Man, excited for you guys. All right. All right, so hey, this is the beginning of a process with Declaration Church. Man, they're going to be going through recruiting like crazy. And in about 10 months, hopefully, we're going to send an incredible crew with them over to Bowie's Creek.
We're going to be in Romans chapter 12 today. If you have a copy of scripture, we're going to talk about brotherly love. Romans 12:9. Through 13.
Now, where we're at in terms of our series right now is we're in a series called Grow. And the series is all about how you and I can take steps of growth in our Christian life.
Now, listen, nobody is overselling what we talk about when we talk about the flywheel at Mercy Hill. Here's the growth flywheel at Mercy Hill. It'll come up on the screen. Gather, group. Give, go.
They're all actions, okay? Gather together. That means serve one, attend one, be here for preaching, group, be in a community group. All right, they happen three times a year. It's a sprint, not a marathon.
All right, give time, talent, and treasure. All right, are you being generous with what God has given you? And go. Live for a mission bigger than yourself. Be involved in what God is doing among the nations, praying for them, go on a trip.
Be concerned about what's happening outside just of your life and into other people's lives. Be on it for the mission. What we say at Mercy Hill is: hey, I'm not saying those are the only four things you ever do as a believer. But what I am saying is, those are foundational pillars to your Christian growth. Can I give you a promise that if you do these four things, you'll grow?
No, I can't. You know why? Because God gives the growth, it's in the spiritual realm. I can promise you, though, that if you just flat out decide those are four things I'm never going to do, you will not grow. Not as a Christian.
Because God is going to allow growth to happen in the way that He prescribed it, because it's His world, it's not our world, and He has decided that these are the things that are good for humans to grow and to flourish. And so, we are calling everybody through this grow card every week of the series: what step are you going to take in gathering, in grouping, in giving, and in going? This week, we're going to piggyback on last week. We're going to talk even more about groups. Guys, Romans 12, 9 is all about groups.
Here's the big idea for this weekend: discipleship happens in community. All right, that's the big idea for this weekend. Discipleship happens in community. What I want you to see is that if we grow, we grow together. That there is no such thing as a Lone Ranger Christian.
Christianity is a team sport all the way. We are tomateillo plants. What that means is, they grow individually, but if there aren't other ones around them, they will not be able to bear fruit because of cross-pollination. It can't happen. You might look a little bit right, but you won't be right.
This happens as we grow together. And here's the thing, and this is one of the mind-blowing things about being a pastor, counseling people over years, okay? And I wanna push a little bit here, but I'm telling you, I've been in this situation so many times. That people will dismiss, gather groups, give go. They'll dismiss one of these out of hand and then wonder why their life's falling apart.
They'll wonder why they're not growing as a believer, and it's hard for me, but I've been there so many times. Y'all, I've sat with people that, man, the problem they had is becoming an addiction. The marriage that was on the rocks is now in shambles. That child they refused to discipline is now going off the rails as a teenager. And what's going on is they end up in my office or one of our pastor's office.
And here's what happens. Man, this is what's going on in my life. I need some help with this area. And we start asking basic questions. Gather, groups, give, go.
Do you come? Do you serve?
Well, no.
Okay. Do you give anything away? No.
Okay. Are you living for a mission?
Well, I'm not really thinking about that. All right. Are you in a group? And I can't tell you how many times something like this has happened to me. For example, okay, life's falling apart.
You're sitting in my office. Are you in Christian relationships with others? Are you in a community group at Mercy Hill? And here's what the person might say: oh, no, no, no, I'm not wired for that. I'm not going to be in a group.
I'm an introvert or whatever.
So you're not going to do a group. Yeah, I'm not going to do a group. And here's what they might say: something like this. Yeah, you keep pushing them. Finally, this is going to come out.
Hey man, I know what the best thing is for me. To which I reply, then why did you call me? Right. I didn't call you. You called me.
You came and sat in my office. All right, so if you already knew what was the best thing, Then why are we here? What I'm trying to get you to see, real quick, right off the bat, and I know I'm shaking things a little bit, I'm trying to be in your face. I can't tell you how many times I have been with people. Who are spiritually stunted in their growth, and yet there are four simple things that we call the church to, and one or multiple of them they have just decided to totally disregard.
And it's crazy, man. It's like somebody saying, I'm going to get really in control of my finances, but refusing to do a budget. It's like somebody saying, hey man, I'm going to get built. I'm going to work out in the weight room. I'm going to get big, but I refuse to eat any protein.
It's just like, on the face of it, you just go, well, okay, man, you can just go keep doing that, whatever you wanna do. But I'm here to tell you that there are four things that are very important. your Christian walk. And one of them is community. Discipleship happens in community, and Romans 12 shows us that so clearly.
Let's dive in. Romans 12, verse 9 says this: Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil. Hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection.
outdo one another. Be competitive with one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal. Be fervent in spirit. Serve the Lord.
Rejoice in hope. Be patient in tribulation. Be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
Now, here's what I'm going to do today. Listen, I'm going to walk through this, these verses phrase by phrase, and then I'm going to do a conclusion, and that's going to be the sermon.
Okay, so we're going to be just sitting in all these phrases, every single one of them. I'm going to hit every one of them. But I got you I got I need you to understand something first, okay? Number one. This is the most concentrated teaching by Paul of ethical Christian living that he has.
I mean, you know, well over a dozen things that you're supposed to do happening in four verses, okay?
So it's do this, do this, do this, do this, do this. Be this way, do this.
Okay, got it. Christians know that. There's a lot of things we're supposed to do. We don't do it for salvation, we do it from salvation. All right, we do a lot of Christian living things, and it's not so God will accept us, it's because we are so blown away by His acceptance.
When you and I know that what we deserved was death and hell and what we got was grace and a purpose in this life and a community of believers and a spirit inside us to guide us and a heaven to look forward to, we get pretty fired up about living the Christian life. And I know we don't do it all perfectly. There's things I do I don't want to do, there's things I don't do that I want to do. But our desire becomes, I want to be this. I want to be one who loves genuinely.
I want to be one who is constant in prayer. I want to be one who has passion and fervor and zeal. All of these things, though, that we want for our Christian life. Listen, this is the point for today. If you miss this, you might as well miss the rest of it.
Okay. The point is. When you look at all of what God is calling us to do. It is a constant motion from the individual to the community. Back to the individual.
back to the community. Here's all I'm saying. When you start talking about living the Christian life, It goes from me to we, you to us. It is never just about y'all, and it is never just about me. It is always individual to community.
We to me. I, us, you, us. It's always moving in that way. And you see it in this passage. Talking about brotherly love with each other.
Now we're talking about prayer.
Now we're talking about being fervent in spirit.
Now we're talking about outdoing one another. It's always interconnected. You know what it's like? It's like sitting with family at dinner. Listen to the next conversation you have over the dinner table or breakfast table or whatever, okay?
You know what's gonna happen when everybody's talking? They're going to weave out of me and we over and over and over because that's what a family does. What do I mean? You're gonna hear phrases like this.
Well, I have a soccer game tonight. but we're going hiking this weekend. I caught a fish, but we ate good dinner. My brother is off to college, but me and the other ones are going to be going somewhere this weekend, or we're all going to school together, or whatever it is. It's always this me to we, me to we.
And what I'm going to try to show you through this passage today is that is by design in the Christian church, which is called a family more than any other metaphor in the New Testament. If it's a family, it's not just about you, it's not just about all of us. It's you and us all together. You can say it like this: Christianity is always about you and us, it's about me and we.
So let's walk through these phrases together. All right, I'm just going to walk through top to bottom, starting in Romans 12:9. Let love be genuine, abhor what is evil, and hold fast to what is good.
Well, right off the bat, what we see is love. Verse 10 is going to talk about brotherly love. It's hard to love genuinely without somebody else being in the picture, right? If I'm called to love, that makes no sense if there's nobody to love. That makes no sense if there's no outward expression of what God is doing in me to others.
It's a command for me. But it is shown through we. The modern problem in Christianity is that a self-actualizing individual community like we are in America. wants the me part without the we part. As soon as we get to the we part, we get annoyed, okay?
And we're like, man, I don't know if I need to deal with all that. It's just about me. And that's not. what God calls us to. You can't love genuinely without others being involved.
Loving genuinely means loving in a non-hypocritical way. That's what loving genuine means. Let your love be genuine, non-hypocritical. Hypocrites play the part of something, but they're not the real thing.
Okay, so a hypocrite would say, Oh, I love you, but their heart is actually divided towards you. Oh, I love you, but I'm willing to gossip about you. That's what is non-genuine, that's hypocritical. We're called to be the opposite of that. You know, I know that man right now there's just this massive If migration is going on in our country, a lot of people moving from up north or way out west, California, all this stuff, they're moving to the south.
They're moving to states like Florida. They're moving to states Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina is getting an influx of people from other places. And if that's you, we are really glad you're here, okay? We don't want you to make here like it is wherever you came from, okay? If we're just honest?
Huh, but But we're glad that you're here, okay? And I'm going to tell you something. You've moved in from out north or the west, or so I want to tell you, there's three things you need to know about southern culture. All right? The first thing is.
In April, summer has begun.
Okay, second thing is mac and cheese is a vegetable. All right, no debate. The third thing is you need to know you really need to know this one, okay? The third thing is When the sweet little old lady in the church or wherever looks at you with a smile on her face and says, bless your heart. She don't mean it.
Okay, it's actually she's saying something very much the opposite of that.
Okay, when we talk about letting your love be genuine, Christians... They don't need to have the smile, let your, you know, bless your heart type of love. They need to have a love that is backed up by what is genuine in the heart. It's non-hypocritical. And actually,.
We're going to talk about love in two verses, and they have two different words here for love. The word here is a word that means a selfless act, an unconditional love. It means a love that is poured out without worried about the reciprocity of it. It's a love that comes from me to you. That's what we are called to do as a church.
And I'm going to tell you something right now. This is not a love that you can just muster up on your own. This is a love that we respond to. Because we see God pouring out his love upon us in this way. And then we get a chance to love others in this way.
You know, Mercy Hill has this big chosen ministry here with adoption and foster care. We build families through adoption, we restore families through foster care. We just hit our 200th family from 2020. We set this goal 2025, 200th adoptive or foster family. And man, it was such a goal to celebrate.
It was a couple of our college kids that had grown up, got married, and now they ended up being, you know, City Project alumni, years and years in the church, long tenure here, and now they're the 200th family. And man, what a praise for that. But I'm going to tell you something: as an adoptive father of a special needs child. A cute picture and a sad story is a good reason to adopt a child. The problem is, you don't need a good reason, you need a great reason.
Because it's hard. Because another trip to the hospital, another trip to the specialist. Because another emotional problem that happened so many times in our church, because of trauma that happened when a kid was young. Because of all of these things. It's hard.
And the cute picture and the sad story doesn't help you at five o'clock in the morning again and again and again. I think about my wife. My wife has loved Faith Ann so selflessly in our house. She has changed that child's diaper literally over 9,000 times. in her life.
For five years, she never slept through the night. I mean, you could count on two hands how many nights of sleep Anna would get in a whole year that would go all the way through the night without getting woken up at three or four in the morning. to change a feeding tube or to do something. A cute picture and a sad story. is not going to go far enough for that.
The way that we are going to go forward in a selfless love. That is not about what I'm getting, but what I'm giving, it is not going to come from mustering it up. That comes from responding to the gospel because we see what God has done for us. You and I, in our sin, you and I in our rejection of God, man, we don't deserve his love and his acceptance into his family, but yet Jesus Christ came and died on the cross in order to give that very thing to us. How genuine is the love of God toward us?
And that is where we learn to be genuine toward others. He says, Let your love, or let love, be genuine. Then he says, This: abhor what is evil. And hold fast to what is good. Y'all, a boring evil is an intense rejection of it.
That's what it is. A boring evil is to loathe it.
Well, the Bible is telling us in community with one another. Abhor what is evil and hold fast. That means glue yourself, literally. That's what the phrase would be. Glue yourself to what is good.
Okay, abhor what is evil, glue yourself to what is good. I was convicted this week as I was walking through this passage because I thought, man, what is it that I abhor in my life? What type of evil do I loathe? And I thought about it for me. You guys know we have such a chosen ministry here at Mercy Hill.
Man, we're very involved with our local pregnancy network. Why is that? Part of the reason is because of the intense rejection. Of evil that I want our church to have when it comes to the culture of death, when it comes to abortion in this country. And I want our church to be one whose hearts are so full.
that to change man for for women to understand that there is another way For them to know that there are people that will walk with them and support them. I loathe the whole industry of it. The culture of death, how many children's lives are being taken. I don't understand how. Our nation can't realize the parallel lines moving exactly together when it comes to the increases of abortion and the increases of fatherlessness.
How can we not see that we're tearing the family apart? It has to be demonically conceived because it's just so apparent right on the face of it. I loathe it. I loathe the fact that under the guise of compassion, There are organizations like Planned Parenthood that specifically target. The poorest and blackest neighborhoods in our country to put their abortion clinics.
I promise you this: you won't find a clinic like that in Oak Ridge. They're targeting a group of people. for this particular evil. And I loathe it and I abhor it. You want to know why I was convicted?
Because I thought. Do I have that same type of reaction? when the sin is Gossip on my part. Do I have that same type of abhorrence and loathing when the sin is maybe I watched something I shouldn't have watched? Talk about somebody in a way I shouldn't have.
When I've become in love with success or money in a way that is not God-honoring, I don't know what it is for you. But here's what I thought. Man, sometimes it's real easy to get on a high horse and a boar and loathe some national evil that you see, and it is evil. But do we have that same reaction when we're talking about something in our own life? I think without community, we will never have that reaction about something in our own life.
Because we'll just keep hiding it and covering it up. until there are other people in our life to help tease it out. and to help us hold fast and glue. ourselves to what is good. He says this: Love one another with brotherly affection.
Outdo one another in showing honor. Brotherly, okay, the idea of love switches to a brotherly love. It's like the city of Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love. I don't know how they have that title, okay? If you watch one Eagles game in your life, okay, but they have it some kind of.
Brotherly love. Love like family. What happens in family, man? In family, one of us is up, we're all up. One of us is down, we're all down.
One rejoices, we rejoice. Brotherly affect, here's what I want you to know. Remember, the whole sermon is most ethically concentrated listening in Paul's writings. It moves from me to we. From you to us, over and over and over.
You know why? Because I can't practice brotherly love without having a brother. I can't practice familial love without having the church as a family. When I read this passage, one of the things that I come back to, and I say this a lot at Mercy Hill, whenever we talk about community. Very simply, if God is calling us to brotherly love in the family, you need to understand something.
You and I were not built to be alone. We weren't built that we will say things. I'm an introvert. I don't need people. I this, I that.
Here's the problem with that: you didn't create this world, you just sort of woke up in it one day. And if there is a God in heaven who has built you and is good to you, then when he says we need family to grow together and we need outlets to show brotherly affection, then we submit our quote unquote wiring. to the way that God has formed and what he has said.
Some of us right now have taken so many Strengths Finder profiles and disk analysis, and I've got my whole thing, my company's got me dialed in all the way. And I listen, I love tools, I love that kind of stuff. I love StrengthsFinder, I love all that. Here's the thing: at the end of the day, you take all that, wrap it in a bow, and submit it right to God. Yeah, this might be how I'm wired.
But I submit this to you because you are the trump card in all of these things. You are the one who has called me to live in a way that is good for me. And what he says here is: love one another. With brotherly love and affection. You were not built to be alone.
You know, on our little homestead farm kind of thing, we love to have, you know, produce some of our own food and all that. And we always keep two cows, okay? And we do, and every they go two years, and then they just leapfrog them.
So we just take one and we take the other one.
Now, we love our cows, okay? The cats at our house, they don't get names, but the cows get names. All right. Chuck Roast T-bone, okay? Brisket, okay?
These are, these are the, you know, so it's, it's like they, we love them, man. We name them and everything.
Now, A couple weeks ago, it was time for my boy T-Bone. He's had a great two years. It was time for him to take that ride. And so he went off to freezer camp, is what we call it.
Okay, and so he's at freezer camp now.
Now, here's what happens with the other cow. Because what happens is there's a gap sometimes between when I have the one cow go to freezer camp and have the other cow. Out there by yourself before I get another one.
Okay. And you know what happens with livestock like that?
Some of you guys know because you've been around it, horses, the exact same way. You take that one cow out before you put another one in and the cow that's there gets really weird. They just get weird. They get very antsy. They're bellowing the whole day.
They're running around the pasture. If you go out there and you start walking beside the fence, she'll just follow you like a dog. walking all around the fence. You know why? Because she wasn't built to be alone.
She was built to have others that are around her, and something is wrong and out of place. when she's alone. And I want to tell you this, you may be used to that weirdness. You might be used to it right now, where it's like, man, I've gotten so used to the isolation and all that kind of stuff, but you are not built to be alone. You were built instead to have a community of people around you that you can show honor to.
I mean, look at what the Bible said: showing honor. What is showing honor? Showing honor is acting in a way that reveals the value of someone else. Are you doing that? Are you showing honor to others?
It actually says outdo one another. It's like I said earlier, I mean nobody's keeping score, but I still want to win.
Okay, and so it's like, hey, we're going to outdo one another in this. It's actually calling us to be competitive. We've had to stop at our staff retreat at Mercy Hill doing like big staff retreat games because it gets so competitive. And it's really weird when you got two pastors yelling at each other about a ping pong game.
Okay. And so we're trying, we had to, but the Bible tells us here. Outdo one another. Find ways. Are you writing cards?
Are you willing to go sit with somebody when they need it at night? Man, are you texting each other? Are you doing these things? Can I just stop? For one moment, and just try to hit right between the eyes.
You want to know what this entire sermon comes down to? How seriously are we taking the relationship part of our Christian walk? Because a lot of us might be like, man, I'm reading the Bible. I come to church. How seriously are we taking the relationship side of our Christian walk?
And I'm going to give you a quick fire away. I'm not going to ask anybody to actually do this right this second. You get home tonight, you look at your phone, and you just go back seven days. Do you have text messages that you have sent or received from people in your Christian community of influence that are checking on you, that you're checking on them? Do you have people that you're saying, hey, man, I know your kid had this doctor appointment today.
I'm praying for you. Hey, what's the outcome of that? Hey man, I know you got this big sale coming up at work. I know you're stressed about it. The only way you're going to know those things is if you're in a group or community group or something like that with friends like that.
If that is absent in your life, this is one of the biggest things about Mercy Heal. Our church, I know this, we have this reputation as well because it's true. There's a little bit of an edge to us. And one of the reasons is because we refuse to be an excused people. If you're sitting there right now saying, Man, I don't have that in my last seven days, there's only two reactions that humans have.
And most of the time, what they'll do is they'll look at that and they'll say, Man, I don't have that.
Well, the church this or the church that, or the church doesn't love me, or the church XYZ. When what you should be saying is, I don't have that over the last seven days, I need to go be the friend that I'm wanting. I need to go get in the relationships and start pouring out. that I'm wanting people to pour into me. Here's what you need to understand today.
Discipleship relationships are forged. They're not found. You don't fall backwards into these type of relationships. Man, they're forged because you look at verse 10, love one another with brotherly affection. You believe that this family is worth it because Jesus paid for it with his blood, and you decide, man, I'm going to jump into that.
Now, I'm not dogmatic about this, okay? I'm not saying a Mercy Hill community group is the only way you can ever find the Christian community and relationships that I'm talking about here. You may have great friendships and circles of friends at work or different. Man, I'm not being dogmatic about it. At Mercy Hill, the way we talk about this is community groups.
Are the organized way that we try to get to the organic nature of what I'm talking about in Romans 12, 9, and 10? There are organized times that help us get to this organic relationship. And like I said earlier, they're a sprint, not a marathon, man. I hope you'll sign up today. We do it three times a year and it's a sprint.
You get in for eight to 10 weeks and then you get out and you see if it's a good group. Used to at Mercy Hill. When you got into a community group, the only way to ever get out was to quit or die. And we realize that's kind of a deterrent for people wanting to sign up. All right, so we're not we don't do that.
Hey, you jump into that group for that nine or ten weeks. And you get out of it, and then you can either sign back up with that group, or you can assign to go a different group, or you can do no group. I mean, it's all up to you. It's a volunteer organization, okay? But you jump in, man, our community group leaders, they want you in a group more than they want you in a group more than they want you in their group.
Okay, they want you to grow like this. Amen. I'm just calling out to you today: take this grow card and take a step of community in the church. We're going to need it if we're going to do these things. Look at this.
Let me just go through these really quick, it's a lot. Do not be slothful in zeal. Be fervent in spirit. Serve the Lord. Alright, so I would put it like this just so we can remember it.
Faith. Fervent. Faithful. I'm sorry, fast, fervent, faithful. Fast, fervent, faithful.
Okay? Don't be slothful. Fast. Be fervent in spirit. Fervent.
Serve the Lord. Be faithful. Verse 11. Rejoice in hope. Be patient in tribulation.
Be constant in prayer. So I'd put it like this. Praise, patience, and prayer. Fast Fervent, faithful, Praise patience prayer. Fasting, let me just say something about each one of them.
Fast and fervent. Man, Christians should be woe guys. You say, what does that mean? That's what it takes for my little kids playing football. Be a woe guy.
Man, don't make somebody push you or tell you you gotta go faster. You wanna be the type of person that they gotta say, hey, you need a whoa. That's what being a woe guy means. One preacher said it like this: I thought it was pretty good. You've never read a biography of somebody who was lazy.
And that's what the Bible is calling us to. Be fast. Be fervent. Man, let's be woe guys, all right? Be faithful in service.
One of the ways I think about faithful in services keeps showing up. You may not realize this at our campuses right here at The Ridge. But guys, week in and week out, you walk in the midst of spiritual giants. They're spiritual heroes to me. And you know who they are?
They were the people that came here and planted this church. I'm not talking about me. I came here for a job.
Okay, there's not a lot of honor in that. There were 30 or 40 people right from the beginning that moved their lives. They got new jobs. They sold houses and moved into apartments. We had college students who graduated from NC State with one major and moved here, couldn't find a job, and decided to paint houses or do landscaping just so they could be part of what God was doing here.
And these are giants that walk among you, but you would never know it. You know why? They're just faithful in service, man. They're 13 years later, and they're still serving kids. They're 13 years later and they're still given.
They're 13 years later and they're still given in groups. What's cool is many of them were in college when they moved here.
Now it's 13 years later. And this very weekend, some of them are having children that are baptized for the first time right here at Mercy Hill. It's cool to see. I think about the Ridge. The campus I'm at right now is called the Ridge Campus.
That is an ode to a history, to a context. When we moved here 13 years ago, there was a church on Pleasant Ridge Road that had had their heyday. They were in decline. They wanted to sow and leverage it all for the kingdom. And there were a few people, and a church gave resources and helped us kind of get going before we even launched.
And they are spiritual heroes, they're giants. You know why? Those people are still here, still servant. I mean, most of the kids have been baptized at this church at some point. had some fingerprint on them from a woman named Linda Dozier that none of you guys know.
Spiritual giants. They're walking among us. You know why? Faithful. Faithful in service.
They keep showing up. Rejoice in hope. What does that mean? I need people around me to remind me that this is not the biggest day on the calendar.
Okay, Martin Luther said it like this. There's two days on my calendar. This day? And that day. That day, way out there, the day, the day of the Lord, the day when all of this kind of consummates together and everything sort of comes and the kingdom is ushered in, that day, we need community to point us to that day.
You know, it says be patient. Patience is hard in a microwave culture. It says be patient in tribulation. I bet some of us can't even be patient in traffic. It's calling us to be patient in tribulation.
Okay, and real heart okay, that hey, that you don't microwave that. Faithful servers over a long time be constant in prayer. Man, not just night and morning, but having a spirit of prayer throughout our days. And then finally, it says this in verse 13. Then I'm going to close.
contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. Remember what I said? It's about me and we. Me and we. Are you considering the needs of the saints that are around you?
It's a call for you to be considered of the community. Of faith that you're in. And then also it says show hospitality. Needs of the saints, hospitality. I think you can say it like this: show honor to the insider and to the outsider.
I know that when we think about hospitality, I know I do. What I think about is what happens in our home. Or where we have our groups come in, our friends come in, and are we a hospitable people? And that's true, okay? But in the Bible, hospitality talks more about being that way towards the outsider, people you don't even know.
Are you hospitable to them? It's not just about what's in the church, it's about what God is doing outside the church as well. This is our call and our mission. All right, let me conclude this way. Big application for this weekend.
I'm going to call you guys across all of our campuses to commit to community. Commit to community.
Some of us right now are stuck in our spiritual growth. You would describe it as being stagnant. And my question for you is. Man, there's four things that we're called to in this growth series. We get them right out of Acts 2:46, and 47.
Gather, group, give, and go. What is your What is your group situation? Are you Are you living life with other people? You know what's a crazy thing? We're going to get to see baptism today.
I'll never forget Pastor Jeremy Dager, who many of you guys won't know. He planted a church in Halifax, Nova Scotia, one of our church plants of the seven that I mentioned. Y'all, this place would not be what it is today without the ministry of Pastor Jeremy. Jeremy moved with us. He was one of that initial 30, him and his family.
He was one of our first elder he was actually the first elder ever commissioned at Mercy Hill But baptism was his Achilles heel as a pastor, okay? And, you know, the first time he stood up to baptize somebody, he was white as a ghost. He was nervous. And he said, I baptize you, my brother. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Father.
and the holy temple. It's like, man. That? I don't know if we're supposed to re-baptize that person now or what. What the deal?
The next time he grabbed them, he grabbed somebody, and instead of saying, I baptize you, my brother, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He got jumbled up and he said, By the power vested in me, I now pronounce you. Wait a minute, that's not the right thing.
Okay. I love Jeremy. I have to give him a shout out on our 13th birthday. I don't know if I mentioned that. Y'all, this weekend is the 13th birthday of Mercy Hill.
Did I say that in this service? I don't think I did. Yeah. Awesome. Praise God.
Hey, you preach a bunch of servers, you forget what you said where. Um, it's great. Our church is not a kid anymore.
Now we're a teenager, all right? Um You know, these baptisms are so incredible, and here's why. Because they're being baptized into a community.
Now, I think theologically they're being baptized into a global church. They're being baptized into the church at large. I mean, all over the world, but certainly that is connected to the local assembly. And they're being baptized into a community, okay? And this is what's so great.
They're outing themselves, they're saying, I want to be part of this community. that grows together. We will not grow. If we don't grow together. And let us do that with each other.
Let us do it. I know some of you are like, man, where do I get the power? To do this, some of you are dealing with. Man, I'm wired as an introvert, I have social anxiety, I don't love people, you know, people and all that kind of stuff. And some of us are there today.
Some of us feel like we've had church hurt in our background. And we're very worried about it. You know, we just don't know exactly what we're going to find, and we've been hurt in the past, and all of that. Where do I find the power to lay some of those things down and trust Jesus with them?
Well, I would say this. The power to commit to community flows from the gospel alone. Because when you begin to realize what Jesus did to bring you into his kingdom, you start realizing exactly what you can lay down to be a member of that family that he purchased. Remember, Jesus didn't die just to save you. He died to save a people of which you are privileged to be a part, you and I both.
Okay, so if I know, wait a minute. Jesus let his blood flow in order to bring me into the family. I needed to admit my sin, believe in what he has done, and confess him as the Lord of my life. In my sin, I deserve death and hell. No community.
But Jesus in his genuine love stood in for me. Then, what do I have that I can't lay down? You're an introvert?
Okay, I get it. You're wired like that? Ben, you might be one of these people that's a little bit like, Linus off of Snoopy, you're like, man, I love mankind. It's just the people that I can't stand. You know, that's kind of who you are.
You hate Lynn. What did Jesus lay down for you? Are you willing to lay down that preference and that wiring for somebody else?
Some of us have dealt with church hurt.
Now, I want to be very clear. Clear with this, okay? Because I've seen this so many times. Guys, there's real church hurt, and then, then... There's other people who claim church hurt because somebody in the church was honest with you.
Those are not those are not the same thing.
Some people, the church's pastors, or people in their group are honest with them. They get hurt and run away. rather than stick and heal and become better. Right? I'm not talking about that.
That's something different. But maybe some of us actually were hurt by the church, meaning a pastor was abusive.
Something horrific. Maybe people gossiped about you. I don't know what it is. I mean, y'all. We get it.
It's a flawed institution. I mean, it's made up of people. There's going to be sin. Here's the thing. Can you trust?
that you don't have to carry that. Because here's the reality: every sin. in this world is either going to be dealt with in one of two ways. One, it was dealt with by Jesus on the cross if people are willing to repent of it and trust him. Or, They will deal with it in eternity in hell.
But either way, you don't have to hold it. Can you release that today? What do you need to do? to be able to come into the Christian community. Let's pray.
Father, we thank you for this time.
Well, we're grateful. Lord, I pray that our church would hang together. God, allow us to commit. To community and relationships, and find those relationships to be the blessing. that you tell us that they are.
Lord, I pray for that one right now. who doesn't have friends. Who's new in their faith? Lord, I pray that rather than being cynical about the church, God, that they would commit. To serve and to be in a group and to put themselves into an opportunity to be in a relationship.
And God, I pray you would form that in their life to the parent. Right now, God, who is so concerned with the child that doesn't have friends, Lord, I pray. that you would break that child's heart and allow them to start pouring out. students or college In order that they would be able to form and forge those Christian friendships. God, let us value them greatly.
In Christ's name, amen.
