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How do you read the Bible and become a daily Bible reader? A rich African man knows. Will you listen to his encouragement? In today's message, Pastor Mike Novotny digs into this.
The episodes are the weekly sermons from 922 Ministries (St. Peter and The CORE) of Appleton, Wisconsin.
How To
Week 4 - The CORE
Pastor Mike Novotny
Good morning everyone. Happy Sunday and welcome to another installment of our series. How to of her jump into quick announcements number one, Pastor Michael didn't see it today. But if you were here last week he said that he has received a call for a really interesting, really important position. He'd be amazing at kind of training up the generation of pastors not just here in America but around the world. So cool opportunity. He'd be a great fit for it. He is a great fit here. So he's got a tough decision to make so if you haven't been praying for Pastor Michael. Make sure you pray for him.
Buy him a puppy, bribe him to stay and just ask God. Now we know they're both good decisions. He's gonna be a blessing if he stays. God's going to take care of us if he goes too.. Make sure you pray for Pastor Michael. And also number two real quick. Last Week if you were here, we had a sermon about generosity and volunteering about giving generously from your hearts. If you would actually go in the lobby, you would see that we set a goal as a church in 12 months, to try to add 150 new volunteers to both of our campuses. And I'm super jacked to report to you after last week's message on both of our campuses. We received 152 people who said they would volunteer. Yes, super, super cool. Actually, you need to look at the bag. There's Christopher and Alejandro. It's their first time volunteering today. So give them a round of applause. Thank you, gentlemen. You guys rock. There's one more big announcement. I'm going to give to you after the sermon has done. So stay awake, don't leave. But first, let's talk about Jesus. I found this great quote the other day that I wanted to share with you. I'll put it up on the screen. The quote was this, “The Bible is easy to understand, unquote”.
Don't say that. I'll show you no one ever. I should say, firstly, I love the Bible as a church. We are infatuated with the Bible. I've been reading the Bible almost every day for the past quarter Century, but I gotta admit what a lot of you have experienced, is that the Bible might be the good book, but it's a hard book. It's a long book. It's an old book, there's weird words in it, names in it. There's a Habakkuk and a Nebuchadnezzar, there's Old Testament and New, there's Apostles and Prophets. And if you're kind of new to it, never deeply studied it. It might be this life-changing book but not every time you read it in the Bible. So powerful it can get straight to your heart and change your life. Or it can go straight over your head and make zero changes in your life. There's been pages of the Bible and parts of it that I've read and it's just hit me. And I said, huh? And there's been other parts of it that I've read where I said, huh? The Bible can be so good. It can make you want to read it every single day or it can be so baffling and seemingly useless that you stop reading it day after day. The Bible says things that we treasure at our church, but let's not give the impression that it's a simple thing to do in church, pastors like me, say the Bible, the Bible, the Bible you should read the Bible. If you're dating someone you should read the Bible together. If you have kids, you should read the Bible to them. When you get up in the morning before you go to bed and I come to church, read the Bible, go to a Bible class and then some of you actually take that step. And the first time you actually try to do it. It is not an amazing experience. You have more questions than answers. More things confuse you than help you. I'm actually that's exactly what happened to me. When I was in high school, I think maybe a freshman 14, 15 years old. I decided I was going to read the Bible from cover to cover and she had a notebook. Or I remember writing like little boxes for all the chapters and I didn't I read a chapter, I check the box, has made me very happy. Just because I read it, didn't mean, I understood it. In fact, there were huge things on the very first pages that as a teenager completely baffled me.
I thought to myself like I'm page 3, if God knows everything and if God loves everyone, why in the world, would he put this tree in the middle of the garden for Adam and Eve to eat the fruit and mess up everything? I mean he had to know that was going to happen. So why did he do it? That confuses me. And I got to all the stories of all the good guys, the heroes, the God's chosen people who were sleeping with multiple women at the same time and I was just a public school kid, but I thought God's not for that. Is he like, multiple baby daddy's sleeping with this girl and her sister and both of their maid servants? What? I don't know what to make of that. And then I got to the stories of Moses and Joshua and the promised land and the walls of Jericho. And it's you know, it's nice when you're a kid but then you think about it. Wait, God's people like rolled up to ancient Israel and they wiped out all the native inhabitants isn't that wrong?
Genocide is bad. And I'm question after question, after question. It wasn't just the weird names and Bible facts I had to learn. It was like, huge concepts about the Good Book. It didn't seem all that great the first time I read it, and maybe the same thing has happened to you. I'm just curious how many of you have ever like opened up a Bible and tried to read at least a page or two of it and a whole bunch of it won't make sense. You can raise your hand to ask if you finished. You know, for a lot of people they get to the Book of Leviticus and then like boom, their Bible reading plan is over. There's challenging parts of the Bible that I can almost guarantee, you're not going to get it the first time you read it. And that could be a problem.
It doesn't have to be a problem.
I mean, honestly, if there's something that I would say in our church service say that completely goes over your head. As soon as church is done, you could turn to the person next to you and say, hey, can you explain to me what that was about? Problem solved. That you could read your Bible and send an email to the pastor. You can reach out to a Christian relative or friend. You can take a little white card in your bulletin and write down your question. One of our pastors would love to answer it in the days to come. I mean honestly if you don't get it, if you would just admit it, problem solved. But it's not quite that easy. Is it?
See if there's something that happens when you don't get it up here. That starts to simmer down here. When you kind of look around and everyone is praising Jesus or you're at a Bible study and everyone is chiming in what they got out of the reading and you just have no clue. There's something actually very powerful and emotional. That happens in here. It's going to sound silly when I say it, but it is an immense emotion that can mess with your faith. You feel Dumb if you’re behind.
You feel like you must not be a church person or a Bible person because these people apparently loved the book but you, you don't. Here's why I say that I've never been in a place where someone kind of raises a shaking, timid hand and how do they ask their question, what do they say? This is probably a dumb question. I got to ask you why would we say that?
If you don't know something, and if no one's taught you, something why would that make it dumb?
Why would it have to act like we're idiots or we're interrupting or were annoying over less than intelligent? Just because noise answers these really valid questions about the Bible are about God. I think that intro to our questions actually proof that we feel when we don't get the Bible, we feel dumb. And so when we take that plunge and we join a group or we sign up for the church study, We join Starting Point or a church reading plan as soon as it happens that we don't get it. There's something that actually. Holds down our hand. So we don't ask our questions. And even though there's people right around us, you could probably provide some pretty decent answers, were scared to ask because we were afraid that they're going to think we're dumb. We're interrupting, we're idiots. And so we just stuff it.
And that's the problem.
Write this down. If you're taking notes, I think the primary problem we have is not what the Bible itself, but it's this statement when we don't get it. We don't admit it.
And when you do that and if you do that, I can almost guarantee here's what's going to happen. You'll give the Bible a chance or you'll start coming to church.
You'll miss most of it. And eventually, if you're not getting anything out of it, You'll give up on it, right? You don't got enough time to just waste an hour going to a place when you don't get it, you don't get anything out of it. As you give up on it, you might join the first week or two of Bible study but then everyone is so far ahead, you'll slowly quit. You might come to church with your roommate, your coworker, or your teammates, or your girlfriend. But if you're like, I do, its just not my thing. You'll give up on it. If you don't get it and you don't admit it, you'll eventually give up on it all together. And that's why today I want to change that we're in the sermon series called how to. And we're essentially learning the really practical Basics on how to do the most important habits of the Christian faith. How do you do Church? How do you live in a community? How do you volunteer and become a generous person? Well, today I'm gonna try to answer this really simple question. How do you Bible
All right, well, this Bible and church Bible at home. A Bible class A group that you join, how do you do that? The best way. And I'm not just saying this to try to keep your attention but what I get to share with you today contains one of my favorite Bible passages in the entire book. Actually when we get to it I'm going to have you like give me a drumroll on your leg so it just warm up your hands, those race. If you need to because what we're about to discover is this man from Africa,
Whoo. The bravest, wisest, humblest mouth faith exalting question today. I want to tell you his story and hope that you imitate him so that you learn how to Bible. So, if you have a Bible with you on your phone and your hands, you just want to follow along on the screen, we're gonna be in Acts chapter 8 today. And here's how the story begins.
Now, an angel of the Lord said to Philip who was a first century Christian, go south to the road, the desert road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. Phillip’s started out and on his way, he met an Ethiopian eunuch, an important official in charge of all the treasury of the Candace, which means Queen of the Ethiopians.
Full disclosure. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. I asked Pastor Michael before church. Here's what he told me. He said just pronounce it with confidence. No one else knows all right the kondik of the Condor K. I don't know how you say the cat. Oh here's what it means. The queen of the Ethiopians. Thank you book of Acts. This man, the Ethiopian had gone to Jerusalem to worship and on his way home was sitting in his chariot, reading the book of Isaiah, the prophet. So we're looking at maybe late 30s AD on the dusty 1000 Mile Road that stretched from Jerusalem down to ancient Ethiopia, modern Sudan, two men, meet
One of them knows the Bible and one of them doesn't.
So, here's Philip the Lord speaks to him and we find out actually two pages earlier in the book of Acts that Philip is quotes full of faith and the Holy Spirit. Right, so he knows Jesus. He follows Jesus, his heart is full of Jesus, he's kind of ten steps down the road when it comes to knowledge of the Bible. But not the Ethiopian
We got a couple things about this, man, we know he's from Ethiopia in the first century that would have been like, well, maybe modern Ethiopia may be modern Sudan. We know that he's a eunuch. Kids, ask your dad's about that when you get home. And we know that he's important because it says he was important, it was an important official in charge of all, not some, but all of the treasury of the Candace he is like the Secretary of the Treasury for the queen of ancient Ethiopia.
A, my assumption is that means he's a very intelligent man. Right? You don't end up as Secretary of the Treasury if you flunk math class. So he is, he's smart. He's accomplished, he's professional. I mean, he's driving in a chariot like the company chariot. The queen probably gave him this. And get this, he has his own copy of the book of Isaiah. Now, you and I might not think much of that. Everyone's got a Bible these days, you can get one for free in the church lobby, but imagine this the first century, this is pre-printing press. How many people would have owned any Bible? Like most of the Scrolls would have been stored at like ancient Jewish synagogues. The fact that this man has his own copy tells you that he's rich, he's powerful. He's a man of means and he's very serious about his faith. Not only did he travel a thousand miles to worship in Jerusalem? No air conditioning. No shocks on the Chariots. No coach bus, right? No flight. 1,000 miles to worship on the way home. He's not just checking the church box. He's studying the Bible because he wants to get it. But here's the problem just because you got a Bible. Doesn't mean you get the Bible.
Let's keep reading. Verse 29, the Spirit told Philip “go to that chariot and stay near it then. Philip ran off to the Chariot and he heard the man reading Isaiah the prophet. You understand what you're reading till the past. Now maybe it's just me but I think this is try to picture what's happening in this moment. The holy spirit says to Philip. Hey go go talk to that guy. And it says so Philip ran up to the Chariot which is in my I think this is the first ever example of a 5K event.
Tourism, right? So Philip rolls up. I think the chariot is still rolling. The guy kind of looks at him funny while he was reading and Philip says, hey, I'm not gonna do this also because I feel like I don't understand what you're reading. Actually, interesting in the Greek language that the book of Acts was written in, Philip asked the question in a way that expects a negative answer, Probably better. Isolation would be, you don't understand what you're reading. Do you?
I want you to take a timeout for just one second, and imagine you're the Ethiopian. You're powerful, you're accomplished, you're polished. You're used to making a good impression. Then suddenly out of nowhere, this random stranger. You have no clue who he is rolls up. Maybe he's a little bit sweaty and instead of asking your name or saying his name or making small talk about the road or the weather or whatever. His very first line is this direct exposing kind of offensive and potentially embarrassing question. You don't understand the Bible, do you?
If you're open, what would you have said?
Dude, I'm good. Yeah, thanks get the horse. You go faster and I'll run, this man fell off. I mean, it was such an exposing question. He must have felt like, so like who are you to call me out? He had every opportunity to blow Philip off but instead he didn't. Instead, what he says, is so good. And here's where the drumroll comes in. Are you ready for it? All right, I need you to get out both hands, put on your pants, your coffees and keep going, cuz I'm about to read to you. Acts 8:31. This is a verse that could change some of your lives. Are you ready for it? Because here's what it says. How can I, the Ethiopiann said, unless someone explains it to me? Oh, That is so brilliant. How can I? How can I understand the Bible unless someone explains it to me? I studied economics, but I didn't study the Bible. How can I understand unless someone explains it to me. I'm rich. I've done a lot in my career, but that doesn't mean I know a lot about God. How can I, unless someone explains it to me, you sir seem like, you get it. So why don't you get up here and help me get it. So, the Ethiopian invited Philip to come up and sit with him. That. This is like a fork in the road moment for his faith. Right. He could have faked it. He could have tried to impress this stranger to understand what you're reading. Yeah. Yeah. I got it. Thanks, I'm good.
Didn't he risk the embarrassment. He risks being exposed as a man who is not as put together as he seemed. He was humble and brave enough to say, I'm never going to understand this as hard as I try. Unless someone like you helps And man was God, ready to bless him verse 32? This is the passage of Scripture. The eunuch was reading. He was led like a sheep to the slaughter. And as a lamb before it's shearer is silent. So he did not open his mouth. His humiliation. He was deprived of justice, who can speak of his descendants for his life was taken from the Earth. The eunuch asked Phillip tell me please who is the prophet talking about, himself or someone else? Then Philip began with that very passage of Scripture and told him the good news about Jesus. If you don't know, this is Isaiah chapter 53. Some people think it's the most beautiful description of the death and resurrection of Jesus in the entire Old Testament. It was predicted 700 years before it happened, but because there wasn't a name. The Ethiopian didn't know what to make of what he’s reading and you know, it was important. Wait, he? Who's he? He's going to take my sins, he's going to be slaughtered, like a sacrificial lamb. He's not going to call his lawyer or demand, just as he's going to take the punishment in my place to give me. Peace, please tell me is this Isaiah? Who's the he? And Phillip smile, pretty big. He is Jesus.
Yeah, man. This was written 700 years ago. But do you know what happened? Just a few years ago in the city. You were just in the city of Jerusalem. This actually came true. He walked among us, Jesus of Nazareth, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, and there are side by side on this dusty, road leading back to Africa. Philip sharing the Good News. The Ethiopian learned things, he didn't know and by the end of the story, the man is baptized rejoicing and happier than he's ever been in his life about his relationship with God.
So what do we learn from this story? Grab your pen, to write this up. We learn this simple fact, if you don't get it, just admit it.
Alright the next time you're reading your Bible you sit in church. You're at a group, you're at a class whenever you don't get it. Have the courage to admit it. Don't try to impress the pastor, don't try to seem like you're all put together. That's not the purpose of people studying the Bible together. You might feel dumb, or embarrassed or ashamed that feeling does not come from God. When you don't get it, just admit it. Because if you admit it, you'll get it and if you get it, you get Jesus. And if you get Jesus, You get the joy of knowing you're forgiven and loved by God. Or if I had to summarize this whole sermon into emojis, it would be this.
All right, is that right? It gives me time to read the Bible. Like, I have no clue what this means. And your instinctive answer that God wants to put in your heart is just I don't know what this means, right. Don't fake it, don't front it. Just admit it. That's why we're here.
Actually it makes me think of this book. I mentioned before, when I was 15, I was tempted to read the Bible. I did read it. I did not get it. But thankfully, God put a fill up into my life. My pastor from up in Green Bay, Wisconsin. I'm not sure if I annoyed him, I don't think I did, but as I was reading, I just grabbed a pen or a pencil and just in my Bible, put question, question, question. And every few months, I would set up a time to go to my pastor's office, and I would just machine gun questions at my pastor. And I'll tell you what, you know what, he never said to me, “You idiot.” Apparently he had had those same questions. Many people in his church had the same questions and it was easy for him to answer. Almost all of my questions. He gave me books like this one, an old book called “When Skeptics Ask”, I wondered. Well, where did the Bible come from? And isn't it possible the Bible got changed and how do you know the Bible is right? And all these other holy books are wrong. And what about this? And what about that? And let me read things like this and I started to learn and I start to learn, they had more questions and I brought them to him and he gave me more answers and he was so gracious, just like Phillip, to sit by my side that what I had the devil might have wanted to shut me up and tell me. Don't look dumb. My pastor was so gracious to help me get it. Because he helped me get it. I get so much out of the book that I haven't stopped reading it since
So here's a big question. Do you think there's anyone like my pastor or like to fill up? Who's in church today?
Do you think literally you don't have to get your chariot hooked up and take the road down to ancient Ethiopia? Do you think there's someone sitting next to you and your role and your section who already knows the answers to your biggest spiritual questions?
Let's do a quick stand up, sit down quiz, you ready for it? I would like you to stand up if you've been going to church pretty much most Sundays for, at least five years. If that's you, would you stand up, five years of church attendance,
I love it. Thank you very much. You can sit down. Would you stand up if you have read, are going to work out today. Some of you, if you have read about the life of Jesus, in The Gospel of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, if you've read all four gospels, would you stand up right now?
Amazing. All right, sit down. Question number three. If you've actually read the entire New Testament. Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1st Corinthians all the way through the Book of Revelation. You've read the entire New Testament, the last third of the Bible. Would you stand up right now?
Got to be at least 40 of you in one Church. Sit down last big question. All right, I'm curious about this one. How many of you have ever read cover to cover Genesis to Revelation, everything that the Holy Spirit inspired? If you've read the entire Bible, would you please stand right now?
I'm counting 40 to 50. Min 58 people. You can sit down. Thank you friends, 58 people in One Church service. 58 people who've gone from cover to cover. Who've read the same passage. Probably had the same question, search for answers and I bet you a cup of coffee and my favorite Bible. If you ask one of those people after church, the thing you've been wondering about God, they would not shame you. And they would not mock you and they would not be annoyed with you Christians, who have understood things about. God, love to share them with people who don't understand things about. God, it is so simple. The answer is right here if you don't get it. Just admit it.
Let me make this really practical for you. If you're brand-new to church. If you've never ever read much of the Bible before, what do you do number one, get a Bible, firstly. I should have planned this better. Well, I think we have six paper copies for free in the lobby if you want to like Black Friday at Walmart, it's like to get one of those afterwards. Don't hurt each other, you can grab one of those. Otherwise, there's always the Bible app, the YouVersion Bible app, YOU. It's what a lot of people use to read the Bible around here that's for free that you could download. Maybe, you know, our church is launching an all Church reading plan through the Book of Revelation. If you do, that's going to give you some structure. Some communities, some extra teaching and resources to help answer your questions you could do that.
Have your brand brand new to everything. You might just want to read about the life of Jesus. Let's say the Gospel of Luke, you can just read those, you could do it. I think, in two or three hours, you can have that done understand the life of Jesus. But whatever you do, write paper Bible, digital Bible, Church reading plan, your own plan, whatever you do, please make me this promise.
When you don't get it. Don't just keep going.
Write it down, keep a notebook, a note on your phone and then reach out to a friend, ask your relative who's so religious, ask them, ask me, write it down, put it on the card, send us an e-mail because listen, the reason we are here as Christians. The reason God has gathered us in the same place, is not to compete with each other.
Okay. This is not like Jeopardy, Church Edition and a bunch of you are going to be losers who are going home. And one of us will be the smartest ever like, know that early the Reason God brought you here, and the reason he brought them here was so that if they're up here, they can get you here. You don't know the beauty of the word justification or redemption or atonement. These are foreign concepts to you, like don't run because you sense the gap, that's the gift, right? The gap is God's gift to you. It means there are people right next to you who can help you grow in faith and knowledge of Jesus.
Because at the end of the day, now, we want you to know about Jesus.
If you feel pain that day was reading Isaiah 53, which means he would have read these very words. But he was pierced for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities, the punishment that brought us, peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. Do you get that?
My heart is so happy that I know exactly what that means. I know who He is. Jesus. I know who the US is US. Pierced, crushed, punished, wounded. I know what that means. And I know the gift that's offered to me to you through, Jesus, the punishment that brought us peace was on Him and by His wounds. We are healed if there's one thing I want you to get out of the Bible, it's not memorizing, the books in order. I want you to get that by the wounds of Jesus. You've been healed. That you and God because of Jesus are like this. Not this. This. Like this.
There's one thing in the universe God wants you to know. It's that if you get Jesus, you get forgiveness. If you got Jesus, you got salvation. And so if these words go over your head, please, please. Please, I'm begging you, just admit it. Because just like Philip, we Christians would love to get in the Chariot and share with you the greatest news in the whole world.
A couple months ago, I met a young woman who just became a Christian. She shared her journey of faith with me, the million questions she had when she first started reading the Bible, and then she told me about this illustrated book that she loved. It was a book about a mole, a fox, a boy and a horse who teach each other the lessons of life. And I bought the book after she recommended it because she said, there's this one page. That was so powerful for her. It's when the boy turns to this big strong horse and he asked the horse. What's the bravest thing you've ever said?
And a big strong horse answers with just one word, “Help”.
Prince, the bravest. Most powerful spiritual word you will ever speak.
His help. Help me get it. If you don't get it, just admit it because that's how you get it. That's how you Bible.
That's great. Oh God, we are so grateful for this book. But how do we know that you love us, that you listen to us, that you have plans for us? If it wasn't for the book we'd have to guess what God or the gods were like but we don't. Are you revealed in 66 books written over 1,500 years by dozens of different authors who had this unified message that you loved the world so much you sent your son who was pierced for our transgressions, was punished so that we could have peace with you? I thank you Father for this revealed knowledge, this book is not easy, but it is profound. It is not shallow. It is so deep that we can explore it like the ocean until the day that we die. So I'm grateful today God for the gift of the Bible and I'm so grateful for the people that you brought here on this very day.
So, We're here just to open some eyes that people would realize though, their answers and they're not far away. You'd have to Google it. It's got to ask the guy next to you. And so, I pray. God for courage, May everyone. Who's listening today, overcome that spirit of fear, embarrassment, and hesitation, may they just admit it that all of us could grow in Jesus together. That's what you want so we want and so we're praying for that today. God may be done for your glory and the good of your people and for the song in Jesus name. Amen.