Camelot is Burning: Training vs. Trying

Transcription

1 Transcript December 12/13, 2015 Camelot is Burning: Training vs. Trying Jake Barker 1 Timothy 4:1-10 Well, hey Traders Point. I hope that you are having a great weekend so far. If this is your very first time, we are so honored that you would join us today. I get the special privilege, and I hope that you will join me to, for the very first time, welcome our north campus. They are streaming live right now as they practice. So will you join me in welcoming them? Man, I m so excited, so excited. They are practicing this weekend and next weekend all for the grand opening on January the 3 rd. This has been a long time coming. We ve been praying about this and God has led us this way for the last four years as we ve been really trying to seek out where He is leading us. I was over there yesterday as they were getting things set up and it looks awesome and there are some incredible people putting so much effort into making this great for the people on the north side of Indy. You may be new around here and you re asking or maybe you ve been around here for a while and you re still asking why in the world would you add another location to what you already have going on here? And really it s pretty simple. We know that there are hundreds and thousands of people in the Indianapolis area who do not know Jesus and do not have saving faith. We find that fact to be both heart- breaking and unacceptable. So we are going to do what it takes. We are going to wreck the roof that s how we say it around here. We will go above and beyond to extend the good news of Jesus and the grace of Jesus Christ to as many people as possible. I hope that you will be praying with us and celebrating on the 3 rd of January as we launch what is hopefully our first of many locations so that we can reach our city for Jesus so excited, man. If you are new, maybe this is your very first time, I need to let you know that we are in a series called Camelot Is Burning. And the idea is this. Many of us, if not most of us, are trying to manufacture or create an Instagram worthy life. We aim at the square and we slap on a filter and try to appear as if we have it all figured out. We at least try to keep up appearances and we try to compare ourselves with other people. If I were to summarize it, we spend a lot of time as we chase the trivial and ignore the important. We chase the trivial we chase after the things that we thought were important or we were told were important. All the while there are some really significant things in our lives, and especially in our homes, that we re just ignoring. And what happens is that in our homes and in our lives whatever home looks like for you these small fires begin and they seem trivial, they seem like we can ignore them, but when we leave them unattended they grow and they grow until they become engulfing flames that take over. And then one day you and I wake up and we ask questions like, Man, why are my kids so mad at me? Why don t my friends call anymore? Why do my parents feel so distant? It didn t seem like that big of a deal at the time but it grew and it grew and we didn t do anything about it. And eventually our Camelot catches on fire. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.

2 So, for the last couple of weeks we ve just been trying to shed light on some areas that many of us are tempted to ignore or to turn the other the way. And we ve said, Hey, what does God say about these things? And what does the Bible really teach. And ultimately what we really want to say is that the battle is won or lost at home. So that s why we re bringing so much attention to it through this series. Now today we re taking the next step in this series. We are going to be talking about doing some hard things some difficult challenges. I don t know about you. I don t know the way that you are wired. Maybe you re one of those goal oriented people. You set those big, audacious goals and then you create plans to accomplish those goals, and then you celebrate when you accomplish those goals. That s kind of you. And if that s you, that s great. You just need to know that everyone else in your life is really annoyed by you, okay? You re just on our nerves, because I have a feeling that they are a lot like me. They are normal people. And what happens is that we momentarily get motivated to do this great thing and then we get distracted, we get bored, we get frustrated and we quit. Maybe we even buy a few things to help us accomplish that goal but all they do is collect dust on our shelf. I don t know about your bookshelf at home but on my bookshelf I have about 10 to 12 books that I really did intend on reading one day. They re big and they make me look smart. And my book mark squarely rests at the end of chapter one. I got to the end of chapter one and I got bored or I got distracted and I quit. And they are just collecting dust. This summer I woke up with this brilliant idea and I decided that we were going to start a garden in our back yard. I just decided. And I just thought, You know what? My kids need to learn how to grow things, and enjoy God s gift of botany so we re going to do this. I don t know how but we re going to figure it out. So we picked out the seeds, and we planted them, and then we watered them. Do you know how long it takes to grow stuff? My kids are 6, 4, and 1 we do not have time for carrots to grow. We lost interest, we got bored. We did grow about 35 jalapenos because, apparently, you can t kill those. We grew nothing else. We re not very good gardeners at our house. In college one day I just decided, You know what? I m young. I have some free time and I m going to learn another language. That s what I m going to do with my free time. So I went to the college library and I checked out this thing called a cassette tape. You remember those things? Cassette tapes where the film would fall out and then you had to get your pencil and you had to rewind it back in. The struggle was very real. So, I got these cassettes and I decided that I was going to learn to speak Italian. I was going to learn to speak Italian. I do not know why I was going to speak Italian, probably to pick up chicks. If I were just being super honest that s what I was going to do. A couple of weeks later I returned them, paid the overdue fine, and the only Italian word I know is pizza. That s as far as I got. My life is full of very well- intentioned goals and dreams followed by very poor plans that were never accomplished. This may extend past our bookshelves, and our failed gardens, and the fact that we only know one language. And if we were all really, really honest many of us would say, When it comes to my faith, or, When it comes to my relationship with Jesus my life has followed a similar pattern. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 2

3 There was a moment of inspiration it was a sermon, it was a conversation, it was a conference and I was on fire. And then I got frustrated. Then I got distracted. And eventually I just resigned to the fact that I must not be good at this. This must just not be for me. Maybe you come around here and you hear these sermons and you re like, Yeah, I want all of that. I want to have a good home life. I want to have healthy relationships. I want to have a growing relationship with Jesus. I want to make a difference in this world. I want all of those things. But no matter how hard I try, no matter how many new plans I come up with, no matter how many books I buy I cannot figure this out. I tried to be pure, but those images they just kept calling me back. Or, I tried to stop gossiping but my co- workers kept doing stupid things and I had to talk about them. I had no choice. That wasn t my fault. Or, I tried to serve my community but my schedule just got to busy and no matter how hard I try, I can t figure this out. So, by a show of hands at both of our campuses, just raise your hand if you ve ever asked this question about the Christian life Why is this so hard? Just raise your hand. Just keep it up for a second, Why is this so hard? Why can t I figure this out? Just take a look around the room with all of the hands raised. This is really important. Why is this so hard? Alright, you can put them down. See, what can happen is that if we spend enough time by ourselves we will convince ourselves that we are the only one who is struggling, I m the only one who can t figure this out. And I show up to a place like this and this room full of people, they must have it all figured out. They know how to read the Bible, and they know how to pray, and they know how to worship and I am the only one in the history of Christianity who can t get my act together. But hopefully you saw those hands in the air. It is so important for us, as a church, to be authentic and real and say, You know what? This is really, really hard for me too. Now, some of you were surprised by the struggle because you were sold on a version of Jesus that didn t have any hard part. In fact, you were told that as soon as you confess your faith, or as soon as you really go All In for Jesus, He s going to fix it all. He s going to take care of those unpaid bills and He will get you the promotion you want. And if you want to get married, He will get you married. And even better, if you re already married He will fix the spouse you have, okay? That was the sales pitch. Then, all of a sudden you came and you actually confessed your faith. You said, Okay, let s do this thing. I m All In for Jesus. And not only did your life not get easier, it actually got harder. It got more challenging. And you re like, Am I doing this wrong? God, I don t think this plan is really working for me. Then we read this in Romans, chapter 7. This is the way Paul describes the struggle. We re talking capital P Paul big deal Paul. Here s what he says, For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. Watch this just see if this sounds familiar, For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 3

4 Does anyone resonate with that? Does that describe anyone else s every single day? God, I want to do the right thing. I want to do the good thing seriously, I m All In. I promise You that I want this but I cannot figure it out no matter how hard I try. Maybe for you and me it makes sense hey, we re normal people. But that s Paul. That s like church- planter, Paul. That s leadership development guru, Paul. The one who like heard the voice of the Lord on the road that s Paul. And he said, Yeah, me too. I know what it s like. I want to do the right thing and I keep falling on my face. I want to read my Bible and I don t get anything out of it. Yeah, me too. Sometimes I feel like I m praying and my words don t go anywhere. They just hit the ceiling and stay there. Yeah, me too. I know what that s like. Why is this so hard? If you have your Bible or a Bible app, I d love for you to turn with me to 1 Timothy, chapter 4. 1 Timothy, 4 is where we are going to hang out today. And the letter of 1 Timothy is a letter from this same guy, Paul, to a younger church leader named Timothy. Paul is giving him advice on leadership, he s giving him advice on church development, and ultimately what we re going to see today is that Paul is going to warn Timothy about two big reasons why people fall away from the faith. He s saying, If the wheels are going to come off of this thing here s why. There are two big reasons. That s what we are going to study today. But before we dive in to chapter 4, I just need to take a moment and tell you why this matters. What s really at stake when it comes to 1Timothy, chapter 4 and ultimately this whole idea? And it s this. In a recent article in the USA Today a writer was citing a lot of the polls that came out about six to nine months ago. Maybe you saw them online or in a news report. And what they were saying is, Hey, we polled Americans and we are finding that less and less of them identify as Christians. So this report came out and some people were just reporting the facts, some news sources were actually celebrating the fact that there seemed to be less and less people in America today who identified as Christians than there were 50 or 60 years ago. But the writer of the articles says, Well, just a second. Let s look at this other Gallop poll that came out. He said, Actually, the same percentage of Americans today are attending church and living out their faith as they did in the 1940s. In fact, today the same percentage of Americans are living a consistent and convicted faith as there were 70 years ago. So, that s not actually changing all that much. Here s what is changing. It s the people in the middle. Over the decades, people have become more and more comfortable those who would have said, Yeah, I m sort- of, kind- of a Christian. Yeah, if you made me choose a belief system, Christian is the one I would choose. Yeah, I grew up Christian, so that must make me a Christian. Today, those people feel more and more comfortable basically saying, No, I don t have any affiliation what- so- ever. And they ve kind of fallen away. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 4

5 If fact, here s how Pastor Tim Keller described it. He said, Both secularism and devout faith are growing. What s going away is the mushy middle of religiosity. He s basically saying that the extremes are actually growing. Those who say, Yeah, I m out, or, Year, I m in, are actually growing. It s the ones in the middle who are kind of wishy- washy, kind- of, sort- of maybes those people are the ones who are disappearing. Here s why that matters. Here s why that matters. Here s why 1 Timothy, 4 matters. The most dangerous descriptor for your faith is casual. Casual Christianity is wildly, wildly dangerous. Casual Christianity looks like, Yeah, that s part of who I am and that kind- of describes what I do. I show up every once in a while. And if you made me choose that s what I would choose. It s that mushy, middle ground. Paul is going to say to us, the stats say to us, that is a wildly dangerous place to be. Maybe, you walked in today and up until about two minutes ago that s exactly how you would have described yourself, Yeah, I m casual. I m not one of those extreme people. I m not like All In. It doesn t totally define who I am. It s a piece of me but I can kind of take it or leave it as I want. And if that s you, I m just asking you to really lock in today. Lock into Paul s words here in 1 Timothy 4 and consider the ramifications of you living out your casual faith for the rest of your life. Now in 1 Timothy 4, verse 1 Paul tells us that we shouldn t be surprised about this trend. We shouldn t be surprised about the mushy, middle foundation kind of giving way. Here s what he says. He says, Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith So Paul is saying, Hey, Timothy. Man, do not panic. The Spirit told us this would happen. Those who were sort- of, kind- of in they will eventually fall away. And what Paul is going to do in the next few verses is that he is going to tells us, Here are the two big reasons. Here s why this happens and here are the things that we need to be on guard for. So let s begin in verses 6 and 7. Here s Paul s first reason, If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths... So Paul says, Hey, Timothy. Look. The people in the mushy middle, if they fall away, one of the primary reasons why the very first one is that they did not know what they believed in the first place. In fact, they never trained themselves, they never studied, they never had a good grasp of what they believe and so they were willing to follow the latest fad, the latest trend and they lost their faith because of it. In fact, he uses that word doctrine there. And maybe that s not in your normal vocabulary on a daily basis. Doctrine means a set of beliefs. And so the Christian doctrine is that which can be gleaned from the revealed Word of God what God said about Himself and how we are to live. That s doctrine. So Paul s saying, Timothy, you have to put it in front of the people over, and over, and over, and over again so that they know what they believe because if they don t they will just follow the latest thing that comes along. In our culture, in our world we would have to admit that maybe more today than in the history of the world we have access to multiplicity of worldviews and belief systems. In fact, we may have access to some irreverent and silly myths. And at some point in your life maybe you bought into one. In fact, maybe you re buying into one right now. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 5

6 For instance, there s one worldview right now that is pretty popular and it s called prosperity theology. And basically, what prosperity theology means is that God is primarily concerned with your immediate circumstances and He would like for you to have as much wealth and as much health as you possibly can get. So, your immediate comfort, the level that you feel comfortable with is tied to the proportion of your faith. So, if you re not comfortable, if you re not healthy, if you re not wealthy then it s because you don t have enough faith. You need to have more faith to get what you ultimately want in this life. But then we read Jesus words and He said things like, In this life you will have trouble. And then He told His disciples to take up their cross and follow Him. Those don t sound very prosperous. Then there s another worldview that is kind of the opposite. It s called poverty theology. Poverty theology says that possessions and stuff are actually bad and so we re going to get rid of those. And your holiness is actually determined by how much you deny. They live in a scarcity mentality saying, God doesn t want us to have these things. But then the Bible says things like, God has given us gifts that are meant to be received with gratitude and thanksgiving. Then there is maybe what is the most widespread one that you ve seen on your Facebook newsfeed and sometimes you ve even posted these things, it s the thing called popular theology. And popular theology is basically a hodge- podge of different selections from the New York Times best seller list and our favorite TV personalities. We kind of build our own worldview. And usually it sounds like this, God wants me to be happy. And the way it s lived out is usually with a pretty inconsistent tolerance that says, You can believe what you want to believe and you can live how you want to live as long as you don t disagree with me. That s the tolerance of our day. These worldviews, they sound true enough or maybe they play on our emotions or our sensitivities and they grab us away from what God truly says. So if you are a casual Christian, it s just kind of flying by the seat of your pants and maybe making it up as you go I just have to warn you, it s dangerous for us not to know what we believe. Paul says that s the first reason why many will fall away from the faith. Then he says, Here s the second one. And it s where we re going to spend the majority of our time today. It s verses 7 through 10. Paul says, First of all they didn t know what they believed and second of all, here s the other thing that you need to looking out for, Timothy. He says, rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. So Paul says, First off they didn t know what they believe. And second of all Paul uses three words that I really want to zero in on. And I believe that these three words are really the answer to the question, Why is this so hard? Why have I not grown in my faith for the last three, six, nine months? I don t understand. And it s these three words: train, toil, and strive. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 6

7 Train, toil, and strive could very well be the reason why this is so difficult. Here s the deal. If you and I know in any area of our lives that we need to train, toil, and strive that means that we are not naturally good at it, right? We don t need to train for things that we re naturally good at. The reason we toil and strive is because we re not good at it yet but we want to be some day. And so here s Paul saying, No, that s actually what the spiritual life is like. Of course you re not naturally godly. Of course you re not naturally good at this stuff. You are a sinful human being and your desires and your behaviors are actually morphed, they re twisted by that sin. So, of course you re not going to naturally be godly. It requires training, and toiling, and striving. So, here s the definition of training that I want to give you. It s really, really good. I came across it this week. It s a little long so hang with it. But here s what it says. Training is arranging your life around certain exercises and experiences that enable you to do eventually what you are not yet able to do even by trying hard. I ll read it one more time. Training is arranging your life around certain exercises and experiences that enable you to do eventually what you are not yet able to do even by trying hard. If we are going to be training for anything in our lives, we arrange our lives around those exercises and experiences: our time, our energy, our resources around exercises and experiences that train us to be good at what we want to be good at but right now we re not good at it even if we try really, really hard. For some of you a light bulb is going off because your faith experience, your journey with Jesus, could actually be defined by a lot of trying. You ve tried to be patient. You ve tried to forgive. You ve tried to have self- control but no matter how hard you ve tried you couldn t make it happen. And Paul is saying, Of course you couldn t. You re not godly. In fact you have to train for this and the good thing is that it s not up to your own willpower and ability. Paul says that there is a different way. In Galatians 2 here s how he describes it. He says, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. So here s what is so important that I can t have you miss it, okay? Number one: Paul is saying that trying by your own willpower to live the life that God intended is not going to work. You will fail every single time. What you will end up being is a frustrated, kind- of moral person. That s what you ll be. But the training for godliness is training as Christ lives in us. That s why there is any hope that we will ever get there any day. Now, some of us understand this idea of training because we do it in other areas of our lives. So a few weeks ago I had a birthday. Birthdays are great for pausing, and reflecting, and panicking about how fast time moves. That s what birthdays are really good at. I turned 32 and I just decided that this year I m going to get in shape. Never been in shape before, I m going to do it this year because, from what I understand, scientifically, it gets harder the older that you get. That s what I understand so I m just going to go for it. So I did all of the right things. I joined a gym and because of my complete ignorance in the world of fitness I m working with a trainer. I ve got Mitch. He s my trainer and he s working with me. He set me up on these exercises. And now that I ve been working out with Mitch, I hate him, alright? I hate his stupid face and I hate everything that he makes me do because according to Mitch in order to get fit Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 7

8 what you have to do is make your heart beat really fast and then pick up heavy things and then put them back down. Apparently that s called exercise. I did not know that. I was unaware. Now the thing is I hate all of it. I do not enjoy running. I hate running so much. It s the worst. The only way that I ll do it is if I m on a treadmill because I want the earth to move for me, alright. That s the only way that I m running. I m just trying not to fall. That s not running. That s just me keeping myself upright. Then when I m lifting weights, man, it is not pretty. I m not good at it yet. My face is like a mixture of constipation and panic. I m not good at this yet. And I know it and I m free to admit it. But what I know is that I have this goal. I have this goal of fitness and I want to be healthy and I want to live a long, healthy life so I m willing to arrange my life around exercise and experiences that someday will enable me to do something that I m not yet able to do even by trying hard. I m willing to exercise physically fit. Another area maybe you re not a workout person but maybe you have an education and you have a diploma from a trade school, or a high school, or college. Some of you went to grad school. Some of you went to college for like six, eight, ten years. Some of you are doctors and then others of you just changed your major four times. That s what happened. But regardless of why it took you so long you did it. You did it. You graduated. And in the meantime you were willing to write these long papers, and stay up late studying for these tests, and completing internships where you did all of the grunt work. Why? Because you had this goal, you were willing to put in the work, you were willing to train, you arranged your life around exercises and experiences that enabled you to do someday what you couldn t do today even by trying hard. So we re willing to train in physical fitness. We re willing to train in our education. But when it comes to our faith, many of us actually have a pretty different attitude. When it comes to putting max effort like we do with our bodies or our minds, when it comes to our spiritual life, when it comes to our relationship with Jesus, not many of us are willing to go through the effort that it takes. Just see if this story sounds familiar and I think it might. Maybe you tried, maybe you signed up for it onetime. You had that momentary moment of inspiration and you tried to read the Bible but you didn t get anything out of it. You tried to pray and it didn t seem to work. And you tried to connect with people and you couldn t find the chemistry and so you came to the conclusion that because you weren t immediately good at this thing it must not be for you. You just must not be one of those spiritual people. There is a select class of Christians who are really good at this stuff. They just fall out of bed doing it and that s just not going to be you so you re going to stay casual. In fact, you re not going to train you re just going to try every once in a while, you ll show up when you need to and hopefully you can have enough faith to save you from hell but not too much that would make you uncomfortable. That s really casual Christianity. And so many of us are not willing to put in the effort but Paul says, Of course you re not good at it. Of course you re selfish. Of course you don t have self control. Of course you want to gossip. That is the sin within you. So this requires training as Christ lives within us for us to accomplish the goal of godliness. So the big question that we have to answer for the rest of the day is this. Real simple: How do we train for godliness? For some of us it s really clear that if you want get physically fit you run and you lift Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 8

9 weights. If you want to learn you read books and you listen to lectures. But when it comes to godliness that word really means living the life that God intended for us how do we train for that? What we did is that we boiled this down into three simple steps, three words that will hopefully get us in that direction. We did a word and then a question that goes with that word. And what we want you to do is just write this stuff down and then talk about it this week whether it s with someone who you know, a friend that you trust, or in your Life Groups. We really boiled it down to three simple steps and I mean simple because they re understandable, not because their easy to live out. First step is this. If you re writing it down, write down this word. It s assess. Assess. Where am I at today? That s the question. Assess the current reality. In fact the first step in training is always defining the current reality. Where am I at today? What are my strengths and weaknesses? What are my blind spots? What are my repeated behaviors that trip me up? First we have to define the current reality. In my exercise program Mitch didn t have me on day one benching 400 pounds. That s not where we started. That s tomorrow but not right now. Not right now. We had to start somewhere so we have to know where to begin so that we can get to where we want to go. Here s why this is so, so important in life. It s up to you. It really is a choice. It s up to you whether you will be ruthlessly honest with yourself, whether you will go through a ruthless assessment of where you are today. But it s certainly your prerogative to say, No, I m out on that. Just know this. Just know this. Whether you assess who you are today, whether you ever do that or not, you have to know that every single other person in your life is already doing it to you. Every single person whom you know is assessing you. They know where you are strong. They know where you are weak. They know where you are growing. They know where you are receding. They see your blind spots. They field them sometimes. And those people whom you spend the most time with, whatever you call them: friends, co- workers, classmates, your kids, your spouse whoever it is, they know. They ve already assessed you. And so it s up to you whether you will be honest with yourself and have a ruthless assessment of your current spiritual reality. That s why you assess. Now there are so many different areas of life that we could talk about and there s no way we have time to cover them all. So what I m going to do is that I m going to get the ball rolling today with two of them. I m just going to throw these out there and you re just going to assess yourself and then in your Groups this week you can talk about them more. The first word I want to throw out it this: Intentionality. Intentionality. Where are you at today with your intentionality? Do you live your life with intentionality or do you allow your circumstances to determine your behaviors? Is your life disciplined around your values or are you a chameleon who changes depending upon your surroundings? Are you putting your energies and resources toward the things that matter most or are you living day to day and kind- of making it up as you go? This matters for all of us no matter what home looks like, no matter who we spend the most time with. Whether we are single, or married, or divorced, or widowed we all have to assess, Am I living my life with the intentionality it deserves? Because this one is a tough one, I told you it was simple but not easy, I ll go first. I ll go first on this one. As God was working on me this week, as I was considering these things, I felt Him calling me to kind- of Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 9

10 weigh the intentionality I have at home versus the intentionality I have in my career. And I found that I have a lot of work to do and maybe you do to. See, one of my roles here at the church is that I lead a handful of teams. And I feel like it is my role as a team leader for everybody to know why they are on the team, and what their role is, and why we are doing what we are doing. So it takes great intentionality to keep people focused on the right goal. I was part of a team recently and I just felt, Alright, we need to clarify how we re going to interact and what we re going to be about so that we can really accomplish the goals that we want. So I poured myself into this list of commitments that we were all going to make to one another and I wrote them down and I presented them at the meeting and honestly they were really, really good. Stuff like: We will embrace risk and learn from failure. We will always talk to each other face to face and not behind our backs. We will be fiercely loyal to each team member. We say the last 10 percent and not leave anything on the table. We will be sparingly sarcastic with one another. That last one was more for me because I know that I can t not be sarcastic so I had to hedge on that one. But regardless, regardless this intense list of commitments Here s how we re going to treat each other and we re going around the circle and we re like, Yes, I m in. I want to be a part of that. I commit to that. And we bear fruit from it. We are such a better team now because of that. That was about 1 p.m. on a Wednesday afternoon. About 5:30 p.m. I walked home, and I put my stuff down, and added about as much value as a hamper of dirty laundry. That s really what I was playing there. I wasn t intentionally encouraging anyone. I didn t offer to help with anything. I really used all of my energy at work and didn t leave anything for home. So here were the people who I say that I love the most if you were to ask me to prioritize I would say home every single time. I would wouldn t even blink: home, home, home. But if someone had watched me that day they would have come to a different conclusion. I felt that God was asking me this question and because it was really hard I m going to ask you this question so I m not alone. If you brought the same level of intentionality from your home to your work, would you still have a job? Would you even be able to survive your career if you put the same level of effort and intentionality into your career that you bring at home? I felt very, very convicted on that one. Am I intentional in the things that I say matter most or am I communicating a very different message to the people who are consistently assessing me? That one was hard. Sorry. We ll move on. We ll get a different one out, alright? Time: How about time? Are we spending our time the way that we want? How many of us would say that s where we are at today? Time is the resource that all of us have and many of us take for granted. So, are we spending our time on things that matter or distract? Do we spend our time on things of eternal consequence or things that won t matter in 24 hours? How do we steward or waste our time? There are so many different applications to this. I m just going to throw out one because I think it applies to a handful of us. I really do believe it does. Let me just ask this question and see what you think. Are we sure; are we positive that we re doing the social media thing right? When it comes to twitter, and Facebook, and Instagram, and Snapchat and then the four that the teenagers are using right now and eventually the adults will find out about it and ruin it for everybody else are we positive, are we Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 10

11 positive that we are doing it right? With all of the time that we re spending on it, is that really adding eternal value or is it not going to matter in 24 hours? End of my life, end of my life I m on my death bed, I m surrounded by my loved ones and I look up at them and say, I just wish that I had updated my status one more time. You know? I wish I had posted one more selfie. At the end of my life am I going to be saying those things? Of course not. Of course not. I know that this sounds like a grumpy, old guy who walked uphill in the snow both ways to school. I get that. I have accounts I am with you. I am with you. I just have to ask the question. Am I really proud of the way I m using my time? Or have I become obsessed with the thing that sits in my hands and don t ever actually invest in the people who are right in front of me. Are we really using our time in the way that we want to? We have to assess where we are at today. There are so many other areas: Intentionality, time we didn t even talk about money, we didn t talk about dating, we didn t talk about career paths, we didn t talk about our kids, involvement in our community, time alone with the Lord there are so many other areas of our lives that we need to assess and define our current reality. So again, this week as we re talking to either an accountability partner or in our Life Groups we really want you to go in on this. Where are we at today to begin the path toward godliness? First I have to assess. That s step number one. Step number two is this: Evaluation. It s evaluation and we re going to ask the question: Why does it matter? Why does it matter? I know where I m at today, I know my strengths and weaknesses, but why does it matter? You see assessment and evaluation are actually two different things. Assessment says, Here s what it is today the reality. But evaluation says, Well there s value to those things. And I have this sneaking suspicion that many of us are actually pretty self- aware. We know where we are strong and we know where we are weak, we know where we re growing and we know where we re fading, we know all of that stuff. But we ve never gone to the extra level of saying, Well, what are the actual ramifications? Why does it actually matter? Questions like, If I m not intentional at home, why does it matter? What are the potential consequences? For instance, if I don t spend quality time with my kids what might happen? If I don t intentionally encourage my friends, what will happen to that relationship? If I don t allow God s word to be my foundation and I m swayed to and fro by the latest spiritual fads, what are the potential consequences? Why does it matter? This is like the next level stuff. Assessment is actually kind of the easy part. This is where it gets hard because we have to face the fact that our current patterns of behavior communicate things to the people who we love, the people who we are around all of the time. So, what are you showing them? Why does it matter? Step number one: We assess. Step number two: We evaluate. Why does it matter? Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 11

12 Here s step number three. Step number three goes like this: Plan. Plan. And here s the question: What one step can I take this week? What one step can I take this week? I ve defined reality, what it is today. I ve evaluated it and asked why does it matter? And now I m just going to commit to taking one step this week in the direction of godliness. Here s a couple of things that I want you to notice about that question. Number one, it s pretty specific. We re talking one step this week. Some of you over- achievers you ve already got your list, you ve got like 10 and you re ready to go. Just stop. What is the one the one step? See, what happens is that many of us have this vision of who we want to be some day and that person is so wise, and so faithful, and so godly and we think, Man, I m a million steps away from that person so I m just not even going to try. So, I m asking you today, What s the one step one simple step this week that you can take. And then notice the time period. We re talking this week. This is not a New Year s resolution that you will quit by February. That s not what this is. This is you saying that this is one step this week that you can take because you know who you are, you know why it matters, and you re going to do something about it. Now, here s my last encouragement to you. Don t do this by yourself. In fact the reason that many of our plans and dreams fall through is because we lack accountability. We never told anybody about it. So, whoever that is for you a faithful friend, maybe your Life Group you share, Hey guys, this is my assessment. Here s why it matters. Here s what I m going to do about it. Not online. We re not asking you to post it online. That s the wrong form for accountability. Do it with someone whom you love who can ask you the question, What one step did you take this week? Now as we wrap up, I just want to end with a question: Why? Why? Why train, and why toil, and why strive? Those words are hard and that s not easy, and that s not vacation, and that s not soft. I don t know why in the world I would put all of that effort in. And Paul actually tells us. I m going to re- read you 1 Timothy 4, verse 10. It says, For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. Paul s saying, Look, you do not train, and toil, and strive so that someday God will love you. You do not train so that you can be good enough to get into heaven. You do not train for any of that. In fact, the reason that you train is because you have been saved. It s because salvation has been offered to you and you are recipients of grace. And this is simply your response. For those of you who know this, you ve been on this path for a while, once this is lived out, once you start allowing Jesus into your life and He starts re- wiring some things, you realize that this is the life worth living. This is the life God intended. And so because of His good grace, you will train, and toil, and strive for the life that He intended. Right now we are going to take this thing called communion. And communion is our opportunity to pause from the reckless pace that many of us are keeping. And we get to spend time with God and ultimately here s my encouragement to you if you are willing to do it. This is risky so I m just warning you. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 12

13 David prayed a prayer in the Psalms and he said, God search me and know me. Know me inside and out and if you are brave enough and you are willing to today pray that prayer to God He will take you up on it. He will assess, and He will evaluate, and He will push you forward with your one step. I m going to pray for you and then the servers will come and give us communion. Father, we are wildly grateful for Your grace. For the new life that You ve given us. For the hope that only You can provide. You are better to us than we could ever imagine. So it is out of our response to Your love, it s out of our response to Your guidance, and out of response to Your grace that we re willing to do this. We re in for training. Push us, shape us, challenge us and give us the path that we need. Father, it is in Your good Name that I pray. Amen. Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 13