Everybody Can: Know God | 12Stone Church

and so welcome to day one of one at 12Stone and if this was if this was anything else it'd be awkward we're all dressed the same across the campuses today so well done y'all look good I feel like we're like a Georgia game when they say it's a white Outsider a black out red out whatever like this looks right and I'm glad that you're here and this this week has been a a roller coaster in a really beautiful way but I just want to read probably my favorite text that I got this week it's from a friend I've known here at 12Stone for over a decade and here's what he said because this was an answer to prayer for the last six months he said hey good morning Jason pray for you this morning commit to do so for the next hundred days and he said this I also thought about this transition and the shift of responsibility but I also felt it shift in me men have followed PK for years and they grew together and made a great impact for God now people will have the opportunity to do the same I want to be part of that however God chooses to use me onward see this this succession is not about two people it's about God doing that that God would that help you feel the shift in you too because this church was never about a person this church was always about Jesus and this church will always be about the next person finding Jesus and in great part hundreds of you last weekend said listen I felt the shift I feel the ownership of this place and hundreds of you gave the next sh offering and I get to tell you today they we we we've officially completed phase one that's we're about 1.2 million of the 3 million y'all have already given isn't that awesome praise God which means I was able to officially reach out and tell our CFO I'm greenlighting the first two or three campuses in their children's space you'll begin to see K12 change across those and and listen just this week we had over a thousand students on Wednesday night we've had over 75 baptisms just since camp God is doing something in the Next Generation and we celebrate what he's doing today and I know that many of you are still in that process going all right God I'm going to ask what should I give and you just say Yes And as you do that maybe you want to hop online to the website or right now you can text nextg to 37748 and continue inside of this nextg offering because again phase one's done we got two more phases to go for us to create a church where our kids go this place is mine not just my parents amen amen so today we start a sort of a brand new series together and if you look down at your shirt if you're wearing it it's called everybody can and this series is going to sit inside of the book of Romans which by the way the book of Romans is fire it's my favorite book in I was just talking we were praying backstage and and we literally said if like every other book in the Bible was lost to history The Book of Romans would have enough for life and godliness and holiness and salvation like the book of Romans is unbelievable I could spend the next 10 years just in the Book of Romans and it wouldn't be enough but the the Crux of of sort of where we're we're starting today is Romans 1:16 for I am not ashamed of the gospel because it is the power of God somebody say power it's the power of God the the power comes from the gospel which is the good news of Jesus it is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes that's why this is called everybody because everybody who believes on Jesus can find Salvation and not you're not just saved from something you're saved to something you're not you're not saved and and put into a religious structure you're saved to to God himself here's how we say it here at 12Stone we believe that everybody can know God and everybody can find Freedom and everybody can discover a purpose and everybody can make a a difference and my prayer in the month of of August is that you would begin to see those statements not as a system that we run as a church listen but it's an invitation from almighty God because this is not a strategic plan a vision or a system to run it's an invitation from God to to live a life full of meaning and purpose and significance everything else in the world tells you just put your 30 40 years into work work get enough money to retire maybe you can afford the boat maybe you can redo your wife's kitchen for and she'll be happy maybe you'll be able to pay for some of your kids' education like that's the goal and yet God's like there's more to life than than just getting through and getting into retirement there is meaning and purpose and significance and if you're honest there's a longing in your soul for that kind of life and it all starts with God In fact when I close my eyes and I think of that life I think about I think about myself at 70 80 years old still walking with God but freed up from my past not still living in the mess of my past looking around it at life and going I know why God put me here and I can look back at my life and see the relationships that God let me impact see when I think of myself as 70 or 80 I I think of a life that ends with one marriage for 60 plus years and I I think of my life as as raising three kids that still want to hang out with me once they don't have to live with me I I think of my life and think of a career that brought fulfillment and meaning I think of myself at 70 my face wrinkling my hair white still looking like a silver fox but still looking in the mirror that was a laugh with me right not at me with me okay but but but I see myself looking in the mirror in the morning and going I can actually be proud of the person I see in that mirror which is a big thing see when my life is over the thing I really want to hear is well done my good and faithful servant and and God wants to give us a life of great fulfillment and meaning and purpose and this month we're going to be walking through that together and I I want to I want to give us a picture for what I think is the true longing in the soul of every person a longing for the life of meaning purpose significance so I want to take you back maybe you've heard this from me before but I was raised in Upstate New York and when I say that those of you from the south are like you're from New York City I'm not three hours north of the city like way up there and let me tell you this the winners were horrendous you'd wake up overnight two to three foot of snow overnight and they didn't even DeLay School in the at where we're from we'd be shut down for a year and a half somehow it we'd be out of school in July with the snow but here's what's awesome the Summers I can't explain the Summers to you because it gets in July and August they get up to 85 in the day but no humidity and no mosquitoes Hallelujah and then when the sun went down the temperature would drop into the mid-60s it's beautiful and so you could sit around all day in the lake and and and play and have fun on the water and then at night you put a sweatshirt on and sit by a campfire and the amount of nights I spent on the lake where I was from up there Lake George on my friend's dock from his his grandfather had a cabin on the lake and we go lay on the dock and look up at the sky it was like nothing I can describe if y'all are in Atlanta where where our campuses are located there is so much ambient light y'all are seeing like seven stars there's let me give you a hint there's billions of them it's unb in fact let me do something different I want to set the tone I want to bring you back to my high school years go ahead and dim the lights across the c i I want to give you a little little V I want you to experience it like I experienced it come on now I would look up into the night sky and that's the Milky Way you can see and I would lay there and look up and it was beautiful and all inspiring and overwhelming it's no wonder that we've been fascinated with the Stars since the beginning of time when you look up at the heavens doesn't it simultaneously makes you feel small and then also you're a part of something way bigger for me when I look at the stars it stirs something in my soul like for me it it it drives me to worship it points me to the one who hung the stars as you look at this it's no wonder that for Generation after generation thousands of years ago in their search for meaning and purpose and significance people would actually worship the Stars they actually made Gods out of the constellations and they would build their religious structures even the pyramids they'd build them to line up with Heavenly Bodies the Stars the moons planets it's no wonder as you see the time lapse of everything sort of rotating around us that for thousands of years people believed that the entire universe revolved around the earth that is until capern Aus 1543 said hey just so you know everything doesn't revolve around us we're revolving around the Sun and in our search for meaning and purpose we long for something up there to bring meaning to us down here the vastness of space points us towards this god-given desire that there has to be more to life than this there has to be a meaning greater than just 78 years on Earth and then it all ends and that's it before you fall asleep let's slowly bring the lights back up see what the stars do to me is they point me to this belief that there's got to be more for thousands of years people would worship the Stars literally would name constellations and make them gods and they look for something up there to bring meaning and purpose to them down here which I believe is a is a good Pursuit meaning and purpose and back then they looked to the Stars today we got a little more clever with it we look to our careers sometimes something out there to bring meaning and purpose to our life and you can spend your whole life and build an incredible career and wake up and go it's still Hollow listen you some of us look to stuff if I could just get the next thing it would bring the the meaning and purpose in here we look to relationships some of y'all are dating looking to fix something broken in here and I'm telling you it never fixes it it only exposes it we look to our our families even sometimes we look to popularity we look to power or control we look to self-expression your felt identity being true to your inner voice like that's how I'll live a life of meaning and purpose some of us have done been this Pursuit towards like spiritualism crystals or or meditation and and and we look in all these places out there to bring meaning and purpose and significance in here and it's a it's a core human desire to want those things but listen here's my premise your search for meaning purpose and significance is actually a search for God whether you know it or not God God put he wrote eternity on the hearts of everybody and so that longing in you is actually a longing for your Creator and our prayer for this series my prayer for you is that God would either reveal himself to you for the first time or for those who walk with Jesus already that God would reveal something new about himself during this series and like I said we're in the Book of Romans and and this is the cool thing that Paul says your desire is actually your search is actually a search for God and the good news is that is that God says this Romans 1:1 19-20 since what may be known about God is plain to them because God has made it plain to them for since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen being understood from what has been made so that people are without excuse God's God's saying through this this verse listen he's made made himself plainly known to you if you would just look around you'll realize there is a God he's as plain to see as a picture one of my friends who's just mean sent to me if you were here last week my car got stuck in the in the golf cart lane he said hey it's marked pretty clearly you shouldn't have been driving there I didn't see the sign but it's apparently clearly marked Romans is saying listen it's as clear to see it's plain it's made plain to us you you should you should see him here's the good news God is not hiding he can be known everybody can know God everyone can know the one who hung the Stars see God is not hiding his Footprints are everywhere I told you I grew up in Upstate New York and like I said in the winter time man it was snow and there's one game that that is not that fun to play in the winner called hide-and seek can I tell you why this is how the game would go I'd turn my back count to 10 my brother would run off and hide and I'd be like ready or not here I literally follow your footsteps and you're right behind the tree like you can't hide in the snow cuz I I could just follow your footsteps to where you're hiding and many of us like it feels like if there is a God he's hiding from us and I'm telling you if you feel like that it's it's not that he's hiding it's that you've not just given an honest look to his Footprints like he's left them in the Stars he's left them on your your heart in fact I want to I want to give you four footprints that point to God's existence and you might be a a a skeptic or a Seeker or you might be here going I've looked for meaning or significance everywhere else I'll give this Jesus thing a try I want to I want to walk through four simple footprints that sort of point us to the EXA existence of God and the first is a is a cosmological footprint Paul said that that God has been he's made himself plainly known plain to them to see the cosmological footprint says something can't come from nothing like I don't want to burst your bubble if you like magicians and they make something appear in their hand it actually was up their sleeve right like something didn't come from nothing the fact that someone who like the fact that we're here means that someone was here before us the fact that we exist means there has to be something that is eternal and just the fact that creation exists means man if you'd follow those footsteps it might lead you to God the second is the teleological footprint I know these are big words teleological and and and what that is is is it it means that creation looks like it was designed like when you look around from the way that a tree root system works to the way that solar systems work to the way that your human body works it doesn't take like a scientist to look and go that was on purpose whether through a telescope or a microscope design is visible everywhere like if the Earth was 1% further or closer from the Sun we'd freeze or burn up if a neutron was 1% bigger than a proton Humanity would not exist there's this thought that like this all looks like it was put together in a design the moral footprint that there's like this uni this Universal moral compass where like we all just sort of agreed that there's some things that almost overarch every culture that they're just wrong or right like murder in every culture for the most part it's like we just know that we know I don't need to read the Bible to sort of go yeah I'd probably wrong to kill somebody like it's it's probably wrong to walk up to an old lady and knock her out cold right like if I did that you'd all be like that's wrong it's a unique or a universal moral compass we all sort of agree and the last footprint is this desire footprint that the desires in US correlate with the reality see the fact that when you get thirsty we have water the desire correlates to Something Real when you get hungry we have cheese pizzas and cheeseburgers praise God like when you're hungry there's a real thing when you're lonely there's people to have friendships with we desire Beauty and love and laughter these desires all correlate to something real and we desire more than just the material world here's how CS Lewis speaks to this desire footprint I love this quote if I find myself in a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy the most probable explanation is that was made for another world if nothing you can find or buy or build or create on this Earth can satisfy then maybe maybe you and I were created not just for this world see there's footprints that point us back that God can be known he's real and can be known like Paul said verse 20 so that we are without excuse God said I left enough footprints that if you go back in the house and say I counted the 10 and couldn't find you you're without excuse I want to be honest for a second one of the things I love about our church I like to think of us as a safe place for people to wrestle down their faith like I hope when you showed up you didn't feel judged like maybe you're not a follower of Jesus you don't even believe this stuff yet and you're here going God if you're real I I want to figure this thing out I love to think of this place as a safe place for you to wrestle and I've been praying specifically for the series as we have moments where we we talk about things like those four Footprints where it's like maybe if you look out there you'll see the footprints that God is real if God stirs or softens or speaks something new in you or God maybe answers a question you've been wrestling with for a long time I I we would love to actually get coffee with you in fact everybody grabbed the cards in the seat in front of them you can put them back in a minute we don't talk about this a ton but these cards are an easy way for you to communicate with us and you might decide today you might check the box I'm interested in talking with a pastor and what that does for us is it allows us to reach out and get coffee because conversations like this what you need is not a big prayer on the screen what you needs a cup of coffee and a conversation right there's questions you might not get answered and you want to sit down we would love to create space for that to happen so feel free to do that you can leave those on your seat at the end of service and your your pastors will tell you what to do with that but our prayer is that you would realize God wants to be known and you can know him not just know him intellectually but know him relationally and that is God's desire for you even the Stars point back as a footprint back to God which brings us back to our space illustration cernus man 15:43 that was even before Kevin was born long time ago and he was the first person to say listen guys everything doesn't revolve around us I know why you'd think that remember the time lapse it looks like we're in the center and everything's revolving around us but he's like guys it doesn't actually revolve around us and people didn't like hearing that in fact the church banned people from looking at his research because they didn't like it so much it wasn't for for another 150 years until it was sort of accepted science that the Earth revolves around the Sun and then eventually the sun revolves around other things and and people in 1543 did not want to hear it why because no one likes to hear that the Universe does not revolve around you parents how many times have you said some version of that to your kid I'm hungry the world doesn't revolve around you bro hey this is not what I want to do uh the universe doesn't revolve around you and we laugh when we say it to our kids but can we be honest we all sort of want it to be about us don't we we love the thought that everything revolves around us and Paul is about to walk through the next 10 12 verses and say listen even though it was settled in 1543 the world doesn't revolve around you the universe doesn't revolve around you we have this propensity to make it revolve around us or want it to revolve around us and and here's the reality if God exists if all those Footprints point us that there is a God then listen he has to be the center if all of that is true if there is a God he has to be the center and look at Romans 1:21 for although they knew God intellectually they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him he's talking to the people in the city of Rome and he's and and back then they gave God this intellectual sort of Nod or tip of the cap but they didn't put God in the center what is religion when you tip the cap to God being out there and he's not the center of your life it's why religion is hollow and empty it's why it's why it doesn't actually give you a life of meaning and purpose and significance we want to put ourself at the center in fact you might want to write this down because this is clever the simple definition of sin is when when we put I in the center like you want like a basic definition what is sin s i n is when you put I in the center when you plant your feet and say everything needs to revolve around me what do I want what makes me happy what makes me glad what gives me joy and the reality of the rest of Romans chapter 1 you might have read this this this this chapter a hundred times you might not have seen this what Paul's about to graphically lay out for us is what happens when a culture a people or a person remove God from the center and put themselves in his place and as we read it you're going to see it's going to feel like if Earth said hey son thanks for the heat thanks for the sweet tan we're good we're going to be the center what would happen is our solar system would spin out of control and I want to read directly from scripture what Paul says because Paul's about to walk us through the path very practically of what's happening in Rome as the people remove God from the the Sun the center of the solar system and put themselves there and and here's the reality the great lie if the if the definition of sin as we put out in the center the great lie of sin is that you can build a life of purpose meaning and significance by putting yourself at the center that's what sin tells you put you in the middle make everything bow to you and you'll build an awesome life and Paul's about to tell us nah let me give it a side if you're a follower of Jesus in our culture today you might feel a lot like Cernic's did in 1543 hey guys the sun doesn't revolve around us and everybody else told him you're wrong and he would have had to ask himself the question am I crazy I've had this conversation more than five or six times with people who are followers of Jesus and they look at the world they look at our culture and they go maybe I'm the one that's crazy the stuff that our culture celebrates the stuff that gets put on television and movies even some of the stuff that's taught in school we like am I the crazy one like maybe everything does revolve around us and Paul's about to tell you ah you're not crazy let let me show you Paul actually describes what's happening in our world right now as we remove God from the center so it starts with this people remove God from the center verse 21 for although they knew God they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him but their thinking became futile and their worship and their and their foolish Hearts were darkened although they claimed to be wise they became fools and look they exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like Mortal human beings Birds animals and reptiles see they removed the image of God at the center and they put themselves in the center and here's what's scary when people remove the image of God they lose the order of God when God's not the center you lose the created designed order he created the Earth to exist in and it continues to devolve and spin out of control verse 24 therefore God gave them over in the sinful Des desires of their hearts to sex ual impurity what does it mean when God gave them over it means God said if that's what you want I'm letting you go and they couldn't even see it as wrong anymore that's what's terrifying they couldn't see that they had lost God's order gave them over in their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator when you remove God from the center there's no God Left To Worship but yourself so you trade the image of God and you lose the order of God so because of this God gave them over to shameful lust even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural in the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another men committed shameful acts with other men and received in themselves the due penalty for their error when you remove the image of God you lose the order the designed created way God ordered the Earth to work and you find yourself spinning out of control and then here's what's left without the order of God All That Remains is chaos confusion Brokenness I want you to see this Paul continues tell me you don't feel this right now furthermore just as they did not think it worth child to retain the knowledge of God so again God gave them over to a depraved mind so that they do what ought not to be done they have become filled with every kind of wickedness evil greed and depravity they are full of Envy murder Strife deceit and Malice they are gossips slanderers god- haters insolent it's getting worse arrogant and boastful they invent ways of do doing evil they disobey their parents come on somebody they have no understanding and no Fidelity no love and no mercy you see there is a path that is always followed when you remove God to move the image of God you then lose the order of God and when you lose the order of God you devolve into chaos and confusion and Brokenness and Paul's heart in in writing this and preaching this is not to scream at people it's to say listen this is what happens when you replace God at the center of a culture people or a person see sin promises that this life's going to be awesome you just put yourself at the center but then the gravity of sin causes you to spin out see when you remove God from the center the only thing that's left is chaos confusion and Brokenness is there any wonder why our world is so confusing and chaotic right now is there any wonder why the next generation is lost on who they are and their identity because it's upside down there's no order if any wonder why anxiety and worry and fear and depression is on the rise because without God's image and Order people spin out into the chaos of space if you will we L the gravity that God has to hold it all together now listen before you get too prideful if you're a follower of Jesus it's easy to say well that's that's an out there them people thing H It's actually an inh here me thing because it's not just when a culture removes God from the center when I remove God from the center of anything it spins into chaos and confusion and Brokenness in fact JD Greer says it this way the root disease of all Brokenness in us and the world is that we have put something or someone other than God at the center of our universe if the sun suddenly disappeared from the center of our solar system we would spin out into space chaos in the same way when you remove God from the center any part of your life spin into chaos see I can't give you seven steps to fix what's broken I can just give you one God has to be the center and I believe God wants to do a cernus likee revolution in our souls listen it doesn't revolve around you you're not the center you don't have your truth you don't have your effort to fix it it has to be God is the center because the nature of the kingdom is that this if you put yourself in the center of your marriage you're going to end with chaos confusion and Brokenness that divorce you had 10 years ago go back somewhere you slid yourself in the center and God won the center of that marriage friendships fall apart when you make yourself the center companies fall apart when employees or bosses make it about them and they're at the center families the future of our kids fall apart when we put our self at the center of it all cultures and communities fall AP when people put themselves at the center your soul falls apart when you put yourself at the center when everything around you has to bow to you as the center everything falls apart and once God's removed from the center nothing else has enough gravity to hold everything together because if you're the center you have to have the Sun's gravity to hold our solar system in place good luck with that now I'm responsible to hold my family together now I'm responsible to hold my company together now I'm responsible to hold my character together we lost the center we lost the gravity it's all on me and then there's a turn Paul says this in Colossians 1 it's beautiful the son which is Jesus s o n by the way we talked a lot about space not s s o n the son Jesus is the image of the visible God the firstborn over all creation for in him all things were created things in heaven and on Earth visible and invisible whether Thrones or powers or rulers or authorities all things have been created through him and for him he is before all things and and and look at this and in him all things hold together see the good news of the Gospel is that Jesus is what holds things together I don't have the gravity to hold it all together only Jesus does which is why we talk about that listen God is not hiding is knowable through what Jesus did on the cross you can know God you're not being asked to follow a religion sign a card about a religion you're being invited into a relationship with almighty God and who's that for Romans 1:16 tells us the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes for everybody look at your shirt it's for everybody but you'll never know God if he's a moon that rotates out there around you or if you have to be the center see God doesn't doesn't take silver medals he doesn't take second place he's either the sun in the middle of it all or he's nothing see it's why we talk about everyone can know God and find Freedom discover purpose because the path to a life of meaning and purpose and significance starts by knowing god so I want to talk to two groups and then I'm going to hand it to our pastors see my prayer over the month of August is that God would open our eyes to what he really wants for our lives and what he wants is not you to join a church or religion he wants you to know him when you know him he can free you from the addictions in the past and the hurt and the stuff and then he can help you discover your purpose there's a reason why you're here and it culminates in a life of meaning and significance and purpose when you live a life that makes a difference like it's bigger than you it's not just about you it's not just about me so the two groups the first is you've never put God at the Center of your life and if you're honest you've looked you might not call it this but it's this is the lane you've looked you've looked for meaning purpose in all kinds of places people you've dated books you've read success in your career trying to be true to yourself like at the end of the day to myself be true that'll that'll give me purpose and it never satisfies the new car gets old the promotion eventually has weight the boyfriend or girlfriend eventually disappoints you you suddenly realize that your spouse didn't complete what was broken inside of you and you looked everywhere you'll never kind of say it direct you'll never find a meaningful purposeful life apart from knowing god he has to be the center where everything spins out control and if you're honest you might cover it up well but inside of you there's a chaos things are out of order things affect you and you're like feels like everything's falling apart it's because you were never designed to be at the center carrying the weight of gravity for holding your life together you can't do it and I don't say this as like a rebuke of you I say this as an invitation because there is one who is made to hold it all together and he would put it back into order he would calm the chaos and bring order and here in a minute the pastor are going to tell you how you can respond maybe it's the card maybe it's a conversation we want you to know that this is a place stick with us you can wrestle this stuff down you don't have to believe like us to belong here hang out ask questions we pray that God will open your eyes to his existence but once you realize he's real has to be the center or it doesn't work second group God used to be at the center this is way more of us God used to be what your life revolved around how you made decisions how you built a marriage how you did finances God you get my first and my best and over the last season you've drifted God used to be the loudest voice and shaping how you did your life if you're honest God is not the center like he used to be maybe not everywhere but in some part of your life and whatever your life orbits around is responsible for the path your life takes you can't help but getting caught in the gravitational pole of whatever is in the center of your life let me ask you is is God still the center of your finances is God still the center of how you're dating single folks is he still the voice that tells you how you should live your dating life is is God still the center of your family or do we just give him lip service on Sundays we check the box we go to church we do the religious stuff but is he the center when your kids ask hard questions or go through hard things do you go to self-help or do you go to scripture because if if you're going to self-help God's actually not the center of your family and now you're responsible to carry the weight of holding your family together is God the center of your career or is the way that you get ahead in life way more like Romans filled with envy and wickedness and greed and lying and gossip does that sound more like how you get ahead in career or is God the center is God the center of your values can I tell you my burden for our church we've got a lot of good people we know how to look like God's the center but it's really complicated when we leave here there's a draw to make everything else the center and not God because you feel crazy like cernus when you do students unbelievably complicated for you I'm sure you sit in services like this and say yes God you're the center and then what that would look like to live out tomorrow at school is like and yet if God's not the center the only result is chaos confusion and Brokenness always always always in fact it's one of the reasons why we do nights like a call to worship this Thursday and Friday CU sometimes we need unhurried time unrushed space in the presence of God to reorient what's at the center and you might not have been planning on being there but you know today God there's some things I need to bring before you and say I want you to be center of this again see wherever you put God at the center he's responsible to hold it together you don't have to wait for Friday because we're going to create some space I know often times we get done and go all right let's get out of here we got to go we got lunch we got this pause see this is the foundational first Domino of everywhere we're going if you don't know God and put him at the center everything else falls apart so we're going to give you some space here across the campuses 12Stone home just sit in this and the Holy Spirit might have already brought some place up where you know God is not the center give it back to him God I want you to be the center of my marriage again I want you be the center of how I parent the center of my finances the center of my values and decision making bring it to to him if you don't know ask him God In This Moment would you reveal to me any place that I've put myself at the center and as you reorient to God's centered living he gets to hold things together so pastors across the campuses and home will you just set this moment up and lead us in this moment of worship

Channel: 12Stone Church

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Length: 42min 19sec (2539 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 13 2023