Are You Thirsty? | Shane Willard

[Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so so [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Applause] so [Music] do [Music] oh [Music] hey welcome to church this morning we're so excited to be here we absolutely love church we love hanging out with you every single week and doing church together it's brilliant it's the best and if you are new with us at our online campus we really want to welcome you and also we'd just love to get to know you so make sure that you head to our connect hub uh the online host is gonna post a link to that below but that's just a great way for us to meet you and also to get connected into some of the great things that we have at new hope so many great things one thing you find in the connect hub is actually how to join a life group and i know for myself life groups have been one of the best parts of my life for the last three or four years i've been part of one absolutely incredible i know you've been a part of lifegroup yes i have a beautiful life group and it's definitely worth getting involved with and it's just great to have some people to catch up with every week talk about life eat some yummy food that's a good time yeah and hey if you're a family with us this morning we have a thrive kids program for your kids it's our thrive kids facebook page i might be biased but i think it is brilliant i watch it every single week it is so much fun and the kids i know will love it this week we're looking at impossible is nothing how god gives us strength to face whatever situations we're facing at the moment that is so so good and you know right now we're gonna spend some time worshiping together and i would just want to encourage us all not to let this moment pass us by and not to let ourselves become distracted by the things around us so right now i want to encourage you wherever you're watching church online from to make the space your own push everything to the peripheral that might have distracted you and let god and praise become your focus as we lean in together this morning [Music] i your hidden glory and creation is now revealed in you our christ what a beautiful name it is what a beautiful name it is the name of jesus christ my king what a beautiful name it is nothing compares to this what a beautiful name it is the name of jesus [Music] you didn't want heaven without us jesus you brought [Music] [Applause] and what could [Music] what a wonderful name it is name of jesus we worship you [Music] savior [Music] you should [Music] glory for you [Music] forever [Music] [Applause] [Music] what a powerful name it is the name of jesus [Applause] [Music] what a powerful name it is [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] the name of jesus christ what a powerful name it is [Music] it is [Music] [Applause] [Music] you are here working in this place i worship you i worship you [Music] you are here working in this place i worship you i worship you [Music] my god that is who you are [Music] [Music] my god jesus i worship you [Music] i worship you you are here [Music] i worship you [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] my god [Music] [Applause] my god that is [Music] [Music] that is [Music] is [Music] is [Music] my god that is we declare you up we make miracle work promise keep the light in the darkness my god that is who you are [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] well i absolutely love those songs that the team prepared for us this morning and you know right now we're going to take a moment to pray for the needs that you guys have submitted through our online prayer requests and also for the needs of our greater church community but i just wanted to take a moment to remind you all that we are constantly keeping you in our prayers we're praying for you all during the week we're enjoying celebrating the wins when you guys submit praise reports and there's a great verse in romans 1 verse 10 where paul says to the roman church constantly you are in my prayers at all times and so i just wanted to remind you and encourage you if you want someone to believe for breakthrough with you this morning or celebrate a win with you then comment it below head online and submit a praise report or a prayer request because we are constantly keeping you guys in our prayers so let's pray this morning father god we thank you so much that you hear all of our prayers and that you know what each and every one of us has on our hearts right now that we're believing for that we're praising you for and that we're waiting to see breakthrough in god i pray that each and every one of us would have a sense of peace that you are working in at all of our situations whether we can see it or not we believe for breakthrough in our finances god and for provision we believe for healthy bodies and minds and we're also believing that families and relationships could be restored father god and that you would bring people back together and we believe for everything that is represented in our online community right now in jesus name we thank you that you hear us you love us and you're always working in our lives in jesus name amen amen isn't god good he wanted to take a moment this morning to thank you for your generosity and to also encourage you i know for myself generosity can often be really scary particularly this time of year when you've got you know christmas coming up and you've got to buy all the presents and also you might be going away on family holidays and all these things seem to be pulling up and this time of year particularly this expense after expense after expense and it can be really scary and sometimes confusing to be generous and i want to encourage us from proverbs 3 verse 5 where it says trust in the lord with all your heart lean not on your own understanding and i know that you know when it's scary to give we just need to trust god and we can trust and obey god and lean on him and not on our own understanding god's way is always better than our way and he's always faithful to provide so i'd love to pray for us as we consider being generous this morning i thank you jesus that you are good thank you that you love us and that when we trust you god we obey you you always make sure that we look after us lord you provide for us and you make a way with it doesn't seem away and this morning we choose to trust you with our finances jesus and it as we trust you lord we believe that you're gonna bless us and increase us in jesus name amen amen i love that thought especially for this season and if giving is your next step then head to our website all of the details can be found there yeah and details for lots of things coming up we have on the 6th of december baptisms come up about baptism sunday and that is always an incredible sunday i love seeing people publicly declare that they're going to follow jesus for the rest of their life and hey maybe you're considering taking that next step on your journey speak to your life group leader or get in contact with us we'd love to talk to you about taking that next step yes and we've even had some brilliant events just this week we got to celebrate sisterhood on monday night which we know you online girls got to enjoy as well and joined us in the room which was so much fun but if you did miss it don't worry it's on our youtube channel right now you can go and have a look but it was a beautiful night yeah and yesterday we had pastor shane willard to a marriage boost session for our married couples and i know all the married couples that were there got something out of it and it was definitely worth their while yeah and we're super honored to have pastor shane joining us here this morning as well but one more thing we just want to highlight before that is uh the 20th of december we are having twilight carols which is so exciting i mean the christmas season is upon us and what better way to celebrate than with carols and so again make sure you head to our website it's actually had a little bit of an upgrade so it's looking very snazzy very snazzy and fresh yes and it's so easy to find everything so we encourage you with that but right now how exciting pastor shane willard is going to be sharing with us this morning and so i hope you guys are getting super excited in the comments right now sending what what i don't know what sort of emojis lots of claps i'm thinking claps hands in the air welcoming him whatever the thumbs up thumbs up and the peace sign of my favorite emojis i throw them into pretty much every message i ever send i love that button let's get super excited and welcome pastor shane willard as he shares with us this morning well hello my friends and family new hope and special hello to our friends in crow's nest new hope central and toowoomba and anybody watching online shane willard here i get to open the bible today i take that incredibly serious any time you open the scripture you want to ask at least two questions one what happened two and more importantly what's happening in me right now because of what happened and so if your type likes following actual bible acts chapter 8 we're going to get there in just a second i want to start by telling you a story it's a story that happened from the late 80s it's about an american who came to australia as a tourist americans are enamored with australia they love it australian culture they love crocodile dundee they love the outback they love these sorts of things and americans can't believe it they cannot believe the sheer size of things in australia and so when my american friends say i want to come to australia i want to see the outback i try to tell them you really don't there's lots better things to see than thousands and thousands and thousands of miles of really nothing um but but they but they insist on it so this american came over and said you know he couldn't believe the size of the cattle properties like my pastor is a is an old cattleman and his his property that he managed as a teenager was 70 miles long by 30 miles wide that's 2100 square miles that to us that's the state of connecticut but to them that's a cattle property and this american couldn't believe how you keep the cattle in certain areas without fencing up the whole property and so he asked the farmer about it and the farmer said what you do is you have a surveyor come in and you dig wells down specific parts of your property and if you have a proper water source the cow won't venture too far from the water source or he'll die and he said to the american might right if you've got proper wells you don't need fences now that leads me to the gospels jesus was leading a transitional ministry away from a fence-based ministry to a well-based ministry in the old testament the ultimate in fence-based ministry there was 613 rules 613 in and out us than them right and wrong clean and unclean 613 of them jesus dumb that down to two fence posts love god and love your neighbor as yourself don't be people who are right about specific verses be people who fulfill scripture by doing unto others as you would have them do unto you the book of acts was the natural outworking of people who had an experience with the risen christ and so here's the book of acts basically in 20 seconds there's a group of people who have a massive experience with jesus and then they do amazing things and then they get persecuted for doing those amazing things and and then they overcome that and they do amazing things and then they get persecuted for doing the amazing things and then they overcome that and then they get persecuted for doing the amazing things and and then this a guy named stephen gets killed he gets murdered under the authority of a guy named soul and then saul ends up converting having an encounter with christ and then he does amazing things and gets persecuted for doing the amazing things so acts is really what happens when people start acting outside of the fence-based ministry and the fence-based ministry is kicking against it going hang on we're profiteering from this you're making this too easy now in acts chapter 8 they are still in jerusalem now jesus told them to be in jerusalem judea samaria the other uttermost parts of the earth there are eight chapters in and they're still in jerusalem until a guy named stephen gets murdered and the massive amount of persecution leads them to branch out and so this particularly a disciple named philip and philip ends up ministering in samaria so it's doing amazing things so much so that people want to buy the gift of the spirit from it and then there's this weird encounter with a guy named philip in an ethiopian eunuch and i don't think i've ever seen a passage in my life that encapsulates the values of new hope church like this this is an amazing scripture that we have questions about so this is acts chapter 8 verse 26 it says now an angel of the lord said to philip rise and go toward the south toward the road that goes down to jerusalem jerusalem to gaza this was a desert place and he rose and he went and there was an ethiopian a eunuch a court official of candace queen of the ethiopians who was in charge of all of her treasure he had come to jerusalem to worship and was returning seated in his chariot and he was reading the prophet isaiah so if you're paying attention so far i already have tons of questions like why is an ethiopian man willing to ride a horse from ethiopia to jerusalem according to google max that's 3 853 kilometers that to give you an idea in all z terms that's riding a horse from melbourne to mount isa turning right and going to townsville that is how far he rode he wrote he rides a horse clutching a scroll from the prophet isaiah this this is um an odd sort of story and the spirit said to philip go over and join him on this chariot so philip ran and heard and heard him reading isaiah the prophet and asked do you even understand what you're reading and he said well how could i unless someone guides me in this and he invited phil to come up and sit down with him now the passage of scripture that he was reading was this like a sheep he was led to the slaughter and like a lamb before his sheer is silence so he opened not his mouth in his humiliation justice was denied him who can describe his generation for his life is taken away from the earth and the eunuch said to philip about whom i ask you does this prophet say this about himself or someone else i mean his understanding is so elemental he's not even sure if isaiah is talking about isaiah or there's somebody else he has no clue about these things and then philip opened his mouth and beginning with that scripture in other words if that's where you are that's where i'm going to meet you he told him the good news about jesus and as they were going along the road they came to some water and the eunuch said see here's some water what prevents me from being baptized and he commanded the chariot to stop and they both went down into the water philip and the eunuch and he baptized him and when they came up out of the water the spirit of the lord carried philip away and the eunuch saw him no more and he went on his way rejoicing what an odd story it's an odd story that i have questions about like have you been paying attention to me reading this story like is there too much information in this story like why include the fact that this guy's a eunuch like why not just call him the ethiopian guy or like bury the ethiopian why the ethiopian eunuch is that information that you need is that information that you wouldn't that's information none of us would want to be made public much less in the worldwide bestseller of all time like that's a weird thing to include and why is he choosing to worship in jerusalem why'd he ride a horse all the way there and why is this why is he clutching the scroll of isaiah out of all the scrolls that would have been available to him and why that one a a scroll about a prophet calling out corrupt systems of power who are abusing the poor and the afflicted why why that and how does the good news apply to an ethiopian who's missing part of his anatomy and is there any reason why he can't be baptized i mean that's a good question like what would philip have been thinking when he went when he said that and and i think the big confrontation of this passage is is are we building another fence-based ministry or are we building a well-based ministry because see like most things in scripture there's a story underneath this story that makes this story make more sense and it adds quite a bit of tension see there actually was a reason he can't be baptized in deuteronomy 23 it says this no one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting as if that would be better may enter the assembly of the lord no one born of a forbidden marriage nor any of their descendants may enter the assembly of the lord not even in the 10th generation and no ammonite or moabite or any of their descendants they enter in the assembly lord not even in the tenth generation so in the first three verses of deuteronomy 23 you have more fences than jesus's entire ministry combined in deuteronomy 23 it says if you're a eunuch forget about it you'll never be accepted by god if you're born of a forbidden marriage you can forget about it i was born in 1976 and in my lifetime i've heard a youth pastor try to use that verse to convince teenagers to abstain from premarital sex his logic was is if you mess up and get them pregnant they could never go to heaven now despise despite the fact that that is hermeneutical butchery um and the people ended up leaving the church right and then people said oh unfortunately they rejected jesus no they didn't they rejected the image of jesus presented to them and that image of jesus should be rejected that this this passage says that if you're a foreigner you got a problem if you're a eunuch you got a problem and actually the presence of jesus itself confronts these things jesus if you check his genealogy there's one 28th moabite there were some certain questions around every circumstance around his birth if you catch my drift right so jesus in his presence itself and then jesus in matthew 19 said that some people were made eunuchs by men but others were born eunuchs by god and as long as they want to live for the kingdom god would accept them and so you have all kinds of things going on here but a guy named philip who grew up in vesada an ultra-orthodox village somebody says is there any reason why i can't be baptized well yeah you're a foreigner and you're a eunuch that's reason enough what are we going to do and what happens is is philip makes a decision to instead of being right about deuteronomy 23 verse 1 he chooses to fulfill scripture by simply doing unto others as he would have them do unto him and you never know how far that might go which leads to this question why is the eunuch clutching the prophet isaiah why of all the prophets well on the same scroll he would have been reading we read this this is isaiah 56 let no foreigner who's bound to the lord say the lord will surely exclude me from my people and let no unit complain i'm only a dry tree for this is what the lord says to the eunuchs who keep my sabbaths who choose what pleases me and hold fast in my covenant to them i will give within my temple and its walls a memorial and a name better than the sons and daughters i will give them an everlasting name that will endure forever and the foreigners who bind themselves to the lord to minister to him to love the name of the lord and to be his servants all who keep my sabbath without desecrating it who hold fast to the covenant these i will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations in hebrew that word is all can you imagine the q a if isaiah was you know in a room of bible studies what about if they're ammonites yeah what about foreigners yeah moabites yeah what about eunuchs yeah you're including foreigner eunuchs the sovereign lord declares he who gathers the exile of israel i will also gather still others to them besides those already gathered so what's isaiah doing here see we've got to remember that if you want to ruin the scriptures just treat them statically the bible is not a static record of what god is the bible is a dynamic progressive moving revelation of what people thought god was leading to the final revelation of god in the risen christ and isaiah is like wait a minute i know the rules say that eunuchs and foreigners aren't welcome but what do you do if a foreigner eunuch wants and isaiah says the heart of god that i understand is not going to cast that person aside that god is better than you thought that god loves people more than the rules and jesus to be a christ-centered community jesus has called us to be people who fulfill scripture instead of being right about one verse in it to do unto others as we would have them do unto us so the characters in this story is an ethiopian eunuch a god fear the rules would have disqualified him but he has ridden a horse days to find the truth you also have philip one of the original twelve who's from bethsaida and he had a choice to live by the 613 fences or to allow his encounter with the risen christ to do something amazing and there was actually amazing fruit from this today 65 of ethiopia identifies as christ followers it's two-thirds the ethiopian christians are indigenous people don't tend to move there and the ethiopian church finds their origins in this story about this eunuch in other words you never know we're one time once choosing to fulfill scripture instead of being right about one verse you never know how far an entire nation of christ followers now as a result of that one moment and actually the whole book of acts is about people being surprised by this kind of stuff like remember in acts 4 they were surprised that uneducated normal people were being used by god why they'd never seen that before remember there's this one time peter is is preaching and it says that just as the holy spirit had filled the jews in the beginning he he filled the gentiles and remember the people were like we didn't think god filled gentiles and peter goes you know surprisingly enough i agree with you i got to tell you i didn't think god filled gentiles either but i just saw him do it and um who am i to argue with what god is up to in our world now that's my best effort in explaining what happened in the passage um let's ask a better question what's happening in me right now because of what happened and what does this mean for us as a community of new hope as we as we reimagine what it is to be a christ-centered community i would say a couple things one jesus never asked are you worthy jesus asked are you thirsty let's say it another way a fence-based ministry is obsessed with who's in who's out who's clean who's unclean who's worthy a well-based ministry is obsessed with who thirsty who wants it let's say it another way a offense-based ministry is obsessed with sending less a well-based ministry is obsessed with loving more and in loving more you automatically sin less a offense-based ministry is obsessed with all things must be fixed a well-based ministry is obsessed with creating a culture where nothing has to be hidden and in in something that doesn't have to be nothing has to be hidden sin loses its power so here is my challenge for us at new hope and affirmation actually i think of all the places i speak for in the world the new hope church has an are you thirsty paradigm more than an argue-worthy paradigm see the critical to building a christ-centered community is being thirst-centered are you thirsty do you want it because see a lack of thirst equals a lack of teachability once we lose our teachability we've lost our thirst the the root word in greek and in hebrew for a disciple is a student like i would rather have 30 50 true truth seeker teachable humble people then i'd want a church of 3 000 unteachable christians that would be terrible that that at new hope as a christian community we're concerned with our youth thirsty what is thirsty thirsty is teachable thirsty i would add to that is humble to prefer other people to understand that our liberties are never to be lorded over other people if it's offensive that there's an entire chapter in the scripture devoted to that if you can eat food altered offered to idols but it hurts somebody else just don't do it in front of them that that freedom is best expressed and experienced when it's submitted to the higher moral ethic of love and that's called humility that in our teachability and in our humility that is thirst i'd say this way a lack of thirst is a lack of responsibility in genesis even before sin entered the situation um people got their meaning from in part from taking responsibility for their world the opposite of that would be blaming would be blaming so what is a thirsty church a thirst centered church a well-based church a thirsty church is a teachable church it's a humble church it's a responsible church i would say one other way a lack of thirst is a lack of passion for our world that that offense-based ministry is only concerned with will you convert it's sort of like if i had an orange and my whole thing is i want to make everybody orange well that's a fence-based ministry so once you become an orange we just celebrate the fact that you become an orange and yes we do but a well-based ministry wants to know what kind of orange are you we want to plug you into the water source so that you could be the best orange you can be like what if you're sour or bruised or sort of rotten a little bit over ripe like we want to plug you into the water source so that you could be the best orange you could be could you imagine a christ centered community with me see if somebody was to say to me what kind of community is new hope trying to build i would say they're trying to build a thirsty community what does that mean it means we're trying to build a community of teachability humility responsibility and a community that is passionate about the infinite possibilities to be christ in our world could you imagine with me a church like that a church full of teachable humble responsible people who are passionate about the infinite possibilities for our world a church committed to fulfill scripture instead of being right about singular verses man that would be the kind of place that i would want to go because the truth of it is is that when we think about a christ-centered community we can revert back easily to a fence-based paradigm and just simply call it god jesus bible scripture truth but the truth of it is is that jesus moved the whole world from a fence-based paradigm to well-based from an argue-worthy paradigm to an are you thirsty paradigm so here's my question for us to wrestle with have we defaulted back have we defaulted back at all to a fence-based are you worthy are you clean unclean paradigm are we more concerned with hang on are you thirsty do you want it are you teachable humble responsible and passionate about the infinite possibilities for our world because i can tell you a new hope if you're teachable humble responsible and passionate about the infinite possibilities for our world you're i you're the kind of people that we're trying to build this thing with because new hope is a well-based paradigm not a fence-based one it's more concerned with thirst than worth it's more concerned with loving more instead of sending less it's more concerned with building a discipleship culture where we have nothing that needs to be hidden instead of having to fix everything we understand that when we bring things into the light the holy spirit is trustworthy to move and work amongst people's lives which leads me to this question are you teachable are you a teachable person or if you haven't thought of it it can't possibly be true are you a humble person are you a flexible person like when you see god doing something do you go well even if i didn't think god could do that who am i to argue with what he's obviously up to i i bless you my brothers and sisters a new hope to let jesus get bigger the cross work better the resurrection be central scriptures get bigger not smaller i bless us to keep going in our well-based paradigm instead of our fence-based one may we be people who are infinitely more concerned with people's thirst than their worth may we be more concerned with loving more instead of sinning less may we be teachable humble responsible and a group of people absolutely passionate about the infinite possibilities christ has for our world thanks for letting me be a part of your day grace and peace everybody well that was such a great message so thank you so much pastor shane for sharing that with us this morning and if you wanted to respond to that message in any way or even just wanted to know more about who god is and what it means to be on a journey with him then we want to be able to get a free bible into your hands because that is just the simplest and the best way that we can equip you on this journey so make sure you engage in the comment below that your online host is going to post and get onto our connect hub because that's how we're going to be able to get this into your hands yeah it really was fantastic i've been going to church my entire life and i thought i knew the bible pretty well but every time pastor shane comes and he shares i learn something brand new and he changes my mindset on a whole lot of things and if you've been blessed by pastor shane's ministries why don't you consider giving to his ministry you can do that online and just tag it shame with our ministries and we'll make sure that gets to him perfect and we are in the christmas season so make sure you head to our website because we have got the details for every campus and what's going to be happening for them but exclusively this is a first-time announcement but exclusively for you guys at our online campus pastor shane willard has a special message for you guys that's going to be on sunday morning on the 20th of december and so get excited yeah marketing your calendars you will not want to miss that at all yeah it's going to be so good but until then we can't wait to see you all next week yeah so do good have fun love life [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] so [Music] so [Music] you

Channel: New Hope Church

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Length: 52min 45sec (3165 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 28 2020