This semester this fall what we're doing is we are going back over the river Oaks way what it is that that really the Truths they're at the basis of what we believe and who we are as a church and what we're trying to do what we set out to do Eight and a half years ago was we set out to be a church that did nothing new ever We wanted to set out to be a church that preached the gospel and believed the gospel and lived out The good news that God has reconciled Himself to man and we want to do that every day and we had the belief that if we would do that Sunday in and Sunday out then then it would work that that message would change us and would make us Attractive and would build up a church and And and we still believe that and we're still going to try to do that We are basically trying to put into effect trying to put into practice What Jack Nicholas believed throughout his career? Jack Nicholas was a golfer if you don't know Still the most successful golfer ever and One of the reasons why he had such a long career was he took time off every year He would take the winners off go back to Ohio where he was from be with his family and rest and then Every spring in time for the masters he would go down to Florida and He would go to his coach his coach his name was Sam Grout and he would say mr. Grout Will you teach me how to play golf and Mr. Grout would say yes, sure mr. Nicholas this is a golf ball and This is how you stand over a golf ball and Mr. Nicholas would take a stance and he would say is this right mr. Grout and we and and Sam Grout would correct him See your clothes, but you're not quite there and then you would say this is a golf club And this is how you hold a golf club and Jack Nicholas would grab the club the way he always had grabbed it. He felt like He would say is this right and mr. Grout would say no, that's that's not how you hold it You've got it just barely off and Sam Grout would take him through every step right down the golf swing and take him through every step and because and and Nicholas Would listen to him and humble himself under him and would let him fine tune him because he knew this He knew that to win golf tournaments. He didn't need to come up with something different every day He didn't need to come up with something completely on her off. He needed to do the golf swing More purely better more consistently than anyone else and he would win He didn't need to go and do something different. He needed to stay right where he was We as a church, that's what we're trying to do. We want to do nothing different We are not trying to come up with a new message for the new people of a new day We believe that the true God of the universe is everything that we need and So we want to do him. We want to be with him. We want to communicate him as clearly as as free of pollution as we possibly can And I think that's what Paul is saying here in Colossians chapter two And that's what I want to take you through tonight this afternoon. So we're gonna read. It's really This sort of account is the entire book of Colossians. So I chose verses 6 through 15 I'm gonna read a little bit further than that Because it's just important to get the whole scope of what's going on We couldn't fit the whole thing in the bulletin, but we do have the whole thing on the screen So if you'll please stand we will read together From the Apostle Paul's writing to Colossians chapter two verses six through twenty three He says therefore as you received Christ Jesus the Lord so walk in him Rooted and built up in him and established in the faith just as you were taught a bounding in Thanksgiving See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty to seat According to human tradition according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ For in him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily and you have been filled in him Who is the head of all rule and authority in him also you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands By putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ Having been buried with him in baptism in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God Who raised him from the dead and you who were dead in your trespasses in the un-circumcision of your flesh God made alive together with him having forgiven us all our trespasses by Cancelling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands This he set aside nailing it to the cross He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphant over them in him Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath These are a shadow of the things to come but the substance belongs to the Christ Let no one disqualify you insisting on asceticism and worship of angels going on in detail about visions Puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind and not holding fast to the head from whom the whole body Nourished and knit together through its joints and ligaments grows with the growth that is from God If with Christ you die to the elemental spirits of the world Why is if you are still alive in the world to use submit to regulations? Do not handle do not taste do not touch referring to things that perish as they are used These have indeed an appearance of wisdom and promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body But they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh You may see what it's Paul saying here he's saying You've got everything you need You have the fullness of Christ you have him and in him you have the fullness of God He is all of God all of the fullness of the God had dwelt in him and bodily form You've got everything when you have him you don't need anything else Just stand there Don't go off and do something new just stand there Just believe in him just don't try to get more than him Don't try to add more to him just get more of him Continue in him Be in him But that never works for me I'm not real good at that. I'm like Chuck. I don't know if y'all have ever watched the television show Chuck It's really not that great of a show. Don't feel like you need to write it down This is not a pastoral recommendation. It's an illustration and Chuck is a guy who accidentally had downloaded into his brain all of the government secrets It's television go with it and Therefore since he has all of the government's in secrets the CIA always uses him to point out spies But once he points the spies out He's told stay in the car And guess what it would be a very boring television show if Chuck ever stayed in the car So he never stays in the car, right because he gets scared Because he sees something that the other guys are missing because he gets worried about his own safety And so he goes a lot he always goes into the battle I'm like Chuck I know that all I need to do is stay in Christ all I need to do is believe what I believe and apply what I believe but it's never enough Because I get discouraged I get discouraged about me. I think that I'm not doing very well. I need something that that I don't have and and I think that I just I think basically that God needs me to help him out He needs my help I just get so discouraged with what's going on in my heart and I just I need to add a little something add a little theology Add a new rule to this or a new rule to that and if I can just do that then then I would be better What's the problem? Paul says these things are no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh Why not because whenever I make myself better? Whether it's through you know diet or a new exercise regimen or something is as Good is reading the Bible every day whenever I do those kind of things and I make myself better what happens? Well instantly I begin to think better of myself. I'm better than I used to be and you know what? I'm also better than you and the second I begin to think that I'm better than you Whatever progress I may have think I've made I Have just began begun to live in the very heart of the worst sin there is I Begin to embrace that the nasty self-righteous pride that destroys the heart and destroys the church and destroys everything it touches So not only is it a no no value to restrain the indulgence of my flesh It's none of no it actually makes me worse The second I begin to think that I'm better than you I'm more of a child of hell than I was to begin with I Just need to stay in Christ and stay in him Because I'm dirty and I can't cling myself And that's the thing we we we just don't understand how dirty we are What does Paul say about us? He says you were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh That means the dirtiness of your flesh and God made you alive together with him having forgiven us all our trespasses You can't get worse than dead you weren't a little bit sick you were dead You're like you're like when I used to let my kids out. I remember one time. I left my boys out to play and I've been raining and And one of them came up running up to me saying can we play in the mud? Yes, you're outside play in the mud Whatever it takes to get you out there and then another one comes knocks on the door says can we just bathe in mud? Yes So the next thing I know I got three boys and they're just Drift from head to toe and they've had a blast and that's wonderful But it's time for the cleaning And as you know if you're a parent and you've been there They can't clean themselves at that point You don't want them to touch the faucet. You don't want them coming into the house You don't want them touching the towels. You don't want them touching the soap soap You want them to do what you want them to just stand there don't do anything stand there And let me spray you down with the hose And if they're young enough we're going to strip you naked right here in the yard and we're going to not even take those clothes in the house And that's how we are we're so dirty that anything we do to try to make ourselves better We're just spreading the dirt We don't understand how broken we are and we get to satisfy with ourselves when we think that means Jesus is dissatisfied with us and and what I want for you more than anything else If you don't get anything else from this whole series I want you to get this when you are have unveiled to you a new part of your heart something that you don't like something That's awful and you feel a new level of sin at that point don't run away from that Don't run away from Jesus because of that Don't try to hide that from everybody else don't try to come up with something that's going to help you So that you never do or think or feel that way again use that as a way to get to him Use that bring that straight to Jesus let that be a new way that you begin to feel more loved by him than you ever have before Let him touch you right there We don't stand there because we're dissatisfied with ourselves and what needs to be bringing us to him drives us away Second reason we won't stand there is because we're dissatisfied with the church the church is a mess It is we all know that there's something new online to make fun of every day whether it be you know a church in town having boxing matches or crazy things or something on the internet something that Victoria Osteen says this week or whatever and And we we don't like that because we feel like you know the church is precious to us and it's important to us And we don't want people making fun of it and so what we try to do is we try to make it better When we come up with new rules to make it better What does Paul say he says Let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath These are a thing shadow of the things to come But the substance belongs to Christ We think I know what we need to do we need to add new rules You can't be a real Christian and drink alcohol you can't be a real Christian and eat meat on Fridays You can't be a real Christian Oh, we come up with new rules like Presbyterians do you know? We have to be sabotarian real Christians don't go to restaurants on Sunday or we have to be like fundamentalists are inside real Christians Don't celebrate Halloween and and they don't celebrate all these other pagan holidays and and we just come up with all this new rule I for new rule I for new rule and Again they have what purpose what do they do they make us feel really good about ourselves And give us a way to judge others And we all do it we all do it Um And it's best to just make fun of all of us right you know that I think we're all legalists and it's pretty cute when you take a step back and look at it Right you have you have the Baptist who don't drink You have the the Presbyterians who drink on son who won't drink on Sunday, but do drink You got the Calvinists who Um Don't think you're a Christian if you don't drink. I mean we're all just kind of different right we all have our own places that we will dance You got you know the Baptist who don't dance at all you got the charismatic who dance in church You got the Presbyterians who think if you dance in church you're going to hell, but it's okay to dance in bars I mean, it's just kind of we're just nuts We all have our own rules and you just got to recognize that they're all our own rules They're just hours and if that's a way to help you get to Jesus great If that is a way to help you get more of Jesus that is great for you If if not eating a certain foods or not drinking if every time that you see alcohol you It makes you think more of Jesus and come closer to him. That's awesome and I'm glad for you But if every time you see somebody else breaking that rule if you look down on them Then that rule is getting you further and further away from the gospel and you need to drop it
We we we we get dissatisfied with the church and we want to improve it with our new rules We get dissatisfied with ourselves and we want to improve ourselves. We don't trust Jesus to do it And we just get scared for the future. I mean sometimes we see stories of people who are You know people who's who's marriages don't work out and we want to we want to identify exactly why they ended up getting divorced so we can not do that We want to control it or we think about our children and we want them to grow up and be perfect We don't want them to be like us. We want them to be better than us And so we make these big hedges and all these rules around all the things that we did because we want them to be better than us And and and we're scared We don't trust Christ for those things and and they just they just don't work Paul says these things have an appearance of wisdom and promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body But there of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh all they end up doing is making us proud Proud of ourselves And they take us further from Jesus. We don't need him And those rules end up being very caustic and divisive I um, I know because I get kicked down sometimes I got asked to Dennis actually invited me to come speak at a school in time And I didn't mean for it to be the last time I was going to get invited to speak to that Christian school It just kind of happened that way and um, you know, I was up there speaking I was trying to talk to him about how great Jesus was I thought that was what I was therefore, but I ended up making the comment God doesn't even care whether you make a's or not That is actually true You need to know that okay? God doesn't care. It's not in the Bible I read the Bible all the time. I've read all the way through it every page It is not in the Bible that you have to make a's and If you're telling your kids are implying in any way that God loves them more when they make a's then you're Keeping guilt guilt on them when they make bees and you're lifting them up and making them self-righteous when they make a's don't do that Okay, God doesn't care. That is true God I think was happy that I said that the parents were not Why because we're so afraid If they don't make a's and they won't get to college and they won't get a master's degree and they won't be wealthy and happy As if everybody who has a master's degree is happy
We're afraid and so we make up rules We don't let Jesus be enough. We can't just stand there We're dissatisfied and we're afraid and we ultimately we just don't believe that God is enough We just don't believe he's enough and what Paul says is you need to just think about that for a second Just think about what you're saying that Jesus is not enough. You have him He is the image of the invisible God. He is the first born of all creation He is the first born of the dead he has been dead and it lives again for you. He has the fullness of the Godhead and you have him You can't get more than that You want to add a rule to that You want to add a requirement to that you can't make that any better He's everything You have him you can rest in that you can stand in him because he has lived and died for us Because he has come in our place and he's done what you cannot do Of what does Paul say he says he cancelled the record of our debt that stood against us with its legal demands He set this aside nailing it to the cross. He did it in our place He came the full God became a man and he walked among us. That's extremely hard to believe I'll be honest. It's hard to believe but when you get your mind around it You understand that this person really did rise up from the dead. He really did die for a purpose died for our sins For us in our place He did what you cannot do And that that necessity that desire to have somebody in your place doing what you cannot do It's so deep in our hearts I got a great illustration of that yesterday Isaac and I we went to the football game And the football game rules more than one yesterday. I'm aware of that We went to the Tulsa OU football game and we got seats right down next to the student section Great seats. It was a little wet, but it was fun And we were next to all these OU students And they were you know slightly inebriated shocking and Loud and you know they were just banging on their chest and yelling you know yelling for the Sooners Which is great, but At some point in my cynicism I wanted to say hey by the way You're not doing any of that You know they started yelling at Tulsa about you go home. You know go back to high school You can't block anybody. I want to go. I bet it can block you. I'm pretty sure he could But why is this guy so invigorated and so overconfident because the person wearing his name on the back The person wearing his jersey is winning. He's doing it in his place The running back is scoring touchdowns in his place And he gets the joy he gets the victory in his mind And that's what Jesus has done for us He kept the law in our place. He was perfect in our place He never thought more about himself than he did about other people in our place He never loved himself and did his own desires instead of God's desires He did it for us in our place. He's done everything necessary for us to present us wholly and blameless before God in our place He suffered what we could never have suffered you could not possibly have suffered enough to made up for every sin every lie Every hurtful thing you've ever thought or said or did you could not suffer enough for those but he did for you in your place He's done it for you And you can't add to that and you can't take away from that There's nothing over here in the fan is doing to help the player There's honestly nothing the fan can do to hurt the player He's over here behind the security guards He's doing it in our place We don't need a second chance Because because you see our selfishness goes so deep that we're like addicted to it would just be selfish again I don't need a second chance. I don't need an example Jesus did it for us in our place And it's so perfect I think that Paul says for us in first 22 of chapter 1 He says he's reconciled us and his body of buys of his flesh buys death In order to present you wholly and blameless and above reproach before him
He's done it perfectly. He's done everything necessary to present you Holy and blameless and this is the most amazing thing He's done it all because he wants you He wants you I had a cold all week and um and I don't know what else was going on really But I just did not want to preach today. I didn't want to preach this It was just kind of even though it's my favorite message on one of my favorite texts I was just bored with it and I couldn't make myself study And Bianca knew that and she was trying to encourage me last night And she said right before she she uh drifted off to sleep Usually she said something sweet like um, you know, don't forget to take the trash out But this time uh right before she went to sleep she said She said try to preach a message that's too good to be true
And this is what makes it too good to be true The only reason to disbelieve the gospel or the best reason to disbelieve it is because it's too good to be true That God himself the Lord of the universe the the Lord that Paul says in this text right and right before he says He reconciles us he says he was the image of the invisible God the one who created and sustains the universe the one who has it all The God who could have anything he wants wants you He wants you and if you believe that that changes everything about you
If you believe that you're wanted that you belong It just changes everything When I was in uh call right after I graduated college. I went and spent a year working in Knoxville and I got in crosswise with my family And we'd both been pretty mean to each other it had been a rough fall And I drove back for Thanksgiving and and the whole drive back. I was just dreading it I just did not want to be in that house and I was pretty sure they didn't want me in that house and I got Into the driveway and I parked out I just sat in the car just thinking I don't know what this is gonna be like I might be about to walk into just a tongue lashing. I don't know what's about to happen here and I opened the door and I heard my sister And she started singing Ricky's home Ricky's home Ricky's home I can hear it coming through the house Ricky's home. I could just trace where she was And she came out the front door Ricky's home Ricky's home and she jumped Well, she didn't jump she couldn't jump she waddled Oh now in the steps of the porch and she ran up to me and she she just covered me with his hog and these big nasty sloppy wet kisses and And I just loved it because I knew I was wanted there
God why did Jesus live and die for us to reconcile us to his fathers to bring us To his father's house You want you he want you that's crazy It's frustrating Part of us you know every one of us at least once a year Sometimes daily we'll ask ourselves the question You know why didn't God make a perfect world why does this world have so much brokenness why does it have so much Evil and hurtfulness in it and the answer is God didn't he could make that world He probably has made that world he says in here there's all kinds of heavens and things going on that we don't even know about But he wants this world because he wants you He thought you were worth suffering for he thought you were worth dying for he wants you And if you've ever felt unwanted and you know that the the belief that he wants you changes everything And that's why we can just Stand there because the Lord of the universe he's not going don't let your fears overwhelm you You don't have to add things to what he's done. You don't have to take things away from what he's done Because he's enough because he wants you and he tends to get what he wants So what can we do we can't We can't get more than Jesus. We don't need to do more than Jesus, but we can't get more of him We need to continue in him Paul says if you continue in the faith stable instead fast Not shifting from the hope of the gospel that you heard which has been proclaimed in the gospel under heaven And of which Paul I became a minister Not shifting from the hope of the gospel Stay right there What does that mean it means It means you first of all you learned the gospel I ask you all to take out a sheet of paper for your family and this is what I want you to do with them We're going to I'm going to give you a chance to respond And the first response you may want to put on there I want everybody to kind of ask themselves where are they today we never do this And of course you don't have to it's not like you're getting a grade, but I would ask you some of you need to learn the gospel you're not standing in Christ You don't get have a hope in Christ you don't have joy in Christ because You don't know what in the world you're talking about You don't know what the good news is You just need to learn the gospel and if that's where you are that's great We've got great just short little books you can read them in 40 minutes We've got bible studies online that you can do in 10 minutes a day and and over the course of a month or two months You'll really understand what we're talking about And you don't have to do them by yourselves you can send us your responses and we'll we'll interact with you But we want you to know the gospel A lot of you grew up in the church and you already know the gospel and and we want you to grow too. We want you to learn to love it We want you to love it when I was in uh When I was 16 years old Craziest thing in the world happened. I grew up in a small red necktown About 1200 people all of them just like me and nightmare and And one of these people just like me who was a lot older than me um, who made a lot of money and and kind of got political power He was elected governor of Tennessee. It was crazy He kind of looked and sometimes acted like boss hog uh, his name was netray macorder and uh, netray that tells you all you need to know about him And uh, he was he was elected governor and when someone from uh, town of 1200 people gets elected governor The whole town gets invited to the party So I went to the party was at the upperland hotel. I had I had a ticket to the inaugural ball that nobody had raspore Anybody could go And I was overwhelmed And I kind of looked at the dances And I got just this overwhelmed scared feeling that I didn't belong there There was just one ballroom was where the country music was being played and and I saw and I had heard that there was a buffet in there And I started to walk up to the buffet line and I saw the Oak Ridge boys, which means nothing to you But it meant a lot to me back in the day And I was I just overwhelmed with this thought of I don't belong in line with Oak Ridge boys So I ended up going back to my room and watching TV What if the governor had come in that room and said I want you here I would have faced it. I would have enjoyed it. I would have loved it I don't want you on the edges of Christianity thinking I don't really belong here Jesus doesn't want you on the fringes thinking
We want he want you to enjoy it he wants you to draw great peace and great joy and great love out of this community So maybe the second thing you need to write some of you already some of you write learn it That's what you what you need to do some of you who've already learned the gospel and he tried I need to love it What you need is you need to love it you just You know the words, but you don't hear the music It just does nothing for you And we can help you we want to help you I want you to love it. Well, we'll send you music. We'll send you books. We'll we'll visit with you others of you You already love it and all you can think of is how you want to share it and for you I want you to write on your next to your name on the friendship pad write live it I need to live it better I need to be in a community group where I can be loved and love others I need to know about mercy opportunities or leadership opportunities in the church I need to know how I can live it out because I'm so overwhelmingly loved in Christ I just want other people to know it I want you to write one of those things and just a second You can either bring those back to the tables or you can put those in the offering plates as they're passed around But I want you to know that you cannot have more than Christ, but you can have more of them And that's how we want you to get more of them
Final illustration so I went a little long Friends here. I wanted to impress them I was in Mississippi. I heard this great story. I lived in the Mississippi Delta where all the plantations were and I heard some stories about those plantations And one of the famous stories that people love to tell was of a farmer who was dying of tuberculosis Called the consumption back then and and so he knew he was dying and he called his only son. He only had one child And he called his only son in and he said son. I want you to know something I love you, but you are irresponsible And if I give this plantation to you, you're going to destroy it and it's going to destroy you And we are the only source of life for all these slaves they depend upon us and you can't handle it So I'm not going to give it to you I'm going to give it to my faithful servant Ben who even though he was my slave He loved me and he has served me responsibly for decades. I'm giving him everything And his son said you're only giving me one thing. He said you can have one thing You can be a field, it can be a home, a house, it can be You know one one thing You can be some of the animals but you can have one thing. What do you want? I suggest you choose wisely and he said That you're giving me one thing and you're giving Ben everything I said right. I'm giving everything to Ben. I can trust him with it So dad finally get one thing I guess I'll take Ben
That's not true story of course, but it's a good illustration If you take Ben you get everything If you take Jesus you get everything
But he doesn't want you to do anything. He wants you He wants to be in a relationship with you Will you come to him and let him have that please pray with me Father in heaven. I do pray that you would give us the grace to come to you To join together with you to know you and to be known by you I pray Father for those who don't know you're gospel that they would Have the courage Lord to write down learn on their on their sheets and let us help them get the right resources in their hands so they can They can understand how much you've loved them what you've done for them and Father pray for those who do know the gospel but they just don't love it The church has been a place where there's been no joy no hope no Nothing I'll pray they would have the courage to write love and I'll pray that we would be able to guide them and show them how immensely Lovable you are Father pray that all of us would learn to live your gospel better with love others And we'd receive their love as we limp toward you. I pray in Jesus name. Amen God didn't just love us with the kind of words or with encouragement or instructions But he actually came to the earth and accomplished