[00:00:00] Speaker A: Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to God. If you're ever in the Madison area, we'd love for you to stop by and study the Bible with us on Sundays at 5pm or Wednesdays at 7pm if you have questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, you can find us
[email protected] be sure to subscribe to this podcast as well as our Sermons podcast, Madison Church of Christ Sermons. Thanks again for stopping by. I hope this study is a blessing to you.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: So tonight we begin our summer series and this is a tradition here. Each summer we have different, usually guest speakers from the area. And this summer we're doing something a little bit different and I'm really excited about it. We are having our shepherds lead our summer series and this is going to be a great way for us to get to know them. And one of the things that you might remember back to Vision Sunday and David's going to get more into this tonight that they talked about was our kind of focus for the year is to connect and connecting with each other. But also there's different facets of that as well. So that's going to be the theme and the focus for the summer. Again, I'm going to let him talk more about that. And one of the things that the ministers have the blessed privilege of is getting to introduce them. So we wanted to introduce them by sharing something funny and like a fun fact, but also something we love and appreciate about them. So that's what we're going to do. So we did some, some reconnaissance work and things on you, David, but so that's what we're going to do each time just to give you a little bit of a snapshot of them and who they are. So David is somebody that if you've been here any amount of time, has a lot of different talents and I'll mention one of those later, he is a really gifted public speaker. He's one of those that can communicate so well.
But one little known fact about David that some may know, some may not know, but he is, if you have struggles at your home, maybe like rodents or reptiles, he might be your guy.
One thing about him, there was a Sunday service here where there was this big lizard that was running through the service. He went and tried to rescue it and get it and you know, save the screaming in the auditorium. Picked it up by the tail, but the tail ripped off and just kept running. So that is a fun fact about David. But also, David is really into gardening. In fact, he has blessed our family with tomatoes, a lot of them, in the past. And so I appreciate him with that. But David. David has served as a Shepherd here for 18 years. For 18 years. And that's a really long time to serve in anything, but especially in the role of a shepherd. And David is very special to me in the fact that he is one of the ones that hired Brandon and I to take on the preaching role. I think he and Mark were in that original group. So if you have complaints, see them. But.
But for me, I love them so much. I've gotten to know them so much over the years. And one neat thing about David is the way he's connected in our community.
Back in the day, he used to be the president of the Madison Baseball association, and part of the reason why there is no baseball games on Wednesday nights is because of him. And so I appreciate that about him. And he also, from what I understand, helped organize the scheduling as well on how they schedule practices and schedule games. Jesse Ortner, I believe, also served in that role, and other people here at Madison have as well. Another neat thing about David is if you've had the opportunity to be in one of his classes, he is a phenomenal Bible class teacher. He does such a good job at getting at whatever the heart of the message is, and he has the gift of that. But the other thing that I appreciate about him is if you've ever been in a meeting with David, and y' all might know people like this, that the room is trying to kind of maybe figure something out, and there's different thoughts on things. He's able to read the room and get the pulse of the room, and also kind of come up with what I like to call Plan C. You know, sometimes you think, well, it's either A or B.
And then he has this gift to kind of figure out what Plan C is. And so I love and appreciate him for that. But there's a picture I want to show of him, and we had another one that we were trying to find. It was him actually on a tree with a chainsaw.
But this, to me, is a picture that really shows who he is. There are so many people in our community that have been blessed by the way that he just comes to their home and serves different outreach things. He's involved, so I know he doesn't want to hear any more about himself. But we just want to say thank you. We appreciate all the years that you have served and continue to serve. And I'll turn it over to David Glenn.
[00:05:09] Speaker A: Thank you for those kind words, Andrew. I appreciate those very much. That really it's been a huge blessing to Liz and I to be able to be in this community and to be a part of this congregation since 89, I guess. And we have been able to raise our family here and to be among you folks and live and learn and serve, and it's just. It's just been awesome. And it's just a great blessing. And this whole congregation has just surrounded us with love all of our lives. And we're just very thankful for that and thankful for the opportunity to serve and to be a part of this good fellowship here.
All right, so connecting, that's what we're going to focus on this summer. We're going to talk about that. And let's just jump right in. And if I finish early, that's your break, not mine. So let's talk. So we're going to talk tonight.
As we dive into this series about connecting and being connected to various aspects of God's work and God's people, it occurred to me that sometimes we're not all so very connectable.
Sometimes we like to just be isolated. Sometimes we don't like to reach out. Sometimes we don't want to get involved. And there's just things. Sometimes it's just not auto magic that we connect with each other. So I want to think a little bit about let's becoming more connectable before we dive into all the things that we're going to have the opportunity to connect to. So our focus today will be on connecting to each other.
And the message is individual. It's for you, it's for me. Okay. So there are these thoughts I want to share with you about how to become more connected. Just some thoughts that I think you can take with you and I think will help as we try to become that person that's easily and able to connect in the way that God calls us to be connected to each other.
The scripture is full of passages which talk about the value of one another and being connected to one another. And this is probably one of the ones that you'd be most familiar with where the wisest man, Solomon, wrote these words about that two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. And if either of them falls down, one can help the other up, but pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.
Also, if two lie down together, they'll keep warm. But how will one keep warm alone? Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. And the cord of three stands is not quickly broken. And this and many other passages talk about the. The very high value of being connected together.
Tonight I want to talk about. The connections that we're talking about are not just the friendships or the hey, how are you? I play golf with you, or we're in the knitting circle together or in a book club together, all the other type of ways that we can form friendships and enjoy light hearted friendships. The relationship that we're talking about when we're talking about being connected together is entirely different, more than friends. Here's one passage right out of First Corinthians where Paul is talking to us about that relationship that we have together in the church. And he talks about, and he uses the metaphor of the body.
And he says, he takes each part and he says, I can't say to the hand, I don't need you. And the head can't say to the feet, I don't need you. And on through he says, there should be no division in the body. All parts have equal concern for one another. And if one part suffers, every part suffers with it. And if one part is honored, all parts rejoice with it. And then again he says in Romans, so we, being many, are one body in Christ and individually members of one another.
So when we're talking about being connected together in this body at Madison Church of Christ and being connected to one another, we're not talking about casual friendships, country club type friendships. We're talking about a serious spiritual relationship with each other that results in us being brothers and sisters.
And those are the things that we want to develop together. Because it's in that relationship that we truly are the body of Christ and we have the unity that Christ paid for. So that's going to be our focus tonight. All of our thoughts are on how can I become connectable so that I can be connected with brothers and sisters.
So we'll talk a little. I want to talk. Just use a stupid, stupid, silly illustration about connectivity. And really a key part of connectivity. More than flexibility, more than a good smile, more than some things. There's a key part to spiritual connectivity that I want to illustrate.
I worked for undergrad for years and years and occasionally I'd get sent on the road when they couldn't find anybody else to do a demonstration.
I ended up in Dublin, Ireland one time and had A big demonstration plan for a couple of clients in two days. And so I got there early and I had this monstrous laptop. I mean, it was like £15 and big battery pack. And I was very smart though. I got one of those doodads. So I knew that the plug outlets didn't work in, in the UK and in Ireland, like they worked here. So I was careful to get that. I got everything set up and I had the demonstration ready to go and I sat down and opened it up and I started to work to polish up and finish the demonstration. And I noticed a little icon on the side, said it was on battery power.
That's. That's not good since I've got it plugged in and I noticed the battery power going down and I've been to say, well, this is not good.
I don't have enough battery power here to finish this demo and to talk to two customers about it tomorrow. So I began to sweat and worry. And so I did everything I knew to do, plugged it into every plug outlet in the room, thought, well, it must be the battery pack, it must be the power charger. So I went out somewhere in Dublin and I ran around to different little shops and tried to find a.
Something that would serve and couldn't find anything. I came in, I said, I don't know what to do, I just don't know what to do.
So after fussing with it and fussing with it and seeing the battery going down 30%, 20%, 10% and thinking, how in the world am I going to song and dance this demo the next day? And so I came back in the room after eating supper that night and I sat down and it was. Came in, it was dark and I throw the light switch and nothing came on.
So I'm funny, I remember. Oh, yeah, take the room key in those rooms and you take the room key and you stick it in this slot on the side and the power came on and what, the laptop came on.
So you got to have power.
You can be really flexible. You can have all kinds of things done to be connected, but if you're not connected to the power source, it's useless.
Silly example. But when we're talking about being connected together, we've got to begin with being connected to Jesus Christ. He is our source of power. It is in him and through him that we have the spirit. We will develop the spirit and the characteristics of our life that allow us to have that connectivity with our brethren.
So as we start tonight, I really want to start there. How can we draw closer to Jesus. And we just finished a great study where we talked about being with Jesus, being like Jesus, and doing the things Jesus did.
So I want to back up to being with Jesus. And there's some things I think we can do, things that we can put in our lives that we can help us to be with Jesus and begin to be transformed, to be like Jesus so that we become much more connectable with our brethren.
So that's what we want to talk about to start with. That's what we want to start with today.
And this notion of being connected to Jesus, Jesus himself was very plain spoken about that, right? He says, you don't want to do anything if you're not connected to me. It's just like a branch and a vine. If the branch is not connected to the vine, just put it in the fire. It's not good for anything. It says, if you remain in me and my words remain in you, then ask whatever you wish and it will be done for you.
So this notion and this idea that we have to be more closely connected to Jesus, we have to spend time with Jesus, is a necessary prerequisite before we can do any of the things that we're going to talk about about being connected to one another.
A really key point for me about this. We try to talk about being like Jesus. We say, that's not possible. I can't be like Jesus. He was perfect. He was God himself. He came and lived on earth without sin. How can I be like him? And yet, when we look at the Scriptures, and here's one, for example, God intended since the beginning of time that we would be conformed to the image of Jesus. That was his plan. He says, I have predestined plan that those that he foreknew would be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.
And then in Second Corinthians, Paul talks to us. He says he's reflecting on when Moses came down from the mount and the veil had to be put over his face because he had been in the presence of God. And continuing from that thought, he says, and we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.
And so the first thing about becoming, spending time with Jesus and becoming like Jesus, is to understand that that is God's intent.
It's not something incidental. It's not something accidental. It's not something that's an option that if we are moving in the direction of spending time with Jesus and becoming like Jesus, that is exactly what God's intent is.
And that way he wants to transform us into be like His Son.
And that process is a transformation because neither you nor I can approach the perfectness of Jesus, nor can we be like him in any way without God's help. And he says in Romans 12, 2, don't be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.
And when we're transformed and when this transform occurs, and when we become more and more like Jesus, the result of that is the work of the Spirit in our life. And the results of those things that occur and become evident in our life are these things. Joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control.
So learning how to be with Jesus enables the Holy Spirit to be aligned with our Spirit in our heart and to begin that transformation process in our lives that changes us to become like Jesus.
And I think sometimes we think that's something that can't happen, that I there's no way I can overcome that bad temper that I have. There's no way that I can learn to become more giving. There's no way that I can move to be more compassionate. I'm selfish. How can all these things happen? God says, I can do that.
I can transform you. I can move you in that direction. When your life is aligned with the life of Jesus Christ, when we spend time with him, the Holy Spirit working in our lives can transform us and move us in that direction. And that's a confidence that we should have.
So let's talk a little bit about some of the things that we can do to align our spirits with the Holy Spirit so He can begin to work that transformation process in our lives, and we can begin to become more like Jesus and thus more connectable.
And what I want to propose to you is that the things that we habitually do, that we do over and over, and it becomes a characteristic habit of our life, those are what we are going to become.
And that's just a general standard observation that we become what we do, what we do over and over.
So I want to suggest to you four habits, four spiritual disciplines that we can put in place in our lives as habits. And the key word is to do them as habitually, that we will begin to be lined up with the Holy Spirit and our transformation that we require in our lives. God can begin and will begin to do the first one Is if we're going to be with Jesus, we have to spend time with His Word. We have to spend time with His Word. We have to be in the book daily basis. Here's just some of the many, many passages throughout Scriptures that talk about the importance and the value of opening a book and spending time reading the book.
In fact, being with Jesus. And the book comes right out of John 1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. So we want to spend time with the Word, open the book, the Word of God, and spend time in it reading every day. And these other passages are just all the greatest characters, all the greatest souls, all the greatest spirits in the Bible that we go to for our examples. They all spent time thinking about and spending time understanding reading God's Word. So the first habit we really need to put in place in our life is daily habitual time spending denyment reading God's Word.
Second one is to open the door for communication with God and begin to pray and to pray without ceasing.
As the scriptures say.
God is anxious to have that relationship with us, that he can hear us, that we can express our thoughts to him, we can open up our hearts to him, we can talk about anything in our life at any time and any place.
And that's the kind of prayer that he's looking for with us. So if we're going to be close to Jesus, if we're going to be close to God, we've got to spend time in conversation, spend time in prayer. And the scripture said that the kind of prayer that God's looking for is the kind where we get in our private place, in our quiet place and we just talk to God, we open up our hearts and we spend time talking to him, praying to him habitually every day.
The scriptures say, as Paul says here, ever stop praying, Rejoice, always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in every circumstance, because that's what God wants for us.
So the second habit to put in our life is to pray all the time and pray intensely and pray between us and God with an open heart. God knows our hearts, but it is incredibly important for us not to try to hide anything from him and to spend time with every thought before him, whether I'm driving in the car or I'm sitting at home, either one third thing is meditate. And what we what I mean by meditate is to find is to take is really the quiet place. It's really the quiet place. It's taking the time deliberately out of your day to find a quiet place and to think about God's word and God's way.
One of the ways that is. That is a good way to do that, is to pick a passage that's particularly pertinent to you and memorize it, say it out loud 2, 3, 4 times, and dwell on the meaning of that word.
And then in that period of time where you have the quiet time and you're letting those words ring in your ears, pray to God about those things, talk to God about that message that he has for you in those words, and then just sit quietly and allow God to speak into your heart.
We don't do this often. We don't do it well.
Or at least I'm going to speak for myself. I'm always in a rush to the next thing on my checklist, the next thing to do, so seldom do I do, as David said, that I will meditate on your precepts and fix my eyes on your ways. And then he talks about the blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of wicked, but he delights in the law of the Lord. And on it he meditates day and night.
And sometimes we just need to remember what he said in Psalms 46. Just be still, be still and know that I am God.
And Philippians, Paul speaks clearly, says, finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, think about such things.
So the third habit that I think we can add to our lives as a part of our discipline of our lives, is to spend quiet time meditating on God's Word. And I really encourage us to go back.
You memorize Scripture when you're little, memorize Scripture again so you can have those parked in your heart and you can call them to the surface anytime you want. And I think that's an awesome way to memorize scripture and bring it into your period of meditation and say it out loud and think about the meaning and the significance of those words of God and do that during your period of time of meditation.
And then the fourth one is worship.
And I want to talk a little bit about worship.
These are some passages here that I read some of them out. But just talking about the significance of worship, you know, worship is about worthiness and the purpose for worship. There are many benefits to worship, but the primary purpose for worship is to adore God, is to raise God up and to put him number one in my life and to express that to him. That is what worship's primary purpose is.
In Revelations 4, the passage says, you are Worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honor and power. For you created all things, and by your will they were created and have them as their being. So throughout Scripture, when it talks about worship, that's praising God and giving thanks to God, but praising him for who he is and what he's done.
Sometimes I think we struggle with the notion of just praising God.
But I think the best, you know, we don't have any trouble praising a ball player or praising singers or praising other people for who they are and what they do should be easy for us when we dwell on God and who he is and what he is and what he's accomplished and what he's meant in our lives for us to give him praise.
So part of our worship, that's the central part of our worship. In Hebrews, it talks about when we pray that we express reverence and awe. Again, this worshiping God helps us remember who we are and who he is.
And He's God Almighty, the Creator, and he is the Savior, and He is the One who comes to us in our times of need.
A third part is thanksgiving. You're familiar with Psalms 100. He talks about to give thanks for all of the things. There's so many things that we can give thanks to God for in our lives, and just a matter of taking the time to do it. And that is a key component of worship.
And in John 4 he talks when Jesus was talking to the Samaritan woman and they were talking, she was saying, well, we worship over here and you guys say, worship over there. He says, time is coming and now is when we're going. When everyone that wants to worship God will worship him in spirit and in truth, for he is a spirit.
And truth we understand pretty quickly. That means however God said He wanted to be worshipped, that's how we're going to do it. But what does it mean to worship God in spirit?
Well, I think a clue to that is you can find in Amos and again in Matthew. In Amos 5, the prophet is speaking to the people and he says a very powerful passage, but it's stunning almost. It says, I hate, I despise your religious festivals. Festivals, your assemblies are a stench to me. And even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice offerings, I will have no regard for them.
Away with the noise of your songs. I will not listen to the music of your harps, but let justice roll on like a river, Righteousness like a never failing stream.
And then in Matthew, Jesus says, these people Honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. They worship me in vain. Their teachings are merely human rules.
So I believe that when the scriptures say that we're to worship in spirit, it's talking about our Spirit. And our lives are aligned with what God is asking. And when we come to worship, we bring a life that's yielded to Him.
It's not hypocritical. When we come into this place and we come to worship, we're not living a life out there that's not consistent with the adoration we're giving to Jesus in here.
And so worshiping in spirit truth means bringing our lives in alignment with his will and bringing that spirit of obedience and humility in here with us when we come into worship together. So those are four things that I believe put into place as practicing everyday habits help us to align our spirit with the Spirit of Jesus Christ and with the Holy Spirit.
And when we do those things, he begins to change us. And we begin to be opened up to all of the things that we need to be in order that we can be connected to one another in a spiritual bond as brothers and sisters.
So I want to tack on top of that four things, suggestions, ideas that I think we can do to be more connectable given these things. As we grow closer to the Spirit of Christ, as we spend time with him, as we begin to be transformed and our hearts are open to the things that he's leading us to do, what are some very practical things that we can put in place in our lives that will help us to connect with our brethren and begin to build those brother sister relationships? So I have four ideas, four suggestions, and that's the first one. The first one is just this is not about developing new social skills.
Some of us are a little prickly, and some of us are teddy bears.
And if you're a teddy bear, that's good. I think if you're prickly, it's not so good.
But what we're talking about is allowing God to work in our lives through the things that we put in place to allow him to make us able to move beyond our own personal quirks and things that we are and allow him to work to change us and mold us and help us to be that person who easily connects with one another.
And so if you're a porcupine today, you can do better.
God can do better with you, and God is looking to do better with you. So I just want to give you a couple of ideas of things that we can start putting in place, each one of them will be something to remove and something to add. And we can do these things and these will help us to grow in our ability to be connected.
So the first one is selfless living.
So often everything we do in our life is measured by its value to us, right? To me, is it going to be good for me? Am I going to have to get involved? Is it going to be painful for me? Is it going to take my time? Is it going to take my resources?
So often when we look at another person we value our interest in being involved with that person is first. How is it going to affect me?
Is it going to cost me time?
Philippians says, don't do anything out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility. Value others above yourselves.
So this first thing that I think we have to remove from our lives is this notion that everything in our life, that the way we value everything in our existence is by measuring how it impacts us. That's got to come out, that's got to go.
That's not going to be possible for us to be a great servant of Jesus and connecting with others if we're always thinking about me first.
And I think one of the worst things the devil does is to just put this notion in our mind that everything in our life is a comparison.
Oh, they did this better than me, or they did this less better than me. Oh, they look better than me or they don't look better than me. This whole notion of living a life of constant comparison just rips apart any opportunity for us to be a humble, connectable brother or sister. And so things that's got to go, selfless living, we got to embrace it and things have got to go is this notion of self first and comparisons and what we need to add. Things that we can add as a practical thing, an on purpose thing. It's just encouragement, practically giving encouragement to others. Look every day, find someone that you can speak a word of encouragement.
It's not hard to do, but you have to plan and be on purpose to do it.
Thankfulness.
We have much to be thankful, but so often we live in the it's not enough syndrome that we got this, but maybe we could get that or maybe this more. We're always one more, one more, one more.
And the spirit we want to develop, the spirit we want to add in our heart is the notion of being truly thankful and finding a reason to be thankful every day.
Third, as Paul said, I became all things to all men by some means. I might save some to learn to be flexible.
Not everybody came from North Alabama, not everybody grew up in Montgomery.
Not everybody went to school where you went to school.
Everybody in our world is from different places and different times and different backgrounds and brings all kinds of things to the table. And if we're going to be connectable with our brothers and sisters, we've got to open ourselves to being flexible.
And flexibility is really opening ourselves to learn to see other people and to accept them where they're coming from.
So that's number one, get rid of this self centered living and begin to develop a spirit of selfless living.
Number two, I want us to learn. I want to learn to see Jesus, to see people the way Jesus sees people. So what I want us to add first is, what I know I need to add is I need to add the gift of listening. I need to be ready to give the gift of listening to anyone that I come in contact with. And it is a gift because 90% of the time my tendency is just to wait till they finish talking so I can say what I want to say or I got something like that, or I want to trump up on what they've just said.
If I want to be more connectable, if I want to be more of a brother to my brethren, I need to learn to listen to people. And Jesus did that.
Secondly, we have to seek understanding.
The fact that we don't understand a person just should motivate us to try to understand them. Where are they coming from? And if possible, virtually exchange places with them. If I were in their shoes, what would I feel like?
This is a practical way of trying to gain understanding is to see the world from a different place. It is not necessarily easy to do, but it has to be an on purpose thing.
And this, this passage to me maybe more than any other passage, is an example where Jesus, the way he saw people was not, I don't think anybody else would have seen them the way he saw them. This passage is, the context of this passage is all of his apostles have just come back from being sent out and they come back with great excitement and celebration from all the many things that they had done in the world. And the demons had been cast out. He was excited for them.
And John the Baptist, his first cousin, had just been murdered.
And what did Jesus want to do? He just, he said, I just want to go away. We're going to go away into a quiet place. We're just going to be in a quiet place for a period of time.
And he looks up and there's this monstrous multitude of people coming up the seashore.
I know what I would have thought when I looked at them, but he said, I saw them, and he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd.
And so I think that that's where I want to be and that's where I want to do is I want to seek understanding. Not immediately put some people in a. Put a person in a box, but try to understand where they're coming from.
And so that means remove stereotyping, prejudice, categorization. It's like Paul said in Galatians, we're all children of God through faith. For all of us were baptized into Christ Jesus. There's not Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. We're all one.
And so I need to be able to remove this notion, the immediate instinct to put people in a box. When I see them and I hear a few words, I box them up, and then that's got to go.
Third, I want to learn humility.
And maybe we should, say, become vulnerable.
For us to really be connected at a spiritual level as brothers and sisters, we have to be open with each other.
We're none of us perfect.
And when we pretend to be perfect, nobody wants to be with us. Nobody wants to connect with us because they know they're not perfect. And they pretty well know we're not perfect, but we're not emitting it.
The notion is we need to be open and able to confess our problems, to talk about our experiences, to share with one another. That's an opening of our hearts and our lives to being vulnerable.
It's absolutely necessary for us to have that deep spiritual relationship that we're called to have with our brothers and sisters.
And the things that flip side of that, the stuff that's got to go is always making an excuse when we make a mistake. Always having some rationalization why it's not as bad as it seemed to be.
And it's saying, I get. So I've said it.
I really got an attitude about it. I am what I am.
Well, I hope you're getting better.
I hope you're getting better.
This notion of I just am what I am, and you just have to take me for what I am, that's not. That's not right.
We know that's not right. God's working to change us in our lives if we'll open ourselves to it. And it's certainly not a justification for our behavior.
So becoming more and more humble, we could even use the word vulnerable.
And the last one I'd like to add is just be available in Hebrews. We're very familiar with this passage where it says let's hold tightly without wavering to the hope that we have for God can be trusted to keep his promise. Let's think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and to good works. And let's not neglect our meeting together as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.
I think we discuss, I think we swing the pendulum all over the place about whether we should be at the gathering of the church scriptures. Don't you ought to be. But the notion is if we want to be connected to our brothers and sisters, if we want to be connected, we spend time with them.
And that means we got to be available, we've got to make ourselves available, we got to be here. Maybe come a little early, leave a little late.
That's just a very practical aspect. If we're going to become more connected, we've got to know people. We're going to know people, we've got to spend time with them. If we're going to spend time with them, we've got to be available.
And it's, you know, our habit, and I don't know if we think it's a Christian habit, is that we need to fill up every moment of our time with something good. Well, that there are good things. There are plenty of good things to fill up all your time. But if you have no open places in your life, where am I supposed to fit in?
How can you reach me? How can you talk to me if there's no place for that?
So easy for us.
As you're growing up with your family and you want everyone, all your families to be successful in all these different ways and you want them to participate in all these good things. And next thing you know, you don't have enough time, time to breathe and you certainly don't have just empty time that's available for that phone call or that note or that person that looks a little worried or looks a little upset that you'd like to stop and spend more time talking to because you're booked. You know the minute the bell rings, you got to go. Cause you're going to the next good thing. And I know that's, that's a habit that needs to be broken. Booking every minute. It's an on purpose decision to open up time in our lives and to free up time in our lives and just make ourselves available.
Be there every opportunity we can. The purpose is to get to know our brothers and sisters.
So let's run back through those things. How many? We got four things we're going to talk about. We've talked about that. Help us draw alongside the Spirit of the Holy Spirit and align ourselves with it.
Spend time with Jesus to begin that transformation process, to make us be his spiritual children and help us to become more connectable.
Those things.
The first thing that we, as we start this thought process, the first thought is that deep personal spiritual connections are necessary.
Are necessary. This is not an option. This is something we're working hard to do. This church will not succeed if we don't have strong spiritual relationships with each other.
So that's the next first. We need each individually. We need to accept that that's necessary and it's important.
And doing that first begins as we presented tonight. First begins with connecting with Jesus in a more deeper and more spiritual way. And as we began to do those things that put us in the presence of Jesus on a regular and habitual basis, then God says, I will begin to transform you and you will become more and more like Myself.
That is my plan. That is my intent. That is what I want for you.
And becoming like Jesus is a transformation process. It doesn't happen overnight. You pop up out of the waters of baptism and poof, you're not. You don't get angry anymore. You don't say ugly words anymore. No, it doesn't happen. It's a transformation process as we yield ourselves to what God is able to do and we commit ourselves to being, spending time with him in the things that we've talked about.
When we begin to do those things, God can begin to change us and those things can be gone from our lives.
So what were they reading the Word of God every day.
Need to do what works for you. Read the Virgin that works for you. Spending time in the Word, dwelling time in the Word, praying without ceasing, in the car, at home, everywhere, talking to God all the time without ceasing, meditating on God's Word, finding time, some minutes every day where you have just the time between you and God to think about His Word, to talk to him about His Word, to pray with him about those things. And then as those things come together in your life, to actually dwell on those and to wait for the Spirit's guidance.
And finally worshiping, putting God first, elevating him, praising him, holding him in the place that he's supposed to be, and doing that all the time, weekends and more.
And then we Talked about practices that we can do things that we can practically do as we work towards connecting to each other spiritually.
Move this notion of measuring everything by myself. Get that out of the way. I'm not the measuring stick. I don't need to be sorted to the front row.
Learning to see people and see as Jesus sees people.
Don't sort them into some category, stereotypical place. Box them up, put them in a place. Our goal is to understand them, to understand one another, to share with one another, to learn to be vulnerable with one another. And that's what we say when we say learning humility, learning the ability to be open with each other.
We're not perfect. Nobody's perfect. Be open with that, with each other and share your experiences.
Many of us have difficulties that we're struggling with, and there are others here who have struggled with those things and have overcome through the guidance and the blessings of God.
Let's open ourselves to that possibility and those connections and be available.
Be available. Don't book your life up to the point where you have no time left for each other. You have no time left for me or this other one.
Think about deliberately set down and plan out your week. Think about, how can I leave time open in this place where I can have time that I'm available? It might not get called this week. I might get called 15 times next week. But make those slots and those times available.
So the scriptures say, just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ's body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other.
Jesus, when he prayed this prayer before his crucifixion, he says, my prayer is not just for the apostles, but I'm praying also for those who will believe in me through their message that all of them may what be one. Just as you are in me and I am in you, may they also be in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. I've given them the glory you gave me, that they may be one, as we are one, I in them, and you in me, so they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
Let's close out with a word of prayer.
Our good Father, we are so very blessed to be your children and Father, as we grow, we want to grow in our relationship with you. We want to be more and more like your son, Jesus. And as we do that, we want to be stronger and stronger in our relationships with each other. Father, we want to be brothers and sisters that hold together with great strength and that nothing can divide us or overcome us or take us away from each other, just as nothing can take us away from you. We pray, Father, you'll bless us in our determination to make that be true. Help us in our commitment to the activities and the things that will enable you to change us and transform us into the image of your son. And then bless us with the activities and actions that will be rooted out of that. They'll open our hearts to each other. We pray these blessings, Father, and pray you'll continue with us in every way. And we pray this in Jesus name, Amen.
