Good morning.
Oh, guys, I have good news to tell you.
Something I've been working on for like seven months.
I am no longer a white belt in jiu-jitsu.
I have been promoted.
I am a blue belt.
Those of you that have been following along, you're welcome.
Just updating you.
My hands hurt.
Everything hurts.
Ribs hurt.
My fingers hurt.
But there's nothing like choking somebody out.
And so it's great.
And sometimes I'll think about staff that I'm frustrated with.
I'm like, Chris Felton.
No, just kidding.
I'm joking.
I'm totally joking.
But yeah, I was excited this last week.
I got promoted to blue belt.
And so I've been pumped.
Really enjoying it.
Getting to do it with my brother.
And it's been a ton of fun.
And I've been the last four days been solo parenting with my kids.
My wife is on a retreat in Nashville.
Getting to kind of refresh yourself.
And you know what?
It's great when you're a parent of young kids because they wake up at odd
hours to tell you odd things.
Like my daughter, I think it was 4 a.m. when she came to my room to tell me,
Dad, I can snap.
And I'm like, yeah.
I'm the only one in the house this week.
Go to sleep.
Yeah.
Or my son.
Or her waking up at 5 going, is it my birthday today?
I'm like, no, it's not.
It's not your birthday today.
She knows it's coming so she's asking every day.
It's awesome.
But then the other day she had to go to a princess birthday party.
And I was a little bit daunted at the idea of dressing her up for a
princess birthday party.
So I called my sister-in-law.
I was like, can I bring her to the house?
And you get her makeup and all that stuff and get her done.
And she gets in the car seat and they're leaving.
I'm like, okay, bye, babe, I love you.
And she goes like this.
Remember, I love you.
I'm like, everything I've done.
Anyway, so I'm surprised I'm standing.
My son is 6 and he's a force.
So it's a lot of fun.
But I want to tell you quickly before I dive into what I'm going to speak
about this morning, I want to talk to you about something that's coming our
way in the end of September, which is Open Heavens Conference.
If you've never been here for an Open Heavens Conference or you've been
here for many years and you've never attended an Open Heavens Conference,
normally we're rallying our troops to host that.
But I also wanted to invite so many of you who have never actually attended
that to attend the Open Heavens Conference.
This year we have Michael Koulianos coming in as a guest speaker.
And then Elisa Smith from Upper Room who's going to be doing guest worship
as well as our worship teams.
So it's going to be an amazing time.
So I wanted to kind of seed that into your minds.
It's the end of September.
Just think about it.
Look at your calendars.
It's the 28th, 29th, 30th.
So just think about it.
Anyway, I'm kind of stalling as well too because the level of anxiousness I feel
because the message is so important to my heart, but yet the person I learned it
the most from was on the front row.
And so I didn't know he was going to be here this morning.
And so I'm like, Lord, I learned all this from him.
So we're going to dive in this morning on a topic that's been really stirring
in my heart and just think Bill said it.
So if you're wondering, if it goes bad, Bill said it.
If it goes good, Bill said it.
But we'll pray, and then we'll get into it this morning.
Jesus, I thank you that you are here with us, and I thank you that you enjoy us,
that you don't tolerate us, that you enjoy us.
And I ask right now that your spirit of wisdom and revelation
and the knowledge of you would be with us this morning,
that we would see you a little bit differently today,
and we would dive into your nature more, and we would learn about you,
and you would fill us up with your presence.
In Jesus' name, amen.
Okay, so I'm going to talk to you about ministering to the Lord.
Now you're wondering why I'm nervous to talk about worship.
But let me give you a couple of verses that have been standing out to me.
Listen, I probably could count them, and there's like 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8,
9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28.
A lot of verses in the Bible about worship.
I've only got 28 of them, only, but I won't dive into all of them.
But here's what I want to open us up with Matthew 28,
and there's going to be a lot of verses I'm going to make reference to,
and I'll give you the addresses to them.
Matthew 28 is going to set us up with something,
and then we're going to read Ephesians and Colossians,
and then we'll dive into some other ones.
But in Matthew 28, there's just one little sentence in Matthew 28, verse 17,
that I want us to see that's going to set us up for our conversation this morning.
So Matthew 28, 17, and it's really simple, really basic,
but there's so much depth to it for us.
Matthew 28, verse 17,
When they saw Him, they worshipped Him.
worshiped him. It says, but some doubted. We're not going to focus on that this morning.
The first part, when they saw him, they worshipped him. When they saw him, they worshipped him.
Worship, this is the parameter and kind of the sandbox we're going to play in, is worship
is the response to his presence. That's what we're going to start with. Worship is the
response to his presence. And worship, you know, God is not seeking worship. He's seeking
first. Boom. Okay. We'll start there. So Matthew 28, 17, when they saw him, they worshipped
him. So hold that in your heart, that worship is that response to his presence. Now, there's
a couple of verses I want to read because I think they really set up something interesting
for us. So Colossians and Ephesians, we'll read Ephesians first. This is Ephesians 2.
You're getting your whole week's Bible reading in one sermon. You're welcome. If I can find
it in my Bible, I know exactly where it is, but I'm shaking a little bit this morning.
I just don't know why, but I'm shaking. Ephesians 2, and then it'll be Colossians 3 will be
the next one we're going to read. But Ephesians 2, man, there's so much good scripture to
read about this stuff. I'm just, as I go to Ephesians 2, I'm seeing notes on other
verses and I'm like, oh, it's a goldmine of goodness. Maybe you'll start reading the Bible
differently today and they'll just start jumping out at you. That'd be exciting. Ephesians
2, verse 20, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ
himself being the chief cornerstone in whom the whole building being fitted together grows
into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you are also being built together for a dwelling
place of God in the Spirit. You are also being built together for a dwelling place of God
in the Spirit. We'll probably dive into this a little bit more depending on how things
flow, but there's an individual, you as a temple of the Holy Spirit. It says this, when
the word became flesh and dwelt among us, that word dwelt is tabernacled. So tabernacled
among us. And then we get the understanding through Paul's teaching that we are a dwelling
place. We are a temple of the Holy Spirit. We get that individual. And Paul is here,
is highlighting another dimension to this. There is your, you are a dwelling place of
the Holy Spirit. He fills you and you carry God in the indwelling. Then there's something
that happens with us together that's different than you individually. That you are being
built together for a dwelling place. The question we should be asking ourselves, if God is not
at church, is church church? If God is not at church, is church church? Because that's
what marks the distinction of the dwelling place is that for dwelling place of God in
the Spirit. And Peter, we'll reference Peter in a little bit, that we are living stones
being put together. A royal priesthood, we'll dive into the priesthood and ministering to
the Lord in a bit here, but there's this dwelling place that God is creating with you and I.
So you and I all have that personal devotion to God, but then there's something that happens
when two or three are gathered in my name. There's something that happens when you and
I gather together. There's something when God is doing something beyond just our individual
devotion. There's something that happens when a group of people, a body of people start
to engage with that calling, that first assignment and that ministry to the Lord. This dwelling
place where God starts to inhabit us and inhabit our praises that is distinct and different
than your personal time, though both are necessary. Okay, so the other part of scripture that
I wanted to read right away is Colossians, and this one is because it highlights both
parts of worship that I really wanted to highlight, but I won't be speaking on the other one.
So Colossians 3 verse 16. A lot of Bible today. Sorry, not sorry. Hashtag sorry, not sorry.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one
another in psalms and in hymns and in spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to
the Lord. So there's one component of our worship, right? Our singing. Psalms, I believe
it's Psalm 100 says, come before his presence with singing. So then the other part is whatever
you do in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord, giving thanks to God the Father
through him. So we're not going to dive into this part as much, but everything we do is
worship if our hearts are set towards him. Jesus has this concept.
when he says, your lips can praise me,
but your hearts are far from me.
So it's not necessarily that you're singing
that makes it worship, it's what's going on in here, right?
And so there's the idea that you could be changing a diaper
and it's worship.
You could be working as a lawyer and a teacher
and a doctor and a physician, whatever it may be,
and it's worship.
So everything is worship.
So that is so true.
But what if you can do is you can highlight that so much
that you can forget that singing is worship too.
If that makes sense.
You can go, everything is worship
to the point where you could spend like kayaking with God.
And it's so good.
I don't like jujitsu with God.
I don't know if that's really what I'm thinking about
when I'm getting choked out, when my mouth is going.
But there's these ideas that everything is unto the Lord,
that no matter what our work, our parenting,
all of that is unto the Lord.
But then there's also this dimension
of the scriptures teaching us worship
that is singing and bringing our song to the Lord
and allowing that we would come with something
that only we can bring, which is our song.
So I'm gonna talk more about that this morning
than everything is worship.
Those two will go like that back and forth
and dance and move in between each other.
You guys doing okay so far?
Okay, great, awesome.
So the idea here that we are being built together
as a dwelling place for God in the spirit,
that we are living stones chosen by God,
a royal priesthood, a royal priesthood chosen
that we might proclaim his praises
because he has pulled us out of darkness and into light.
That's Peter talking to you.
He's telling you that you have been chosen for praises
and you are a royal priesthood, a royal priesthood.
And so the question we ask ourselves is,
what is a priesthood?
What is the priestly ministry?
What is that?
So we're gonna dive into a little bit.
We'll see how far we go get together, guys.
I'm so excited that I'm still shaking.
I'm not gonna lie.
I feel such a like buzz inside of me
that I'm like, wow, it's hard to focus,
to be honest with you.
Woo, it's good.
You know, I used to, before I truly had this moment
of giving my life to Jesus,
my parents would take me to church on Sundays
and I would go and worship when it happened
and I would find myself getting gripped by something
something would hit me and I didn't want to show anyone.
So I gripped the chair in front of me as tears.
So when the tears started to form,
I yawned so that I could fake wipe them away
because I could feel the sense of presence
when people started to sing,
that started to do something in me,
but I was not ready for it.
I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Whoa, this is too raw and real.
Like I was like, oh, I'm being undone already,
but I was young and didn't know what was going on.
So I would grip the chair in front of me
and then when tears, I would yawn.
And then I remember when I truly encountered the Holy Spirit
in my place of surrender,
you couldn't stop me from crying,
from shouting, from jumping.
I was doing circles in worship.
I was jumping all around.
I was, you know, like just extravagant.
I was just being extravagant with it and passionate.
And you can say whatever you want about passionate people,
but I'll tell you what,
passion looks like performance to the passive.
And so it's like I was letting my heart go,
just such a radicalness in me
that maybe my extravagance may have offended
those that wanted to be in proximity to Jesus,
but not intimate.
And so I was jumping all over the place
and I find David moving the arc of the presence,
doing things like that.
I see this royal priest who wears the Lineni Fad
because he's carrying this priestly part of his life
and he's the king.
And so he's bringing the arc back to Jerusalem
and he's dancing undignified before God.
And he's, someone died moments earlier.
So like, hey, I'd be dancing like that too.
If somebody died because they didn't,
they mishandled the presence, mishandled the arc.
And so David is this royal priest dancing before God
undignified, completely giving himself away to God.
This honoring of God in his whole being.
When David is operating in this,
he's operating in what he knew was the priestly ministry
that Deuteronomy 10 talks about.
And then it's also in Exodus 19, in Deuteronomy 10,
the Lord says, give me the Levites.
Give me these priests who will minister to me.
They will minister to me in song and incense
and burning of offerings.
And he gives all the other tribes of Israel
portions of the land, inheritances.
And then he says to the Levites, he says.
There won't have any inheritance in the land. He says, I will be their inheritance.
That the priestly ministry is gripped with the reward of God.
And that we are gripped with God as our reward.
That His presence is enough.
While we're seeing all these other things, all the tribes get what they want. That's good, good, good.
We have God. We have the role of ministering to God, singing to Him with psalms,
and bringing our song and the offerings of the people, representing the people.
So priests had, we would call it three, but you can call it two types of ministry.
But you have that one ministry to God, right? That first ministry to God,
then ministry to the world. And then ministry to the world has two components, right?
To the church and to those that don't believe.
But the ministry to God is that first ministry that sets right everything else.
It's that first ministry that sets everything else right.
And we, as individual temples, get to give our song to God.
And then we, as a body of believers, a church, we get to give God our song,
and He gets to dwell among us, which we'll talk about that a little bit
when you read verses like Acts 16, I think it's 16,
where God shakes the prison as Paul and Silas are singing songs of worship.
Yeah.
And the prison shakes God.
And then in Chronicles, where worship is happening, we'll get there.
But temples were where God rules and reigns, and His presence is there.
That's what the idea was, that the temples would be these overlapping spaces,
and the priests would have this ministry of ministering to God
and offering all that they were to offer.
And they had this heart of worship that treasured His presence,
that knew that He was their inheritance,
that they would be doing this on behalf of all of Israel.
And then David has this royal priesthood moment
where he is offering his worship to God as he's dancing undignified, right?
We all know that song, I will be more undignified than this.
John Wimber said this, dignity is not a fruit of the Spirit.
That's what John Wimber said.
It's something we've been testing out with our young adults,
is the exchange of dignity for presence.
As a group of people who have been so aware of social media
and how people see them and perceive them and how they project their life,
that I'm going, yeah, you got to come to the altar, die, and watch what God gives you.
You'll feel foolish at the end of it that you try to keep what you had.
But you'll get Him in such a way.
And so we also learned this, that with worship,
we started to learn that crowds are different than hungry people.
We started to learn that because the numbers in the room
didn't determine the level of presence that was being kind of experienced
in the ministry that happened to God.
And you think about the woman with the issue of blood
who presses through the crowd and touches the hem of Jesus's garment.
And Jesus says, who's touched me?
And the disciples paradigm is everybody's touched you.
And Jesus is like, no, no, no, who touched me?
And there's a woman who touched him and pressed through the crowd
that hunger is what we're talking about versus just a gathering of people.
And that there's this anticipation that you could touch God
and that God would touch you.
So worship, as we think about this more and more,
there's dimensions of this, but the Thanksgiving praise and worship,
when the priests would start to offer these kinds of ministries to the Lord,
Thanksgiving, I want to kind of sometimes be super practical with you
and other times we can dive into some deeper things.
But Thanksgiving praise and worship, as we're a corporate dwelling place for God,
Thanksgiving is in our individual life and together is our
thanking him for his acts, the things he's done.
Praise is thanking him, sorry, praise is a response to his nature.
So how would that work?
If you're like, how does that work?
Sometimes it just happens and you're not really thinking about it at all
and it just flows naturally from you.
But other times it's God provides for you and all of a sudden you're like,
oh, thank you that you've provided for me.
And then you move into praise, which is you are the provider.
There's that change that happens.
You go, oh gosh, I'm thank you for your provision, your acts.
This is like when it says that Israel knew the acts of God
and Moses knew the ways of God.
And you have this moment where the acts of God,
thank you, God, that you are provider.
Then, sorry, that you've provided.
Then it's, oh, thank you and I praise you for being provider.
And so those two different distinct things are thanks and praise
and then worship is that response to his presence.
So you have the acts of God that you're thanks for what he's done
and praise and thanksgiving.
and praise, and then you have worship response to Him.
So the worship, the reason why this is important
is because it is the priority of the church.
Ministering to Him, the priority of the church
to be gripped by God as their prize,
ministering to Him, unembarrassed in their love,
undignified.
There's, how do I put it?
Like, you know, if you've been on the lake
and you've wakeboarded on the lake,
there is, you fall, if you fall on a board
and the person on the boat should put a flag up
when you fall, and the flag isn't for you,
you're in the water.
You know you're in the water.
The flag is for everybody else who's riding on their boat
to know that there's something in the water they can't see.
And so the reason why I'm bringing this up,
because in the story of David in 2 Samuel,
there's a moment as he's being undignified before the Lord
that Michal sees him and is like,
oh, the king, so undignified before people,
didn't see the undignified worship of David
as an opportunity for her.
So, well, here's why I'm bringing this point in
from the wakeboarding reality is this.
The people who are on the other boats are saying,
I see a flag, therefore there must be something
in the water I can't see, but I must drive my boat
according to that reality, even though I don't see it.
David is giving an invitation to everyone.
Everyone going, there's something in the water
you can't see, but if you can see it,
you will respond like this and drive accordingly.
And Michal doesn't, she actually holds that
and it says she was barren from that day forward.
The despising of the extravagance introduced
an unfruitful life.
That's why Isaiah says, sing, O barren one.
That's why Isaiah is going, sing, O barren one,
because the barrenness that got welcomed in
at that callousness towards David's worship
did something in her that can only get broken
when they step back into extravagant praise,
when they step back into worship and they go,
oh, I missed something, I've missed something.
In Mark 6, there's an interesting story
that has nothing to do with worship,
but I feel like it has everything to do with worship.
You know, you have those verses, you're like,
I don't know how this connects, but it does.
In Mark 6, you have Jesus going to Nazareth,
really interesting.
Mark 6, then he went out from there
and came to his own country and his disciples followed him.
And when the Sabbath had come,
he began to teach in the synagogue
and many hearing him were astonished saying,
where did this man get these things?
And what wisdom is this which is given to him
that such mighty works are performed by his hands?
Is this not the carpenter, the son of Mary
and brother of James and Hosus and Judas and Simon
and are not his sisters here with us?
So they were offended at him.
But Jesus said to them, a prophet is not without honor
except in his own country, among his own relatives
and in his own house.
Here's the interesting verses five and six.
And now he could do no mighty work there
except that he laid his hands on a few sick people
and healed them.
And he marveled because of their unbelief.
And they went about the villages in the circuit teaching.
Here's what's interesting.
Their familiarity with Jesus stopped them
from being able to receive from him.
They couldn't get over what they knew about him
in a way that was like, wait a second,
isn't this so and so?
The lack of honor, he actually calls unbelief later.
The familiarity with Sunday morning,
the familiarity with singing songs.
If we're not careful, we can allow that familiarity
to go, isn't that so and so, isn't that so and so
and keep us from receiving what God wants to do
to all of us.
He'll end up doing to a few individuals.
But when we together start to honor him,
something happens in a room together
that he's desired to do, but has received through honor.
That has received through honor of him
and the honor of others.
You start to see others in worship
and you start to let them be kind of catalysts
to your own extravagance.
That you see them entering into that holy of holies
and you're like, I want that.
And then you yourself start to honor God
and you start to get over your own familiarity.
with God and your own familiarity with songs and you close your eyes and you
return to the tenderness of your heart and recognize he's right there and all
of a sudden your heart erupts with worship and you start to receive from
God in ways and then you realize again it's really weird when you're in worship
that you get benefits. It's like you you talk about worship and you're always
like and then this can happen in your life and this and you're like it's
almost a little bit kind of like stark where you're like it's kind of weird
because the joy is him but he's he's so amazing that he's not he's not content
in being a gift giver. He's like I want to give myself to you and so the worship
as the highest priority of the church is so important for us to understand
because when we do that everything else flows properly. Everything else flows
properly. When we minister to the Lord, when we set our heart to minister to him
to come together and go worship isn't the warm-up, that it's not the the thing
we're doing to get to where the rest of it is so that we can learn about other
things. It's that honestly worship is that prize, that joy, that delight
that we get to give to God and if somebody preaches that's awesome. But
there there there is instruction and that's important like I get that like
absolutely important to give instruction and teach the Bible teaches that we
should be teaching but there is something that happens as a dwelling
place of God together when we enter into that priestly role of ministry to the
Lord where he becomes the price and we are infatuated with him and we are
delighting in him and your heart comes alive in ways you didn't know it needed
to come alive and then everything else you do makes total sense after that
because you can even you can even think about all the important things you're
supposed to do in ministry before worship you can think about all the
aspects of God's plan and mission to change the world that you're called to
do before worship and jump right to them before worship but that priestly
ministry to the Lord first is what sets everything in order that's why Isaiah
has this encounter and in that encounter he's lost in the throne room of God and
then he has this repentant moment because he becomes aware of stuff in
God's presence and then he hears that God is looking to send somebody and then
he says here am I send me it comes from that encounter in the throne room of God
that he gets sent out properly so worship is that response to his presence
and we treasure his presence and what we worship shows what we value most that's
worth sorry worship that definition to ascribe worth to something to show our
highest value we orbit around him not ideas about him him that's why Israel
cloud by day fire by night followed the presence wherever it went because the
life of worship that ascribing worth at the most important things imagine
setting your house in order and then the cloud moving like if any of you have
this is kind of an exaggeration here but it kind of gets the point because any
of you have moved ever you hate it it is horrible I'm in a minute middle of a
renovation I feel like I just moved into my house again I'm like this is
horrible there's dust everywhere but it's it's it's worth it for what you
get but like the idea is that when you're moving somewhere like okay
finally settle then you're like the cloud
and that's it that's the test of worship right that's the test of our highest
value is I've I've set my life in order but God is moving but God is moving I
know I just did X Y & Z but God is on the move and my highest value is him so
I move with him I go with him I remember it was a Sunday night it was stream of
FTV and I was in my bedroom on hilltop and I could sense God was moving and I
drove down at 930 and just laid on the front carpet because I was like oh
something is happening because there's there's a worship that anticipates God
dwelling there's a worship that anticipates that God would do something
in our midst there's there's a worship that when you treasure his presence that
you're like whoa the atmosphere all of a sudden is electric where you you are you
all of a sudden you feel this sense in your heart why you're alive you're like
I was doing all these great things in my life and all of a sudden you're
worshiping and God starts to dwell God starts to inhabit our praises and then
his rule and reign in your heart starts to come alive and you're like whoa
everything else
starts to fade. And you say things like, David, better is one day in your courts than a thousand
elsewhere. That's that worshipper heart that's like, oh, better is one day with God
in his courts than a thousand anywhere else. And that's an invitation for experience. That's not
like poetry, just poetry. That's not David going, let me give you a poetic phrase that will just
provoke you to think great things about God. David's like, no, there's a way to taste God
that you end up saying to yourself and everyone around you, better
is one day. And I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of God than anywhere else because
you start to taste God in worship. And his presence becomes your treasure and he starts to just
move in such a profound way. And you're drawn deeper. You're drawn deeper and you're,
the revelations of who he is like flashes before your eyes.
And he inhabits our praises. And he, like, I think about inhabiting the praises of people,
of his people. And I think about a chair and I'm always like, without praise and worship,
God doesn't have a chair to sit. You can do all kinds of stuff, but you're like, no,
my first job is to go, here's a chair for you. It's like that honored guest. It's that guest
that comes in your home and you go, no, no, no, I've got, I've got a lot of things to take care
of. But the first thing I take care of is you. Here's a chair for you. Here's a place for you.
Because if we don't get this reality, if we don't hold onto this in our hearts, that that ministry
to the Lord is our first ministry, that ministry of worship. If we don't get that in our hearts,
we can actually reduce church to like instruction for living life.
We can go, okay, let's just get the next instruction for how to do this, this, this,
this, and this. And then let's get our next task and assignment for how we're going to change the
world. And church can become just that equipping. Equipping is, gosh, that's what the saints,
that's what you were supposed to do, equip for ministry. But if we forget that ministry to the
Lord and we don't equip ourselves in that either, then there's a problem. And so for us, it's
remembering that we're not coming just for instruction. We're not coming even just to be
like, okay, cool. I saw my best bud. That's awesome. Those are all great things. It's like
when you worship, you're like, oh my gosh, there's so many benefits, but I don't shout the benefits
first. It's that I get to worship God and that there's a dwelling place for him created when I
bring my stone to the table, that we are living stones being built together, that when I bring
my stone to the table and to the conversation, I put it right where it's supposed to go.
And then you and I, we link arms and we start to create this temple for God to dwell.
It's the idea that we're not looking to tune ourselves to each other.
Like a tuning fork, if we try to tune ourselves to each other, we'll be off.
But if we tune ourselves to the same tuning fork, we'll be all synced up.
And so when the presence, it's like this, the centerpiece of the kingdom is not the church,
as Jack Hayford says, it is the king. It's that tuning fork. God's presence sets us all in order
and sets us all in right relationship to one another. And we start to create a dwelling
place for God and stuff starts to happen by accident. Chains start being broken off of
people by accident. They weren't even anticipating that morning to get deliverance.
But then someone sings a song of deliverance and all of a sudden their insides are shaking
because they thought they were coming in to sing a few songs and hear a good message.
But God moved as worship starts to erupt from people and God moves and all of a sudden they're
going, whoa, what is happening in me? And then you wake up and you realize you were on the floor.
That resisting that familiarity and rejecting tenderness is a key as well.
The familiarity, when I say rejecting tenderness means when there's tears right here,
don't try to fight them.
Like, it's like that moment when I pulled into the office
the other day and I pulled in my car
and I was listening to worship like the whole time in,
but I pulled into my car
and the moment I pulled into my parking spot,
it was all of a sudden,
as if like when the Psalm says, He cascades over you,
all of a sudden, I felt like He cascaded over me
the other day.
And I was in my car for an hour just crying,
just crying as I was one after another wave of God's love,
wave of God's affection and desire,
a sense of completeness.
I started, like, it was just wild for me.
And I'm going, okay, it's that turning to the burning bush,
then you hear God speak, Moses, Moses.
It's that making sure that when we're tender before Him
and we're turning our affections to Him
and we see how it just dramatically changes
even the direction of our life.
Okay.
Let's read.
Let me see in Acts 16, you guys should read,
we should read this.
It's a good one.
It's just awesome.
And then, let me see here.
I told you a lot of Bible verses today.
Go to Acts 16, then we'll wrap up with,
let me find it.
Yeah, okay.
Then we'll do 2 Chronicles 5.
Two places where God's invasion happens.
Okay, Acts 16.
Now, we will start and let's,
we'll do verse 25.
But just to let you know,
typical day for Paul, preaching gets imprisoned.
Just having a good old time and just stirring up the pot.
Someone is talking to him and he, I love it.
It's the one time I get permission to be annoyed
in verse 18, where it says,
Paul was greatly annoyed and turned to the Spirit.
I command you in the name of,
just there's no tolerating of this demonic spirit.
That's just a message right there for us.
So verse 25, they're imprisoned.
And at midnight, Paul and Silas were praying
and singing hymns to God.
And the prisoners were listening to them.
Suddenly, there was a great earthquake.
So that the foundations of the prison were shaken
and immediately all the doors were opened
and everyone's chains were loosed.
I love it.
Two individuals who did,
who were in there for the wrong reasons, right?
They're just like, they're innocent in the sense of like,
they haven't done any real crime
in the eyes of these people there or whatever.
But they have this heart that while they're in prison,
worship is coming out of them.
They're not going, this is unjust.
This is, no, they're singing hymns.
This is like the antithesis of complaining about a bad day.
That worshiper is like, oh, I will offer song to God.
That's just like, oh yeah, right.
Good.
So there was a great earthquake
and the foundations of the prison were shaken
and immediately all the doors were opened
and everyone's chains were loosed.
So he has this moment, he tells this prisoner,
he's like, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ
and you will be saved and so will your whole household.
That this divine inbreaking of God follows this worship.
So in 2 Chronicles 5 that I mentioned earlier
is another divine inbreaking of God
that does something as the priests are ministering.
Did you know that David had 4,000 people
ministering with instruments?
That's like if everyone in our service had an instrument
and everybody in every service we have had an instrument
and was equipped with that instrument
for night and day, worship.
You go, there's some better things to do.
We've got a lot of stuff to go and take care of.
It just confronts our productivity mindset sometimes.
It confronts our quickness to go and do other things
instead of be at his feet.
So good, Jesus, help me.
And so,
Let's read this whole you guys down for the longest portion of scriptural reading then we'll wrap up here
So so Solomon assembled the elders of Israel. This is verse 2 and 2nd Chronicles 5
Now Solomon assembled the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes of the chiefs of the children of Israel
Jerusalem that they might bring the ark of the covenant of the Lord up from the city of David, which is Zion
Therefore all the men of Israel assembled with the king at the feast which was in the seventh month
So all the elders of Israel came and the Levites took up the ark the priests carrying the ark
Which we know they carried on their shoulders as God rests on them
And they brought up the ark in the tabernacle of meeting and all the holy furnishings
And and we're in the tabernacle the priests and the Levites brought them up
King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel who were assembled with him before the ark were sacrificing sheep and oxen
That could not be counted or numbered for multitude
Then the priests brought in the ark of the covenant of the Lord to its place in the inner sanctuary of the temple to the
most holy place
under the wings of the cherubim
For the cherubim spread their wings over the place of the ark and the cherubim
overshadowed the ark in its poles
The poles extended so that the ends of the poles of the ark could be seen from the holy place in front of the inner
sanctuary
But they cannot be seen from the outside and they were there to this day
Nothing was in the ark except the two tablets which Moses put there at Harab when the Lord made a covenant
with the different children of Israel
When they had come out of Egypt when it came to past
The priests came out of the most holy place for all the priests who were present had sanctified themselves
without keeping to their divisions and the Levites who were the singers and all those of Asaph Haman and
Jew
And
With the sons and their brethren stood at the east end of the altar clothed in white linen
Having the symbols the stringed instruments and the harps
And with 120 priests sounding with trumpets
Indeed it came to pass when the trumpeters and the singer see this is just not chaos here. Look at this. We're as one
You
Can't make that unity just by trying to be like everybody else. This is coming because you have one focus
They have one focus to make the sound the singers were to as one
to make one sound to be heard and praise and thanking the Lord and when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and
The symbols and the instruments of music and praise the Lord saying for he is good for his mercy endures
forever that the house
The house of the Lord was filled with a cloud I
Remember one time I did a shout of praise at the end of worship during the time when that glory cloud was here
I did a shout of praise all of a sudden glitter started appearing across the stage and I went like this
Here you go, I'm done. I don't know what to do with this. This is not my Chris is all like yeah. Yeah. Come here
It's the cloud filled filled with a cloud so that the priest could not continue ministering
Because of the cloud for the glory of the Lord filled the house of God
So the priest could not continue ministering they could they were so raptured by God when his manifest presence
They couldn't even continue doing what they were doing. That was great beautiful and wonderful
They couldn't continue because God's nearness is manifest presence
His excellence his beauty his wonder was so
Saturating the environment of everyone there that they couldn't keep doing what they were doing
These divine in breakings of God in response to a community who has set their hearts to be worshippers
Anticipating what could happen when we're together and we sing I
Don't know what you do when you read these things, but I get like hungry I
Start to get like
Kind of just like oh my gosh
I don't know what you do when you read these things, but I get like hungry
I start to get like kind of just like oh my gosh. I want this
Like that's that my heart just starts to get provoked and it starts to cut at me and go oh
This is that thing to hunger for
The heart after God the seeking of his face the yes to the invitation of going after him
We've I asked Bill and Dan like a couple weeks ago
No, yeah a little about a month ago if we could just worship as a staff on Wednesdays
Because just I felt this this has been in my heart and many other people's hearts my god
This is not like that not like saying this is in my heart as anything special, but so many people coming
to a point of like, oh, we need to do this together.
And I feel this renewing in our staff and in us.
And I was like, God, okay, when do we feel this moving
in directions, even in our church?
And it's a weird message to preach
because you're like, this is who we are.
It's always that awkwardness where you're like,
I'm like, oh, this is the beauty of who we are.
And I feel like I'm just reminding myself
of that responsibility and that privilege.
And we as a staff have been doing it.
And it's been amazing to set our hearts,
to minister to the Lord, to worship Him
and allow our all to be given to Him,
to seek His face together.
And I felt like something, God was just amping us up
in every level, on every service,
in everything that we're doing, of that ministry to Him.
Even for you guys in your homes,
I had texted Bill about that first love stuff
and that morning after I texted him about it,
I put on that song that they played, First Love,
they were playing it today.
And my kids come out and they start to dance
and my daughter grabs her pajamas
and she just starts flagging in the house.
And this first love childlike tenderness,
and I'm just weeping at the table.
I'm just crying.
It didn't last hours, but it was enough.
It was like, oh, this is bread and drink to me.
And I felt so like, oh, what?
I don't care anything else I'm doing.
This is what I want.
And I felt like that was just on God's heart for us
this morning to remind us of who we are in this
and to let our hearts be so provoked
into what He has made possible for us,
what He's made available for us
as we carry that role of priestly ministry
and we come together.
What we do individually matters
and it's almost like a backbone to corporate worship.
But it's when we get together, oh my gosh,
I'm like, I'm hungry.
I have no idea where you are,
but I am hungry to see God move in our times together
because I'm like, listen, we get together
not to just sing songs and to hear good messages.
There is a celebration of His presence
that is marking and distinctly different
that I'm like, oh Lord, I'm hungry for more of that.
So let's pray for that to increase
that hunger in our hearts.
I did this, I talked about this
with our young adults the other day
and it was this awkward moment
where you end up trying to like minister
and you sing and it's powerful and it's beautiful
and you're like, that's so uncomfortable.
But Jesus, we ask right now
for that ministry of the priestly ministry to settle on us,
to refresh us in who we are.
We know this, this is who we are, this is what we do.
This is, this is,
this is the gift we have from you.
It's been pioneered for years here, God.
And I feel like there's some
that within the last two years moving here,
God is drafting you into this
in a way that you're like, oh, I've hungered for this,
I've heard about this and there's a drafting in
for some reason, I feel like the Lord is saying
like there's some that have,
that are getting put into a new way,
it's something they haven't thought about much of.
And Holy Spirit, I ask right now
that you would start to fill our times together,
that we would have everything be worship
and then in our times together,
you would inhabit the dwelling place you're creating.
That from our hearts, we would touch your heart.
We will be ones who are after your heart.
We take on the ministry of worship to you,
gripped by you being the prize, Holy Spirit.
In Jesus name, amen, amen, amen, amen.
Whoo, I feel like I'm sweating like crazy.
Joel's gonna come up here
and handle the rest of our time together.
Love you guys, so great to be with you this morning.
Bless you, bless you.
God bless you.