Sunday 10am | The Father's House

And I think it's important for us to realize that Jesus did not die upon the cross to create a bunch of scattered eclectic individuals who have submitted their lives to him. Jesus died to create a unified body, a bride, his church. You know, Matthew chapter 16, he's he's speaking to his disciples and he says, I will build my church on the revelation that he is the son of God, he is the Messiah, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. [00:49:02] (29 seconds)  #JesusBuiltOneChurch

And the word he uses for church is this word ekklesia. It would have been a really common word in the Greek vernacular at the time. And you know, a couple hundred years before Jesus ever showed up, both Thucydides and Demosthenes, who were these Greek historians, they used this term ekklesia to speak to the civic assembly that was gathered together for the sake of doing kingdom business. [00:49:32] (24 seconds)  #EkklesiaAssembly

So Jesus takes a word they're familiar with and says, just like the Greeks and Romans had their little assemblies, I am building my assembly. I am building my people, and I am calling people out of sin, calling them together for the sake of kingdom business. Jesus said he would build his church. And I want you to hear me, when God saves you, he adopts you into a family. To follow Jesus is to follow Jesus together. [00:49:55] (29 seconds)  #AdoptedIntoFamily

Let me just read this again because he has a very specific definition for what unity looks like within the body of Christ. And he really lays this out for us in Philippians two verse one. Therefore, if there's any encouragement in Christ, any consolation of love, any fellowship of the spirit, any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit and intent on one purpose. [00:50:30] (27 seconds)  #Philippians2Unity

And Paul, his when you read through Pauline letters, all of Paul's letters, he loves the phrase in Christ, speaking about what in Christ means. And he's pulling from the reality that there is a day, every single one of us, we are going to stand before the judgment seat of Jesus Christ. There is a day when God is going to look at us and we are going to have to give an account for how we stewarded our life. [00:51:34] (25 seconds)  #InChristAccountability

He writes to the Corinthians and he says this, we destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive to obey Christ. When we are in Christ, we need to take care of what's going on in our heads. The way we think, the way we speak, the way we view things, the opinions, the ideologies we hold. Think I there's a lot of people that you act like your mind is like a UFC fight, you just let all the stimuli in there. [00:53:53] (29 seconds)  #TakeEveryThoughtCaptive

Hear me. Thoughts become words. Words become actions. Actions become habits. Habits become destinies. Your thoughts matter. And listen, some of us, we have some bad opinions in this room. Some of you are Dodgers fans. It's gross. Some of you like the Lakers. Repent. Some of you listen to Nickelback on the way here. Like, this is not the nineties guys. Come on. [00:54:22] (35 seconds)  #GuardYourThoughts

Have the same love. And what he's saying is have you been comforted by the power of the love of Jesus? That should begin to produce a one love within the church. First John three sixteen lays out the love we have experienced. It says, by this we know love, that he laid down his life for us and so we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. [00:55:53] (24 seconds)  #OneLoveInChrist

So if you've experienced the beauty of the servanthood of Jesus while he laid down his life for you while you were yet a sinner, the comfort that comes from the love of Jesus, it should produce a new kind of love within his people, his bride. And what it means to have one love is to love what God loves and to love how God loves. See, our culture has some definitions for love that aren't necessarily lined up with scriptures teaching. [00:56:16] (32 seconds)  #LoveGodsWay

You cannot claim to love God and live a life of unrepentant, habitual sexual immorality. You cannot love God. I will. Thank you. cannot claim to love God and live a closed fisted, narcissistic, greedy life. We cannot live a life that looks at people on the outside of faith with hate and judgment. If we are going to love God, we must follow the clear teachings of his word. That's what love of God looks like. [00:58:05] (42 seconds)  #HolinessAndCompassion

True love loves truth. And sometimes the most loving and servant hearted thing you can do is actually confront a brother in Christ that is not lining up with the clear teaching of the word of God. We have a cultural understanding that love is just condoning, love is just celebrating, love is letting people do whatever they wanna do and just putting a stamp of approval. That's not God's definition. [01:00:36] (25 seconds)  #ConfrontInLove

Listen, that's like if you came up to me and said, I just, my truth is I love playing in traffic. I just feel like I was born to play in traffic and frolic and on 80. I just I I that's who I am. What's not loving is for me just to say, yes, you do you, boo. That's not loving. It's not loving for me to let you get smoked by a bus. [01:01:01] (25 seconds)  #LoveMeansIntervention

Have you experienced fellowship with the holy spirit? That should produce a unity in spirit. You know, the bible tells us very clearly that that we actually can't get saved unless the holy spirit draws us. See, something happens when the word of God is preached. When the word of God begins to be preached, the Holy Spirit begins to draw us and convict us and to say that, hey, this is true and you need to repent of your sin and bow your knee to the Lordship of Jesus. [01:02:02] (28 seconds)  #DrawnByTheSpirit

And in that moment, we have a choice. Am I going to submit my life to Jesus and his lordship, or am I going to stiff arm grace? And what begins to happen is when you submit your life, you repent of your sin, you declare Jesus is Lord. The Bible says the Holy Spirit takes up residence inside of you. There is a regeneration that occurs, and you are now a temple of the Holy Spirit. [01:02:29] (25 seconds)  #FilledWithHolySpirit

So Paul is saying, have you experienced that infilling power of the Holy Spirit at salvation? And if you are a Christian, the answer is yes. He's saying that should produce a one spirit reality within the church. That should produce this family uniting bond that nothing else can produce. The word in the Greek literally means one soul. [01:02:54] (24 seconds)  #OneSpiritOneSoul

I just want you to consider the compassion of Jesus for a moment. The God that spoke the stars into existence loved humanity enough to enter humanity as an infant dependent on his mother. And he was willing to live a life experiencing temptation like we do, pain like we do, betrayal like we do to serve you and I. And then he allows hands he created to crucify his. [01:06:03] (37 seconds)  #CompassionOfJesus

He allowed Romans he dreamed up from their mother's womb to raise him up on a cross bloody and naked for the world to see. It's the compassion of Jesus. You know throughout the gospels, it says that Jesus was moved with compassion and Paul uses this same word. And one of the most prominent places it pops up is Luke 15 where it talks about the story of the prodigal son. [01:06:41] (29 seconds)  #CompassionInTheGospels

It says there was a son that took his inheritance and goes out, spends it like crazy, wastes all this time, wastes his reputation, wastes his money, comes to the end of himself, says maybe I can just beg to be a servant at my father's house. So he decides to take a step back home. And the bible says the father sees his son coming. He's way out there. [01:07:10] (22 seconds)  #ProdigalWelcome

The son that had wasted money, wasted time, wasted reputation. He says the father was moved with compassion and while he was a long way off, began to run towards his son. And he threw a robe on his back and sandals on his feet and a ring on his finger. The compassion of Jesus. [01:07:32] (21 seconds)  #FatherRunsToYou

Has anyone experienced that compassion? Anyone else? Has anyone made it? Has anyone made a mess of their marriage? And while you were a long way off, the father ran towards you. Or maybe you were stuck in your addiction. You had no hope. You're a long way off, and the father ran towards you. And maybe you were stuck in your sin, and you didn't see a way out, but the father ran towards you. It's his compassion. [01:07:53] (32 seconds)  #GraceForTheBroken