Becoming Too Casual With The Things Of God | Creative Church

I'm gonna give you several scriptures today, but I wanna talk about holy things. God's calling our church back to holiness. Leviticus chapter 10, verse one, two and three, it says, "Then Nadab and Abahu." Don't name your kids that. Nadab and Abahu, "The sons of Aaron each took a sincer "and put fire in it and incense on it "and offer profane fire before the Lord, "which he had not commanded them. "The fire went out and devoured them. "They died before the Lord. "And Moses said to Aaron, 'This is what the Lord spoke saying, "'By those who come near me, "'I must be regarded as holy.'" - That's right. Amen. - "And before all the people, "'I must be glorified.'" We serve a holy God church. Let's pray, Father, I thank you for your word. Anoint me to minister it with clarity and simplicity. Lord, preach privately as I preach publicly in Jesus name. You know, thank God that we now live under grace through Jesus Christ, but the principle remains the same. Holy things should remain holy. Communions should not be rushed. Prayer should not be mechanical. Baptism is not about performance or photo opportunity. Marriage should not be disposable.

There should be preparation and prayer and purity and holiness for the things of God. And I think so many times we become casual with the things of God. You know, we dress casual, people dress casual, and the church feels casual. And next thing you know, people become casual. We live in a world that has told pastors and church people to be relevant. Just be relevant, be relevant. But I'm concerned that in our attempt to be relevant, we've lost reverence. We've lost reverence for the things of God. I'm not trying to get you to change the way you dress or anything. I'm talking about the posture of your heart. I do think those things do affect us somehow. Like my daughter's, even my wife, like Lilliana, if she puts on a dress and she wants to wear hills now, I told her women don't wear hills 'til they're 35. But she puts on these little hills and I said, and she gets dressed. She puts on a dress in her hair and a purse and everything about her changes. It's like she's in like a costume or something. Like the way she walks changes, the way she talks changes, the way she sits changes. Like her little brother, she's like, I can't be bothered with you right now. Like everything changes because she's postured herself.

And I'm not talking, I'm not trying to get you to dress different or anything. I'm talking about the posture of your heart. I think that we need to not treat the things of God with such casualness. I think even when we come in here, I'm getting ready to, I'm writing a prayer right now that our parking lot team is gonna actually hand you and your hand you before you park and say, would you pray this over your family before you get out of the car? Like, hey kids, we're getting ready. I'm gonna be able to talk to your kids for you going to someplace. And you're like, hey, let me tell you how to act in here. Come on, mom and dad. Anybody that had to have that conversation when your kids were in? Don't touch anything. Right? Like you have to say, I think we have to let our kids know this isn't Costco. (audience laughs) This isn't Sam's Club. This isn't the community center. People are healed here. Lives are changed here. This is holy. God is in here. His people are here.

There will be people weeping. There's a reverence and a holiness. We want our kids to have fun and they do have fun, but we also want them to know this place is holy. It's not, I wasn't allowed to chew gum in church growing up. Anybody else grew up like that? Like, I wasn't, I'm not saying not to chew gum. If you're chewing gum, don't feel, damn. I'm just saying, I just think we can drift so far. And now while the worship's going, we're just like sitting down or we're drinking our Starbucks. And it's like, is God here? Would you really take that coffee into the throne room? I don't even think you'd take it into the Oval Office. I'm just asking. And again, we have coffee in the lobby. I'm not saying we can't have it. I'm just saying, I think you shouldn't have it if it affects your heart and worship. If you can't worship because of it, you shouldn't have it. If you're like, I'm distracted. If your phone distracts you, put it down. Like if you can't keep your heart engaged in worship, put it down. And just say, I'm here. I'm here for just a few minutes. Like literally all week. And I need my heart focused. I need the Lord to touch my heart. I mean, are you on the phone at the doctor? If you need healing, you go see the doctor and you're like, yeah, I'm just like, I'm just on. I'm just, you know what I mean? You're like, actually, God did like do a miracle in your life. And you're on Facebook. I'm just, what I'm bringing up is I don't want you to feel condemned. I'm not here to condemn you. But I'm trying to wake you up. I'm trying to stir you. I'm trying to like turn the lights on in your heart and say like, I think there might be, I think we may have drifted unintentionally. A little too far in relevance that we've lost our reverence for the things of God. And I'm not talking about like the organization. I'm talking about you personally receiving things from Jesus. I think, I think our leaders, you know, before we serve communion, we pray, repent, search our hearts. I don't want to lose the tenderness of the things of God. I think when

leaders lose tenderness, the people lose reverence. And honestly, I think the church needs to, we need to start praying together more. Not only spontaneous prayers, but sacred prayers. Prayers that Jesus taught his disciples to pray like the Lord's prayer. Pray the Lord's prayer. You can pray it more than once a month. You can pray it more than once with us a week. Pray it while you're getting dressed. Pray it on your way to work in the morning. Like just let prayer be upon your heart. The Lord told us to pray. The early church prayed constantly. And I think we should, we should pray it more with a reverence and a holiness of heart and sacredness of heart. And it's not just rep, it just sounds like repetition. Repetition is not bad. Vane repetition is bad. Vane repetition is when your heart is no longer connected to it. You're just doing it to do it. You cannot be saved that way. Roman says if you confess with your mouth and believe in your heart. Just because people say things, I can't hear what comes out of your mouth, but I can't see your heart. Only the Lord sees your heart. When man looks at the hour to appearance, God look at the heart. When we read the Nicene Creed, even of our faith, our statement of faith that we believe in God, that one Lord, that we believe in Jesus, begotten not made, that He has risen from the dead. We believe in the virgin birth. How many of you believe the creed of our faith? Come on church, can I get any amen about that? Like, these are declarations that bring the church back to purity of the gospel. They center the church on Jesus and not activities and entertainment. What's the church doing? Entertain me this week. We're talking about the cross. We're talking about baptism. We're talking about holy communion. And we can shift away from these things. But the early church had rhythms of prayer, rhythms of communion, rhythms of fasting, rhythms of Scripture, rhythms of... Let me just ask you, do you have a rhythm of fasting? Like, do you fast a meal a month? Or is it like, I just don't do it, honestly. I just don't. I just don't have a rhythm of fasting. But Jesus says some things are only done, but by prayer and fasting. We're like, let's, that last portion of Jesus, He messes... You made a mistake. No, is it prayer and what? Fasting, do you have, as a Christian, do you have a rhythm of fasting? I'm not telling you what it ought to be.

I'm just asking you. Do you have a rhythm of prayer? Do you have a rhythm of reading the scriptures? What book are you going through right now? What are you reading in God's Word? What is God speaking to you in the scriptures? When do you read the scriptures? Some of us have a rhythm of coffee more than we have confession. Do you have a rhythm of confession? Where you confess you're saying? Jesus told-- how many of you-- this isn't like I came up with this. Like, I got an idea-- let's do confession. These are the sacraments of the church. Jesus told us to do-- he said, confess your sins one to another that you may be. What? He healed. Do we have a rhythm of confession in our heart? All of you have a rhythm of gathering. You're here today. Come on, give the Lord a praise for that. Come on, amen. Somebody's like, I got one. But a rhythm of reverence, of holiness. When we give, it is worship. Worship is a sacrament. Worshipping the Lord. Do you have a rhythm of giving to Jesus? Do you have a rhythm where you confess sin?

Do you have a rhythm of fasting? Do you have a rhythm of these things? And see, we can lean into entertainment. Whatever church-- see, when you practice sacraments, they slow you down. Because sacraments require participation. It requires a whole church to participate. When we do communion, we go, we're all standing now. And everybody get their cup. And everybody has to fight with the little thing. It slows everybody down. People like me who can't see, are just believing God for a miracle. And it just slows everybody down, am I right? When I know, when I go, OK, if you're here and you're sick and you need a miracle, come now. And I know there's people going, are they going to pray for all these people? Seriously? Like individually? They're going to anoint all of them. They're going to come down and acknowledge each person that's being water baptized and anoint them with oil and pray for them and make us all stand here. Yes. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Yes. Well, some people didn't like it. They're going to leave. They're going to do another service. We won't do that. That's what church in all of America have stopped doing it because you can't rush it. How can you rush praying for the sick? I mean, who amongst us wants to be in the hospital and I come see you and I just run in and run out? You'd be like, whoa. Do we not rush this? The whole family's there. Everybody's believing for a miracle and I just run in and... Why are we good with it on Sunday?

We wouldn't be good with it. People need a miracle from Jesus. How long does it take to heal someone of cancer? I don't know, but let's give God a moment to touch your heart and change a life. People have been dealing with pain all week. Can we not agree with them for a moment? Come on church, I'm talking to you. It slows us down where we wait. We have to wait. We live in a world that celebrates hurry, that celebrates speed, but you serve a God that rewards waiting. That's why I think when we run in here, it's like we don't posture our heart, our family who run in here and run through worship and run through this and run through that and run out and just get out of here. And then we wonder why there's no tears that ever fill our eyes. There's no miracles in our heart. There's no miraculous anymore. And we lose the wonder. When everyone participates... It frustrates those that want to hurry. It's like following my family. It's like being behind us at TSA. (audience laughing) Like when we all, all 10 of us, we go and lie, I can see people like, "Get ahead of them, Mario." They don't want to be behind us. They're like, (audience laughing) 'Cause we all gotta participate. Am I right, baby?

We have lots of stories about how people look at us with our kids. They count us. We can tell they're counting 'cause they're like, (audience laughing) they're like, they're like Usher's County and Church want. (audience laughing) Acts chapter two, verse 46. So continually, I'm sorry, so continuing daily with one accord in the temple, breaking bread from house to house. They ate their food with gladness and simplicity of heart. We've got to get back to simplicity of heart. I think we loved each other more when we knew less. My little kids who love the Lord, they don't love the Lord out of theology. They love the Lord out of simplicity. (audience laughing) They just love Jesus. Well, explain to me, you know, the hermeneutics and homiletics and the theology, you know, of the Greek of this text. And they get into, we start debating Mr. Moderator, there are some extremities that would desecrate the sanctity of the particular position which this perpetrator has suggested that they've had a legitimate conversion experiment. (audience laughing)

What are you talking about? We just get into all this theology that we lose the wonder. We got to get back to loving the wonder of holy things that we can't explain. Go explain the Trinity to my five-year-old. Go explain the Trinity. Go explain how when somebody goes in that tank and they come out the other side, how somehow all of the old is gone and everything becomes new. You can't do it. It's a miracle. Explain how the communion is the blood and body and how it heals you. Explain how putting oil on people and honoring James chapter five in the scriptures. You can't do it, it's the wonder, it's the mystery. How did two become one in marriage? I don't know, it's a sacrament. It's holy before the Lord. We've got to get back to loving the wonder again. The beauty of holy things again. Notice this, they had prayer, they had gathering, they had worship, they had fellowship, they had temple, they had the table that we gather around the table. That's what we're getting ready to do with all of these discipleship groups that Jeremy's leading you, it's not up and all up, they all gathered around the table. It's like my family, when we get ready to sit down

and there's always somebody missing, it's like where's Augustine? Where's Nicholas? And then you send somebody to go get them and then they're gone. I don't know what happens to that second person. It's like, now we got to send a third person 'cause we've got two people down behind enemy lines. Like go, where are they? And then, is this happening y'all's home or is it just mine? It's like, what in the world happens? So we're all waiting at the table because we're a fam, this is what it's like on Sunday. I know that we're not, there's not a physical table here but when we partake of sacraments, we are all around the table. Picture in your heart, church is one giant table and we're all here. And when you're not here, we're going, where's Jeremy? Where is, where are they? We're at the, we're a family. Come on guys, you're not an orphan. You have a family. It's called the family of God. You're not a number. When Nicholas is missing, I don't go, where's number two? I go, where's Nicholas? You have a story. You have a testimony.

You bring, my oldest two have phones. I save them in my phone with what they bring to our family. It says Nicholas. children know what they bring to your home? If you don't know what we miss when we miss you, what do you bring to the family of God? I promise you you bring something to the family of God. Come on, can I get an amen about it? You're a part of the family. It used to be an old song. I'm so glad I'm a part of the family of God. I'm the only one in here. Lord help me. Anybody know that old song? No, nobody. They didn't sing that up here I guess. I was southern. But we would sing it. We would literally as a church would be like 800 of us and we'd hold hands and sing that song. I remember it as a little boy. I remember singing that song. We're part of the family of God. I just I think so many times we get into like this isolationist mindset with like what's in it for me. And I don't know if any of you have that in your family but it's not attractive. I like it when my kids add value to each other. When they love each other, when they serve each other, when they care about each other, when they they're like looking at each other and laughing with each other and talking with each other. Some of our greatest time together is a family. We were just sitting in the living room the other night. Am I right? And Joanne has this thing where she doesn't want to go to bed yet until she's cuddles with the twins. And so she's like sitting in the twins because those are the last two and they're getting bigger and she's like, "They're my babies and they're getting big and we got to go through this." So she's like, "They're on dinner." And then all so that everybody's trying to like get close to mommy and everybody's sitting there and we're all there. And like we're all just like we just start talking and laughing and engaging and you know just being goofy with each other and encouraging each other and then we then we shift to our prayer. And it's like the greatest time. There's no movie. There's no this or that. We're just all there. We're just being together. I think sometimes we lose that as a church. We lose the wonder of just being together. It's not just running in here, getting information and running out here. It's like at some point can we slow down to be a family. I've got like you know because Alexandria's like 20 now and I had to talk to her and I was like, "Look, you can't just like run in here from work, change, eat and leave." Like we're a pit stop. You know like we're this like NASCAR

pit crew to fuel you. God help me. And I was like you got to like engage. I said, "When was the last time you took Liliana out for a coffee?" Just her. I don't know. When was the last time you took Victoria out? Because Victoria's never going to ask you. Liliana will ask you. But Victoria's never going to ask you. I don't know. I was like, "Take them out. You're going to regret it one day. Slow down. Slow down. I'm telling you, I tell you this for your own, but I'm telling you about this family. This is the family too. Come on church. This is the family. I've got like slow down. That's why I say things like, "Can you know the person next to you?" Can you like, "What's your name?" You know like, "Are you going to be here next Sunday? I'm going to be here. Can I listen to me?" Like get to know one another. I'm telling you sometimes I miss some of those things in the church I grew up in. I mean, women would get together and bake bread and rolls and cakes. I remember as a little boy, so I would eat them and like, they had bake sales. I'm not asking you to do a bake sale. We're not doing a bake sale. I'm just saying they did things to engage, to spend time together. They like slowed their life down to know the body of Christ. Wasn't just about what I can get out of it. The early church understood the sacredness. We kneel. We lift our hands. We pray aloud. We take communion. We enter the waters of baptism. We anoint with oil. We gather around tables. We confess sin. We worship together. The Christian faith was never meant to be disembodied. We do it with our body. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld the wonder of His glory. This is why communion matters, baptism matters. Laying hands on the sick matters. If I was just trying to run through the quickest service, we would have to get rid of all the sacraments. Like if you look at the 90 minutes or 100 minutes we're here, it's most of it is sacramental. It's participating together, serving the Lord together, reflecting on the body of Christ together,

reflecting on the resurrection together, worshiping together, celebrating what Jesus has done in our lives together. And this is why it matters. And I think many churches, listen, we've accidentally trained people to consume services instead of participating in holy moments. This invites participation, so it's not just come to church, it's come to counter Jesus. Listen to me, come encounter Jesus, come kneel again. Come kneel again, come repent again. Come take the bread and the cup again. Come remember His wounds again. Come watch somebody go into the waters of baptism and see their life change forever again. Come watch marriage, covenant reflected in Christ and His church, gather around prayer moments, come hear the church pray, hear the church sing. That's why sometimes I'm like, bring the band down, I just wanna hear the people sing. And it's holy when we do these things. It's holy when we gather in His name and there's gotta become a tenderness. There ought to be weeping in the presence of the Lord. Moments where baptism fills holy again. Moments where we recite the creed of our faith and it brings us all back together and I want people to have a hunger in their heart again for holy things. I don't wanna just be relevant,

I wanna be reverent towards the things of God. That it would happen not just in this house but at your house. Come on church, can I get any men about it? The holy things of God. I don't have my band come back up, we're gonna pray here in just a moment. Even when we give to the Lord, it is worship to Jesus. And worship is sacramental. It's generosity, everybody say generosity. It's generosity towards your brothers and sisters. Generosity is the language of heaven. Giving is not about money, it's about our nature as Christians. We can give our time, we can give our words. Listen to me, I'm almost done. Listen to me, a selfish Christian is contradictory to the cross. The Father gives glory to the Son, the Son gives glory to the Father, the Holy Spirit gives glory. They all, in the Trinity, they all prefer the other. They're all giving, always giving honor to the other. Wow. John 14, 10 and 11, the words that I speak to you, I do not speak of my own authority. What authority do you have, pastor? What authority do you have over God's people?

Let me tell you what authority I have as a senior pastor of this church, none. I have no authority. Look at me, I have no authority. The only authority in this house are the scriptures. There is no authority outside of Holy Scripture. I can't yield any authority, I have no authority, I have no authority. The only authority in this house are the Holy Scriptures. That's why I'm always talking to you about the Scriptures. The Trinity is a fellowship Look, before there was humanity, before there was earth, before there was money, there was giving. God has always been giving Himself away. The Father, to the Son, the Son, to the Father, to the Holy Spirit. Generosity should be our family resemblance. It should be how we look like Jesus. My son, Nicholas, looks a lot like me. Come here, Nicholas. I know I'm out of time, but come here. I love Nicholas. It's my 17-year-old. This guy is a lot like me. And he's not just like me in some of the ways that he looks. He's like me in his mannerisms. He's like me with his, like, paranoia and fears. He's so much like me, actually. He frustrates me a lot because I don't want him to be the me I am. I want him to be the me I want to be. But he's not the me I want to be, he's the me that I am. Anybody, any parents have that in your world?

And you're just like, oh, my gosh, that's totally me. And I don't want to be like that. And I mean, I don't mean any kind of way towards you. But there's a resemblance because I am in him. There ought to be, if before money and the earth, before everything that we know, there was generosity in the trendy. It ought to be in us to be a generous people. And I'm not just talking about giving to church. I'm talking about, you can give more things in an offering to church than money. You can give your heart, your time, your talent. You can slow down for a moment and actually know somebody in God's house. You're following what I'm saying to you? Like, this is a part of us loving God's people. There ought to be a resemblance because the Lord lives in your heart. Thank you, Nickley. I love you. The Lord lives in your heart. That if people look at him, they're like, that's why I'm passionate about those kids. That if somebody looked at you, they go, they belong to Jesus. They belong, it's undeniable, undeniable that you belong to Jesus. This is what I'm saying the church has to start to become again. We've got to ask God to wash our heart to do something new in us. And I know what I'm saying is not good for like crowds, but it's good for people who bear the cross of Jesus Christ. This team cannot replace obedience with performance. Us just singing louder is not going to replace surrender. It's not, guys. Just serving more is not going to replace like sacrifice. When you walk out these doors in a couple minutes, there's a noise out there that is like hurry. You're lay speed up, go faster, and it's loud.

That's why when you walk in those doors, if you look up, there's a word there that says "sanctuary." A sanctuary is not like the world. You've been to like a nature sanctuary. There's not like skyscrapers and buildings and all that. It's like, oh, it's a sanctuary. This is a sanctuary. It pulls you out of the noise to where you can hear again. Make your home a sanctuary, not a movie theater. Make it a sanctuary where your kids can hear the presence of God, where you're not speeding up, you're slowing down. Hug 'em. Come on. How old are they now? or dinner with anybody, they're still picking you right now. Slow down. Listen to me. Slow down because if you live long enough, you're going to need your kids to slow down for you. Look at me. Slow down. Slow down in here. Because if you live long enough, you're going to need the body of Christ to slow down for you. Slow down for it. See, we got a young church, which you're always going to be young. Come on. Alexander and Nicholas, they're young, like, "Come on, dad. Bye." You should make it all the noises for it. Watch your other hand. Come on. I'm like, "Look, there's a time I was doing that too. Come on, anybody with me?" Like, "You going to be 47 one day too. You going to be. Come on. Listen to me. If you come in here and you're just like, "Run, run, run, run, run." You try to model love by how much hurry you have. Then you know what you're teaching the next generation to show love by your absence. Don't show the body of Christ how much you love us by how much money you make. By how gone you are. Love is spelled T-I-M-E. That's how you spell love. Come on. And if you just model to your kids, I love you because I'm gone all the time. I love you and I'm never here. I love you and blah, blah. Then when they're grown and you're old, "Mom, I love you. Look how hard I'm working." Dad, I love you. I don't have time to come help you. See, you got to slow down. The kingdom celebrates waiting, not hurry, not rush. And as much yes, you need to love your family and slow down for your family, but you need to love God's family. And you're going to need God's family to love you. Take time with people. Take time with you. Love them. So into them. I'm not talking about a tithe. I'm not talking about an offer. I'm talking about you. So you into people. And so with nothing of expectation

in return. The scriptures say that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. I'm if you can say like me, God didn't get a good deal with you. He didn't get a good deal with me. I made mistakes. Anybody else made mistakes? But while you were sinning, He died in hopes that you would believe. You sow your heart into people not knowing, not promising. You sow it in faith. That's what Christ did for you. So let's be a church that practices the holy things. We don't fall in love with hurry here. We fall in love with waiting. We fall in love with the sacred things of God. [MUSIC PLAYING]