Are You Part of God's Family?

Whew! Y'all can be seated if you are not already. If you are capable of that, if you are excited, we are okay with that.

Alright, Charismatics with a seat belt, you can go run around. We're gonna have us a good time. Man, what an awesome last few weeks it has been. And I just can't help but think, as one of your pastors, I can't help but think about how we have really been emphasizing prayer over really the last few months here at the Summit Church. And simultaneously, as we've been elevating prayer, God has been elevating some miracles in our midst.

And I don't know about you, but I just don't believe that's a coincidence. And so I still believe in the power of prayer. Just for me personally, I think y'all got to see it at this service, but just a few weeks ago, as a father of four, I was able to baptize my oldest daughter right over there. And so one of the greatest things we could ever imagine. One down, three to go for my wife and I. And then a little over a month ago, she's actually here.

I'm not gonna embarrass her. But one of our dear friends and neighbors who has been coming since Easter, who we have been praying for, surrendered her life to Christ about a month ago. And so we are celebrating. We just really do believe that prayer changes things. And so I just can't help but throw it out there. It might be a little cheesy, but is God good? Is he good?

Yeah, all the time and all the time. God is good. Amen and amen. Hey, if you have your Bible, go ahead and pull it out.

We're gonna be in Mark chapter three is where we're gonna be. It's the New Testament, Matthew, Mark chapter three. This weekend, we're actually gonna step away from our first Corinthians series, but we are going to remain on the subject of the church, specifically when it comes to the church as the family of God. One of the things I've been reminded of over really the last 18 months since COVID began is the reality that we don't go to church, but that we are the church.

My kids, I love how they say it. They don't ever say, are we going to church? They say, are we going to worship? And I never want to correct them on that because we are the church and we go to worship alongside our church family, right? And see the church family, it's just supposed to be this collective body of believers under the sole banner of the name Jesus Christ. A people who, as we often say around here at the Summit Church, are gospel above all people, which sounds great, right?

Like maybe this is your first time here and if it is, I'm so glad you're here and you've been hearing these awesome things or somebody invited you to come to this awesome church and already you've seen maybe a little cracks or crevices or duct tape holding together some of this stuff. And Pastor JD and Pastor Brian have reminded us of this over the last two weeks as we've looked at the church at Corinth, that the family of God sometimes can look pretty dysfunctional, can it? Is the church dysfunctional? Yes and some of y'all said that way too quickly and way too loudly, yes and amen. But John Moeller, is the church still God's family?

Praise God, yes and amen. You know, I can't help but think that when someone says the word church that we all have maybe different preconceived notions of what that word means. When someone says it, maybe it brings up something good or maybe it even brings up something bad in your life. And you know, I'm curious, have you ever had maybe like a thought or thought you knew something but it turns out that you really didn't? Or maybe like a word or a phrase that you've used your entire life years and years and years, then all of a sudden you come to realize like, oh that doesn't actually mean what I think it means. Some of you live with somebody that is often wrong but never in doubt, right? I've had a few of these over the years.

Don't hold me accountable to this one. But when I was growing up, I loved WWF wrestling, okay? Not WCW, that was the fake stuff. WWF was real, okay?

That's what I believed. And I kid you not, I remember the day and the time. I remember where I was, what was happening when I came to the realization, spoiler alert, that all wrestling is fake, okay?

My entire worldview had been flipped upside down. All of a sudden I've got all these questions. I'm like, I mean, did the undertaker ever really die and come back to life? Like, did he fake his death?

Like, is Stone Cold Steve Austin even drinking real beer? Or is this like Mick Ultra, that he's just like, what's going on here? I don't know what's happening. Like, my entire worldview had been flipped upside down. And I can make fun of myself, that was as a kid, but this still happens. I'm unashamed to tell you this, just last week, this is not a joke, just last week I was in a text thread with some friends and I don't remember what they were talking, what we were talking about, but somebody said, man, this person's killing me, they want the whole kit and caboodle. And they typed it, right? Kit and caboodle. And I responded by saying, don't you mean the whole kit and caboodle, like meow? Like, and they were like, haha. And I was like, no, I'm not kidding.

And sure enough, I Google it, yours truly, who has a master's degree, incorrect, okay? And they were like, just to help me understand how you come up with kit and caboodle. And I was like, well, I know what a caboodle is, like, I've got three girls, that makes sense. But to me, the kit and the whole point of that phrase is like somebody's trying to get everything they can, right?

And to me, kitten, cats are incredibly selfish individuals, so they're going to try to get as much as they can, put it in their caboodle and then go about their day, right? Like that's just what I thought. And before we get too far off track, my point here is that there are things in our lives that we think we know, but what we really need sometimes is kind of an Inigo Montoya to come alongside us and say, you keep using that word and I don't think it means what you think it means.

All right? So what we're going to see today from Mark chapter three is that Jesus fundamentally redefines what it means to be part of God's family. So you might think that just because you show up to a building once a week, or because you grew up in a Christian family, or because you prayed a prayer or walked an aisle, that you're good with God, that he's happy with you, that your eternal bed of clouds awaits you in heaven and that you are part of the family of God. And I truly do hope that's true.

I hope you are. But here in Mark chapter three, Jesus is going to challenge what we believe about being part of God's family. And then he's going to tell us the implications of being part of God's family. So Mark chapter three, one of the things that I just love about the gospel writer, Mark, is how he's one of the few that actually focuses more on Jesus's doing than Jesus's teaching. I also love how fast he writes. He's the one that just writes and immediately and immediately and immediately. And so for somebody that talks fast and loud, I'm like, this is my kind of guy.

If I were to write a book, it'd probably look like this. And so Mark shows us that Jesus is a man of action. And by implication that in the Christian life, neutral is not an option. See, at this point in Mark, just three chapters in, Jesus has already been doing miracles. He's been healing. He's just appointed the 12 disciples.

And now he's got this great crowd that's following him. So what I want to do, I just want to walk verse by verse through this and make some observations. Mark chapter three, we're going to begin in verse 20, okay? Verse 20. It says, then Jesus went home and the crowd gathered again, so much so that they could not even eat.

Now pause. The author Mark, one of the things we need to know is that he does not cast crowds in a very positive light. Crowds represent the people who just find Jesus interesting from a distance. To them, he's just kind of this, you know, strange guy who's healing and performing miracles and leavening. He's kind of the David Blaine of the day. So they're curious.

He's just doing magic tricks, right? If you think of the crowds, think of them kind of like modern day Twitter followers. They're curious. They're loud.

They're easily entertained, but they're also incredibly irrational, right? That's kind of the crowd. These are people who like Jesus as a lucky charm and a miracle worker, but they would quickly reject him as Lord as we're going to see. But what Mark makes clear about this following, this crowd is that Jesus was never Jesus never set out to impress a crowd. Jesus set out on a mission from God to usher in a kingdom that everything Jesus does has a purpose.

So look at verse 21. It says, and when Jesus's family heard it, that the crowd was gathering around, they went out to seize him. Your translation might say to restrain him for they were saying he is out of his mind. This is bold from Jesus's family.

They go out to seize him to restrain him because they think he's out of his mind. Jesus's friends and family were convinced that at best, he was confused or at worst, he was deranged and had completely lost his mind. So at this point, they decided to stage a little family intervention.

I'm not kidding. When I say this, when I was about 16, if you will, my parents had to impromptu stage a family intervention with me, not because I was being too much like Jesus here, quite the opposite. And when they did, I did what any level headed kid would do to try to improve that they are perfectly sane. I tried to run away from home. And so I may or may not have made it to the front of the neighborhood before my dad convinced me I was a complete idiot and got me back in the car. But this is kind of what's happening with Jesus's family.

All right. They've come to stage this little family intervention with them and consult him on his own life choices. Because see, they thought Jesus was out of his mind.

That's what the text says. And one of the reasons they thought that is because Jesus was not living what we could say was a normal Jewish life. Jesus's obedience to God the Father was so radical that even his own family thought he was crazy. And so by implication, just three verses in, there's a question that we have to ask ourselves here. If we call ourselves Christians, little Christ, do other people ever look at us?

Does the proverbial crowd ever look at us? Ever look at the way that we live out our faith and think that we are crazy? Not weird. Crazy.

There's a difference there. Okay. Crazy. Have you ever had anybody ask you like, hey, help me understand why you don't watch that show. Everybody watches that show.

What's wrong with that show? I don't understand. Help me understand. Hey, help me understand why you as a Christian treat your marriages like this. Help me understand why you have this view on the sanctity of marriage or the sanctity of life or divorce. Help me understand why you're so generous with your money.

Just help think about this outside of the walls of the church. How does it make sense that I go to work, earn money, it goes in my bank account, and then I take it out of my bank account and give it away freely? It doesn't make sense.

The way we spend our money should not make sense to the world. If you've had anybody ask you like, why are you always asking me how you can help? Why are you always trying to serve me? How do you have such positivity going through such pain and hard times in life? Does anybody ever look at the way you live your life and say that just does not make sense?

You are out of your mind. Because if somebody can look at you and say that if you live in a way that does that, that gives you the opportunity to tell them about the kingdom that you are living for, the kingdom that is not of this world and about the Jesus who gives you hope in all of life circumstances. The family of God, church, should look and live fundamentally different than the crowds of culture.

That's what we've been seeing. So everybody's packed in this house, right? Look at verse 22. Everybody's packed in this house and the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, Jesus clearly is possessed by Beelzebul and by the prince of demons he casts out demons. And Jesus called them to him and said to them in parables, hey guys, how can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, then that kingdom cannot stand. See, it's not just Jesus's family who thinks he's gone crazy.

Everyone else does too. And so Mark singles out another group of people that he calls the scribes. Now the scribes were part of this religious elite of the day. You've heard of the Pharisees.

The scribes are kind of the elite of the elite. And the scribes are over in this corner kind of talking trash about Jesus to one another. When all of a sudden Jesus comes over to them and even though they never spoke to Jesus or asked him a question, Jesus comes over to give them the answer to the question that they never asked him because Jesus has this really cool thing he can do where he can read your thoughts and know what's going on, right? And so Jesus comes over to them and they're like, hey, how can how can Satan or, you know, he came to by the name of Beelzebul to cast out demons and all this. And Jesus is like, I just need you all to think about your logic here. If I'm playing for the bad guys, why would I be casting out the bad guys? If I were sent here by Satan for Satan's rule, why would I be casting out Satan's minions? That doesn't make sense. If I'm Jesus, I'm like, that's the stupidest logic I've ever heard.

And you are supposed to be the smart ones in the room. But then the saddest part is, is Jesus is going to go on to tell them that, hey, your failure to recognize who I am is actually going to lead to your eternal damnation when you actually think that just because you're part of the religious elite, that you are grandfathered into God's family. And he's going to flip that on its head. And so while Jesus is teaching all this, skip all the way down to verse 31.

It just keeps getting more interesting. Verse 31 says, and his mother and his brothers came and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. And y'all, the symbolism is so rich in the fact that Jesus's family is the one outside. Because again, Jesus is about to redefine who is inside his family. He's about to show these religious elites that who they think are in might actually be out.

And that those who the elite think are out are about to be welcomed in. This is one of the things that makes the gospel so scandalous, that it isn't necessarily about who it excludes, but rather who it includes, who it welcomes in. Pastor Brian showed us this so beautifully last week. The phrase he uses is little people, how God chases down the little people in the world's eyes.

That's why the gospel is so beautiful, y'all. And then verse 32 says, and a crowd was sitting around him and they said to him, your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you. And Jesus answered them, who are my mother and my brothers? And looking about it, those who sat around him, he said, here are my mother and brothers. For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.

So let's look at this. Four ways that Jesus challenges our thinking on what it means to be part of the family of God. Four ways that Jesus challenges our thinking on what it means to be part of this gospel community called the church. First, what I see is that Jesus challenges what we'll call a standard assumption.

A standard assumption. That's right here in verse 31. Look at verse 31. It says, and his mother and his brothers came to him and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. And a crowd was sitting around him and they said to him, your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.

See, the assumption here is that Jesus would have gone straight to his family when they called, right? Especially in first century Israel. We're not there, but in first century Israel, your entire identity was built on what family you came from. Your family origins in so many ways defined your identity and in most cases predetermine your prospects and even your potential in life. So these are very strong.

These are very practical. And I want to talk about this a little bit more. Very proud family bonds at play. So when Jesus's family comes along and they can't even get inside to the house to get near him, that in and of itself would have been incredibly disrespectful.

Let's think about it like this. Let's say right now while I'm up here, let's say we've locked the auditorium doors and somebody comes running up here on stage and they say, hey, Pastor Curtis, your wife is actually in the lobby. She's trying to get in here. And what if I said, who is my wife? All of you are my family. Like that'd be an incredibly disrespectful way to talk about my wife, right? My wife has precedent. She has priority. My wife doesn't need a backstage pass to have access to me. She has access to me that nobody else has. And in the same way, y'all, this is Jesus's mother we're talking about. Some of y'all talk to your mama like that, you'd catch a backhand, right?

I mean, what's going on here? Does Jesus not love his mother and his brother? Of course he does. Before we jump the gun, let's not be foolish here and think that Jesus is suggesting that we don't care or love or serve or provide for our families. The point he's trying to make is that not even our family should stand in our way to ultimate allegiance to God. Jesus would never suggest that we abandon or ignore our families, only that we put God's will above everything else in life. The way this is often says, Luke chapter 14 verse 26, Jesus says that our love for God should be so great that our love for our family should actually look like hatred in comparison.

It's a hard teaching. See, what Jesus was doing is he was using this opportunity to challenge the standard assumption of the day about family and teach something extremely important. The fact that he had a greater family than even his biological one, that the family he was creating in and through the church of Jesus Christ would trump even the bonds of biology. And so Jesus is telling them and he's telling us, hey, if you want to follow me, then your identity, your primary identity, your main identity, the foundation of your identity can be in nothing else. That your identity as a follower and disciple of Jesus in the family of God is more important than any other allegiance you have in life. What he's doing is he's challenging the standard assumption about what is most important in your life, about what matters most to you. And so for some of you, that is family.

For some of you to follow Jesus might actually cost you your family. I don't want to belittle that. I don't want to pass over that.

I don't want to make light of that. That's the reality of your situation. But Jesus comes to you and he says, I promise I'm going to be worth it. I promise that the spiritual and eternal family that you gain in the church is going to be greater than any earthly family.

For some of you, the most important thing is your job or maybe financial security. And following Jesus might actually cost you that thing. Before I was in ministry, I was in sales for many, many years. And let me tell you, the moral and ethical standards according to the world in sales are not the same standards as Jesus's standards if you're in sales.

Okay? There are so many ways, so many sales tactics I could have used to beef up my bottom line, but to do so would have been to compromise my faith and not live out my faith in the way that Jesus has called me to do it. And so some of you following Jesus and actually living out your faith and being part of the family of God, having somebody look at you and say, I don't understand why you won't sell like that might actually cost you your job. But Jesus is saying what you gain in me and the kingdom is so much greater. Some of you, the most important thing to you for some reason is your personal freedom. You think that escaping outside the bounds of what God has called you and the way he has called you to live according to this book is actually going to bring you the most freedom and the most pleasure and the most joy. And Jesus is saying, no, no, no, I created you.

I know it gives you more joy and more pleasure and more freedom. It's not going to be living your life. It's not going to be love is love. It's not going to be any of these things.

It's not going to be what the world tells you. It's going to be to live according to the way I have designed you is what God says. And so he's here to challenge the standard of assumption about what we think is most important in life. Jesus is saying freedom and family and purpose and provision and pleasure are all great things, but they are first and foremost found in me and your identity as a disciple and a family member of the church of God is what is most important.

This is the standard assumption he's challenging. He's reminding us of the new family he's creating in Christ. And so Jesus challenges the standard assumption and then he goes one step farther and challenging their thinking by asking a strange question.

Number two, a strange question. This is in verse 33. It says, and Jesus answered them, here's a strange question.

Who were my mother and my brothers? If you are wondering what verse to write in your next Mother's Day card, this is not the one, all right? But y'all listen, these are not the words of an insensitive and careless man who's indifferent to his family. On the contrary, the gospels give plenty of evidence that Jesus was so deeply devoted to his earthly family.

If you want to go another step farther, history shows us that Jesus himself has done more for the family unit along with the valuation of women and children than anyone or anything else in the history of the world. Jesus was not being rude and ignoring this request. He ignored them because he knew that even though their motives were right, their method of going about those motives was wrong. Because see, when Jesus's family came to take him to seize him, if he had gone with them, then he would have actually been playing right into the hands of the religious opposition. Because they would have been like, see, Jesus's family thinks he's crazy and he agrees with them because he's going so so he's going so he's obviously crazy. So you can't take this man from Nazareth. You can't take him too seriously.

You can't listen to anything he's teaching or saying. No, no, no, Jesus was on a mission from God and not even his own earthly mother was going to stop him from completing that mission. Now, I want to be incredibly fair to Mary here. Mary is actually one of the few people in the scriptures who seems to, from the get-go, be more aware and more supportive of the mission that Jesus was on from the day he was born.

There's so many places that Mary exhibits such incredible faith. I mean, just think about it. You're hanging out and two angels drop down and tell you you're going to be pregnant when you're a virgin. Not sure if y'all are aware how that process works.

That's not how it normally works. And she's like, all right, let's roll. Like, this is kind of what she does. And then fast forward to the end of Jesus's life and at the cross, she's one of the few people that doesn't abandon Jesus. So there's so many places that Mary exhibits great faith. But right here, something's going on and she just doesn't quite see what Jesus is doing.

And so she comes to get her son because she thinks he's gone a little crazy. And see, without even realizing it, Mary's doing the same thing that so many of us struggle with today. See, so often we have this view of family where protection and preservation are actually our highest priorities. And those should be priorities. Hear me clearly.

That's great. But often our desire for comfort and safety and protection of our family come at the very detriment of what God might be calling you to do. We see this all the time in our church. We see it where a student comes to their family and says, I want to go on this mission trip.

I feel like God has ignited something in my heart and I want to go and parents out of not wanting their student to go because of wanting to protect them, don't allow them to go and do what God has called them to do. We have men in this church who think that it's more important to create a lavish lifestyle for their family so they work 14 hours a day but don't realize that by doing that they're making themselves absent as the spiritual leaders of their household, which is the primary and main thing God has called them to do. We have brothers and sisters in the faith who do not want to confront one another about sin and have hard conversations because they're afraid it's going to damage their earthly relationship, even though God calls us to hold one another accountable and build one another up.

And if you've been part of one of those really hard relationships, you probably were actually closer to the person when it was done, not farther away. Y'all, even here at the Summit Church, as awesome as this is, we have so many so-called followers of Jesus who are only willing to be obedient as long as God's will aligns with your wants. And so we all need to hear this message that Jesus is preaching right here. We must refuse to allow comfort to become more important than our calling and our obedience as followers of Christ.

If you and I are following Jesus and allowing him to be Lord of our lives, we will not be living in neutral. We'll constantly be seeking out God's calling on our lives daily, not trying to seek out what's the most comfortable place you can go sit and be entertained once a week on Sunday morning. What Jesus is showing us is that Jesus is showing us here is that true family affection should never be a deterrent to God's call on somebody's life. In fact, rather, it should be the greatest source of encouragement and support of service to whatever and wherever God has called someone. One scholar, I love how he says it this way. He says, a family, a church family, an earthly family should be a harbor from which the ship leaves to sail the seas and not a dock where the ship ties up and rots.

Let me make this incredibly personal for a moment. What that means, what that means is that my daughter, my daughter who I baptized a few weeks ago, the one who stood right over there in that tank and I said, baby, do you believe that Jesus has done everything necessary to save you? And she said, yes, I do doubt. The one, the one who I asked, okay, in light of that declaration, babe, that's, that's your declaration of him as savior.

Now what about Lord? Avi, are you willing to go wherever Jesus sends you and do whatever Jesus calls you to do? And she said, yes, that's awesome. That's a proud moment. We clap.

We celebrated top three greatest moments of my life. But the reality is there could be a day coming where she comes to me where she says, mom and dad, I feel like God is calling me to take the gospel overseas to an unreached people group. I feel like God is calling me to China. I feel like God is calling me to Southeast Asia.

I see what's going on in Afghanistan. And instead of fleeing out of there, God is actually calling me into that place to be salt and light into that dark place. And I'm here to tell you, even as one of your pastors, me in my flesh, remove the spirit of God for a second in my flesh. What I am going to want to do in that moment is wrap my arms so tightly around her and say, no, baby, don't go there. Daddy can't protect you there.

Daddy can't. He doesn't know what awaits you there. And what her job is going to be is to say, dad, remember that declaration I made where I said, I'm willing to follow Jesus wherever he sends me, even though I love you, dad, Jesus is my highest priority. Jesus is my greatest mission. And this is where Jesus is calling me to go. And then my job as her earthly father, but greater than that, as her brother in Christ, as her spiritual brother is to then support her and pray for her and serve her and love her. And as she goes and hopefully shares the gospel and listen, she might go and she might get hurt. Something might happen, but then what if God uses that pain and that hurt to bring people to Christ?

Then we have to say in light of eternity that that's worth it. And I'm getting, I mean, like Robbie, can you even think about this Sidney Langley overseeing, like, can we, this is, this is the reality of what we're doing here. This isn't a game. I get choked up even thinking about it. My daughter's in first grade, like, she's going to school tomorrow. That's where she's going.

Okay. But this is what we're called to do. And y'all, God might not be calling you somewhere overseas or somewhere incredibly hostile to the gospel. He might just be calling you as a parent back to your home to raise up the beautiful kids that he's given you.

That's your first mission field. God might be calling you as a teacher back to your classroom to be salt and light there. God might be calling you here at the summit church as a single man or a single woman to be a church father or a church mother who mentors and loves and disciples and praise for younger folks in our church.

For a lot of you, you're, you're bought in. You're like, yes, I'm here. I'm rallied around this mission.

I'm right around this vision. And this weekend, God might be calling you to finally get off the sidelines and get in the game and begin serving right here, right now, this weekend at the summit church. And some of you are like, oh, pastor, this church is just so big.

And I just want to get to know some people first. And then maybe I'll start serving. So let's work on that. Pastor JD shared with us a couple of weeks with us a couple of weeks ago, that over the last like eight years, our annual church survey shows that the people who feel most connected, most known and most loved at this church are the people that serve. That's the common denominator, not the people that are in small groups, which is awesome, not the people that give, which is awesome. The people that serve, those are the ones, those are the ones, the people that are on serving teams feel most connected. You want to feel, you want to make the big summit church a little smaller, start serving, get on a serving team. You say, well, I don't know where to serve.

About 200 feet from where I'm standing, there's an unreached people group right back there called Summit Kids. Go serve. There's people right now serving in what we call a prayer ministry. There's people right now sitting in a room, flex A, right over there who are praying for you, praying over the service, praying over my sermon. You're like, I wish they'd pray a little harder for your sermon. It's just not like you can go serve in the prayer ministry.

Some of you need to serve in guest services. You know why? Y'all like Buddy the Elf. Smiling is just your favorite. Y'all were just born with a smile on your face, so you need to go hold a door and smile and greet somebody for the glory of God. Some of y'all are like, I don't like kids.

I don't like fake smiling. Fine. You know what? You know where you can go serve? Parking team, okay? You can wave a baton. You can get somebody, production team back there. You can sit behind a camera. You ain't got to smile at anybody.

You can just point the camera up here, okay? You're like, well, I don't know if that really makes a difference. Helping the gospel go forth clearly through production and a high quality standard so that people can hear the gospel, which is the power and the salvation for all who would believe, and then people's eternities are changed. I'd say that's pretty important, okay? You're like, is parking team important? I don't know.

We may or may not have had 766 first-time guests at this campus, the Capitol Hills campus, alone in 2021. I think probably helping them find their parking spot pretty easily, therefore eliminating any barriers for them to receive the gospel, I'd say that's probably pretty important, amen? The point, y'all, is that we have to stop prioritizing comfort over obedience and start serving one another as the body of Christ and the way we are called to do, okay? Jesus challenges the standard assumption.

He asks this strange question, and now he's going to make a shocking statement, a shocking statement. Look at verse 34. It says, in looking about it, those who sat around him, he said, here are my mother and my brothers. Again, let's not lose sight of who Jesus is talking to here. He's talking to the Jews of the day, the Jews who would have been radically offended by Jesus's words because the Jews were God's special people. They were God's family, right? They were the chosen ones. They were the ones who God gave salvation and favor and blessing. They were Abraham's descendants.

All the promises of Genesis 12 and 15 and 18 and all these covenants, it was theirs because they were Abraham's descendants. But then Jesus hits them with this shocking statement to make clear that the new family he is building is not made up just of descendants of Abraham but of believers in Jesus. It's not just about the family you are born into. It's about the family you can be reborn into. It's not being part of the right family or the right race or the right culture or even the right church or whatever.

There's no physical connection that gets you an automatic bid into the kingdom of God, into God's family. Now what I don't want you leaving here thinking is that you must do something or come from the right background in order to earn your way into the family of God. I can tell you personally it's so easy to believe that our sense of belonging to the family of God is based on something we do rather than from someone who did something for us.

To slide back into thinking that our worth is defined by our social class or our friendships or our moral goodness or whatever it may be. And honestly for 21 years before I became a believer that's why I thought I was a believer for that 21 years that I was actually not following Jesus. Candidly I was from a really great family.

I felt like comparatively I was better than most. I had great grades, I had great manners, I went to church, I went to confirmation class, I only slept with the girl I was dating at the time and sure I partied a ton and could drink with the best of them but I didn't do like any heart drugs at least right. I don't know if I should say that up here but nonetheless but my sense of belonging to God's family was based on something I was doing. I thought all week I just accrued this list of sins and as long as on Sunday morning I asked God to forgive me of those that that's what kept me in like God I'm here, I'm present, I showed up to church, I asked for forgiveness right but then I go living my life exactly how I wanted to. I never said it this clearly but I thought God owed me salvation based on my background and my upbringing and my church attendance and my morality and I cannot say it any clearer or louder that is not the gospel. That is works-based righteousness.

That is trying to earn your way to God by climbing a religious ladder that you will never reach the top of. In fact even as one of your pastors right now you removed Jesus from the equation and I stand here right now and the only thing I am owed before you is condemnation. That's the bad news but that's also why the gospel is such good news that because even though you and I could never measure up Jesus measured up for us. The good news is that even though you and I sin and fall short every single day Jesus has already made provisions for that sin. It is finished by living the life we should have lived and then dying the death that you and I should have died and then to prove ultimate victory over sin to prove ultimate victory over death.

He rose again three days later and now those of us who are in Christ even though we die yet shall we live in Christ for eternity. That's the gospel. We can't earn it.

We certainly don't deserve it. The gospel is the power unto salvation. Listen to me for any and all who would believe to anyone who would call upon the name of the Lord they're welcomed into the family of God. You're welcomed in by faith in Christ and Christ alone the family of God that over centuries has welcomed zealots and the religious elite and has welcomed tax collectors and cheats and sinners and thieves and drunkards and liars and legalists and churchgoers and prostitutes and the self-righteous and the proud and the depressed and the prisoner and the addicted and all sorts of other sinners just like you and me so welcome to the family of God if you fit in those categories okay. Now we who are part of this family we who have been saved who have been born again who have been regenerated whatever phrase you want to use whatever theological term we who have been welcomed into the family of God have done so solely based on what Jesus has done for us. It's not on biological or political or church affiliation not on good works or good resumes or good behavior no it is not of good that I have done it is nothing but the blood of Jesus. This is all my hope and peace this is all my righteousness that's why we sing oh precious is the flow that makes me even though I make everything red with my sin it makes me white as snow there is no other fount I know that can give me the satisfaction the foundation and the hope and the salvation there is nothing but the blood of Jesus and so church what I'm sent to do what Pastor JD sent here to do every single week is to stand up here and open this book and present to you not a standard you must live up to but a savior that you have the opportunity to bow down to and when you bow down to that savior and make him lord of your life he doesn't shame you he doesn't condemn you no you find a savior my wife loves this who lifts your head and instantly welcomes you in to become part of his family no matter what you've done no matter what's been done to you no matter what that abusive parent said about you no matter what hell you have endured and no matter how many times the brokenness of life has threatened to break you you can know that there is a place you belong and it's called the church of Jesus Christ is the church JD is the church perfect you said it way too enthusiastic no the church is not perfect is it full of sinners you got one is it full of those who are going to mess up and let you down yes is it going to be your perfect confluence of music and preaching and service and community and fellowship no so yes the church of Jesus Christ is dysfunctional the summit church is dysfunctional which means you should feel right at home but even in her imperfection and dysfunction the church is going to be the divine albeit dusty body of Christ the true family of God who are brothers and sisters rallied around one thing which is the gospel of Jesus Christ the power unto salvation for all who would believe and that body of believers we're called to care for one another to love one another to serve one another to be there for one another to pray for one another to speak truth and to encourage one another every single day so for those of you who are here and you feel like you don't have a place in the world to call home this is your place if you're here and you don't know what it's like to have a family or yours is dysfunctional at best Jesus today is welcoming you into his family if you feel like you've never been able to do enough or be good enough to be part of God's family the good news is that faith in Jesus is the only prerequisite into becoming part of God's family and when you enter into that family you instantly inherit a heavenly father who loves you the holy spirit who dwells inside of you a brother and a friend in Jesus who right now at this very moment is at the right hand of the throne of God praying for you a cloud of Christian witnesses who have gone before you and a whole slew of brothers and sisters in Christ right here in this church who would love to walk beside you and encourage you has nothing to do with the family you're born into it has everything to do with the family you can be reborn into by putting your faith in Jesus which brings us to our final way that Jesus challenges our thinking he challenges it with a significant truth a significant truth and this is where our belief meets our behavior look at verse 35 so who's part of the family of God Jesus says for whoever does the will of God he is my brother and sister and mother those who put their faith in Jesus and then demonstrate that faith by doing the will of God and obeying his commands that's who's in the family of God we've told you this many times before but you will only know the will of God in as much as you know the word of God may the summit church never be a people who are only hearers of the word but who are doers also now to be very clear I've said it enough but obedience does not mean enough but obedience does not start a relationship with Jesus only faith can do that but obedience is a sign of the faith that you have put in Jesus gospel obedience always flows out of gospel transformation see because when when Jesus becomes your savior God's story becomes your story his mission becomes your mission doing God's will becomes your delight and your desire because the gospel is no longer just the power to obey it's the power that makes you want to obey when my wife first got saved she used to say that God changed her want tos her want tos changed because in the gospel she realized that Jesus did for her what she could never do for herself and when you realize that it makes you want to obediently follow him and engage as part of the family of God I'll close with this many years ago during desert storm ABC news was doing this report they were actually out kind of near the battlefield with with the platoon group and it was on the eve of this battle and the reporter called over this young African-American soldier and they asked him this question they said how do you think the battle's going to go are you afraid and the guy kind of thought about it for a sec and he responded he said I think we'll do just fine I think we'll do okay we're well trained and he kind of took this big deep breath and he looked over at his fellow soldiers and he started gesturing toward him to come near him all his army buddies started surrounding him and he started putting his arms around his army buddies of every age and race and color and all of a sudden he got kind of a smile on his face and he continued by saying I'm not afraid I'm not afraid because I'm with my family and the other soldiers got all excited and they started shouting they started saying tell them louder say it again say it again say it again tell them a little louder and he said I'm not afraid this is my family and we will take care of one another y'all if that's not the creed of the local church I don't know what is this this collection of people from all walks of life from all backgrounds of all skin colors of all cultures of all political parties this is my family and we will take care of one another because we are united by one thing the most important thing and his name is Jesus summit there is one name that we will declare above all else and it's the name of Jesus there is one thing that this church will prioritize above all else and it's the gospel which is the power unto salvation to change people's eternities and so as we march forward together on this mission from God we will not be afraid because and I need y'all to look around just look around this is your church family and we will take care of one another take care of one another so the very simple and very obvious question is have you ever experienced and accepted the love of God by receiving Jesus as your savior and becoming part of this family I told you nobody in here was born a Christian it's not because of what family it's not because of your moral deeds it's have you repented of your sin and placed your faith in Jesus it's only by belief and faith that you come into God's family and if you are part of God's family I'm here to encourage you to push you a little bit that you shouldn't be living life in neutral you should be asking yourself where is God calling me to take my next step of obedience as part of this church family God I thank you for your word I thank you that it does not return void I thank you that you save people and that you send them on mission God wouldn't be true of every single person here gotta pray I ask in Jesus name amen