Good News to Share: With Others & With Yourself

Today, he's doing some ministry travel. And I did hear, if any of you are a couple of you have asked, I think everything's fine with him and the folks over there.

So we'll be looking forward to having him back.

next week. Please do also remember in your prayers, Pastor Brad and Rachel, on just kind of kicking off their sabbatical last couple weeks, that they would have a refreshing, encouraging time in the Lord and be back to us, I think, just after Thanksgiving, if I remember correctly.

So be praying for them. It is my privilege to preach today. I never want to take it for granted, and it's an honor and humbling privilege to stand before you. We're going to be in 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verses 16 to 21 in just a couple minutes.

So feel free to make your way there. There are there are Bibles underneath many of the seats you can grab. I don't I won't have the text on the screen exactly, so Love it if you'd look along with me there in 2 Corinthians 5. Verses 16 to 21. Very famous passage, but I'm hoping.

To come at it from a couple different angles today to see some new things and to grow in the Lord. I titled the message: Good News to Share. with others That'll be fairly obvious when we look at the text. Uh but One other angle I want to hit from it is that it's it's good news to rehearse and share. with yourself as well.

Okay. I want to start by really just pointing out the first three words in our passage today. It says, from now on. From now on. From the Apostle Paul is that From now on, with an eternal perspective, things in Christ.

are fundamentally, cosmically, eternally different. That when you come to Christ, you then look at your life, you approach eternity, you approach purpose completely different. There's a fundamental shift going on. And you'll see that as we as we look at these few verses. that has happened and is going on for the life of the believer.

When Um When I was in at Dallas Seminary many, many years ago now, The church I was working at, I was a part-time youth director. For pre-small youth group, Um The associate pastor at that church moved on to plant a church. You may have heard of it. It's called Lifeline Community. Anyway.

The leadership of that church decided to change up some things and how they staffed.

Okay. And it was good decisions. Actually, looking back on it, they made the right calls. But what that meant for me was a functional demotion. They were super kind to me.

They wanted to help me finish out seminary.

So for the next year and a half, they gave me basically this. Miscellaneous intern status. Yeah. Uh primarily with supervision over our junior high youth ministry, which consisted of a whopping two students. And one of them was the pastor's daughter.

She kind of had no choice but to go.

So. But they were kind. They let me finish out my seminary studies in that role. And uh but I gotta be honest with you, in my insecurity and in my sort of inward selfish focus, uh there were parts of that I I I balked that. And I complained.

I lamented that. struggle to a couple uh fellow students at seminary. And I know I couldn't really complain to the church, right? But I did, and I'm not arguing that complaining is a good thing, I'm just telling you what I did. Um I lamented to th to a couple of guys, but I picked the wrong guys to complain to.

They were um they were my age now, which is just called that middle age. We can stick with that, but I was 27 at the time. And Uh They weren't hearing me. I was complaining. I was like, I felt like my opportunity to participate in ministry discipleship has been taken away from me.

And they just looked at me and they're like, what are you talking about?

Sounds like the perfect opportunity. for discipleship. They weren't hearing my complaining. You see, they had grasped at that point that from now on Eternity future in Christ. Things are different.

That you don't have to be defined by the role that you take on or the title you have. You'll have many in life. And it doesn't have to define you. And they grasped that. It took me a while to get there.

I was a believer. But I wasn't quite up to speed. on the from now on mindset.

So I'm thankful. That did they They made that encouragement to me. They rebuked me, basically, and they said, Stephen, we're going to let you. Talk that way or think that way. And praise God, he was patient with me in that too.

And the church leadership was patient with me. It was some of the next year and a half was some of the sweetest ministry moments I had, even though it was with just two students. And it gave me a love. for the for youth ministry and ministry in general in the local church. That it gave me an opportunity that I didn't realize I needed in my arrogance to sit under an actual youth pastor for a couple years and just watch.

What happens if somebody who knows what they're called to do and serving students and serving in a local church? And so I'm thankful for that. I praise God for those times. that it helped me start to see That From now on, things things are different. If you don't see that mindset, we're going to see as we unpack the first two verses.

in our passage today. There's a dangerous temptation that can happen with you. Is that you can look too far eternally inside of you, not eternally, but internally, is what I mean to say, inside of yourself, and you can become unhealthily consumed with that.

So I'm excited for this passage today. You'll see if you're there already, it's a very famous passage, right? But I don't let that familiarity rob you of the opportunity to learn a little deeper from it. Um So from now on, we can We can dive into who we are in Christ. which we've talked a lot about if you're observant here the last three weeks.

But even beyond that What who you are, Christ. can help you serve others with. All right. Just a couple reminders. about Second Corinthians.

More than a couple. That's a busy slide, I know, but just we'll go through it quickly. Just to orient us to where we're at in 2 Corinthians, this is. Paul's fourth letter that we know of for sure, we have two, right? 1 and 2 Corinthians.

You see how he had a Very intensive and busy ministry with the Corinthian church. Deeply personal, you'll see all kinds of vulnerability in here if you read through the letter. His authority is being challenged. He's battling common enemies. You'll see, as you read, if you read all the Apostle Paul's letters, you'll see he's regularly.

combating legalism and false teachers or or wrongly motivated teachers. He in those are the same battles in a lot of ways he's He's engaged in with the Corinthians, an all-based and motivated out of Christ's love for him, and the love that he now has for people because of Christ's love for him. Our immediate context is is framed by hope. Hope and suffering. And he suffered a lot.

If you look at the life of Paul and what he did, there had to be something real going on here. And obviously, I believe there is, or I wouldn't be standing up here. That he suffered a lot and he was looking at death all the time, and there was a lot of hope in Christ because of that. And then it's framed on the other side by an urgency. An urgency for salvation to engage people.

not as just what you see on the surface, but an urgency for real, deep, eternal things.

So that's where we find ourselves.

Now I want to I want to approach this like at its base. If you've been here more than a couple weeks, you know. Basically, what the gospel in its pure simplistic beauty is. That we were sinners, we're in need of rescue. We're facing wrath and judgment, rightfully so, that we want and we put on ourselves.

And Christ rescued you. He offered himself on the cross, rose again in power. To offer that to you as a gift. It's beautiful. Enough for a child to understand.

But the layers of complexity underneath that that unfold in our lives are many. I'm just picking six. From this passage that I want to go over with you, okay? I want, you know, I think as we do that, we'll see there's so much. There are so many good things to share with others.

out of the gospel. Just the pure gospel itself, obviously, we need to share that. And then the layers of unfolding complexity that can bless people's lives. are many and we ought to be sharing it. And secondly, We can't forget to share that with ourselves.

And I'll talk more about that as we go.

So that's the approach, unfolding these six layers. Look with me at verse 16. Verse 16. How can we get That eternal from now. From now on, mindset, things are different.

Verse 16 says, 2 Corinthians chapter 5, from now on, therefore. We regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, We regard him thus. no longer. The first layer of good news I want you to share with others and yourselves is this.

God sees us with an eternally relational perspective. It's far deeper. At just the surface level. And Christians get the privilege and opportunity and calling to engage others in that same way. The Apostle Paul certainly knew.

What it was like to be looked at. beyond just what he had done. the persona he had built up. You read about the road to Damascus. Christ engaged him at a deep level.

beyond just what he had done. He'd made a lot of mistakes. You guys know him a little bit enough to know that he was a killer of Christians and many other arrogant things. It was about who he was and God said, no, I'm going to look beyond that. I'm going to go look deeper than that.

So you can imagine the passion that would well up in him. as he shares this with people. as he had been looked at beyond just the surface. Uh Um The word regard there in your text from now from now on, therefore, we regard. It means to relationally know by seeing.

and perceiving with a depth You don't just look. What's on the surface, on the material, what people project. You look deeper than that. And I think for us as Christians, if you're a Christian here today, how can you not? Look at people.

beyond just what you see. You have to. I have to look at the depths. I have to. I interviewed to be a pastor at this church nine years ago, exactly this weekend.

I looked it up. I looked at the old flights that I had been given to come here for the weekend to interview, and it was exactly this weekend, nine years ago. Um And when I got to Lifeline, I I came to serve as a youth pastor at that time, and I largely had no idea what I was doing. I just knew I wanted to serve the Lord. I wanted an opportunity to serve in that way.

And I had a lot of learning to do. And Lifeline has been Incredibly good to me. Like, I often will think and tell people, like, I've definitely been given much more from Lifeline. Than I've ever given out.

So but my first year was was pretty rough. If if I'm honest with you, it was You know, I You can blame the partners of 2014 it would have been that that brought me here if if uh but it was it was rough Uh and a lot of that was my own fault. A lot of that was learning the hard way, how to do some things. And learning how to lead and and by failure in a lot of ways. There was uh one student in particular though that was really, really tough for me.

And he did not like me. And he was not shy about letting me know that. He did not like me. Um And to paint the picture properly, he did some things in youth ministry that were pretty rough. It wasn't just that I struggled with Somebody not liking me, although I did struggle with that.

But it wasn't just that. He created an environment that sometimes was unsafe, that was challenging for other students. And I, as a leader, had to think, what do I do here? I'm not sure what to do. And he's really challenging me.

And I remember after months of this, I I went to Pastor Brian and I said, I think we might need to think about asking them to leave. Which is a really tough thing to do, right? We're supposed to be an invitational welcoming place. As a church, certainly as a youth ministry, you never want to do that. It's not your mindset.

But I I didn't really know what to do. And he looked at me as quick as could be and he said, It's not an option. We're not going to do that. He basically said You better figure it out. We're people who look beyond the surface.

We leave the 99 to go after the 1. From now on, basically, we regard no one according to the flesh. He said, you got to look for gospel potential. And I'm thankful he did. That student was tough, but I said, all right, boss, let's do it.

Pray for me, help me. And he did. And We move forward with this student. We never asked him to leave. And I don't know where that student is today with the Lord.

I have no idea. But he got a welcome here because That's the kind of thing Jesus asked us to do from now on, to look beyond just the surface. That's what he's done for us. I'm thankful he did that with me. And not only that, the text says, even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, you see what he looks at your depths of darkness and says, come on.

And he says, I'm going to change your eyes. In your heart, so that you can see Christ not just as a good teacher. not just as an ancient historical figure. but as someone who saves your soul. Don't you long?

Every one of us, maybe we don't talk this way, but every single one of us wants to be loved at the depths. You want that. And thankfully, in Christ, you are. Let's look at the next layer of good news to share. The second layer I see.

From verse 17. Says, let me read verse 17. Therefore, super famous verse, right? Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away, and behold, the new has come.

Praise God for that verse. What a classic, beautiful verse about the depths of a new core identity granted to you in Christ, right? The layer of good news is this. And I know this is wordy, but the Christian believer is blessed to be described as in Christ. Which me it means we are established entirely new.

in kind. on the foundation of Christ alone. as relationally his. There are a million truths from this verse I could share. It's going to pain me a little bit.

I have a real passion for identity in Christ. And I'm not actually going to spend a ton of time in our passage today hammering that. And it will pain me just a little bit, but I think there's some other important things to attack here.

So First thing I want to do is point out the word new there. You may have heard, if you've studied this verse at all or seen it from other people, you've probably heard this explained, but I think it'll be helpful for us today. The word new is it's not like new, as in like an update. Like your operating system on your phone needed to fix a couple bugs or something, and so you got an update, just changed a little bit, helped it work better. It's not the latest iPhone.

I don't know if any of you got the new one. You got titanium. Good job. That's awesome. It is more like the invention of the telephone in the first place.

Or maybe the invention and the production of the first iPhone, the first smartphones. It's new entirely in kind. It's something that Christ entirely gives to you a new nature. Um it's and it's a game changer. From an eternal perspective.

And we'll unpack that a little bit. But if you know who you are, You then know what to do. And this thing is worth multiple sermons. I I've I've got a um On my bookshelves, I've got this much space on gospel identity type things of books written. It's beautiful.

dive into that and I think you'll be blessed. And you're fortunate.

So this is worth a bunch of sermons. But you've gotten two the last two weeks. If you're thinking with me correctly, Pastor Brian finished up the story series on recreation. One of the best. Messages on gospel identity I've ever heard.

You should go check it out or check it out again. And then last week, Aaron did a great job. Pastor Aaron did a great job on the cleansing work of Christ's blood on our behalf. You don't have to actually sit. And beating up your conscience all the time.

So, beautiful things. And I don't want to repeat a bunch of the stuff of the great work they've already done. I'd encourage you to just go dig into that. But I do want to borrow from their work a little bit the last couple weeks to hit a few different angles on our passage today that I think will be helpful for us.

So let's go ahead and do that. A quote from this pretty good pastor, Dr. Brian Hurlbaugh, he says this. Get in your minds. That the identity that you have in Christ is what allows you then to do anything in this life.

anything of victory, anything that accords with the glory of God. Anything that makes a kind of kingdom impact. It comes in and through the life of Christ that is in union with you now. And this last line.

So that means. that it changes every single thing you do. Uh I think I mentioned just a few minutes ago, you're going to have multiple different roles and titles. in lowercase i identities in life, and that's okay. You can embrace those for the glory of God and serve in them.

But there's only one capital I identity that you need to have. Anytime you get that out of whack, you warp things internally. and you warp your opportunity to extend outward. You just do. You just do.

There's no way around that. I would be lying to you if I had told you otherwise.

So the first reminder I want to give us is there is no launching ground for ministry of any kind unless you know who you are as a new creation in Christ. You'll see this pattern. I encourage you to look for it, in fact. It's it's it's Um holistic throughout the Bible. But in particular, Paul is really good at it in his writings.

You've got to know who you are before you know what to do. In our passage today, what is he doing in the first couple verses? He's telling you of the goodness of who you are in Christ. And then the last verses where we'll spend more time. He's telling you.

Uh How you know what to do then? And you'll see that pattern always.

So you you can't launch into ministry. Without knowing who you are. Another pretty good pastor, Aaron Dodds, last week told us this. It's the second angle and reminder I want to give to us about this idea of new creation identity. He says.

Very well written here. He says, it's the expression of all Christians, experience of all Christians. Every single Christian at one time or another to various degrees of severity or duration. Maybe in a moment or a season. and that we have an extremely hard time believing what God Himself says He has done with our sins.

and living in that freedom. Um I love, as I told you, the concept of a gospel-based core identity. I absolutely love it. Um And I could talk a lot about it. But but I have to be honest about that, right?

One of the dark side or dangers or weakness potentially. of focusing on who you are in Christ is that You didn't warp that. Appropriate. Focus on on who you are in Christ. Inward.

and you become idolatrous. in self-focus. Or You sort of suppress the truth. You're like, yeah, that's good truth. You feel this exactly what Pastor said, and then so you won't apply the truth, which we'll talk about more of who you are in Christ.

Um That can dangerously fester. into unwittingly becoming way more selfish. than you might ever realize you've become. And so Uh be encouraged. By who you are in Christ.

But don't warp it. We'll talk more about that, so I need to move on. There's another angle about identity in Christ, new creation and status in Christ I want to hit, but it just plays perfectly out of a couple things in verses 16 and 17. Let's uh I want to, if you look with me at verse 16 and 17 again, I want to point out just a few words there. In verse 16, it says.

We regard no one. No one. 17 it says, Therefore, if anyone. Anyone?

So what Paul is is reminding the Corinthians about and encouraging us with This isn't Just good advice and encouragement. to be given out to other people. Those people out there. That person's struggling and give them that encouragement.

Now it applies to you too.

Now this is going to sound harsh, but I think it's true. It applies to you too, and in fact, when you don't apply it to yourself, You're sending. And you need to repent of a low view of the love and power of God in Christ. I know, and I'm looking at. I'm gonna look not directly at anyone hopefully right now, but uh I know some of the sweetest Godliest.

Awesome, wonderful people in this church, and in Christians I've met throughout my years as a believer. They will give out the godliest encouragement, the godliest wisdom. They'll be the first to pray for someone. They'll be the first to listen to a struggle and to give words of life.

Some of the best words of life to others you can imagine, and yet they will turn around and not. Take that in. as true for themselves. Um That's the devil's tool. I'm just telling you.

It will destroy you. Because what will happen is you'll start to think that truth's good for other people, but it's not good for me. And that is a suppression and a minimization of the beauty and the goodness of Christ, and it's wrong. It's wrong.

Now, I'm going to share a couple other things to expand on this rebuke a little bit. And I get it, I struggle with this too. I do. It's probably, if I'm being honest, it's one of the deepest struggles I have. Uh which is Part of why I feel like God's calling me to preach it.

Um It it applies to you too. not only will you kind of turn inwardly in in unhealthy ways, You'll start to become a legalistic Measurer of fruit in comparison of other people, and you won't serve the Lord in the ways in which He wants you to. See, there's layers of good news to share with others and yourself, and you'll be minimized in your ability. to share that with other people.

So it's not just be encouraged Yes, be encouraged, but you're actually limiting what God wants to do in and through you.

So I struggle with it, and I get it. By the way, if you're already struggling with this, if you're already feeling like, ah, this doesn't apply to me, God doesn't really love me deeply, as He says. Then this may feel like I'm a further beating into the ground and that is not my intention, but I think it's a healthy rebuke. In fact. I'm gonna Do it a little bit more.

Listen to Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones here. It's great. Great preacher. from a couple of generations back.

And in this quote, he's actually referencing If he goes to share the gospel with somebody with a non-believer, And he's wondering, maybe God's working in them, and they might be ready to receive and trust in Christ for the first time.

So that's the direct context of the quote, but I think it applies to us too, as believers. We create this false sense of modesty and humility. And it's dangerous. Listen to the quote. He says, I'm not good enough.

That sounds very modest. Very godly, right? But it is a lie of the devil. It is a denial of the faith. You think that you're being humble.

But you'll never be good enough. Nobody's ever been good enough. The essence of the Christian salvation is to say that He is good enough. and that I am in him. Uh If you're in Christ today, you My guess is, you're probably tempted at times to jump back into legalism and accrue enough.

good works that you deem Satisfactory to the Lord that He would accept you and love you. And that is just lies.

So we think we're being humble sometimes as believers when we maybe put ourselves down. Again, you might be that person. To go share encouragement. and new creation identity with somebody else. But inside you're struggling with things and you won't tell yourself the same exact stuff.

You think that's humble? But it's not. You're missing out on the opportunity to be loved by the community of God. And I get it, we're hard. Community Christ.

It's tough sometimes, I get it. But it's not humble to suppress The truth of God. That applies to you too. We got to preach this to ourselves over and over and over again. It's about a 10-year-old book now by J.

D. Greer. Used to be president of a Southern Baptist Convention. Great book called Gospel. I look at I I got this thing as a tattered mess.

One, because I spilled coffee on it once, but other ways 'cause I just look at it a few times a year. All the time. And I think this is the key. To New Creation Identity, as a launching ground for ministry, he says this. Maybe you're not as successful as you thought you'd be.

Maybe you feel like you let your parents, your family. or yourself down. Maybe you sense a general spirit of disapproval over your life. He says, preach the gospel to yourself. You must tell yourself that because of Jesus.

You have the absolute approval. of the only one whose opinion really matters. You must dwell on this great truth daily.

sometimes hourly.

Sometimes every minute. Um in verse seventeen. Uh by the way, he This new creation verse, right? He's You guys realize There are general truths in the entire passage we'll study today that. They're good for Christians to use and spread among everyone.

But he's also talking to the Corinthians whom many of them he would describe as believers.

So you you have to Speak to yourself that new creation life regularly. Um In April, Michelle and I, my wife and I, got the chance to be in Venice, Italy for three days. And it was awesome. It was as beautiful and romantic and enchanting as you might imagine it would be in a million different ways. But as you zoom in On it.

It's quite a labyrinth of confusion to navigate. Um Or at least it would have been.

So I'm a Usually, when a pastor is talking about cell phones, he's talking about them in a negative light, right? But I uh Uh we It wasn't a labyrinth of confusion to navigate because we were tied to our phones. Um By the second. Locked in.

So that I can navigate. You see, that shoreline on the upper right-hand side of that picture was where we would have to go. We stayed on a little island right outside of Venice, actually, a little short ferry ride. And we would have to go to that coastline every single day. We'd explore Venice a little bit, hang out.

Go to that coastline. I didn't zoom in any further, but it is a maze-like mess down there. It's beautiful in many ways and so fun. And yet, if we did not stay locked onto our phone, We wouldn't have been able to navigate very easily.

Now, there were times, right, where we would. I put the phone away and we just enjoy the restaurant or enjoy walking around and checking out the awesome experience, right? But whenever I wanted to move forward with purpose, we had certain things we wanted to see, certain things we wanted to do. Obviously we wanted to go back home and sleep at at nights. We had to get to that that coastline there.

Whenever I wanted to move forward with purpose. Man, we were locked into that. We were just like all the other tourists there. In fact, people had to be careful because they were like this. You know, crash into each other.

We did that. to be anchored in.

so we can move forward with purpose. I love Pastor JD's quote, because that's you cannot move forward with purpose in the Christian life, and I mean this. Unless you are locked in. to who you are in Christ, almost by the second. Almost by the second.

I think we too often I am certainly guilty of this My garage door last night broke down at nine, like at seven o'clock at night. And I'm like, oh my gosh, how am I going to get out of uh luckily the The service we use came out, and it was an error that they had made. But I'm like, Starting to get upset on the phone with these folks, and the Lord's like, wait a minute, wait a minute, this is a person. Look beyond the surface here. And he thankfully calmed me down and I was like, All right, well, when you can get out and they came out at 10 o'clock at night last night to fix our garage so we could get our cars out.

Um You gotta be anchored in to every second. of who you are in Christ.

so that you can move forward with purpose. And and look. and what others need and what God wants you to do. Let's look at the fourth layer. You're probably saying, like, man, that still was a lot when I gospel dinner.

You're right, it was. I couldn't help myself, but. 18 to 20, or 18 to 19. Let's read those two verses together. All this is from God.

who through Christ reconciled us to himself. and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. That is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself. Not counting. What a great couple words.

Not counting their trespasses against them and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. The fourth layer of good news to share with others and with yourself. Is that God himself is the driver of Uh all the ability to look at at depth. with people in the right perspective. He's the author and the driver of the fundamental newness in Christ that we get.

Because, as we'll see, we unpack these last few verses, that he enjoys exchanging hostility for friendship. That's what reconciliation means at a very simple level. exchanging hostility for friendship. He enjoys that. He enjoys doing it with his enemies.

And Joey's saying, I'm not going to count those things up anymore. Through the work of his son. That we also our commission to share.

So all credit goes to God. He has purpose for us in this new identity. And this is the danger, right, of a gospel identity, a focus in a warped way, is that you begin to look at it like it's an idolatrous. Self-confidence boost. And and that's not the intention of it.

You should be encouraged. If you're down today, You should be encouraged that Christ loves you with a depth you can't even imagine. I want you to be encouraged with that. But what you don't want to do is then warp that into a self idolatrous confidence boosting. kind of pep talk.

That's not not the goal of it. Mm-hmm. Romans 5.9 is clear, other places as well that We are under the wrath and judgment of God rightfully because of our sin. We choose that, we go after that. It's not like he's a mean God.

We choose sin, and we, as we face his goodness, are deserving of his righteous judgment. And so we're in danger of that. We need rescue, right? We're self-proclaimed enemies of God. And what he does is he says, I want to extend the hand of friendship to you.

I want to remove the hostility that you caused. I didn't cause it. But I'm not going to count it up. I want to remove that hostility and bring you into friendship with me. Two times in the verses we just read, in verse 18 and 19, there is the call.

You see it says gave us this ministry. and entrusted us this message. were called twice. to be responsible. Experiential sharers of this good news that we've received.

We'll talk more about that when we get to Ambassador in the next verse, but. There is nothing sweeter. The relationships that have enmity or hostility between Um In between them. being brought together. and reconciled friendship.

You know what? One of the sweetest things for me as a Christian is when when I've cause trouble. or enmity or hostility in a relationship. Isn't just the forgiveness part. I think we feel duty-bound, and we are.

as Christians do forgive. But man, what I encourage you to do if you have if you're moving forward in forgiveness with somebody is to comfort them with that. Not just the same, yeah. I transactionally forgive you. No, I won't talk to you anymore, but yeah, you're forgiven.

I don't know that that's of the Lord. But there is a sweet opportunity to invite into comfort with that forgiveness that we'll see. Verse 20 is phenomenal. We'll see that in a second. That's the heart of God.

That's the heart we get to be a part of.

So let's get right to verse 20 because he's going to expand on that same stuff. The fifth layer of good news to share with yourself. and with others. Let me read the verse. Therefore.

We are ambassadors for Christ. God making His appeal through us. We implore. You on behalf of Christ. Be reconciled to God.

Man, I love this verse. As I studied this passage, I'm real fond of verse 17, right? I love that identity stuff. I love it. But verse 20 has become a new favorite for me.

There's a lot of sweetness in there. I hope I can unpack some of it for you. But the layer of good news to share is that. The experience of friendship with Christ, it naturally produces. A needful desire.

Let me explain that phrase, needful desire in a minute. to be used by God to come alongside others in his comforting call. of invitation into friendship. As I said a minute ago, he he's not interested in A trans transactional Distant Yes, you're forgiven. That's sort of my obligation as God and what I said I would do based on my son.

That's not His heart. He wants deep friendship with you. You see the word ambassador? It it actually is the same word we get our word elder from. Meaning someone with some experience.

And in this sense, it's not The formal role of elder on like a church leadership board. It's that you have to have years of lifelong experience as a Christian. No, it's just saying, have you experienced, have you tasted of the Or the forgiveness of Jesus? You're a representative. Just be who you are.

You are a representative if you've had it even one day. You now are someone with experience to share. That's all it means. Good experience. They're naturally easy to share, aren't they?

I've preached three times since I've been to Italy. I know at least twice I've referenced it in sermons. If I've talked to you out there, I've probably annoyed you with it. Why? Because it was a fun, awesome experience.

It was easy to share and talk about. It's good. Good things are easy to share. Which begs the question if if we're not sharing any of this stuff. How good do we really see it?

That's a question we, and myself included, need to ask. But you see the word appeal? Look at verse 20 still. Look at it. God's making his appeal.

It's the same word. is often referenced of the Holy Spirit, right? This idea of a comforting. Put put his arm around your shoulder, come alongside you, Kind calling out. That's what it is.

You see the kindness of God. wanting to use his son. to bring enemies into friendship. Um Look at the phrase, we implore. We implore.

By the way, we're part of that we. If you're a Christian, you're included in the we to implore. What does it mean? To implore. It's the best way I could, as I was looking at the word.

studying it a little bit. Is is The phrase needful desire. It's like a want and a need, Mary.

Now, God, in his truest sense, theologically, right, I don't want to commit heresy up there, he doesn't need anything. He is fully self-contained and self-sufficient. And beautiful as and holy as such.

So he doesn't need like you and I need things. But he chose in the beauty of his word to write, to use this word to say, Hey, I really want you. It almost like a need. Even though theologically, of course, he doesn't need anything. But that's the heart he wants to display to you.

that we get to represent. Verses 18 to 20: It is the groundwork of life, of the kingdom of God, right now. You want to know what to do in your life as a Christian for his kingdom purposes coming out of the story series that Brian did a few weeks ago? 18 to 20. That's the groundwork life of the kingdom of God.

And I think many of us, I fear. Myself included, we may be missing out on these opportunities. Because we either suppress the truth of God about who we are, it doesn't apply to me, or nobody here likes me, or I don't fit in, or whatever lies you want to rehearse, or we just use identity in Christ as a self-confidence boost. And then we're missing. The call to be experiential sharers of what God is doing.

And I don't want us to miss that. I think. God for his word that he's not going to let us Miss that out. I don't think the last few sermons are by accident. Aaron and I didn't necessarily talk about what we were going to preach.

Brian didn't give us a passage that he wanted us to preach.

So I don't think these things are accidental. that God is calling our church. And us as individuals to say, let's build on that foundation of who we are in Christ, let's enjoy it. That's Let's rest in it. But it's not just for ourselves.

Um There are a million things I could preach about this. Absolute millions of them. Uh yeah.

Somebody asked me recently, why why do we do the fall festival? There was a ladies' tea yesterday. Why? Wh why did Kyle, bring some of our missionaries up and share. Why are we doing that?

Why would you come to church regularly? Why would you come to church events that we do? Why would you serve in youth ministry, kids ministry, worship ministry? Why would you stick with community when it's hard? It's hard.

I've hurt people here. I've been hurt. Why would you do those things? There are people, this isn't so much a why question, but more of an observation. There are dozens of people in this church right now that need to know there's a depth of friendship available to them not only in Christ but amongst each other.

People hurting here. In here Right now. And know that. The answer to all those observations and questions is the same. Christians are experiential representatives supernaturally.

Duty bound. toward invitational outreach. And not only invitational outreach, but in reach. amongst each other. talking to Christians.

He's going to tell them Well, he did, right? We're covering verse 20 right now, he says. Be reconciled. Why would he tell Christians that? Because they need to move deeper into it too.

He wasn't saying you weren't Christians. He's saying this reconciliation, this removal of hostility and movement into friendship is something you need to move into deeper every day. I Man, there's so there's just a million things I could say. I I was in charge of the Fall Festival for the first time this year. Aaron gave me a ton of great help.

And I gotta be honest with you, I was worried sick about it. for weeks. It's nerve-wracking. I'd never let anything of that size before. I plan a lot of youth events over the years, but they're not to that scale.

And I had a lot of great help. You guys, by the way, this is my chance to praise you. I did not lack for help. Thank you. But What I say is You know what my favorite part of that day was?

It had nothing to do with the festival time. It was early in the day, probably like uh One In the afternoon, I think. I was setting up some stuff out there, huh? All by myself.

So waiting on like the bounce house people to come and all that. And uh this lady walked across. The parking lot. And she's like, what are you doing? What's going on out here?

And I just got to talk to her. I got to spend about 15 minutes talking with this lady about what we're about, what's going on, what the gospel is. And those kind of moments are beautiful, and there's a million of them, right? I could share with you so many things. I could preach forever on this topic right here about why.

But you need to assume God is doing something. There aren't any ordinary days, even though we feel ordinary all the time. you should assume he's at work doing some things. But if you become so warped inwardly You won't ever look out. May we not let the lies of false identities Or inward twisting of our new identities in Christ oppresses us from pursuing.

These really joyful opportunities to represent him. You have something to share. But it could be overwhelming. You're like, what am I going to do? Become a street preacher tomorrow?

Maybe you could. I I don't know. What God wants you to do exactly and to live this kind of thing out. One uh uh the professor I had at seminary is uh on evangelism. was Dr.

D Dr. Douglas Cecil. He says this in a in a book. On evangelism. He said, One of the paradoxes of ministry is that if you focus on evangelism, it will be a burden to you.

It will be a heavy weight to your soul. You'll feel guilty and defeated.

However, if you focus on just loving people and giving yourself away in ministry and service, evangelism will take care of itself. Ask God to reassure you about who you are in Christ. Don't let my beating that up a little bit today stop you from doing that. Be reassured in the love of Jesus and the security of that. Genuinely, genuinely.

And then ask him, how can I, God, help me know, how do I turn my eyes out? both inside this building and with these people. And wherever you take me in my little micro community that you've called me to. I was uh I was supposed to preach last weekend. Aaron graciously switched with me.

I was at a uh a funeral in Texas last Saturday. My home state is Texas, and in the last three years I've been there eight times, usually really short trips. for either impending death or funeral six of the eight times. Um And I was with a friend of mine, we were going to the same funeral. Good friend of mine.

And uh We're just reflecting on On the age we are, we're middle-aged men. He's a couple years older than me, so that's good. Uh And he's like, you know, my parents have passed. He said, I was like, How's your dad doing, man? How's your dad doing?

He's like, Yeah, he's okay. He's getting up there. You know, he's struggling. And he was like Now I'm telling you this story because I I My friend is The nature of his job. Doesn't allow he's he's pretty regular in church attendance, but the nature of the kind of work he has doesn't allow him to commit to any leadership responsibilities or roles in the church at this particular time.

So, I want you to know that God, if you seek Him on this, He can get creative with you on how you can. Be a sharer of this experiential goodness that Christ has given you.

So he's. He's like, you know, my dad's not getting any older. uh any younger.

So I I started I do this like kind of on this. I have this app where I do this devotional. and I read it every day. And then I make a couple comments and I text it out. I text the link to the devotional and my couple comments to my dad.

To my two br to two of no, three of his brothers. None of the mature believers. He's like, Steven, I don't know what's gonna happen with this, if anything, but I just wanna do it. I feel like I can't time there's no time to waste on this stuff to share.

Now one of his his dad basically sends him back Smiley face emojis. One brother just completely ghosts him, doesn't send anything back. The other brother gets into it a little bit with him. And in a loving, also not kind of like a little jab kind of way, it gives them some barbs back. But the point is, he's engaging it.

Now, am I telling you to do that? No, not necessarily. I don't know. But I do know if you seek God on it and you just say, Lord, how can I be poured out? Show me what to do.

There's no time to waste. He'll give you ways to do it. And that's sort of the beauty of walking with Christ. You don't have to conform. to this particular ministry exactly.

You can seek him. and be used by him. In that way. The last layer. Last verse for our time today.

For our sake, he made him. To be sent. who knew no sin.

So that in him we might become the righteousness of God. Very critically, theologically important verse. for the Christian life. You could call it the core of the gospel almost right there.

Okay? But the the layer to share is is is this. Christ alone paid entirely. For the great exchange of our sin for his righteousness and all its subsequent kingdom blessing opportunities. I just want to share.

I want to let Pastor Brian teach us, to be honest with you.

So look at this with me, because there's a bunch. You could do with this one verse. On um That's sort of the atoning exchange of Jesus for us, right? But listen to him. Back in 2019, he preached this, and in fact, I'd encourage you to go watch it.

It's pretty cool to see the passion that comes through in it. But he says this: the full existential, speaking of verse 21 of our verse, we're finishing on, the full existential weight of him who knew no sin. himself, but was seen as having sinned. and fully bore all the existential implications of that sin for you. And God looked at him as though he had done it himself.

Now what do you get from that? You get a righteousness that you've never tasted of. You get a perfection that you could never sniff at. It's never been tainted by sin. And I love the way he finishes this up, okay?

It says, You get to wear that robe irrevocably for the rest of your mortal and immortal life. He's a pretty good preacher, huh? I I I just want to Wrap up. pretty quickly with this. I want to read to you the next verse.

From After our passage today, it says this: 2 Corinthians 6:1. Working together with him, then we appeal to you. not to receive the grace of God. In vain. Everywhere.

All around us. In here? Out, where you go? There are people hurting. They need to know Christ for the first time.

They need to know that from now on things can be different. And everywhere inside of this place The same needs are around you. I do this sometimes. What would my life be like if if Christ didn't Reach into the depths and rescue me. What would it be like?

What stupid decisions would I have done? What evil would I have engaged in? How has he protected me? How has he comforted me? Do you realize there are people all over her that don't know that?

That need that. Everywhere you look, there's more going on to the story. They need that. And they need to know that from now on things can be different for them. And we've got to live it out amongst each other.

And I know it's hard. I think this is the third time I've talked about the difficulty of community because I've seen it from so many different angles for so long now as a leader in a church. But even at the end of all that pain that sometimes exists, I wouldn't First of all, I can't change it because God says not to, right? He calls us the community. But even experientially, I wouldn't change it.

because the healing that he can work through and amongst us is also very real too. Question is this. We would do well to ask ourselves what we actually believe. If we never find ourselves examining people from a soul health perspective. Verse 2 of chapter 6 goes on to say this: Behold, now.

is the favourable time.

Now is the day of salvation. Let's pray. God, thank you for the depth of needful desire. that you have for friendship with us? That we saw on your word today?

We know you don't need anything in the truest sense. But in the richness of your word we see your genuine heartfelt commitment. to a relationship with your people. And we thank you for that. You aren't just committed to To do that because you're bound, but you actually enjoy.

engaging us. inviting us out of hostility and into friendship. Thank you for that, Ga. May the truth of our new core identity in Christ alone fuel us tremendously in hope and service to others. on your behalf.

Comfort us in your love, Jesus. and help us to experientially represent that among uh each other. and among our broader community also. Behold, now is the favourable time. Because of you, Jesus.

In your name we pray. Amen.