08152021 The Road Home Al and Mike

thank you larry and peggy uh you know i it's uh being in the forever family especially uh working there most of your life as i have and mike has you realize we're sort of like another infamous family once you're a maid man or in our case a remade man then you're always going to be in the family business and that's what we're doing here today and we would be remiss if we didn't go back to the bible in romans 15 which is where we've been studying and it's if we're going to honor folks for spending their lives preaching the gospel then we need to go back and see why they would do something like that and i think in this text in romans 15 it's very clear as to why any of us would do what we do paul is at this interesting place this is almost what i call a reflective passage because he's at the end of the book but he's also at the end of his life i mean he doesn't have too many years left when he gets to rome that's pretty much going to be the end of the line and even though he is forced into a house retirement he never quits either he wrote some of his greatest books from being a house under house arrest in rome and in a sense as we get into this text he's really going home to both his homes you remember paul is a roman citizen he was born in tarsus which is actually in turkey modern turkey but he is a roman citizen so he's going to rome and he's going to try to express some love to the church and that's kind of going back to his roots but he's also going to stop by jerusalem because that's also his home he spent the first part of his life preparing himself to be a pharisee and to do all these things he was going to do for the jewish people and then jesus christ showed up and changed his life and changed his mission and so i love this text i love what it's all about because at the core it's just what we care ministry has been about it's about the gospel impacting people you know in the first couple of verses here of chapter 15 verse 14 through 16 he gives us a little picture of the singular focus of the gospel and uh i can't help but think about that that's the way larry has always been he's always said such a strong singular focus right where it needs to be on the story of jesus and paul reminds the church of that and the importance of it he says here i myself am convinced my brothers and sisters that you yourselves are full of goodness filled with knowledge and competent to instruct one another yet i have written you quite boldly on some points to remind you of them again because of the grace god gave me to be ministers of christ jesus to the gentiles he gave me the priestly duties of proclaiming the gospel of god so that gentiles might become an offering acceptable to god sanctified by the holy spirit so paul reminds them the central purpose of his entire ministry to bring all men jew and gentile into the into the church and it was driven driven by his recognition of god's grace and we talk about a lot here at wfr that our dna the the folks that started this location place of people loving god and embracing christ in us is a dna of the gospel of jesus christ it has been the core of everything we've done it's our reset button we're not perfect we've made mistakes along the way we've been here over 60 years but our reset is always back to jesus and always back to what he did for us you stay on that path and you're always going to come out in the right place you're always going to want to impact the world and there will be those dreamers and those visionaries and those people that step up and they'll realize that the grace of god is now on me but i love the way he describes it he's like a priest and he got that from his jewish heritage he said but instead of preparing a sacrifice and putting it on a fire and then having the smoke go up to the almighty and saying we hope you remember that we're sinners instead now we are the sacrifice we know from romans 12 right he is preparing us that's what paul said he was doing he is a priest preparing people for the sacrifice of their lives why so that they can live forever that's why we focus on the gospel that's why it is the core of everything we do and that singular focus also paul understood you see his writings over the next few verses that it was a ministry and a focus of service he says here in verse 17 therefore our glory in christ jesus in my service to god i'll not venture to speak of anything except what christ has accomplished through me and the leading the gentiles to obey god for what i have said and done by the power of signs and wonders through the power of the holy spirit of god so from jerusalem all the way around to a colonium i have proclaimed fully proclaimed the gospel of christ and i think about that idea that one he is serving and at the same time he's not looking for any attention himself he says i'm doing this so god gets the glory and more people are brought into the kingdom you catch that in there god gets all the glory in your service in verse 17 jesus gets all the focus when you have a message and the holy spirit gets all the credit because he lives in us a servant is singular in their focus because it's not about them it's about whom they serve and i think that's the power for all of us we are servants of jesus we are servants of people and we are servants of the gospel of christ and he says there in verse 19 and 20. it's always been my ambition to preach the gospel where christ was not known so that i would not be building on someone else's foundation rather as it is written those who were not told about him will see and those who have not heard will understand this is why i have often been hindered from coming to you he understood he had a desire for people who had never seen or never heard he wanted them his ambition was he wanted to make sure they had an opportunity to get in on the gospel and that's why his service was so strong it's also an area of sharing look at verse 23 but now there is no more place for me to work in these regions and since i have been longing for many years to see you i plan to do so when i go to spain i hope to visit you while passing through and to have you assist me on my journey there after i have enjoyed your company for a while the idea is that he wanted to be with him he wanted to share and he even talked about taking gifts that they had and sharing that with those who didn't have anything back in jerusalem that's what the gospel does that's what our servant the nature does it allows us to share what we have with other people let's face it folks what's the good and good news if we can't share with other people i mean when something good happens in your life what do you want to do man you want to get on there and start texting people you want to call people you love you want to tell them something wonderful has happened you want to get on social media and say look this blessing that i have good news is only good if it's shared with other people otherwise it's something only we can enjoy unfortunately we live in a culture that loves to share bad news on a consistent basis and try to make you feel worse so we counteract that by being those who are willing to share not only share the good news of jesus but also share physical blessings that we have with one another and share in community that's what it's all about we are there to build one another up that is our purpose that is our point you know i was thinking about this last section that we're going to look at in in the verse 33 33 the struggling uh nature of the gospel and about paul's own struggle there and in the battles that he came because we're all because we have the victory in the and and because we know it's already over the battle's won yet from now until then we still have some struggles but we do know the victory is ours right and so i was thinking about how you need people in your life that will create a new boldness that will embolden you to do things you know you need to do that's uncomfortable i i always hate i always hated that i always hated door knocking uh and and of course larry and them were experts at it and i was always so uncomfortable to to knock on the door or whatever and yet yet through the campaigns and especially early on uh years ago when the during the school we were going campaigns and and uh larry and bob taught us uh how to share the gospel and i i was all nervous and i back then i carried a pocketknife everywhere i went we were on a campaign up and i think we were up in canada at the time knocking doors and and so i had this bad habit of i had my knife in my hand and i would just open the blade and close it open and close it you know when i got nervous and so we had knocked on the door and the lady comes to the door and so we start the questioning y'all trying to do the uh you know uh get into a bible study or whatever and uh so you do that question right what uh if you died today remember that now you said that if you died today so i'm asking if you died today uh would you spend any time to begin now flipping my knife open and so she says you know no thank you we don't want anything you know he closes the door and my buddy that's with me the silent partner who should not have been silent by the way but with silence he's like you know you you know you opened your knife with that lady when you asked i said well no i didn't but there's no wonder i'm not having any luck here i better leave that campaign stuff to larry i'm not very good at it but thanks to khaled he ended door knocking i guess that's yeah we talked about this on the podcast last week larry because dad was talking about you know the way he looks because we did a local campaign he said every time i would knock on the door i would see a little bit of part of the window open and then nothing after that nobody was going to answer the door right but what we what they were trying to do what we're trying to do is share through the struggle it's not easy it's not easy being bold and sharing with jesus it's not easy in our current culture to speak out for truth right and but what paul has said here is we have to do that and look we're going to struggle he said pray for me and my struggle it's not easy sharing the gospel helping people i mean being up late at night dealing with people in their sinful situations it's not easy it's work but it's work that pays off with eternal life it's worth it and look we're not perfect none of us are so we have our own personal struggles that we have to deal with and paul was very honest about that look i have things i have thorns in my flesh i wish i didn't have them but at the end of the day we do what we do because god has saved us and he has saved us through jesus christ so he says in verse 30. i urge you brothers and sisters by the lord jesus christ and by the love of the spirit to join me in my struggle by praying to god for me pray that i may be kept safe from the unbelievers in judea and that the contribution i take to jerusalem may be favorably received by the lord's people there so that i may come to you with joy by god's will and in your company be refreshed i love that phrase that somehow that getting together with god's people who are single-minded about the gospel who you walk with on this journey it refreshes you to be together and then he said the god of peace be with you all and amen so in this text there's a singular nature of the gospel a serving nature a sharing nature a struggling nature but then at the end of the day for all of us as we close this morning there is a spirit nature of the gospel of jesus did you catch those words in those last texts when he talks about love and joy and peace and and struggle that's why the holy spirit lives in us we are forever changed when the holy spirit of god indwells us right we know different we know better we grow spiritually when someone is willing to teach us and guide us with this same guide that the holy spirit wrote to make us strong to help us be mature right and we're helping to build the kingdom one block at a time by continuing to share the gospel all around the world it is our job it is our privilege it is our singular right as a son or daughter of the almighty but it all starts with the decision and there may be someone today that's here that's watching online that hasn't made that decision that's the first step because jesus christ died for you on a cross for all of your sins he was raised out of that tomb which we sang about beautifully this morning because death wouldn't hold him he went back to the right hand of the father because there he mediates for us and he said look i won't leave you i'm coming back to get you that good news of jesus christ is available for you and he says all i want you to do is believe i'm here trust in me change the way you're living and live for me because it's a better life the holy spirit will lead you into so many great things and i tell you what be baptized into me a new birth the holy spirit now living in you what an opportunity that we have today and we want to offer that invitation to you or to anything that's holding you back any struggle that you may be having today is a day a glorious day that we honor people who need to be honored but also we honor god with changed lives if you have a need at all today why don't you come while we stand and while we sing

Channel: Whites Ferry Road Church

Views: 496

Rating: 5 out of 5

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

Id: iScHhuEDYew

Length: 14min 4sec (844 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 17 2021