Keep Showing Up | Victory Church

so um uh so uh so so so so good morning church welcome to the father's house let's just stand together and exalt the name that is above every other name we've come to worship the name of jesus can we just lift our hands and just thank him would you just say thank you jesus for your blood thank you we're so thankful thank you that you so love the word father that you sent your only son jesus and thank you that we have um we have a beautiful relationship with you we have communion with you because of the sacrifice so lord we exalt your son we love the son we exalt jesus above everything that all eyes and all hearts will be directed to the beautiful person of jesus be exalted god in the mighty name of jesus and the church say amen let's worship jesus this morning so oh the perfect son of god in all his innocence was walking in the dirt with you and me he knows what living is he's acquainted with the grief a man of sorrow son of suffering he knows what living is he's acquainted with the grief a man of sorrow he knows what living is is, is acquainted with a grief, a man of sorrow, son of suffering. Oh, blood and tears, how can it be that there's a God who weeps, there's a God who bleeds. Oh, praise the one who weeps for me. Hallelujah, to the son of suffering. Hallelujah. Some imagine you are distant and removed, but you chase the star in merciful pursuit. To the center you are graced, and the broken you embraced. And in the end the proof is in your words. Thank you, Jesus. And in the end the proof is in your words. Blood and tears, how can it be that there's a God who weeps, there's a God who bleeds. Oh, praise the one who would reach for me. Hallelujah, to the son of suffering. Oh, blood and tears, oh, blood and tears. How can it be that there's a God who weeps, there's a God who bleeds. Oh, praise the one who would reach for me. Hallelujah, to the son of suffering.

Your love still reaching. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Your cross, my freedom. Your stripes, my healing. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Your blood still speaking. Your love still reaching. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Glory to God in heaven. We give you glory, Lord. Glory to God in heaven. Forevermore. Glory to God in heaven. Glory to God in heaven. Your cross, my freedom. Your stripes, my healing. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Your blood still speaking. Your love still reaching. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Your cross, my freedom. Your stripes, my healing. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Your blood still speaking. Your love still reaching. Oh, praise King Jesus. Glory to God in heaven. Hallelujah to the one who saved my soul. Glory to God in heaven. In heaven, forever this will be our song Glory to God in heaven Glory to God in heaven And we sing Glory to God in heaven Amen, amen, amen. Praise God today. Good morning Victory Church. I hope you're doing well. We are so glad that you are here to share in what is a holy moment. Today we're going to see in just a few moments, we're going to get to witness a public display of something that God has already done privately. A transformation from old to new, from death to life. Romans 6, 3 and 4 says this, Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him through baptism into death so that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father so we too might walk in the newness of his life. Amen. Baptism is not just a symbol. It's a spiritual declaration. It's the moment when our faith is put on display. When the inward work of salvation is expressed outwardly through obedience. When you go onto the water, you are identifying with the death of Christ.

Your old life, your old ways, your old identity buried with him. And when you come out of the water, you are declaring now that you share in his resurrection moment. His life, forgiven, restored, and made new. Amen. To those of you who are choosing to be baptized today, we want to say we're so proud of you. Congratulations. We're so honored to share this moment with you. Understand this isn't a moment about having it all figured out. This is not about being perfect. Baptism is about obedience and surrender. You're saying I belong to Jesus. You're publicly marking a line between who you were and who you are becoming. The same power that raised Christ from the dead is now at work in you. And you are choosing to walk forward in that new life. And we say congratulations. We're proud of you for sure. Today, church, we celebrate baptism as a victory moment. It's evidence that God is still saving, still restoring, still calling people from darkness into his marvelous light. Every baptism tells a story of grace. Every person coming up out of the water is a reminder that the gospel still has power. We celebrate because baptism strengthens our faith. When we witness others take this step, it reminds us of our own story,

the moment that we said yes to Jesus, the grace that we received, the new life that we were given. It calls us back to our own commitment to walk in the obedience and the newness of life. So today we rejoice. We're going to clap. We're going to celebrate. We are going to have a great time because it's not a religious ritual. It's a resurrection moment. Heaven rejoices and so do we. We're proud of you. We stand with you and we commit as a church to help you take your next step closer to Christ. Let's pray. Father, in Jesus' name, we honor you today, Lord. We thank you for those who have made a decision to take this step, Lord, to declare that you are their king. They're on the Lord's side today. We stand with them. We honor you today for this time. In Jesus' name, amen. You unravel me with a melody You surround me with a song Of deliverance from my enemies Till all my fears are gone And I'm no longer a slave to fear, I am a child of God. I'm no longer a slave to fear, I am a child of God.

Oh, thank you, Jesus. From my mother's womb, you have chosen me. Your love has called my name. And I'll be born again into your family. Your love flows through my veins. And I'm no longer a slave to fear, I am a child of God. I'm no longer a slave to fear, I am a child of God. Oh, I'm thankful that I'm no longer, I'm no longer a slave to fear. I am a child of God. I'm no longer a slave to fear. I am a child of God. Oh, I'm your child forever. I am surrounded by the arms of the Father. I am surrounded by songs of deliverance. We've been liberated from our bondage. We're the sons and the daughters. Let us sing our freedom. Oh, oh, oh, oh. You split the sea. You split the sea so I can walk right through it. My fears were drowned in perfect love. You rescued me so I can stand and sing. I am a child of God. You split the sea. You split the sea so I can walk right through it. My fears were drowned in perfect love, I know. You split the sea so I can walk and sing. I am a child of God. And I have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus.

I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back, no turning back. The cross before me. The world behind me. The cross before me. The world behind me. The cross before me. The world behind me. No turning back. No turning back, no turning, I have decided. I have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back, no turning back. I'm no longer a slave to fear. I am a child of God. I'm no longer a slave to fear. I am a child of God. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. We thank you Lord for the privilege to be called sons and daughters. The dawning of heaven crucified Worthy is the Lamb To open the book and break the seal Worthy is the Lamb Of God who reigns forever and ever Worthy is the Lamb Worthy, you're worthy, you're worthy

Worthy is the Lamb Worthy is the Lamb Forever you're worthy, forever you're worthy Worthy is the Lamb Worthy is the Lamb Come on church, sing it out Worthy is the Lamb Seated on the throne Just look at the Lamb of God We crown you now with many crowns You reign victorious I lift it up, and I lift it up Jesus, Son of God The dawning of heaven crucified Worthy is the Lamb Worthy is the Lamb Worthy is the Lamb Worthy is the Lamb Morning church, how we doing today? Hey ma'am I'm kind of speechless, honestly I just love watching people get baptized And see them making that decision publicly I'm just kind of speechless Just turn around, alright, this is awkward Just turn around and greet the person next to you Alright, isn't it good to be in church? I don't have anything bright to say or special to say It's just a good day to be in the house of the Lord is all Amen

So good to see you guys Those of you watching online, we welcome you We have a special moment today in baptism So honored that you're joining us today No matter where you're watching from Honored that you're with us I want to greet the Edmond Campus Love you guys so much Greet the Great Vine Campus Come on, make some noise for our campuses and our families That join us every week We love you, we're grateful for you Those of you watching online, thank you for being here with us today Sorry, I just... I hate it when I cry right before I come up on stage Because then I look silly, but I don't care So we had a good day here in the house today The presence of God is powerful And I'm just grateful for that So glad you guys are here Thank you for being here today A couple quick things before I jump into the Word for today If you're really slow with your Bible You can start turning to Luke chapter 11 You'll have like five minutes to get there So hopefully you can find it A couple quick things We've been talking about this for a while And it's getting closer and closer You're probably tired of hearing about it

But you're going to hear about it again So we usually do 21 days of prayer and fasting coming out of the New Year And we didn't do that this year Because we're going to lean into doing Lent It doesn't mean we're Catholic We're not a Catholic church But there's some real beauty in going through Lent Lent starts on February the 18th this year And we'll lead all the way up to Easter weekend And we'll be producing content for you every single day You'll get content every week Something that you can fast every day It doesn't mean you have to fast for 40 days But every day we're going to lean in in a different way You may fast social media one day You may fast sweets one day You may fast food one day You may fast words one day Come on somebody How many of you know we need to fast some words every now and then Just talk less So it's going to be a great time So you want to be a part of that That starts on February the 18th Which is a Wednesday Day at all of our campus every single campus is going to do a worship night start to start out lent. Okay Uh, so that is on february the 18th mark your calendar every campus is a little bit different on what time that starts Uh, so just your local campus will tell you or better yet if you if you don't get emails from victory church You're going to miss out on a lot of information So if you don't get our emails you need to go to your connect

Table at your lobby and make sure you're signed up to get information from victory church over email Okay, so that's coming you want to be a part of that? And then also every year we do something called the state of the church address And it's a time where we talk about kind of the business of our church in a sense It's for it's kind of a family meeting For it's great a lot of the same things I say every year I talk about who our elders are who our board structure looks like what it looks like I talk about how my salary is set as a lead pastor We talk about our finances and what how much money came in how much money did we spend how much was left over? What is our debt we go into details on on this stuff because we want to be a church that's transparent And we want to be a church that that uh, that is a place that you can trust And how do you know whether you can trust a church unless people show you? Whether we're trustworthy and so we do that every year this year is going to be a little bit different Usually we I spend an entire weekend service doing it and I can always tell the people that really are interested in this because they're like leaning forward like writing down numbers and they're Really engaged and then the person sitting next to them is like And so this week this year we're going to do it just a little bit different the content will all be there and you can Drill in as much as you want But we're going to do it over video and we're going to send out an email that has that on it So every all the nerds can like lean in and watch it over and over again Because some people are like I come to church to get a word. I don't want to do math at church And so this year we're gonna do a little bit different. You can see that it'll hit your inbox It's probably around late february. So we're getting some finalized numbers from 2025 coming in. So That'll be coming up and we'll talk about heart for the house and all those sort of things So that's coming. Let's let's bring our tithes and offerings into the storehouse. Amen So we celebrate that here at victor church because we believe it's a privilege I want to read a passage of scripture that might be a little different Maybe you've never heard this or or seen this or read a verse like this in the context of giving but I want to try To show you that I believe it's applicable In jeremiah chapter 2 verse 13. It says this

This is the lord speaking. He says from my people Have done two evil things They have abandoned me the fountain of living water And they have dug for themselves cracked cisterns That can hold no water at all And this isn't particularly talking about giving in the context of this But I think there's some nuggets and some principles that we can find in it that applies to giving If you go to israel if you're ever in israel or do a study on the nation of israel i've been there a few times and there's the sea of galilee that we see in scripture and And the sea of galilee is a body of water that All most of the water from the sea of galilee comes from mount hermone which is just north of there And if you ever go to mount hermone There's springs that are under this mountain that bubble up and it just kind of oozes out of the mountain everywhere You're just walking along this mountain and there's just water coming out all under you and all different places and a lot of that water trickles down and goes into the sea of galilee and sea of galilee has I've talked about this before Sea of galilee has a release that goes out into the jordan river The jordan river goes north to south all the way down to the dead sea And the dead sea there is no outlet Things go to the dead sea to die. There's no living things in the dead sea and this is a picture Of even what we're talking about. It says my people have done two evil things They've abandoned me and then he describes who they've abandoned. They've abandoned the fountain of living water something that flows And it says they've dug for themselves Cisterns things that hold water that never release anything. They just hold on to it And this is a picture really this this illustration Geographically is a great picture to us Even with our finances that that we are to be more like the sea of galilee than we are the dead sea

That we we have no problem releasing what we have for others to benefit from Because we know that we have mount hermone our living god our living fountain That for everything we release we know that he's going to supply our every need according to his riches and glory So we don't hesitate. We're not afraid we don't hoard. We don't dig cisterns and hoard and protect That's the dead sea and everything that hits the dead sea dies. So we're living water We're to be like we're to we're to be living water that things flow out of us Because we know we have a source that's flowing into us We don't live by fear and this is a principle in giving and so we we we lean into that today Let's pray for the offering father. We thank you for the privilege and honor it is to give And we want to be more like the sea of galilee Than we are the dead sea. We want to trust and obey we want to release because we know that you own the cattle on a thousand hills. You have everything we could ever need. All of what we could ever need is found in you. And so we release today, we release it because we have faith in a good God. So we give in that manner, whether we're giving online or at our exits, as we leave today, all of our exits have receptacles to give. So we give in that posture, we give in that way in Jesus' name and everybody said. All right, Luke chapter 11. So some of the most important breakthroughs in history didn't happen because someone tried harder. They happened because someone refused to quit too soon. In 1928, a Scottish scientist named Alexander Fleming was working in a small laboratory at St. Mary's Hospital in London. He wasn't famous, he didn't have a research team.

He was simply studying bacteria day after day, doing work that most people would have seen as ordinary. In September of 1928, Fleming returned from a short vacation and began sorting through Petri dishes that he had left behind. And one of them had been contaminated by mold. Most scientists would have thrown it out and started over, but Fleming noticed something unique. Around the mold, the bacteria had been destroyed. And instead of discarding it, Fleming paused, he leaned in, he studied it, and he asked questions. And that moment didn't change the world. In fact, for years, nothing seemed to come of it. But by 1929, Fleming had published his findings, but the scientist community largely ignored them. He couldn't isolate the compound, he didn't have the technology to turn it into medicine, and many researchers believed it would never be practical in any way. But Fleming kept showing up, he kept documenting his work, he kept paying attention, he kept believing that there was something worth staying with even when progress was slow and recognition was absent. And more than 10 years later, in 1940, two scientists, Howard Florey and Ernst Chain, picked up Fleming's research. They refined the compound, they figured out how to produce it in a usable form, and that mold that Fleming refused to throw away became penicillin, the world's first true antibiotic.

And by 1941, penicillin was used to treat infections. During, discovered just before World War II, penicillin would go on to save countless soldiers' lives and become one of the quiet forces that helped turn the tide of the war. And since 1941, penicillin is estimated to have saved over 500 million lives. The breakthrough didn't start because Fleming was the smartest in the room, it didn't start because he had the most money to do the research, it didn't start because he had the most research team and all of the backing, it started because he was stubborn. The miracle wasn't brilliance, it was persistence. And with that, let's look at Luke chapter 11. So in Luke chapter 11, verse one, you can go back and read it later, it's this portion of scripture where Jesus has been praying and he comes back and his disciples look at Jesus and they simply say, teach us how to pray. Teach us how to pray. And this is a passage that many of us are familiar with, it's a prayer that many of us are familiar with. He says, if you wanna know how to pray, this is how you pray. Let's all do it together for those of us who don't know it, let's just say it together, ready? Our Father, who art in heaven,

hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And that's what we do. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever, amen. And that's where we usually stop, that's where, you know, end of the prayer, end of done, we pick up, we're gonna pick up today after that. Verse five, verse five, here we go. Then, teaching them more about prayer, he used this story. Suppose you went to a friend's house at midnight wanting to borrow three loaves of bread, and you say to him, a friend of mine has just arrived for a visit, I have nothing for him to eat. And suppose he calls out from the bedroom, don't bother me. That's what I would say at midnight, because I've been in bed for three hours. Don't bother me, the door's locked for the night and my family and I are all in bed, I can't. help you, this is Jesus' words, watch this, he says, but I tell you this, though he won't do it for friendship's sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need,

listen to this, because of your shameless persistence. And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for, keep on seeking, and you will find, keep on knocking, and the door will be open to you, for everyone who asks, receives, everyone who seeks, finds, and to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. I am beginning to think that Jesus is attracted to shameless persistence, that he's drawn to this idea of his children being persistent in what we're pursuing. If you've missed the last several weeks, we kind of got into this rhythm, and it started out as not a sermon series, not a sermon season, I was just gonna show up every day and preach what I felt like the Lord put in my heart, but it's kind of turned into a rhythm, if you haven't noticed, and I started finding the rhythm of these three-word phrases, and so we've done three weeks of them, today I have another three-word phrase for you, but we got a review, just for real quick, and if you missed any of these, you can go back and watch them, they're all in the archive on YouTube or the website. So remember the first one, say this with me, say, it is well. It is well. It is well. Remember the second one, it wasn't near as fun,

say this with me, say, I was wrong. I was wrong. That's good, you guys were louder that time, but in the past weeks, you've been like, I was wrong. Nobody wants to say that one. The last one we talked about, say this with me, say, I'm being jealous. I'm being jealous. I thought the last two, I kind of beat you up a little bit, it's kind of a little too harsh on you guys, so today we're gonna learn a new three-word phrase, so look at your neighbor, and help me introduce the title of today's message, look at your neighbor and say, keep showing up. Keep showing up. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word, it's sharper than any two-edged sword, and in this house, it's the only thing that's truth. For the next couple of minutes, Lord, we alleviate distraction, we will not allow our phones to distract us, we will not let anything distract us, because we're leaning in to your word, and so, Father, help me communicate your word, your will be done at Victory Church, as it is in heaven, and so, may your word come forth today in an encouraging way, in an uplifting way, in a challenging way to us, in Jesus' name, amen. I see this rhythm, even in scripture,

that some of the biggest breakthroughs were preceded by men and women who kept showing up, who just kept being persistent. You think about Noah, you know, I like to think about Noah sometimes, and everyone's like, yeah, he built an ark, it was cool, but do you realize the persistence that he would've had to show? Some theologians, historians believe that it took him anywhere from 50 to 75 years to build Noah's ark, and some people believe it took 75 to 100 years. I say, who cares, either way, that's a really long time, of showing up when it had never even rained before. You're building something that really no one's ever built before, but the persistence, the shameless persistence of Noah to just keep showing up every single day, little by little, one little peg at a time, one little piece of wood at a time. Joseph, think about Joseph, the persistence that he had to keep serving, to keep a humble heart after his brothers had thrown him in a pit, after he had been sold into slavery, after he is imprisoned, over and over and over again, but the persistence to just keep showing up, to keep serving, to keep a humble heart. Joshua and the Israelites, we all know the story of Jericho, they walk around and the walls fall.

Yeah, but they walked around a whole bunch of times with nothing happening. To me, it'd be a lot cooler if you walk around one time and one layer of bricks fall off. It's like, hey, we're making progress, let's do it one more time. No, they went around and around with nothing happening, but because of shameless persistence, shameless persistence. Time and time again in Scripture, you see this. Jacob, Jacob wrestled with an angel. The Lord says that, the Bible says that Jacob wrestled with the Lord in the form of an angel. And you talk about shameless audacity, shameless persistence. Jacob had the nerve to look this being, this angelic being, and say, I will not let you go until you bless me. That's pretty impressive. And so it's like the Lord is trying to teach us something in this text in verse nine. Let's read it again. Verse nine says, and I tell you, truth. Keep on asking, and you will receive whatever you ask. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be open to you. I think it's important that it says keep on. Some translations just say keep. Keep asking, keep knocking, keep seeking, keep knocking. The NLT that I'm reading out of says keep on, and I think that's important because if you look up those words in the Greek, in the Greek it's in the present continuous tense. So that's important to know because it doesn't say, hey, you asked once, and so you're good. No, it's this repetitive keep on asking. It's present continual tense, that we keep on doing it. Even after you've done it 10 times, you do it again. It's the idea that we keep showing up. And it's almost like Jesus is just trying to tell us in the simple text, hey, just listen, just keep showing up. And I've always read this text for years

that ask, seek, knock, ask, seek, knock. And for some reason when I read it, I just kind of always lumped all three of those together. Like it's just a repetition. He's repeating himself just so we really get it. Hey, ask, and seek, and knock, as if all three of those things are basically the same thing. And as I dove into this a little bit more, I want to try to present to you that maybe those aren't all three the same thing. That maybe they're different dimensions of persistence. When Jesus is saying, hey, what I'm asking you to do is to be shamelessly persistent. And there's three ways that I think you should do it. I think you should be shamelessly persistent in the way you ask, in the way that you seek, and in the way that you knock. And I want to try my best over the course of the next few minutes to try to break that down a little bit for you. Let's talk about the first one. The first one is keep asking. And the way, the little tag that I would add to the end of it is I would see this as kind of a relational dependence. When you keep asking, and this is like the form of prayer, this is honest prayer, like it's a need. And we all know what prayer is, right? But even when we keep on asking, there is a relational dependence. Asking means, this is what asking means. It means I don't have it. I can't fix it. I need help. I need help. And it is a dependency. It's like when your kids ask, how many times do your kids ask to have a friend over? Not once, not twice. It is over and over and over and over. It's because they're relationally dependent upon you to say yes. And if they didn't think it was possible, they wouldn't keep asking. They wouldn't keep asking. So even in the idea of keep on asking, there is, even in that, you're proving your faith. Because the minute you stop asking, it means you no longer have faith. So when we keep asking the Lord, but John, I've been asking the Lord this for seven years. Yeah, I get it. But there's this element, what we're saying is I don't have clarity. I don't have strength. I don't have direction. And asking is a dependence for direction. So what's the answer? Keep showing up. Come on, we're going to say it a couple of times today. Look at your neighbor and say, keep showing up. We're going to keep showing up in our prayer life because asking doesn't have to be polished. It has to be honest. Some of the times that I keep on asking, I become my annoying kids to my heavenly father. It's like, come on. I am living proof that God will not strike you dead with lightning when you talk honestly to the Lord. Because some of the times I'm coming to the Lord like, Hey bro, I'm calling God bro. But you know

what I mean? I'm just being honest. I'm being real with them. He can take it. He can take it. So, so we bring our honest prayers. Let me show you another passage where Jesus uses a similar story. If you want to flip over just a couple of pages to Luke 18, watch this. This is such a, this is such a great story. Chapter 18 of, of, uh, of the book of Luke verse one, it says, one day Jesus told his disciples a story. This is so good to show that they should always pray and never give up. Verse two, there was a judge in a certain city and he said, he said, Jesus said, who neither feared God nor cared about people. A widow of that city came to him. How often? Repeatedly. Repeatedly saying, give me justice in this dispute with my enemy. The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, I don't fear God or care about people, but this woman is driving me crazy. I love this. I'm going to see that she gets justice because she is wearing me out with her constant requests. It's like this woman is driving me absolutely insane. Now watch verse six. The Lord said, learn a lesson from this unjust judge. Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don't you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him when? Day and night, repeatedly. Keep on asking, keep on asking. Keep showing up in your prayer life. Never stop, never stop asking. He says, will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly. Now listen to this last sentence. But when the son of man returns, how many will he find on earth who have faith? He is tying faith to asking.

That when we keep on asking, he's saying when Jesus returns to earth, how many people will he find that are still asking? That are still praying? That have kept on praying? That have kept on seeking? That have kept on knocking? My wife is so much better at this than me. Like my wife is a prayer warrior beyond anything me. Like she's like, let's pray, let's pray. I'm like, we prayed for that yesterday. Does God have a short term memory? Does he not remember that I... My wife gets it way more than me. Keep on asking, keep on asking, keep on asking. The judge said, this woman is... I feel like that's the Lord looking at my wife. This woman is driving me crazy with all of her asking. There's something to this. There's something to this about asking. So we keep on asking, even when we're disappointed, even when the prayer has gone unanswered, even when we're so tired of saying the same thing to God over and over and over again. Jesus invites us to keep on asking. The second thing is we keep seeking. We keep seeking. I would label this differently. I would say that seeking is faithful action. Faithful action.

To me, this looks like movement, obedience, pursuit. There are some things that you keep on asking for. And then there are other seasons where you need to act, not just ask. Give you an example. Maybe for years you have prayed for your marriage and you've prayed for your spouse and you've prayed that you could have the healthy marriage that you always dreamed that you could have. And that's great. You know what you should do? You should keep on asking. But you know what else you should do? You should keep on seeking. There should be action to it. It's one thing to ask that God would heal your marriage. It's another thing to keep serving your spouse when they don't serve you. To keep showing up every single day. I got a golf clap over here. I don't know what happened over here. So we keep showing up. We keep seeking because seeking is obedience. Before the outcome. Asking is I'm asking for direction. It's almost like seeking is you know the direction, you're not seeing any action. When you ask, you're needing the Lord to speak to you for clarity, for vision, for direction. But there are other things in your life

that you feel like the Lord has already told you. Or you just know that it's a principle in scripture. You're to have a healthy marriage, right? You know this is true. So there's some things that I need direction for. There's other things that I got the direction, I need movement. I gotta put my feet to action. I gotta put my hands to action. And so I gotta keep showing up every single day. And then many times this is one of the most difficult ones to do. So we keep showing up with our actions. And what this is, is seeking is where obedience and the mundane coexist. And this is, for me, this is one of the hardest things to do. It's showing up, it's whenever you know what you need to do and your feelings come right head to head with each other. Because this is showing up at your dead-end time. job that you really don't like, and you believe with everything in your heart that God has a better job for you out there, and you even may even know what area that you have a passion, and you've asked, and you've asked, and you've asked, and you've asked. There's a portion of, I'm so sick of this, I don't even wanna show up. Keep showing up.

Keep showing up. You keep on seeking. Seeking is the action part. It's parenting again today, when you're exhausted from parenting yesterday. Come on, somebody, come on, parents. You keep showing up. You keep showing up. You keep being kind to people who aren't kind to you. You serve a boss, you honor a boss that is not honorable. You serve people that don't serve you back, because you know that it's the right thing to do, so you keep showing up. You serve at church. Even when no one notices you're serving at church, you just keep showing up. You keep doing things. You keep doing it. You keep serving. You keep tithing. You keep loving. You do good things without applause. Every time I write a sermon, I get an opportunity to practice what I preach, and I hate it. It's terrible. And so yesterday, we set up and tear down at Grapevine Campus. It's a school.

We're believing for a building. God's gonna get us a building. I know it, but we just had some challenges, and nothing major, but just inconveniences over and over again. I was just so discouraged. Yesterday morning, I was so frustrated. I'm like, God, we need a building. I'm just letting him have it. And I'm like, okay, I gotta look over my sermon notes, and I sit down, and I start looking over my notes. I gotta keep showing up to church at school at a place where it feels impossible to gain momentum as a church. So it's like even in my own life, God is preaching that these sermons just hit the back wall and come back and hit me right in the forehead. You gotta keep showing up, even when you don't feel like showing up. When we keep seeking, when we keep on seeking, what we're saying is, God, I'm still moving toward what you promised. Even though I don't feel any momentum, even though I don't see any movement, you said it, so I'm going to keep acting upon it. I'm gonna keep moving towards the thing that I believe you have for me. Many of us know this passage in Galatians. Galatians 6, 9 says, so let's not get tired of doing what is good.

At just the right time, we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up. Amen, yeah, we can give a little praise break there. The translation that I have memorized is, so don't grow weary in doing good, for at the proper time, you will reap a harvest if you don't give up. So there's three things in this text that really stick out to me, that are really important, that speak directly to this point that we're talking about. The first thing that this passage really communicates to us, which is really good news, it's not on the screens, but you can write these down. The first thing it communicates is that harvest exists. This is good news. Because the thing that you're discouraged about, the thing that you're waiting on the Lord, sometimes it's just good to know that there actually is a harvest. Because it says, at the proper time, you will reap a harvest, okay? So just know that in your life, there is a harvest that exists. It's out there. It's out there. The second thing is timing matters. Timing matters. I'm not as excited about the second one. Because it says, at the proper time, at the proper time, you will reap a harvest. So it forces the question,

who decides what the proper time is? I've discovered that it's not me. And every time I relearn that lesson over and over and over. And I try to tell God, I got this all figured out if you would just listen to me. I know exactly the perfect timing. But timing matters. And I don't get to choose the timing. And it's giving this harvest, this agricultural parable or analogy, that a farmer has seed and they know that this seed has the potential of harvest. And so they put it in the ground. Because why? Because they know that harvest exists. It exists. Farmers don't doubt what's going to happen when they put the seed in the ground. They know exactly what's going to happen. But they also know that it happens at the proper time. or doesn't get impatient and walk up to the seed and shame the seed and what's wrong with you and yell at the seed or dig up the seed and say, you're a useless seed, I'm gonna do this another way because it knows that at the proper time, the only thing in this text that demolishes and destroys the harvest is giving up, is giving up.

It says, don't grow weary in doing good, keep showing up, keep showing up, keep showing up, keep showing up, keep showing up, keep showing up, don't grow weary in doing good, keep showing up for at the proper time, you will reap a harvest if the only thing that can ruin the harvest is you giving up, is you giving up. Look at your neighbor one more time and say, keep showing up. Number three is keep knocking, keep knocking. I would say the way that I would articulate this to differentiate them is knocking is like an endurance at the barrier. So let's think about what knocking is. You wouldn't knock on a door if it wasn't in your way. It's a barrier. It's something that's standing in your way. So when we knock, what that looks like is it looks like resistance. It's opposition. It's delay. It's something that's standing in my way. Where I want to be, where I believe God has called me to be is just across the threshold in the promised land on the other side of whatever that looks like, whatever your promised land is, the job, the spouse, the money, the whatever, right? It's just on the other side. And all of a sudden, something comes up.

We use this vernacular sometimes, we say, well, that door closed. I thought that that was gonna be my path and that door closed. And so there's this barrier, there's something that has stopped. And knocking always follows disappointment. Because knocking, the invitation from Jesus is to keep on knocking. Well, knocking is persistence after disappointment. You don't need to knock if the door was open. A closed door is usually a very disappointing moment. When you thought something was gonna go a certain way, it didn't go that way. It feels like someone has slammed a door in your face and now your only option to get where you believe God has called you to go is to knock. So knocking means that something is in the way, it means the door's been closed, it means that access has been denied. And some of you might be in this place, you might be in a very discouraging season where discouragement tries to take the lead because you've been knocking a hundred times. Like you feel like you've spent the last 15 years knocking. And this can be a really dangerous place in our lives because this is the part of our lives where quitting actually begins to seem reasonable. It actually begins to make more sense to quit than it does to keep showing up.

And this can mean a lot of different things. You can quit on a lot of things. You can quit on your marriage, you can quit a job, you can quit trying to follow the Lord, you can quit trying to overcome addiction. There's a lot of things we can quit. We can quit on the Lord completely. We can quit going to church, we can quit a lot of things, right? You could quit life. You know? And this is such a dangerous spot because it actually begins to look like wisdom. Quitting starts to look wise, which is so bizarre. What's the answer? Just keep showing up. Keep showing up. I was talking to my, I'm in a circle with some men and earlier this week on Thursday, I was kind of just testing, you know, testing the content of my message on the group. And it's like, well, if this isn't good, I'll figure something else out before the weekend. But we were talking about some of the subjects and the guy in my group, he was talking about this group of kids in his neighborhood. This story really blessed me. And he was like, I got these kids in my neighborhood that come over and play with my kids.

And, you know, they'll just come in and out of the house like they own the place and take stuff out of the pantry. And it's like, so finally one day, we just locked the door. And, cause we needed, we wanted some privacy. And these kids would come to the door and they would try, it was locked. And so they just start knocking, knock, knock, knock, knock. And they were just like, we're not answering the door. Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock. Which by the way, can we just take a second and give a praise break for the ring doorbell? That was the greatest invention of all time. I mean, you used to, you'd have to be like kids, shh, hide, get behind the couch. Now it's just like, let me see. Oh yeah, I'm not answering that, okay. But he said these kids were so. persistent, so persistent that they knocked for a couple of minutes. And then he said, finally, they walked around and went through his side gate and went around his backyard. And they were looking in the back windows. Mr. Lewis, we're trying to come open the door. And I was so blessed by that story. Because to me, it gives the perfect picture, the perfect picture of what Jesus is articulating. It's just because of your shameless persistence. And what I told him was, I said, you know what that means, right? It means that over the course of however long you've known these kids, you have shown them so much love and so much care. And you've provided for them. And you've made them feel so welcome in your house, that the thought of you locking the door didn't even cross their mind. They're like, why would he not want us in there? He loves us so much. And I think that that should be our heart. That we should have the heart of, I'm going to keep knocking because I know that my Heavenly Father loves me so much. He's never left me. He's never forsaken me. He's never left me begging for

bread. He's always provided for me. So I'm going to keep on knocking and keep on knocking and keep on knocking because I know that he loves me. And what I have found is that sometimes I get so obsessed about knocking on this door. And I think this is the door. God opened this door. And then all of a sudden the door opens over there. And I'm like, oh, turns out that was the right door. This was not the right door. So sometimes our obsessive knocking might be we're knocking on something that God has something better, that this is not the right path. But I love that Jesus doesn't shame us and say, you idiot, you're knocking on the wrong door. You know what he tells us? Just keep on knocking. Just keep on knocking. Like he's drawn to our shameless persistence. So I think our only response is to keep showing up. Just keep showing up. If you're in recovery and you've messed up, keep showing up. Keep showing up over and over and over and over and over. If you've, if you're a dad or a mom and you've made horrific mistakes and if you could go back in time, you would do things so much differently. You know what you should do? Keep showing up. Just keep showing up over and over and over. If you've, if you've messed things up with the Lord and you feel shame, like you think that you've messed up and God can never love you again, that's a lie from the pit of hell. What you need to do is keep showing up. You keep showing up over and over and over again. Let me read one last passage for you in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 36. Listen to these words. It says, patient endurance is what you need now so that you will continue to do God's will. Then, somebody said then, then you will receive all that he has promised. Shameless persistence. If I just keep showing up, if I just keep showing up over and over and over, no devil in hell is going to keep me from showing up over and over and over and over and over and over and over by faith. So we're going to keep asking, what did you stop praying for? What have you given up on praying for? Jesus' invitation is, hey, keep asking. I like it when you ask because it shows me that you're dependent on me. There's relational dependence. We're all about independence in America and I don't know why. Jesus loves it when we're dependent on him. Keep seeking. Keep seeking. This is the action side. It's not enough to just pray. Show up. Show up. Show up to work with a smile on your face in that dead-end job you hate. Show up. Show up. Keep showing up. Keep showing up. Watch God move. Watch God move. And then keep knocking. Whatever barrier, whatever challenge is in your way, just keep knocking.

Keep knocking. We bow your heads for a moment. I want to give a quick invitation to those in the room or watching online or perhaps at one of the other campuses. that you're in a season where you, in whatever area of your life, you really are hanging on by a thread. Like there's an area of your life where you're exhausted. Galatians 6, 9 says, don't grow weary. And your first thought is too late for that. I'm already weary. I'm exhausted. It may be something that nobody even knows about. It may be a mental health thing. It may be an anxiety or an issue that you just deal with internally and no one even really knows that you have it. You just, you hold this thing internally. It may be an addiction. It could be a million things. I'm not trying to name them all. It may be a relationship. It may be a marriage. It may be a financial struggle. And you're just sick and tired of being sick and tired. And you're exhausted. I wanna pray a prayer for you. Not a transition prayer. I wanna pray, hopefully the type of prayer that really invites heaven to open and for you to genuinely be ministered to this morning. So if you're here today or at one of our campuses,

I'm gonna invite you just on the count of three. And no one's looking around. It doesn't really matter. It could be something large. You could have contemplated taking your own life. It could be that severe. Or it could just be a small thing that you just can't seem to overcome or a prayer that you've prayed so many times you're nauseous. It could be big or small, it doesn't matter. If you're here today and you're in a place where you've had difficulty showing up, will you just raise your hand at all of our campuses? Just shoot your hand up real high. Awesome, yeah, hands going up all over. Put your hand down. Father, I transition this moment from something that I can do to something I can't do. And there are moments where it just gets to be above my pay grade. And I can't do anything from this moment on. I can preach your word, look at your word, articulate as best I know how, but when it comes to the supernatural, it's only you. The Bible says it's not by might, it's not by power, it's by your spirit, says the Lord. And this is one of those moments. And God, you know every hand that was raised. You know every hand that wasn't raised, but they still feel it.

My prayer, Lord, is that you would send the comforter, the Holy Spirit, to one of the characters of the Holy Spirit that is listed as, that he is the comforter, that he brings peace. So I just pray that even now, as we don't rush this moment, that we genuinely invite your presence to come into this room. We invite the Holy Spirit to come and to be almost tangible in nature at the calmness and the presence and the peace that you come to rest on us. And it's hard to have hope without peace. So we first receive that, we receive this peace that comes only from you. The Bible describes it as a peace that surpasses understanding. It means it doesn't even make sense that I should have peace, but I do. So I pray that peace would come and rest on this house right now, Lord. Rest on every campus, rest on every person. And the second thing I pray, Lord, is that you would bring a supernatural strength. Many of us have tried to have endurance in and of ourselves, naturally, with our own strength, with our own understanding, with our own energy, and we fall short every time. What we really need, Lord, is a strength that can come only from you, a strength that lasts, a strength that brings endurance through the storm. And so I pray that you would send that strength

to your sons and to your daughters. These are your children, Lord, not mine. I pray that you would give them the strength to do what you tell us to do. You tell us to keep on asking, to keep on seeking, and to keep on knocking. I pray, God, would you give them supernatural strength to do that very thing, and that their faith would rise even now, that they would walk out of here differently than they walked in, because not because the sermon was good, not because church was good, but because you were good. And you sent strength. You sent supernatural strength. I pray that over your children today, Lord, in Jesus' name. If you keep your head bowed for one more moment, I wanna just give an invitation to anybody in the room who doesn't have a relationship with Jesus. I'm not asking you if you're religious or if you grew up in church. I'm asking you if you have a personal relationship with Jesus and if you don't, I would love to pray with you, have you pray a prayer. The Bible says that Jesus died. as a gift for us that is not something you could earn. It's not like you get your life in order and then he'll do it. It's like, no, while you were a sinner, Christ died for you. We don't shape up.

We just come and receive this free gift of salvation. So if you're here today and you need to accept this free gift, and if you were to die today, you're not sure exactly where you would spend eternity, I wanna offer this free gift to you from Jesus. So if you're here today or watching online and you don't have a personal relationship with Jesus, I just wanna invite you to receive it. This is between you and the Lord. So if you're here today and you need to receive Jesus as your Lord and Savior, just shoot your hand up, will you? Just raise your hand real high and say, that's me. I see that hand right there. Yeah, who else? Anybody else say that's me? Yeah, back in the back. See those hands? Yeah, right here. Praise the Lord. Anybody else say that's me? Yeah, I see you, man. All right, where are my stubborn ones at? The ones that knew that they were supposed to raise their hand, but they hesitated. Like the Lord loves, yeah, there's a hand right there. The Lord loves that stubbornness. He wants to use it. He wants to use it.

Anybody else? Yeah, there's a hand right there. Awesome. Anybody else? Like you felt those butterflies in your stomach. Let me tell you something. That was not pizza. That was the Holy Spirit prompting you and urging you to respond. Anybody else that say that's me? I need to give my life to Jesus. I'm ready to do it. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. All right, so the Bible says in the book of Romans that we believe in our heart, we confess with our mouth and we believe in our heart that Jesus is Lord. And there's a journey we go on. There's a faith walk and a lot of things that all of us in this room are on. Every day, we're taking one step closer to Christ, but it really does begin with just inviting Jesus into your heart. The Bible says, in fact, to use the same analogy, it says, I stand at the door and knock. Will you let me in? So there's a moment where Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart and we get to open the door and invite Jesus into our life.

And that's what you're doing right now. So everybody under the sound of my voice, everybody in the room, just say this prayer with me. Say, Father God, thank you for sending your Son to die for me. Jesus, I receive you into my heart. I believe you died on a cross for my sins and you were raised to new life for my victory. And today I'm saved. I'm a new creation in Christ. My life is yours. Would you lead me and guide me in Jesus' name? Amen. Amen, church, can we celebrate that? Woo! Well, we are thrilled for you and we wanna connect with you. We'd love to give you some resources. We'd love to pray with you. And so in just a few minutes when we dismiss, prayer team will be on both sides of the stage under the screens. If you need prayer for any reason whatsoever, leave your seat and come down for prayer, okay? Come down for prayer. But if you raise your hand, or maybe you didn't raise your hand, but you prayed that prayer and gave your life to Jesus, we wanna give you a Bible. We wanna give you resources.

We wanna love on you. And so don't just jet, okay? We want a relationship. We wanna do life with you. And so just connect with us in that way before you leave today, all right? God bless you guys. Thank you so much for being here. Pastor Adam, come on up here, brother. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Pastor John, for a challenging and encouraging word. Man, what a great day, right? I was glad to be in the house of the Lord today. It's so exciting. Keep showing up, man. I'm so challenged by that. And I hope to challenge you with that as well. Women specifically. Tuesday, 9.30, we have a women's Bible study that starts this week. So we'd like for you to keep showing up to that. Sorry, fellas. You can keep showing up for something else, but not that one. We'll do that together. Also out in the lobby,

we have our youth is gonna be attending the LA Dream Center in the summer. And they are currently raising money to do that. They're doing that by a bake sale. So goodies on the floor. Be sure to swing by there and take a pick. If you're not into sugar, you can buy it for somebody else. You don't have to buy anything. We just want you to give. Matter of fact, we're not even putting pricing on there. It's all by donation. You can give by check. You can give cash. You can give by credit card. You don't have to eat any calories. You can still be a part of building the kingdom and sending our youth to the mission field. So swing by there and be a part of that today. Why don't you stand with me today? What a wonderful day we've had. So one of the things we like to do on Baptism Sunday is offer spontaneous baptisms. And so we've had people who have been here today who said, oh man, I didn't know it was Baptism Sunday. I wanna get baptized. and they're gonna be here today. We wanna celebrate that as much as we've celebrated every other baptism here today. So when we dismiss, if you have a few minutes,

come over there and hang out by the pool. We've got it set up and we wanna help people start their new life in Christ today. Also, I look forward to seeing every one of you this Wednesday for midweek gathering. It's all gonna be awesome. We have food at 5.45. We have prayer and communion and a time of fellowship together. Starting at 6.30, we have circles meeting. We have youth here, kids here. It's gonna be a great night. That is this Wednesday. We hope to see you at the midweek gathering. God bless you. We are so glad that you guys are here. And remember, here at Victory in Christ, we live life to the full. God bless you. ♪ Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh ♪