Standalone: September 5, 2021

Standalone: September 5, 2021

Jay Perillo - September 5, 2021

Community Group Study Notes

  • Of the 4 makers of a Spirit-filled that were taught on Sunday, which would you say is a strength of yours and which would you say is a weakness?
  • What types of things require patience and endurance? Read Romans 5:1-5 together. What can suffering produce in a person who has Christ?
  • For what does Paul remind us to give thanks? (What we have in Christ because of what God has done for us) What does that remind us about God’s character?
  • How could you incorporate Paul’s model for prayer in Colossians 1:9-12 into your own prayer life?

Abide


Sermon Transcript

It's great to be with you today. And whether you're joining us online or other media, or you're listening, thank you for joining us. And if you're here at Crosspoint, it's just great to see faces. So, thanks for being here. It just feels so full this morning, our nine o'clock service here. Most certainly, my prayer is that it wouldn't just be filled with us, with just my words. That our service here together, that our time together, again, however you're joining us, that it would be filled with the Spirit of God. When I was asked to give our message this morning, I was asked a number of weeks ago, I was drawn towards a, I was like, "What do I preach on? What kind of sermon do I give?" And for some reason, I was drawn towards Jesus's first sermon as recorded in the Gospel of Matthew. And so, in the Gospel of Matthew, we see that Jesus, he gathers his disciples and then he goes and has this type of spiritual retreat for 40 days. He does some battle, right? The enemy is attempting to get him to stop his spiritual mission that he is on. Coming out of that, he goes up on a mountain side. You and I know it as the sermon on the mount. It's Matthew chapter five, six, and seven. And so, of course, I'm reading that. And Jesus covers a number of topics. And so, I didn't necessarily know at first where I wanted to go, but I just was really drawn towards when Jesus is talking to the people of God. Now, don't get me wrong. His church that he builds on Peter has not yet been established, but we read about the people of God and what God wants to do in this world all the way back in the Old Testament. And what Jesus calls the people of God is, he says, "You are salt and light. You are the light of the world, right? A city on a hill cannot be hidden." And we see that in the Scriptures, that you and I, we were in darkness. We just saying about it. If you're here in our service, we just sang about it. And that we were called into this marvelous light. And what God is saying is now that you have a source, now that you are this, or now that you know what the source is, you become a source. That's what it means to be in relationship with God. That once I experience the love and truth from hearing the gospel from a relationship with Jesus, once I become a Christian, I now become a source of that. Now, obviously coming out of the time that we've just come out of, or are still in, actually I should say it seems like there's light at the end of the tunnel. It has been an interesting year and a half. I never thought perhaps I would experience some of the things I've experienced, like growing my hair out. So, you thought I was gonna go somewhere else for a second there. You know I had to get it in there for a second. So, yeah, I have not cut my hair since the world got a bit weird. I figured the world was getting weird, maybe my hair should get weird. My grandma didn't really like that philosophy. But nonetheless, I tell her there is light at the end of the tunnel and grandma, this helped to raise money to fight against human trafficking. So, I was, yeah, I was like I used that leverage there for something. No, don't get me wrong. I have a new appreciation for women and people with long hair. What it adds to your morning routine, it's something else. Like when I had short spiky hair, I just had to do this and be like, messy looks good. Right? It looks... Now I'm like nervous as I'm up here, that I'm gonna have all these stray strings that would distract you from the Word of God, because you'd be like, "What is going on with this young man's hair?" Nonetheless, I think we have this incredible opportunity as the people of God, as the church to be a beacon, to be a source of light in a world that's dealing with a health crisis, things happening on the other side of the world, where we pray for people in another country, Afghanistan, our brothers and sisters, the people of there. We've got tropical storms, people without power, and Louisiana just seems like one after the other, there's a storm, whether it has to do with our health, whether it has to do with political unrest, whether it has to do with weather patterns, whatever it may be, it just seems like it just continues to pile on. And we have this unique opportunity as the people of God. But here's the thing. If we're being honest, if I'm being honest, when stuff like this happens, my natural reaction to those things is typically panic. It's typically fear. It's typically anxiety left to my own thoughts. There's unrest in my soul, but yet to have this call on my life to bring hope and light to the world, but I've got this unrest in my soul. And I think that's where the Spirit of God comes into play in the life of a believer. And so, I'm actually not in Matthew. If you turned to Matthew, sorry about that. I'm in Colossians. Well, what I wanna talk about for us today in our time together is what it means to be a Spirit-filled church, what it means to have the markers of a Spirit-filled life. And I think Paul really helps us out. Paul is writing a letter to the Christians of Colossi. And he's trying to encourage them. And so, we're gonna be in verse nine. I'm gonna get there in a second. I just wanna give us a bit of context in the first eight verses of Colossians because Paul, he's affirming their faith. He is saying, "You have authentic faith. You heard the true gospel. You received that. And now I see love and truth in your lives." And so, he's affirming that they are Christians and believers. Because here's the deal. As the Bible says, you and I are not born Christians. There is one begotten Son of God, Jesus Christ. And Jesus says, you and I must be born again. And what Paul's doing is he's affirming that. I had that experience. I was born again as a teenager in my later teenage lives, near the end of high school. And who I was before, even though I was on this planet for a short 16 years, was different than who I was after. And most certainly, it was a process. The Bible says, it's the process of sanctification, where you become more and more like Jesus. And that that takes time. But when you say yes to Jesus, when you say yes to God, you say yes to the Spirit of God dwelling in you and you become a temple of God. And so, as a result of that in the first eight verses, Paul then encourages them verses nine through 12, with some specific things. And we have it on the TV for us this morning. He says this, "For this reason, since the day we heard about you." See, Paul, he's so busy planting churches in cities. He hasn't even been there yet. You see in verses one through eight, Epaphras has been there and established that. But he says this, "We have not stopped praying for you." That's what Paul does as a pastor. That's what I believe I'm called to do for our college-age young adults, and our church. That's what we as a staff look to do together on a weekly basis during the week here at our church. Is that we wanna pray that God would do things in your life that would cause you to continue to grow in your walk with Jesus. He says, "We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will, through all the wisdom and understanding that the Spirit gives." I'm gonna pause for a moment here and I'm gonna grab this guy right here. Now, see, when I was asked to preach a couple weeks ago, they said, "Do you wanna use the screen? And do you wanna draw on it?" Now, here's the deal, I've never done this before. But I'm a boy. This seems like a toy, right? And so, I was like, "Oh, maybe I can have some fun here." So, my hope is I'm not too much of a distraction, but I'm also hoping that I don't like, that I can use this in a good, effective way. But I was like, man, this seems fun. I can draw some colors. And sometimes my wife is like, "Dude, why are you such a child?" And I was like, "Well, Jesus calls me to childlike faith." Now you know what it's like to live with me. Pray for anybody who does or any of my friends or family. So, anyways, I can Jesus juke people sometimes. So, here we go. The knowledge, wisdom, and understanding that the Spirit gives. I wanted to point this out at first, because this is what it means to follow Jesus. Is that knowledge, we're talking there. We're talking about facts, right? We're talking about knowing things, right? Some people would say theological concepts. Some people would say Bible history, knowing things, right? Knowing specific things in the Bible, but it's more than that, right? Because the Pharisees were filled with knowledge, but they lacked and understanding when it came to the Messiah Jesus Christ, right? So, we need to know that this is all encompassing wisdom. That's almost like knowing what to do with it, applications, street smarts, understanding. And so, my point here is, is that following Jesus, isn't just sitting on a stool or a chair or in front of a screen and being able to recite things or knowing spiritual concepts and being able to talk through things. This is about knowing and applying, being doers of what the Spirit is filling you with doing, being doers of the Word. Does that make sense? So, that is what he's getting after with that. And then he goes into that they may live a life worthy of the Lord. So, he gives us this blueprint of what it means to live a life where God says, "Well done, good and faithful servant. You made use of your time here on this planet. Everybody only has only so much time. You did something with your life." What does he say? He says, please him in every way. And he says, good work that bears fruit. We'll get after that. Growing in the knowledge of God that you would have good work that bears fruit and that you would continue to grow in the knowledge of God. And then he gives us two more. You can go to the next slide. According to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience and giving joyful thanks to the Father. That you would have good work, that you would grow in your knowledge, that you would have this level of great endurance and patience, and you would give joyful thanks. That this would be the marker of your life. "Thanks to the Father," we can finish the verse, "Who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light." What Paul is getting at is what we just sang about, is that your presence is my victory. That life, it can get rough. That life, we can struggle. Our current circumstances might stink, but here's the thing, everything we have, everything we need, we already have in Jesus. And that's the markers of someone who is filled with the Spirit. So, I wanna talk about this idea of having a spiritual life. But I also understand sometimes, depending on your background, your church background, or depending on how you personally are wired and how you relate to God, sometimes when we start talking about spiritual life, we say, well, things that are spiritual, sometimes it's not concrete enough for some of us and we're like, "Man, I don't know. I don't have experiences like that. For me, it's just simply I read words on the page and I do my best to do them. That's that simple. That's my life. I live very practical." And I just wanna say that the Bible actually agrees with you on that. And so, I wanna be a Bible geek for a second, and I wanna go back to what I found to be one of the first ideas of talk, where the Bible talks about someone being filled with the Spirit and how practical it is in Exodus. So, in Exodus 31, it says this, "Then the Lord said to Moses, 'See, I have chosen Bezalel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah, and I have filled him with the Spirit of God, with wisdom, with understanding, with knowledge, and with all kinds of skill, to make artistic designs for work in gold, silver, and bronze, to cut and set stones, to work in wood, and to engage in all kinds of crafts.'" Interesting, right? That he mentioned that, "I have filled Bezalel with my Spirit." I love the Old Testament as it gives us these spiritual breadcrumbs, right? Because Jesus isn't on the scene in the Old Testament, right? But the Old Testament is pointing towards Jesus. And also some would say, well, where do you get this idea of the Trinity? And where's the Spirit? Did it just come later? Was it just introduced after Jesus says, "Hey, I'm gonna send you the comforter as the Spirit. I'm gonna... " No, we see Jesus and the Trinity and the Spirit all throughout Scripture, we see these breadcrumbs. But my point today is that him being filled with the Spirit of God, not only meant wisdom and an understanding and knowledge of God, but he also grew in his profession. Like he made artistic designs. He may be the first artist. I don't even know. It's the first one I read of here, right? That he worked with his hands with gold and silver and bronze, right? To cut and set stones. I mean, he's like a mason. I mean, this guy did a number of things. And my point is, is that God sent him on a mission, right? He filled him, he sent him on a mission and it had also to do with his profession. And so, your profession is part of your mission. It isn't your only mission. Of course, you are to be good at what you do. I believe that Christians and followers of Christ should do excellent work and you should excel in that, especially since God gifted you in that way. And you should work hard at that, but that your profession isn't your only mission, but your profession can lead to the mission. What I mean by that is we are all representatives. We are all missionaries. As we just came out of, we are all ambassadors of Christ, of God. And that has to do with where you spend your 40 hours a week plus, or wherever you find yourself. Or if you're in school, as you prepare for that, that's where God has you now and God wants you to be light in that space and in that context. But let's look at the four markers of a Spirit-filled life that Colossians has for us this morning. First marker is this. Good works. Good works, and specifically good works that bear fruit. Here's the deal. We do not believe that the Scriptures teach that you and I work for our faith, but we believe in a faith that works. That faith requires action. That faith is active. That belief requires you to move towards something that you don't just believe something and sit on that and say, "Yeah, that's nice. I believe that." But that's almost like saying, "I love Italian food, but I've never had pasta." Speaking from an Italian, that doesn't make any sense, right? So, it's almost like saying, "I love the Buffalo Bills, but I've never watched a single down. I've never cheered them on." You didn't hear me say I never went through a table. I think you can be a Buffalo Bills fan and not go through a table, by the way. But the point is, is that your faith should produce good works. He says this again. I've got it on there. "So that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way, bearing fruit in every good work." That a marker, that a sign of a spiritual life, that your life is filled with the Spirit is that you have good work in your life. Jesus, in John 15 gives this idea that he is the true vine and that you and I are branches. And that if you and I would abide, you and I would abide in him, that we would do good work. Apart from him, we can do nothing. In Ephesians 2:10, it says this, "For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." That's your destiny. You have a destiny on your life. You have a calling on your life. That is why we value every human being. God says, "I've known you before you were in the womb. I knit you together and I've got good works for you to do." That's all tied to this, to Christ Jesus. Your good works are tied. And so, you can start doing good works once you know the good Son of God. But God has prepared you to do these things. So, the questions that we should ask ourselves are what kind of fruit have I been producing in my life? Let's take work, for example. When is the last time in my work context, I looked at someone and said, "You know what? I'm praying for you. I know you've had your struggles, whether it's in work or out of work, I know you've had these issues. I'm praying for you." When's the last time we've had that spiritual conversation. That God's provided these opportunities, but we can't get past that slight awkwardness to take it to that level. We're just a bit hesitant. When's the last time you and I stepped into something that beared fruit because of the good work that the Spirit is doing in and through us. Fruit is also on the inside, right? When I think of fruit and bearing fruit, I can't help, but think of the passage in Galatians, right? So, not only is fruit external. And I know sometimes us as people who wanna accomplish things and get things done, that we always look at the external, but fruit is also on the inside. Like, am I becoming more loving, more joyful? Do I exude peace in my life? Am I growing in patience? Everybody needs to grow in patience. What about kindness and goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control? These are the fruits of the Spirit. So, not only what we do for God as externally, but what we're allowing God to do inside of us that overflows because what's happening in here, always overflows to the world around us. What fruit have you been yielding lately in your life? Because good works that bear fruit are a marker, a sign of a spiritual life. The next one I have for us. And I went full pastor on you, full preacher. They're all Gs. Okay? So, the next one is growth, right? What does Paul say? I've got it right here. What does Paul say? "So that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way, bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God." Peter says this in his letter, to give us another verse. He sums up his letter to the believers. And he says this, "But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever. Amen." Grow, grow, grow. Growing in the knowledge of God. When Paul is writing to Timothy, who he's mentoring, he's setting up to be a pastor, Timothy actually helped with the letter of Colossians. He was with Paul. And Colossians when Paul was writing to Timothy, looking to mentor him, he says, not only read the Word of God, but study the Word of God, in chapter two verse 15, so that you can correctly handle the word of truth. The implication is, is you and I can have the word of truth and incorrectly handle it, right? And we've seen that. You can see it. There's examples of that, that assuming that the truth says something that it simply does not. But having the Word of God be part of your everyday life, applying and obeying it. Like I had mentioned before, I came to Jesus later on in high school. I did not have this big extensive church background. At times I struggle to tell the difference between Moses and Noah. For some reason, I always mix them up. For some reason, I thought Moses was on a boat. I don't know why. But I'm in Buff State now. I have yet to have my call to vocational ministry. But my faith is really growing. I can see that I can see some of the fruit in my life as a result of that. But I'm sitting... I went to Buff State for my undergrad. And I took almost all of the religion and philosophy classes. And so, I was sitting in a religion class. And my professor just happened to be a Franciscan priest. He starts talking about the gospels and the sources of the gospels. I won't get into it because I don't have the time. Unless you guys wanna hang out till noon and make everybody wait in the parking lot. I don't think Pastor Jerry would like that though. So, I probably shouldn't do that or you may never see me again up here. Nonetheless, he starts talking about Mark. And he's talking to him about this man named Mark. And I came to his realization. He's saying, Mark, not a disciple of Jesus. And I'm like, "Wait, no, the gospels are written by disciples." Right? And so, I'm like, "Yeah, Mark. Mark. The Gospel of Mark. This has gotta be in." So, I'm looking through and I'm looking through these names, I'm like, "Where's this Mark Guy? Like what was he doing? Like what does this mean? What is he like skipping rocks while Jesus is restoring eyeballs? Like what was this guy doing?" Right. Found out like I didn't even know who the writer of the Gospel of Mark was at that time. And I was like, "Wow, like I'm basing my life on this. Maybe I should grow a little bit in my knowledge and understand that Mark wrote from Peter's perspective." Right? So, that he wrote from a disciple's perspective, Peter's, but Mark wrote it down, John. Mark was the guy who wrote it down. So, I realized I needed to continue to grow in my knowledge of God, which is found in the Word of God. But here's the deal, healthy things grow. Do they not? Healthy things grow. My wife loves gardens. She loves flowers. It's one of the many differences between her and I. We are not the same person. See, because I don't really understand it. It's like you see someone calm and give someone a bouquet of flowers and it's supposed to be a sign of my love. I mean, it doesn't last very long. So, like what is that? Like what's the message here? Like, "Hey, here's the sign of my love, a dozen roses." Or, "Here's a sign my love, like a dozen tulips." And then like few days later, they start to smell bad. Like they really start to smell bad if you put them like in a vase or whatnot, right? But my wife, she loves flowers. We've got gardens. And here's the deal, healthy things grow. Do they not? We've got hostas and hydrangeas, I think. I dunno, these purples and whatever we have them. She loves them. I'm like, "Yeah, they're cool. It's just, ain't gonna last very long. Deer's gonna munch on them. Sorry. I'm just glad we're feeding animals." So, here's the deal, though, healthy things grow. Do they not? If you do a vegetable garden, healthy things grow, right? It serves its purpose when you can take tomatoes and cucumbers and whatnot from that at harvest time. The same with your relationship with God, healthy things grow.

Healthy relationships grow. Do they not? Right? You grow in knowing one another, right? Whether you start on your first date, you know that person better years later, years into marriage. Healthy relationships grow in the knowledge of one another. You ask someone if they're a good spouse or a good husband, it's because they know their partner. They understand things about them and they know how to demonstrate love and kindness to one another. Healthy relationships grow. Here's the thing, you continue to grow in Christ. You don't just give your life to Christ when you're a child, or when you're a teenager like myself, or in your 20s, 30s, 40s, or whatever, you don't just give your life to Christ and then just move on. You don't just have this one little spiritual moment, this one confession, and then go, right? Just like in my back yard, I wouldn't plant, right? I wouldn't plant lemon trees and then go look for lemon somewhere else. I would look for the lemons where I planted them. You don't grow out of Christ. You grow in Christ and you continue to grow in your knowledge of him. In the 16th century, William Tyndale, he is the reason we have the Bible in English. And he was thrown in prison for it. And so, at the Vilvoorde Castle in Belgium, his one letter we have, he writes asking for a few things. He says, he writes and asks for some warm clothes because he says he's freezing. And he asks for his Hebrew Bible, his Hebrew grammar, and Hebrew lexicon so that he can simply study. That was William Tyndale. I asked questions of myself, of if I was stranded what the first thing I would ask for is different things, different tools, so I could study the Word of God. That's the place Tyndale put the Word of God in his life. That's the priority he put in his life. The question is, does the Word have its proper place in your life and in my life? Now, here's the deal. We, as a church, we're committed to help in that, right? So, we have Sunday morning services where we look in and dive into the Word of God, right? We teach the Word of God. We also have a number of classes, discipleship classes, how to grow foundations. We also have community groups that are centered around the Word of God and what is taught to expand that out, to expand application. So, we, as a church are committed to these things for you. And we pray that you would use them and engage in them. But on top of that, we would also pray that you would know how to grow in the knowledge of God, yourself. That you would take the time to get into the Word of God, to hear what the Spirit has for you, because the Word of God is alive and active. It's sharper than any two-edged sword. You don't just read the Bible. The Bible reads you. It'd be very different if every Sunday we came here together and we just looked at a novel series and a graphic novel series, like which would be kind of weird, right? If every week we just came, we read like a chapter of "The Lord of the Rings," like no one's life is being changed if we do that. I might be like, "Wow, that's kinda cool." Or like, "Wow, that's really nerdy." Either way, there's just something different about the Word of God. And it claims that authority. It claims to have authority over your life and my life. The question is, will we give it that authority? And we have to give someone or something authority. We all worship someone or something. I believe we're all worshipers. So, the question is, do we worship Jesus? And the Word that is given to us that is a vehicle for you and I to hear from God and to grow from God. All right, four markers of a Spirit-filled life. Here's marker number three, a great endurance. A great endurance and patience specifically. Paul says this. "Being strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience." My friend, my coworker, he leads our middle school right now at SHiNE or high school, Jeremy. He's back in seminary getting his master's in divinity. And so, one of our lunches, he was showing me his index cards of his Greek words. He's taking Greek right now. And so, I was looking at that. And so, then that made me feel a little confident, a little comfortable as I was studying for this message. So, here's the deal. I kinda struggled a bit with English. So, for me to tackle Greek, that's just kind of a big feat. So, here we go. Endurance, the Greek word for endurance here is hupomone. Hupomone, which literally means to abide under or to withstand great weight, right? So, this level of endurance can withstand weight of the world. And so, as I'm studying this, all I could think of is I can withstand the weight of the world because I know who has the world in the palm of his hands, right? And that's me growing. That's not naturally. I'm not naturally bent towards that, but I understand that. And I can withstand the weight of the world because I know who has the world in the palm of his hands. The next word is patience. Makrothumia. Makro, almost think of macro. That means a long time. And thumia, think thermometer. Heat. I can withstand the heat for a long time. I can take the heat in the kitchen. I think back to my days back in the day, right? When we only had flip phones and you had to text with T9 words. And some of you still don't even know what that is. And that's long gone, which is mildly hilarious to me. "SportsCenter" used to be where I would get my sports information, right? Now it's like Twitter. You can just pretty much find it really quick instead of having to wait for the top 10 plays or whatever. But when I was younger, like "SportsCenter" was the thing. And I just remember when I think it, I just remember this thing they had that was just like called The Hot Seat, that they would put somebody on this seat and they would just grill them for, I don't know, a few minutes. And they called it the something hot seat. Hot seat was probably sponsored by like a beer company or something like that or whatever. But that's what I thought of is with God, you can withstand the heat. You can sit on the hot seat because again, because of the Spirit that dwells inside of you, I thought of first century Christians, right? They didn't fit in very well in the Roman empire when we're talking about post-Jesus. The next few generations. The next few generations that had to carry the gospel. And so, the ones that loved God under the rule of Nero really, really suffered persecution. Nero was crazy. He was nuts. And one of the things he would do is he would ignite Christians on fire and use them as torches when he had his massive parties. It's disgusting, right? I mean, that's insane. But here's one of the things that Christians were known for in that day. It's praising God as they were persecuted, singing praises, not condemning or cussing out or cursing those that hurt them and harm them. But instead, they just focused on their king. They focused on their Savior, and they just praised him. And that made an impact in the world around them. That made an impact in the Roman empire. Just before service, we spent some time praying together. And one of my brothers that's in the room right now, prayed this verse out, which I thought was so fitting. But I can't help, but think of a verse that might be common for many of us. But nonetheless, the truth is so incredible. But Isaiah 40:31 says, "But those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength." See, your strength needs to be renewed. You will run out of strength. "Will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles, they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint." They have this great endurance and patience. When the world around them is crumbling, when life is tough, when it seems like nothing is going their way, they demonstrate the reality of Jesus in their lives. They are filled with the Spirit and they show and demonstrate this great endurance and patience when life and circumstances are just plain awful. What do the people in our lives see? Do they see the Spirit manifest itself in such a way? Like they look at us and go, how were they handling this so well, that it almost seems supernatural? Because it is. It's the Spirit of God that does that in the life of the believer who is full, who lives in the fullness of all that Christ in the Spirit has for us. I wanna be that church. I believe our world needs that church. I believe our world needs that more than ever. Last one. Last G for us. Gratitude. Gratitude. What does he say? It says this, "And giving joyful thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light." Giving joyful thanks, right? 1 Thessalonians 5:16 says literally that this is the will of God. That the will of God is that you and I are thankful in all circumstances. So, questions for us to ask, is does our life explode with thankfulness? Does our life explode with thankfulness? Do we show gratitude in our lives? Here's something that wars against you and it wars against me, is a spirit of entitlement. That you and I, we become coheirs in Christ. That you and I get this, we fall into this trap of entitlement. And especially those of us who are really good at being religious, right? I've done A, B, C, and D. I know so many other people didn't do those things. Or I didn't do A, B, C, or D. I know all these people that did. Therefore I'm owed. Therefore I earned something. And again, that is not the gospel. The gospel is your good works, my good works are like filthy rags in the sight of a pure and holy God. But gratitude fights against a spirit of entitlement. And entitlement typically leads to anger. Anger and bitterness towards God or towards God's people or towards God's creation. That's what entitlement does. That you get mad at God and say, "God, I've done this and this. Why have I not received this?" Or you get mad at those around you. Or you become that person, the one who constantly complains. You become that person who's always known as complaining about something or about someone. Gratitude fixes that. Gratitude is the remedy. Being a grateful person, the grateful person remembers all they have in Christ. All they have in Christ. As I had mentioned before, all they have. Paul expounds on this, expands on this later on in Colossians two. He says, "So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as your Lord, continue to live your lives in him." No next one. Oh, it's cut off. All right. I'm gonna read it then from my Bible just because. It's so good. It says this, "So then, just as you receive Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith, as you were taught, overflowing with thankfulness." Overflowing with thankfulness. Just as you receive Christ, you received that Spirit. And as a result of that, your life overflows with thankfulness, because of all that you have. All that you have. A grateful person remembers all they have in Christ. So, as we wrap up our time here, markers of a Spirit-filled life are those that have good work that bear fruit, those that grow in Jesus, that have a great endurance and have a gratitude, a thankfulness. And so, I wanna be a Spirit-filled person. I wanna be a Spirit-filled church. And so, my statement for us this morning is really quite simple. And it says a Spirit-filled church starts with the Spirit-filled person. It doesn't just start with a Spirit-filled pastor. It doesn't just start with a Spirit-filled worship leader. A Spirit-filled church includes you and includes me as the body of believers. And if we are to be a Spirit-filled church that is a light to the world, that is a source of God's hope and truth and life, then you and I, so, my question as you leave today is to just look at your life, do an inventory, look at the markers in your life, press your life up against the truth of Scripture, and then go wherever God's leading you. He's looking to push you towards something. And so, just go. Grow and go wherever God leads you. Let's close our time in a word of prayer, if you would, please. With our heads bowed and our eyes closed. Thank you so very much for your kindness and your attention. My prayer is that you wouldn't have heard just from me, my prayer is that God's Spirit was with us this morning. That it was resting on us, it was resting on me, and that you heard from the living God. I would just pray that wherever you find yourself, whatever your current circumstances are, that you would sense the presence of God in your life. If you're new, or this is the first time you've come, or first time you've listened in a long time, just know that God has arranged the details of your life to have you here so that he could speak to you. That's far beyond anything I would know or understand. But if God arranged the details of your life to be here, it is my prayer that you heard and sensed a clear message from him. And for the rest of us, I wanna pray together as a church to ask God, to fill us with his Spirit. That we will live in fullness of his Spirit. So, with heads bowed, eyes closed, I'm just gonna ask whoever feels comfortable, or whoever's in that place, they're gonna ask God for that, they wanna pray that prayer with me, would you just open up your hands in front of you. You don't have to do it big. This isn't about anybody else. This is about you and God. But sometimes you and I were too busy holding onto other things, that our hands aren't open to be filled by God. So, I just wanna ask us as a church to say this prayer. God, fill us with your Spirit. Help us to live in the fullness of your Spirit. That we would be a people that would demonstrate to the world around us that Jesus Christ is king. The king who died on the cross for humanity, the king who paid the price for sin so that people would have an eternal life, so that people would have hope in him. God, fill us with your Spirit as we walk our everyday lives. God, continue to build us up as a people so that we can make a difference in our city, in our communities, in this world. I pray all of these things in Jesus' name. Amen.


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Subject: Standalone: September 5, 2021

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