Why Is the Church Often Messy and Awkward?

Why is Church Often Messy and Awkward?

Refresh:

• Why should we care about the church?
• What’s the point of church?
• What makes a good church?
  • Did you find out why you go to the church you currently go too?

 Attention Funnel: Kid’s Making Messes

• Church can be a little bit like those videos.
• It can be messy.
• And what I mean by that is it can be awkward, uncomfortable, difficult, and sometimes make us want to run for the doors.
• My goal tonight is see how Ephesians explains why church is messy, and what God is doing in the midst of the mess.

Big Idea: God is at work in the mess.

Gluttony

Attention Funnel: Good Things Becoming Bad Things – Trampoline, Skateboard, Snow, Diving

 Introduction:

• Good things can quickly turn bad.
• This is something we know from experience… (Story from your own life).
• This can also be a way for us to understand sin. Sin is often taking something good and using it for the wrong purposes.
• It’s often not just “doing bad things,” but it is good desires that run wild. And go off the tracks.
• We could say this with what we have covered the past two weeks: comfort, and money.
• This week we will say the same thing about food (and many other categories of things we enjoy in this world)

 Big Idea: Enjoy God’s gifts, but don’t worship them.

Main Points

• Food is a gift from God.
• We can turn food into a god.
• Idolatry is absurd and offensive to God.
• Fight back with fasting and feasting.

Sloth

Attention Funnel: Something with growing up or becoming an adult. “Growing up is hard.”

• Learning to do household chores, learning to drive, learning to exercise, learning to make small talk, learning to shovel, learning a good golf swing

Introduction:

• Tonight we turn to a sin that is less common in our vocabulary: Sloth
• Perhaps the first thing you think when you hear the word sloth is (so picture of a sloth, Sloth from the Goonies, Patrick) or maybe you just think of someone who sits on the couch all day.

Big Idea: Sloth is refusing to do what is difficult.

Main Points:

• Sloth lives for comfort.
• Sloth resists obeying God.
• Put your faith to work.

Envy

Refresh:

• Big Idea: Either we kill sin or it kills us (Romans 8:13)
• Fighting a grizzly bear. Removing the Blindfold.
• Last week we talked about Pride – with the big idea that “We should spend our lives making much of God rather than making a name for ourselves.”
• This week we move on to Envy.

Attention Funnel: Rivalries

• In a rivalry, it’s not just that you hate losing, but you also hate your rival winning. You hate when they succeed.
• “Envy is the feeling of unhappiness at the blessing and fortune of others.” –Joe Rigney
• “Envy is the consuming desire to have everybody else as unsuccessful as you are” – Frederick Buechner

Big Idea: Envy hates when other people are a big deal.

• To look at Envy, we are going to look at the story of Saul and David.
• Saul is the first King of Israel. He makes some really big mistakes along in disobeying God and as a result God says he is going to make someone else king.
• David is a young man who we find out that God plans to make king. David is perhaps most famous for killing a giant named Goliath… we pick up the story of Saul and David soon after this happened.

Main Points:

• Envy Compares.
• Envy Cuts Down.
• Envy Complains
• Grace Crushes Envy.

Pride

Introduction:

• Refresh:
  • Kill Sin or It Will Kill You.
• Sin is not like the creatures in BirdBox… that if you don’t see them they can’t harm you. It’s the exact opposite, until the blindfold is removed and you see sin for what it is, it will do the most harm to you.
• That’s exactly what we want to do in this series… take off the blindfold and expose sin in our lives and then fight back against sin with the power Jesus gives us in the Holy Spirit.
• Tonight, we start with pride.

Attention Funnel: Dumbest Guinness Book of World Record Records

• Why do people spend time trying to achieve a Guinness World Record? To make a name for themselves.

Big Idea: We should spend our lives making much of God rather than making a name for ourselves. 

• To look at pride, we are going to look at the story of Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel.
• Nebuchadnezzar is the absolute ruler of the world at this point in time (586 B.C.) He can pretty much command anything and it gets done (POWER). He can get pretty much anything he wants (WEALTH). Everyone in the world knows who he is and pays him respect (FAME).
  • Warning: With wealth, knowledge, power, and fame often comes pride.
• The book of Daniel tells us about King Nebuchadnezzar because Daniel was one of the people from Israel that that he took captive when he raided and destroyed Jerusalem.

Main Points:

• Pride is making a big deal of ourselves
• Pride tries to steal what belongs to God.
• Get your eyes off yourself and onto something better.

Anatomy of Sin

Attention Funnel: Who Wins in A Fight?

Introduction:

• How many of you go hunting? How many of you go bear hunting? How many of you would go grizzly bear hunting?
• If you have watched the Movie the Revenant you have a picture of how crazy a Grizzly Bear encounter can be. The bear attacks quickly and keeps coming back in an effort to kill Hugh Glass. It won’t give up, won’t run away, won’t back down, until Hugh has finally managed to kill it. (Perhaps show video for Senior High).
• Imagine yourself in that scenario. There is no going into the fetal position, no convincing the bear to run away. Either the bear dies or you die.
• This is what happens when you encounter something from the outside that threatens your very life. But what about the thing that resides within all of us that threatens our very life… sin.
• Over the next seven weeks we are going to be going through a series called Death Row where we look at some of the common sins that still tempt, enslave, and kill us. Why?

Big Idea: Either we kill sin or it kills us.

• The Christian life involves becoming more like Christ. This is what we refer to as sanctification. And a big part of that process is to fight against the sin that is still present in our lives. (John Owen – “Be Killing Sin or It Will Be Killing You”)
• This is based on Romans 8:13 – “For if you live according to the flesh (which is the word Paul uses for sinful nature here), you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.”
• Kill sin… or it will kill you.
• Goals for this series:
  • 1) I want sin to be exposed in this series. And so, if you listen to this series and are never once convicted of sin in your life… then this series has failed.
  • 2) The other and ultimate goal of this series is also that we would fight against sin in our lives and that we would replace it with something better. And so if you only feel convicted by this series and never respond with action and feel hopeful in the fight against sin, then this series has also failed.
• My goal tonight is to show you the importance of identifying and fighting against sin by giving you a small anatomy of sin.
• To do that I want to look into Jeremiah 2
• But before we do… let’s get a definition of sin so we are all on the same page: Sinning is any feeling or thought or speech or action that disobeys God.
  • Sinning is any time I think, feel, speak, or act in a way that disregards God or thinks that we know better than Him.

Main Points: 

• Sin kills our happiness.
• Sin robs us of our freedom.
• Sin hides from our sight.
• Jesus gives us the power to kill sin.

A King On His Throne

Attention Funnel:Close Encounters with Animals

• What’s the wildest encounter you have had with an animal?
• There’s something about encountering a wild animal in which you are both drawn to try to get close and yet fearful of getting to close.

Series Introduction:

• Throughout the Bible we see God show up in some unusual and extraordinary ways.
• This is not to say that God is not always present and working in the world.
  • God does not show up in the world on Sundays and then catch an UBER back to Heaven until he comes back later in the week to pick up his weekly Chick-Fil-A.
  • God is always present and always working. Everything that happens, happens because of him.
• But at certain times, God pulls back the curtain so that people get a clearer glimpse of who he is and what he’s doing.
  • This is where a Stranger Things comparison is fitting. In Stranger Things there is a parallel world called the upside down. Most people don’t even realize it’s there. And yet and certain times people get a glimpse into the upside down to see what’s really happening. The upside down was there all along, but it’s only when the curtain is pulled back that people actually see it.
  • Now this metaphor breaks down, because it’s not as if God lives in a parallel world where he is constantly trying to break into our world. He is as real, even more real, than the chair you are sitting on right now. But we don’t always see him clearly.
• These encounters are not regular or often, but they reveal God clearer than ever for us to see.
• Although our experience may look very different, we still have the opportunity to encounter God.
• And what we learn from these strange encounters will hopefully make us hungrier to encounter God
• Tonight, we start with Isaiah.

Big Idea: Encountering a Holy God will change us.

Main Points:

• God is Holy because no one and nothing else is like Him.
• Without God’s holiness, sin isn’t a big deal.
• Without God’s holiness, His love is cheap.
• Without God’s holiness, we are self-focused.

Gender Dysphoria

Introduction:

• If someone walked through our doors tonight who was obviously transgender, how would you respond?
  • Whisper to someone else, avoid them, go up and tell them they are living in sin, make a joke to friends about them, welcome them in, ask them their name, treat them as any other human being?
• I wish I could sit down and have a conversation with each of you to get a feeling of where you’re at on this issue… but my guess is that I’m talking to 3 or 4 groups of people tonight when it comes to this issue.
  • 1) “It’s all good!”
  • 2) “Eww, yuck!”
  • 3) “It’s personal.”
  • 4) “I want to respond well, but I don’t know how to.”
• In many ways, this lesson is meant more for the last 3 groups then it is for the first.
  • Because In case you haven’t picked up from the previous lessons in this series… I believe the Bible teaches that the gender we are born with is the gender we are to live according to, and so to live in opposition to that gender is to live in opposition to God’s good design and therefore live in sin.
  • Just as I believe to act self-righteously, show favoritism, gossip, and slander someone else are all to live in opposition to God’s good design and therefore sinful.
• My goal in this lesson is to increase compassion in us for those who may struggle with their gender and to offer hope to you if you are personally struggling with your gender.
• Before we get started, let me define a couple terms for you.
• Gender Dysphoria – “A person who experiences discomfort or distress because there is a mis-match between their sex assigned at birth and their gender identity. This is also the clinical diagnosis for someone who doesn’t feel comfortable with the gender they were assigned at birth.”
• Transgender – “An umbrella term to describe people whose gender is not the same as, or does not sit comfortably with, the sex they were assigned at birth.”
  • A transgender man is a biological woman who identifies as a man.
  • A transgender woman is a biological man who identifies as a woman.
• Clarify the difference – I don’t believe the person who struggles with gender dysphoria but is not openly identifying and living as the opposite gender is living in sin. But I do believe the person who openly identifies as transgender and is living as the opposite gender is living in sin.
  • Here’s another example: For me to be frustrated with my wife is not necessarily a sin… for me to act on that frustration by giving her the silent treatment, yelling at her, or trying to put her down is a sin.
• However, I would say that gender dysphoria is a result of sin tainting this world. It is a form of brokenness that people may experience as a result of sin effecting our hearts, our minds, and our bodies.

Big Idea: Christians live as broken people that are being transformed by Jesus.

 Main Points:

• Everybody is broken.
• Everybody believes some gospel.
• Everybody still wrestles with sin.
• One day, Jesus will fully restore everybody.

The Death and Life of Manhood

Attention Funnel: Hurdle Fails

Introduction:

• Refresh from last week – How did we define what it means to be a man?
  • Men Lead, provide, and protect.
  • Jesus is the model man.
  • Men gladly sacrifice for others.
• I hope you saw that picture and got excited about it. Guys I hope it gave you something you want to pursue. And Ladies, I hope it gave you something to encourage and expect in men.
• But I also wonder if some of you weren’t sitting there thinking, “That’s great, but where are all these men at?” OR “That’s great, but why is it so difficult and hard to be that type of man?”
• Genesis 3 provides the answer… it tells us that when sin enters the world, it directly effects everything… including manhood.
• As a result of sin, men face certain hurdles that get in the way of being the type of man we described last week.
• Tonight, I want to talk about what some of those hurdles might be and how God works to restore men and enable them to overcome those hurdles.

Big Idea: Guys face unique hurdles in their effort to live as godly men.

Passage: Ephesians 2:1-10; Genesis 3

Main Points:

• Sin works to kill manhood.
• God works to restore manhood.
• Men work to become more like Jesus.

Independence Day

Introduction:

• When I was in middle school, several friends and I had the best fort that any middle schooler could ask for.
  • It was a fort that could only be accessed by fourwheelers…
  • It had a recliner chair, bunk beds, a creek out back that we put our mountain dew in to cool, and a fireplace to have all our great late night discussions around.
  • We loved to go spend the night at this fort. We would make fires, cook hot dogs, drink Mountain Dew until our teeth hurt, and talk about what we would do if a murder on the run from the cops broke into our fort while we were sleeping. The answer of course was a roundhouse kick to the face and then threaten him with our swiss army pocket knives.
• Why did we love this fort so much? Because it represented independence.  It represented that we could survive on our own apart from our parents.
• In many ways, this is the same thing that drives people to live off the grid. They want independence. They want to be free of needing other people to help them survive. They want to be self-sufficient.
• The past couple weeks we have been exploring ways that God is different than us…
• Tonight we want to continue that journey by looking at the fact that God is self-sufficient. He doesn’t need anything or anyone. He is utterly perfect on his own.
• We see this in several places throughout the Bible, starting with the Isaiah 40 passage that we have been in.
• Isaiah 40:28-31

 Big Idea: The God who needs nothing created us to need him.

 Main Points:

• God doesn’t need anything.
• We don’t want to need God.
• Weakness is the new strength.