Sermons & Adult Classes

Amen. Our God is awesome. I got an extra dose of that this morning on the way here. Something had never happened to me before. I think God really wanted to encourage me. I was driving down Curry Ford at a good Christian speed in my Toyota Corolla and all of a sudden I’m just going along and there’s this man on the sidewalk and he starts cheering me on. He’s like, yeah. Go, go, go!

I’ve had that happen cycling before and jogging before, never before in my car. So I was like, yeah, my car is pretty cool, huh? It’s not even a convertible. Man, this is hard work right here. Thank you. Thank you for the encouragement. He gave me what I needed. I was like, God is awesome here. That was a great way to start the day. I do want to thank for everyone that was here in the last service that are still laughing at the same jokes, I appreciate you as well. I don’t have new material. I will say one week from today, just 15 miles from here, the World Discipleship Summit will begin. Yes. In Old Testament times, all of God’s people, they would save up. They would put their lives on hold for weeks. They would travel hundreds of miles by land and sea for their own conferences. These were international religious festivals such as Passover, the Feast of Tabernacles and Pentecost, just to name a few. These were not just two hour Sunday services. These were week long gatherings, not including the travel. A feast of fellowship to celebrate together and most of all, to remember together their extraordinary identity as God’s treasured possession.

In the same way, 15,000 disciples from around the world will travel to Orlando for one week. Your brothers and sisters in Christ will flood our city from far away places such as South America, the Caribbean, Africa, Australia, Europe and Asia. Disciples will find a way to get here from war torn countries in the Middle East and the Ukraine. They will step off the plane at the Orlando International Airport full of joy, with a huge smile on their faces because they’re excited to see you. For one special moment in time we are Jerusalem. We’re the host city. We’re the host church for thousands of God’s people. And it’s not an exaggeration to say you and I are in the middle of a historic moment. Don’t get distracted. Don’t blink. You could miss it. One week from tonight, it officially begins. I think this begs the question of all of us, what’s the best way to prepare now for the World Discipleship Summit? Let’s search for answers together in Romans chapter twelve. What’s the best way to prepare? It’s almost here. Romans chapter twelve. And I know many of you have prepared for this for years. You’ve saved your money.

You’ve asked for time off. Many of you have downloaded the app already and you started picking your classes. You can’t wait. You know when early check in is at the hotel. You’re ready to go. Your heart is there. Your heart is ready. Some of you started serving the WDS long ago. You’ve been praying for this event since long before we even knew that covid 19 was a thing before it even existed. You signed up to volunteer for hours at the conference. So many were here yesterday for the workshop that we had in the morning. Some of you, I know, have even secretly donated hundreds, perhaps thousands of dollars so that people you don’t even know can experience this conference. Your heart is ready. I know some of you are new to the church or you’ve recently joined the church. This is new for you. But I commend you. I’ve seen so many of you just hey, what is this? Okay, how do I get on board? And you’ve been able to get on board and make every effort to participate in the summit. And I thank you for that. Then I’m sure there’s a handful of us, you’ve heard the announcements the last seven years, but for whatever reason, you’re not prepared. You mean single tickets cost money? The expectation to serve, to give, or even to pay for anything, including parking, comes as a complete surprise. And I get it. I’m the same way. When I’m distracted and the worries of life and other things come right in front of me, my heart can drift to a funky place too. But no matter where you’re at this morning, today is a new day. From this moment forward, what’s the best way to prepare your heart for the WDS? Let’s read. Romans, chapter twelve, verse one. This will help us with the conference and really so much more. Romans twelve, verse one. Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual or rational act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is, his good, pleasing and perfect will. So, chapter twelve starts verse one with therefore.

So what’s it there for? Well, in the first eleven chapters, paul writes this masterpiece on God’s mercy given to broken sinners just like us. The death of Jesus on the cross. This proves that God is a mercy millionaire and that’s the motivation for the Christian life. That’s why we’re here today. God’s mercy in Jesus, that’s the engine of gratitude that propels us to do what we do. In view of God’s mercy, God’s word then commands us to do two things here. Number one, offer your body as a living sacrifice. On the heels of our Hebrew study, you’ll notice this is temple terminology. Back in the day for public worship at the temple, you would never, ever dare to show up empty handed. You would come with a burnt offering. That was the expectation from God, the best, most expensive animal from your flock. And what this would do, this would demonstrate that all you had, your very best was completely at God’s disposal. Then you fast forward to us as followers of Jesus today. Our bodies have now become the new sacrifice. Instead of an animal, we now bring to God the very best of ourselves.

And to be a sacrifice means, like the animal, we’re now fully at God’s disposal, and we would not show up to anything empty handed. In view of God’s mercy, we now offer our bodies to God and everything that we do. Not only that, we’re a living sacrifice, a living killing, if you will, a paradox. This means our sacrifice is an ongoing thing. This is what is holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. The literal translation here is logical. This is only logical. This is the only logical way to worship, the only reasonable way to worship in view of God’s mercy. It means you’re thinking clearly, not just emotionally. In other words, once you grasp God’s mercy in your life, anything less than a total sacrifice of yourself to God is completely irrational. Would the people that know you best, describe your life as a living sacrifice. And sometimes we can ask such and such, is this person still a Christian? Are they a Christian? I think they’ve been baptized. Okay, that’s a great start. But here’s how you truly know. Is this person a living sacrifice? That’s it. Number two, in view of God’s mercy, god’s word also commands us, do not conform, but instead be transformed.

So when it comes to being a living sacrifice, this is where the rubber meets the road. And we’re given two patterns here: the way our culture thinks and the way God thinks. And transform here in the Greek, is the same word we use in science for metamorphosis, right? You may remember that back in the day, okay, it’s the caterpillar transforming into a butterfly. That’s metamorphosis. That’s the word here. That’s the miracle that’s happening. So in view of God’s mercy, the way we think must undergo a metamorphosis, a metamorphosis of how we respond to our circumstances and our suffering. It’s a metamorphosis in how we navigate our relationships in this world. It’s how we respond to what triggers us in our culture, on social media and in the news. Your body belongs to you. No one can tell you what to do with your body. And that’s absolutely true if you conform to the pattern of this world. But the transformed mind says this as for me and my body, it belongs to God as a living sacrifice. So, in the context of our sexual desires, do you not know that your body is now a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have received from God?

You are not your own. You were bought at a price. Therefore, honor God with your body. That’s one, corinthians 6:19 and 20. Guard your itching years. Do not conform to the pattern of our culture, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. So what does this all have to do with the summit? I don’t really know. Okay, we’ll get there. We’ll get there. We’ll get there. We’re going somewhere, but let’s keep reading. Here, in verse three here, we find practical instructions on how to be a living sacrifice. Romans twelve, verse three. For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment in accordance with the measure of faith God has given you. Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not have all the same function, so in Christ we who are many, form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts according to the grace given us. If a person’s gift is prophesying, let him or her use it in proportion to their faith.

If it is serving, let him or her serve. If it’s teaching, let that person teach. If it’s encouraging, let him or her encourage. If it’s contributing to the needs of others, let them give generously. If it’s leadership, let that person govern diligently. If it’s showing mercy, let him or her do it cheerfully. Verse three. It tells us to be a living sacrifice. We must have a sober judgment of ourselves. Let’s face it, you and I are not naturally self aware. If that’s news to you, I just prove the point. It’s much easier for me to judge someone else and get it right 95% of the time than to correctly judge myself. So in context here in this scripture, to be sober about yourself, it means you’re not too high on all the different skills that you bring to the table. But it also means that you’re not too low on your skill set either, right? It’s a balance. It’s sobriety. Right? So you’re in touch with reality about your talents, not to serve yourself, but to serve others and to build the church. So if you ever played this game, would you rather? Who’s played this game before?

All right. Shame on you. It’s terrible. It’s a fun game. It’s a good game. Let’s play now for just a moment. Would you rather Gil Hidalgo take pictures at your wedding or me? I’ve got a great or Gabriel. I could ask Gabriel as well. Would you rather have Gabriel or Gil take pictures at your wedding, or would you rather have me take pictures at your wedding? I have a newer iPhone. It will do the job. Yeah. I still say things like, I got to get my pictures developed. Where’s Eckers. On Sundays, and be careful how you answer this. I am very sensitive. On Sundays, would you rather have me preach, or would you rather me be in charge of the baby’s class? Or have me in charge of security? I’ve been working out. I’m huge.

All right? Would you rather right. Here we go. All right. And the next one, I’ll do it again. Would you rather have Jessica Jolly as one of your lead singers up here on stage or would you rather have me? Why are you so quick to say yes? Give me a chance, man. I’m not very sober right now. I’m saying Jessica or me. Right. As a singer, I felt like in the last service, my audition was not very good. I feel like I need a second chance. A second chance before you just say yes, jessica, give me a shot here.

Thanks, I mean, there’s an open spot with Chandler moving away, so I was going to go for it, right?

All right. So if I’m sober minded, really my ceiling is maybe I could lead a song at a small baptism that’s probably I have been redeemed that’s all I can do but that’s sobriety and not being so sober. But to summarize verses four and five, we’re all in the same standing with the gospel all the same at the foot of the cross. But God has gifted each one of us with distinct personalities, experiences and abilities to serve. Not serve ourselves, but to serve one another. So we see in verses six through eight a sampling of these gifts that God has given to our church. Now, keep in mind as we look through some of these, your role, your mindset is this summit is about to start. I’m just going to highlight a few of these. Verse seven starts with serving. Now, we’re all supposed to serve. Many of these you see on this list, we all can do. But God has gifted us for those reasons I mentioned, personality, experiences, abilities to really be able to serve the church in a great way in these areas. Now, here it starts with serving of verse seven.

In the Greek, this is narrowing it down to practical service. This person is very good at practical tasks. This is what you would call the ultimate team player. They bring that chemistry to the team. And this is the person that actually does not need the spotlight and kind of does better in the background to make things happen. We all need to aspire to that. But that’s really a God given gift as well. In verse eight, it highlights the gifts of encouragement and giving. This Greek word for encouragement literally means to come alongside someone. That’s encouragement. You’re coming alongside someone. And some of you are incredibly gifted in this area. You make other people feel around you that you’re right there with them. And we need people like that. I need people like that. You’re invaluable because you serve the people around you as a supporter, a greeter or welcomer. And then if you have the special talent of giving, of course, again, we’re all supposed to give. But this specialized talent here, it doesn’t mean that you necessarily have to be wealthy. Amen. But rather, you’re wise and you’re considerate in your generosity. You’re anticipating needs several bounces down the road ahead of the rest of us, right?

And I think about last Saturday when we had Don Mcgillips memorial. All the different people that shared who not all of them really knew each other that well. And they were somewhere from different cities. They all were telling stories about how Don had contributed to their needs, specifically and even anticipated needs well in advance. And he took care of people with food, with money, with encouragement, with time. That was Don, right? So that’s a special talent of giving. And all these build up the church. We all need this. So this takes me back to the original question. What’s the best way to prepare myself for the WDS? Here’s the mindset. This is it, right here. Here’s how we prepare our hearts. The World Discipleship Summit is worship. All of it. Not just the singing. All of it. And it’s already started. The worship has already begun. It’s been going on for years. All of it is worship. The preparation you saving your pennies to go, giving your time, your resources, that’s worship. That’s what the Bible defines as worship. We just read it. The keynotes, the classes, the music, the singing, all of it. All of it is worship.

A life giving conversation over lunch, hugging someone that you just met in the elevator, that’s worship. It’s giving of yourself. It’s standing on the corner directing traffic, volunteering with kindness and a smile on your face. All of it. That is worship. Meeting needs in the moment, paying the parking fee for the car behind you, slipping a $20 bill in the pocket of a missionary, that’s a living sacrifice. That’s your worship. And at the WDS, we have this unique opportunity to see this on display with 15,000 people and their collective gifts. All of it is worship. The World Discipleship Summit will be worship.

So maybe you’re late to the party with this conference, and I would just appeal to you please don’t be the older brother in the prodigal son story. Please don’t be grumpy now and refuse to come. Join the party. Some way, somehow, get involved, find a way to serve. It’s not too late. Don’t miss your opportunity to worship. In view of God’s mercy, the logical response, the rational response to this conference is this you and I must offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. It’s a golden opportunity for us to love our brothers and sisters from around the world, to show them the love of the Orlando Church of Christ.

Look at verse nine. It tells us about love. It says, Love must be sincere, hate what is evil, cling to what is good. Be devoted, be committed, be all in for one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves. Many other translations say it this way outdo one another and showing them honor. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. Share with God’s people who are in need and practice hospitality. Bottom line love one another as if you were related by blood, which of course you are in Christ. And Paul challenges us here. Honor one another above yourselves. And that’s my appeal to us. Next week, let’s outdo one another and showing honor to our guests. Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. Do whatever it takes. That’s a living sacrifice. Sacrifice your time, your resources, your own needs and emotions, all to provide for someone else in need. Do whatever it takes. That’s a living sacrifice. That’s how the Bible defines true worship. I do think you need to start visualizing it. Imagine the victory if we all do this.

Just imagine that. Imagine what it will feel like. 15,000 souls together in one place for one week. One moment in time as a living sacrifice. A few weeks ago, your sister in Christ, Brenda Hale, painted a vivid picture of this scene for us, and I’m going to borrow it today. This comes from a Facebook thread on how to be thrifty at the summit. Very good thread. There is some good stuff on Facebook occasionally. One in 1000, especially if it comes from Brenda. But she painted a vivid picture of the scene and she’s speaking on how to really be able to use your money and your resources wisely at the conference. And Brenda writes: great ideas I read. The conference has been in the plans for over five years, seven, giving us plenty of time to put some money aside. But I also know unexpected things happen along the way that can take a toll on many financially. With all respect to my fellow brothers and sisters, we have spent money on vacations or other things, but in my eyes, this time together will be the greatest vacation of all. It is a treasure, a kingdom banquet on earth, where angels and the spiritual presence of God will be among his children.

I’m not asking us to be unwise, but sacrificial. We should have been preparing for this, like the virgins in Matthew 25 and their oil, and they have plenty of it. Right now, it’s all about our hearts and what we value and what we treasure. Our children will get to experience a piece of heaven on earth. They will get to see God’s work and the unity of believers, which is of great value. God will do amazing things as we come together. He will strengthen us, encourage us, increase our faith, give us dreams and visions, and a greater passion for his mission and the hope we have in Jesus Christ. I and my family look forward to being there with you all. I am thankful for this opportunity the Lord has blessed us with and we will make the best of each day. On another note, we are bringing our own snacks, we are bringing our NutriBullet for smoothies, bringing our own water. And we’ve been saving our money so we can have a meal with other disciples once every day. Be encouraged. You’re going to be filled in ways that words can’t even describe. The Lord smiles from heaven and when he sees his children gather, he smiles on us.

Hasta la vista, baby. My fellow warriors, stay faithful. Brenda Hale. Thank you so much for Brenda. I think she was at our first service. But that really captures the spirit and paints the vivid picture of what we’re talking about. Brothers and sisters, you and I are in the middle of a historic moment. Don’t get distracted by the worries of life. Don’t blink or you could miss it. One week from tonight, the World Discipleship Summit officially begins. In view of God’s mercy, let’s offer our bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. Please now join me in prayer as we remember the sacrifice of Jesus and the mercy of God on each one of our souls. Let’s pray. Father in heaven, words fall short and expressing our gratitude to you. Father, help us to be living sacrifices in view of Your mercy and view of Your plan to give up and watch your son suffer and die for us, that the Creator would die for his creation, that the Judge would take the judgment that should come on us. Thank you God, so much for Your incredible mercy. Thank you so much for Jesus. I pray that you just work on our hearts.

Take us to a new level of gratitude. Help us, God, just to just be those living sacrifices that our body is willing and able to serve you and to serve others and use the gifts you’ve given to us. We do pray for the upcoming weeks that your spirit will move in a powerful way and we can look back on this time and say God was truly with us. Thank you for Jesus. We thank you for the cup that we take now that we remember the blood and what he gave up for us. We take the bread and remember his body as well. Thank you God. We don’t deserve this, but You’ve given it to us. Help us to respond in gratitude and celebration and as living sacrifices. We love you and we pray in Jesus name. Amen.

Hi, my name is Tyler, if you guys don’t know. But I’m here and I lead the singles ministry with my wife Molly. Yeah, but today is a really special day. So if this is your first time time and welcome. I want to introduce you to the conclusion of a series we’ve been doing. And when I say the conclusion, this is a longawaited conclusion. Since January, have been working on the book of Hebrews. So you can open your Bibles to Hebrews last time. It’s a little bittersweet, but I just want to say congratulations. You have done it. It’s an accomplishment, really, and it’s something to be proud of. It’s a lot of focus to stay just with your attention fixed on what God is saying to you in Hebrew says, pay attention and I hope you have. And today is the last time for that. But it has been an incredible journey and I hope you are better for it. Amen. But we’ve milked it as far as we can. And the author, he calls it in our text, we’re in chapter 13, and if you look here in the last section, he does call it quite brief.

And those are two funny, funny words when you even compare this book to the rest of the New Testament. This is a chunky kind of book. And what he means is he could have said a lot more. And I do want to say we could have gone on a lot longer. We could have done this series for two years easily. And I don’t know that would have been the best choice for us. But it’s cool that it comes at the end and we got the conference ahead and it’s just going to be a new way forward. But for us today we conclude and congratulations, reason to celebrate. But if today is your introduction, I also want to cater to you too. So for just a second, yeah, we’ve come a long way and this is just an outline of the book. This is where we’ve been and where we are today. So in case your memory is a little hazy, just for a second here, does anyone know or does everyone know the theme of the book yet? What is it? Jesus is better. This is 13 great chapters that just gush about Jesus and his greatness and his awesomeness.

And the author in the first section, he does a lot to just kind of compare Jesus to everyone you can imagine. The priests, the angels, the prophets, you name it. And then he goes into what Jesus does is better, right? The priesthood, he offers the New Covenant versus the Old Covenant, just all of that stuff. He intercedes for us. And then the last section here is about the life that Jesus calls us to follow his footsteps in. The better life. His ways are better, a better man has a better way. And today we’ve come all the way to the end of the journey. And just to wrap it up, I actually want to give you guys an opportunity to share with each other. So I’m going to open a discussion up for a few minutes here, and I’ll put the question up as I share this, but I want to hear what you guys have gotten from this book, like your takeaway. And so for our time in Hebrews, what something that has stuck with you that you’re going to carry out of these times? And I gave a few people a heads up. I know this is on the spot and this is a little irregular, but if you would like to share, would you mind just standing up so we could at least see you and maybe hear you better?

But what would be your takeaway? And I’ll try to reiterate if you guys can’t hear. So. Yeah, go ahead, Brian. To be clear, maybe in like 20 seconds or less. Okay?

Thank you guys for everyone who shared and on the spot too. But I do hope that with all the sermons and all the lessons and the deep dives really, that we’ve done, that you feel like you know Jesus better, that you know at least who he is and that you’re more amazed with him. I do think someone actually it was a younger person. I think it was like a preteen that said, I like what I’m learning, but they’re very philosophical and it’s like, okay. I hear what you’re saying, right? It’s like you got to stay with it. There’s a heady kind of part to who he’s telling you who Jesus is. But there’s more than that too. And as theologically lofty as this is, I just want to remind you guys here as we get in now to the next part, that this is actually a letter. You kind of lose that, right? Because the beginning has no introduction that’s at least personal.

It’s kind of just boom, Jesus, blah blah, blah, blah, all about Jesus. And there’s not a lot of introduction. But here at the end of the letter, which is where we’re at today, you’re going to see that this is indeed super heartsy. And you’ll see the personal touch. And if you glance at verse 19 right before our section here, you’re going to see him ask for prayer. He has a prayer request, right? Like, please, I want to be with you. I long to be with you, so pray that God makes that happen. It’s a really heartsy turn to this letter. He clearly loves them and he longs to for a blessing on these people. And so today we’re going to end with his benediction. Benediction, huh? Have you ever heard that word? Maybe not. Do you even know what it means? It’s a fancy word because it’s a fancy benediction. I thought I’d say but it’s basically a blessing. It’s a blessing for his people and a blessing basically meaning, like, as I conclude, I pray and I want to know that God would do these things in your life.

And this is also it’s just so appropriate for us. But benedictions are common in the Bible, like God in Numbers, chapter six, he actually taught the priest how to give a benediction, how to give a blessing to his people. And when they would part from meeting together, they would usually give a blessing to their people. Numbers 6:22, God says, May the Lord bless you and keep you. The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you. The Lord turn his face towards you and give you peace. First Thessalonians all the letters tend to have a benediction. Verse five, verse 23. May God Himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, body and soul be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it. And sometimes they come in the middle of a letter, right? Like Ephesians 320. This is a common one we’ve heard. Now, to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine according to his power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the Church and in Jesus Christ throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

So what is the benediction? After all this stuff about Jesus, what’s he gonna say? What is there more to say? Let’s just read here and we’ll read our text today. It says, now may the God of peace, through the blood of the eternal covenant, brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus Christ, that great shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to Him through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. So here we are. And he starts with the word now, right? It’s a signal word. He means get your landing gear out. We’re about to land this plane. Now, okay long gush about Jesus. Here we go. Let me just gush about Jesus one more time in this long sentence. But it’s a long and beautiful sentence and there’s a lot packed in there and it might kind of look a little confusing. I wonder if you just said it in one breath. But yes, that’s just one sentence. Yeah, but it’s a lot, and you might have to come up for air at the end. But it really is just a sentence.

There’s nothing intimidating about a sentence. It’s got a subject, a verb, maybe a noun. So if I could just help you out here and boil the sentence down to the simplest message. What he’s really saying here in the sentence’s skeleton is simply this: may God equip you. That is his blessing, that is his prayer. May God equip you. May God equip you the church. And so he decorates it with a lot of beautiful words, right? He talks about the who equips, why, how for what? Why does he equip? All these things. God and the amazingness that he is, he fits it all in somehow. But ultimately, at the core is a plea and prayer that God is going to equip his church. He wants to leave them empowered. Like, you guys, I’m leaving a prayer with you. And I know I’m ending this letter, but this is my prayer as I end my letter. With all that the first century church was going on, I mean, consider that in a few years, the temple would be destroyed. The Jews were definitely under Roman oppression. There was a lot of persecution. They really needed encouragement. And I’ve got a few of you do here today.

I don’t want to compare whatever hardships, even from pew to pew, but I do think that all of us need encouragement. We’ve all had challenging things, and we will have them in the future. But it’s cool to see that God has already done what he’s done in Christ to equip us and to provide for anything we’re going to go through, to sit with us through the storm and walk us through it. So he has a calling for us and a purpose for our life. And when he says equip, that word really, he wants to make you fit for something. He wants to complete you or prepare you, kind of bend you into shape, kind of like a chiropractor. One of the definition is to readjust you and to your full potential that God is doing for his calling in your life. And as he offers his blessing, he’s also reminding them of a lot of things about the greatness of our God. So I don’t want to skip these reminders, but I want to take a closer look. And this will be where we land here. But we’ll just kind of zoom through here, and the first reminder we come to is he says, now, may the God of peace. Let me pause. That He wants them to remember that they’re being equipped by a God of peace. That’s an identity. That’s his title. But that’s the essence of our God. He’s filled with peace. That’s his whole nature, and that’s also what he offers people. We need peace. No one can pretend we don’t. I bet if your AC went out the second you sat in your car, you’d lose a little peace. There’s all kinds of things that we’re just craving and crying out for peace. We need it every day. Even this week. I have two small kids in my house. My house can feel like this. I call this a screaming, poopy, pukey war zone. At any instant, that’s what my house can become. It doesn’t smell peaceful. There’s nothing peaceful on some moments in my house. And we gather it back together, but it’s fragile and I think even my phone, my phone is not peace inducing sometimes. I bet you look at your phone and you’re like, why did I look at that? It’s gone. And you’re like, where’s the peace go? And the news? Whatever. We need to stay in touch with the world. But if we are, we realize the world needs peace.

The world can’t find it. There’s war, there’s famine, there’s so many things going on. But peace only comes from the God of peace, the kind that you want, at least. The kind that lasts. God who is peace is also the giver of peace. And we get peace, the scriptures say, through Jesus. He gives it through Jesus. Romans five one. It says, therefore, since we’ve been justified through faith, we have peace through God, with God, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Ultimately, we can trust that this God of peace is going to bring us into his rest.

Hebrews four talks about how don’t miss out on God’s rest. That’s like a summary of the gospel. I want you to know my rest. The God of peace wants that for us, and he wants to give it away. The second reminder you come to, he says, now may the God of peace who through the blood of the eternal covenant, we have a God of peace, but we have a God of promise. That we have a God who he has bound himself to us in a covenant, a promise. It’s like an eternal pinky promise. Unbreakable, forever binding. It’s eternal. We’ve heard about the covenant, but this word eternal here is inserted at the end of the book. It’s forever and it’s sealed by the blood of Jesus. It’s an expensive covenant, and it’s about our freedom. So we have a covenant saying we are his forever more. Forever more we are his. And this is really a great time to remind them of a faithful God, a God who promises them faithfully, and he wants to be joined with his people. And so when you think about a God who’s done all this, he spent that much, why would he not equip his people?

That’s what he wants to do. And so may God do it. May God do what he set in motion from the moment Jesus came to die equip you. And so essentially he’s saying, may God equip a covenant people, but not just the covenant people, covenant people that have this kind of power in their corner. We have a God of power. Third reminder. Now, may God who brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus. Here he reminds them of the power of God above and beyond even death. In Hebrews two, he alludes to the resurrection, and that sure gives peace, right? But here he makes a direct aim at the resurrection directly saying, look, you have a man who raised from the dead, and that’s who’s in your corner. This is a foundational reminder. This is more than a reminder this is foundational to our faith. Because of Jesus’victory over death, that’s why we can have peace. And because of his victory over death, that’s why we can even trust his covenant, that it meant something that was good, that the check won’t bounce. He can back up his claim that we are in a covenant with Him.

We can trust the resurrection. The good news that we who would otherwise die are now those who have been rescued from the grip of death. Consider that the resurrection power. If God is going to equip us and give us the power for something, if he can resurrect a man, he’s giving us that kind of power. That’s high voltage. You don’t realize what you got in you, and you have it by God’s spirit. And that’s an awe-inspiring power. I don’t know how to really wrap my mind around that, but that’s what we would be equipped with. Other reminder here is that we have a wonderful shepherd. The scripture says a great shepherd. Now, may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant, brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep. This is a recurring theme, biblically. You’ve probably heard that God’s people are like sheep. Have you heard that? Everyone say “baah”. Yes, it’s true, you guys are like sheep. But you know why we’re called sheep? It’s because we’re dumb and we’re helpless and we’re prone to wander away from God. You should know that firsthand.

And you should realize we need our shepherd. We need Him. He says, Jesus is our great shepherd. That’s a wonderful adjective. Ever since we’ve wandered away in the garden with Adam and Eve man, since the beginning, our shepherd Jesus has been pursuing us to bring us back into his fold. I want you back. Come on. He’s in the business of finding lost sheep. He is our shepherd. In John ten, Jesus says I am the good shepherd. A good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. So as the good shepherd has died in our place, past tense, he has tasted death so we can taste peace with God and escape death. He’s already done that in the past. He’s a good shepherd who did that. But present tense the scripture says he’s a great shepherd because he hasn’t left us since then. He’s still guiding us. He’s still in us. He wants to lead us by his Spirit in a life that he wants to make only he could create in us. And if he did in the past, and he’s doing it today, you better believe he’s going to be shepherding us in the future.

First. Peter 5:4 says, when the chief shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away. So we have a wonderful, great, good and chief shepherd. And so these four reminders, you can really see who this God is that wants to equip us. The author would pray, please equip them. But these are wonderful things to keep in mind of. Who is equipping us?

He’s a God of peace, of promise, of provision, of power. You can count on this great God to equip you. It’s a small thing.

Or to complete you. Or it might get more uncomfortable, to prepare you for something or to readjust you for his purpose. I don’t like the chiropractor I’ve been once, I’m scared to death to go back. But when he’s like, all right, just stay still. I need to crack you back into shape. God is doing something in your life too. He’s pushing you towards something because he has something prepared for you. And Scripture clearly shows that our growth as a disciple of Jesus though, it happens by his power, by Him working in us. Working in us what is pleasing to Him through Jesus Christ. As Andrew Murray, a great Christian from centuries past, he said this really well. He said, as little as you can reach to heaven with your hands, can you of yourself live such a heavenly life. You don’t have the kind of power you need to live this life, but it is possible with the help of the Holy Spirit. We’re talking about deeds right now. But doing the Christian life on your own, it doesn’t really work. It doesn’t. You need God’s power inside of you to do this. Even Jesus knew this.

Like he was dependent on God. John 15:19 the son can do nothing by himself. Those are Jesus’ words. He’s like, I can’t do it by myself. And if Jesus knew this to be true, then let me rest my case by saying Jesus is better than you. So you would do well to depend on God the way he depends on God. But if there is any part of this at all for you to do, it really looks something sort of like this surrendering yourself, trusting Him, yielding yourself, emptying yourself of your will so that he ultimately can work in your life. It’s a really passive thing, but it’s important. That’s what you need to do to be equipped to be ready to have God’s power work in your life. Because God has much to do thtrough you. He has so many great plans for you. I can’t imagine how the world would be changed. Every one of you guys would let God work his fullest potential in all of his power that he wants to through you. It’s Ephesians 3:20, like mind boggling what God can do through you. But we get in the way a lot.

We strive to kind of do things on our own and just have our own standards or ideas of what’s best, not what God has in mind here. He has a plan and he has a call on your life. He has a purpose for you. And Scripture shows that he is in the business here of working in you what is pleasing to him. It’s not about a superhero power, it’s not about finding out that you can shoot webs out of your ears or what does Spiderman do. But there are so many things that we could think this is about us doing something and it’s not about us. The emphasis here is on what God can do, not you. He’s doing the equipping by his Holy Spirit. It’s the highlight of his power for his progress and his purpose in your life.

That’s what he wants to do. And that might sound kind of selfish, right? Like the scripture here equipping you with everything good for doing his will. What about me, God? It might sound I don’t know. Are you consumed with yourself? I don’t know. That’s something to grapple with. But think about it. He just spent 13 chapters elaborating on how if anyone deserves glory at all, it is only God and not us. He’s the only one that deserves glory, every bit. It all belongs to him. And for you to know that our amazing God wants to do amazing things through you should humble you to the core. Humility, just awe like whoa. All you should be left to say those thoughts are really inappropriate. You should be like, here I am, Lord. Like Samuel said, right? Here I am, Lord. Do your will. What you want to do is what I am ready to do. And at the end of this book he’s laid out we come to the last line here, but he’s laid out in our site all the amazing things that God has done and is still yet to do in us.

And then he kind of ends this benediction with the phrase, Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.

He’s at the end, what’s he going to do? And so here he is and I feel kind of like he’s just overwhelmed by the greatness of Jesus at this point. He’s made a massive case at every angle he could come at. Jesus is better and it feels like it’s like a submarine at ocean depth, just being crushed by the weight of the glory of Jesus. And he’s running out of time and he’s desperate and his heart swells with joy and bursting out and he says to Jesus Christ, be glory forever and ever. Amen. He finds relief in his cry, like what more can be said? Is anything more fitting than saying to Jesus, be glory forever and ever. And I think if you’re not convinced, read the end of Revelation and you’ll see that that’s all that happens in heaven. Maybe more, maybe God changes the subject. But if he doesn’t, all we can do is say Holy, holy. It’s all that’s fitting here. So I just ask where your heart is at this morning, does it say the same? Because the more you gaze at Jesus, his greatness, his power, his covenant, his kingship, his priesthood, his blood poured out for you.

It should always drive you just to your knees to worship and fall down before God. And so that’s how he ends. And as if he forgets he has something more to say, he closes also with a PS. The last section is a postscript. It’s a PS. And so we’ll read this too. It says, brothers and sisters, I urge you to bear with my word of exhortation, for in fact, I’ve written to you quite briefly. I want you to know that our brother Timothy has been released. If he arrives soon, I will come with him to see you. Greet all your leaders and all the Lord’s people. Those from Italy send you their greetings. Grace be with you all.

So he calls this letter he characterizes it as an exhortation, right? An encouragement. I just wrote you a big encouragement. It’s a call. I want to encourage you to do something. Go all in for Jesus. Case rested. And we know that it is indeed giving it its readers a lot of encouragement. If you’re on the fence, this book is for you. If you’re just getting in, read Hebrews. It will make the case that Jesus is no one to be on the fence for. It’s funny that he calls this letter brief, though. I mean, we’ve done 20 weeks of sermons. He’s done around 10,000 words. I wonder what his full, unabbreviated thoughts would have been if you would have let this man go. All right. How long would he have gone on? I don’t know. If someone got a cramp in their hand and they’re like, hold on, buddy, I can’t write anymore. Or maybe it’s like I’m out of paper and papyrus is gone. We’ve used all the papyrus in the town, who knows? But the truth is, we don’t know why he ended here. But we do know that he could have gone on and on and on and on.

And that’s clear, because truth be told, it really is a small and ridiculously brief letter. This is the smallest letter there could be compared to the infinite truths that this letter contains. Do you remember what the Apostle John said at the end of his Gospel? The last sentence he said was, Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose the whole world would not have room for the books that could have been written. And that’s really it. You can never, ever fully express the greatness of God. The greatness of Jesus Christ is inexpressible. You can give your best shot, but you’re not going to do it justice. That’s why holy, holy, holy goes on forever and ever like there’s more to be said, but are you, church, are you guys giving it your best shot? Our call is to show the world that Jesus is better, not just to know for ourselves, but to give it a shot, just like he did, and tell the greatness of the story of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s worth every breath we breathe. It’s worth every word we speak.

It’s really the call for us going forward. May God equip us to do that. So, friends, this is all we have. This is the end of the day. I don’t know what to say. I’m a little sad. It’s bittersweet. I’ve had a great time. But we’re going to land the plane here, and you land the plane. You go to baggage claim. You get your bags and you take with you what you can for the journey ahead. And I really ask you to consider your takeaway. But here’s your homework. It’s not over for you. It’s over for us here together. But I want you to read Hebrews one more time. I want you to get alone. If you can read it out loud, even better. Go into nature. Read this letter of Hebrews, spend a date with Jesus and read it and ask yourself this question are you making it the one aim of your life to glorify Jesus? That’s what it’s all about. So although this ends, I’m sure this writer kept speaking about Jesus and writing about Jesus in his own time, right? What more will we say about Jesus? There’s so many more stories about how he’s worked in our lives.

And as we remember Jesus, we’re going to take communion right now. It’s a time to remember Jesus, and I want our meditation to be today let’s just let it be how Jesus is better than anything that could compete with Him in our lives. Just ponder the greatness of Jesus together. Amen.

All right, we’re going to pray. Dear God, thank you so much for this morning. It’s been a long time to really hear the fullness, but we can talk about Jesus and listen about Jesus forever. And we look forward, God, in our walk with you, to getting to know Him deeper and deeper and deeper. May you equip this church, God and all of its people, with the ability to do what’s pleasing to you, to do the work you have set out for them. May you equip us God, god of peace and of power, our great shepherd. May you really just help us to be what you wanted us to be. All for the name of Jesus, and all for his glory. It’s in his name we pray. Amen.