Church, would you bow your heads?
Me, father God, you
and you alone are good.
You are kind, you are patient. You pour out your mercy.
Lemme thank you for your son Jesus,
and whom we can come even into your presence.
To Him. We give all glory and honor
and submit our lives to you.
Father, we ask for the power of your spirit.
Would you unite our church
and pray all of this in Jesus name.
Amen. Church, grab a seat.
From the moment you step foot into this place,
you become a part of something bigger than yourself.
You who don't have it all together, you who feel broken
or unworthy, become welcomed into a family of families,
a family on mission to love God.
Follow Jesus and share hope
to the person sitting in your row,
to the neighbor down the street and even to the fatherless.
In a faraway land, you are called to something great.
You sitting within these walls where we gather
to sing his praise, where we feast on his word
and drink from the well that never runs dry Here
where the wandering are met by the wonder
of the wide open arms, the arms
of the Father, a light bearer.
When you step beyond these walls, you carry a flame
that pierces the darkness.
You walk with courage, bringing hope to places
that have forgotten the sound of it.
You are a part of something bigger, part of a body,
teaching our children to know him,
to love him, to follow him.
Not just someday, but today.
In the moments that shape eternity a body that
through prayer and petition, seeks to see the weak,
the poor, the sick, the hungry.
Not with earthly eyes,
but through the lens of God's boundless grace
and limitless love.
We say to neighbors with bare shelves
and empty bellies come and eat.
We say to young people, bombarded
by a digital world fighting to steal their attention
and confuse their purpose.
Come and be still be found.
We say to women and children rescued from trafficking,
not just in far off lands, but right here in the triangle.
Come and be set free.
We are a body that says, here I am Lord, send me.
And so we go, we build.
And Port-au-Prince, we pray revival into existence in
France, we disciple with boldness in South Asia,
a body on purpose, a purpose greater than ourselves,
a kingdom purpose that calls each unique part
to fulfill the great commission.
United unshakeable, immovable. We crave God's word.
We know his voice. We are a family. We love God.
We follow Jesus and we share hope.
Yeah, I mean, look, when I, I watch that
and even I'm reminded of like, oh my gosh,
we're involved in all these different places.
The the hope that we get to share with the world.
And so that's a part o of all of our stories.
We actually, uh, had a team leave this week
and go to Chernobyl, France, uh, to be
with the ICG International Church at Chernobyl.
So we've got a mission team there right now.
So keep them in your prayers. Uh, alright, let's get going.
I got a quote I wanna start out with.
If you want to go fast, go alone.
If you want to go far, go together.
And, uh, you've probably heard that quote before,
but it captures a theme straight from scripture
and really the heart of God for his people.
And really what it gets at is the power of unity.
And we right now as a church family,
we're at a sacred moment.
And for years, we have had faithful men and women
and students get up early on a Sunday morning and they go
and they convert a school, uh, to a place
where a worship gathering can happen in Fuqua
and in Garner, in Northwest Kerry.
And I want you to know, I know you have prayed in hallways,
uh, you have baptized people in inflatable tubs
that leak water and air.
Okay? I mean, that, that's the,
the lengths that you've gone to.
You have created room for people to meet Jesus.
And now, this weekend as a church, we've made a decision
to consolidate those mobile worship gatherings
and pull them into our permanent campuses
at Apex in Raleigh.
Multiple communities, two campuses, one family,
one mission, and one church.
But before we move on, it is so important for those of you
who are a part of those mobile campuses
and really for all of us to recognize and celebrate
because of your faithfulness,
lives have been changed for all of eternity.
That is not going away. That is going forward.
The mission has not ended in these communities.
It's gonna continue to expand through you.
And I'll tell you as sure as I'm standing right now,
I here right now, I have this conviction in my soul
that God is at some point in his timing,
he's gonna open a door for us
to launch back out in those communities in his timing.
But until that day, your ministry assignment,
it may have shifted on Sunday morning,
but your missional impact, it continues Monday
through Saturday in your neighborhoods and your schools
and your workplaces, all through your communities.
Hope is there because you're still there.
And you could hear me say
that and you like, what do you mean?
Do you mean like the hope that we
have in Jesus is still there?
Or do you mean like hope Community Church is there?
And I would say yes, yes to both,
because yes, you have a hope of Jesus inside of you
and you are there, but you are also Hope Community Church.
And so wherever you are, the church is there.
But I wanna recognize also that I know this kind of change
brings with it some emotion.
And that's okay. I'm right there with you for some,
this feels exciting.
Uh, I've talked
to people from mobile campuses over the last couple weeks,
uh, who have said things like, you know what the truth is,
setting up chairs e every single week,
setting up the piping drape.
I could use a little break. Uh, I've talked
to some other folks, uh, that have said, man,
I think this is the right decision.
I don't know what took y'all this long.
I think we should have done this five
years ago, coming outta COVID.
We've been through so much and there's a
part of me that understands that.
But we gotta recognize that you don't just go
and make decisions without being obedient to what it is
that God's calling you into.
And I've known beyond a shadow of a doubt,
God has not called us to not be on mission in
those communities.
And so we've waited until God said, Hey, no, let's,
let's change directions for a bit.
If, if I'm being perfectly transparent with you,
there's probably also a part of me that said, man, I don't,
I don't want it to look like we're making a decision
from a place of weakness.
Uh, I've got campus pastors out there
that have busted their tails.
They've done everything that they could do
to reach those communities.
There's, uh, the, the church family in those areas
of sacrifice they've given.
I I don't want anybody to have this sense of, man,
maybe we didn't do enough.
And the reality is that is just not true.
But for some people it is exciting.
Uh, for others as bittersweet.
And I get this, okay, I live in Garner.
I live one mile from Garner Magnet High School.
And from day one, my wife
and my three kids have been serving at that campus.
Every single weekend we have turned down vacations
because my wife says, no, no,
I serve in special needs ministry at the Garner campus.
Like those are our people.
We've got a community group out in Garner that's grown
to like 40 people, 20 adults, 20 kids.
It, it's a, it's a madhouse. Like those are our people.
So I understand. And if you're in that place, it's okay.
And the reason you're there is
because what you've built matters.
And so we gotta recognize that.
And so before we go any further, I, I want you
to hear me say thank you.
Thank you for the way that you've loved, thank you
for the way that you've served, for the way
that you've sacrificed, the way
that you have carried this mission forward here
in Raleigh at our Apex campus.
Can we just celebrate the way that they have served?
Yeah, that's right.
Thank you. All. The mission is not finished.
But for this decision to have the impact
that I believe God desires, we have to see
that this is more than just a, a move of people in seats.
Okay? This is a move of God.
And we gotta recognize that when we started this,
it was really a practical decision.
It was largely driven by, by finances and logistics.
But through time in prayer and,
and engaging God through reading scripture,
this has become something so much deeper.
This is, this has become a calling
and a, a, a calling that I believe is gonna allow us
as a church family to move forward more unified,
more aligned, and more effective than maybe we've
experienced in years.
Because if you want to get right down to it,
the world right now is ripe for division and dissension.
People are divided over politics.
They've got opinions, preferences, you name it.
But in a world that is divided over everything,
God calls his church to stand strong together
and to show the world what the love
and the unity of God is all about.
And I believe that's a large part of what it is that God has
for us in the season moving forward.
This is not just a rearranging of rooms, okay?
Through God's sovereignty.
This is not just a rearranging of rooms.
This is a realigning of our hearts as a church family
from Genesis to Revelation.
You see God's heart for a unified people.
And so this week, what we're gonna do,
we're gonna take a deep dive into one of the clearest calls
of unity that you see in all of scripture,
Philippians chapter two.
Uh, in that, Paul writes, make my joy complete by being
of the same mind,
having the same love being in full accord and of one mind.
So if you have your Bibles, uh, go ahead
and turn to Philippians chapter two.
Uh, to give you a little bit of context,
Paul wrote this letter to the church in Philippi.
He wrote it from prison
where he's being held captive for sharing the gospel.
And he's writing it to a church that he started to,
a church that he loved deeply.
And he's encouraging them towards the things of God,
what God has for his people in the midst
of cultural pressure, persecution division.
And at, at a moment where standing firm in
unity came at a cost.
And so I think it's so appropriate for us
to take a look at this, uh, this weekend
as a church family together.
Uh, before I start reading, we're gonna go
through 16 verses one through 16.
I do wanna give you an outline. I know some
of your note takers, and so I'm gonna give you an
outline of what's covered by Paul.
It's kind of, we're gonna look at it in three chunks.
The first Paul gives us a call to unity.
Secondly, he looks in at an example of unity.
And then we'll wrap up by looking at the result of unity.
So we'll start out, we'll look at the call
Philippians chapter two.
It says, so if there's any encouragement in Christ,
any comfort from love, any participation in the spirit,
any affection and sympathy, he's saying, if you've received
anything from Jesus, so to us that hope,
if you've received anything from Jesus,
let it show up between you.
If you've been loved, love others.
If you've received comfort, comfort others.
If you've been served, serve others.
If you've enjoyed fellowship in the spirit,
protect fellowship with one another.
Do so at all costs. He gets to verse two.
He says, complete my joy by being of the same mind,
having the same love being in full accord and of one mind.
Understand unity. It, it's not sameness. Unity is oneness.
It's one heart, one purpose,
one direction it goes on.
He says, do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit,
but in humility, count others
more significant than yourselves.
Let each of you look not only to your own interests,
but also and to the interest of others.
Unity doesn't mean that we think alike on everything.
It means that we love alike in everything.
And that's good news
because unity doesn't, it doesn't erase diversity.
It redeems it. It's what happens when different people live
for one another with one purpose.
And so, as we talk about unity, as we step into this call,
uh, for unity that Paul gives to the church, I want you
to know when you fight for unity,
you actually step into a battlefield.
Uh, Jesus said in the gospel, specifically in the gospel
of the mark, he says, A house divided against itself
cannot stand.
It's true for nations. It's true for our families.
It's true for the church.
And I want you to, the, the devil knows
that he can't defeat the church, okay?
He knows that Jesus said very
clearly, I will build my church.
And the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
The tomb is empty. He's proved it.
Jesus has already won that battle. Can somebody say amen?
Amen. That is a battle that's won.
But the enemy can still distract.
He can still divide, he can discourage,
he can dismember the body.
He can cause division. And the truth is,
he's been running the same playbook for thousands of years.
Here's what the devil does. He isolates.
He pulls us out of community.
He makes us think that we're fine alone.
We see that in Genesis, uh, right out of the gate, Adam
and Eve aren't together.
The serpent shows up. He divides,
he turns believers against one another.
Um, Eve takes a bite of the fruit,
and then she gives some to Adam.
Um, first of all, he should have been there to,
to help prevent it in the first place.
God shows up on the scene and God
and Adam says, Hey, the woman you gave me,
she did it like it's her fault,
right outta the gate, same game plan.
He divides he'll distract, he'll do whatever he can do
to get our eyes off of Jesus and onto ourselves
because our personal opinions
and preferences are always right or maybe not.
And he causes destruction.
He'll ruin our witness through bitterness or pride.
That's the playbook. But here's the good news.
Christ did not just come to to counter Satan's schemes.
He's already defeated them.
Uh, Colossians chapter two, verse 15.
It says, he, he being Jesus, he disarmed the rulers
and the authorities and he put them to open shame
by triumphing over them.
So understand, when we fight for unity,
we're not fighting for unity.
We're not fighting for victory.
When we fight for unity, we're not fighting for victory.
We're fighting from victory.
We are standing on what it is that Jesus has already secured
for us and our lives.
So the enemy, he isolates, Jesus gathers
the enemy divides.
Jesus, unites the enemy distracts.
Jesus focuses us on the gospel. He says, remember me.
Remember who I am. Remember what I've done for you.
The enemy destroys and Jesus restores.
There is no man, no woman, no child who has ever gone so far
that they could escape the love and the grace and the mercy
and the hope that Jesus offers to us.
That's the power that we walk in.
And so Paul gives a call to unity
for those who are in Christ.
He says, have the same love being full
accord and of one mind.
Uh, I wanna show you what this looks like. Okay?
It's one thing to talk about unity.
It's another thing to actually see it.
So I've got some volunteers who have been voluntold.
They're gonna come out, we gotta go fast.
We don't have a whole lot of time. Let's
welcome these folks to the stage here.
Okay? Alright.
So we got here a tug of war rope
and, uh, we're gonna see
what it looks like when we've got folks
that are rowing in opposite directions.
Um, here's what I'm gonna say.
Unity doesn't happen with personal agendas. Okay?
So look, here's what we got. We got Rob Jones here.
So Rob is our creative director. He's a worship pastor.
So Rob's gonna be tempted to say, Hey,
the most important thing in the life
of the church is when we get together and worship.
Okay? Yeah. You got, yeah, you got Dave Nuity.
This is our marriage pastor.
He's gonna say, there is no program.
More people are clapping. He's like, there's no program.
More important than reengage for the life of marriage
or hope parents, or hope for parents.
I knew I could get Dave here
'cause I told him he could come on stage
and wear one of his t-shirts.
And look, uh, he's here.
This is Kelly Kelly's involved in our local
impact ministry here.
So like all things, uh, um, um, uh,
goodness gracious working in our schools, um,
fostering hope, everything with our food pantry,
Kelly's involved in Nestor, student pastor here.
He's gonna say, Hey, next gen ministry.
Next gen ministry is where it's at.
Uh, we got, look, we got all these,
but look, we got Doug Stride, apex campus pastor.
He's gonna say, apex is most important.
Matt, Curtis, we got big Texas back here in the bat.
He's gonna say, the Fuqua campus is where it is.
Now let's look what happens. We all get together
with our personal agendas.
I was told by two people, this is a really bad idea.
Um, somebody could get hurt.
And I told them before, if you get hurt, it just goes
to show what the bad things
that can happen when you're not unified.
Okay? So it's, um,
workers' comp will cover some of this stuff, okay?
On the count of three, let's see what this looks like.
1, 2, 3. There we go. Clap for him. Let's go.
Let's go, let's go. Let's go. Let's go. Come on, worship.
Come on, Fuqua. Let's go. Fuqua.
Okay, stop, stop, stop, stop. Stop, stop, stop.
Okay, enter.
Entertaining, entertaining.
Um, not the most efficient way to get from A to B. Okay?
Now, let's watch this. Everybody grab a hold of the rope.
Let's take a deep breath and let's just walk
10 feet this direction.
Let's see what happens. Hey, look at that.
No stress, no strain,
no pain, no injuries.
All right, look, let's stop, let's go 10 feet. Let's go.
Go 10 feet back the other direction.
Oh, look at us, look at us
brothers dwelling together in unity.
Alright, let's let them know you appreciate 'em.
So you get the point. Unity does not happen
with personal agendas.
It does, it doesn't. Unity happens with a commitment
to oneness as the church family, as a family of God.
We've gotta be committed to a oneness.
So we're called into it. How do we get after it?
Paul gives us an example of unity.
He says, have the mind among yourselves,
which is yours in Christ Jesus.
Anytime somebody says Jesus is the example,
I'm gonna be honest, I get a little bit nervous.
I'm like, okay, well now you've set the bar pretty high.
The Bible does tell us though, that, that, um,
when we place our, our trust in Jesus,
we have the Holy Spirit inside of us.
The same spirit of God that rose Jesus from the dead.
Is it work in us? He can be at work in our lives.
Is it work in our lives? He, so he says,
Jesus is the example, have the same mind among you,
which is yours in Christ Jesus,
who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality
with God, something to be grafted.
You ever met somebody that acted like
the universe revolved around them?
Oh yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, we've met that person.
Well, guess what? Uh,
actually the world does revolve around Jesus.
Okay? The Bible tells us it's through him
that all things were created.
And he says, he says, no, no, no.
He did not account quality with God,
something to be grasped.
But instead he emptied himself.
Look at this, by taking the form of a servant,
being born in the likeness of men
and being found in human form, he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to the point of death,
even death on a cross.
That's the example. Jesus, the king of the universe, the one
through whom everything was created, he had every right
to rule, but he chose to surf.
He he had every reason to stay in heaven,
that he chose to came near.
Can you imagine a king stepping off his throne,
setting his crown aside,
and then kneeling down to wash the feet of his servants?
That's Jesus. That's the king who stooped low to lift us up.
That's what unity looks like. It looks like humility.
It's not thinking less of yourself,
but thinking of yourself less pursuing humility.
It places others needs above your preferences.
And oftentimes just being honest
ahead of your own priorities.
And speaking of honesty, let, let's be honest with ourselves
for a minute, we hear a verse like that
and we're like, yeah, go Jesus.
Right? That's, that's the way to go.
But if we're honest with ourselves, we're, we're tempted
to think, but wait a minute, if I do
that, how do I get my way?
I mean, that's a real question.
If I do that, if I look out to others, if I serve even
to death, death on the cross, man,
who's gonna be looking out for number one,
who's gonna be looking out for me
and friends, I just wanna tell you what I'm doing.
And at hope we stand on the word of God.
All I'm doing is reading the pages, uh,
the words off the pages of the word of God.
And at the end of the day, the reality is we either believe
that our way is better,
or we believe that his way is better.
And oftentimes those things are gonna compete
and we've gotta make a decision.
But here's, here's what I do know from, from close
to three decades of following Jesus.
When we follow Jesus' example to stoop low to serve,
he takes responsibility for lifting up
what needs to be lifted up.
And you could have confidence in that
because you have a good savior.
And so I wanna give us some time to reflect.
I want you to ask yourself, where am I clinging to my rights
when Christ is calling me to release him?
Where am I grasping for control
when he is calling me to serve?
Where am I bringing unity
or disunity in your marriage where you work?
Maybe you're in high school or college on your sports team.
Goodness gracious, this'll preach to a football team.
Uh, how about your HOA you bringing unity to your HOA
Lord knows they could use it.
I I intentionally live in Garner.
We don't have those out there. We don't have HOAs.
I, my, my neighborhood, uh, there's a guy
who lives right across the street from me.
And I'm not kidding, for seven years,
he had about 11 cars in his front yard.
And, uh, people would kind of walk by
and they'd see me working out in the front
yard taking care of my lawn.
And they're like, does that gonna ever bother you?
I'm like, you know what? No. You know why?
Because he paid for that dirt.
He can do whatever he wants to on that dirt.
And you know why I think that? Well, you know,
I'm happy about that because I don't want nobody coming over
here and telling me what to do on my piece of dirt.
So I'm okay with it. Now, I know some of y'all
who live in care, you're like, I don't
know if that guy could be my pastor.
We keep things neat and
clean over here, and this is what we do.
That's okay. We can find unity in our differences.
All right? It's not a big deal.
But for as for me and for my house,
we're gonna live in Garner, no HOAs
That's taking scripture outta context.
And I repent. Uh, Paul calls us
to have the same mind of Jesus.
The best way for us to do that is to stop
and remember as Paul highlighted
how Jesus sacrificed for us.
And so here's what we're gonna do. If Paul gives us a call
to Unity, and if he says, Hey,
take on the same mind as Christ Jesus.
And then, uh, remember his example, what we're gonna do,
we're actually gonna remember his example together.
And I know as a church family, we took communion last week.
I just can't sprint through this passage
of scripture saying like, this is the turning point.
Uh, look to Jesus as the example,
and then us actually not take time to remember.
And so, um, what we're gonna do,
we're gonna stop right now across our two campuses,
across all of our communities that are represented.
And we're gonna remember how this was modeled for all of us.
Uh, last week at Raleigh, when we took communion together.
Uh, I read from one Corinthians chapter 10, verse 17.
It says, because there is one bread, we who are many
or one body for, we all partake of the one bread.
When we take the bread and the cup together, we declare that
what unites us is greater than anything that can divide us.
Any political party, any race,
any socioeconomic status,
what unites us is greater than what can divide us.
So whether you're here from Fuqua or Garner
or Northwest Care, or Apex or Raleigh or Holly Springs or,
or there is one table, there is one bread,
there is one family, and there's one savior.
And so if you have the elements, uh, I wanna encourage you,
uh, across our campuses, take this out.
And I'd like to remind you, um, we see in the gospels,
specifically in Luke, um, the night
before Jesus' crucifixion, he's sitting around the table
with his disciples and he passes around the bread.
And he said, this, this bread is my body
and it's gonna be broken for you.
And so what I want you to do, I want you
to open that up if you haven't already.
And I want you to take The wafer,
which represents the body of Christ.
And I want you to remember Jesus' body being broken for you
and not just broken for you,
but broken for every other man, woman,
and student that's in the room that you're in right now,
across both of our campuses,
and ultimately every Christ follower on planet Earth.
And as you're ready, let's take and eat.
And likewise, you pass around the cup.
He said, this wine, it, it
represents my blood of the new covenant.
And so every time you take
and drink, do so and remem it to me.
And so before you take and drink, I i want you
to remember Christ's blood that was shed for you,
that was shed for me, that was shed for every man, woman,
and student that's in the room that you're in right now.
And you're with us at our Apex campus
and want you to, I want us to recognize the unity
and the oneness that is available to us through the death
and resurrection of Jesus.
As you're ready, take and drink.
Jesus, we thank you for making us one
Lord, I pray that you would forgive us for
where we've allowed division
to creep in To the body.
Lord, I pray for personal forgiveness in my own life.
We've had a lot of tough decisions
to make over the last few months.
Lot of hard conversations.
I'm certain that I haven't gotten
everything right along the way.
Lord, I see leaders in scripture confessing
sins on behalf of their people.
And so, Lord, I say, forgive us
of our sins at Hope Community Church for moments
of division of dissension.
Father, I pray that as you pray, Jesus in John 17,
that you would make us one as you and the Father are one.
Lord, we love you, and we pray and ask.
He sings in Jesus name. Amen. We're not done yet.
We're not done yet. Um, we've read a call to Unity.
We've been reminded of the example of unity.
So what's the result? Uh, let's jump over to verse 15.
Actually, we're gonna start in verse 14.
So Philippians chapter two, verse 14, it says,
do all things without grumbling or disputing.
Um, I'm gonna read
that one more time for the people in the back.
Okay? Do all things,
do all things, do all things
without grumbling or disputing.
Why? Why do we do that?
So that you may be blameless
and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst
of a crooked and twisted generation among whom you shine
as lights of the world, Um,
do all things without grumbling
or disputing that you may be blameless
and innocent children of God without blemish.
Do you know that you were created in
the image of a triune God?
That's what the Bible tells us in Genesis, father, son,
holy Spirit, when try to explain this, um, the,
the Trinity has forever existed, father, son,
and Holy Spirit, um, for eternity past
and will exist for eternity forward in perfect unity,
perfect harmony, perfect love, perfect submission.
You were created our, I was created in that image.
We as the body of Christ, show a picture of Jesus
to the world through that image, in part through our unity.
So what Paul is saying here is, do this so
that you may be blameless
and innocent children of God without blemish in the midst
of a crooked and twisted generation
among whom you shall shine as light in the world.
What, what he's saying here is when the church walks in
unity, the world sees Jesus clearly.
John 17, I referenced this earlier in, in my prayer.
Jesus prays for unity in one
of his final prayers before the cross.
And he says, father, I pray that they may all be one as you
and I are one, so that the world may believe
that you sent me Jesus tied our witness to our oneness.
How the world sees Jesus is gonna be impacted
by how unified we are.
There's another result, uh, of our unity as well.
I want us to see, um, Psalm 1 33.
Short little psalm so powerful.
In fact, uh, someone put a note about this, uh,
a little devotion on our Apex campus Facebook page.
So it was so good. I I don't have time
to get into all that, but this is what it says.
And this is King David here talking about unity.
He says, behold how good
and pleasant it is when brothers dwell together in unity,
he says, it's good, it's pleasant, it's peaceful.
What's it like, David? It's like the precious oil on the
head running down on the beard, on the beard
of Aaron running down on the collar of his robes.
Uh, this is a picture of a, a consecrated priest, like holy,
completely forgiven.
He's saying it's anointed, it's sacred, it's holy.
There's something about unity that shows a picture
of God that's anointed.
It's sacred and holy. And then he goes on to verse three.
He says, it's like the dew of Herman,
which falls on the mountains of Zion.
It's like water in the desert.
And he finishes, he says, for there the Lord has commanded
the blessing life forevermore.
It's what God blesses. He says, how good and pleasant it is.
When brothers dwell together in unity,
it's like sustenance for your soul.
The Lord commands his blessing.
Unity is where God commands his blessing.
Now, when I say a blessing,
you might be like, okay, what does that mean?
Does that mean if we're unified, I'm gonna get a new car?
It doesn't mean that, But what if
the blessing that comes from unity
is just the unity itself in a world
that doesn't experience it at all?
What if there's just something about how we were created
that we will never experience the life that Jesus came
to make available unless we pursue,
actively pursue in humility, unity in our lives?
And if you hear me say that
and you're like, I don't even know if that's possible,
maybe you've actually never experienced it,
the result of of our unity, it's the blessing of God.
And it's a divided world, seeing a picture of Jesus.
Unity isn't a strategy, it's not a goal.
Unity is a spiritual necessity for ourselves
to experience the blessing of God
that he created us to experience.
And for the world to know the gospel of Jesus.
I'm gonna tell you right now, it makes
your relationships better.
Humility and peace. It always beats pride
and conflict all day long.
It makes our church stronger.
The United Church, it's unstoppable in love and mission.
It makes our world brighter
because when we love one another, people see Jesus.
So lemme ask you a question.
What are the areas in your life where you're tempted
to not pursue unity?
I wanna encourage you this week, spend some time,
ask the Holy Spirit, say, God, uh,
you might not even know about the Holy Spirit.
That's okay. Go to God.
Say God, please reveal to me the areas in my life
where I'm not pursuing unity.
'cause I wanna experience your blessing in my life.
I want the world to know Jesus.
'cause what's at stake is the blessing of God in our lives
and the witness of Jesus to the world.
So we have a call to unity.
We have an example and we know the result.
So here's what I want in this next season.
One church, multiple communities, two locations.
Let's just not attend church together.
Let's move on mission together. Let's serve side by side.
Let's give generously. Let's love deeply.
Let's be a people that reflect the unity
of the God that we worship.
Because when the wall,
when the church walks in unity together,
the world sees Jesus clearly, I know that we can agree that
what the world needs right now is
to see a clear picture of Jesus.
And so here's what I want us to do In the next 30 days,
I want you to make a commitment
to strengthen the unity within the family of hope.
A few things I wanna encourage you
to commit to serving twice a month.
I mean, look, when when we look at what it says about Jesus,
he said, have this mind among you, which is those
of Christ Jesus, who though was in the form of God,
did not count equality with God something to be grasped.
He emptied himself by taking on the form of a servant.
Man, if we're gonna pursue this unity thing,
it's gonna take, we've all got roles
and responsibilities to serve the body of Christ.
Maybe you can show some love, um, by inviting someone to sit
with you next Sunday.
Maybe it's someone from a mobile campus
and they're still like, I don't know if I'm gonna try
to find another church in my community with the, if that's
what God's calling me to do, that's great.
But maybe invite 'em over.
Maybe it's somebody who's never been to hope before.
I wanna encourage you to consider maybe giving
to the first time, or if you're already giving,
maybe growing in your generosity towards what it is
that God is doing through the family of God at Hope.
Know, a few months back, I, I challenged the church like,
Hey, if, if, if every person who calls Hope Home
would just give 500 additional dollars between then
and the end of the year, this is the impact it would make.
And I'm here to tell you, and I'm proud of this, uh,
there's been some folks that have jumped in on that
and we've seen a change in kinda
where our forecasting contributions are headed to the end
of the year that's gonna enable us to hit 2026, uh,
a bit more where we want to be.
But I will tell you this, it's definitely not everybody.
And I don't say that to guilt anybody. I I really don't.
I know that we're all in different places financially,
but I do know that if we're a church that's striving
for unity together, it is gonna cost us something.
I do know that following
after God is recognizing that the blessings
that we have in our lives have been given
to us to bless others.
And so I wanna encourage you to consider it.
I wanna encourage you to show hospitality.
We've got new folks showing up at Raleigh and Apex.
Maybe you've never seen them before.
Show hospitality by committing
to learn one person's name every single weekend.
What if, what if we were a church
that somebody new could not show up without somebody
introducing themselves to
what if we were that kind of church?
The world needs right now, a family of God that will shine
as Paul wrote as lights in the world.
So moving forward, let's continue.
And look, I'm talking to a church
and I, I know we're unified, we're in on all this stuff.
But in a world that's divided right now,
I don't know that it can be more important.
Let's love, let's serve, let's forgive, let's walk humbly so
that through us, the world may see the life
that Jesus came to make available.
You pray with me, father Lord, I thank you
for your word Jesus.
I pray that you would give us your mindset, humble,
gentle, selfless, obedient.
Teach us not to look to our own self-interest.
Lord, it's so hard. We got a world
that's throwing stuff at us all the time.
We got a world that saying, Hey, we got, we got social media
that telling us that everybody in the world agrees with us
and we're a hundred percent right.
Lord, help us to see your word.
I pray that your word would root down into our
soul, Lord.
And it would be like a spring that comes out of us
Lord, both for the blessing that we, uh,
that we have available to us through your goodness,
but also for the sake of the world coming to know the hope
that we have in Jesus.
Lord, we love you and we pray and ask all these things
and the powerful name and the unifying name of Jesus,
and all God's people said together.
Amen. Amen.
Church, Would you stand and sing to the only one who's
and I
and
Who
and
who else is?
Come on. If you believe that Jesus is the only one worthy
of praise and honor and glory, lift your voices.
Put your hands together. Lift a shadow of
God is doing a new thing in his church here.
Hope Community Church around the world, the church
of Jesus Christ is strong because our king and Savior is
Seated on the throne and
Forever and ever, his church will get together
and declare that
He is Worthy.
And that is good news for us today.
Church, such a good thing to be together, to be united.
Whether you're in person
or online, it's a good thing to be together
to lift up the name of Jesus.
If you knew welcome, if you're online,
you can drop new into the chat.
We'd love to get you plugged in to all the things
that God is up to here at Hope Community Church.
And listen, this weekend's a big deal across all
of our campus, all the things
that your part's moving mob campuses coming into
Raleigh and Apex.
And we don't want people to get lost in the shovel.
So if you're attending a Raleigh campus specifically,
we want you to text the word Raleigh to 7 2 9 8 9.
We wanna know where people landed so
that we can keep you connected and keep you plugged in
because we are a family who loves God follows Jesus
and shares hope.
Hope we love you and we'll see you next week.