Romans #26 - Rebels with A Cause: Die to Yourself?

[Music] so [Music] all righty we're in the book of romans i'm so excited if you've got a bible go to the book of romans chapter 12 one of the most amazing books in the history of the world this is going to be so fun at least for me and i'm glad you're joining us here's the big idea as we enter into romans chapter 12 christians are to be rebels with a cause as everyone is rebelling against god we are going to rebel against the world while they take their pants off we're going to put our pants on as they're picking up a bottle we're going to pick up the bible as they are picketing and protesting we're going to be worshiping and praying amen we got our own little countercultural rebellion started as god's people and the big idea is this that at some point in your life as an individual married couple family and or church family we need to decide what kind of people we're going to become what kind of lives we're going to live what kind of legacies we're going to leave that's where paul drives all of his great book of romans to this point of decision in chapter 12. so let me catch you up to speed the first 11 chapters of romans are primarily about our relationship with god our vertical relationship with god how god loves us seeks us saves us forgives us pursues us adores us never leaves us nor forsakes us from chapter 12 through 16 the remainder of the book that we'll be in this summer he talks about our horizontal relationship with one another and the point is simply this once you have a relationship with god you now have an example for all of your relationships and you have the resources for all of your relationships so god forgives us so we forgive one another god loves us so we love one another god pursues us so we pursue one another god is generous toward us so we're generous toward one another the big idea is simply this that the way god treats us is the way that we get to treat one another and set culture as a family and church family now if this overview of roman sounds familiar it's possibly because the apostle paul is echoing the lord jesus they came to the lord jesus when he was walking on the earth and they basically asked him which is the greatest commandment because in the first five books of the old testament there are 600 laws or commands lists of do's and don't do's and they said well this is a very long list could you tweet this for us summarize it boil it down jesus said it actually comes down to two things love god love others love the lord your god with all your heart soul mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself jesus said it's all about your relationship with god and then your relationship with god informs and transforms how you relate to others paul takes this same model of jesus and outlines this incredible book of romans and so where we find ourselves today is in romans chapter 12 and up until this point everything has been driving toward what is called cooperative commands up until chapter 12 most of what we have learned is what god does from 12 through 16 we learn what god does in us and through us how we cooperate with god the first thing we learn is to die to self and live for god now this is going to be counter cultural and revolutionary because if you don't know jesus who do you live for you live for you you wake up every day you look in the mirror you're like what do you want what do you think what do you need right what do you feel how how do you desire once you wake up and you meet the lord jesus you're okay what do you want what do you think what do you need what do you feel what do you desire our shift goes from living for ourself to dying to ourself and living for our god this is what he says romans chapter 11 verse 36 through 12 1 to him be the glory forever amen so he wraps up the first half of the book and then he transitions i appeal to you therefore brothers so we're to love one another as christians like family by the mercies of god here's the good news god has mercy you didn't get it right the first time god has mercy you didn't get it right the 72nd time god has mercy you got it right for a while and then you blew it last night in old town i you know god has mercy welcome we're glad to see you god has mercy to present your bodies as a living sacrifice holy acceptable to god which is your spiritual worship so the big idea here he's going to talk about from 12 through 16 how do we worship the god who has saved us how do we worship the god who has saved us so we're going to talk about what worship is and is not and we're going to apply it through the remainder of the book but let me deal first and foremost with some things that i call worship myths i hit these with the real men on wednesday night and if you're a guy we'll see you on wednesday night we got two weeks left live and online you don't want to miss it there is an army of men assembling in the name of love and service it's a wonderful amazing thing to see and i'll share with you what i shared with the men five worship myths number one that worship is solely for christians worship is not something that christians do it's something that humans do if you're breathing you're worshiping that everyone worships someone or something somewhere and in some way people worship in different places in different ways but they're pouring themselves out they're giving themselves to they're devoting themselves to someone or something we can't help it we're made to live for someone or something and if it's not jesus it'll be someone or something else number two the other myth is that worship is something that start and stops it doesn't you're constantly worshiping you were worshiping before you came here you'll be worshipping after you leave here you worship when you go to work you worship when you go to school you worship when you go to the grocery store store we're always worshiping we're living for someone or something the the desires we have the decisions we make the thoughts that we uh entertain uh the dollars that we invest or divest that ultimately all of that is connected to the heart and decisions of worship who or what is in the position of priority in addition there is this myth that worship is something that only happens in church and it starts and stops worship never starts and stops and it exists outside of the church another myth is that worship is just a genre of music is it just a genre of music no worship does include singing and stick around we're going to bring the band up at the end they're going to do a great job you're going to be so happy that i'm done and you're going to love listening to the band we do believe that worship includes the singing of songs to the glory of god but worship is bigger than just singing it's not just the songs that we sing it's the lives that we live that worship includes our singing but it encompasses all of our living and then the last myth is that worship is something that is for women and children but not for real men so most churches it's predominantly women and children so most men think i i don't go to church churches for women and children god is for women and children worship is for women and children now we're glad that women and children know love and worship god but worship is also for real men so let me ask you this so guys let's just do this we got nothing else to do so let's just do this if men don't worship in church what are some other places and ways that men worship where do they go they go to the bar okay there's an honest answer in church thank you sir the bar okay so some people go to the bar and what it is for them that becomes their community and what they're doing there they're offering their body as a living sacrifice and they're sacrificing their liver and their job and their marriage it's a living sacrifice thank you sir okay where else do men go for worship if they don't go to church they go to the golf course many men they worship they're handicapped they just do and they're always trying to reduce it and some men can't make it to church because they're at the golf course and they're spending their time and their energy and their money and instead of tithing to god they're tithing to the country club right oh welcome to scottsdale shots fired okay where else do men go to worship god if they don't go to church they go to the stadium have you been to a college football game just so you know college football is a cult just go you'll see it they have a grill they have a sacrifice there's a guy in the end zone dressed like the mascot he's the high priest everyone else is singing the song it's a cult just so you know we're all wearing the same colors i mean it's a cult and if our team wins yeah resurrection if our team loses crucifixion if we're losing but we come back in the fourth quarter yeah our god rose from the dead and and and and there's even you know in judaism there's a pig involved but in football there's also a pig involved we just carry the pig over a chalk line and it's a weird religion okay where else do men go to worship if they don't go to church work some guys keep working they're working all the time they're offering their body as a living sacrifice to their job to their career to their income to their place on the organizational chart the point is simply this we're all worshipers we're always worshipping the only difference between human beings is who or what or how or when or why we are worshiping and what he's distinguishing here is what i'll call old covenant worship before jesus new covenant worship after jesus so in the old covenant you would go to church the synagogue the temple and you would bring a sacrifice so if you were in the old covenant you would never come to god in worship empty-handed the worship includes involves a sacrifice so you would bring an animal and that animal would be the sacrifice the sacrifice would die so in place of you as a substitute for your sin the wage for sin is death the animal the sacrifice the substitute would shed its blood and give its life for you for your sin that was to foreshadow the fourth coming of jesus the lamb of god who takes away the sins of the world behold our passover lamb has been slain that jesus comes to die in your place for your sins as your substitute as the sacrifice who dies he then rises from death he conquers sin he forgives sin he conquers death and then ultimately you and i are not to give a sacrifice that dies we are to give our life as a sacrifice that lives so in the old covenant the sacrifice dies in the new covenant jesus is the sacrifice and your life is the living sacrifice let me ask you this is it sometimes this will be a little controversial but is it sometimes a little harder to live for god than die for god it is see when someone dies for god we call them a martyr and we honor them rightly so but if somebody comes up and they says deny christ or we're going to end your life he said i can't deny christ they kill you it's over you see jesus you get rewarded now let's say that you have to live for christ sometimes that's harder let's say you're 20 years of age and you meet jesus in college and then all of your professors start to assault and berate you and then to see your grade point average diminish and then you graduate and then you work in a field where you are then opposed because of your christian faith and then you're trying to raise your kids and your family has disowned you and they have harassed you and they have opposed you and now for the next 60 years of your life every day you're a living sacrifice you're making sacrifices in your relationships you're making sacrifices in the upward mobility of your career you're making sacrifices in your earning potential you're making sacrifices in your reputation the point is this if you're going to worship god it is going to cost you something and i'm just telling you this the way the culture is trending the price of following jesus just got much higher it's not just gas and home prices that are up so is the cost of following christ and we're going to offer our bodies if we are true believers as a living sacrifice and so he helps us to figure out who or what or how or when or why we worship and i'll give you three questions from this section of romans glory he says to god be the glory both now and forever amen so the glory is this who or what is in the position of preeminence and prominence in your life who or what is the thing i can't live without my life will have no meaning if it goes away what's on your heart when your feet hit the floor in the morning what's on your mind when your head hits the pillow at night what is the thing that you fear the most what is the thing that you long for the most what motivates you what inspires you what drives you who or what is in the position of glory that all things are for it and if you lose it your life is altogether cratered and shattered who or what weighs heaviest in your life that's the glory question if it's not god it's someone or something else the second question is amen he says to god be the glory both now and forever amen amen is cheering for your team in a sporting event when everybody jumps out of the seats and they're ah that that's their way of saying amen when a band comes out for the encore and the the crowd is just in a frenzy and they're cheering that's their way of saying amen who or what team are you cheering for this could be your political party your sports affiliation this can be your investment portfolio this can be your cost per square foot valuation of your home this could be your kids this could be your spouse this could be your band this could be anyone or anything who or what is the team that you are on and you are cheering for and then this question living sacrifice who or what do you make the biggest sacrifices for look at your schedule where does your time go and the best and first of your time you only have so much time so you're going to sacrifice some things so that you can allocate your time toward those things that are in the glory position how about your money look at your budget where your treasure is your heart is look at your budget where is god versus other things do you give first and best to god or first and best to someone else look at your energy you only have a limited supply of life energy where do you invest it who or what gets the first and best of your time and your energy and your money what occupies your thoughts what motivates your heart these are the questions that we asked to find the gods that we worship now in saying this he gave us a clue a bit earlier in the book in romans chapter 1 verse 12 verse 25 he said that everyone is a worshiper and what divides humanity is not race or color or creed or nation or income or gender but worshiper and that there are two kinds of worshipers those who worship the creator and steward and enjoy creation as an act of worship or they invert and they worship created things rather than the creator god that's what he told us in romans 1 25 and so let me say it this way if you take a good thing and you make it a god thing it becomes a bad thing usually usually our problem is that we're not worshiping a bad thing but we're worshiping a good thing in a bad position i'll give you an example so let me just uh let me ask you this um give me some examples of addictions or compulsions or self-destructive behaviors that people tend to get into just give me a few okay alcohol is the first one that's a good good pick ultimately okay god does god allow us to consume alcohol yes or no okay and if you're baptist you're wrong yes he allows us to consume alcohol and the baptist destroys like it's grape juice it's like have you been drinking that's a terrible translation okay so uh so yes god it's the bible says that god gives wine to glad in the heart of man did jesus make alcohol why yes it was his first miracle so god our god jesus made and drank wine okay so therefore it is not a sin but can you have alcohol replace god in the glory position yes and what happens then is alcohol becomes your functional savior you've had a hard day just pour a toll drink you don't need to be filled with the holy spirit you can be filled with alcoholic spirits it's a counterfeit that ultimately now what you are doing is you are worshiping alcohol instead of the creator this is how you become an alcoholic you worship yourself into addiction and the problem with alcohol is this like all other addictions they lie they tell you they're going to make it better and they only make it worse they tell you that they're going to give you life and they only bring you death and so for some people they say you know what to worship jesus i can't consume any alcohol because for me as soon as i touch alcohol it takes the glory position the god position in my life i had one friend of mine who's a recovering addict he said recently said alcohol is undefeated in my life every time i touch it it wins i lose so i can't touch it so what happens is he used to worship alcohol and he used to replace the creator with the created and now every time he's tempted to drink and he doesn't what he's done he used to worship his way into addiction now he's worshipping his way out as opposed to grabbing the bottle he's going to cling to the lord okay and so this is what happened so for the alcoholic they worship alcohol for the control freak they worship sovereignty they don't trust the god sovereign if you if you're a control freak you have a god problem you don't trust the real god to be sovereign you trust yourself so you think if you were sovereign you'd be safer and that's that's taking yourself and putting yourself in the god position the person who is a glutton that eats too much their god is their stomach the apostle paul says they worship their way into trouble and the way you worship your way out is you offer your body as a living sacrifice which means you eat vegetables and go for a walk that's how you repent something to pray about okay and the point is simply this even some of us what we worship we worship other people we call this codependency and people-pleasing it's you know what whatever you want whatever you say whatever you like whatever you need i just need to be aligned with you you just tell me and i'll do whatever pleases you is that what pleases the lord and sometimes we even worship our own kids i've seen this all the time even a bad excuse you say this even a good kid is a bad god even a good spouse is a bad god and sometimes we look at our spouse and we're like you're the most important no no that should be the lord look at the kids say hey kids you need to make make my life meaningful and valuable and purposeful it's like no no no that's that's god's role we could take created things and put them in the creator's place and as a result we're still worshiping giving ourselves making sacrifices i'll give you one example i've shared this analogy before but i've been a senior pastor 25 years and early on i was doing college ministry primarily with young college kids many of them were brand new christians and of course they come from the world they're living and sleeping together they're breaking the commandments they're dating relating and fornicating it's just it's just a disaster and so i'm always telling them you know that to offer your body as a living sacrifice means that you don't just give your heart to jesus but your body see a lot of us like i gave my heart to jesus well what about your hands oh those are mine no they're not what about your belt oh that's mine no jesus is lord overall that means he gets your hands in your belt see a lot of us want to give our hearts to the lord we don't want to give our bodies to the lord that's why some of you love jesus and are sleeping with people you're not married to and so there was one occasion where this college gal came up to me and she said i don't know what the big deal is pastor mark i love jesus i'm a christian i've accepted jesus in my heart and i'm dating a non-christian i just moved in with him and i'm sleeping with him but we're not hurting anybody and we're not you know we're not we're not causing any harm she said i don't know what the big deal is i said now here's how god sees it i said so there is your boyfriend and there is jesus these are now the two most prominent men in your life is that true she said yes it is i said okay so which one is in the glory position she said it's jesus i said well does jesus want you to date the non-christian boy answer come on dads back me up answer no see these things are not clear when you're a college boy you're like it's not clear and your dad you're like crystal clear i see this so clearly so i said i said to her i said so does jesus want you to date this voice she's like no i said does jesus want you to live with this boy she said no i said jesus wants you to sleep with this boy she said no i said okay so you had a decision jesus or the boy was going to be in the glory position in your life i said you know what just happened you put the boyfriend in the glory position that's what you just did jesus says something the boyfriend says something and you choose the boyfriend over jesus i said so here's how jesus sees it your apartment is a temple your bed is an altar your boyfriend is a pagan high priest and when you lay down you are offering your body as a living sacrifice it's demonic and it's spiritual and it's worship okay you and i need to think like god thinks so that we can live like god says and so oftentimes we look from our perspective we need to look from his perspective that's what paul is here doing for us once we understand that all of life is worship and all decision making all value holding all dollar spending all word speaking is ultimately worshiping then we are told to worship god with our head our heart and our hands and that's where he's going to go in this remaining section of romans romans 12 2 first of all worship with your head do not be what's the word conformed conformed to this world this fallen sinful fleshly foolish deadly world but be next word transform those your options conform transform by the renewal of your mind that by testing you may discern you got to test things don't believe everything you read online don't believe everything you read in the news don't believe everything you think don't believe everything you feel don't believe everything your friends think and feel test to discern is it true or false or right or wrong what is the will of god what is good acceptable and perfect good acceptable and perfect so what he says here is this okay if your whole life is worship now first of all with your mind you've got to make a decision that you're going to be conformed or transformed you're going to be conformed to the pattern of the world are you going to be transformed by the word of god that's those are the two options okay so just let me ask you this what are some of the things that are at work powerful cultural forces and pressures in our world that are seeking to get you to conform to a godless baseless world tv social media media news government education if you believe any of it if you follow any of it you're being conformed okay and let me say this that ultimately you can't be a loyal servant of jesus and a gullible follower of worldly conformity you just can't okay that ultimately all of social media is to get you to conform they're going to berate you and harass you and lie about you somebody says pastor mark how do you know this i know a guy so they're going to seek to pressure you to conform and ultimately what the world loves those who are non-christians and ultimately satan is a work behind the world what they love is when a christian or someone who professes to be a christian conforms to the world they will cheer you not jeer you they will celebrate you not oppose you because you are an apostate we learned that just a few chapters ago in romans we are in the middle of a massive generational apostasy woke christianity progressive christianity liberal christianity red letter christianity lgbtq alphabet soup christianity tolerance instead of repentance christianity far going to the left social cultural marxism critical theory nonsense demonic garbage christianity is all apostasy and a mass apostasy is underway okay i'll call the shots i'll take the shots all that is is conforming to the pattern of the world if you're following someone who has not the spirit of god and believes not the word of god you are not a faithful servant of god period and what happens is there is some of your translations will say there is pressure from this world to be conformed to a pattern of living if you step out of line you will be punished you will be throttled you will be name called and you will be opposed so let me just riff for a minute so here's how the pattern of the world works two people are having sex they have no intentions of getting married or having a job they get pregnant they have two choices we're going to kill the child or we're going to birth the child they birth the child then they read that they're basically told from the culture that the child is a is a good person they're a blank slate with a clean heart which is not true the only person who ever thinks that is a person who's never tried to raise a child okay the evidence doesn't hold up in court and so what you're told is they're good they're just good and they're going to evolve and get better all they need is a high self-esteem which is pride which is demonic which is satanic which is not helpful so we have kids who are horrible with a high self-esteem so we give johnny a participation trophy uh we tell him he's amazing everything he does is incredible we we put his d plus papers on the wall and we just shed tears for his amazing achievement okay so so then johnny reaches the age or sally when they reach the age where the parents are like we're sick of them they're driving us crazy they're horrible uh we have the terrible twos we have the terrorism threes we have the tragic fours you're five we're going to put you in school because obviously the institution will know what to do with you this is where the brainwashing begins and this is where the cult entrance initiates and so what tends to happen is people who create education they write curriculum they don't have any children okay they don't because if if you're let's say you're you're not heterosexual a little secret you don't make people you can't it just the plumbing doesn't work so what happens then is um or if you do have people and you kill them you're not putting them in the future so so what you do you go get a degree so you can write curriculum to then steal other children from people and then brainwash them we call that curriculum and education so now now you go to school and you're told gender is a spectrum you should just try them all and sexuality is something to explore starting at age oh 10. and then there is no god and you're a good person you need to have a high self-esteem well then then we hit the teen years and then it's just total craziness you're just going to drink you're going to do drugs you're going to be suicidal you're going to cut yourself you're going to consume social media you're going to care about what people think about you online you're going to take selfies where you're lying about your life pretending like it's awesome and uh you're gonna have a lot of broken-heartedness a lot of sexual deviancy and then at 18 the parents are like we're just exhausted go to college and now we say okay now you're an adult you're 18. make all your own decisions which is not true have you ever met an 18 year old they're not fully cooked they're just not they're just they're not ready to make a lot of decisions so then we send them to college to a university which is really a cult that you pay for um and so you go to the university this is all true okay you go to the university and then you're just totally brainwashed every single class is antichrist anti-god anti-repentance anti-health anti-holy spirit okay all right so there's a guy who's bitter that he paid for his kids college okay so so then so then you're in class and now you're just filled with poison and critical theory and self-righteousness and protesting and self-destructing and you're drinking and you're rebelling and you're arrogant and you're foolish and you're perverted and you're going into debt massive debt you're going into the trifecta debt credit card debt card debt school debt then you graduate with a degree that there's no job for they didn't tell you that and then you spend your 20s doing what nothing getting drunk racking up debt going to old town congratulations you made it here right all of a sudden now you're sleeping around you're living with people you you're getting a broken heart you're picking up a venereal disease you're you're tempting yourself with certain addictions you're racking up your debt and around 30 you're like it's time to grow up and so what you do is you find somebody who lacks discernment and thinks you're a good idea and then you um they get a dress you get a suit depending upon what team you're on maybe vice versa no judgment so that it looks official you get somebody with a piece of paper to make it legal and you get married you have no pre-marital you're broken you've got a lot of hurt and trauma you've now doubled up your debt you have no idea what you're doing you're married for a few years you're like this is terrible you're like you're selfishly no you're selfish you're terrible you're terrible you're both right you both need jesus but instead what you say is let's add a kid so then you get pregnant you had a kid and now now all you do is you just fire up the drunk carnival again all right some of you i've just explained generations of your family hey where's the drunk clown leading the conga line come on kids get in line follow grandpa so what happens then you're raising your kids and you're totally not loving your life it's not working so then you hit your 40s and 50s and you get a free midlife crisis you're like i'm going back to my 20s so you get hair plugs and a camaro you trade your spouse in for two people whose total age is a third of your original spouse right you get a condo and and you go on tinder and you lie and that's what you do so then you you just you just waste all of your time and your energy and your money and you obliterate your family then eventually you retire then you sit around just grumpy bitter jaded complaining about politics you're like the government ruined my life and so you're voting for someone to make up for your life of mistakes while you're just grumbling following things on the internet welcome to scottsdale okay so true or false this is the pattern of the world it's totally true you should see people's faces some people were like he's picking on me i'm ministering to you this is revelation tell your parents all right tell everybody this is the pa it's not working people aren't healthy they're not joyful it's not working everybody's arguing and fighting and blaming and no one's repenting and worshiping and changing so what he says is don't be conformed to the power of the world be transformed by the renewing of your mind you got to think differently change starts in the mind and the first two most important things you can ever learn is romans 1 through 11 who's god 12-16 who am i those are the first two things you got to figure out see what we do we go to school and we learn about our personality but we don't learn about our god we write essays about ourselves we don't write essays about our god the problem is we start with us we don't start with him and as a result we don't even know who we are so paul says this other option is not to be conformed but to be transformed so here's what this means friend to be a christian is to be a freak minority subculture you're the outlier you're the outcast you're the oddball you're the weirdo just wear it proudly everyone else is right so here's my idea like i've been faithful to my wife we're heterosexual um i read i read the bible and i like it crazy okay but you know what i'm on team jesus and i don't mind leaning over the plate taking one for my team because at the end of the day everything else is failing and jesus and the word of god for generations has proven itself to always be working see i love you and i want you to be healthy and holy and happy and for that to happen you need to have a transformed mind not a conformed mind what paul says elsewhere is the mind of christ so how do you get a transformed mind let me tell you that being conformed is external circumstances pressure berating lying manipulating transformed is internal it's the holy spirit new heart new nature new desires new passions new pleasures new mind the reason that the non-christian doesn't understand the christian is because they have not been transformed internally they've only been conformed externally so here's the big idea the holy spirit wants to transform you internally the culture wants to conform you externally the point is simply this you're gonna get in trouble just figure out what kind of trouble you're gonna get in are you gonna get in trouble with him because you're being conformed are you in trouble with them because you're being transformed you're gonna get in trouble the question is who are you getting in trouble with and what do you get in trouble for okay if there is a conflict between the world and the lord my friend you have to pick a team and once you pick a team there is going to be a price to pay a sacrifice to be made which is an act of worship and what ultimately he's saying is this we can live kingdom down or hell up we could live by the spirit we could live by the flesh we could be transformed by god or conformed by the world he told us back in romans 7 8 that this ultimately comes down to living in what he calls the spirit or the flesh the flesh is conforming to the world the spirit is being transformed by the lord paul articulates this in greater depth in romans 5 16-26 let me just read it to you faith comes by hearing the word of god we heard in romans walk by the spirit to lifestyles daily choices the decisions we make the places we go the relationships we have the sex we have the money we spend the alcohol we consume right that worship is often very practical daily decisions that involve our physical body and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh does a born-again christian still have desires that are temptations of the flesh yes we do for the desires of the flesh are against the spirit there's a conflict and the desires of the spirit are against the flesh for these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do so if you are a born-again believer your deepest desires your deepest nature your deepest longings are to obey the lord you have lesser desires and temptations to be conformed to the world but you're living in the midst of this battle between the transformation that is in you and the confirmation that surrounds you and so here's what he says uh now the works of the flesh are evident meaning this is pretty obvious tell me if you've heard of any of these things number one sexual immorality is that still a thing i wasn't sure thanks for confirming that okay impurity sensuality idolatry sorcery which is false religion and spirituality enmity strife jealousy us against them factions divisions you know narrative creating name calling warring that's our whole world fits of anger and i would say right now america has two emotions that's our entire emotional spectrum angry asleep that's all we got nobody's happy yes people how are you doing they're like you're doing great liar liar no one's doing great no one's doing great he goes on rivalries dissensions divisions conflict head-on collisions envy oh something good happened to you well i need to destroy you because i'm jealous of you and i can't rejoice with you drunkenness or jesus and somebody say i haven't done any of that so he adds this little junk drawer and things like these what he's saying is gotcha okay you did something and if you didn't you're religious you're proud gotcha okay so that's the works of the flesh is that our world today is there a conforming pressure to just be a pervert get angry join a team declare war vent yes is there an alternative way to live yes oh i just thought of this this is an alternative lifestyle okay it's called the fruit of the spirit it's our version of the alternative lifestyle but the fruit of the spirit is love you know what last year we ran really low on toilet paper and hand sanitizer but every year we run low on love how many people right now you feel like the world could use a little more love i could i'll give you a hug afterward all right joy is our world filled with joy no because you know what the world can't produce love and joy only the spirit of god can produce love and joy what holds people together in the world is unholy alliances not happy alliances patience oh man testimony in the front row of laughter okay patience we don't live in a patient world do we no no we just don't patience kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness self-control against such things there is no law and those who belong to christ jesus have crucified the flesh since jesus died we need to put the flesh to death with his passions and desires if we live by the spirit let us keep in step with the spirit let us not become conceited provoking and envying one another what he says is you know what we expect them to behave a certain way out there but we're a counter culture we're a subculture we're a kingdom culture in here they are of the world we are of the lord we don't hate them we love them but we want to live by the fruit of the spirit to give them a counter-cultural way of living an alternative lifestyle invitation when they ask why are you joyful why are you happy how come you forgive each other why do you guys get along his name is jesus and you need them too okay and so a couple of things um that god ultimately wants mindful christians not mindless christians and the problem in our world is there is far more feeling than there is reflecting and everyone is driven by their emotions and their passions and and this is the whole point of social media and little clips and just things out of context just to get you to emotionally fire and respond and that what he says is to be transformed by the renewing of your mind so you can test to see what is true and false and you can discern to see what is right and wrong so let me give you an example there's nothing wrong with being passionate but you need to be a mindful christian not a mindless christian there's a lot of mindless shallow baseless self-help not god-help man-centered not god-centered bible-light not bible-heavy teaching and as a result there's just an entire generation of mindless christianity and mindless christianity is conformed to the pattern of the world and cannot be transformed by the spirit in the word of god i'll give you an analogy some years ago i i grew up poor and i had a buddy he lived on a lake and he had more fluent family and he was like hey i've got a sailboat at my house i was like that's crazy he's like would you like to go sailing for sure that's what i want to do so i go to his house we jump in the boat and it's this little sailboat and my buddy was a master he was like an artist so the sail and the rudder he's got a hand on each and he just literally is an artist and he just takes us all around the lake the sail is filled with power and it's directed by the rudder it was amazing he's like do you want to try it's like i do i was not a good i'm lucky to be alive i'm lucky to be here is a miracle i was not i couldn't figure it out i could either do the sail or the rudder i couldn't do both at the same time so i get the sail up and i'm like we're going so fast he's like yes toward the dock okay okay oh yeah router run run run run runner then i'm scared you know what i'm scared no so now i'm no i'm not really scared like okay all right rudder rudder rudder he's like you got to put the sail up oh yeah i was either straight but no power or powerful with no direction that's most christians there's a whole generation the sale is up nobody's got their hand on the rudder we're passionate we're emotional we're excited we're protesting we're online we have causes we got things to do where are you going i don't know but it's fast okay that's a problem [Music] that's a problem and so passion is great but mindful christianity is the rudder that directs it okay one of the reasons that i'm so passionate about you learning the bible is so that you can be mindful christians this is why the sermons are long this is why we tend to go through books of the bible i want to thank you for the honor of being your pastor and teaching you the bible and what i like to do i like to give out study guides to help you learn the word of god so you can be transformed by the renewing of your mind the third edition of the roman study guide just came out you go to real faith if you go to the store it's free download it great if you want to give a gift we'll send you a copy there's daily devotions you can sign up for five days a week i will send you an email to your inbox i love helping you learn the word of god i don't know of any better way to have a transformed mind than to learn the word of god by the spirit of god that's that's just my whole conviction and so if you're new let me just tell you this this is the book that god wrote it's perfect it's the only perfect thing on earth the reason we don't edit it is because god got it right the first time and it's not old it's timeless that means it's always timely and people don't change and god doesn't change but god uses his word to change people to become like his son jesus christ and i'll just tell you a little story my background and why i'm so passionate about you being transformed by the renewing of your mind through the spirit of god in the word of god i was in college actually in high school i met grace my now wife and i wasn't a christian she gave me my first bible and i went off to college and some of you know the story i became a christian reading the bible god saved me reading the bible and so then i'm at a state university okay question state university does it exist to conform or transform it's a conforming institution meaning everything is against god and the word of god and if you don't conform your grade point average goes down you're punished there's a sacrifice so i'm reading the bible i become a christian so i go to my first pastor and i said okay pastor i had the bible in one hand and i had something called a systematic theology in the other biblical theology is where you look at the books of the bible chapter by chapter verse by verse which is what we tend to do the most here and then systematic theology is where you take the topics and you pull the scriptures out and you categorize them you drop them into topical buckets both are good no complaint toward either i've actually co-authored a systematic theology with a thousand footnotes i'm not opposed to it that being said i had a systematic theology in the bible and i asked my pastor great guy taught through books of the bible i said is this a good book and he pointed the bible he's like have you read that whole book i said no sir so he said okay then give me this book so he stole broken tape one of the ten commandments he stole my systematic theology my pastor stole my systematic theology i was like oh i said he said he said you go read your whole bible first i was like okay i didn't know okay i'm a new christian i'll do it i'm told so i uh once you've been a christian for a while you don't do what you're told but i'm a new christian so i do what i'm told and so i started reading the bible and i read it as fast as i could i was really intrigued by it the spirit of god awakened this desire in me to learn the word of god weeks or months i know how long i read it and so i went back to my pastors like i read the whole thing now i'll be honest with you i didn't read it all with equal devotion like i read the genealogies and i was like hebrew phone book i'm out i just kind of read fast like okay and then i get to the stuff like get a goat and i'm like i feel bad for the goat i don't have a goat moving right along so there's stuff i read quickly i'm not going to lie to you okay and i got to revelation i was like drug test okay i like i don't know what we're talking about here okay so um so so i go to my pastor and i'm like okay i read the whole bible i said can i have my systematy back he said no you can't i said well what do you want me to do he's like here's your assignment pick a short book of the bible study it until you know it from heart you've memorized verses and he taught me how to study a book of the bible and he said take some months and do that he said just think about it sonny said you're 19 20 whatever i was he said there's 66 books in the bible imagine if you took six months for every book of the bible he said by the time you're in your 50s you will have gone through the whole bible at the time i thought 50. that's so old and now i'm like it's not that bad so um so i picked first john i read the whole thing and i i actually loved it i was way more excited about it than my classes so i go to my profe my pastor i'm like all right buddy uh pastor buddy what uh what uh what now he said pick another book and do it again i said how long do you want me to do this where he said do you do this till you die so that's what i've been doing i pick a book of the bible and study it teach it to you pick another one okay and you know what it happened at the same time that i was in state university what was state university trying to get me to do conform to the pattern of the world but i'm being transformed by the word of god the spirit of god will use the word of god to transform the child of god that's how this works so in every class i go to my sociology class they're like we're all good and evolving and i'm like nope i go to my gender class they're like there's a spectrum boys and girls gender class was the worst 15 minutes of my life i uh i'm in my i'm in my philosophy class and they're like all ideologies are just perspective there is no truth i was like i met a guy who said he was the truth wrong so in every class the conforming pressure is there but the transforming power is greater see let me tell you this parents i didn't say this in the earlier sermons but the holy spirit brings it to mind if you want to raise mindful christians you need to raise christian children who are not naive but wise naive christians don't know the difference wise christians do when our kids were little i'll give you an analogy it just comes to mind we'd be watching shows sometimes you know nickelodeon disney all that stuff that's just garbage tastic part of the brainwashing program okay but what we would do is i would hit pause and we'd talk about it hey what about that and what i wanted them to do is to have mindful christianity for them to discern truth and error and wisdom and folly my kids knew a lot but they didn't do a lot because they knew what was right and wrong sometimes the only way to know right and wrong is to let them see what is wrong okay and so what god wants is he wants mindful christians not mindless christians that being said then we worship god with our heart the internal reflection of okay who am i how did you make me let me assess myself romans 12 3 for the grace given to me that's one of my favorite lines in the whole bible because my wife's name is grace i quoted that to her yesterday she was making me eggs she's like for the grace given me i just i just thought it was cute so for the grace given me i say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly we tend to think better of ourselves not lesser of ourselves we call this self-esteem it's also called in the bible pride the bible has nothing good to say about pride it's demonic it was satan's sin and it's the mother of all sins always pregnant with evil but to think with sober judgment some people they think like they're drunk the opposite of sober is drunk each according to the measure of faith that god has assigned him what he's talking about here is in your heart figuring out okay god who who am i okay i know who you are now you're jesus christ okay who am i and what he says is to assess yourself with sober judgment you ever met somebody that their assessment of themselves seems a little drunk you're like how are you doing i i sometimes i'll meet with married couples and let me just tell you this usually the husband's the drunk one when it comes to evaluating the relationship she says we're like how are you doing like we're doing great you look at her she's like she's tapping her gun and she's not blinking she's not blinking you're like bro i don't think that's a sober assessment she's she's actually got it loaded like i don't think you guys are doing great sometimes what happens is we're not the best person to diagnose ourselves so sometimes other people in the community of faith help us to how are you doing i've met people they're like i'm doing great no you're not i'm healthy no you're not i'm wise the wise person never says that right and so it's soberly assessing yourself who am i who did god make me to be and what he's talking about here is if you're going to serve you need to have humility and this is knowing who you are and the place that god has created for you to occupy and what kills us is what he says an over-inflated view of self let me say this some of you aspire to things that will hurt you some of you aspire to positions that will destroy you what humility allows humility allows you to be content with whatever position god has given to you the jesus christ is humble he was willing and able to serve and reign in the past and in the present as king of kings lord of lords so he was humble enough to receive glory honor and praise he was also humble enough to come into human history to live without sin to work a carpenter's job and to die on the cross for you and me to serve us what humility allows it allows number one you to welcome god to serve you some people will say that christianity is easy all you got to do is accept jesus actually it's hard because you don't participate you don't you don't add you don't earn you're a beggar you're like i got nothing and i need everything that takes humility it takes humility for you to allow jesus to serve you and to allow others to serve you how many of you you like to serve but you don't like to be served i got it i'll pay i'll pay for half let me at least contribute you're like no i got this no no no i got to do something ah that's pride and humility also allows us to serve others jesus said i didn't come to be served but to serve humility allows us to be served by god and others and to serve others on behalf of god and that ultimately is what worship is let me say this you can't be healthy unless you allow god and others to serve you and you can't be healthy unless you're serving and what he's talking about is just being content with your position see ultimately if you're on team jesus let me just say this who cares what position you play right if you're on team jesus you're like i read the book it goes well for us in the end like we're all going to dance in the end zone it's going to be awesome so who cares what position i play some people say i got to be the quarterback why why just figure out who you are and how god made you to be and be content with the things that he's assigned for you to do see what paul says elsewhere he says i've been rich and i've been poor i'm fine either way he says i've been in power and i've not had power i've had people love me and ride against me either way if that's what god has for me i'm content with that let me just say that our whole world is lacking in contentment and just saying this is who i am maybe i live in a penthouse maybe i live in an outhouse either way i'm content how many of you right now really contentment is just something you just don't have and the result is that you're offering your body as a living sacrifice to get things that god doesn't want you to get to do things that god hasn't asked you to do and to become someone that god didn't create you to become and the reason that god may be stopping you is because he loves you and he's saving you from you and so once you understand in your heart who you are then what you can do is you can worship god with your hands and just say okay who am i what's my place on the team what's my role jesus i'm here to serve what would you assign for me to do that's where he concludes worship god with your hands romans 12 4 8 for as in one body so as metaphor analogy the church we're like a body we have many members or parts fingers toes ears eyes we're all different we need each other and members do not all have the same function the reason that we're different we're better different if you go to church and you're like we got 57 preachers that's a weird church that's like a guy with 57 likes congratulations you're not going to fall over but you really need a head you know in christ and individually members of one another having gifts spiritual gifts spiritual enablements and endowments that differ according to the grace given us let us use them whatever your thing is just do your thing if prophecy and proportion to our faith of service in our serving the one who teaches in his teaching the one who exhorts or encourages in his exhortation or encouragement the one who contributes in generosity the one who leads with zeal and the one who does acts of mercy with cheerfulness so the first thing he's saying here is that as a church family we're like a body and we all need each other we're interdependent mutually necessary and if one of you is missing or not functioning we're all suffering let me say this people don't just have gifts people are gifts you don't just bring a gift you are a gift my kids they have gifts but my kids are gifts in the family of god you're the children of god you don't just have gifts you are gifts and we love you and thank you it's an honor to have you but how many of you in your physical body god will use physical experiences to illustrate spiritual truths how many of you have had something go wrong or out of culture in your body and you realize it all kind of works together i had this recently i re if you saw me recently on a few weekends i was a little i was walking a little weird it's because i i really i tweaked i hurt my back now somebody asked how did you do that i'm sleeping i don't know what happened like welcome to 50 the check engine light comes on i don't know like in a bed is so i mean everything you buy comes with a manual because the attorneys got involved like you buy a you know a hair dryer they're like don't eat it or use it in the shower you're like oh well thank you but that's i was going to eat it in the shower oh my god like you know so a mattress doesn't even come with an with an instruction manual they're like i'd have to figure it out so because with the mattress there's two things they're like well if i lay down and put it on me that's not very good let me try this way oh that's so much better so they know we're gonna figure it out it's a fairly simple mechanical process so i crawl into bed and i wake up in the morning grace is like what i was like and i rolled over i said because when i was in high school i played football and i was running the wishbone and some kid he speared me with his helmet right in the middle of my back somebody asked pastor mark were you good at football no that's why i'm working this job on sunday i wasn't that good i'm free i'm free on sunday so every once in a while i tweak it so recently i tweaked it and you know what happened all of a sudden i was like oh it affects everything and all of a sudden my back is the muscles are tightened up but now the muscles in my leg are tightened up now my neck is out of counter so i literally i recently finished a sermon on a week and i was like i literally i'm leaving this down like i'm 175 years old everybody's like are you okay no i got wounded rolling over in my bed every part works together we all need one another and what he's saying is each of you has a gift or gifts and and there's four gifts lists in the new testament romans 12 we just looked at first corinthians 12. first peter four ephesians four the lists are different some people think you put them together you get a total compiled list i don't think that this is an exhaustive list by compiling them i think they're examples i think anything that you can do any ability skill talent you have if the holy spirit uses you to serve others on behalf of jesus it is a spiritual gift it is a ministry and so what we'll do here we'll do just this little list and just some of you this will explain you but the key is figure out who you are and what god made you to do and what this is what are you passionate about what are you good at what are other people appreciate about you serve somewhere if it doesn't work try something else but it starts with prophecy this is the person who is very passionate they have strong opinions they're very divisive they lead with courage there's a strong reaction people try to stop them from proclaiming the word of god they come out of the woods they're a little untucked and they're a bit unpredictable know anybody like that okay pray for me that's the gift of prophecy hey that was fun okay how about serving how many of you you're like i don't care what do you need first of all to get you're like what do you want to do they're like what do you need that's the gift of serving i don't care this whatever this is my wife grace she just likes to serve and help she doesn't she doesn't mind whatever she'll do whatever and i and i have the gift of being served so it's incredible in our marriage the gift of teaching he talks about these are people who like to research and study summarize and then communicate and they love it when the light bulb goes off those are the gift of teaching we tend to be i've also got a gift of teaching tend to be more introvert we like dead people who write books and then we go tell living people what they said that's what we like to do and so you know we've accepted footnotes in our heart and you know we we like to read we do some of you like books so yeah we love that some with a teaching gift they're good one-on-one like counseling or mentoring some are good in a small group asking questions some are good in the class lecturing some are good in a big group that's the gift of teaching exhortation or encouragement encouragement is literally to put courage into someone grace's daddy gibb was a pastor we named this church in honor of him he passed away some years ago and he was the founder and pastor of something called the trinity church and he had the gift of encouragement and i forget i was talking to grandpa gibb gracie's dad and i said what do you think your gift is i'm brand new christian he said i have the gift of encouragement or exhortation and then i met a guy in his church he had a smaller church there really was a lot of people that he counseled broken people and so i asked this guy i said i said so tell me your story he's like well i was a drug addict for 18 years trying to get clean and sober i was like wow how'd you do that he said well every week give bought me breakfast for 18 years i was like so you were high at breakfast every week for 18 years he's like yeah and gib would talk to me and say jesus loves you there's hope for you i believe in you you're gonna get clean and sober if not this week then next i'll see you next week for 18 years and he said then one day i believed him and i've been sober ever since seeing you hear that and you say that's a lot but if that's your dad aren't you glad that somebody with a gift of encouragement hung in there okay that's those are the people who they encourage they exhort they see the future they have hope they share their faith then there's also the gift of generosity most people don't have the gift of generosity some people do meaning they love to give okay how many of you have the gift of generosity you love to give okay put your hand down because the people with the gift of receiving they're like awesome i got a pocket for you watch out okay and and here's the deal jesus said it's more blessed to give than receive and so there's something called prosperity theology that to say that you give to get a blessing here's the truth you don't give to get a blessing giving is the blessing you're just like you know what because everything i have is a gift from god and he he gave it to me to share it with you and now i'm doubly blessed because i get to receive it and share it my son gideon who's our son who's getting he's 15. he's always had the gift of giving when he was a little boy i'll tell you crazy story he uh one day i saw him rolling up a whole bunch of cash he had like 100 bucks like a big wad and he put it in his pocket he's going to christian school i was like what is that but he's like walking around money walking around where are you walking man little guy and he said no i always i always need some walking around money i was like okay all right so then we get a call from the teacher she says gideon is such a great kid she said uh she said he's always got a lot of money yeah he rolls deep that kid you know and uh she said but every day there's some kids that forgot their lunch money and gideon finds out who they are and he always buys them lunch and if they need supplies he buys them and he said he's always asking the kids what they need and he's always giving to their needs see if if you love people you don't want to use money excuse me let me say this if you love people you don't want to use people to make money you want to use money to love people it's a way that we give grace it's generosity and then he talks about leadership these are the people who call the shots and they take the shots and a leader is really motivated by deep profound love for the people and they're willing to go out front and say i will take the arrows so that we can advance the mission because these people are priceless that's leadership and that's my heart for you and you need to know that and then lastly he talks about mercy compassion empathy these are the people who sympathize they empathize they have compassion sometimes these are the people they know exactly what to say and sometimes they know there's nothing to say i'm just going to practice the ministry of presence and be here with you and for you in it because i love you and what he says is i love the last word in chapter 12 verse 8 cheerfulness what he's saying is if we're transformed rather than conformed and we worship god with our head and our heart and our hands and we spend our life serving others as god has served us joining jesus in his work of ministry he says there's cheerfulness it's the greek word for hilariousness it's the best life it's a joyful life it's a happy life that's why during this crazy season that we've lived through in the last year this has been a happy place this has been a joyful place this has been a cheerful place because we're being transformed because we're filled with the spirit because we're seeking to serve one another as jesus christ has served us and the christian life is not the easiest life but it's the most joyful life because there's only joy in life in the spirit amen and so what we're talking about is worship i'm gonna bring the band up you've been worshiping by listening now you're going to be worshipping by singing and then you're going to depart to worship by serving and let me just tell you this i know it's hard i know the world is dark i know things are difficult i know christianity is under attack i know jesus is diminished in popularity but the good news is this i've read the word of god and in the end jesus returns he conquers satan's sin death hell the wrath of god he brings a kingdom that never ends and if you are serving jesus it says to him be the glory forever and ever amen that you're on the winning team that goes forever okay now i'll close with one thing yesterday i was prepping the sermon i go outside to prepare the message and the messenger i'm praying and i'm preparing the word of god and this came up it was about a five or six foot mojave rattler came up to me and i'm literally praying i'm like okay lord i want to get your word out and i want to love your people here comes a deadly snake and i thought isn't this illustrative of the christian life we're in the word of god trying to advance the kingdom of god and a deadly enemy shows up the bible says that satan is like a snake the demons are like snakes so here's what i did i i chopped its head off and uh and then in a tribute to the lord jesus i built a fire because that's where jesus is gonna throw the snake when all is said and done and i threw the snake on the fire and prepped the sermon jesus is going to win you're going to be honest

Channel: Real Faith by Mark Driscoll

Views: 4,893

Rating: 5 out of 5

Keywords: Mark, Driscoll, ministry, thetrinitychurch, scottsdale, arizona, bible, teaching, gospel, theology, jesus, biblestudy, faith, bibleverse, hope, hug, help, love, christianity, christian

Id: _NivIawflC4

Length: 65min 49sec (3949 seconds)

Published: Sun May 16 2021