The Church of Eleven22 - The Word of God: Unwrapping Christmas - Wk 5

Episode Date: December 31, 2023

In order to live according to the Word, you have to read the Word. - The Church of Eleven22™ is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. Eleven22 is led by Pastor Joby Martin and based in Jacksonville, Florida, with multiple campuses throughout Jacksonville and the surrounding areas. To support The Church of Eleven22 and help us continue to reach people around the world, visit https://www.coe22.com/donate

Amen. Would you all stand for the reading of God's word? I'm going to pick up in Luke chapter 2, verse 21, where we left off on Christmas Eve. It says, and at the end of the eight day, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. When the time came for their purification, according to the law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord. as it is written in the law of the Lord, every male who first opens the womb

shall be called holy to the Lord. And to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtle doves or two young pigeons. Now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel,

and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ. And he came in the spirit into the temple, and when the parents brought the child Jesus to do for him according to the custom of the law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said,

Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation, that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for the revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel, and his father and mother marveled at what was said about him. And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary's mother,

behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed, and a sword will pierce through your own soul also, so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed. And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Finyel, the tribe of Asher, She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was 84. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer, night and day.

Coming up at that very hour, she began to give thanks to God and speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem. And when they had performed everything according to the law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee. to their own town of Nazareth, and the child grew and became strong, filled with wisdom, and the favor of God was upon him. May the Lord add blessing to the reading of His word. Amen.

Amen, you can be seated. I don't know if you caught it, but six times in this passage, it says something like according to the word or as it was written, that Mary and Joseph, Simeon, Anna, they were all living according to the Word of God. Now, I was thinking it's New Year's Eve and maybe some of you all have made New Year's resolutions

and I hate to bust your bubble, but 50% of you won't even make it to the end of January on your goals in New Year's resolutions. 9% of you won't keep them, will only be 9% of you that will keep them at all. So I just had the idea. What if we just got rid of New Year's resolutions and New Year's goals? And we just, we kind of became people like Simeon who said, Lord, I want to live according to your word. And what if the banner over 2024 for us was that we would say,

Lord, according to your word. Whatever you want to do, I want to live according to your word. Now to do that, something very important is required. To live according to God's Word, you have to actually read God's Word. And so what I want to do is I want to give you 24 reasons for 2024 that we should read God's Word. We'll give you 24 reasons why I need to read the Bible. Okay, so buckle up, here we go. I need to read the Bible because the Bible is inspired by God himself.

In 2 Timothy 316, it says all scripture, not some, not the parts we like, not the easy ones, all scripture is God breathed or breathed out by God. What he's saying, what Timothy says, hey, it is not just that the authors were inspired, but the scripture itself is inspired. And I need to read it because this is God's word to us inspired by God. I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible is the truth, capital T, truth. John 1717 says, Jesus says, sanctify them in the truth. Your word is truth.

And because the word is inspired by God, it is infallible and in error. It is without error. And we live in such a relativistic time that we need something objective to cut through all of that. And we live in such an ever-changing world that we need something that is timeless

so that it will become timely for all of us. Now listen, I know when I say the Bible is the truth, there's some pushback that you may give and you'd be like, well, Adam, I don't really want to read the Bible because I don't really believe the Bible is the truth. And I would say, that's fine. You don't read things that you believe, you read things that you don't believe are true all the time. See Instagram. And so don't read it just because you believe it's true. Read it until you believe it's true. So I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible, number three, is God's self-revelation. Romans chapter 1 and verse 19 says that there is a general revelation of a God out there.

That you can go out and watch a sunrise at a beach or go and see the fog roll in over the mountains somewhere and you can look and there is enough there to hold us accountable to knowing there is a God. But that general revelation is not enough, it's not specific enough to tell us. us about who that God is. And what God has done by giving us his word is he has said, here specifically is who I am. I want to reveal to you who I am. Now listen, if I'm just left up to myself in that sort of general revelation of God, I will fashion and form God into my own image. And so what I need is for God to tell me who he is so that I can be formed in his image.

That here's the thing about all this is, is how good is God? Think about this. How good is God? That he wouldn't leave us to sort of fumble around in the dark to try to figure out who he is. But he would come and say, let me tell you who I am. Let me show you who I am. So I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible, number four, it works in real life and faith.

It works. 2 Timothy 316 that we just read in 17 says this. All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable or useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Colossians 316 says, let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom. Jesus said in Matthew 724, everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. These words work in real life and real faith.

In fact, there was a study done, and a guy named Jeff Martin wrote an article in 2021 about this study that was done by Dr. Arnold Cole and Dr. Pamela Avigo at the Center for Bible Engagement. And what they did was they did a study of Bible reading on 40,000 people. That's a legit study. And here's what the findings were. Jeff Martin writes, he says, reading the Bible one to three days a week had, quote, negligible. to little to no effect. One to three days a week, had negligible,

little to no effect on your everyday life. But when day four was reached, the effect spiked in an astounding way. Now listen to what their research found. Feelings of loneliness dropped 30%. Anger issues dropped 32%. Bitterness in relationships dropped 40%. Alcoholism dropped 57%.

Sex outside of marriage dropped 68%. Feelings of spiritually stagnant drop 60%. Viewing pornography drops 61%. Sharing your faith jumped 200%. And disciplining others jumped 230%. reading the Bible works. It works. When James writes in 4-8,

if you will draw near to God, he will draw nearer to you. It's true. It works. I need to read the Bible daily because number five, the Bible is the account of God's cohesive work across all time.

Think about it in the video that we just saw. The Bible is a collection of 60, six documents, written over a couple thousand years, 40 different authors, three different languages, three different continents. And yet it is telling one singular account of the God of the universe and what he's doing to work. There's a study that was done by a guy named Dr. Chris Harrison. He's professor of human computer interaction at Carnegie Mellon. And what he did was he, studied all of the cross references in the Bible where one part of the scripture points to another part of the scripture, pointing forward or pointing back. And what he found was

that there were 63,779 cross references. Across 66 books, across 2,000 years, 40 different authors, three different languages, three different continents. You and I couldn't do that if we could just singularly write our own document. We couldn't come up with 60,000. 63,779 cross-references. And he charted it out, and this is what it looks like when he charts it all out. And all of that is pointing to the fact that God is doing a cohesive work

all the way through time. And I need to read my Bible daily because I need to hear about that. I need to read my Bible daily because it is God's specific final revelation of the gospel. I have serious daily gospel amnesia. I am prone to wander and prone to forget it,

and I need to be reminded of it all the time, all the time. And Ephesians chapter 2, verse 4 and 5, it says, but God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, while we were dead in our trespasses and sins, God made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you have been saved. That's the gospel.

The gospel is, hey, the good news is, you and I were created in the image of God. Male and female, he created us. And we were to reflect God. We were to be in a perfect, unbroken relationship with God. But we do all the time, on our own, what Adam and Eve did, which is we look at God and we go, hey, I know you designed this whole thing. I know you created it. I know you engineered it. I know you're overall. But I think I can do

better with my life than you can. And so thank you very much, God. You go over there and sit down. I'll go over here and I will be king of my life. You won't be king of my life. I will be Lord of my life. You won't be Lord of my life. And I'm going to run things because I think I know how to do things better than you. And what Scripture tells us is that when we do that, that is called sin. And because God is just and God is holy, he will not look the other way at that. He will not just brush that under the carpet and kind of forget about it and say it's no big deal. That is cosmic treason to God. And it says because of God's justice and God's holiness, the verdict against us and Romans says the wages of sin is death.

That our relationship with God dies. That our true humanity dies. And in the end, we die because of that. But the good news is that God is not just holy and not just just, God is also rich in mercy. But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us. Not, listen, God is not rich in mercy because you and I do a bunch of great things that impress him.

God is rich in mercy because of his own great love, independent of us. And because of that great love while you and I were dead in our trespasses and sin, sin does not make us bad. It's far worse than that. We're not just mistakers in need of a life coach to help us get a little bit better at our life game. We are actually walking dead in our sins. But God reaches in while we are dead in our sins and makes us alive, alive. He doesn't just make you a better version of you. He doesn't just give you some tips and tricks so that you can do life better.

He actually takes you from death to life. It's what this entire 10-10 life journey has been about for us for two years, that God would give us life and life to the fullest, life abundantly, eternal life. And he does that by grace. That's the gospel. And because you and I, if you're like me, you have gospel amnesia just like I do,

and we need reminded every single day of the good news. I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible number seven is powerful enough to save a wretch like me. In James chapter 1 verse 21 it says receive with meekness the implanted word which is able to save your soul. That God's word, God has breathed power into his word that as we are exposed to his word, It has the capability, the ability to save our souls. 1 Corinthians 118 says, for the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing. But to us who are being saved, it is the power of God.

Romans 116 says, for I am not ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God to salvation to all who believe. And then I love when John writes this in John chapter 20, verse 30 and 31. He says, now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book. But these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God, and by believing you may have life in his name. Salvation comes through the word of God.

I remember you in a 15-year-old, a young life camp, but Lake Champion up in upstate New York. And I remember one night, I couldn't tell you who was speaking. I couldn't tell you the topic they were talking about. I couldn't tell you about any of their jokes, funny stories, analogies. What I can tell you is he opened up the Word of God, read the Word of God, explained it,

and it was like scales fell from my eyes. It's like I breathed for the first time in my life. Martin Luther was a Roman Catholic monk. lived in the early 1500s. And he was in his cell at a monastery one day, and he gets the book of Romans, and he sits down and he begins to read it. And when he read it,

he came alive to faith in Christ for the first time. And when that happened, it kicked off what is called the Reformation. And you and I are here today because one person got in daily, into the Bible and read the word of God because it has the power to save. I need to read the Bible daily because it is necessary for spiritual growth and maturity. Jesus says in Matthew 4-4, that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

It's like daily food for my soul. I need it as much as I need to eat dinner at night. John 831, so Jesus said to the Jews who believed in them, if you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples. Listen, I've never met a spiritually mature person. I've never met somebody who is growing in their faith that isn't daily in the Word of God. It is absolutely necessary. If you want to grow in your faith,

if you want to become mature, that we would spend time, in the Word of God. I need to read my Bible daily because the Bible sanctifies me. Again, John 17, 17, sanctify them in the truth. Your Word is truth. Here's the truth.

I can't sanctify myself. I can't make myself more like Jesus. I'm not strong enough to do that. I'm not good enough. I don't know enough. I'm not powerful enough to make myself be like Jesus. But what Jesus says is sanctify them in the truth.

Your word is truth. His word has a power to shape us and mold us and conform us and grow us up to be like Christ. I need to read my Bible daily because the Bible never fails to accomplish what God wants to do in me. Isaiah 5511 says, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth. it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose and shall succeed in the things for which I sent it. Do you know how much of a comfort that is, like right now for me

as you sit here and look at me? What we're doing right now does not depend on how eloquently I speak or how funny I am or not or whatever it is that you think is great. What it depends on is that God has promised, that His word will not return void. God promised that as we put the word out, that he will do exactly what he purposes to accomplish in it, and it will never return void.

And I need that now, and you and I need that tomorrow morning. We need God to do the thing he purposed in our life. I need to read the Bible daily because it is the weapon to overcome temptation and sin and Satan. In Matthew chapter four, when Jesus is out in the wilderness, and Satan comes and tempts him three times, Satan comes to him, tempts him, and then Jesus says,

it is written, and then quotes scripture. And Satan tempts him again, and he says, it is written, and then he quotes scripture. Satan comes again and tempts him, and Jesus says, it is written, and he quotes scripture. The scripture is the thing. It is the power of God. it is the most important words we could ever hear.

You know, the most important words about eternity is he is risen. The resurrection of Jesus. That's what 1 Corinthians 15 says. But between now and eternity, the most important words in our life are it is written. Ephesion 617 calls the word of God the sword of the spirit. you and I are engaged when it comes to temptation and sin in a supernatural battle and we need supernatural weapons to fight against supernatural temptation my willpower is not enough to get me through it's not my natural willpower I need a supernatural weapon against the supernatural enemy

I need to read the Bible because the Bible is so freeing. It's so freeing. John 831 says, so Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, if you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. I know what you're thinking is, some of you are thinking, well, listen, if I read the Bible, it's so constricting, Adam.

There's so many rules. Like, I don't, I just, I mean, it's going to take away all of my freedom. And I would say, no, it's going to do the exact opposite. It is going to give you more freedom than you have ever thought was possible in your life. It is so freeing, who the sun sets free will be free indeed. And God's word, the truth of God, you will know it when you dive into it. And God will set you free in ways. that you never thought were imaginable.

All right, take a deep breath. We're halfway. All right. 13, I need to read the Bible daily because it's where I find true grace, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,

gentleness, and self-control like I can find nowhere else. Nowhere else. Jeremiah 15, 16, says, your words were found and I ate them. and your words became to me a joy and a delight for my heart. I'm telling you will not find grace in nature.

You will find survival of the fittest. You will find, I mean, go sit out in nature for a while. You will not find the bobcat that goes, go ahead, little Fawn, just go on your way. No. You will find the exact opposite, and it's only in the Word of God, that I find love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

And I need it. I need to read the Bible because it discerns me. It reads me. It shows me who I really am. In Ephesians 412, it says this, for the Word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit of joints and marrow, and the Word of God, listen to this, the Word of God, discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. God's Word discerns my thoughts. God's Word discerns my intentions of my heart. It's like a mirror that gets held up.

that when I read God's word, I look at it and it shows me something about me. It reveals my blind spots that I can't see. The Bible reads me as I read the Bible. The Bible exposes me as I get exposed to it. Now listen, here's a warning, okay? Don't read the Bible regularly if you don't want to see the real authentic you. If you are happy with fake you, don't read the Bible. If you don't want to live a self-aware life, stay away from the Bible.

Because the moment you begin to read this thing, it will show you the real you, and it will draw you to live the most self-aware, authentic life. I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible governs where and how I discern. God is leading and speaking to me. 1 John chapter 4 says, Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God. For many false prophets have gone out into the world.

There's a bunch of spirits out there. You're going to hear a bunch of voices. They're going to sound like God, but you need to test them because there's a bunch of them that are false. There's one that's true and there's a bunch that's false. He says, verse 2, by this, you know the spirit of God. And then in verse 6 he says,

the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. The Holy Spirit that inspired the scripture to be written will never tell you something that contradicts what he inspired to be written. And so if you think,

if you've got a hunch, if you've got a leading, if you feel like you've got a word from the Lord, the thing to do is to go back to the word of God and say, does this match the word of God? it is the thing that will help you to discern. I love in the Tintin life, we've been talking about how Jesus is the good shepherd and the sheep will hear his voice.

We talked about where Mary's at the wedding at Cana and they were going to make more wine and Mary says, do whatever He Jesus tells you to do. And we would say, hey, you go, do, listen to your shepherd's voice and do whatever he tells you to do. And the question is, how do I know if that's the shepherd's voice? You read this. This will tell you the shepherd's voice. This will tell you to do whatever you are supposed to do. We need less, I think, less I feel, and more it says. This God is not giving any more revelation.

He's doing something better. God is giving his spirit to give more illumination of the thing he has already revealed in his word. That's far better. He's shining a light on his once and for all revelation, and he's making it come alive inside of us so that we see things we've never seen before. I need to read the Bible 16 because it is making deposits that I can draw on later. I don't, listen, I don't come. to the Bible every day and get something that is applicable every day to everything that is going on in my life.

It just doesn't happen. But I can't tell you how many times I've walked into a hospital room. I've sat down at a lunch with somebody who is in real need. I've walked into a living room where somebody's spouse has just died. And I've been out somewhere and I don't have a Bible with me and I walk in there and I need scripture at that moment. and what I need is to go back and draw on the deposit I'd been making maybe 10 years ago. I remember sitting on the operating table two years ago. As I'm getting ready to go in to have cancer removed out of my neck.

I don't have a Bible. And I'm sitting there and I need, oh, like, Lord, I need the words to come back to me that you have given me over the years. And you do too. I need to read the Bible daily because it helps me pray. It helps me pray more. It helps me pray better, more better. And here's what I mean. This may sound a little shocking.

I don't know, maybe it won't, but I'm not the best prayer. I'm not. I lose track of thoughts when I'm praying. My mind wanders off. Like I'm praying about something really important, and all of a sudden I'm thinking about surfing. Or I'm here. Listen, I get in front of people and I pray and I fumble over my words and I forget something or I will pray something and then I'll be thinking, Lord, did I really say that?

I'm sorry. I don't think that's right. I take it back. Never mind. And what the word of God does is it helps me to pray better. What you can do is you just, the passage you just read, you just pray it back. You just work through and pray it back. And here's the thing.

God inspired those words to be written, so you know they're right. You know they're pleasing. And so when you pray God's word back to him, you know that you were praying better. I need to read the Bible daily because it is living and active. Hebrews 412, for the Word of God is living and active. I've heard all the time when I talk about reading the Bible, somebody will always say, well, I've already read it, to which I'll go, no, you haven't. Let's be honest, come on. The whole thing, you read the whole thing. And I would say, even if you have, it's living and it's active.

Listen, I have a master's degree in divinity. I have a doctrine in theology. I've been doing this for 28 years. I've been teaching the Bible almost every single week. I probably read the Bible 20 or 30 times through the whole Bible. And yet every time I come to read it, I'm telling you I see something new and I'm like, has that always been in this book? I never saw that before. Wow. Because it's living and it's active. I need to read Bible because it brings blessing. Revelation 1-3 says, blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy. I don't know about you. I need to be blessed.

I want to be blessed. And if you want to be blessed, if you need to be blessed, God says right here in his word, blessed is the one who reads aloud these words. If you need to be blessed, read the word of God. I need to read the Bible. daily because the Bible number 20 is full of God's promises that I desperately need reminded of. Deuteronomy 31.8 says it is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you. He will not

leave you or forsake you. That's a promise. And that's in Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy is just the second telling of the law. We don't even want to read the first telling of the law, let alone the second. That incredible promise is in God's word. Isaiah 5410 says, For the mountains may depart and the hills be removed, but my steadfast love shall not depart from you. And my covenant of peace shall not be removed, says the Lord. That's a promise.

Philippians 419 and my God will supply every need according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. That's a promise. John 639, Jesus says, this is the will of him who sent me. He's saying, this is God's will for me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. He's talking about you, believer. I get asked all the time, can I lose my salvation?

And my answer to that is, wrong question. The right question is, can Jesus lose you? and his answer is, I lose nothing that the Father gives me. That's a promise. Matthew 1128, come to me all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. The Bible has 8,810 promises in them. And 2 Corinthians 120 says, all, all 8,810 promises of God

are yes in Christ Jesus. And I need to be reminded of the promises of God. I have so many problems that come at me all the time that I need to be reminded of some promises, and so do you. I need to read my Bible daily because the Bible is hard to read. It's hard to read.

It is. I'll grant it to you. It's hard to read. I love this passage in 2nd Peter, chapter three it says this starting in verse 15 and i count the patience of the lord as salvation just as our beloved brother paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given to him so this is peter like who followed jesus around one of the disciples he's writing about the apostle paul and he's saying paul has been given a wisdom he's been given inspiration by god and then he says he writes in this

wisdom given to him as he does in all his letters like a feet Galatians, Romans, all those letters. When he speaks in them of these matters, there are some things in them that are hard to understand. That's Peter, the Apostle Peter, like the guy who walked around with Jesus going, there's stuff in Paul that's just hard. That should make you and I feel a whole lot better.

But then he says there are things in them that are hard to understand which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures. Peter's saying as, I know Paul's tough to read, but he is scripture. Peter is saying Paul, who is alive at this time when this is written, is writing scripture.

That's astounding. And I need to read it, not because it's easy. I need to read it because it's hard. And I need to keep reading it because it's hard. I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible is not just functional. It is beautiful. It's beautiful. Psalm 119, in the way of your testimonies,

I delight as much as in all riches. I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways. I will delight in your statutes. I will not forget your word. This is my comfort and my affliction. that your promise gives me life. My soul longs for your salvation.

I hope in your word, how sweet, listen to this, how sweet are your words to my taste? Sweater than honey to my mouth. I need comfort. I need the beautiful, sweet, good words of God in my life. Here are the last two. I need to read the Bible daily

because it's what Jesus read and knew and lived and I want to be like Jesus. When Jesus's out in the desert and he's confronted by Satan and tempted and he says, it is written, it is written, it is written, how do you think he knew how it was written?

It's because he had read what was written. He spent time in it. And if Jesus spent time in the scripture, I want to spend time in them because I want to be like Jesus. And here's the last one. This is the most important one to me. I need to read the Bible daily because the Bible is the cradle of Christ. It's the cradle of Christ.

John 539, Jesus says, you search the scriptures because you think in them, you have eternal life. And it is they that bear witness about me. He's saying it's all about me. All of the Old Testament, Jesus said, is all pointing. It all holds me. All of this, this is like a cradle that holds Christ. And I need to read this word of God, not out of some religious duty. I need to read this because it's the thing that is going to hold Christ and put it up into my life.

And I need Jesus. I want to be with Jesus. I want to be close to him. I want to know him. I want to spend time with him. And it is the thing that holds Jesus. You will find him nowhere else other than this. Now, you go, okay, fine, uncle.

Like, I give, right? 24, okay, I know why, I need to read the Bible. Okay, the problem is, Adam, I just don't know how to read it. Let me help you for a second, okay? You need a couple things when it comes to reading the Bible. First of all, you need a time to read the Bible. I'm an early riser. I get up about five in the morning.

It's quiet in my house. Nobody's up. Get my cup of coffee. I can read my Bible. That's my best time of the day. Maybe 2 a.m. is your best time of day. You're up. You're ready to go.

It is your best. But I would say no matter what it is, you need to pick your best time. and it needs to be the time and it needs to be the consistent rhythm of the time. Not a little bit of time here and not a little bit of time there and a little bit of time there.

You need a time. And you need a place. Actually, I wanted to bring my living room and set it up in here. And if I could, it would have looked like this. We have a couch in our living room. It's got three cushions. And next to the left end of the couch,

there's a table with a lamp on it and the table has a drawer. And the drawer is important because inside the drawer is a Bible with a bunch of pens and my reading glasses, because the Bible is so small, the print, even in the large print, is so small. I got glasses in other places,

but these reading glasses stay in this drawer. And this Bible stays in this drawer. And I get up in the morning and I fix my coffee and I put it on my Florida Gator coaster and I set it right there and I sit down right on the very left cushion and that's my time with God. That's my place.

I hope when I die, there's like a well-worn divot in that left cushion of our couch. You need a place. And fellas, the throne is not the place, okay? You were thinking it. I just said it. And you need a plan. And to help you, we have a plan for you.

And so if you'll text the word Bible to 4-4-11-22, Text Bible, B-I-B-L-E to 44-11-22. Go ahead, get out your phone right now. Text the word Bible. Here's what we're going to do. One, we're going to give you the sermon notes from today so that you can have all 24 points so that whatever you missed, you can just have them.

So number two, more importantly, we're going to give you this Bible reading plan. And what this Bible reading plan is, it is a year-long plan already charted out five days a week, not seven, five days a week, but it's more than four. and it will walk us through reading the New Testament, a chapter a day, five days a week. So what you do is you go out text 441122, Bible to 441122. We will send you a link and you can download it.

And what I would say is print it off. Print it off. Put it in your Bible and keep it and put it next to the place at the time. Now let's just imagine for a minute. Imagine a year from now. We get back to December 31st next year. And you had spent regular daily time with God in the Word of God. I mean, imagine, imagine for just a minute.

Feelings of loneliness dropped 30% by this time next year. By this time next year, your anger is down 30%. Your bitterness in your relationship had dropped 40% the drinking that you just can't get a control over, it's 60% better. Sex outside of marriage, it dropped 68%. That feeling of sort of spiritual stagnation that you're like, why can't I get over the hump on this thing?

That had dropped 60%. I struggle with pornography. I don't want to do it, I don't want to do it, I don't, how do I do it? That thing has dropped 61% because God has given you something far more beautiful to look at. Sharing your faith jumped up 200%.

You're sitting there right now thinking, I don't know how to share my faith. Do this, you will know how to share your faith. Discipling somebody else jumps 230%. Imagine that. Imagine the impact that would have on your marriage, on your dating life. Imagine the impact that would have on your kids.

your neighbors, that coworker that's like, imagine that. Imagine that impact it would have on our church. Imagine the impact it would have on our city, in our world. Now imagine none of that happens. Imagine you get none of those benefits. You read for the next year and you get none of those benefits. Here's what you still get. At the end of the year, you still will have spent daily time with God.

And think how, just think how please, how pleased God would have been to sit down every morning or every evening with you, his son or daughter, and pulled you up close and spent time with you. Think how honoring and pleasing that would have been to the Lord. Let's pray together. Father, you said through Jesus that when when we were to pray, we were to pray like this, our Father. So God, we are so grateful that you are not some distant, far-off, generic deity, but you are our heavenly Father. You rule and reign in the heavens right now, our heavenly Father.

God, how would be your name? Your name is above every other name that at the name of Jesus, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that He is Lord. To your glory, Lord, hallowed be your name. Father, your kingdom, God, we pray your kingdom would come. We're begging you. God, let your kingdom come and let your will. The thing that is happening in heaven right now as you rule and reign from your throne

God, would your kingdom and your will that occur there, would you bring it so that it is a reality in our day and in our life? Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And Lord, forgive us. Oh, God, forgive us. We do things we shouldn't do. We don't do things we should do. We said things we shouldn't say, and we haven't said things we should have said. And so, Lord, would you forgive us and forgive us as we forgive others. And God, lead us out of temptation. We find ourselves in the middle of battles that we have no idea and no ability to fight

and we need you to lead us, to draw us, to bring us out of temptation and deliver us from evil. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever and ever and ever. Amen. Did you stand? The Word of God demands a response.

So what we're gonna do is we're gonna respond by singing. We're gonna sing some words from Scripture. It's actually we're gonna sing words that are out of the Apostles Creed, which comes directly out of Scripture. And so we're gonna sing what we believe out of the Bible. We can pray. Maybe you need to grab one of those Bibles, grab your Bible,

and come down here and get down and pray some scripture with God. And we're gonna bring you. We're going to bring our first and best because God gave his first and best in Jesus to us. And so let's respond. Let's sing. Let's pray and let's bring.