05312020 Living in Grace and Truth Al Robertson Mike Kellett

so guess who's here Mike and Alan are in the house how you doing gentlemen I noticed when I came in Mike your car wasn't here and I was like I wonder if is maybe is Mike late or you know that's not typically your your mo usually on time we're really first one here usually it sounds like well where's Mike I walk in and I see the bike the bicycle I should say because you drive a bike too because by the bicycle ride your bicycle and I rode the bike in it's beautiful in the early morning and so been getting out getting on the bicycle I saw him I thought he was a Mormon elder we're knocking on the way in you know I tell everybody about the live stream doesn't start knocking door that's it yeah you gotta get well you know they shut down my racquetball playing so I had to go go to something different so now I'm on the bicycle so about if you see me out there you know desperately pedaling and give me a word of encouragement or stop pick me up I don't know LaRon is good to know that you're levitating now as well yeah that gift that's a that was impressive so Harley you're back to work I guess if it folks don't know Harley as a hair person and I know my wife spends a lot of money at your place that's all I know but I'm hoping that you're fixing all the blondes that you don't need fixing or you just thank you but Rhonda it's it's it's kind of crazy you you wouldn't you wouldn't think that so many people would be into getting their hair done and this week leading into rain which is the salon that I work at and it is it's been a fun ride it's been interesting seeing people clients how they left and then seeing them come back a different person so well you know I've been on record as holding you in high regard as an essential worker so I'm glad you're back to a new like makeup and that kind of stuff too I do because yeah we need some help yeah I don't know if you have a big enough case to figure out Shackleford was talking about how how white my eyes were from wearing sunglasses on the golf course and I was like if Joe is noticing it's gotta be bad right I mean each other usually ever says anything like this so I was like she said who's your hair makeup person I said we got a small staff yeah they're not helping us out on that in down yes sometimes can't be helped go it sorry so so let's have our scripture reading today from Remy Barclay is gonna read our scripture today good morning Church today's scripture reading is John 1 verse 14 the word became flesh and made his dwelling among us we have seen his glory the glory of the one and only son who came from the father full of grace and truth thank you so much for a me appreciate that so very very much it is a passage is so very very important to our study in the book of John you know we've been going through we've gotten through five chapters now I'm preaching through this and the the idea of course John Ron sout lays out the he wrote this book for the purpose of of really proving who Jesus is he's Messiah and that he is the way to have salvation and so at the very beginning he's going to establish as we studied in John 1 now not only is he the word he's creator he's unaccepted even though he's really undeniable the savior of the world and that he became flesh he pitched his tent or tabernacled as it was a dwelt among us and he's the only Son but the phrase that really I think kind of gets overlooked sometimes is this I did that he was full of grace and truth and so that's something we want to kind of flesh out a little bit more and see the need of of us being full of grace and truth and the need for that in our world Oh Mike I think what we're seeing unfortunately every night on television in our culture is showing us how important it is for the idea of needing grace and truth you know obviously an injustice happened and which we all feel terrible about and justice needs to take place but now we're seeing that sort of expand into something about retribution and violence and all the other difficult things that are happening and a peaceful protest is being hijacked and so I think more than ever this is important this idea that how we react and how we respond and to me it's just motivated me to think we got a big job to do to try to convert people to Kingdom thinking instead of just responding like the world does yeah because injustice from a worldly viewpoint just creates more injustice and a responsive ungodliness to ungodliness only raises the level of godliness I mean and so it's a very very difficult thing look our hearts ought to go out and and our hearts ought to be enraged at the injustice that takes place through a death like has happened to George Floyd this this kind of thing should not be it should not be in our country should not be in any country's right should not be in in among people but definitely folks that respond in terms of Christians response look I don't expect the world to respond like my Christians response right but as Christians our response has got to be the response the Christ would have full of grace and truth racism is such a such a horrible thing in our country it's terrible it's simple in any country and then just exist in ours by the way this is the problem worldwide always has been and as a church Allen our history and they they burned a cross right out here behind me in this parking lot because this church here was willing to accept people of all races and so we've been this is a battle that's a long ongoing battle for a long time look we don't want to be as a church we don't want to be colorblind we want to be colorful because the variety of everybody's talents in history and everything all pulled in who are converted to Christ I'll add something to the body that's very very much needed and so responding with grace and truth in our culture is a very very difficult and hard thing to do but we've got to help kind of clear the smoke a little bit or the air and get back to the simple things that really help people respond like God expects us to and it's an encounter with God and with Christ is what changes us and I think back my story in Exodus - you remember Moses he's a young man he's been trained in the military we don't know what his relationship with God was at the time but he sees an injustice happen and so then he immediately acts on it from a human perspective and so he kills someone and then he sees two fellow Hebrews fighting later and he comes to them he says you shouldn't be fighting there why are you gonna kill us like you kill the other guys because as you said now of course we got this multiplication where he immediately was fearful and ran for his life forty years later he has an encounter with God and then you get two numbers 12:3 Moses was a very humble man more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth so here we got a guy that's willing to murder somebody because he thinks it's wrong and now becomes the most humble man on the earth that's a big statement what happened in encounter with God is what happened it changes you changes the way you view things it changes the way you view other people so that's gonna be our answer to deal with anything and we do with grace and truth and you know the the Bible in John 1 these first five chapters has really dealt with that when we see Jesus and how he dealt with people you know the very first miracles turned the water into wine demonstrates Jesus dealing with people with grace and truth his concern about the embarrassment of people there at the wedding but also even more importantly the teaching of his disciples of who he really was and how he was going as truth I was gonna impact those around so you saw the Samaritan woman which of course it was a grace act just to have a conversation with her but you noticed he brings truth into it and he basically revealed to her about how we were gonna worship from going forward I mean that was big moment for her and then of course she tried to get theological and he went straight to her heart and he says well what about your husband yeah and by the way are there on that Samaritan woman case he he overcame a person of a different race mm-hmm a person of a different religion and person of a different gender and yet the truth of who he was challenged her life and she responded in such a great range she became a great witness that impacted a whole town you know earlier in Nicodemus this case here's a religious guy who still didn't understand and see who Jesus was and had the need for grace and truth to be applied to his own life by the one called the Christ so then he goes and he heals you know the the Official Sun which again was a grace act you know and it showed his power by the way that you know he's not limited by time and space then there was a crippled man that was at the pool he heals him as well and he does it in such a way that he's gonna spark a conversation about the Sabbath I mean that's the way Jesus always is he does everything you know with motives to be able to teach beyond that point but of what I love about that story is even that man who had now been healed and seemed like this was it for him Jesus comes back and reminds him look there's something more important than you've been able to run around and that is that you turn to me he says stop sinning or something worse is going to happen to you and I love that he cares enough about us when he extends grace he always wants us to do the right thing and to trust him and to live in him it was Justin about that particular time when Jesus when jesus healed this guy who couldn't get into the water and this was a place people came for healing the blind the lame were there uh and I've often wondered I mean it only tells of Jesus healing one person there but there were multiple people that needed healing yeah and yet and I don't know it doesn't tell us everything he didn't maybe he'll them all but Jesus did not on earth he'll everybody that needed healing physically so because it wasn't his goal even though his compassion heart always went out to people in tough situations but at the same time his goal was something greater than that right that was to get him to and we got to always keep in mind the greater goal even as we have compassion and and act on it toward people we always do it in the name of Jesus and point them to a greater thing I love the concept to me it's life you imagine a coin and on one side is Grace and the other side is truth it's the same coin it's just you flip it over and you get one and you get the other in a great description of as Romans five in Romans six there's a beautiful description that Paul lays out in Romans five about what grace is it Nina comes back in Romans six and says well that sounds so great we should just be sending like crazy let's just go sin crazy but that's not at all you said I know means do you do that yeah we died to that so you flip that coin over and now you've got this concept of truth grace is a gift it's an unknowable favor from God we cannot earn our salvation and people have tried it will not work it has to be the gift from God truth is a foundation it's a destination so one as a gift the other is something that we discover and we discover the truth we know it in John 14:6 one of the greatest statements in the Bible Jesus said I am the way there's your direction I am the truth that's your destination because once you know then you know and I am the life therefore I'm the action if we are Christians we live as our Savior wants us to live that's the life we live in him it motivates us it changes us and the Holy Spirit of course is our guide to get us there I've always said that kind of growing up my particular religious background that we hollered truths and whispered grace I think now that's kind of flip-flopped in the in the evangelical world where there's a whole lot of hollering grace and whispering truth it doesn't get a lot of white and doesn't need a lot of attention anymore unfortunately and yet Jesus was full of grace and truth which is what we have to be in grace and truth tells me where I'm going it tells me who I am and it tells me what I do and and I have to always be sure that I'm responding to any life our situation I ran into with grace and truth always on my mind he knows how Jesus impacts people in different ways I mean sometimes it's the truth that speaks to us and shows it to us clearly I get emails all the time right from our podcast audience and they're like man something we discussed or talked about from the bow it just hit him and they were like I know I need to change I need to do so it was truth then they realize once they saw the truth of it that man grace is wonderful other people sense and feel the grace of God some some blessing that they got and they think you know what I need to dig more into that so grace leads the truth and you look at some of the conversions in the Bible I mean look at Paul Paul was converted first by truth right I mean he's going to round up some more Christians and all of a sudden you know he's blinded on the road and he's like who are you who's this voice I am Jesus whom you are persecuting that's truth that's a big old bucket of truth when you're just looking up and all of a sudden you're blinded right that led him then to grace and Paul can grow some of the most eloquent beautiful pastors on Christ but you look at Peter it was the other way Peter was right there he was the right-hand man of Jesus he said you're the son of God he had these wonderful moments where he understood the truth and then what happened manna when it all hit the fan where is he he's denying and so you see that beautiful picture in John 21 when Jesus extended that grace to him he did in a conversation that was going to explain to him what his truth was going to be and that was it wasn't gonna end well for Peter and yet what did he do that of that once he realized that truth in that grace he wound up being the guy that preached the first gospel sermon and really began the church so you see you there's different ways to find it the key is to look to be a seeker to be a surgery you know in first John he writes about this assurance that we can know that we are saved and I remember first time I ever read that verse I thought how can one person know they're saved you know but you know it only because of grace and truth when I first learned about the grace of God covering my bad behavior oh wow what a relief it was and then later on I also learned that grace not only covered my bad behavior but it covers my bad theology because I don't know the Bible perfectly and well I know the I'm solid on the gospel I'm still learning a lot and so I'm still discovering not the truth of who Jesus is I've got that but still discovering a lot of truth in the Bible and and figuring out how it applies to my life and so understanding grace and truth will always tend to keep you pretty humble because Satan is always that a reminder of your guilt he's always that reminds you of past sins in your mind and and would love to bring those up and let those be a burden to your life and keep you from focusing in on what God has done for us but the gospel frees us because Jesus was full of grace and truth it frees us to share the greatest news in the spirit of the greatest command of loving God and loving everybody else so you as you're going through your walk you know things happen and as most of you know and our church family here we had some some big news yeah hey you made the newspaper out the first time not unusual but and I can always count on it when the Robertson family makes the newspaper the ones I'm Kryon me I get emails and messages and which is real simple I just pull them back to your email I don't know I really don't give it out but but you but but tell us about the news because to me this was a great example of actually responding with grace and truth to a surprise it came up in your guys so so obviously God built us a platform and you guys our church have been a part of that to be able to share the transparency of who we are what the gospel is done to change first mom and dad and then later our entire family I mean you guys were there with us every step of the way so it's not ironic to me that I got a letter delivered here to the church that was addressed to dad which happens quite a bit and I got the letter and opened it up and I get a lot of letters from a lot of folks that have done studies about their family history and maybe they'll find a thread that crosses our family so I get that a lot so when I first read it to be honest with you I just thought oh here's another person Kenneth Robertson sounds great and I just kind of set it aside once I looked at a little more carefully with Jase we realized that there was a woman that was claiming she was our sister and dad's daughter and so I looked at the date you know I looked at when she was born the year and I thought well that can't be right because that's the year dad was converted but once I did some math and backed up nine months I realized oh this may have happened because it was when mom and dad were at their lowest point in their marriage and in our families right before we came here twice very Road and so we began to look into it and I wasn't sure at first what to do my because you know this is the sort of news it's obviously life changing and so me not knowing whether it was truth or not made me cautious and apprehensive and yet at the same time at the you talked about truth and grace at the same time I knew there's a 45 year old woman that is looking for her father and so I immediately felt empathy before I even met this person whether it was true or not true and I thought we need to she needs to know whether Phil Robertson is her dad or not and so it finally led me to have a conversation with mom and dad about it and which was really interesting conversation that you have with your parents about their lives before there were Christians and I heard things of course I had never heard in my life that night and and none of it was pretty dad has been very you know transparent about his life and it was terrible during this period of time mom who wasn't drunk in high through that time of his life remembered a lot of details and so that led us even more to think we've got to find out about this so we did a paternity test and it turns out 99.99% true that I have a sister named Phyllis we--but we've known for a couple of months and so we've been trying to figure out how to best tell the story to America because it is a story of grace and truth and the first time they came down Phyllis came down with her husband just two sons and two fiancees they're both getting married this year and they all came in so we're meeting for the first time I picked him up at the airport and there's there's hugs and there's tears and it's amazing my because I loved her deeply and I had never met her which has never happened in my life before and it was such a strange feeling so we shared a lot of Tears and so before we had the kind of the bigger family gathering dad wanted to talk to her alone and and she wanted to talk to him as well and so we had all said look now fellas you got to understand dad's not a touchy-feely person we're trying to wear out we're setting her up to know he's used to dealing with you know hairy-legged boys and so just expect him not to be very tender or whatever and of course we were couldn't be more wrong when that first moment happened of course you can imagine a lot of Tears and dad held her hand and hugged her and he told her he said you are the only good thing that came out of the worst part of my life and it was such a it was so soothing for her to to hear the these words cuz she's you know she's looking for her dad and now she's found him and she's not and we're famous on top of that slit scared her even more and mom through the whole process mike is even from the night we first talked about it was so full of grace she said oh I've always wanted a daughter you know all I had was Jeff before you know which was as close as we could get right and now it's like I've got this daughter and I said well and she said so am i her like her stepmom I said no mom you're not her stepmom she said am i her half mom I said oh you're not you can't be a half mom and she said well I want to be something so the first time we talked to Phyllis on the phone I said well let's let her determine what you're gonna be and Phyllis determined that mom would be her special mom and so that's what she calls her mom okay and the grace you think about this I mean anybody that has news that 45 years later your husband has fathered a child from a human perspective that's very difficult and it's very hard but you know what happened my 45 years ago she forgave dad when he became a Christian and so that meant that she's lived a life for forgiveness for 45 years and so when the moment comes like this you step into truth and you accept it and you embrace it you know you think about that the the gospel changing someone's heart and life a your mom and your dad's are if they had not been practicing and growing in their own character of grace and truth all these years then they wouldn't have been able to respond the way they hadn't responded right and so and and look something like this could be this thing could be true for a number of us who were in the world you know those kinds of things could happen but but to have that development of in growth and even within our church I think about the transparency of waswe Road and where we can go down front for our forever family we can be together and we can share our mess-ups and we know God can turn our messes into a message yes well and even in the most surprising times of our life it didn't surprise God right and so and I don't think God was surprised at the reaction your mom and dad had I remember when your dad came into the elders meeting and you guys shared with our elders I I loved our elders so much because they are men the her full of grace and truth but one I love to feel humble response and sharing the story but but also just the support and encouragement from other godly men that know how to respond with grace and truth toward people who keep discovering things about their life well and dad's journey and dad needed that as well because you know he said it on our pockets which by the way so only unashamed podcast which is our podcast I know a lot of you watch it already we broke the story and it started out with the four brothers and dad basically telling what had happened today I think at 4 o'clock the podcast will have mom and Phyllis on there kind of getting their perspective and we decided we wanted to frame the narrative and tell the story as it really is happening unfortunately as we know you can't always trust media to tell a story the right way the truthful way so they tend to sensationalize so it's been out there a lot of you have probably seen it but we wanted there to be a context for everything that's happened and that's been a great blessing and on the podcast dad said he said I'm embarrassed it was very humble and you know he was tearful when he said it and any of us would be embarrassed to have to talk about what we had done in our past life and so for Dad you know I it's it's sad for me that he has to go through it but at the same time you have to respond the right way and so I looked at that and I say here was a man who was young Moses and now I'm seeing a man who is humble Moses at the end you know toward the end of his life and that's a man that has walk with God well and the great thing about about feel and I could say this about a number of our older members in this church is that they've always been transparent about their lives right and so you know secrets have power and so when we're open with our lives about our past or our future yeah God forgives us our sins they're never brought up again God doesn't hold us accountable for those right yet there are sometimes consequences that come along but what's great is that God doesn't create evil it doesn't make people do evil things but God can sure manipulate it when it happens in people's lives and I'll of course I love the verse in Romans 8 and we use it so many times as so many people's favorite verse that we know in all things God works for the good those who love Him who have been called according to his purpose and so this is one of those things that God it's just kind of worked for the good and I will say you know I've seen the picture of all all you guys there and I've seen Phyllis she definitely improved the look of the greats I just want to say it's very easy to do that's a low bar Mike yeah for years they said I was the best-looking Robberson I said well that's a low bar right I mean if you can't shine than that you know you got problems Phyllis is a tremendous woman she and her husband celebrated 26 years together yesterday so obviously she loves the Lord she loves her family and she never quite fit in and she couldn't figure out why now she knows why good news is Church family you'll get to to see them a lot more because they're moving here to West Monroe we're very excited about that because they won't spend as much time as possible with their newfound family and so I know I know you're watching fellas I just want you guys to know how much I love you today you know again to take us back to the verse we started with that Jesus Christ the word became flesh and he made his dwelling among us he became one of us and we have seen his glory the glory of the one and only who came from the father full of grace and truth I think about how much I need grace every day I love the verse His mercies are new every morning cuz that's how often I need them you know all of us none of us deserve to be right with God but because of God's grace and the truth of who Jesus is we have that opportunity you have that opportunity today wherever you're sitting to make your own response to the death by resurrection of Jesus if you need to be baptized into Christ we can make that happen it's in writing a message give us a call we'll take care of that if there's a need in your life that that you need the prayers of of this church the brothers and sisters send that in we want to walk this journey together and and we want to respond in every situation with grace and truth and look our country needs God's people to be full of grace and truth and well look I've got to I don't even why I don't want to turn on the news sometimes it can get very discouraging but you don't want looking the world is a discouraging thing the Broadway is discouraging the narrow way it's more difficult Jesus says swim you're never gonna make the narrow way the broad way you're never going to include everybody and how the world acts is somehow another being okay and right so yeah we've got a job to do to preach the good news of Jesus because change lives who become men and women who are full of grace and truth know how to respond later on in life when things come their way that's what we've seen in your mom and dad that's what we saw in this book of John to these people that Jesus encountered and it's why we continue to see as we teach people who Jesus is so I'm excited about opportunities to share the story of Jesus with people and to watch people's lives changed nothing excites me more than the simplicity of someone accepting Jesus for who he is making that mood to obey Him being baptized into Christ watching someone be born again I did that that lights my fire and I'm excited about that and I want to see that happen all over the world and so that's the kind of thing we get to be involved in and watch my road because of the emphasis of the gospel in this church as well as all the mission efforts that happened through one kingdom and all those other things so it's it's an exciting time Ryan I know that working in one king and we send some exciting things take place overseas even there in that pandemic right absolutely you know it's amazing to see our representatives around the world are on the front lines they have responded and responded as we would expect them to as Christians meeting the needs of their communities being out out front and and and providing food providing shelter providing education even for for the virus in that situation so it's been amazing to see the response come from our representatives and we're still supporting them and and if you want to find out more about that you can go to one kingdom org or talk to any of us come up here and visit with me or Mike but thank you so much for being a part of our livestream family if you have any questions or if you just want to continue this conversation please contact us at info at wfr church org have a blessed day

Channel: Whites Ferry Road Church

Views: 2,057

Keywords: Whites Ferry Road, WFR, WFR CHURCH, Church of Christ, Duck Dynasty Church

Id: AcpjFwCvxqo

Length: 31min 16sec (1876 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 01 2020