The Everyday Life of a Disciple

years now. Today's sermon comes from Acts 2 42 through 47 and they devoted themselves to the Apostles teaching and the fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers and awe came upon every soul and many wonders and signs were being done through the Apostles and all who believed were together and had all things in common and they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need and day by day attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes they received their food with glad and generous hearts praising God and having favor with all the people and the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved. This is the word of God for the people of God. You may be seated. Thank you Olivia. Good morning summit church. It's so good to be with y'all. You heard Olivia just read Acts 2 so y'all go ahead and take your Bibles out. Scroll there and get there. I want you to meet me there as Pastor Brian says, "Hey my name is John and I'm one of the pastors here. It's so good to be with y'all today." We ended our series in Ecclesiastes last weekend. If you weren't able to listen to that whole thing, please can I commend that to you. Go to our website, find all of those we want you to be able to be encouraged by that. Now I don't know if you know this. I know some of you do. This Tuesday is a big day in the life of our city. It's a big day in the life of our town. It's a big day in the life of our state, even our country. This Tuesday is when the NHL season opens up and our hurricanes are taking the ice against the stinking Florida Panthers. And man I can't stand them. I can't stand them. Florida doesn't need ice. Like they don't need an NHL team. It's just a lawless swamp there, right? Like that's why all of you from up north moved there and then came here because you don't want to be there, right? And we're glad that you are here. Look, I hope our boys put them into the wall in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Amen. Now look, here's what I have noticed since June whenever we won the Stanley Cup. There's some of you that have been here for a minute, right? You've been here for oh, oh, wow. You've been a Cain's fan for a while. Then there's some of you that just showed up. Let's be honest, right? In fact, by show of hands, how many of you have been a Cain's fan

for 20 plus years? How many of you 10 plus years? How many of you went to the parade? How many of you are going to the game this Tuesday night? And y'all didn't invite me. Unbelievable. Shame on you. Shame on you. Not my wife already said I can't go. We got soccer practice, but I mean, we can still talk, right? We can still talk. Look, there are those of you that are devoted fans and then there are those of you that are bandwagon fans because everybody loves a winner. Everybody loves it. In fact, if you are a bandwagon fan, hey, look, we're glad you're here. We got room for you, all right? And we got nothing but love for you. We want you. We are glad that you were here. Just don't hop off if things don't go our way this year, all right? Because see, a bandwagon fan shows up when things are good. Man, we show up. You posted in May, let's go canes. And all your friends from back home were like, who are you? How do you even know what hockey is? Devoted fans, man, you've got a Reebok jersey. None of this fanatics mess, right? Like, you've got the gear. Like, you've been there. You've been to the games. We went to four games. Last year, got my son a jersey of marketplace. I mean, man, we're in. We are for it. But band wagon fans show up when things are up and to the right. And I wonder, I wonder if some of us in here treat God and His church the same way. I wonder if there are those of us in here that as long as we got the career that we want, the relationship that we want, the things in life that we want, if our life is up and to the right, man, we show up. Praise God. We post about God. We do a verse of the day. Man, we are all about Jesus because He's all about us. But then, when life gets hard, that relationship breaks up, we may lose the job. Our health begins to fade. We fade on God because we believe He's fading on us. See, we're going to talk about the everyday life of a disciple today. And everyday life of a disciple is a devoted disciple. See, I can tell a devoted king's fan from a band wagon fan. You know who their mama mama is. You know where they're from. You know how many teeth Jalen Chatfield has, which is three, it's three. And man, it's hard to chew if you are him,

but the boy can skate, right? You know about them. You know them. See, a Ben Wagon knows about the team. You probably don't even know the season started this Tuesday night. But a devoted fan, you know the team. You're vested in the team. And see the life of a growing disciple is life of a devoted disciple. So what I want you to do, right, right, right, right now, just think to yourself, don't answer out loud. I want you to really think about your spiritual life and your relationship with God. Are you a Ben Wagon fan? You just show up 'cause things are good. Are you a devoted disciple? You are committed to Jesus Christ because he is committed to you. See, we get devoted from two verses in our passage today, verse 42 and verse 46. Verse 42 says, "And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, fellowship to the breaking of bread and the prayers." And I love the new American standard version of verse 46 because it uses the word continuing, which is the same Greek word that devoted is in verse 42. Verse 46, "Day by day, continuing with one mind in the temple and breaking bread from house to house,

they were taking their meals together with gladness and sincerity of heart." Devotion here, the definition of the Greek word means staying and growing in the same thing in the same place. Staying and growing, progressing in the same thing in the same place. Does that characterize your discipleship of Jesus Christ? See, before we get to the rest of Acts 2, I wanna take us back to Acts 1 and give you some context about what's happening there. In Acts 1, Jesus Christ said, "Just died, died, buried three days in the tomb, boom, he's out. Now he's gonna live for 40 days on the earth, holds in his hand, holds in his side, he's gonna eat, he's gonna walk, he's gonna apparate, he's gonna do all the things while he's here on earth for 40 days. In fact, Corinth written it says that over 500 people saw him when he rose back to life. That's 12 and a half people a day for 40 days. If you're skeptical of the claims of Jesus Christ, I want you to look into this. Because this is a fact that shows that Jesus Christ rose from the dead, that 500 eyewitnesses saw him. Now, when the 500 eyewitnesses saw him, Jesus walked with him for 40 days. On day 40, Jesus calls everybody together and he goes, "Look, I've got a role, but I want y'all to stay here because the Holy Spirit is going to come. So I want y'all to remain in Jerusalem

until the Holy Spirit comes and let's read what he says in Acts 1, 8. Jesus says this, "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, stop. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you." And let's talk about who the Holy Spirit is for second. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of God, the third person of the Trent Trinity. This is the Son of God, Jesus Christ, second person of the Trinity. The first is God, the Father. Jesus Christ is saying, "Hey, hang tight, wait here because you're going to receive power when the Holy Spirit comes." He doesn't say he's going to take your life to the next level. He's going to make you the best version of you that you can be. He's going to solve all the problems. He's going to take care of everything and make sure your life is up and to the right. No, no, he says, "But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes." Church, we need to realize what this means. This is the power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, the same Spirit in Genesis one that hovered over the deep. This is the Spirit that was and will always be.

This is the Spirit of the living God. But you will receive power. Not you will receive a good day. Not you will receive a good report card. You will receive power. Do we actually realize that the power of God and the Spirit of God rest within us, lives within us, dwells within us, speaks to us, comforts us, teaches us, of the living God dwells within us? Do you live like that? If you're a follower of Jesus Christ, the power in the spirit of God dwells within you. That means the power to overcome porn, the power to put that drink down, the power to be a peaceful man in your home, the power to forgive, the power to repent, the power to endure, the power to love, the power to forgive again, the power to go again, the power to do everything that Jesus Christ did besides die for your sins has been given to you through the power of the Holy Spirit. What are we talking about? It's the power of God. He said, "You will receive power. "Not you will receive a calm presence "and a nice summer breeze. "Not you will receive a good day. "Not everything will be okay. "It was the power of God, the Holy Spirit "that has given you power to live the devoted life

"that Jesus Christ died for you." See, the Christian life is not about what you do for God, it's about what God has done for you. And God didn't leave you. He said, "The Holy Spirit, to you, "to dwell within you, receive that and live in that, "that the power to defeat your fears, "the power to defeat your shame, "the power to tell Satan to go take a hike "is from the Holy Spirit and dwells within you." It's the power of the Holy Spirit that God has given to us, but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, come on. And you will be by witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the world. Let's see, the purpose of the power of the Holy Spirit is for the proclamation of the gospel. The purpose of the power of the Holy Spirit, and so that you would proclaim the goodness of Jesus Christ. The life of a devoted disciple starts with having the Holy Spirit come upon you and give you the power to live the life that God has called us to live. And so then we see Jesus tells them to wait. He says, "Wait, hang tight." 10 days later, they're in the room praying, and look, I want you to put yourself in this room. Put yourself there. This is 50 days after Jesus died, 50 days after. You're praying in this room, you're waiting,

and then all of a sudden you hear a loud noise. Mighty, rushing wind. Think about the engine of a 747. No, no, think about a hundred engines. That's how loud it was. Think about that noise. You're in this room, you're in this room, praying. You're praying. You hear this noise, and all of a sudden, tongues of fire acts says, just start popping on top of everybody's head. Just pop, pop, pop, pop. And all of a sudden they begin to hear languages that they don't know. They begin to hear languages of other nations. They begin to hear people proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ in other languages. It would be like all of you that can't speak Spanish. When someone at Español just led us in those songs, you could understand every word without the subtitles. That's it. And the Holy Spirit spoke through them and people got saved. The Holy Spirit moved. The Holy Spirit does what the Holy Spirit does. And Peter, in Peter's way, stands up, preaches a sermon which must have been a banger, right? Because scripture tells us 3,000 people at least got saved. 3,000 people. And I love this 'cause this is already the Holy Spirit

fulfilling the promises that Jesus gave them. When he said wait, the Holy Spirit's gonna come and then you're gonna be my witnesses in Jerusalem, which is where they were. You will be my witnesses there. And what we see is that the proclamation of the gospel came, put yourself there. You're hearing other languages and you understand them. And you're speaking them. You're speaking in other languages and people are being saved. I see that in the power of the Holy Spirit does what only he can do, verse 37. Now when they heard this, they heard the proclamation of the gospel, they were cut to the heart. Cut to the heart, let's talk about that. Being cut to the heart means that they were convicted, means that they saw truth, means that they saw, you know what, I am a sinner. You know what I have? But now I believe and I see because of the Holy Spirit opening my eyes that Jesus Christ is the only way to be saved. They were cut to the heart. See that's what precedes salvation is that the Holy Spirit opens your heart and your eyes to see that Jesus is the only way to be saved. My prayer is that for those of you that have never surrendered your life to Jesus Christ that the Holy Spirit would do that to you today. In fact, I'll just go ahead and lay it out clear. The fact that you're here today is not because somebody nagged you enough to be here and that they promised you a great brunch after this.

The fact that you're here is because the Holy Spirit is pursuing you. That God is drawing you. That God is calling to you. And what the Holy Spirit is trying to do is pierce to your heart and get to your heart to cut you in the heart so that you see that you were created for a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and that He has done everything necessary to save you. So they were cut to the heart. Cut to the heart. And then they said, "Peter, what do we do?" And He says, "Repent and be baptized." So then they were baptized and that we've got baptism weekend coming up in October. And man, we hope these tanks are full. We want you to be in it. We want everyone you know to be in it because we want them to be cut to the heart and receive Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit working on them. And then we see in verse 41 that 3,000 of them got saved. Look, there's a quote by Pastor Tyler Satan who preached here last year. He wrote a book on the Holy Spirit called The Familiar Stranger. I want you to read that book. In that book, he says, "The Spirit, the Holy Spirit, is the conduit between what I believe and the experience of that belief. The Spirit is not about making worship, gatherings, more exciting. The Spirit is about making faith more real. It is the Holy Spirit that grows you in your devotion to God. It is the Holy Spirit that grows you in your affection for God. When you were cut to the heart, man, the only response is to surrender your life. And see, whenever we believe differently, we're cut to the heart. And as a disciple, we don't just believe differently. We live differently.

We live devoted to him. You know, there's a story about a CPA named Michael. Michael was from a small town. In fact, first, kid in his family to go to college, all the hopes and dreams of family on him. Many goes to college, befins a professor that becomes his mentor. And Michael, 15 years after that, finds himself in the conference room with every page of his misappropriating of funds. Every page of his bezel man is just being laid out in front of him, laid out in front of him. The evidence stacked so high that he couldn't overcome it. There was no debate that he had stolen and he had cheated. He expected the cops to walk in the room and escort him out. But instead, the owner of the company, his mentor, comes in the room, his mentor looks at him. This is the guy that gave him everything, gave him a chance when he had no experience. Looks at him and says, "I know what you did, I know what you've done, I've paid the price, I've taken care of it, there's going to be no consequences, you can go back to work." He, Michael was wrecked and he said, "But why did you do this?" And his mentor said, "Because grace is costly and I chose to pay it." That's the same thing God did for us. What do you think that did for Michael? Changed the way he lived, he no longer was working for grace, but from grace. See, that's the life of a follower of Jesus Christ. What makes us devoted to God is because he has done everything necessary to save us. We don't work for grace, we work from it. We don't work for forgiveness, we live from it. We're not devoted to God to get anything from God, we are devoted to him because he has not withheld anything from us. And so what we see when we are devoted to God, remember that definition, that we stay

in a relationship in the same place with him and we grow in that day by day. You know what, Summit Church, we have something called the five identities of a disciple. We just thought that sounded cooler than five characteristics, right? So we've got worshiper, family member, servant, steward, witness. Today in our text, we're gonna talk about worshipper, but we live differently as his disciples devoted to him. So the first we're gonna talk about devoted to worship, devoted to worship. Verse 42, again, says, "And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching "and to fellowship and to the breaking of bread, "which we all know sourdough, right, and the prayers." Verse 46, "And day by day, attending temple together, "verse 47, praising God and having favor with all people." I love Tim Keller's quote about worship. He says, "Worship is seeing what God is worth "and giving him what he's worth." Worship is seeing what God is worth and giving him what he's worth. You know, I heard the story of a boy that lived near the beach. He and his dog were out on the beach. One summer day, man, he could smell the salty air. He could fill the sun, getting the rise 'cause he lived on the east coast. And so he began to walk and began to see all these starfish were on the beach. And he just picked one up, threw it. Picked another one up, threw it. Did that for as long as he could

before he had to go home and wash up and get to his summer job. Well, he did it again the next day. More starfish were on the shore. And the next day, more starfish. This turned out, this turned into day after day, week after week, he began to do this. And one day he comes home and he's washed up. He's sitting at the table eating breakfast and his mama said, "Hey, baby, why do you go out every day "and throw the starfish back into the sea? "Why do you do that?" And he took a bite of his breakfast and he drank some orange juice. And he said, "Well, mama, that's where they belong." See, the same is true about our hearts and our lives. Worship is seeing what God is worth, which is our whole life. And it's us giving him what he's worth. It's us throwing our life and our hearts into the sea of God's grace and his goodness. I don't know if y'all are like me, but I wake up every day with the starfish of my life washed on the shore of my heart. I wake up every day thinking, you know what? This is probably the day Ashley's gonna be done. With me. This is it. The world is going to be pulled off of her eyes, right? I wake up every day going, "Man, are my kids gonna deny me

"when they're 21? "Are my kids gonna deny Christ? "Is my health gonna hold out for my family? "Are my investments right? "Is this finally the Sunday that Capitol Hill's "is just tired of having a pastor that stutters?" And they're like, "You know what? "He's out of here." That's a joke by the way. Two weeks, two weeks ago here, I had a guy come up to me and I was just trying to mess with him and I said, "Hey, how many peas are in worshiper "without thinking," he said, "Are you saying it?" (audience laughing) Said, "All right, fair enough. "I'm not now. "You know what I mean? "Not now 'cause it can be one or 10. "Who knows?" Those of y'all that were here last week, we're not gonna talk about the cough I had during communion, I'm not gonna do that, 'cause y'all have let me know that all week. Believe me, people have clipped that and sent that to me. It happens, enough of that. I think that you know what? I've done enough, that's it. You know what I have to do? I have to take the starfish of my life and throw them back into the seat of God's goodness

and worship leads me to do that. God's word leads me to do that. God's word teaches me the truths of God that I can live by. God's word holds me fast. God's word shows me. Psalm 119, 105 says, "What thy word?" Not my word, not John's word. Your word, God, is a lamp into my feet and a light and to my path. You know what? Dallas Willard says this about worship and the word. He says, "We must not worship without study. "For ignorant worship is of limited value "and can be very dangerous." Very dangerous. Prayer is the same way. When I pray, I take the starfish of my life and I throw them back into the sea of God's grace and God's goodness. When I talk to God, God listens. God hears. God speaks back to me. You know what? Our own Pastor Brian says this, the older I get, and man, is that dude getting old, right? Like, I mean, it's significant, right? The older I get, the more I realize that the real power and prayer is not getting my wish list checked off,

but encountering my Lord and Savior. It's not about a wish list, it's about our Savior, it's about a relationship. We are devoted to God because He is devoted to us. Ben Wagon says, "What can I get out of it?" Devoted says, "God, look at all you have given to me in yourself." You know, we have an elder here that a few years ago, he had a brain bleed, scary times, scary times, and he got put in the ambulance, sent to the ER, right into the OR, they're doing all these tests and everything on him, right? And I asked, I said, "Hey man, what were you thinking during that time? What was going through your mind because he's got a wife, kids, grandkids?" And I'm like, "What were you thinking?" And he said, "John, of course, I was praying. Of course, I was saying the word of God to myself." He's like, "But what kept me with singing worship songs over and over and over? What kept me was the praise of God. What kept me was the songs that we sing at church. I sang as many of them as I could because they reminded my heart and they threw the starfish of my life back into the grace and the power of Jesus Christ. You know, I had the same thing happen to me a few weeks ago. I come here, man, all week and long, the whispers were just all over me. I don't know if you get those, but they were just like, "John, they don't appreciate you. John, your family's so lucky to have you." Then they would say, "You know what? You're not enough. Your family deserves better. Your wife deserves better. Your kids deserve better. Your job deserves better." And all week and long, just the whispers of doubt, fear and everything. And when I came into this place, it wasn't what the words that the pastor said that changed

my heart. It was not the songs that we sang, but it was me coming down to the altar here, praying and pouring out my heart and life to God that I got up from there changed because worship doesn't change your circumstances. It changes the posture of your heart. It changes you because it gives to God what He is worth and He is worth your life. He is worth complete surrender. You know, not only do we worship here, but we're a family here. We're a family here. And that's the second thing that we are devoted to here, devoted to family. Verse 44 says, "And all who believed were together and had all things in common." In fact, verse 45 says, "They sold their possessions to help one another out." Somebody had a need, man, they went to next door, Craigslist marketplace. Sold their couch, gave them the cash. They were doing whatever they could to provide for each other because they were family. That's what family is. That's what family does. And look, there's not a Christian that I know that does not want this kind of church. I hear from you all the time, "Oh, man, act to whoo." If we could just live in acts to, man, we just share, we just praise, we just pray, we just break bread, we just live life, man. That's what the Lord died to give us acts to. Jesus, can we please have acts to? And I hear you, and I want that too. But let's be honest, everybody wants a family, but we don't want to be a family member because being a family member means you got responsibilities. Think about it. When your friends used to come over to play, who had to clean, clean up? You were them, you because you're a part of the family, right? Many of us want to come in here and we want to talk about our preferences.

Man, kids check in to two minutes. Man, student check in was loud, was students. It's going to be loud. Man, it's too cold in the auditorium. Look, that one's on me because I'm not going to sweat in here, all right? I'll tell them to jack it down. I'll tell my wife the same thing. In July, we keep it a nice, Chris, 65. I'm like, we will eat rice and beans, but I'm not going to sweat in my house. Amen. Amen. So I treat this the same way. Look, many of us come in here. We come in here and we want to treat this church like a college student coming home. You got two months of dirty laundry that you ain't touched. When you come into the house, you dump that on the floor and the fridge better be stopped with all your favorite things. And you come, come in, you grab that, throw food in your mouth and say, all right, mom and dad, I'll see you tonight. Then you go out and hang out with your friends. Lord knows when you come home. Then you come, come home. And Lord knows when you're going to wake up because you don't go by a clock when you're You're gonna be upset and they don't love you and this is why you don't come home more, right? So you get up then eat that breakfast give them enough information where it seems like you're being honest with them But you're not full full in them or yourself about your life Then you go hang out with your friends again in the clothes that mama just washed the night before and made daddy fold Right you go out that night come home and the only reason you go to church It's because they promised you a lunch and that's the last good meal You're going to have until the next time you come home and then you know daddy is gonna stick a hundred bucks in your pocket for gas

That's how we treat the church We treat the church and want to come dump our lives and say fix it We treat the church and say hey the lights were too bright Hey parking lot was too tough Hey kids check in was too hard Y'all are here to serve me Why are y'all not here for me and look I want you here guest. I want you here. We are here for you But we also want you to become family As he being a part of the family Means you got responsibilities Means you got to show up for each other Means you got to get close enough to somebody's life that you can see the blind spots that they believe and you can step into Those blind spots and draw them out of them It means that you show up at 2 a.m. When they are suffering and hurting it means you show up when marriage is on the rocks It means you show up when they've done something wrong and when they've done something good You said a meal train whenever somebody dies or somebody has a kid It means you show up for them and live life with them because Jesus Christ showed up for you Jesus Christ didn't die for you to be a part of country club and get what you want out of the church Jesus Christ died to give you a church a representation of himself his bride so that you may love his bride and they may love you That is the family that we get to be a part of and look I know I know families are weird I Get it. I get it. You're weird if you don't think If you don't think your family is weird, it's probably you right like they talk about you when you're not around all right It's okay. We all do it. It's all right. Look pastor JD is weird, man He's weird and he's overseas so I can say it all right He likes tapas small plates Love shareables, right? You go to lunch with him He's like hey you mind if we order like three or four things and share him. I'm like no, I'm a man I don't want three or four things to make a meal. I want a meal No, I don't want to give you half of my burger and we split your sweet potato fries

If I wanted that I would order that Good grief you got a beer and then drive a truck act like it, right? and And he loves small dogs Duh doesn't like big dogs. He'll stand up here all the time ooh cats, but I'm like you like a dog that's smaller than a cat That makes no sense pastor Curtis. He's weird He is this man at lunch this past week told me having one docs in his weird - is fine That'll make sense Why is one weird why is too fun? Who are you? It doesn't make sense look I've got weird things to ask my wife or my close friends. I don't eat round things I'm weird. All right. We're not gonna go into it. All right This is just we're all weird. We are let's level set and Jesus Christ came and died for all of us So you can't hold somebody's weirdness against them Because Jesus didn't hold it again against you You can't hold their sin against them because Jesus didn't hold George against you Jesus took that on the cross And look the other thing about being part of a family means that you're known It just means that you know And if we're honest that scares us It scares us because if we can be honest We don't really like ourselves We know we've messed up We've know we've made some mistakes. We know we've hurt people And we know our past and we don't want our past to become our present And we don't want you to know the worst things about us because we're afraid that you'll leave us like everybody else See here's the beauty about the cross of Jesus Christ is that you're known There's nothing hidden from Jesus Christ in your life and everything you've done and everything somebody has done to you Has been covered on at the cross of Jesus Christ That's the most beautiful thing in the world to be known and loved at the same time If you're like, John, that's great for you to say on stage,

but I don't think that's real. Cool, watch this. How many of you in this room, by show of hands, have had somebody from this church show up for you? When times were hard, when times were tough, when you were believing doubts, when you were experiencing fears, when you were going through hard things in life, by show of hands, how many, how many in this church had somebody show up for you for you? Hands down, how many, how many in this church have shown up for somebody else, when they were walking through that show of hands? How many of you right now, if somebody's going through pain and suffering, are willing to show up for them? All right, hands up, keep them up. If you were new here, or skeptical about the love of God, these are people right here, that I want you to go talk to afterwards, because we want to love you, and we want to care for you, hands down. Being a part of a family means you belong. And if you want a place to belong, this is it. This is a place where it's okay to not be okay. This is a place where you can bring your mess because we got a lot of ours. Jesus Christ can take all of it. Look, we want to be your family here. Being a family member means you're known, and you know others. You show up for them, and they show up for you.

And when we're a family, we begin to live life together. And as that, God grows our family. And that's the last thing we live as a devoted disciple, devoted to witness. Verse 47, "And the Lord added to their number, day by day, those who were being saved. And the Lord added to their number, day by day, those who were being saved." And I know, I hear you. You're like, yeah, John, that was acts. That was acts, that was then this is now. The Holy Spirit was active there. Who are you talking about? The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God was active then, but He's not now. The same God that was and is and is to come. The same God that has no beginning and no end. You're saying His Spirit, just stop. You're saying that God saved you and then said, hey, it's up to you now, you're on your own. You're saying that God saved you and now has abandoned you. You're saying that the Holy Spirit is active in this world. Look, let me prove to you that the Holy Spirit of Acts is the Holy Spirit of today. It's the Holy Spirit of today and it's happening here. It's happening here. God added to their number daily, right? Daily. At the Capitol Hills campus alone, we baptized 454 people last year.

There's 365 days in a year. Added to our number daily. Added to our number daily. Look, I know of a Bible study in Wake Forest started when a dude just shared the gospel with another dude. The other dude was like, I'm not ready yet. He's like, cool, let's read Mark. So they read the book of Mark. That guy gets saved. They invite more into it. Now, three years later, there's like 45 to 50 guys meeting one Bible study in North Raleigh, one Bible study in Wake Forest and one in Wilmington of all places. I can tell you somebody else at this church to share the gospel with a guy at his gym. As he did, he came to Christ. They began to invite more into it. Out of that now are three Bible studies with like 50 plus guys meeting in homes across R.D.U. There's a member of our church moved into a neighborhood here in North Raleigh and just pray God, give us lost neighbors. As they did, they moved in. They built a relationship with their neighbor. So much so. So that that began to them doing life together and everything else they shared about Christ with them. And then that neighbor gets saved in his car one night by himself and then leads his wife to Christ.

They are now coming here and growing in it. I could tell you about woman. Up in Roseville, it was like, you know what? I want to reach the neighborhood. I don't know how, puts out on next door and says, hey, anybody want to come to Bible study at my house? Random women from that neighborhood showed up. She has led people to Christ. They meet in her home every week, studying the word of God. I can tell you about our middle and high school students that are leading Bible studies on their campuses before school, during school and after school, seeing their friends come to Christ. Look, the Holy Spirit is moving. The Holy Spirit is doing things. Do you want him to use you? See a bandwagon, fans, says, I don't want to be inconvenienced. Bandwagon fan wants to keep Jesus all to themselves. A devoted disciple says, Lord, use me. Lord, use my life. In fact, let's do this right now. I want you to get a name in your mind, a face in your mind of somebody in your life Get the name in your mind. Get their face in your mind. Who is it? I want you to get their name and face in your mind.

Can you see 'em? Can you see the name? You just heard from the Holy Spirit. Listen to me, the Spirit of God just spoke to you. There's nothing on your power that would make you come up with a name and make you see a face but the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit just spoke to you. The Spirit of God just spoke to you and just told you, hey, I'm moving on this person. I want you, this week, to move towards that person. I want you to invite them to lunch. I want you to invite them to church. I want you to ask them, hey, what do you believe about God? Ask them about their life. Move towards them like Christ has moved towards us. Look, that was the Holy Spirit revealing that to you. Now you might be here today and you may have lined your life up and said, you know what? I really don't feel the power of the Holy Spirit in my life. I don't think I am a worshiper, family member or witness. Well, that may be because you've never been saved. You may be trying to be a fan, but you've never surrendered your life to be a disciple. See, all you have to do, scripture is clear. All you have to do is confess and say, Jesus, I'm a sinner. Jesus, I need you. I surrender my life to you. Come and be my Lord and my Savior. And scripture says you will be saved.

And at that moment, that you surrender your life to Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit comes and dwells within you. And if you just pray that prayer, then the Holy Spirit is dwelling within you. And I bet right now you feel an overwhelming peace and joy. You might be here and you're just skeptical still. I'm so glad that you were here. Please, please do two things for me. Keep showing up, keep showing up. I want you to just keep coming. We want you here. We want you here. Second thing is I want you to ask and pray, God, reveal yourself to me. God, reveal yourself to me. That's a prayer that God will always answer. And I look for the rest of us here. Which one, worshiper, family member, or witness, did the Holy Spirit put his finger on in your life that he wants you to grow in? Which one is? Look, we want to help you grow. Because we don't want to just be a church that believes differently. We want to live differently, devoted to God because he is devoted to us. It's not about what we do. We're devoted because of what God has done. I want you to receive that love

and that finished work of the cross today. Let me pray for us. Lord, I pray for those that just prayed to receive you, that just prayed to surrender their life to you. Lord, I ask in Jesus' name, Lord, in Jesus' name, that you would grow their affections for you. Lord, help us see them. Help us move towards them like you have moved towards us. Lord, I pray for those that are here and would say, hey, I'm not ready to do that yet. And they're skeptical. Lord, I pray they just keep showing up. Holy Spirit, that you move upon them. And Holy Spirit, we pray that you move upon our church, to move upon our homes and our lives and our children and our marriages, that you breathe upon us, that you move upon us, that we may be witnesses of you for the proclamation of the gospel that you would add to our number, day by day, those who were being saved. But we ask this of you, only what you can do. We surrender these things to you and we love you because you first loved us. Lord, God, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen, amen. Well, look, we just learned, we just talked about worship. Let's stand now and let's, as family,

praise God for being so devoted to us and let's respond in song and devote motion to him. (gentle music) (gentle music)