Compelled by Christ's Love Dr. Steve Walker

Transcription

1 September 28, 2014 Compelled by Christ's Love Dr. Steve Walker We're going to open our Bibles to 2 Corinthians, chapter 5. I want you to, at least in your own heart, over the next few minutes, be able to say, "God, surprise me today." I'm not sure any of you got out of bed and came to church this morning hoping the preacher would try to talk you into quitting your job and moving somewhere in the world. If I can do that, that would be a humongous miracle and answer to prayer, but for most of us, I'm not going to want you to quit your job and move somewhere in the world. For most of us, I want us to just open our eyes to the mission field on which God puts us every day. The apostle Paul helps us actually open our eyes in this passage. If you have your Bibles open and ready, let's go ahead and stand for the reading of God's Word. We're going to look at chapter 5, starting in verse 11 through the end of the chapter. "Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we persuade others. But what we are is known to God, and I hope it is known also to your conscience. We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart. For if we are beside ourselves, it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you. For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised." Father in heaven, I just pray, in the name of Jesus, that you would surprise us. In the power of your Holy Spirit, God, completely blow us away today and cause us to see our world, and our world right here, differently. God, I ask that the result of today would just be epic in the history of our church, that we would look back on this year and see your mighty hand moving in the lives of our people. God, we ask you to do no less today. We pray this in Christ's name, amen. I stopped short of the end of the chapter, because we're going to get there eventually this morning, but I want you to know the main theme, the central idea of this whole passage, is in verses 14 and 15. In verse 15, we actually see the gospel. It starts at the end of 14, where it says, Canyon Hills Community Church 1

2 " that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves " That's the gospel, that Jesus Christ died, once and for all, for all. Yet the punch line of this passage is actually in verse 14. This is the nail the hammer strikes hard in these verses. "For the love of Christ controls us " I like the phrase compels us better. Most of your translations may actually have those words, compels us. I think that's a better choice for the word that's actually here in the original language. The word compel actually means to be pressed into duty. It means to be forced to do something, to feel this overwhelming pressure from inside of us not from the outside, but from inside of us to respond to something. That's what Paul is saying here. "For the love of Christ pressures us from the inside. It compels us. It forces us to respond and do something." That is the punch of this passage. What is it that the love of Christ, accomplished for us on the cross, compels us to do? Well, there are several things in this passage I want us to see. Let's go back to verse Because of what Jesus has done for us, we are compelled to fear God. "Therefore, knowing the fear of God " he says. There is a strange kind of spiritual paradox to this idea of fearing God. The unconditional, undeserved love Jesus shows toward us through his death on the cross actually causes us to fear God more. How holy must God be that he hates our sin so much that he was willing to send his Son here to die, to sacrifice his own Son's life to save us from his own coming wrath and punishment on our sin? How holy must God be? He must be so holy, pure, and righteous that he cannot leave sin unpunished. He cannot let our sin go ignored. If God were just to ignore sin, that would be equivalent to a divine contradiction, and that would be an impossibility according to Hebrews, chapter 6, verse 18, where it tells us, " it is impossible for God to lie " This word Paul uses here for this idea of fear is the same word from which we get our English word phobia. That word actually carries with it this sense of terror mixed with awe and respect. It is this weird combination of being absolutely terrorized and yet, at the same time, having this sense of awe and respect. All week, I was trying to figure out how to explain this word. It's so unique in the Greek language. I don't know if you can define it as much as you can describe it. I don't know how many of you are like me, but I am deathly terrorized of heights, so much so that I'm willing to pay a man, every year, $1 million to put up my Christmas lights up. That's how terrorized I am. There's a terror there, but there's also this incredible mix of awe and respect that causes me not to get up on the roof. When I do, I don't go very high and I don't get close to the edge. There is this terror, this fear of heights that's so strong, I have such a respect of what the result will be if I fall, that I do not let myself get close to the edge of anything high. I am so afraid of heights that I will never stand on the top couple of rungs of my ladder, going anywhere. I don't care how short or Canyon Hills Community Church 2

3 tall the ladder is. That is the kind of fear Paul is describing here, this terror mixed with awe and respect. Here's the context leading into that statement. In verses 1-10 above, he just got done talking about the judgment seat of Christ. Look at verse 10. "For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil. Therefore, knowing the fear of [God] " he says. In 1 Corinthians, chapter 3, we're told that all believers will have our deeds judged and rewarded accordingly, so we have this reverential awe and respect for Jesus as our divine assessor and our future Judge. In Revelation, chapter 20, we are graphically shown and told that all unbelievers will have their souls judged and rightly condemned. The writer of Hebrews said, in Hebrews 10:31, it will be " a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" in that judgment moment. What compels us is this righteous fear, awe, respect, and terror for a holy God before whom everyone is going to stand one day. That's where Paul begins this compelling motive to take the gospel everywhere we go. He also says we are compelled to persuade others. Look at verse 11. Because, "Therefore, knowing the fear of [God], we persuade others." Because of the coming judgment, it will be a terrifying thing for those who don't know Jesus, and so Paul reminds you and me that part of our responsibility that comes from being mercifully saved from God's wrath and punishment in the judgment is to take every opportunity we can to share Jesus with those who will listen. I love the way the apostle Peter encourages us in 1 Peter 3, verse 15. He says, " but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared " See the motive there. It always starts with the holiness of the Lord. It says, "Be prepared to make a defense. Be prepared to explain to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect." The reality of life is that we will all die one day and then stand before God, and so we are compelled. We must be compelled by that to try and convince anyone who would hear it to believe Jesus came to save sinners who believe. Paul is letting the pressure out. He's saying to the Corinthians, "This is why we have to do this. This is what it's all about, church." Then he keeps going, and I love this part. 2. We're compelled to be ourselves. He writes that our testimony of Jesus' power to save us is in no way bragging about us. When people repent and turn from their sins and turn to Jesus for forgiveness, we can take no credit for that. I love verse 12. It's kind of a tongue twister. He says, "We are not commending ourselves to you again but giving you cause to boast about us, so that you may be able to answer those who boast about outward appearance and not about what is in the heart." There were a bunch of people in the Corinthian church who were not impressed with Paul's outer appearance. He would try to convince them about the power of the gospel and they would look at Canyon Hills Community Church 3

4 him and say, "He's average." We think Paul was fairly average. There was nothing about him that stood out. Paul is saying here, "Hey, Christians. That's actually good when it's like that." The world loves Don't we love to undeservingly idolize anyone and anything? We live in a culture where we are just desperately looking for someone and something to worship, even if they're evil, crude, nasty, and mean. We'll do anything to have someone to applaud and worship. It was no different back then. Paul says, "Listen. If you're going to boast about anyone when it comes to the gospel, let it be about what Jesus has done to change their hearts, not about their outward giftedness, appearance, or ability. Let's boast about how much Jesus is doing to change them. Then, in verse 13, he says, "For if we are beside ourselves [if we sound crazy], it is for God; if we are in our right mind, it is for you." Do you know what he's saying? He's saying, "Hey, church. There are going to be some people out there who think we're fanatics. There are some people to whom we're going to talk about Jesus and they're going to think we're okay. Either way, we don't care what our reputation is. We don't care as long as some are persuaded to trust Jesus." In these couple of little sentences, Paul is giving you and me permission to just be us. He's saying, "Do you know what? The more average, the better. We don't want people idolizing anything about the messenger. We want them hearing the message. We're not about impressing people or pointing the spotlight on us. We're about pointing the spotlight on Jesus, who has changed us, starting with our hearts." Amen? That's a huge pressure release for all of us, because when we're talking about testimonies like this, and maybe considering doing something crazy with the gospel in the next couple of years in our lifetime, is look in the mirror and go, "Ah, there's nothing there. I can't do that. I'm not like them (or him or her)," or whoever we want to idolize. Paul says, "No! That's the best part! We don't want to somehow walk around with all the attention on us. We want all the bragging to be about Jesus. 3. We're compelled to fully trust in the death and resurrection of Jesus. This is the gospel. He says here, at the end of verse 14, we are compelled, " that one has died for all, therefore all have died; and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves " Jesus died and rose again, it says, at the end of verse 15. " but for him who for their sake died and was raised." Jesus died and rose for God's glory and our sake You might remember all the way back to the garden of Eden, where God puts Adam and Eve in paradise and says, "For all eternity, you're going to have my presence with you. You're going to have my provision. You will have everything you need. You will have my protection. You will live forever. Canyon Hills Community Church 4

5 But, over here, there's this one tree over here, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and I don't want you to touch that tree. I want you to trust me, that I have all the knowledge you need. I have all the power you need. I have all you need. Live in a relationship with me, of trust and faith. If you choose not to, and you want to go your way and eat of that tree, you will surely die." Of course, we know the story. Adam and Eve died and brought the curse and consequence of their sin upon all of humanity. Therefore, we are all going to die. That came from man choosing himself over God. Paul says, "Do you want to know what's compelling? What's so compelling is that Jesus loved us so much that he lived a perfectly obedient, sinless life and then sacrificed himself and died our death in our place. Then God raised him from the dead, giving him the power over death so all who believe in him would live." Now look at verse 21 in relationship to this gospel. "For our sake " There it is again. " [God] made him [Jesus] to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." We see here, in these verses, when we trust in Jesus' death for us, God will spare us of all the punishment that must come upon sin. When we trust in Jesus' resurrection for us, God will give us the gift of his Son's righteousness. All of Jesus' perfection and sinlessness he lived in this life, that we can't do for ourselves, God will credit to our souls and make us righteous based on trusting in Jesus. Church, this is what separates the God of the Bible from all other religions. Our God entered into our suffering to save us from our sin. No other religion in the world has that claim, and that's compelling. That's what we trust in. 4. We are compelled to live for a higher calling. If you look at verse 15, " he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him " Paul says Jesus' love for us is what compels us to no longer live for me, but for Jesus who died and was raised for me. What does that mean? How does that look? What does it look like to live for Jesus instead of ourselves? Well, at the root, it means our measure of success and happiness in this life comes through a completely different matrix. You see, what the world constantly does to you and me is scream this message that life is like a party, so have the most fun you can, at all costs. Or, the world will say, "You know what? No, life's not a party. Life is a race, so you'd better win, at all costs. You'd better win this thing. You'd better get to the end and be first." Or, the world will say, "No, no, it's not a race. It's not a party. It's a thrill, so get all the pleasure you can, at all costs." That's what the world is telling us. The world would say, "Do you want to be happy and successful? Then you'd better believe life is a battle, so you'd better defend and protect yourself, at all costs." Then the rest of the world would say, "No, all those people are wrong. Basically, life is a random evolutionary accident, so survive, at all costs!" Every one of those puts you or me at the center of our happiness and success. Every one of those is man-centered. Listen. When you live your life with you at the center of your life, something happens. You get really disappointed, because once you get to know you really well, you look in Canyon Hills Community Church 5

6 the mirror and you think, "You know, I'm not all that great. I really don't know how I can make life be so meaningful, happy, and successful with me being the main goal." So what does it look like to not live for ourselves? What does it look like to live for Jesus and his cause? Well, I'm going to give you a few ideas. I'm hoping maybe something I say in here might just grab your heart a little bit today. How does it look different? Well, I think it might look different this way. We might wake up every day, seeing our workplace, our office, our school, our neighborhood, as our mission field. We have a mission. Every day we get up, we are in the mission field. That's how it starts. That's how it changes when we live for him. It might mean we start taking a little less vacation time in order to go on, maybe, one of these mission trips somewhere in the world, maybe even every other year, or every couple of years. It may mean making sure our finances and budget reflect a priority for the spread of the gospel and God's kingdom. If someone were to audit your finances, your bills, your obligations, the way you spend your money, it ought to convict you of being a Christian. It ought to convict you of caring about the spread of the gospel to people who desperately need it, who are going to face the judgment without Jesus. It may mean taking an active interest in befriending our neighbors for the hopeful privilege of leading them to Jesus. I was so convicted about this. I've lived in my house for close to 20 years. I've had the same neighbors the whole time. The way I've excused myself of trying to reach out to them is Just about every one of my neighbors is religious, of some sort. Very few of them are Christian, but I know what they do. Right next door to me is a Buddhist woman. She's a single woman. She has lived there the whole time. We have people of all different kinds of religious backgrounds that stop short of the gospel and Christianity, and I've just kind of written them off. I've been convicted that I have to figure out a way to reengage and befriend my neighbors. Maybe that's what it looks like. It might mean using our home as a place of ministry and opening a bedroom or a place up for a single mom, widow, or kid studying to go into the ministry, and letting them live with us for little or no charge. It may mean adopting or taking in foster children. I don't know what it means for you, but living not for ourselves, but for him who died and was raised. It might even mean giving up a career and all the comforts of this life to serve him full-time in gospel work. That might be the perfect time to elbow the person next to you and say, "He's talking about you, right here!" We're compelled to live for a higher calling because of what Jesus Christ has done for us on the cross. 5. We're also compelled to believe this life isn't all there is. In verse 16, "From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer." This is a compelling reality. In verse 16, Paul says, "We don't regard anyone as only human, only flesh and blood, not any more." Canyon Hills Community Church 6

7 He admits, at first, everyone thought Jesus was jus a human, just a guy who came along, did some great things, and said some great things. Yet after the resurrection, all that changed. Because Jesus is alive, we are confident that this life isn't all there is. It doesn't end here. Yes, we are all human, absolutely, but we're also all eternal. I quote this verse all the time. Ecclesiastes 3:11 reminds us that God has put eternity in the heart of man. In every single person's heart, he has reserved a place that is eternal. Abraham Lincoln even got this when he wrote something like, "Surely, God would not have created such a being as man to exist only for a day! No, no, man was made for eternity!" That matches up with Solomon, who wrote Ecclesiastes 3:11. Every one of us has this inborn instinct that longs for immortality. This is a game changer. This life isn't all there is. We will be eternal. We will live forever. How does this compel us? This is how it compels us. It reminds you and me, church, every single day, that those people who live in the jungles of Brazil and Papua New Guinea, the deserts of the Middle East, the inner cities and our major metropolitan areas, the mountaintop villages of Nepal, where I'm going to be in a couple of weeks, in prison cells in our jails, on campuses all over in our major universities Do you know what it compels us to believe and understand? They are all populated with people who have souls that are eternal. They will live eternally, either forever with God in loving fellowship, or isolated and separated from God in eternal darkness and torment. See, while life here on earth offers us a lot of options, eternity offers us only two: heaven and hell. After this life, there is no purgatory. There is no soul sleep or celestial migration. There is no reincarnation. There isn't this blissful soul, floating around in space, forever and ever, with this happy grin on our face. I think that's what most Americans think, who don't believe in Jesus. We're just going to kind of fade into eternity and we're just going to kind of float around together for the rest of eternity. Can you believe the kind of crazy faith it takes to believe that nonsense? That's crazy! We have a Savior who has risen from the dead and has proven to us that there is life beyond the grave. He came, not just to rise, but to die to pay the price for our sin so that in the next life, we could live forever and ever with God himself. Amen? We have the amazing privilege of telling people the way, the truth, and the life, the next life. 6. We are compelled to hope for a completely changed life. In verses 17 and following, I love this. "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses [sins] against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ " Canyon Hills Community Church 7

8 I love verse 17. The key word is anyone. He says there, very clearly, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ " That tells us Jesus changes people completely. That word, anyone, means no one can say they are too bad, too far gone, to receive the grace and mercy of God. That's the most hopeful thing we can see there today. Jesus loves us, not based on how good we are or how bad we were, but he loves us and died for us based on his goodness and love, not on ours. That is gloriously freeing, because it opens the door to heaven wide open to anyone. Why does this compel us so much? Why is what Jesus did on the cross, open to everyone, anyone, so compelling for you and me to possibly see ourselves on this video screen, giving testimony to the power of God and the gospel through us? Why? I want to break it down a little bit further. A. Because all of our worth and potential is maximized in Jesus. Through faith in him, everyone has a future. There's always hope. He says here, " if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away the new has come." A new heart with new affections and desires, a new mind with new understanding about who God is, a new eternity with God forever, no matter how disappointing and treacherous the life has been before Christ. He says here, in Christ, all things are new. A new start The God of second chances reboots our life when we put our faith in Jesus Christ. I'm not talking about some cotton candy version of Christianity. Don't get me wrong, church. I am not insinuating here that if you come to Christ, all your problems will be gone forever and life will be easier. I don't preach that message. I don't think it's a biblical message. We know too well that the Christian life is promised more turmoil and more persecution than it is more peace in this life. Yet we have eternal life. We have an inheritance that is guaranteed and kept in heaven for us by God himself, and it may mean we are compelled to have our hearts and minds changed. Ultimately, we will need to look forward to the next life to have our bodies restored and to be free from sin, pain, hurt, anger, depression, disease, and tears. All that is going to go away. Amen? All things are new in Christ. That compels you and me. It must compel us. B. All of our failure and successes are minimized. When we come to Christ, the old has passed away, Paul says. All of us have a past, and none of our failures or our successes will define us any longer. That means there is nobody we know, no matter how bad or how good they are, who is excluded from the life-changing power of Jesus Christ. All of our failures and all of our successes fade in comparison to the wonderful knowledge of knowing our Savior, Jesus Christ. If all of our future is maximized and all of our failures and successes are minimized, just to prove to you that I can be a poet, all of our sin and wickedness is sanitized. I could rhyme! I'm so proud of myself. That's what it means. Listen, I don't know about some of you, but if this weren't true, I'd be a depressed person. Every one of us can have our sins removed, and everyone we know can. Their sins no longer will be counted against them and they can have peace with almighty God. They can have a clean slate. How many people are desperate for that? How many people have wrecked Canyon Hills Community Church 8

9 and ruined their lives in so many different ways? To hear the hope of the gospel, that our sin, our trespasses, it says here in verse 19, will not be counted against us anymore 7. We are compelled to accept the ministry of reconciliation. Paul gives us this great, compelling truth, starting in verse 18, "All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation." We are given a message and a ministry. Verse 19 is the message. The message is that only in Jesus Christ can we be reconciled back to God and have peace with him. Only in Jesus Christ can we be made new through his death and resurrection. That's the message. The ministry is that we take the message wherever we go. We take it to work. We take it to our family. We take it to our neighbors. We take it to school. We take it on vacation. We take the message on business trips, to homecoming, even to prison if we have to. We are all missionaries. We have been given a message and a ministry. Not one Christian in the world can say, "My life has no purpose and meaning." That is not true. God has given your life a message and he has given it a ministry, and it doesn't matter where you are or what you do or don't do. That is your high calling, and we are compelled to accept that because of Jesus. Then, in verse 20, he says, "Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us." We are God's agents of bringing people and God back together. In the business world, they have headhunters who try to get potential employees and employers together and match them up. I think Paul is saying, here, all of us in God's family are soulhunters. I'm going to actually start a cable TV show called American Soul-Hunters. It'll probably last half an episode, but it will sound good. It will get your attention. That's who we are. We are ambassadors representing what Jesus Christ has done on the cross for all who will believe. We have to embrace that, church. We have to open our eyes and our hearts and see ourselves as that person, that ambassador, that messenger of reconciliation, wherever we are. The good thing is, again, we get to be ourselves. We don't have to be anyone else. We don't have to compare ourselves. We don't have to be impressive. We just have to be average and just brag about what Jesus has done and is doing in us. I want to call on all of us today to be soul-hunters. In fact, I'm going to ask you, if you would just close your eyes for a minute, just take this moment. Would you be willing, at this very minute, to say, "God, I invite you to open my eyes. Open my heart to this idea of being your ambassador"? Would you be even willing to say, "God, forgive me. I've gotten so caught up in the world. I have actually had myself at the center of my life. Forgive me for that, and, God, renew me to see my message and my ministry"? Whatever your words are, go to God with that. While your heads are bowed and your eyes are closed, I wonder how many of you are a little farther down the path already. I wonder how many of you, by just a quick showing of your hands, when I ask for them, would say, "You know, Steve? I want to go further. I'm ready. If, Canyon Hills Community Church 9

10 sometime in the next year or two, God might want me to go on one of those short-term mission trips, I want to be open to that." I wonder how many of you are already there. If you would just raise your hand long enough for me to see it Put it back down. I want to pray for you. I'm not going to ask you to sign or say anything. I just want to know there are people right now in this room who are thinking, "You know what? I want to do this." Maybe you want to do it again. Awesome. All over the place Father in heaven, would you move in our midst today? Would you do something surprising? Would you open our eyes to our neighbors? Would you open our eyes to our workmates, our classmates, and our teammates? I pray, God, you'd open our eyes to the people all around us. Compel us, God, to love lost people and to be willing to tell them about what Jesus has done in our lives. God, we ask that we would look back on today and it would be an amazing, historical time where we can see that you started to do something incredible. We pray, God, for many souls to be won, and we pray this in Christ's name, amen. Hey, some of you are in here right now and you're not Christians. You know that, and this stuff I've just said is just flying over your head like, "Man, I can't tell anybody about something I don't even have myself." I just want to ask you, if you want that to change, if you want your relationship to Jesus to change and you want to know what it means to repent and allow him to be your Savior, to put your faith and trust in his death and resurrection, right after I dismiss you in just a minute, there are going to be some people over here who are going to be excited to talk to you about that. Don't leave here today without having that conversation. Before you run, I want to ask all of our elders who are in this service to make their way up here and come up and stand next to me and beside me. We want to give you an update on where we stand with Project They have elected me to speak on their behalf. If you're really new with us here at Canyon Hills, last April, we officially committed to trusting God for the next 20 years of ministry here at Canyon Hills. This October, we're starting our twentieth year, and so we have, over the last couple of years, been praying and seeking God's will for how he would want us to be prepared for the next 20 years of ministry here at the church. So this past April, we launched Project "To whom much is given, from him much is required." We have seen God give much. In this service and the next service, we are seeing standing room only. People are usually standing along the walls and sitting on the floor. We need to make room for what God is doing, and so Project is all about pushing that wall out and getting some more seats in here, enlarging the lobby, and putting a new youth ministry center in. We launched that a few months back. About four to six weeks ago, we announced the good news that the city had granted us our building permits. It's all systems go. We're ready. We have permission to do everything we Canyon Hills Community Church 10

11 believe God needs us to do. That was the great news, but there was bad news, and we were very honest with you on that Sunday and said, when we got everything back and started adding up the changes the city was requiring, the cost of the project moved from $5 million (which we thought was reasonable and something we were willing to do) to about $5.6 million. We felt that the difference between those two prices was too much and too serious for us to ignore, so for the last four to six weeks of tough meetings, we now stand together in front of you with the cost of the project at a place where both the trustees and the elders believe allows us to walk forward by faith and fiscal responsibility. You see, when the city came back with our permits, there was an increased cost, as I said, of about $600,000. These were primarily unforeseen code and requirement costs, engineering requirements, as well as an industry-wide increase in labor and materials. So with all that added up, we had a pretty big percentage increase. With all the meetings we've had recently, we are excited to say we got that approximately $600,000 increase down to about $228,000. We just about got $400,000 off the increase. The architects, the general contractor, and our trustees worked really hard at trying to squeeze everything we could to negotiate with the city every way we could to get the cost closer to what we needed and wanted it to be. Here's what we've projected. If we continue, just at the present level of our giving that we committed to in April, of generous and sacrificial giving Some people are just tithing for the first time. Others are giving more for the first time. Others have given first-time gifts. That's exciting. If we just keep doing what we're doing, we believe all the money will come in by the end of the project. By the way, with all the delays and all the work we've had to do to get the price down, the project is not going to be completed by Easter, which was our hope. It's now going to be completed by July, so it spreads it out a little bit longer, because we're getting a later start, but, nonetheless, it will require all of us to continue to trust God to be faithful to us. If, for any reason along the way, we can see our giving isn't keeping up with the construction costs, then, church, the men in front of you, your elders, are committed to come to you with all transparency and let you know what the need is. We have had a long history of responding in generous sacrifice for the cause of Christ. If, after we find out what we need and the funds still aren't enough, then we will look for a place to stop the construction until we can resume it again. We remain committed to a no-debt position. Our desire is to joyfully and expectantly walk by faith and keep all of our current ministries and operational budgets for next year completely level. We're going to do everything we can to not raise our budgets. There are going to be no adjustments to salaries. We're going to keep everything as tight as we can without, hopefully, sacrificing one ounce of our ministry, both here and around the world. That is what we are committed to. We are not going to let a building project drive us and drive our church. We will move forward by faith Canyon Hills Community Church 11

12 because we believe God has called us to prepare ourselves for the next 20 years, right here in this location, but we will not obligate God beyond his provision. Amen? Amen to that! So next week, we are going to start. The construction contractors are going to stage the place. This place is going to start rocking and rolling, literally. There are going to be walls coming down. There are going to be a lot of messes. We're going to see the progress. I just pray and hope that together, we will remain faithful. In fact, I pray and hope that a whole bunch of you who are new will say, "We want to be a part of something like that," and join us in faithfully giving your tithes and offerings to Canyon Hills. We will be as transparent as we possibly can. Did I say that right? You don't know this, but they're ready to jump on me if I say anything wrong here. We are together on this, and we are excited about the future. I'm going to ask Jeff Dunlap, the chairman of our elders, to just close our service in prayer and thank God for what's happening. Jeff Dunlap: Let's pray. You are a great God, and we come to you with humble hearts, Lord, knowing how greatly you've blessed us and our ministry through these years and what you've done through us, not because of who we are, but because of who you are. We lay our plans before you, Lord. We make plans and you will guide our steps, and we know we can trust you in that. We look forward to seeing you do amazing things through this congregation, to this church, through this building plan, and through our ministries here and around the world. We're just so grateful to you, Lord, for where you've put us and what you've called us to do. We trust you completely. In Jesus' name, we pray, amen. Canyon Hills Community Church 12