FBO Sunday - 08:30am

um we wanted to just make sure that you had somebody to welcome you because if you were coming in our front doors this morning there would be all kind of smiling faces from the parking lot all the way through to the worship center so this is kind of our opportunity to get to know you to smile at you i mean to chat with you a little bit so wherever you're logging in from i see monty good morning um would you just let us know where you're where are you watching from this morning where you're tuning in to church from um in your pajamas we love that i love that i mean online church in pajamas is pretty good almost as good as being here in person not quite that's right yeah yeah that's right so let us know where you're watching from i see um shannon saunders on our serve team what's up um she's in missouri so thanks for serving from missouri i don't know if you've got a time change out there but you're probably up a little bit early so extra shout out for that yeah i'm seeing some thumbs up here on facebook but i don't have any any names yet so i'm excited as you are joining me here on the facebook feed i'm covering facebook you're on the website right uh just drop in where you're watching from tell us what the weather's like you know i got in my car this morning and it was not quite as humid as last sunday i remember it was nice this morning like are we headed to fall dare i dare i believe that you can't think it or it's going to stop from stop it from happening monty out in seminole county i live out in seminole county so we'll have to have a seminole county party sometime it looks like i've got janae janana janena awesome i love it i'm sorry if i butchered your name but it's a beautiful name it's so pretty and i'm glad you're watching from it looks like brazil awesome mary coming in from south carolina i love that i love that drove through south carolina recently we took a road trip up to virginia okay went that way yeah pretty good pretty good in south carolina i'm trying to think last time i drove through south carolina i think there was just waffle houses and chick-fil-as like the whole time i drove shirley you saw a cracker barrel oh probably a cracker bro of course of course of course good morning robin from maryland gosh we got the east coast represented pretty strong today oh no i've got mike from new york where it is sunny at 61. i love it oh is that mike and he's in the hudson valley mike i used to live like super not far from you yeah oh that's cool he actually i think you work on the radio show anyway he worked in a radio that uh radio station that was our radio station i love that well welcome mike i'm so glad you're here candy's here she's from tavares that's pretty cool john welcome john from california those californians that get up and watch the 8 30 what time is it out there like 4 a.m it's pretty awesome for real five five it would be five eighteen nine i can do math hey if you're just tuning in uh good morning and welcome my name is corey i'm the online campus pastor here i'm angie elkins i'm a volunteer here and we're just taking some time to yeah to greet you and welcome you the service is going to start at 8 30 as usual but we just want to be that friendly face you see when you come to church you know if you were to walk up and get out of your car in the parking lot you would see people smiling and welcoming you and um we want to be those people today so we're glad you're here yeah so should we bring on our special vip guest something else that we're going to do we're going to be here pre-service and post service so we'll be back here kind of just to talk a little bit after um the service is over but something you're gonna see around um this time is that we're gonna try and have somebody who maybe you wouldn't ordinarily see on camera come in and chat a little bit about what they do here at first orlando sometimes it'll be staff sometimes volunteers but we've got um for our first guest one of um my dear friends and i know one of yours and mine someone who's gonna come up here and talk a little bit about small groups because that's what she does so i will uh i will hush up and introduce our friend brett nelson brick come on we got a little spot for you right here i have a little step stool i know because i'm a tiny human so thanks for bringing that coffee this morning so sweet i love it welcome so brett you're on staff here i am at first orlando tell everybody what you do here yeah so now i do all young adult groups which is something like corey said i'm really really passionate about underneath the table and so the table is our 18th not this table but our ministry the table good joke that was a good time i'm a dad i love it i love the dungeons um so our table ministry here is young adults ages 18 to 30 which we all meet on tuesday nights at seven but i handle all the groups underneath the table which is something i'm super super passionate about which is what you said yeah so uh we've been talking about we talked about groups last week we just launched a bunch of online groups if you're looking for an online group we've got some that are still open and taking people if you're looking for a group we'll drop a link in the chat but tell us a little bit about why you're passionate about groups why are you you know working in the group's department for the table what you know what is it like being in a group yeah so for me i know my husband and i right after we had first got married we were kind of in a season of just being semi-new to orlando we have been in orlando for a little while but not made lifelong friends yet i would say we were still in that transitional period um and so we ended up forming a like newly merely newly engaged group about five years ago now four to five years ago with some friends they were kind of acquaintances at the time but we knew that we vibed with them we knew that we connected with them and so we were like oh i could see us meeting with these people every week and now fast forward you know four years later they i would consider those people our family we don't have any family here in orlando um and so those are the people you know i would consider my brothers and sisters we've met for almost five years now we've been through everything together through getting married to job changes losing jobs gaining great jobs to people moving away and us still keeping in contact and just every life stage that you could go through in between we've been through together covid we had the zoom calls where we would play the games and try to like keep ourselves entertained as friends yeah and so it was just great but i think that experience i had kind of been working with groups but that experience of what it was like to be known and loved by so many other people was why i became really passionate because i think everyone deserves that kind of experience where you're known and loved by people that you would consider family um and i think i would consider that a success that's pretty awesome i have a question but before i ask my question if you have any questions about small groups or about even the young adult ministry that we have called the table um drop some questions in the chat we'll be happy to get to them in a minute but my question is um because i have been in groups that are very awkward yes and so haven't we all haven't we all in and outside of church too because like some of my social groups are just very awkward yes uh was it awkward you like the group that you've been in now for like almost five years was it always like family or did it take like what was the journey a little bit like oh no because i think when people because often we hear the story of the person who has a great group yeah and we talk about how important community is but i think sometimes we forget that sometimes it's just like a little bit of work to have it's a lot of work lasts for a long time yeah and it's it is a lot of work like i remember in the beginning just for our stage of life we really had to put kind of an attendance policy on ours because you know in that stage of life you're busy and everyone's getting married and it but we did that not to limit ourselves but to make sure that we were experiencing the most out of that group that we possibly could um and because we showed up every week we did you know played games together ate dinner together sometimes we went through a lesson sometimes it was a stage where we just needed to hang out and build community um because we did it faithfully every single week it turned into family but that was not the case the entire time it took a few years of us going through everything together for us to get to that point i think it's interesting because once you commit yeah it's like okay i'm gonna try this and then you get over that okay i'm done trying now i'm committed yeah then it just sort of starts to snowball into where you want it to be yeah and then it ended up being that you know the girls would text each other and say i want to go to target together and you know at the mall and then the guys would want to go to the gym like oh our money is going away yes exactly the men were very worried there for a little while um no but it turned into and then you know certain couples forming great friendships and going on double dates and that turned into helping one another move and that turned into you know every single negative thing that was going on or prayer requests like we were helping with that and i think that that of course takes time going through different life stages and so i would say if to anyone out there whether it be an online group or an in-person group whatever it is like take the time to be committed to it because if you're committed and you show up every week and you go above and beyond that i think that's when you're going to see a life change and a friendship change that's really how you see the impact of your time yeah that's really cool it's not like a quick fix it's more like a no it's an overtime uh someone taught it to me a long time ago might have been someone uh from andy stanley's church but it was that small groups are preventative more than they are like reactive or responsive it's just a way to be in community before you really really need community yeah because there are stages where you're able to help someone else but then there are stages where you desperately need it and i think a lot of times the awkwardness that comes is when people are being reactive right it's like oh my gosh i need it i need it um whereas if we can all get in it before we really need it it may not be nearly as awkward yeah that's awesome i think we're all looking for people to do life with yes you know and and especially in orlando or wherever you are because of the way even the city is laid out we just feel so spread out and separated and so just knowing we have that group you know on a text thread or let's meet at target and sodo or whatever yep um to have that let's do life together for sure it's amazing that's what everyone's looking for so that's why i'm passionate about it awesome yeah thanks thanks so much for being here you're welcome it's almost time for church you better get in there i will i'll get in there bye guys thanks for coming that's so good i love it i saw one person just uh i saw a blessed betty asked a question first of all i loved your username because it really made me smile but she asked if they were in person and online or online if you weren't local yes we have online groups i mean it's someone from our team will reach out to you yeah and uh tell you how to sign up because you can just go you can text groups to 407 777 or there's a link in the chat there because we have groups that are happening in person today at 11 30. we have groups that are launching this week and then we've got groups that are happening online yeah it's it's great and i i love that because i told you last week the story that i've been in a text thread with my group my my group of women that i've been studying the bible with for gosh i want to say four summers now we we didn't get to summer 2020 because of coco we could have done it online i guess but we didn't and we um but we did get back together this summer and so it's just awesome to know that when there's a prayer need and or any kind of need we're on it yeah yeah yeah i mean we bought a washer and dryer for a friend in need once oh wow yeah pretty pretty cool like opportunity just to be there for people especially especially when you can't do your laundry um right i see some more people commenting in from all different places i saw on youtube we got people from jacksonville um shout out to jacksonville um at athens georgia we've got people coming in from all over the country so thanks so much for being here again my name is pastor corey i get to be the online pastor here and i'm here with my friend angie yes thank you i'm i'm angie i'm a volunteer here at first orlando and i'm watching facebook here and there are so many of you joining now we're so glad you're here the service is gonna start in just about two and a half minutes about two minutes now and so many of you are probably wondering how do i actually participate in worship online and um corey and i this is something we've been talking about like how do you do church online and so there's a lot of ways one of the ways is we have people we have volunteers right here interacting with you so if you comment or you have a prayer request they are the ones that are commenting on our team our online team but also we would love for you as viewers to comment on each other's comments and pray for each other yeah get to get to kind of connect with each other the way that we would if you were walking through the lobby right here um on your way into service you'd wave high you'd say hello kind of similar to that and then as worship gets going you know you can leave a heart you can put some emojis if something in the worship or something that you're hearing is resonating with you let us know we would love to just have that opportunity because we're not in the worship center it's okay to talk um and no one's gonna yell at you for being loud to your neighbor because you can just chat online so it's one of the really cool opportunities that we have today yeah drop an amen in the comments praise the lord whatever i love it one of the really cool things that our team does here online is they'll give you scripture references that are mentioned in the sermon yeah if you missed any of the main points too you can always check the chat we're always here and then um the last thing before we sign off is we have a live prayer happening um all throughout service so you can click live prayer and one of our team will be there right there to pray with you so let's go to church that's right let's go to church joining us here we go be here at the end see you later happy sunday first orlando my name is tammy and i'm a part of the hispanic campus here at first orlando i'm so excited to be with you this morning this past week kick off the hispanic heritage month and you may not know this but we have over 20 different hispanic countries represented here at first orlando so if i could i want to say a little something to my spanish-speaking friends hola amigos bienvenidos aita grand famiglia the first orlando muy contentos de nosotros today we're in week two of our dream again series and we're talking about finding the unique purpose that god has prepared you for but before that we're going to sing a few songs around here that's the way we worship the god who we love and who loves us and if this is your first time here we wanna i want to say welcome we're so glad you're here and we believe that you're here for a reason so let's get started welcome to first orlando will you please stand and join us as we sing standing on the promises of [Music] of god my king through eternal wages let his praises shout and see standing on the promises of god [Music] i'm standing on the promises of god standing on the promises [Music] standing on the promises of god [Music] i'm standing on the promises of god standing on the promises [Music] standing on the promises of god [Music] [Music] i'm standing on the promises of god standing standing standing on the promises of god my savior standing [Music] standing on the promises of god [Music] oh my team fortress is [Music] [Music] is [Music] and with [Music] earth [Music] in psalm 91 it says that he who dwells in the shelter of the most high shall be with the lord almighty his fortress and his salvation we're gonna continue to sing that hymn but we're gonna take it up a notch so sing with us mighty fortress [Music] [Music] is on earth [Music] did we [Music] losers [Music] the man of god [Music] jesus [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] no thanks [Music] us through himself [Music] is [Music] this kingdom is [Music] is [Music] is our [Music] [Music] you know in jeremiah chapter 20 jeremiah calls the lord a mighty warrior who's his defender and his protector against his enemies and this morning as we stand to sing this song as we declare this truth let's cling to the hope that god is our defender [Music] in his name is [Music] in the presence of jesus [Music] [Music] jesus our savior he is [Music] to the touch of your [Music] set my feet on a solid [Music] is [Music] oh [Music] he is [Music] [Music] jesus god is [Music] the lord [Music] [Applause] is [Music] [Music] upon the name of the lord [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] jesus [Applause] [Applause] he is [Applause] [Music] thank you so much for worshiping with us this morning please be seated as the choir and orchestra continue to lead [Music] price [Music] shameful sin placed on him [Music] washes me oh the blood of jesus [Music] it is my victory [Music] wide [Music] the great i am [Music] jesus washes me [Music] jesus [Music] [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] it is my victory [Music] [Applause] [Music] no greater love grace how can it be [Music] is washes me [Music] [Music] is oh [Music] [Applause] raised [Music] yes it is [Music] [Music] yes [Music] [Music] oh my goodness when's the last time you thank jesus we're just his blood while we were yet sinners he died for us long before he ever called him lord long before he ever knew him jesus shed his blood for you i just think it'd be appropriate in light of that song and the worship for us to just say thank you jesus for your blood can we pray father i just uh it's just not many things that just boggle my mind but the love that you had for us that that just that while we were sinners even in our sin jesus you shed your blood for us and i just want to say thank you we want to say thank you for the blood that cleanses that saves and redeems thank you jesus in jesus name and let the church say amen wow the choir they're amazing and i know they enjoy when you are worshiping with them and sometimes if you happen to know one you let them know you really appreciate them and last night this place was filled with worship oh my goodness we had over 3 000 men gathered in here and it was an amazing night oh i want to thank those of you who got to be a part we had many teams that were working to help make that happen and brian buckley and better man event it was a wonderful opportunity for us to celebrate the name of jesus here's some great stories and just be able to be together and have a good time worship in the lord well i want to welcome those who are streaming it's always a joy to have you and i know what that stream means because many times in my life when that was the only way that i could connect and i'm so thankful you're able to connect with us so wherever you happen to be streaming from we welcome you and we're glad that you're a part of this day as you know we probably haven't talked about it maybe in the last 30 minutes but here there and everywhere is a phrase that we came up with to talk about the vision to touch the generations to come and and every once in a while i'm just overwhelmed with the potential and the power of that vision because when you walk out in the courtyard area when you walk around and you see the number of children it's amazing in fact last night i i was sitting here on the front row and one of our dads had his son over there and that son man he he looked so happy and the dad texted me later and said he had the time of his life he said he's just it's made a difference for him to be here and to experience what's happened i just think we have opportunity to really touch the next generation and that way for us as a church is through the children's ministry and that involves what's happened with the playground but also what's happened with kids one now that used to be called e1 but we call it kids one and so it's it's done and we finished it up in 2019 or whenever it was maybe that's when we started it's done and it's already open and online but guess what today you get to have a sneak peek of kids 2 which is the second building that is under construction now and and they've asked they we asked them if we could do this and they said yes we want you to write on the floor scripture we want you to write the name of maybe one of your grandchildren or one of your children or maybe someone you know and pray that the lord might bring them and they could really come to know jesus and learn about him in that room in that building so we're going to have opportunity right on the first floor and they've left it open for us and here's what you do right after the service you go back to the center lobby and there'll be people ready to direct you over you'll take a left go to welcome center a you can go there as well there'll be folks ready to direct you you'll get a pen you'll get something to write with and we're going to go over them right i remember when we wrote on this floor and what a moment that was you remember that and i remember what i wrote about right here or wherever it was it might have been back here we've we've made a few changes in the states but it just means a lot when you get to do that and so we want to invite you to to do that with us today so as immediately after the service i'll give you direction to go and to be able to write on the floor you know we've been talking about a tool that we've shared with you called share and it's basically the word share s-h-a-r-e the word share has meaning each letter has special meaning like the s sense an opportunity you remember since that opportunity where's where's a place or an opportunity for me to share christ well let me tell you what happened we have a young man who is faithful here when he can be here because of his practice schedule his family's in our church the hollers are here at first baptist his name is alec holler and i plays for the knights and man it was an unfortunate loss the other night broke my heart and uh and to lose our quarterback but hey we're going to pray the lord gives them resiliency and they're going to bounce back but this young man came in to see me and he said david i just want to glorify god i want to be a college student that plays football and does well in my life but most of all i want to glorify god can you help me with that now let me tell you i don't remember the last time i had that kind of conversation with a young man and so i i did what i could and he's got great family great home and man there's some neat things happening and i want to commend our coach gus malzon who is a strong believer himself and things are happening bible studies are happening and you know what i got a call from alec a week ago he said hey there's another player another tight end on the team who has given his life to christ and he wants to be baptized can we come to the church can we use the outdoor baptistry absolutely are there cows in texas yes come on we'll let oh my goodness it was a wonderful thursday evening i think there's some pictures and we had a great time in fact one of these uh yeah look at that picture it is the only picture i've taken in a long time where i don't feel tall i don't know what happened i just got lost oh some big boys but uh zach is a young man's name and you know who helped me baptize him alec did because he's the one that i think was influential in that moment and i invited him to be in the water with me and he did it so can we just give thanks to god for those kind of moments happening so wherever you sense an opportunity i want you to use that opportunity for him hey i want to thank you for giving you know i don't i don't say this a lot but i know for me and for rachel being able to give and be a part of this means i got to be a part of that baptism now i was there obviously doing it but i was also there because of my giving and you're there because of your giving you see when you give everything that a church does everything a church is about you are a part of that and we've tried with kova to make giving as easy as possible not to take away the moment but to just enhance the opportunity and so we do it often online there are other ways to give as well but if you want to know more you can text the word give to 40777 and there'll be directions and it's very simple push pay is a great tool and i use it every weekend so i want to encourage you and i want to say thank you for giving to the work of the lord here in this church so last week we talked about how you're unique some of you more unique than others some of you i've never met anybody like you right that's all of you really i know we try to find replicas no god didn't make another one he only made you and you know what he designed you for something special and he called you to something special now that's jeremiah chapter one today we're in jeremiah 20. this is not the fun part of the journey what if you say okay lord i'm ready i'm going to go after it and then you begin to struggle because oftentimes the calling of god involves struggle so can i tell you a good friend of mine was watching an egg began to crack and a little chick come out of the egg and they're watching with their grandmother and the little chick was having trouble and without thinking she reached down to tear the egg away to help the little chick and the grandmother said no no no no never never help them she said why it's having trouble getting out no you see there's something valuable about the struggle and you have to struggle to grow and david loveless is going to come and talk to us out of jeremiah 20. what happens when you're in that struggle god is working let's pray father thank you for the day thank you for the opportunity to be in your word now teach us by your holy spirit in jesus name amen [Music] good morning many of you saw last week while pastor david was teaching a terrific message in jeremiah 1 we had a potter up here on the stage and she took a lump of clay just like that and over the course of the service she turned it into something beautiful like this now this is still unfinished but right here because i'm up close and personal you can see the unique lines that she was able to put into it she uniquely expressed a part of herself into that and yet it's still being formed eventually it'll get painted and to me this is a fantastic picture of what god has been doing and continues to do in each one of our lives he acts as like this unique potter this is the way it's described in jeremiah he's uniquely shaping our life and this particular pot right here it's got two things going for it first of all it's got unique beauty to it and then also it has a unique and important function again the same thing is true for your life and for mine god has formed and fashioned us with unique beauty as well as function for our life here's the way it's described over in jeremiah chapter 18. it says there but the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands so the potter formed it into another pot shaping it as it seemed to be best to him in light of that i want to invite you to turn over to jeremiah chapter 20 or turn it on on your particular device while you're turning there i want to tell you about a guy that really had an impact on my life years ago his name was howard hendricks he was a professor at dallas seminary and whenever he would uh open up the semester for all of his students he would usually draw out a funnel and in this funnel he would said hear all the different things that you can do with your life he said but what you've got to do is to find the one thing that you must do he said learn to distinguish between all the things you can do versus the one thing that you must do he went on and he said this he said the more successes you and i have life the more can do's that fill the top of that funnel you've got to be careful because and he made this statement he said because most opportunities are distractions in disguise most opportunities are distractions in disguise he said if you aren't careful you'll spend your whole life just filling up the top of this instead of finding the one thing that you must do so today we're going to see that the prophet jeremiah he knew exactly what was the one thing that god wanted him to do but he met some unexpected challenges in it so here's what we all wrestle with who we are who we are becoming sometimes is in competition with what god has designed us to be let me give you several examples of this because jeremiah wrestle with this first of all there's the me that others want me to be the me the others want me to be a good example of this was from the olympics back a couple of months ago in japan how many of you watched the olympics are really exciting to watch simone biles most of you would recognize her name she was she's one of the best gymnasts of all time but something odd happened throughout that two-week period of time where she was constantly feeling displaying herself as being very distraught very anxious and things like that and what she ended up doing she prayerfully i mean she tearfully held a press conference and she said she was pulling out of the team's final because she said something's not been right about these games for me she said i was struggling with some things i wanted the games to be about i wanted to be participating in it for me but what i now realize is i was still doing it for other people most of our lives are often lived out in the expectations of other people i know i've wrestled with this myself there have been many times based upon the expectations people had in my life oh my gosh i felt the pressure of that and feeling like i need to gain their approval then there's a second version of me not only the me the others want me to be but the me that i want to be so let me show you a picture of the me that i want to be okay this is her right here bear grylls that's who i want to be he's a great outdoorsman epic adventurer now i know a lot of you are nervous immediately go wait a minute david i thought you you would want to be like jesus well i want to be like bear grylls because i know for a fact he has jesus in his heart okay so i want to be bear grylls with jesus in my heart this guy he's unbelievable he was the youngest to scale mount everest and he did it 18 months after breaking his back he sailed a small sailboat across the ocean he goes out into deserts for 30 days at a time and lives off the land i would love to be bear grylls like that in fact 10 years ago i went out and i purchased a bear grylls knife there's an official bear grylls knife and i purchased that thing now i've never used it but it immediately made me feel more like bear okay i even looked at putting on he has a clothing line and i was going to buy some bear grylls pants as well as a shirt thinking like i was going to hurdle myself 100 feet off a cliff down into the water but that was just flat out not going to happen many of us know that our true selves aren't good enough for other people's approval so we often will cultivate an image that will do that i have done that and then there's the third version not only the me that i want to be and me that others want me to be but then there's the me that god wants us to be just know this this is the constant struggle of our lives right here all the other lesser versions of ourselves are constantly seeking to compete with that that's why i love as pastor david unpacked this last week out of jeremiah chapter one jeremiah knew the one thing he must be and who god had created would be again verses 9 and 10 he just simply says i've put my words in your mouth see today i appoint you over nations and kingdoms to uproot and to tear down to destroy and overthrow to build and to plant in other words god had identified some of the things that were sabotaging the nation of israel from becoming all that he designed them to be and so his unique assignment to jeremiah was to tear down things in order that something brand new could be built and could emerge out of all of that so last week pastor david made a couple of really important statements he talked about how in the life of jeremiah we see a one-of-a-kind divine design that is also a picture of our lives we discovered again as he was teaching us last week about how god's been dreaming about our lives from the very beginning of time but let's just pause with this god has a dream for you from the beginning of time that he's never ever ever given up on no matter what kinds of successes you've experienced in the past or what kinds of failures you've experienced god has never ever ever given up on that dream mark twain said this one time he said the two most important days in your life is the day you were born and then the day you discover why you were born so here's the big thought out of scripture today as you live out your god-given calling expect some challenges expect some challenges here in jeremiah chapter 20 that you've turned to we catch the prophet jeremiah he's in a crisis of his own calling he's done his best to live out of his one-of-a-kind divine design but he's been met with ridicule with rejection on severe severe fronts he's literally been placed in stocks at the city gate because he was constantly going against the status quo and he's suffering and he's angry with god because his life doesn't look like this one of a kind divine design in all of that here's what he says in verses 7 to 10. now buckle your belt because this is raw and strong you deceived me lord and i was deceived now god hadn't deceived him but that's the way he emotionally felt to him you overpowered me and prevailed i'm ridiculed all day long everyone mocks me and he goes and says whenever i speak i crouch proclaiming violence and destruction so the word of the lord has brought me insult and reproach all day long but if i say i will not mention his word or speak any more in his name his word is in my heart like a fire a fire that shut up in my bones i'm weary of holding it in indeed i cannot i hear many whispering terror on every side denounce him let's denounce him all my friends are waiting for me to slip saying perhaps he will be deceived and then we will prevail over him and take our revenge on him he's calling for change he's calling for reform in the midst of the idolatry and hypocrisy that the nation of israel has been through but now he's ready to give up on his god-given call he's angry at god for what his life has become and his life just doesn't look like what he thought it would be here in verses 7 to 10 it invites us into jeremiah's struggle there's this raw emotion i love that that this is not sanitized in scripture because it reminds us of what the struggle is in each one of our lives when we're seeking to live out god's call for us i love the way it puts it over in the message translation there in verses 9 and 10 he says but if i say forget it no more god messages for me the words are firing my belly a burning in my bones i'm worn out trying to hold it in and i just can't do it any longer have you ever noticed how sometimes you and i can start off trying to live out what we perceive to be our god-given call and all of a sudden we begin to doubt it because of challenges we've had a couple of weeks ago my wife corona and myself uh we went over to one of our grandson's house he uh has just turned five he was just going into kindergarten this year for the first time his name is judah so we went over and said hey jude tell us about how kindergarten's gone here the first eight days so he was describing it all to us and then we were asking about friends he's met and things like that and then we asked him so what's your teacher like this is my five-year-old grandson's exact word he said well she used to be energetic now not so much that's only eight days in imagine what kind of shape she's going to be in eight months in you know she used to be energetic but now not so much because of the challenges that were there so here in verse 9 jeremiah gives words to what those of us who live with a sense of god-given calling we know this down deep to be true you and i here's our problem it's that we cannot not do what god has placed within us it's like a fire that's been shut up in our bones it's got to come out of us so what's the specific calling that god has on your life now let's just pause there for a moment and recognize the fact there are two kinds of calling there's a general calling it's what we all have in common and there's a special unique calling a common calling we all share together comes out of the great commandment the great commission to honor god and to help others that's the calling we all have on our lives as christ followers right but the specific special calling of our lives is the unique way in which god wants us to be able to honor him and help other people in the world in which he's placed us what is it for you is it to help heal people through the medical community is your special calling to teach underprivileged kids is it help fund impactful ministry is it to train emerging leaders or maybe it's to create paintings that would stir all and wonder people that would look at it i love the way the writer of ephesians chapter 1 and the message translation it says it's long before he laid down earth's foundations he had us in mind he settled on us as the focus of his love to be made whole and holy by his love you know that word holy has nothing to do with perfection holy means something that's been set apart for special specific use that's your life that's mine as well and he goes on he says this it's in christ that we find out who we are and what we're really living for long before we first heard of christ got our hopes up he had his eye on us he had designs on us for glorious living part of the overall purpose that he's working out in everything and everyone you are part of that you are a part of what god's uniquely working out for everything and for everyone right now at this point in history that's pretty significant but we got to be aware though they're going to be challenges in it i think that's a further reason why the apostle paul later on the new testament said don't be weary and well-doing because in due time if you don't give up they'll come a brand new harvest that he wants to produce out of our lives so a true sense of calling will never let us give up on what god has uniquely designed us to be to me there's something worse than suffering in life it's when i have nothing in my life that's worth suffering for what is the one thing that you must do that will withstand the test of pain in any dimension of suffering here's something that's been helpful to me i just call it the sweet spot tool and in it it exemplifies how you and i can prayerfully examine our passions our abilities and our context helps us prayerfully examine what are my god-given passions what are the things that fuel me the most because of the things god's allowed me to go through then my god-given abilities what are the things that i'm best at my competencies and then the third thing the context where has god wanting me to place my impact because that's where it's going to be the greatest so the very center of the the uh convergence here in this venn diagram that's the sweet spot it represents the one thing i must do now jeremiah is clear speaking god's word is no longer something he merely can do he must do and it's the test of pain that really reveals that to him again back in verse 9 he says so your word is in my heart like fire it's like fire that shut up in my bones it's also impossible to talk about calling a purpose without talking about pain it's impossible to talk about passion without talking about pain because it's in our pain and our challenges it becomes the incubator in our pain and our challenges what it does is in our pain this is where god begins to identify our passions it's in our pain that god grows our abilities it's in our pain that god reveals the context in which he wants us to place our effort the very word passion many of you would know means to literally suffer and to be acted upon that's what passion actually means that's where we get the phrase the passion of the christ jesus was walking out his own unique calling here on earth just as weird to do and yet he experienced a lot of suffering and a lot of pain that formed the passions that were it's important for you and i to recognize the difference between things we're interested in and things we're passionate about for example i'm really interested in exercise okay i i really enjoy exercising i enjoy hiking and rock climbing and walking and hiking things like that we do those things together now as much as i'm interested very energizable by it and regularly do it during the winter months any time early in the morning i step outside and it's below 60 degrees i go i'm not doing that that's way too i don't want to freeze now i've got warm clothes but i'm like i don't want to get cold so i'm good if it's north of 60 degrees oh but i should probably mention this during the summer months if i walk outside early in the morning and it's above 90 i go i'm not doing that i'm going to burn up i'm just going to profusely sweat why would i want to do that so those that's something that i'm interested in let's contrast that with something that someone else is passionate about this last week a family friend of ours in another part of the country he's in his 30s and he's trying to think of a unique way that he could propose to his girlfriend so what he decided to do was to take the engagement ring and to swallow it and then for him to tell and complain to his girlfriend oh my gosh i'm in a lot of pain they're going to go to the hospital they're going to do an x-ray and there he was going to propose to her with the engagement ring in him see i'm just interested in exercise he's passionate about getting engaged he's willing to withstand the test of pain that we probably don't want to think any further about but it's in our passion that passion is a conviction that must become contagious because it withstands the test of pain pain is not the opposite of our calling it's the very incubator in which calling grows now we've got a process here at first orlando where if you're fuzzy or you need better clarity on the one thing you must do we have a process to walk you through let me just give you a couple examples of those who have recently been through the process alex says this he said i exist to honor god and help others by leveraging my abilities to connect imagine learn and communicate with a passion for fatherhood for boyhood for curiosity and my contribution in the context of a growing community so he understands his common calling when he's talking about his special specific calling a young lady by the name of rachel recently wrote this out she said this is really important she said i exist to honor god and help others by developing community impact through strategic partnerships and personal empowerment to affect systemic change those are great but remember the big thought from scripture today is as you and i live out our god-given calling we should expect some challenges so listen to jeremiah's confidence as we move from verse 10 to verse 11. he says but the lord is with me like a mighty warrior so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail they will fail and be thoroughly disgraced their dishonor will never be forgotten the lord is with me like a mighty warrior see he had clarity on his calling but god had to come along and confirm it because of all the pain that he was going through ultimately jeremiah could only look to god to really be able to validate his calling that's why it again it says in verse 11 but the lord is with me like a mighty warrior so my persecutors will stumble and they'll not prevail so what has god uniquely called you to be what do you where are you feeling the challenge in it where you feel like there's a fire that god's placed in me to do this one thing and if i don't do it it's like it's got to come out of me back uh in 2008 in china there was a massive uh earthquake uh registered 8.0 on the richter scale and there were tens of thousands of people that lost their lives that particular day you imagine all the homes the buildings that just collapsed out of that story came the story of a guy i read about called lynn howe he was nine years of age he was in the second grade and he was in his elementary school in the hall when all of a sudden all the walls collapsed it knocked him unconscious and after a few minutes though he got up he regained consciousness and he crawled through that rubble and came out on the other side but then he looked around he went where are my two friends they were in the hall with me so he crawled back into the rubble and he ended up pulling both of them out later on some reporters said why did you do that you were safe in getting out why did you go back in i love his response he said because i'm the hall monitor it's my job oh my gosh this guy he was willing to crawl back into the rubble to me if we could choose to live our lives outside of the rubble of the world then you and i are going to miss what god wants to do but when we embrace our calling when we choose to go back into the rubble of life we risk pain we risk rejection we risk being caught in the aftershocks of a very very broken world but when we're motivated by our calling we'll step into a broken world and through the power of god help make it better again that's a part of what god's calling all of us to do to crawl back into the rubble with the god-given call we've been giving and to make something or someone beautiful again by the way if you're still fuzzy on this whole process and would like more help in your own calling we've got a workshop coming up it's just simply called calling 101 and this calling 101 it's about discovering and naming god's unique calling for your life the one thing that you must do i'm going to be teaching along with some other leaders all you need to do is just text the word workshops to 407 77 and we'll be glad to work that out with you so again the big thought is as you live out your god-given calling expect some challenges more than 30 years ago my wife crone myself moved to vancouver british columbia we had never been to canada a day in our lives we were doing research and trying to figure out where we wanted to plant a brand new church we discovered that vancouver was the second most unchurched population in north america so we moved up there we got acquainted with 10 people and we started this brand new church and someone's home and eventually we moved into an elementary school it was wonderful but it was very difficult we were more than 4 000 miles from our family from our friends we had plus it's just different being in canada in canada they celebrate thanksgiving in october that's just not american wouldn't you agree you know it's just not they called napkins serviettes they don't have monday night football they have hockey night in canada they don't measure how many inches of rain it's rained within a month they measure how many hours the sunshine has actually been out it was hard those first couple of years were really really hard they were the most difficult years we had experienced up until that point in time we wondered whether or not we'd heard the right call for our lives it got so bad one night we had a date night went then downtown to stanley park which just thinks central park there in stanley park we just started walking around and it was typical vancouver evening it was misting and uh it was really really foggy it was really socked in and we eventually found a little stone ledge and we just sat down in the stone ledge for an hour or so and we both just held each other and we just wept because of the hardness of because of the challenges that we were facing and we were sitting there wrestling with have we heard the call of god right for this season of our lives after about an hour or so we just turned around we prayed we recommitted ourselves to the call we felt like god had on our life for that season of life right there about a year later we went back down to stanley park now is the day time there's no fog you could see clearly and we walked over to the place where we had prayed and cried together and guess what the name of that very place was we were amazed when we saw this right here hallelujah point that was the ledge we sat on and we had no idea in the midst of the worst crisis right there god was saying he was trying to put an asterisk and he was trying to put an exclamation point that you have been called here we're now more than 30 years removed from that there are lots of those people that we first started at church with and came to christ and discipled that to this day we had deep relationship with we were with a number of them just a year ago and they talk about how that was the most formative time of their lives and the way that has stayed with them and i think oh my gosh the times we wanted to give up so right now if you're feeling foggy or in pain over your calling it could be that you are sitting on top of your own hallelujah point that god wants to raise the fog bank and invite you to back end come back into it with greater clarity and with greater confidence let's pray together lord we're just really we're blown away by the fact quite frankly that you've created each one of us for something unique here in the world in which you've placed us lord i pray for all of us this morning will you bring new levels of clarity that would help us distinguish all the things we can do versus the one thing we must do just like with jeremiah and then will you please come and confirm the very word of the lord to us in jesus name we pray amen amen thank you david yep well done sir well done thank you yeah encouraged david i um i know we've talked about it before but it's just so good to take notes write things down as god speaks this is the journal i carry with me just about everywhere and here are the notes that i wrote just now i don't draw near as well as he draws my venn diagram looks like an accident it it's not but it i know what it means and i wrote a lesson very important don't swallow an engagement ring i think that's that's one of the most important things we got to remember i can tell you the most important thing he's called you and just because he's called you doesn't mean it's going to be easy but you know what he gave you something called the church to come alongside of you to encourage you so i want to encourage you if this morning you really just needed that i mean i love that picture at the end the hallelujah point you needed that could we be the ones that god uses to help you stay in there don't give up you can reach out to us you can text the word connect 407 777 or if you're here you can go by one of our welcome centers on either side and there'll be people there to encourage you if you don't know jesus that's the first step life will always be foggy as long as you don't know jesus but it's amazing when you give your life to him man he is the sun shine he is what makes life work and so i want to encourage you let us help you be a part of that process and today as we as we leave those of you here on the in the room physically we really appreciate the opportunity to get to walk over to see what god is doing in here there and everywhere especially kids too that second building and so i want to encourage you if you would like to go over just take a look on the ground floor you'll be able to write uh scriptures and names uh here's what you do you go out to the center lobby in the back or over to a on this side and they'll people direct you and then they're going to have you in the pens when you get there and just uh remember there'll be generations to come after us that'll walk on those floors make god show them his amazing love so let's go and be blessed and thank you for being here today and thank you for streaming god bless you guys have a great day we'll see you next weekend hey thanks for staying tuned all throughout service what a great service oh good so good yeah it was uh an awesome time i love pastor david's message to us um just about committing to that calling and finding it and staying committed to it because we all have one yeah absolutely so good yeah i'm curious in the comments in the chat if something really stuck out to you would you just let us know we'd love to to hear from you i was reading some comments throughout it looks like a lot of people were really resonating with what pastor david was talking about this morning yeah um i did just want to give you a quick note if you're watching and you heard pastor david talk about uh going to ride in kids in the kids building on the floor what that is if you've never been in our building before we've got a beautiful facility for your kids to come and hang out and learn about jesus during service and so we've just done some renovations but before we carpet all that up we're giving people the opportunity to write um some some scripture some prayer on that floor um and so if you're coming here later today that's an option for you even for children who are coming you know you may have grandchildren or nieces or nephews or your own children that will be coming here and ministry will be happening around their lives and so it's pretty neat to come and write their name and maybe even a prayer over them we did that when we moved into the current worship center yeah i've heard that story the renovation and i remember the verse that i wrote i wrote on the platform because i sometimes get to sing on our teams and um i so i wrote a a verse that was really special to me on the platform there and so it's just so neat and when i stand in that spot i remember it's right here but i had a friend that called me during that time and said hey um i'd really like to come up to the church it was during a non-church service time and write the names of my children on the floor of the worship center so i think that's so cool especially you know maybe for an expectant mom who might know the name of her child you know right write that baby's name on the floor who will be coming and experiencing the children's ministry here for years to come yeah yeah oh well um you probably heard a couple of things during service about your calling and um because pastor david mentioned workshops that's coming up in just a few weeks we'll actually have some people coming in at the beginning of service um to talk with us about the kind of workshops that are coming up i'm actually teaching one of those workshops so just a little plug yeah okay you'll hear more about it in a few weeks but it's just a great next step coming out of the dream again series um but again if you haven't joined a small group yet we've got small groups that are happening right now we've got a 9 30 and 11 o'clock small group online but then we've got monday tuesday wednesday as well so if you haven't joined a small group um you've heard us talk about it a little bit you've heard pastor david uh it is just such an important place especially right now as we're talking about calling and finding your calling within the context of community i think that's something that we've just kind of continued to touch on as really important yeah it really is and you know we were talking earlier about doing life together you know just finding people to do life with and i've often said this i don't know if i said this to you last week corey but you know when you're in college like that stage of your life or high school you're kind of with your friends all the time it's just sort of the natural thing and then you graduate and it's kind of downhill from there when it comes to friendships because you you have to be more intentional right and i think one of the things i hear most from women is that they have a hard time making friends and so um joining a group even if it's an online group it's a step toward making those kinds of lasting lifelong relationships but i love the idea that it does require commitment you know brent nelson was here earlier before the service and she'll be back again before our 10 o'clock service but she was talking about how she just had to commit you know to showing up every week because it's that faithfulness of that recurring time together with those people that build upon that friendship so i love that that's so that's so true and so awesome i was just looking at some comments um joe yost um she's been looking for a church for a few years and she found fbo we're really glad that you're here really glad that you were tuning in online joe um it's really encouraging i've seen a lot of really really funny comments throughout the chat so i'm swallowing a ring and some some people were really just really cool but it's just so it's just so awesome if you're looking to connect a little bit more uh engaging in the chat is such a great way to do it um if you're if maybe something in that message kind of stuck on your heart or if you've got questions you can always click request prayer or you can connect text connect to 407 777 those are great next steps for you to take yeah janae just asked in the facebook feed where she could connect to an online group and so that answers her question right just as corey just said connect to four zero seven seven seven so um it's so exciting to see you guys uh responding and you know looking for a place to connect online with each other i think we've all learned during kovid that being connected online is a really good option yeah you know it was one of those things that seemed so awkward at first and now it's just our new normal now we're good at it we're getting better at it i should say we're not great at yeah if you haven't joined our first orlando online facebook group you should do that it's a great place to connect with other people um who are posting and we take a lot of prayer requests a lot of opportunities to connect there over kind of some needs or things that we're all facing uh but yeah i think that's about it i yeah it's it we we're just glad to be here with you guys we want to be that friendly face when you come to the service or you're leaving the service that uh you know that we are noticing that you're here we see you we're virtually shaking your hands that's right and giving you a smile and um just thank thankful that you guys are joining us this is something new we're trying it's like this is just the second week we've done it but so far so good yeah we haven't messed it up yet there's there's still time there there yeah there's two more services today all right well i think that's everything thanks so much again for being here today for being online for chatting with us i mean again if you've got prayer requests we'll be here um our volunteer team is online and they're spectacular shout out to the online eight thank you online teams all right and i think that's it for us we'll see you next week thanks guys see you next week you

Channel: First Baptist Orlando

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Length: 82min 57sec (4977 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 19 2021