Churches in Westampton Township

“Because one of our greatest enemies of following Jesus is not a lack of opportunity, it's an abundance of distraction. I do mean this very much. Like, we there's plenty of opportunity to follow Jesus, but the thing that I deal with is distraction more than anything else. Because there's an abundance every we have the opportunities, but we're distracted so much from the priorities Jesus was actually living for. So what does that look like? Well, Jesus prioritized time with the father. Luke five sixteen says, Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed. Jesus modeled his life for us to follow, and part of that priority for him was time with God.”

“But what is the noise in your life right now that doesn't need to be there? What is getting your attention that does not need to get your attention right now? In the business world, they call us the tyranny of the urgent. You guys have heard that before. They call it the tyranny of the urgent because the things that are urgent could be little tyrants in your life if you let them, dictating everything you do. This needs my full attention. This needs my attention. This needs my attention. A lot of it no, it can wait. Lot A of it is not as urgent as it wants you to think it is. So what's the noise that needs to go? What are the distractions that need to leave? And then do this as you're going throughout your day, as you're evaluating honestly, as you're removing the distractions, pray this every day. Jesus, help me to want what you want.”

“Because the truth is is that what you prioritize today will shape who you become tomorrow. This is just a it's just a fact. What you prioritize in your day today is not just about today. It will shape who you become tomorrow. And if you look at your life, you can tell what you prioritize. You can tell what matters to you. Now, we're gonna talk about priorities, we have to talk about where they actually come from. If we're gonna talk about the message of Jesus, the priorities of Jesus, we have to look at where his priorities came from. And for Jesus, the priorities that he modeled when he was here actually came from the mission that he had.”

“So his priorities came from his mission. So let me ask you a question. Have you ever written a mission statement for your life? Have you ever sat down and actually written a mission statement for who you are going to be as a follower of Jesus? We have mission statements for a church. We have mission statements but for you personally, have you ever written a mission statement for your life? Because I will tell you what, if you do not have a mission statement to live from, you will let everything else determine our priorities. See, Jesus had a lot of things competing for his priorities, and because he knew what his mission was, he knew what he was to be about.”

“Do you value the presence of God? And what would it look like in your life if you were to say, well, not as much as I should, or not as much as I want to, what would need to change to make that happen?”

“How the king of Israel, and this is how she said it, and I can't do it, like, this is a snarky voice. If I could do a snarky voice right now, it's like, oh, how the king of Israel is like, you're out there distinguishing yourself among the people. Look at David, right? Like, I gotta imagine it was one of those kind of tones. Not that any of you would ever speak that way to your husband or wife, right? But I'm just saying, like, people like this would. And so, how would you distinguish yourself going around half naked in full view of all the slave girls and the servants, like any crazy vulgar person would do, right? And she's got this disdain. You're going to hear the dripping, the anger at him for making her potentially look stupid. Because remember, she's his wife, like, so what King David did would have come down on her. Like, oh, you're married to that crazy guy? She's like, I don't want any of that. Right? So, she comes in and immediately, not going, man, what was that? The presence of the Lord. Not celebrating the presence of the Lord. She immediately goes after that thing that she's like, you looked like an idiot.”

“We are, psychologists will tell us, we are psychosomatic people, meaning that sometimes our bodies influence how we feel. Our actions influence how we feel. Meaning that you might come into worship being like, I don't really feel like worship. But when you raise your hands in worship, when you raise your hands in worship, it's not just trying to get people to look at you. There is something that it actually communicates to our soul and it starts to put us in a place of actually like, I feel a little more connected. There's a vulnerability. There's a connection here that's happening to my soul and my body. They're connected to each other.”

“When you worship in the spirit, right? And how many times do you think maybe the thing that you want to see God do in your life, you're not seeing him do because you've taken his presence way too lightly. And he's calling you to repent of that and to get back to a place of recognizing when you worship, you're worshiping a holy, God. And to see just how much he's done for you by making a way for you to be in his presence and to bring the spirit into that. It's not just the routine.”

“Worshiping is not an option. Worshiping the God the way he's called us to worship him is not an option and David learns a valuable lesson about worship and when you value God's presence you value reverence over reputation when you learn to value the presence of God you will learn to value his holiness representing reverence before the God of this universe more than you will care about your reputation.”

“We oftentimes have to go to ourselves and go, okay, Lord, there might be some humility you got to do in me before I can get back to worshiping you for who you are. Like, I might need to be humbled here a little bit. I might need to be humbled in my own eyes, because sometimes we think we're the best thing to walk around. Right? We're like, man, you're lucky to be in my presence. Like, you don't know how good you got it. Right? We have that mindset a little bit. Like, I'm all that. And if, you know, you're a child of the 90s, I had a bag of chips. Right? Like, you have, like, we have that phrase. Like, we think that about ourselves. Right? And sometimes if we're going to get back to the place of true worship, reverent worship, valuing the presence of God, we need to recognize our true position before his authority. We need to bring some humility into that place.”