Forgiven and Active (2)

Intro

A few years ago, George Barna and the barna group did a massive study of self-professed Christians in America over the age of 18 and they found something interesting. They found that they could identify a spectrum of faith where each Christian was finding their journey to be. 10 stops ranging from Completely unaware of sin to profound love of God and people. Let’s look at these stops...

(Show picture)

Distribution of Adults along the Transformational Journey

Stop 1: Unaware of sin……........…1%

Stop 2: Indifferent to sin…............16%

Stop 3: Worried about sin...............39%

Stop 4: Forgiven for sin…................9%

Stop 5: Forgiven and active……….24%

Then, we really want to focus on this second half of the journey. So we begin today with stop 5 and then we will press on into the rest.

Pressing On:

Stop 6: Holy discontent……............6%

Stop 7: Broken by God…….............3%

Stop 8: Surrender and submission…..1%

Stop 9: Profound love of God…… 0.5%

Stop 10: Profound love of people..0.5%

Here is what is so important about this second half of the journey:

It is what we are created for. It is the full story

This is Wesleyan faith. Our contribution to the conversation....and if our people fit in this cycle then we have failed and because the greater group of Christians have, then our voice has been all too quiet.

I just want to give you some statistics....and please know this data is old now. With growing secularization and downward trends heading into COVID, there is no telling where we are now!

Barna Survey

14% say their faith in God is their highest priority in life

15% say every moral choice they make is consistent with the Bible

16% believe that absolute moral truth exists and that it is defined by the Bible

17% say the Bible is the medium or resource that has the greatest influence on their decisions

19% say that they, as individuals — not government, businesses, churches, or non-profits — have the primary responsibility for addressing human poverty

58% believe that the Holy Spirit is a symbol of God’s presence, power or purity, but is not a living or impactful entity

58% believe that if you are a good person, or do enough good things, they can earn their way into Heaven

There are pages of these. Largely what came out of it though, was the larger percentages were active in the church. They had some grasp on Jesus and they wanted to serve and be involved. But the greater transformation was not there.

Alright, you ready for this journey?

Scripture

Acts 2:36–39 NIV

36 “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.” 37 When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?” 38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”

Pray

Let’s set the scene here. This is Peter’s Pentecost sermon. This is phase 2 of this great movement that has begun in Jesus. Now the disciples are about to take it on and walk in the mantle that has been placed on them. They are told to wait for power, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and they do. The Spirit falls, signs and wonders of God are all around and evident for all of those that are gathered in Jerusalem for yet another feast.

And then Peter begins to lay it all out. The full presentation from their jewish history and God’s work through the prophets. The foretelling of this work of Christ....all the way to the work of humanity to seal the need for a savior by killing him on a cross.

And what we get in our text is their response. The moment the light bulb goes off and they see it for the first time. When their hearts are ignited.

Do you remember when this happened for you? What was that season like for you?

I bet if we are honest....it did not happen to many of us in the room. Not pentecost, that happened to noone. But raise your hand if you went to see Billy Graham before knowing Jesus at all and he presented the gospel to you and bam!

BG what must I do?!

Ok not BG but maybe a youth pastor or someone else?

For me: I became interested, in some ways had no better options at the time, and gave it a shot. I dipped my toes in a little at a time and I woke up one morning and was like....geez I think I am a christian

So really, I want to talk to three different people this morning for just a minute:

The person that has no clue about where they are with this Jesus thing

The person that is dipping their toes in the water, slow cooked like JW

The person that is all in and jumping into the church

This is where the journey of the second half, of pressing on begins:

Let’s begin with those that are really uncertain about Jesus and Christianity....

Jesus: A Helpful Concept

This group is hard because they might not be in the room, but if they are desperate to try something different brought them here, or some other outside motivation.

Ask them about Jesus and you get an indifferent, “Eh.”

this is the straight faced emotionless emoji. The one my wife sends me when I text bad jokes.

unsure about Jesus and this Christian thing. All kinds of motivations to be here. Maybe a relative, partner, or for the kids. At another appointment we had a worship service during the hour of Student SS and worship....so we had a bunch of parents that would do that. Give our kids a little something of what we had. But if we are really honest, we are “eh” about this Jesus thing.

I dont know how you got to this place....

hurt by the church

hurt by people in the church

maybe got into it and it turned into something you didnt want

or maybe you got a place of discomfort and pulled back.

I have been there friends. Here is my hope, that you might come to know this God that Peter is preaching about in Jerusalem.

That you would come to know that God created you with identity and purpose. He created you to be his son and daughter. Not just in the familial sense like we think of. But God wanted you to be the first born. The one that would create and lead and steward in his name in the world. That you would carry his agency in the world.

And in our lives and throughout history we have made it clear that with that agency and freedom we often choose ourselves. If you think I am wrong think about marriage or any long partnership, working relationship you have been in....or think back to when you had your best friend as a roommate.

Goodness....this is hard because we choose ourselves and its not necessarily that we are then bad children that God is ashamed of (though it carries that), it is more that God knew what we were called to be, full of love for others and full of love from God and we have not gotten to live into that.

So he showed us the way.

Jesus. Not just a symbol, not just an example, but a real historical person. Non Christian historians talk about this person and the movement born around him. This movement claims that this person is in fact their God come to not do what gods do....destroy, conqueror, win, or even be popular, but to truly live, truly love, to suffer, and to die.

This Jesus had very strong things to say about God, about the kingdom of heaven, and about us. These things have consequences and possibility about who we might be with him.

This Jesus is claimed to have died and then defeated death. The one end no one could flee. And when he rose again, it wasnt just physical death that was conquered but it was the spiritual death of that separation we have experienced being buried.

This movement, it created something that has never stopped. No regime, no amount of persecution, no amount of failure, backbiting and ugly, no amount of schism, political mess, no amount of human error could stand in the way of this kingdom that Jesus spoke of.

Friend, you may not fear God. You may not fear hell. You may not even fear being bad. My parents and grandparents responded to those things.

But I wonder if you desire clarity of identity?

Friends, this identity is not based on performance, or party lines, or achievement, or success, but it is received…given.

Written on your bones, and set free in Christ.

Next, is the religious…seeing Jesus as a good model

Jesus: A model for good

Some belief in all of this...

shrug emoji....

I think this is the born in the church person, the one that came with a partner or spouse. or the one that just thinks this is what youre supposed to do....

What does it mean to put your faith in Jesus?

Wesley is very helpful here....

For too long we have reduced faith to something minimalistic

Wesley.... this is what it is not.

not simply the practice of moral virtue

not even a simple intellectual belief in scripture....it is not enough to say, yeah this book is good.

not even just the knowledge that Jesus is son of God

Finally, not even the faith of the apostles of the gospels

Leading a young adult sunday school years ago, just starting out in ministry...

This sounds scandalous but then Wesley clarifies, three important aspects of faith it makes sense. And if you are dipping your toes in the water…this is where you are aiming. At some point you have to confront these....

Faith is not a general, vague, or self-determined experience. To make it so is to rob the power of Christ to save.

Wesley, this is what it is

1. Faith in Christ: Faith in Christ (and God through Christ) as the object of faith

2. More than the devil’s faith: “is different from that of the devil in that it is not barely a speculative, rational thing, a cold, lifeless assent, a train of ideas in the head; but also a disposition of the heart.” .....intellect and heart

3. trust in merit of death and resurrection: Beyond that of the apostles, in that saving faith “acknowledges the necessity and merit of his death and the power of his resurrection.”

<Preach this out!>

Jesus: The Goal of Life

What happens when you get to this place?

For me, I filled my calendar. I mean every day/night of the week. Church, bible studies, being around the people of the church. (Except Friday and Saturday nights, I left that open for my social life....yeah Jesus still had some work to do). But I just remember feeling like I needed to do more. Mission trips, leadership, etc.

For you, it might have started with baptism and membership in the church. Well, I guess it is time to join…We just need to be involved.

By Barna’s work, this is where most of us are.

That is exciting that most of us are like the ones in Acts 2.... We have experienced this presentation of Jesus in some way, and we have responded with WHAT MUST WE DO? What do we do!

There is plenty to do, and we need people to do....

As I close, let me turn to a challenge and a teaser for the coming weeks....

Faith is not about doing, it is about being

There comes a point where doing is exhausting if you are not becoming. The Pentecost congregation ask the natural response question, WHAT MUST WE DO? but it is the wrong one....

WHO ARE WE TO BE?

You are more than what you do for God. We are not trying to build a the greatest non-profit Conroe has ever seen. No, we want to be a people that believe far more in God. For too long, we in the church, your leaders and preachers, we have cheapened grace to say that the Christian journey is about a decision you make for Jesus and then you need to get plugged in at the church.

Here is the issue....when COVID happens, when crisis strikes, we are left with marginal faith.

No, there is more than that. Will you press on?

Will you go Further up, further in?

The difference between the old Narnia and the new Narnia was like that. The new one was a deeper country: every rock and flower and blade of grass looked as if it meant more. I can’t describe it any better than that: if ever you get there you will know what I mean.

It was the Unicorn who summed up what everyone was feeling. He stamped his right fore-hoof on the ground and neighed, and then he cried:

“I have come home at last! This is my real country! I belong here. This is the land I have been looking for all my life, though I never knew it till now. The reason why we loved the old Narnia is that is sometimes looked a little like this. Bree-hee-hee! Come further up, come further in!”