Definitive Action on Necessary Godly Reforms

- Good morning, 121. Will you stand and worship with us, morning? (upbeat music) ♪ I'll search the wood ♪ ♪ The hand couldn't feel me ♪ ♪ The man's empty praise ♪ ♪ The treasures in faith ♪ ♪ Never in mine ♪ ♪ You gave them all ♪ ♪ You put me back together ♪ ♪ And every desire is now satisfied ♪ ♪ Here in your love ♪ ♪ Oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Nothing is better than you ♪ ♪ I'm not afraid ♪ ♪ I'll show you my weakness ♪ ♪ My failures and flaws ♪ ♪ Lord, you've seen them all ♪ ♪ And you still call me friends ♪ ♪ 'Cause the God of the mountain ♪ ♪ Is the God of the valley ♪ ♪ There's not a place your mercy embrace ♪ ♪ Won't find me again ♪ ♪ There's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Nothing is better than you ♪ ♪ Oh, there's nothing ♪

♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Nothing is better than you ♪ ♪ You turn morning to dancing ♪ ♪ You give beauty for ashes ♪ ♪ You turn shame into glory ♪ ♪ You're the only one who came ♪ ♪ You turn morning to dancing ♪ ♪ You give beauty for ashes ♪ ♪ You turn shame into glory ♪ ♪ You're the only one who came ♪ ♪ You turn grace into gardens ♪ ♪ You turn bones into armies ♪ ♪ You turn seas into highways ♪ ♪ You're the only one who came ♪ ♪ You're the only one who came ♪ ♪ You're the only one who came ♪ ♪ Oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, oh, there's nothing ♪ ♪ Better than you, Lord, there's nothing ♪ ♪ But nothing is better than you ♪ Amen, amen, we give Lord praise this morning. What a beautiful day it is to be the house of Lord, worshiping together. Whether you're here in person, if you're online, if you're watching on your prison cell, we just give God praise this morning for who He is and what He has done. We'll continue in worship. ♪

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ I've been healed in your hands from the moment that I wake up until I lay my head. I will sing of the goodness of God. All my life you have been faced in. And all my life you have been so, so good. Every breath that I am able, all I will sing of the goodness of God. I love you for my mercy, you will let me through the fire and the darkness arise. You are closed like no other, I've known you as a father, and I've known you as a friend and I have lived in the goodness of God. And all my life you have been faced with, all my life, all my life you have been so, so good. Every breath that I am able, all I will sing of the goodness of God. Your goodness is running out, it's running out to me, your goodness is running out, it's running out to me. With my life laid out, I surrender now, I give you everything, your goodness is running out, it's running out to me. Your goodness is running out, it's running out to me, your goodness is running out, it's running out to me. With my life laid out, I surrender now, I give you everything, your goodness is running out, it's running out to me. Don't my life you have been faced, don't my life you have been so, so good. Every breath that I am able, all I will sing of the goodness of God. All my life you have been faced with, all my life you have been so, so good. Every breath that I am able, all I will sing of the goodness of God. You can have a seat as we get to celebrate with baptism's name. And one thing I love about baptism Sundays is we get the opportunity just to celebrate, we get to respond when somebody professes their faith in Jesus and they make that public announcement, we get to clap, we get to cheer, and if you're new here, we've been in a study at Nehemiah and what we've seen so far is that the walls of Jerusalem have been broken And then what happens is they're separated into two different groups, two different choirs, and they march, and as they march, they're worshiping, they're singing. Then eventually they come back together and they just erupt in praise and worship together, not because of the things they've seen themselves accomplish, but with the ways they've seen God meet them, and the things God has done every step of the way. And I think that's such a good example for us as we get together on Sundays throughout the week, we're separated, we're going into our different places, we may face opposition, our walls may be crumbled down, but we still get together together, God meets us every step of the way. We get to be in God's word, we get to pray, we get to confess, repenting each other, but then at the end we get to come back together every week, and it's such a privilege, it's such a blessing that we get that opportunity every single Sunday to gather and worship.

But when they gather together and worship, they just gather together and give God a thumbs up and say, "Hey, thanks God, that was great." It says they erupted in praise, they sing hymns and songs of joy, songs of celebration. So I want to encourage you this morning church to sing, to sing loud, sing for what God has done, it might have been a tough week, but unlike the people of Nehemiah and the Israelites, we get to look back on the cross, we get to look back at what God has done for us. We get to serve a God who is holy, who is worthy, who is greatly to be praised, a God who loves us enough that he'd be willing to send his only son to take on the sin and the punishment of sin and suffering that we deserve. But our joy and our celebration comes when three days later he was raised again, he turned alive, the week at the spend that he turned alive on him, and that is worth singing about this morning, that is worth praising him this morning. So even if you have a terrible voice, sing it out, the Bible calls us and tells us to make a joyful noise to the Lord. So I encourage you this morning, as we sing, to sing loud, give God the praise, the honor, the worship and the glory that he deserves this morning. Amen. ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah in the presence of my enemies ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah, louder than the unbelief ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah, my weapon is a melody ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah, and heaven calls to fight for me ♪ ♪ I'm gonna sleep out of the storm ♪ ♪ Louder and louder, you're gonna hear my praises roar ♪ ♪ Up from the ashes, hope will arise ♪ ♪ That is defeated, the king is alive ♪ ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah with everything inside me ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah and I will wash the darkness flee ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah in the middle of the mystery ♪ ♪ I raise a hallelujah in fear you lost, you hold on me ♪ ♪ I'm gonna sleep out of the storm ♪ ♪ Louder and louder, you're gonna hear my praises roar ♪ ♪ Up from the ashes, hope will arise ♪ ♪ That is defeated, the king is alive ♪ [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] # And it's your breath and our love # # So we pour out our praise # # Pour out our praise, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise #

# And you only, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise # # Pour out our praise, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise # # You only # # # # # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # Oh, and all the earth will shout your praise # # Oh, and all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # It's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise # # Pour out our praise, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise # # You only, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise #

# Pour out our praise, it's your breath # # And our love, so we pour out our praise # # You only, it's your breath # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And our love, great are you, Lord # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # Great are you, Lord # # And all the earth will shout your praise # # Our hearts will cry, these bones will see # # And all the earth will shout your praise # Follow you, Lord, great God, you are worthy of our praise, God, of our worship. God, we are thankful for the breath in our lungs and that breath turns into praise for you and for you alone, Father. God, thank you for the gift it is to celebrate people coming to new life and you and professing that publicly in baptism. Thank you for the gift it is to sing to you, God. God, it is just a gift to praise and worship you and to be called a child of yours, Father. So, God, this morning I pray, as we dive into your word, God, we give us the ears to hear, God, the hearts to receive it. God, would you give us eyes to see we are leading us in the hands of God. Father, we love you, and it's just a gift to serve and honor you this morning. We ask all this, all in the name of Jesus. Amen, and we see that. - There were portions of that

that I did not pre-approve just to be clear. Love those guys, so give a phenomenal leadership to our serve week. We've been talking about what it means to be sent. And serve week is a phenomenal way to test something or to try something. Oftentimes we may not know exactly what it is that God has for us if he's stern something new. And there's opportunities to give it a try. And serve week is a great way for you to give that a try. And then our encouragement is if you have families that you participate with your family, shoulder to shoulder. So we have a number of things where everyone can be a part, no matter the age in serving. If you're turning your Bibles to Nehemiah, we'll be in Nehemiah chapter 11. And this is our last week in Nehemiah. My hope is that anytime we do a study of a book of the Bible that we come to the conclusion of it, we're moving on to something different, but we're simply building on what it is that God has been doing in our hearts and that we were just continuing obedience to the way he's worked and shaped us in this particular book of the Bible. In order to wrap this up, I've got seven or eight, I have so many points today that I couldn't count them, but I just want to see what God does with us and move through those well at the end of these chapters to supplement what we do this morning.

Our Against the Grain podcast that Eric leads, he's done such a great job of tying into what we do week to week in our sermons so that we can have more depth to whatever a particular topic is or build on something that we might not have spent as much time working through. Two podcasts I would recommend for you off of this week's message that will be helpful is the radical idea of rest. We'll be talking about the Sabbath, Andrew and Beth Sawyer's, my son in daughter-in-law began tracking with a couple of guys named Jefferson Bethke and Jeremy Pryor a year or two ago, maybe longer, my daughter-in-law. And he's just shown some really cool ways of how to revise the way we think about family in the West. One of his books is Family Revision, it's excellent read, it'll challenge the way we're thinking, but one of the ideas that is really encouraged is the idea of Sabbath and having that 24-hour period of rest and ways to do that is young families, whether you're single, whether you have expanded family, whatever it is. The podcast is to help think about ideas and ways to live out the Sabbath. Cam, Hayes and Caleb Cortez, they're leaders of our worship and they did a podcast, worship is a way of life. Great way to lock into what God is doing at 121 and the way we think about our worship

that also is one of our topics today. So I encourage you to take a listen or watch those particular podcasts. To move through this part of Nehemiah, I want us to work under one idea for the many ideas. And my hope really today is that you'll be encouraged, so many of you should just be really encouraged by what you hear because you're living this out really well. And there might be one thing in here or two things in here, it's like, okay, I might need to get that a little more in order. And what Nehemiah has done, it's not just about building a physical wall, it's about a reform of the heart and being obedient to the way God has called us to actually live. So it's not just about a structure, it's about a heart. In a heart, there's a heart of worship and a heart of love for God in such a way that our desire is to follow God in very specific ways. So definitive action on necessary godly reforms, that's what I want us to think about. Definitive action, Nehemiah is calling the people to definitive action, he's not asking them to think about it for a while, he is laying it out and he's bringing it and he's saying, this is how God has designed us and we need to reform our hearts today and get in line with the way that God has designed things. Actually, there'll be the greatest joy in satisfaction

when we are in line with the ways of God. So the first one we begin with is in chapter 11 verses one through three. And it's to populate the cities with godly people. In chapter 11 verse one, now the leaders of the people lived in Jerusalem, but the rest of the people cast lots to bring one out of 10 to live in Jerusalem, the holy city while nine tenths remain, excuse me, while nine tenths remain in the other cities. And the people blessed all the men who volunteered to live in Jerusalem. All righty. So what happens here? Jerusalem was underpopulated. It was part of why they were struggling and couldn't rebuild the wall. A number of people from different cities had come in to help them rebuild the wall. Now the walls rebuilt. People are returning to their cities. And in order for Jerusalem to function well, the city need to be populated and populated with the people of God. In that day, the way the will of God was determined oftentimes with the casting of lots. So the first way they desired to populate the city of Jerusalem was a cast lot. So at one out of 10 in different cities then would come and live in Jerusalem. However, in verse two, there's this volunteering

that goes on to live in Jerusalem. One way perhaps to think about this is decades ago, we had a draft into the military. So you could either be chosen into the military or you could volunteer to be in it. What's happening here, some are being chosen to go to Jerusalem, others are volunteering and they're blessing those who are going to the city, verse three. Now these are the heads of the provinces who lived in Jerusalem, but in the cities of Judah each lived on his own property in their cities. The Israelites, the priests, the Levites, the temple servants and the descendants of Solomon's servants. So this wide array of people, godly people populating the cities. When we talk about living scent, one of the movements has been happening for years now is a move for global workers and for US cities for people to go and be sent to the cities. People are moving to the cities more and more and more. And oftentimes the cities are some of the most liberal and ungodly places. So we populate the cities with godly people. We send people that plant churches in the middle of the city. There was a couple in our church a few years ago that God put on their heart to move to the northeast and they're in Boston helping a church

and being a part of helping the movement of Christ in the city of Boston. Maybe God has you exactly where he wants you in the city where you are. It could be that God is stirring you for another city that you might be a part of bringing the message of Jesus into that city. So the first thing we think about today is in our own hearts today, are we in the city that God has invited us to be into? And I guess a good question would be have we ever actually asked God, is this where he wants me? Is this the city where he has me? Is this the neighborhood where he wants me to be? Did I pray in the first place about where I am? And if not, maybe it's good just to ask a fresh. God, am I in the right spot? Is are we in the right place today where you want us to be in the city to serve the city? That's first thought. The second thought is to joyfully worship with gratitude to God. If you'll move to chapter 12, Travis alluded to this when he was leading us in worship. But as followers of God, and on this side of Nehemiah and the rest of scripture, through Jesus Christ, are we joyfully worshiping with gratitude to God? Verse 27. Now the dedication of the wall of Jerusalem, they sought out the Levites from all their places

to bring them to Jerusalem so that they might celebrate the dedication with gladness, with hymns of thanksgiving and with songs to the accompaniment of symbols, harps and liars. Now there are moments where something happens that we gather to celebrate and worship God for what he's done. This was one such moment. The wall is completed. It was a 52 day project amidst much persecution at obstacles and now it's done. And they're pausing to celebrate and worship God for what he's done. There've been those moments over the years at 121 that I can just mark in my heart and mind where God met us in a way that was different than other ways. When we gathered on a Monday night and celebrated our 25th anniversary as a church, I don't know how to explain what it is that God did in that moment. Years ago, we had a worship service out at the lake and several people were baptized out at the lake. It's where we all gathered on a Sunday morning. There was something about that morning that God met us and he was worshiped with a joy and a praise. A few weeks ago, I mentioned at a celebration of life, we sang the doxology at the end of the service. It was different than other moments.

So we gather weekly, and then there's those moments that God has us to uniquely gather and celebrate something specific that he's done. This was one such moment. The wall is finished, and now they're gathering. And this is the model of what worship is to look like for us all throughout scripture. They are celebrating with gladness. And the only way that we will actually celebrate with gladness is when our own hearts are glad. Apart from a glad heart, it would be difficult to celebrate with gladness. How do our hearts become glad? And Psalm 16, 11, it says, you make known to me the path of life, and your presence is fullness of joy. And in your right hand, there are pleasures forever. Oh, there's a joy that comes in knowing Jesus Christ crucified and risen. On the cross, he took our sins, and he freed us up. There's no condemnation in Christ Jesus. Only life and life abundant in him. He's the resurrected one who's conquered sin, overcome the world, conquered death, destroyed the works of the devil. He became the wrath of God for he took on the wrath of God for us so that we could avoid it. What about that would not cause our hearts to be glad today?

And when we have a glad heart, and we know Jesus, and we abide deeply in Jesus, and as we abide in him and grow in him, that joy and gladness grows, and it's out of a glad heart, then that we worship God in gladness, which would lead us to a logical question, wouldn't it? If we cannot worship God with a joyful and glad heart today, maybe we don't know the God who gives joy and pleasure deep in the heart. Or maybe we're not abiding deeply in him so that we are refreshed in him and full of who he is and enjoying him for who he is. Do we need reform today in our hearts in the way that we approach the worship of God? Do we come with a glad and grateful heart? Do we realize Zephaniah 3.17 is as true for us as it was true in Zephaniah's day? The Lord your God is in your midst of victorious warrior. He will exalt over you with joy. He will be quiet in his love. He will shout over you with shouts of joy. How could our hearts not erupt back in a joy towards him when he is erupting in joy over us? And that is happening this moment. They recognize God is the one behind this project. And then as Travis described in verse 31, then I had the leaders of Judah come up on top of the wall and I appointed two great choirs, the first proceeding to the right on top of the wall

toward the refuse gate. And he ends up putting choirs on the walls. Do you remember early on in Nehemiah? This is the beauty of working through a book of the Bible. Do you remember what Tobiah and Sam ballot, how they were mocking Nehemiah and those who were building the wall? Do you remember what they said? They said, you're not gonna have what you need to do that. You're not builders. That wall is going to be so fragile that a fox could walk across the top of it and it will fall. Welcome. (congregation laughing) We're gonna load that thing with two choirs on either side and we're gonna exalt the name of God over this city today. And they did it with joy and with gladness, verse 36. And as kinsmen are mentioned with the musical instruments of David, the man of God, there's this generational passing down of worship, the kind of worship that David did with his instruments, Ezra the scribe went before them, then verse 40, then the two choirs took their stand in the house of God, so did I and half of the officials with me, then verse 43. And on that day, they offered great sacrifices. They rejoiced because God had given them great joy. God is a giver of joy. Even the women and children rejoiced,

so that the joy of Jerusalem was heard from afar. There was this joy that was heard. And I would say today in John 4.24 that for those who know Jesus Christ, that what God is doing is He is searching for worshipers who will worship Him in spirit and truth, who will have the heart's affection to match and align with the truth of God. Not an emotion and affection that's out there. This stirs our hearts for Him, and there's a joy that He rups out of Him. This past week was see at the pole. This has been going on for decades now. Once a year, students will gather around their flag poles. It started out high school and middle school decades ago. Now elementary school students do it. So here's one picture this week. Here's an elementary school this week. And these are students that are gathering outside of their schools, praying, praising, worshiping their God. And praying that their campus will know Jesus Christ. It's a beautiful picture of worship. And then a few years ago, we had a man named Dave Eubaint come to our church. He is part of a ministry called Free Burma Rangers. He was a special ops guy, and instead of coming back when his service was over, he stayed in Burma. He's been in Iraq.

This is in Ukraine. And he's just trained locals, how to fight in a military way. They do medical kinds of work. And then they'll do VBSs and share the gospel. And there are all kinds of people coming to faith. This is an Australian reporter that was at one of his trainings in Thailand. She's in Ukraine covering what's going on in Ukraine, ran into Dave Eubaint. She's given her life to Christ. She was baptized outside of Kiev. It's a beautiful picture of the gospel spreading out and a joy and a celebration. In his work in Ukraine right now, he came in to contact with this particular church. And this is on the front lines. There have been over 20,000 people that have come through this church in need. And in the church, the pastor said, in the last four years, three or four years, everybody's had food. Every need has been met that's come through as we've helped people pass through. And then here they are on the front lines of a war torn area worshiping God. All over the world today, people have experienced the joy of Christ, the joy of God in them, and they're responding in worship to God. Do our hearts need reform today in joy?

And the way we approach our worship as a community, privately, our small group life, and as we go. In my mind, there ought to be such a joy radiating from you that everywhere you are, whatever neighborhood or city that people can see and hear your joy from afar. Even if they just see it in your face. Joyful worship. So third thing that happens here is Nehemiah was the governor of Jerusalem for 12 years after the wall was built. And then he returned to Artaxerxes in Southern Iran where he was the cup bearer. He stayed there for a while. Then he came back to Jerusalem and the reforms that he had started had gone awry. Now this says something about leadership today. When there's a leadership vacuum and no one replaces the leader with the same kind of intensity and zeal and definitive action, then people tend to wander and go adrift. That's what we see happen in Israel's history. You've seen it in your workspaces. You know when you have effective leaders, you know when you have ineffective leaders, you might have a season where it's good, a season where it goes south. Somebody comes in and that's good again. That's what's happening here. Nehemiah comes back and he's not happy with what he sees.

And I don't know that we should emulate necessarily what he does, but we should have the heart that he has for the holiness of God and the purity of the people of God. So the next thing is to preserve the sacredness of God's work. Tobiah and Sambalot were ones who mocked the work of Nehemiah. While Nehemiah was gone, the high priest gave Tobiah a room in the temple. Nehemiah comes back, he discovers this in verse 70. He said, "I came to Jerusalem and learned about the evil "that a lie sheep, he's the high priest, "had done for Tobiah by preparing a room for him "in the courts of the house of God." It was very displeasing to me. Then I gave an order, and they cleansed the rooms. And I returned there the utensils of the house of God with the grain offerings and the frankincense. I wonder if this is a bit of a foreshadowing of when Jesus cleansed the temple. So we want to make sure today that we maintain the sacredness of God's house, that we maintain the sacredness of the things of God. Jesus would say that a little 11, 11, is the whole lump of dough. You let a little bit of unsacored get moving, and it expands the whole thing. So we want to guard our heart. Is there anything today that's not

being preserved or made sacred around God's work? The next reform that he speaks of is to give generously to God's work. In chapter 13, verse 11, so I reprimanded the officials and said, why is the house of God forsaken? Then I gathered them together and restored them to their posts. Back in chapter 10, before Nehemiah left, he had put back in place for them this idea of how they were to be generous toward God and towards the work of God. In verse 12, all due to them brought the tithe of the grain, wine, and oil into the storehouses. The tithe is not, depending on what your church background is, tithe is probably not a word you're using in your business today or in your work or in your home. But the word tithe means a tenth. And the idea is that the first tenth, the Old Testament descriptors, the first tenth of what we have goes back to God. So the very best of what we have, the first of what we have goes to Him, not the leftovers of what we have go back to God, but the first of what we have. And this is what he had put into place in chapter 10, verse 32. We also placed ourselves under obligation to contribute usually one third of a shekel for the service of the house of our God. So we placed ourselves and said, we're gonna put a third of a shekel. The law required that they do half a shekel,

but they're poor and they're doing what they can in this moment, but they're committed to not neglecting the house and the work of God. Then in verse 35, he says that they might bring the first fruits of our ground and the first fruits of all the fruit of every tree to the house of the Lord annually and then bring to the house of our God, all the first born of everything that we have. Then verse 37, we'll also bring the first of our dough, our contributions, everything, the tithe of our ground to the Levites. We're bringing the first of everything. Then verse 39, thus we will not neglect the house of our God. They were committed in chapter 10 under Nehemiah's leadership to not neglect the work of the house of God, but something happened when Nehemiah left. Maybe their hearts weren't bent towards it. And when there was a pressing of leadership on it, then it was happening and when that was removed, it was not. Some thoughts about generous giving from the scripture. Probably the biggest problem is our understanding of what is God's and what is ours. Psalm 24 one says, "The earth is the Lord's "and all it contains, the world and those who dwell in it." Everything that you and I have is God's. We are managers, not owners. 100% is God's. 100% of our time, 100% of our talents,

100% of our treasures, resources are God's. So the premise that we begin with is everything is God's. How am I using everything that he's given me? Not just I give him my first 10th or if I even do that much, but I give him a little bit, I give him a 10th and that's all that I give to God. No, it is all God's Psalm 24 one. In Malachi three, the prophet would say that the people, the whole nation was robbing God. And they said, "How are we robbing God?" Like, can you just think of a way that you might rob God? How can I rob God? Can't see him. How am I robbing him? Well, you're robbing him by not bringing your tithes into the storehouse. So bring them and test me, God says, and then watch things overflow. Now here's a challenge with the way sometimes we'll turn around and think about giving. I might even give more. So that God will bless me. I'm gonna say today that's the wrong motivation. There are really godly people who have nothing. And there are really godly people who have a what. Why God chooses to entrust different people to different things? I have no idea. But it's from him, it's all his. And then I'll work out of what he's given me.

And then see what he chooses to do with it. Luke 638, Jesus said, "Give and it will be given to you." Good measure, press down, shaking together, running over. They'll pour it into your lap for whatever measure you deal out to others, it'll be dealt to you in return. In 2 Corinthians 9, verses 6-38, especially verse seven, the way we're to give is the way God has purposed it in our hearts, not grudgingly or under compulsion. God loves a cheerful giver. Say, okay, well, I'm not cheerful, so I'll just keep my money. If I'm gonna be miserable, I might as well keep it. No, sometimes we give our way into cheerfulness. You say, you know what, it's a bummer. I brought my friend today and you're talking about giving. It's the very thing they don't like. I've shared this story often over the years and we never know what God is doing in the life of someone. In a friend of mine years ago, he was addicted to drugs. He had all kinds of struggles going on, sin issues. He ended up going to fellowship church one Sunday and Ed Young was preaching on tithing. Now, you would think somebody done go to church for a long time, they're addicted to drugs, all these different struggles. A message on tithing, maybe not gonna be the best one. But you know what happened that day with him? He lessened and he thought, you know what, I can't get anything else right in my life, I can do that. You never know what God is doing in the heart of a person. So we don't have to cringe when we hear something talked

about it, we think, oh, geez. God is bigger than the way we interpret life. In a friend of mine, the time he had two little boys that were in elementary school, he went to a Lutheran church and the Lutheran church had a Sunday school in the worship time, and his dad was dropping off his son and Sunday school, and the way Sunday school worked, they would study the Bible and then they would have envelopes and you put some money in the envelope and you give your tithe on your way out. A little boy asked his dad that day when he was dropping him off, he said, "Do you have my quarter?" And he said, "You know, I don't have any change "on me today, so I don't." And his son got really upset and almost started crying, and the dad said, "Well, what is wrong?" He said, "If I don't have my quarter, "I can't pay my way out of this place." (audience laughing) A cheerful heart, you don't have to pay your way out of here, it's a generous opportunity if you'd like to give. (audience laughing) When we move into the New Testament, and some people will say, "Well, the tithe is not "in the New Testament," and you know what? You can make a decent argument about that, but generosity is, and nowhere in the New Testament do I see things backing down from what the old was. So I cheer you on if you see it that way and shoot way past that 10%.

Because God is looking for generous givers to do His work. I want to share with you a few things that just happens to what you do. And I've had friends tell me at other churches here when they hear their pastor talk about ways they've given, he said, "It just feels arrogant." So I don't know if this feels that way or not. I think it's okay sometimes just that we know what God's doing through the money that's being given. But in the last few years, six stones built a new building that they work out of to meet needs in the community. And 121 gave $100,000 to that project and that effort. The Mid Cities Women Clinic. Yeah, it's awesome. The Mid Cities Women's Clinic built a second clinic in Haslett not too long ago, and 121 gave $100,000 to that effort to help girls have their, keep their babies. We are funding a church plant training center in India. It gave $100,000 to help with that effort. Our church funded the courts that are being used for our neighborhood and community to reach. those are the buildings and the structures the wall was built but the hearts are being reformed so those structures just enable things to happen and to move out and to be a help and then Thursday night we had a small gathering here and our church is served with orphan outreach for probably 20 years they've recently changed their name to ever known so you'll start hearing it that way but we've working Honduras consistently there's a school called NICO they've bounced from building to building and there's been a desire from people to help build a permanent kind of school structure so there was a gathering 15 people showed up on Thursday

night just to hear about it and they were looking to raise two hundred thousand dollars for phase one it would be a four hundred thousand dollar project and the 15 people left and then Kevin stayed behind and he watched the ever known ladies get a little bit giddy looking at their phone and he wasn't sure what was happening he said what's going on he said two hundred thousand dollars just came in already for the building who know but it's just the hearts are generous and somehow you just lay it out there and people are waiting and so you just get it out see what where is God work is God working everybody's heart to do that no he may have something different for you but we have an open heart and a joyful heart to give two other things rethink how we're doing Sabbath I shared that podcast with you at the outset this is what was going on in Nehemiah's day verse 17 of chapter 13 then I reprimanded the nobles of Judah and said to them what's this evil thing you're doing by profaning the Sabbath day did not your fathers do the same so that our God brought on us and on this city all this trouble yet you're adding to the wrath on Israel by profaning the Sabbath what set the people of God apart one of the signs that set them apart was the keeping of the Sabbath and I was interested I was listening to a podcast yesterday about the Sabbath and I'd not picked up on this before but the month the year or based on lunar calendar the Jewish festivals lunar calendar the only thing that is not on the lunar calendar is the week and the week is grounded in creation in Genesis 1 six days of work one day of rest it's built in the very fabric of the creation of God and it continues but the Sabbath is for man not man for the Sabbath someone shared a story with me of our New York mission trip the summer and they stayed in the Jewish quarter and they were walking around one day in the Sabbath and everything was shut down which is actually kind of cool we're in Jerusalem last time we were in Israel and on the Sabbath in Jerusalem it's almost eerie because nobody is out they just cease and somehow it works imagine that we said they were walking along and a man came out and said asked two of our students to come up and could they help him do something because he couldn't work and so they gladly went up they were asked to turn the light on because he would have been violating the Sabbath for them to turn the light switch that's not the point the point is to cease from all activity and rest I'm grateful for my son and daughter-in-law that are kind of leading the way afresh for us in a way to think about the Sabbath I would cheer you on to do the same

some people by the way would argue there's no need for a Sabbath because in Hebrews 4 we're told that we have our Sabbath rest it's permanent in Christ himself the work was done on the cross once we have Christ we actually have a permanent Sabbath rest within us we walk out of a place of rest and in the fabric of creation is six days on one day off you could argue by the way we might get into far less trouble if we actually worked six days and just took one off for marriage. And in Nehemiah 13, he comes back to something he had talked about in chapter 10, and it was mixed marriages. And mixed marriage is not in the sense of an ethnic mix or a national mix, but in a religious mix. This was the problem in Israel. Now, here's where I would suggest we probably don't follow in Nehemiah's example, although the idea he's passionate about for sure, but in verse 25, "So I contended with them, and cursed them, and struck some of them, and pulled out their hair, and made them swear by God." You didn't know that was in your Bible, did you? "You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take of their daughters for your sons, or for yourselves." Did not solemnly King of Israel sin regarding these things, yet among the many nations, there was no king like him. And he was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel. Nevertheless, the foreign women caused even him to sin. Let me just share with you. I know it's not always the popular idea. We're not interested in popular or interested in following God's design. That's where the greatest joy is. And we can start today. We can't go backwards. We can start today, and God is incredibly gracious in meeting us in today. And this is what he says about marriage. And I would say the problem is in 1 Corinthians 6, 19, and 20. Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit and that you're not your own? You have him from God. In verse 20, "For you've been bought with a price, therefore glorify God in your body. Your body is not yours, and my body is not mine. Our bodies are gods, and the Spirit of God, through Jesus Christ, indwells our bodies. It's God that we honor and His design for our bodies and for our lives." In Genesis 2, we're told that a man and a woman, they're to leave their father and their mother, and they're to cleave to one another and become one flesh. And that one flesh is not just that consummation of a wedding night. That consummates, and then it is an ongoing lifelong becoming more and more in a one flesh, intimate relationship with each other as we grow in our relationship with God. And then the sexual part of our lives is designed for marriage. The song of songs describes beautifully the sexual nature of our marriages, but it's for a husband and wife in

marriage. And then we find later in Matthew 19, 6, that what God has joined together that no man is to separate. God is the one who puts together marriage. It's a covenant relationship. It is binding, and it is not to be broken. In 2 Corinthians 6, 14, He gives us guidance, if you will, and warning that a believer is not to be bound with an unbeliever. So while that was true in the old, it's also true in the new. Why is that? Because when two people come together, something starts to happen as we grow in that relationship. Here's a way I know how to explain it. If this is a husband and wife, and you start out here, and then over the ensuing years, one has a relationship with Jesus. One does not. What starts to happen is this one's kind of growing this way, this one's growing that way, and you actually grow further and further apart. That's not bound together in Christ. Now, if we're in that kind of a marriage, what happens with Scripture is clear, the person that's a believer, you absolutely stay put, and you're begging and praying God to change the heart of the spouse, and living out Christ before that person, for sure. But I would even say today, this is not just about different religions or faiths, I think you better take a look honestly and seriously at it if you're in two different denominations. I've watched this difficulty for decades now with people, and everybody thinks it works because they're madly in love and everybody just forgets any kind of reason. no, we're raising them Catholic. No, we're raising them non-denominant. What are we gonna do? And then most people quit. Or we just say, you know what? The kid can figure it out. In whatever, whatever thing do we do, where we just say, let the kid figure it out. But that seems to be a thing in faith all the time, but we'll just let them figure it out. Okay, well, they don't figure everything else out on their own too. No, it's your job as a parent to instruct them in the way that they should go.

That's your job. So we wanna be united. Can those things be over? I'm not saying they can't be overcome to some degree, but it's difficult. And so if we can, we wanna do it God's way. And then the best we can from there, wherever we are today. And we can be a help on these things, by the way. And then I would say to the single person today, 1 Corinthians 7, verse 35, that Paul says for the single person that there ought to be an undistracted devotion to the Lord. My son's church in Fort Worth, the pastor did a series on heaven. It's paradox church. If you wanna hear, it's great series. But it hit me for the first time, 'cause I always talk about marriage being a beautiful picture of Christ in the church. And it is. But you know what I've about concluded? That a single person with an undistracted devotion to the Lord might be the best picture of what goes on in heaven, because there is no marriage in heaven. And so what a beautiful picture either way, married or single with an undistracted devotion to the Lord. Then ultimately we land at the marriage supper of the Lamb. What happens when we think about being sent

when we live really healthy single lives or really God honoring marriages? We're actually free to be sent and serve and do the things that help each other, do the things that God has sent us to do. So how do we wrap our time? I've been taking Spanish class, some of our staff are, taking classes. So this is how I would say we end. Contesta la Pragunta. Answer the question. What did Nehemiah do? He asked a question and then he asked God if he could be the answer to the question. Are you willing to ask God the question? What about my neighborhood and my city? And then God, I'm in. What do you wanna do with me in it? And then are there any reforms necessary today in our hearts and hopefully loads of gratitude? Father, thank you for our time this morning and so grateful for your word and God that we can be strengthened, encouraged, affirmed, that we can be challenged, convicted. And God, we know you love a repentant people. So I pray we'd not be afraid to come in repentance today. We'd also not be afraid to just hear well done from you today. And there's no need for reform. You're moving the right way. So God, I pray we take definitive action.

Whatever it is that you start our hearts to do. I pray that in Jesus' name. Let's be quiet for just a moment and if any of these things have struck you, let this just be a small space to consider what to do with them. And again, we're available to talk any time on any of these things that would be helpful.