Gospel Fluency - Week 3

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- So, I need to get a few things off of my chest this morning.

- First of all, when are they going to finally announce the release date for Spiderman Beyond the Spiderverse?

- I know that it got delayed due to the writer’s strike last year, but the original release date was supposed to be last March, and they still haven’t even announced when it’s coming.

- You end the last movie on a cliffhanger, and then you leave me hanging off of the cliff?

- How dare you.

- But I am very excited to see the conclusion of what very well might go down as the best superhero trilogy ever.

- Moving on.

- I’ve been doing some functional strength training – switching from the total body workout plan I was doing for a couple of years into breaking up into 2 upper body days, 2 lower body days, and 1 conditioning day (1 or 2 – or maybe 0 depending on whether or not I can convince myself to work out when my watch starts buzzing at 4:40am).

- And yes, it is just a fact that it is better to work out in the morning.

- Not a scientific fact.

- Just a “Matt is right about this” kind of fact.

- But the workouts are going good, and hopefully my lovely wife appreciates all of my hard work.

- On the other end of the spectrum, did you know that it has been too long since I’ve eaten a stuffed crust pizza?

- Seriously, I need to get one right away.

- Maybe this afternoon, if someone should feel the prompting of the Holy Spirit, you can just leave it at my door and I promise it will disappear!

- Because, as you hopefully know by now, that is the best food on the face of the planet (maybe second to Deb’s banana split pie).

- Alright, any questions?

- Let’s close in prayer.

- Ok, ok, ok, no we’re not done quite yet.

- We’re in week 3 of our series Gospel Fluency, where we are talking about how we can speak the Truth of Jesus into the everyday stuff of life.

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- And last week we went over the Gospel message – the Gospel story.

- And if you missed that one, I would strongly encourage you to go back and check it out on our Facebook page.

- Because it is very important that we understand what the Gospel is.

- As we said last week, even if we decide not to believe it, not to follow it, not to live according to it, that is our choice and God-given right.

- But we should at least know what it is.

- We should at least know what we are choosing not to follow.

- But, as we move forward this morning, if we decide we are interested in taking a step closer to believing the Gospel story,

- Or maybe, if we’ve already decided that we’re all in on the Gospel.

- Then, what now?

- How do we take that true Gospel story – as we talked about it and ran through it last week – and grow fluent in it?

- How do we move from not only understanding what the Gospel is, to being able to speak it, share it, and apply it into every day life?

- And, for that, we need to move forward in our 101 ABC’s class of Gospel fluency, and remind ourselves of something that we all understand when it comes to learning a language.

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- If we’re going to grow fluent in any language, we have to speak it… a lot!

- For example (just speaking hypothetically here), if I took a French class, for a couple of periods a week, all the way up until grade 10, and then never gave the French language another thought, then – for example – I might find myself to be a 38 year old man who doesn’t really know any useful French (except to say “je ma’pelle)

- But, for my kids, who are in French immersion, who when they come home have books to read in French, they request books from the library that are translated into French, they speak with their mother in French, they talk to their friends sometimes in French.

- Well then, they might just know more French than I do, even though they aren’t old enough to stay home by themselves yet.

- But we understand this.

- To learn any language, we have to speak it, a lot.

- And the same is true of Gospel fluency.

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- If we are going to grow in Gospel fluency, then we have to speak it… a lot!

- So then, the question that we need to consider today, is are we regularly speaking the Truth of Jesus?

- Are we speaking the Gospel to one another?

- To our friends?

- To our families?

- To ourselves?

- If ever the day comes when my kids stop speaking in French, they will forget and lose their ability to speak in French at all.

- They have to keep it up, they have to be intentional and consistent in it. Or it will be gone and will be a lot harder to relearn later on down the road.

- And so, are we talking about the Gospel enough to actually know how to talk about the Gospel?

- Or, are we not speaking the Gospel, and therefore we are forgetting and losing our ability to speak the Gospel at all?

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- Luke 6:43-45

o “A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. A tree is identified by its fruit. Figs are never gathered from thornbushes, and grapes are not picked from bramble bushes.

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o A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart.

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- Jesus says here “what you say flows from what is in your heart”.

- So, if we want to consider whether or not we are talking about the Gospel enough to grow fluent in the Gospel, a question that needs to go right beside that is “do we love the Gospel?”

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- Because we will talk about what we love.

- This is what Jesus is telling us here.

- Whatever we love, whatever we treasure, is going to flow from our heart, through our mouths, and into the lives of others.

- Out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.

- Therefore, if we want to know what we really love the most, we need to look at what we talk about the most.

- Maybe it’s a Spider-man movie, or workout program, or favourite food, or something else.

- We will talk the most about what we love the most.

- Think about it this way.

- Have you ever had to ask a parent or grandparent to show you pictures of their new baby/grandbaby?

- No!

- Do you know why?

- Because you didn’t have time to ask, they were already showing you pictures and telling you all about them.

- Or let me give you another example.

- Back in 2006, I met a young woman named Chantelle Unger.

- And it didn’t take me long to realize that I kind of liked her.

- And, I know I’m not alone on this, so guys, please just give me a subtle nod to show me you’re with me, but for the first while after I was interested in her, I talked about Chantelle more than I talked to Chantelle.

- I’m sure that my friends in our college dorm were just eager for me to hurry up and ask her out already.

- Because they were tired of me talking to them about her all of the time.

- And I’m sure everyone here can relate to this in some way, with some relationship or topic that just gets you excited and you can’t help yourself but talk about it.

- And maybe you also realize, that these things that we love, and these things that we talk about, almost become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Because we don’t just talk about what we love.

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- But we also love what we talk about!

- Think about it this way:

- Because I love Chantelle, I talk about Chantelle.

- This makes me think about Chantelle more, which makes me love her even more.

- This makes me talk about her more… and so on and so forth.

- It just grows and grows and grows.

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- So today, as we continue to step forward in our journey towards Gospel fluency, we need to consider this question “Do you love Jesus?”

- But, in order to properly consider this question, in order to accurately answer this for our own lives and hearts, we actually need to ask a different question.

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- “Do you talk about Jesus?”

- And maybe for some of us, we find ourselves wanting to grow closer to Jesus, we want to feel a greater sense of love for Jesus, we want to love Jesus more (maybe we feel like our love for Jesus is lacking).

- If we want to grow in Gospel fluency, then maybe this is a good place to start.

- Talk about Jesus.

- Specifically (and less intimidating), start by talking about Jesus to yourself.

- Read a Gospel (Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John) slowly and pay intense attention to Jesus’ actions and words.

- Take notes, write down questions, study and look into answers for those questions (I don’t know everything but I’d be happy to buy you a coffee or lunch and we can talk about what you’re learning and wondering about Jesus based on your time in the Gospels).

- Study Jesus, and talk to yourself about what you learn about Him.

- Recite, repeat, memorize (we just finished memorizing Romans 8:38-39 a few weeks ago, go and do that to a particularly meaningful verse in the Gospels now!)

- And then, as you grow closer to Jesus, talk about what you’re learning about Him with others.

- Your coworkers, your friends, your family members.

- The more we do this, the more we will love Him.

- And the more we love Him, the more we will do this.

- Because as we talk about Jesus, our heart will grow closer towards Jesus, and we will love Him more.

- Let’s take this idea a little further.

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- Not only do we talk about what we love, but we talk about what works.

- People who talk about Fords, love Fords because they’ve had good experiences with Fords working.

- People who talk about their diet, love their diet, because their diet worked for them.

- People who talk about how the Toronto Maple Leafs are the greatest team in the NHL, love the Maple Leafs because… well, I guess there is an exception to every rule.

- But this is why testimonies can be so powerful.

- Hearing people share stories of how God has made a difference in their life, can inspire and transform someone else, because it matters when we talk about how “God works”.

- The Gospel works.

- The Good News really is good news in the everyday stuff of life, and it has changed countless lives (and continues to change lives by the power of the Holy Spirit).

- But the unfortunate reality is that many followers of Jesus would be more comfortable if they were asked to talk for 5 minutes about the features they enjoy on their new cell phone, rather than if they were asked to talk for 5 minutes about why they love God.

- So, we each need to consider this as honestly and personally as we can.

- Is the Gospel working in our lives?

- Is it changing us?

- If so, then we need to tell people about it!

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- Ephesians 2:8-10

o God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it. For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.

- As we saw last week, at the very beginning of the Gospel story is the understanding that we were all created in the image of God.

- We were created by God to participate in the work that He called us to do in His creation.

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- And now, through Jesus, we’ve been created anew (recreated, new creation as we saw last week) for the good works that God has always had planned for us.

- The Gospel works, and the Gospel is meant to work in the lives of others through us.

- Jesus saves, forgives, heals, fills with His Spirit, sets free, enables us to live a completely transformed life.

- This is the Gospel. From creation, through the fall and redemption, to new creation

- We know the Gospel message (at least we should if we listened to last week), but does this Gospel message actually work for us?

- Because, when it works, we will talk about it.

- And so, at this time, I want us to pause, and I want us to consider this as we head into communion together.

- We take communion together every week, to regularly remind ourselves of Jesus’ death for us.

- His broken body and His shed blood.

- We remember that it is His sacrifice that brings us life.

- He saves us, by grace.

- And we can’t take credit for it.

- It is a free gift of God.

- This means that no matter what we’ve done, no matter what we are currently struggling with, no matter where we feel weak, Jesus has already offered this free gift to us.

- He has offered to create us anew (make us new) by the power of His Spirit.

- He has offered to “work” in our lives, so that He can show others that His Gospel works through our lives.

- And so this is open to all followers of Jesus, even if today is the moment you want to accept the free gift and be created anew.

- ***Take communion

- Now, with all of this said, we also need to be aware of the spiritual dimension that is going on at the exact same time.

- As we seek to grow in Gospel fluency, there is an enemy who does not want this to happen.

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- Ephesians 6:12

o For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.

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- 1 Peter 5:8

o Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour.

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- John 10:10

o The thief’s purpose is to steal and kill and destroy. My purpose is to give them a rich and satisfying life.

- There is a spiritual battle going on, all the time, all around us.

- A battle against the Kingdom of God, by an enemy who wants to oppose God in every way.

- We live in a war-zone that we can’t always see and aren’t always aware of.

- And there is an enemy who wants to see us fail and fall (never to get back up).

- So, if this battle is all around us, if there is an enemy who doesn’t want to see us become fluent in the Gospel, what can we do about it?

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- 2 Corinthians 10:3-5

o We are human, but we don’t wage war as humans do. We use God’s mighty weapons, not worldly weapons, to knock down the strongholds of human reasoning and to destroy false arguments. We destroy every proud obstacle that keeps people from knowing God. We capture their rebellious thoughts and teach them to obey Christ.

- So, it’s a good place to start to just start paying attention to what we are speaking about most often (that will tell us what we love, what we trust, what works).

- Take note of conversations we have regularly, and are we more likely to talk about the football game or Jesus?

- If we scroll through our social media posts, do we post more about our political beliefs, or the Good News of Jesus that transcends platforms and politicians and nations?

- So we need to pay attention to that.

- But then, taking it even further, we also need to pay attention to what is going on within our own minds.

- And we need to be aware of the enemy who wants to distract us with thoughts and emotions that are not in line with the Truth of Jesus and His Gospel.

- If we talk about what we love the most, then we need to stop and think about what we are talking the most about. Not only to others, but also to ourselves.

- Because we don’t just talk to others, we also talk to ourselves.

- What are we spending the most time thinking about?

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- We need to “capture rebellious thoughts”. Some translations say we need to “take our thoughts captive”.

- We need to take an individual thought, lock it up and hold it still, and then begin to examine it from all angles.

- What is this thought calling me to believe (or not believe)?

- What is this thought telling me about who I am in Jesus?

- Is this in line with what I know to be true of God?

- And, if it’s not, then throw it away and don’t give it another thought.

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- So, let’s consider for a few minutes some ways we might be able to take our thoughts captive, and figure out whether a thought is from God or not.

- Whether a thought is the Truth of Jesus – the Truth of the Gospel – or not.

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- Sometimes we can tell if a thought is in line with the Gospel by simply asking “is this thought a lie, an accusation, or an encouragement?”

- Because the enemy comes against us with lies and accusations.

- “Look at what you’ve done. God could never love someone like you.”

- “Don’t forget the ways that you’ve failed.”

- Those are accusations and lies.

- Remember the two lies we saw last week that are the foundation for what the enemy throws at us.

- God’s Word is a lie, God’s work is insufficient.

- So we need to pay attention to our thoughts. Are they lies or accusations?

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- Or perhaps, are they temptations?

- A temptation is usually something that promises a shortcut to get to what we want, which doesn’t take the path that God wants us to take.

- In our temptations, the enemy says “You don’t have to trust God’s way to get you what you want, trust me and take my way, because I’ll get you what you want faster.”

- So we can recognize lies, accusations, and temptations as the work of the enemy.

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- Another way to help tell whether a thought is Gospel fluent or not is whether the thought brings division (or unity).

- Because the enemy always wants to bring division to the Church of Jesus.

- The enemy not only wants to cause us to stop trusting God, but to cause us to stop trusting one another.

- The enemy wants us to stop loving one another, to stop believing the best about one another, to start believing the worse about one another.

- So we need to pay attention!

- We need to take our thoughts, feelings, emotions, ideas, and we need to take them captive and examine them.

- Another idea for this morning to help us consider whether a thought is from God (the Truth of the Gospel) or from the enemy would be to ask this:

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- “Does this sound like good news?”

- Because the Gospel is Good News!

- That’s literally what the word means.

- As I’ve said so many times I forget where I originally heard it, if we share the Gospel with someone, and they don’t leave understanding that what they’ve heard is good news, then we shared it wrong.

- They might not believe it.

- They might not trust in it.

- They might not decide to follow it.

- But, at the very least, they should be able to understand that what we’ve shared, if we actually do believe, trust in, and follow it, would be Good News.

- And then, if we still aren’t sure whether something is from God or not, we can consider this.

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- “If I believe this, if I trust this, if I put my weight into this, what will my life look like as a result?”

- “What ‘fruit’ will this produce in, through, and around me if I continue down this path?

- Because if it is from God, then it will produce the fruit of the Spirit.

- It will produce a life that looks like Jesus.

- It will produce someone whose life brings Good News to others.

- You know, the day that Sony announces the release date for Spiderman: Beyond the Spider-Verse, that announcement will be good news.

- And Mike and I will talk about it.

- Chantelle and I will talk about it (mostly so that I can beg her to let me go to Regina on opening night to see it).

- And you know what else?

- The next time I run my foundational strength patterns test, anytime I improve my scores, anytime I “level up” my moves, I will tell someone – even text people that I haven’t talked to in a while – to tell them the good news.

- And later this afternoon, when I am eating my stuffed crust pizza, that will be good news.

- And my kids and I will talk about how good it tastes!

- Because this is true of me, and I’d be willing to bet that it’s true for you too.

- We will talk about what we love, we will love what we talk about, we will talk about what works, and…

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- We will talk about things that are good news to us.

- And, think about this, we don’t need others to teach us how to talk about it.

- We just do it.

- Naturally.

- Automatically.

- We don’t need seminars, teaching us how to share the good news about the Riders finally not losing a game.

- We don’t need training courses educating us on the proper outline to follow after we’ve read a good book and want to tell our friends about it.

- It’s just a part of who we are.

- And so again, as we prepare to wrap things up for this morning.

- The Gospel literally means “good news”.

- Is it “Good News” to you?

- If so, will you talk about it?

- To yourself?

- To others?

- So, this week, let’s pay attention to what we are talking the most about.

- Because that will reveal what we love the most.

- We need to humbly and seriously consider this.

- If we find it difficult to talk about Jesus, if we don’t enjoy talking about Jesus, then do we love Jesus?

- Because when it comes to Gospel fluency, maybe we lack training (and we’ve still got a ways to go with practical ideas that will hopefully help).

- But maybe it’s not training that we need first.

- Maybe it’s love.

- So let’s be mindful about what we spend our time talking about the most, and consider what that means for what we love the most.

- And then, let’s pay attention to what’s going on in our minds.

- The thoughts, the attitudes, the feelings.

- And then, let’s slow down, take them captive one by one, and examine them to determine whether they are from God, or not.

- And, whenever we find something that isn’t from God, let’s repent.

- Apologize and then turn from it.

- Go in a different direction.

- Let’s turn to the Truth of Jesus that is available to us right now today.

- And so this week, let us try to take our thoughts captive.

- And next week, we’ll consider how we do the second part of what Paul writes about, which is to teach them to obey Jesus.

- Close in prayer

- (*) Now What?

- Benediction:

Let the majesty of the Father

be the light by which you walk,

the compassion of the Son

be the love by which you walk,

the presence of the Spirit

be the power by which you walk.

Scripture:

- Luke 6:43-49

- Ephesians 2:1-10

- Ephesians 6:10-20

- 1 Peter 5:6-11

- John 10:1-18

- 2 Corinthians 10:3-5

Pray:

- Pray for God to help you fall more in love with Him, and that your growing love for Him would motivate you to talk about Him more (both to yourself in your thought-life, as well as to others around you).

- Pray that the Holy Spirit would give you a growing awareness of your thought-life, and any specific thoughts that need to be “taken captive”. Pray that God would help you to slow down and think intentionally about the things that are running through your head each and every day.

Discussion/Reflection:

- What are some of the things that you talk about the most? Is it fair to say that these are some of the things you care about the most (or at least are the most excited about in this current season of life)? Why or why not?

- Do you love Jesus? Do you talk about Jesus? Is your answer to these two questions the same or different? Why?

- What are some of the things that have “worked” in your life that you have wanted to share with others (a diet or exercise program, an enjoyable book or movie, a new phone or computer, etc)? Does the Gospel “work” in your life? If so, how? If not, why not?

- There is a spiritual battle all around us that we may not always be aware of. What can you do to help maintain a healthy attitude towards these spiritual dimensions of day-to-day life (not ignoring them, and also not obsessing or being terrified of them)?

- How might you read the Gospels in a way that better allows you to grow in your love for Jesus?

Now What Next Step:

- This week, spend some time taking your thoughts “captive”.

- Make note of thoughts that regularly come into your mind, things that you find yourself thinking or saying to yourself on an ongoing basis.

- Then, one-by-one, ask the following questions:

o 1) Is this thought a lie or accusation?

o 2) Is this thought a temptation?

o 3) Does this thought bring division?

o 4) Does this sound like Good News?

o 5) If I trust this, what will my life look like?

- After you’ve done this alone, get together with someone else who has done this, and share about the process and anything you learned. Pray for one another and encourage one another as you both seek to take your thoughts captive and submit them to Jesus.