Men and women.
Friends, I want to again just add my welcome.
I would love to be able to connect with you and you with us.
These connect cards are a great way to stay connected with us.
Give us any information that would be important for us to know
of what's going on in your life.
Prayer requests please use those.
Make available yourself to those.
I know we bring a lot of stuff in to to Sunday mornings.
We carry the week with us.
And so if you are in need of prayer,
we there's people in this church with prayer lanyards.
Take advantage of that.
Let them intercede on your behalf before
God and be encouraged and strengthened in that.
Also make sure that as you move through today that you're smiling at somebody.
Here's what I know.
I know sometimes some people come to church
and this is the only smile they get.
I know sometimes you come to church hoping someone will give you a smile
and and so let's make sure we're doing that.
This was a great week in the life of our church.
We went through VBS all last week.
I want you to pay these numbers two, 68, 86, 21, 25, 41, 96.
Here's what that means 268 kids registered, 86 volunteers, 21 decisions
and rededication, and $2,541.96
given to a very small, impoverished island.
First kids to have food.
So well done, church. Well done.
Tricia did a great job leading that
and her whole team did a great job leading that.
It was a great celebration and a great way for kids to get connected to Jesus.
Thank you for your investment in the kids of this community.
We have a little video I want you to to watch in just a moment.
We're going to be ready to go with that. Let's play that video.
Our feet on the ground, our eyes on the cup.
We're ready to serve. Never gonna give up.
We lead with love. When the game gets tough.
Shining for Jesus. That's more than enough.
Come on, let's look to the Lord and trust his way.
Cause he gives us strength every day.
Don't let him stay with just two young.
Stand tall, speak truth. Show love.
Come on.
Live right side by side.
With maybe the lie that the world can't see. Oh,
where a mission to set hearts free.
So when the whistle blows.
And it's time to start with. Play with courage.
With all our hearts.
With things get tough. We won't give in.
We dig down deep. Gonna go for the win.
Come on, let's look to the Lord and trust his way.
Cause he gives us strength every day.
Don't let him say we're just too young.
Stand tall.
Speak to show love.
Come on, live right side, right side with.
Gave me the lie that the world can't see.
Where our mission to set hearts free.
What do we do?
Love like Jesus and live His word.
When things get tough.
We walk by faith and let it show.
When we feel small, he lifts us up
and leads us all when others help.
Instead, we're part of God's amazing plan.
Don't let him say we're just two young stanzas.
Be true. Show love.
Come on.
Liberation. Right?
Shall we gave you the life that the world can't see.
Don't let them say we just two young stand tall speeches.
Your love.
Come on Liberation rash I will be be the life
and the world can't seem to.
Be. The life that the world can't see.
Who, where I'm missing to set free.
You can clap for that. That was good stuff.
That's a great week.
Our team did a great job.
Trish did a great job.
And imagine there were kids in the back
that were kind of doing the motions to that song that was going on.
Imagine all that was done with a part time children's director.
Imagine if we had a full time person.
Yeah, you got to pay for that.
But it's worth it.
Like, like there's so much good that's going on in this,
in this church and for the kids in our community.
And God's got some great things planned for the future.
I'm excited.
Tricia, a great job.
Your team did a great job.
We need to invest more in children's ministry and adult ministry.
No doubt
we got some things coming up as well as for kind of your spiritual formation
and in helping us follow Jesus better parents.
Child dedications coming up on the 12th.
Take advantage of that.
If you got a little one that you want
to dedicate yourself to, raising them in the biblical standard.
Also on that day as a baptism, the last baptism, we had 40 plus this one.
I think we got 20 more.
It's going to be a great celebration.
Take advantage of that.
If you haven't been baptized yet and leading into that
as a baptism class next Sunday as well.
If you want to get baptized,
you want some information about that, please take advantage of that class.
Also.
One last thing men pay attention.
Men's event in August. Chili and cornhole.
I think that's commanded in the Bible somewhere.
So just guys, keep your eyes out.
It's an open door event for all guys, so keep your eyes open.
More information come in very, very, very soon.
Matthew 17
Jeff did a great job introducing us to this chapter last week.
Sean, I were able to be in Sioux Falls with our son Wyatt over Father's Day,
which was a great time being together with he and his dog moose.
It's great for us to be back.
I'm going to unpack chapter 17 today.
I'm going to go back a little bit, cover what was covered briefly, a part of it
yesterday because it kind of sets up the rest of Matthew 17.
Matthew 17 is important for our spiritual development
because Jesus really starts pressing into who he is and what it means
to follow him. Now
just push pause
for a moment on Matthew 17,
because I want to introduce you to something that will help you.
This week we talk about the idea of spiritual formation.
Being a disciple a follower of Jesus doesn't mean just accepting him
as our Savior and going to church.
There's a process of forming of spiritually.
And in this church we talk about four words belong, become,
give and go, that I belong to God's family by faith in Christ and what he did,
I become made into his image as he, as he.
As he grows me, I give to his kingdom everything he's given me.
I give it back to him and invest in his kingdom.
And then I go on mission with him in the world and my community.
So that's how we're formed spiritually to belong,
become, give and go.
And so to help us kind of assess our own spiritual formation,
what we've done, and this is something new that we put out there,
I want you to take advantage of it on your your mobile device.
We have our app.
And if you go to our app at the bottom right,
there's a more button, I highlight it for you.
You go to that more button and it will take you to this page
where there's a devotional tab.
Click on that devotional tab.
And what we're doing now is we're providing
a five day devotional based on the Sunday message.
And so it's all it's all there on the app for you.
So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday
you can continue interacting with what we just talked about on Sunday.
And in that devotional it gives you a synopsis of it.
It gives you
a summary of it and walk you through it.
And then at the end of the five day devotional, it gives you a huddle.
Questions.
That's what we call our small groups, small group, group questions.
So if you have a group of people, you want to kind of process
the message through more during the week.
You go to the just keep scrolling down to the huddle study guide, a little summary
and then key verses and some questions
to guide you through discussion and then life application.
Some key takeaways.
So all of this based on the Sunday morning message, all on the mobile device
to help you become spiritual,
mature, form your own spiritual development.
So you're not reliant upon showing up
somewhere all the time and then nothing until you show up again.
This is where to keep you involved in God's Word. Out the week. Do you follow?
You follow all that? Yeah.
So everything we look at and Matthew 17, it's a really crucial chapter right now.
Everything we look at the day is going to be on the app
there in that devotional section,
the five day devotional and the questions for your small groups.
Take advantage of it.
Matthew 17.
This transfiguration.
That's the key event in Matthew 17.
Jesus is up on the mountain.
He takes Peter, James, and John with him.
And in up on this mountain with Peter,
James and John, Jesus is what we call transfigured.
In other words, God the Father shows up somehow.
Moses and Elijah are there with Jesus, and Jesus
is transfigured into basically the visible
visibly his full
divinity, his full holiness, his full righteousness.
It's all on display and it happens on top of this mountain.
And Peter, James and John get to view this.
They get to see Jesus in all of his glory
is so transformative for these guys that later,
when Peter writes his letter, his epistle in Second Peter
chapter one, verses 16, 17 and 18, he writes about this moment.
It was, it was it's such a pivotal, transformative moment
of the transfiguration of Christ in all of his glory.
And we don't know how, but somehow Moses is there,
the representation of all the love of God and Elijah's there,
the representation of all of the prophets prophesying that this Messiah would come.
They show up with Christ in His transfigured holiness,
all on this mountain, and in essence,
all of the holiness of God in Christ is on display.
And it was proof of Jesus's perfection.
It was proof of his complete and utter sinless holiness.
And he proved it's possible.
And I don't
see this anywhere in Scripture, but in my mind,
I think at that moment
Jesus has been talking to the cycle's a lot about going to the cross.
He knew the cross was coming, and in that moment
he experienced the pleasure of the father.
He experiences the presence of Moses and Elijah,
all pointing to him, him and his full glory.
He could have said, you know what?
This is perfect.
I'm out.
Could have ascended back to heaven.
Having accomplished a sinless life on earth, having proven to this
that it is possible, and he could have said, I've done it.
I've given you the perfect example of my life.
Good luck. I'm out.
But he didn't.
He came down from the mountain
and he walked to the cross.
Not for his sake,
for my sake and for your sake.
They walked down the mountain and into a mess.
John, the mountain is glory.
But the bottom of the mountain is pain.
He walks into the life of a tormented son.
Of a father
who's pleading for the life of that child
to confuse disciples
to the public failure of his own followers.
See, we love the mountaintops,
but most of following Jesus happens
in the valley.
Where we encounter our own hurt
and we encounter other people in pain
with limited resources, personal weakness.
And we're called to trust God anyway.
That's discipleship.
See, what I know from Matthew 17
is that the mountaintop reveals his glory, but the valley reveals
our faith.
There's a few big ideas I want to walk us through in this.
This passage of Matthew 17.
And the big ideas are these
Jesus shows us in Matthew 17
that kingdom authority resides only in the King.
It's nothing we possess.
It's nothing we own.
But we have access to the authority of the king
through the king Kingdom presence comes only through the cross.
Submission to God and Kingdom
freedom is not selfish.
It's a life of generosity.
And so let's look at this first one.
Jesus shows us that kingdom authority resides only in the King.
And I'm going to go back to verse five and read I'm going to read a few verses.
So just follow along here.
Jeff covered some of this, but it's important to tie it all together.
Starting in verse five of chapter 17,
he was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them.
And a voice from the cloud said, this is my beloved son, with whom I am
well pleased. Listen to him.
When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified.
But Jesus came and touched them, saying, rise, and have no fear.
And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.
And as they were coming down the mountain, Jesus commanded them, tell
no one the vision, till the Son of Man is raised from the dead.
And then the disciples asked him, well, then why did the scribe say
that Elijah must come?
Must first Elijah must come.
And he answered, Elijah does come.
And when he and he will restore all things.
But I tell you that Elijah has already come.
And they did not recognize him, but did him whatever they pleased.
So also the Son of Man will certainly suffer at their hands.
Then the disciples understood that he was speaking to them about John the Baptist.
Let me unpack this a little bit.
There on this mountain,
Jesus is transfigured and they hear,
they hear from God Almighty.
This is my son, in whom I well pleased.
And what's he say?
Listen to him.
Now, that's kind of surprise to me, because this is God Almighty.
And I would think that if God Almighty is going to speak
to someone and say, now listen to me,
right?
He doesn't say, listen to me.
He says, listen to him. Why?
Because he is the Christ, the son of the living God,
the one through whom is forgiveness,
redemption, and salvation.
He is central.
Listen to what he says.
All attention is on him.
And at that voice the Bible says in verse
six that they fell down on their faces, terrified.
Please know they weren't terrified when they saw this transfiguration take place.
They weren't terrified when somehow Moses shows up.
They weren't terrified when somehow Elijah shows up.
They weren't terrified when they saw the his his clothes shine like the sun.
They weren't terrified.
They were terrified at the voice of Almighty God and at the voice of God.
Terror strikes them and they fall down on their face,
completely overwhelmed at the voice of God.
That's significant.
I wonder how often that
we hear the voice of God and are just so unimpressed.
And when they fall down on their face
after hearing the voice of God, what does Jesus do?
What's the Bible say?
He touches them and he says, rise.
I want you to pay attention to this.
I want you to get this.
He says, rise, have no fear.
After they're terrified, then he says,
rise, have no fear.
See, here's here's how this goes.
We want God to empower, but God must first overpower.
They were not empowered to rise in courage
until they were overpowered by the authority of God Almighty.
We miss this.
Most of us come and we say, God, you gotta help.
You gotta show up. You gotta give me strength, you gotta give me power.
And God says you've not.
First let me overpower you.
I, my word, must first overpower you
in a way that causes submission.
That you fall on your face
out of reverence and fear of who I am.
And when you allow that to happen in your life, then
and only then can I empower you to rise and have no fear.
Do you understand?
We must become weak and overpowered by God
before we can become strong and empowered by His Spirit.
And unless and until you have humbled yourself
and submitted yourself to the authority of Almighty God
and allowed him to overpower and overrule all things in your life,
don't expect him to empower you
in your weakness.
And they lifted up their eyes.
And what do they see?
Only Jesus.
Why only Jesus?
Because he's enough.
They don't have to see anybody else,
just him.
And then they say this weird thing.
Okay, well, like we just saw Elijah.
But the scribes say that Elijah has to come first and he's gone,
and you're here and the kingdom isn't here. Like, what's going on?
What they were referring to.
And I don't have time to get into this part of it. I just want to give it to you.
You can do some research on your own if you want to.
Is a prophecy in in Malachi four.
That says, in essence,
before the kingdom of God comes upon the earth, Elijah has to come first.
And Jesus says, well,
Elijah did come like the Old Testament prophet Elijah, he's already been here.
But he what Jesus was saying is that he is still to come.
Revelation 13.
The prophecy will come in revelation 13 that two witnesses will come
in the last days in the tribulation, and give testimony to God.
One of those will be Elijah.
And so he's saying, he was here, but he's still coming.
But in essence, he's already been here because John the Baptist was known
as one who moved in the spirit and the power of Elijah to prepare the way.
So Jesus, here's what Jesus is saying.
He's saying, look, don't doubt this.
He said he was coming.
He's already come, and he is still to come.
Just because you don't understand it all right now
doesn't mean there's anything wrong with this.
It means you just don't understand it right now.
Do you follow?
Same thing goes for us.
And then the Bible in chapter
17 goes through this in verse 14.
And they came, they came.
And when they came to the crowd, a man came up to him, and kneeling before
him said, Lord, have mercy on my son, for he has seizures, and he suffers terribly.
For often he falls into the fire, and often in the water.
Honestly, at that point I'd be like, well, don't let him get near fire and water
like it's an easy solution.
And Jesus answered.
Oh no. Yeah. Verse 16,
and I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him.
I mean, this father's desperate.
It's like my, my, my son's in
desperate, and there's nobody to help.
Jesus, you're my final.
You're my last.
You're my only hope right here.
And just answered.
Oh, faithless and twisted generation.
How long? Am I to be with you?
How long? Am I to bear with you?
Bring him to me.
And Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of him,
and the boy was healed instantly.
Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, why couldn't we cast it out?
And he said to them, because you your little faith.
For truly I say to you, if you have faith like the grain of mustard
seed, you will say to this mountain, move from here to there,
and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.
This dad,
in desperation, brings his child to Jesus
because he knows Jesus is enough.
I don't need to look at anybody else.
Jesus, I just need you.
And he brings his son. Let me just say this.
Apart from Matthew 17, let me just make this note.
Dads,
our main job
is to get our kids to Christ.
We might have a lot of other responsibilities.
They're all secondary to that.
Our job is to get our children to Christ.
To to
to put them in a position where they have the opportunity
to submit themselves to the Lordship
of Christ, to be overpowered by Almighty God,
so that Almighty God can then empower them with His Spirit.
That's our job.
It's their job to respond.
That's not on.
Our job is to get them to him.
Do you understand? Dad's?
Yes. Yes.
Now I'm going to say something as controversial.
One of the best ways to attach your children's
heart to Christ in his kingdom is through their generosity.
And yours as well.
Generosity and given is one of the best ways
to attach your heart and your children's heart to Christ and His kingdom.
The Bible says where your money is, your heart will be also parents.
If your children aren't involved in the knowledge and the practice
of your own generosity, and don't
practice their own discipline of tithing,
you run the risk of raising kids with detached hearts
from the kingdom.
You follow that part.
Not as much.
The Bible says where your treasure is, your heart is.
Attach your kids hearts.
That's your job.
It's one of the best ways to do it.
And it's this I say like like we tried.
We couldn't we couldn't drive them out.
Why couldn't we?
In other translation, other books
of recordings of this very account,
Jesus says, well, some of them only come out by prayer and fasting.
Here's what he's saying.
He's not like
they didn't have time to pray and fast right then, like there was this thing.
What Jesus was saying is like, he's not saying
because something appeared in your life, you have to pray in fastest in or no,
you stay prayed up.
You stay fasted.
So when the time comes, you're ready.
That's what he's saying.
And because you're not prayed up, you're not fasted up.
You're not ready.
But he says even beyond that, he says, I'll tell you why
you couldn't cast him out because your faith is twisted.
You have little faith.
What did he mean by that?
If twisted little faith couldn't drive out demons, here's the.
They had been given the authority to drive out demons a couple of chapters earlier.
Jesus gave them to drive out demons, and they actually did it previously.
So why not now?
Twisted faith.
The problem,
as I understand Scripture, is not that they didn't believe,
but that they started to believe what they once believed.
See, when they originally had the authority
that resides in Christ Himself, not in their own authority,
there was a necessity to depend completely on Christ.
And they experienced that.
They experienced the authority of the King, lived out in their lives
because they were completely reliant upon him. Now
they were reliant upon themselves.
They had unbelief in the dependance and the necessity of Christ,
and started to believe in their own ability.
It was twisted faith, and we do the same.
We start relying on our own
resources, our own abilities, our own knowledge,
our own expertise.
We hear what the call of God is, and we think, yeah, but I can't
because I don't because I can't because they don't, because they can't.
Because they don't.
Because all of our focus is on
rather than saying, Lord, if you've called me to it, I'm
your lying completely upon you.
I'm completely dependent upon you and your authority over my life and in my life.
You do whatever you want to do.
I'm just going to say yes.
In Romans 12 verse three,
the Bible says that God has given to each a measure of faith.
Here's what I understand about that
that God gives us a measure of faith.
And honestly, when we're young, it's easy to believe, isn't it?
When we're little, when we're little, we believe everything about the Bible,
everything about God, everything about Jesus, everything about
God's love, everything about us provision, everything about everything about Jesus.
Like we just know I believe it. I believe we love it.
And what happens as we get older?
We start to believe what we once believed
because we rely on our experience.
We give more credence
to our pain than on the Word of God,
and we start to believe everything we once believed.
It's not that we don't believe,
we just unbelief.
And so then this spiritual formation is believing what we once believe,
that we now unbelief that we once believed it.
You follow and our faith get twisted,
and that twisted faith accomplishes nothing,
because we've forgotten that the authority
of the kingdom of God resides in Christ alone.
I don't believe in any of my ability,
any of my resources, any of my opportunity
is Christ and Him alone.
He is my hope.
He's my strength.
Here's what I know.
When you're when you're in your, you know, your early and 20s and stuff,
you're busy building your life and your career and your identity,
your future, your relationships, your hopes, your dreams.
Listen, young one, don't confuse ambition with faith.
You can hustle hard and be spiritually hollow.
Christ and him alone.
You grow a little bit more in your 20s and 30s.
Kind of life takes over.
You got to manage a marriage.
You got to manage a mortgage.
You got pressure, got aging parents, you got kids.
You got expectations and hopes.
You can have so many opportunities and challenges in your 30s and 40s,
so many opportunities and challenges that you forget
that you are completely dependent upon Christ,
capable of nothing on your own.
You get your 50s and up and,
you know, we got experience, we got history, we got wisdom.
And pretty soon our experience, history and wisdom become
can become a substitute for dependance.
And if we're not careful, we drift from the kingdom.
Christ in him alone.
All the authority of heaven resides.
In Christ.
We own nothing. We have nothing capable of.
Nothing gets him and Him alone.
Don't get your faith twisted.
You follow.
Verses 22 through 23.
Jesus shows us that kingdom presence comes only through the cross.
As they were gathering in Galilee, Jesus said to them,
The Son of Man is about to be delivered into the hands of men,
and they will kill him, and they will be raised on the third day.
And they were greatly distressed.
They have this great moment of deliverance of this young boy who was suffering
from this demonic possession, that that in some Bibles that says epilepsy.
That's how they kind of explained it.
Back then, it was just suffering from this demonic possession.
Jesus cast him out like, that was amazing.
And then immediately Jesus goes into, hey, but don't forget where I'm headed.
This whole thing culminates in the cross and the resurrection,
the cross and the resurrection.
After this healing, he says,
The Son of Man is going to be rejected and beaten and died, and he'll be raised.
And they were so
tore up about that.
And Jesus just wants to remind him, though you've seen the glory of the experience.
The mountaintop.
Though I have a theory over everything
in your valley, it's still headed to the cross.
But the cross has always followed with the resurrection.
See, following Jesus means that my preference is my plans,
my comfort, my money, my schedule,
my calendar, my ideas, my identity
all falls under the Lordship of Christ and it all must be submitted.
Jesus says, you want to follow me?
Take up your cross, submit everything that you have to
me and my kingdom and my way, and it is the way of the cross.
See, we
have to understand that for the disciple,
the cross is not a decoration, it's a direction.
And everything in the disciples life has to point to the cross
completely submitted to the overpowering authority
of God Almighty.
And we have to ask ourselves,
what do I have that is still mine?
My time, my plans, my money,
my hope, my comfort, my family's priorities?
Listen, the call of Christ is not add me to your plans.
The call of Christ is to follow me with everything
in your life.
See, for many,
the biggest obstacle is not obedience.
Somebody say that for many Christians, the biggest obstacle to obedience
is not confusion, it's cost.
For most people who want to follow Jesus,
the biggest obstacle for following Jesus is not that we're confused about it.
The biggest
obstacle is because we understand the cost and is too high.
It's the biggest obstacle
to follow in Jesus.
So usually we know what obedience requires.
We just don't like the cost of it.
And Jesus says, you're going to follow me, follow me.
I'm headed to the cross.
You have to take up your cross,
be completely overpowered by the rule
and reign of my kingdom in your life over every aspect of your life.
Only then will I empower you to walk the way of the cross.
You'll be able to do it.
But my presence comes
only through the cross.
And then in Matthew 17,
Jesus shows that the kingdom freedom is not selfish.
It's not about us.
Kingdom freedom.
There's a freedom to be generous.
This is a
weird thing to put at the bottom of chapter 17.
Look at what all this great stuff, this profound teaching, profound moments,
healing and authority, and a call
to radical discipleship, all of this,
I imagine this is like, well, this is like, this is a this is
I can't even know how to understand what's going on right now.
This is amazing to be with Christ in this moment, this transfiguration,
the demon and then this call disciple,
radical discipleship.
When they came to Capernaum, collectors
of the two drachma tax went up to Peter and said, is your teacher not pay the tax?
He said, yes.
And when he came to the house, Jesus spoke to him
first, saying, what do you think, Simon?
From who do kings of the earth take toll or tax from their sons or from others?
And when he said from others, he said to him, then the sons are free.
However, not to give an offense to them.
Go to the sea, cast a hook and take the first fish that comes up,
and when you open its mouth, you'll find a chuckle.
Take that and give it to them for me and yourself. What
does that seem to
fit anywhere in what we've just read?
It's just weird.
All of a sudden the IRS shows up.
Once there, you know, more than their fair share, you know?
And Jesus is filling out the tax form
and sending the like what?
Let me.
This needs some explanation.
The basically this became the temple tax.
And the guy is asking for the the annual fee.
In their day there was a law on the books.
There was a law
in, in, in Exodus
about this tax that had to be paid.
Exodus chapter 30 said that
males, I think like 20 years and older, had to pay
two drachmas tax.
That was on the books. It was the law.
And so this tax man comes in. Peter.
Hey, don't you and your your rabbi Jesus pay this tax?
Apparently Peter and Jesus were the only two from this area
at this moment, and that was the era that was being taxed.
And so Jesus is like, oh, let's talk about that, Peter.
They want the tax.
Let me ask you this question.
Do kings tax their sons?
And we would say, what?
No. Look at Hunter Biden.
He doesn't he doesn't have to leave. But.
You lean Jared
Kushner is going to have to he's going to be just fine.
Like kings don't do that to their it.
Take money from everybody else. Right.
And you know you hear what Jesus is saying.
This is for the this for my father's house.
Dads don't tax their kids.
I don't have to pay nothing.
I'm not under the law.
That's what he's saying.
That law doesn't apply to me anymore.
I don't I don't have any obligation to pay that.
That's what he's saying.
But what does he do?
He says, Peter, I want you to go fishing.
Now, this was out of
the ordinary for Peter because though Peter was a fisherman, Peter fish by nets
and Jesus saying, don't take your net, take a pole.
He was like a pole.
What do you mean, a pole?
Like one line for one fish.
This was so counter to everything that Peter knew
and everything that Peter had experienced.
But because Jesus said it and the father had just said, listen to him.
Guess what Peter's going to do?
Go put a line in the water and he pulls it out.
And this fish has a coin in its mouth.
The law said two drachmas
per man, two men in question.
That means the law required for drachmas.
The coin in the fish's mouth was called a set tier,
which was worth exactly four drachmas.
And so Jesus says, though I am under no obligation
to give, nor be generous, I will.
I'm going
to set for you an example of what a kingdom
freedom of what grace is like, that grace gives
when it doesn't have to.
Jesus says, I'm free to not,
and I'm not obligated to, but I'm willing.
Sea Kingdom freedom is not the right to do less.
It's the grace that does more.
That's what kingdom freedom is.
Spiritual formation
means that the disciple does not ask, what do I have to do?
Spiritual formation means that the disciple asks, what is spiritual maturity?
Call me to do, and it's always more than what the law demands.
That's grace. That's love.
So in a real practical way,
I'm going to do two things in wrap up real practical.
And then one more spiritual thing, real practical ways.
We have the opportunity where our spiritual formation
and discipleship is seen in super practical terms,
to improve our ministry site here, to continue adding staff,
we need to add to serve our church body to reach this community.
We've talked about the lobby reconstruction and we're still doing that.
We're gathering more information and more opportunities for that.
That's still in the works.
The office remodel, the capital improvements we have to increase
our children's ministry leadership and staff and program.
We have to increase our young adult ministry.
It's just too important for us not to.
God's doing a lot of things, moving us.
He's grown us and it all requires sacrifice, not out obligation, but out of grace.
And we've
talked about the idea that every giving unit
over and above our regular tithes and offerings, $1,200
over the course of the next few months. However, that works out.
Some of some of us need to do that in a little bits in recurring form.
Some of us need to do it one big shot.
Some of us just need to.
We want to replace all these chairs. We need to.
Some of us just need to say, you know what?
I'll just take responsibility for my chair.
Or maybe for two chairs for somebody else.
Like it's all not because we have to do, not because we're obligated to.
There's no law about it whatsoever. And we're free under grace.
Not to.
But grace always does more than what the law requires.
Do you follow it? Always. That's just what grace does.
And Jesus models it for us.
We don't.
We don't give to keep the plan of life.
We give to keep the mission moving.
We come off of, we say VBS with all these hundreds of kids,
all these decisions a baptism,
two baptisms, or one baptism ago of almost 40 people, 20 more of it.
This one.
It's just amazing what God is doing,
but it requires us to give and to serve really well.
And we know that every dollar that's invested in Kingdom
work is a disciple making tool.
So thank you.
You're an incredibly generous church.
I love the fact that our VBS can generate over $2,500, and none of that go to us.
Go to feed hungry kids in a
Caribbean island that I can't mention online.
It's just amazing.
And so so wherever that sits with you, it sits.
But I want you to remember God just said, just listen to my son.
The way of discipleship is the way of the cross is the way of submission.
He must overpower everything in our lives before he can empower us.
That's part of what this is about.
But back to this coin thing.
This this is the this is the highlight.
Don't I don't want you to miss this.
The law and the tax was two drachmas
per person, Peter and Jesus.
Jesus just said, I am not obligated to that law, I am free.
It's not my debt, Peter.
But so I can drive this point home.
I've been talking about the cross this whole time so I can drive home
the point of the cross, go fishing, get a coin.
What Jesus paid
was not his debt.
What Jesus paid was Peter's debt.
Because Peter oda debt he couldn't pay.
Jesus says, your debt
that's required of your life is not my debt.
You just saw my transfiguration.
You saw my holiness.
You saw I'm not going to the cross for my debt.
You have a debt you can't pay.
And I will assume your debt.
And I will pay the price of your debt, because you can't.
That's what the fish story is all about spiritually.
Peter Ota, debt he couldn't pay by law.
Jesus said, you can't pay it.
I will, and I will identify with your debt and pay it.
Do you see the power of this?
It's all about the cross.
This, this picture, this fish
and this coin is all about this sin debt that you and I can't pay.
That Jesus says, no, it's not my debt, it's your debt.
I will willingly pay it anyway.
And it's exactly what Paul says in the book of Colossians, canceling
the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands.
This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.
The cross is the payment for my debt, for your debt
that he is not indebted to, that he willingly pays anyway.
Incredible.
God with a Jesus like that.
Why would we not listen to what he says?
And follow him?
Not just on the mountaintop, but in the valley of the shadow of death?
I will fear no evil, for you are with me, your rod and your staff,
they comfort me.
Because that's who Jesus is.
My natural response is, I will belong to your family
by faith, and I will become
Christ like in my life, in
holiness, in discipleship, in righteousness.
And I will give everything that you ask of me
gladly back to you, because it all came from your hands.
And I will go on mission with you in this world
and in my community.
With a God like that,
won't you give your whole life to his kingdom?
See, faith that follows Jesus is not a faith
that stays safe to itself, nor selfish nor self-reliant.
It's a faith that follows Jesus and depends on him, denies
himself, gives and goes.
It's too important to deny.
And it's too important to give secondary effort
and allegiance to Christ and Him alone.
I want you to pray with me,
father.
Thank you
that you have loved us with an everlasting love, that you looked at us
and saw in us people who owed a debt that we could not pay,
that you assumed our debt as your own.
That you paid the price
when you didn't have to thank you that you walked the way of the cross.
Thank you for the high and holy calling that you've given us that says,
if you want to follow me, you too must walk the way of the cross.
Allow me to overpower you so I can then empower you.
Father, I
pray in this moment that if there's anybody here
who is not allowed themselves to be overpowered by your.
That in this moment they would suggest themselves
and humble themselves under your authority,
that they would allow you to overpower them
and submit their lives completely to you.
Friends, I would invite you to this moment to say that very thing.
Father, I give you permission to overpower me.
I submit my life to you.
I believe, Jesus that you paid the price I couldn't pay for my salvation.
Thank you.
I accept that price.
I accept what you did.
And I put myself under your authority.
Oh, God,
as I do that, would you empower me to live a holy life
to folly with my whole heart,
with my to loveth my whole mind, my whole soul, my whole being?
Christ, you are enough, man.
We see you and only you and do in this church
what it is you desire to do in our community.
Revive this church, awaken
those who are spiritually dead and use us to do it.
We love you.
We trust you. In your name I pray. Amen.
And I love you, man.
I'm proud of you. It's so good to be back with you.
I want you this week to read chapter 17.
And every time I open up the Bible, I think,
oh my gosh, I just can't believe this is so good.
And then I start looking towards what's coming.
Matthew 18 is amazing.
It's going to take us a couple of weeks to get through it. It is so good.
So read chapter 17, go on your app, go through the five day devotional,
get together.
Some people talk through those huddle questions.
Let that spiritually form you and read chapter 18 and get ready for next Sunday.
You got it.
I love you.
I'm proud of you.
Stand up. Let's sing.