Don't Bow to the Counterfeit | Recalibrate | Week 2

well good morning everyone let's go ahead and stand to our feet so glad you guys are here with us this weekend listen psalm 150 verse 6 says let everything that has breath praise the lord so that's what we're going to do today we love to invite you to join us as we sing and as we lift up the name of jesus all right let's go [Music] no [Music] this all belongs to you we're full of expectations [Music] there's nothing you can't do come on lift it up [Music] [Music] is [Music] faith is in the air all your promises will shine everything with prayers [Music] is [Music] [Applause] oh [Applause] [Music] oh we praise you jesus [Music] [Music] heaven [Music] with now [Music] is [Music] [Music] everything [Music] is [Music] is oh [Applause] [Music] mighty brushing with [Music] [Music] now open [Music] holy spirit move again on love heaven now [Music] heaven's open right here right now jesus is here jesus is here [Music] in church as we're standing here as we're worshiping together the reality is that jesus is here just let that sink in for a moment the same jesus that we're singing about the same jesus that we're worshiping in this moment is here right now with us that means that freedom is here that means that healing is here that means that peace is here restoration is here that's what we mean when we say that heaven's now open we don't need to wait until we get to heaven to see the things of heaven because of what jesus has done his death his resurrection the victory that he's won for us the gift of his holy spirit we now have access to god we now have continual access to the presence of god at any moment so that's why we celebrate jesus it's all because of him and it's all for him so let's continue to worship [Music] our together we won't fear the fight there is one who's stronger hard-pressed on each side we will not lose sight of the one who's greater one name one name holds victory one voice that silence is [Music] jesus [Music] on the battlefield yes they do down [Music] in the mighty name of [Applause] holds jesus victory [Music] [Applause] [Applause] [Music] every victory [Music] [Applause] is [Applause] is is is eternity jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] jesus [Music] lord there is so much more silence the noise tear down the walls within [Music] lord takes thee lord takes five give us [Music] we've had a taste and we've had a glimpse of heaven but there is [Music] but there are greater things [Applause] give us help even more [Music] there's nothing until [Applause] hunger [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] is [Music] help us [Music] welcome traders point online so excited to have you with us here today and especially if this is your first time with us today we are so excited that you're here we're honored that you spent a part of your week with us so thanks so much for being with us here today and whether this is your first time with us or you've been with us for a long time we want you to know that we would love to be able to connect with you and we know there's a good portion of our audience out there that has been here with us for a while and we just haven't had a chance to hear your story to get to know your name and we'd love to have the chance to do that so we'd love to hear from you in our tpo connect form it'll come through in the chats but you can always find it at tpcc.org tpoconnect and we'd love to follow up with you hear your name get to hear your story and to see how we can come alongside you in your walk with jesus so let us know through that connect form and something that i hope that you know about us if you've been with us for any amount of time is that we as traders point we have a huge heart for meeting the needs and loving vulnerable children around the world and we have an incredible opportunity right now to come alongside vulnerable kids from the other side of the world right here in the state of indiana you see about 40 miles south of india indianapolis there's camp atterbury and they're at camp attebury there's 6 600 afghan refugees right now and out of that 6 600 about half of them are under the age of 19 and around a thousand of them are four years old and younger and so the needs are incredible right now and we put a website together that's going to come across your screen and that's a amazon wish list that we've put together it's basically gift cards that we are going to use to bless the afghan refugees at camp atterbury to come alongside them meet their basic needs and necessities and all of the funds go straight to afghan refugees at cap attebury so we'd love for you to join us in the mission of serving vulnerable children from all over the world uh and so check out that website we'd love to have you join us in that well another thing that we're really excited for is the recalibrate series which continues on today and so i just want to encourage you one more time check out tpcc.org journal there's a box there that allows you to say that you want to be followed up with about group and so we have this group that is kicking off tomorrow night it's a short-term group we'll kick off monday nights nine o'clock via zoom and it's a way for us to get face-to-face with other people from traders point online over zoom but it's a way for us to talk about what god is teaching us through the preaching uh through the daily bible readings through the romans journals and as we come together in group it's a chance for us to build life-giving relationships and share all that god is doing in us so really excited about to check out the website for more details but we're going to hear from our lead pastor erin brockett let's go ahead and prepare our hearts to hear from god's word together [Music] all right well i want to welcome everyone gathered across all of our physical locations and those of you joining us online we are super thrilled to have you with us today and hopefully you were able to get one of these recalibrate journals last weekend we did run out of them and we're trying to get as many back in stock as we possibly can because we want you to have one and i want to encourage you to bring it with you every week don't leave it anywhere and forget it because of just the scarcity of these we every one of them is really important to be able to give away to people that want to have one but i do want to draw your attention to the qr code inside and scan that because it opens up a whole bunch of additional resources to our study in romans that you don't want to miss sign up for the daily bible reading because i said this last week that there's no way we're going to get through the entire content of the book of romans in 11 weeks but through daily bible reading and the additional studies we will and so you're going to leave a whole bunch on the table if you don't take advantage of that now a couple quick things before we get going first of all i just want to celebrate the fact that we are going to be launching our midtown campus in january and we're excited about that can we give it up for the midtown campus those of you that have been our church for a while may recall that we had launched northeast and our midtown campuses right before covid we had to make the really painstaking decision to push pause on both of those campuses knowing full well that in the future we would relaunch them again we're still working on plans for northeast but we have a date for our midtown campus we have a campus pastor from midtown his name is alex diaz and he and his wife erin relocated with their family here in the summer and just an incredible family and in fact i just had alex over to my house on thursday night and we sat around the campfire enjoying this incredible weather that we're having and man i just love his heart love his heart for god i love his heart for people in fact i'm going to have him preach in a couple of months so that way our entire church can get acquainted with him and i just want to ask you to be praying for the start of this campus we are for the city and this is an important area in our city and just be praying towards the launch of the midtown campus in january uh one other real quick thing before we get going is that i just want to make you aware that here in about 30-ish minutes or so there's going to be a small section of this message that might be a little bit sensitive to young ears and so if you are a parent and you've got little kids in the room with you right now not trying to cause any alarm just speaking as a dad like if as a father i would want to have this heads up just want to make you aware of that and maybe i don't know here in five minutes or so you might get up take a little potty break and check your kids into our amazing kids ministry environments they are awesome all right they'll love it well um last week we kicked off this series in romans by saying that all of us have our internal compasses calibrated in different directions and what i mean by that is that all of us have a way to perceive right and wrong good and bad just and in just and we're we all have an opinion or perspective on the myriad of issues that are going on in our world right now and we're pretty certain that our perspective is the right one but the thing is is that we all have a voice or a set of voices that is informing the perspective that we have and and that's not all bad but we need to evaluate it from time to time and so for some of us the the perspective that is informing the direction of our compass is maybe cnn or fox news maybe it is the latest book on enneagram or the instagram influencers that you follow and like i said none of that is bad but periodically we need to stop as followers of jesus and recalibrate our compass and ask ourselves do those voices sound anything at all like the voice of jesus and so what we're doing in this series is we're using the book of romans to do what it's been doing for people for centuries recalibrate our lives back to true north because the last year and a half has knocked all of us off to some degree and by true north i mean this following after jesus in every area of our lives and the fancy word for this is lordship and very at a very simple meaning it simply means that i'm gonna follow jesus first and everything else is a distant second it's the realization that what god is really after isn't my belief like oftentimes we're like well you know i believe in god and it's a good place to start but the bible even tells us that even the demons believe but they don't necessarily follow jesus see it's understanding that until i give god my heart it's just empty actions and empty religion you see when god evaluates your life and mine he's not looking at external conformity to a religion or even a set of beliefs but an inward transformation of the heart by his spirit which then always affects the way that i live my life now oftentimes what happens is that most of us are on board with jesus we like the idea of jesus as savior but then there's this thing sort of battling against that called the way i want to live my life and eventually those things will come into conflict and at that point we have a decision to make and we can choose to reject jesus god will allow you to do that you know it's called free will in fact i'm out on that or or we maybe use excuses to help us uh kind of excuse walking away we'll say things like well i can't believe in a god that would allow pain and suffering in this world and so we think by walking away from him it solves it or we say you know i don't think that i like what god has to say about this subject over here so i'm going to choose to reject it or here's what's happening increasingly in our world today is that we just take who jesus is and what he says and we reshape it to fit the way that i want to live and that is not lordship and so this is the question that paul is going to place the focus on in our passage today the question is who or what has my heart and i want you to write this question down in your journal i want you to really grapple with this question this week and i want to urge you not to answer it too quickly because my mouth can say one thing but my credit card statement and internet history can say another and so what paul's going to do by way of review is he's going to open up this letter just like we saw last week by telling all of us who he used to be before god got a hold of his heart and who he used to be was a self-righteous religious jerk but then he says to in another letter to a young man named timothy he goes amen i'm the worst of all sinners like the grace of god completely humbled him and he says if it can change somebody like me then it can change anyone and it is available to everyone and so paul what he's doing is he's traveling around the middle east on these missionary journeys and he's telling anyone and everyone about this gospel message that has the dynamite power to save now what he's doing in romans is he is writing a letter to an incredibly influential yet massively divided church in rome and he's saying hey listen all of your compasses are calibrated in different directions because of the culture in which you live and he says it's not a bad thing for you to have these perspectives or traditions or backgrounds but you need to keep the main thing the main thing and he would say hey listen it doesn't matter if you're jew or gentile good or bad religious or non-religious all of us are equally dependent upon the complete righteousness and finished work of jesus alone and he says this gospel has power to save now from chapter 1 verse 18 to the beginning of chapter 2 what paul is going to do is he is going to painstakingly explain what it is that you and i need to be saved from in other words if the good news of the gospel doesn't really sound all that good to you it's likely because you don't really understand just how bad the bad news really is here's another way of saying it paul's got to get us lost before he can get us saved which is one of the reasons why the passage we're going to look at today is really challenging and in fact some of these verses when we read it here in a moment like i just wouldn't be surprised if maybe there's a little bit of an emotional reaction that sort of rises up within you this section of romans is not only difficult like it's become one of the most despised passages in the entire bible and i am going to teach it today don't you wish you were me like i i can i could just feel the envy in the room and online like you guys are like i wish i could trade places with aaron today uh i uh you know some message i've been preaching for 20 some odd years and i've just learned that some messages man they just get you cheered like a hero and others pounded like a nail and i had a mentor a few years ago say to me he goes you know aaron he said preaching sometimes requires you to throw yourself into oncoming traffic because the wisdom of god's word is going to run in the opposite direction of the ideologies of culture and so i just want to acknowledge that i want to acknowledge that i'm not getting out of this message today without disappointing some someone and i'm either going to disappoint some of you or i'm going to disappoint god and i just want you to know i love you but i'd rather disappoint you because god's got a bigger truck all right and so so um to turn to the person beside you and just simply say this these are going to be some hard truths go ahead i'm praying you have the humility to receive it but by the looks of you i'm not very optimistic all right no actually like just in all seriousness i just want you to know my heart and if you missed last week's message i go go back and read this like i just want you to know that i stand on this platform not because i've got it all figured out i stand on this platform as a fellow struggler and i want you to know that there are areas of my life like right now that i need to submit to the lordship of christ and there are areas that i thought i submitted to the lordship of christ but i got to go back and i got to resubmit myself to the lordship of christ and i just want you to know i'm right there in the struggle with you now the reason why this is one of the most difficult passages in the bible is because it flies in the face of the dominant ideology of our culture listen uh that we have all had our compasses calibrated to and continued to some of you since the day you were born you don't like know anything different and the reason why this is going to sound so alarming to you is because it's so dramatically different from everything we hear however i will say this as christians we haven't done ourselves any favors when it comes to the way in which the end of romans chapter 1 gets taught or communicated here's what i mean is that this passage was never meant to be used as binoculars examining the lives of other people from a distance this passage is meant to be used as a mirror to get a good look at ourselves paul is going to say hey listen the ground is level at the foot of the cross we are all in the same boat like there is no such thing as a super christian that person does not exist like it doesn't matter if you listen to caleb and have a jesus fish on the back of your car where you listen to ac dc and you have an evolution fish on the back of your car or like me you listen to ac dc and you have a jesus fish on the back of your car right that'll blow all your categories all right it's like we are all in need of jesus what what this means is there is no such thing as a major sin or a minor sin there may be different consequences to sin but no such thing as a major one and a minor one this means that there is no uh good guys and bad guys we are all bad guys there's only one saving good guy and his name is jesus so before we jump in what i want to do i just want you to know my heart i want to do surgery not be a hatchet man right i want to use a scalpel not a machete and so to do that i want to provide a little local anesthetic i want to take us to the old testament book of daniel you don't need to turn there i'm just going to give you the cliff notes version but we need to understand what has been going on behind the scenes for centuries it is nothing new so in the book of daniel you've got this really evil king by the name of nebuchadnezzar everybody at all of our campuses say nebuchadnezzar it's a fun name to say but he's an evil guy and he rules over the city of babylon and he captures jerusalem and when he does he takes into captivity four young men from judah's royal family they are the best of the best and he intentionally does that because he wants to take the best of the best from the opposing team and he wants to indoctrinate them into the ideology of the babylonian culture so he changes their diet he changes their training regimen their study curriculum and even their names daniel's name gets changed to beltashazar and then his three friends are shadrach meshach and abednego or if you grew up in church in the 90s rack shack and benny all right and so he takes these guys and kind of puts them into this ideology and they are get this they are determined to live for god in the midst of a very ungodly culture and they live their lives in such a way that jesus was on full display meaning they didn't get mean they didn't get obnoxious they didn't get a judgmental they didn't show up at the rally with a big sign said hashtag nebuchadnezzar not my king like they didn't do that they live for jesus in a way that stood out imagine that there's so much we could learn from these guys in fact this should be our next sermon i just decided it right now like this should be our next sermon series all right now check this out verse 20 whenever the king consulted them in any matter requiring wisdom and balanced judgment because god gave them just this incredible ability even the ability to interpret dreams he found them look at this 10 times more capable than any of the magicians and enchanters in his entire kingdom now these guys were living in such a way that it stood out nebuchadnezzar was like man what is different about you guys now fast forward to daniel chapter three nebuchadnezzar makes this gold statue 90 feet tall and nine feet wide he tells everyone in babylon to bow down including our boys daniel shatter agnesia and abendigo verse 4. then a herald shouted out people of all races and nations and languages listen to the king's command when you hear the sound of the horn the flute the zither i play a mean zither by the way lear heart pipes and other musical instruments bow to the ground to worship king nebuchadnezzar's gold statue anyone who refuses to obey will immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace now what i want to point out here is this isn't just a kid's story this is a counterfeit worship service it is the demonic equivalent of what we just did a few minutes ago there was an image to worship we worship in an image too we worship the image of jesus who is the image of the invisible god and the exact representation of his nature and here nebuchadnezzar said bow to this counterfeit king the gold statue and if you don't we'll throw you into a counterfeit hell a fiery furnace now last week i told you that we have a very very real enemy behind the scenes who is not a cartoon character and he doesn't you know do the foaming at the mouth head spinning around thing that hollywood portrays him as he's just simply a really really good liar he's a deceiver lots of smoke and mirrors and here's the deal he's been doing it way longer than you've been around and he knows all the tricks of the trade and we just got to open ourselves up to the fact that we could be deceived by a deceiver because he's really really good here's the other thing that he is is he is a counterfeit satan does not have a an original bone in his body god creates satan counterfeits what that means is if god gave us fruit loops which we all know he did satan gives us fruit spins like if god gave us pringles satan gives us prongles if god gives us dr pepper and mountain dew satan gives us dr bob and mountain shouting if god is the true god of heaven which he is satan is the counterfeit lowercase g god of this world god gives the holy spirit the word is paraclete which means helper satan counterfeits with unholy spirits called demons god creates revival satan counterfeits with confusion chaos and pandemics god calls people to repent of destructive behavior and false belief because he loves you satan counterfeits with tolerance and normalizes destructive behavior and false belief because he hates you whatever god creates satan counterfeits and he is still doing this today and the church has been on its heels long enough we need to recognize the bible says that our real battle is not against flesh and blood and what that means is our battle is not against people who have a different political conviction than you or somebody that has a different skin color or a nationality or a lifestyle that our real battle is against the principalities and powers of this dark world behind the scenes creating division and confusion and chaos therefore the church doesn't need to be woke as much as it needs to be awakened and what i mean by that is that we recognize the injustices that have gone on in our past and even today and we recognize the real enemy behind those injustices and we say no more like in the name of jesus like no more you you're not going to create this division and confusion and friendly fire within the body of christ any more now you might be sitting there going okay aaron nice little history lesson from the old testament nobody's creating gold images today to tell us to bow down now you might want to rethink that this is from north korea this is not 600 bc this is 2021 a.d these are some government leaders in north korea people bowing down to these gold images this is from turkmenistan and this is a warrior on a horse riding in with a sword and if you know anything at all about your bible specifically revelation you know that is a copyright infringement like that's our thing jesus rides in on a horse with a sword coming out of his mouth and a tat on his leg that's ours here's the next one this is modern-day china that's just downright creepy right now you you look at all this and you say well why okay why are these same things still happening because the same spirit is still working times places and people change the spirit behind it remains the same that means that as a church we have to be full of the holy spirit because we are in a battle with unholy spirits we need an outpouring of the spirit of god and power not just more fancy strategies so our culture uh today in the western world i i would agree with you it's likely not going to create a 90-foot gold statue and tell us to bow down but what our culture will do is it will tell us to bow down to an ideology ideologies are the idols of our day there are ideologies in our culture right now that if you will not bow down and they don't use the word bow they use the word affirm everything in the ideology we won't throw you into a furnace but we will fire you cancel you boycott you de-platform you remove your books from amazon bow to the counterfeit or else this has always been satan's strategy now fast forward 800 years after the book of daniel to the book of revelation and the city of babylon which is long gone gets mentioned in revelation chapter 14. it says fallen fallen is babylon the great in other words she's no longer here she who made all the nations drink the wine of the passion of her sexual immorality this is saying that the city of babylon is long gone but the spirit of babylon is here working behind every culture and nation across time urging people moving people away from faithfulness to jesus in other words satan really isn't all that bothered with you believing in god what bothers them is when you follow him so he's like man believe in him all you want but i want to try to urge you away from faith what do you really like to do is get you to not believe in god at all but if you won't do that because god has placed eternity and hearts of men he'll just get you to reshape what jesus says to fit the way you want to live and the primary strategy is sexual immorality in all of its forms why well because whatever god creates satan counterfeits so god created the universe and he said it was good then he created the human body and he said oh man that is very good and so satan takes the apex of god's creation did you know you were the apex of his creation and he creates a counterfeit and he's urging us to replace it for god himself in other words the thing that is most likely to replace the worship of god in our lives is the worship of sex the sexual revolution ideology of the last 50 years is the dominant ideology shaping our culture today because times places and people change the spirit behind them remains the same now it is with that knowledge that we are ready to read romans 1 18. preaching helmet is on all right but god shows his anger from heaven against all sinful wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness now automatically like you there might be a little bit of an emotional response that rises up within you you're like i don't like that at all talking about the anger of god like some translations call it the wrath of god and you say well that sounds oppressive and repressive and god is love and he is but you need to understand that the opposite of love is not anger the opposite of love is indifference the very fact that god is angry shows how great his love is for you here's just a question that i've got why is it not okay for god to be angry you are aren't you angry right now about something haven't you been angry over the last year and a half about something whether it's politics or a social issue or mass mandates or vaccine or no vaccine like we get angry over things here's the thing that's that's right for us to get angry about we we should get angry about injustices that we see in the world however we need to come to recognize that everyone everywhere is guilty and on the wrong side of the greatest injustice ever committed we put god on a cross here's another question you ever been ripped off you ever had somebody misrepresent something you said you ever had somebody steal intellectual property from you doesn't it make you angry see god created this world he designed it to be without pain disease war hurt and pandemics and an enemy came in and he lured us away with empty promises that turned out to be outright lies it goes all the way back to the question that he asked adam and eve in genesis did god really say what does that sound like we take jesus we don't like what he says because it means we got to change the way we live so we reshape it and we say well he didn't really mean that that is the play that he's been using since the beginning of time and he threw this world into chaos and brokenness the effects of which we all feel it was never intended to be this way when was the last time that you genuinely grieved the relationship with god you were meant to have but don't have because of your sin and other people's sin i don't know i think anger is a pretty appropriate response maybe we could cut god some slack and know that he's not angry at you he's angry for you verse 19 they know the truth about god because he has made it obvious to them for ever since the world was created people have seen the earth and the sky through everything god made they can clearly see his invisible qualities his eternal power and divine nature so they have no excuse for not knowing god one of the oldest arguments that i hear periodically is people say i don't know that i can believe in god because what about all the people who have never heard and i think we have this like sort of false idea or dichotomy in our minds that one day you know we're going to stand before god and god's going to be standing in front of the pearly gates and he's going to say why should i let you in and we're going to fumble around our words and we're going to maybe say that i was a really good person or i meant well or i attended christmas and easter and god's going to go yeah but you didn't know jesus sucker and he's going to go boom and we're going to go but nobody ever told me come on i think we use that as a smoke screen let me just make this one observation it's interesting to me that everybody i've ever heard that from has heard okay so let god do his job he's sovereign over the people who quote unquote haven't heard but right here paul says in romans everybody knows is invisible qualities in other words he's saying that in the same way that a house reveals something about its builder even though you never met the builder or a painting reveals something about a painter even though you never met the painter creation says something about its creator maybe even though you haven't seen the creator with your own eyeballs all this just fell into place or how do you explain this like how do you explain why we sort of feel bad about like things that are wrong in the world like where does that even come from so this is what a lot of uh philosophers will call and i'm not going to nerd out on this too much i just want to introduce the terms to you one is called the cosmological argument this goes all the way back to the days of aristotle here was the question behind this article of this argument why is there something rather than nothing and where did the original something come from what that means is if the world really did indeed begin billions of years ago with the bang where do the materials that cause the bang come from like you can't just keep going back in infinite regress into nothingness eventually something has to come from somewhere nothingness doesn't just explode although it'd be really cool to just make something explode with my mind here's the teleological argument and the root word there is teleos it just means purpose what that means is that when scientists look at the universe they'll say like it feels as if everything has been finely tuned for a purpose the purpose namely being life on planet earth so if you look at our atmosphere the levels of nitrogen oxygen and carbon dioxide are so dialed in that if they're off just a little bit life is unsustainable on earth or take the water molecule many of you know it's the only molecule whose solid form ice is less dense than its liquid form which means that ice cubes float to the top of your iced tea instead of drift to the bottom that's a big deal when it comes to like the oceans because if ice didn't float it would drift to the bottom of the oceans freezing the oceans making life unsustainable on the earth or check this out if jupiter wasn't the size and in the orbit that it's in astronomers predict that there would be 10 000 times the number of asteroid strikes here on earth making life unsustainable do you realize what that means jupiter is like the dennis rodman of planets he is grabbing rebounds and setting pigs so that way planet earth can get open for the three-pointer of life and those of you have no idea what i'm talking about because you don't know basketball trust me that's good right or we could put away our telescopes and we could pull out our microscopes and see the same thing like the strands of the dna are absolutely incredible it's phenomenal and the odds that that just happened over like billions and billions and billions of years would be similar to like if a ink factory just exploded and then a billion years later it produced the collected works of shakespeare like scientists say that the odds of this all just happening is like somebody flipping a coin and it coming up heads every second for 10 billion years in a row so either we're just that lucky or perhaps we have an anti-god bias we know we don't want to know because if it's true that means some things in my life have to change it's like pushing a beach ball under the water it's just going to keep coming up and if anybody suggested truth that runs against the way i want to live my life the automatic reaction is to suppress it that's what was going on in daniel chapter 3. canceled culture is another form of romans 1 truth suppression because the bible doesn't just tell us what happened a long long time ago it tells us what always happens when an ideology becomes an idol look at verse 21 yes they knew god but they wouldn't worship him as god or even give him thanks and they began to think up foolish ideas of what god was like and as a result their minds became dark and confused claiming to be wise they instead became utter fools and instead of worshiping the glorious ever living god they worshipped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles i've said this to you before that we were all made to worship even if you don't believe in god and even if you're not musical what worship is is it's affection aimed towards something and we're all doing it we we worship at a concert we worship at a football game we are taking our affections and aiming it and here he's saying that we don't just stop worshiping if we don't worship god we worship created things we worship other things and i don't want to like oversimplify this but this is a lot of what we're seeing today is that a lot of addictions of all kinds whether you are addicted to video games food alcohol sports working out or porn those are all worship problems we are nursing our wounds and insecurities and shortcomings we are taking our affections and aiming them in the wrong places and it doesn't fulfill and it produces anxiety and depression so god abandoned them to do whatever shameful things their hearts desired that sounds really really harsh unless you are a parent with small kids any of you ever like being with your kids or they're asking for something that's gonna harm them but they think it's good can we please stay up all night can we please eat the whole jar of nutella and eventually you're tired of fighting with them and you're like knock yourself out we'll see how that goes for you see understand god's not being harsh here every time the bible says don't that is god saying don't hurt yourself but because he's given us free will he will say hey listen go ahead knock yourself out go down that road like like like see see how that's going to work out for you but he continues to be here and he's made a way for us to get back to him by grace i'm so thankful for that see over the course of human history the thing that we tend to worship the most is sex and what this next section is going to say is that the real test of lordship in our lives usually ends up manifesting itself in some way in the form of sexuality sex replaces god as the new religion look at what it says verse 24 as a result they did vile and degrading things with each other's bodies they traded the truth about god for a lie there it is so they worshiped and served the things god created instead of the creator himself who is worthy of eternal praise amen now i just want to say this to the room and to everybody at all our campuses and online right now put away the binoculars and grab a mirror because what paul is going to say is we are all in the same boat we are all guilty of the same thing the word lust in the greek is the word porneia and it simply means any sexual activity in thought in eyes or in body outside of a biblically defined marriage between a man and a woman and jesus would even take it a step further and he would say man if you've ever even had a lustful thought you've already you're already guilty of committing adultery and i thought about asking you to raise your hands if you've ever had a lustful thought but i already know the answer we're all in the same boat and listen god does not send people to hell for sexual sin now in our sexual sin we want what we want and so we refuse uh we we exchange the truth of god for a lie listen over and over and over and over again which separates us from christ and christ is our only bridge to god verse 26 that is why god abandoned them to their shameful desires even the women turned against their natural way to have sex and instead indulged in sex with each other and the men instead of having normal sexual relations with women burned with lust for each other men did shameful things with other men and as a result of this sin they suffered within themselves the penalty they deserved now i want you to know that there's an emotional reaction that's rising up within you because everything within our culture calibrates the compass and the exact opposition of what you just heard i do want you to know that paul's not picking on same-sex attraction because if you read this within its entire context what he's doing is he's providing a pretty exhaustive list of all the things in which we have been deceived to exchange the truth of god for a lie and he is going to put we're not there yet we're going to get to it he's going to put gossip and disobedience to parents right next to this since it's how we've all done it now you may be here and you're like well how does the church think about this issue i preached specifically to this topic in april of 2019 in a series called asking for a friend i'd encourage you to go back it's on youtube and on our website you can watch it and then the week following a friend of mine named caleb kaltenbach who was raised by two gay parents he was here and he preached on this subject i think those messages will really really help you what i want you to understand is that this ideology has been so inundated within our culture that automatically there's all kinds of questions and maybe even resistance and i would just simply say this whether it's same sex attraction or opposite sex attraction in which we are tempted to to treat it outside of the way god designed it um here's here's the line of reasoning and maybe even something you're thinking right now aaron people in order to be a complete and fulfilled person you have to have sex and i would just simply say we worship a man who died single and never had sex jesus was the most peace peace-filled content healthiest person to ever walk the planet and he died in abstinence and he never had sex can i can i just say this very lovingly in order to be a complete and fulfilled person you you don't you don't have to have sex you're not doing it right now at least we hope not all right i mean in fact many of you right now if you're being really honest i mean i'm i've got a broken heart like multiple times over and a bunch of other issues i'm dealing with because i sought to satisfy sexual urges outside of how god designed it now listen uh god is not a prude this is not old-fashioned god was the one who created this he's all for it but it's like fire that's a helpful analogy fire is great with when where it is in an environment where it can provide warmth for your household get it outside of that burns the house down since they thought it foolish to acknowledge god he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done their lives became full of now here's the exhaustive list and we're all in it every kind of wickedness sin greed hate envy murder quarreling deception malicious behavior and gossip they are backstabbers haters of god insolent proud boastful they invent new ways of sinning and they disobey their parents i love how he just throws that in there they refuse to understand break their promises are heartless and have no mercy here's what i want to point out in those four verses he said a mouthful but you will find the roots of economic social spiritual and family disorder it's all in there remember we have an enemy who specializes in deceit and he counterfeits the good gifts of god and oftentimes i will hear you've likely heard it too maybe you've even said it how can god be so good when he allows all the pain and the suffering that is in this world and i will simply draw your attention back to the fact that we have an enemy behind the scenes who is creating chaos god so often gets blamed for satan's schemes here's what that means satan breaks wind in the back seat god gets blamed for it listen jesus defeated him on a cross his destiny has been decided and now he is wreaking as much havoc as he possibly can on god's creation and since you are the apex of god's creation guess who is enemy number one to him he's gunning for you it's like he is a rabid dog on a chain he can run around to a certain parameter but he's limited but he's trying to bite everyone that he can and the answer to this is not to reject god due to the pain and suffering of this world it is to run to him look at verse 32 they know god's justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die yet they do them anyway and worse yet they encourage others to do them too so what that means is the ideology of culture demands that you approve of them doing these things unless i celebrate and support you then i'm intolerant let me just say this as lovingly as i can if you need other people's approval for your convictions then maybe you need to reconsider your convictions and i just want you to hear my heart in this i just want to talk to you for a minute right now like if you're uncomfortable if you're angry if you're like this is not the church for me i totally respect that let me just say this if you don't like what god says about sexuality but you really want to follow jesus you need to ask god to change your heart if you don't like what god says about money and generosity you need to ask god to change your heart if you don't like what god says about loving your enemies and forgiving those who have hurt you you need to ask god to change your heart and here's why he's not changing he's not changing for you he's not changing for me he's not changing for the culture here's what he said that he would change he sent jesus to a cross to change your heart the transformation of the heart now for those of us that are feeling pretty good about ourselves because the whole sermon you've been like amen tell them aaron i'm going to send this to my neighbor [Music] chapter 2 verse 1 he's going to take aim at the rest of us check this out you may think you can condemn such people who are such people in your mind you're just as bad you have no excuse i think you just open hand slapped us when you think they are wicked and should be punished you are condemning yourself for you who judge others do these very same things and we know that god in his justice will punish anyone who does such things what he is referring to here is what theologians will call the doctrine of total depravity and total the doctrine of total depravity says while everything we do is not completely sinful this means that there is good in you there's good in everyone why because everyone was created in the image of a good god there is good in you but listen it's not enough why because nothing we do is completely untouched by sin which means that our perspectives and our desires and all that stuff has a flawed fallen sin nature to it in which it makes us susceptible to the deceptions of an enemy and we need the holy spirit to give us eyes to see so he's saying here listen no amount of work will pay it off no amount of good effort will pay it off you need a savior and i can only begin to grasp the power of the gospel when i understand just like paul and i'm speaking as aaron brockett here the worst sinner i know is me that's the worst sinner i know i know my heart i know my motives i know how subtle i can be with it i know the things that i need to continue to submit and resubmit to the lordship of christ self-righteousness always leads to self-condemning and now he's going to end on a high note aren't you thankful for that about time somebody said don't you see how wonderfully kind and tolerant and patient god is with you that's a question meant for you does this mean nothing to you can't you see that his kindness is intended to turn you from your sin what's that mean that means that we've all allowed ourselves to be deceived by a deceiver we've all said well i love jesus but i don't really like what he says about such and such and so i'm going to twist jesus to fit the way i want to live it means that i love jesus as savior but not really his lord and yet i'm still here and i've still drawn breath into my lungs and god hasn't returned yet and that is an act of kindness because he wants everyone to come to repentance he wants everyone to turn now i want to wrap up with something that i heard a lady named jen wilkins say just this last week she on her podcast she was talking about the end of romans 1 and she said this about fell out of my chair she said there are two ways to escape from feeling guilty about your sin you can repent or you can repeat turn from it or repeat it over and over until you no longer feel remorse like you no longer feel any conviction over it like i would even say if you've done something and you just feel that heaviness that conviction that is the holy spirit that's actually a really really good thing none of us are perfect we're going to continue to fall and we've got god's grace there what should alarm you is when you no longer feel convicted and right now if you feel convicted you need to act upon what you have heard who or what has your heart right now and you can make that decision today and so what i want to ask you to do is just ask yourself like how do i need to respond to this message for some of you you just need somebody to pray with you some of you maybe need to confess some stuff some of you need to say man i've been guilty of this like i've been kind of twisting jesus to fit the way that i want to live no more i want to follow jesus as savior and lord some of you today maybe need to be baptized and i want you to know that the waters of the baptistry are going to be open this entire series long what better time to do it and so today at all of our campuses you want to be baptized we will more than happy to sit down with you talk with you and get that done but you need to respond in some way don't bow to the counterfeit bow to the one true king who in his grace loves you enough to give everything to reconcile that relationship with you but i'm just going to ask all of our campuses right now if you would just stand to your feet i'm going to pray we're going to sing and we're going to give you a chance to respond father we come to you today we thank you so much for your infinite goodness and kindness and forgive us when we exchange the truth that you have given us for a lie god fill us with your holy spirit give us eyes to see what's really going on god i pray that you we would take this maybe conviction that we feel and turn it into tangible action that would draw us closer to you god the church we've we've been on our heels for far too long right all right now we want to keep our eyes fixed on you we want to lean in we want to want to come together and we want to push back the principalities and powers of this dark world because you have given us the holy spirit to do so we ask this in jesus name and everybody says amen let's sing [Music] [Music] cheese how great the chasm that lay between us how high the mountain i could not climb in desperation i turned to heaven and spoke your name into the night then through the darkness your lovingkindness [Music] tore through the shadows of my soul the work is finished the end is written jesus christ my little [Music] who could imagine so great a mercy what heart could fathom such boundless grace the god of ages stepped down from glory to where my sin is the cross has spoken i am forgiven the king of kings calls me his own beautiful savior i'm yours forever jesus christ [Music] praise the one who set me free hallelujah death has lost its grip on me you have broken every chain there's salvation in your name jesus christ [Music] then came the morning that sealed the promise your very body began to breathe and out of the silence the roaring lion declared the grave has [Music] everybody [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] jesus [Applause] [Applause] [Music] jesus christ [Music] [Music] every day jesus christ [Music] [Music] so if you're feeling god's there or something up inside you right now i just want to echo what abe said if you're feeling the need to confess a sin maybe to repent maybe to just pray with somebody maybe today you're thinking about following jesus for the first time ever wherever you're at if you're feeling something stirring up and calling you to take a step closer to jesus today i just want to encourage you text the word jesus to 87221 we'd love to be able to encourage you would love to be able to come alongside you whether it's listening praying for coming alongside helping walk you towards jesus whatever that looks like we want to walk with you and so again text jesus to 87221 and our team would love to be able to encourage you and come alongside you if you need prayer today we would love to pray for you head to tpcc.org prayer well we hope you have an incredible week ahead go out and make a difference we'll see you right back here next week

Channel: Traders Point Christian Church

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Id: wODtMrl6qG0

Length: 69min 52sec (4192 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 26 2021