invested in. Show me your bank account statement this last month and I'll show you what story you're living. Show me what makes you worried on a Tuesday night. What creates anxiety in your heart and I'll tell I'll tell you what story you're invested in.
So I wanna invite you to peer into the telescope because the story we believe in is that he lived, he died and he rose again. And the story that we're telling you now is that's true. And when that's proclaimed, you have two options, reject it and rebel and riot or accept it and pledge your allegiance to a different king. And therefore, invest and live your life in a better story. Amen?
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