Still on Training Wheels?

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically from the audio and may contain small errors.

The last week, we continued our series through the book of Galatians. And so today, we're going to be in Galatians chapter 4. We're technically going to start on the last verse of chapter 3, but it should be right next to chapter 4. And so last week, we left off with this verse. In Galatians 3:29 it says, and if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise. Okay, in the book of Galatians, in the letter to the Galatian churches, as we have been talking about, this is a region, this would be like a letter to all the churches in Johnson County, for example. So this is a letter to the Galatian churches in the region. To help the Galatian churches understand what's going on, we have a lot of really heavy contrasts, a lot of black-white, right? A lot of big differences. And so the contrasts are there to help the churches understand what's going on.

And so in chapter one, what do we see? We saw the heavy contrast. We saw the heavy contrast. I received the gospel from Jesus, not from any other man. I'm not writing the coattails of the apostles. I heard the gospel from Jesus. Chapter two, what do we see? We saw justification by faith, not by works. And then chapter three, what we saw last week was we have the law versus the promise. So we have this really heavy contrast. And 329 helps us understand kind of where we're going, because it mentions the promise. But today we're going to have another sharp contrast. We're going to be contrasting heirs, that's H-E-I-R-S, heirs and slaves. Aires and slaves. Except that this contrast works a little differently. Okay, and we're going to see that in Galatians chapter four, and then we're just going to read one and then three. We're going to skip two for the sake of time.

Galatians chapter 4 verse 1 says, I mean, so he's bringing some clarity here, I mean that the heir, as long as he is a child, is no different from a slave, though he is the owner of everything. So we're having contrast, but he begins in verse 1, talking about how they're the same. Skip down to verse 3, in the same way, we also, when we were children, were enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. Okay? So what he's saying is that an heir and a slave, when they're young, look the same. Or when an heir is young, the life is no different than the slave. They're both enslaved to the elementary principles of the world. We're going to get to what that is. And some of your translations are going to say something different than elementary principles of the world. It's one Greek word, stoichiion. And there's a lot of kind of variation on what it means, but there's something that's

going to be helpful for you guys if we think of them like training wheels. The elementary principles of the world here are like training wheels. Training wheels, as we know, are designed to be outgrown. If you have a mature cyclist who will go for 30 miles at a clip, like Hollis, Hollis is claiming to be a mature cyclist. Carol, can you amen that? Okay, amen, all right. If you put training wheels, you wouldn't put training wheels on Hollis and his motorcycle, you wouldn't do it. That would be limiting, unnecessary. It might actually mess his bike up. We would not want that.

Part of growing up, right, when you learn how to ride a bike, part of growing up is getting those training wheels removed. Okay, so we can think of these elementary principles as training wheels. We'll keep them going. Verses four and five of Galatians four, it says, but when the fullness of time had come, so when we grew up, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. Okay, we discussed this last week at length, okay, that Jesus obeyed the law for us so that we could be rescued from the penalty of not measuring up. So that, in fact, we could raise our hand without any condemnation and say, I want to follow you, Jesus. I want to live this abundant life with you. Because God could easily say, in that moment with our hand raised, say, why? Why would I do that? The only reason we get to raise our hand and do that,

the only reason we don't have condemnation is because Jesus obeyed the law for us, okay? Now, that's just good. I'm glad you're amen-ing. I mean, let's just take some hopes of joy in that today, right, that we are free. I mean, we just sang it. We're free, free, forever we're free. Come join the song of all the redeemed. The reason that they're redeemed is they're redeemed from the law. And this is what Galatians 4 verse 5 is telling us. And the point here is that there's this contrast that's developing between heirs and slaves. It says, unlike heirs, restrictions that slaves have never go away. If you're a slave, verse 4, it says the fullness of time had come. If you're a slave, the fullness of your time never comes. You have restrictions forever. That's what being enslaved actually means. So the restrictions then are not training wheels for the slave, they're shackles.

And to a child learning how to ride a bike, training wheels might feel like shackles, right? But ultimately it's helping them, okay? Unlike heirs, the restrictions of slaves never go away. And this is really the point that he's getting to in Galatians chapter four, Because in verse seven, he says this, so church, you are no longer a slave, but a son. And if a son, then an heir through God. You are an heir, not a slave. The Galatian churches were having trouble with restrictions. They were having trouble identifying what they should and should not stop doing. They didn't understand how to deal with rules. And they believed that if they quit doing whatever they were doing, that they were doing something bad. So let's keep reading to find out exactly how this was happening, exactly what is happening. Galatians 4, 8. It says, formally, you did not know God. Oh, excuse me, formally, when you did not know God,

you were enslaved by those, to those by nature are not gods. I butchered that. Essentially, when you didn't know God, were enslaved to things that were not gods. So he's being really clear with the church now and he's saying, look, you used to be slaves. You used to be shackled up. You actually were shackled up by things that were much less powerful than God. Compared to God, they were weak and powerless. They were not gods. So he continues into verse 9. And this is the crux right here. This is the part that we understand what's going on a little more. He says, but now that you have come to know God or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world whose slaves you want to be once more? He's saying you have a relationship with God. This is your identity. You are an heir with full rights, with full inheritance, with full security.

And so what we can deduce then is that in the Galatian churches, something has happened. Someone has tricked them into thinking you're not an heir, you're a slave. Those restrictions, if you keep doing them, they're going to save you. These restrictions that we're talking about, we see what they are in the next two verses in Galatians chapter 4, verses 10 and 11. It says, you observe, talking about the restrictions here, the elementary principles of the world, you observe days and months and seasons and years. I'm afraid that I may have labored over you in vain. Now look, this does not sound like a lot. It says you observe days and months and seasons and years. sound like a lot, but we know it's serious because of the next verse, what it says, I'm afraid that I may have labored over you in vain. So this isn't, this isn't some like small, confusing issue.

This isn't, you know, a little thing. This is a big deal, but why is a calendar a big deal? We need to understand. So whenever he says, you observe Dave's months and seasons and years, this is actually a callback to Genesis 1 14 when it says that God created light for signs and for seasons and for days and for years. What Paul here in Galatians 4 10 is likely pointing to is the Jewish calendar. So the Jewish calendar, there There were seven feasts on the Jewish calendar, seven major feasts. And this is, again, this is confusing because we don't really live like this. We don't really know anybody who's feeling oppressed by Valentine's Day. We don't really know anybody who's like, oh, it's Memorial Day. We got to, this is going to take over my life. I mean, we're just happy to get a day off work. We're not beholden to the American calendar. We might decorate our house or stress over the Thanksgiving meal, but it's not quite the same.

The Jewish calendar, there were seven major feasts, there were other minor feasts, there were Sabbath meals. The Jewish calendar was a dominant force in Jewish culture. You were always living in preparation for the next feast, for the next thing, okay? You were always saying, okay, I have to prepare, I have to do this a certain way, it has to look just right, I have to check all of these boxes for every feast and every Sabbath meal, I had to start at just the right time. To say that the Jewish calendar dominated Jewish culture, it's actually an understatement. It was more like oppression. Because although we cannot imagine living like that, like according to all of those feasts, what we really can't imagine is doing it because you wanted to stay a Christian. The Jews in these churches believe, and we're teaching other people, that if you didn't follow this Jewish calendar just right, if you didn't do exactly what you needed to do

needed to do in order, big checklist, whole deal. If you weren't doing that, then you were in danger of losing your salvation or not being a Christian in the first place, however you want to say it. That's what we can't imagine, is having to perform those functions just the right way to stay being a Christian. However, and this creates a big question for us because we've been reading Galatians 1 through 3 and we're kind of looking at like, well, if Paul came and established churches and established leaders and preached the gospel, if the churches understood the basic understanding that Jesus gave himself to set them free, then how, how in the world are churches in an entire region falling for this wholesale? How do they believe, how have they somehow, somehow reverted back to a calendar and all the, you know, all the rituals they're in and living that way, how do they believe that

that they can somehow step into these feasts, this calendar, and believe that it saves them. Where did it happen? How did it spread? Not just to one church. And remember, this is not the internet age. Information takes a bit to travel. However, all the churches, or at least most of them, in the region of Galatia were swallowing this wholesale. What's going on? How did it spread so quickly? Who brought this idea to life? And ultimately what we're asking is why? Why would they take on this slavery? Not just how did it happen, but why? What makes sense here? And this is the question that's developed in verses 12 through 16. We're gonna skip over that. We're gonna go straight to 17 where we begin to get answers. We're gonna look at Galatians 4, 17 and 21. Okay. Now go with me here. It says in verse 17, they make much of you. We're going to get to who they is in a minute.

They make much of you, but for no good purpose. They want to shut you out that you may make much of them. And it says, tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not listen to the law? And he's about to make a few points on listening to the law there. But let's follow this for just a second. Who's the they in Galatians 4:17? Well, it's the same people that are in Galatians 4:21. It's people who want to live under the law. So part of the law for them was living according to this calendar, was observing days and seasons and months and years. It was doing things the right way. And these things are also connected to what Peter was doing. Remember in Galatians 2, 11 through 14, Peter was making people, he says, how can you, whenever Paul was confronting Peter, he says, how can you force Gentiles to live like Jews?

All of this goes together. It's people that desire to be under the law. It's people that are trying to add to justification by making Gentiles live like Jews. And what their message is, if we can kind of summarize it all here, it said their message is, You can only truly be saved if you follow Moses's law, if you observe specific principles and special days.

If you do that, if you follow circumcision, if you follow the Feast of Weeks, the Feast of Booths, if you follow the Passover, if you follow this, if you, Rosh Hashanah, if you follow all Yom Kippur, you follow all these feasts, all these Jewish feasts. And can you imagine being a Gentile, being introduced to all this and go, oh, okay, well, now I've got to do, I've got to live by this calendar. I've got to, you know, I can't eat with other Gentiles now. I can't, and it was a, it was a toxic message. You can only be truly saved. You're not really Christian unless you follow Moses's law, complete with principles, special days, calendars, eating, et cetera. What we've seen is that the in-crowd mentality, the in-crowd mentality is taking over. Who's the they? The they is the in-crowd. How do we know that? Verse 17 it says, they make much of you but for no good purpose they want to shut you out

that you may make much of them. Does that sound like high school to anybody? Okay right. You really I mean does that sound like you know office culture? Does that sound like, I mean, lots of things. People excluding people, right? There were people in the Galatian church, chez, all the churches, that were excluding other people who didn't follow their teaching. They were creating an in crowd over here, and they were saying, hey, hey, I don't know if you could make it. You don't follow Moses's law close enough, right? And they were creating an in crowd. Social media is probably the more modern expression of this that if you want influence anywhere in our culture that if you, you know, you can take even a good thing like stopping human trafficking, for example. Well, then you would create your own little hashtag, you create your own little group, and then anybody who doesn't understand, well, you don't belong. You're not in the crowd.

Only the people who really get stopping human trafficking are allowed in here. And it's a way to build influence. It's a way to make it seem like what you have is private, is yours, and you'll only give it out. You'll only let them be included if they agree, if they do what you want them to do. In fact, there are churches that try to grow this way. There are businesses that try to grow this way. We create in crowds and we say, okay, well, you just maintain that in crowd. And, you know, if people want to get in, then they'll shape up.

And this, this is why people were turning to slavery, not just in one church, not just in two churches, but in more than a handful of churches across an entire region in Galatia, which is a pretty big region. It's because they wanted to belong. They were submitting to special days, to special rituals. They did it because they wanted to do something the right way, the way this in crowd was determining it. They wanted to be included. They didn't want to miss out. And so they conformed to everything. And ultimately, ultimately, and this is ironic, they turned back to slavery All because they weren't sure of their own identity. They turned back to slavery, an entire region of churches. They turned back to slavery because they were listening to other people say, you are not good enough. More specifically, you are not Christian enough. And let me tell you, there are many people, more than I actually like to think about.

It's upsetting. Who go into a church building, who attend a church meeting, and who feel like an outsider, simply because they're not included. And when they try to include themselves, the message is clear. You, maybe you're not good enough, maybe you're not Christian enough. Do you do things our way? The entire region of churches was turning back to slavery because they didn't know who they were. They were insecure in their own identity. This message ran rampant through Galatian churches, and it runs rampant today. Not only it works both sides, right? On one side, you have people that are desperate, desperate to one up other people. They just don't wanna be on the bottom of the totem pole. And so in their flesh, their flesh rises up, and they just, they want to make sure they're better than, they want to make sure, or they want to make sure they're not less than.

So on one side, you have that. On the other side, you have people. Look, we're humans. We are wildly insecure about things that we really should be secure about. And on both sides, we are wildly insecure. We are wildly insecure, especially about spiritual maturity, especially about that. And so you have the enemy working both sides. And it's easy to see it spread, not just to one church, but to a region of churches. Friends, it can be crippling, crippling to believe that you are not good enough. To believe that you need to somehow do something extra to measure up. to feel like Jesus is making you ride the bench because you are tainted goods. You are second rate, you are low grade material.

Because the enemy knows that's an easy lie to believe. It's easy. If Christianity were a football game, most people believe that they belong in the nosebleed section in the stands, not on the field running a play. If Christianity were a football game, most people, most Christians believe, oh, they believe they belong at the game. Okay, oh, I'm a Christian, but they believe they deserve to be way up in the nosebleed. And maybe, maybe not the nosebleed, maybe the, you know, the second tier, right? However they think of themselves. But rarely, rarely will we really understand our calling to get on the field and run the ball, throw the ball, catch the ball, block, right, to follow the metaphor a little bit of Christianity or football. Look, part of the reason I came to South Burleson Baptist Church to begin with, part of the reason that the Lord put me here was that He put a desire in my heart to set people

free, to see people set free. I'm not setting people free, Jesus is. To see people set free to obey. And a lot of times that throws people off because when you think about obeying, they immediately think, well, I don't obey enough. If I say anything about obeying the Lord, the first kind of tripwire in your most brains is, I'm not well, I'm not, I don't obey and I'm not good enough. I messed up yesterday. I messed up last week. I messed up really big a couple of years ago and I'm still paying for it. My life's forever altered for how I messed up. Well, join the club, join the club. I'm glad you're here. We're all the same, right? We're all the same. And God put a desire in my heart to see people set free from the mentality that they do not belong, from the mentality that they don't belong on the field. You know, the reason that people don't believe that they are

equipped to make disciples has a lot more to do with their past than their present. A lot of people, a lot of Christians feel disqualified. And we are similar to what was happening in the Galatian churches and that we think it's not a Jewish calendar with feasts, but it's, I never miss a quiet time. I always pray when I should. I always have, I have great children. I have, you know, my marriage is perfect. I don't miss a Sunday, I serve it. Whatever, whatever you want to do, however long you want to make that list, go ahead and make it, but it just doesn't matter. I don't care about your lists. Well, to be clear, Jesus does not care about your lists, and neither should somebody else. I didn't come here to make an in-crowd. I didn't come here to make a longer list and to see how high you guys could jump. That's not why the Lord brought me here. The Lord brought me here to see people set free, to obey for real from the heart,

without this cumbersome weight that you aren't good enough, or that life has passed you by. You are still here. You are still able, and as much as you are able, you're breathing, so you're able to do something. And God has a plan for us. And you know, I get asked a lot. I get asked a lot, hey, how's it going? How's it going in South Birla's? Just old friends, ministry contacts, things like that. How's it going in South Birla's? And you know what's funny? If I know them really well, I'll kind of talk to them about it a little bit. Because there's all these horror stories, you know, that people tell about how terrible it was whenever they went through a revitalization process with the church and all that. And I'll tell them, you know, the obstacles I've seen, it's not a faction of people that, you know, wanna whatever, it's not hard heartedness, right? I don't think there's a soul in here who would not, you know, say and mean, you know, I wanna

follow the Lord. I wanna be obedient. I wanna walk in fullness of joy. I wanna live abundantly according to Jesus. I don't think there's anybody in here that would not raise their hand and say that. I don't think it's hard heartedness. It's not sectarianism. I believe it's that we don't know who we are, that we don't understand our God-given gifts and our ability to walk in that. Not perfectly, but to walk, to walk in it, to minister. that I think that in our church, and I hope that you hear this for what it is, it's not trying to cast aspersions at all, I'm mainly just trying to diagnose something. In our church, we have a lot of people that believe they are either riding the bench or are in the stands, but they do not believe they are in the play. They do not believe they have the ball or are close to it. for one reason or another, that is gone. So I just wanna encourage you,

I wanna encourage you toward action because I can sit here and tell you that you're not a slave. I can tell you all day, you're not a slave, you're an heir. I can't, I can say, and you can amen me all day too, huh? I mean, you can amen me anytime, sir. You can do that all day. What an encouragement. But the only way to believe that you are an heir is to act on it. The only way to believe that you are an heir And not a slave is to quit acting like a slave and begin acting like an heir. So I want to give you three things to keep in mind. Acting like an heir. Even though sometimes you're going to feel like an impostor. Let me just help you. You're going to feel like an impostor, but you're not. You're an heir. Might be a bad heir or a dumb heir, but you are going to be an heir regardless. Not a perfect one. Number one, if you're going to get on the field, if you're going to play the game,

You need to begin investing in a few people at a time. You need to begin investing in a few people at a time. One, two, don't try to eat the whole pizza and one bite. Just invest in one, maybe two people. Spiritual growth, spiritual growth in people, revival in people always begins when they begin to invest in somebody else. in people's hearts. If you are feeling spiritually lethargic, if you feel like it's been a while since you've heard from the Lord, since you've had your spirit stirred, I would encourage you begin to invest in someone else because you will begin at that moment to care more about their development than your own. You will begin to help them on their journey and their fight against sin. And what will happen is that you will get a glimpse of what it means and what it feels like to serve someone. And when you do that, you begin to understand on a heart level, on a

hands level, you're calling to be an heir and not a slave. Look, we have connect groups that are going to be starting up and that's going to be a way to do that. I'll get to that in a minute, but we also have life groups. And this is more of a life group application. Life groups start every January and every July. So there's going to be coming, some that are coming up pretty soon. And so you can begin even now considering, should I join a life group? Who can I jump into a life group with? But I would encourage, let me just, let me encourage, even before January hits, okay? What if you began to intentionally spend time now getting to know someone else and just for fun? You know, if you're over 40, get to know somebody under 40. And if you are under 40, get to know somebody over 40. You get to know somebody else for the purpose of jumping into a life group with them, of

seeing if you can trust them. Sometimes you can. You get to know somebody in your life, maybe not, and that's okay. Not everybody needs to be in a life group with everybody else. But you can begin even now. What if you did? What if you begin even now in investing in somebody else's spiritual growth and listening to whatever somebody else is dealing with and helping them through it, building that kind of relationship? We're going to have a contact with Church Picnic in two Sundays. We're here every Sunday. This is a great opportunity not just to say hello to people that you know, but to begin to get to know others, people that you don't know. I want to challenge you to do that. Begin investing in people a few at a time. We really need to, if we're going to begin to live like heirs, we need to embrace slow heart change as a solution.

Embrace slow heart change as a solution to problems. This is a call to remember that real change happens one at a time. If you go for, hear me, if you go for broad sweeping change, If you want the entirety of our church culture to change tomorrow, your only resort is to create in-crowds. The only thing you can do is to pretend like something is cool over here. Maybe it is cool. But to pretend like it's cool over here and then shut people out from it, but only let them in whenever they start to conform. That's the way that broad-sweeping change happens. We can see that on social media. We can see that. But even with that broad sweeping change, even if there's marching in the streets, even if there's one voice going out about the message, people's hearts change one at a time. They change slowly. Creating in crowds, going for broad sweeping change, it might give you more results faster,

but it's not real. It's not real. We should still be practical in our efforts. So hear me, it's not a call to quit being practical. We should still be practical. In fact, I actually believe it's more practical to consider that it happens slow, but the kind of change we're going for, hear me, the kind of change we are going for as Christians in the kingdom of God and our work here as a church, specifically, the kind of change we're going for is generational.

We are looking 70 years down the road and hoping for change. This is biblical. God didn't just change things because people were tired of how something was being. God set things in motion so slowly that there's even a verse in scripture that says, hey, don't worry, whenever it seems really slow, God's still working, okay? God works slowly. But the kind of change we're going for is slow change. It's heart change. Hearts don't change quickly. Hearts change slowly and over generations.

Practically, what does this mean? It means that we're okay with indirect ministry, with indirect disciple making. So, for example, maybe one of you is going to serve, to serve, is going to sign up to serve on a service team. We're going to talk about this more at the business meeting, but I'm just giving an example right now. Maybe somebody signs up to serve at the service team, they sign up to take out the trash, a job that's already taken, by the way. But they sign up to take out the trash, okay? Now, when you are gathering trash cans from rooms, that does not feel like making disciples. It just doesn't. Just going to spoil it now. It doesn't feel like it. You know, when Dan Hey is rehearsing songs with Sadie, as enjoyable as those songs are, rehearsing songs does not feel like making disciples. Right? The reason it doesn't is because it's indirect. Watching babies does not feel like making disciples.

But all those things I just listed are. They are all making disciples. Because we are working together as a church, our church has both a direct ministry in making disciples and an indirect ministry in making disciples. Service teams, the way that we cooperate together as a church, is our indirect way of making disciples. It's like taking the trash out of your own house as your indirect way of loving your family. Taking out trash is not the same as a bouquet of roses. I mean, unless you're my wife and then taking out the trash, it's almost the same as if it became roses. Bless you. Bless you.

We're all different. In fact, in 1 Corinthians, we see this, 1 Corinthians 12 through 17 through 18, it says, it talks about the church being a body. It says, the whole body were an eye. Where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each of them, as He chose. So let me just be a little on the nose here. Let's just talk about body parts. I'm a mouth. I'm a big mouth. So my wife says. I walked into that one. The way I serve the body is preaching, leading, comforting, exhorting. That's the way I give, that's the way I serve. Some of you though, your noses and eyes and ears, you're able to detect the first signs of danger. Dan Hey is a nose, eye or ear, because he can detect danger. If you have a lie that you are living, like some kind of double life, I would encourage you to steer clear of Dan Hey.

Because he will, I mean his whole family's laughing because they know, he will find you out. I don't know how, I don't know how. He doesn't even know how, but he just knows. It's just, he can just detect things, right? Some of you are not eyes, nose, and ears. Some of you are hands and feet. You are quiet, but you are willing to just do something. Daniel Souter. Daniel Souter is a foot. You prefer the foot, over the hand and foot. Daniel Souter's foot, because he just is not going to voice his opinion that much, he just wants to do something. Just point him in a direction, tell him what to do, he'll do it. Some of you are kidneys and lungs. You are hidden, but you keep our church running well. And as a service to you, I will not name you. Some of you are hearts. You're compassionate, you're caring, you listen to hurts. A human body needs kidneys just as much as it needs a mouth.

Probably more, actually. A human body needs a heart just like it needs hands and feet. just like it needs noses, eyes, and ears. And without an investment from everywhere, our body will remain undeveloped. We need to go for indirect slow heart change so that generationally, so that we can build a healthy church that will grow and move forward and plant more churches that will plant gospel seeds in the lives and hearts of people. How are we going to do that? We're going to do that by being a healthy church family. We're going to share the gospel with them, but then they're going to see the gospel when they come here, whenever they're with our family. That's the hope. This is why our vision is to plant gospel seeds in relationships and in groups and churches. Because without it, without a functioning, healthy body where everybody's invested, everybody's serving together

as much as they're able. Without that, we won't see the generational change. We might see a couple of bumps here and there with some, you know, we might create some excitement, but then that excitement will die down. And I don't think I need to tell the people that have been here, the legacy members of South Rose Baptist Church that you will have seasons of high cotton and seasons of low cotton. It's not all roses and sunshine and unicorns. You will have difficult seasons, but the kind of change we are going for is generational. We want to get somewhere in 70 years, and that's going to require a faithfulness that extends beyond your lifetime and your capabilities and mind.

Lastly, if we're going to act like an heir, if we're not going to act like slaves, we're going to act like heirs. We want to invest in a few people, jumping a life group, start thinking about it now, start praying about it now. You want to embrace slow heart change with some indirect ministry. Lastly, you want to leverage where you are. You want to leverage where you are. Use your own position exactly where you are to obey Jesus's calling on your life. Now let me, let me erase the mystery. What's Jesus's call on your life? Jesus calling your life is to make disciples. Same as mine, same as our church. That's his calling. But it's for you, it's to make disciples in a particular way. No one is called away from making disciples. No one handles making disciples over here, right, while you do your own thing. So let me just run through a few situations of where you are.

Are you a supervisor at work? How can you bless the people that report to you? How can you serve them? How can you love them? How can you demonstrate the gospel to them? How can you share what's going on in your life? Teachers, teachers can love children and you can love children in extravagant ways and you can impact families in ways that few other people can. Stay at home moms. You might feel like, you know, your circle's too small, like that you can't make disciples, that you're only, you know, I'm going to make disciples of my children. Well, that's good. I mean, let's make disciples of our children. Amen. Let's do that. But your call extends beyond that. Your family is also to be a light to other families. If you are retired and have a feeling some of you may be, what are you doing with your free time? Where are you investing? What are you praying for? I get it.

Being retired, you want to connect with family. You want to see friends. You want to do things you want to do. You want to go on vacation. Yes and amen, right? I hope my retirement is half as good as all the awns, okay? The call though hasn't stopped. Your life is still going. Making disciples is still on the table. It's still a call. Matthew 28, 19 and 20 does not go away when you hit 66.

It's a calling on all of us. So let's all take it. Let's all make disciples directly and indirectly, both. We don't need to pick one or the other. Let's do it, let's do it together. As we pray, as we enter into our time of response, I want you to consider, I want you to consider what you are doing with your time now. I want you to consider maybe how you think about your own spiritual life. How you think about your own self? Do you think that you're riding the bench? Do you think you're in the nosebleeds? Do you think you're just watching the game, letting the young people play? No, no. What we are called to do, we're all called to be on the field in the game.

And if you feel like an imposter, if you don't feel like an heir, it's okay. We all feel that way. You aren't supposed to ever deserve it anyway. So you're gonna feel like an impostor, you're gonna feel like you don't deserve it. Just roll hard with it. Keep making disciples. Keep encouraging, keep investing people one at a time. Keep going for long-term change. Let me pray for us. Jesus, we thank you for this opportunity to just to listen to you and to be obedient, help us to act like heirs.

And it's your name that we pray, amen. Like a river attendeth my way When sorrows like sea billows roll Whatever my launch, thou hast taught me to say It is well, it is well with my soul It is well with my soul, with my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. Though Satan should buffet, though trial should come, let this best assurance control. That Christ has regarded my helpless estate, And has shed his own blood for my soul. It is well, my soul, it is well, it is well with my soul. My sin, O the bliss of this glorious thought, My sin not apart but the road. If nailed to the cross and I bear it no more, Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul! It is well, it is well, with my soul, with my soul. It is well, it is well, with my soul. And Lord hates the day when the fae shall be sight. The clouds be rolled back as a scroll. The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall appear, even so it is well with my soul.

It is well, it is well, with my soul, with my soul. It is well, it is well, with my soul. Lord Jesus, I pray, God, that You would speak to our hearts today, Father. You would show us how we are to be making disciples. Lord, that call is upon us all. Father, whether we're making disciples in ways that are indirect or ways that are direct, Father, we pray that we are helping people to know You and training them so that they may help people to know You as well. Lord, we love You. We thank You for Your grace, God. We pray that we wouldn't turn back to the slavery of the law, but be just free to obey. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.