Looks Can Be Deceiving - Sam Kelly (Full Experience)

house let's start off and prepare our hearts to meet with God by reading his word together you read this with us Psalm 100 says enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise get thanks to him bless his name for the Lord is say with me good his steadfast love endures forever and his faithfulness to all generations heavenly Father we come before you today to bless your name and to give you the worship that you are worthy of holy spirit we have your way this place we give you praise and honor and glory praise God from home of blessings flow praise him oh creatures hear me Lord praise him above the heavenly home praise Father Son and Holy coz you ready to praise God this morning come on hands together let's go God we lift up the joy for those you want to build it on sing it out I have built the hands that bear the scars reach down to rescue me and I have known the love of the Father's heart a prodigal melody from where I was to wear them now it's over we'll be come on the more the more and more I see a fool around me I can't help but praise you praise you Lord I can't help but lift up shouts of joy I think about it but when I think about how could you bet your faithful now to me and I can't help but praise you praise you Lord come on and praise for the blood you spilled to save my life but did I cannot repay for the cross you bore with your pin arms salvation that called my name here we go when I was from where I'm now it's over we'll be the more and more I see you I can't help but praise you praise you Lord come on and sing it I can't help but lift up shouts of joy the way I think about how could you bet your faithful now to me I can't help but praise you praise you Lord I can't help but just cuz I'm free got no chains on me I'm human redeemed say I can't help but fall on the knee and bury my sheep who opened my grave I can't help but just cuz I'm free I got no chains on me I'm human redeemed I can't help but fall on the knee and bury my sheep who opened my grave I can't help but praise you praise you Lord sit down I can't help but please shouts of joy when we think about it when I think about how could you bet faithful now to me I can't help but praise you praise you Lord I can't I can't ♪ I can't ever praise you, praise you Lord ♪

♪ Come on and praise him, come on and praise him ♪ One of my favorite lines in that song is when I think about how good he's been. When I think about how good he's been, come on, let's sing that one more time. ♪ I can't help but praise you, praise you Lord ♪ ♪ I can't help but lift you, shout to you ♪ Come on, sing it like you mean me. ♪ When I think about how good you bring ♪ ♪ Faithful now to the end ♪ ♪ I can't help but praise you, praise you Lord ♪ ♪ I can't help but praise you, praise you Lord ♪ ♪ Because ♪ ♪ Grady's thy faithfulness ♪ ♪ Grady's thy faithfulness ♪ ♪ Morning by morning ♪ ♪ The mercies I see ♪ ♪ All I have needed ♪ Thy hand hath provided, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, and He is everything I need, so I will not worry, I will not fear the enemy, He said that He loved me, He said that He's with me even though I walk through the valley of shadow and death and still I know He has good friends, He has good plans for me as He does, so I will take heart in deserts and gardens, He has good plans, He has good plans for me, if I know my father, I know my father has good plans. And He says to us, "I know the plans I have for you," He says to us, "The Lord is my Savior, so why should I doubt my victory, and why would I question, the rod has to stand the cup with me, He quiet so on earth, He quiets the storm inside of me, so I could be better than walking with Him without me, He has good plans, He has good plans for me, so I will take heart in deserts and gardens, He has good plans, # If I know my father, I know my father has, He has good plans #

# He has good plans for me, so I will take part in desert and gardens # # He has good plans, He has good plans for me # # If I know my father, I know my father has, good plans for me # # Come on, scripture says that even though I walked in the valley of the shadow of death, # # He is with me no matter what, he is with you today, # # So let's declare this with boldness and confidence, # # That he is never going to let us down, he is never going to let us go, # # So is everything you've got, come on, say surely, # # Goodness in mercy, we'll follow us, here we go, come on, sing this out! # # When, truly, you could dance, and mercy will follow out to me, # # So feel it, find me, come on, he's never left you in the battle of hope, # # He's with me no matter what, today, come on, hey, come on, hey, # # And mercy will follow out to me, so feel it, come on, don't look at the storm, # # Look at him, the author and protector, surely, you could dance, # # And mercy will follow out to me, so feel it, not find me, # # 'Cause I'll be where all I hear in his house, surely, # # You could dance in mercy, we'll follow out to me, # # So feel it, well, not find me, everyone, # # I'll be where he has good friends, he has good friends for me, # # So I will take on it, test it, take on it, # # He has good friends, he has good friends for me, # # If I, oh, he's never gonna let you down, # # He has good friends, he has good friends for me, # # So I will take on it, test it, take on it, # # He has good friends, he has good friends for me, # # If I know my father, I know he has good friends. You know, I want to tell you a story that talks about this great God that has good plans. There's a family that had moved from Venezuela seeking a better life, and shortly after they had moved, unfortunately, they were going through a really painful divorce. So the mother, by the name of Anna, she has a daughter who was struggling through a really tough

time. She was wrestling with depression, and she found the youth ministry of fellowship church called The Mix. And this young girl started coming. She started finding community. She started being under the teaching of God's Word. And this past February, she committed her life to Christ and went publicly with her faith through baptism at our One Night event. And those are good plans, but the good plans don't stop there. Because you see, Anna only speaks Spanish. She can understand a little bit of English, and she keeps on coming. Because she sees what God is doing through her daughter. And so she's believing maybe something's going to take place in her life. And then all of a sudden, we start introducing Spanish translations. And just last Sunday, Anna, who had already put her faith in Jesus, went public with her faith through baptism. And so here's what I'm here to tell some people in this church. That God is a redeeming God. That God has good plans for every individual. And God has good plans for your life. Can we take a second church to thank that God who has good plans? Come on. Hey, do me a favor right now. Take a second church in your neighbor. Look at them in the face and tell them God's got good plans for you. and then go ahead and find your seats. (upbeat music) - Well again, good morning to every single one of you. Welcome to Fellowship Church. Hey, my name is JC. I am our young adults pastor here at Fellowship Church. We are honored that you've chosen to join us here this morning, especially if you're tuning in online. But I also wanna take a moment to welcome anybody that is here for the very first time church. Can we welcome all of our first time guests? Thank you for being here. Listen, we care so much about people finding community just like Anna and her family. And a great way to do that is by filling out the connect card on the seat back in front of you. Simply put down some information.

And then once the offering passes later on the service, you can go ahead and drop it in there. Or maybe you're a little bit more text savvy. Go ahead, tap the seat back in front of you. And it's gonna direct you on all the perfect ways in getting involved in the life of Fellowship Church. And I am here to tell you the life of Fellowship Church has some amazing things in store. And as we step into this time of generosity, it is with great honor to tell you that we have broken ground on the anchor center. And maybe for a lot of you, you have no idea what that is. The anchor center is a beacon of hope for children, students, young adults, and families. And we have just broken ground because we have seen what God is doing through the next generation. And Fellowship Church is about fighting for families. So this is gonna be such an amazing time. If I can be just very honest with y'all, I have never been more excited to see construction take place in DFW than right now. And I know that truly it comes back to thanking so many of you for your generosity. And in addition to not just this amazing facility that we're gonna be building, but here's the thing that I even wanna remind us since the beginning of 2025 till now, we have seen over 2,000 children and students commit their lives to Christ

and go public with their faith through baptism church. That is worth celebrating over and why we remind ourselves we give. And so right now I'm gonna go ahead and call our hosts forward. And as they pass the offering, a reminder to everyone, if you wanna get connected to the Life of Fellowship Church, drop that connect card in there. And as they do that, today we have the honor and the privilege to hear from our global youth pastor, Pastor Sam Kelly. And he's got an amazing message in store for all of us. But I also wanna take a moment to read to you a passage of scripture for this morning. It's found in Isaiah chapter 40 verse 28. It says, "Do you not know? Have you not heard the Lord is the everlasting God, the creator of the ends of the earth? He will not grow tired or weary in his understanding. No one can fathom." Do you not know? Have you personally not heard? You know, Anna and her family they knew about God, but they didn't know him until recently. Isn't it amazing to think that the God of the universe, the One who created the ends of the earth, desires to know you? Now the question is, do you wanna know him? Because you can.

So here's what I want us to do as a church in your seats. I want you to open up your hands. Just a posture of surrender. Maybe you need to see something that you've been carrying that you need to give up to God. I'm just gonna ask everybody, open up your hands. And I want you to repeat this after me, not because of someone on a microphone telling you, but I want you to repeat this for yourself. Say God, no, no, say it like you mean it. Say God, I wanna know you. I don't wanna know about you. I want to know you. Reveal yourself to me. Would you open my heart and show me who you are? Will you stand with me as we pray and continue in worship? Lord Jesus, we come to you with a posture of wanting to know you. Not an idea about you. Not a little bit about you. We want everything to know about you. And we pray, God, for the person in the room who has not made the decision yet to follow you. May they make that decision today. Show us who you are in this time. We pray all this in your holy name. Amen. (gentle music) (gentle music)

[MUSIC PLAYING] Who thought I'd find you at the lowest place? Who knew you'd feel me in the crawl? Who knew you'd make good in my mistakes? And nothing like I thought you were your better? Would it God, would it God? Would it God, would it God? Your faithful? Would it God, would it God? Would it God, would it God? I thought you'd show up for perfection 'Cause what kind of cards for the lies? They say it's over for us in me But you say, no it's not, no it's not Where you say, no it's not, no it's not Would it God, would it God? Would it God, would it God? That's just who you are Would it God, would it God? Would it God, would it God? He's Yahweh, the Lord The God of compassion and mercy He's slow to anger full of steadfast love He loves his tears, his love On a thousand generations He forgives in equity, rebellion and sin It does not excuse the guilty, this is who he is If the highest place I reach is out of your feet Then I'll turn it off, if the best thing that I'll see Is your glory, they'll see it all

And your love has changed my life I'm forever satisfied God You are, do you want to see Him today? He's here in this place The highest place I reach for Him today He's reaching for you It's the best thing that I've seen Is your glory, they'll see it all Because we've seen you And your love has changed my life Now I'm forever satisfied God, you are, yeah And if the one word is, if the one word Is the only thing you speak Then I'll turn it off, if I feel your heart Then I'll see your head But I still have it open But I have you no treasure Of this life God, you're satisfied Oh, you are Lift that up, hold your heart To the hell that's the God you want You are, yeah We want to know you are, yeah We want to go, say We want to go, we want to go And hold your kick today We want to go, we want to go He's pursuing you

He ain't left to die We want to go, we want to go To every season You can play well We want to go, we want to go We want to fill the hole with you If the heart is playing If the heart is playing Is that your being gone Then I'll turn it off It's the best thing that I see If the one word is, then I'll see it all Your love has changed my life Oh, you're satisfied Oh, God, you are You are, yeah Lift that up, hold your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart And fulfill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart And fulfill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak

You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart To the hell that's the only thing you speak You better fill your heart ♪ Everything ♪ ♪ And nothing but you ♪ ♪ For your spirit out of this place ♪ ♪ Holy Spirit, have your way ♪ ♪ And Jesus, name me pray ♪ ♪ Amen, church, you may be seated ♪ (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - Church, would you join me this morning in prayer before we dive into the teaching of God's word? Jesus, we thank you for these moments that we share here together. Let us remember what it is, what a gift it is to gather together. Help us remember that this moment is the only promised moment we have right now. So let us make the most of it. God, I pray that as we open up your word, that your word would not return void, that you would open blind eyes, open closed-off hearts to the beauty of the gospel.

We ask all these things in your son's name. Everybody said, come on, everybody said. Okay, we're gonna start off this morning, a little different, and I need your participation. The 930 did all right here, but I know the 1115, you got the extra hour of sleep, and you are going to be engaged and locked in. I'm talking to our campuses too, at Dallas, Fort Worth, Frisco, and El Paso. Here's what we're gonna do. I'm gonna throw up two images side by side, and we're gonna do a couple of these, and your job is to determine which one has been generated by AI. Do you think you can participate in that? You can say it out loud, saying it's better, or you can hold up a one or two. Here's the first photo. Can you tell me which one you think has been generated by AI? Say it out loud, you gotta say it at the campuses, we're listening, hold up a one or two. Okay, one, two, three, let's see which one it is. It was one. I saw a couple of people that were wrong. Let's go to image number two, let's see if someone can get 100% here. This is the second image. Can you tell me which one you think is AI generated? Hold up a one or two, say it out loud. I don't know, do something.

Two, that's what you think? Okay, we're gonna say one, two, three, and it was two. Correct, well done. Okay, image number three, let's throw it up. Which one do you think has been generated by AI? Say it out loud, hold up your one, hold up your two. I see a lot of people not participating. That's okay. Lot of twos, let's see which one it's two, correct. Anyone at 100% so far? You locked in, ready to go. All right, let's see if you can make it. We got two more. Which one do you think has been AI generated? This one's a little bit easier, hold up your one or two. Come on, say it out loud, turn to your neighbor, tell them which one you think. I see a two, I see a couple of ones, I see some more twos, one, two, three, let's see. It's one. Okay, this is the hardest one. This is gonna be very challenging. I saved the hardest one for last. Let's throw it up, here we go. Which one has been AI generated? But not after this year, 'cause this year's our year. Got some Cowboys fans in the house. I was talking to someone earlier this week and they were like, man, I'm telling you, after this preseason, this is our year.

I'm like, 'cause preseason is the determining factor of who's gonna win the Super Bowl. Anyways, this year is our year. But isn't it crazy where AI has brought us? 'Cause I don't know about you, but images like 12 months ago, it was really easy to spot the fake. Like somebody had eight fingers on one hand. There was like a fourth eyeball somewhere. Someone's ear was on their shoulder and you're like, yeah, that's obviously not real. But now it's like, man, I genuinely can't tell the difference. And I think AI has taught us a lot of things, not the least of which is that looks can be deceiving. And I've found that what's true of images is also true of people. That there are people who externally on the outside, they look like the happiest people on planet Earth, but internally they are absolutely miserable. There's other people that walk through the hallways of your school or maybe your office at work. And externally, they look like the most confident people in the building. They walk into every single meeting like they own the building. But internally, they are riddled with insecurity. Then there are those people who everybody thinks like that person is like what everybody wants to be. They've got the house, the spouse, the cars, the stuff. And yet the predominant thought when their head hits the pillow at night is,

I actually hate who I become. And I would say most importantly and most unfortunately, there's a good group of people who look like they're Christians, but they don't actually know Jesus. And in order to unpack that important reality, we're gonna take a dive into a section of scripture that I haven't heard a lot of people teach from. Whenever I prepare for a sermon, I like to read scholarship, read commentaries, and also look at what other communicators have set upon a certain text. skip over, and in just a moment you'll see why. But I'm thankful that our church, fellowship church, we're gonna preach the full counsel of God, the verses that everybody loves, and the verses that raise some question marks so that we can wrestle with the word of God. So we're gonna turn to Acts chapter five, but before we get there, I've gotta give you some context. Acts is the book that's speaking about the beginning of the early church, like this is the start, this is the delivery room, this is after, Jesus has died on the cross, risen again from the grave, and for 40 days he's walking with his disciples, he's teaching, he's telling them what's to come, and that's a great reminder for every single person in the building this morning, because we do not serve a dead God, we serve a living God, anyone thankful for that reality today.

And so he's hanging out, and then he promises that the advocate, the Holy Spirit is gonna come, and then he does something wild. He literally ascends into heaven, and the disciples are like, what is going on? And then in Acts chapter two, we see the Holy Spirit descend, and the church begins to spread like wildfire. In one day, there are 3,000 people that go public with their faith, the church begins to grow, and this community of people called the church, begin to take care of each other, like the world has never seen. The generosity that they're showing is unfathomable, and at the end of Acts chapter four, there's a man named by his nickname, his nickname's Bartibus, could you imagine if that was your nickname, kind of a rough nickname. And so they tell the story, Acts, the writer's name's Luke, he's a doctor, and he's intentionally writing this at the end of Acts chapter four. He speaks of a man named Bartibus, who sells a piece of property, and brings all of the proceeds to the church just to take care of this community, and to take care of others. And Acts chapter five verse one starts with this phrase, but a man named Ananias. So he is intentionally giving us a contrast of two different stories we're gonna pick up in verse one. It says, "But a man named Ananias with his wife Sephira

sold a piece of property, and with his wife's knowledge, he kept back for himself some of the proceeds, and brought only a part of it, and laid it at the apostles' feet. But Peter said, "Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart "to lie to the Holy Spirit and keep back "yourself part of the proceeds of the land? "While it remained, unsold, did it not remain your own? "After it was sold, was it not at your disposal? "Why is it that you have contrived this deed in your heart? "You have not lied to man, but to God?" And I wanna make something abundantly clear at the beginning of this passage. The point of this passage is not to say, "Hey, you need to sell everything and give it to the church. "You can exhale this morning, you're gonna be okay." The heart of this is not simply a generosity problem, it's an honesty problem. Ananias came and presented like he was giving all of the proceeds, but behind closed doors, he kept back some for himself. So the sin here is not that he didn't give enough, the sin here is that he wanted others and God to believe that he was something that he wasn't. He wanted the level of recognition that Barnabas got, but he wasn't willing to give the same amount of surrender that Barnabas gave. And that's very helpful and important for us to understand this morning, because Ananias and Sephira looked the part

and they played the part well. But how many of us know that the goal of Christianity is not to play a part? The goal of Christianity is to follow Jesus Christ humbly and honestly. Jesus did not die for you to give a good performance on a Sunday, he died in order that your entire life might be changed and transformed by the good news of Jesus. And so I just imagined the scene, because Ananias thinks he's fooled everybody. And so he walks into church that day maybe with a little gangster limp, like yeah, people are about to be so impressed by what I'm about to do, given all the proceeds and stuff. And he walks in and he's getting ready to impress everybody. But I'll tell you one person who wasn't impressed, the most important person, God. God will not be fooled. And that's very important for all of us to understand this morning, that you can look the part, you can play the part well, you can fool your spouse, you can fool your friends, you can fool the pastor on the stage, but you cannot fool God. And that should deliver a healthy amount of fear into all of us, including the preacher on the stage. But it's also actually the best news ever, why? Because there are some people who are exhausted in their performative Christianity.

Like their church friends know them as one person, the friends at the country club know them as another person, the friends at the office know them as another person. And I'm here to tell you that if you find yourself in that category today, one if not more of those people is just a costume. And Jesus is here today to invite you, dare I say, command us to take the costume off and step into something that's real, not perfection, but honesty, not perfection. than your fake perfection. But there are a lot of people who keep the costume on and to a certain degree I understand it, because the cost of taking the costume off and living a real honest life is too high. A couple of weeks ago I took my boys to New York City and it's their first time going there and so they were fired up and so we fly on a plane, we land a Newark airport and we are in the airport and we still got like a 45-minute Uber drive to get to Manhattan. But my boys are so excited that my oldest son, Thunder, he's walking through the terminals and we're passing like concession stands and like gate D7 and Thunder's like New York City is amazing. This place is unreal. Well my buddy, this is not New York City, this is an airport. So we get into the Uber, we drive to Times Square, we get dropped off and I bought them like a hot dog at a concession stand because that's what you do in New York City and we're walking through Times Square and my younger son, his name is Dodge, he's like sniffing and I'm like what's going on? He's like dad, New York City kind of smells like steak and I'm like it smells like something buddy, let's keep moving, okay? And so one of the mornings I wake up and there's one of those guys on the side of the street selling all the counterfeit handbags, you know what I'm talking about, if you've ever been to New York City and so because I'm such a hallmark husband I face time my wife and

said hey, are there any of these fake verses that you would like and she's like yeah show me some and they're like you know the Louis Vuitton, the Gucci, the Chanel, all the stuff and she picked out one and she was like hey how much is that one, same that looks unreal and the guy's like 60 bucks and so as a man I'm like alright I'm about to negotiate down to 20, let's go, it's on. And right as I'm about to start negotiating I hang up the FaceTime and a police car turns the corner and turns on his lights. And I see something so impressive in a matter of 0.78 seconds. This man had probably a hundred handbags laid down in a sheet and he grabbed this sheet in 0.34 seconds and starts sprinting down the sidewalk, probably ran a 4-5-40, we should sign them for the cowboys, it was phenomenal. And my boys are left there like what just happened, dad, I'm like well what he was doing was legal and they're like are we doing something illegal, I'm like you don't need to ask that question son. That's not the point of this moment but thank you I appreciate that. But here's the question because the counterfeit industry is a big one in New York City and really across the world and to the untrained eye like a lot of them like they look exactly the same. What's the biggest tell that one's fake other than some random guy on the side of the street trying to sell to you, it's the cost. If you want the real thing it's going to cost you more and the same is true in a true relationship with Jesus. You want the real thing, there's a cost that comes along with it and there's many people who want the benefits of Christianity without the surrender of Christianity. Jesus in Matthew 1624 says you want to know what it looks like to follow me, pick up your cross daily and pursue me aka there's a cost and the cost is die to yourself and follow him and that cost is why so many people live double lives one way on a Sunday morning completely different way on a Friday night because to fully surrender to give him every space in place of my life well that just that cost is too high. Back to the scripture we're going to pick up in verse 5 this is where things get real

so buckle up. Here we go. It says when Ananias heard these words he fell down and breathed his last whoa and great fear came upon all who heard it the young man rose and wrapped him up and carried him out and buried him after an interval of about three hours. His wife came in not knowing what had happened and verse 8 Peter said to her tell me whether you sold the land for so much like you said you give it all is this what you sold it for? She said yeah yeah for sure like that we're giving it all that's how much. Peter said to her how is it that you have agreed together to test the spirit of the Lord behold the feet of those who have buried your husband or at the door and they will carry you out immediately she fell down at his feet and breathed her last when the young man came in and found her dead they carried her out and buried her beside her husband and great fear came upon the whole church and all who heard these things I love verse 11 it's like great fear filled the church like yeah no kidding two funerals before the 1115 service let out I think there would be some fear I'm also like could you imagine the Netflix documentary that get made from that like pastor kills two members of the church for not giving enough money I'd go viral. (audience laughing) This is the New Testament, this is after the resurrection, we're in the period of grace, like what's going on? And first and foremost, we have to look at the context of what I mentioned earlier. We are literally standing in the very start of the church, the delivery room of the church. This new age that Christ is the bedrock of. And if you know your scripture well, you know that oftentimes at the beginning of something brand new, God has a pattern of making his holiness undeniable. And he is doing so in this moment. And he's trying to help his bride see that a pure church is a powerful church. That if you want power in the house of God, it is directly attuned and tied to the level of purity in the house of God.

So Acts 5 is not merely God protecting his reputation, it's God protecting his bride. Because scripture teaches what parents already know, the Lord disciplines those he loves. This is discipline at its finest. And some people sit back and go, well, seems kind of aggressive. I couldn't have just given him like a second shot. To you, I'd say, imagine tomorrow on Labor Day, you are swimming in the beautiful crystal clear blue waters of Lake Grapevine. I don't know why you're laughing so hard, but imagine you're swimming like you see like a 14-foot bull shark. And there's like a bunch of people swimming in the water, like, could you imagine me insane. I don't know one person that would be like, hey, hey, guys, how's your Labor Day going? Good, my two, hey, I just can't help but notice something that there is a man-eating machine behind you. And I just, you know, if you have the time, you think maybe, only if you want to, maybe you just hop out of the water, get in the boat, because there's a man-eating machine behind you. No, not going to do that. You're going to yell, shark, get out of the water, and no one's going to look at that person and be like, well, that's a bit loud and obnoxious. Oh, you're going to get out and listen. The alarm is loud because the danger is real. Acts chapter 5, God is sounding the alarm to his church. Don't mess around with sin. Don't live in the lie of hypocrisy. Do not stand around and play with pet sins in your life. Why? Sin destroys the thing that God loves the most which is you. He knows, he knows where that relationship that doesn't honor him leads you in 15 years. He knows where that seemingly harmless habit is going to end in 10 years. It's going to shackle you to addiction.

So the alarm is loud because the danger of sin is real. The Lord disciplines those he loves. He's trying to protect his bride, but secondly, the reason why God is doing this is because of something we've lost sight of in 2026 in our western world. God is holy, which means sin is never small to him, ever. And this is a lesson that we can all learn from. This is what we do as New Testament believers. We have to hold two truths at the exact same time. We have to hold one truth in one hand. That God is a loving, gracious, compassionate, forgiving father that desires an intimate relationship with us. And in the second hand, at the exact same time, God is a holy and just and righteous judge. But what we tend to do is we tend to like steer towards the side that we like better, which in 2026 is like the compassion, forgiving father that just loves us no matter what. And here's what happens. If you lean that way, you will mistake the patience of God for permission from God and you will live in habitual sin that is actually destroying you. But on the flip side, if you lean towards the righteous, holy judge and just go towards that way, sure, you live like a mortal good life, solely based out of fear, and you will never have the intimate, real relationship that God desires with you. So what do we do? The truth is found in detention. We have to understand that, yes, he is holy and sin is never small, and yet he is gracious and compassionate. A thing that I think describes this really well is Isaiah chapter 6. For times sake, we're not going to turn there. But Isaiah gets a vision of God. He says that there's angels with six wings, which is just crazy to me, are crying one word over and over and over.

Holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy, holy. And when he sees God for who he is, he sees himself for who he is. The first words out of Isaiah's mouth in this vision are, woe is me, I am a man of unclean lips, AKA, I don't belong here. And at that moment, an angel comes down and cleanses his lips. And that is the order and the beauty of the holiness of God. We are exposed so that we can be cleansed. Never one without the other. You experience the magnitude of the grace of God when you understand the magnitude of the holiness of God. A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to go on a dirt bike trip through the deserts of Arizona and it ended in the Grand Canyon. And I had been to the Grand Canyon before when I was like a little kid. Don't really remember much. And so obviously, growing up, you always see photos of the Grand Canyon. And I'm just gonna be honest, because the teenagers are gonna be like, ah, it's a big thing. That's deep, not that impressive. And so we go on this dirt bike trip and it's like nine hours of dirt bike riding through the day, it was insane, it was amazing. But the last day ends at the Grand Canyon. And I just remember being like, oh, we're here,

I may as well go look at it. And I walked up to the edge and I remember like, trying to catch my breath, just like beholding this. There was a certain amount of all, like, oh my, like seeing this in person, it's different, the magnitude of this. Now how many know, the Grand Canyon didn't change. My proximity to it did. And when I got close, I was filled with all. I would argue the same is true or the relationship with God. The closer you get, the more amazed you become and how holy and good he is. And you're like, God, why are you trying to hang out with me? And he gives us grace. And I'm thankful for that reality. Verse seven and eight is one of my favorite parts of this text. It's really easy to brush over because it almost sounds like a sarcastic question where Peter's asking like, hey, did you really sell it for this much? It's a trap, but it's not. It's a moment of true mercy. A moment for Sephira to tell the truth. This is a gift and ultimately she decides to keep the lie. Why? 'Cause Sephira did something that we convince ourselves of many time. And that is that the consequences for confessing her sin, she thought we're gonna be greater than the consequences

of concealing her sin. And that's not true, George. The consequences for confessing your sin are never greater than the consequences for concealing your sin. And God in acts of mercy will oftentimes give us chances and moments to come clean. And my prayer is that we wouldn't make the same mistake that Sephira did. I love James, what he says of confession. He says, confess your sins to one another that you might be healed. What does he say is on the other side of your confession? Healing. We convince ourselves the opposite. And there may be some consequences to your confession. But I'm here to tell you, they never outweigh the consequences for concealing the sin in your life. I heard one of the most amazing definitions of growing in your spiritual walk with Christ is closing the gap between sin and repentance. Closing that gap, there's some people before God, like they'd never admit that they were wrong. Hold on to wrongs for decades. I'm not admitting that, heck no. And they step in a relationship with Jesus. And all of a sudden they start to open themselves up to the spirit of God, bringing things to mind that they need to confess, they need to repent of. And all of a sudden it goes down to years. And all of a sudden it goes down to months.

And then it goes to weeks. And then it goes to days. And then all of a sudden you find yourself mid-sentence like, ah, I'm gonna stop. I'm not gonna do that. And my question to us is this, what would marriages look like with two individuals committed to closing the gap between their sin and their repentance? The thing I can't get out of my mind in this text is how much Ananias desire to recognition. Like he just, he saw Barnabas get named and he's like, ah, I want that kind of recognition. And think about this reality. Here we are 2,000 years later. By name, just not for what he wanted, because if you make recognition, your top goal oftentimes you will be recognized is not for the right things. So when you live for the applause of people, eventually who you really are gets louder than who you're pretending to be. Your goal of life is not to be recognized or seen by other people. The goal of life is a person. His name is Jesus. And our goal is to walk honestly and humbly before him. So what do we do? Well, I think for some, it's time to take the costume off and count that cost. It's worth it, but take off the costume. For others, it's time to confess that sin. Maybe it's, you need to have a conversation with your spouse today. Maybe it's a friend, maybe it's a trusted pastor in your life. You need to experience the healing that is found in confession.

For others, it might just be continuing to fight to closing that gap between your sin repentance. My prayer is that we would honestly assess our lives and view, where do I need to change? Because my question that I'll end with this morning is this. If we were to throw your life up on that screen, what would people say, real or fake? I don't know how to talk about your life, the past seven days, if you call yourself a Christian, we threw it all up there. The stuff that you thought nobody sees, but God sees, what would people say? I'm not talking about perfection. I'm talking about like when you've made mistakes, have you gotten honest with others and with God and owned up to your mistakes? What would they say? Real or fake, my prayer is that we would be a group of people who would chase after purity and after the holiness of God, that we would experience a God who was gracious, compassionate and desires a deep and intimate relationship with his people. And a God who was also a holy and righteous judge. Did you buy your heads with me? Maybe you're in the room and you didn't realize that it was possible to have a real intimate relationship with God. I'm here to tell you it is. And only once you see the holiness of God, can you understand how great of a gift this is? But maybe you're in this room today and you've never made a decision to commit your life to the person of Jesus Christ, to give him everything. I'd love to lead you in a prayer to do exactly that today. These aren't magic words, what matters is the posture of your heart. Just say this after me. You don't even have to say it out loud. You can just say it in the confines of your heart. Say, "Lord, today I admit that I'm a sinner in need of a Savior.

I believe that you are a holy God. And I also believe that you desire a relationship with me. I believe you sent your son to die on a cross and three days later he rose again from the grave. And today I choose to follow you humbly and honestly. I take the costume off and I give you everything. Lord, I lift up everyone under the sound of my voice here and at our different locations. God, by your spirit, would you give us the strength to live this out, to not live hypocritical lives, to confess, to repent, to take the costume off, to sincerely follow you and give you every aspect of who we are. That we would look at our lives and say that we are not perfect, but we are honestly and humbly following and pursuing you. We ask all these things in your son's name. Everybody said, Amen. Come on, can we thank Pastor Sam, listen, no one in the movie, no one stirring, I want to share with you three things. Before we dismiss you all, number one church family, can we just celebrate every single individual that has just professed Jesus as Lord. We want to celebrate you. This is the best decision you could ever make. And we want you to know that this faith journey is not meant to be done alone. To my right and to my left, we have an amazing team of volunteers that would love to play some Bible in your hands, would love to help you with your next steps and even pray alongside you. And even in general, if you need any form of prayer, please stop by and we would love to help you. Number two, next Sunday is going to be a really special time. our first responders and not only are we going to honor those and remember those but we're also going to honor pray and bless our first responders next Sunday. You know we live in a culture that is about defunding the police and dishonoring but here's

what I'm here to tell you fellowship church backs the blue, fellowship church cares about and I believe that we are a church family that should care about these people. You know we even were shared that there's a woman who's actually going to be joining us who lost a loved one who died in the line of duty and I believe that there's so many people that we could be interacting with and we could even do our part in getting people here next Sunday is not only we remember but we pray for God to continue to do something amazing. Here's a great way you could do that. By tapping the seat back in front of you it's going to take you to a link. I would ask everyone to do this right now but tap the seat back in front of you. It's going to take you to a link. You could click honor the brave and it's going to take you to a Facebook event that you could immediately share on your social media because here's the reality. You know people that may be first responders. Maybe you know a loved one who's lost someone in the line of duty. This is the Sunday to bring them and we know for a fact that God is going to do something so special in and through this. Finally church will you stand to your feet as we declare this as we step into this week. Stay with me on the count of three ready one, two, three, Jesus thank you that in you I am loved, forgiven and blessed for you. I will reach up and worship, reach out to share my faith and reach in to become more like you and because of you. I know the best is yet to come church. We love you. We'll see you next Sunday. God bless. We'll praise you, praise you Lord.