Full Service On Demand - September 5, 2021 - Grace Community Church

hello there grace fam and welcome to grace online i'm maddie and i'm logan and we want to officially welcome you here to grace community church see for those of you who may not know we are one church in two physical locations right here in sarasota florida and we stream our services every single weekend in order to help you find god's direction for your life and grow in your walk with jesus exactly and you know in just a minute or two we're gonna hop into a time of powerful worship and some incredible bible-based teaching and preaching from pastor chip as he continues his series on the book of galatians this is also a time of fellowship and community in the live chat so be sure to pop on in type it on up and say hello so let's get excited guys because no matter where you are we get to worship jesus together matty i have a question for you yes did you know that when you check into grace community church on facebook or instagram your check-in automatically ends up going towards our non-profit sponsor of the month automatically if anyone checks in yeah if anyone checks in whether you're in person or whether you're online that's awesome see for this month of september we're excited to come alongside haiti partners and every 10 check-ins will provide a day of school to a child in need guys it really is that simple by checking into grace you're not only telling your friends and family about your church but you're also making a difference in lives all around the world in a super simple way and the easiest way to do this on facebook is by creating a post hitting the check in button and then searching for one of our two locations you can also use the link in the live chat to directly go to our facebook page as well so make sure you check in now like like seriously pull out your phones right now like pull out your phone like check in right now hey that was easy i know that's all you have to do thank you so much for helping us out by checking in all right guys now it's about time for service to begin and listen this is more than just an online message we would like to invite you to join with us join with your whole church family as we enter into god's presence no matter who you are or where you're watching from he wants to meet you right where you're at so we want to encourage you to stand or or kneel or just worship in your own way and join the grace worship team as they lead us and from all of us here at our church thank you so much for being here and welcome to grace come on stand to your feet come on each and every one of us have a different story but we have a reason to praise the lord amen come on let's put those hands together hallelujah you're the jesus come on let's sing this out i saw satan fall like lightning i saw darkness run for cover but the miracle that i just can't get over my name is [Music] [Music] still the miracle that i just can't get over my name is registered in heaven and my praise belongs to you forever come on lift it up in this place this is my testimony from death to life cause grace rewrote my story i'll testify by jesus christ the righteous i'll justified this is my testimony this is my testimony [Music] come together sons and daughters bought with blood and washed in water oh sing the praises of the spirit son and father our god will finish what he started come on you believe that oh our god we'll finish what he is my started [Music] from death to life cause breakthrough wrote my story i'll testify by jesus christ the righteous i'm justified is my testimony this is my testimony come on if you have a reason to sing put those hands together come on [Music] if i'm not dead you're not done later things are still to come oh i believe if i'm not dead you're not done [Music] greater things are still to come oh i believe if i'm not dead you're not greater things are still i believe this is my testimony from death to life cause grace rewrote my story i'll testify by jesus christ the righteous i'm justified this is my testimony this is my testimony from death to life cause grace rewrote my story i'll testify by jesus christ this is my testimony this is my testimony no matter where you're sin and tell god what you're thankful for in this place tell me you're thankful for what he's done for you and me hallelujah hope we're grateful in this place that you gave us a story lord you are our testimony you are a testimony [Music] [Applause] [Music] for it is by grace you have been saved through faith and this is not from ourselves it is a gift of god not by works so that no man can boast church let's continue to worship and let's find hope in these words [Applause] if you've been walking the same old road for miles and miles if you've been hearing the same old voice to the same old lies if you're trying to fill the same old holes inside there's a better life there's a better life if you've got pain there's a pain taker if you feel lost there's a way maker if you need freedom we'll save it he's a prison shaken savior if you've got chains he's a chain breaker y'all believe that [Applause] we've on search for the light of day in the dead of night we've all found ourselves worn out from the same old fire we've all run to things we know that just ain't right but there's [Music] if you feel long [Music] he's a [Music] if you believe it if you receive it if you can't feel it somebody testify if you believe it if you receive it if you can't feel it somebody [Music] somebody testify [Music] he's a wedding maker if you need [Music] if you need freedom of saving he's a jet breaker [Music] [Applause] what beautiful and powerful worship thanks so much for singing with us but before we continue in worshiping together i want to take a quick moment to welcome anyone who is just jumping into today's service i'm chris pedro and i am coming to you from our lakewood ranch campus and we truly are so glad to have all of you with us online this weekend now as an extra special shout out to anyone who is here as a new guest we want to acknowledge you and let you know how glad we are that you are here if that's you feel free to just jump in into the chat and say hey for a moment or more importantly we would really love to connect with you as well and so here's how you can help us to connect with you you can either visit our new website greysarasoda.com and click the i'm new button or you can use your phone to text the phrase new guest srq to the number 9700 by doing either of those two things it will bring you to our digital connect card which is just a really quick and simple way for us to get to know a little bit about you that way we can connect with you we can be praying for you and we'll even send you a free gift from our church as well just to say thanks for being here plus it will also allow you to plan a future visit to either of our two campuses right here in sarasota florida as we would love to meet you face to face sometime soon so please do check those things out but the most important thing that we all want you to know is that we really are so glad that you are here with us this weekend so welcome now whether you are new or maybe if you've been going to grace your entire life you should all know that our mission statement here at grace is to reach the unchurched by being intentional neighbors who reflect christ and there really are so many different ways that god is using us as a church to reach people in sarasota in our surrounding community and even all around the world and that's only able to happen because of your generosity so like we say almost every single week thank you so much church family it's through your giving and your generous hearts that you are allowing god to use you in a real significant way and for anyone that maybe hasn't taken that step in your given journey just yet or if you would like to be a part of what god is doing here at our grace family we want to give you an opportunity to give as well here at our church we want to be contagiously outrageous in our love and our generosity towards others just as the lord has been toward you and me so again i want to invite you to trust in him watch god move in your life and see him use your gift to reach others and to do that just take a look at the bottom of the screen or you can hit the link that's available in the chat but again thank you everyone for trusting the lord with your finances and for supporting grace community church let's all just take a moment to go to the lord in prayer and ask god to bless this week's offering god we love you so much we thank you god that you really can break every chain as we just saying and lord i pray that as we worship we don't just worship you with our words but we worship you in our giving god we pray that we take everything that we have to give take our time our talent our treasure use it for your kingdom use it for your glory and god we can't wait to see how you're going to use it to reach others and god i pray that you wouldn't just bless those who are able to give bless those who are unable to give as well god we love you we praise you we honor you and it's your in your name we pray and everybody said amen thanks for praying with me grace family now let's continue in worship with the grace worship team worthy of every song we could ever seek worthy of all the praise we could ever break worthy of every breath we could ever breathe we live for you [Music] jesus the name above every other name jesus the only one who could ever save worthy of every breath we could ever breathe we live for you we live for you and only there is no one like you there is none beside you open up my eyes in wonder show me who you are and fill me with your heart and lead me in your love to those [Applause] [Music] worthy of every song we could ever see worthy of all the praise we could ever bring worthy of every breath we could ever breathe we live for you [Music] jesus the name above every other name jesus the only one who could ever save [Music] is worthy of every breath we could ever breathe [Music] there [Music] is none beside you open up my eyes in wonder show me who you are and fill me with [Music] there is no one like you cause there is [Music] with your heart and lead me in your love to those around me [Applause] [Music] cause we live for [Music] let's sing this together today sing we will build our hope in our life in the person of jesus christ sing i will build [Music] cause i will build my life upon your love it is a performation i will put my trust in you alone and i will not be shaken i will be [Music] is [Music] [Music] there is none beside you [Music] show me who you are [Music] [Music] there is no one like you cause there is [Music] who you are [Music] is [Music] not be shaking [Music] god we just returned to you in this moment we remember what it was like when you first called our name and we said yes god come and take first place once more [Music] god you're still our first love you're still our only one [Music] i'm returning to a secret place just an altar and a flame love is found here in our sacred space i hear your voice i see your face [Music] you're still my first love you're still my only one you're still my first love you're still my only one [Music] there's a table just for you and me break [Music] perfect union nothing in between i am yours and you are mine you're still my first love [Music] you're still my only you're still my first [Music] you're my only one [Music] [Music] [Applause] may the flame of my heart always be lit i wanna burn [Music] my forever beating out of my chest [Music] always feels i wanna burn forever [Music] [Music] my first love you're still my only one you're still my first love you're still [Music] i wanna stay forever always you're still my first love you're still my only one you're still my first love you're still my only one [Music] blessing us together i'm coming back to the heart of worship and it's all about you it's all about you jesus i'm sorry lord for the thing i've [Music] when it's all about you it's all about you jesus i'm coming back to the heart of worship and it's all about you come on blessing that it's all about you jesus i'm sorry lord for the thing i've made it when it's all about you it's all come on let's just sing that out i'm coming back [Music] i'm sorry lord for the thing when it's all about you it's all about you jesus come on let's get him to praise this place it's all about [Music] father we bow right now we take a moment to just remind ourselves that everything you are worthy of everything that we are everything that we will ever be and lord so often we we make things about us we make things about all of the things that are going on in our world and our lives not that those things are not important but lord it really is all about you it really is about lifting you up in this place and honoring you and calling you the king of kings and the lord of lords you are so worthy of all that we are and lord we we confess it's so easy for all of us to remove you from that place of first love and somehow put other things in that place lord right now in this moment for all of us here and those watching online i just pray that we would take a moment to say lord we're sorry for the things that we've made things about you we're sorry for the way in which we've got distracted at times lord it is all about you you are the king of kings and the lord of lords you are worthy of everything and lord we just want to say thank you for what you've done for us that you continue to come after us even when we stray lord you are such a wonderful god we love you and we thank you and we praise you for that and lord we ask that as we go to your word that you would speak to us a new and afresh and that nobody would leave here and nobody would tune out on the internet or the mobile app or the website the same way as when we came in or when we tuned in i pray lord that you would speak to us in a powerful way and we're gonna give you all the praise and all the glory in jesus name and all of god's people said amen can we give the lord a hand clap and you can have a seat amen [Applause] you know i grew up in a very very small town in kentucky the town was called cynthia it's a town of about 66 6 66 6 700 people so very very small town just you know the the the farmers the the working you know blue collar people you know just sort of the backbone in many way of the of the south and when you grow up in a small town there's dynamics that are in a small town that are that are not the same as in a large town there's still dynamics in any town you live in but in a small town you almost take on sort of a certain vernacular there's certain words and phrases that like everybody knows and if you ever come from a large town and you come into a small town you realize everybody sort of knows each other and everybody sort of knows how to talk and you sometimes feel like you're out of place and i remember growing up there was a there was a phrase that was used a lot um it would properly be called an idiom but uh it was a phrase that i mean it got used everywhere and you've probably heard this phrase before but in cynthiana when i was growing up in the 70s this was definitely a phrase that i heard all the time and it was the phrase the real mccoy ever heard that phrase before the real mccoy well so like you know you'd be out on a farm with a person who had an incredible tobacco crop and he would say boy look right there that is the real mccoy of course what that meant was is that was a great representation of an authentic tobacco crop where you could be at little league and um you know the pitcher wouldn't have been me but the pitcher would have been pitching really really good striking everybody out and somebody would go that pitcher right there he is the real mccoy and obviously what that meant was that's a great representation of what it looks like to pitch that's an authentic you know representation of being a pitcher now when we come to the new testament there's there's no phrase in the new testament called the real mccoy but but i can tell you that there is one element about the new testament that absolutely has to be the real mccoy and we're going to look at it this weekend and we're going to continue to look at as we study galatians and that is the gospel that we cannot get the gospel wrong that the gospel has to be understood for what it is and we're going to delve into that this weekend but before we do and i try to do this at the beginning of every message that i do because i know that it's good to just summarize what we've done i also know that there's maybe people that are new or maybe tuning in for the first time we're going through the epistle that paul wrote to the galatian church and we're going through it line by line and what's important to get and we'll keep coming back to this often is that paul in his first missionary journey he traveled as part of that journey he traveled to what we would call modern day sort of southern turkey and in southern turkey he planted a number of churches that at the time the region was called galatia and he told the predominantly gentile group that if they would believe in jesus they would believe that he had forgiven their sins and if they would believe that he rose again on the third day they could be the people of god and many of them converted well as paul would normally do he would stay for a while and then he would go well when he left some people came in in chapter two of galatians we're gonna hear they're gonna be called the men from james scholars call them judaizers i believe these people were believers i don't believe that they were unbelievers i believe they were believers maybe some of them weren't believers but i believe they were believers i believe they thought jesus was the messiah but they came in and said hey what paul told you his gospel is about half right if you really want to be the people of god you believe in jesus but you've got to get circumcised you've got to keep the law and you've got to eat right and paul you know he's not really that much of an apostle because he didn't really walk with jesus and you know he's a people pleaser he likes to tell people you know things that they like to hear but this is what you really have to do to be a follower of the messiah well paul hears that and he basically goes ballistic he is absolutely just irritated that that's happened and he writes galatians and when he writes it he writes it as all these books in the bible are written in a literary fashion he writes it in a way that you can follow the line of reasoning all the way through and what he does to explain to the galatians that his gospel is the right gospel that it is the real mccoy he uses the theme of the exodus out of the old testament to write this epistle in in chapter 4 verse 19 he sort of says sort of the the the crux of this whole epistle he wants to see christ not the law not performance not any of those things he wants to see christ formed in the galatian church and so he writes it this way this is the this is the literary flow of galatians he says christ should be formed in you he tells them in chapter one verse four that they've been delivered from the present evil age we looked at that last week and so that means that they've been delivered this is the this is the real exodus in jesus the real exodus has happened but what's happened in chapter one verse six which we'll look at this weekend they've quickly turned away much like the children of israel when they were at sinai they started worshiping the golden calf and paul reminds them he says there isn't really anything to turn to there's not a different gospel there's not another one and of course if you remember moses was highly upset at the children of israel in chapter two we have another highly upset because paul has a throw down with peter then in chapter three he reminds them that they're really the children of abraham in chapter 4 he reminds them they're no longer slaves but their sons and in chapter 5 they need to live it out because in chapter 6 verse 16 they are the israel of god and that's the theme of what's going on here and now as we've looked in chapter one we've looked at the first five verses paul has said hey i'm an apostle i want to make sure you know that and i want you to know that god's given you grace and peace and you've been delivered from this present evil age and we're going to give god praise for that what he normally does after that is he gives thanksgiving not in this letter he hits it right straight ahead so in verse six he says i'm astonished i'm astonished that you were so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of christ and are turning to a different gospel he says i'm astonished this is not like a an astonishment in a positive way this is a this is as negative he's shocked he's the word means to marvel it means to be amazed but in a negative sense he's like i cannot believe what's happening i'm shocked i'm blown away i'm flabbergasted at what is what's gone on here that you galatians that i preach jesus to that you are so quickly this idea of quickly is a sense of speed he's like these people came in and taught you something differently than what i taught and you didn't take time to process it you didn't think about it you didn't stop it go and collect 200 you just quickly deserted i'm i'm blown away that you have so quickly that you're quickly deserting and this word dessert means to turn away it means to abandon and in the original language it's in the present tense which means they're in the process of deserting which is why paul writes he wants to arrest that he says i am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him now i'm convinced when we read scripture that many times we don't stop and pay attention to the words that's why we're doing this line by line that's why we're reading it the way that we're reading it because i want you to see how important each one of these words are notice here he says i'm astonished that you're so quickly deserting him he doesn't say that you're quickly deserting a belief system he doesn't say that they're quickly deserting what i taught you he doesn't say you're quickly deserting your performance or your ethics or your morals he says i am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him a person a relationship you're deserting him this isn't this isn't you got a few things wrong you're deserting him so we got to take a moment here when we're reading this this is where we should pause and we should start to read for application we should notice that for paul what really is constituting everything is a relational nature with a person you're deserting him not a creed not 18 checks that you can say i believe not some ethics or morals not that any of those things may not be important but for paul it's the relational nature and i wonder how often we as christians sacrifice the relational for other things that we put on top of other people rather than getting people to jesus are we trying to convince people of other things like oh no you should believe this about this you should believe this or are we trying to get people to jesus because for paul he says i am astonished that you're so quickly deserting him who called you he's the one who gave you the call he's the one that took the initiative to speak to you he's the one that took the initiative to prick your heart to bring you to him and i love this about paul notice here paul is the one who preached the gospel to the galatians but he realizes he's not the one that called them god is and let me just say this for everybody who preaches for everybody who teaches for anybody that shares the gospel or shares jesus it is our responsibility to share the gospel it is god's responsibility for the results want to say that again it's it's incumbent upon what i'm doing here what you may do or at work or at family wherever when we talk to people about jesus we're not responsible for the results we're responsible for the message paul says he's the one who called you not me i mean i preached the gospel to you but i'm not the one who who called you he says i'm astonished that you're so quickly deserving him who called you in the grace in the unmerited favor of christ you're walking away you're abandoning and you're turning to a different gospel at this point when we're reading the text we should stop and go whoa what a different gospel we should start thinking about application like what constitutes a different gospel would we know would we know what constitutes a different gospel how would we know is there a way that we can know and when does it become a different gospel when is it when is it that we move from connecting people to him and when we start connecting people to other things we we should want to know this when we read this we should be going man i need to know what's going on here i mean i need to pay attention this is pretty serious i mean paul is he's pretty pretty serious here i i need to pay attention and he says not that there is another one but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of christ he clears it up he's like i know the people that came in i know they said hey paul's gospel you know it's sort of half our gospel is the real deal and paul's like i know it sounds different it sounds like it's a different gospel and i get that and you're turning away to something that sounds different but let me make something very clear there really isn't another gospel there's only one there's not another one he says but i know that there are some this word is plural in greek there's a group of people that have come in that if they started to talk to you that it started to share with you that have told you about jesus and told you about what it means to be israel and what it means to be jewish and what you have to do these people they're what they're doing is they're troubling you they're they're creating angst they're disturbing you you you you thought you knew that you were a child of god and that you are part of the people of god and these people have come in and what they've done is they've made you start to doubt they've made you start to question they've made you start to think maybe what i believed is wrong maybe what i've anchored my eternity in is false he says there's some that have come who trouble you and they want to distort they want to change they want to turn it they want to make it different than the gospel of christ at this point we should stop and say i wonder if there's any area in my life where i might be saying things to people who are believers and i'm troubling them i'm messing them up i wonder if it's possible that it could possibly be that i could be thinking that i'm doing the right thing because i believe the people that came to galatia to said hey what paul said yeah you know they didn't come there because they were terrible people they came there because they thought they were right they came there because they thought those people needed to hear the truth i wonder in what ways we might distort the gospel we should be asking these questions because this is serious and then what paul does is he gives a hypothetical situation he says but even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preach to you let him be accursed whoa man that's that's strong paul so he says let me give you a hypothetical situation if not saying we would but if we any of my group the brothers that are with me that have written this epistle if for some reason we me or any of these other people that come by or even an angel shows up i mean an angelic messenger shows up he's like whoa it's an angel he says even if we or an angel from heaven should preach it's not saying that they're going to he just says if this were to happen if for some reason we or angels from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one that we preached to you let him be accursed i can't begin to tell you how difficult that word is because it means that the person should be devoted to destruction by god serious like this is if you ever read any biblical book that you go you know what i i need to like turn off the tv here and i need to take off the earbuds and i just need to have a moment here of looking at the text and figure out what is going on this this might be the one he says even if i accursed if an angel cursed for reading this for application we should be going man the gospel is serious business like paul's paul is quite hot on this thing like this is one of those things this isn't like polly's like yeah if you want to eat some meat go ahead if you don't eat some meat it's okay you know and if it's got a guy that wants to eat meat it's good but if somebody doesn't eat meat it creates them to stumble just don't go eat meat go eat meat somewhere else but you can eat meat and you know what on romans 14 if you want to worship on one day other than the sabbath go ahead if you want to worship on the sabbath go ahead you have whatever day you want this isn't paul talking about a lot of the intangibles where christians can disagree and where they can have some issues and maybe see things a little bit differently for him this is serious and he's telling us that the gospel message is more important than the gospel messenger i don't care how slick i don't care how good i don't care how eloquent i don't care how angelic if anybody preaches a gospel other than the gospel paul is preaching they need to be removed out of our lives and we need to go on and do something else because the message is important you should be asking man are you going to help us out here like what's the message here we're going to get there but i'm setting this up because i want you to feel the weight of what paul is saying now he moves from the hypothetical to right now he says i've said before and i'm going to say again if anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received let him be accursed he brings it right into the moment if anyone's preaching and by the way they are they they've come in and told you like you need to understand they're on shaky ground like they're they're they're on real shaky ground because we're hinging eternity on this thing and then he says so let me ask you you guys like to you know how you guys say that i'm people pleaser did i just come in and just say things make everybody feel happy i give you just sort of the half truth let me ask you a question am i now seeking the approval of man or of god like what i just said that didn't that wasn't like easy goosebumps i just i mean i flat laid it down in kentucky we would say paul shucked the corn i mean he flat laid it out he goes am i now seeking the approved manner of god by trying to please man is that what y'all think i'm trying to do here he says if i is this what you think i'm doing seeking the approval of man seeing the approval is that what you think i'm doing he says if i were still trying to please man because he's going to tell us next week and follow him and tell us about his autobiography tell us about who he was before as if i was still trying at one point i was i was actually trying to please man but keeping the law and doing the things that i was doing he said if i were still trying to please man i wouldn't be a servant of christ now what do we do with this well we're going to call this the takeaway because this is important is we need to realize that the gospel needs to be taken with the utmost seriousness and when i say that we need to know one of two things here we need to know when the gospel is being compromised and when the gospel isn't hugely important because i grew up you know with people that would read galatians 1 6 about they need to be accursed and i mean i think every christian in america was accursed and they were the only one living right and part of it was because of a misunderstanding of the gospel because he says if if they're not preaching the gospel then accursed that's the strong but we got to know what is the gospel when is it being compromised when is it not being compromised when is it not the gospel that we're actually arguing about when is it sort of like the peripheral things of christianity that we're arguing about what is the gospel what does it look like and here's the unfortunate thing most people in america most people in church when they say that church preaches the gospel what they're really saying is that church believes this this this this this this and this the way i believe it and they say it the way it is that's not the gospel the gospel is not a catch-all phrase for everything we believe the gospel doesn't include your view of genesis 1. the gospel doesn't include the way you view the end of the world the gospel doesn't include a number of things that we try to make it it doesn't do that the gospel in the new testament is used in two ways and to understand this is imperative we understand this we're going to be in a great place because we're going to know when it's being compromised and we're going to know when we're arguing about things that have nothing to do with the gospel they're just christian sort of intramural debates what is the gospel when in the new testament the gospel is used in two ways it's used as entry and it's used as story and i'll explain what these mean entry is when you read the passages of scripture where it says they preached the gospel and they responded and so many people were saved or when they said what do i got to do to be saved and they tell them there's there's a there's an element of the gospel that is entry and that element usually comes with something like repent and believe the gospel this is the entry we're going to talk about this in depth but this is the entry part this is how do you have a right relationship with god because if we get that wrong then everything we're hinging eternity on is wrong got to get that right the entry part's got to be right we'll come back to this we're talking about entry in depth but entry is part of the way the gospel is talked about in the new testament there's also the part of the gospel that's talked about as the story an overarching narrative so like when jesus says that he's preaching the gospel of the kingdom that what does it mean for jesus to be king what does it mean for us to be citizens of the kingdom of god this is also part of the gospel the gospel has entry and the gospel has story and if we don't understand the entry we're going to get it wrong if we understand the story we're going to get it wrong and those two elements are the way the gospels talked about in the new testament no other way it's talked about it's either an overarching story of the gospel which like in romans romans paul says in verse 16 of chapter one that he's not ashamed of the gospel well the gospel is what he talks about from chapter one all the way through to the end of chapter 11 which is how god is redeeming the world how he's the good news of how he's bringing all things back to himself but the gospel is also used is what do i have to do to be saved believe the good news so let's look at these in depth so that we know as a church what the gospel is and what it's not and when it's being compromised and when it's not being compromised so that we know what to tell people and we're authentic christians that if paul were to come and hang out with us he wouldn't say well man i don't know what you guys are preaching man it is a different gospel from what i taught we want to make sure that if paul showed up he would go yes yes you got the gospel right so let's talk about entry entry has three components and i'm doing this to teach so that we understand the gospel the gospel when we talk about the entry how does one become right with god there's three elements to that there's the message there's the response and there's transformation here's here's the way it works the message is always the same christ died for sins and he rose again on the third day that's the anything else you add to that not gospel that's the gospel this is the good news this is what do i got to do to be saved well you got to get circumcised you got to register for this party you got to have this view on genesis 1. you got to have this view on divorce you got to have this view on eschatology you got to have this view of church government the thief on the cross jesus didn't go hey man how did you vote in the last galilean election can't be in my kingdom until i get a couple things right the philippian jailer what do i got to be saved believe on the lord jesus christ and you'll be saved the message is always the same the message is that christ died for our sins and he rose on the third day now when that message goes out there is a response one of the responses can be no the true biblical response the response that shows that you have been called by god is when there is belief and repentance now belief is trust in other words we're trusting that that message is going to make things right with god and the word repent which has been sort of over uh it's oh there's like religion has been added to that word it simply means to change your mind metanoia is the greek word meta is to change no nuas's mind it means to change your mind in other words you were living this way and now you go i'm gonna live this way it was actually used when kings would overthrow a town that they would they would send letters into that town and they would say your king is no longer your king he's been defeated you need to repent and now you need to give your allegiance to the new king so that word was pregnant when jesus used it it was basically saying your allegiances now are no longer somewhere else now they are to jesus and so there's the message which is that jesus died and rose again on the third day there's the response which is belief and repentance and if belief and repentance is genuine what happens in our lives is the holy spirit takes residence in you and me and there is a transformation we become a new creation we all of a sudden have a different outlook on life we now want to serve god we now want to do the things that god's called us to do this is the entry part of the gospel when we come to the story part of the gospel this is the story is that a good god created the world and it was beautiful it was awesome but what happened is the world rebelled the world sinned the first couple adam and eve walked away from god i mean if there wasn't sin it'd be genesis 1 2 and revelation 21 and 22. we'd have a pamphlet for the bible but there's been sin and so now god has to restore and this is also the good news this is also part of the gospel that there's a story that's being told and that story is told in our lives both now and in the not yet because jesus is on his way he will return one day but we are heralders of the fact that he's already king he's already won you can enter in not on anything you've done on christ alone because of his grace alone through faith alone period that's the entry and when you enter now you're part of a story and this is why when we read in the new testament when it talks about living right it talks about not doing these things and whatever that's story that's not entry we enter only through christ and what he's done for you and me we can't bring enough we can't pray enough we can't do enough we can nothing we can bring nothing we believe christ alone because of his grace alone through faith alone we're made right with god but now we're part of a story because we've changed and said i want to live towards god now we're part of this story of restoration and we're to be doing things about his story we're a part of a drama it's not our drama it's his drama can you imagine if you went to a play and you tried out and they gave you the lines and you said i don't like the lines man i'm going to do what i want to do i'm going to say it the way i want to say it they would say no this is not your drama this is not your play you got to sort of follow the lines the story of the gospel are the lines that you and me should follow which is why as a church here we want to be intentional neighbors we do the things on the outside we teach the way that we do we do all of this stuff because i want people to know jesus and know that they can come to know jesus not based on anything they've done no matter what you bring in here no matter what you've done no matter how bad it is jesus says you can come based on what i've done for you alone because of my grace alone if you will just trust me alone and when that happens now you're part of a story and the story is how god is bringing restoration to the world that we live in so let's go back here to entry message response transformation let's talk about that this is the entry if we don't get this right we're in trouble so i'll make it very clear here anything that takes away that distracts or diminishes him and his work is a problem which means this jesus plus nothing equals everything make it even more clear jesus plus something equals no gospel oh well yeah but you can't you got to do this you got it no no no no no no don't trouble people with putting garbage into their lives about how we enter don't take the story and put it on the entry the entry is christ alone through his unmerited favor of grace alone by faith alone so let me put this here listen to this let us never confuse what makes one a christian with what one should live like as a christian you're saddling people with stuff that paul would go wrong don't put that junk on people don't don't lead with all that other stuff trying to get them to understand you've got to see the bible this way in that way in this way and that why would anybody want to believe anything about the bible if they're not a christian why would anybody care about your views on ethics if they're not a christian and yet we feel like if we can argue somebody into submission about some point or some position that we have we've won no we haven't won we've lost because typically they don't want to hear anything else it's like time out okay you won i'm leaving can i tell you something if i could get the world or you could get the world to believe everything right about ethics everything right about morals everything right about the way we should interpret the bible not one person would still be saved we've got to get people to jesus and anything that distracts from getting them to jesus to understand that christ alone through grace alone by faith alone means that you are a child of god anything that takes away from that we've got to call out now when it comes to the story this is a whole other part of our our gospel we're now entered into a story and since we've entered in a story we've said we want to believe in jesus and we love jesus and we honor jesus and we're and we're following jesus then now we have lines we have things that jesus says this is the way you're going to do we have props we have communion bread and wine we have things that we do that jesus says this is part of the drama this is part of being my followers this is part of restoring the world so anything that takes away distracts or diminishes from the story is actually a problem we put it this way let us not allow the story to somehow become about us our happiness our best life our destiny and fail to be about the story and here's the beautiful thing about the story you get the story right and you follow the lines that jesus says that are right and you live the way that god wants us to live and we all live that way guess what we got the best life that you could ever have at all because his ways are better than our ways now [Applause] entry and story huge that we get this entry is savior story is lord he is our savior and he is our lord how's he our savior christ alone grace alone faith alone he's now our lord and we're part of his story which means that we need to live this thing out which is why when we read the new testament and the writers are saying don't do this don't live like that don't do it they're not doing that to tell them they're not believers they're writing to them as believers they're saying you got the story wrong we got to get the story right because the world needs to see the right story the world needs to see the right christ and so entry and story become huge and so now when we talk about what does it mean to preach a different gospel it's not really one at all it's anything that detracts from the entry and anything that detracts from the story and once we get those things right we can start to realize that hey you know what worshiping on this day or that day or some of these things or maybe you're that those are those are not the central elements of the entry in the story the story that we got to get right is that god changes lives and we're part of heralding his kingdom the entries we've got to make sure that people understand they are justified by faith alone because of grace alone based on the work of christ alone let us never ever ever forget that that is what changes the world folks martin luther read this epistle which led to the protestant reformation which led to all kinds of people coming to faith if the church can get the entry and the story right let me tell you something watch out because it's the greatest message of all and it changes our lives it gives us meaning and it gives us purpose and it gives us all the things that we're looking for and i'm gonna ask you two questions and then we're gonna pray and sing a song first first question is and i'm asking this sincerely have you ever got the entry right like maybe you grew up in church maybe maybe you you talked about god maybe you you heard about god maybe you think you know some things about god but did you ever say you know what hold on i'm hinging all of my eternity on what christ did alone through the unmerited favor that he's offered to me alone by simply my trust in him if you've never done that right now would be a great time to do that right now would be a great time to make that commitment and maybe you go well yeah you know i i believe that but you know i just sort of hang out here you know and i come to church but i'm really involved and i don't really get what then let me encourage you to get a part of the story because the story is part of the gospel too you can't have one without the other stories so important that's why we want you involved in groups we want you involved in outreach we want you involved in doing things because when we start to go out and tell people about jesus it changes our lives and it's what god wants you and me to do maybe you've never joined the story maybe this is the moment to do that can i pray for you father i love you and i thank you for your goodness and your mercy and your kindness i thank you for the gospel i thank you for what you've done for us i pray that everybody that hears my voice here and online understands that if we believe that you died on the cross for our sins then you rose again on the third day and we put our trust in that and we decide to reorient our life around that that we will forever be changed and father i pray that we would also understand that part of that good news is how you're reconciling the world back to yourself and how you're using us your people to do it help us lord to see that we have a tall order ahead of us that there is a wonderful task that we can be involved in of helping so many other people come to know that they can have eternal life through christ alone through his grace alone and by faith alone holy spirit you are welcome in this place right now i pray that you would fill us anew and afresh i pray the pentecostal fire would fall upon our church this weekend to be blown away with the richness of god's grace in the incredible nature that he wants us to be on his team to do incredible work to bring restoration to the communities that we live in until he one day steps back in in a way that we see him and know him face to face lord let that be a reality for all of us in jesus name would you stand with us and let's sing holy spirit you are welcome in this place busting there's nothing worth more there's nothing worth more that will ever come close nothing can compare your our living hearts [Music] i've tasted emcee of the sweetest of loves when my heart becomes free and my shame is undone [Music] you are well come here come flesh this place and fill the atmosphere your glory god is what our hearts long for to be overcome [Music] by your presence [Music] [Music] there's nothing worth more [Music] your prayers [Music] i've tasted and [Music] of seen when my heart becomes free and my shame is undone and your presence lord your presence lord holy spirit holy spirit you are welcome here come blood your glory god is what our hearts long for to be overcome [Music] [Music] let us become more aware let us become more aware of your presence let us experience to the glory of your goodness let us become more aware of your presence god we want to experience you let us become more aware of your presence let of us goodness let us become more aware of your presence let us experience the glory of your [Music] me complete this place and fill the atmosphere your glory cut is what our hearts long for to be overcome by your presence [Music] [Applause] [Music] wow what an awesome service and like we say often around here at grace that more than just a good experience we hope that you really were able to have an encounter with jesus and if there's anything that we can do to help you in your walk with christ if something from today's service has spoken to you or if you just want to pray with somebody please don't hesitate to reach out to us you can either send us an email at grace gracesarasota.com or you can call the phone number that's on the screen and in the chat we really would love to hear from you and also to anyone who is here as a new guest don't forget to go to our website graysarasota.com and click the i'm new button or you can text new guest srq to the number 9700 logan what was that number 9700 good job thank you and either way you do that you'll be able to fill out our digital connect card and receive a free gift from our church who doesn't like a free gift i love forget i know right and then from there you'll be able to plan a future visit to our lakewood ranch campus or our bee ridge campus right here in sarasota because we really would love to meet you face to face but grace family it's now time for all of us to go out and be those intentional neighbors that god is calling us to be we love you guys so much and we can't wait to see you again next time and don't forget invite a friend and as always thank you so much for joining us here at grace where everyone is welcome

Channel: Grace Community Church

Views: 317

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Sarasota, Lakewood Ranch, Church, Grace Community Church, Worship Service, Chip Bennett, bradenton, florida, manatee, Grace Church, Bee Ridge, learn to read the bible, what does the bible say, sarasota church, fastest growing church, dr. Chip Bennett, sarasota worship service, bradenton church, lakewood ranch church, grace sarasota, grace worship, bee ridge church, LWR florida

Id: k7_ZFtKfMAs

Length: 76min 28sec (4588 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 09 2021