This recording is from Christ Kingdom Church in Avalon Park, Orlando. Visit us online at ChristKingdom.org for our calendar driving directions and more audio recordings. We are in the midst of a new year as Joe helped us last week as he preached on the start of the new year and what some of that man and God creating all things new. Where we are in 2009 and I want to talk about new things as well and follow up with that. In fact, I want to challenge you instead of thinking about your new year's resolution. By the way, how many of you made any kind of new year's resolution? Raise your hand. Raise your hand. Oh my goodness. Only a few. Is that it? Raise your hand if you made a new year's resolution if any type this year. The rest of you heard just like, hey, I don't make any then. Yeah. Okay. All right. I'm not going to ask how many have already failed on a new year's resolution with that. But let me challenge you to do something even better than a new year's resolution. Let me challenge you to have a new year's revolution to totally think about something here this morning that could revolutionize the way you think, the way you view yourself, the way you view life. And most importantly, the word all begins the way you view God. Because depending on how you view God will have a direct comparison to how you do what we're going to talk about this morning. And it follows them at the title of stewardship. We're going to be talking about that this week, next week, maybe a week after I haven't decided yet. But this month has a lot to do with that. And as we'll go on in the service, you'll understand more and more why. But let's turn right now to Matthew 25, 14 through 30. If you have a Bible, you can turn there. That's first book in the New Testament. I think it also is printed in the bulletin. It will be on the screen behind you as well. But here, God's Word, we read from Matthew 25 verses 14 through 30, a story that will be familiar to many of you. Verse 14, again, it will be like a man going on a journey who called his servants and entrusted his property to them to one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. So also the one with two talents gained two more. But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground, and hid his master's money. After a long time, the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. The master, he said, you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more. His master replied, well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful with a few things. I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness. The man with the two talents also came. Master, he said, you entrusted me with two talents. See, I have gained two more. His master replied, well done, good and faithful servant. Now with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness. Then the man who had received the one talent came. Master, he said, I know that you are a hard man harvesting where you have not sewn and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you. His master replied, you wicked, lazy servant. You knew that I harvest a bride not sewn and gather where I have not scattered seed. Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers so that when I return, I would have received him back with interest. Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more. And he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has, will be taken from him and throw that worthless servant outside into the darkness where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. This is God's holy and inspired word. Well, if you grew up in church at all, or have you been going to church at all, you no doubt have at least read or probably heard a sermon on this passage. Because this is very common. And often comes up around a time that we are talking about stewardship. But I want to just kind of unpackage a few things and give some insights here on it. One, you might be thinking, all right, what exactly is the term of a talent? Our first thought we think of talent is thinking about physical ability and giftedness and things like that. But this is actually a term or unit of measurement from mass. So what he is talking about here is directly to do with some concept of finances. So let's say for example, if it was a talent of gold, and usually it would have been a talent of gold or talent of silver, that term of measurement talent was used with those. But if it was a talent of gold that he is talking about, that he gave one man one, one man two, one man five, it would be equal to about 75 pounds of gold, which would have been equal to 20 years of wage for an average day laborer. Now, does that give you a picture? So one got the wages of 20 years, one got it for 40 years, okay, and you see how it goes on. There is a lot, a financial stewardship is being entrusted from the master here to his servants. So it gives you a picture. But what I do think this passage is talking about more than just finances, it's giving us a principle here that all that God gives us, all that we have that comes from God has been entrusted to us, just like finances are, but not just finances, your time. You know, for many of us, I think most of us would agree, especially in this country, that time sometimes feels a whole lot more valuable than actual dollars and cents. But it's not just that, if any of you are in poor health, you'd say, you don't know what you got until all of a sudden your health is gone, or you're in a period of sickness or disease, and you'll realize that wow, that is something that could be even more important because that affects your time perhaps. It certainly can affect your finances, but you begin to see, you'll package it more and more, that we have been entrusted with a lot. And I think this passage as much as it does talk about money, it's talking about all and everything that God has given us, no matter what that is. Jesus is the one telling this parable, and he's making it very clear that God is the master, and he's entrusted servants, all his creation, and especially human beings, made in his image, he's entrusted with very special things. That he expects us to do something with. So as you look at that here this morning, I don't want you to think so much about how they did this, how did the guy with five get five more? How did the guy with two get two more? How did the one with one get nothing more? But I want you to really ask the question is this, why? Did the guy with five want to get and go out and get five more? Why did the guy with two go out and get two more? And even just as interestingly, why did the one do nothing with it, but dig a hole and hide it? So I'm hoping to give at least four insights this morning, four lessons from this parable of the talents that really are focused at answering that question of the why here this morning. And how you deal with your talent will show just like it did for them something very deeply about what you believe about God. So let's dive in. Number one, first point there as we follow through this, four lessons, lesson number one, I think there's an outline in your bulletin if you want to follow along. Lesson one is this, God owns you. Now that is not politically correct. In fact, I even thought about ways I could rephrase that this week because I thought, you know, I just kind of sound strong. You know, especially in this country, right, who has a heritage of things like slavery, and one that we like to distance ourselves from, one that we are moving away from, and one that is a shame, a rightful shame on this country, and other than ownership like that, people don't like to think about the idea of being owned. And there's some good reasons for that as we know. But this is very clear that God owns us, and there's no way around that to say that it's very important for us to get this. Notice at the very beginning of this passage in verse 14, the very first verse of this parable says this, again, it will be like a man going on a journey who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. They were his servants, and everything that he gave them was his. And you, if you are a human being, according to the Bible, are made in the image of God, and you are his because he made you. And everything you have has been entrusted to you, but it's his very important concept for us to get. It's his servants, it's his property, we are his. And why would I say that? Well, one, there's two reasons. One first reason is the right of a creator, the right of a creator. In this country, especially, we do take a lot of time to make sure that things like copyright laws, things like trademark registration laws, things like patent laws are in place to protect somebody who is a creator of something, because we know how important it is. I've had a little bit experience myself with that, and that some of you might know, I am a little bit of a songwriter on the side not in recent years, but I've had to go through the process of being able to take a song and try to get it copyrighted, and know and understand what some of the laws are. Plus, we as a church try to make sure that when we are projecting music and using lyrics and printing music, that we are honoring copyright laws so that we don't infringe upon that, because it's very important for that. Because what happens when a copyright or something that's registered or patent is violated is something that really falls in the category of theft. I mean, think about it with things like plagiarism. When you take an idea that somebody else has created and you present it, basically verbatim, but don't give credit to the originator, and either imply that you are the originator or even say plainly that you are, and kids don't do this in school. If you are caught, you will be told that you have plagiarized. You have stolen ownership from somebody else. Very important concept that we believe in this country rightly so, that the owner has rights. Genesis 127 says this, so God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him, male and female, he created them by the very laws of our own country. God is fully protected by these nations laws that he is rightful owner because he is the creator of you. He's the creator of the earth. He's the creator of every living thing that exists. So God owns you knowing because of a right of a creator, but secondly, he owns you because of a right of a purchaser. I mean, think about it. I mean, how many of you have a BJ's, Sam's, or Costco membership? Raise your hand. Got a little membership card. Okay. More of you have that than made resolutions. I just want to point that out this year. Okay, so you got to go in there. Now, what's one thing that as far as my experience has been at least, at every single one of those stores, when you are on your way out with your possessions, all right, you have to stop at the door and do what? Show your receipt, right? And usually they take a little whole punch thing and just kind of punch it out to kind of have proof that they check that. What's going on there? What's that? They don't trust their customers? That could be they are making sure, right, that ownership has transferred. They are making sure you have made a legitimate purpose, I'm not purpose, but purchase their that morning. They want to know for sure that these items no longer belong to BJ, Sam's, or Costco, but these items belong to John Mary Alice Archer, or Mike and Allison Lee, whoever's making the purchase there. They want to know that, and you have rights, and the right is that you can carry that out from your car, not in paper bags, so they don't provide it, but you can carry it out of your car, load it up, take it home, and you can consume it any way you like, because you now have a right as a purchaser. Well, the Bible goes on and tells us something in many places, Revelation 5.9, for example, when it's talking about in heaven, it says they sing a new song in heaven. What were they singing about? They were singing, you are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals because you are slain, and with your blood, you purchased men for God from every tribe and language, people and nation. Every human being has been created by God, but all those who place their faith and trust in Jesus Christ, even more so have been purchased by God. Where sin and the enemy have stolen you away, even though God still owns you as a creator right, he repurchased you back and bought you to himself for those that have faith in Jesus Christ. God owns you because he created you, and for all those who have followed Jesus Christ because he has purchased you by the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. Well, number two, God owns you, but here's the problem that we see in this story, many pretend that he doesn't. Many pretend he doesn't. It's been several years ago now, and I'm not sure how well Michael remembers the story well or not, but you remember when you were around 12 years old, you came, you were a long time coming back from 7-11 where he rode his bike up to go get a drink or something. And when he walked back in the door, he was like, what took you so long? What was going on? He was like, Dad, somebody stole my bike. I was like, you're kidding me. No, so we got in the car. We went right back up to 7-11 because I thought, you know, who would have done this? Is it still in the area? It might just dump it somewhere. So we're driving around there. And sure enough, we see it two kids. I'm not sure they're both on a bike or whatever, but coming to buy on a bike. And I stopped. This was back with Superstar Video. It was still there. Stopped right by the Superstar Video. Got out of the car because I saw this kid walking up and Michael's bike. And I walked up to him and said, I think that's my son's bike. And I was trying to think to myself, is he know that I'm a pastor? What could I get away with here? Because I was not real happy about this. And this, you know, Michael was maybe 12 at the time. Maybe this kid was 14 or 15. Maybe a little bit older, obviously not old enough to drive because he was looking for a bike. So anyway, he comes up and plays dumb with us. He's like, oh, you know, I don't know where your son's bike is. I'm like, yeah, you're sitting on it. So I'm thinking how I can kindly move through this here without taking this kid or calling the cops or whatever else. And he finally says, well, hey, he can have this bike. I found this one behind the Windix year, whatever, just a little while ago. I've already got a bike. Why don't he just have to take this bike? I had a range of emotions going through my mind, some of which I can't share this morning, exactly on this polite offer from this young 14, 15 year old boy. But I thought to myself, look, you are not the owner of that bike. And you're going to offer it to me now, pretend that you are. And offer it back to me as though that should be some kind of reward or you should be padded on the back. I took the bike back and decided to let this slide here since we got it back so quickly. But made sure he knew that I understood all along whose bike it was and suggested he not ever do it again. What do we do with God, though? When we even, for a second, begin to act like God has an expectation about our lives, about our time, about our talents. I mean, me being just a simple human being has that kind of response when I hear somebody talking about a bike that they don't even own, because I'm the one that bought it, or it was a Christmas gift, however we got it wasn't this guys. How could God, a holy God, view us? We have a kind of a mentality or an attitude that challenges who's the real author, who's the real owner of something like that, because many pretend that God is not creator, owner of it all. And where we see that, look in verse 24 here, this passage. And we skipped down to the one guy who did differently than the guy with five and the guy with two, verse 24 says this, the man who had received one talent came. Master, he said, I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here's what belongs to you. If you look deeper what was going on there, there was two realities. There was an inner reality in this guy's mind, and there was the outer reality what we saw. Let's look at the inner reality first. The inner reality of this guy was a wrong view of God. Because what does he say about his master? I knew that you are a hard man, really. Harvesting where you have not sown. Are you sure? Gathering where you have not scattered seed. Can you name a time? He had given this one servant what was his and entrusted it to him. He wasn't asking for something that wasn't his, but this guy inwardly thought he was. He said, hey, I know you are taking stuff all the time, that's not yours. Now you are coming looking for what I have got. All right, you can have what I have got. There is a total misconception of who his master is. He thinks that his master is not a gracious master in reality when he was. What he had received was not his in the first place, and it was freely given to him. There was also an outer reality. The outer reality that we see here is his actions, verse 25. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. The outer reality was fear because of that, leading to doubt of God. Oh, he knew God was powerful. He knew his master had the ability and the power, but he never acknowledged in his heart that it was his masters in the first place. So when his master comes, he is fully prepared that he needs to be able to give back or something. Because you are a hard man. Not realizing that his master had entrusted him something. What does he tell the guy with five and the guy with two, entering into your master's joy? Does that sound like a hard master or one that is delighted to give and to allow you to participate and invest and read the reward and come and share in his wealth? This guy, inwardly, had a very different view of God in his outward actions demonstrated it. Many pretend he doesn't. My question is, do you? Number one, God owns you. Number two, many pretend he doesn't and number three, Christ followers yield to the truth that he does. Christ followers yield to the truth that he does own us, own everything. I remember back in 1986. I was coming up on prom. I remember, you know, with prom, you always want to look nice. You know, you got to get the tuxedo. You want to take your day to a nice dinner. You want to get together with friends and maybe have fun going together. You just want the whole nice night to be nice and fun and exciting and just kind of glamorous. Because you know, as a high school student, you can't afford to eat like that. Again, you might as well make it happen and make it count that one night. Well, one of my challenges in doing that in 1986, my senior prom was thinking, you know, because I knew some of my friends had some big bucks and they were going to rent a limo and they were going to go in style. And it was me and my Volkswagen Rabbit. A 1977 Volkswagen Rabbit. Now, let me clarify. It had a souped-up engine. Okay, you couldn't see the engine, but I knew that it was souped-up and told everybody I could. But that is what I had to ride. Now, as I was thinking about that, what I was going to do, I didn't have the resources to do much else. Fortunately, the girl I'd asked to go with me, her dad knew my situation. He knew my pain and he knew that he owned a brand new Nissan 300 ZX, which for 1986 looked something like this. It actually was black, but this was the best picture I could find. But up there at the top, yep, that's the one I was driving. I understood, let me tell you, when he made that offer, when I took it and said, yes, there was never a question in my mind, who owned that 300 ZX? And a look on his face when he handed me the keys, made sure that I wouldn't forget who owned the 300 ZX. But you know what, it was a wonderful, joyful time to be able to take that, to think he would entrust that to me. And think for a second, do you think I treated it poorly compared to my own car or better? Yes, say better, you bet I did. Do you think even though it had the ability to exceed the speed limit, that I was going to take the chance of getting a ticket and somebody else's car that they had loaned it to me for the night? No way. It was a very different perspective. It was a very different attitude. Similarly in verse 16 through 17, we see a very different attitude among the one with five talents. The one with two talents. What does it say in verse 16? The man who had received the five talents went once and put his money to work and gained five more. So also the one with two talents gained two more. We see a very different response, because you know what, there was a very different inner reality for them. The inner reality of these two people was a true view of God. It was a true view. It was understanding that, look, we haven't forked anything to get these talents. They've been given to us. We've been given this opportunity from a master who loves us and cares for us. And he's going to trust us with his wealth. My goodness, yeah, we want to take responsibility and we want to please him. We want to do what's right. Why would they not? They saw a gracious master, not one who was hard, reading where he had not sewn, gathering where he had not cast its seed. And it led to a very different outer reality for them. They had faith leading to trust in God. They were like, hey, I didn't fork up anything here to make this happen. It was a gift to me. I've got nothing to lose out of invested, out of go work hard. I shouldn't operate in fear. My master has more talents he can give anytime he wants. I can be free to live for him. I had a very different response because Christ's followers yield to the truth that he does own them and everything. When you know that all that you have doesn't belong to you, you see it as an entrusted gift. And what do you do with gifts? You receive them. What else do you do with gifts? You enjoy them. What else do you do with gifts? You take care of them. What else do you do with gifts? You invite others to appreciate them and to enjoy them with you. Because that makes it even more joyful. You have a different perspective when it's a gift. Rather than look at it as a loan and God is a loan shark. When you've been trusted with a gift you want to honor the giver and the giver's purposes as well. I mean, think about it for a second. Think about my prom example of the 300 ZX. What have I been so caught up in the 300 ZX? Because I actually remember driving my rabbit over to the house, parking it and getting out in my tuxedo to take possession of 300 ZX. What have in my haste and my excitement, I had pulled out the driveway in the 300 ZX and forgot Lord Mises daughter. I mean, think about that. Do you think I was more inclined to want to honor his daughter that night and make it a fun time? And respect his wishes are less inclined. I was more inclined, right? You would have been more inclined. Because you're like, wow, this is a gift to disrespect the giver's wishes and intentions, which the point was really as much as it was a gift to me, right? It was more of a gift to his daughter that she would have a wonderful time as she would have a nice time. If I had dishonored his daughter that night, I would have gone against the very nature and purposes of the giver. Christ followers are very concerned about the intentions and pleasing the giver with their gifts. Because the understand has been given to them by God. My question though is, do you? Number four, fourth lesson. God owns you number one, too. Many pretend he doesn't. Three, Christ followers yield to the truth that he does in four. Following Christ leads us to living as stewards. Following Christ leads us to living as stewards. That's the response. That's what happened in this parallel that Jesus told. They didn't set out going, all right, we're going to be stewards. They simply received graciously from their master. They believed it was from him and trusted them. You know what came naturally, stewardship. They didn't have to work for it. They didn't have to read a book about it. They didn't have to have somebody come alongside and correct them and say, no, no, no, you need to be steward. They lived out of a real relationship that they were in. And what did it breed, stewardship. I didn't think about and have to intentionally go through a, you know, give myself geared up to, you know, give a wonderful, prom experience to this guy's daughter. I simply received it and it became part of the night and I enjoyed it. I entered into his joy just like God invites us to enter into his. So I want to get real practical here this morning. And many of you know what impacts Sunday means for us as a church. It's a chance for us to think about what are we doing? How are we stewarding what we have? You know, sometimes it's difficult for us pastors, by the way, to talk about money and things like that. Because we feel the pressure of thinking, all right, people are going to think we're just after their money. But you know, I had a repent of that this week. I had to realize that, wait a minute. That's the mindset of the person that got the one talent. That's the mindset of thinking that there's not the master's joy to enter into. And that's how I can be as sinful in a whole different way in this whole process. It's not to be boldly coming for you and tell you about the opportunity that you have to enter into your master's joy by stewarding all that you have. And if you have to white knuckle things that you check volunteering for things, you're missing it. If it's not the overflow of the joy of thinking, look what God has entrusted and blessed me with. How could I not want to use it for him? I mean, where can I sign up for whatever God's called me? That's the kind of mindset that should be coming from someone who's a Christ follower that understands what God has done for him. Who he is. So as I've said that here, I want to talk about some ways you can do that. Acknowledged first off, let's all begin with acknowledging our propensity to reject his ownership. Let's just be honest that we don't, none of us do this perfectly. So let's just be honest that when we feel this rejection, we feel this sense of wanting to close up my time, my resources, my talents and gifting. To think that I'm using it primarily for myself, we all have a tendency to do that. Let's just honestly say, all right, true. I am prone to want to do that. And let's begin repenting from that here this morning. Let's use our communion time to assist us in doing that. Let's just be honest about that. But let's open our hearts as well to say, God, that's not. I know that's not the truth. That's not who I want to be. Set me free to do that. God need by your spirit here during this process. And let me encourage you to resign yourself to embrace the life of a steward in three main ways. Time, giftedness, and finances. I want you to think about here. I'm going to give you some real practical opportunities to think about how am I using my time? And does my time look like one who doesn't believe that God owns it? Or does it look like one who fully knows that God owns it? And it's been a gift to me. If you don't think your time is a gift, talk to somebody that's lost a loved one. Talk to somebody who's been very sick and thought that may not survive. And some out one of them will tell you, no time is a gift. You need to embrace it as that. It's a special gift. Think about your giftedness because we see it on the stage here by some. We see it when you walk in the door and see, man, some people are just gifted to greet. What is your giftedness? Because God's gifted every one of us with things. Things that you can uniquely do. Things that you can do uniquely better than others can do. They can do things better than you can. But where has he gifted you and the thirdly finances? Where has he called and gifted you in those areas? All that you have is his. Where can you give there? Well, right now, getting real practical, I want you to pull out of your bulletin. This insert, this is, looks like this, says make an impact, be impacted on the top, both sides. And let me say right up front here too, that if you're a visitor, you're a guest here this morning. You're kind of in the locker room. You're here in the locker room talk. Me, the coach, talking to the players here, they were on the team here together. And just like a camera or, you know, would be invited in or reporters. You're invited to come in and listen, but don't feel pressure to do this. Okay, because I'm talking to the team. And if you're on the teams, because you're a church member here, or you call Christchurch your home. If that's the case, then you're on the team. And I'm talking to you. So nobody else who's a guest, if you feel any obligation here, at all. But if you're inclined, you're moving towards joining the team, feel free to jump in as well. Just know that coming into this. I want you to think about first off the side that says make an impact, that side on make an impact. And I'm going to go through that in very clear detail, but just to give you some real practical examples of what that looks like, what that means. I've asked Mike Lee and Aaron Phillips to come up and just share real briefly about how they were used in part of making an impact during this last hour. During this last outreach, working with the assistive family just last month here. So Aaron, Mike, who has come first? Why don't you all both come up? I'm not going to turn sharing. Where's the... Oh, thank you, Jason. We'll let Aaron go first, because it's her birthday today. Yeah, happy birthday. All right. Thank you so much. Well, okay. I guess I'll use this. This is not what I'd like to do. I'm going to use this. Jason asked me to talk about what impact it had on me to assist in the... You know, assistive family thing that we did at Christmas. And I emailed him back right away and was like, I don't know what I'm going to say, you know, because it just feels so normal. Like, I feel like, of course, we should do this. And so it didn't have this major profound impact on me in that way. But I did walk away thinking that I hope that this wasn't... Like, this is not the only time I do this at Christmas, or this isn't the only time we do this at Christmas. That this is just such a regular part of our church life. That this happens all the time, not just with money, but with kindness. And just the out workings of becoming of the kingdom. That we should be doing this. So I thought of two things this morning when I thought about it is... A Theologian once said that we should preach the gospel always and sometimes use words. And then I thought about Matthew 11-5 when John the Baptist is asking if Jesus is really the Christ. And it starts in verse 2. It says when John heard in prison what Christ was doing, he sent his disciples to ask him, are you the one who has to come or should we expect somebody else? Jesus replied, go back and report to John what you hear and see. The blind received sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf here, and the dead are raised. And the good news is being preached to the poor. Well, Allison and I also as well took a family. And the thing that comes in my mind so often is that when we serve others, we go with the open heart to serve others. And oftentimes God uses that service to touch our own lives. And so we got together with the woman named Martha. She lives over here just next to Avalon. It's amazing, five minutes from Waterford slash Avalon is rural Arkansas. I mean, it's just trailer parks. And you kind of drive out there and you realize this is a very different world than the subdivision of Waterford Lakes in Avalon Park. So the woman we met with Martha, she has cancer, she's a single mom, I think she's living with her boyfriend. And you know, very different world than the world that most of us here live in. But I'm just struck again by how often that when we take time to serve others, the God uses that in our lives to touch and impact us. And so in some ways, I would say be selfish in serving because God's going to touch your heart in that service. Thanks, Mike. Well, there's just a couple examples of people and I laugh how they were tying it in so well there with the fact that by making an impact, you're also being impacted by that. And here's one of my favorite stage illustrations. Meet Taylor. Can I say how to Taylor? All right, I have to admit now here, this is a really, really emotional shock here across the bow here. So as you look on that front side here of making an impact here, these are the kinds of opportunities that are there with that. So pull that sheet out. You can look at Taylor too as you look at me and look at that sheet there. But where might God be calling you to make an impact in our church ministry there? Worship. You can see across down there, there's some opportunities. And some of you maybe have some real giftedness in this area. Some of you just are, hey, that'd be kind of fun. I'd love to do, you know, be a video tech or, you know, yeah, I really enjoy singing. Where could you, is that an area you're interested? And by the way, if you're already involved in some of these areas, check these boxes again. We do those three times a year. It's just a good way for us to know who's serving where and where they're interested. Look at Sunday logistics. You can see a handful of things there where you can get a part and get in helping us here. If you're not sure where, you can see the last one there, wherever the greatest need. Just let us know, hey, I don't know what, I don't know if I'm sure we get anywhere in there, but I'll do something. Check that box in. Youth ministry, Jason would love it to have people that are working and helping him there in different areas. Children's ministry, Taylor would absolutely be excited if many of you would be a part of doing that. And let me just say here too, our philosophy here is a church. If you are a church member, we assume that you will be volunteering with our children's ministry. All of you should feel obligated to check teachers' assistance. Teachers' assistance is one that basically comes in and just helps the teacher. There's no advance preparation other than arriving a little bit early and being available. That's our expectation of every church member, and why would I say that? When we baptize babies, you take a covenant vow. You agree as a church member to assist the parents in the raising of these children. That's a vow before God, and I would be a poor pastor if I didn't give you opportunities to fulfill that vow. So before God, every time a baby's been baptized here and there's more scheduled coming, you're taking that commitment. I'm going to give you an opportunity to do that. Whether it's with youth ministry or with children's ministry. And Taylor would love to see you soon. Adult ministry there at the bottom, there's some places. If you're just administrative, you're not sure exactly where to check that box, but that will give you some ideas where you can plug in. If you look through that, you'll have more time later. Taylor, thank you for helping me out, bud. Thank you, Tiffany. What a good baby, just like his mom. All right. Now, having looked at that, and maybe you already have been checking, we're going to give you some time after this to continue. Flip it over to the other side about be impacted, because we believe these go hand in hand. So Aaron and Mike both shared as they were investing in lives, they were helping assist families. They were being blessed at the same time. We believe that making a commitment to be impacted is just as important. So I'm going to ask right now the dolies will come forward and just share briefly their experience with that this past year as well.
Hi, all I'm Brett. This is my wife Lauren. And in many ways 2008 was a very, very difficult year for us. For example, a lot of stuff happened in April. Lauren's brother died of a drug overdose. In May, we had a lot of joy with her son being born, but we also learned that my brother had infidelity in his marriage. And then in August, Lauren was in the hospital for a week because of appendicitis, and having a newborn that makes it even harder, and she was very, very sick. And as we were thinking about how God has been good to us over the past year, it's hard to see it first, but we really, as we've reflected, we've seen that for a while we really lost sight of what it looked like to trust God. We were really just waiting for what was next instead of trusting him for his goodness in our lives. And as we learned that we could trust him, we really also learned that God really loves us and he uses his people to love us. And he has used many of y'all to love us through our hard times. We really have felt carried through some of our difficult times by many of you who have prayed for us and made meals for us and celebrated with us in the joy of the birth of our son. It's been a little confusing having such joy and such sorrow at the same time, but y'all have really made the road a little bit easier for us. So thank you for doing that. As you look on this back sheet here about being impacted, being involved, and some of the very friendships and relationships they were talking about were a result of being in a small group, and things like that, plugging in there, being connected, that's an important part in order for you to experience being impacted as well. And on this side, here's some areas too, where I just want to challenge you as a steward, to say, no, I'm going to attend worship regularly. Now that might seem like, is that really something to check and commit to? Absolutely it is. Because as you're here, as you're interacting with other people, as you make worship a priority, not only are you coming and hearing the ministry of the Word of God and invited to pray and worship a God's people, but you know what, sometimes you're going to be sitting next to the person that's had a really hard week. And that's the words to say, that's going to encourage them. Or you're going to be the one that's having the hard week, and somebody's going to come up to you and just put their arm around you and say, hey, I was thinking about you this week. You know, I'm praying for you, what's going on? Who knows how that might work, but it is an important area. Faithful giving. Look on there. I tend to stewardship dinner. That's something that's coming up, and that's for people that are, again, if you're a church member, or you call Christ King and church home, we have that coming up January 24th. That's how we've done it. This little yellow insert inside your bulletin has that a place for you to sign up for that to come. Our desires for every person who's a member or calls Christ King and church home can be there that night. At least one person from every family unit be represented. We'd love for both spouses if you're married to be there as well. We're going to provide child care for that as well, so please fill this out, drop that in the offering basket. Look at that date, mark that date. Be with us that night. It's going to be a wonderful time. You can also see there, it says, join a financial peace university group. This insert's been in there for several weeks now, about a month. These classes are starting as small groups at the end of January. This might be a great spot for you to plug in there, because maybe you're thinking, yeah, I'd like to be a better steward with my money, but you know what? I don't know where to begin, because I'm not in the practice of doing that. I'm not in the habit of doing that. You know what? Maybe I'm in debt. Christmas was a lot bigger than I thought it was going to be, and I'm in trouble. In this class, it's specifically designed to use godly principles to help you get out of debt, to help you be able to be the kind of generous giver that you want to be, to help you have some security of anesthetic for down the road and be a wise steward in planning for your family, all kinds of things with that. So we are starting at least four brand new groups, actually three brand new groups and one current group that want to encourage you to be a part of, but check that if you're interested. By the way, checking any of these boxes doesn't say you're committed. It just tells us that you're interested. So please check if you have interest. Starting point, that's a place there. If you knew the church is a place to come and be able to get connected, a place just to start, and we do it the first Sunday of every month. Maybe checking that's a good place. So yeah, we're going to give that a shot. We're going to come and try. Previews class, that's the class that's required to go through to join the church. And if you're not a member yet, you're like thinking, yeah, we've been putting that off, you know, or we couldn't make the past dates. Here's the next one coming up, market, plan on it. It's a Friday night, Saturday morning and Saturday night. And if you ask those that have been through it, I think they'll say, yeah, it was a really meaningful time. It'll help you in making that decision. And then community groups here, you'll see the financial piece university ones there. If there's one night or a couple nights that work for you, check the nights that do. If you're interested in doing that, it's a 13 week course. It'll take us right up into the end of spring. But those are all brand new groups. I don't feel like you're coming into something. Three of those are brand new ones. There's a place couple of women's groups. We're starting to form some men's groups. So we'd like to know any men that are interested. And there's a new one for couples there, growing strong in God's family. An actual discipleship course that's going to be really challenging and really good. So there are opportunities. And let me encourage everybody. Everybody's to be involved in some kind of a small group in our church. If you really want to experience the community and be impacted. So let me encourage it. If you're not already signed up in one, mark all those that are of interest at all. So everybody's got it here. You've got the little sheet here. This is just a tool. Again, it's not committing you to anything long term. But it is telling us you have an interest. And somebody this week will follow up with you in every specific area that you have. So anyway, during this preparatory time to commune in and so on, I'm going to encourage you to fill this out and think about it. I'm going to encourage you. Again, if this is your, if we're your church home, please fill this out and mark it and drop that in the offering basket when it comes by as well too to help us with that. Anyway, we will do a Jeff. Let's do the offering during the last song so people have extra time to fill things out. If you're not ready to fill it to turn that in yet, then you can certainly mail that in the office or bring that in next week. But I'd love to have everybody's today if at all possible with that as well. And just one final thing. Again, the financial. Yeah, by the way, did anybody need an impact sheet? Thank you, Jeff. If you didn't get one in your bulletin, and you really need one for every person, maybe not kids, but every adult person needs one because your giftedness would be different than your spouses perhaps. Raise your hand if you need a sheet. It didn't get one. All right, so we're looking okay. All right. Thanks, Jeff. We'll collect those in the offering basket at the last song. And don't forget, we have that preview. As soon as the service is over here this morning, we're going to launch right into a 25 minute preview. Childcare is extended. You're covered there. So those that need to lead can. We invite you to stay and you'll really get a good taste of financial peace university as well. But let me pray for us now. Father, thank you for a chance just to come and to talk, talk shop in a lot of ways about very practical things related to our church, but also talk about things that are important. To talk about God, what it means to be really living in faith before you and understanding that we're stewards. So God, would you come and do that work? Do that transformation in our lives? God, would you come call us back to yourself and remind us God of those areas, some small, some big perhaps that we are living as we are the true owners, rather than living as you really being the true owner. God, show us where those areas are, in regards to our time, in regards to our giftedness, in regards to our finances, and God help us in faith, God, to turn away from that, to trust the work of Jesus Christ. So God, come cleanse and God, come and forgive. Let me pray this in Christ's name. Amen.