Get in the Game: Join the Team, Win Souls

And the apostle Paul goes on and he says this, all athletes are disciplined in their training. Boy, they are. They do it to win a prize that's gonna fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. We are doing this. We are winning for a prize that is never gonna fade away. Why? Because it's the souls of men and women. [00:52:09] (24 seconds)  #EternalPrizeNotTrophy

The other point that I didn't get to, and I didn't even tell the other group this, is this, is God's not looking for you to be a fan. Come on. How many know God's looking for you to be a participant? And see, the problem in the church is is there's a lot of people who love Jesus like they like their favorite team. They're a fan. Come on. But they're not participating. [01:25:40] (26 seconds)  #BeAParticipant

Come on. And winning isn't for our personal glory either, and it doesn't really come with a trophy or with a bunch of accolades, at least in this life. But let me assure you that our winning, come on, as the church does come with a prize, and it's the greatest prize of all because it's the prize of the harvest of souls that we help win to the lord, come on, and bring into the kingdom of god while we're here on the earth. [00:51:14] (31 seconds)  #HarvestOverGlory

And before any of you think, well, I don't know if that's proper to build your message off of a Super Bowl commercial. In fact, it sounds a little sacrilegious to me. I wanna remind you that Jesus, he often taught what is called parables. Ain't that right? And he would use these stories that they could identify with in order to illustrate spiritual truth. And so that's what we're really doing today. [00:43:31] (28 seconds)  #ParablesConnect

And so for some of you who are already kind of intimidated a little bit by that thinking, oh, pastor, I'm just not comfortable sharing god's word like you are. That's not what I'm talking about. You don't have to preach to people to get them saved. In fact, if you preach to people trying to get them saved, you're probably gonna turn them off, and they're gonna avoid you when they see you come around. [00:54:46] (21 seconds)  #YouDontHaveToPreach

And the apostle Paul goes on and he says this, all athletes are disciplined in their training. Boy, they are. They do it to win a prize that's gonna fade away, but we do it for an eternal prize. We are doing this. We are winning for a prize that is never gonna fade away. Why? Because it's the souls of men and women. [00:52:09] (24 seconds)  #DisciplinedForEternalPrize

But you know what's so cool about God is is you don't give, especially sacrificially. Giving sacrificially really gets the attention of God. Just read your Bible. Anytime somebody gave sacrificially, It always got god's attention, and he moved in a special way when they did that. But the Bible says when we honor god with our tithe and offering, that he'll open the windows of heaven and he'll pour out blessing upon us that is more than just sufficient. [00:37:32] (33 seconds)  #SacrificialGivingBlesses