Worship Weekend | 2022

So in our frustration, in our fear, in our calling as citizens that were not of this world, but were in this world as Christians, what are we supposed to do in all this chaos? How are we supposed to respond in this moment? And I'm just gonna tell you right now, hope this is gonna be encouraging, but here's how this needs to be encouraging. I need to encourage us to look at all this differently.

That's where you're gonna get the encouragement.

We still need to act. We still need to be involved as citizens. But what I think we need to see different is the world does that too. The world already knows that. The world already knows we need to act. We already know that, and we need to be a part of it. But we carry a deeper answer. We carry a deeper hope. We carry the cure, not just the containment.

And I think when we act just like the world, and we only get all into the argument, and all we care about is containment and policy, and that's all we care about, I think some of the frustrations, some of the fears is we think that is the answer. And when we become what we're fighting, we act just like the world.

And we get caught up in containment talk, we forget to bring the cure. We become like a doctor who treats only symptoms, but never talks about the disease itself. And all we do is we make our patients comfortable until they die from the disease. We gotta do something different.

We gotta have a different response to the chaos. Yes, there needs to be actions.

Yes. But I believe, as your pastor, looking at scripture we're about to look at in this word, is there's there is a lie that's suddenly being the the enemy's doing the same thing he always does. He starts with a half truth and takes you to a full lie.

And and the half truth, like, what do you do with Adam and Eve? Hey, there's action that you need to take to be like God, and the only way you need to, you need to be like God by ignoring God.

And I think if you only look at the political side of things, only look at those physical answers to contain evil, We get caught up in saying, we gotta make we gotta be like God. We gotta fix this problem while ignoring God in the process.

That's the original lie. And one of the things I've seen out there, and now it's dangerously been spouted around by Christians all over the place is Thoughts and prayers are useless. We need to be people of action. You know what? That's a half lie.

The original sentiment was thoughts and prayers that are are just words we say. We don't really mean it. It's kinda like, I'll pray for you, and then I don't even remember your name after I walk away. Yeah. It also thoughts and prayers are useless if you're not a believer.

The bible though says, the prayers of the righteous availeth much.

What does that mean? Righteous doesn't mean perfect. Righteous means you're in right standing with God. If you are a follower of Christ and you choose to go, I wanna see the heart of God. I wanna embrace what God has. I wanna look his ways. You will pray at the heart of God, and it will have a power to it. So to say no more thoughts and prayers, now you've fallen for the full lie. And you've said, hey, I gotta I gotta take the fruit. I gotta go fix this problem. I gotta go do something about it. We stopped acting like Christians, and we've become what we're fighting.

If everything you think about and get mad about, and everything you post, everything you fight about, everything sounds exactly like a political party, there's something wrong with how you see God.

I'm not saying we don't have political opinions. I was out there, I'll argue. I got tons of opinions. I am a very opinionated person. And I believe in trying to be a good I know who I wanna vote for, I know who I don't want in office, I know what I stand for. But that's only containment. That's not the cure.

So I wanna read a passage that I think will give us hope and a challenge on how we should respond to the world around us right now. And it'll I think it'll help us with some of our fear and our frustrations.

And it's in Isaiah chapter six. What's happening in Isaiah six, the old testament, Isaiah called to be a prophet, which is to carry a message, kinda like what I'm doing now. Hey, he's in a chaotic world. It's a chaotic world. It's Israel. Israel at this point has as the Northern Kingdom's already been overrun,

the Southern Kingdom has stood, the Southern Kingdom is wealthy, they're militarily strong at this moment, but but there's chaos, and and and the problem is the people

are thoughts and prayers only in in word. They they're supposed to be God's people, but they they say the words, but they don't really really connect with who God is and the healing. So they're basically doing like the type of judge. Everybody does what's right in their own eyes. There was a lot of injustice happening. There there there was a lot of chaos in that. There was a lot of messed up in the court systems. The rich were taking advantage of the poor, and and and all of this was chaos. And in the middle of all of that,

it says here in in Isaiah six chapter one, it was the year that king Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. King Uzziah had been one of the good kings. And he'd been king for fifty two years. And and but he ended poorly.

At the end, he he had disobeyed God to an epic level. He ended up with with leprosy and finished out his reign, not even being connected, kind of isolated in a way. So even while he was still at the end of the kingdom as his reign, he was really disconnected and had no idea what was going on and wasn't physically able to run the show. Imagine the chaos. Like, we've never experienced that in our country where a leader is probably not capable of leading, have we?

See, I can joke a little here. Here we go. And in that, he dies. It's chaos even today when this happens, but when a king died, especially when it brought stability and goodness for fifty two years, and then right at the end kinda fades off, this was a time that was very similar to our time.

You had a country that was wealthy and powerful, but was already kinda declining. It was already having struggles and didn't realize it. There was chaos. When a king died, you had sometimes civil war, you had economic craziness,

you know, chariot prices were going through the roof, supply chain issues, you know, all that kinda stuff. But there was a lot of fear of the unknown. And here's Isaiah saying, it's when in the midst of all of that, he saw the Lord. I could stop at just that verse and preach for another hour. I'll just say this,

is your first move in the cast, when you hear about another shooting, when you hear about another prejudiced action, when you hear about this or you look at all this fighting in the political side of things, do you see the Lord first?

Or do you let fight or flight response kick in? Because look what it goes on. It says, it was near King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. Then he describes his experience. He was sitting on a lofty throne,

and the train of his road filled the temple. Attending him were mighty Seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings, they covered their faces. With two, they covered their feet, and with two, they flew.

They were calling out to each other, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of heaven's armies. The whole earth is filled with his glory. Their voices, this is just not the voice of God, this is the voice of these angels worshiping.

Says their voices shook the temple to its foundations, and the entire building was filled with smoke. And so they they were worshiping, and and and it was thundering, and it was loud, and and the room was filled with smoke. I mean, they must have had a smoke machine. They had the the

those fogging machines and lights. No. Just kidding about that. But think about this moment. He gets to see in the year the king died, in the year there's utter chaos, in the year there's a great unknown, in the year that your country is falling apart without even realizing it's falling apart because people are just giving God lip service, and there's a lot of injustice, a lot of crazies, a lot of unknown. He sees God in an act of worship. He sees God on his throne. He says, holy, holy, holy. In in Hebrew, when you repeated something, that was for exclamation. It says it's it gets progressively more powerful to say it. And if you said it three times, like,

holy, holy, that meant infinite. So he is declaring he's watching these angels declare that God alone is holy. God is the holy, sitting on his throne in power and might and the worship of him. He's basically large and in charge. And think about the juxtaposition, the year the king died. When people are in chaos,

when there's all this craziness going on, when the Northern Kingdom's been overrun, and yet people are ignoring and living out their materialistic lives. In all of that, God is still completely in charge. And he goes, that's the first thing he saw. How about you? And then look what he said after he saw it. He said,

where the heck have you been? No. That's not what he said.

He said, do you see all the idiots? You see, you better get a good king next because we need a better king. If And we don't get the right king, we're gonna have a problem. And then we gotta get a better this, and we gotta no. Did he say that? No. The first thing he said when he saw the Lord was, it's all over.

I am doomed, for I am a sinful man. I have filthy lips. Then he goes, and I live amongst the people of filthy lips. The first thing he saw when he looked up and saw God was he looked in and saw his own heart.

Guys, as believers, when we see things weird in the world, the first thing we need do is see God, see him for who he is, see that he's holy, see that he's still there, still that he is in charge, that he is ruler of the universe, to know that he still has a plan. And then the first thing we should do when we see the holiness of God is not point out all the problems he needs to take care of, we need to look at our own hearts first.

Before we point fingers out there, you gotta look inside. I would challenge you right now, if you're really angry over what's happening right now, see the Lord and then look in your own heart and say, why am I really angry? Is it really all righteous anger over unrighteousness? Or is it a fearful anger, a controlling anger?

Why am I afraid? Why am I fighting all the time? Why am I so anxious? Because that's what he did. He looked at himself first, then he looked and he says, we are filthy lips. And what he meant smuggled lips is we say things with our mouths, but then our hearts are so far from the truth.

But he says, yet I have seen the king, the Lord of heaven's armies. So he's saying, but I have seen God, the Lord of heaven's armies sitting there and still the king of kings. The book of John describes this and describes who that was sitting on the throne, who God was. He says it was Jesus. This is pre incarnate Jesus.

It's important because look what he does next. Says what happens then, then one of the Seraphim flew to me with a burning coal he had taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. He touched my lips with it and he said, see, this coal has touched your lips.

Now your guilt is removed and your sins are forgiven. That's symbolic of how that came from the altar of incense where they burn the incense, they do sacrifices, it was for

forgiveness. It was looking forward to what Jesus would come, the savior. So it's symbolically saying you have actually been made right. You've been made right with God. You are now forgiven. You are right now with me. That's the act of turning to Christ. It's the act of actually if you already know Christ. It's the act of when we repent. It's like we already know him, but we need to confess our sins and turn back to him. It's the act of you have now been declared redeemed by me.

God is the one who healed. Jesus is the one who brings the healing. Government, all of our attempts in this world contain evil, but only the gospel can cure it.

Only the gospel can cure it. And he says that. So then after that, now that he's dealt with all of that, he says verse eight, then I heard the Lord asking, whom shall I send as a messenger to this people? Who will go for us? Us is kind of just a side note. Us, Trinity, father, son, holy spirit. That's why he says us. Anyways, that's just a nice little theological thing I like to throw in. He says, but then who's gonna go? Now he offered. He gave a call. He didn't make us robots. He goes, alright. Who wants to now go make a difference?

Now who wants to take on the mantle, the mission I'm sending you to go? And at that point, Isaiah says, here I am, send me.

And most messages on this passage stop right there and celebrate. Here I am, are you gonna be willing to send? Are you be willing to send? Are you gonna be willing to send? We talk all positive, but let's keep reading. Because God says, yeah, go. But look what his mission is, and say this to the people.

Listen carefully, but do not understand. Watch closely, but learn nothing. He's not saying to manipulate these people. He's saying, you're gonna tell them to listen to what God has, to listen to the cure, to listen to the answer. And they're gonna hear, listen, but not understand. They're gonna watch, but learn nothing.

They're not gonna listen.

He goes harden the hearts of these people, plug their ears and shut their eyes. That way they will not see with their eyes, nor hear with their ears, nor understand with their hearts and turn to me for healing. So he's saying, hey, you're gonna prejudice, but most of the people are gonna harden their hearts. They're gonna get mad. They're gonna say you're ridiculous. Anything we say as a Christian, we're heading into a culture that's very similar to this. We're already there, where people go, thoughts and prayers, that's stupid. And then we go, you, thoughts and prayers are stupid.

Let's act like everybody else. And then when someone like me says this, we're like, you politicize everything we say, and then we get angry, and then we wonder why we're so angry and distraught. Because we're trying to do God's job instead of just take the message he gave us and look to the hope he is.

If your goal is you think policy and procedure, we can actually cure evil, you're gonna be mad, angry, sad, and everything in between the rest of your life. We still should engage. We're still called to be in that battle too,

but we gotta take the message that God's shared and we gotta understand that we might be in one of these times where most people aren't gonna listen. Because then look, verse 11 is the most raw, real I I can relate to this guy. He said, then I said, Lord, how long will this go on? He's like, really?

How long do I have to do that for? How long is this world gonna keep going this way? I'm gonna try to bring the truth of your healing and who you are, and they're gonna ignore me. And he says, till next Tuesday. No.

He says, listen, until their towns are empty, their houses are deserted, and the whole country is a wasteland. Until the Lord has sent everyone away and the entire land of Israel is deserted. He says until it's done.

They didn't come back from this for a long time. God let them end up getting overrun by the Babylonians and carried off into exile. Israel ceased.

Think about that. God's chosen people wouldn't listen to God to the point where their mighty country stopped.

What if as believers in a time of great chaos, in a time that king Uzziah died, in a time when it seems like democracy is in trouble, in a time when it seems like our country is wrestling over everything, in a time when evil seems to break out more than it used to, in a time when it seems crazy. What if,

what if our call is for such a time as this? What if,

I love this country and I think I have the higher ground to say this, you've been in this church very long. My dad fought in three wars. He was proud. I love this. I am a patriotic person. I love this country, but I gotta tell you guys, I separate country from kingdom. And

I understand that God has used this country. I understand he's blessed us to be in this country. I stand that he made something special with us in this country. I believe all of that with all my heart, so I understand that he gave us a special freedom. We've enjoyed a special privilege as Christians to be in this country. We've had all of that. But what if that time is over?

What if we are exactly where Israel was all those years ago? What if we're still got the wealth? We still think we have the might. What if we're on the downside? What if we never come back? What if this is the beginning of the end for America? I pray to God it's not.

I would not like it. I'd be saying, God, how long is this gonna go on for? But what if he's saying until it's done?

And here's what I gotta say, some of you got mad that I said that. How dare you? How could you be a Christian and believe that about God bless America? If that's what you're thinking, then you got a problem. You have connected kingdom to country. They are not the same thing.

United States Of America is not even mentioned in the last book of the bible. Think about that. Think about that. If you find your hope as our faith needs to be about getting our country to a certain place,

of course I strive for it. Of course I pray for it. Of course I want this country to turn the other way. Of course I want that. But that's not where the hope is. What if it doesn't come back?

We need to hold on to the real hope,

and we need to be messengers of the real hope. And maybe God, the enemy wants us to act like the world, we become what you're fighting, then why are you fighting? He wants us to get so caught up in containment and the warfare over containment and the arguments and the fighting over containment, we forget to be the bring the cure.

We forget it. Because look what he says. He goes, even if a tenth of remnant survive,

it will be invaded again and burned. So he says there will be a tenth of remnant. So he's saying, you realize you're preaching, there will be a certain percentage of people that are gonna get it, and they're gonna stay with you. It's not everyone. There's always a remnant. God always has a remnant. There's and he says they will survive, but then there's still gonna be challenges. There's still gonna have a tough go at it. There's still gonna be these moments. So there's hope in what you say, but there's still gonna be these these downward moments. But then he ends with this, but as a terebinth or oak tree leaves a stump

when it's cut down, so Israel's stump will be a holy seed. There's the key. He says that through all this, you're gonna do a message that most people aren't gonna listen, you're gonna be faithful.

You're not gonna fight the way they're gonna fight. You're not gonna you don't say I agree with you in order to get you to like me in order so we can go some direction. You're gonna stand up with the message that's true. He says the message that actually brings healing. The message that brings the cure. Yes, Fight for the causes. Fight for judge. The the prophets would stand up and talk about justice and all that, but they said true justice comes when we turn our hearts to the Lord, when we see the Lord, when we come to know Jesus. This is Jesus himself pre incarnate saying this, and he says out of that stump comes a holy seed. You know what he was talking about? That's a direct prophecy of the God who's telling him that is the God who's gonna become a baby, and he's gonna come out through that stump is where Jesus comes from, and he's gonna die on the cross for the cure of it all.

Goes, you have the message of real hope, and through even this tough time, through the country going away, through all of this, you bring the message, the remnant, and through the remnant will come deceit, and the seed is me, and the seed is the falling. And just like they were looking forward to the Messiah, you realize we look back at how Jesus died on the cross, but we are still called to look forward to Jesus coming. He came once. He's coming back. And the next time, Anan is a lamb, it's a lion. And it is the lion of Judah, the one that will bring justice and true justice and true love. And so the things you get mad at, like, do these people get away with that? They're not.

None of us. And that's why we look at our own heart. You're not gonna get away with your sin either. God is not grading on a curve. You can't say, well, I'm less evil than you. You gotta deal with your heart.

And when you look up and you see the Lord, you then look in, then you look out, and then you're like, God, where do you want me to go? What do you want me to do? And you see everything in a different light. So yes, we're brokenhearted over the tragedies. Yes, you know, we should care. That's what thoughts are. Thought, think about them, feel, have empathy. That's what we should be. It should break our hearts. It should make us a little angry over evil.

But then we pray, and we see the Lord, and then we seek the Lord, and then we step forward with the right balance of action. We act in the right way. And whatever we do to try to talk about containment policies,

we better, as Christians, bring the gospel. It's not about the gospel saying if you have the gospel, you bring the containment. It's like you use containment issues to bring the gospel. That's what we're supposed to bring. And so maybe some of us are all worried because we're like, there they are, send them.

But no, I'm telling you. So we're gonna we're gonna worship some more. Hope you hang in there. But first, we're gonna pray. We're gonna pray, and I'm gonna let you guys pray for about a minute, then Ian's gonna lead us into some more worship and seeing the Lord. And

I'm gonna challenge you through this worship time, this prayer time, to see the Lord. See your own heart. Then say, here am I, send me. And as you say, here am I, then pray. And then you know what? Instead of just getting mad, virtue signaling, throwing showing outrage online,

Start praying for the families that lost their children. Start praying for the families that lost loved ones at a store just because their skin was the wrong color. Start praying for that brokenness. Start praying for all the stories that's happened every day

around the world way more than just these ones we see on the news. And then start praying for how God would have you to be involved, but bringing the love, pointing people to Jesus by loving them like Jesus. But you know what else we should pray for? Pray for our country. And here's a novel idea. Pray for our leaders.

Pray for the leaders. That's what makes a Christian different. The Bible says that God can direct the art of a king. He has used evil kings to do good things.

He has used idiots to do good things. And instead of just being so mad, if your idea is I want this current president, I want whoever to fail so miserably so we can win election, Hey. What about praying that even if I don't like them, even if I'm gonna vote for someone else, even if I'm gonna want them out of office right now, I'm gonna pray for them that God bends their heart and uses them to help solve issues and get past it. And if you are more worried about winning election, then you don't really give a rip about people. You don't give a rip about that. You'd be like, I want to throw the pilot off the plane while we're still landing.

You might not like that pilot. Next flight, you might want a different pilot. But do you really wanna kick the pilot out while it's still in the air? Or do you want him to land the plane? Pray for him. God used a donkey before he can again.

That's what we should do as Christians. Because all the rhetoric, all the hard can usually comes from an idea that we are fixated on containment as the cure. And then we get really mad when we can't contain it. And we get mad when the opposite side that we disagree with has control.

And the only thing we can do about that is let God do that. Pray for people, don't pray on them.

That's all I think we should pray about, so let's pray. Father, I just pray as we go into this moment that we see you, we seek you, and then we pray for this world. We pray for our country and our leaders, and I pray for each individual prayer in this room. That God, your spirit will lay

on the hearts of everyone listening, everyone online, just things that break their heart.

May they talk to you about that now.

Heavenly father, we thank you that you hear our prayers.

We thank you that we can give you our burdens. We can give you our fears.

We can lay them down at the cross and be free.

God, in moments when it feels like there's no way out, God, you can make a way.

God, seasons when it feels like we're trapped, and it feels like we can't get to the place we wanna get to, God, we can rest in you.

God, with weight, it feels like we're carrying. God, you can lift that off of our shoulders.

We thank you that you are a source of hope. You are a source of strength.

Worship you. God, we honor you.

May these not just be words that we're saying, but God, may these be honest prayers that we're giving to you.

As we sing, may these not just be songs.

May they not just be lyrics, God, but may they be true and honest cries to you. We need you in this world, God. We need you.

And these be sweet sounds to your ears.

Church, in this moment, I'm gonna have you stay seated, and we're gonna go into this next song. It's called gratitude. And like Bill was saying, even though there is so much evil and so much chaos in the world, we're gonna choose to see the Lord. We'll make that choice right now. And so as we sing, what I want us to do

is just think of one or two ways. Maybe there's way more that you have seen God prove faithful in your life and in your heart.

That he has come through when you couldn't, when he remained faithful, when you weren't,

when he has blessed you when you didn't deserve it, which is always. He's a good God. So as we sing, take a moment and just thank God for what he's doing. Because I know there's a lot of wrong going on, but we still have reasons to be grateful.

So in this moment, just thank God. And as the spirit leads, you can stand and join us in worship, but we're gonna sing.

Because all that I have is a hallelujah hallelujah and I know it's not much I'm nothing else fit

I've got all these points. I've got just one room with my arms stretched wide.

Gonna

Amen. Come on. We praise our God. He's worthy.

We're gonna continue to worship in this place this morning. How many of you know that praise is a weapon? So we wanna raise a weapon, a razor sharp of praise in this room today. Amen? Put your hands together.

We're the midst the We're in

world.

Gonna

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