Kerwin Baptist Church Daily Broadcast

Welcome to the Kerwin Baptist Church broadcast today. Our question is, I believe that getting to serve God is a privilege. And I might have sounded a bit, I told my wife, I got in the car, I said, isn't it amazing, I always planned this really nice message.

I planned this nice, friendly, everybody smiling, leaving happy. And I said, something happens when I get in that pulpit, I don't know what it is, and I get passionate about something and that might come across like I'm trying to be hard. I said, it's just so important to me. But I don't know about you, but I believe that you and I, it should be a privilege for us to be at a church, especially to be at this church, to get to serve God with our lives. That's the ministry that we have been given. Notice if you will, chapter four, verse one, therefore seeing we have this ministry. Today I want to deal with this particular portion of scripture, not the ministry we've been given, but secondly, the message that we have been given. You see, this ministry is something that you and I ought to be privileged to partake in, but as we partake in the ministry that God has called us to do and opened up doors for us to serve Him, whatever area of our lives, whatever vocation you're in, as we serve and minister, you and I have to keep in mind that there is a particular message that God has asked us to give. It's not a good message or one of many good messages. It is the particular message that God has said, I want you to spread.

God doesn't want just anything coming out of our mouths. If you and I are representing Him, and if we're going to say it's not us, it's Christ. Well, if we're representing Christ, then we got to make sure that the message is based solely on Christ. And I want you to know, if you will, in verse five, notice this, number one this morning, I want you to see the subject of the message. By the way, nothing will go right or do right or be right if we don't get the subject right. Notice this, for we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus, the Lord. It's interesting, it's kind of a negative and a positive.

In English language, there's some fancy terms we give for that. I'm not going to impress you with that today. But you'll notice that we're told immediately this is what is not to be the subject of your message. And this is what is to be the subject of your message. This is not what you're supposed to preach. This is what you're supposed to preach. This is what is not to be the priority.

This is what is to be the priority. For we preach not ourselves, but Christ Jesus, our Lord. This word preach in this verse means to herald or to proclaim. So it doesn't mean you got to be behind a pulpit and you got to be the pastor of the church to pay attention to what is said here.

It's all of us. It is as we go out and we minister as the first verses told us, as we have ministry we are to proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ. He is to be the subject.

Now listen to me, I want you to get this this morning. I believe often times he is simply a part of the message. But he is to be the priority of the message.

Are y'all with me this morning? Often times he's just part of what we share. He is supposed to be the entirety of what we share. Often times we mention Christ a little bit and then we talk about our education and what we think and how we feel and how we perceive things to be and what we think about a subject. And what we're told here is that as we minister the message is to have one subject and that one subject is to be Christ Jesus our Lord. That's to be the subject. Let me remind you that at this church our goal and I'm sure you could scrutinize everything on any ministry and nothing is going to be always like it ought to be but everything that takes place here in youth ministry, bus ministry, awanas, upwards, all those things the subject of that should be Christ. That should be the priority. And you say well let me ask you this, we have community days preacher, how does Christ get the priority of that?

I'll easily tell you. Every person that comes gets the gospel. Second every person that comes, some of them this is the first time they've been on a church property in years. Third you would be surprised how many people when they have a tragedy or a trial in their life that they'll contact that church that reached out to them. Also I can't tell you how many people were around our church people that got to talk about the things of God. We have people sitting right here in this building that have joined our church because of our community day. You see everything that we do here has a motive and it's to somehow give people an opportunity to come to or hear about Christ. We are not a social network here. This is not a social club and you know I don't agree with the church becoming where everybody wants to hang out and this is you know and I think you ought to hang out at church don't get me wrong but I think the reason we come to church should be centered on Christ not the entertainment of man.

There's a difference there. So he's to be the subject. Number two I want you to see the servant of the message. Look at verse five. For we preach not ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants. May I tell you this that and if you can hear me out the subject of the message is only as effective as the servant represents it.

Look at me. If Jesus is going to be the subject and we're going to represent him look at me if we're not servants to people then they're not going to think a whole bunch about our subject. If we don't represent Christ well then they're not going to care about the Christ we tell them about. We can get up here and preach all day long about Christ but when you go into the community if we're not servants to people. If we don't portray ourselves as servants and by the way that's what we're to be. We're to be servants. We're to serve Christ first and foremost and when you serve Christ you'll find yourself serving others because that's what Christ did. He was our example. He said likewise do ye and he is who we are to follow and Jesus as we mentioned last week sacrificially gave himself a sacrifice to us.

He sacrificed to us. We are to sacrifice to others. Look at me dear friends if we are the servants we should be then they'll be begging to hear more about the subject that we discuss. They'll see there's something different in them. They're not centered on their self. They're centered on others. The servant of the message.

Ourselves. Your servants. You say well preacher what do I get out of that?

Well that brings me to the third thing. I want you to see the stimulant of the message. What is it that stimulates us to minister and to give this message? What is it that motivates us to serve?

Notice if you will verse 5. For we preach not ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants for Jesus sake. We do it for Jesus.

Not for anybody else. You know what motivates us to give the message out and to minister to others? You say well they'll just run all over us and they'll just step all over us. They don't appreciate one thing we do. We didn't do it so they would appreciate it. We did it because of what Jesus has done for us. Let me tell you something I don't care if we have a big community today, give away stuff, I don't care and people don't ever thank us one bit, complain about the whole thing.

We didn't do it for them. We did it for Christ. And look at me I believe you and I ought to love people but I want you to listen to me closely. Even if we didn't love people Christ loves those people. And if we're serving Christ we're going to reach them even if not that we love them it's because Christ loves them. It's all about Him. It's not ourselves but Christ.

The stimulant of the message. You see I think you and I have to realize that this whole thing that we do this Christian life this is of Him, through Him and for Him. It is for Jesus sake. By the way when you and I determine and have gotten this whole issue settled that we are doing this for Christ that will stimulate you to serve. I'm doing it for Jesus.

I'm doing it for His sake. I want you to notice number four I want you to see the sovereign of the message. Now this is where I thought it really got interesting. You'll notice in verse five we preach not ourselves but Christ Jesus the Lord that's the subject and ourselves your servants that's the servant of the message for Jesus sake. That's the stimulant of the message. Alright but look at verse six. Now we bring God into the mix. For God who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And let me tell you something really interesting if you enjoy studying the scripture. You'll find all through the Bible that somehow someway just about everywhere you find God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. In verse five we find about Christ. In verse six we find about God and you'll find in verse seven in just a minute we find the Holy Spirit being mentioned.

I don't care where you look and how you look when you find one you find the other. Thank God we serve God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit. God the Father made us. God the Son died for us and literally paved redemption. He saved us and God the Holy Spirit indwells us. They all have a ministry.

They're all the same person and everything we do we do for them because we love them. I want to challenge you here at this ministry. You're going to get real discouraged. Real discouraged. If there's any part of what you do you're doing it for people.

And I know what I'm talking about. You'll find yourself so discouraged that you just don't know what to do. You don't want to talk to anybody, see anybody. You don't even hardly want to go to church.

You don't want to open up your Bible and read. And somehow in those moments you've got to get settled in your heart that I am doing this for Jesus. Because he loved me I love him.

And I'm doing it for him. I want you to notice the sovereign of the message in verse six. First we see God the Creator. For God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness.

That means this. There was nothing and the Bible says in the beginning God created. He made light to shine out of the darkness. He put the firmament. He hung the planets.

He hung the stars. He made our solar system. He made the entire universe. He created the water and the mountains and the flowers and everything that we see. He is the Creator. And we need not forget that. I want you to notice his sovereignty. Not only is he the Creator but second God is the initiator. Notice this.

For God who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness hath shined in our hearts. That means this. Look at me. I want you to get this. For anything ever to happen somebody has to start it. Somebody has to initiate it. Now I've got a wonderful wife and I'm thankful that God brought her into my life and all these things but somebody had to start that.

Somebody had to initiate it. And there was a young man that went to our Christian school and we had our Christian school here that went to my wife's church and he knew her and he knew me. He went on mission trips with us and just he kept telling me, hey there's this girl at our church you need to meet. She's a good Christian girl. You need to ask her out. You need to meet her.

And I was like yeah, yeah, yeah. Been there done that. Bought the t-shirt. Threw away the t-shirt.

It doesn't work out. Lord I've told you about this lady at our church. She doesn't go here now that set me up with a girl one time and I didn't just go with her so she had a friend that was coming and they were going to pick me up and we were going to go to some church function or whatever and I was at that church house and this girl got out of the car to come up and I'm going to tell you something.

I've never seen a skirt so short in my entire life. Here I am at the church house coming to pick up the youth pastor. Everybody driving by. And I thought dear Lord. So I got in that car real quick. No I didn't. I got out and told her I said I have a church function I'll just meet you there.

And so I met them there and it was bad. I said I'm not getting set up again ever again. So you being judgmental. No I'm not being judgmental but when you're the youth pastor I think you've got a testimony to uphold. You do.

And I thought no he said well you need to, you need to, you need to. So here we have this scenario. Here's maybe a good girl, maybe not a good girl. Here I am trying to serve God.

But for us to ever get married and for God's will to have ever been done somebody had to initiate it. And so guess what I did? I called her on the phone.

I started the ball running. And when I called it was about 8 o'clock at night and her sister who is here in our church also answered and said well she's in bed. Who goes to bed at 8 o'clock at night?

That is not the kind of girl I want to marry. She probably wanted to read a book for an hour and then went to bed at 8 or something. Man I'm wanting to have some fun.

You know reading the Bible and praying is what I'm talking about. Man how boring. 8 o'clock at night. What in the world? My wife found out the next day.

There's a lot of reasons for that by the way. She found out the next day. She goes you didn't wake me up? And so it's about a week or two later and I called.

And we talked a little bit. What? You weren't asleep? She wasn't in bed. What? She wasn't in bed.

You were in your bed? Yes. Alright. We have a very unique relationship in our family. Anybody else want to talk about the situation today?

Anybody else got something they want to put into the? Bless God I'm telling the story. It'll be the way I say it was.

Anyhow I'll let them fight about it later. All I know is that she didn't get to come to the phone. And I called back two weeks later and I talked to my wife and bless her heart she's as sweet as can be but she just was not a conversationalist. And I'm going to tell you something.

I could not tell you how far and how much my wife has come out of herself to try to be friendly to people. And I'm telling you my wife was shy and I got on the phone and it was like one word answers you know I was trying to think of things to say. So then when I called her back the second time I literally all joke I made a list of things to talk about. Why? Why am I embarrassing my entire family for this?

Why? Because I'm letting you know that I had to initiate. And when you initiate then somebody has to respond.

That's the way life is. And I want you to know that when God created you and me he initiated. And when God loved us so much that he sent his only son he initiated. And I want you to understand that not only did God create but he initiated. He's the one that gave you the chance.

He's the one that's contacted you. And it is up to us to respond and if we don't respond don't blame him for it. Everyone wants to say how could a loving God how could he send people to hell? Let me ask you something how could a sane person not respond to a loving God that bought redemption for them?

It's not his fault it's our fault. God creator. God the initiator. But I want you to notice this God the illuminator.

This is great. For God who commanded the light to shine out of the darkness hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. God the illuminator. That means this that somehow God created and then God initiated but you and I because of our sin we just are not able to understand. So God has to illuminate us. God has to give us the ability to understand his word.

That is why it is our job to get the gospel to people. Guess what the Holy Spirit of God does? He begins to draw folks to God.

That is the illumination. He begins to shine the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. Doesn't make sense to unsaved man. But when unsaved man hears the gospel God begins to draw them to himself. God the illuminator. By the way you are only if you're here this morning and you're saved you're only here saved because God loved you enough to draw you.

And thank God you responded. If you're here this morning maybe you've never been saved you don't know a lot about a church maybe you've been in church your whole life and when you hear a preacher preach and they preach about salvation different things there's just something you get uncomfortable. That is the Holy Spirit drawing you, illuminating you, letting you know about the knowledge of the glory of God. I want you to notice fifthly this morning I want you to see the savior of the message. Notice if you would at the end of verse six in the face of Jesus Christ.

So listen you've got to get this. God created, God initiated, God illuminated and you see that all in the face of Jesus Christ. You say preacher what do you mean? That means this we know that Jesus left heaven, came to earth, died on the cross for our sins. That means this that everything about Jesus while he was here on earth pointed to God the father. That means this that everything about Jesus gave glory to God the father. That means everything about Jesus brought glory to God the father. Everything about the knowledge of the glory of God is seen in the face of Jesus Christ. Everywhere Christ went, now you've got to get this use your brains. Everywhere Christ went he glorified the father.

You believe that? So now you and I have this ministry and we are to spread the message. That means this everything about God the father was seen in God the son. Everything in us people should see God the son.

You don't get it I can tell you don't get it. Look while Jesus was on earth everything pointed to God the father. With you and I on earth everything we do should point to Jesus. Everything Jesus did point to the father. Now we're in Christ so everything we do ought to point to Jesus and when it points to Jesus, Jesus points to the father. It all ends up at the father. It all glorifies God. That's our job. That's why if we don't give the right message and we don't have the right subject it will never give glory to God.

I better move on I don't think you're getting it. Number six. I want you to see lastly the spirit of the message. We see the sovereign of the message in verse six. The savior of the message in verse six at the end and I want you to see the spirit of the message representing the Holy Spirit of God. Look at verse seven.

I love this. But we have this treasure in earthen vessel. What are we talking about here? We're talking about something that literally resides inside of our soul. You and I are the earthen vessels.

You got that? We're vessels. We're here on earth. We're the earthen vessels. And we have this treasure in earthen vessels. Number one under this I want you to see the vessel of the spirit. Earthen vessel. We have this treasure in earthen vessel.

That means this. That literally Christ lives in us. We are the vessel that houses the Holy Spirit of God.

Wow. How could we not minister for God when God lives inside? Verse number two I want you to see the value of the spirit. The vessel he says is in earthen vessel but notice what he says. For we have this what?

Treasure in earthen vessel. It's not just something or someone. It's valuable. I've said it before.

I'll say it again and I'll say it next week and the week after that whatever. You and I have no idea the untapped resource that the Holy Spirit is inside of our lives. It is a treasure. What is a treasure? It's resourceful. It's valuable. If you find a treasure you don't ever have to worry about anything again. It takes care of all your needs.

Doesn't that sound familiar? But my God shall supply all your needs according to his riches in Christ Jesus. Isn't it amazing how God's word all interconnects? We have a treasure living inside of us. That means this that he's been so good to us that as we minister and give the message he meets every need that we have. I want you to notice thirdly the victory of the spirit. Notice this but we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power. The excellency of the power. That means this with the Holy Spirit living this is the victory of the spirit. He not only gives us power but he gives us excellent power.

I was reading an article and I thought this was interesting. The excellency of the power. This lady was going to church and I believe it was in Iowa as the story relates she was going to this church in Iowa and she came up to the pastor and she said pastor I want you to pray that God will somehow provide me a job. And the pastor said well you've gotten fired.

She says well no I really haven't gotten fired but he said you've been working there almost 30 years. She said yeah and she worked at an umbrella factory and she said that what happened is because their power grid system she says that we have plenty of business and we can't fill all the orders. She said but we have so many machines that make these umbrellas that there's not enough power. We don't have enough power source. And she said machines will cut off different times and so until they're able to get more power they don't have enough power to run all the machines. And she literally said this we have more machines than power. Can I tell you something about us? We've got more power than machines.

We got all the power in the world but nobody willing to work. The excellency of the power. The power of the Holy Spirit never runs out. It never stops. It never sleeps.

It never quits. It's never seen a problem too big. It's never seen a mountain too high. It's never seen a valley it couldn't cross. The power that the Holy Spirit is inside of our lives it's a treasure and it's excellent power.

It never runs out. I want you to notice this lastly. I want you to see the victor of the Spirit. He's promised us victory but notice this at the end and this is very, very important.

Get this before we're done. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. There's our theme again. Not ourselves but Christ. What I'm saying by this is every victory that you and I ever get God is the victor not us. God's the one that brought that. Not us. It is of God.

Not us. There's a man named Dr. Herbert Jackson and he was teaching a seminary missions class and he was telling this testimony and I copied and pasted this out. I thought this was interesting about Dr. Jackson.

I've read a couple other articles by him and I thought this was interesting as we've been trying to build our missions thing. I've been looking up different things and missions and Dr. Herbert Jackson he talked about as a new missionary he was assigned a car as he was on the field. He was going to be there two years serving and he was given a car by the mission board but the car did not run without a push.

And so being a man that was willing to work whatever after pondering this problem he kind of came up with a plan. He would go to a school near his home and he got permission to park his car there in the evenings. And he would get the kids from that school to come out in the mornings and push his car to get it started. The rest of the day as he made his rounds he would either park on a hill or leave the engine running.

And he used this procedure for almost two years. He said ill health forced me to leave and a new young missionary came to the station and when Dr. Jackson began to explain his arrangement of getting the car started and how he did it throughout the day this new young missionary began to look at him a little bit puzzled and he said, let me take a look. And he picked up the hood of the car and before Dr. Jackson could finish telling how he kind of makes his rounds to leave the car started so that he wouldn't have to push it a different direction the new missionary interrupted he said, why Dr. Jackson I believe the only trouble is this loose cable on your battery. He gave the cable a twist, stepped into the car, pushed the switch and to Dr. Jackson's astonishment the engine roared to life. For two years needless trouble had become routine. This is what he said, the power was there all the time only a loose connection kept me from getting that power.

Dear friend I'm here to tell you the power has been there and is there and will be there all the time. What you and I often have a problem with is a loose connection. As I close today I thought it was interesting that many of you might have watched the Rose Bowl Parade and we always do. You know I find it's really not that interesting it's just something you have to watch for a little bit it's tradition. And you kind of look and it's like a movie you saw when you were eight you thought was wonderful and you see it when you're 30 and you're like man that's dumb. You watch the parade and the floats go by and it's like man this is about as boring as watching racing this is ridiculous.

Anyway I'm picking with you I'm picking with you. Thank you for listening today. We hope you received a blessing from our broadcast. The Kirtland Baptist Church is located at 4520 Old Hollow Road in Kernersville, North Carolina. You may also contact us by phone at 336-993-5192 or via the web at kirtlandbaptistchurch.com. Enjoy our services live and all our media on our website and church app. Thank you for listening to the Kerwin broadcast today. God bless you.