Transcription
[Applause]
Well, good morning. Hey, welcome Beltway Park. My name is Jeffrey. I am the lead pastor here and I am excited for, I, I am so excited for this weekend. Uh, if you are a guest, I just want to tell you how honored we are that you're here. I don't know if you saw a billboard that said, "Honk if you're coming to Beltway" with a giant goose on it. Maybe that's what got you here, which, if so, that's pretty awesome.
Uh, maybe you got invited by somebody. I don't, I don't know how you got here this morning, or maybe you're checking out the online campus for the first time. I just want to say, we are honored that you're here. If you take that guest card that I know the moderators talked about at both campuses, if you take that and then after service, take it to our guest services, they're going to give you a gift. They're also going to give you one of the books that we're going through. So, it is, they're only 10 bucks, but they're going to give you one of those books so that you can jump in and be a part of where we're going to go.
We are kicking off something that I have been, I mean, it is not an understatement to say, I have been looking forward to this weekend for months. I remember when I first read Mark Batterson's "Wild Goose Chase" and I remember like, think we were talking about, "Maybe we'll use it for the spiritual growth campaign," and we were planning it like, this is probably eight months ago, and I remember going, "This, if we catch this, like, this will change our world." And it, it'll change our church, it'll change the way we do life, it is going to change us. It's going to offend us at points, we're going to get our toes stepped on, but I like it. It is, it, it helps my brain be unlocked and my spirit be unlocked to, to ways that I knew that the Holy Spirit wanted to move, but I had been hesitant to like, jump into.
So, here's the ways you can engage. Attend every service. You're one for eight already. Okay, good job. Seven more. Say seven. >> Okay, you know how many that is? One more than six. You've already got the first one done. Okay, so seven more. If you can't be at one of the physical campuses, you can be at our online campus. It's on YouTube afterwards. So, just engage in every service.
If you haven't gotten involved in a life group, oh, I'll throw on the beltway.org/goose, /goose, which is, for the record, my favorite URL we've ever gotten to have. Belie.org/goose. That's great. If you, if you aren't involved in a life group, go to belway.org/goose. I guess I'm just going to say it 15 times. And, uh, and you can click "Find a Group." Get involved in a life group. You, hear me clearly. If you're not involved in a life group, you are missing out on a giant part of Beltway Park. It is one of my favorite things that we get to be a part of. Get involved in a life group. It's not too late.
Invite a friend. If you're gonna have an opportunity to like, have your eyes open to some things that God has for you, don't you want that for the people around you? I mean, I, I do. I want it for the people around me. Uh, you can, we have a podcast that drops every Monday. Okay. Mondays, "Beyond Sundays" podcast. It's on Apple Music. It's on Spotify. I got to be a part of a conversation with Keith Robertson. Does anyone remember Keith Robertson? Yeah. He's still alive. Okay. He is, he's old then. I mean, I told him that, but he's alive and he is, he is, we got to have a conversation, me and Sarah and him and his wife Megan, and it was awesome talking about the cage of routine and how God often keeps us like, how we often stay stuck in routine and miss out on what God has.
And, and then, then the last thing, I know the moderators talked about this. Text in that number to text the word "goose" to the number that was on the screen. Then we'll put it on there again after service. But you want to get those questions. They're going to help you take, like, the next step in what God has for you. And I, I want, unashamedly, I want everything God has for me. I want the life that God has for me. I want it for you. Which is why I've been looking forward to this weekend because I know that this book can change our world.
And I was thinking this week, like, "Okay, how are we going to get into it?" Maybe I'll awkwardly stand on a, a bench for a little while, 'cause this is, uh, this is about the level of adventure we're okay with with our faith. Didn't think that was coming, did you? Like, this is the level of risk we're often willing to, to go to bat with with God. Even a little old pastor David with his, you know, Davidness, he's terrified of heights. I don't know if you know that. Like, terrified of heights. It's hilarious. He could do this. I guess this is like, I mean, I'm almost 40, but like, that's, I mean, that's not that hard. I mean, I'm probably going to be sore tomorrow, but it's not that hard. And we settle for like, this level of faith. Like, "I'll do the church thing. I, I'll come to church Sunday." That's, that's great. I may even show up again next Sunday. I, I'll wear the Christian t-shirt. Like, I, I'll do, I'll do this level of risk and adventure. We might get crazy and like, jump off. We might serve in kids ministry, tithe. Like, we may do crazy stuff, but we often settle for an adventureless faith.
And my question is this: Are you having fun? Does, does being a believer, a Jesus follower, feel like it's full of adventure? Does it kind of feel like, "Ho-hum, Bible belt, I'm just going to do it"? Because you know what our faith should look like and feel like? Should look like this.
[Music]
Here they go. Don't go over there yet. >> That was me, right? You didn't think that was coming, huh? I jumped out of a perfectly good airplane. Actually, me and my sister-in-law did. This is my sister-in-law, Julianne. This is a few years ago. Sarah and I were on vacation with Sarah's family. We were at South Padre Island and we, where we were sitting on the beach, these people kept coming down on parachutes, landing right behind us. And finally, Julianne looked at me and she was like, "Hey," or looked at our whole family and goes, "Hey, does anyone want to go skydiving with me?" You've never heard seven people say no faster. Okay. I mean, it's the, she didn't finish the words and they're like, "Absolutely not." And I was like, "Yeah, let's go. That sounds awesome."
And one of the best parts, who's gone skydiving in here? Let me see. It's always fun. See, it's always impressive, some of the people that did. Uh, but one of my favorite things about skydiving is actually the form you have to fill out before you get to go skydiving. It's hilarious. It's like, "Okay, uh, you understand that you could die." Check yes or no. You're like, "Yes." And it's like, "No, seriously, like, there's a chance of you dying and your insurance isn't going to pay. You understand that?" "Yes." And it's like, "Are you dumb?" Check yes or no. It's like, "Yes. Get me out of that airplane."
And so then the, we fill out the form. The next day we, we go and we're, uh, like getting ready, putting on, put on everything. And then what you don't think about when you sign up to go skydiving and you've never done it before is you have to be strapped to another person. And so I was strapped to another man closely. It was intimate and I did not like it. And we're walking, like, strapped together. Imagine that for a second. Okay. You have another person on your back and you're just walking together, and then they're like, "Okay, we're going to get in the airplane." And I, I don't know what I expected. I expected an airplane, okay? Not a Toyota sedan that's barely like, it's the tiniest airplane you've ever seen in your whole life. It fit four people. It could have not fit one more. It was so small. I sat in his lap. Picture that. It was awful. I could, I could tell you what he had for dinner the night before. Like, it was close. We were, we were snuggling.
You start to go up to 10,000 feet and then, I mean, they're smart at what they do. They give you zero seconds to think. They open that door and you are out. And I mean, it is, I can't even describe to you that experience. 10,000 feet. We got to fall a few thousand feet, which feels like you're falling forever. I mean, it is beautiful. We're, we jumped out over the ocean. So, we're like, we got South Padre right here and we got ocean on both sides. I, it's gorgeous. And then the guy goes, "All right, it's time to pull." So, pull the parachute open. He goes, "Hey, you want to have some fun?" I'm like, "Homie, I'm having fun." He's like, "Grab that right there and yank really hard." So, I did. I yanked it and then we started to corkscrew down, which to our family looked like we were falling to our death. And it kind of felt like it to me, too. Do all these fun things. We hit the ground and I remember thinking, "I, first of all, can't believe that I jumped out of a perfectly good airplane. I cannot believe that experience." Like, it was, it's impossible to describe. You really just have to do it. It was breathtaking. It was so much adventure.
And I began to remember that story this week and I thought, "When is the last time we would say something like that about our faith? It was breathtaking, full of adventure." Being a Jesus follower should be one of the greatest adventures of our lives. We should be talking like that. "Can you believe I'm ne- You're never going to believe this crazy thing that God did. Like, it was unbeliev-" and, and God said, "Do this." Oh, it was incredible. I mean, it should flow out of us like that. Yet, often, I think, if we're honest, our faith looks like just kind of ho-hum. I'm going to just meander along through our life. And I get it. This right here is way more comfortable than being 10,000 feet in the air and the airplane door flying open and you knowing you're about to jump out of that thing. Like, just doing the church attendance stuff. Like, that's super easy and comfortable. I get it. Especially here in the big country. The big country, it's probably easier to go to church than it is not go to church. It's easy to do the t-shirt Christianity thing and never really have a faith that is full of adventure.
But I want an adventure-filled faith. The adventure is worth it. Yet, so often we settle for religion instead of relationship. This is way easier. Religion's easy. It's easy to just do the things you do, the, do the things you're supposed to do. Relationship means sometimes I got to go, "Hey God, my heart is really hurting and I've got to be vulnerable." You know what guys are not known for? Vulnerability. We settle for just religion because that's easy. We settle for comfort instead of calling. Sometimes, you know what? God calls us to crazy stuff. I mean, I remember when we moved here in 2003, and I remember sitting in my bedroom in our house on 45th Street. My family was going to move. I was going to stay back 'cause I was a junior in high school. And I remember God saying, "Hey, go." I had gone to school at a private Christian school since I was in kindergarten. I'd known these same kids my whole life, and I was going to have to go to a public school for a year and a half. I was going to have to leave all of my friends. My best friend lived there. Like, I'm going to have to go away from everything. It would have been way easier to stay. And God said, "Go." And you know what? It was still hard at times, walking into a new school as a junior in high school. Not fun. Yet, it is in that "yes" that God changed my entire world.
We settle for control instead of trust. I like being in control. It's swell. You know, I'm not in control. I have to trust the Lord. I gotta, I gotta give him all these things. That's easy. We settle for fear instead of freedom. I mean, I just, I don't know about you, I'm tired of settling. I want whatever God has, in however ways that it might come about. I want to experience everything he has for me. And it comes when we chase the wild goose.
If you haven't read ahead in the book, the wild goose is an image that comes from Gaelic and Celtic spirituality. And they would talk about the Holy Spirit. And instead of a dove, like we see in scripture, like we talk about often around the church, they would talk about it as the wild goose. This is how it is in Gaelic. Who wants to try to say it? Yeah, nobody. Uh, and our Irish friends, I'm sure, are going to watch this later. And so here, Inda, Angela Long, I'll butcher this. Okay. It is "Gae fen." So that means wild goose. When we think of chasing the wild goose, it is a fruitless endeavor. It is, "Why would you do something so crazy?" It is believing the Cowboys could win the Super Bowl. Like, that's it, right? Thursday he hurt. Okay, it was sad. And so that's how we often think about wild goose. When they talk about it, they talk about the Holy Spirit as somebody that's going to help them walk in mystery. Not something you could tame or control. They would adventure and pursuit. Following the Holy Spirit, full of risk, but also full of adventure. The Holy Spirit is bold. You think about the difference in a dove and a wild goose. I don't know if you've ever met a goose. Like, they're bold. They let you know they're there and then they bite you. And that's a wild goose. But they pictured this life of chasing after, hear me, chasing after the Holy Spirit as a life full of adventure and experience. Chasing the wild goose. The Holy Spirit is the only way to chase after the life God has for us. The only way.
Yet, there are things that keep us here, into the comfortable places. There are things that, that we choose to stay here, things that keep us there. They call them cages. Things like fear, comfort, responsibility, routine. Some of these things aren't even bad. And yet, because of those things, we stay stuck, not jumping off into all that God has. Listen, good things can keep us from God things. Being too tied to routine, to responsibility, those things can keep us from doing the things that make no sense. When God says, "Quit your job and take a different job," it's like, "That doesn't make sense. I'm going to get paid less." Sometimes God calls us out of those places, out of, out of the good for the sake of the God thing.
Too often we sit with impotent prayer lives. Like, we'll toss it up there to God like, "Hey God, just, you know," we don't believe it. So often we have powerless, spiritless lives. J.I. Packer says it like this: "Apart from the Spirit, not only will there be no lively believers and no lively congregations, there will be no believers and no congregations at all." But then he goes on, "But in fact, the church continues to live and grow, for the Spirit's ministry has not failed, nor ever will fail with the passage of time."
I don't want boring, adventurous Christianity. I want skydiving faith and I want to experience all that he has, even if it makes us uncomfortable at points. And the way we kind of see that unlocked in scripture is through a man named Nicodemus. So, if you will open your Bibles to John chapter 3. If you did not bring a Bible, there is a Bible around you at our physical campuses. If you don't own a Bible and you want one, you can take that Bible home with you. We're going to be in John 3.
What's happened in this, this part of the story, the narrative of scripture? So, Jesus has begun his public ministry and he, he's done the, the wedding at Cana, the water into wine, his, his first miracle that we see, and then he does the, the flipping over of the temple tables. And then we get to John 3 and we get this interaction with him and a man named Nicodemus.
John 3, chapter, verse one. "Now there was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews." Now, who is Nicodemus? Because we have to understand him to understand the rest of our text. Nicodemus, it says, is a Pharisee, named ruler of the Jews. So he's a part of the Sanhedrin. He's a part of the governing body that would oversee the Jewish people. So, he, being that role, we know would be wealthy, a person of influence. But when Nicodemus walked in the room, people were like, "Oh, that's Nicodemus. I know that guy. Like, he matters. He's important." So, that is the image that John gives us about Nicodemus. He is a Pharisee. So, not a Jesus follower, a member of the Sanhedrin.
It goes on, "This man came to Jesus by night and said to him, 'Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him.'" So, he goes when? At night. Why? Because he doesn't want anyone to know. Listen, if a Pharisee is seen going to talk to Jesus and like, inquire about the things of Jesus, he's going to get kicked out of the, the Pharisee fantasy football league fast. Like, they're booting him. He's gone. They, they are not going to like him talking to Jesus. So, he goes at night and he goes, "Jesus, how are you doing this stuff?" It doesn't compute in his brain. He's confused about how in the world Jesus is doing the things that he's doing, because that can only happen unless God was with him. But Nicodemus knew that there was something on this man. He knew that there was something that he was stirring up. He knew that whatever was going on with Jesus mattered and was better than whatever Nick had.
And we get the tension of where Nicodemus was because we can be here. And we can know that if I jump, like, I'm going to, my marriage is going to be different. I mean, Jesus says in John 10, you, you go seven chapters later and Jesus says he came that we might have life and have it in abundance. That, that life is in him. And so he says, "Hey, I mean," we say, "Yeah, I mean, I know that over here is better. I know that I can be a better dad. I know that I can be a better mom, a better employee. I know that, I know that I can be better in every, I know I can walk in abundance." And yet, we still live in this tension of going, "Man, but what's it going to cost? What am I going to have to do? What about, am I going to have to be uncomfortable? Am I have to look weird? Like, what, what does that look like?" And that's the tense place that Nicodemus is at.
So, he goes to Jesus by night. He says, "Rabbi, we know you're a teacher come from God. For no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him." Jesus answered him, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." And Nicodemus said to him, "How, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"
Now, if you've grown up in the church, you've heard the phrase "born again." It's normal to us. And I have, every time I've read this story, I've been like, "Nicodemus, you know, that's not what he's saying." But then this week, I thought, "Imagine hearing that for the first time." Like, you've never heard the words "born again," and this guy Jesus looks at you and goes, "You got to be born again." Like, I get his confusion. I mean, it's a weird question. Like, "How can a grown man go back into his mother's womb?" But you get him going, "I don't even know what that means. You're telling me I got to be born again? What is, what does that mean?"
Jesus goes on, Jesus answered, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit." Jesus is like, "No, it's not physical birth. You don't have to shrink back and get into your mother's womb. That's not how it works. You got to be born of both Spirit and water."
And there are differing opinions from scholars on what Jesus exactly was meaning in verse five and six. I believe that what he was meaning, he says water and Spirit. Water, I mean, they, they would have already began to see baptisms happening and this image of baptisms, which is one of my favorite things that we get to do at Beltway. If you've said yes to Jesus and you haven't been baptized, bel.org/baptism, /baptism. Fill that form out. Get baptized. Because it's baptism when we do it over here at the South Campus and at the North Campus. When we do that, it is a declaration of, "Hey, I couldn't do it on my own. I'm powerless. I needed somebody. I needed something to happen on my own. I was dead. And therefore, I will in baptism die to who I used to be and be raised new."
So, Jesus says, "First, if you're going to be born again, you got to know you can't do it. Then you got to die to who you were and then be raised new. And then born of both water and Spirit. When we say yes to Jesus and we walk in repentance, then we are given the Holy Spirit. And it is only through the Holy Spirit that you can do the things God calls you to do."
Hey, it is only through the Holy Spirit you will be able to jump. Just like they didn't send me up there on my own with a parachute to jump out of that plane, they put me with a guy. And my guy had jumped a bunch. We were talking to them on the plane 'cause what else are you going to do as I snuggle up with him? And Julianne, the guy that Julianne was with, he had jumped like 700 times. And my guy had jumped like 350 times. I'm like, "Why did I get the scrub? My life mattered less." But I was attached to this guy who knew what he was doing. You'd hear him talk about it, talk about all the ways that they've done, all the times they jumped that day, all the cool things they've done. I mean, this guy was skilled. On my own, splat. But I was attached to an expert. And it is because of my confidence in the expert that I got to have joy in the process. It was because I was attached to somebody that I was even able to do it. That is the image of the Holy Spirit, born of the water and of Spirit. The Holy Spirit given to each and every believer to live the life that God has for them. That is the image that Jesus is giving.
Goes on, "Do not marvel that I said to you, 'You must be born again.' The wind blows where it wishes and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit." And I love this analogy from Jesus because I grew up in Lubbock, Texas. Lubbock's known for two things: wind and throwing tortillas on a football field. That's it. Okay, that's all we got. Wreck 'em, whatever. But it's windy in Lubbock all the time. It was so windy growing up that I remember multiple times we had tornado warnings because they thought there was a tornado because of the violence of the wind. And Jesus uses the image of wind to, to describe the Holy Spirit. He says, "The wind goes where it wishes. You hear its sound. You don't know where it comes from or where it goes." He's going, "Hey, Jason, I have the Holy Spirit. It's going to be a ride. There are going to be times it's going to go one way." And you're like, "Really? You want me to go there? You want me to do that? You want me to talk to this person?" Then it takes us to another direction.
Life with the Holy Spirit won't always be predictable. And if everything in your faith feels predictable, we may not be fully chasing him. I'm going to say that again. Life with the Holy Spirit won't always be predictable. And if everything in our faith feels predictable, we may not be fully chasing him. If you've never been uncomfortable in your faith, you are not walking closely with the Holy Spirit. You're here. You could be here if you said yes to Jesus. You're here. You're like, "Doing some other things." But if we've never been called to do anything that seems countercultural, we haven't, we've never felt like God said, "Hey, try this. Go this direction." If we've never gotten to a place of being uncomfortable at any point, then we probably are not chasing the Holy Spirit in the ways that he would love us to chase him. I'm not saying we seek out uncomfortable. I'm just saying sometimes God calls us to that. And if our life is always predictable and never uncomfortable, we've missed it.
Chasing after the wild goose, the Holy Spirit, is the only way to chase after the life God has for us. Nicodemus said to him, "How, how can these things be?" And Jesus answered him, "Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you do not understand these things? Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and bear witness to what we have seen, but you do not receive our testimony." Jesus looks at him and he goes, "Hey, Nick, buddy, aren't you a teacher of Israel? Like, you're the one who's supposed to know this. You don't know this stuff."
But what I love about this interaction is that Nicodemus, a Pharisee who knew if other Pharisees saw him, it was going to be no bueno. This guy still felt safe to come to Jesus and ask his questions. God's big enough for your questions. He is. What we have to do, though, is exactly what Nicodemus did. Nicodemus could have had these questions. He could have gone and talked to all his Pharisee buddies and be like, "Hey, y'all heard about this Jesus guy? He's, he's doing some wild stuff." He could have just, you know, never gone anywhere else. Instead, what Nicodemus did is he allowed his questions to push him closer to Jesus, not further away. And we often allow our questions and our doubts to go, "Well, God's not going to love me like that because I have this tension place. I can't go to God with that." Like, it's, it's me saying, "Down." Listen, he already knows. He's God. We can go to him in the places that we're wrestling with doubt or confusion or church hurt. Like, we can go to him with those places. He wants to wrap us in his arms and be like, "Hey, let's chat." And we often allow those questions to push us away. And with Nicodemus, you see it push him to Jesus.
You, you got this interaction that I love because I love thinking about Nicodemus being who he is, a wealthy Pharisee of note, and still having a life that people would envy. Still, it wasn't enough. And if that's the case for Nicodemus, what does that say about you and I? Chasing the wild goose, the Holy Spirit, is the only way to chase after the life God has for us. And it begins with new birth. Our boy Nick had it all. He was going, making a name for himself. And still, whenever he went to Jesus, Jesus said, "Hey, it's got to be, you got to be born again."
The first cage, that's not even in the book, but the first cage is the cage of sin. Our own sin will keep us from the life that God has for us if we don't ever get it taken care of. Our sin is a cancer that will destroy us outside of Jesus. What we have to have is this: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God."
Sometimes when we talk about heaven and hell, people go, "Well, how can a good God send people to hell?" And this tells us the opposite. God didn't send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved. He wants us to have, "I will give you a new heart and a new spirit I will put within you. And I'll remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh." He wants a new heart. My heart is irreparably damaged. I can't fix it on my own. Being born again is not about going to church. If you're here today because your spouse made you come, you're here today just out of obligation, and you've never said yes to Jesus. It's only in him that we get a new heart. I can't be a good enough person. I can't will myself to having a new heart. It is irreparably damaged. Outside of, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come. Therefore, not if anyone does good things, not if anyone says the right things. No, if anyone is in Christ, it is only in Christ that takes us out of who we were into being a new creation.
The cage of sin is the single greatest hindrance. It, it is the cage above all cages because outside of that, I can never step into the life that God has. The chase begins by seeking. We see that in this interaction with Jesus and Nicodemus. Nicodemus seeks out Jesus to go to him with his questions because he wants to know more about what is going on. And if I can be like, real harsh, just this week, as I was praying for you and praying over you and praying over our church, my prayer was for every person here that you would have holy dissatisfaction in your life because I don't want you to settle for this. I don't want to settle for it. I don't want my daughters to settle for it. I don't want my wife to settle for it. That if we're here, we haven't jumped on that plane yet, that we would begin to feel dissatisfied because what God has for us is something so much better.
Jesus talks about it like this: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, to the one who knocks it will be opened." "Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him?" Does that sound like a God that wants everything for us? Or a God who's going to be stingy with his blessing? Ain't it? If you, who are evil, which is not the nicest thing Jesus ever says about us, if you, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your kids, if you, Jeffrey Turner, know that you want to bless your kids, and I do. They're incredible. I love being a dad. I love being their dad. When they ask me for stuff, I want to get it for them. Do I always? No. Sometimes it's not practical. But I want them to have every blessing I, as their earthly father, can give to them. If you, then, though you are evil, still want that for your kids, how much more will a perfect heavenly Father, how much more will your Father give good things to those who ask him?
The chase begins when we start seeking after the things that he has for us. But then the chase begins with surrender. Is surrendering to him. Looks like this in Galatians 5: "But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other to keep you from doing the things you want to do. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit."
Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh. I've died to who I was. I am surrendering my life to him. And then what should happen? If you ever like, "Have I done that? Like, I, I think I said yes to Jesus. I mean, I, I did when I was younger, but like, is that, is that I really chase after Jesus? Is that my life?" Go back to this one. "And the fruit of the Spirit is love and joy and peace, patience." We can ask ourselves. We can use this as a grid. You don't have to be perfect at. Are you going to be perfectly loving all the time? No. You going to always have peace? No. Always be patient? Everyone that's raised kids can say no. We know that's not reality. But if we are staying in step with the Spirit, living a surrendered life, then we'll be growing in this. I should be more peaceful today than I was a year ago. I should have more love in my heart for people. Like, that should be evident in my life. I should walk in more self-control. It should be something that we are growing in. That happens when we live a surrendered life, staying in step with the Spirit. Those who belong to Christ Jesus have let their flesh die. If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit.
I told you I'm so excited for these next few weeks. I think, I think some of us are ready to jump, ready to open that airplane door, fly out of there, find what God has for us, experience what he has for us in every way. And that's going to be messy sometimes. Learning how to chase after the Holy Spirit, chase after the wild goose, it's not always a clean journey. But the result, the adventure that we could walk in. And think just for a second, what would happen if just Beltway Park caught this? I mean, I want it for everyone in Abilene, the Big Country. I want to bless the other churches too, like, have revival and God move in tremendous ways. Those are my friends. Let's just talk just Beltway for a second. What would happen if just Beltway caught it? We're like, with reckless abandon, "I'm going to chase after the Holy Spirit and whatever he has. I want everything. I'm going to say yes even when yes feels like it's going to stretch me. I'm going to step outside of comfort because I trust him. I'm going to jump and begin to see all that God has." That's the journey we're on. And I'm excited. I feel like God has great things in store.
So, just for a moment, if you will bow your heads, close your eyes. Nothing magic happens when you do that. It just allows us the chance to focus. I'm going to ask two questions today. First is this: If you've never said yes to Jesus, he's there. He wants nothing more than for you to leave this place saying yes to him as his, as your Lord and Savior. It begins with repentance, an acknowledgment that I can't do it on my own. I can't give myself the new heart that Ezekiel talks about. That is only found through saving grace from Jesus's death on the cross. So, if that's you, don't leave today without getting that taken care of.
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You can come talk to one of our prayer partners after service if you want. For everyone else, the question is, where you at? Would you say that you've jumped out of that airplane? Does your faith feel like an adventure? It's not always going to feel that way. There's going to be times that we go through difficulty and suffering and all that. I know. Have we settled for comfort instead of calling? Control instead of trust? If so, God's inviting you to jump and experience what he has for you.
God, I thank you so much for who you are. I thank you for the way that you love us. I thank you for the invitation to adventure. Would we say yes? We say yes to whatever you have and everything that you offer. It's in your name we pray. Amen.