The Church of Eleven22 - Wk 22: Abide

Episode Date: September 5, 2021

Christ’s invitation is not for you to DO more, but is for you to be near Him; for apart from Him, you can do nothing. Visit coe22.com/john to download the journal, find series resources and more.

Amen, amen. Amen. It's good to see you, church. I'm Ryan Britt. I'm one of the pastors. I'm grateful to be able to open God's word with us today. But before I do, I just want to encourage and pray for some of you. And so if you're here and you are in a disciple group, you are a disciple group leader,

you're a disciple group coach, you're signed up for disciple groups this week. Would you just put your hand up in the air? Yeah? If you're pumped about it, you can put two hands in the air, you know? All right, I just want to pray for you. we are launching disciple groups fall semester and groups are a primary discipleship environment for us as a church. And so I just want to pray for you as you step into this new season of ministry with your group. And so let's pray.

Father, thank you for my brothers and sisters. I thank you for their salvation. I thank you for the calling you have on their life. I pray that this season of ministry they're stepping into would be rich. I pray that their relationships would be deep and meaningful. Father, I pray that the discussions they have in their groups would be transformative, rooted in truth, Father, they would hear your voice and that they would respond to it. I pray that you'd give them the exact words that they need to encourage someone who needs encouragement.

Father, I pray that in all their relationships in life, that you would use them to lead people to discover and deepen a relationship with you. I pray that they would be keenly aware of your presence and that it would be their good. We pray all these things in the power of Jesus' name. And all God's people said, amen. Amen. in. We are launching groups and we have thousands and thousands of people who gather in hundreds of groups literally all over the country now. If you're joining us online, we have online groups. I'll just visit a group down in Sarasota, Florida that has 85 people, 85 adults that gather every week for a group in Sarasota. And they got like a bazillion kids. And so it's the biggest disciple group. And it's down in Sarasota. There's the right group for you.

If you haven't had the chance to jump in one, text the word groups to 44, 11, 22. Right now. and we want to help you find the right group for you. Groups are, just like all things here, all about discipleship. And ultimately, what discipleship is the growing in our relationship with Jesus. Discipleship is not primarily a program. It's not primarily a class. It is not primarily a specific kind of liturgy to be practiced. It is a relationship with Jesus Christ.

And we, the Church of 1122, are a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we've been doing that over the last couple of months studying word by word verse by verse through the book of John. And so it's fitting today that we talk, that we're reading from John 15 and talking about it because it is where Jesus explains to us what it looks like to have a relationship with him. So far in the book of John, Jesus has made a series of I am statements. He has said things like, I am the bread of life. I am the light of the world. I am the door of the sheep. I am the resurrection and the life. I am the good shepherd. Last week we studied where Jesus makes the most radically exclusive claim in the history of humanity where he says,

I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the father except through me. These I am statements are identity claims by Jesus. What is it that Jesus is trying to get us to see by making all these identity claims. Well, what he's trying to help us understand is that at the foundation of our relationship with God, that identity precedes activity. That identity always precedes activity. And so Jesus continues the conversation from last week. He's at a table with his friends, his followers, and they're sharing the mill,

and this is where we find him in John, chapter 15, verse one, where Jesus makes another identity claim where he says this, I am the true vine, and my father is the vine dresser. Why does Jesus spend so much time on identity? I mean, you can argue it is the thing he talks about as he talks about the coming of the kingdom of God. Why does he spend so much time on identity? Well, here's the reason. It's because you can't know who you are until you know whose you are.

you can't know who you are until you know whose you are. Who am I is a soul question. It's actually hardwired down to us. It's the question we ask as the result of being a soul. You see, you're not primarily a body with a soul. You are primarily a soul that currently has this body. And praise God, I'm looking forward to my next one. But you are primarily a soul that has a body.

And what it means to be a soul is it means that the you, you are eternal, that you are actually on an eternal journey of desire, a quest that is marked with wantings from deep inside and ultimately as a soul we are looking for something. We are searching for something. We are searching for our forever family. That's the quest that we're on. We're looking for family. We're looking for unconditional love.

We're looking for absolute, meaningful, deep belonging. We're looking for relationships. whereby we draw and we see significance. That is what it means to be a soul. It means to be on this eternal journey of desire. And ultimately what we're looking for is our forever father. And when we find him through Jesus, it has the power to change everything. You see, my earthly father, he was a good man.

He was a pastor for many, many decades, was faithful, loved his family well. was successful. He struggled through some things in his life very, very well. He gave himself to the gospel. One of the ministries that my dad volunteered for for multiple decades was that my dad served as the chaplain for the police department in the county where I grew up. And he would get beeped, or his pager would go off multiple times, multiple nights a week, or our phone would ring, and the police would call and they would say, we need you to come with us. And he would go and he would knock on people's doors and he would be the one that would notify them that they had just tragically lost a loved one. And he did this week after week after week, after year, he would go

and he would show up and he would care for people and he would minister to people and he would be present with people in some of the worst moments of their life. He was a really, really good man. And one of the things that he got as a chaplain was that he got some swag. He got a, he got some police hats. He had a police jacket. One of the things that he got a chaplain. One of the things that he got a chaplain. things they gave him was multiple real deal police badges. And so my dad had these badges and he would do ride-alongs and he built a lot of great relationships with different police officers over the years. And one day I'm 16 years old and I come home and I see one of my dad's badges sitting on the countertop and I think, hmm, I'll come home the next day and it's still sitting there on the

countertop. And after about a week of this badge sitting on the countertop, I'm like, I want to see what's in it. And so I open it up and there's nothing in it. It's not really being used. And so I think to myself, hey, I'm going to hold on to this, put it in a safe place. And in case my dad ever needs it, then I'll know exactly where it is. And so I take it to my car. I get my license. I get my insurance and I get my registration.

And I stick my identification inside of my father's credentials. You see where this is headed? I put my identity inside of my father's credentials. Sure enough, I'm driving down the road, and as I had seen once or twice before, the blue lights were behind me because I was certainly exceeding the recommendation in regards to how fast I should go.

And so sure enough, we pull over to the side of the road, and the truth is this happened many times, and normally it ended in a ticket, I ended up getting so many tickets, I got kicked off my dad's insurance, I had to go to driving school. It was a whole thing. It normally didn't end good. But in this one instance, I get pulled over to the side of the road, and the officer approaches my window, and my window's down, and he says, son, do you know how fast you were going? And I think to myself, the real question is, do you know how fast I was going?

Right? And he says, I need to see your license and registration. I'm like, okay, is it okay if I reach into the glove box? And he says, yes. And so I reach in, and I grab my father's back. and I hand it to him. And as he sees it, he's like, whose badge is this? And I'm like, well, it's my dad. It's my dad's. And he opens it up, because this was like the badge on the top. It was like the Dragnet badge where the badge is on the top and you flip it over. Look, listen, so far in the sermon, I have mentioned beepers and dragnet. We're going old school tonight. I'm kicking it old school. All right. So he opens it up and he's like, who's your dad? And he sees my last name and he goes, Britt. Is your dad

Billy Britt? Yes. Yes, he is. He's like, man, your dad's the nicest guy ever. And I'm like, he is the nicest guy ever. He says, three years ago, your dad went on a ride along with me, and he told me, he's the person who told me about Jesus, and that's the night I became a Christian.

And I'm like, isn't that just amazing? He's like, and so sure enough, He closes that thing up. He hands it back to him and he's like, son, I need you to slow down. And on your way home, you need to tell your father. When you get home, tell your father. I said hello.

And I'm like, you got it, boss. You know? And off I go. Now, as that police officer was approaching my car, to him, I was just another teenager who was speeding. And I was. I was just another punk teenager who was speeding. But as soon as he realized who my father was,

my identity changed to him. You see, sometimes we've got to. to look around the situations in our life, sometimes we need to be reminded who our father is. We need to be reminded how far our father in heaven has gone in order to give us the right to call him dad. This is why Jesus goes to inordinate links to help us know that God primarily wants us to know him and to relate to him as father. Because when we know who our father is, it has the power to change everything. Jesus says, I am the true vine.

And my father is the vine dresser. If you were at the table with Jesus that day, growing up the way that they did, and Jesus used the words true vine, your brain would have immediately gone to the words of the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 5. It's known as the song. And so let's read it quickly

because it sets up the rest of John 15. Isaiah 5 says this. It's known as the song. It's a metaphor. talking about God's relationship to the people of Israel. As spoken through the prophet Isaiah, it says this, let me sing for my beloved, my love song concerning his vineyard.

My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it, and he cleared it of stones and planted it with choice vines. He built a watchtower in the midst of it, and he hewed out a wine vat in it. So this vineyard belongs to a very loving person, my beloved, it is planted in a secure and fertile place for the purpose of producing fruit. The vine dresser, the owner, has cleared all the stones, done all the work necessary,

and he planted the vine in a very fertile place. And he didn't just plant any vine. He planted the best vine so that that vine would grow and produce fruit. But he didn't leave that vine alone. He put a watchtower in the vineyard, and so now he is protecting the vine. What God is trying to get us to see in the people of Israel to see at the time is that he has done all the work necessary in order for his people to produce fruit. That he has done all the work necessary in order for his people to produce the best wine, to flourish. And so this is a picture of the redeeming work that God does for his children.

And then it continues. And it says, in the vine dresser, he looked for his vineyard to yield grapes. but it yielded wild grapes. Some translations say worthless grapes. And now, oh, inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between me and my vineyard. What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it? What God is asking Israel is,

what more could I possibly do to prove to you that I love you? what more could I possibly do to prove to you that life has lived best when it's lived my way? You see, the most freeing experience we can have today. As believers, is when we look at the cross of Jesus Christ and then we peek into the empty of tombs and we realize that God has nothing left to do in order to prove that he loves us. He's already done it all. God's saying, what more is there to do? And then he asked this question.

But when I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes? Jesus says, I am the true vine. Remember quickly, God's relationship to the nation of Israel. God chooses in the Old Testament of people for himself. This is Israel. There to be his children. He puts a promise on them. He says, I will be your God and you will be my people.

This is a covenant where God has chosen them in order to show his glory to them in order to show his glory through them. And he put them in a place called the promised land. And by giving them the promised land, the idea was that God, that the nation of Israel would flourish, that through their success and through their victory, that all of the world would look at Israel and they would say, how is this possible? And that Israel would give testimony to the glory of God. And they would say, it's because our God is the one true living God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God chose Israel to be their choice. children, and he made a promise to them. And now, because of Jesus, everyone who ever believes gets

grafted into this promise of flourishing. They gets grafted into the promise. And so Jesus is the vine that was planted in the promised land for God's people to flourish, and that, like, branches, we nourish ourselves from that vine, and we grow and we flourish. Jesus says, I am the true vine. I am what Israel was always supposed to be. You don't have to look any further, I am here. You see, identity, when we wrestle through it, often we ask it in two questions. We say, who am I and what is my purpose? But the more I think about this, the more I think it's faulty and its logic. I think that it's a misunderstanding because the truth is, who I am is my purpose. What if our purpose in life is not primarily something for us to do, it is someone for us to become. What if our purpose in life

is not primarily something for us to do? It is someone for us to become. You see, Israel was God's beloved. I love that word. We don't use it a lot. Beloved. If you break it apart, it means to be loved. That God's children's purpose on this earth is that they would be loved by God. It's to be loved by him. It's not so much about what I do. It is about who I am becoming. Jesus continues in verse 2. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes that it may bear more fruit. Is anybody ever experienced any pruning in their relationship with God? Anybody ever experienced any pruning? Anybody ever had any unhealthy thought patterns or some unhealthy habits that God removes from our life, maybe some

unhealthy activities we give ourselves too that God pulls on and God prunes in our life? Why does he do that? The interesting thing about pruning is this. If you look up the definition, it says that the practice of pruning entails the targeted removal of diseased, damaged, dead, nonproductive, structurally unsound, or otherwise unwanted plant material from crop and landscape plants. Pruning is the targeted removal. Anyone who cares for their plants prunes their plants.

If you don't care about it, then you're just going to let weeds grow and wild growth take over. But if you care about your plant, you're going to prune that plant. Why? Because pruning is necessary for growth. And so when we go through pruning seasons in our life, we often ask the question, why? God, why are you trying to remove these things from my life? And the answer is, it's because God doesn't like wild grapes growing in his gardens. He has gone too far.

He has worked too hard, and he has done too much to let the weeds of this world grow up in the life of his children and choke out their joy and to choke out their purpose and to choke out their meaning and to choke out their significance. When we trust in Jesus, we are given the Spirit of God. And the Spirit of God produces fruit in our life. It produces love, joy, peace. patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control, that these are the things growing out of our lives as God's beloved, and God loves us too much to let us give ourselves to

things that would distract us and things that would ultimately rob us of his purposes in our life. He's too good. He's got too many great plans for his masterpieces in order to let them and let their joy be choked out by wild growth. That's good news. You see, when you're going through seasons in your life, it's encouraging to remember that pruning is not the point. God is never just trying to see how much pain we can tolerate in life that he prunes us for a purpose, and that purpose is for his fruit to grow. One of my favorite verses is Romans chapter 828. We talk about it all the time here.

It says that God works all things together for the good of those who love him and who are called according to his purpose. What if part of what that verse means is that God works on those who love him because they're called according to his purpose. God works all things together for the good of those who love him and who are called according to his purpose. What if part of what that means is that God works on those who love him because they're called according to his purpose? And when God is doing his fashioning work in our life as he removes things and he prunes us in order for us to grow into our fullest potential for his kingdom, we have two choices. Choice number one is to resist the

work of God in our life. We can try to ignore it. Or we can try to negotiate more favorable terms. We can try to distract ourselves as to not have to think about it. That is one choice. But the better choice than resisting it is to rest in it. When you hear that word rest, don't think, kicked up in your recliner with some Netflix on relax. Resting is more about digging in. It's about climbing into, think of it in terms of climbing into your sheets at night and getting all covered up in it. The best image that I can give you to understand this word, rest, is other than the one that Jesus paints us in a branch nourishing itself from a vine, it's like, dig in there like a tick. That's the mental image that we get when we hear the word rest. Dig in, lean in,

climb in, get covered up in. Jesus is about to start using this word abide. And every time you hear the word abide, I want you to think rest. Remain in, get covered up. in. So if we are supposed to rest in God's fashioning work in our lives as he forms us into the fullness of his purposes for our life, the question is rest in what? In what work? Well, that's a great question. I'm glad you asked. Jesus answered it. Verse three, listen. All right, gather yourself. You're going to want to hear this verse. Jesus says this. Think about who's talking here. It's not me. This is the king of all kings. The one who was and is to come. him. He's the one talking, the Lord, God Almighty. Jesus the Christ, he says this, already

you are clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Already you are clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Who here knows that the word Jesus has spoken over your life is a better word than anybody else can speak? That when Jesus Christ climbed up on that cross and he pushed up on those nail-pierced hands and those nail-pierced feet and he said, it is finished. It is forever and he meant it and that is the word over your life

and that are the best three words, the most beautiful three words you will ever hear for all of eternity. That Jesus has spoken a better word over your life than anyone else. Can already you are clean because of the word. I have spoken to you. This is the gospel.

This is a gospel statement. The good news of Jesus Christ is best understood in two parts. I've been taught it since I was a little boy, and primarily for most of my life, we focused on one part of the gospel, and the part of the gospel was that I'm a sinner in need of a Savior, which is true. And the way it was taught me was that my life is like a chalkboard, if you will, and what I had contributed is that I had filled my chalkboard up with sin, that countless times, both by nature and nurture, I had. had rejected God's love in my life, that I had tried to take my life into my own hands, that I had

tried to forge my own identity, that I had resisted God's purposes and tried to write my own story, that I had wanted to do things my way all the way down the road that I paved for myself, not even thinking about God. And because this is what I contributed to my life, that I am a sinner, which is true for all of sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Absolutely, that each has turned to his own way, all like sheep we have gone astray. And because I'm in this situation where the chalkboard of my life has been filled up with me resisting God's love and purposes in my life, then I'm in need of a savior. I need someone to come and live life in my place. I need them to come and to fully and wholly devote themselves to God's love, to God's

purposes, to God's word, to God's law, and to live life perfectly in my place since I have not done this. And that if they would live life perfectly in my place, then they would be the perfect one to pay the just and due penalty for my sins. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord, that sin has to be paid for, right? And the eternal consequence of sin is death and separation from God, and that without the shedding of blood, there can be no forgiveness for sins. And so I needed someone to come and live my life for me and to pay the due penalty by dying in my place so that my sins could be forgiven and praise God from whom all blessing flows. Jesus the Christ left heaven, came down from earth and he did all the heavy

lifting necessary in order for sins to be forgiven. Right? That is one part of the gospel and that's good news. And when I place my faith in Jesus Christ, I trust in him. His blood washes over my sin. It cleans my sin and I am justified and he makes it just as if I never sinned. This is the good news of the gospel. He cast our sin as far as the east is from the west. Now, for the majority of my life, I thought that at this point in time when I trust Jesus for the forgiveness of my sins, that it is now my job to fill up the chalkboard of my life with my good works and that I was supposed to do good works in order to earn or to pay back the gift that I had been given in forgiveness. But that's just not the gospel.

See, the other part of the gospel is not only does Jesus cleanse our sins and all of our unrighteousness and cast it as far as the east is from the west, that he actually fills up the chalkboard of our life with his good works. And so forever and ever, I get credit for all the things that Jesus has done. And I get credit for all the things that Jesus is. This is known as the credited righteousness, the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ, that my identity is now firmly rooted in his credentials.

And everything that Jesus has earned is credited to me by God. That is the gospel already. You are clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Church, if you were a believer in Jesus, Christ, you are not in the process, God is not in the process of forgiving you. You are forgiven. Will you trust it? You're not auditioning for God's family. You have his approval. Will you trust it? We are not in the process of earning God's favor in our life. We have been guaranteed through Jesus Christ to God's faithfulness. Will you trust it?

every single day from the first day we believe is a journey of trust. The invitation of Jesus is to come and follow him. This is an invitation to trust him. To know him is to love him and to love him is to trust him. Last year I read a book called Ruthless Trust by a guy named Brennan Manning. I highly recommend it. And early in the book he writes these words. He says that trust is our gift back to God.

and he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for the love of it. Think about what he's saying. When I read that out about fell out of my chair in my living room, I was like, what? Trust is our gift back to God. And he finds it so enchanting that Jesus died for the love of it. Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8 says that we are saved by grace through faith, which is a gift, not of works, lest anyone,

should boast. And so God sees His beloved and he sends the gift of faith, he gives to his children and the return on this gift is trust. And that God is so wild about his children's trust that he would send Jesus Christ to die on the cross to secure

that trust for himself. That'll preach right there. Goodness gracious. Already you are clean because of the word. I have spoken to you. Jesus continues, verse four, abide in me and I and you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine. You are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I and him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me, you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, he is thrown away like a branch and withers.

And the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned. That's intense. That's intense. It sounds terrible. To quote Charles Barkley, that sounds terrible. Here's what Jesus is getting at. The cost of not trusting Jesus is incredibly high. The cost of not trusting Jesus is incredibly high. He says, apart from him, we can do nothing. What he means is that as a soul on an eternal journey of desire, apart from him, we will never be a part of anything that's truly fulfilling for all of eternity. that we will never have any true deep points of satisfaction, and that will last for all of eternity. Apart from him, we can do nothing. And here's where Jesus begins to talk about the outworking of identity in our life.

When we see our identity as rooted in him, our identity is firmly rooted in his credentials, what begins to happen. And he begins to talk about this thing called intimacy. And intimacy, like identity, is another soul word. And the best definition I can give you for intimacy is that it is nearness in both proximity and presence. Intimacy is nearness in both proximity and presence. Here's what I mean.

I can be around my family, but not near my family. Right? I can be around my wife, but not near my wife. I could absolutely be an absent father. I could be gone doing whatever, whatever away from my family. But being with my family, proximity, it absolutely matters. But being around them is not necessarily the thing that can forge intimacy. You see, it's both being around and being intentional in our presence.

Proximity and presence work together to forge intimacy. And Jesus begins to talk to us about this intimacy in verse 7, how we can be both around and near. Verse seven, he says this, if you abide in me and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you. By this, my father is glorified that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. As the, verse nine, what a verse. As the father has loved me, so have I loved you.

Abide in my love. as the Father has loved me, so have I loved you, abide in my love. Does God the Father love God, the Son? Oh, man. Oh, man, it's like a cosmic upheaval kind of love. It's a love that we don't even have categories for, that our language is far too feeble and finite to try to get any sort of substance around. The Father is absolutely an adoring, abounding, abiding love.

with the son. There's no doubt about it. And Jesus says, as the father has loved me, I love you. Trust my love. Right now, I don't care where you've been. I don't care where you're headed in life. I don't care what you've got in the skeletons. I don't care what situation you're facing down. The most important thing that you need to know about who you are and the most important information you will ever get in your life is this. God loves you. God loves you. God loves you. You. God loves you. you. Do you want to know God? Do you want to know Christ in the power of his resurrection? Last year, or earlier this year, Pastor Ryan Kwan was here preaching and he was standing about right here and he, man, he's a really good dresser. And so he was just dressed to the tense.

You know, I mean, just nice. Got a great shoes on and he's preaching. And about a quarter of the way into his sermon, he makes this statement. He says that every problem that I've created for myself in my life is the result of me not trusting that God loved me in that moment. What? I fell out over here on my chair. Y'all didn't move. Y'all didn't clap. Nobody was like, woo!

He just kept on going. He says, every problem I've ever created for myself in my life is the result of me not trusting that God loves me in that moment. How true is that. When the Puritans used to preach the gospel and people would surrender their life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, they would get saved. The Puritans would say that this person has now been seized by the power of a great affection. I love that. Seized by the power of a great affection. See, this is not about religion. This is about relationship. This is not about some

moral upstanding ideology. This is about knowing someone and being known by them, seized by the power of a great affection. If you hear the good news of Jesus, Jesus Christ and you think to yourself, this is just too good to be true, you're just starting to get it. You're just starting to get at the church today, the Big Sea Church, of which we're a part. It's not necessarily in need of more gifted people or necessarily in need of more intelligent people. What the church has a need for is deep people. And the thing about depth is that it requires digging. It takes effort.

So for a movement, for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ, it is a fair and right question to ask, well, how do I do that? How do I deepen my relationship with Jesus Christ? Well, here's a question. What's easier in life? Is it easier to be healthy or unhealthy? It's not a trick. That's a legit question. Is it easier to be healthy or to be unhealthy? Unhealthy every time. It is easier for me not to exercise than it is for me to exercise, especially when I'm just getting started or I've been off it for a while. It is easier for me to eat conveniently than it is for me to eat clean. In any relationship in life, the truth is that health requires effort. And at times it is hard work, but the truth is, the more you do it, the more you want to do it. the more you practice health, the more you want to pursue health. Jesus describes in verse 7 how we stay healthy in our relationship with him, how we stay near him.

He says this in verse 7, if you abide in me and my words abide in you. Listen, nothing can replace the Word of God in the life of the believer. Nothing can replace the Word of God in the life of the believer. Nothing can replace the Word of God in the life of the believer. supposed to abide in Jesus' words in order to stay near him. We actually have to know his words. Nothing can replace the Word of God and the life of the believer. In Jesus, in his teachings, he gives us some behaviors, some things that if we practice them over and over and over and over again in our life, that they will produce fruit and we will deepen our relationship with him. Some of these behaviors

that Jesus gives us, these things are historically known as spiritual disciplines or spiritual practices, he gives us a whole list of them, just to name a few. One is prayer. Prayer is our ongoing conversation with God. It is how a child communicates with the father. It is an ongoing conversation. It is how we turn our ear, the station of our life, to God's station. It's how we lean in and listen to him. Do you all remember when TVs before they had remote controls, anybody? Most of you're like, nope. Some of y'all remember. You'd beat this knob. You'd have to turn it. me and my brother were so lazy that we used to tie our shoes to the end of blankets and try to like lasso the knob, right? And that's how we try to get it to turn. That's what prayer often is.

Prayer is, that's what prayer is, it's turning the station of our life to the station of the kingdom so that we can hear the voice of the king. See, two things about prayer. One is, I encourage you to every day have specific dedicated time where you spend time in prayer with God. Right, whether it's five minutes or 15 minutes. minutes or 50 minute, time is not necessarily the measure of effectiveness. When Jesus teaches us how to pray, if you read the Lord's prayer, it takes about 60 seconds to read. And so time is not necessarily the measure of effectiveness. However, intentionality over time always produces fruit.

Intentionality over time always produces fruit. So prayer is one. Another one is fasting. We're fasting right now doing the Daniel fast as a church as we prepare for saturations. fasting is a described behavior in order for us to deepen our relationship with Jesus Christ. And you know what? It's hard. It's hard. But I've learned in my life that the more challenging something is, the more power it has to change me. The more challenging something is to do, the more power it has to change me. Prayer, fasting, studying the scriptures, abiding in his words, stewardship,

bringing back to God all of our gifts, talents, resources, everything he's trusted with us, and leveraging those things for the good of others and for the advancement of, God's kingdom. Gratitude is a spiritual discipline. Gratitude is a choice. It's not a feeling, amen? Confession, belonging to a church, being in relationships with other believers.

These are all some things that God, Jesus gave us so that we could draw near to him. Are there any Olympics people here? Anybody into the Olympics that just ended? Did y'all watch the Olympics? Okay, cool. Me and my wife are the only people evidently in the planet who watched the Olympics.

We're Olympics people. And I knew I had married the right woman a few years ago. We were watching, I can't remember with the exact Olympics, but the American swim team was swimming relay, and they're swimming, swimming, swimming, and they beat the Australians for gold by like one, one hundredth of the second. And you see Michael Felt standing at the edge of the pool just screaming and his muscles are ripping, ripping out much like mine are right now. And come on, guys, it was a joke. And so he's screaming, and my wife, I look over my wife's jumping up and down on the couch, and she's just swimming, she's screaming, swim like. a shark's chasing you. And I'm just like, man, that's my girl right there. I love her. Right. This past Olympics, the probably the dominant narrative in the Olympics was Simone Biles.

And Simone Biles was supposed to clean house. She's undoubtedly the greatest gymnast that ever lived and she was going to win gold and everything that she competed in, but she ended up not competing. And the reason she and her coaches said that she didn't compete is because she got a thing known as the Twisties. And what the Twisties are, you really only ever see it in gymnast and divers. What the twisties are is that your muscles don't just remember things. That in order for your muscle memory to take over, your brain has to send certain triggers in order for your muscle memory to work the way that it's supposed to. And then when you get the twisties, the triggers in your brain are not going off, and therefore your brain and your body are disconnected, and it's very, very, very dangerous. And so the way

you get over the twisties is that you have to relearn all of this muscle memory. You have to give yourself again to all of these practices that you've been doing for years in order to get your brain and your body to work together. See, this is what spiritual disciplines are in the life of the believer, because sometimes, even every believer I've ever known, sometimes it's easy to just get twisted up in life. Sometimes it's easy to get twisted around the axle of things that are secondary or tertiary or distracting to get wrapped around whatever's right in front of me and miss the bigger picture of what God's doing. It's easy for me to chase feelings and instead of be rooted down in truth, it's easy to get twisted up in life.

And these spiritual practices are like training your gospel muscle memory so that no matter where you go and no matter what you face, the truth of God is in you and you have it on command. It's spiritual training. Because of Jesus, his life, his death, his resurrection, and his return, the indwelling spirit of God, it is possible for us to deepen to a point in our relationship with Jesus Christ where the gospel is our go-to in success as well as in struggle. You see, with Jesus, it is possible to experience loss in life but not lose your joy.

With Jesus is possible to be faced in the most trying of times in a pandemic, but not to be overcome with panic. With Jesus, it is possible to have success without losing our soul to it. It is possible to face adversity without being overcome by it. it. Spiritual practice is how we near ourselves to Jesus, and he is the one who makes all things possible. Jesus continues in verse 9, and he says this, as the Father has loved me, so have I loved you, abide in my love. What environments are you choosing to put yourself in in order to stir your love for Jesus and to remind you that God loves you? What choices are you making? What

environments are you putting yourself in that remind you of God's love for you. You're here today. You're tuned in online. Good for you. That's something for sure. And I hope that somehow today is encouraging you and that you get fed when you come to church here and you'd be like, yeah, we do. When Pastor Jobie's here, hey, look, I know. Relax. Come on, guys, if you can't get about it, you can't, come on. They're like, oh, he knows. Oh, I know. It ain't. I'm good with it. I love you. It's all good. What environment are you putting yourself in that stirs your love for Jesus? You see, on a parallel track to spiritual dissonance in our life is a thing called spiritual pathways. And these are the activities or the environments we choose to put ourselves in that remind us of God's love and help us to grow in God's love. Now, all of us are not wired the same way. Not all of us go to the same environments and get the same kind of natural reaction to that environment. And that's okay. It's a part of our unique designed. For example, there's some people who would go to the beach and they would walk down the beach and they would feel the sand beneath their toes and they would feel the sun on their

face and hear the roar of the ocean and they just start to think bigger thoughts naturally. It just starts to happen. Well, hopefully those thoughts are grounded in truth and they leave toward God and then in that moment you could have a real experience in your relationship with Jesus Christ. There's all different kinds of pathways. I got in Gary Thomas wrote a book called Sacred pathways. I highly recommend it. You can learn all about it. But some people, they love God best. They best connect with God outdoors. Some is through their senses, concerts, beautiful paintings. Some are more traditionalists. They like to connect with God through ritual and symbol, things like practicing communion, recited prayers. For other people, they're known as ascetics or ascetics,

and they need to get alone and practice thinking and praying in solitude in order to most effectively communicate with God. And some of y'all are like, man, I've been telling y'all for years to leave me alone, right? That's not necessarily what I'm talking about. But some people need solitude and they need time alone. For other people, they get, it's mystery and celebration. They love to cook feasts and have the whole family there, and that just fills their tank and helps them to think about God's love in their life.

No matter what your pathway is, here's my encouragement to you. Practice on the path. Practice on the path. And so it's cool to just go walking on the beach, but it's way better to go walking on the beach with the word of God in your ears, with prayers coming from your heart and with your mindset on God's love in your life.

It's just different. It's just different. So practice on the path. Pathways or fill up activities so that we can pour our lives out. If they ever become places we just retreat to, then we have distorted the path or lost the purpose of the path.

Spiritual practices and pathways work together in our life to produce fruit. And here's the thing about intimacy. Intimacy, the truth is, when it's done right, it just gets better over time. When intimacy is done right, it just gets better over time. You see, my wife and I,

we just celebrated our 15-year anniversary. 15 years. Yeah, thank you. We've certainly had our moments, but God's been good. We just celebrated 15 years. My wife's incredible. Her name's Jennifer.

She's 5 foot 1. She is 30 schmick years old, and she weighs 100, and come on, man, y'all think I'm crazy. She was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee to fill in Susan. In elementary school, her family moved to Hendersonville, and then a little later to Lebanon, Tennessee, outside of Nashville, where she graduated from high school. She got a full ride to Converse College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, where she majored in art and business. After college, she moved to Birmingham, Alabama, where she got her master's degree in art education, and there she met the main. man of her dreams. I don't know what y'all clapping for. There she met the man of her dreams and was married on August 12th of 2006. She's the mother of two daughters. She lives in Jacksonville,

Florida, is a college professor, drives a Chevy, and is most certainly wired as an acetic as her life motto is, leave me alone. I'm just kidding. Now, you know some information about my wife. But do you know my wife? See, that's often the place that we can easily fall into in our relationship with Jesus, is that because we know some information about him, that we think that that's the same thing as having a relationship with him. But knowing some things about someone and knowing someone, these are different things. You see, I know my wife. I know her. I know her biblically, but that's a whole other sermon series. I know my wife. I know her. She is the queen.

of facial expressions. Her face will always tell you what she is feeling. She sees everything. There's not a detail in the world that she would ever miss. Her highest aim in life is to be helpful. She believes that the world can be a better place and she wants to help everyone around her to live in that better place.

She is radically loyal to her friend. She is not just beautiful. She carries beauty on her soul. She sits in my daughter's room night after night listening to them share about their day. She's asking questions to understand their little hearts. She loves being a mob. She was made for it.

You see, my wife's crazy ticklish. More on the left side than on the right side if I could get an amen. Sometimes she talks in her sleep, and she says the funniest stuff. One night she told me to take the oysters out back on a two-by-four. She takes a shower every night before bed because obviously cleanliness is next to godliness. She's a big fan of dry shampoo, and when she touches me, I fall apart. I can hear my wife laugh in a crowded room, and I can feel it in my bones. The invitation from Jesus is to be near him.

The Bible tells us that we can draw near to Christ in a way that we carry his aroma with us. He wants us to be near him. He wants us to be near him. He wants us to be able to hear his voice in our lives. it to be unmistakable and absolutely clear. He wants us to be near him. He wants us to hear him speak over our life and to rejoice over us as his family. The father wants us to know him so well that when he sings his rejoicing over us that we can feel it in our bones. The invitation is to be near him. Verse 10, Jesus says this as we head toward the close of our

time. He says, if you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love. Just as my father's commandments, just as I have kept my father's commandments and abide in his love, these things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be full. Joy is not a feeling to chase church. It is a person to know. And his name is Jesus Christ. You see, joy and obedience are inseparable in the life. for the believer. For the believer to be obedient in our loving trust to Jesus is the same thing as to experience joy. Jesus doesn't say that he is going to give us a joy of our own. He says that he is going to put in us his joy. And you can bet that his joy is full. My favorite

confession of faith says this, that the chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying him forever. You see, a relationship with God is meant to be enjoyed. Pastor John Piper says this, that God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. Joy is not a feeling to chase. It is a person to know. So identity, knowing whose we are so that we can know who we are. Intimacy. Practicing nearness in both proximity and in presence. When these things work together in our life, it produces the fruit of obedience. which is joy as we trust in Jesus. The point is this, Christ's invitation is not for us to do more,

but it is for us to be near him. For apart from him, we can do nothing. And this is my commandment, verse 12, that you love, love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends. if you do what I command you to hear that word, friend.

Imagine with me for a second. Imagine with me for a second that today's the day. But today's the day where you close your eyes, we close our eyes on this life, and we open our eyes on eternal life. We pass from this life to the next, and we find ourselves in this moment as we open our eyes on the new city.

find ourselves standing at the edge of the new city and we're at the gate. And this gate is spectacular. And somehow this gate stays open all the time. And yet evil is not allowed to enter into the city. You see, there is no sun because the city doesn't need sun because the glory of God is revealed through Jesus Christ. The sun is what gives light to the city. And we open our eyes and it's a little disorienting at first because we've never seen mountains this tall. We've never seen skies so beautiful. We've never smelled, smells so rich. We've never heard rivers rush in this way.

We've never experienced breathing in this way. We've never had our lungs this full. And in this moment, we're beginning to realize that this is truly what it means to be alive. We have unrestricted access to the kingdom of God. And there we are, stepping into forever. And then all of a sudden, there he is. Right in front of us. His eyes are fire.

He's got this robe coming off his back that's dipped in blood. He has the scepter of the righteousness of God in his right hand. He is the lion of Judah, the king of kings, the one who was and is to come. He is the firstborn. He is the preeminent one. He is the one who has conquered death and grave and hell. He is Christus Victor, and he's right in front of us. What would we do in that moment?

Well, we'd do exactly what the Bible tells us we would do. We would bow down. We would fall down before him. Every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. And so here we are facing the dirt. And can you imagine with me for a second? What if he does for us? What he has done for so many?

And he reaches down and he picks us up. And he's looking at us and he starts to dust us off. And he starts to bring us close and he grabs us by the hand and then he leads us to the table. And he pulls out the seat and he says, I've been saving this one for you. And he sits us down and the seat reserved for us. And the whole family's there. unconditional love, absolute deep, meaningful, belonging. Everyone is there and the king sits down at the head of the table.

And he begins to speak to us. What do you think his voice would sound like? You think it'll be kind? I do. I think it'll be filled with kindness and gentleness and confidence. And he begins to speak to us. us. And what if at that table on that day, just like this table on this day in John 15, he begins to share these words to us. We hear the king speak these words and he says this, no longer do I call

you servants. For the servant does not know what his master is doing, but I have called you friends. For all that I have heard from my father, I made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you. And I appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide so that whatever you ask in the name of my father, he may give it to you. These things, I command you so that you will love one another. And we will love one another. perfectly, without contest, we will love because he has perfectly loved us. We can trust him. Let's pray together. Jesus, we thank you that with you all things is possible.

And we trust you. And we pray that you would help us to grow in our trust. and that we would deepen. Father, anywhere that wild grapes or wild weeds are growing in our life and they're choking out joy, Father, would you prune them? Would you remove them?

Would you cut them away so that we can live in the fullest realities of your purposes in our life? We thank you for your promise over us, that you are our God and we are your people. We thank you for setting your love on us we thank you for demonstrating your love for us and that while we were still sinners Christ, you died for us.

Father, we thank you for the good news that it is to be a part of your family. I pray that we would somehow today, God, that you would help us to just better understand even a little bit that you are our father and that that has the power to change everything. I pray that your presence would be real, that your presence would be rich, and that your voice would be loud to my brothers and sisters. as they deepen their trust in you. We pray all these things by the precious and victorious name of Jesus. And all God's people said, amen.

Would you stand with me? We're going to respond like we always do. We're going to pray, draw near to God. We're going to bring our ties and our offerings. And we're going to sing, declaring back to Christ his worth in our life and proclaiming truth, reminding ourselves and everyone else who our father is. Let us pray, let us sing, let us bring. Let us bring. Let us bring. Let's respond.