APR 19 2015 | John 15

Sea Change Church · "John 15" · Adam Stadtmiller · April 19, 2015
John 15
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

So if you have your Bibles, open them up. If you haven't already, the John chapter 15. I gotta say the baptisms was so powerful. You can just feel, I love what Mark said. He said he can just feel something going on here and I can feel it too and hopefully you can. And I can't really put my finger on it other than it's God and who can explain God. But it's good stuff what God's cooking right now. And matter of fact, do you smell the cooking? What's going on? That's lunch right there. So we do that here.

Are we pumping that in through the... That is awesome. Right, goodness. Today's chicken. I know there's some roasted chicken on over there. So oatmeal sundae is behind us and we are on... I love oatmeal sundae. It was my idea and it's staying. Gosh, that smells really good. How do they do that? Okay. You got your Bibles open here. If this passage is so rich when it talks about the struggle going on between two worlds, the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of earth and how it plays out in earth.

And he talks about hate and disagreement and the war of two kingdoms. And this passage is so rich and Jesus systematically breaks down what is happening and why as believers we are not like the world. And why the world... And when it speaks of the world... Remember last week I said that the world consists of an enemy, which is Satan. It consists of an ethos, which is Satan's game plan. And it consists of those who follow the enemy's ethos, even if they don't know that they're following the enemy.

The enemy does not care if you know if you're following him or not. If you are still within the game plan. And he loves extremes. I said he loves either being in a country where there is so much demon worship, like I've been to Indonesia, and there's just everywhere you go, there's statues and people believe in demons and they believe in false gods and which we should because they do exist.

Or he wants to be in a country like France that is going completely to secularism that doesn't believe in anything, anything that would be super natural. He loves extremes and that's part of his game plan. But when Jesus talks about being hated, he says you are hated for a reason. And I think this is key. This is the key of this entire text that we're looking at.

It's because of who you belong to. The core reason is the enemy hates you. The world hates you because of who you belong to. Now I said last week that the enemy without people to belong to him has no power. Imagine the world without human beings. Imagine the enemy being placed here with the animals. I mean maybe he could get, you know, some llamas, you know, to create some rebellion or something like this.

The great llama rebellion of 2015. The alpaca revolution. But really the enemy without people is powerless. Do you get that? The enemy without people is powerless. The enemy without people agreeing and working as his minions is powerless. I mean obviously he could cause strife for his demonic ranks and things like that. But the enemy needs people to have power.

This is why it's important that we don't have anything in our lives that we say this belongs to the enemy. Now we're still as believers under God's complete sovereign protection. But if we want to give the enemy something and say you can have this. Let's say it's an addiction to something. Let's say it's anger. Let's say it's unforgiveness. What you are saying and what you're doing is you are allowing the enemy to belong in your camp.

You give him belonging. And Christ says and the Bible says that we can live lives that extricate the enemy from every area of our life. And what it means is we won't stop being attacked. But the attacks go from inside of the wall. And I talked about the keep last week inside of a castle. To outside of the wall. When the enemy comes, when Satan comes before God, which it says he does regularly, and accuses the brethren because he is the accusing of the brethren.

And he wants you to agree with his accusing about you, by the way. So he not only goes to God persistently, but he comes to you and tries to get you in agreement with lies. Like you are an orphan. You are not cared for. You are powerless over this situation. You will always be manipulated. You are a victim. He tries to get us to agree with these things and to have ungodly beliefs that he can bring into his belonging.

And God says that you belong to me. And if we want to extricate the enemy from everything in our lives like Job did, then we can. Remember, the enemy could not attack Job. Why? Because God said, and the enemy even spoke this out of his mouth in the book of Job, that he had no belonging. He had no open doors. Know that you are protected by God. But if you want, through your own decision and through our own volition, we can go open the gate.

You know, castles have a gate for a reason. They have watchmen on the walls for a reason. And we can open ourselves. So all this goes to this battle for belonging. And the battle for belonging and God saying, I want to belong to every part of your life. And I want you to fully come into belonging to me where there is a complete intimacy of belonging.

The enemy wants to get little areas of your life and wants to share belonging with God because he knows he has no true power in your life if there's nothing that belongs to him. So what I've been trying to do is get every area of my life, my tongue, my heart, my mind, my ungodly beliefs, my thoughts, my actions, out of the belonging of the enemy and consistently where every gate is closed in our life.

You know, I said last week that a lot of people, one of the lies is God just created all these rules because, you know, he just wants you to follow rules. He just wants you to do what he says. And he's this dad that has this perfection plan. And you have to be perfected to get this plan for him to love you. That's not it at all. God looks at the different areas of our life, even the ones that we struggle with, and he says, give that to me.

Your marriage. Oh, I want your marriage. I want to belong to it. The tongue, the way you use your tongue in your marriage or with your mom, in your relationship with her or in your business finances, I want to belong to that because in belonging is blessing. The more that belongs, the more blessing. It is impossible to have the king of the universe enter into something and belong without just blessing following off God.

Imagine, like, you know, I used to tell junior high kids, but it still works, that God has, like, a Velcro suit, okay? Going back to my junior high days. And he has these, like, you know, like Christmas ornaments. And imagine the other part of the Velcro, and the ornament has, like, love and joy and peace and, you know, prosperity and these different things of blessing.

And I can't think of any other blessings. Anybody else think of any other blessings? Good stuff, okay? And he takes them and he puts them all over himself, but these Christmas ornaments are heavier than the Velcro can actually hold on to. And when you invite God, they just kind of fall off him into your life. And what I would say to the kids is we want to invite God into our lives because when God is present, the things of God, the blessings of God, the gifts of God will just fall off.

And that's why God's presence in worship, like what Hannah brought today, oftentimes people will just get giftings. You'll just see God because he's in the room. You want God in your life. You want to be with him in the morning. You just want his stuff. You just want to rub up on him, you know? Another analogy I would say is if God had flour all over himself and he comes and gives you a hug.

That's what getting with the Lord is. He just gets all over you and changes you. And that's what we see happening here. It's God. I don't know if you could sell any great theological books on the flour and Christmas Velcro ornaments of God. But it's about belonging. I want to say it's about belonging and that Satan hates you when you don't belong to him.

Why? Because he has no power. Satan is all about power. Get out. If there's anything that belongs to him. Now, once again, let me not freak you out. You are under God's protection. Thank God for God that even when we're messing up and we're letting the enemy come into our lives, God is still like, no, no, no. I'm going to sovereignly protect you, okay?

So don't go freaking out, all right? But the more we give to God, the better. And so that's what it says. It talks about belonging. It says in verse 19, because we belong to the Father, the world has no authority over us. And the other reason we are hated is because we testify to the truth. Now, I want to say what? Jesus says that the word if there, if, it says in verse 18, if the world hates you.

And I spoke about the Greek meaning of that last week. That if actually means when they hate you. It's a foregone conclusion. It will happen. It's not if, okay? And you might not see someone coming up and knocking your door down like we see over in certain, you know, Islamic states right now where there's a real hatred. People are being beheaded for the cross.

But there is an ethos that is being controlled by an enemy that has a foundation of hate. And in our country at the moment, it might not look like hate, although it feels to be shifting a little bit towards people of faith. But in our country, it might not look like that. Remember, the enemy has many ways to accomplish what he wants to accomplish.

And if he can do it singing a sweet song, he will. Or if he can do it bashing down doors and taking prisoners, he will. But the world hates you nonetheless. Why? Because it is controlled by the enemy. Scripture says that the spirit of the air, we spoke about that last week, the enemy is the God, little g, of this world. Okay? Now, he's on a leash.

All right? The enemy is on a leash. But he still has power today. And so we see that we want to make sure that if we're being hated, which will happen according to the use of that word if, that we're being hated for the right reasons. Okay? If you're going to be hated, which you will be, be hated for the right reasons. Don't be hated by the way that we share the gospel.

There are so many ways to share the gospel that I would say are so obtuse, that are so offensive. Now, Jesus himself is a stumbling block. Jesus, the message of the gospel, it says in scripture, is offensive. If you could put it in the nicest terms and share the message of Christ being crucified, Jesus says that the message is offensive itself.

It is a what to people? Stumbling block. Just the message. And we want to share the truth of God, the scripture says, in what? In love. But we still want to share the truth. And so when we're being hated, which we will be, we don't want to be hated by the way in which we live. We want to be hated because of who we belong to and that we testify to the truth.

And so one of the hardest things today is to learn how to share the gospel, the power of the gospel, in a way that proclaims the love of Christ. But let me just say, when push comes to shove, you are going to be at one point will be challenged to stand for what you believe. I want to say it's beginning, we're moving into a time where it's going to cost you something to be a Christian.

Okay? It's going to cost us something to be a Christian. I wonder how long until, well, I won't say that. I just think it'll cost us to be a Christian. I'm not going to say what I think might happen, but I think it will. And will we stand for the truth and for who we belong to? Well, we're going to go into what to do about it, responding to the hatred of the world.

One of the things in regard to responding to the hatred of the world and really responding to the enemy, because the gospel is about people, right? Our fight is not against who? Flesh and blood, okay? So the enemy has his minions, like I said, that follow the ethos of the enemy. But our battle is not with them, okay? Our battle is never with people.

Our battle is not against flesh and blood. And you know what Satan wants us to do? He wants us to focus our attention, our anger, our upsetness on who? People. But it says that our battle is not waged there, but it's Ephesians, it says where is our battle waged? In the heavenly realms. And we have spiritual weapons of our warfare that are used for the pulling down of what?

Strongholds. I want to say when you think about the world, when you think about ISIS, when you think about religious freedom, when you think about all these different things, that all the different news are propagating regularly, do you find yourself upset at people and what's happening and the message on the world? Or do you find yourself upset at the enemy and what he's doing up here in the heavenlies?

I want to say if you're upset at guys over in another country beheading people, or if you're upset about people marching or whatever the thing is that is in the common day, and you're upset at them, your focus is in the wrong place. And if the enemy can get you to focus on people and to hate people, then he is winning the battle. I want to say where is our focus?

Our focus is in prayer. Our focus is in the word of God. Because it says that these are weapons of our warfare, are what kind of weapons? Spiritual weapons that can overcome every pretense, every argument, and every, it says, demonic stronghold for the pulling down of demonic strongholds. I want to say, guys, our battle is not here. It is not people.

It's never people. God so loved people that he gave his only son for people. We realize, get your eyes off the people. Get your eyes on heaven. And get your eyes on what God is doing. He has weapons of our warfare. This doesn't mean that we don't engage people. And we need to learn, like Kai, this class yesterday, we had 20 or so people turn out to how to learn to have a conversation with a Muslim.

They have no idea. You know, I find a lot of believers hating Muslims and not knowing how to talk to them or anything about them. We often hate what we don't understand. And I'm so happy that our admissions leaders, Kai and Bev, are opening this class so that we can learn more to have a conversation because conversations are between people. We never want to hate people.

And so our responses then, when we respond, when we understand that the battle that we're fighting is not here with people, it's in the heavenlies, you're going to be much better at having a filtered response. Here's what we want, and this is so key. When you respond, now this is good for church life as well. This is good in your family, working with your kids, and it's good for evangelism.

Filter. Okay? Let's get a filter. And the filter is called the Holy Spirit. Okay? He is the filter. When you understand that your argument, your frustration is not with another person, but even if you have a discussion or disagreement with your wife or your parent or your kids, it isn't with them that you need to fight that battle. We fight the battle in the heavenlies.

And we ask God, bring agreement. Bring us the three-corded strand it talks about, where Jesus is the third quarter. I can't get my fingers to do that. There we go. Now I have a fourth one. Kind of funky looking. We have a three-corded strand, and we begin to pray and say, God, my wife and I are in disagreement. God, for a week, before I bring this up again, we don't have to bring it up again, okay?

You know that scripture that says, make sure the sun never sets on your anger? It doesn't say make up. It says on your anger. You get that? People have used that verse all the time. You've got to make up with me because the sun can't set, or we're not in God's will. No. It says you don't be mad, okay? Let's get that one right. Everybody's like, whoa, what just happened right there?

I just took away like 15 spouses' arguments right there. They're like, figure your anger out. What does the Bible say? Figure your anger out. You can go to bed and not make up and not be angry anymore. It's okay to wait until the morning or next week to discuss something. You know, one of the best tools we've learned in marriage, my wife and I, is learn how to table something.

Oftentimes, six days later, it doesn't even matter. What were we arguing about? It was over. Or you could just make it go all week if you want. You know, it's up to you. We have these filtered responses. And when we realize that we're battling in the heavens, it really allows us to go to God, takes our focus off what we're upset about, concerned about, and we let the Holy Spirit be that filter, as opposed to spontaneous reaction.

You'll see in your notes there. I want to say the immediacy of today's social media and 24-7 news cultures inflames reactionary living. Reactionary living. I've got to say, if we can make a difference as believers that is going to be countercultural, it's not living as a reactionary. Do you get that? Immediately going to the website, immediately, you know, you hear this news come out, and then all of a sudden it gets switched 24 hours later.

There's just this immediacy. I've got to say, immediacy rarely needs to be used. We're living in a culture right now that is like, the house is on fire, the house is on fire, run outside. You know, I keep running outside, and there's no smoke, you know. Very few times do you have to run outside because the house is on fire. But we're being told, and this culture is moving in a way, that is telling you the house is constantly on fire.

And I want to say, being people of peace, that understand that God has a plan, that when you see these things, Jesus says when he talks all about the things that are going to happen, he says, when you see these things, look where? Up. Why? Because the day of your what? Redemption is here. Take heart. When you see the news, as opposed to go, ah, ah.

You know how believers should do? You know what Jesus said we should do? You need to filter that fear. I want to say, if you're spending more time with the news on than you are the Bible or worship on, it's going to be real hard to live in truth. It's going to be real hard to live in faith. It's going to be real hard to live in peace. I want to say, if you can have people, have you ever seen a captain that has peace in the midst of a storm?

Jesus, big storm. What's he doing? Sleeping. Why? Because he's grounded in who? His Father. And everything was filtered through the Holy Spirit. I want to say, where's your filter? Do you even have a filter? You know, we have a vacuum in our house right now. The filter broke. It blew out, okay? I'm vacuuming the house. Dust everywhere. It's kind of counterproductive.

Filter. Filter. Just filter everything. What is God saying? I love when someone comes to me and says, you know what? I wanted to meet with you, but I've waited two weeks to pray on this. Love that. You know what I don't like? Monday morning after your sermon and email. I don't get too many of those. But I can be the same way. I want to filter everything.

What's God doing? What's he doing? We're going to see that here in the scripture. You know, I put in the notes that Christ was pretty much the original reactionary. There's a lot more. I mean, not Christ, but Peter. You know, what's that guy? You know, brings two swords to Jesus on the night before the crucifixion. And then, you know, Malchus comes up to him and he cuts the guy's ear off.

You know what I mean? And then, five minutes later, he's running naked, okay? Or John's naked and they're like taking off. And then he's denying Jesus. I mean, come on. Back and forth. Because he had no understanding of what God was really about and on about. You know, your filter lets you know what God's doing. We are not what of the devil schemes.

What's the word? Unaware. Unless we choose to be unaware. We can choose to be unaware. And the less you spend time with the Lord, the less you filter things, the more unaware we're going to be. I don't want to live unaware. This week, I had some things hitting me. And I'm like, God, what's happening here? I talked to Kai about him. Kai said, do you see?

He emailed me back. He said, do you see any patterns? And all of a sudden, I saw some patterns. And I thought, I'm not unaware of what the enemy is doing. I'm not unaware of what he wants to do in my family. I'm not unaware of what he wants to do in our church. I'm not unaware of what he wants to do in our staff. I'm not unaware of what he wants to do in La Jolla.

I'm not unaware of what I believe he wants to do on this block. I'm also not unaware of what God wants to do in those same places. And we will take that ground. We will take that ground through demolishing of strongholds, focusing on prayer. And that's why I like, we have more prayer meetings a week here than we have business meetings. And I love that.

And we want to continue to increase that. So how do we overcome the tendency to become a reactionary? I did say it right. One, we must submit our opinions and corresponding actions to the filtering of the Holy Spirit. Look at verses 26 and 27 on the text. Verse 26, it says, when the advocate comes, that could be counselor, person who advocates for you.

The enemy is the accuser, but who comes against the accuser is your lawyer, the advocate, who speaks to you. And it says, whom I will send from who? The Father. So Jesus is sent from where? And where's the Holy Spirit sent from? Yeah, who's in charge? Right. And he is a spirit of what? Truth. I love it. Truth. The Holy Spirit is full of truth. You know, I feel like I'm constantly battling.

If I have an emotion that comes up and it's like a fear or anxiety, I can usually say, Lord, what's going on here? What's the lie? Enemy's always trying to lie. He'll control you with lies. And what's the truth? Getting into the truth. Truth. To the spirit. It's a spirit of truth. I love it. A spirit of truth. Who goes out from the Father. He will testify about me.

I love that. If he's going out from the Father, that means he's getting his commands from where? The Father. And the Father loves you. The Father cares for you. The Father would send his son for you. He delights for you. He wants to put his arms around you and say, you are mine. I love you. You're not an orphan. Come home. And then he takes that message with a message of love and a message of power.

And he says to the Holy Spirit, go accomplish my bidding with Chuck, with Tina, with Adam, with Carrie, with Victoria. Accomplish my bidding with them. You see, the Holy Spirit that filters our action is sent out from the Father. And when we filter our actions and our opinions through the Holy Spirit, we are also filtering through the love of whom?

The Father. You see, it's so important to take our opinions and the actions that follow and filter them. Just remember a giant filter. And before you act, you need to filter your actions. Actions flow from what? Oftentimes, opinions. I want to say, don't be a slave to your own opinions. You don't know that much. Neither do I. We, look, look. Don't, I got to say, I don't, I trust myself.

But let me just say, I don't trust my first initial response. I'm getting to the point where I'm beginning to trust the action I made because I believe that I'm following God. But I want to say, I don't trust my initial reactions because oftentimes they come from the flesh or what I ate that morning or how I'm feeling. I need to filter even how I feel about myself.

Opinions about myself, I have to take them and take them to the Holy Spirit. Say, do not become in bondage to your opinions. We have, I mean, we are an opinion-driven culture. I want to have less opinions and more heart. I want to have more of a heart for people. You can have an opinion about people or a certain people group. You can have all these opinions.

But I find sometimes when I get past with the machete of God's word and the filter of the Holy Spirit, I find a heart that makes more sense to me and feels more right than the opinions. Does that make sense? That oftentimes I have these. You ever had an opinion about a group of people and then God touches your heart for them and the opinions don't matter anymore?

And someone said to me the other day, you know, I just feel like sometimes like I want to make sure that because of your love for people, you'll still speak truth. And I thought, well, you know, that's a really good point. But at the same time, I'm like, thank you that I'm even in that conversation. That I'm afraid because you love people so much you might not speak truth to them.

And I was like, first I was kind of offended. I was like, ah. And I thought about it. I thought, that's cool. Because that wasn't there 20 years ago. But I am about truth. And God says to speak truth. But it says in verse 26 and 27, Now look at this next verse. And you must also testify. Meaning, who testifies first according to verse 26? And then what?

You must testify. You know when we get in trouble? When we start testifying before the Holy Spirit testifies to us. Before God uses his word and the Holy Spirit unpacks the word of God, right? So in the morning, when you start your day. And by the way, you can read the Bible more than just in the morning. Or at night before you go to bed. It's there.

It's available to you, by the way. Like at noon, two in the afternoon, for a coffee. Like it's a resource. We've kind of built in this thing. Like do your daily quiet time with God. And then you're good for the day. It's available all day. It's there. It's God's word. Try using it. Your boss comes in and gives you a hard time. Go get the Bible. Start reading Proverbs.

Or react. I'm going to quit. I'm quitting. Ah, I'm out. Do you cut off Malchus' ear? Is that you? You're going to cut off your own nose to spite your face is what's going to happen. Remember my old job. There was so many times I get frustrated with something. You know, I've done all my old jobs at some point. You know, ah, quit. Ah. Ah. My mentor said to me, he says, you're going to quit.

This African-American guy is my mentor. He lives up in Carlsbad. His name's Ed. He's amazing. Well, he's a professor. And he said, you're going to quit. I said, yeah. He said, that'll feel real good when I said, yeah. That'll feel real good. I'm going to quit. He says, well, there's a stress of being stressed at work. And then there's a stress of not having any money for your family.

And he says, about three days in after the feel good goes away, you're going to have a new stress. You choose. I stayed. It was the best decision I ever made. Had I not, I wouldn't be here. Wouldn't be here had I done. And, you know, I was angry. I don't even remember what I was angry about. That's how important it was. And God, yeah, praise the Lord.

Verse 26 and 27 highlights, look at this, that our testimony is always a secondary retelling. The story we tell, the actions we live. Your life's a testimony, okay? We're living testimonies. So you're always telling a testimony. The testimonies today, I love. We've got to do more baptisms. If you haven't been baptized, let's do that again. That was awesome.

It's a secondary retelling. I want to say, are you the primary storyteller in your life? All we should be doing is retelling stories. We're just retelling stories. We're taking our opinions, we're setting them aside. Not that you can't be honest with God about what your opinions are. He wants you to be honest with him. I'm angry at you, God. You know, you're bothering me.

I don't like the way you're treating me. Yada, yada, yada. Just go out. Just be real with God, okay? Then ultimately, he will come in and share what his heart is. And then we want to retell when he's reframed our hearts. You see, that's what it is. The Holy Spirit is in the reframing business. He wants to take your opinions and what you're going to do about it and how you're going to figure it out.

And then he wants to reframe it with the love and the power of God. You know, he's a carpenter. And he knows how to reframe. The Holy Spirit learned a lot from Jesus in reframing. It's a secondary retelling. Here's a key. And this is in your notes. It says, when we fail to filter our responses through the Holy Spirit, we often, and I wanted to put always, but I didn't want to be that definitive.

We often forfeit the grace, the power, and the truth available to us. If you're going to be Peter, you're going to cut off ears, and you're going to take it in. You know, you're going to be constantly upset. The enemy is in the business of stealing your piece, okay? So watch the news. You know, not that we shouldn't be aware. We need to be aware of what's happening in the world.

But, I mean, you know, we need to be careful that it doesn't become the filter. Because when we're filtering our opinions through some talking head on CNN or Fox or whatever your persuasion is, oftentimes we start responding and reacting and taking the opinions of the world. We do not want the opinions of the world. We want the opinions of Jesus.

It says, when things look like they're their worst, it's darkest before the dawn. Hope is coming. Put your hope in Jesus Christ. And God is good. The Father loves you on and on. We don't want to forfeit grace, power, and truth. I want to say, if you want grace, you want power in your truth, get a filter. The filter is worship. The filter is prayer.

The filter is the word of God. The filter is the fellowship of the believers. These are the powerful tools that it says that are the weapons of our warfare. Fasting. Worship. Thanksgiving. Tools. And it says they will demolish strongholds. And they will fill your life with grace, power, and truth. And if you feel that you don't have enough grace, power, and truth right now, get a filter.

Get a filter. It's available to us. And rest in the power of God. Finally, it says this, and I love this in verse 27. This is not a you should. This is you must. It says in verse 27, and you also must testify. Now, you can testify any way you want. I gave the analogy a few months back of, you know, maybe you're a spotlight. Maybe you're a chandelier.

I don't know. But the light of God needs to be shining from your life. Maybe you're a flashlight that goes into dark places. You know, maybe you're a nightlight that comes along people and keeps them from being afraid. I don't know how you're going to shine your light. But be who God has made you to be. Maybe you're an artist. Maybe you're a singer.

Maybe you just love to go in and encourage people in hospitals. Whatever it is. But we must share the testimony. We must share the testimony. We must go out and share the testimony of Christ with those that don't know the story. With those that don't understand. And I got to say, this cannot be understated. Like, we have to be sharing the testimony.

Because there's power in the testimony. There's power. When those people spoke today, I could feel it resonating. There was power. There was just a power. That is the power of testimony. It says that the people will be saved by the shed blood of the Lamb and what? The power of the word of their what? Testimony. It says that they will come to know God.

This is my paraphrase. I'm paraphrasing. But it is the power of God and the word of your testimony. The word and the actions that must be filtered through the Holy Spirit. When we are speaking from a place of a divine love where we know that we have a Father of security that loves us. The way we react is different. People will begin to say to you, you know, hey, you're different than other people.

You know, after years and years, I'm finally beginning to hear that. I didn't hear it for you. I used to think, how do you get there? How do you get there? I try. I tried to be nice. I tried to do all these different things. It wasn't until I understood that a Father loves me. And all of a sudden, it just feels like the things that I'm trying to do are filtered through God.

Through the Father's love. You have the same experience. Maybe you're already having that experience. And so we have to share a testimony. Let me just quickly share as we come in for a landing what a testimony is. A testimony is a redeemed story. Stories are a dime a dozen. Okay? Hollywood is full of stories. But testimonies have been redeemed. And I shared Bill's story today.

It wasn't just a story. There's a lot of stories about people that have come through from hard places. But Bill has got a year of sobriety. He's back. You know, he's working. He's got himself a new suit. He was telling me that he's excited. And it's great to see him around the church and volunteering. He serves and works. Testimony. Why? Because it's infused with the power of God.

A lot of stories. But you infuse it with the mercy and the grace of God. A story becomes a testimony. And it's testimony save you. I love all the storytelling the church is doing. And we have a big thing. Hey, we're going to be storytellers. And I love good story. But I want a testimony. I want a story that's been redeemed. That talks about the power of God.

It's a redeemed story that reflects, as you'll see on your notes, the glorious light of the good news of Jesus. They say, is your life reflecting the glory? Look at this verse. I'm going to read it here in a second. Not a second Corinthians. It's reflecting your life, reflecting the glorious light of the good news of Jesus. And if you feel guilty about that right now, don't.

Guilt belongs in hell with the devil. Okay? The only way to understand and reflect the glorious light is to spend time in the glorious light. To filter it. To spend more time with God. To spend more time letting him know and agreeing with his love for you. 2 Corinthians 4.4. It says, Satan, who is the God, small g of this world, has blinded the minds of those who don't believe.

They are unable to see the glorious light of the good news. That's the gospel. I'm going to say the Bible also. We'll have a look at a couple of scriptures here in a second. The gospel has power. It has a supernatural power. When you speak about what Jesus did on the cross. And that's the gospel. Our stories are important. Hey, God, love me and save me.

Okay? Your story. I was an alcoholic, you know, 26 years ago. I'm, you know, I've been saved. Those are important of what God has done for me. And I think it affects people. Your story affects people. But the only gospel that is promised to have power is the one that says that Jesus Christ came, born of the Virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, risen again, and is coming back.

When you share that story, that story is not just a story. It is the power of God. That story has a supernatural. The world would call it magic. We don't call it magic. It's a supernatural power that has the heart, that has the ability to change hearts. It's power. It has God's power in it. It is different than your story. And we want to learn how to weave our story in with that story.

You see, that's when it becomes your testimony. And it has the ability to pierce hearts. Let's look at a couple scriptures as we come down. As we speak about the truth, because that is the truth of the gospel. Before I get to those scriptures, I just want to say this. I believe the enemy is trying to change the argument right now to everything except the power of the gospel.

Get upset about this. Get upset about this. Just turn the news on. There's a million things to get upset about right now. And I want to say, I think they're important conversations. We need to have Christians. I know at UCSD, they had an atheist and a Christian speaking this week. Apologetics is what that's called. Reasoning of the faith. We need all of that.

Okay? We need to have a reasoning of the faith. That needs to be there. But that cannot be our primary voice. The primary voice, the primary thing that we need to say on a regular basis is, yes, this is all important. This is all true. But let me tell you about my Jesus and what he did for me. That is the primary voice that we are sharing on a regular basis.

The good news of the glorious light. And if the enemy can get us to change the argument, to constantly be talking about the things we're upset about, and we're constantly angry, and we're coming from a place of feeling unraveled within our soul because the world is falling apart. We don't know what to do about it. That is where he wants us to live, in that argument.

But what Jesus wants to do is have us share the primary message, which is the good news of his death and resurrection, and that he's coming back again. That is where we need to constantly be reshaping. So when we're in a conversation with somebody, just like a salesman, and we're not saying be a salesman, okay? But have you ever been in a place and you're trying to talk to the guy and he keeps bringing it back to the product, keeps bringing it back to the product?

What, do you really want this car? He keeps bringing it back, bringing it back. I want to say as we share the gospel, let's just keep bringing it back to Jesus. Because there's an inherent power that is in there. Let me just read these two scriptures and then we'll be done. Romans 1.16. It has power that cuts to the heart. It says, Paul says, I am not ashamed of the gospel.

For what is it? It is the power of God that brings salvation to everyone who believes, first to the Jew and then to the Gentile. It is the power of God. You want to walk in power? Start sharing the gospel. Share your story? Share the gospel. Share about Jesus. Now you've got to weave it in. It might take you a couple weeks. I'm not saying you have to do it right in the moment.

You're a chandelier, spotlight, lighthouse. I don't know what kind of light you are. Share the gospel regularly. And look at this. And then Peter found this out. Because after Peter got done being a reactionary, he learned how to respond to the gospel. I want to say he started cutting off ears. But in this scripture in Acts, he ended up cutting to hearts.

He started cutting off ears, but he ended cutting to the heart. Listen to this verse and we'll finish. And Hannah, if you can come up, we'll finish our last song. Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this. God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah. That's the gospel. It's the gospel. I spoke to my Jewish friend this week.

I said, you know, Jesus is Lord. And I said, who do you think Jesus is? We keep talking about it. We play basketball together. I keep telling them about it. We keep talking about Jesus. It says, when the people heard this, they were what? Cut to the heart. And said to Peter and the other apostles, brothers, what shall we do? I think it says four to five thousand people were added to that number that day.

See, Peter figured it out. Had nothing to do with a sword. The enemy wants you to use a sword to attack the issues of today. Jesus wants you to use one too, but it's the one that cuts to the heart. And so Peter started filtering things to the Holy Spirit. Why? Because the Holy Spirit fell right before that at Pentecost. You see, he got a dose of the Holy Spirit.

And then all of a sudden, everything went from his opinions about Israel and what Jesus had come from to what Jesus was really about. You see, the Jewish followers of Jesus were so focused on Israel and the nation state of Israel and becoming a nation again and all that goes along with Zionism that they were missing why Jesus really came. You know, you hardly hear them talk about that ever again at the end after Jesus and they get filtered through the Holy Spirit.

What do they start talking about? Jewish souls. My one Jewish friend said to me last week, he said, I wish Christian churches, he's a Messianic Jew, cared as much about the Jewish soul and understood it as much as they do about the Jewish nation state. I thought, wow. And he said, it's the same thing that the disciples were dealing with. It was the same error that they had.

They cared more about the nation state of Israel than they cared about the Jews and their souls. I thought, wow, that is powerful. Let us not make that mistake again. Let us care about Jewish people. Let us care about cutting to the hearts of all people, to the Jew first and then to the Gentile. And it says there that, like I said, Peter stopped cutting off ears and he started cutting to the hearts with the power of the gospel.

I asked that you guys would stand. And then we're going to have Hannah sing. And then I'm going to ask that God would bless us with gifts of evangelism. And we're going to have an opportunity to ask the Holy Spirit to fall on you and to equip you and to filter you and to change your opinions. We're going to have a little bit of time just here, a couple minutes.

Hannah, take us away and I'll come up for a blessing in a second. Yeah, Adam was talking about God's light shining in us. And this song is called Radiant God. And I actually wrote it right here in La Jolla, looking at the super bright sun as it was setting and saying, God, you are so beautiful. Let that light and beauty shine through my life. So let's just ask that, and I'm just asking you to worship with me, but to ask God to fill you with his spirit, that people would see that beauty and light of who he is in your life.

The glory of your presence. The warmth inside your eyes. You melt the dark away, bringing light to all my days. I worship you. I worship you. I worship you. Radiant God. Beautiful friend. Savior of love. You gave me my freedom. You gave me my freedom. Risen you shine. Bright like the sun. Spirit of God. Fill me anew. I worship you. Bright colors of your beauty.

Bright colors of your beauty. Illuminate my soul. Electrifying love. I hear you call me and I come. I worship you. I worship you. I worship you. I worship you. Radiant God. Beautiful friend. Savior of love. You gave me my freedom. Risen you shine. Bright like the sun. Spirit of God. Fill me anew. I worship you. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. Worthy, worthy, worthy are you.

You radiate with love, with beauty and with strength. Let everything in you shine through me. Shine through me. You're a radiant God. Beautiful friend. Savior of love. You gave me my freedom. Risen you shine. Bright like the sun. Spirit of God. Fill me anew. I worship you. Spirit of God. Fill me anew. I worship you. Oh, God. In the face of yourland. If you're a persona.

You're a creator. He's a bacterium. That's me. This is the voice of your heart. This is the voice of your heart. This is the voice of your heart. This is the voice of your heart. Oh, God. That's it. That's it. Who are you? Not all of you. In the face of your heart. Oh, God. That's it. In the face of your heart. That's it. In the face of your heart. I worship you.

Spirit of God, fill me amoe. I worship you. We just ask our prayer team to come forward. If you want prayer today, it's available to you. If you need healing, if you want a touch from the Holy Spirit, as soon as we finish, Hannah's going to continue to play. If anyone wants to come forward and just sit here and kind of bask in the presence of the Lord or be prayed for, we'll anoint you with the oil if you have a healing request.

But with that, before we start, if you just say, God, I need a filter, first of all. Or if you say, I just want a new way to share the glorious light of the gospel, my testimony. Give me the gift of evangelism. Just put your hands out, and we're just going to pray. It's a symbol. Lord Jesus, we want a church full of evangelists, Lord God, that share the power of the good word, of the news, of the glorious light, of the testimony of Jesus.

And as I walk through these aisles, God, now sweep afresh anew, God. You give gifts. Give gifts. Testimonies, Lord God. Testimonies, God. And God, the weapons of our warfare, Jesus. Bless this group. Let this be a church known for its evangelism, Lord God. God, give story, God. And we pray for power. We pray for conversions, Lord Jesus. More conversions out of this church.

For those that are looking for a filter, God. They want to filter their opinions, God. They don't want to be in shackles to fear anymore that comes with wrong opinions, ungodly opinions. Lord, we pray, God, that the Holy Spirit would fall. God, let them know who their Father is, Lord Jesus. So, God, we bless this congregation. For those that need sustenance, bless them, God, with their finance, Lord God, with healing.

Those that have, anybody who has a back issue right now, go forward and pray for a back issue. Just feel like God wants to heal a back issue. Maybe has something wrong with their ankle right now. I just, sometimes I feel like the Lord, she puts things on my heart. I'm going to throw it out there. So, God, anybody who's having a struggle with a relationship, you can go forward for some prayer.

Maybe wants more gifts of the Spirit. Go forward for prayer. So, Lord, we thank you, God, for this congregation, what you're doing for La Jolla. We ask for La Jolla. Start here. We ask for La Jolla. Just ask right now. Ask for La Jolla. Ask for UTC. Ask for PB, Mission Beach. God, all the way through Del Mar. God, begin to expand our territory. Expand the territory of this church.

We pray against the enemy. For those that are struggling with depression, anxiety, and fear, we come against it in the name of Jesus. Just say be gone. Just be gone. Be gone. And we just bless you. In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. I want to thank you for being at church today. We love you. Thanks for coming home. There's great food next door.

And we will see you next week. God bless.