Don't Despise the Small Things | Zechariah 4 | Nathan Glover

Thank you, Allison Park Church. It is a privilege to get to be with you this morning. I hope you enjoyed that video as much as I did. My name is Nathan Glover. As I said, I work for Urban Impact Foundation, and my parents are pastors Ed and Tammy Glover who founded Urban Impact back in 1995. And so we've been at this thing for a long time. And there is a unique blessing, a unique privilege of getting to work in a particular area of God's vineyard over the decades and seeing the power of God over time. What I really want to do today is I want you to get to know my family. As you heard in the video, Urban Impact is one big family on one mission, to make disciples that make disciples in the city of Pittsburgh. And so that's who we are. And I want you to get to know our family. We're gonna start with my immediate family. You can see on the screen. This is my immediate family. This is my wife and my four kids, Elijah, Shakira, David Israel, and Samuel. And if you look at the fuzzy head that I am holding, that little baby, if you don't think that's cute, you have no soul. Heaven is not even on the table. I'm kidding, but obviously he is very cute and I'm very serious about it.

And so I love, that's my family. I'm very proud of them. And so that, we have been urban missionaries on the north side since 2012 together. And my parents have been at it actually since 1986. And so I'm gonna, we're gonna get to know sort of who Urban Impact is, who the Glovers are, and what God, the passion that God has put in our hearts. So let me show you 1986, the north side. That is Allegheny Center Alliance Church. My father was hired to be the outreach pastor at that church. And right next to it, you can see that little house is my parents' house, the house that I grew up in, where they moved onto Avery Street, onto a street where four out of five homes were boarded up or unoccupied. And they see the north side, which is as big as Erie, Pennsylvania, with a population the size of Butler, and they're going, how are we, this little family, doing outreach for this little church, how are we going to make an impact in an area so big with so many people to reach? Let me fast forward to 2025. That is what Urban Impact looks like today. Today, you see all of those buildings, all those schools that we're in, all the community centers, the yellow buildings that are new, Urban Impact now owns those,

and in the middle is our campus, where we, on the dead center of the north side, we are located, and all of those houses, you see all those white and yellow houses, all of those houses represent urban missionaries who have also moved their families into the north side of Pittsburgh, now replicating what my parents have done and are doing, and now it has gone from one urban missionary family to dozens in all 18 neighborhoods of the north side of Pittsburgh. Isn't that awesome? And that's what you get to see when you put one foot in front of the other, trusting God day by day on a mission for Jesus Christ, and we are making disciples that make disciples throughout the north side. I wanna go to the next slide where you can get some numbers to help you understand this. Just this last year, we worked with over 2,200 children and youth. That's just through 12th grade. We had over 1,100 responses to the gospel. Now, you might be thinking, does that mean that half the kids that came to Urban Impact respond to the gospel? No, that number represents just, that 2,200 number just represents the kids we work with in program. It doesn't represent the families or our alumni,

which is now several thousand people, even larger than that, and those folks are coming to Christ because our goal is to transform lives in the city of Pittsburgh one person, one family, one block at a time. We served over 30,000 meals this past year alone, and what you see here, you guys run a killer VBS. Anyone love VBS in the room? Any VBS fans? Yeah, I love that in the front. My wife runs the VBS for our church. It's a huge undertaking, right? Dozens of volunteers, lots of hours beforehand to get ready to do 9 to 5, or 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., Monday through Friday for a week, training kids up to love Jesus. What you see here, that is Urban Impacts VBS with one major difference. It runs nine consecutive weeks in the summer from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., why? We serve primarily single-parent homes. And so this allows all those families to have a place to their, the mother or the father or the grandpa or the grandma can go to work, and that kid can be raised up in the love and likeness of Jesus Christ. This camp is also an education-based camp where we're gonna do math and literacy support. So imagine the work it takes to do that, and that is just one of the education programs

that our education department puts on. Isn't that unbelievable? Imagine the discipleship that happens for that almost 200 kids. It's amazing. And right now, you guys are in the middle of a campaign called Kingdom Builders. When you give to Kingdom Builders, this is one of the things that you give to, Urban Impact Foundation. You guys, I'm sure, would love for all of these families, these single-parent homes to have a place to place their kids, but you can't provide that, but we can together, and you are when you give to Kingdom Builders. Isn't that amazing? Let me show you Urban Impact Athletics. We had 980 students in Urban Impact Athletics just this past year. The vast majority of the kids that have responded to the gospel every year come to us through athletics. We do baseball, basketball, soccer, and flag football. We also have a Performing Arts Academy with 350 students in that Performing Arts Academy. I don't know if you can feel it right now, but there's a change in the arts a little bit. There's a change in the arts. You can see it with The Chosen. Anyone go see the David movie? Oh, I hope you go see it.

It was amazing. I believe that God, God created the arts. We know this from scripture, and I believe that God is taking the arts back for himself, and this is one place where we are redeeming the arts for the Lord Jesus Christ, and 350 kids are being discipled through the arts at Urban Impact Foundation. And that is what you guys are a part of, and the partnership between APC and Urban Impact is just beginning. It's just getting going. You're gonna be hearing more and more about Urban Impact in the coming years because we are on a mission now together, and your Pastor Jeff is about business, and I can't wait to see what we're gonna do, and you guys have a campus on the north side of Pittsburgh. Pastor Dave Leak, I think, is in the building. I miss his preaching so much. I love Pastor Kyle. He's killing it, just so you know. But Pastor Dave, are you here? Can you raise your hand for me, brother, wherever you are? Right over here. Can we give him a round of applause? It's awesome to send him to Jacksonville, but bro, I miss you, love you to death. What we are doing in the north side,

this is the beginning, guys. I don't think we've peaked. I think there's more to come, but before I get really preaching, let's get into God's word, and we're gonna be looking at Zechariah chapter four. This is a message I have preached before. I have felt the Lord burden me with it to preach it many times, because it has really transformed my life, and I believe that God has a word for you this morning from the prophet Zechariah chapter four. But in order to understand this word, we are going to have to do a little history lesson. Now, I'm a nerd, okay? As they said earlier before I got here, I went to Oxford University. That means I'm a nerd, okay? I like nerdy things. If you're a nerd, any nerds in the building? Nerds? Okay, some nerds? All right, my people, welcome. We're gonna have fun. If you're not a nerd, I just apologize. We're gonna still have a good time. I'm gonna do my best to make this fun, but we're gonna do a little history lesson to understand the historical and the biblical context of our passage today, because with the prophets,

that's the only way to understand them. You have to understand the context, and then you can understand what the prophet is saying. So before we get into it, let's pray one more time, and then we'll get into this. Father, I just pray that you would be with me. You would take my lips, and you would speak through them. You'd take my mind. You'd take all of our minds, and you would think through them. You would take our wills, and you would bend them to your own, and you'd take our hearts, Lord Jesus, and set them on fire with love for yourself. All this we ask in Jesus' holy and precious name, amen. So our passage comes from Zechariah chapter four, but we're going to begin with the formation of the kingdom of Israel, which happens under King Saul. You can see a slide of it right here. That is the formation of the kingdom of Israel under King Saul, but Saul ends up rejecting the Lord, and so. David ascends to the throne, and he builds up the city of Jerusalem as the political and spiritual capital of Israel. David's son Solomon is considered the wisest king of Israel, and he builds the temple of the Lord. You can see a replica of that in this slide. And he builds up the temple of the Lord,

and it becomes not just the spiritual capital of Israel, but the spiritual capital of the world. God places his presence here. This is really the forerunner in all of the sacrificial system that is taking place there for Jesus Christ. Now, if Solomon is the wisest king of Israel, his son Rehoboam may be the stupidest. His son is so dumb that he manages to alienate 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel, and the country splits in half, as you can see in this slide. Above the kingdom of Israel, 10 tribes go. The northern tribes break off from Rehoboam, and the tribe of Judah, which if you remember, David was from the tribe of Judah, so these are his relatives. They stick with Rehoboam and David's line, as well as the tribe of Benjamin sticks with him. Now, the northern kingdom rejects God pretty much out the gate, and they are eventually destroyed by the Assyrian Empire. The Assyrian Empire was the biggest, baddest empire that Mesopotamia had seen to that point, and they tried to destroy the kingdom of Judah, but God saved the day and protected them, but after this event, the southern kingdom of Judah rejects the Lord, and they are destroyed, as well as the Assyrian Empire, by the Babylonian Empire,

and the Babylonian Empire is led by someone you might remember if you've read the book of Daniel, King Nebuchadnezzar. King Nebuchadnezzar destroys the Assyrians, destroys the southern kingdom of Judah, and destroys the city of Jerusalem, and the temple that God has put his name upon in Jerusalem, and so the Jews are very concerned at this time. They're like, how do we worship the Lord without the temple? How do we worship the Lord without the sacrificial system? But it gets worse. Nebuchadnezzar has taken all the people he sees as valuable from that area, and he has transported them to his city in Babylon and the surrounding area, so now they are not even in the land that God promised them, and they are terrified of the future, and so God raises up a prophet named Jeremiah, and Jeremiah speaks a very famous word. Anyone know Jeremiah 29 11? That word was spoken to these people in Babylon, right? I know the plans I have for you, the plans to prosper you, not to harm you, to give you hope in the future. He's saying that to them as they feel like they have no hope and they have no future, so he says, I'm gonna plant you here, but in 70 years, I'm gonna bring you guys home. I'm gonna bring you guys home, and when I bring you home, we will reestablish the temple and worship of the Lord in Jerusalem.

Now, the Babylonian Empire gets destroyed by the Persian Empire, and Cyrus the Great, who establishes this empire, has a totally different plan than Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar wants all the power near him. Cyrus is like, no, I want it all to the extremities, so I got buffers kingdoms before bad guys come kill me, so he sends the Jews back to Jerusalem, and 70 years later, just like Jeremiah said, God's word stands true. Isn't that amazing? You ever wonder if God's sovereign? He raises up a kingdom to do one thing that he wants to have happen, then he raises up another kingdom to do the opposite. God is sovereign in our world. It gives me great comfort, and when the Jews come home, they are led by a man named Zerubbabel, and they take that green path that you see on the screen. Zerubbabel is a descendant of David, and so Zerubbabel takes them home, and just like Jeremiah commanded, they begin reestablishing the temple in Jerusalem, but while they're there, they make some enemies, and those enemies are like, hey, we don't like what you guys are doing. They send word to the Persians and say, if you allow these Jews to finish this temple, they will rebel against you, and the king of Persia is no longer Cyrus the Great.

He doesn't even remember what the Jews were told to do, so he just sends word back, stop building this temple immediately, and so the Jews stop, and they start building their homes and their infrastructure. and they leave the temple of God incomplete, and it is into that moment, that situation, that the prophet Zechariah receives this vision from the Lord. Let's read it together in Zechariah chapter four, starting at the first verse, it says this. Then the angel who talked with me returned and woke me up like someone awakened from sleep. He asked me, what do you see? I answered, I see a solid gold lamp stand with a bowl at the top and seven lamps on it and seven channels to the lamps. Also, there are two olive trees by it, one on the right of the bowl and the other on its left. I asked the angel who talked with me, what are these, my Lord? He answered, do you not know what these are? No, my Lord, I replied. So what is this image? Okay, imagine it with me, you've got two olive trees and they are funneling their oil into a menorah. And a menorah is a famous symbol for the Jews. Moses commanded it to be built as a symbol of God's light in and to and through the world. Now, I asked Chad GPT to draw me a picture

of what this might've looked like and this is what the computer cooked up. Kind of cool, right? Not bad, I don't know if it was like that, but there you go, Chad GPT, thanks. And so you have these two olive trees providing the fuel that the lamp is burning. Now, what does this mean? I'd love to go into detail on what it means, but that for most of us will be pretty boring. So I'm just gonna give you the facts, okay? You ready? The two trees stand for Zerubbabel, they stand for two men. They're a symbol of two men, Zerubbabel and Joshua the high priest. And what the vision is communicating is that if they will obey God, they will provide the fuel for God's light out into the world. But how is that gonna work? Let's keep reading. Verse six, so he, the angel said to me, Zechariah, this is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel, one of the trees, not by might nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord Almighty. What are you, mighty mountain? Before Zerubbabel, you will become level ground. Then you will bring out the capstone, that is the final stone of the building, to shouts of God bless it, God bless it.

Then the word of the Lord came to me, the hands of Zerubbabel have laid the foundation for this temple, his hands will also complete it. Then you will know that the Lord Almighty has sent me to you. What is this saying? It's saying this, that the way that Zerubbabel and Joshua the high priest will share God's light to the world is by finishing the temple. But you'll notice this mighty mountain in Zerubbabel's way. What is that? That is the Persian empire. And the Persian empire are serious business. Do you know what would generally happen to a person who defied the king of Persia? This is what they'd do, they'd take a pole, they'd stick it in the ground, and they would stuff that person on it till they died. That's kind of serious. Now, I don't know about you, but if God had delivered this message to me, I'd have a lot of excuses for him. I think the first was like, I don't wanna die, especially not through impaling, that just sounds bad. But also, also, God, we've been really faithful, right? Right, haven't we? We left our homes in Babylon, came all the way here. We're living in this glorified refugee camp in Jerusalem. And like, we don't really have a lot of money or resources. Should we really be spending the tiny amount of resources

that we could spend on, say, a police force to protect us, or maybe just like houses so we don't have to live in tents, and instead build an empty building? An empty building that might get us killed? Like, does that sound logical to you guys? No, we got some spiritual people in here. You're like, no, no, no, I would build it, I would build it. Hey, you're better than me, you're better than me. Nate Glover, Pastor Nate, I would be like, I don't know. I don't know, maybe we'll take up an offering and just see, you know, add some extra stones or something. But what makes Zerubbabel one of the unsung heroes of the Bible is that he's not like me. He goes, I'm gonna do this. And I think that one of the reasons he does is the next passage, verse 10, where it says this. Who dares despise the day of small things? Who dares despise the day of small things? Since the seven eyes of the Lord that range throughout the earth will rejoice when they see the chosen capstone in the hand of Zerubbabel. See, Pastor Nate, I'm too small to get that done. Or that thing, too small for me to do. We got a lot of other stuff to focus on. We don't need to be focused on that. What difference is it really gonna make to the world to build a little temple? Don't we make those excuses to the Lord? Don't we go, you know, God, I feel burdened

about this person or about this thing that I know you want me to do, but what difference can I really make? Or like, God, I've got so many other things I gotta focus on, really this? But Zerubbabel gathers the people of Israel together. And he goes, we're gonna do this thing. And they do. They start building the temple. And the enemies of Israel see it. They get a detailed list of people who are defying the emperor. They send that list to him. But Zerubbabel sends a letter as well. And he states to the king, he says, look, if you'll go back and look at the annals of Persia, you will see that Cyrus the Great commissioned this temple. Like, we're supposed to do this. And the king of Persia who originally told them not to, he's dead. There's a whole new king named Darius there. And he reads both these letters. So he goes back and looks at the annals. And he sees, sure enough, Cyrus commissioned this thing. And he sends this delegation back to say this. This temple must be completed. And not only must it be completed, if anyone stops it from being finished, I will take a pole out of their house, stick it in the ground, and impale them on it.

In other words, God takes the enemies of the Israelites and turns them into their advocates. He takes that hill, just like he promised, and he turns it into level ground. And Zerubbabel gets to see it. Why? Because he did not despise the day of small beginnings. If big Z is too scared to do this thing, God will raise up somebody else. But Zerubbabel gets to see the miracle. Because he said, I'm going to take my small thing. I'm gonna do the small thing that God is asking me to do. And I'll trust him for the big thing that I could never do. And that brings me to what is my only point really today. And that's this. We cannot despise the day of small beginnings. The day of small things. Because God loves to start small. He loves it. He goes out of his way to do it. Isn't that what Christmas is all about? Every Jew on the planet wanted God to show up in mighty power with angels to kill all the bad guys. But he's like, I'm not doing that. I'm going to come as the tiniest version of a human that is possible. I'm gonna come as a baby. And he's not even Caesar's baby. Or the baby of Caiaphas, the high priest. He is the baby of a tradesman in Nazareth.

That's like the West Virginia of the Roman Empire. It's like nothing going on there, guys. He's like, yes, that's where I'm sending my kid. What? And we as humans, we have a tendency to despise these small things. We're like, I'm not doing that. I'm not doing that. We have a tendency to despise these small things, but God sees them as powerful opportunities for faith. He wants to take a small seed and make it the biggest in the garden. He wants to take a little batch of yeast and work it through the whole batch of dough. God loves to start small. And if we despise the small things that he's given us to do, we may find that we are despising the very heart of God. And this we cannot do. I love talking about all the cool things Urban Impact's doing. I love it. I get excited, but that is not how we started. Urban Impact Athletics is reaching hundreds of kids today. But when we started, it looked like this. Yeah, that's Urban Impact Basketball right there. Mm-hmm, that's middle school. And let me tell you this, if you look at that picture closely, here's what you're gonna see.

There are 14 students and 11 leaders. We got 11 coaches for 14 players, guys. Like, what? Right? But my dad saw this and he said, that is who I'm called to serve. And he did not despise the day of small things. And so now, because he was faithful with that, God has given us this. Where we're working with the Steelers and the Pirates, and we're working with hundreds of kids and thousands of people called Jesus Lord because of Urban Impact Athletics. And my dad would have seen none of it if when it was 14 kids and 11 leaders, he goes, this is too small potatoes for Ed Glover. Let me show you another picture. Check this one out. This is my parents' living room. And that's my kids pretending to be Ninja Turtles. I love that. That's a pretty small living room. You got like four people in there, like five kids, and it's pretty packed. When Urban Impact Performing Arts began, it started as a choir and we all met in that living room. All the kids, all the volunteers, all the staff, and we all fit in there. And I was in that choir, so you know it wasn't even good. Like, we're terrible.

But my mom was like, this is the few that God has given me. And because she was faithful with that group, now it looks like this. We have like 200 kids in our choirs now. We've got instrumental music, we've got every kind of dance you can imagine. We're making short films. They've already won national and international awards. It's like God's doing something amazing, and we would have seen none of it if when it's a living room filled with middle school kids. My mom goes, ah, it's just not for me. And God is doing it again. I had this vision that God gave me. When I, actually, well, let me first. I went to Oxford University, and when I came home, that was the peak of the valuableness in the eyes of the world of Nathan Glover, right? I had so many job opportunities that I could have been a part of, but I had this burden in my heart that we at Urban Impact need to start a training center to raise up missionaries who are going to take the place of my parents, and then I believed it would also multiply around the nation and around the world, and we would take back our cities for Jesus Christ, and that's what we were gonna do, and it all started like this. Yeah, that's three guys,

and Justin, Julia, and Jericho, all Js, and God said, for a year, Nate, you're gonna train these three people, and that was the beginning of what we called the Urban Impact Training Center. Best part about it, when people ask me, where is the center, I would say, here I am. Wherever I am, that's where the center is. We were a center with no center. I mean, it's just so bad, right? And I, like, frequently throughout this year, I'm like, God, why didn't I take one of the other jobs? Three people, what difference is this gonna make? But I remembered this verse that I'm preaching from. Do not despise the day of small things, which my mother would quote to me all the time, especially when I was taking out the garbage. She's like, don't despise the day of small things. Gotta do big things, right? But I remembered it, and I saw my father do it, and I saw my mother do it, and I saw what the Lord did when they were faithful with something small that God had given them, and so I said, who, what kind of man would I be if I did not trust the Lord now? So I did. That was in 2019. You can go to the next slide. We can fast forward the tape. Now we've trained hundreds of people,

and they're in cities and in places around our country and around our world. We'll go to the next slide. To handle the growth, we now have a center. That front building is the Urban Impact Base. The back building, that silver building back there, that is the Urban Impact Training Center that is completely full of people who are being trained to be urban missionaries just like me and my family. Isn't that wild? It also hosts missions trips so that people can come down, see what we're doing, become a part of it, and maybe hear the call of God on their life to come join us. We are now training and doing all the things that I dreamed God wanted us to do, and I would see zero if I despised it when it was three people. God loves to start small. He loves it. And so here's my question for you. Is there something small in your life that you know God has called you to do, but you haven't done it? And maybe it's like, I'm too afraid to do it, I don't think I'm big enough for this, or maybe there's someone you need to share Christ with, and you just aren't doing it, because you're like, God, why would they listen to me? Or maybe you're like, I've got so much going on,

I got too much to do to be a part of this. God loves to start small. Whatever faithfulness looks like for you right now, and I'm gonna pray, Lord, I just pray right now, in this room, that if there is a person, I believe there is a person, that you are knocking on the door of their heart, and you're saying, please trust me with this. God, bring it to their mind right now. Bring it to their mind when they're in the car. Bring it to their mind when they're sitting at home eating dinner. And Lord, help them to have the courage and the faith to not despise the small thing that you have given them, so that they can see the amazing, impactful, powerful thing that you wanna do in the future. In Jesus' name, amen. I don't think it's also an accident that I am here to talk to you about kingdom builders, guys. James says this. He says that true religion is not being polluted by the world and looking after widows and orphans in their distress. Now, you might live in an area where there aren't a lot of widows and orphans. Maybe you do live in an area where there's a lot of widows and orphans, but here's what I can tell you. At Urban Impact, me and my family, we're surrounded by widows and orphans.

And maybe in your area, you can't really do that, but you can with us. And guys, you got a campus on the north side of Pittsburgh. This is the beginning. This, and that campus is small. Right now, we're small. But I don't think we always will be. God's gonna do something special. Now is the time to invest. Because when it's big and it's blown up and it's awesome, everyone's gonna wanna be in on it. But now's the time to see with the eyes of faith and to believe God when it's hard, to give Him an offering of faith, which is God's love language. God will work with those that work. He will move with those that move, but He will not sit with those that sit. Don't sit. You can invest in the kingdom of God now. And it's the counselor, and it's the capital C church. That's what Kingdom Builders is all about. We can't be, or sorry, Allison Park can't be everywhere, Urban Impact can't be everywhere, but we, the body of Christ, the church, we can be by the power of God. And when you invest in what Pastor Jeff is leading us to do,

you are doing that. The north side is a worthy investment, guys. Not because there's money there, but because in the city of Pittsburgh, there is more images of God per square inch than all the surrounding areas. Help us reach Him. Father, thank you for these wonderful people. Thank you that they are filled with the Holy Spirit and that they believe that the Holy Spirit is powerful, not just in the Bible, but today. You do it now, and we've seen testimony of that on these screens, that if we are faithful with the little things that you give us, you do impossible things that we could not have imagined. And so, Father, we give to you our best. We give to you what you have entrusted us. We give it back to you so that you can get the glory and that our glory can be your glory, and that we can, in community, enjoy it together. Bless your name, bless this church, bless the Leek family. In Jesus' name I pray, amen. Can we stand together and respond to this now? Sing you're worthy. ♪ You're worthy of it all ♪ ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ Formed from You are all things ♪ ♪ Answer, You are all things ♪

♪ You deserve the glory ♪ ♪ You are worthy, You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ Formed from You are all things ♪ ♪ Answer, You are all things ♪ ♪ You deserve the glory ♪ One more time, sing You're worthy. ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ You are worthy of it all ♪ ♪ Formed from You are all things ♪ ♪ Answer, You are all things ♪ ♪ You deserve the glory ♪ Awesome, can we give it up for Pastor Nate again for that awesome word. Thank Him for being here, amazing. And as we get ready to close the service, what we're gonna do is, since it's about to be the new year, every year we take time to do family blessing prayer. So I'm gonna invite our pastoral staff forward. So some of our pastors are gonna line their way across the front. And if you would like us to pray blessing over you or your family, you can come forward in just a minute and we're gonna pray blessing over you in the new year. And the team is just gonna stick around and sing. I know that some of you have kids in Kids' Zone or Kids' Zone Junior. And so we're gonna stick around for a little bit here.

You can slip out and grab them and come back and we'll pray over all of you and your family. But before we go, would you just stretch forth your hand like this? May pray blessing over you. I pray that the Lord would bless you and your family as you leave this place. And that as He begins to give you small steps and the small things like Pastor Nate was saying, that as you take steps of obedience, the Lord would multiply what He wants to do. His kingdom, His power, and His favor, not just you and your family, but in the world around you, that He would use you as an influence, as a light to those around you. I pray blessing and favor and protection over you in Jesus' name, amen.