THE CHURCH | Week 4 | Sermon

gonna take your chair because you're younger and have more synovial fluid in your joints, so there you go. Synovial fluid in your joints. I don't know if I've ever even heard that before.

Synovial fluid in your joints. Why, if you didn't know already, we've talked about me for a second. My name's Matt Rose, this is my wife here. I am originally from Arkansas, but she's not my sister, I swear. I had to make the joke, you know, Arkansas. But because I grew up in Arkansas, I've

never really been a fan of too many professional sports. I liked watching, I liked playing when I was younger, but specifically, I've never been an MLB fan. We got any MLB fans in the room?

We got three or four right here. I saw a couple hands raised though. It's okay, you're a different level of social. So I've not always been an MLB fan because of where I grew up, and even when I grew up, I lived in New Orleans for a little while. They had a minor league team. I lived in Charlotte for a little while, they had a minor league team. And now I live here, where there's a major league team. But when I got married about eleven years ago, my wife isn't from Arkansas,

she's from Houston. Yeah, I know. She's an Astros fan. Don't say it. I know you're thinking cheater, cheater. Don't say it. No, it's offensive.

But she's an Astros fan, and so every year between September and October post season starts, and all of a sudden she becomes a person I don't like to be around quite as much because she is watching

MLB on the phone, on the TV. She's all into it. And like I said, I've never been really engaged in that. And when we first got married, I was realizing she was all into it. I'd trying to go on a date, she's like, no, I'm watching the game. Can we go somewhere where we can watch the game? And then I'd be trying to invite people over. She's like, oh, we watching the game though. I'd be trying to have a real conversation with her about something that is deep within my spirit that I wanna talk about and she's like, uh-huh, uh-huh. She's just watching the game and it would frustrate me, right? Because she's engaged in something that I'm completely disengaged with.

And it frustrated me at first but you know if you're gonna be a good husband what you need to do is become accommodating to the things that your spouse enjoys

or is engaged with. So I moved from being against it to kind of accepting it. It was like this is a reality I gotta do. This is a cross I have to bear in my life, that between September and October I gotta deal with an annoying Astros fan in my household.

And so I said, you can watch the game. I wouldn't engage in the game with her. I wouldn't pay attention to it. I would put We have a group thread with her whole family who's all from Houston,

and they have this group thread where during the games they're like play by play in every single thing. I've got like 50 messages, and it's like, did you see this? Did you see this? Did you see this? Did you see Yeah, we saw it. You're all watching it, right? And so I just pressed do not disturb, and I would be not a part of the family during September and October. But I was okay with it. I would deal with it. But now that I've moved to Arizona,

I have an MLB team. I need to say out loud proudly, I'm a Diamondbacks fan. You

better clap at some of the good sermon points we have later. This is a Diamond I'm a Diamondbacks fan. And I went from previously disengaged to Guys, now I'm engaged. Right, I went to the first of the Astros games a couple weeks ago and that dude almost hits a home run but then the Astros guy catches it and I'm like, Man, it's messed up. That's a bad call. I'm all in when it comes to these games. I love going to them. I like watching them. Friday night, anyone see the game on Friday night? We're not talking about last night's game, we're not gonna do it. But Friday night's game, that was a good game. Somebody say amen if they saw it. Who

was there, anyone there? Yeah, that was a fun game to be watching. I wish I was there. The crowd felt electric, at least from my phone. I was sitting there, I should have been praying

because I was prepping for this message yesterday and today. I should have been doing some last minute prep. I probably should've been pouring into my kids like a spiritual pastor should. But I was sitting there trying to do some last minute study while my phone had the game on and my kid was watching Kung Fu Panda

on the main TV. And I'm just sitting here focused on the game, trying to be a good dad but also trying to study last minute because I've never preached in front of you all before. Guys, that's how engaged I was. Because there's something that I've recognized.

When you move from being disengaged with something to being fully engaged in something, there is a blessing that comes with it.

There's a blessing that comes with being a Diamondbacks fan. It actually adds joy to my life where previously there was empty. No, I'm just kidding. But it does. There's a blessing that comes with it. And in our spiritual walk, many of us have become content being disengaged with our faith.

But there's a blessing that comes with being engaged with your Creator. And as we've been going through a series called The Church in the book of Acts, we see a guy named the Apostle Paul.

That dude's engaged, right? Anyone? Like Paul's engaged. He's engaged with his Creator. This dude eats, sleeps, and breathes this stuff. This is why he said in one Corinthians ten thirty one, he says, Whatever I do,

whether eating or drinking, I'm doing it all to the glory of God. I think of the things that are true, right, honorable, pure, lovely, and of good. I'm always thinking about my Creator. I'm always trying to track with where He's going. I'm trying to understand the movement of God's spirit so that I can do what He's called me to do. That dude was engaged.

Pastor Daniel brought an amazing message last week where he talked about Acts 16. Paul receives a vision he's trying to go into Asia, but he's called to go to Macedonia. And he goes to Philippi,

and he has this little Bible study with a girl named Lydia, but then pretty quickly Duke gets put in prison. And even while he's stuck in prison, he just got beat by some canes and he's sitting down. They start worshiping. Then there's some sort of earthquake. Prison bars open up and then the jailer becomes a Christian.

This dude's engaged no matter what situation he might find himself in. And after this scene, we see Paul goes to a place called Thessalonica. He's there for three weeks. He's preaching the good news of Jesus in the synagogue. And then,

like he had some success. Some people were into it, but the Jewish leaders at the synagogue, the text tells us that they were jealous of what Paul was doing, so they started persecuting the church. And then Paul, for his safety, was sent to a new city called Berea.

In Berea he does the same thing. He starts preaching in the synagogue. And then the text tells us that it was even more successful than it was in Thessalonica.

It seems as if almost everyone that dude talks to is trusting in Jesus, becoming a follower of the way. But then the Jewish leaders from the synagogue in Thessalonica, they go to Berea and they start inciting riots. And again, for Paul's safety, he's put on a boat and shipped down to a big city called Athens.

And this is the text we'll be in today. When he gets to Athens, Paul doesn't stop. Paul continues. While he's waiting on Silas and Timothy to join him in Athens, he sees that there are idols in the city. Wooden carvings,

that there are stone idols, that there's gold and silver idols. He sees that it's a city full of idols, feels the conviction of God's spirit, and immediately goes and starts reasoning in the synagogue. And lo and behold, two groups of people start hearing him talk. Epicureans

and stoics, they start hearing Paul, and they're like, who's this idle babbler who's talking about weird things that we've never entertained before? Like the resurrection from the dead? And they say, strangely, they say, we should hear more of this guy. So they take Paul to a big public venue called the Areopagus,

where catch this, literally what they do is it's a bunch of men who meet together, they think they're philosophers, and they say, let's hear new ideas of philosophies that are coming into the city. So they bring Paul and he preaches the Gospel to them.

And at the end of him preaching the Gospel, there were three responses. It says that some believed. It says that others said, We should hear them again. This is a cool, he's a good articulate communicator. We should hear them again. And the text tells us that others jeered. Paul was very clearly engaged with his Creator,

and he was concerned about the things that God was concerned about. But the text that struck me as most interesting that I wanna bring to you all today and give you a few points from that I really believe will help you is in Acts chapter 17

verse 16. Here's what it reads. It says, While Paul was waiting for them, that's Silas and Timothy, in Athens, he was deeply troubled by all the idols he saw everywhere in the city. When I first read this passage, it was in the New American Standard Version, and it says this. It says that his spirit was provoked within him

because it was a city full of idols. And the question that provoked me was, man, how did Paul get to that place where he could attain to the things that God was saying? Because God was speaking and Paul was able to listen to it. And the big idea for us today that I want us to ponder on is God is always speaking.

Isn't He? He's always speaking. The Bible tells us that, Behold, He stands at the door and He knocks. And all He wants us to do is open it and attend to the things that He has for us. God is speaking to you. We just don't hear it. And the big idea for today is this question, God is speaking, but are you listening?

And I wanna give us three action steps that I believe will help us listen or apprehend the voice of God more effectively. God's speaking. He always is. If you're here today, I want you to know that God is speaking. He's not silent. He's not quiet. It might be a still small voice, but I need you to know He is speaking.

And if you attend to what He might be saying through these few steps I'll give you, I think you'll hear them. I think it would change everything about your life. My first point

is that I think we need to accept our current placement. We need to accept our current placement. We struggle to do that. Like if I were to ask you to raise your hands and say, how many of you struggle with where you currently are? And you were honest, there'll be a lot of hands raised in this place.

Because all of us had hopes, dreams, and ambitions of where we would be when we hit certain points in our life. I thought at 21 I would be here. I thought at 22 I would have been here. I thought at 25 maybe I'd have gotten married to the perfect person. And then at 27 I'd have had two kids. And then at 29 I'd have had two more kids. Two of them would be boys, two of them would be girls. They'd be perfectly healthy. I would have been the thirty under thirty in whatever industry that I would have joined. I would have hit promotion, promotion, promotion. Then I'd have been the boss of everybody else and nobody would be telling me what to do. We all had hopes, dreams and ambitions. I remember when I got married

and we were on a honeymoon. My wife said, What do wanna be when you grow up? And I was 23 at the time. And I said, Maybe I'll be president one day. I'm 35, I'm not the president. I'm not even close. It's not gonna happen. That's not where God took me. And many of you, you had hopes, dreams, and ambitions.

Many of you thought, man, what I wanna do one day is I wanna get married. And then many of you, you got married.

And your hopes, dreams, and ambitions are a little different than the reality.

Because marriage is amazing. I need you to know, sweetie, I love you with the love of Jesus. I'm never gonna leave you nor forsake you. It's character of God in me is gonna stick with you through thick and thin. You're amazing. You're super cool. But

marriage is hard. It's definitely harder than I thought it would be. In fact, it was way harder than I thought it would be. And we're doing well, don't get me wrong. But you know, she does things that I wouldn't have expected. And I do things that she wouldn't have expected.

Many of you had hopes, dreams and visions of what it would be like to be a parent. And then you had your kids.

And there's a gap between your expectations and your reality. I don't even need to tell you parents about the first time I had to change a diaper. I was like, Goodness gracious. The first time that kid piped up and spoke back to me with disrespect.

The first time the teacher called me up and said, Hey, your son's not acting the way he should. You could think of whatever it is for you. The expectation did not meet the reality. And when there's a gap between my expectation and my reality, when I struggle with my current placement,

I am hindered from apprehending the voice of God. Many of you, and I wanna be more serious for a moment, many of you had something happen to you when you were younger that never should have happened to you. Maybe you did something that you struggle to forgive yourself for.

And these very things are on your mind right now and they create an environment of guilt and shame in your life. And that guilt and that shame about what happened in the past is preventing you from apprehending the voice of God.

And I want you to know that whether it's something, a fear of the future, whether it's an expectation gap, whether it's guilt and shame about the past, all of those things when they come into your psyche they will inhibit you from hearing God's voice. But what I want you to know right now is this,

that He who sent His Son to live a perfect life, to die on the cross for your sins, to raise to walk so that you might have abundant life and eternal life with God the Father. He accepts you right where you are. He's not concerned about your past. He's not stressed out about your struggles. What He wants right now is for you to know Him deeply

and accept your current placement. In fact, because He accepts me, I can accept me right where I'm at. And one of the biggest things that you can unlock right now, the prison that's keeping you back from hearing God is the fact that you haven't accepted where you are. Just accept it. Paul was able to accept it.

Paul was amazing at that. Do you realize how frustrated Paul could have been? Right? How many of you, I wanna show of hands, a genuine show of hands. How many of you have ever been kicked out of a city before? Yeah, yeah, know it's happened. Every single

service is someone who got kicked out of a state or a city and it wasn't because of what Paul was doing. How many of been kicked out of two cities before? How about three? Oh my gosh, someone's bad back there. Raise a hand. Man, Paul could have been so frustrated.

At the beginning of the missionary journey, it starts with what could be perceived as a failure where he and Barnabas are no longer bros. They're not hanging anymore. He goes through a few cities and then he tries to get into Asia, but then he but the spirit of God prevents them. He wanted to go there but he didn't get to, but then he has a vision. He goes to Macedonia, hangs out in Philippi and is good at first but then he gets stuck in prison. He could have gotten frustrated about that, but then he just starts singing hymns. Then the jailer trusts in Jesus. Then he goes to Thessalonica.

It's good, but then it's bad. He has to leave. Then he goes to Berea. It's good, but then it's bad. He has to go to Athens. And he's sitting here in Athens and he could be feeling, I'm a failure. And many of us didn't get where we wanted to be and we feel like failures.

That doesn't matter in the eyes of God. What matters is that you seek Him and accept your current placement. God wants you to accept where you are. The second thing He wants us to do is align our thoughts to His thoughts.

We've got to align our thoughts to His thoughts because many of us, we've become content. We've become okay. We trusted in Jesus a while back and we're comfortable in our place coming and sitting in church. But many of us have failed. Even though we accept our current placement,

we have failed to align our thoughts to God's thoughts. God wants you to know Him. God wants you to apprehend every aspect of His character.

God wants to do what He did with Adam and Eve in the garden. He wants to walk with you in the cool of the day. The image I have is that Adam and Eve could walk and they could ask Him questions. They could learn more about him and he could talk to them about their day. God wants to know you deeply. He wants you to align your thoughts to his thoughts. What does it say in the book of Hebrews? It says he wants us to fix our eyes on Jesus who is the author and perfecter of our faith and when we look to Him, we see an example of what it looks like to live a life following

God. Paul was able to align his thoughts to God's thoughts. When he's sitting in a city that he's never been to before and looks around,

he's so consumed in what God's called him to. He's thinking on the things that God called him to think on. He's concerned about the things that God called him to be concerned about. Then when he looks around and sees all of these idols, he's like, like his spirit is provoked within him that there is a problem

because they're centering their lives around something that will never bless them or sustain them and he's bothered by it. You're all in a city, not just the city of Phoenix, but you have a household.

Like what does it look like for you to align your thoughts to God's thoughts to the point where your husbanding and your wifing looks different? Your Netflixing and your chilling looks different. Your parenting

looks different. Your being an employee or being a manager looks different. God wants to embed Himself into every aspect of your life. He wants you to align your thoughts to His thoughts so that in your city, you are provoked by the very same things that He is provoked by.

I'm convicted that there are probably people in this room who would be more provoked if I said something negative about Taylor Swift or the Diamondbacks than if I incorrectly preached scripture to you. It's because we're desensitized

to the things of God but we need to align our thoughts to His thoughts and I'm not saying we have a city full of idols like Athens, but we can probably all agree we have a city full of distractions.

The things we're doing with our kids, the things we've got going on in our schedule, the things we've been spending money on, all of those things become inhibitors to us hearing the voice of God because they come in between us and God.

And I'm not telling you to quit anything right now. What I wanna encourage you to do is put Jesus at the forefront of everything right now. What does it look like for you to centralize Jesus in your life? Let Him be the gravitational force that drives everything

in your life. This is what it was for Paul. That even when he faced rejection, he could come in, go through the mental exertion of getting over what could be perceived as a failure and then thinking on the things, like he says in Philippians four:eight,

things that are true, right, honorable, pure, lovely, and of good repute. Paul knows that if I'm gonna have peace in this life, I've gotta think on those things. He knows that if God's gonna do a work in me, I have to work out my issues with fear and trembling. I also have to work out my salvation with fear and trembling. Paul knows he has to seek

the Lord. Jesus tells us the one way to spiritual success. He says, Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and He'll add everything else into our life. We have to align our thoughts to God's thoughts. God wants to walk with you in the cool of your day.

He wants to spend time with you and engage with you. How would my relationship with my spouse look if it stayed the way it started? When I first got married,

she would ask me how my day was, and I get back. I'm like a typical dude. Right? You guys know what I'm about to say. She'd say, How was your day? And I'd say, It was good. She'd say, need more than that. I said, It was good, and I went to work.

That's what it would look like at first, and I realized to have a dynamic relationship with my spouse, I needed to give her more details. And a lot of you are wondering, how do I align my thoughts to God's thoughts? It's simple. I know we complicate

it sometimes but it is much more simple than you think it is. God loves you so much, He stands at the door, He knocks, He is waiting for you to ask Him to come in. It's as simple as, God, be with me today.

I'm on my way to work and I'm struggling with this thought and this thought and this thought. God, help me take those thoughts captive to the obedience of Christ so that I can honor You with my life. God,

me be a better parent right now because my kid is acting a fool, and I don't know why he's acting a fool, but he is. But God help me be patient with him, loving toward him, and help me parent him in a way that he loves you when he gets older. God help me be a better husband or a wife right now.

God help me know what you would do in this situation. God give me discernment and wisdom that surpasses my current understanding of this situation.

All you have to do is ask Him. Some of you are like, well how can I know about His character and what He really wants for my life? One way you can do it is by apprehending His nature in the Bible.

And you might be thinking that's 2,000 years old. It was translated from Greek or Hebrew. I don't understand this stuff. I get it. I get it. But even that's more simple than you think it is because God cares so much that you know Him

that not only does He give you an image in the person and work of Christ Jesus, but He will supernaturally interfere with your difficulty so that you can understand something that you wouldn't have understood.

Like when you step into God's Word, just start reading it. You might leave today and to align your thoughts to God's thoughts, you just start

reading. You You might start in the book of Mark or the Gospel of John or Acts and just start reading and you're like, I don't get this. This is weird. This is different. But then you might stop and say, God reveal yourself to me. He will.

He loves you that much that He will help you align your thoughts to His thoughts. And there's one more thing, but before I get there, I wanna keep it as simple as possible. I'm a big fan of the Kiss Method. You know what that is? Keep it simple, Sally.

We're in Phoenix. Wild, wild west, right? Can say it. Keep it simple, stupid. So I'm gonna invite two of my guys up here. Karez and Ray, why don't y'all give them a hand on their way up? It's intimidating to come up on a stage.

I gotta tell you about these guys though. So Corez, he's the first guy walking up. Corez reached out to me in January and it happened to be at midnight on a day where I was wondering, God, who are you gonna send to be a part of our church in Phoenix? God, don't know who's gonna come, I'm stressed out. I know we have to have a team.

And 12 to 15 ended up coming out but at that point I didn't know who was coming out and I said, God, send somebody. And I'm laying there sulking on the couch, probably doing the opposite of what Paul was doing in his safe house in Athens, and I'm like, God send somebody. And after I prayed, at midnight, this

dude reaches out on Facebook. I didn't even know who he was.

And I didn't do what I typically do with Facebook messages that I don't know. I typically block them, you know. I don't know you, right? You gotta be careful on Facebook. But he reached out, and I'd just been praying, so I was like, I'm gonna look at He wrote the most tactful Facebook message I think you could ever write, and he said, We saw your vision video that we put out last August.

And we sat on it. We didn't know what we were feeling.

And he said, My wife and I have been praying about it and we feel led to open up a conversation because we think we might be called to be a part of this work. And he moved out here in June. So that's awesome. I wanna use you as an example. If someone's clapping, go ahead. Man, the work of God should be applauded. So

I want you to be an example for me of what it looks like to accept our current placement. So face everybody. You know, tracking cam's gotta get you. Can you see it? Oh, looks so good. IMac right over here. All right, so the way I want you to show people is by showing them what it looks like to

not accept your current position. So give me the posture, the facial contortions. You don't wanna be here right now.

That's good.

You remember that one time your parents forced you to come to church and you didn't wanna go? I don't wanna go. I remember my mom forced me to go to church in eighth grade and I didn't want to and I was like, these people gotta be weird. They worship a dude who died two thousand years ago, supposedly resurrected himself from the grave. That's weird stuff. These people gotta be losers and I think I'm cool. So I showed up at church at Sunday school and it was Christmas and I realized really quickly that these people weren't that weird and it was that moment that got me connected to the church.

And eventually I accepted my placement in that church, trusted in Jesus and from that point the trajectory has obviously shifted,

right? And so you remember that point. Maybe some of you came today because your spouse told you we need to go to church because stuff ain't working out the way we wanted it to. And so in order to get together the way we need to, we gotta start coming to church. But you don't wanna be here. You're just doing it so you can stay in the relationship, right? This is what it looks like to not Show them, show them. Stick that lip out.

Bro. But you're here for a reason. God brought you here today. I believe that with all of my heart. God brought you here today and He wants to speak. He's already speaking. He wants you to hear what He's speaking. And if you can just accept your current placement in a seat at Rock Point Church in the East Valley today,

you might actually hear the voice of God telling you what He desperately wants you to do to follow Him. You gotta accept. The second thing we have to do is we have to align. And so I wanna tell you about Ray for a second. You wanna step up here next to Corez. All right, so Ray has been in Phoenix for a little while.

He's recently retired out of the Marines, and he

well anyways, I got here in March and I posted in April on What's Happened in Buckeye, is like a Facebook group with thousands of people. And I just posted a picture of me and my wife, I think it was that picture. I was like, Hey, we're starting a church out here in Buckeye. Y'all should come hang. And his wife

commented, Congrats, or something like that. And I reached back out by message. Hadn't heard back from her yet, but the next morning Ray reaches out to me, we meet for coffee that morning at ebb and flow over there in Buckeye,

and he sits down, he says, Hey, checked out the website, looked at the vision. We've been praying for a place here in Buckeye. We're in. And from that point, he's been in, heavily in. And so, like God has done a work there. They're clapping for you, Ray. Don't get used to it. I'm just kidding.

I want you to represent what it looks like to align your thoughts to God's thoughts. But again, the way I wanna do that is by, you know, showing us what it doesn't look like to align your thoughts. So pretend you're cool being here, but you're mentally checked out. Oh.

I know, last night people were watching the game. Today you're checking your fantasy to make sure everything's kosher. Games have already started. You might be thinking, gosh, lunch is gonna be so crowded when we get out of here. I hope it doesn't go long. I'm looking at my Google Maps right now because there's so many different restaurants and I don't know which is the quickest to get to on my way home so I can get the kids to a nap.

Some of you have already left. You already sent someone to go get you a seat because you got eight people going with you and you don't wanna stay at church. You wanted to make sure you got a good seat at the restaurant or you wanna make sure that the thing that you put in the oven before you left is still good so that when you get home, everybody gets to eat comfortably and you're more focused on that stuff. I'm not saying you're a bad person, I get it,

I get it. Yesterday I was thinking about the score of the game while I was preaching from stage and it didn't work out, see it wouldn't have been worth it. But many of us are, we're cool being here. You've been coming week in, week out. But you've been mentally checked out.

And God's calling you to align your thoughts to His thoughts because you can be here week in, week out. You could be here for years, but unless you choose intentionally to align your thoughts to God's thoughts, then you're gonna miss out on what He wants for you. You gotta align your thoughts to God's thoughts. But

accepting God is an intellectual enterprise,

right? Paul says, I've learned in any and every season to become content in whatever situation I might find myself in. Paul's learned that. He can be okay. Many of you can accept where God has you. That is a good step. It's an important step. Many of you have aligned your thoughts to God's thoughts. You've gone to Bible study. You've struggled to understand what your salvation means. You've worked it out with fear and trembling. You're starting to understand what it looks like to follow Jesus. You've done like Jesus when He was in the Garden Of Gethsemane when He's like, If this cup may pass from me,

then okay, but if not, not my will but your will. You've recognized that God's will is more important but it's intellectual for you right now. You've accepted, you've aligned your thoughts to God's thoughts. But in the end, unless we do this final thing that I wanna emphasize right here in verse 16,

it says this, Paul was sitting in Athens and while he was waiting for them, verse 17 says this, he went to the synagogue to reason with the Jews and the God fearing Gentiles, and he spoke daily in the public square to all

who happened to be there. Paul didn't just accept where he was and align his thoughts to God's thoughts. In the end, he acted. Y'all give it up for these guys. I'm gonna let them go sit down.

God is calling you to act in line with His calling. And I'll give you the example of Paul. Paul acted. He didn't know what it would produce, but he acted in line with God's calling, and so he goes to the synagogue, starts reasoning,

and while he's reasoning, the Epicureans and the Stoics hear him, and then they put him on a bigger platform in the Areopagus, And what happens? Some people jeer. Some people said, We need to hear you again on this thing, but some believed. When you respond in line with God's calling and actually act on it,

You don't know yet, but you will see fairly quickly that God is trying to do something in you and through you that ultimately will bless you. We've gotta act. Like what would happen if David hadn't come up when Goliath was shouting negative things about Yahweh? He acted. Nehemiah

who sees the people off in Jerusalem that are unprotected because they have no wall around the city and he is deeply troubled. He's disturbed. He is provoked in his spirit. What if Paul had not acted on his conviction? None of us in here would even have the gospel. So the question I have for you is God speaking.

And even if you've been listening and aligning, are you acting? Are you acting? Some people in this room, you need to take a step of faith and actually act on your conviction.

You might need to change something in your household. You might need to change the way you're interacting with other people. Some of you have felt in your spirit that you need to serve and participate in what God's doing, but you haven't taken the step because maybe you're too busy or you feel like you don't offer anything, I want you to know that if God's calling you to do it, he's gonna bless you as you do it and he will reveal to you fully what he's trying to do as you do it.

So some of you might just walk out of here and just sign up to serve. Some of you have heard Pastor Bill talk about giving from stage. You've read in the Bible that it says the flood gates will bust open. God will fill your storehouse

abundantly as you give to Him back out of what He has already graciously given to you. You've seen it. You know that God's calling you to give up your tithes and offerings, but you haven't done it for fear of what might happen to you within your financial situation. I get it. But if God's calling you to do something,

in the end, you've gotta act and respond in line with His calling. Some of you are ready for the next big challenge of your faith. That might be leadership. It might be changing something about the way that you read God's word.

It might be starting a Bible reading plan for the first time. Some of you are ready for cheaper rent and you're ready to move to the West Valley. I don't know.

Somebody already chose to do it. Whatever that is for you, I can't tell you what it is, but what I can tell you is if He's calling you, like as you've aligned your thoughts to God's thoughts and it becomes clear to you that this is what God wants you to do, don't sit in apathy when He's called you to act.

And I'll close with this one thing. There's some people in this room, you have never acted on what God has stirred within your heart. You've never trusted in Jesus. And the Bible says that there's a very simple action we can do. We can confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord

and believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead. And in that we receive the free gift of God, which is abundant life, eternal life, and connection with our creator. So in a moment, I wanna lead you through a prayer to take that action

to follow Jesus for the first time. And for the rest of you, I wanna encourage you with a prayer to boldness, to act on the conviction that God has placed within you.

So if everybody's heads would bow, eyes would close, let me pray for us. For those of you who need to trust in Jesus right now, it's a simple prayer. It's not magical, but it does align our thoughts to God's thoughts. And the Bible says this is what it takes to trust in Jesus. You might say, God, I believe

that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. I believe He died on the cross and rose from the grave. Father forgive me of my sin, make me a new creation and I will follow you for the rest of my life. I'll revolve everything around you. Today is my new beginning.

And if that was you, we're excited for you and for the rest of you, I wanna pray this. God give them boldness to act on their calling. Whatever that might be. It could be as small as reading your word. It could be as big

as, I don't know, going overseas and being a missionary. I don't know what it might be. You've called people to big things and you've called people to small consistent things. Whatever it is for the people in this room, I pray that they would act on it. So God, give them the strength right now to act.

God, we love you and we trust you. It's in Jesus' name that we pray and God's people said. Amen. Before you leave, I wanna encourage you with a few things. First, can we celebrate those who trusted in Jesus for the first time today? Amen. If that was you, I wanna encourage you to go to rockpoint.io

and under the tab that says, Say Yes to Jesus, let us know about it. Someone will definitely reach out to you and will help you take your next step toward God.

Thanks for joining us online this weekend. Let us know if we can help you guys in any way. Make sure to follow us on social media and connect with us on the We Are Rock Point app for prayer and everything happening here at Rock Point.