Life.Church with Craig Groeschel - You’re Uniquely Created to Make a Difference | Book Club: Part 4

Episode Date: June 26, 2022

When Jesus came to earth, He didn't just disrupt the status quo, He radically transformed people's lives. You were created for a purpose—to break down barriers and build relationships just like Jesus. We'll learn how to make a lasting difference in this message. ABOUT THIS MESSAGENo one has all the answers. That’s why we need a variety of voices to help us grow. During our new series, Book Club, we’ll get fresh perspectives on identity, relationships, anxiety, and more from people who have been there and wrote the book on it.  WE’RE OPENWe’re continuing to monitor guidelines and best practices for gathering in a safe way. Learn more about everything we're doing to keep you safe and how you can help by using hand sanitizer, washing your hands often, and more: https://www.life.church/updatesFind a time and attend a service with us: http://www.life.church/locationsNEXT STEPSHave you made a decision to follow Jesus? You may be wondering what’s next on your journey. We want to help! Let us guide you to your next steps in your walk with Christ: https://www.life.church/nextABOUT LIFE.CHURCHWherever you are in life, you have a purpose. Life.Church wants to help you find your next step. Our hope is that your journey will include joining us at a Life.Church location throughout the United States or globally online at https://www.live.life.church. Find locations, videos, and more info about us at https://www.life.church or download the Life.Church app at https://www.life.church/app. FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIAFacebook: http://www.facebook.com/life.churchInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/life.churchTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/lifechurchTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lifechurchCONNECT WITH PASTOR CRAIGYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIId...Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/craiggroeschelInstagram: http://www.instagram.com/craiggroeschelTwitter: http://www.twitter.com/craiggroeschelTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@craiggroeschel#lifechurch #craiggroeschel #createdforapurpose Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I want to take you to the book of Acts chapter number 17. I wrote this book called Upset the World. I actually got the title from the Bible, and I want to read you the context, and then we'll pray and we'll just go wherever the Holy Spirit tells us to go. Is that all right? Acts chapter number 17, verses 1 through 9, here's what it says. Paul and Silas then traveled through the towns of amphipolis and Apollonia. I want to go to Apollonia and came to Thessalonica where there was a Jewish synagogue.

As was Paul's custom, he went to the synagogue service, and for three Sabbaths in a row, he used the scriptures to reason with the people. He explained the prophecies and proved that the Messiah must suffer and rise from the dead. He said, this Jesus I'm telling you about is the Messiah. Some of the Jews who listened were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with many God-faring Greek men and quite a few prominent. women. But some of the Jews were jealous, so they gathered some troublemakers from the marketplace to form a mob and started a riot. They attacked the home of Jason, searching for Paul and Silas so they could drag them out to the crowd. Not finding them there, they dragged out Jason and some of the other believers instead and took them before the city council. Paul and Silas have caused

trouble all over the world. They shouted. Which is why I shouted. Because when you read the Bible, you should read it the way that they wrote it. And they said they shouted. So I shouted. And it felt good. And it relieved some nervous energy. So I'm going to say it again.

They shouted. And now they're here disturbing our city too. And Jason has welcomed them into his home. They are all guilty of treason against Caesar, for they profess allegiance to another king named Jesus. The people of the city, as well as the city council, were thrown into turmoil by these reports. So the officials forced Jason and the other believers to postpone, dang, and then they released them. I just find this fascinating. And as we get into it, I just want to pray, and then we'll just see where the Holy Spirit takes us.

Is that all right? Let's pray real quick, shall we? Holy Spirit upset us. Amen. Still do the whole prayer. I pray quick. I'm the one you went over for Thanksgiving dinner. You'll literally eat it while it's hot.

Before I get into my points, I have to give you why this message is such a burden for me, why I was so compelled to write the book, and why I believe that the Bible is the most upsetting book that's ever been written. Jesus had the most upsetting life that's ever been lived. And for the last 2,000 years, he's been upsetting people through other people, which means we must be upsetters ourselves. On January 14th of 1996, I gave my life to Jesus Christ. I was sitting at the back row of my parents' church,

my parents' pastor to church for 15 years faithfully. It never got over 100 people, but they were faithful to the people that God calls them the shepherd. I was a rapper at the time. I was a battle rapper in L.A. It was this close to signing a deal that got me on with death row and snoop dog and Dr. Dre and Tupac. Obviously, God had other plans. I missed a bullet.

Dodged a bullet, literally. And so now I've been able to preach the Lord, preach about Jesus for the last 26 years. But on that day, on that back row, on January 14th of 1996, I had the most upsetting moment that has ever happened in my entire life. To give you a comparative analysis, I have had other things. that has happened in my life that were disturbing. At the age of eight years old, I was sexually abused by a neighbor

that lived across the street for me for a six-month period of time. At 12 years old, I was exposed to pornography, and by 19, I was a full-blown porn addict. These are all things that are disturbing, all things that are traumatizing, all things that are absolutely devastating and debilitating to a young child that is growing up.

I lost my brother subsequently as I was older on September 17th of 2004 to a car accident. He was killed instantly. I have had some traumatic experience happened in my life. I've had some devastating moments happen in my life. And none of them have been more upsetting than January 14th of 1996. Because on that day, on the back row of that church, I literally had my life turned a Up, side, down. Which by definition is all upset really means.

It's amazing to me how American culture and colloquialisms can turn a word that means something so literal and turn it into something so vitriol. That rhymes, and I should be applauded for that. I'm just kidding. Oh, I love y'all over there. These people over here love rap. They love rap. Upset simply means to be turned upside. down. Does not mean to be made angry. Does not mean to cause contention. It literally means to

turn over. And on January 14th of 1996, sitting on the back row of my parents' church, I had the most upsetting moment that's ever happened in my life. The Holy Spirit, while praise and worship was going on, the Holy Spirit said, you're a sinner. This was the most Matter of fact statement I had ever heard in my entire life, there was no condemnation with this statement. It was like pointing out you have mustard on your blouse. He was just like, you're a sinner. And as soon as he said it, I was made aware of it. I have never been more aware of anything in my whole life.

I'm a P.K. kid. I've heard every single sermon, and I went straight to the clubs after that. None of them settled in. But on this day with no sermon being preached and no altar call being given on the back row, I hear the Holy Spirit say, you are a sinner. And the moment he said it, the moment I realized that I was disconnected from a relationship with God. Now, this is a Pentecostal church, y'all. And so I hear this word at the beginning of service.

Sunday school had just ended, praise and worship had just started. And I am aware that I am a sinner and I need a savior and I need to. to confess Jesus, but I'm in a Pentecostal church, so this means that I'm at least three and a half hours away from a moment. I'm legit over under about three and a half hours away from being able to stand up and confess that I need Jesus as my personal Lord and Savior. And I could not wait that long, so you know what I did. They had this moment.

If anybody has ever been in a Pentecostal church, charismatic church, There's a moment that they have and some of the churches called testimony service. And I don't know why they sanctioned testimony service but anybody can get up and you don't know what you're going to get.

But people can just pop up and just be like first giving honor to God who is the head of my life to the reverend, the saints, the bishop and all the saints and the friends. I just want to tell you what God has done for me and somebody would get up and testify of how faithful God has been

and five people got up before me and I'm standing in the back. my dad's officiating the service and he's going you go you go you go and I'm just standing in the back waiting for my turn I'm like hurry and on this day not everybody had a testimony some people had complaints that masqueraded as testimonies if you've ever been in that type of service you know like you just need to sit down I don't know if you know but this is this is not a testimony lady you just complaining And then my dad looked and he goes, I think Tim has something to say, which was a shock. Because I wasn't the P.K. that also sang in the choir. They knew I was in the club the night before. And they said, I think Tim has something to say. And you know when you're in a small church, everybody's nosy?

So I got this number. Say what? And I said three words. I give up. And it was a side. silent then as it is now, because everybody wanted to know, give up what? And I said, I need to give my life to Jesus right now. With no sermon preached, no altar call given, I gave my life to Jesus. And I've been upset ever since. I preached my first sermon five weeks later, February 25th. of 1996. You have no idea how happy I am that nobody has that sermon. You have no idea how happy I am YouTube did not exist because I did not even know what I was talking about, but they were kind

enough to let me finish the sermon anyway. But God would use the gift of communicating and preaching to literally pull me out of so many things that I was bound to. And I realized that being upset that wasn't enough, I also had to live upset and spend my life upsetting others. So these are the points that I want to give you today. How many nerds do we have in the building? You love taking notes. You just like, come on, raise your hand real, real high. If you're a nerd, you should be proud of it because nerds rule the world.

Keep your hand up. Keep your hand up. Real high, real high, real high, keep it up, keep it up for just a moment. Now look on your row. Look at everybody that has not raised their hand because they will work for you one day. nerds literally rule the entire world. If there's anything that's good in the world, a nerd is behind it.

So take notes, and if you're not a note taker, take notes anyway. Point number one, I have three points. Here's the first point. Upsetters are attractive. This is the first thing I want you to know about upsetters. They are absolutely attractive. I'm not talking about their physical procreitude.

Big word, it's in the dictionary. Look it up. I'm not talking about. about procritude as much as I am talking about the power that the Holy Spirit puts on the inside of them to declare that Jesus is Lord. Let me read for you again, Acts chapter number 17, verses 3 and 4. He explained, this is Paul, he explained the prophecies and proved that the Messiah must suffer and rise from the dead. He said, this Jesus I'm telling you about is the Messiah. Some of the Jews who listened were persuaded and joined

Paul and Silas, along with many God-fearing Greek men and quite a few prominent women. Here's one thing I want you to know, and if you get the book and read it, you will find this out. Upsetters are absolutely attractive, and it has nothing to do with your externals and everything to do with the eternal that's on the internal in you. It is the Holy Spirit. It is Christ, the hope of glory that is on the inside of you that makes you a true. to people. When you give your life to Jesus, something changes on the inside of you

and other people notice and they will start to be attracted to you in ways that you probably didn't even want them to be drawn to you by. I am an introvert. I know you don't believe it, but I am team introvert. Introversion doesn't mean that you don't like people.

It just means they drain you. Y'all are draining me right now. They have ordered me a wheelchair to wheel me back out to my car after. Because when I'm in front of people, I get drained. When I'm alone, that's when I recharge. That's all introversion means. It's how do you recharge? Some people charge in front with a lot of people around.

That's extroversion. I'm an introvert. When I get back to my hotel room, it's quiet. And my kids aren't there. I've never felt Jesus like I feel when I'm by myself. Do you think Jesus cared about my personality before he called me? The moment he got on the inside of me,

he said, I'm going to attract people to you and I don't care if they drain you. It's the cruelest joke of all time. I should work in IT in a church. I should not be in front of people. My anointing is to be an accountant. I want to work with numbers. Not people that want to talk about numbers.

But when he calls you, your personality is not taking into consideration. He doesn't care if you're quiet. He doesn't care if you're loud. He doesn't care if you're extrovert. He doesn't care if you really love to be around people. He doesn't care if you really love to be alone. When he calls you, he makes you attractive because there are people that need Jesus through you. There are people in this room that you will reach, that I will.

never reach. There are people in this room that God will send to you to reach that Pastor Craig will never reach. The Holy Spirit needs his spirit in you and your personality to reach the people that are just like you. If you are a book nerd, he will send you book people. If you are a quiet person, he will send you quiet people. If you are a gamer, he will send you gamer people. If you are a golfer, he will send you golfer people. If you're a nerd, he'll send you nerds. If you're dumb, he'll send you dummies. It doesn't matter what your vibe is.

He needs you. I just need to say that again. He needs you. I'm going to say something to you that is going to be so sobering, but I hope it's encouraging to you at the same time. do you not know that the Holy Spirit in you only has you for the time that you're alive to reach people through your personality expression in a way that he's never had prior to you in human history and will never have after you go back to be with him forever?

Which means for the time you're here, the worst thing you could do is rob us of You. We don't need the cheap imitation you. We don't need you to be a copycat of anybody else. We need the Holy Spirit through you because it's the attraction through you that reaches people. Paul is on record in Scripture as saying that I'm not the best speaker. Like, his preaching shouldn't have worked. He was not the guy that was on the circuit that's like, we can't wait to hear Paul. No, they said that about Apollos. They never said it about Paul. Paul priested message one time, and a guy got so bored and tired, he fell asleep, fell out of the window, and broke his neck.

Paul stopped the sermon, walked over to him, and was like, in Jesus name, get up. And the dude got back up. I'm pretty sure he was like, Paul, you should have left me dead, fam. I was with Jesus, why did you bring me back here to, I was trying to get out of your sermon, you brought me back into it, and you still ain't done? The Holy Spirit makes you attractive. The power of God on the inside of you is supposed to upset others, and upsetters are attractive. Point number two, please write this down.

Upsetters are distractive. Upsetters are distracted They're attractive and distractive People will be drawn to you And some people are going to be drawn away from you In consecutive scriptures You have people that were like

Oh my goodness this message is compelling I got to have it And in the next verse it's like yeah We don't like this guy at all And if you really live for Jesus right You're going to have both Here's what it says But some of the Jews were jealous

so they gather some troublemakers from the marketplace to form a mob and start a riot. Wow. They attacked the home of Jason, searching for Paul and Silas so they could drag them out to the crowd. Upsetters are both attractive and distractive. I've been preaching for 26 years, and I've gone some places, and I've had people love what I've had to say, and I've had some people hate what I've had to say. I appreciate the church in Australia a few years ago, and afterwards all these people lined up to say thank you,

and they were blessed, and all these people came to Jesus. We had a massive altar call. It was awesome. And there was a group that I noticed that was allowing everybody to go first before they wanted to come up and talk. It was about eight of them. And when you got so many people lined up saying,

great message, great message, great message, you can get encouraged. And so I was so encouraged. And I'm like, oh my goodness. And so this group that had eight people, they waited to the end. I'm like, wow, they must have, they must want to say it in unison. Maybe they wrote a song about how great my sermon was. I have no idea how they wanted to do this, but let's hear it.

And so I go over there and the ringleader, the guy's arms was folded like this. And I was like, hey, guys. Do you like the sermon? No. As a matter of fact, I don't even think you were in the Bible. I don't even think your message. was Theologically correct. As a matter of fact, I doubt the validity of the people

that just gave their life to Jesus. Because I don't know if I just heard a sermon or if I was at a comedy show. I was like, oh, well, I can see that y'all didn't like the message that much. And I said, well, it sounds like you're really passionate about Scripture, as am I. But it seems like we don't agree on the delivery.

I feel like I did what I was supposed to do and this guy said no because you didn't preach against sin and I was like I'm sorry what? He said yeah you didn't like tell them about their sins I'm like do you know how many there are and like if I was to read like the screen credits of every sin how could I ever get to the good news at the end of it he was way smarter than me

so he quoted like four chapters from memory Then at the end I just said, hey, the enemy would love to cause division. Can we just pray? And this dude refused to even unfold his hands to pray. To which everybody else in his group was like, dude, we can't be that petty. I'm praying. Here's the thing. I didn't walk out of the room thinking to myself, oh, my goodness, the whole day is ruined

because these eight people didn't like my message. when you preach through the word that God has given you, understand that some people will like it and some people will hate it. It is not your job to grade it. It is your job to declare it. And at the end of the day, the Holy Spirit will do exactly what he will do to get people into his kingdom.

We post our stuff on Instagram and social media. I have a team that does that, and we get all kind of reckless stuff in the comments. People are like, yay, that was a great sermon. Somebody else is like, you are the worst preacher I've ever heard. Click my YouTube link for the breakdown of how horrible Tim's message is. They have way more time than I do. By the time they're editing the video to talk about how terrible I was,

I've just won three matches of 2K-22 NBA. Y'all thought I was reading the Bible again. I have to have a break. So, upsetters are attractive. And upsetters are distracted. Point number three, please write this down. Upsetters are upsetting. I know that sounds redundant.

But upsetters are upsetting. Here's what this angry mob says about Paul, Silas, Jason, and everybody else. Not finding them there. They dragged out Jason and some of the other believers instead of instead and took them before the city council. Paul and Silas have caused trouble all over the world. They shouted. And now they are here disturbing our city too.

They were like spazzed out. And what's amazing about this, they caused trouble all over the world. In the Greek, it literally means that they've literally turned the city upside down. It's literally what they said. They've turned the city upside down. They've caused trouble all over the world. Now they're here disturbing our city. too. I'm a literalist, so I hear everything literally. It drives my family crazy.

My wife will say, hey, babe, I'm about to run to the store, and I'm like, the car. She's like, you know what I meant. I'm like, I'm so sorry, but you said, you said run, and I'm like, the car. Anyway, this angry mob says something that is wildly outlandish and not true, and at the same time, absolutely prophetic. They said they've caused trouble all over the world, which they hadn't. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the uttermost parts of the earth, they got to Asia minor. But the whole world, they hadn't reached the whole world. So it was exaggerative on one end and wildly prophetic on the other. Like they had no idea that they were being this prophetic when they said what they said. Because here it is, 2,000 years later, and what that angry

Jewish mob said is actually still happening. It's the reason why there is a representation of God in Edmund. There's a reason why there's a representation of God in Texas. There's a reason why there's a representation of God all over the world because we are still following the same blueprint of Paul and Silas and preaching the gospel of Jesus everywhere we go. The gospel is literally still going all over the world. And oh my goodness, now you'd have made it to our city too. How did you get here? Who let you here? The Holy Spirit didn't let us here. He unleashed us. Here. Do you not know that you are supposed to be the greatest upsetter in your community? That some of you all have prayed for your neighbors to have an experience with Jesus.

And Jesus's response to you is, then go over there. God, please fix them because they're crazy. and he's like, as soon as you knock on the door and say hi, I can upset their world. And upsetters have such a beautiful opportunity to do this every single day. I get to upset people every single day with the way that I live my life. And sometimes I get to follow it with words. So every day I'm just waiting for the Holy Spirit to nudge and say, buy her coffee.

Say hi to that guy. Hey, I know that's a complete stranger. Give them a hug. encourage that person. I have a word of encouragement that I want you to give to me. I'm like, they're going to think I'm weird. Anybody's beside me, you get a prompting from the Lord to do something in your life? You argue for like eight minutes, like. If it's really you, give me a good sign.

Give me a sign. Give me a sign. Give me a sign. Let a bird fly past my car and then I'll do it. Like, we do all these random things. He's just sitting up there like, oh, why am I negotiating with you? I'm a Lord. Supposed to do what I say when I say it. But we are supposed to be upsetting. Those that have had their lives overturned should spend their lives overturning. It's not a one and done deal, and it's not just for preachers, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers.

It's for every single one of us who is a believer in Jesus Christ. Who will you upset? Who have you been assigned to turn upside down with the message, love, and love? hope of Jesus Christ. It might be your mom, it might be your dad, it might be your siblings, cousins, neighbors, friends, foes. You never know who he wants to use you to reach. But I promise you, if you dare to do it, your life will become more exciting than you've ever thought possible. will literally get out of the bed every morning going, Who do I get to get to die?

For you to show me. It's so much better to live life as an upsetter. Would you buy your heads and close your eyes? What is God speaking to you through this message? What might he be saying to you today? My hope and my prayer is that through this message, through this book, you have the opportunity to see God and you partner together to turn the entire world upside down with the message, love, and hope of Jesus Christ.

Jesus, let it be so for all of us, for your glory, and none of our credit in Jesus' name. Amen. I love you guys. Bye. Let's go. Let's tell Pastor Tim, thank you. And let's just continue on in that spirit of prayer. Father, thank you that you're stirring within us. And God, we believe that you want to call us with all of our different personalities to serve you by serving people and upsetting this world as you're praying today without looking around. I wonder how many of you would say I am a follower of Jesus, but yet I haven't been very upsetting lately. In other words, I haven't really been making the kind of difference that I know that God would like to empower me to make. And I want to be open. I'm

available. I'm ready. I'm watching. I want God to use me. If that's you, would you lift up your hands right now, just all of our different churches. You can type it in the chat. I want God to use me. Father, thank you that you're working even right now. And God, I've blown away by the thought that now is the only time in history that you have to use these people, this short window, through their unique and specific gifts to glorify you and to reach people with your love, your message of hope through Jesus. So, Father, we make ourselves completely available. We are interruptible. I pray God that even today, if we're in a church building, that maybe we couldn't even leave without stopping to be available to you to reach out to someone, to be a blessing to someone, to give a word of encouragement, to take someone to lunch, invite them to a life group to pray for somebody. God, even for those online in a chat right now, I pray that they might even see a need and be a blessing to someone.

God, all through the days of our life, we ask that your Holy Spirit would just nudge us. and we'd recognize those promptings. God, make us attractive, the Holy Spirit in us, to draw people to you. And God, even if we distract, if there are those that don't know you and don't handle a message, God, we pray the only way that would be offensive is by preaching the offensive message of the cross,

that our sins would be offended, but we'd be drawn to Jesus for His grace. And God, we ask that all of us would be upsetting in this world, turning the world over, away from sin, away from darkness, into the light and into your love and your kingdom. God, use us, we pray. As you keep praying at all of our churches, there are some of you that recognize, just like Tim said, at the back of a church, he recognized his need for Jesus, and his whole life was turned over.

This is the goodness of God. When you recognize, just like the Holy Spirit said to him, you're a sinner, it sounds kind of harsh in our culture today, but when you're really honest, you recognize we've all done things that we're ashamed of. We've sinned and we've fallen short of God's standard. The good news is that God doesn't leave us dead in our sins, but he's loved and why we were still sinning, even when we didn't know him. Jesus gave his life for us. Who is Jesus, the son of God, the sinless son of God, the perfect one, who shed his blood

as the innocent sacrifice so our sins could be forgiven? And today, wherever you're watching from there, are those of you, and it's not because of my words or Tim words, it's just because of the power of the Holy Spirit. You're being drawn right now to God. And you know, it's your time to say, I give up. I can't do it anymore. Jesus, I give my life to you.

Would you forgive me? Would you make me new today? Wherever you're watching from, those of you, you need his forgiveness. And not just as forgiveness, but you want his joy. You want his life. You step away from your old life. You step toward him. And it's just, it's just,

surrender, Jesus, save me when you cry out to him, his name, as powerful is the name above every name. He will forgive you. All of your sins gone. He makes you brand new. He fills you with his spirit. You'll never be the same. Wherever you're watching from today, those who say, yes, I need it. I'm ready. I step away from my sin. I step toward Jesus. Today, by faith, I give my life to him. That's your prayer. Would you lift your hands high right now, all of our churches? Could somebody say, thank you, God, to those today who are coming to faith in Christ. lift up your hands. Those of you online, you can just type it in the chat.

I'm giving my life to Jesus. We're all going to pray together, just wherever you are. Just pray aloud. Pray Heavenly Father, I give up. I give my life to you. Jesus be first.

My Savior, the Lord of my life. Forgive my sins. Fill me with your spirit. So I can be an upsetter. so I can know you and show your love. Thank you for new life. I give you all of mine. In Jesus' name, I pray.

Can somebody celebrate right now? Let's give God thanks and praise for His goodness and new life in Christ.