Let's play a game. It's fun. We're all here If you if you recognize where these quotes come from just shout it out ready I'm gonna make you an offer that you can't refuse Good Was that too hard? How about this? I'm the king of the world on social energy. It's a birthday party First person to shout it get surprised How about How about you had me and hello? Jeremy Glyer. How about come to the dark side how about I think I'm taking crazy pills Zoolander good Love that How about 60% of the time it works every time He's on purpose because there are movies these are movies that you I knew you were gonna know These are movies that you didn't watch once you watched five 10 some of you 15 times These are movies they're that did more than entertain us. They got into our bloodstream They became our vocabulary they they set our sense of humor. They changed the sense of humor for a generation some of them these are movies that Whether you like it or not kind of affected your morality of what was acceptable and what wasn't it They they they set what you expected from romance and from love they They were the movies that made us according to Netflix the movies that made us And I say all that because today what I want us to do is I want us to reflect on what I hope what I pray Is the message that has made us a church? It is a message that I hope you do not go a week without referring to It is the one sentence that I hope deeply affects how you see yourself and Effects how you relate to everybody that you love Your family Your friends Your children your parents that's family Family and friends kind of covers it all your enemies people you don't know And in that sentence the most of you already know what it's going to be that sentence is this You are way More deeply broken by your sin More deeply stained by your sin Then you would have ever feared and You are more loved and have more of a hope because of that love You are more precious to God than you would have ever imagined that you would have ever hoped and Those two things go hand-in-hand And if we believe that that that changes us it makes us it makes us less self-aware less less self-conscious It may it allows us to love other people without always wondering what they think of as it makes us Free from criticism honestly because whatever you want however you want to criticize me I would say yes, probably true and more it makes us It makes us broader and bigger as a church and as a as a person and it's how we interpret our history of course I made mistakes I made terrible mistakes but the loving Lord of the universe is gonna bless and and and redeem those mistakes It's how you we see our future There there there's things out there that I'm afraid of but I know that those days are in the hands of the Lord of the universe who loves me and I can trust him with them It's how we view everything It's how we view everybody That we are more broken by our sin. We are more sinful than we ever feared And we are more loved than we would have ever imagined And you're saying to yourself where is that in the Bible pretty much in every page But definitely on Ephesians chapter 2 so let's stand and read that together Here the word of the Lord and You were dead and the trespasses and sins and once you once walked Following the course of this world Following the prince of the power of the air The spirit that is now at work and the sons of disobedience among whom we all Once lived in the passions of our flesh Carrying out the desires of the body and the mind and we're by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind But God being rich in mercy Because of the great love with which he loved us Even when we were dead in our trespasses made us alive together with Christ By grace you have been saved and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus So that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus For by grace you have been saved through faith And this is not your own doing it is the gift of God Not a result of works so that no one may boast For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand That we should walk in them That's for the reading of God's word It is more precious than gold even fine gold and is sweeter than honey straight from the honeycomb I hope you believe that Please be seated We are more sinful than we had ever feared and we are more loved than we would have ever hoped The first thing I want you to see is who we were Who we were And Paul starts it route right there the second word you were dead you were dead in your trespasses and sins Notice all the things he doesn't say he doesn't say you were in trouble He doesn't say you were sick He doesn't say you were having a bad day. He says you were dead You were gone There is nothing that you can do to help yourself when you're dead I don't want to be I don't want to pander to you but like you know that right If you're sick you take part in the process you take part in the healing process You do you take the medicine You try to feel better beyond can I watch sense and sensibility this week for the 700th time and You know there's this dramatic scene where one sister is begging her other sister don't give up I need you she's sick She's in a fever. They're afraid she's going to die and she's begging her Don't do it I need you I can't live without you There's a part of the healing process that we take part in but that's not this That is not your salvation you had nothing to do with it Because you were dead you were dead and what you were dead in your sins following the course of the world Following the course of the world you didn't necessarily do anything intentional to follow the course of the world You just went the direction you were going You know one day A friend of mine was leaving New Orleans to drive the Jackson and And she just followed the course of the traffic with everyone else and everybody knows that Mrs. Cippy is east of Louisiana So she got on the interstate and went east Then This friend of mine who I don't know who she was that she called me and she left a message on the answering machine saying I'm in Alabama I Mrs. Cippy's actually you go north to get to Jackson 90s um and she just followed the course She made one wrong turn Two hours ago one wrong turn she just followed the traffic
I uh before I got married there's this old country He's a country lawyer he's a funny guy and he uh he does a divorce lawyer Which kind of made him an expert on marriage in some ways if you think about it And he thought he was an expert on everything and I did too and I would spend time with him from time the time and I went to him And it's like what do I need to know before I get married? What do I need to know and he hooked him and he goes you want the most important piece of advice I can possibly give you Yes You want the piece of advice to make your wedding night better than you possible you thought possible I guess He said every time you do what comes naturally You did it wrong every time Everything that comes natural is wrong It's following the course of the world It's what is it you know what it is It's self-centeredness It's self-preoccupation It's the that's following the course of the devil that Paul goes on to say this is Following the prince of the power of the air it's doing things for self. It's using Self as this interpretation device for all of life It's that that desire that makes you when you walk into a room wonder what people are thinking of you when you walk out of the room You wonder what people are thinking of you You're when every time you hear a piece of news your first thought is how does how does this affect me every time You see a picture you look for yourself and you want to see how that is a picture You define whether it's a good picture or a bad picture about how you looked in the picture Everything is about you Right now you're wondering am I talking about you? Yes That's the that's the That is the philosophy of life that we are born with it is all about you. It's all about me It's all about self when a baby cries at three in the morning. They're not wondering if they're waking anybody up It's natural To think about yourself at all times to interpret everything according to how it's going to affect you
and it's broken And it leads to all kinds of sins it leads what's what's the what's the heart of sexual immorality It's using another person to please self what's the heart of greed? It's thinking of nobody else but getting as much as you can for yourself What's the heart of pride is putting yourself above others? What's the heart of wrath? It is justifying and taking vengeance for yourself What's the heart of gluttony getting as much for myself as I can What's the heart of envy? I don't want you to have anything nice. I want it for myself All the sins are all rooted in that one thing the course the natural course of life The course of the world to do everything for self And so we see yeah, that's that's where all those bad people live The Paul doesn't leave it with the bad people Like he's describing these people who are walking following the course of the world. They're following Satan I'm like yeah, they're bad. And then he says this haunting verse and it really should get under your skin Among whom we all once walked now who's part of we The apostle Paul's part of way You know how Paul described his life You can turn to Olympians chapter three if you want to and read it He says when it comes to righteousness according to the law I was perfect Wait a minute Paul You mean the people who are following the course of the world the people who are following Satan could be Following Satan by keeping the law and being perfect You were one of those people yeah He was doing it to justify himself He was doing it so he could feel good about himself He was doing it So that he could have God's arm in an arm bar and get what he wanted because he's done everything Right and God owes him and whether it's the slavery of Of sin of immorality or the slavery of being perfect. It's all slavery And that perfectionism that desire to do everything right At least to the absolute you know that some of y'all know this so well you could you could finish the sentence for me That desire that obsession with doing everything right Leased to the absolute inability to forget yourself At least to the inability to forgive yourself when you do something wrong If something if your children do something wrong you know absolutely without doubt it's your fault
Because you weren't perfect In all those actions are designed to create a world For yourself to protect your reputation to protect your need to be needed
That is what the course of the world looks like And some people is incredibly immoral and other people it's perfectly moral But it's all for itself And we're helpless we can't get out of it. What Ricky? What what can we possibly do? It's being bad leads to death and being good leads to death. What can we possibly do? Nothing Because you're dead That's the answer The Bible sows everybody up under that you understand that That's who we were So we were but it's not who we are. It's who we were. What did God do? What did God do for people who were dead in the trespasses and sins? Look at verse four So beautiful The God Being rich in mercy Because of the great love with which he loved us Let's stop there Let's stop there for a minute You know a good place to stop Why would he love us? We were dead
You don't know either I know it's because of nothing good you had done Because you were dead I know it's not because of any potentially salient you because You're a mess now Because of the love with which you loved us
I don't think I first really understood this passage to some degree I mean just a tiny infantestible amount. I understood this passage on October 10th of 1996 when We went to the hospital and and my wife gave birth and the doctors cleaned off This miracle And put him in my hands and my hands to small arms And I looked at him and he looked like a lizard
It's gray One eye closed the other one was just a little slit And he didn't recognize me He didn't know me he didn't care about me He probably tinkled on me I don't remember He would many times If I were looking for you know for what I'm getting out of this What am I looking at here? I'm looking at this child who's going to wreck my life He is going to wreck my Sleep he's going to wreck my finances totally. He's going to wreck my love life. He's going to wreck my life He's going to mess up my house. He's going to mess up every single thing I own and one and when I die He's going to get everything I own He doesn't care about me He looks at me with all the loving affection that he looks at a lamp post He has there's nothing you're getting absolutely nothing out of this child that you would die for
And that's how the father loves us That's how he loves us not because of what he's going to get out of us but because of Because he just loves us It's really the reason why it's the reason to the biggest question there is Why is there anything instead of nothing because the father loves us and he wanted somebody to love
And if you believe that you have any idea how much that would affect you If you believe that you have any idea how much that would affect you There's a pastor that I Learned a lot from his books and never got the chance to meet him But I think it was Jack Miller and in his church new life church in Philadelphia They were it was time to you know, it's a nominate some new elders And so they were going through the nominees and seeing who they thought was prepared to be an elder and who wasn't And there's this young guy just he just loved the Lord and he he knew his theology was sharp and he had a servant's heart And everybody was sure they'd make it great elder and Jack said he's just not ready And they all looked at it and said why would you say that when I argue with you but why would you say that He said he's just he's got a sadness to him He just has no idea how big of a center he really is If he if he just if he knew How big of a center he really is He would be infused with joy, but there's a sadness there. He's not ready In a few years he'll be ready If you That's a convicting words aren't there And you know me some of you I mean, I'm not saying that you can never be sad You know that we spent the entire summer last summer talking about that But what's the background music what's the baseline of the of the soundtrack of your life Is it why do I never get what I deserve or is it amazing grace Is it how in the world have I gotten all of this Is it joy that when you were dead When you had nothing to offer He loved you He loved you because of the love with which he loved you
I want to keep going but I think some of you might want to stop there and just be asking yourself question I had a mentor who the first person to talk to me about planning a church Thought he could do it thought I could do it He was wrong, but um He he had a great story about it. He would tell us children He used the sermon illustration all the time and I'm stolen it from him and he's okay with that He said every when I had three children two boys and a girl and whenever they turned four on their fourth birthday You put them on his lap and he would look them in the eyes very very dramatic guy and he would say Do I love you And it's a yes dad you love me Well I ever stop loving you No dad you're never gonna stop loving me If you ran away from home when I love you yes dad you'd love still love me If you robbed a bank would I love you Yes dad you'd still love me if I If you killed somebody robbing a bank would I love you You said both sons stopped at that point I went hmm I think that's crossing the line I think you would stop loving me if I killed somebody and he He's super dramatic like I said you got down to his knees and look him straight in the eye and said If you killed somebody I would still love you and I would come down to that prison every day And I'd bring you peanut butter and jelly sandwiches because I know you like him
you Did not start this relationship and nothing you can do will end it You didn't start this and nothing you can do will end it
Don't tell me wouldn't change your life if you believe that Some of us live our entire lives trying to get the approval of someone else And we're never gonna get it You're never gonna get it and that hurts and it leaves deep scars and and I want you to understand something You can't change someone else's opinion and you sure can't go back in time and get that loving gracious opinion that you needed when you were two years old You can't get it now. I'm sorry You can't change someone else's opinion, but you can change whose opinion you care about You can change what opinion matters more to you than anybody else's And if you will invest God without ability with you will invest him with the ability to have the most important opinion of you in the world. It will change you It'll make you infused with joy
He loved us was what he did and what did that love or result in he He unites us with Christ. If you notice there's there's three words here He made us alive together with Christ He raised us up with Christ and we see he seated us with him in heavenly places and Christ Jesus He united us to him. What does that mean? That means that everything he did for Christ. He's done for us and Conversely it means that everything that he we deserved he did to Christ were united to him He made him who you know send a bson so that he would suffer for us And so that we could become the righteousness of God. He raised us up. We're not dead anymore. He seated us In heavenly places Did you feel like you woke up in heavenly places this morning? Probably not But what's he saying here? This is what we call the prophetic past tense. This is past tense stuff He made us alive. He raised us. He has seated us and heaven with Christ It's past tense every one of them wise. Well, like I said it's called the prophetic past tense That means it is so certain that it might as well have already happened It can't be changed A friend of a mentor of mine took became pastor of a church And and the church was not what he'd been told it was and it was kind of this strange thing They had a leadership committee that ran the church. They were really the elders They had the elders who basically the deacons and they had deacons who were usheres And and his first week of the job he disbanded the leadership committee They didn't like that And one of the women who were on the was on the leadership committee saw him in the hallway and he said and she Asked him when he had done and he said she asked him when the leadership committee was meeting again He said never ever will it ever meet again and and he said She said to him. I don't think you can do that and his response was oh, I think I can I think I did I think it's done
You might think that you're never going to be in heaven you may feel like you're so overwhelmed by darkness And sadness and despair that you will never be raised up and God looks at you and says oh, I think you will
I think I can I think it's done. Can you can you live with that truth? Can you internalize that truth? That's what he did he saved us by his grace We we brought nothing to this equation, but our deadness in our sin and he gives us everything in Christ So what are we now? We are his workmanship the whole thing this entire Relationship is is by his grace so that no one can boast. We are his workmanship. He's proud of us We're the we're the piece of furniture that he made by hands that everybody who comes into the house He shows and says look at this what's really shown someone makes a piece of furniture I wouldn't know but I've heard other people do it and they say we look at this whether I they're not asking you to admire the furniture Where are they asking you to admire? They're prowess their ability God is and this is a strange verse honestly. I don't know who he's showing us off to
That's not answered but The he is showing us off Not because we're so beautiful, but because he wants everybody to see how gracious he is He wants everybody to see how gracious he is and he's created us. He's recreated us for a purpose and that purpose is good works We have work to do not not to own our salvation But because of how love we've been we can't help it and we have communities that need to be built and we have people that need to be loved And we have injustices that need to be made right and we have lost sheep who need to be found We have lost brothers who need to be brought back home. We have scared brothers who need to be comforted We have hurting sisters who need to be hugged. We have good things to do And at the end of days he's going to look at those and he the preciousness of our God is that every single hug every single tear We wipe every single word that we Stammer and stutter over trying to encourage someone he remembers He says not a drop of water is given to a child in my name that won't be rewarded
These are the good works that he's laid out before us So that people see his grace and and we kind of look to him and go why would you reward us?
It's just what he's like You know it's kind of like Christmas When you're in fourth grade And you're you're tired of drawing pictures for Christmas, right? I was The year before I'd drawn pictures and I kind of looked at everybody's face and was like This isn't as good You know, they all said that they loved them, but they didn't And I saw them in a trash can That was the great Christmas the fourth great kiss Christmas was going to be a real Christmas and and I was going to buy something for my mom But you know I had a few problems. I didn't have any money I didn't have a job. I didn't have a car. How was I going to get to the store? I had no idea about anything And so I was kind of pouting around the house and my mom asked what's wrong? And I said well, I really I need some money for Christmas presents and she just didn't even Bad and I she said well, there's a lot of tree limbs out in the yard. I sure like it if someone could pick those up That was my job Anyway, but this time she paid me for it $10 That she took me to K-Mart that night and she said on the way You know, there are these necklaces they're selling. They're so pretty. I'd love to have one They were nine dollars So I went and bought one put the bag kept it over By the car seats which couldn't see it on the way home Went back into my room found the only box second files this big Put it in the box of a bunch of paper tried to wrap it use the whole roller wrapping paper Started crying wrapping presents is hard Got a magic marker out wrote Ricky can't wrap. I spelled it RAP. I think that was prophetic but
brought the present both the box tour said will you wrap this but not look inside Just she wrapped it and I put it under the tree And Christmas morning I went and got the present the present she Had paid for the present she had picked out The present she had wrapped and I put it in her lap And she unwrapped it and she held that necklace up and she gave me the biggest hug It's a thank you That's what it means that we are his workmanship creative for good words and he's prepared before hand for us He paid for him He sent him out for us But he lets us he lets us pretend like we're helping and he looks forward to hugging us and saying thank you Please pray with me Father in heaven, we just we have a hard time remembering these words. We have a hard time letting this this idea that we are more loved than we could have ever imagined We have a hard time believing it We have a hard time applying it
So Father I pray that you would write those words because of the great love with which you loved us You made us alive together in Christ. I pray that you would write them in big letters in our hearts I pray that you would create a community out of those words We pray in Jesus name. Amen