Sermon: Know, Serve, Impact
Series:
Slide Introduction
If you have your Bibles open to Luke 19 and I want you to see this interaction between a man name Zacchaeus and Jesus
Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy.
What you need to understand is this Zacchaeus guy was a bad, bad, bad man.
Because during this time he worked for the only known super power at the time and that power was the Roman Empire.
And in order to finance their great empire, the Romans would often levy heavy taxes on all nations under their control.
And so this didn’t sit well with the Jewish people because they didn’t like the idea of their tax’s dollars going toward a secular government with all its pagan false gods.
But like all things taxes no matter how much you hate to pay you still have to pay; and so the Jewish people were forced to pay.
And so, tax collectors were the most unlikable people. But there’s also a twist to this. The people who would usually collect the taxes from the Jewish people were often there own people.
So you would have Jewish people collecting taxes from other Jewish people for the Roman empire. And to make matters worse these Jewish tax collector would often scam there own people. Charging way more then what they needed so they would make some money.
This is why Zacchaeus is a very wealth man because he was scamming his own people and everyone knew it.
Verse 3: 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd.
4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
Understand climbing a tree for someone like Zacchaeus was very demeaning. For a man with such wealth and power this was very below him.
Slide When Jesus came by, he looked up at Zacchaeus and called him by name. “Zacchaeus!” he said. “Quick, come down! I must be a guest in your home today.”
Slide Zacchaeus quickly climbed down and took Jesus to his house in great excitement and joy. But the people were displeased. “He has gone to be the guest of a notorious sinner,” they grumbled.
Notice how willing Jesus was to be associated with sinners. He didn’t worry about the criticism.
Slide Meanwhile, Zacchaeus stood before the Lord and said, “I will give half my wealth to the poor, Lord, and if I have cheated people on their taxes, I will give them back four times as much!”
Verse 8 is such a huge moment in the life of Zacchaeus and his story.
After meeting with Jesus Zacchaeus realized that his life needed to be different; that he needed to make some much needed life changes.
And we see this in verse 8. We see that Zacchaeus is willing to give half of his wealth to the poor and to give back to those he may have cheated.
We are seeing the inner change within Zacchaeus through his outward actions. You see just following Jesus with your heart or mind isn’t enough. There has to be some kind of outward action showing the change within.
And we see this Zacchaeus. Zacchaeus had an encounter with Jesus and it changed his life. Knowing Jesus should cause our behavior and habits to change.
And I want you to see how Jesus responds to all this…
Slide Jesus responded, “Salvation has come to this home today, for this man has shown himself to be a true son of Abraham.”
Remember the religious establishment and the Jewish people reject people like Zacchaeus. They consider people like Zacchaeus scum.
And yet here comes Jesus saying, “Hey this Zacchaeus guy is a true Jew, he’s a true son of Abraham.”
Remember Abraham is the father of their faith. God had promised to make Abraham descendants into a great nation and they would be as numerous as the stars.
And so this infuriates the religious establishment but notice what Jesus does next…
Slide “For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.” Luke 19:1-10 (NLT)
The Good Shepherd had come to find His lost sheep.
That’s a huge and profound statement Jesus is making here because not only is he forgiving sin and restoring people’s relationship with God.
But He’s also laying out his mission. He’s telling us why He came. He came to seek and save those that are lost.
The Good Shepherd had come to find His lost sheep.
He came to bridge the gap between sinful man and a Holy God.
He came to take away our sin and to make us whole and pure.
Jesus came to give us life and to give it to us abundantly.
This was His mission, this was His purpose…
And so this morning I want to talk to you about our mission is.
What we are wanting to work toward…what we are to become the DNA of our church. So who are we as a church? What are we wanting to become? We are a church…
Slide That wants you to Know God Intimately
This should be the most important thing to me and this should be the most important thing to you.
And every single one of us should play a part in someone else’s faith journey (whether it's praying for someone; building someone up; hold someone accountable or just doing life with someone).
We all have a part to play in someone’s faith story because all of our faith stories are linked together in the bigger story that God is writing.
When people are growing in their intimacy with the Father; all of these other areas of serving and impacting are going to take care of themselves.
Slide We are a church…that wants you to Serve God Passionately
God has given each and every one of us gifts and talents for building up the body. And we want to see you using your God giving talents to serve wherever God has planted you.
Slide And we are a church…that wants you to make an Impact for the Kingdom
No matter what season of life you're in…no matter the age you can make an impact. All of us in here want to see you making a difference where ever God has planted you.
We want you to Know Him, Serve Him, and make an Impact for Him.
This is what we desire as an eldership. This is what we are wanting you to desire as a church and this is what we are working toward.
And so what I want to do now is spend a little bit of time talking about who we are and what we are working toward.
Slide 1. And so who are we? We are a church that wants you to Know God Intimately
We want you to know God in a deeper and more personal way.
We believe that’s the foundation for what we are wanting to build.
The more intimate, the deeper, the more personal your relationship is with God the more you’re going to grow and make an IMPACT FOR HIM.
And in the Old Testament King David was the perfect example of a man that just knew God intimately. I want you to look at what he wrote is Psalms 63.
And I want you to understand that David wrote this Psalm from a very low point in his life. David is on the run in the wilderness because his own son, Absalom, is trying to kill him. And so David is all alone and he’s looking for God’s companionship and His protection.
Slide Look at the intimacy here: “O God, you are my God; I earnestly search for you. My soul thirsts for you; my whole body longs for you…I have seen you in your sanctuary and gazed upon your power and glory.”
Slide “Your unfailing love is better than life itself; how I praise you! I will praise you as long as I live, lifting up my hands to you in prayer. You satisfy me more than the richest feast. I will praise you with songs of joy.”
Slide “I lie awake thinking of you, meditating on you through the night. Because you are my helper, I sing for joy in the shadow of your wings. I cling to you; your strong right hand holds me securely.” Psalm 63:1-8 (NLT)
You see true intimacy with God happens when we make the decision that we want to be closer to Him. And the way we draw closer to Him is when we start to make Him a priority in our lives.
You see David didn’t have this kind of relationship with God because he worshipped him in the low points of life.
For David worship was a lifestyle. God was a priority to him and David spent his days drawing close to him.
True intimacy with God happens when we make the decision that we want to draw closer to him…when we make him a priority in our lives.
True intimacy happens when we love Him more then anything else we have.
True intimacy happens when we want nothing but Him.
True intimacy happens when we’re obedient to His Word.
True intimacy happens when we make Him a priority and meet with Him.
True intimacy happens when we pick up our Bibles and learn more about Him.
True intimacy happens when we make fellowship with other believers a priority.
It’s incredibly important that we have deep meaningful relationships with one another. Those relationships are going to help us grow in our intimacy with the Father.
True intimacy happens when we show up on a Sunday morning for worship constantly.
Please understand how vital worship is in your spiritual walk. I realize how easy it is to gloss over worship or skip it here and there but it’s such a vital part not just in your spiritual development but for ours as well.
We need you to help us grow in our relationship with the Lord. We need your gifts. We need your wisdom. We need your life experiences. We need your encouragement. Frankly we need you.
So, please make worship a priority.
You see the closer you get to God…the more you make Him a priority…the more you chase after Him and try to figure who He is the closer He’s going to get to you.
In the New Testament Book of James, James gives us the key to true intimacy with the Father.
7 So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
8 Come close to God, and God will come close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts, for your loyalty is divided between God and the world.
9 Let there be tears for what you have done. Let there be sorrow and deep grief. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy.
10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up in honor. James 4:7-10 NLT
How can we know God intimately? James gives us someways to grow in true intimacy.
Slide 1. Humble yourself before the Lord
Humbling yourself before the Lord means having a little bit of humility.
It’s about letting go of our pride, our self-importance and self-entitlement and realizing when we compare ourselves to the Father we are nothing.
It’s being realistic about who you we are and who He is. That He’s way, way up here and I’m way down at the bottom.
We humble ourselves before the Lord knowing He’s superior.
Slide 2. We resist the devil
We don’t allow Satan to entice us and tempt us. When temptation comes we flee. We don’t entertain it. We seek the Lord (in prayer, speaking Scripture & reading it) and we flee.
Slide 3. We wash our hands
We wash our hands and purify our hearts. We repent or turn from our sin and we seek forgiveness through Jesus Christ.
We humble ourselves before Jesus confessing our sin and wrong doing and ask for forgiveness.
And because of His great love He’s going to take away our sins.
Why? So we can come back to the Father and continue to grow in our intimacy.
Slide 4. Let there be remorse (deep regret) for our sin
When we have sinned against a holy God conviction, guilt, shame, and remorse are a beautiful thing. Because it’s an indicator that there is true sorrow or regret for what you’ve done.
Those feeling should cause us to seek after the Father NOT to hide from Him.
When we seek to hide or run from God because of our personal behavior Satan is trying to play on our emotions so that he can drive a wedge between us and the Father.
Don’t be like Adam. Don’t try to conceal and hide. Come back to the Father and wash your hands.
You’re going to find out in this life there’s going to be a lot of washing of the hands.
Slide 5. Humble yourself before the Lord
Please understand the Father is for you. He’s not some angry old man wanting to lay down the hammer on you. He knows you're going to mess up. Hence, the reason why we need Jesus
So no matter what you’ve done. How hard you’ve fallen…how far you’ve drifted…or how bad you’ve been. You can always push the pride aside and humble yourself before the Father. He loves you!
8 The Lord is compassionate and merciful, slow to get angry and filled with unfailing love. 9 He will not constantly accuse us, nor remain angry forever.
10 He does not punish us for all our sins; he does not deal harshly with us, as we deserve. 11 For his unfailing love toward those who fear him is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.
12 He has removed our sins as far from us as the east is from the west. 13 The Lord is like a father to his children, tender and compassionate to those who fear him. Psalm 103:8-13 NLT
We want you to grow in your intimacy with God because we understand when you do every other area in your life is going to be blessed because you are growing in the Lord.
Slide 2. We want you to Serve God Passionately
We want you to serve God passionately within the church and outside of the church.
I want you to look at the words of the Prophet Samuel in the Old Testament.
Samuel is about to give His farewell speech because the people of Israel have been complaining and complaining that they want to be like the other nations and have a king rule over them.
And so Samuel is getting ready to step aside as Israel final judge, so they can have their king. And so he is making this farewell speech to the people and I want you to notice what he says…
Slide Look at what he says to the Israelites: But be sure to fear the Lord and faithfully serve him. Think of all the wonderful things he has done for you. 1 Samuel 12:24 (NLT)
So when I was looking at this verse a couple of things stick out to me.
One the word, ‘fear’ in Hebrew language, means having feelings of profound respect for or reverence for someone
So another way of saying this is to have a profound respect for the Lord…or reverence for the Lord…or fear for the Lord
And faithfully serve him. That word ‘serve’ in the Hebrew language means to be a slave too, or to be indentured to God.
Basically, it means serving God with this incredible amount of energy and intensity as you are giving yourself to him.
This is some pretty powerful stuff when you really think about it. But why? Why would we give him profound respect? Why would we give him such reverence? Why would we pour ourselves completely out to serve him?
Slide Well, Samuel told us why…. [Because] of all the wonderful things he has done for you. 1 Samuel 12:24 (NLT)
Listen when Jesus came to this earth he didn’t serve mankind half-hearted. He didn’t serve mankind when it was convent or when it was easy. He served us with this incredible amount of energy and this intensity.
He served us to the point where he poured himself out for us at the cross so that you and I could have eternal life and a better life for today.
Slide I mean look at this. Look at what Jesus said, “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many.” Matthew 20:28 (NLT)
Do you realize that if you’ve made Jesus the Lord of your life that you become a part of that many. He gave His life for you!
Yet, why do we serve Him so half-hearted? Better yet, why aren’t we serving Him at all?
I mean I don’t want us to forget about the words of Samuel: Be sure to fear the Lord and faithfully serve him. Think of all the wonderful things he has done for you. 1 Samuel 12:24 (NLT)
Think of all the wonderful things He has done…
Think about how he woke you up and you were able to swing your legs out of bed.
Think about how he has provided a life for you in one of the riches nations every.
Think about how he has given you family and friends to do life with
Think about how he has given you the ability to go and make a life for yourself
Think about how he has given you the ability to bless the people around you
Think about how he has given you the health you have
Think about how he has given you these gifts, abilities, this passion, and the know how to sustain yourself here on this planet
Think about how He has called you to Himself and that you’re no longer caught in your sin. That you're no longer lost. That your name has been written in the book of life.
And don’t ever forget how He has given you this incredible gift called the Holy Spirit that you can chose to tap into and do life with.
Think of all the wonderful things He has done for you…
And ask yourself “Am I pouring myself out with the same kind of intensity that Jesus poured out for me.”
Now you might be sitting here thinking, “This is absolutely impossible. There’s no way I can do that.”
Yes, you can…it goes back to the beginning statement. Grow in your intimacy with God.
When you grow in the Lord He’s going to change the desires of your heart. His desires are going to become your desires. But you have to be willing to grow in your relationship with Him.
26 Jesus looked at them intently and said, “Humanly speaking, it is impossible. But with God everything is possible.” Matthew 19:26 NLT
Now for the Pharisees sitting in the church thinking about all the people that need to hear this. Let me ask you, “Are truly, truly, truly pouring everything you have out for the kingdom of God. Are you truly, truly giving all that you have to serve Him.”
Before we start to condemning others we should do some self-evaluation and ask, “Am I serving God passionately?”
Wherever God has planted you; we want to see you serve Him with everything that you have. We want to see you SERVE HIM PASSIONATELY.
Slide 3. Finally, we want you to make an Impact for the Kingdom of God
I believe with every ounce of my being that God has a plan and a purpose for your life. That he has set you apart with talents and gifts to make a difference in someone’s world.
You’re not a mistake…you’re not worthless. In the kingdom of God you have value and you have worth in spite of what others may say…in spite of what you’ve been told.
Nothing is worthless in God’s kingdom because he wants to use you to make a difference.
I want you to look at what the Apostle Peter said about you…
Slide Watch this: But you are not like that, [like what? You're not like unbelievers] for you are a chosen people. You are royal priests, a holy nation, God’s very own possession.
Let me tell you way this should be one of your favorite Bible verses. You see in the Old Testament people couldn’t approach God directly. A priest acted as a go-between God and sinful people.
With Christ victory on the cross everything changed. Now we can come directly into God’s presence without fear and trembling.
Watch this: 16 So let us [not just a priest or a pastor; not just the ones with a Ph.D; not just the ones with super special titles; BUT US that have that have made Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior we can] come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. Hebrews 4:16 NLT
You don’t need some man of the cloth to have a direct relationship with the Father. You’re apart of that royal priesthood; His holy nation; His very own possession.
Why? Why in the world would God want to give you a title like that?
So that you can make an IMPACT for Him in your world.
God has given us the responsibility of bringing others back to Him; reconciling there broken relationship with the Father.
18 And all of this is a gift from God, who brought us back to himself through Christ. And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him.
19 For God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people’s sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.
20 So we are Christ’s ambassadors; God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, “Come back to God!”
21 For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ. 2 Corinthians 5:18-21 NLT
Let me try to explain how this works…
God brought us back to himself. Taking away our sin and making us right with Him. When we trust in Christ, we are no loner enemies of God. We’re no longer strangers or foreigners to Him; We’re family…He’s our Father and we’re His children. We’ve been adopted into His family.
Because you have been reconciled (or made right) with God you get to make the privilege of making an IMPACT for Him.
Realize we have the privilege of encouraging others (who were once like us…LOST) to come and be reconciled to the Father. We have an opportunity to make an IMPACT in someone’s eternal destiny.
You get to play apart in that! Now back to your verse that should be your new favorite verse…
Slide As a result, you can show others the goodness of God, for he called you out of the darkness into his wonderful light. Once you had no identity as a people; now you are God’s people. Once you received no mercy; now you have received God’s mercy.” 1 Peter 2:9-10 (NLT)
God has created you to make an impact in this world. He has revealed himself to you and called you out of this spiritual darkness so that you can take the light of the gospel and bring other people out of the darkness.
I absolutely love this church. I never, ever thoughts I would find a church that I could love like my home church.
The last few years have been difficult; they’ve beed trying, and frankly they’ve been disappointing. I think we can honestly say that the last few years have been exhausting.
Along the way we dropped our calling as a church.
I don’t ever want to make that mistake again. I believe whole heartily in the mission of this church. I believe with all of my heart that this is the mission that God has given PCC.
TO KNOW HIM; TO SERVE HIM; TO MAKE AN IMPACT HIM
Now we need to be committed to His mission. We need to be all in ready to the work of the Kingdom both as a body of believers that call this place home and individually as we are living out our daily lives.
WE WANT YOU TO KNOW GOD INTIMATELY; SERVE GOD PASSIONATELY; MAKE AN IMPACT HIM WHEREVER YOU ARE
Let’s pray…
