Today we are beginning a brand new series here at Thomas Road. And it’s a series entitled “Myth Busters.” Now how many of you have ever watched the show on the Discovery Channel, I think? Is that right? The Myth Busters Show. I’ve watched it. We love watching that show. One of my favorite episodes is, will the duct tape boat float? How many of you saw that one? And, by the way, it did. And it was pretty cool.
But you know I love watching the Myth Busters. My family, my kids-we watch it all the time. And it’s so cool because they blow stuff up all over the place. You know, they come up with this idea and they try to figure out will the hot water heater, if it explodes in your house, will it literally go through your roof? It will. I watched it. It went like, I think 150 feet up in the air that time that I watched. It was incredible. And other things on that show. You watch that show and it is so neat to see them do all those things and blow up all those things.
Well, what we’re going to do over the next few weeks is we’re going to be talking about some of the myths that are in the church today. Some of the things that we have created in our own minds of what the church is, and whether those things that we’ve created in our own minds, the ideas and the concepts that we have about church, about whether they relate back to or are in line with what the Bible says about the church. What Jesus says about the church. And those are the ideas that we’re going to talk about. And, over the next few weeks, well you know me, we’ll probably blow something up on this stage too. Now who’s excited about that? Yeah, I’m excited about too.
I called Jon Daggett a couple weeks ago and I let him know, we’re going to do a series at the church and I want to blow something up on stage. And there was a pause and he was like, OK. So we’ve figured it out. We’ve got it under way. Because what we want to do is we want to literally blow up the concepts and the ideas that we have about what church is because we want the church to be this. We want the church to be what Jesus wants the church to be, not what man wants the church to be. That’s what we want the church to be. That is what our heart is. That is what our passion is. That’s what this church started in 1956 was all about. Let’s go out into this world and preach the gospel to every creature, making disciples of all the nations, going out into Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth. Take the death, the burial and the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Take it there and to let you know that Jesus Christ died for your sins. He was buried for you and He rose again for you and because of that, we have the gift of salvation only through Jesus Christ and the sacrifice that He made. That’s what the church is supposed to do.
Unfortunately, in today’s world we have come up with some other ideas. We’ve come up with some other plans. But it’s not new. This is not something that we’ve created in 2010. It’s something that literally goes back thousands of years. In fact, if you look back in the Scriptures, in the Book of Isaiah, in chapter 29, there’s a verse that I want to read this morning as we begin this series. It says, “Therefore the Lord said inasmuch as these people draw near with their mouths and honor me with their lips, but have removed their hearts far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the commandment of men.”
Let me read that to you in the New Living Translation. It says it this way, “And so the Lord says these people say they are mine. They honor me with their lips but their hearts, oh their hearts are far from me. And their worship of me is nothing but man made rules learned by rote.” Rote memorization, the man made rules that we come up with, of what the church is supposed to about, of what we tell people the church is about. And so often, and it’s sad that this happens, but so often the church today, the church becomes about the man made rules and not about the son of man, the God-man who came to this earth and died for our sins. We’ve twisted, we’ve changed, and we’ve changed the idea and the concepts of what church is supposed to be about.
Well, what we want to do is go through some of these myths and try to figure out whether these myths are accurate, whether they are biblical, whether they are spiritual, and whether they are from the heart of God? What Christ wants us to do? And if they are not, then let’s figure out how to move past those things and to begin to do what Christ wants us to do.
Now it was a problem thousands of years ago in Isaiah’s day but it was also a problem in the day of Christ Himself. When Jesus walked on this earth it was a problem then. Look what it says in Mark chapter 7, verses 5 through 7, “So the Pharisees and teachers of religious law asked him (asked Christ), why don’t your disciples follow our age old tradition? They eat without first performing the hand washing ceremony.”
Now let me just stop right here and briefly say, I would have made a great Pharisee. I really would have made a great Pharisee because I am a germophobe and I wash my hands 28 million times a day. Anybody with me on that? How many? Absolutely! I go to a restaurant and I plan it so that when I walk into the restaurant, I realize that there may be someone in there that I know and someone that I want to say hi to. So I never go to the restroom when I walk in to the restaurant because I want to save the washing of the hands until right before the food comes. And so I’ll come in and I’ll go through all of that and then right before the food comes, or as the food’s coming, I’ll go and I’ll wash my hands and I’ll come back. And literally, and Jessica and Nicholas, you can attest to this, almost every time I do that, when I sit back down someone comes over to the table at that moment and puts their hand out. And, hey, it’s so great to see you. And then I have to go again, don’t I, Jessica and Nicholas? Yes. And then I get back that time and they come and then what happens again? Over and over. There have been times that I’ve washed my hands twenty times during a meal. I’m just religious about that. I mean I’m passionate about that. I wash my hands constantly. That’s just why I would have made a great Pharisee. Has nothing to do with the sermon. But I just wanted to point that out.
“They eat without first performing the hand washing ceremony. Then Jesus replied.” And I love it when Jesus replies because I love hearing what Jesus has to say and what He thinks about things that are important. “And Jesus replied and said this. You hypocrites.” Isn’t that great? How would you like to be called a hypocrite by Christ? Anybody here want to be? No, we don’t want to do that. “You hypocrites. Isaiah was right. Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you. For he said these people, these Pharisees, they honor me with their lips but their hearts are far from me. Their worship is a farce.”
The New Kings James says, “Their worship is in vain.” That’s the Greek word, matēn. Matēn, which means fruitless, without purpose, a waste of time. Now think that through. Jesus was talking to the religious leaders of the day, saying to them, “You hypocrites. Because of your age-old traditions. Because of your man made rules, you hypocrites. Isaiah was right when he was talking about you and said with your lips you worship me but your hearts are far from me. And your worship is a waste of time because it’s not about me. It’s about your rules. It’s about your preferences. It’s about what you think is important.”
In the church today we have to get away from those rules, those preferences, those things that we have created the church to be and get back to what Christ wants the church to be.
Now today we are going to talk about a myth. We’re going to talk about some myths that we create. We’ve already talked about how in Isaiah’s day those myths were there. We talked about how in Jesus’ day the myths were there. It was also a problem in the Apostles’ day. Those guys who actually were in the founding days of the church. In Acts chapter 1, they were excited, man, because they had that prophesy that the church was just around the corner. Man, they were excited. They were pumped. They were looking forward to it because they were told by Jesus Himself that the church is on the way.
In Acts chapter 2, in fact, they were actually doing church. And, man, they were doing it right. People’s lives were being changed. People were getting saved. Incredible things were happening in the church in Acts chapter 2.
But in Acts chapter 5 things started taking a little bit of a turn. In Acts chapter 5 the myth started coming into the church that it was all about money. You remember the story of Ananias and Sapphira, that it was all about money.
In Acts chapter 6 the myth began to creep into the church that the church is all about me. The church is there to meet my needs to serve me.
And so we see that not long after Christ told them the church was coming. Not long after the church was even started, the myths started to creep in.
In Acts chapter 8, Simon the sorcerer even had the idea that you could buy the power of the Holy Spirit. If you gave enough money, if you spent enough cash then you could get the power of the Holy Spirit in your life.
And so you see that not only in Isaiah’s day, not only in the time of Christ, not only in the Apostles’ day, the myths were there. But today those myths are here just as much and we call them the preferences. We call them those man made rules that we memorize and what the church is supposed to be like. What it, is supposed to be.
And so today we want to begin looking at some of these myths. And the first one that I want to share with you today, and this is a powerful one. This is a powerful one. It is the myth that church is for perfect people. Now you think at first glance well, of course, we don’t believe that. We don’t believe church is for perfect people. But yet we look at the churches around our nation today. We see churches maybe in our own community and maybe even some people in this very church that we think, you know what, church is for people who look like me. Church is for people who dress like me. Church is for people who have the right hair length and listen to the right music and read the right version of the Bible.
A few moments ago I read to you out of the New King James Version and then I also read to you out of the New Living Translation. And I do that often here at Thomas Road. Do you know that before this week is over, I will get emails from people, upset with me, blasting me because I dare use the New Living Translation on this stage. I’ll get them. And that’s okay. I don’t mind. I give my email address out. If you want it, just see me afterwards and I’ll give it to you and you can blast me too. It’s okay. It’s okay because my job is to try and get you to understand the Word of God and I’ll use any means that I can to help you do that.
But we have this idea about the statement itself, “The church is for perfect people.” We think well, of course we don’t believe that, but yet in our actions, we act this way. And so over the next few weeks, what we are going to do is we are actually going to build a church. We’re going to build a church facility on this stage and we’re going to build this church facility with the concepts and with the ideas that we have in 2010 of what the church is supposed to be and what it’s supposed to be like. We’re going to do that and we’re going to look at these concepts and look at these ideas to see if they are accurate, if they are biblical, if they are what Christ ordained for the church.
Well, let’s start right here with this one, with this idea, with this concept, that church is for perfect people. We can say this right out of the gate. This one is busted. This one is just flat out wrong because that is not what Christ intended the church to be. That is not what He wants us to do.
Look with me in the Bible in Mark chapter 2. We are going to read in Mark chapter 2. We are going to read again right from the words of Christ Himself. We’re going to see from His life, from His example what He wants the church to be.
It says in Mark chapter 2 verse 14, “And as he passed by (as Christ passed by) he saw Levi, the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax office and he said to him, follow me. And so he arose and followed him. Now it happened as he was dining in Levi’s house that many tax collectors and sinners also sat together with Jesus and his disciples for there were many. And they followed him. And when the Scribes and the Pharisees (here they come again) when the Scribes and Pharisees saw him eating with the tax collectors and sinners, they said to his disciples, how is it that he eats and drinks with the tax collectors and sinners? And when Jesus heard it, he said to them.” Here we go, Jesus replied. Jesus came back with his answer. “He said to them, those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”
Today out of this passage I want to show you four truths in this passage of what the church wants to be, what He wants us to be and what this idea of church is for perfect people, why Christ does not want us to act like that.
The first one is this. Jesus wants imperfect people. Jesus--His desire is for imperfect people. Now listen. How many of you are glad of that? I’m thrilled because I can tell you I am imperfect. My wife, she’s got a list. I’m imperfect. You are imperfect. All of us are imperfect. But Jesus wants imperfect people. That’s who He’s looking for.
Look what it says in verse 15, in the first part of that verse. “Now as it happened, as he was dining in Levi’s house.” Now you’ve got to get this idea. You’ve got to understand that Levi was a tax collector. And in first century Jerusalem, man, the tax collectors were the absolute bottom of the barrel as far as human race goes. These were awful people. They were crooked. They were people that no one wanted to be around. No one wanted to hear from them. No one wanted to have them knock on the door. No one wanted to be around these tax collectors at all. Things haven’t changed much, have they?
These are the people that no one wanted to be around literally. These are the people that came up with the idea of going to Rome and they paid Rome for the privilege of being tax collectors. They went with their own money and bought that right, bought that opportunity. And then what they would do once they had the authority from Rome, once they had been given the blessing of Rome? They went back to their homes and they began collecting the tax from their friends and their families and their neighbors. But they had an idea. They knew this. They could actually start to skim off the top. And they would get very very very very rich by collecting the taxes from their neighbors and their families and from their friends. And that’s why no one wanted to be around them. That’s why no one liked them. That’s why everyone hated them.
In fact, in Jewish tradition, in first century Jerusalem they weren’t even allowed to come into the temple to worship. They weren’t allowed to be there. They were thrown out of the synagogues. They couldn’t be part of that social system that the Jewish people had created through the synagogue. In fact, listen to this. It was even accepted that tax collectors, when they died, and when their corpses were being taken to the place where they were going to be laid to rest, it was okay that you could throw rocks at their corpses. Anybody want that job? You do not, put your hand down. Come on, Jeff. Nobody wants that job. Nobody wants that.
Listen, it was so bad people could throw rocks at you when you were dead. They could throw rocks. That’s how bad Levi was. That’s who Levi was. And Jesus called him. Jesus said I want you to follow me. That’s huge because none of us today, none of us today would consider ourselves to be the bottom of the barrel. We probably wouldn’t consider ourselves to be the worst of the worst. But you know what, we probably look inside of ourselves and think, you know what? I’m not good enough. I don’t have what it takes. I don’t have the ability. God can’t use me.
But do you know what’s cool? When Christ called Levi, who then became somebody, they changed his name and now he’s known as somebody you are probably familiar with. His name was Matthew, the disciple of Christ. That Jesus took the person who was at the bottom of the barrel and put him to work and used him to do incredible things. In fact, Levi, when he was called that day, almost instantly went in and got involved with small group. Got involved with ministry. Got involved with serving, almost instantly. He didn’t have to wait to get cleaned up. He didn’t have to wait to get changed. People still thought of him as a tax collector. They were looking forward to throwing the rocks at him when he died. Yet, Jesus put him into action right then.
And so today, in today’s church, when we have this concept, this idea that the church is for perfect people we’ve got to get beyond that and realize that Jesus is saying the same words that He said to Levi, to Matthew, 2000 years ago. He is saying to us, follow me. And if we will do it, He will put us to work today. He will put us into action today. He can use us today and we don’t have to wait until we get cleaned up. Isn’t that great? And do you know why that is? Because when Jesus came to this earth and died on the cross for our sins, was buried and rose again for our sins, He did so, so that point number two in this passage, “so that whosoever will.”
There wasn’t this lucky group of people over here that just happened to be over here in this corner. That these were the ones whom Christ came to die for. That this is the group that could actually go out and experience salvation. No, Christ came so that “whosoever will.”
Look what it says in Mark chapter 2, continuing in verse 15, in the last part of the verse. It says, “many tax collectors and sinners also sat together with Jesus and His disciples for there were many and they (plural, lots of them, whole bunch of them), they followed Christ.”
Levi wasn’t special. Levi wasn’t the kind of person that maybe got caught up with a bad crowd but really he was selected to be somebody special. No, he was just like everybody else. And Jesus didn’t just call Levi just because Levi was special. Jesus went there and it says that many of them were there. Many of these tax collectors. Many of these guys had rocks with their names on them. Many of them were there and they followed Jesus. Why? Because “whosoever will.”
The church exists today to bring honor and glory to Jesus Christ and to take the message and the gospel of Jesus Christ around the world so that whosoever will, the people that we have the opportunity to talk to, to minister to, to impact, to influence all around this world, that we are able to speak to on a daily basis, that we have the opportunity to share that message so that whosoever will can come to know Jesus Christ. It’s an incredible story. An incredible truth.
But we also have to understand this. Yes, Jesus wants imperfect people. And yes He did so because whosoever will come to Him can be saved and can be used and can serve, but here’s the problem. From this passage we see, point number three, that others might say you’re not worthy. We already established that Jesus doesn’t think that. But here it says, “Others might say that you’re not worthy.”
Look what it says in verse 16. “And when the scribes and the Pharisees saw him eating with the tax collectors and the sinners, they said to his disciples, how is it? How could he possibly spend his time eating with them, with those people, with those sinners? How is it that he can be around them?” You see, the problem that we have in churches today is that while Jesus wants imperfect people, Jesus wants all.
The problem is that many times as Christians, we take this and we put this into action in our churches. We think that the people who walk in the doors of our churches better look like us. And they better act like us. And they better like the music that we like. And they better listen to the music.
Listen, I remember back when I was about 18-19-20 years old, somewhere around there. And you know, back in those days, even here at Liberty, we had rules about music. And we still do but back then in fact there was one particular group that I loved. This group was incredible and we weren’t allowed to listen to them. And there was this group called Truth. Anybody ever heard of Truth? Yeah, you’ve heard of Truth. We weren’t allowed to listen to them, but I was a rebel. And I did. And my passion, man, I wanted to try to talk my dad into letting me bring Truth to come to Thomas Road and to come to Liberty to sing. And I went to work on him. Every night I would talk to Dad. You know what I did? Back then we had cassettes. We didn’t have CDs and we didn’t have MP3s and we didn’t have IPods, all that stuff. We had cassettes and so what I would do, I would go and find the songs that I knew were kind of low key, you know? And I would put them onto another cassette so that I could play them for Dad so I could say, “Dad, listen to this group, man, they’re great. They’re just like what we play on Sunday. You’re gonna love them. We need to bring them here.” And I kept doing that over and over and over again. Night after night after night after night and finally he said, “Okay, let’s bring them in.” Not because I changed his mind. No, because he was sick of hearing from me. (Jonathan, don’t get any ideas, buddy.)
And so finally we got to bring Truth here. Man, I was so excited when they came here. You know it was kind of cool because that night when Truth came for the first time, I met this girl named Shari, who was in Truth and that was the first time I met Shari. So, had it not been for me bugging the daylights out of my dad to begin to listen to and to bring in a different group, I wouldn’t have met Shari and I probably wouldn’t have been married to my wife and I probably wouldn’t have my beautiful kids here and things would have been a lot different. So, that has nothing to do with the sermon either.
But the point is that we’ve got to get away from the preferences that define us and begin to let our principles define us. So often in today’s world and in the church today we are defined by what we are against. We are defined by our own preferences. And listen, it’s okay if we are defined by what we are against if we are against sin, if we are against things that go against the Word of God. Man, be defined by that, there’s nothing wrong with that. But don’t be defined by your preferences. Don’t let people look at the church and think, I don’t want to go to that church because they don’t like how long my hair is. They don’t like the fact that I don’t wear a suit on Sunday. Listen, I wear this suit every Sunday. Well, not this same suit, I have more than one. I wear a suit every Sunday and I wear a tie and I do that. And you know what? That’s a preference. And I do that because of tradition. I do that because my dad told me to. I do it because my mom would kill me if I didn’t do that.
I mean there’s nothing wrong with that. But let me tell you something. If you come into this church wearing jeans and a t-shirt and with your tennis shoes or your flip-flops, and you sit here, and you’re here because you love Jesus. And you’re here because of honoring Him and worshiping Him and love Him. Let me tell you something. You’re not only welcome; we want you here, because it has nothing to do with what we wear. It has nothing to do with how we sing. It doesn’t have anything to do with the music that we like, or the hair length. It has everything to do with the condition of the heart.
Let us be defined by our principles and not our preferences. That’s what Christ wants from us. That’s what Christ wants to get us to live by because others say we’re not worthy. But listen, aren’t you glad Jesus doesn’t do that? Aren’t you glad that Jesus doesn’t do that? That He doesn’t look at you and say, “Ah, your hair is too long. Oh, you’re not wearing a tie today. Sorry you’re out of here. Oh, that music you’re listening to.”
My son’s got an IPod and the other day I was flipping through that IPod and I want to take a hammer and smash it. I wanted to destroy it because now they’ve got this Christian music that’s like, well I just wanted to smash it, Jason. Just destroy it, you know? Which tells me I’m getting old, Charles. I mean, I’m getting old. But listen, aren’t you glad Jesus doesn’t look at us and define who we are and decide whether we are worthy by those things rather than by the condition of the heart?
Look what it says. Verse 17, “When Jesus heard it.” When Jesus heard what the Pharisees had to say, when He heard what those people had to say, here’s what He said. He said this to them, “Those who are well they have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”
You know one thing that I appreciated about my dad so much was the fact that he said it often. He lived it, that he would go anywhere if he had the opportunity to share the gospel. If he had to walk into a bar to share the gospel, he would do it. Dad always said, “Listen, I’ll go preach the gospel in hell if they promise to let me out.” That’s who Dad was. And that’s who we need to be because listen, not because Dad was but because that’s what Christ was. That’s what Christ says here. The Bible is clear. It is so obvious about whom Christ wants a relationship with, about who He wants us to be. It is so clear. Romans 3:23 tells us that “all have sinned,” right? Everybody, you, me, everybody. We’ve all sinned. And “we’ve all fallen short of the glory of God,” meaning that we have no value to God whatsoever. But then Romans 5:8 “that God demonstrated his love toward us in that while we were like that, Christ died for us.”
And then it goes on to Romans 6:23, that says “the wages of that sin that we live in, the wages of that sin is death.” but because Jesus loved us so much and because He died on the cross for us and because he was buried and rose again for us, because He loved us that much, that by that point, by that gift, by that sacrifice that now “the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Jesus doesn’t evaluate us by who we are; He evaluates us by who He is. And I’m glad that He does.
We keep reading in the Book of Romans and we find out in chapter 10, verse 9 that “If you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.”
Now listen, I don’t want you to get me wrong today. I don’t want you to think that I’m saying because of Christ, because of what He has done for us that we can live however we want to live. Oh no, I’m not saying that. I don’t want you to get the idea today that we can live in sin and that we can do all the stuff that the world does. We can do it all but because of Jesus, man, everything’s okay. Everything is cool. No, I’m not saying that. What I’m saying today is this. Jesus Christ wants to reach every single person. He wants to change their lives. He wants to wash them in the sacrifice that He gave. He wants to change your life forever. And when Jesus changes you, you’re changed. When you try to let the church change you, it lasts a little while and then you go back. When you let the pastor… when you think the pastor can change you, you know you might be changed for a week or two, but then it’s all going to go south. But when Jesus changes you, you’re changed. Everything is changed. The imperfect are made perfect, not because of us, but because of Jesus. That’s what Christ wants the church to be. And He wants it to be for all.
Second Peter chapter 3. You know what that verse tells us? It tells us this, “that Christ is not willing that any should perish.” My friends, Jesus loves you so much that He died on the cross for your sins. And I don’t care what your sins are, and I don’t care what your past includes, and I don’t care the problems that you have caused and the people that you’ve hurt, Jesus Christ loves you so much, He died on the cross for your sins and He is willing to pay the price for your sins. He did it on that cross and He is willing to give you that free gift of salvation today. Today. That’s how much He loves you. Why don’t you close your eyes and bow your heads this morning.
Lord, we are humbled by the gift that you have given. We are so grateful for your love; so grateful for who you are, so grateful for the cross, so grateful for your death and your burial and your resurrection, God. That today we stand here in awe of who you are. We can’t believe that you love us that much but Lord, we thank you that you do. God, we thank you that the church is not for perfect people. We thank you that you want imperfect people, that you want all people. That you are not willing that any should perish. And so today we stand here in this place honoring you and worshiping you, praising you for what you’ve done. But also, Lord, we are asking you in this place today that if there is somebody here listening to my voice that hasn’t been changed by you, God, I pray that today you would speak to their hearts. God I pray that today you would change them, that you would wash them, that you would make them into what you want them to be.
With our heads bowed and our eyes closed. Today we’ve been talking about this myth that Jesus’ church; it’s all about the perfect people. Well today I hope you’ve gotten it. I hope you’ve understood it. The church is not for the perfect that Christ is not for the perfect. Christ is for the world. And if you are here today and you’ve never met Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, today I’ve given you the gospel I don’t know how many times, probably ten, twelve times today. And that’s great.
But in a moment we are going to sing a song, “Come Just As You Are,” which is a perfect song for this time because what I want you to do is, if you don’t know Him, if you don’t have a relationship with Him, if you’ve not been changed by Him, then I’m just asking today, realize that you are a sinner. We all are. There is nothing shameful about that. We all are sinners. We are born with a sinful nature. But Jesus as Savior can wash you as white as snow and He wants to do that in your life today. And if you have never met Him, in a moment I’m going to invite you to come to this altar. Meet me here and allow us the privilege of sharing with you how Christ can change you today. Or maybe if you are a Christian but you’ve gotten away from God. You’re not living for Him. You’re not walking with Him. You’re not serving Him. Or maybe you’ve got these preferences in your own life that have skewed the way you think about the church and the way you think about Christ and the way you think about the mission that we are all on. You know maybe you just need to come and kneel here and say, “God, I’m sorry. God, I know it’s not about me; it’s all about you so use me today. Help me to focus on that.”
Maybe you want to come and join our church. Maybe you want to come for baptism. I’m baptizing tonight and I’d love to baptize you here in this place tonight because, what an awesome opportunity to, after we have been saved by the grace of Jesus Christ, to stand up to the world and say, “Hey, I am a new creation.” And so tonight if you want to be baptized I’ll be doing it, I’d love to baptize you tonight.
Whatever your need is I just want you to know that God loves you. God cares about you and God is waiting for you. He is waiting for you. And as we sing this song, I’m going to ask that wherever you are, don’t be embarrassed. Don’t be shy. You just listen to the heartbeat of God, that still small voice. He is speaking right now in your life and if He’s calling you. If, like Levi, He is saying to you, “Follow me,” just do it. Don’t do it for me. Don’t do it for Thomas Road Church. Don’t do it for your family. Don’t do it for your friends. Don’t do it for you neighbor. Do it for you and for Christ.
As we all stand and as we sing this song together I ask you step out right now.
Lord, today we are so grateful for your love. We are so grateful for salvation. And God, I pray now that as we leave this place, Lord, you would continue to speak to our hearts because we know that outside the walls of this building there is a great big world that is lost and they are dying and they are going to hell. And we know that only you can save them. So God, I pray today that you would put into our hearts the passion, the mission, that as we go out into that world, that we will do everything that we possibly can to share with them that message of hope and that message of love and forgiveness that you give. And God, for that we will give you all of the praise, all of the glory. We are humbled that you would use us, Lord. I just pray that we would see lives changed and souls saved because those imperfect people that stand before you today, all of us that we follow after you that we serve you, Lord, that we would walk with you. And Lord we thank you in advance for what you are going to do. In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen.